Read Online Private Heat by Robert E. Bailey - Free Book Online

illegal entry.”
    Officer Randal Talon crossed the porch in one step, snatched the screen open, and buried a low shoulder into Sergeant Franklin. Sergeant Franklin cascaded into the room backward. On the way down, he said, “Don’t do it, Randy!”
    Randy did it. “Karen, you bitch!” he said and scanned the room. “Get your ass out here!” He started for the kitchen. I stepped to block the way. “You’re under arrest, asshole.” He launched himself like a lineman after a quarterback.
    The stream of pepper spray hosed him on the forehead. His eyes crossed and his face went from mean to “Aw, shit.” I’ve heard a lot of people say that pepper spray would not deter them. Randy probably would have said the same thing. He would have been wrong. I had to sidestep as he sailed by. He hit the carpet—most of the way to the kitchen—knees and forehead first, his hands being occupied with covering his face. After a moment and a loud “son-of-a-bitch,” he abandoned the custody of his face to his left hand and groped his right hand back to the Highpower.
    Franklin got to his knees and fell, hands forward, onto Randy’s gun and hand. Rolling like a shark with a mouthful of seal, he wrestled the pistol loose.
    Unfortunately, the front room being small and closed in, the good sergeant and I also got a small dose of pepper gas. Franklin got to his feet, and despite his discomfort, hooked Randy under one arm and started dragging him toward the door, the Highpower dangling in his right hand. He summoned me with a nod of his head, and I hooked Randy under the other arm. We hauled him out the door and set him on the edge of the porch.
    A white-striped green garden hose lay coiled next to the door. I turned it on, adjusted the spray to a cone of fine mist, and hosed my face down.
    Franklin punched the magazine out of Randy’s weapon and put it in his pants pocket. He slid the weapon into his belt just behind his left hip. Randy remained seated and folded very tight. I handed the hose to Franklin. He hosed down his hands and then his face. Between eruptions of profanity Randy reexamined his lunch. When Franklin was satisfied, he turned up the spray and set about hosing Randy.
    â€œI told you to just get your stuff,” he said. “Why didn’t you just get your stuff?”
    My eyes were getting smoky again, so I went back into the house. Karen peeked out through a narrow crack in the bathroom door. I shook my head and she closed the door and snapped on the lock. In the kitchen I rinsed my face in the sink. On my way back out I opened a side window in the living room.
    I stepped back through the screen door and onto the porch. Talon was very wet but mostly composed. “You’re under arrest,” he said, “for illegal entry, interfering with an officer, assaulting an officer—”
    â€œNo. He’s not,” said Franklin, “but
you’re
getting close.”
    â€œBullshit, Franky,” said Randy. He leaned toward the sergeant and pointed his finger at himself. “I’m a police officer. I said he’s under arrest.” He shook his finger at the sergeant. “It don’t matter what you think, you gotta back me up.”
    I took the shirt box off the pile and dropped it onto Randy’s lap. “Keep that up and all you’ll be is a thug on the street, a liar in the courtroom, and a monster in your own home.”
    Talon threw the box at me. It hit me, edge on, in the middle of my chest. I took two quick steps back, hoping to avoid the sharper contents of the box. Hypodermic needles and pharmaceutical bottles exploded in a shower over the porch and lawn. He scrambled to his feet and I had the pepper spray out.
    Sergeant Franklin stepped between us. He backhanded the can, looped a headlock onto Randy, and bulldogged him out to the Monte Carlo. As Franklin handcuffed him to the steering wheel of the Monte