Street Rules

tack.

'I don't want you, Ocho. I don't want your homes. I want the person that I know did this. Thing is, I don't have a lot of evidence, so the DA's gonna laugh me out of her office when I go to her and say oh it's this other person not Octavio Ruiz. But if I can prove it's not you, and none of your crew, she'll have to look at what I got. Then we can lay off you. I don't like wasting my time chasing after you any more than you like my detectives all over your ass. If you help, we both get what we want.'

'No matter what we was doin' that night?'

'Except for murder, I don't give a flying fuck.'

'How do I know you ain't lying?'

'You don't. All you have is my promise. Ask around to see if it's any good.'

Frank and Ruiz maintained a stare. Finally Ruiz said, 'I've heard a you,' and started to talk. He stuck to the story he'd told her in the box, only this time he added it was a business trip; he and his vatos had gone there to sell some guns. A .22, two .38s and a .44.

Frank nodded.

'I need to know who the homes were.'

Ruiz pouted and Frank assured him, 'I ain't gonna bust nobody. I just gotta check out your story.'

'Man, this don't fly, bustin' my vatos.'

'I'm not bustin' anybody. I already told you that. But just hangin' with your homes doesn't make a very strong alibi. I want people that were there, that are gonna swear to me that you were there too. That's all. I get that, you never see me again.'

Ruiz sneered. 'Yeah, right. First it's me, them my homes. You fuckin' one-times are all liars.'

'Hey. Whatever. You can believe me and have me out of your life or you can have me in your face and in your friends faces until I get my answers. And if I have to do it the hard way, I'm taking everybody down with me, and I'll tell them it's 'cause you were too fuckin' chicken-shit to cooperate.'

'Ain't chicken-shit,' Ruiz laughed around a drag on his cigarette.

'Then let's end this right now. It's on you, man.'

Ruiz considered her from behind the curling smoke.

'You know if somethin' was to happen to me, I got people on the street reppin' me. Even if you was to fuck me, you couldn't fuck everybody.'

Frank nodded submissively. Her acquiescence lured Ruiz into thinking he had the upper hand. He stared at her some more, hard, before saying, 'This is fucked, man.'

Then he gave her names. She wrote them down, and as she was leaving he said, 'You got a sister?'

'Yeah,' Frank lied. 'She's a secretary at the station.'

'I thought so. You better be tellin' me the truth here, you know what I mean, cuz she's a nice lady. You wouldn't want nothin' to happen to her, you know what I'm sayin'?'

'I hear you, man.'

Frank made it to the station just in time for briefing. It was short and tense, with a lot of unanswered questions and accusations that Frank said she'd explain later. She rushed back out, eager to catch Ruiz' homies still in bed. Camped in rush hour traffic she reflected that letting Ruiz go was highly immoral, and illegal, but she needed every thing she could lay her hands on to nail Placa's shooter. She didn't like bargaining over felonies, but told herself it was only a matter of time before Ruiz got in trouble again. Sooner or later he'd get caught for something.

She further rationalized Ruiz' shooting wasn't as serious as Placa's murder. It was a simple accounting based on the rules of the street: one lesser crime was not equal to or greater than the crime of murder. The only flaw in this logic was the possibility that Ruiz' next crime might be murder.

But Frank was willing to gamble on that. Inching along, she consoled her conscience with the fact that the Estrellas weren't inherently bad. They were simply playing a bad hand as well as they knew how. They hadn't gotten a lot of opportunities and none of them, except Placa, seemed to have the wherewithal to change their lives.

On the other hand, there was no justification for the shooter. Here was someone who had it all, who was sworn to uphold the law and protect the public, but was instead using his position to create more power. Frank could excuse ignorance and she could understand avarice, but she couldn't bear his total disregard for a justice that she still believed in, still fought for and tried her best to maintain every day.

Clay had nailed it during their first session together. Work was all Frank had. It was her god, her muse, and her passion. And to do her work she had to believe that justice existed at some level. Whether it was meted out from the courts or delivered swiftly on the streets, she had to know that there was a reason why she did what she did every day. Sometimes she failed, that was true, but not for lack of effort. Sometimes the system beat her and it was easier to go along so she could get along. And like with Larkin, sometimes, she looked the other way. Her old boss had been right when he'd said sometimes law and justice didn't recognize each other on the street.

Frank could justify until the freeway cleared, but the truth was, she would use whatever she had to get this bastard. If that meant playing outside the law and on the streets, then Frank was in the middle of the road. Joe had asked her if she was willing to take on the risks of this case and she'd meant it when she answered yes. If she had to, she'd leak what she had and let public sentiment force Nelson into action. It would probably get her fired, but better to be fired she reasoned, than not be able to look at herself in the mirror.

An hour after the deadline that night, when she still hadn't heard from anyone, Frank called the chief. She hadn't dug up much since yesterday. This bastard's tracks were well covered, but Frank had sworn testimonies from Claudia and Gloria, as well as Ruiz, Lydia, and two home boys. Not the most reputable witnesses, but Frank was hoping she could parlay the quantity of wits for the quality. She'd forked over a small ransom to a source at the phone company who faxed her a years worth of phone bills. She'd highlighted all the calls to Julio Estrella's house, and then the sudden flurry of calls to Claudia's house after the massacre. It wasn't much but it was better than what she'd had. He sighed heavily and told her he'd call back. Frank paced while she waited, jumping on the phone when it rang. Nelson told her to proceed.

Frank shot her fist to the ceiling, and yelled a silent, Yes!

'But only on trafficking and extortion charges.'

'What?' she yelled, unable to contain her dismay.

'The department's legal team and the DA's office feel that at this time those are the only charges you can substantiate.'

Despite the over-riding sensation that she was in a bad free-fall, she picked up the chiefs use of 'you.' It dawned on her as she listened to his self-serving rationale, that she was in this alone. All the way.

'The homicide charges aren't based on anything more than circumstance and hearsay. A bad attorney could laugh us out of court on that; in the hands of a good attorney . . . well, I don't even want to speculate on the repercussions that could invite.'

Nelson said more politic things, then pointedly warned Frank from pursuing any investigations other than the ones he'd sanctioned. She hungup, dumb-struck. But she shouldn't have been.

The twenty-four hours had been to tear apart what little Frank had; the chief had only been stalling her. And she'd been an idiot to think he'd stick his neck out. Frank was furious with herself. She circled the empty desks in the squad room. It hurt, she thought. It hurt that she'd set herself up for a fall, that she worked for a man and an organization that wouldn't back her in doing the right thing. Their gross and abject failure was wounding. But what hurt the most was Frank's failure to protect Claudia and her children, the live ones as well as the dead.

Frank slammed a quick one-two at the wall, cracking the plaster board. She knew it was stupid but she welcomed the pain in her fists. It was better than the pain in her heart and she did it again. She bowed her head against the wall until she'd collected herself, then started making phone calls.

Chapter Thirty

She sat stoically behind the big desk. She had one card left and was waiting to play it. Her fingers beat a staccato on the chair's scarred old arms. Finally she heard him. Click, click. Those were his shoes on the stairs. Click, click. Through the squad room. Click, click, and into her office. He was handsome, even with the scratches on his face and swelling jaw. Of course he was as immaculate as always. He always rolled out beautifully. Tonight it was a tailored navy pinstripe with silk tie and French cuffs.