Chapter 2
Terran
Coming up onto the address, a lone woman was sitting out on the front steps with her legs curled up to her chest, a phone pressed tight to her ear while she watched us from her spot.
The house behind her remained dark, no porch light flicking on as TJ and I climbed out of the cruiser, nor any flickers from beyond the curtains drawn over the front bay window.
She was talking quietly, a few stray words catching my ear, “Yeah, they’re here… okay, thanks.”
“Evening.” TJ hooked both of his thumbs under his jacket and around his utility belt. He stopped a few feet from her, keeping a good ten feet away. “We got a call that there was something going on at this address. Were you the one who called that in?”
She nodded, the phone slowly falling away from her face. “Yeah…”
Outside of her shaking form, most likely from the thin set of PJ’s she wore, she looked unharmed.
No red stains covering the front of her white button down, no bruising darkening her soft features, or twisting her hands in odd angles.
When she stood, she wrapped her arms around her torso protectively, keeping in place on the step she’d just been sitting on.
The door to her house was pulled shut, no shadows dancing in the darkness beyond the paned window that faced into the entryway or signs that anyone else was inside for that matter.
“Want to tell us what’s been going on?” TJ asked.
“My boyfriend is really drunk. He came home late from drinking with a few buddies. His story wasn’t adding up on why he was so late, so I questioned him and he got aggressive. I think he’s also on something.”
“Aggressive how?” I asked.
Her shoulders hunched forward. “He, um… he was shoving and hitting me. He broke down the door to the bathroom when I locked him out. When he got it open, he dragged me out and threw me to the ground and told me he was going to stab me. Normally, when he gets drunk, he passes out, but for some reason he was really wired.”
“Does he have access to any firearms?” TJ stepped forward as he spoke, his hand coming out to gesture for her to come down from the front steps. “Weapons of any kind?”
Weirdly, she remained rooted to her spot, glancing up for only a moment when TJ drew closer. “No guns. We have some kitchen knives that are really sharp that I use for cooking.”
“Okay. Why don’t you come hang out by my cruiser for a bit. I’ll go inside and talk to him. What’s your name?”
“Naomi.”
“Naomi, I’m officer Riviera and this is officer Bishop, my partner. He’s going to be taking your statement while I go inside and talk to your boyfriend…”
She frowned. “His name is Thomas. He’s normally not like this. I don’t know what’s gotten into him. He’s passed out right now on the couch. I can’t wake him up but he’s snoring so I know he’s alive.”
“Well, we’re here to figure it out.” I did my best to give her a reassuring smile, nodding back toward the flashing lights behind us. “Why don’t we get out of the cold for a bit. You look freezing.”
She glanced between us, wary.
Unfortunately, these things were all too common among domestic situations.
A victim, out of desperation and self-preservation, calling us to come break up a violent fight and then feeling regret the moment we showed up and the potential for their significant other to get into trouble with the law was put on the table.
I’d seen it too many times living in the shoddy apartments with my sister and mother growing up—hearing the fights our neighbors had with their partners and the knock ‘em, drag ‘em out disputes that usually landed one or both of them in jail for the weekend—before she’d shacked up with my stepdad and gotten us into a nice high-rise over on the western side.
Sadly, that too, had come with its own set of consequences.
“We’ll get this all figured out,” I said.
Naomi’s arms tightened around her body for a brief moment before she slowly stepped down and onto the crumbling walkway leading up to her house.
Her slippers had fine pills woven into the once fluffy fabric, the toebox stained from years of use.
The PJ set she wore had a faded pattern on the front of it that was barely recognizable, clearly a favorite clothing item of hers.
She was tired looking, though pretty. A round face with full lips and long lashes, her eyes slightly narrow at the corners.
Her hair was pulled back in a clip that was already partially slipping, leaving a few chunks of her dark hair falling down over her shoulders.
She followed me toward the cruiser, her head trained back to look over her shoulder while TJ approached the front door, a hand ghosting over his gun holster.
“Unit 12 to dispatch.” His voice rang right next to my ear over the radio. “Requesting medical assistance to 92 Bay Road in Edgewood. Possible substance abuse and overdose.”
“Overdose?” Naomi gasped.
“Just a precaution.” I latched onto the handle of the door, pulling it open for her while stepping back. “Why don’t you take a seat? Got the heat cranked up, so you’ll be nice and toasty.”
She had a hard time tearing herself away from watching TJ disappearing inside of the house, a worried frown deepening the wrinkle between her brows. When she finally did so, she slowly sat sideways in the passenger seat, keeping her legs hanging out and her arms still tucked around her body.
“Unit 12, this is dispatch responding to your request. Medical unit in transit. ETA seven minutes.”
“10-4,” came TJ’s response.
Unzipping my jacket, I let both sides part just enough to sneak my notepad from my belt and flipped it open to a crisp blank page, the pen tucked in the loop hanging from the side tugged from it and fitted into my hand.
“Why don’t we start from the beginning. You said he came home late from a friend’s house?”
She nodded slowly. “He got off of work at six… usually, it only takes him half an hour to get to our house. When an hour passed, I tried calling him but he sent me to voicemail and then texted me, saying he was going to a friend’s for a few hours.
I was pissed but I didn’t think anything of it until he came stumbling through the doorway. ”
Nodding, I scrawled my pen across the page quickly, jotting down the cliffnotes of her statement. “You said he was acting weird?”
“Yeah. He was drunk and slurring his words but it was more than that. Usually, when he comes home from the bar, he’ll pass out on the couch within minutes, but tonight he was yelling at me and throwing things. Acting really manic after I questioned him on why he was out so late.”
“Why would you assume drug use?” I already had a feeling I knew the answer, but leading her into a false statement was the exact opposite of what I wanted. If we were able to convince her to press charges on this guy, her statement needed to be clean without any of my input influencing it.
“His friend has a history of dealing. Got clean for a while but he just broke up with his wife. So…”
“What was the substance?”
“Molly and coke.”
Deadly combo.
Certainly enough to put someone in a manic state after partying until the wee hours of the morning. “What’s the name of the friend?”
Right as she was about to answer, the telltale sounds of shots rang out from inside of the house. Three of them in a row.
My heart dropped instantly, my hand flying to my radio as I pivoted on my feet. “Shot’s fired! All units to 92 Bay Road! Edgewood!”
Tossing my notepad, I ripped my gun out of its holster and brought it forward, climbing the steps up to the front door in one long stride. I had the muzzle trained forward as I entered, a single light on in the hallway leading into the house giving me my only light source to work with. “Riviera!”
“Fuck!” I heard him spout out from deeper inside, following a loud thump that sounded like a body dropping.
The radio next to my ear lit up with responses, drowned out quickly by the blood rushing in my ears.
Pinpoint focused ahead, I trailed down slowly to where I could hear my partner’s radio chiming in the silence.
My steps were muffled by the thick carpet lining the hallway, no other sound of movement catching my attention while I headed to wherever he was.
Coming up to the first doorway, I wrapped my gun around the corner, stepping in behind it.
A dark figure was slumped over on the carpet, next to the shape of what looked to be a couch.
Curled in on themselves while they breathed heavy, the chimes of our radios going off at the same time forcing me to lower my gun.
“Riviera—”
“Squirrely fuck,” he muttered. “Hit me in the fucking balls…”
Ouch.
“You shot at him?”
“Got a hold of my gun,” he said, voice strained. “Shot at me.”
My heart lurched. “You hit?”
“Not as far as I can tell.”
Either shock or he was genuinely the luckiest son of a bitch on the planet. “He still have a hold of it?”
“No. Kicked it under the couch.”
Well, that was one positive.
Spinning on my heel, I drew my gun forward again. “Stay here.”
The resounding scoff that followed me out of the room was both annoyed and snide, a condescending mixture not blowing past me in the slightest. A dumb statement, sure, but one I needed to make on the off-chance TJ tried to get up and follow me.
I wasn’t willing to risk him aggravating any bullet wounds he may have sustained in the midst of his tussle with our perp.
So far, he was well enough to curse at me, a good indication he would be pulling through this with only a bruised sack and a hell of a heckling session once we got back to the precinct. That’s all that mattered at the moment.
“Unit 12. Medical assistance ETA 2 minutes.”
Two minutes too fucking long.
“Thomas!” I called out, stepping back into the hallway. “Come out with your hands up. Don’t turn this into something it doesn’t need to be.”