Walk in Darkness - A Thriller (Jon Stanton Mysteries) (16 page)

33

Stanton sat outside Assistant Chief Chin Ho’s office and took two Advil without water. The cellophane wrapping crinkled as he smashed it in his palm and threw it in the
wastebin near him.

Seven
in the morning and he hadn’t slept last night. He’d stayed awake watching the moonlight dance on the ceiling.

“Detective,” the receptionist said, “they’re ready for you.”

Stanton walked in and saw three men. Ho was sitting down at the desk and Childs was seated on the couch, looking out the window. Ransom Talano stood behind Ho with his arms folded.

“Detective Stanton,” Ho said, “sit down please.”

He sat and crossed his legs, leaning back on the chair. The office was cooler than the rest of the building, decorated with medals and framed photos of past chiefs. In the corner was a small statue of Justice holding the scales.

Chin Ho took a newspaper off his desk and slid it across to Stanton.
A copy of today’s
Union-Trib
. The headline read SAN DIEGO’S ANGEL OF DEATH and had a photo of Stanton underneath the top caption.

“Have you read this?” Ho said.

“No, but I can guess what it says.”

“You can guess? And how can you guess?”

“The woman that was killed was a client of Gary Coop. He’s got contacts everywhere. I’m sure this is a hack-job, considering he’s suing us right now. He’s trying to taint the jury pool.”

“It is a hack job.
And a damn good one. He paints you as some kind of maniac and us as accomplices.”

“She made her choice. She wouldn’t drop the weapon.”

“What about Darrell Putnam?” Ransom chimed in. “Did he make his choice too?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve had two deaths weeks apart, Jon,” Ho said. “The two officers involved were suspended with pay. Same for you. Please hand over your badge and gun to the sergeant before you leave.”

“I didn’t shoot her, Chin.”

“I know. But you were the commanding officer on scene. It was your responsibility.”

Stanton rose. He placed his sidearm and badge on the desk. “Keep them. I don’t want them back.”

Stanton stepped out of the precinct building and a smile came over his face. He lifted his head toward the sun and felt its warmth come over him. He felt as if chains had been lifted. There was
lightness to him that he didn’t want to end. Like he could go anywhere and do anything.

He took out his phone and called Melissa.

“Hey,” she said.

“I quit.”

There was a long pause on the other end. He waited for what seemed like minutes before breaking the silence.

“Mel?”

“I’m here. What happened?”

“You haven’t seen the paper?”

“No, I’m just getting the kids ready for school.”

“Go online and check out the
Union-Trib
. They’ll hear about it at school so you should explain it to them now. I was involved in a shooting that ended in someone dying. Tell them I tried to save her.”

“I will. When can you come over?”

“In a couple of hours.”

“Okay. I’ll see you then.”

“Okay.”

“Jon?”

“Yeah, I’m still here.”

“I’m proud of you.”

He paused. “I’ll see you in a bit.”

He hung up and walked to his car. As he got in, he thought about what his life was going to be now. His schedule as a professor
had been flexible and allowed him to leave early and take his boys to Padres baseball games or to catch afternoon movies. He’d never been stressed as he knew exactly what to expect in the coming day.

After he had retired from the force the first time after the shooting with
Eli, he remembered it was difficult for him to sleep. Images of the dead filled his dreams and called to him. There was one dream in particular where he was lying on a lounge chair on some beach, the setting sun filling the sky with its golden glow. The water foamed in large clouds and the sand was smooth, untouched.

He was making love to a woman. She was slender and blond in a red dress. She had kicked off her sandals and was barefoot as she lifted her dress and cradled him around the waist. Her lips were soft and embraced perfectly white teeth and she kissed him so hard he couldn’t breathe.

She pulled away and he saw that her face was just exposed skull, adorned with flowing blond hair.

That’s when
he would wake and feel his shirt clinging to him with sweat, and the pounding of his heart. Sometimes he would go back to sleep; most nights he couldn’t. But when teaching, the dreams faded a little each day until one night, he didn’t dream at all. A few nights after that he dreamt about his family and the ocean. Eventually, the dream with the blond stopped all together.

In the past year, it had returned.

Stanton started the car, anxious to get away from the precinct. He would go home and surf until the sun went down and then go take his wife and kids to a big dinner anywhere they wanted to go. Then they would stay up late and watch movies. He would pop popcorn and with any luck, Melissa would allow him to stay the night.

As the engine turned, he noticed something on his passenger seat. He looked over to see the open file and ten year old Sarah’s picture
lying out.

34

Calvin Riley saw a puppy on the corner and it excited him. When he was a kid at his grandparent’s home, the neighbors had many dogs and cats and it was a quiet, safe neighborhood where they felt they could allow their pets to roam. It had started with insects, but they had no expressions. Cats and dogs had expressions and he absorbed them like a sponge as he cut the animals apart in his grandfather’s basement. He took some photos once and his mother discovered them. He was never left alone to play outside there again.

The newspaper arrived eleven minutes late. Calvin knew he had access to any news he wanted online but there was something about holding an actual paper in his hands that made him feel adult
; important, somehow.

“You’re late,” he said to the man that had hopped out of the truck and was loading papers into a bin.

“What?”

“I said you’re late.”

“Fuck off, asshole.”

Calvin glanced around and saw that no one was near. He stepped next to the man and grabbed him by the forearm. He brought the arm up around his back as his other hand was placed on the man’s neck and slammed his head into the bin. Calvin had him pinned there, applying pressure to his arm the more he resisted.

“You need to learn to be nicer,” he said. “You never know what people are capable of.”

A
couple stepped out of a shop nearby and Calvin let the man go. He took a paper and crumpled up a dollar and threw it in the man’s face. He walked back to his Beetle and got into the driver’s seat. He wanted to read the paper right now, but decided he wanted to feel the anticipation more. He would read it when he got home.

He drove slowly on the freeway in the far right lane. The wind was warm and he rolled down all his windows and let it fill the car. He glanced at the passenger door and saw the lock. It had scratches carved into it from when he had attempted to make it a one-way lock so no one could open it from inside the car. He was unsuccessful and
had briefly considered taking it to a mechanic, but knew that would be something that would be remembered.

When he got home
, he parked in the garage and ran inside the house. He heard his mother in the kitchen and snuck upstairs to his room. Quietly, he shut the door, kicked off his shoes, and lay in bed. He pulled out the newspaper, flipped to the Op/Ed section, and began to read the article:

SAN DIEGO’S ANGEL OF DEATH

When I was fourteen, I remember walking home through the Edgewater neighborhood in Miami, Florida. I had been at a dance and the girl I had gone with decided there were better fish in the sea and had gone home with one of the basketball players whose name I wish I could mention here (he’s now a professional mover, so life does have a sense of justice).

I had rounded a corner near a small deli when a car came screeching to a halt across the street. Two men sprung out and opened the backdoors. They pulled out a man that was covered in blood from head to toe. He was wearing a leather jacket and I remembered thinking what an ugly color of brown the jacket was. They pulled the man down the street past a lamppost and I saw that his jacket was actually white but was so soaked with blood that it appeared brown.

The two men threw the third guy into an alley and proceeded to give him the worst beating I have ever seen (not counting a Lakers/Cavs game). They pummeled his head, his chest, his stomach, even his arms and legs when he tried to use them to block their vicious blows.

Finally, when they figured he had had enough, one of the men grabbed a baseball bat out of the trunk of the car and proceeded to break the man’s legs at the knees. The two then got into the car and drove away. I was horrified.

I had never seen, or been in a fight, that had drawn blood. And here was this man lying in the alley bleeding to death and no one was around to see it but me.

I looked both ways down the street and there were no cars. It was just
me and this guy. I was maybe four blocks from home. I could make it, forget about him, and just have it be a little mystery in my life.

But, conscience got the better of me. I ran across the street and checked the guy’s pulse. Mostly because I had seen them do it in movies. His heart was still beating
but he was unconscious and blood was pouring out of the wounds on his face. I ran down the block until I found a bar that was open and had the bouncer run back with me. He checked the guy out, and called emergency services.

The next day a detective from the organized crime section of the Miami-Dade County Sheriff’s Office came to my house. I’ll never forget him. His name was Detective
Macks and he was easily the biggest man I had ever seen. We sat on my porch and talked about what I had witnessed the other night. Macks was calm and patient and told me that I was a hero for what I did. That the man that had been beaten had done nothing wrong and didn’t deserve the beating he got.

“What are you
gonna do when you catch the guys?” I asked.

“Nothing,”
Macks said. “My only job is to catch them.”

Macks
did catch his men. And true to his word, neither one of them were harmed. Macks testified against them in court and when it was my turn he sat in the courtroom the whole time and then walked me out. When the trial was over and the scumbags convicted and sentenced to ten years apiece, Macks took me out for an ice cream (little weird for a fourteen year old, I know. But he was old school).

I remember
Macks because he is what a cop should be. He busted two thugs in the Cuban Syndicate and no one was hurt. He did his job and went home for the night.

I wish we could say the same for our boys in blue right here in sunny San Diego.

The nightmare of the Michael Harlow administration has left a scar on our police force that seems to tear open every few months, revealing a fresh allegation of corruption or brutality. Harlow was, to put it plainly, the most corrupt sonofabitch to ever wear the uniform in this county. But he wasn’t alone.

Most of his henchmen have been rooted out and brought to justice, but a few linger. Most notable among them: now Assistant Chief Chin Ho and Detective Jonathan Stanton.

For the most part, the Assistant Chief has kept a low profile. He moved up from the field quickly and has adjusted to life behind a desk with the quiet resolve we expect of our police force. But Jonathan Stanton, well, that’s another story.

You may remember Detective Stanton from several years back. When he joined our police force, the speed and depth of his manner of solving cases made more than a few people stand up and take notice (there was even talk, believe it or not, of his possibly being
psychic).

But that Detective Stanton has gone the way of VCR’s and Beta. The new Detective Stanton is a killing machine.

The Sandman Kidnappings held this city by the throat for months and we thought we could put another win in Stanton’s column with the identification of Darrell Putnam, an unemployed iron worker that lived with his mother, as the culprit. Detective Stanton chased him down like a bloodhound, resulting in his death.

Only problem is
, he didn’t do it.

This paper has obtained internal memoranda from the SDPD relating to the ongoing investigation of the Sandman cases. To put it bluntly folks, Stanton killed the wrong guy. The Sandman cases are still unsolved.

Not a month later, the death of Angie Aviary has rocked the sleepy city out of its stupor. A housewife and mother of three, Angie was shot numerous times by members of the police department led by Detective Stanton while hosting a party for her children.

This has to stop.

We cannot have a maniac with the right to carry a gun and a badge murder two innocent people and then get away with it. Eventually, he will get what’s coming to him. But in the meantime, are we supposed to suffer through botched investigations and murders?

This reporter says, “Hell NO.”

Write the police chief, the commissioner, the mayor, the governor, your legislators, your congressmen, hell, write your old teachers and priests. Write anybody that will listen that we will not tolerate cops murdering innocent civilians in the city any longer.

Calvin put the paper down and placed his hands behind his head as he looked to the ceiling. The editorial, no doubt, was filled with half-truths and misdirection and he wouldn’t have cared about it except for a single line:
The Sandman cases are still unsolved
.

Calvin ran that line through his head over and over until it made him sick. Darrell Putnam had been the guy. What had they found that made them think otherwise?

He jumped out of bed and went to the computer the family shared in what used to be a den but was now just a room they kept their clutter in. Calvin sat down in the rusted office chair and opened Google Chrome. He searched for Jonathan Stanton and found several articles about him relating to closed cases.

He had solved cases no one thought solvable. There w
ere even a few cold case homicides, one almost twenty-five years old. A few articles talked briefly about his personal life. One mentioned that he was an avid surfer.

There was an old black and white photo of him at a crime scene in a wooded area. Calvin stared at the photo a long time, burning every curve and surface of his face into his mind.

After reading for nearly an hour, he turned the computer off and leaned back in the seat. There was a poster up of Led Zepplin, a concert no one in his family had gone to.

The Sandman cases are still unsolved.

Calvin took a deep breath and stood up to get to his car. He was going to have to meet Jonathan Stanton.