Thorpe concealed a radio inside his jacket and ran the ear-bud out his collar. He left the Jeep, walking briskly toward 6th Street with Collins in hot pursuit. Thorpe rounded the corner on the south side of 6th and noticed additional responding units. They included a couple of unmarked cars. He recognized two day-shift narcotics investigators pile out of an Impala. Thorpe flagged them over.
“What’s up, sarge?”
“Stay next to me. Look for troublemakers. And let’s try not to get our asses kicked.”
On the north side of 6th Street, Thorpe saw a man with a red beard in a white robe with dark sunglasses preaching hatred behind a podium. The man’s pulpit sat atop the first of three sets of concrete stairs. He was surrounded by four hooded friends with so much pride they chose to hide their faces. Uniformed cops covered the steps in front of and behind the Klansmen. The Mounted Patrol Unit—six officers on horseback—completed the detail. The police presence continued to grow.
Thorpe and company approached the protesters from behind. Though the crowd was racially diverse, the majority was black. Most of those assembled appeared peaceful, but a small core had trouble on their minds.
“Agent Collins, circle around, get your identification out, and join the officers across the street,” Thorpe ordered.
“I’m coming with you.”
“I need you away from here. I’ve seen this before. There are some in this group looking for any opportunity to cause trouble. And believe me…you’re an opportunity.”
“I can take care of myself,” she said, clearly insulted.
Thorpe swung around and pointed his index finger at Collins. “I’m sure you can. But if someone decides to cop a feel, and we have to take him down, the fight’s going to be on. Then all those officers across the street will have to come over here to save our asses. And if one of them gets hurt, it’ll be on you.”
Collins conceded to the logic; she nodded and took a circular route toward the uniformed officers. When she neared the line of blue, she displayed her identification and was allowed inside the perimeter. Thorpe watched her climb the steps and assume an elevated position where she could observe.
A few minutes ago, the man behind the podium had been citing FBI statistics in an effort to show that blacks commit far more crimes against whites than vice versa. The tempered comments had been but a warm up. The speaker had ratcheted up his rhetoric; he now spouted inflammatory remarks along evolutionary lines.
Thorpe felt pride as he looked upon the stoic faces of the officers, many of whom were black, protecting a man even as he insulted them. Thorpe’s pride in his fellow officers was tainted with personal shame, because he knew it was his actions that had tarnished one of the finest police departments in the country.
Thorpe estimated the crowd to number three hundred plus, with fifty or so having the potential to make real trouble. They were the young and angry, and most of them had worked their way toward the front of the pack. Within this assemblage, Thorpe identified an even smaller clique of five. Each one wore long white t-shirts visible below their coats. All but one hurled racial insults at the officers across the street. It was the quiet one in the group who most troubled Thorpe. Younger than the rest, maybe sixteen or seventeen, the kid paced like a caged predator. He appeared to be working up the courage to do something he shouldn’t. Whatever he was planning, it bothered him so much he’d disconnected from his surroundings. His attention had turned inward.
Thorpe risked moving through the crowd to get a closer look. The three undercover investigators managed to maneuver within several feet of the clique. The quiet one continued to pace behind his buddies, sweating despite the cool weather. Thorpe noticed the kid’s eyes flash downward on two separate occasions.
Shit.
People in possession of illegal firearms often touched them or looked down to where they were concealed. They feared the weapon produced an identifiable outline in their clothing. Instead of a bulge giving them away, it was usually their behavior.
Thorpe glanced at the two narcotics officers. A nod of their heads indicated they’d also recognized the potential threat. The tricky part was what to do about it. Taking down an armed man in a hostile crowd does not constitute easy work, but Thorpe had to step in before the kid committed to his foolish intentions.
The three undercover officers formed a small huddle and discussed their play.
“Snatch and grab,” Thorpe began. “The kid is the football; I’m going to wrap him up and pin his arms to his side. Tanner, as soon as I do, you grab his legs. Frank, clear a path for us to the skirmish line; knock the piss out of anyone who gets in our way. Got it?”
Both men nodded. Thorpe looked up and locked eyes with Collins. He made a circle above his head with his finger and pointed down indicating the three of them. Then—continuing with the football analogy—made a motion similar to the tomahawk chop toward the officers across the street. He didn’t want the skirmish line to think the three of them and their football were demonstrators breaking ranks. Collins appeared to understand his message. She descended the stairs and spoke to the sergeant in charge.
“Hard and fast. Let’s go,” Thorpe commanded.
He hoped to hell the kid had a gun. Their makeshift fullback, Frank, had just knocked two guys out of the way and kicked over the wooden barricade while Thorpe and Tanner followed carrying the “football” through the defensive line. If Thorpe had guessed wrong, and the kid was unarmed, they’d all get their asses sued. Never mind they were trying to save people’s lives.
Football safely across the plane of the end zone, Tanner unloaded his share of the burden. Thorpe crashed to the pavement on top of the pigskin. It was then that Thorpe heard the sweetest sound—the clank of heavy metal striking concrete.
Fumble.
Thorpe rolled the kid over and was rewarded with a chrome handgun lying on the sidewalk.
Thank God.
If the little shit hadn’t been armed, ten different camera angles would’ve captured another rogue white cop abusing minorities. With juicy footage like that, Thorpe might be charged with manslaughter after Jessie Jackson’s body was found in front of his television—killed by one of those fabled four-hour hard-ons.
Thorpe’s relief was short-lived. The football’s friends had stood in shock for a few seconds but now realized one of their own had just been abducted. They stepped over the fallen barricade in an ill-conceived plan to retrieve their comrade. Others in the crowd, believing they’d witnessed Thorpe face plant a black man for no good reason, decided to join in the festivities.
Chaos. The drove, which had been headed straight toward Thorpe and his prisoner, were now fleeing every direction but—thanks to six mounted police officers and seven thousand pounds of horse meat. Most people were just trying to get the hell out of the way, but the fifty or so who’d been looking for an opportunity had found it. Several youths had entered the parking lot to the southeast and were now in the process of expressing their freedom of speech by smashing car windows.
His fellow officers were going to be busy for a while, but Thorpe had had enough. He handed his football off to a uniformed patrolman, dropped the magazine out of the suspect’s handgun, and jacked a round out of the chamber.
“Hey, Tanner, Frank, good job. You two ever want to come over to Gangs, just say the word.”
“No offense, Sarge, but fuck you.” Tanner smiled.