easygoing Fred Dean. What a world-class jerk.' Jody shook his head in wonder. 'What a train wreck that guy turned out to be.'
'I loved your dad. Your parents treated me like I was their own.'
Jody shrugged and turned again to look out the window. 'When he went broke, he left me hanging out there with no fuckin' values… Nothin'. You didn't have money or parents, but you had everything. You had beliefs. You had your code, corny as I thought it was. I cared about nothing. Worse still, I couldn't settle for less than we'd always had, and couldn't find any legal way to get that standard of living back.'
'So you make this score and then all your problems go away?' Shane's headache was pounding, but Jody's confession was even worse.
'You always loved being a cop,' Jody continued.
'Yeah,' Shane answered softly. 'Yeah… It seemed like a great profession. I thought it was noble… Blue knights standing up for the innocent. I thought the battle was about right and wrong. But it wasn't about right and wrong; it turned out to be about legal and illegal, rules of evidence… The Police Discretionary Clause… The Miranda. Make some tiny technical mistake, and a confessed child molester goes free. I loved it until it turned me into a cynic.'
'I never loved being a cop,' Jody said quietly, turning back to study Shane's reaction. 'I loved what it let me do. Turning on my gum-ball, and running a red light to get to a ball-game on time. I loved being able to get some asshole down on his back in an alley with nobody watching, then shove my piece in his mouth and listen to him beg. I loved seeing that look in his eyes. The look, man… Better than sex or drugs. It validated me, y'know? The look said, 'I know you can do it. You can light me up and walk away, and nobody will even ask why.' The look said: 'I know you're all that's between me and eternity. I'm alive for only as long as you allow it.' Shit, nobody had to say anything. It was there, pure and clean… No misunderstandings, no technicalities, just a beautiful fact.' His eyes were almost glowing as he spoke. Then he paused and studied Shane. 'You never felt that on the job, when you pulled down on some asshole? Never felt the pure joy of that?'
'No,' Shane said. 'I was in it for something else.'
'Yeah.' He snorted. ''Service in the public trust.''
'Maybe we could've stood for something, Jody. Maybe we still can. Chief Filosiani's different. He wants to try and put it back the way it should be.'
'Chief Bada-bing? You're dreaming, Salsa. You trust Filosiani and he'll fuck you over just like the rest a'them swivel-chair heroes on the sixth floor of the Glass House. And that's not cynicism; it's truth. But, hey… Go ahead and fantasize. That's what I always liked most about you. You knew how to have dumb-ass dreams.' He turned and, without another word, walked out of the bedroom, snatching Papa Joe's contract up off the bed as he passed.
Shane turned on the TV news.
He never should have, because Alexa's funeral was the headline story. Shane sat, mesmerized, as Chief Filosiani spoke about her courage under fire:
'It is with tremendous regret that I am here this afternoon,' the chief said to almost two thousand of L. A.'s finest, who were standing in their dress blues on the Police Academy training field. Even Chooch was there. Shane caught a glimpse of him standing with his head bowed as the TV shot panned over to Buddy. Chooch looked as though he was crying. Shane put out his hand and touched the TV screen.
The blond female news anchor came on camera, continuing the story with a slide show over her right shoulder: 'Sergeant Hamilton, a recent Medal of Valor recipient, was gunned down by her ex-boyfriend, Detective Sergeant Scully.'
No! What is this? Shane was on his feet.
He leaned forward and stared. Shane's picture appeared over the shot of the Police Academy memorial service. It was his Academy graduation picture. He looked youthful and proud. 'Sergeant Scully had been undergoing a psychiatric review and was deemed by his LAPD commander to be emotionally unstable when apparently he was driven to murder.'
No… It was an accident. Why are you saying this?
The shot switched to the police brass band playing 'Taps.' There were shots of a Helicopter Air Unit fly-by: five black-and-white Bell Jet Rangers and a Hughes 500 passed low over the field. Then more shots of Buddy dressed in a black suit, somber and grief-stricken… Shots of the ceremony later, at Forest Lawn, as the casket was lowered with a twenty-one-gun salute. Buddy was handed the flag off the coffin, folded into a tight, career-ending package.
Shane stared in disbelief at the screen until the newscast switched stories.
His mind kaleidoscoped. His thoughts tumbled. Images flashed before him:
Lisa on top of him, her head thrown back-guttural and feline: 'Fuck me, you bastard!'
Chooch standing in the airport, carrying his helmet and shoulder pads: 'Give her the ring, Shane.'
Jody, just a minute ago… His words soft, but horribly prophetic: 'You trust Filosiani and he'll fuck you just like the rest a'them swivel-chair heroes.'
And finally, Alexa… In her dress-blue uniform, standing before him, disapproving and remote: 'There's darkness in you, Shane. It would never have worked. You went your way, I went mine.'
Chapter 30
THE SPEEDOMETER ON the Vogue motor home hovered near seventy while its tires sang in the rain cuts on the concrete highway. The ornate grille reflected the dotted white lane markers on the chrome bumper, hoovering up lines like a Main Street junkie.
Shane was trying to sleep in the big blue crushed-velvet club chair, forward of the galley. Jody was stretched out on the bed in the rear compartment. Tremaine and Lester Wood were up front, engaged in whispered conversation, while Victory Smith was in the booth nursing a beer and brooding.
But Shane was restless. His mind kept touching the edges of new, soul-defining realities: Alexa's death, Chooch left in the wake of this catastrophe, the powerful memory of sex with Lisa-a woman he knew was corrupt and dangerous but whose darkness he was inexplicably drawn to.
When he thought about everything that had happened, he knew Jody was right.
If Tony was on the level, why would the LAPD be calling him a murderer on TV and making him a shoot-on- sight fugitive for every law-enforcement agency in America? The Day-Glo Dago had picked a scenario that eliminated Shane from the equation. It was now pretty obvious to Shane that Filosiani didn't want to face the consequences of his own mangled plan. A plan that had resulted in the death of a police officer under his direct supervision. With this news story, he had cut off Shane and forced him to run. Shane was completely alone.
The weird thing was, it didn't seem to matter much. His perspective had changed. He felt like someone else. His world had lost the vivid colors that had always characterized his thoughts and feelings. In their place, a gray mist had descended, taking the volume way down. Shane suspected he no longer had very many things he really cared about. Maybe he had become like Jody. Although the treasured memory of Alexa and Chooch lingered, even these once powerful performers in his life failed to fully penetrate this new fog of listless disinterest.
He began to realize that the ache inside him was really more of a craving. He needed something… Something to brighten this reality.
How had Jody put it?
A little chemical help after a confusing day.
He was looking at Lester Wood's travel case sitting on the blue carpet, not five feet away. He wondered if Wood had found a way to smuggle one of his little Baggies past Jody's inspection. Or maybe he had found a connection in Palm Springs and hooked himself up, scored some polvo bianco. So Shane stretched his foot out around the case and began to nudge it closer.
'You banged the bitch, didn't ya?' Victory interrupted his thoughts, dropping into the chair in front of Shane. 'I told ya t'leave her be.'
'Get away from me,' Shane said softly.
