Port City Crossfire (A Brandon Blake Mystery, Book 1) Read online

  “Just go,” Brandon said.

  “Public property on this side, Officer Blake,” Estusa said.

  “Interview this man,” Tiff Rawlings said. “Ask him what it feels like to shoot someone in cold blood.”

  “How does it feel to meet the mother of your shooting victim?” Estusa said, pointing the recorder at Brandon. “Does it make you regret your actions?”

  Brandon bit back the words welling up inside him. Go to hell you piece of shit. He finally moved, peeling his shoes off the ground, turning his back on them, and he heard Estusa say, “Mia. How are you doing?”

  She’d come from the parking area, had her book bag in one hand, a Starbucks cup in the other. “Abukar texted me,” she said to Brandon, took two steps toward the gate. The photographer was shooting, the camera like a single eye, shutter snapping.

  “Mia, could I talk to you for just a few minutes?” Estusa said, veering toward the gate, cutting her off. “Because this is almost as much about you. Your past. Your experience as a victim. Your intimate relationship with a man who has killed more than once.”

  “Leave her alone,” Brandon said, moving to the gate.

  “Just a few minutes,” Estusa was saying, moving toward Mia, following her as she retreated, the photographer shooting from beside her, getting both Mia and Brandon in the shots, maybe Tiff Rawlings, too, now leaning against the fence and watching.

  “No comment,” Mia was saying. “I have nothing to say.”

  And then Brandon was through the gate, heard Tiff Rawlings say, “Is this your little honey? How does it feel to sleep with a murderer?”

  “That’s not fair, Mrs. Rawlings,” Estusa said, close to Mia now. “Mia didn’t shoot your son. She’s as much a victim as—”

  Brandon grabbed him by the shoulder, spun him around.

  “Brandon, don’t,” Mia said.

  “Get your hands off me,” Estusa said, shoving back.

  “You’re a psychopath,” Rawlings yelled.

  “Brandon, don’t,” Mia shouted.

  “You piece of shit, I should kick your fucking ass—”

  And then a car hurtled up, slid to a stop behind Rawlings, still against the fence. A shiny black Grand Cherokee, the driver’s door flung open. Big blonde guy rolled out, jeans and a pink polo shirt, trotted to the woman, pulled her down like he was taking her off a cross.

  “Tiff, stop it,” the guy said, holding the woman by her armpits. Tiff Rawlings pointing at Brandon and screamed, “It was him. There he is.”

  The guy looked at Brandon, kept backing up, dragging the woman with him. He called out, “You’re finished, you son of a bitch. You goddamn coward. We’re gonna put you away. You’re fucking done, you hear me. Gonna own your sorry ass, you pathetic piece of shit.”

  “Not gonna get away with this,” Tiff Rawlings screamed over her shoulder. “They’re gonna lock you up. See how you like it then, Blake, you fucking murderer.”

  The guy stuffed her into the passenger seat and shoved the door shut. As he was coming around the front of the Jeep a cruiser pulled up. South Portland—Otongo and Robichaud again. The Jeep backed up and swerved out into the road. Rawlings braked, pulled up to the fence, slammed the truck into reverse. For a few seconds, their gazes were locked, Brandon and the parents of the kid he had killed.

  And in that moment, Brandon expected to see seething fury. Blind hatred. Two people who would kill him with their bare hands. But he didn’t.

  He saw the woman look at him, then at her husband. She was impatient, like it was time to go, what was he waiting for? The guy shot a glance back, like he was annoyed with her. He said something and she spat something back, and he turned as the Jeep began to back up. She turned and looked at the patrol car, then back at Blake, and, as the Jeep started to drive off, then braked hard to stop, she flipped him off.

  In that glimpse, she wasn’t crazed by grief or hysterical or seething with anger. Brandon’s last glimpse was of Tiff Rawlings suddenly shouting at him, the words muffled through the glass, the Jeep pulling away, Brandon thinking it was like she’s been playing a part and had just gotten back into character.

  Estusa was twenty feet to one side, had his recorder out and the photographer had backed off to the other side of the road, snapped a longer lens on, kept shooting. Otongo told Estusa to vacate and Estusa protested and Otongo said, “Don’t make me lock you up because you’ll be mailing your stories in from the county jail.”

  “The roadway is public property,” Estusa said.

  “Where you’re creating a public nuisance,” Otongo said.

  She started toward him and Estusa started to back away.

  “Brandon,” he called. “You change your mind, know where to reach me.”

  Brandon shook his head, saw Mia walking back toward her car. He caught up, came alongside her and said, “I’m really sorry.”

  “I know. Me, too. But I can’t stay here. Not with this.”

  “They’ll be leaving.”

  “And then they’ll be back. And tomorrow everyone will know. We’ll be trapped, Brandon, stuck on a goddamn boat.”

  “I can’t leave. I won’t,” Brandon said.

  “You can stay at the apartment,” Mia said.

  “They’ll follow me there. Estusa, then whoever comes next. At least here there’s a fence.”

  “Whatever, Brandon. I’m going. I’m sorry. But it’s just too much.”

  She was wide-eyed, her voice quivering.

  “I’ll call you later,” Brandon said.

  “Right.”

  “After they’re gone.”

  “Okay.”

  And then Mia started walking faster, almost broke into a trot. The doors cheeped on the Volvo and the lights flashed and she yanked the driver’s door open, slung her bag across the front seats, and slid in. The motor started with roar and she swerved across the lot and out. As she skidded onto the pavement, the photographer ran five steps closer, crouched and fired.

  Brandon started to run toward her. Caught himself. Pivoted right and slowed, walked to the fence and the gate, barely looking at the Rawlingses, now in their Jeep, the cops leaning into the windows on both sides. Estusa was beyond the Jeep, back turned, on the phone. “Yeah, he grabbed me,” he was saying. “Oh, yeah. Clamped right on.”

  And then Brandon was through the gate, slamming it shut behind him. He walked down the ramp, saw people eyeing him from the other boats. Kyle on the Grady White, sitting in the stern, pretending to rig a fishing rod. The MacMasters, sitting on deck chairs on Ghost Dancer. Tommy Kim, from Junkman, a sloop moored beyond the floats, was approaching pulling a dock cart.

  “Hey,” he said, flashing a brief smile as he passed, no chitchat today, not even a comment about the cops beyond the fence. He knew not to ask.

  Tommy kept walking and Brandon stepped over the transom and onto Bay Witch, the cruiser rocking almost imperceptibly under his weight. He looked back toward the yard, saw that the cruiser and the Jeep were gone, presumably Estusa and his photographer, too. Or they could be waiting, the photographer staked out with a telephoto aimed at the boat, waiting for Brandon to come out on the deck with a beer.

  Killer Cop Drinks While Victim’s Parents Grieve

  Brandon scowled, went through the hatch door and down into the galley. He threw himself heavily on the settee on the port side, away from the road. Put his head in his hands and took a long deep breath. Exhaled.

  “Shit,” he said.

  He got up and crossed to the galley, took the clean dishes out of the rack and set them in the cupboard. Took a mug out of the cupboard, the French press off the shelf, and filled the kettle. Turned on the burner and the kettle hissed against the flame.

  Brandon filled the press with coffee, waited for the water to boil. It didn’t, not fast enough, and he turned away, started neatening the stuff on the chart table: a boating magazine, one of Mia’s literary journals, a book on teaching poetry.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Brando
n said.

  He put Mia’s stuff in one stack, feeling an ominous premonition. Shook it off and the kettle began to whistle. He crossed the three steps to the other side of the cabin, turned the gas off and poured the water into the press, then turned back to the settee, sat back down in the same spot. Stared out the starboard side and eyed the yard. No cruisers, no distraught people in sight.

  Brandon held the mug to his lips and blew. Sipped. The coffee singed his lips and he blew again. Sipped again. Looked across the top of the mug to the writing desk.

  His laptop. He looked away, replayed the advice in his head: stay away from alcohol, don’t read the paper or read the online comments, don’t watch news on TV. He was drinking coffee. He didn’t have a television. He wouldn’t read the Review, Estusa’s crap.

  But the laptop sat there like a beacon, the silver MacBook seeming to glow in the dim cabin. Brandon took a sip of coffee and stared. Put the mug down on the table and got up, pulled to his feet like he’d been hypnotized. He picked up the laptop, walked back to the settee and sat. Flipped it open.

  A deep breath.

  A pause.

  He opened the browser, went to Facebook.

  Typed in Thatcher Rawlings. Waited.

  There were two. One was in Chico, California. The other in Moresby, Maine.

  Brandon tapped the keyboard, his hands like a puppet’s, attached by strings to some invisible puppeteer. He waited as the wheel turned, and then Thatcher Rawlings profile page appeared.

  Where there should have been a profile photo of Rawlings, there was a picture of Harrison Ford. He was young and was holding a stubby handgun with red lights showing under the barrel.

  Brandon stared, tried to place it.

  Blade Runner.

  Rawlings had been tagged in a dozen posts, high school kids. RIP, Thatch.…I know you’re in a better place.…It’s only a movie, man.…Don’t worry, Thatch. That cop’s gonna fry.…got your back thatch.…Love u, bro.…since when is there a death penalty in Maine? For shooting a freakin’ video?…Blake’s gonna like it in prison. Not.…shoulda had a real gun, dude, but who knew you’d be gunned down in cold blood.…you know what happens to cops in jail. Don’t drop the soap!…You’re at peace, Thatch. That cop will have this on his head the rest of his pathetic life.…My heart goes out to the Rawlings family.

  And this, from H. James Kelly, Esq.:

  On behalf of the Rawlings family, we thank you for your support. Please respect the family’s privacy at this time. We will be releasing more information about Thatcher’s tragic death, the circumstances surrounding it, and next steps when that information becomes available. In the meantime, please remember Thatcher in your prayers. He is gone but will never be forgotten.

  Brandon felt his jaw clench. He swallowed hard. The puppeteer flicked the strings again and Brandon’s finger tapped.

  About Thatcher Rawlings.

  His favorite movie was Blade Runner. His favorite activity was paintball. There was a photo of Rawlings in protective goggles, a paintball gun aimed at the camera. He was smiling, the same enigmatic grin that he’d flashed just before he died. His goal in life was “to hunt replicants, like the ones that are all around us, including the jocks at Moresby High. You know who you are, d***heads.”

  Back to the profile page. Rawlings had 45 friends, a very small circle for Facebook. They were mostly his age, looked artsy, like they might do high school band or drama. Not jocks. Three or four of the friends were older, one with another Blade Runner character for her photo—the blonde woman with black makeup across her eyes. A replicant, Brandon thought. An actress whose name he should know. This was a serious fan, and was that what Thatcher Rawlings had been? Was that what he had been doing at the bar? Some Blade Runner scene? Living out his fantasy?

  “Jesus,” Brandon said.

  He sagged back on the cushions, threw his head back. Had that been Thatcher’s fatal mistake? Being a geek with very bad judgment?

  Brandon looked around the cabin, felt the bulkheads start to close in. The boat seemed small, the reality suffocating him. He couldn’t think his way out of it, couldn’t distract himself enough to shake it loose. The three shots, the three dark blotches in the kid’s chest, like paintball except not paintball at all. The kid’s amazed expression as he fell backward, the unblinking eyes that stayed wide open as he died.

  “Oh, god,” Brandon said.

  He stood, crossed the cabin to the starboard side and looked out. There was another TV crew on the other side of the fence, a van with the station’s call letters on the side. A guy this time, his back to the boats, cameraman with the camera on his shoulder, aimed, it seemed, at Brandon’s face.

  He stepped back, was reaching for his phone when it buzzed. Mia? Kat?

  Brandon picked it up, didn’t recognize the number, read the message.

  How can you sleep at night, you filthy piece of shit?

  He clicked the screen dark. The phone buzzed again. A different number.

  Hope you go to prison with the rest of the murderers you piece of human garbage. You’re lower than scum Blake. Prison is filled with better people than you, asshole.

  Brandon flicked the message away, started to put the phone down but it buzzed again.

  What were you afraid of Blake? That the plastic gun would shoot plastic bullets? You’re a coward Blake, like all cops. Need that gun and badge to make you feel tough. But you’re not tough Blake. You’re a pussy.

  Brandon looked away, then back. The phone hummed again.

  Officer Brandon Blake: He was a good kid. He never hurt anybody. Why didn’t you just try to talk to him? Why didn’t you tell him to stop fooling around? Why didn’t you tell him to just put the gun down? He used to come over our house since he was 4. He was the sweetest boy in the world and now he’s gone.

  He put the phone down but the texts kept coming, the phone buzzing like an upended beetle. And then it burbled, the ringer. Brandon leaned closer.

  Mia.

  He waited and the phone rang five times then stopped. There was a chime: voice mail. Brandon picked the phone up and flicked the screen. Waited. Listened.

  “Hi, Brand. Just calling to make sure you’re okay. Why don’t you come over here? We can order Thai, watch a movie or something. Estusa was parked out front for a while but now he’s gone.”

  Brandon closed the voice mail, then his eyes. He put the phone back down. He was staring at it when it buzzed again—a text, the words MURDERER and COWARD legible even upside down. Brandon reached for the phone and texted Mia:

  I’m fine. Hope you are too. Don’t talk to Estusa. I’ll call you later.

  He tapped send, waited a few seconds and put the phone down.

  The television crew left and was replaced by another one, local Fox News. Brandon crossed to the galley, put the milk back in the tiny refrigerator. He shook the coffee grounds out of the French press into the trash can and rinsed the press in the sink. Then he wiped the counter down, folded the dishcloth neatly and hung it on its hook.

  He stood there and looked out the window at the sunny September day, a good day to be on the bay. Brandon considered it, taking the boat out of the harbor, way beyond the islands, where nobody could find him. He hadn’t had Bay Witch out for a couple of weeks, the last time limping back from Chebeague Island with the motor misfiring. Not bad, just a little skip, enough to be unsettling. Water in the fuel maybe, because he’d drawn the tank down. He’d been meaning to change the fuel filter, add a can of dryer to a new tank of gas. Hesitating, he decided against a cruise, because of the boat and not wanting to be stranded out on the water, another way to get his name in the paper. He could write the story himself:

  Brandon Blake, the Portland police officer who shot and killed a Moresby teen Thursday, was assisted by the Coast Guard Friday after his cabin cruiser had engine trouble in Casco Bay.

  Blake’s 28-foot Chris Craft, Bay Witch, was just east of Peaks Island when the cabin cruiser developed engine trouble. Bla
ke’s destination was not known. He is on administrative leave with pay pending investigation of the shooting. Portland Police said that his movements are not restricted, though he is expected to be available to investigators.

  Meanwhile, the family of 16-year-old Thatcher Rawlings, the teenager shot Blake shot and killed Tuesday night after the youth reportedly refused to drop a plastic gun outside a Portland bar, was preparing for his memorial service...

  Brandon went back to the settee. Sat. Rested his head in his hands and closed his eyes. He saw the blood. Thatcher’s eyes, the moment when they faded and went blank. That instant played and replayed. Where there was life one second, then there was none. Just like that. All of the life that Thatcher Rawlings had contained, all that he’d been for 16 years—liking movies, paintball, being a jerk or a geek or a nice kid—was gone. The person he had been was erased. Thatcher Rawlings no longer existed.

  Because he had pulled the trigger.

  Because he had fired rather ducking. Doing nothing. Letting the kid play his stupid game with his plastic gun, then chase him down, put him on his belly, snap the cuffs on and say, “You little bastard. You know how close you just came to getting shot?”

  Brandon could see it, that scenario. It was like wishing could make it come true. The kid on the ground. Brandon calling in, suspect in custody. A collective exhalation. A little disappointment. The cops who itched for a chase missing out on one. The cops who had been in one before breathing a sigh of relief.

  It was excruciating, seeing the way it could have played out. And then the fantasy faded and reality filtered back in until it was thick as fog, choking as poison gas.

  The phone began to rattle again. Texts coming in one after another, the phone buzzing like an alarm. Brandon eyed it like it was a living thing, then lunged and grabbed it. Where were they getting his number? He flicked through the latest barrage—God will punish you even if the cops won’t…hope you die slow…it isn’t over—until he found it. A group text, the recipient list trailing off. This is his number. Got it from a good source. The press isn’t all bad. Text and let him know his life will be hell too.