malfeasance?'
'Let me just read the charges. Then you can talk,' Cal said.
'Yeah, but…'
Bob Utley put his hand on my arm. Then he smiled calmly at Cal and said, 'That'll be fine, Captain. Go ahead.'
'Three: making false and misleading statements during an inquiry,' Cal continued, 'and failure to cooperate with an ongoing investigation inside proper department channels.'
'That's the whole point,' I jumped in. 'The investigation wasn't ongoing. I. A. closed it despite a plethora of facts supporting a bad due-process complaint.'
Again I felt Bob Utley's hand on my arm. I looked at him and he turned his big, sad, hound-dog eyes on me. Eyes that said, Please don't do this. I nodded, shut my mouth, and turned back to Cal.
'Lastly, there's this failure of good behavior charge stemming from actions taken outside the line of duty on another police officer in full view of the general public, causing discredit to the appointing authority-i. E., this department.' Cal looked up. He was finished and glad to be through it.
'We're challenging that failure of good behavior thing on the grounds that it wasn't part of the original charge sheet and was recently added,' Utley said pleasantly. 'Our position here is that as a result, it can't be part of this case. And due to lack of correct administrative procedure, should probably never be filed at all.'
'I, uh…' Cal looked at the Legal Affairs lieutenant.
'We added that charge as an addendum,' Lt. Sheppard said. 'It saves going through a separate I. A. process all over again at a huge waste of tax dollars. You'll get the charge sheet and affidavit today.'
'Can't do it that way, Lieutenant,' Utley said.
'Wanta bet?'
'Yeah.'
Just as everyone started trading stink-eye, the door flew open, and Alexa came into the room holding a single sheet of paper.
'Sorry I'm late,' she announced.
'Lieutenant,' Cal said. 'What are you doing here?'
'I'm Detective Scully's defense rep,' she said evenly. 'He asked me yesterday and, as of a few hours ago, I've decided to accept. I was detained upstairs at a hearing that just let out.' She sat in the remaining empty chair and nodded at the command staff gathered in Cal's office. She obviously knew them all.
'I don't believe that as a division commander, you can represent him, Lieutenant,' Sheppard said softly.
'Yes, I can.' She fixed hard eyes on him. 'You don't have all the facts, so don't push this, Arnie. I'll dropkick you out that window.'
Man, I love Alexa when she gets like this. I fought to keep my expression stern.
'Anyway, it really doesn't matter whether I can or can't because I'm filing a writ of mandamus on Shane's behalf to strike this whole proceeding,' Alexa said.
She handed the lone piece of paper to Cal, who looked down, holding the sheet like it just came off the bottom of a birdcage. Then he handed it to Captain Detorsky, who handed it to Sheppard. Each of them in turn stared at it in disbelief.
'We're filing that pursuant to the Code of Civil Procedure one-oh-eight-five,' she said. 'The writ requests an inquiry into whether the department proceeded without, or in an excess of, its jurisdiction, and whether there was any prejudicial abuse of discretion. It is the contention of the accused that he was suspended without pay a full day before his supervisor's review and eleven days before his Skelly hearing, and that said action denied him his protections under Paragraph Six of the Police Bill of Rights.'
'He was suspended?' Sheppard sputtered. 'By who?'
'By me,' Alexa said. 'In my role as head of the Detective Division, I suspended him without cause, and in so doing, violated his rights of discovery and due process.'
She stood and motioned to me and Bob. 'Come on, guys. We're out of here.'
I followed my wife and my union rep into the hall. There was mass confusion in the office behind us as they started passing her writ of mandamus around, all talking at once.
I looked at Utley. 'Can we do that?'
'She's your division commander. If she suspended you before the Skelly, then this case is over on a technicality.'
I turned to give Alexa a hug, but when I did, I saw that she had already disappeared. I scanned the fifth floor to the elevators, but she was nowhere in sight.
Chapter 28
In less than a minute, I made it up to Alexa's office using the stairs. I found Ellen standing in the outer office talking to the Detective Bureau Deputy Assistant Commander, Chuck Ward, who was holding a thick case folder. Both of them turned as I bolted through the door.
'Where's Alexa?' I blurted.
'Gone. I think she went down to the fifth floor to see you,' Ellen said. 'She left her review almost twenty minutes ago. Haven't seen her since then.'
'I'll come back at a more convenient time.' Chuck Ward turned and left quickly.
'What's going on?'
'Alexa's been replaced. Chuck's the new interim head of division now.'
'Tony relieved her?'
Ellen looked sad, but tried to put a good face on it. 'Listen, Shane. Maybe it's for the best. It's been a nightmare around here. I think she needs to work on getting better, first.'
'You don't know where she went?'
'Home, I guess.'
I left, got in my car, and blew out of the police garage. I tried her cell. Nothing. It went straight to voice mail. I tried our house-same thing. I made it home in forty minutes, which is excellent time, even for me.
Alexa wasn't there. I went outside and looked up the canal path, thinking that maybe she was walking around the neighborhood breathing in the ocean air and trying to calm herself down. I didn't see her.
I called her cell again, left a second urgent message, then got in the MDX and took off for USC. She might have gone there to see Chooch.
I arrived in record time, mostly by cheating and using my flashers and siren.
It was a little past five by the time I arrived at Howard Jones Field. I found Chooch in a receiver and quarterback meeting of fifteen guys in the east end zone. All of them had taken a knee and were gathered around a position coach at the center of the circle. I spoke to an assistant and had Chooch pulled out of the group. We found a spot on the sidelines where we could talk.
'Has Alexa tried to reach you?' I asked.
'I don't know. I don't think so.'
'Where's your cell?'
'It's… it's in… What's going on?'
I told him that Alexa had failed her administration review and was being replaced as the head of the Detective Bureau. I told him how she came down and saved my ass in Cal's office by burying herself even deeper and admitting that she illegally suspended me before my Skelly hearing.
'Maybe that was her plan all along,' Chooch suggested. 'Maybe that's why she did it, so she could use that to help you later.'
It didn't sound like Alexa to me. She was too much of a Girl Scout for that kind of blatant manipulation. Then I realized that I couldn't swear to that right now because I really didn't know her anymore. I had no idea what she would now regard as acceptable behavior.
'Chooch, if she calls I need to talk to her. I'm worried.'
Chooch reached out and took my arm. 'Dad, don't leave her.'
