Wet Work: The Definitive Edition (10 page)

A crowd of about fifteen people had congregated on the far left corner, huddling behind cars parked outside a grocery store. Opposite was a rundown apartment building, six stories of squalid, cramped accommodation if the rest of the street was anything to go by. Santos cut the siren, slowing the car. Whatever was causing the disturbance was more than a gang of kids firing up cherry bombs, judging from the frantic movements of the crowd, several of whom were pressed to the ground.

Then Nick saw him, and his stomach tensed as adrenaline flooded his body. Like the saying went, it ain’t over till it’s over, and he suddenly knew his first day was only just beginning.

The man was over six feet tall, black, big-boned, broad-shouldered, and had hands so huge that they made the pump-action shotgun he was holding look like a toy.

“
Shit,” Santos muttered, yanking the radio from its holder.

He pulled the car over to the right, parking behind a rusted, garishly painted green-and-yellow Chevrolet van as Nick saw the gunman start striding up and down, a tiger in an urban cage, his movements bristling with violence.

Santos clicked the radio to send.

“
Control, this is Car Seven. We’re on Broad. 10-39 in progress. Copy?”

The radio hissed with static then clicked.

“
Control. Copy. What’s going on?”

“
We have a black male, probably an E.D.P., armed with a shotgun, firing at pedestrians and residents. Request backup immediately. Copy.”

“
Copy, Car Seven. Backup on its way. Over.”

“
And send a meat wagon,” Santos added, then said to Nick: “Stick close to me. Don’t fire unless absolutely necessary. Understand?”

“
Yes.”

“
Okay, the way that cocksucker’s jumping around, he’s on something. Forget whatever you learned about dealing with an Emotionally Disturbed Person—this one’s trigger-happy. We’re not going to be brave or stupid.”

Santos got out of the car, gun in hand, and went to the trunk to remove a megaphone. Nick followed, pulling his Smith & Wesson from his hip holster.

“
You can’t touch her! You fuckers can’t touch that bitch, she’s mine!! You all gonna die, muthafuckers!! They’re comin’ for you! An’ you!” The man waved his gun, pointing it like a ruler at those onlookers foolish enough not to be burying their faces in the sidewalk as he strode up and down outside the apartment building’s entrance.

“
We all gonna die!”

Santos inched his way up towards the building behind the cover of the row of vehicles, megaphone in one hand, gun pointing down in the other. Nick crept behind him, his heart pounding. Sweat drenched the armpits of his shirt, flowing down his back towards the seat of his pants.

Jesus, the guy was big and ugly and mad as hell. He had a torso like Hulk Hogan, the face of a prize-fighter who’d gone six rounds too many with Mike Tyson. He was wearing running shorts and nothing else, his muscles sheened with sweat and what looked like blood—Nick couldn’t tell for sure against the color of the man’s skin.

“
It’s happenin’! I know it! Can’t you feel it?!” the monster with the shotgun bellowed as he stopped pacing. He turned in their direction. “We all gonna die!! Who’s first?!!”

Santos stood slightly, raising the megaphone to his lips. Nick noticed Santos was also soaked with sweat.
It doesn’t matter how often you deal with this shit,
the detective had said to him;
it still gets to you.

“
This is the Police. Throw the gun down and place your hands on your head. We are not going to harm you.” Santos sounded like Darth Vader doing Mickey Mouse through the megaphone.

“
Fuck you!!
Fuck you!!
” the black man screamed, raising the gun, pumping a new shell into the chamber.

The windshield of the car behind exploded. Nick hurled himself to the ground, shards of glass dancing off his cap.

Shit!

His bowels churned with fear.

One of the women on the ground, a slim, pretty girl in her late teens, screamed. And screamed. A child was crying and a dog barked in the tenement behind them. Every sound tore at his ears, competing for his attention.

Santos crouched beside him. “You okay?”

Nick nodded.

“
Hang in there. Call Control and check on the back-up.”

Nick pulled his radio from his belt, pressing the button.

The gunman resumed his litany of rage and madness.

“
You can’t touch me!”

“
Somebody shut him the fuck up,” muttered the middle-aged man nearest to Nick as he called Control.

“
This is Car Seven, copy?”

“
Control, copy. Over.”

Santos eased himself up as Nick spoke with HQ. There was no way he could reason with the guy. Probably on some kind of PCP derivative, he thought. Completely A-1 wacko, totally bugfuck. The Emergency Services Unit better get there fast or there was going to be blood all over the sidewalk. He’d been through this scenario a handful of times before and it nearly always ended the same: someone was going to get hurt and it was a miracle no one was dead or dying because the crazy son of a bitch was ready to go right over the edge. He could feel it coming.

“
Throw down the gun and place your hands on your head!”

The brute responded by whirling in his direction, pumping another shell into the breach, firing instantaneously. Santos threw himself down. A loud boom was followed by an explosion as the charge hit the roof of the car and took out the other windows. The woman started screaming again. Somewhere in the distance, he thought he heard the wail of sirens and he signed with relief
. Let it be over with quickly, please God.

Nick turned to Santos.

“
They’re on their way. Two units and the EMS.

Santos nodded.

“
You want some more, mutherfuckers?!!” the gunman bellowed. “You won’t take me!
You can’t take me!
”

Nick glanced around the front of the blasted Ford and saw the maniac shift his position.

Later, when he tried to put it all into perspective, he found he couldn’t remember exactly what happened next. It wasn’t like they wrote in books, where something happens and time stands still, and it certainly wasn’t like an action movie where the violence suddenly goes slo-mo and every detail stands out in stark relief. It happened so fast there was no memory because there was no conscious thought, only pure instinct, fluid movement, cause and effect.

As Nick peered around the fender, the man raised the gun, pumped the chamber, turning the barrel towards his own face. Nick brought his gun up, shifted his body weight, crouching, his two hands and the gun coming together to form the apex of a triangle as he shouted
“Don’t!”
, took aim and fired.

The bullet caught the giant in the right shoulder, jerking his arm as he pulled the trigger, the combined force of the slug and the shotgun’s discharge throwing him back like a spastic puppet, spinning him towards the wall of the apartment building as the blast gouged the right side of his face, stripping ebony skin to the bone, splintering an eyebrow and shaving off a strip of scalp, the bulk of the charge smashing the window directly behind his head.

Nick eased up into a standing position, ready to fire again as the man collapsed, screaming, to the sidewalk with a heavy thump.

Santos blinked, turning to Nick. The woman on the ground shrieked hysterically. The rookie’s expression was blank as he lowered his gun. The detective was stunned. The move had been so smooth, so fast he’d only just caught the whole thing: Nick shifting into the crouch, the gun coming up, the crazy black fuck turning the shotgun barrel on himself, the blossom of blood appearing on the man’s shoulder. For an instant, silence descended on the street, then was shattered as approaching sirens wailed banshee-like from down the block. Santos dropped the megaphone and ran, gun in hand, towards the downed man.

The gunman writhed on the ground, his shotgun lying near the apartment wall, his hands grabbing his face as he cried out,
“Brenda!!”
Santos threw a glance back at the rookie, who was starting across the street as two patrol cars and an EMS wagon came tearing up the block, lights flashing. Then the sirens cut and the silence rolled back in as the vehicles screeched to a halt.

“
Thank God.”

Santos whirled, gun up, at the unexpected voice.

An old man with a bloodied face and a gigantic bruise on his left cheek stumbled out of the building entrance.

“
The children. He killed the children,” the man said before slumping on the steps.

Two cops raced over from the nearest patrol car as Nick walked up to Santos, who was staring down at the black.

His face had paled beneath his tan, and the detective could see emotion welling up the rookie’s green eyes as the full consequences of his action hit home.

“
The children,” the old man muttered again.

“
Where?” Santos asked.

“
Up there.” The man waved a finger towards the stairwell.

“
Get a medic over here,
now!
” Santos shouted. “Stay with him,” he said to the two officers as they came to a halt. Then to Nick: “Come on.”

He turned, entering the building. Nick followed.

The stairwell reeked of piss, dope, and garbage, the walls oozing wetly in the stagnant heat. Nick and Santos took the stairs three at a time.

A door opened as they reached the second floor and a pair of nervous red eyes peered out of the gloom.

“
Police!
Stay in your apartment,” Santos snapped as he saw the first body. The fearful occupant slammed the door.

The corpse was an elderly woman, her spindly arms and legs akimbo as she lay sprawled at the foot of the stairs leading to the third floor. She’d taken a full blast to the chest, the force ripping open her torso like a smashed melon, exposing the shattered rib cage and punctured lungs. One brown, wrinkled breast hung on strands of tattered skin, lolling against the rent fabric of what had once been a floral print cotton dress, its pattern now deep red from the thick heart blood covering her body, the walls, the floor. Santos recoiled from the heady tang of blood and excrement that cloaked the hallway and heard Nick gag behind him.

The detective continued up the stairs, suddenly aware the rookie had stopped.

Nick stood in front of the corpse, eyes wide, and Santos was certain he saw a tremor ripple up the kid’s back.

“
Come on.”

Nick looked up at him, eyes wide, his pale face sheened with sweat.

“
Move.”

He started up the stairs behind Santos as the detective spied an open doorway on the next floor. In one of the other apartments a TV set droned, the sound shifting to loud canned laughter followed by a voice he recognized as Jackie Gleason’s.

The Honeymooners
, he thought obliquely.

It never ceased to amaze him how, in these life and death situations, his senses went into overdrive, every little detail clamoring for his attention. A large, jagged crack in the plaster of the stairwell wall caught his eye, shifting his focus away from the TV noise. Droplets of blood ran down the dirty green paint, glistening in the strip of light spilling from the open apartment. Splashes of red flecked the cracked linoleum at the top of the steps, a macabre signpost pointing towards further tragedy.

The apartment was
de rigueur
tenement: fractured plaster, chipped dirty paint, worn carpet, thrift-store furniture. Santos paused in the doorway until Nick reached the top of the stairs. The door on the right led to the tiny bathroom which reeked of animal shit. A tray of soiled kitty litter stood beneath the cracked basin. He turned to the left, his nose tensing again at the heavy scent of blood. He pushed in the door and found the children’s bedroom.
Sesame Street
wallpaper ran along two walls—Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch and Bert and Ernie smiling in mute impotence at the bodies of two little girls propped up on the bed. Santos let out an involuntary groan as he stepped further inside.

The girls were aged between three and five, he guessed, their hair carefully styled in corn rolls and colored barrettes, both cute as proverbial buttons—or had been until the maniac downstairs had taken a carving knife to their throats. Each one had her eyes closed, her expression peaceful, innocent as only a sleeping child looks lost in the land of dreams. Although their heads rested on their chests, he could clearly see the serrated incisions that had slit their necks from ear to ear like grotesque Cheshire Cat grins. Their clothes—one was wearing an aqua dress with Care Bears skipping through clumps of daisies; the other, older child a pink T-shirt with a ribbon bow and white panties which contrasted sharply with the ebony of her legs—were soaked with blood like someone had dipped them in a barrel of ketchup. He grabbed the wall for support and backed out of the room, colliding with Nick, pushing the rookie into the hall.

“
Don’t go in there,” he managed to say before clamping his hand over his mouth as his throat flooded with bile. He swallowed it.

During his fifteen years on the force he’d seen it all: shotgun suicides, throat slashings, stab wounds by the dozens, severed limbs, putrefying bodies that had decomposed undetected in apartments until they had burst open like rotting, exotic fruit, mutilated corpses so disfigured they bore no resemblance to the human form, cranial matter spread across ceilings like globs of pale peanut butter, the ugly face of death in all its guises. But this, the brutal violation of innocence, still got to him like nothing else. Like the mangled baby in the trash compactor. Or the eight-year-old kid who got creamed by a runaway Mack truck and had been dragged half a block, the pulped, scraped body resembling nothing more than rags stuffed with raw hamburger meat.