Murder Corporation Read online

  I turned to leave and the one on the couch shouted, “Aight then. If you ain’t no pig, get over here and suck my dick.”

  I looked back. “What?”

  “If you ain’t no pig, suck my dick. Did I stutter?”

  I looked to the two men. I’d heard of the elaborate things narcs officers had to do to try to convince dealers they were legit but I hadn’t heard of this.

  “I’m not suckin’ your dick.”

  He pulled the gun out from under the cushion and aimed it at my head. The other one lifted his shirt and took the .38 Special out and pressed it against my temple.

  “Yo, I told you this motherfucker was a pig. Smoke this fool.”

  “No,” I shouted, “wait. I’m not a cop. Eduardo told me to come here and that you guys would give me a good deal. That’s it. I’ll just leave, all right. I’ll just go and you guys can call Eduardo later and straighten it out with him.”

  The one on the couch pulled out his cell phone. “I’m a call Eduardo right now. And if you lyin’, I’m a smoke your pig ass.”

  He began to dial. I felt the heaviness of the gun against my head, though I knew .38s weren’t that heavy. I tried to turn to look out the window and felt the gun press harder so I stopped and looked forward, my mind racing.

  “Eduardo—”

  There was a crash in the kitchen. Both men looked down the hallway leading there and as they turned another sound came from behind me. It sounded like someone dropping a small glass. The man on the phone crumpled as brain, and skull, and blood exploded onto the wall behind him.

  I spun my forearm up and twisted the gun away from my head. A round went off and into the floor. The man punched at me and I twisted to the side and hooked him in the jaw. His head snapped to the side and I thrust my knee into his groin and slammed my elbow into his face, causing him to stumble back and fall. The front door opened and Ty came in, gun first, and swung left and right, sweeping the place.

  He looked to the corpse on the couch and then turned to the other man.

  “Roberto,” Ty said, glee in his voice, “cómo estás?”

  “Fuck you,” Roberto said, spitting blood onto the floor.

  Ty kicked him in the ribs, causing him to spin to his side. He aimed his weapon at Roberto’s head. I jumped over to the corpse and took the gun out of his hand. I lifted it and aimed at Ty’s head.

  “Drop your weapon,” I said.

  Ty looked at me like I had fallen out of the sky. His eyes were wide. They flickered with amusement and a smile came over his face.

  “Well, what’d ya know? Baby Boy’s got balls.” He stepped over to me a few feet, but I didn’t budge.

  “You murdered him,” I said.

  “That piece a shit was about to put a bullet in your head. I saved your life.”

  “We had no reason to be here. You sent me in here to distract ‘em.”

  “So what?”

  “You risked my life and theirs for no reason.”

  “No reason,” he said, incredulous, “you fuckin’ kiddin’ me?” He pointed to Roberto who had gotten up to a sitting position and was clinching his nose, his eyes blackened from the break. “You wanna know what these homies do with the money they make sellin’ glass? Roberto, tell him what you do with the money you make.”

  “Yo I want my lawyer. Fuck you, Ty.”

  Ty tilted his gun and fired. The round went through Roberto’s knee and he screamed. I felt the trigger against my finger, the pressure as I began to squeeze…but I stopped. He was looking at me with cold eyes and I could tell he knew I wouldn’t do it.

  “Roberto, tell my boy what you do with the money you make or you’ll be in a wheelchair instead of crutches.”

  Roberto was holding his bloodied, torn knee, tears coming down his cheeks and mingling with the blood from his nose that wasn’t stopping. “Girls.”

  “What kind of girls?” Ty said.

  “Hoes.”

  “How old, smart ass?”

  “Young.”

  “Roberto you be vague one more time with me and I’m goin’ to blow your dick off. How young?”

  He hesitated, holding his leg. Ty looked to him and Roberto glanced up and then away. “However old the johns want ‘em.”

  Ty turned to me. “They traffic children for sex, Baby Boy. That’s the kind of people you’re defendin’ over your superior officer. Now put the fuckin’ gun down.”

  He didn’t move, his gaze burning into me. I slowly lowered the gun to my side. We didn’t move and we didn’t speak. I tossed the gun onto the couch.

  “Roberto’s on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted. Ain’t that true, esay?”

  Roberto didn’t respond.

  “You sent me in here to get trapped,” I said. “You wanted them to pull their guns. You knew they would. You wanted an excuse.”

  “I don’t need an excuse,” he said. “If I wanted to smoke ‘em I would’ve walked in here and done it. I wanted you to buy some meth so we coulda made an arrest. Sweat ‘em at the farm for info on their girls. You’re the one that got us in this situation.” He looked to Roberto and then back to me. “Leave.”

  “No.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me. I left once and someone ended up dead.”

  “I’m your superior officer and I’m orderin’ you to leave,” he said, his voice raised.

  “We’re calling this in.” I took out my cell phone. I dialed dispatch and put the phone up to my ear. He watched me, his hand getting tighter around the gun. We stared at each other as I waited for the operator to come on.

  He took a deep breath, let it out, and placed his gun back in the holster at his side. “Fine. We’ll do it your way.”

  “Dispatch, this is Sandy.”

  “Sandy, this is Officer Thomas Boyd, badge number 12876. We have an OIS at forty-two Del Pico. Suspects are neutralized. Requesting medical.”

  “Copy that, Officer. ETA on the nearest unit is ten minutes and we’ll put in a request for medical immediately. Be advised that they’re more than twenty minutes away.”

  “Roger that.” I hung up and put the phone back in my pocket. I sat down on a sofa against the wall. We didn’t take our eyes off each other.

  “Yo,” Roberto said, “I think I’m bleedin’ out, man. I ain’t gonna make it ten minutes.”

  I looked over to his kneecap. The flesh was mangled, blossoming up red and white from the bone. I stood and took my belt off. I walked over to Roberto and tied the belt around his leg at the femoral artery. I tightened it enough that he howled in pain and then I secured it with a knot and put a pillow from the couch underneath his leg.

  “He’s gonna rat on us,” Ty said. “Your career will be over.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Why don’t you care?”

  “I didn’t sign up to be a murderer.”

  Ty laughed. “You got such a childish view of things, Baby Boy. The world ain’t black and white. This man rapes little girls and then sells ‘em as slaves. Slavery, Officer Boyd. That’s what we stopped today. Those girls he has are locked in a van somewhere, ready to cross the border into Mexico and then go all over the world. Many of ‘em are American, born and raised, with parents wonderin’ where they are. You wanna talk evil? He,” Ty said, pointing to Roberto, “is evil.”

  “Fuck you,” Roberto said. “I’m a sue your asses. I’m a take everythin’ you motherfuckers got, yo. Everythin’. You fuckers won’t be mall fuckin’ security when my lawyers eat you fuckers up.”

  “You hear that?” Ty said. “He’s gonna get a nice fat paycheck from the county and then go sell those girls for another payday. He’s gonna be a rich man.”

  “Damn right I am.”

  Ty glared at him. “Shut the fuck up you piece of shit.”

  “Yeah,” Roberto said, “talk shit motherfucker. We’ll see who’s talkin’ shit after I call my lawyers.”

  “Flint, right? That’s your lawyer.”

  “That fat fuck is gonn
a rape your ass. I ain’t gonna leave you with clothes, yo. I want everythin’.”

  Ty turned to me. I was staring at Roberto, images of young girls locked away in the dark, crying and frightened, running through my mind.

  “This is evil,” Ty said. “This is why you became a cop. To stop people like him. We’ve almost done it. We’re close. But he’s about to slip away from us. We’ll lose our jobs and he’ll become rich. Does that sound like justice to you?”

  “Ya damn right it—”

  Before the words were out of his mouth, Ty stood up and swung with the handle of his gun. It impacted against Roberto’s mouth and sent several teeth flying through the air, clinking as they hit the walls and slid down. Roberto was on his back, a new fountain of blood running out of him as he swore through gurgling breaths.

  I didn’t move. I didn’t try to stop Ty. I just watched the blood that leaked from Roberto’s mouth, down his neck, onto the floor.

  “Officer Boyd,” Ty said, “look at me…Tommy, look at me.”

  I looked.

  “Tommy, this man is Satan on earth. Do you understand that? And our system is set up to protect him. To coddle him, to make sure that he profits as much as he can before he retires. There’s a wave of evil out there,” he said, motioning outside through the window. “It just waits for opportunities. That’s all it does. Just waits. And when it finds them it jumps and we’re never fast enough to catch it. We can only push it back a little here and a little there and that’s all. But that little bit is just enough that we’re not swallowed by it. We are the last defense for the innocent bastards out there that will lose everything to people like this without us. We’re it. If those people don’t have us, they don’t have anything.”

  I didn’t move for a long time and then I turned my gaze back to Roberto who was trying to speak through his damaged mouth. Ty slowly got up. He walked over to him and took out his gun. He pointed the gun at Roberto’s head and then looked at me, and pulled the trigger.

  I didn’t move or speak. The breath had left my body and it felt like I couldn’t suck in air. I leaned back, staring at the ceiling as the smell of gun smoke filled the house. Ty sat back down, and within minutes, we heard the sirens outside and saw the flicker of reds and blues against the wall. Uniforms opened the door and came inside.

  CHAPTER 13

  We didn’t give any statements. As a courtesy, the uniforms said we could come by the station tomorrow and give them. Detectives came out and they spoke to Ty for a few minutes. We had to give up our guns for the night but they assured us that we would be cleared soon and we could get them back.

  Ty dropped me back home and I got into my jeep. I heard Ty shout, “Goodnight,” as he drove away.

  It was dark now and the moon was out. There was a lot of traffic on the freeway and I was grateful for it. I had Led Zeppelin turned up on the stereo. I didn’t want to go home and I could only think of one other place to go. I drove to Maria’s and parked outside.

  I didn’t know what I was doing here, or why, of all people’s, her face was the one that had popped into my head, but I was here now and looking into her windows, hoping to see her. I sat there a long time and when I was getting ready to leave her door opened and she stepped out. She looked at me and then walked over.

  “What’re you doing here?”

  “I…Maria, I’m…nothing. I’ll leave. I’m sorry.” I started the Jeep.

  “What did you come here for?”

  “I don’t know. Just to say I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for this.”

  She folded her arms. She exhaled loudly and looked down. “What is it you want? You want me to say I forgive you? Fine, I forgive you. Is that what you wanted? Does that make you happy, cop?”

  “No.” I paused. “And I’m not a cop anymore.”

  “You quit?”

  “Not yet. But tomorrow morning. This isn’t why I became a cop.”

  “They murdered him, didn’t they?”

  “I don’t know. They’re all saying Remy went for Ty’s gun…but I don’t know.” I cleared my throat. “Can I buy you a cup of coffee and talk?”

  She looked back to the house and then to me. I could see her face soften. She walked around the Jeep and climbed in and sat down.

  Cup O’ Joe had the strong scent of brewing coffee and weed. Part of the space was set up for poetry slams and acoustic bands and another part for local artists to display their paintings and metal works. Every few minutes one or more people would go out back for about fifteen minutes, and then come in reeking of marijuana smoke.

  We sat down by a window overlooking a busy street in the art district. The area used to house blue-collar workers and their families, people on welfare, and single men that came from broken marriages. But a younger, hipper crowd of college students from UNLV started moving in and the liquor stores and fast-food restaurants turned into thrift stores and art galleries.

  I sipped a vanilla cappuccino while Maria nibbled at a slice of cheesecake.

  “He had a kid,” Maria said, not looking up from her cheesecake, “somewhere. I think he’s almost sixteen now. They didn’t talk at all after his mother took him to LA. But Remy had a picture of him hanging from his rearview mirror.”

  “I’m sorry, Maria. I wish there was something I could do.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not you. It’s not even those other cops. Remy sold drugs. I know what comes with that. I’m more mad at him that he got himself into this. I think it’s his fault and I feel horrible about it.”

  I didn’t say anything and looked out the window to a homeless man that was shouting to people passing by. His genitals were exposed, his feces-stained pants around his ankles. Within minutes a cruiser arrived and the man was arrested and taken in.

  “In my neighborhood,” she said, “cops take half an hour to come out when someone’s getting shot. But here some poor homeless guy makes a few businesses uncomfortable and they race down here.”

  It was quiet between us a long time and then she took a deep breath and said, “I’m sorry too.”

  “About what?”

  “It wasn’t your fault and I took it out on you. I’m sorry.”

  I took a sip of cappuccino. “How long have you lived in Vegas?”

  “About fifteen years. I came when I was really young from Colombia. My dad was a professor and he got a job teaching at UNLV.”

  “What did he teach?”

  “History. Latin American history. He really liked teaching it I think. But I don’t know. He wasn’t the type of guy you could walk up to and ask him what he was feeling. What about you?”

  “I was born in San Francisco and then we moved to the East Coast. I moved out here after my time in the Army.”

  “What’d you do in the Army?”

  “Infantry. I was in Iraq for two tours.”

  “A lot a my cousins are in the military. They thought it was a way for them to get out of the ghetto.”

  “It is that, I guess.”

  “Did you enjoy it?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “To turn you into a soldier they have to break you down, break down your psychology. Your paradigms. Then they try and build you back up. But before they’re done you get shipped off to fight. And that’s where you build yourself back up. But you don’t come back the same. It’s hard to relate to anyone that wasn’t there with you after you come home. It took me a long time to even be able to have a conversation like this.”

  “Why’d you join then?”

  “Duty, I guess. Loyalty. My father was a soldier, and a cop. My granddad was a cop too.”

  “I bet your dad’s proud of you. Soldier and then a big-time police man.”

  “He died before I was born. Desert Storm. A grenade flew into camp and he covered it with his own body. At least that’s what my mom told me growing up,” I said, with a melancholic grin. “I looked up his service records when I got older. He got shot in the back by friendly fire. His bes
t friend was the one that did it.”

  “My father passed too. He died of cancer. I think it would’ve been better to see him get shot. He got so skinny at the end I didn’t know who he was. I was a kid so I’d be too scared to see him. I wouldn’t even hug him at the end.” She took another bite of cheesecake and then pushed her plate away. “But I got mi mamá and Abuelita. More than most.”

  “Can I ask you something? You seem like…I mean the way you speak. You don’t sound like someone that would be found in a police raid of Remy’s apartment.”

  “You mean I sound educated? I am. I have a bachelor’s from UNLV in political science.”

  “Really? You wanna be a politician?”

  “No. I want to work at a non-profit. Something that helps inner city youth get out. They don’t have any role models. Most of their fathers are gone and so the only people they have to look up to are drug dealers.”

  A band began setting up to play. We talked a bit more and listened to half the first song. They were so loud and annoying that we left and walked slowly out to the Jeep. I drove the long way back to her house and stopped out front.

  “I’d like to see you again,” I said. “I know this is the worst possible time to say something like that. But I don’t know when else I could do it.”

  She took a pen out of the center console and took my wrist in her hands. They were soft and it made my belly tingle. She wrote her number on the back of my hand.

  “Call me tomorrow,” she said.

  “I will.”

  I watched as she walked into her house. I looked across the street; the gang of young men was still there, still watching me. One of them stood up and began shouting. I ignored him, and drove away.

  CHAPTER 14

  The next day was the first day off I’d had in two weeks and I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. I showered and turned on the television, flipped through a few channels, and then turned it off. I went and changed with a speedo underneath my jeans and headed out the door.

  I drove to the rec center near my house and went into the locker room. It was empty except for a few old men and they tried to chit-chat. I was polite but didn’t engage them. I stripped down to my speedo and headed to the outdoor pool and found an empty lane.