The bullpen was buzzing when Steve got up from his desk, report in hand, and crossed to the closed inner office door. Mike was on the phone, deep in a conversation that didn't seem to be going well, so he waited, using the opportunity to scan the room behind him. Everyone was busy, it seemed, even moreso than usual. There had been a spate of homicides in the last two days; four suspicious deaths had been reported in a forty-five hour span.
A homeless man was clubbed to death in the Tenderloin, a young woman had been beaten to death by her now missing boyfriend according to her distraught parents, a young man was fatally stabbed outside a dive bar in North Beach and a tourist had been mugged and murdered near Fisherman's Wharf. That was the case Mike and Steve had caught and, with it, the eyes of City Hall and the entire city.
The new year was getting off to a very bad start and everyone was on edge. Even the usually unflappable Sekulovich seemed to have a shorter fuse than normal.
His eyes drifting back to his partner, Steve watched as Mike nodded once more, saying something short and pointed as he dropped the black receiver back on the desk phone then sat back in the chair, taking off his glasses, tossing them on the desk and running both hands over his eyes. Steve quietly opened the door and stepped into the room. Mike lowered his hands and looked towards the younger man, his face reflecting everything he was feeling at the moment.
Steve gestured at the phone as he sat in the first guest chair, raising his eyebrows questioningly.
The older man sighed. "Condon. He got another call from City Hall." He growled, staring daggers at the phone. "What? Do they think we can just pick the killer out of thin air? Do they think we're just sitting on our duffs here doing nothing?"
Smiling slightly in commiseration, Steve held out the paper in his hand. "Preliminary autopsy report."
His eyebrows shooting up in surprise, Mike reached for the report, picking up his glasses with the other hand. "That was fast."
"Like I said, preliminary."
Glancing at his partner once more before slipping the glasses on and looking at the paper, he asked, "Anything we should know?"
Steve shrugged and shook his head. "Nothing we don't know already. The guy was shot with a .22 in the thigh, it hit the femoral artery and he bled out, fast." He sat back. "I still think it's what we've thought all along, that it wasn't deliberate, that the mugger thought he was just incapacitating his victim. He was a big guy…"
Mike looked up overtop of his glasses. "The victim is still dead, it's still murder."
The younger man nodded. "The bullet has been sent to ballistics. Maybe, if we're lucky, the gun has been used before."
"If we're lucky," Mike mumbled, still scanning the report. He looked up and handed the paper back. "Okay, well, there's not much we can do until then. Listen, go over all the eyewitness reports and see if there's anything you think we should follow up on."
Nodding, Steve got to his feet and moved to the door. "You know," he began quietly as he turned back to face the older man once more, "I don't remember a year starting out this… angrily. Do you?"
Mike's stare unfocused and he pursed his lips before shaking his head slightly. "No… no, I don't… and I've been at this a lot longer than you have, buddy -" He caught himself and a self-deprecating smile creased his face. "Sorry, I forgot… again."
Steve chuckled. "Don't worry about it." His eyes caught a green file folder on the far corner of the desk. He nodded towards it, his furrowed brow asking the question.
Mike followed the look. "The Chu Shing murder. I want to make sure we don't put it on the back burner too soon."
Nodding in agreement, Steve stepped through the door then looked back. "Closed? Open?"
"Closed… please…" Mike smiled slightly with a soft shrug before turning his attention back to the papers on the desk in front of him.
Steve closed the door and slowly crossed to his own desk. The Chu Shing murder was one of two open cases they had going, the other being a dead call girl found in a flophouse just off Market two weeks before Christmas. The Chinatown murder had drawn the attention of City Hall as well as the Chinese business community. The owner of a mom-and-pop restaurant had been murdered in front of his wife and daughter when he refused to hand over the day's receipts to a masked and gloved gunman on Christmas night. The brazen act had galvanized The City for several days over the holidays, but when no arrest had been made before New Year's Day, attention outside Chinatown had waned.
Clues had been minimal; the wife and daughter had been too distraught to remember much of anything, and the bullets dug out of the victim's body had not been a match to anything they had on file. The streets of Chinatown had been empty when the killer had made his escape so they didn't even have an eyewitness.
Steve glanced around the bullpen once more as he sat, habitually flattening his tie as he did so. The babble of voices was still higher than he was used to, a definite sign they were being strained to the limits of their resources, and temperaments, at the moment. And the continuing rain did nothing to help dissipate the oppressive atmosphere that seemed to be affecting everyone, no matter how sunny their usual disposition.
A couple of hours later, having gotten nowhere in any of their investigations despite numerous phone calls and a couple of trips to R&I and the crime lab, Steve was startled when, across the bullpen, Dave Grabowski almost jumped from his chair and jogged across the room to the lieutenant's door, rapping on it loudly and urgently. Mike, on the phone and deep in conversation, turned towards the interruption with an angry scowl which quickly disappeared when he saw the anxious look on the inspector's face. He beckoned the young man in before turning back to the phone.
"Ah, listen, Gerry, let me get back to you, okay?" he said quickly, apology evident in his tone of voice. "Something's come up here that needs my attention right away… Yeah… yeah, thanks." He dropped the receiver on the cradle as he turned his full attention to the excited inspector now looming over his desk.
Grabowski pointed at the black desk phone. "Line three. It's a woman saying she has information on that Chinatown shooting on Christmas Day. She sounds nervous and scared. I thought you should be the one to talk to her."
Nodding, Mike picked up the receiver and punched the button for the third line. "Thanks, Dave," he said quickly, glancing at the door as Steve stepped through and slid along the wall in front of the desk.
As Grabowski backed towards the door, he looked at Steve. "A woman who says she knows something about that Chinatown murder," he whispered as he slipped out of the office and softly closed the door.
Nodding, Steve sat quietly, his eyes glued to his partner. Mike's complete attention was focused on the task at hand.
"This is Lieutenant Stone. I was told you have some information about the Chu Shing murder that could help us find the killer," he began softly. He listened for a bit. "Yes, I see. So, ah, do you think you could meet with my partner and myself…?" He paused, his eyes briefly snapping up to meet the frowning green ones across the desk. He nodded to himself softly, "Yes, yes, I understand." He reached for a small notepad, bringing it closer and picking up his pen. "Yes…" He began to write. "Yes, that would be perfect. Yes, thank you, we'll see you then. Thank you for calling." He hung up, staring at what he had written, then looked up at his partner. "She's agreed to meet with us. At 5 o'clock… Chinatown." He looked at his watch. "Corner of Grant and Sacramento."
"Who is she?"
Mike shook his head. "Wouldn't give me her name. Says she lives in the area and she saw someone running from the restaurant about the same time as the robbery was taking place."
"Why didn't she come forward earlier, I wonder?" Steve mused, knowing Mike hadn't asked that question.
The older man shrugged. "Scared, I guess. She sounds Chinese… maybe she was afraid someone would find out it was her, especially if the killer is someone from that community. She said she knows the family and has been ashamed of her silence."
"So why does she want to meet us on a street corner?"
Mike shrugged again, punctuating the move with raised eyebrows. "We'll have to ask her that at five o'clock. But I, for one, am not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Not when we have nothing else to go on right now. You?"
Steve snorted a laugh. "No, sir, not me." He glanced at the window and the raindrops still coursing down the glass. "Do you think we could be lucky and it'll stop raining by then?"
Mike glanced over his shoulder, chuckling. "You're grasping at straws there, smiley."
"Always the optimist," Steve laughed as he got to his feet.
# # # # #
Miraculously, the rain had stopped by the time the younger man threaded the large LTD through the rush hour traffic towards Chinatown, and the sun had come out. They had left in plenty of time, knowing they needed to find a place to park in the area, despite the fact that they could ignore most of the 'No Parking' signs by dint of being an official city vehicle. Still, there was no point in annoying the locals.
They finally found a spot on California in front of St. Mary's Cathedral and made their way through the crowded streets towards their destination. Mike glanced at his watch. "Let's slow down a bit," he said, decreasing his fast pace considerably. "I don't want us standing around on the corner like two sore thumbs. It's not like we blend in. I'd rather we get there right at five."
Though the streets were still slick with rain, the sunshine was a welcome surprise and Mike shrugged out of his topcoat, folding it over his arm. Steve elected to keep his raincoat on. They meandered their way up Grant, sidestepping almost every three feet, it seemed, to make room for a local scurrying from shop to shop, loaded with white plastic bags of fresh produce, meat and fish. It was a bustling humanity that felt naturally soothing.
They arrived at the corner precisely at five. Trying not to be too obvious, they scanned the area but could see no one checking them out. They were standing in front of a restaurant and the enticing smells were making both their mouths water. Steve had just turned around to look at the Peking ducks hanging in the front window when the sound of screeching tires and a scream tore through the air.
Mike, who had been staring down Grant from where they'd come, knew immediately what those sounds meant and spun in that direction. A large dark sedan was heading straight towards them and, as it reached the curb, he had just enough time to violently one-arm Steve out of the way before jumping as high as he could to clear the grill as the speeding car hit the curb, the front end dipping with the force of the impact as it continued into the red brick corner of the restaurant.
As terrified shrieks rent the air all around, the brick crumbled and both plate glass windows shattered, raining glass down on the crushed front end of the car and the two detectives lying motionless on the sidewalk on either side.
