Pike stared back.
Rollins snarled up his lips to show Pike the double-wide hole where his teeth should be.
Pike said, 'Sweet.'
The trip to the Men's Central Jail would take about twelve minutes with the usual downtown traffic delays. When the last of the six was in and seated, Deputy Montana called back through the cage. 'Listen up. No talking, no moving around, no bullshit. It's a short trip, so nobody start any crap about having to pee.'
He said it a second time in Spanish, then the driver put the van in gear and pulled out of the parking garage and into traffic.
They had gone exactly two blocks when Rollins leaned toward Pike.
'You the one was a cop, aren't you, muthuhfuckuh?'
Pike just looked at him, seeing him, but not seeing him. Pike was still thinking about Krantz, and about the case that was slowly coming together against him. He was letting himself float and drift and be in places other than this van.
Rollins poked the older black guy, who looked like he'd
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rather be anyplace else on the planet. 'Yeah, this muthuhfuckuh the one. I got a nose for shit like that. I heard'm talkin' about him.'
Pike had arrested a hundred men like Clarence Rollins, and had fronted off five hundred more. Pike knew by looking at him that Rollins had been institutionalized for most of his life. Jail was home. The world was where you went between coming home.
'You a real Aryan muthuhfuckuh, ain't you, them fuckin' pale ass eyes o' yours. Lemme tell you somethin', muthuhfuckuh, it don't mean shit to me you killed some muthuhfuckuh. I killed so many muthuhfuckuhs you can't count, an' there ain't nuthin' I hate more'n a motherfuckin' cop like you. Lookie here—'
Rollins peeled back a sleeve to show Pike a tattoo of a heart with
'You know what that means, muthuhfuckuh? LAPD one eighty-seven? Means I'm a cop-killin' muthuhfuckuh, that's what it means. You best fear my ass.'
Rollins was working himself up for something. It was as predictable as watching a freight train round a bend, but Pike didn't bother paying attention. Pike was seeing himself in the woods behind his boyhood home, smelling the fresh summer leaves and the wet creek mud. He was feeling the steambath heat of Song Be, Vietnam, when he was eighteen years old, and hearing his sergeant's voice shouting at him across the dry scrub hills of Camp Pendleton, a voice he so wished to be his father's. He was tasting the healthy clean sweat of the first woman he loved, a beautiful proud farm girl named Diane. She had been from a proper family who despised Joe, and had made her stop seeing him.
'How come you ain't sayin' nothin, muthuhfuckuh? You goddamned well better answer me when I talk to your muthuh-fuckin' ass, you know what's good for you. Your ass is trapped in here with me.' When he said that, Rollins flashed the long slender blade hidden in his sock.
The other places and people melted away, leaving only the
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van and Pike and the man across from him. Pike felt as peaceful as the woods behind that childhood home.
'No,' Pike whispered. 'You're trapped with me.'
Clarence Rollins blinked once, clearly surprised, then launched off the bench, driving the blade square at Pike's chest and pushing with all the power of his legs.
Pike let the blade slip past his hands, then trapped and folded the wrist, channeling all the speed and power of Rollins's own attack in turning the knife. Gunnery Sergeant Aimes would be pleased.
Rollins was a large, strong man, and considerable force went back into his forearm. The radius and ulna bones snapped like green wood, slicing through muscles and veins and arteries as the bones exploded through his skin.
Clarence Rollins screamed.
Deputy Sheriffs Frank Montana and Lowell Carmody both jumped at the scream, bringing their Mossbergs to port arms. The three Hispanic prisoners were bunched together at the front screen, making it hard to see, but Rollins was thrashing around in the aisle like something was biting him.
The driver shouted, 'The fuck is going on back there?' Carmody yelled, 'Knock it off! Get back in your seats!' Pike was down in the aisle with Rollins, who kept turning over and flailing and spinning around. Rollins was screaming in a high, little girl's voice as a three-foot geyser of blood sprayed all over the back of the van.
Montana said, 'Holy fuck! Pike's killing him!' Montana and Carmody both tried to sight past the His-panics over their Mossbergs. Montana screamed, 'Get away from him, Pike! Get back in that seat, goddamnit!'
The Mexicans saw the shotguns and scrambled out of the way, still trying to avoid the blood. They were probably thinking about AIDS.
Pike lifted his hands away from Rollins and eased back onto the bench.
Clarence continued thrashing and rolling and screaming as if his whole body was on fire.
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Montana shouted, 'Shut up, Rollins! What the hell is going on back there?'
The older black man said, 'He's hurt! Can't you see that?'
Montana shouted,
The older man said, 'He's bleeding to death, goddamnit it. That's blood.'
Rollins kept howling, the blood spraying everywhere. The older man was squatting on his seat, trying to stay clear.
Pike said, 'I can help him. I can stop the bleeding.'
'Stay the fuck in your seat!'
Carmody peered through the mesh. 'Shit, he ain't faking it, man. He's bleeding like a stuck goat. One of these bastards musta cut him.'
The older man said, 'He ain't been cut! That's his goddamned bones stickin' out! His arm's broke. Can't you see that?'
Montana could see it even with the way Rollins was carrying on. The bones looked like pink ivory.
The driver said that they were only another ten minutes from the jail, but when he said it they were locked down in the thick traffic. The van didn't have a flash bar or siren, so there was no way to get the cars to move.
The old man yelled, 'Ten minutes in your butt! This man needs a tourniquet. We ain't got no belts or nothing back here. You just gonna let him bleed like that?'
Montana said, 'Fuck. We'd better do something.' He could see the bastard bleeding out back there, and the three of them getting sued by the ACLU.
Montana told the driver to radio their sit-rep and request a medical unit. He left his shotgun and his sidearm with Carmody because he didn't want to tempt any of these bastards with a weapon, then pulled on vinyl gloves. He just knew that bastard had AIDS. Every one of these scumbags probably had it.
'You cover my ass, goddamnit,' he told Carmody.
Carmody shouted at everyone to stay in their goddamned seats, trying to make himself heard over Rollins's moaning
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and flopping. Every time the blood squirted toward the Mexicans, they jumped in a little herd.
