Killing Zone (24 page)

So far, the dispatcher had not put out the call for officers on standby to report, but Wager had the familiar feeling it would be soon. The watch was stretching thinner as more requests for backup came in, and call numbers for units from the adjoining districts began to be heard on the local frequency. He guessed that recruits from the Police Academy had been turned out to relieve those veterans for duty in this district.

A brightly painted Channel 9 television van, with a cherry picker folded against its roof, lumbered past Wager.

A pair of motorcycle officers followed, emergency lights dark as they slowed a bit for stop signs and then darted across in front of oncoming cars. The traffic sections would set up vehicle control points at the intersections surrounding the most volatile action, while Patrol would move in to determine whether or not a SWAT team should be called to the scene. That was often a tricky question; once SWAT was called, command of the scene shifted to the team commander. And despite a lot of schooling, many of the officers in Patrol did not like to give up their responsibility, because that meant they weren’t cop enough to control their own territory.

Through his partly open window, he heard the drawn-out wails of sirens and, for a moment, the wind-tossed shouts of voices. He thought briefly about driving in for a closer look and decided against it; there was no sense adding to the confusion of traffic, and besides, he didn’t want his Trans-Am trashed. A fancy car driven by a Chicano through the middle of a Five Points riot. All he’d need to attract more friendly notice would be a Confederate flag on the antenna.

Settling against the seat back, he listened to the muted sounds of the radio and waited for the alert that would call him and other standbys in. Initial queries and requests had slacked off and now situation reports were starting to come back. Wager recognized a few of the voices, and his imagination filled in the pictures that the words only hinted at. DiFeo, the born-again detective in Burglary who always said “God bless you” instead of “Thanks,” called for an ambulance in the 3200 block of Marion, where a looter had been injured by a shattering plate-glass window. Ryan, the alcoholic sergeant from the district’s fourth precinct, called for support in pursuit of a fleeing vehicle. Another voice that Wager did not know needed help to head off trouble: “We’re going to need some backup. We got a bunch of juveniles down on the corner of Thirty-third look like they’re trying to organize themselves into something.”

“Yessir. We’ll get it to you.”

“Ten-four.”

Wager started the Trans-Am and swung it around toward downtown and the Headquarters Building. It wouldn’t be long now before they called in the standbys.

The personal car lot was almost full, the yellow-orange glow of tall lamps bouncing back from metal roofs to illuminate the occasional figure hurrying like Wager toward the entry. Above, in the bands of dark windows that striped the stone facade, lights from various offices dotted the building. Wager let himself through the security gate and nodded to the uniformed sergeant behind the long shelf of desk. Upstairs, the civilian on duty in Crimes Against Persons lifted a hand when she saw him come in.

“I was just going to call you, Detective Wager. Lieutenant Wolfard just sent out a call for all standbys.”

“I’ll tell him I’m here.”

Despite all the activity in the halls, the offices were almost empty; most of the duty-roster were on the streets, and the off-duty personnel stayed only long enough to be told where to report. At his desk in the corner, beneath the silently flickering television set, Devereaux talked to someone on the telephone about a new development in one of his dozen open cases. “Four years ago—yeah—two kids burned to death in a dumpster. No, this kid comes in a couple hours ago to say his father set it on fire and burned them up. No, he’s a screwball—the kid. He’s such a flake—hates his father so much that he’d turn off a jury. No, I’ve got it down to where the old man did start a fire in somebody’s backyard, but that’s all I’ve got. Yeah. Yeah. He’s got a brother knows something about it, too, but he’s in jail for butt-fucking his brother, so what good’s he in court?”

Despite the riot, routine work had to go on, too.

Wager stuck his head into Wolfard’s office and the lieutenant, on the telephone, beckoned him to sit down. “Yeah, that’s right.” He covered the mouthpiece to tell Wager, “Kansas City.”

Out-of-state units always wanted to talk to a detective, and at night C.A.P. got all the calls whether it was their work or not. Wager settled into the plastic chair and glanced through his mail while Wolfard kept saying “Yeah, yeah, that’s right.” Nothing from outside had been delivered in the last few hours, and none of the memos said anything that was important. But one did catch his eye, a warning from the chief against taking liberties with bodies of the deceased. Wager had heard the story: a decapitation victim found where he had committed suicide by hanging himself with a piece of thin wire; when the body was placed on the stretcher for conveyance to Denver General, the investigating officer tucked the man’s head under his arm like a football. The memo said that when the sheet was pulled off, a nurse fainted and chipped her tooth and now was suing the city. All personnel were reminded of the appropriate section in the Operations Manual that prohibited unprofessional conduct, and of Section 18-13-101 of the Colorado Criminal Code, which classified abuse of a corpse as a Class Two misdemeanor.

“Do you have anything yet, Wager? Anything at all?” Wolfard was finally through with Kansas City and, rubbing at the dark flesh under his eyes, sipped at a steaming cup and stared at Wager like he was a stranger.

Wager shook his head. “Nothing more than I had at the end of the shift.”

“That wasn’t too damned much.”

Wager stared back at the man’s hostility. “That’s right.”

Wolfard rubbed his eyes again. “You remember what the chief said about keeping me informed so I could keep him informed?”

Wager remembered.

Wolfard slid a memo from under a blank sheet of paper and pretended to read it closely. “I thought you might have forgot. I goddamned thought you might have forgot, since you forgot to tell me about the possibility that Green was involved in malfeasance.”

“I don’t have any evidence of that.”

“But you goddamned well had information about it. You had it and you didn’t tell me, by God—what you did was go over to Councilman Albro’s office and accuse him of taking bribes, too!”

“I went over to Councilman Albro’s office to check out the rumor. If he thinks I accused him, let him file a formal complaint.”

Wolfard snapped the memo at Wager. “What the fuck do you think this is? Van Velson sent it down. Councilman Albro states you were insulting and insubordinate to him in his office.”

“If that’s an official complaint, I want to see my copy of it. If that’s an official complaint, I want my hearing properly constituted and the complainant present.”

The lieutenant’s mouth pressed into a dark, lipless line. “This may not be official, but by God it is a complaint—and it’s from a city councilman.”

“You know what the manual says about complaint procedure, Lieutenant.”

“All right, Wager. Let’s forget about this for a minute. Just what the hell have you learned about Councilman Green and possible influence peddling?”

“I never said anything to Albro about that rumor.” Wager nodded at the memo pinned under Wolfard’s forefinger. “There’s not one thing about Green in that memo.”

“I don’t give a damn what’s in the memo or not. I’m asking you what you’ve found out about Green!”

“I haven’t found out anything about him. I heard a rumor he was peddling votes on the zoning board and I’ve been checking it out. So far, no evidence.”

“Where’d you hear that rumor?”

Wager felt his head lower stubbornly; it was the habit of a lifetime, and his mother when she saw it used to say, “There he goes again—
un torito testarudo
, ‘stubborn little bull.’” And he heard the angry Spanish inflection in his own words, “I promised I would not say.”

Wolfard sagged back in his chair. “You promised.” He leaned forward again. “I don’t give a shit who you promised. You tell me.”

“No.”

“What?”

The word had been clear. Wager didn’t need to repeat it.

“Detective Sergeant Wager, that’s an order. I want to know who gave you the information that Councilman Horace Green may have been selling votes.”

“It’s a politically sensitive source, Wolfard. I promised I would keep it confidential. I’m going to keep it confidential.”

“I can suspend you, Wager. You were ordered by the chief to keep me informed. You’ve disobeyed that order and mine as well. I can have your goddamned badge, Wager!”

Not without a long series of hearings and a hell of a lot of due process and paperwork. Wolfard should have thought of that before he started threatening. “I’m the assigned detective on this case, Wolfard. It’s my case and my judgment how I get information about it.”

“I can by God reassign the case.”

“You by God better have good reason to. Or I’ll file my own complaint.”

“You haven’t kept me informed!”

“There’s nothing to inform you about. Nothing but rumors. Unsubstantiated rumors. No goddamned cop is going to run in and out of here with every rumor he hears on the street, and no administrator worth a damn is going to want him to.”

“This isn’t an ordinary case—we’ve got a fucking riot about to happen out there!”

“So you want to go out and cool it by telling them Green was crooked? Is that what you want to do, Wolfard?”

The lieutenant sagged back again, a deep breath puffing his lips wearily.

Wager jabbed him once more. “That would really quiet things down, wouldn’t it? Those people already think we’re covering up for the White Brotherhood. Now you go on out there and tell them Green was crooked. See what that gets you, Wolfard.”

“Jesus.”

Wager stood up. The lieutenant’s face didn’t follow him but kept staring at the now-empty chair. “I’m the assigned detective, Wolfard. It’s my case. Any facts I get—facts!—I’ll inform you. But by God I’ll run my cases the way I think right.”

“Wager—” Wolfard sighed again and rubbed his eyes. “Ah, shit.”

Stubbs was busy at his desk and didn’t look up when Wager came in.

“I want to ask you something.”

“Hi, Gabe! Seems like we were here only a couple hours ago.”

“Why did you tell Wolfard about those rumors on Green?”

“Hey, I—” He studied Wager’s eyes and then shrugged. “He cornered me. He had a complaint from Councilman Albro on you and wanted to know what it was all about.”

“I told you to keep your mouth shut about it.”

“Listen, Wager, I did it for your own good. He wanted to know why you went over to see Albro in the first place, and I told him it was nothing heavy—you went over to check out information.”

“So you told him what information?”

“Well, yeah. He wanted to know all about it, so I had to tell him.”

“No, Stubbs. You didn’t have to tell him. All you had to do was tell him to talk to me.” Devereaux came quickly into the office to grab his radio and hustle back out with a quick “See you on the street.” Wager dropped his voice as the man disappeared around the door. “When I tell you to keep quiet about something, Stubbs, you do it. Now that rumor’s going to run all through this goddamned building like Epsom salts, and you can bet your pimply butt we’re going to hear from the goddamned FBI or somebody about why we didn’t bring them in sooner.”

“Gabe, the lieutenant said—”

“To hell with what he said. This is my case.”

Stubbs, his face a shade of red, repeated, “I did it for your own good, Wager. I wanted him to know you weren’t screwing around with a city councilman for no good reason. And by God it’s our case, not just yours.”

Somebody else’s good is nobody else’s business no matter whose case it was. “You let me worry about my own good.”

“Wager—Lester. I want to see you two a minute.” Wolfard’s voice came around the door frame and cut into the tense silence between the men. They masked their feelings as they went into the lieutenant’s office. He glanced at them and seemed about to ask something, then thought better of it. “I just got word from Intelligence that the White Brotherhood’s meeting up in Morrison at a place called the Four Aces. I think you’d better talk to them.”

Nothing would come of it, Wager knew. What were they going to do, throw up their hands and surrender when he asked them if they killed Green? “You really think it’s worth the time to interview those people?”

Wolfard’s voice was almost a whisper. “Yes, Wager. That’s just what I do think. Rumor has them connected to your case. Your case. I want you to find out what they know about your case.”

Wager shrugged and started to leave.

“And one more thing—maybe just as important.” Wolfard almost smiled as his eyes held Wager’s. “Intelligence says the Uhuru Warriors put out the word to the White Brotherhood—dared them to be on the streets tonight.”

“They’ll get their little black asses kicked,” said Stubbs.

“Any ass-kicking goes on, we’ll do it. You tell them that, Wager. You tell them to stay the hell out of Five Points this whole weekend.”

Wager nodded. Wolfard was right about that item, anyway: It was at least as important as the lead on the killing. And knowing they were already under police surveillance might keep the White Brotherhood from answering the Warriors’ challenge. For a while, anyway.

2157 Hours

Morrison was one of those mountain towns molded by the shape of creek beds that carved their way down the face of the Rockies to spew into the Cottonwood tangles of prairie. Tucked between the Hogback and the foothills, it was surprisingly close to Denver, yet kept its feel of isolation because it was still too expensive to develop the steep slopes and rocky cliffs that surrounded it. The main street—almost the only street—twisted along the foaming waters of Bear Creek and was lined by stone-faced shops and small frame houses turned into stores and boutiques. Nearby and out of sight behind outcroppings of weathered cliffs, was the Red Rocks amphitheatre whose weekend crowds pumped money into the small town. Even now, they could hear the thud of heavy electronic instruments and an occasional roar like distant surf as the crowd cheered whatever rock group was filling the open night with noise. Wager swung into a gravel lot crowded with four-wheel vehicles, pickup trucks carrying camper shells, and an assortment of city cars bearing Denver plates. In the twilight that gathered like thin smoke among the folds and valleys of the mountains, he saw a couple standing on a large boulder washed by the creek and half-hidden by the screen of willow and wild plum that lined the stream. Isolated by the sound of water, they slowly turned to kiss, their bodies pressed tightly against each other from lips to knees.