Read Online The Martini Shot by George Pelecanos - Free Book Online Page B

went to church on Sundays, too. But a junkie was what he was. Heroin was a slow ride down. Some folks could control it to some degree and never hit the bottom.
    I asked Harry if he could find a place to sleep that night other than his house, and he told me that he “supposed” he could. I told him I didn’t want to see him again any time soon, and he said, “It’s mutual.” I chuckled at that, giving him some of his pride back, which didn’t cost me a thing. He walked down the alley, stopping once to cup his hands around a match as he put fire to a cigarette.
    I drove back over to Georgia. A guy flagged me down just to talk. They see my car number and they know it’s me. Sergeant Peters, the old white cop. You get a history with these people. Some of these kids, I know their parents. I’ve busted ’em from time to time. Busted their grandparents, too. Shows you how long I’ve been doing this.
    Down around Morton I saw Tonio Harris, a neighborhood kid walking alone toward the Black Hole. Tonio was wearing those work boots and the baggy pants low, like all the other kids, although he’s not like most of them. I took his mother in for drugs a long time ago, back when that Love Boat stuff was popular and making everyone crazy. His father, the one who impregnated his mother I mean, he’s doing a stretch for manslaughter, his third fall. Tonio’s mother’s clean now, at least I think she is; anyway, she’s done a fairly good job with him. By that I mean he’s got no juvenile priors, from what I know. A minor miracle down here, you ask me.
    I rolled down my window. “Hey, Tonio, how’s it going?” I slowed down to a crawl, took in the sweetish smell of reefer in the air. Tonio was still walking, not looking at me, but he mumbled something about “I’m maintainin,” or some shit like that. “You take care of yourself in there,” I said, meaning in the Hole, “and get yourself home right after.” He didn’t respond verbally, just made a half-assed kind of acknowledgment with his chin.
    I cruised around for the next couple of hours. Turned my spot on kids hanging in the shadows, told them to break it up and move along. Asked a guy in Columbia Heights why his little boy was out on the stoop, dribbling a basketball, at one in the morning. Raised my voice at a boy, a lookout for a dealer, who was sitting on top of a trash can, told him to get his ass on home. Most of the time, this is my night. We’re just letting the critters know we’re out here.
    At around two I called in a few cruisers to handle the closing of the Black Hole. You never know what’s going to happen at the end of the night there, what kind of beefs got born inside the club, who looked at who a little too hard for one second too long. Hard to believe that an ex-cop from Prince George’s County runs the place. That a cop would put all this trouble on us, bring it into our district. He’s got D.C. cops moonlighting as bouncers in there, too, working the metal detectors at the door. I talked with one, a young white cop, earlier in the night. I noticed the brightness in his eyes and the sweat beaded across his forehead. He was scared, like I gave a shit. Asked us as a favor to show some kind of presence at closing time. Called me “Sarge.” Okay. I didn’t answer him. I got no sympathy for the cops who work those go-go joints, especially not since Officer Brian Gibson was shot dead outside the Ibex Club a few years back. But if something goes down around the place, it’s on me. So I do my job.
    I called in a few cruisers and set up a couple of traffic barriers on Georgia, one at Lamont and one at Park. We diverted the cars like that, kept the kids from congregating on the street. It worked. Nothing too bad was happening that I could see. I was standing outside my cruiser, talking to another cop, Eric Young, who was having a smoke.