Swing Shift Read online

  Swing Shift

  By H.J. Raine

  This is dedicated to A. who told me it was my turn to show LGTB kids that the bullying isn't their fault and to the Colorado safe school coalitions who have backed me up.

  Valentine's Day in New Amsterdam was bitter cold. Detective Edward Sorenson ducked his head and pulled up the collar of his trench coat as the late winter wind cut deep. He was walking back to the station from an evening interview with Roland Hansen's gardener, Waters, who had insisted on meeting at the bar Glow.

  Ed enjoyed the comfortable atmosphere for the talk, but had limited his on-duty libations to ginger ale. Waters, on the other hand, downed fine whiskey as if it were tea, and after the barkeep of Glow confiscated Waters' car keys, Waters walked home. That left Ed to watch the bar's owner with his new lover. The two men seemed utterly in love with each other, and it left a pang of jealousy in Ed's chest.

  Walking along 22nd Avenue, Ed watched cars, busses, and taxies as they honked, dodged, and swerved to the curb to let off and take on passengers. All the restaurants and bars in the rich and brightly-lit Fashion District were thronged with people, and it seemed that everywhere Ed looked someone was holding hands, laughing, or kissing. Hearts and cupids decorated all the big store displays, and you would have thought some demented tagger had gone in for cases and cases of pink glitter spray-paint.

  Ed slipped his way through the crowd and concentrated on the outcome of his meeting. The gardener reported that Hansen had deliberately marred the estate's manicured lawn and had asked for help to bury a bundle that seemed awfully close to the size and shape of a body. Ed wasn't entirely sure he could trust the sodden gardener's word, but the testimony fit in with far too many pieces of hard evidence over an angry domestic who was now missing from the Hansen household. At the top of Ed's to-do list was working up arrest and search warrants to take a closer look at the torn garden.

  As one of the newest detectives on the Special Investigations squad, which concentrated on highly publicized cases, Ed was used to working under strict deadlines and plenty of political pressure. And Ed, of all people, knew that bringing murder charges against an old money family like the Hansens of Shadgrove was going to bring down a firestorm of scrutiny.

  The fan of a swung baseball bat under sodium lights caught Ed's eye. His conscious mind said he was crazy, muggers would never work in the trendy Fashion District, but Ed obeyed instincts he'd picked up in his years patrolling the slums of Gehnbatton and slipped swiftly into the shadows.

  The impact of something hard meeting flesh sped Ed's feet. The logical part of him said it was stupid going into an alley by himself. The resulting cry made him pull his solid, heavy Maglight free of its belt ring. He hesitated when he touched the pistol in his shoulder holster, deadly force was rarely needed for simple battery, even in a one on many scenario. Frowning, he left the semi-automatic nestled in its place. The touch settled the part of him that didn't like doing this, and Ed ran forward. When he was nearly on top of the sounds, Ed flicked on the powerful flashlight.

  "Drop it!" Ed barked in his most authoritative tone. "This is the New Amsterdam Police. Drop your weapon, and put your hands in the air. You are under arrest."

  Three young men blinked at him. The shortest was about half a foot taller than the back of the green dumpster behind them. One was platinum fair, with eyes that flashed green; his thick coat bore Greek letters stitched in gold thread. The other two had dark hair and dark eyes. One of those sported a crooked nose that looked like it had been broken a few times, and the other was fat for his height. All three were in dark jeans and running shoes. Ed fixed it all in his mind while time obligingly slowed on a wave of adrenaline at the three to one odds.

  The distinctive ring of aluminum bouncing against brick and pavement made Ed snarl, "I said, hands up!"

  The two darker guys obeyed. Blondie hesitated, spat a curse, whirled on one sneakered heel, and hightailed it down the alley. The other two bolted after him, moving with the herd instinct of spooked deer.

  Ed vented a roar of adrenaline, aggravation, and sheer rage, but didn't give chase; safety of the victim always came first. Besides, he'd gotten a good enough look at the perps to call an APB on their asses.

  Kneeling by the crumpled body at the edge of the alley, Ed trained his flashlight on the still form. The man wore bright red skinny pants, a fashionable pearl jacket far too thin for the weather, and a lavender shirt now splattered with the blood that was pouring from a scalp wound. A James shopping bag spilled equally colorful contents onto the pavement. The victim's skull looked whole, but one arm was bent at a horribly wrong angle.

  "Shit," Ed whispered, but turned so that he could get fingers on the guy's throat, trying to ignore the fact that the man was beautiful, with high cheekbones, a slender nose, and thick long eyelashes as dark as a shadow's kiss. A pulse fluttered under smooth shaved skin, and Ed sat back with a sigh of relief, dug out his radio, switched to the channel for dispatch, and hit the talk button.

  "Got a 242 in an alley between West 32nd and Winchester, east of 22nd Ave."

  To Ed's delight, it was Mary Innes who answered; she always made everything easier getting through dispatch.

  "You need an ambulance?" she asked, briskly.

  "Yeah, he's hurt pretty bad. I also need an evidence kit."

  "You see the perps?"

  "Yes." Ed rattled off a quick description. Knowing that the dumpster behind the boys was probably four and half feet tall at the back, he listed heights, likely weights, and what they were wearing. "They were running east when last seen. Can the Fashion District patrol..."

  "I got it. I'll get the APB out. They're not armed, right?"

  "Right."

  Sirens wailed, came closer. Within seconds an ambulance shouldered into the mouth of the alley from the busy avenue, and blue bubblegum lights started flashing from the quieter east end of the alley.

  "Got 'em, Mary. Over and out."

  "Out here too. Good hunting."

  Ed put the radio away, heard Mary's crisp voice issuing the APB on the main channel, and two patrols responded. EMTs boiled out of the ambulance to swarm over the pathetic bundle of unconscious hurt on the street. A van with the flashing blue lights moved ponderously from the other end, weaving between dumpsters.

  When the evidence van stopped in front of Ed, out hopped Connor Adams, one of the senior officers of the Westside detective division. Adams was broad-shouldered, and his thick hair all gone to salt and pepper. His Irish green eyes never gave away anything, but took in everything; he'd always made a killing at poker. Adams had been in the force for nearly twenty years, and he'd outlasted three precincts and five different Chiefs.

  "Hey, Sorenson, whatcha got?"

  "Assault."

  "With baseball bats," Adams said, noncommittally. "Fingerprints and bags?"

  "Yeah."

  They both walked to the back of the vehicle. Adams unlocked the door, and Ed stepped into the back. The interior was lined in compartments, and he pulled out a fingerprint kit and the large sized plastic bags for putting the bats in after they'd gotten what they could from them. He also found two pairs of disposable gloves, and when he hopped back out, handed Adams a pair. Adams pulled them on without comment.

  The big searchlights on the front of the van transformed the dark alley with brilliant light. The EMTs had the victim strapped onto a gurney and were lifting him into the back of the ambulance. Smears of blood Ed hadn't noticed came into vivid focus, and he sighed at seeing the tread of a sneaker in red.

  "You want to get that print?" Ed asked Adams, thinking about the amount of work needed to thoroughly dust for prints. "Or are you willing to dust the bats?"

  "You sure you want to take the pi
ctures at the hospital?" Adams asked, instead of answering. "It's not going be pretty."

  The question had the weight of something else behind it. The older officer saw far more than he let on, but Ed really didn't think Adams knew Ed was gay, since Ed kept that pretty tight to the vest. However, Adams' concern over Ed having to obtain graphic evidence of what was clearly a gay bashing could be thought of as a friendly gesture. Looking into Adams' expression, Ed didn't see any condemnation or implication that Ed might be too squeamish to do the job.

  "Yeah, I think I'll be all right," Ed answered.

  Adams relieved Ed of the fingerprint kit and the bags. "Then you get the footprint and photographs. I'll do the rest."

  Ed chuckled. "Does that mean you'll do the paperwork too?"

  "Nah," Adams drawled. "I'll leave that to the smart guy who interrupted the crime-in-progress."

  "Ninety-nine percent paperwork..." Ed started, heading back to the van.

  "One percent fun. Get to it, junior."

  "Yes, sir."

  Ed got the ground evidence kit and the cameras from the back, one Polaroid, the other a real film. He'd also need them for later, so he signed everything out of the van's inventory. He snapped pictures of the entire scene and the prints, carefully made an imprint of the sneaker, bagged everything up, and tagged them for the evidence locker.

  On the radio, one of the patrols reported picking up the three boys without a fight. Ed went back to work, knowing now that the evidence would be used, for both the initial arraignment and any subsequent trial.

  The meticulous work got Ed's adrenaline back under his control. He rarely ran directly into violent situations without some warning. In most of the high-profile cases that Ed had to handle, there was ample information about what the situation entailed, and the greatest danger came from impromptu press interviews, not people wielding baseball bats. The shooting on the New Amsterdam University campus had been well in progress before Ed was called to the scene, and most of the cases that he now worked on came with evidence already bagged or people already buried.

  Ed's hands shook when Adams handed him the carefully covered baseball bats.

  Adams' eyebrows went up, but he only asked, "Want a ride back to the station?"

  "Sure." Ed bit his lip and got the tags on without disgracing himself.

  Ed swung himself up into the passenger seat while Adams took the wheel. They drove out into the lights of the Fashion District among the crowds that were oblivious to what Ed had just experienced. It was all part of being a police officer: always set a little bit askew from the rest of the world. He did all the dirty work behind the scenes so that these people could be completely ignorant of what lurked in the shadows. Oddly comforted by that, Ed settled into his seat and tried not to sigh too loudly.

  Adams gave him a look but turned back to his driving. "This can't be the first time you've chased perps down an alley?"

  "Nah. First three years of my five years on patrol were in Gehnbatten," Ed said.

  "Huh. That would get your feet wet."

  "Yeah." Ed realized that his shaking wasn't just from the insulating distance of his new position.

  The silence stretched in the cab when Adams caught nearly every light on busy 22nd Ave., and Ed wondered how to bring it up or even if he should. It wasn't as if he were flagrantly out to everyone in the precinct, though most of his squad mates knew. Being gay wasn't something he exactly hid, but it wasn't something that he brought up in random conversations either. One never really knew with police personnel.

  "So, what do you think of the Chief's butt?" Adams asked.

  Ed gaped. "What?"

  "I thought I was pretty clear," Adams drawled. "Did you start in Special Investigations three years ago?"

  "Yeah."

  "The Poplar case was your first?"

  Completely mystified as to where this was going, Ed nodded.

  "The Chief had to make a statement to the press when the kidnapping first happened, and you were there, all spic and span in your brand new suit." Adams' voice held a certain amount of relish. "I remember, because you'd just been promoted from the West Division's front line, and I was there with a bucket if the shit hit the fan. Do you remember what happened before the briefing?"

  "Oh." Ed stammered. "Uhm... yes. Yes, I do."

  As part of the supporting personnel for the press conference on the case, Ed had been assigned one of the seats behind the podium. Along with the forensics expert, the dispatcher for the case, the DA, and the recorder for the proceedings, Ed was lined up feeling like a kid waiting to get on the playground. Police Chief Isaac Whittaker walked in from the other direction with his entourage of advisors and the Mayor's men. When the group passed the line, the massive form of the Chief in the flesh rather than on some screen had made Ed's head whip around for a good look.

  Usually this was a safe way to ogle straight men, because most straight men never had a reason to look back, so they never caught on to a gay man checking them out. Ed's composure for the rest of that day was shot when he found himself staring into the narrowed eyes of the Chief, who was clearly examining every inch of Ed. Luckily, Ed didn't have a speaking part, but when the Chief shook Ed's hand in congratulations on a solid case, the touch lingered half a beat too long.

  Adams cackled. "It's just a rumor about him eating cadets for breakfast. Really."

  "I'd heard it was for lunch," Ed said with a grin. "Uhm. So that means the Chief is actually.... uh..."

  "Yeah, like Danny and his man Clark." Ed watched Adams' profile, saw Adams make a shoulder check before changing lanes. Adams treated Daniel Germaine like a nephew, ever since Danny's father had died when he was still Adams' partner in the field. The affection and respect ran deep in the tones of Adam's voice. "The Chief'll be glad you got these guys. Solid case."

  "I think I'm getting the picture," Ed said slowly. He'd known that New Amsterdam's police force welcomed all orientations as well as races, creeds, and genders, but he hadn't realized, until this instant, that the support for the gay community really did go all the way to the top. "And, yeah, it was the hate that really got to me, since it could well have been aimed at me." Ed mused. "Though I would have liked to see 'em try that on the Chief."

  Shared laughter cleared out the last of Ed's jitters for the rest of the ride to the Precinct's parking lot. Adams handed Ed the crate of items and then drove off on another call.

  Ed got everything checked into the evidence locker, got to his desk, and found just enough time to fill in the warrant forms for Hanes' arrest and a search of the gardens.

  The patrol team came in with the three men in custody. Ed helped with the booking procedure, got photos and fingerprints off the morose college students, and did a quick background check. Ed found a simple assault history on Blondie from two separate high school altercations and Broken Nose had three others. Ed frowned when he found that the boys were all members of a frat on NAU's campus, but he added it all to his report.

  Two hours later, Ed stood in night court for the initial arraignment along with the patrol officers.

  The hearing left a bad taste in Ed's mouth. He and Castle and Simons kept utterly professional expressions when faced with irate parents on speakerphones and the blond boy's utterly unrepentant, "The fag deserved it." It helped that the judge set bail at ten thousand because of the attitude thus displayed, but Ed was disgusted by the whole thing.

  Afterward, Ed approached the bench, and Judge Reynolds gave him an intimidating look from over her reading glasses. He smiled and handed her the paperwork for the warrants.

  To Ed's utter surprise, Judge Reynolds took one look, pursed her lips, and reached for her pen. He was used to her grilling him about the exact plot of land, the reliability of the witnesses, and the extent of reasonable proof he might have to justify the request. Instead, she signed both warrants with a flourish and sealed them with the Great Seal of the Court of New Amsterdam.

  When s
he looked up at Ed to hand the sheaf of papers to him, she quirked a half-smile. "You look like you've just seen a miracle, young man."

  "I... Uhm... I think I have," Ed stammered, unsure of what to ask or how to ask it without sounding like a twit. "Why..."

  "Waters," she said with a smile that would have done a Sphinx proud. "Your main informant is Steven Saltare Waters."

  "The gardener?" Baffled, Ed looked at the papers in his hand.

  She nodded, but maddeningly offered nothing more than that. "Do you have anything else for me, young man?"

  "No, ma'am."

  "Get going then, my docket isn't going to clear itself." Judge Reynolds hesitated and then added more softly, "May the rest of your night be uneventful, young man. Those idiots were a nasty piece of work."

  "Yes, ma'am," Ed said and turned away. Now he counted two miracles in one night, and he left feeling inexplicably lighter.

  By then he realized it was ten, and he had to get downtown to Saint Cam's. He went back to his desk, picked up the cameras, and got an unmarked patrol car from the pool. St. Camillus de Lellis Hospital had seen centuries of use and abuse. Its crenulated stone facades were pure white, and the bas-relief of Greek gods and animals dancing on the pediment was lit by spotlights. Still, standing as it was in the midst of Mirbest's wealthiest neighborhoods, the building housed the best that modern science and architecture could produce for the care of New Amsterdam's citizens.

  The entrances to the ER were designed for ambulance flow, walk-in triage, and staff safety. Ambulances had their own gated way at the side of the main building that opened directly into acute care. Everyone else had to use the big doors marked 'Walk-in.' Ed had his badge out before he even got to the security guards, and once in the deserted waiting room, one of the three triage nurses behind glass took one look and buzzed him into the emergency department proper.

  Ed went through and found Anthony Santoro waiting for him. The door locked behind Ed with a solid sounding shnick. Anthony had been at St. Cam's ER for as long as Ed had been in the force. Ed respected Anthony's abilities after seeing the man run triage after gang turf wars, drug house busts, and the NAU shooting. Anthony's decisiveness saved lives, smoothed out the chaos, and eased fear. Best of all, his bedside manner was attentive and respectful. Ed should know -- he'd been in one of those beds.