The sun was high in the sky before the black detective finally appeared. It was nearly noon. He had been sitting in front of the police station for over six hours. He was hungry and dehydrated. His mouth felt like he had been drinking dust. He licked his chapped lips and squinted through eyes blurred from lack of sleep. The detective was wearing a pair of tan high-waisted pants and a white blouse with billowing sleeves buttoned all the way to the top. She was wearing a pair of black pumps. She looked like she should have been carrying a riding crop. It was definitely her. Dale started his engine.
The detective pulled out of the parking lot in a sleek black BMW sports car with large chrome rims on the tires. If he hadn’t known that she was a cop he would have thought she was a drug dealer or a stripper. She had obviously picked up her taste in cars from the suspects she dealt with.
Dale followed her to the 215 freeway staying two or three car lengths behind as they traveled south toward Henderson. The BMW exited at Green Valley Parkway, then continued south past the Green Valley Ranch Casino and The District retail shops and restaurants. Dale studied the happy couples, the families, the groups of teenage friends, all enjoying themselves shopping, talking, laughing, and embracing. It was a life that Dale could scarcely imagine. He had never had a best friend let alone a group of friends to hang out with. He had never been part of a couple. His family had never gone out for a fun afternoon of dining and shopping. His mother and father had been too busy chasing the next high to take him on any fun family outings.
The BMW turned into a small gated community on Horizon Ridge. Dale waited until she’d turned the corner before stepping on the accelerator and racing to catch the gate before it closed. He just barely made it through the gate and caught a glimpse of the BMW as it turned the next corner. Dale piloted the Sonata through the maze of cul-de-sacs one block behind the detective’s BMW. Dale spotted the BMW pulling into a garage and he stopped his car at the end of the block. He hopped out of the car and jogged down the street toward the detective’s house. The garage door began to close and Dale broke into a full sprint. He slipped under the door just before it closed. The detective wasn’t in the garage. The fire door slammed shut and Dale jumped, startled. She had gone into the house. Dale crept slowly toward the fire door. His hand trembled as he reached for the handle and his heart pounded like a taiko drum. He could not be sure that she had not seen him slipping under the garage door. The detective could have been crouched on the other side, aiming her weapon, prepared to shoot him the minute he opened the door.
Dale placed his ear against the door. He could hear water running in the kitchen and the detective hum-ming and singing some gospel song. Dale inched open the door. The detective had her back to him. She was washing dishes and singing. It was not the gospel tune Dale had thought it was. You didn’t shake your ass like that to gospel.
The door was open a quarter of the way. Dale knew he couldn’t open it much wider without the tightly wound springs in the bomber hinges squealing. He stood in the doorway, a few short feet from the detective, breathing hard. He had the old hippie cop’s .40-caliber Glock in his hand. He could have just shot her in the back. He pulled the hammer down on the pistol and the detective whirled around, reaching for the pistol on her belt.
“Don’t do it, Detective. I will kill you.”
The detective had her gun out of the holster. All she had to do was raise it six inches and it would have been pointing directly at Dale’s chest. He knew she was probably a better shot than he was. Dale had never even fired a gun before but he already had his gun aimed at her stomach, and with her so close, he could hardly miss. All he had to do was pull the trigger. He could tell by the look in her eyes, the doubt, the fear, that she knew he had her. Dale wished that he was a sharpshooter like the cowboys on TV and could have shot her in the arm or something just to get her to drop the gun.
He saw the look in her eyes change from fear to anger.
“Aw, shit!” He knew she was about to shoot him. He knew it beyond the shadow of a doubt. This was why he preferred to ambush his victims rather than confront them face-to-face. You could never guess how someone would react to being attacked. Some became terrified, passive, and compliant. Others, like this detective, fought.
The detective raised the gun. Dale closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. The bullet went low, hitting the detective in the belly instead of the chest. The detective paused for a second, wincing and grimacing and belching up blood. Dale waited for her to fall or scream or run. He was still pointing the gun at her. The black woman’s eyes widened in shock, then hardened.
“Oh fuck.”
She started moving forward again, aiming her nine-millimeter at Dale and pulling the trigger. Bullets struck the fire door, the doorjamb, and whizzed past Dale into the garage. One dug a searing furrow along the side of Dale’s head, barely missing his left eyeball. She was aiming at his head. Dale dove behind the kitchen island and returned fire. He struck her in the chest, the thigh, her right arm. She continued moving forward. The large woman dove on top of Dale and began punching and clawing at his face. He felt her hands clamp down on his throat and squeeze his windpipe shut. He was already breathing heavily from the adrenaline racing through his veins after being shot at. With the large black woman’s hands clamped down on his esophagus he could not get any air into his lungs. He still had the gun in his hand and he aimed it at the detective’s chest and pulled the trigger until the hammer fell on an empty chamber. Blood sprayed Dale’s face and arms as each bullet bore a new hole in the detective’s torso. Finally, she rolled off him and collapsed onto the kitchen floor, bleeding out on the ceramic tiles, dead.
Dale coughed and wheezed, then took several deep breaths trying to slow his breathing. His lungs burned with each breath. His heart hammered in his chest. Dale’s arms and legs trembled uncontrollably. He tried to stand but the trembling in his legs almost dropped him back to the floor. He held on to the kitchen island and waited for the trembling to stop. Dale looked down at the dead detective.
Jesus, that was one tough bitch, Dale thought. Even with almost an entire clip in her chest and stomach she had nearly killed him. Dale grabbed her by her legs and dragged her toward the fire door. He spotted her car keys on the kitchen island and grabbed them. He dragged the detective out into the garage, opened the rear door of her BMW, and pulled her up onto the backseat. Dale shut the rear door, slid into the driver’s seat and shoved the detective’s key into the ignition. There was a garage-door opener attached to the visor and Dale pressed the remote. The garage door rattled and squealed in its tracks as it rose. Dale started the engine and put the BMW in reverse. He pulled out of the garage and drove off down the street. Several of the neighbors had come out of their houses. An elderly couple carrying a dachshund and wearing what looked like matching pajamas and slippers tried to wave him down as he sped off down the street. He was less than two blocks away when two police cars raced by him heading back toward the detective’s house with their sirens and lights blaring. If he had been even two minutes slower, they would have caught him.
Three more police cars raced by as Dale exited through the gate and turned back onto Horizon Ridge. Soon he was back on the freeway, headed home, the dead detective bouncing around on the backseat. Blood rolled out from beneath the driver’s seat and pooled under Dale’s feet, sloshing onto his shoes. Dale took the 215 and headed toward North Las Vegas. Back to the abandoned house where he’d left the old detective with the ponytail.