CHAPTER TEN

Sgt. Ortiz met with the Rabbi around noon. The Assistant Chief signed off on an incident report that said he had directed two detectives from the Brooklyn Narcotics Bureau to pursue a drug dealer for investigative purposes. The report further stated that a physical encounter with the drug dealer went bad; one detective was shot and the drug dealer escaped. Assistant Chief Miles assured Ortiz that, with his background on fighting drugs, even if the report surfaced elsewhere in the department, nobody would look twice at it.

"What about our lieutenant and the precinct captain," asked Ortiz. "They are going to go ballistic if they find out that you tapped us for an assignment, and they didn't get copied on it. Especially when it involves a detective getting shot."

"Let me deal with it If that issue comes up," Miles said. "I can insulate the two of you by declaring that I swore you both to secrecy. That will start another shit-storm, but that will be between me and the command staff. And, since I'm the fucking boss, I really don't care."

"One other detail," Ortiz said. "I will need to advise one of my detectives about your name in case he needs to explain this report. If he gets confronted about it, and denies it, he'll be screwed at the precinct no matter what you say after the fact."

"Sergeant ," Miles said. "We are getting deeper and deeper out into the ocean now. And I trust your judgment. So, tell your people what they need to know. It would seem our fates are now intertwined. From this point on I will have to trust you as much as you have to trust me."

"You sure you want to rattle his cage this soon, Jimmy? We might be tipping our hand before we have a chance to actually connect him to something."

"I'll take any opportunity I can get to rattle his cage. I still can't believe he was able to squirm out of that court case."

"Do we want to request any backup before we do this," Eva asked.

"Nah. Shouldn't need it," Jimmy replied. "He's an ass, but he's not stupid. I notified the lieutenant over at the seven-three that we would be in his district, just out of courtesy. But I don't think we'll have any problems today."

Eva and Jimmy parked in front of the Brownsville home of DeShawn "Sweet B" Baskins. There was a group of people sitting on the front porch, many of them holding beer bottles. As the detectives got out of the car, Jimmy announced, "Anyone still here in ten seconds will be spending the night in jail."

There were shouts and mumbles from the porch, but the crowd began to disperse. Eva and Jimmy kept an eye on all of them and didn't leave the side of the car until the last of the crowd was out of bottle throwing range. As soon as they took a step, Sweet B appeared in the doorway of the house and shouted, "Detective! Man, I'm starting to like you. You're like that white boy, Rocky. No matter how bad you get beat, you just keep coming back. Just remember that this ain't no movie."

"That a threat, DeShawn," Eva asked.

"Not even. Just reminding detective Burke that fiction, much like all those things he is always saying about me, is a lot different from reality."

"I've got some reality coming your way, DeShawn," Jimmy replied. "You're not as good or as lucky as you think you are. You will mess up, you will get caught, and you will go down."

"Detective, I'm not sure that I can take your word on that." Sweet B said. "You've already done your best — and your best didn't get the job done."

"DeShawn," Jimmy said, "Somebody is taking out your competition around town. You know anything about that?"

Sweet B said, "As sweet as I do things, I didn't realize I had any competition. Lots of people wish they could be me. But there's only one genuine article."

"DeShawn," Eva said, "If you're not taking out the competition, then you should be worried. You might be next on the list."

"Hey, it's the law of nature," Sweet B said. "We all got to go sooner or later. But it's not about how long we got, it's about how good we got it while we're here."

"Great," Jimmy said. "Now, I'm getting advice from a drug dealing fortune cookie."

"Don't shoot the messenger, detective," Sweet B said. "Sometimes they shoot back."

"I'll be back to see you, DeShawn."

"No doubt. Or, maybe I'll come see you next time. Or, maybe you'll never see me at all."

Back in the car, Jimmy said, "Well, that went nowhere fast."

"What were you expecting, Jimmy? He was just going to confess?"

"He's done stupider things in life."

Ortiz updated Gil Martinez about his conversation with the Rabbi. Then he told him who the Rabbi was, but emphasized that he shouldn't contact him unless it was an emergency. And, even then, he should be careful. There was nothing tying any of them to the Rabbi yet. Backing them up or not, the Rabbi was still a politician who had managed to outsmart and outlive his competition on his way up to the Assistant Chief position. That meant he was both lucky and devious.

Martinez took his vest and the incident report over to the NYPD Quartermaster warehouse in Queens. After filling out the necessary forms, he took the paperwork and the vest to one of the distribution windows. The clerk in the window began looking over the paperwork and typing on his computer. He stopped at one point, looked closer at the numbers on the incident report, and began slowly retyping them into the computer. Again, he stopped all work and stared at the incident report. Then he raised his eyebrows and asked, "The Assistant Chief signed off on this?"

"Yeah," Martinez said. "Is there a problem with that?"

"Well," The clerk said. "The biggest problem is that your report is not in the system."

"What?" Martinez looked genuinely confused because he was.

"It's not in the system, and I cannot process anything that's not already in the system."

"Well, maybe you should try," Martinez said. "I just recently got shot by some asshole, and that's turning out to be less painful than this fucking process."

The clerk was suddenly on the phone. Upon hanging up, he said, "My supervisor is coming over. Perhaps he can do something. The computer will not let me process anything without all the paperwork being in place. Maybe he can override it."

Just then, another man appeared beside the clerk and began whispering. The two of them proceeded to whisper back and forth for about a minute. Then the supervisor said, "Detective, the only way that I can process this is with a verbal approval from the Assistant Chief himself. Do you really want me to call the Assistant Chief and ask him about this?"

Martinez was taken aback. This little weasel just subtly asked about calling his bluff. Martinez could feel pride and anger swelling up within him. He really wanted to punch this weasel about a dozen times.Martinez thought about all the stuff he had gone through in a police career on the streets, and here was this little dipshit taking a moment to revel in the power he had in this little computer kingdom.

"If you don't call him, then I will." Martinez said. "You pathetic little desk humper."

The supervisor gave a resigned shrug, as if to say that he tried to give the detective a chance. He picked up the phone, dialed a number he knew from memory, and asked to be put through to the office of the Assistant Chief.

After a few moments, the supervisor began explaining the situation. Martinez could not hear the conversation. But, when the supervisor's sorrowful look turned to one of absolute horror, Martinez guessed that the Rabbi was currently threatening the little man. After what looked like a dozen apologies, the supervisor hung up the phone and returned to the counter.

"Detective, I am so sorry for the delay. I apologize profusely for any trouble that I may have caused you. As a matter of fact, Tom, just go get this sized vest and bring it up here. There's no need for the detective to wait on us any longer." Turning back to Martinez, he said, "Your new vest will be right out. We'll take care of everything ourselves. If you could just sign here, we'll take care of all the rest. Do you need anything else today, sir?"

"Just a new vest," Martinez said icily.

"Of course, sir. It will be here any moment now. Again, I apologize for the delay."

Shit, thought Martinez, this Rabbi connection might be dangerous. A man could get used to this new level of respect real fast.

As they were headed back to the office, Eva and Jimmy decided to stop by the Brooklyn North Narcotics Bureau. As they entered the Narcotics squad room, it looked more like they were entering a war room. People were standing around in black bulletproof vests and laden with web gear and gun holsters. Some were cleaning or sighting in AR-15 and MP-5 rifles, while others were checking and loading magazines full of shiny new bullets.

"Whoa," Jimmy said. "You guys are pretty serious about fighting the drug war, eh?"

"Hey guys!" It was the booming voice of detective Curtis Jefferson. As an enormous and effective linebacker for his college football team, he was expected to be drafted into the NFL right after graduation. But a knee injury sidelined him into a career with the NYPD. Now, as a Detective Sergeant, he was in charge of the Narcotics Bureau for the Brooklyn North division.

"Hey, Curt." Eva said, "Transferring to Beirut?"

"I wish," Jefferson replied. "Sunny days on the beach, lenient bosses, well-defined battle lines. Instead, we're gearing up to go raid one of Sweet B's houses. Of course, we can't tie him to it. But it's always nice to be a pain in his ass. Speaking of which, hey Jimmy, what actually happened with that court case? Heard shit through the grapevine, but you know how that goes."

"Lawyer fucked me," Jimmy said. "Don't ask. One of Baskins' houses, huh? Anyone I know?"

"Maybe," Jefferson said. "We're going after one Carlos Padget, AKA, Little Boo. Sells dope out of a house over in Bushwick. Warrant should be here in about ten minutes or so."

"Hey, Curt," Eva asked, "Have you heard anything about anyone trying to move up in the world? Maybe someone that's been taking out competition around town?"

"You, uh, referring to that little hot potato you guys have with the triple homicide and the Baltimore guys? Or are you asking about Harlem?"

"Damn, Curt." Now it was Eva's turn to laugh. "You guys keep up with everything, don't you?"

"Hey, somebody calls you when it's time for you to go to work. Nobody calls us unless the mayor or the chief get a bad news cycle, so we've got to stay on top of everything."

"Well," Eva said. "If somebody called us before anyone was killed, our jobs would be a lot easier."

"Hey, Curt," Jimmy asked, "You guys got room for a couple stragglers today?"

"Oh yeah," Jefferson said. "You guys got vests with ya?"

"Yeah, in the trunk. When are you leaving?"

"Soon as the warrant clears. Last I checked, it's been signed. Just waiting on it to finish clearing channels and get faxed over. Shouldn't be more than ten minutes or so. Here's a spec sheet."

Jefferson handed Jimmy a piece of paper with the address of the house being raided, a miniature neighborhood map of the area, and list of particulars about their main suspect and some details about the house he was in.

"Sweet," Jimmy said. Turning to Eva, he asked, "You game for a raid? See if we can find anyone to lean on?"

"Sounds good to me," Eva said. "Curt, we're going outside to strap up and wait for you guys. We'll just follow the caravan as you guys leave."

"Copy that," Jefferson said. "See ya out in the tall grass."

After the raid, everyone was back at the 83rd precinct, processing evidence and booking suspects. There were only four suspects arrested at the scene, but there were a lot of drugs and weapons that were confiscated. Eva was headed toward the coffee machine when she crossed paths with Curtis, who was headed to booking with a large stack of papers.

"Hey, Curt. You guys made a good grab today."

"Yeah, we got a few," Jefferson said. "We've done better, but Sweet B is still going to feel a loss from this one."

"Curt, tell me something. What was that thing with you guys busting out the window at the back of the house?"

"Hah!" Jefferson said. "That is an old trick we use to stun our prey, so to speak. It works as a shock tactic. If we do something like that at the same time that we hit the front door, it usually causes too much confusion for them to react quickly. That provides valuable time, which can help to keep us safe."

"Ohhhh," Eva said. "Pretty sweet tactic. You guys do make a science of it."

"We have to do something for an edge. Just too many bad guys and too many guns out there. We need every advantage we can get."

"Hey, have you seen Jimmy? We still have to do some work today."

"Last I saw him, he was down the hall with one of the perps we grabbed today. I think he's leaning on him for information."

Jimmy had gone through and talked to all four suspects that were arrested in the drug raid. He was offering to make deals with them, one at a time, based on their current situation and what useful information that they might be able to provide. He didn't actually have any authority to make deals, that was up to the District Attorney's office. But if they didn't know that, that was their loss. They had the right to a lawyer and the right to remain silent, but no right to an explanation of the New York state legal code and procedures. It only worked on one suspect, but one was all that he needed.

One of the suspects told Jimmy that he should take a look at a white guy named Sully. Apparently this was the guy who sold Sweet B and his crew their firearms and ammunition. Sully was also rumored to be attempting to build a heroin distribution network of his own. Sweet B had turned him down, preferring to deal in cocaine sales these days. But some of Sweet B's dealers occasionally bought heroin from Sully to sell on their own.

When he finally caught up with Eva, he couldn't wait to tell her. In turn, she couldn't wait to tell him about her discovery of how and why certain police units would break a window before breaching the door during a raid on a house. "They might have been copying our tactics, Jimmy. That would explain that brick in the house with the three dealers."

"Seriously, Eva?" Jimmy asked. "Didn't you hear what I just said? We might have the ideal suspect, and you're still thinking about a brick?"

"Jimmy, how can you ignore something so obvious. Whether this Sully guy is involved or not, if this is a tactic that they are using, then it's pretty damn important to understanding our case. Especially if we see it happen again."

"Partner," Jimmy said. "I know you have way more experience than me, but I really think you're way too focused on that brick. Even if the brick figures into this somehow, knowing who might have done the deed is far more significant than why. The lawyers and the shrinks can figure out why. Besides, we already know that these guys have some sort of tactical training."

"Yeah, Jimmy. But it's a detail, and details often make the case. Besides, where they got their tactical training can be pretty damn important if we find one guy but can't find his partner."

"Well, let's go find this guy, and then we'll know whether we can find his partner."