Chapter 2
Well in honor of tonight's S9:7 episode and the frisky Sgt. Jamie Reagan depicted in the previews, not to mention our introduction to Lena Janko who seems oddly similar to mommazilla (cough, cough, Eva), I had to get this next chapter up despite a crazy day! Thanks so much for the reviews!
"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKIN' LADY? ARE YOU EFFING BLIND?" the enraged van driver thundered as he slammed his hand down on the crumpled hood of the car while he surveyed the damage, which to be fair was minimal to his already aged and rusted relic of a red-striped 1990's Chevrolet high top conversion van, and far more extensive to the little car that had hit it. "YOU'RE GONNA PAY FOR THIS! DO YOU HEAR ME?!"
"Sir, I'm going to need you to calm down!" Jamie ordered as he came alongside the scene and quickly flashed the gold badge at his belt when the larger man turned around to confront him.
"JUST WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, JAMES BOND?" the driver demanded as he took in Jamie's formal attire in a loosened bow tie, white dress shirt, and tuxedo pants.
"Special Investigator, Jamison Reagan, NYPD," Jamie responded evenly with all the authority he could muster as he assessed the situation with an eye to the middle-aged woman in the car who appeared unhurt but seemed slightly dazed after the airbag had deployed.
"Well, Mr. 'Special Investigator,' what'r you gonna do about this? There's nothing to investigate!" the other man continued shouting. "BUTT OUT! THIS IS MY BUSINESS! SHE HIT ME!"
"I know that, but she's not the one out here acting like an ass, so cool it, or I'll have the responding officers charge you with disorderly conduct for starters if you don't ramp it down right now!" Jamie barked as he flashed his light around. "I'm looking at the damage here, sir, and frankly, I don't see where that's going to be worth a trip down to Central Booking and a court appearance considering your van looks as if this wasn't the first time something like this has happened."
"We started moving, and he just slammed on his brakes and stopped in the middle of the bridge," the other driver mumbled a confused explanation as she held her head and fumbled for her phone.
"I PULLED TO THE SIDE!"
"Ma'am," Jamie softened as he addressed the woman in the car. "Just stay put. My wife and I are both NYPD. She's right behind us and already radioed in for additional police and an ambulance, okay? Everything will be fine," he assured even as he looked back and saw Eddie outside and hopping back and forth next to their vehicle, no doubt trying to shove her swollen feet into a relocated and now too-small pair of heels in order to come over and back him up.
"What? More cops are coming?! I ain't stickin' around here for that neither!" the van driver proclaimed with a sudden nervous look and realization as he abruptly turned and headed back for the front of his vehicle, seemingly with intent to drive off before the other unit, whose sirens could now be heard behind them, got there.
"HEY! WAIT! You can face charges for leaving the scene of an accident, too! Up to 90 days in jail for starters!" Jamie declared as he hurried after the man with added suspicion given that reaction and grabbed his arm from behind, mindful of his state and the size difference between them.
"GET OFF OF ME!" the driver thundered and spun around, shoving Jamie hard into the side of the van just in front of the back doors where he lost his balance briefly and wound up leaning against it after taking a bad step with his still-mending leg.
"HEY! HE IDENTIFIED HIMSELF AS AN NYPD OFFICER! THAT'S ASSAULT!" Eddie yelled as she finally joined them with her gun at the ready, although still concealed in her purse, and looking slightly less than menacing considering her current state of, well—dress.
"AND WHO ARE YOU, LADY?" the man sneered. "CAGNEY OR LACEY?"
"WATCH YOUR MOUTH, AND JUST STAY WHERE YOU ARE!" Jamie ordered in defense of his wife and banged his hand against the van's panel in frustration while trying to right himself, thoroughly tired of this whole encounter now and almost wishing the uncooperative jackass had successfully gotten back into his vehicle and sped away as this would no doubt soon entail hours of paperwork cutting into that precious me time with his wife he had been longing for. That was until he heard it, a very faint…
...thump, thump, thump.
"What's that?" he demanded, instantly on high alert as the hair on the back of his neck tingled and the now-suspect looked primed to bolt once more. "You've got a passenger? Who else is in the back of that van?"
"NO ONE!" the man snarled as Jamie took a step towards the back doors. "HEY! YOU AIN'T GOT NO GODDAMN BUSINESS IN THERE!"
"Eddie! Hold him!" Jamie directed as she drew her weapon out and leveled it just as their backup arrived in the form of a rookie named Todd Bailey and a sergeant from the 2-3 who luckily knew them both well, so there was no need for formal introductions.
"DON'T MOVE!" she ordered, anyway.
"Well, if it isn't a 12-David reunion from the good old days," Sergeant Bill Barnes, one of their former bosses before a transfer up the line chuckled even as he likewise had his hand on the gun in his holster in case it was needed given the apparent tense situation. "What's going on here Reagans? You guys pulling some kind of black-tie sting together tonight?"
"Just coming home from a wedding, witnessed a minor 10-53 that might have just turned into something else, Sarge," Jamie advised as he banged on the panel again and that faint thump, thump, thump was evident to everyone once more. "He's got someone else in there but refuses to let us see… could be a kid; there might be injuries."
"What's your name?" Sergeant Barnes barked at the driver who had frozen in place with his hands up.
"L-Lyle Thompkins," the man answered with hesitation as despite his previous bravado he was clearly now unnerved at being surrounded and being held at gunpoint, even if it was by a blond woman with an unkempt updo in a cocktail dress on a bridge.
"Well, Mr. Thompkins, who do you have in the back of the van?"
"N-no one, just a dog," the man admitted in what appeared to everyone to be a bald-faced lie.
"A dog. You buying that Reagan?" the sergeant demanded as he took charge of the situation.
"Only one way to be sure," Jamie advised as he put his hand on one of the backdoor latches and yelled. "NYPD! Show yourself if you're able!"
Thump, thump, thump...
"Hey! You need a search warrant!" Thompkins demanded as he took a sudden step forward only to have Eddie reposition her aim and Sergeant Barnes join her with his weapon out. "I got rights!"
"You want us to get a warrant just to see if your dog is okay? Counselor?" Barnes questioned, well aware of Jamie's Harvard Law degree and recent appointment to the NYPD Legal Department.
"Probable cause," Jamie determined although the logic was borderline iffy and could be challenged. "Suspect in a traffic accident is pulled over illegally on a bridge with an unknown and possibly injured passenger or detainee making deliberate contact with officers. Under the automobile exception rule, any vehicle, including boats, may be searched so long as an officer has probable cause to believe the vehicle contains evidence of a crime, the instrumentalities of a crime, contraband, or what reasonably may lead to the commission of a crime," he quoted verbatim.
"Sounds good enough to me, and I don't have a fancy sheepskin from an Ivy League school," Barnes agreed. "Open it. Cover him, Bailey."
"Jamie, be careful," Eddie urged as she watched him pull the door open and gingerly look around the dark corner of the van bed with his flashlight.
"OH, DAMN IT! You've got to be kidding me!" came the angry reaction to whatever was found back there, and after a minute's pause, Jamison Reagan was seeing red and moving faster than he had since his accident as he rounded the corner to put Lyle Thompkins up against the side of the van in a flash. "SERIOUSLY? YOU SICK SON OF A BITCH!"
"REAGAN!" Barnes yelled. "What's he got?"
"Tell them!" Jamie challenged as he was all up in Tompkins' face. "TELL THEM WHAT YOU WERE PLANNING TO DO HERE ON THE BRIDGE!"
"AIN'T NONE OF YOUR DAMN BUSINESS! THEY'RE MY PROPERTY!" the van driver retorted.
"NOT ANYMORE!" Jamie shot back before pushing himself away from the other man in apparent disgust.
"Jamie! What is it?" Eddie demanded since few things set her husband off in that manner except for someone hurting children or…
"Puppies," Jamie revealed with his teeth gritted. "Three of 'em tied in a sack with rocks in it. Nothing but skin and bones… covered in fleas. He pulled over to toss them out in the middle of the river, DIDN'T YOU? HUH?"
"I ain't sayin' nothin' more," Tompkins invoked and then immediately opened his mouth anyway and went back on that declaration. "They're sick, and I was just gonna put them down out of their misery," he defended. "I ain't done nothing wrong. You can't prove that."
"New York Agricultural and Markets Law, Section 353-a. Aggravated cruelty to animals," Jamie cited the specific statute from memory once more. "A person is guilty of aggravated cruelty to animals when, with no justifiable purpose, he or she intentionally causes serious physical injury or death to a companion animal with aggravated cruelty... a felony," he emphasized. "Now, get him out of my sight!"
"You heard him, Bailey," Barnes directed as his rookie took the man into custody and pushed him into the back of their RMP after handcuffing him. "You sure, Reagan?" he asked as he conferred with Jamie. "You know these animal abuse cases get thrown out more than half the time. Odds are he won't do a day, just pay a dime fine... especially 'cause he didn't actually do it."
"Not this one. Just go back there and make sure the other driver is okay, I'll handle this," Jamie vowed as he ran his hands through his hair in a classic stress tell and Eddie joined him at the back of the van to assess the situation. "We gotta document everything, Ed," he advised as he pulled out his phone. "Get pictures of all of it… the bag, the rocks and each of these poor guys," he added as she did as he asked while he carefully removed the tiny, weak, almost skeletal, non-descript breed, light cream, and yellow-colored pups one by one and laid them gently on a blanket where they made little effort to move save for the gentle thump, thump, thump of the smallest one's tail on the floorboards.
"Oh God, Jamie… they don't look good," Eddie worried as her motherly instincts kicked in while she held the light and knew her animal-loving husband was taking the sight hard. "You can see all of their ribs sticking out, and it must have been sweltering in that bag stuffed together in the back of the cargo area in this weather… plus they could have gotten hurt and thrown around in the accident! There's nothing to them! Shouldn't we call Animal Control?"
"Almost all the city shelters close at eight on the weekend," Jamie shook his head. "No one's gonna get out here in time. There's that 24-hour emergency clinic in Brooklyn. We can call ahead and be there in about a half hour if we take the FDR."
"We… you mean like this," Eddie hesitated for just a second of course as she eyed him in his tuxedo remnants and her uncomfortable dress, and then gave in as if she had a choice—their much-anticipated evening as husband and wife alone thrown on the back-burner once more with these three fragile lives on the line. "I'll pull up here; we can toss the car seats in the back so you can ride in with them, okay?"
"Yeah, I'll clear it with Barnes. Just go, Ed," Jamie begged. "I don't think this one's gonna make it much longer," he worried over the smallest pup… the one whose thumping tail had alerted them to their presence but had now stilled.
###
"So, there's like no coffee or anything worthwhile in the vending machine out there," Eddie noted as she tugged down at her hem before sliding into a hard, plastic seat next to her husband in the waiting room of the clinic. A glance at her watch showed it to be just before four-thirty in the morning after they had been there for hours while hoping for better news about the three pups. "Considering they wouldn't even let us in the door without you forking over our platinum credit card, at least they could stock some decent caffeine and sugar," she grumbled even though she was not technically supposed to have the former anyway given that she was still planning on nursing Joey through the next week or so until he was slated to be cleared for attending daycare and she would be returning to work at the 12th precinct. "Jamie, I talked to the receptionist… this place could run over a thousand dollars a day for each of them, even if all they do is give them fluids. That's insane! Who can afford to do that?"
"I know," he lamented as he considered their financial situation which was stable but far from allowing for such extravagant expenses especially since they had both been out of work recently with medical bills of their own and the added responsibility of a growing family. "I'm sorry. The vet here said if it was too much, we might be better off putting them down humanely instead… the shelter would have probably done that already, but I just needed to give them a chance, Ed. I'll find the money… where there's a will, there's a way," he promised.
"I know you'll take care of it," she assured. "That's not really what I'm worried about."
"Well, maybe can get them transferred to Bear's regular vet in the morning if they make it that far," he continued to bargain. "Should be a little cheaper than this place, or one of the no-kill rescues might be able to take them in a few days."
"That's good. They need to find homes though… I don't want you to get too attached, okay? We've got a deal, right? No dogs for now."
"Yeah, I know what I promised before, Ed… but I just had to do this."
"You wouldn't be the boy scout I married if you didn't," she conceded with a sigh as she reached over to peck his cheek with a kiss and grabbed his hand.
"If nothing else, we got their conditions documented so we can charge that bastard to the fullest extent, you know? Barnes texted me; they're doing a sweep of the guy's house and found six more dogs dead or in horrible shape. Looks like a puppy mill type of situation gone bad. The investigator wants a DNA swab because now he's claiming he found them on the side of the road and was just taking them home even though it looks like the mom's laying back in a cage at his house."
"Scumbag. So, anything new on Manny, Mo, and Jack? Do we know what they are at least?"
"Jackie," he corrected. "Two boys and a girl. Best guess is some kind of three- or four-month-old Dachshund mixes except one of the boys only has a nub for a tail, so no idea what the cross could be. Nothing else except that the rapid heartworm tests came back negative at least."
"Well hallelujah for that I guess… although lambchop, I really have no idea what that means," Eddie admitted to him, having never been around any animals except their own cat before. "They get worms in their hearts? Ick."
"Probably a deal breaker at this point," he nodded. "The treatment for that would kill them in the condition they're in."
"Lovely," she sighed as she snuggled into his shoulder to rest her head after wrapping her arm around his elbow. "Well, then it's good the poor things don't have that."
"I'm really sorry I wrecked our night," Jamie apologized again as he returned the favor and leaned in against her. "You should go home to change and get some sleep. I'll wait here."
"And break up Cagney and Lacey?" she scolded as he chuckled at the imagery. "We'll have other nights; besides, we're closer to Mom's here, and I promised to pick the kids up by seven so she can go to work. I have to admit it was kind of fun running a scene with you again… it's been a while. When I heard that thumping, I thought the guy was going to turn out to be some kind of sicko serial killer up there dumping a body… you know the whole classic back of the crappy van scenario, although I guess he sort of was. I'll never understand how someone can be so heartless."
"Kids and animals," Jamie agreed before closing his eyes and fading away for an hour or so of uncomfortable shut-eye. "Hopefully there's a special place in hell waiting for him."
###
"Reagan?" came the inquiry from the doorway that jolted both Eddie and Jamie out of their improvised nap just a short time later. "I'm afraid we have good news and bad news," the overnight vet informed them as she stood there with a folder in her hands.
"W-what is it?" Jamie asked, fearing the worst as he stretched out his cramped neck and stood up while his wife struggled to do the same, a glance at his watch showing they had about a half-hour before it would be necessary for at least one of them to leave and retrieve Kaylin and baby Joey from Eva's new apartment near Prospect Park.
"I'm afraid the little female was far too compromised due to dehydration, heat exhaustion as well as some likely internal injuries she suffered in the crash, and she succumbed a few minutes ago despite all efforts," she informed as their hearts fell.
"Oh, no…" Jamie's shoulders sagged in sadness, and Eddie gave him a comforting squeeze on his hand as she knew it hurt his heart to fail anyone like that, human or non-human made no difference. "Damn."
"Poor little Jackie," she mourned too. "So, we didn't get her here in time?"
"I'm afraid not."
"Wait, but you said there was good news?" Jamie hopefully added as he caught on to the second part of the announcement.
"Yes, the two males were much stronger and have already responded very well to being cooled down, tubed with fluids and appear to be stabilized. We've treated their external parasites, they've started drinking on their own and show interest in food, although that has to be introduced very slowly in small, frequent amounts, so their systems aren't overwhelmed," she warned. "Considering it's the weekend, and it appears that's all that really needs to be done, I think it's possible for them to receive adequate care at home with a follow-up at your own vet to continue treatment if you're willing. Otherwise, they'll have to stay here until I release them to Animal Control on Monday and then they'll go to an overcrowded city shelter. That's dangerous in their condition, as you know since they will likely only be given a five-day hold before there is the risk of euthanasia. I've written out everything that's needed. I understand cost is a consideration since you two are just good Samaritans footing the bill."
"Really? We can take them home?" Jamie perked up immediately like an eager child even as Eddie considered the ramifications of letting both her soft-hearted husband and a certain little blond-headed girl form attachments to the two remaining little creatures.
"Jamie, wait!" she played the only other card she knew might make him hesitate and think twice. "What about Bear?!"
Poor Eddie, her heart's in the right place, but she might just find herself outnumbered now as a preoccupied husband, a dedicated preschooler, a baby, two young puppies needing round-the-clock care and an unhappy big cat make life interesting for our lovebirds back at the home in Bay Ridge. Next, our story continues as they struggle to find time to make that needed connection, until she decides to take things into her own hands, so to speak. Maybe Jamie's not the only frisky one, lol.