Chapter 8:
I Hurt for You
"You wanna talk to me?" she asked as he slammed another door. He'd been restless all night.
"We're sitting here-" he began. He almost visibly brought himself under tighter control. Just as he seemed about to speak again he shook his head. "No. I'm fine."
She followed him when he turned to leave the room.
"Michael! Mike!" He ignored her, stripping off his tie and dumping it and his suit coat onto the bathroom floor. He didn't slam that door in her face at least. He continued to jerk at his clothes with such force and ferocity that she was surprised buttons didn't pop off his shirt. His belt made a slapping sound as it hit the tile siding. When he stepped out of his shoes they seemed to take the brunt of his anger, crashing against the linen closet and reverberating. The violence in him seemed to shock her into silence for a long moment. He was pulling his undershirt over his head when he heard her soft pleading.
"Miguel..."
Michael's face was hard when he turned to her.
"Please, please talk to me."
He shook his head. "Don't call me that. Not because you want something from me. Don't use who I am that way," he ordered harshly. He turned his back on her to start the water, then adjusted the shower head to his liking. It seemed as if he knew he was wrong in the accusation because he turned to her and cupped her face in his hands. They were like mirror images of angst and hurt and frustration. He pressed his lips hard against hers and breathed in her scent...even as he backed her out of the room.
"I-I didn't mean it like that," she told him. "I want to understand. I need to be able to help you and I just can't get a grip on it...I can't wrap my mind around why this case is different. Why it's so much more difficult."
"I'm tired of victims, that's all," he told her.
"Hispanic victims?" There was an edge to her voice that he couldn't step away from. He never noticed that he switched to Spanish.
"You see that? You think you know me that well? I'm tired of victims who look like me. I'm tired of the people around me assuming that none of us has a right to be here. I'm tired of the faces that look like mine being the ones who are afraid and accused and-"
She frowned at him and shook her head. "That's not true, Michael. You know it's not true. We've worked cases where you were the first to jump on a Latino as the doer. And we've worked cases where every single person in the unit ignored possible undocumented immigrants to focus on a non-minority suspect."
He threw up his hands and turned away from her. "You don't see it. You're one of them."
It was the wrong thing to say. Her palms slapped hard and loud against his back. She fisted her right hand and would have landed the punch on his shoulder if he hadn't turned around to catch her wrists. He couldn't hold her and stop her mouth at the same time, though. And he couldn't restrain her and wipe away her tears. So he let her shed them as he watched.
"You son of a bitch! Is that what you see? A me and a you and we're so different?!" She didn't notice the switch, either. She cursed him fluently in three different languages. And when she berated him she spoke in his native tongue. "The Mexican immigrants aren't the only ones getting the short stick, Miguel. The Orientals are shipped over in boxes on container ships. The Slavics get flown over as mail-order sex slaves. And children of every color get picked up, beaten down, and left for dead. Or worse. They come to expect abuse. Get a grip! Your people aren't being ignored by the police! And they're not the victims of the system! If you want your neighborhood to stop getting raided by the INS you need to get the goddamned Mexican flag off of the porches! They chose to come here. They were free to do so. And yet they mock the very country they left their fucked up world for. Why do you think people get angry? You perpetuate the problem! You build isolationist camps in the middle of cities and you don't let anyone in! Huana's is the only non-gringo-bashing bar in this block. And I still get looks. You get looked down upon because you're with me. Instead of your own kind! Fine, then! Go back! Take the frigging state and leave the rest of it behind! Go!"
Michael's heart broke as her words became incoherent and gave way to sobs. He held her wrists until he was sure she wasn't going to hit him again. Then he wrapped his arms around her and just held her. Her tears soaked his bare shoulder and the trembling made his stomach knot tighter than it had before.
When she'd settled a bit - - if the softer crying could be considered settling - - he explained what he'd meant. His voice was low, his English heavily accented. "I don't see victims who were born speaking Spanish, Tanner. I see women who were used. It's not the race; it's the rape. The innocence in trying to make children's lives better only to be singled out because of a demographic." She heard the gasp in his breath that told her he was trying not to break down. "I see you. Strong and silent. Living with it - - dealing with it. I got hold of your service record from vice. I see these young women and I see what our kind asked you to be - - just because you spoke the language. I've seen the transcripts and I've seen enough to read between the lines. I know what you did. What your teammates let happen to you. Your partner," he spat. "And it makes me sick that I can't stop it. That I can't make it go away." His hands crushed her shoulders, squeezing as though he might be strong enough to make the situation turn back. "I will never let anyone hurt you. But who stands for the rest of them? Who keeps the monsters away when the monsters wear the same uniform we do, pray to the same God, pledge to the same country? What makes us different? Where is the sense in it?"
Tanner let his arms support her as she realized what he was saying. She wondered which reports he'd gotten access to - - which of the ugly things in her past he'd read about. Vice was not a pretty place. She'd been chosen to join the team because of a specific set of skills - - the ability to be a fresh, female face and form.
"I didn't want you to know," she said quietly. "I didn't mean for you to find out that way. Why didn't you just ask?"
Michael shrugged. "Because you've only ever told funny stories. And they're too short. You left because your Nonna needed you, but you left because you wanted to." He lifted her chin in his fingertips. They both bore the signs of tears and temper. "Something was up from the first day you came. It wasn't fitting in that was hard, it was trusting us. And it went deeper than being saddled with a hostile new group of people." His voice dropped to a whisper as the room filled with steam around them. "I thought when we got closer that you'd tell me the things that keep you up some nights. The things that haunt you. But you didn't. And when I ask you only laugh and tell me that homicide is a lot cleaner. That you can tell who the good guys are in this division. And I wanted to know, so I asked around and got some stuff. Which is what you've been doing these last couple of days."
Tanner nodded. "Your behavior is becoming more and more erratic. You can't keep up like this and not end up going off on a civilian or worse. You're acting crazy and people who I thought would know why are looking to me for answers."
"I carry a taser, Tan," he said. "I've used it. Had it used on me. You can't imagine how bad it hurts. And for those women to be working for children while some predator hunts them down? It's too sick. I can't deal with it. I look at those pictures and I see you. I see you...bruised and violated and-"
He lowered his brow to hers and cried over an innocence she'd stopped grieving for being lost.
"You're so sweet with me," he whispered. "So giving and joyful and sane. How could someone hurt you? Those girls are always smiling and laughing in their pictures. Except their immigration pictures - - where they look scared to death. It should be the happiest day of their lives. The day they become Americans. What makes them sad? What frightens them?"
Moyer shook her head. "I don't have any explanations for you," she said. "But I'm watching you tiptoe closer and closer to the edge and I'm afraid you're going to lose it. Irrevocably. Soon."
Sanchez shook his head. "I'm not there yet. I'll transfer out before I get there. I promise."
"To what?" she asked.
He shrugged. "White collar crimes. Internal affairs. I don't know. Maybe back to a beat. We'll see, okay?"
She nodded - - it was the only thing she could do.
Michael pressed his lips to her brow and stoked his thumbs over her cheekbones. "I need a shower. I need to wash away as much of this case as I can. Do you want to join me?"
He wasn't surprised when Tanner shook her head. "I'll make you a drink," she said. "Open some wine or something. Give it just a few minutes to settle in."
"Are you angry with me?" he asked.
Tanner shook her head again. "No," she answered simply. He heard the truth in the simple word. She wasn't washing her hands of the discussion-she really and truly felt no anger or resentment that he would dig into her past. He felt that weight at least slide from his shoulders as she reached up to squeeze his wrists and then stepped out of the room to allow him the privacy in which to exorcise his demons.
