The Witness Wore a Puppy Tail, chapter 8 (Patreon)

Leaving the captain’s office, Ken was faced with the problem of what to do with his troublesome office. “Let’s talk. I’ll buy you a coffee,” he offered.

“Is that a real coffee or are you offering me something out of your break room that’s going to poison me?”

Ken sighed. Sometimes Robert required a lot of effort. He must have been a joy as a teenager. “Real coffee. There’s a shop on the corner.” Ken didn’t wait for an answer; he headed out of the squad room and double timed it down the stairs. He could tell from the odd looks aimed his direction that Robert was behind him. 

The glass front on the station showed a street nearly empty of pedestrians. One older woman with a little teacup dog walked slowly, her dog investigating every crack in the sidewalk, but other than her, the steady stream of cars provided the only movement. Sara Peterson was on the front desk, and she laid halfway across her counter, pointing to her computer as she talked to one of the younger patrol officers. The scene was so familiar that Ken felt a stab of fear at losing it. If he pissed the captain off too much, he wasn’t just risking a paycheck. He was risking losing a place where he belonged.

Ken respected Robert and his ethics. He admired the man’s willingness to throw him into the breech, and the man’s ass. However, he had to get Robert to stay out of the case. Since threats clearly didn’t work, Ken was going to try a new approach. Honesty. 

Walking outside, Ken was slapped with the humidity and heat. The forecast had called for rain, but apparently all the water was hanging in the air. Ten feet down the sidewalk, Ken’s shirt was already sticking to him.

Robert fell into step beside him. “You are fucking good,” he said, his tone admiring.

“Excuse me?”

“Getting Steve to talk. I have never seen him trust a cop like that. You’re really good at getting people to trust you.”

“I want to help. I think most people can sense that.”

“Which implies most cops don’t want to help,” Robert quickly added.

A few feet from the coffee shop and the glory of air conditioning, Ken turned to face Robert. “That is not okay. You can’t run around disparaging every cop in the department. I get that you had problems, but these people risk their lives to keep the city safe.”

“Safe? Do you want the statistics?”

Ken narrowed his eyes. “I know them. I also know how many criminals we’ve gotten off the streets and how many people we’ve saved from dangerous situations, but that’s harder to capture in a statistic. So how about you stop demonizing the people I respect?”

“I...” Robert turned toward the coffeehouse before scrubbing the back of his head. “I know plenty of police officers are good people. But you have to admit some are shitheads.”

Ken grimaced. “Yeah, but that’s true of any profession. I bet there are a few shitheads working at that fancy university of yours.”

Robert snorted. “More than a few. Totally, totally more than a few. I get it. I wouldn’t want Loyola judged by those guys. But sometimes cops do this whole unity thing that drives me up a wall. If some of you are being shitty, then shouldn’t the others call out the shittiness?”

That was.a hard question to answer, and Ken didn’t want to do it in the heat. Walking toward the coffee shop, he tried to collect his thoughts. Cops should be better at policing themselves, but in dangerous situations, it was so important to know that the person at your back would have your back no matter what. He and Brigi had argued about everything in private, but in public, they always had each other’s backs, all the way up to the point that a building had fallen on them, ending that partnership.

“You’re about to give me excuses, aren’t you?” Rather than confrontational, Robert sounded weary.

“It’s hard to call someone out when you know your life may depend on how quickly he comes to your rescue next week.”

“At least you’re honest about your selfishness,” Robert said as he passed Ken and headed into the coffee shop. Ken stood with the breeze from the air conditioner chilling him. He didn’t like the idea of characterizing that as selfishness; he considered it more common sense. Robert did have a way of reframing ideas in terms that Ken found uniquely uncomfortable.

Inside, Robert had ordered his coffee before Ken had reached the counter. He waited, one hip resting against the counter as he scrolled through his phone. Ken wondered if he was making arrangements with a client, but since Ken had no evidence of illegal activity, it wasn’t any of his business. It still gave him a twinge of discomfort. He ordered a plain coffee so his was ready at the same time as the frothy pale thing Robert had ordered.

Ken led the way to a table in the corner. The worn brick wall shielded Ken’s favorite table from the sun that streamed in through the plate glass window, and he chose the seat facing the room. This time of the day, the business was slow, but three people had each claimed a table, and each was busily typing away on tablets or smartphones, and a steady flow of people ordered coffee to go. At shift change at the station, this place would be packed with cops, but hopefully Ken could have a semi-private conversation. He would have talked to Robert in one of the interview rooms, but that seemed a little antagonistic.

“So, you want to talk?” Robert turned a chair around and sat on it backward. “I assume this is about the case. You don’t strike me as someone suicidal enough to accuse me of prostitution again.”

“You’re not really into small talk are you?” 

“No. Are you?”

“Not really,” Ken admitted. “I appreciate your help in finding Mr. Sulley—”

“But...” Robert said, cutting him off.

Ken decided to go for quick and brutal. “But you have to stay out of the investigation. I have to color inside the lines or my captain is going to pull me off this case.”

“He wouldn’t,” Robert scoffed. His tone made it clear that he considered the possibly about as remote as aliens landing and setting up a booth in Jackson Pack to sell novelty t-shirts.

“He just wrote me up for taking you with me to a witness interview, so I’m pretty sure he will pull me off the case if I don’t stop breaking the rules.”

Robert sat bolt upright. “He did what? I will give him a piece of my mind.” He started to stand, and Ken reached across the table to grab his arm.

“No, no you won’t,” he said, holding Robert in place.

Robert sank down into his chair, but he had a mutinous expression. “He’s giving you shit because of me. I’m not going to let that slide.”

“He’s angry about my choice to involve a witness in this case. Your father is a lawyer, so you know I’m playing with fire,” Ken countered. Robert was many things, but he wasn’t stupid. He had to understand they were violating department policy, even if he didn’t know the exact magnitude of the rule-breaking.

“My father is a lawyer; that’s why I know Steve is worthless on the stand,” Robert said. He leaned forward and took a more conspiratorial tone. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

“You’re probably right about Steve, but I broke the rules.”

“Because I blackmailed you with the promise of a lead,” Robert blurted. He threw a hand in the air as if to emphasize his point. “I’ll take the blame for this.”

Ken appreciated that more than he could express. Robert might be a nosebleed, but he was an ethical nosebleed. He would never hang someone out to dry in order to cover his own ass, that’s for sure. However, he couldn’t fix this. “That’s not going to work.”

“It might,” Robert said, but he didn’t sound that sure.

“You don’t have a great reputation with cops, so please don’t help me,” Ken said. If Robert went to bat for him, Ken would definitely end up suspended. Hell, if Robert showed up in a puppy tail, the captain might throw Robert in a cell and fire Ken. “I like this job, and I’d like to avoid losing it.”

After giving an indignant huff, Robert pulled his arm away from Ken’s grip. “Hey, I am a fantastic communicator.”

Ken crossed his arms and took his time studying Robert. From all appearances, the man believed his own untruths. However, the cops who knew Robert did not describe him as a strong communicator. They were a little less complimentary. “Hennery thinks you’re the spawn of Satan.”

Robert narrowed his eyes. “Do not talk to me about that son of a bitch.”

“And that is why you’re not going to talk to my captain. This is my problem and I need to handle it.” Ken wasn’t thrilled with sharing his past, but Robert had a stubborn expression that suggested he wasn’t going to drop this unless Ken gave him a reason to. “The fact is that I have a bit of a history, and Captain Jenkins fears that I’m losing perspective. That has nothing to do with you, so you can’t wave a magic wand and fix it.”

“A history?” Robert’s expression immediately turned to concern. “Bad?” he asked with a frown.

“Bad enough,” Ken said. “I was out with a local guide, and we ran into trouble.” Ken took a deep breath and tried to figure out how to tell his story or how much of it to tell. He had expected Robert to push, but instead he folded his arms over the back of the chair and settled his chin on it, waiting patiently. In some ways that made it worse. If he asked questions, then Ken could shut him down with the shortest possible answers. Ken wasn’t proud of his habit of doing that, but it was a bit of a pattern with him. But Robert just wasn’t giving him a lot to work with in terms of getting defensive.

“We were working in an area where the local minorities had been targeted for a lot of verbal abuse. I had reported that up the chain, but the analysts said the situation was stable.” Ken stopped. He didn’t like remembering this part of his past. 

“They were full of shit, I take it.”

“Right up to their eyeballs.” Ken rubbed his face. “I discovered that when some locals set off an improvised bomb and a building fell on me.”

“Ow.” Robert shifted in his chair. “That hurt.”

“It hurt my local guide more,” Ken said. “When I came to, some of the women who had survived the initial attack had pulled me out, but they said he was dead.”

“Wait. The military didn’t come for you?”

“My radio equipment was damaged and then left behind in the wreckage,” Ken explained. The women had cut most of it away to get him out before the insurgents had come back for him. “The women who got me out dragged me though the desert while I occasionally returned fire when locals tracked us.”

“These women… they were part of the minority group that got attacked?”

Ken nodded. “They were. Not a one of them got out of that town without losing a family member. Some of them lost everyone. Husbands, fathers, mothers, children.” A familiar nausea rolled through Ken. He’d spent his first year after the attack sucking on antacids.

“Because higher ups didn’t listen to you about the danger,” Robert summarized. “Okay, I can see where your captain is worried, but this was far more about me backing you into a corner than you going off and playing cowboy. I can tell him that.” Robert looked so damn determined to fix this.

Ken leaned over and patted the man’s arm. “I appreciate you offering to throw yourself on the verbal grenade, but the captain is worried that I’m not seeing this situation clearly. Having you get involved won’t change that. He’ll just think you have a hero complex as big as mine.” Ken gave a quick snort of laughter. “The funny thing is that the captain and my shrink both thought I was wrapped up in my own head because I didn’t save everyone that day, but the fact is that I didn’t save anyone. I didn’t even save myself. I had a house land on me like the Wicked Witch of the East. After that, I was busy trying to avoid passing out or dying.”

“Having a hero complex isn’t exactly bad,” Robert said gently.

Ken sighed. “If you want the criminals to get convicted, it is. I need to follow procedure so that when we catch these guys, we can get them off the street. And that means that I really need you to give me space to work this case.”

Robert’s expression twisted into an unhappy frown, but he didn’t argue.

“I have to get myself focused on the law.” Ken held up his hand when Robert opened his mouth. “That doesn’t mean I care any less, but I do have rules to follow. And if I’m hanging around Steve and his gay bar on my off hours, that’s my choice. But I can’t explain it if you keep showing up in the middle of the investigation. You have a history with the department; your father is a big name. Any defense attorney could turn your involvement into reasonable doubt, and you know it.”

Robert wrapped his fingers around the back of his chair and leaned back. “I get it. I don’t like it, but I get it.” He paused and looked around the shop. His arm muscles corded as he gripped his chair so tight that Ken half expected him to leave finger marks in the wood. After an awkwardly long silence, Robert said, “If you’re looking to hang around at gay bars, try The Bombe and Pretty Exiles. They have good floor shows.”

Ken smiled as he stood. “Thanks for the recommendation.” Weirdly, this felt like an ending. Ken couldn’t say he knew Robert, yet he found himself reluctant to leave the man. Robert sat motionless. His legs sprawled out to the sides so his sneaker was right next to Ken’s shoe, but he didn’t move it. “See you around,” Ken said.

Robert shrugged. “Sure.” 

Ken fled out into the muggy heat of the late afternoon.

Chapter 9: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-9-17964838 

Chapter 10: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-10-18290483 

Chapter 11: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-11-18463879 

Chapter 12: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-12-18561312 

Chapter 13: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-13-18583563 

Chapter 14: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-14-18835280 

Chapter 15: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-15-19009742 

Chapter 16: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-16-19049610 

Chapter 17: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-17-19064720 

Chapter 18: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-18-19083274 

Chapter 19: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-19-19142224 

Chapter 20: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-20-19153311 

Chapter 21, 22, 23: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-21-21192263 

Chapter 24: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-24-21260957