“The word wolf also means predatory, rapacious, and fierce.”
I chuckle finally to ease the pressure and counter, “So what’s your point?”
“I want to call you the Raven.”
“You can call me Detective Beau, Officer Cruz.”
She sits up as if I pinched her and looks out the windshield.
I have to laugh. “I’m just kiddin’, Juanita. Beau’s fine. I just don’t like nicknames.”
A minute of silence is broken when she says, “I told you, everyone wants you to be the one to find the Wolf. It’s all they’re talking about at headquarters.”
I don’t like where this is going.
“Because you’ll kill him.”
“You shouldn’t hang around headquarters so much.” It’s my turn to stare out the windshield at the dark night. The apartment building is now bathed in exterior lighting. The night is extra dark because it’s moonless and in the darkness I feel a heartache, or rather the memory of heartache.
Her name was Lily and I thought she was the one. Soul mate, you know. Only she walked out on me at the lowest point in my life. Lying in that hospital bed after the operation to repair the knee I tore up in the spring game at L.S.U., sophomore season, with my bright future as a quarterback all but gone, Lily told me she didn’t love me anymore. I wanted to run after her, convince her it couldn’t be over because I still loved her, but I couldn’t even get out of bed.
It was for the better, I suppose. And the heartache only returns if I think back. I fidget in my seat thinking how the Wolf reacted to his heartache. Where did he find the fury? I’ve never felt anger toward Lily and I guess that’s the difference. The Wolf let his pain turn into rage. The Raven left his pain where it belongs because life is a series of losses. The Sioux know this and so do the Cajuns, refugees from Canada driven to the swamps of south Louisiana.
“I wish something would happen,” Juanita says.
Those chocolate-brown eyes stare into mine for a long minute and her face looks very relaxed, calm, and lovely in the dim light. I feel my heartbeat now, but the moment is lost as I catch a movement behind Juanita’s head and tense a moment, then I see it’s a homeless man.
Juanita turns as the man stops and asks if we can spare a buck.
I climb out and he starts to back away until he sees me dig into my pocket. He’s middle-aged with a scraggly beard and a well-worn knapsack on his back. I give him a five and he thanks me. I pull out the Wolf’s picture and ask him if he’s ever seen this man around. He shakes his head and thanks me again and hurries away.
When I climb back in Juanita says, in a shaky voice, “I didn’t see him coming up behind me.”
“That’s what you got me for.”
“Partner, right?”
“Almost.” She nearly smiles and all the depressing thoughts fade away from my brain. “Saw a bumper sticker yesterday that said, There are three kinds of people — those who can count and those who can’t.”
It takes her a second and then she laughs.
It hits me as soon as I wake up the following afternoon. The Wolf broke into Kim’s apartment and laid in wait for her. I get dressed in a hurry. An ex — Green Beret is no one to mess with but he’s the one on the lam, not me. If he’s dumb enough to come at me, he’ll join the list and I’ll cruise through another Grand Jury hearing. I’m thinking maybe I should call Juanita, or at least Jodie, but all I have is this gut feeling and I hate to roust the troops, especially if I’m wrong.
Stepping away from Sad Lisa, I see the brown-green water of Lake Pontchartrain is as still as a pond. There’s no wind whatsoever, the warm air steamy with humidity and the fishy smell of iodine. The calm is unsettling. To a Lakota warrior, any change in the environment, especially when normally rough waters are suddenly calm, can be a warning from nature. The warning is understood, if that’s what it is. It reinforces my gut feeling and I make sure to carry two extra clips of ammo, not that I’ve ever needed that many bullets to kill someone.
Parking behind Bessie Cleary’s apartment house, I walk up to the garage gate and wave to the retired N.O.P.D. man who recognizes me and opens the gate.
“Something wrong?” he asks, pulling out his Glock.
I shake my head. “Just checking.”
“She’s at work,” he calls out behind me, and I wave as I tuck my portable radio into the back pocket of my faded blue jeans. I wear a short-sleeved gray dress shirt over a navy-blue T-shirt. Unbuttoned, the shirt covers my knife and holstered Beretta. My gold star-and-crescent badge is clipped to the front of my belt. I’m breaking in a new pair of black Reebok running shoes.
I go up the back stairs. Bessie lives on the third floor, at the front of the building. I turn into the hall from the backside and freeze. He’s at the far end of the hall dressed in black fatigues and black combat boots. Working on Bessie’s door, the Wolf doesn’t see me creeping along the hall toward him. I ease out my Beretta and flip off the safety. My heart’s already pounding but my hands are steady as I raise my weapon in the standard two-handed police grip.
A door opens between us and a young woman steps into the hall, drawing the Wolf’s attention, and he spots me and bolts.
“Police!” I raise the Beretta and the woman falls back against her door. I race past. The Wolf leaps into the front stairwell. My Beretta cupped in both hands, I stop at the opening of the stairwell and hear footsteps descending heavily, thudding on the carpet.
I follow the sound down the stairs, keeping on my toes, pointing my weapon ahead as I take each turn. I can still hear him descending as I reach the landing above the ground floor. A metallic slam echoes up and I stop and ease my way forward until I see the front door slowly closing. He’s outside now and I run for the door, catching it before it closes, hitting the metal bar and swinging it outward. I hesitate a second, then scramble through the door.
The Wolf races around the corner, down Howard, not even looking back, moving flat out. I pull my portable radio from my back pocket and charge after him.
I key the mike. “3124 — headquarters!”
“Go ahead, 3124,” the dispatcher responds.
“I’m in foot pursuit of a signal thirty suspect. River bound on Howard from Constance Street.”
I describe what the Wolf’s wearing and what I’m wearing, trying my best to keep my voice low and calm. Last thing I want is to sound like a lunatic on the air. Excited voices fill the speaker but I can’t hear as I pump my arms, running hard, Beretta in my right hand, radio in my left.
People watch us from the sidewalks and the street, standing with wide eyes, like deer caught in headlights. The Wolf’s a half-block ahead of me, running head down, not looking over his shoulder as he cuts between parked cars into the street then back through them, up on the sidewalk in case I’m crazy enough to let off a round or two. He bowls over an elderly couple coming out of a furniture store as he turns another corner.
“Police!” I yell as I jump over the couple, who don’t seem seriously damaged. I try my best to tell headquarters we’re on Annunciation now, heading uptown. I’m gaining on him, I think.
When he turns at the next corner, he glances back at me, but doesn’t lose stride. I don’t know what street this is, but it’s even narrower. We’re heading toward the river again and there are fewer people here. A man in a hard hat steps from a building in front of the Wolf and then leaps out of the way, crashing against a parked car.
I manage to croak out “Police!” as I pass to keep him out of the way.
The Wolf turns down South Peters and I know this street and try my best to tell headquarters we’re heading downtown now. Cars are parked on both sides of this skinny street. A siren echoes in the distance, then another. The cavalry’s coming, thank God.