Four Walls

22

JACK MULRONEY COULDN'T BELIEVE his bad luck.

Actually killing Barker wasn't anywhere near as bad as he thought it would be. He just walked up to the fence and shoved his improvised blade between the links when Barker was stupid enough to be standing too close. The bastard was leaning against the fence drinking from a bottle of water, sweat dripping down his face after his weightlifting exertions.

That got him sweaty. Not the box. If anything, that pissed Jack off more. Gave him even more reason to stab his sorry ass. He limped over to the fence and just did it.

What he hadn't expected was the blood. Christ, it was everywhere.

In fact, that had kept Jack frozen to the spot where he was standing for at least a couple of seconds, watching the blood just gush all over the entire weight yard, like a red version of those seltzer bottles in old comedy TV shows, just spritzing all over the place.

Fischer, though, he took charge. He made Jack drop the shiv and then all the other guys huddled around him. Nobody would say anything to the COs, and he'd be clear.

Even if he wasn't Barker would be dead. Twice, he showed Jack up-on the field and in the box. Three times if you counted him exerting himself in the weight yard, the bastard.

Of course, things didn't go according to plan after that. He figured there'd be the usual internal investigation. Russell didn't know nothing from nothing, so Jack didn't expect much there, but instead he called in the NYPD.

Jack hadn't expected the full-court press the case got. It was probably because of Washburne. Everybody in the prison, on both sides, was sucking his dick pretty regularly, so his dying probably got the cops' hackles up.

Just bad luck was all. If Washburne hadn't died, they probably never would have figured out that Jack killed Barker.

And nobody would've cared. Jack knew he wasn't anybody special, but Barker was even less than that. Just some drug runner from Brooklyn, same as fifty other drug runners from Brooklyn. Nobody would miss him.

And Jack killed him. He deserved it.

Now, though, Jack was in Rikers, and soon he'd be transferred to a maximum-security facility. They hadn't told him which one yet. He didn't really care all that much. Sure, he'd be tried, and maybe he'd get the death penalty-but at least he showed Barker what for.

It was worth it just for that.

Stanton Gerrard hated going into the chief of detectives' office these days.

Ever since Mac Taylor had walked into that office and blackmailed Brigham Sinclair and Gerrard himself, Sinclair had been in a perpetually foul mood.

However, he'd been summoned to His Majesty's sanctum, and Gerrard wasn't stupid enough to turn down such a request. He'd put in his time on the streets and then some, and right now, his goal was to retire with as big a pension as he could scrape up-and also to stay as far off those streets as possible. Not that the job didn't need doing, but there were lots of better, younger police who could do that. Guys like Don Flack. Gerrard had always had a soft spot for Flack ever since the young detective came under Gerrard's command, and he knew that guys like him would keep things from getting out of hand on the pavement.

Gerrard, though, was too old for that. When he closed his eyes, he could still see the crazed eyes of that junkie on Forty-third Street who almost stabbed him. This was back in the late eighties, before Disney had taken over Times Square, and the area was a squalid cesspool of drug dealers, whores, and junkies.

That junkie had almost killed Gerrard. Instead, Gerrard shot him in the leg. He figured it would wound, but he hit a major artery, and the junkie bled out and died.

Whenever Gerrard found himself awash in the stupid politics of being one of the bosses, he remembered that junkie, remembered those eyes, remembered the drugged-out lunacy of the man as he waved his knife around-remembered the stomach-twisting fear he felt as he squeezed the trigger.

He'd done his duty. From that moment on, Gerrard was the good soldier. The same bosses he used to make fun of at the bar after the shift ended suddenly became his best friends. (Okay, he still made fun of them at the bar after the shift ended, but more quietly now.) After years of disdaining the sergeant's exam, he took it and placed high. Promotion suddenly became a desired goal instead of a dirty word.

If nothing else, he justified being a boss by saying that he used to be rank-and-file. At least he understood how they thought, and maybe he could be a better boss than the guys who used to make his life miserable.

On some days, he even believed that.

Today, though, he thought as he entered Sinclair's office, wasn't going to be one of those days.

As soon as he closed the door behind him, Sinclair exploded. "A memo! Can you believe this, Stan? The man sent me a memo. He couldn't even do me the favor of a phone call."

"Who sent a memo?" Gerrard asked, not unreasonably, since he didn't have the first clue what Sinclair was talking about.

"The commissioner!" Sinclair cried, holding up a sheet of paper.

"What about him?"

"I requested that Malik Washburne get a blue funeral."

"And he said no?"

"In a memo, Stan! The man gave the best years of his life to the department, and this is what he gets?" He held up the memo near his scowling face. "'After due consideration, I'm afraid I must decline your request to give the former Officer Washburne a departmental funeral. I believe it would be inappropriate to provide an honor guard for someone who was convicted of homicide and who died in prison custody.'" He slammed the paper down on his wooden desk.

Gently, Gerrard said, "Did you really expect anything different?"

"A different answer? Of course not. I owed it to the man to ask, but I'm not stupid, Stan. No way they fire twenty-one for a guy who killed two people while he was soused. But I expected to be told that. I don't even rate a phone call anymore, Stan."

"Maybe he just wanted to have it in writing."

"Then he calls, tells me that, and follows it up with a memo that says, 'As per our conversation, no honor guard.' Fine. Instead, I just get a brush-off." He pointed at Gerrard with an accusatory finger. "This is Taylor's fault."

Gerrard blinked. "I'm sorry?"

"The commissioner's pissed that Taylor got off. He wanted at least a reprimand-and I couldn't tell him why that happened." Sinclair shook his head and sat down at his desk. "Or he does know why, and he's pissed about that. Either way…"

Taking the guest chair opposite the chief, Gerrard said, "Look, Mac's not exactly at the top of my Christmas card list right now, but I don't think you can put this on him. He thought his back was to the wall, and he acted. And I don't think the big boss gives a rat's ass about some guy in the crime lab anyhow."

"He gives a rat's ass about Clay Dobson. That gave the department a black eye, and I cost him his handy scapegoat." Sinclair shook his head. "Keep an eye on Taylor, Stan. He needs to be either the absolute best cop in the history of the NYPD, or he needs to go in disgrace. It can't be anywhere between those two."

Gerrard left Sinclair's office more than a little confused. Did he actually just defend Mac Taylor? Will wonders never cease?

But he saw Sinclair's point. If Mac excelled, then Sinclair could point to that and say that it would've been bad for the department if he'd been punished. If Mac screwed up, then Sinclair could serve him up to the commissioner on a silver platter.

It was going to be an interesting next few weeks.

Dina Rosengaus missed the morning shift.

She had been applying for jobs elsewhere in the neighborhood. A Subway had opened up on Johnson Avenue with a HELP WANTED sign in the window, there were four supermarkets in the area that were always looking for cashiers, and she'd also filled out applications at the Staples on Broadway, some of the restaurants up on Riverdale Avenue, and the CVS on 235th Street.

But nobody had given her a job yet.

Of course, all the jobs asked if you had a criminal record, and she had to answer in the affirmative. She had been arrested, fingerprinted, the whole thing, but her parents' lawyer-a fellow Russian emigrй and husband to her father's cousin-was able to get her to plea to a lesser charge and pay a fine, which her father had paid. She hadn't even spent any time in a jail cell, though she did spend hours sitting at one police officer's desk with nothing to do except think.

Mostly she thought about Maria Campagna and her stupid necklace. If she hadn't felt the need to show it off all the time, maybe Dina wouldn't have taken it.

It wasn't like Dina killed her. And Jack hadn't either, for which Dina was grateful, as she liked Jack. No, it was that guy from across the street.

Dina had never liked him.

While her father had paid the fine, it was only on the condition that she pay him back. At that, he told her he'd wanted to let her rot in prison for the rest of her life, but her mother convinced him it was better to pay the fine.

"But you will pay me back, every penny!" he had bellowed in Russian.

School had been miserable. The summer-session classes were smaller, so it was harder for Dina to hide in the back of the class and hope nobody noticed that the girl who got arrested was there.

At first, it hadn't been that bad. People found out that she had been one of the ones who found the body, so that raised her in several people's estimation. They wanted to know what the body looked like, what it smelled like, what the police did.

But eventually, they found out that she had stolen from the body. Dina had no idea how they found out-she certainly didn't tell anyone. Then again, she didn't tell anyone that she had found the body, either. The information simply was there.

The same people who were morbidly but genuinely curious about the look of a corpse were now disgustedly querying why she would do such a thing, and wasn't it gross to touch it, and isn't that like necrophilia or something, and on and on and on and on.

And nobody would give her a job.

Which meant that she spent her mornings, not in Belluso's Bakery pouring coffee for commuters and people walking their dogs and parents taking their children to school, but sitting at home alone wondering why she'd thought taking Maria's necklace was a good idea.

Maybe she'd look for a job that wasn't in the Riverdale area. She could find something in Manhattan, take the 1 train to and from whatever job she got.

If she could get a job. Maybe being a criminal would keep her unemployed forever.

No, that was ridiculous. People got out of prison all the time, and they must have gotten jobs.

Dina would find something.

Then maybe she could stop thinking about Maria Campagna and her stupid necklace.

Malik Washburne's funeral was packed. Mac supposed he shouldn't have expected any less.

About half the people were NYPD, Mac among them. Many of them wore their dress blues, for all that it wasn't a departmental funeral, though Mac was not among those. He hadn't worn his blues for Aiden Burns's funeral last year, for much the same reason: when they died, neither Washburne nor Aiden were police officers anymore.

However, Mac was wearing a tie. The last time he'd worn one was, ironically, Aiden's funeral. That had been a modest affair. Aiden's family, of course, all attended, and several friends, none of whom Mac really knew, and her other ex-coworkers from the crime lab.

Aiden had been a good friend. Mac had nothing but praise for the excellent work Lindsay Monroe had been doing the past two years, but often Mac found himself missing Aiden's fiery passion, smart-ass remarks and dedication to justice. True, that dedication had led to Mac having to fire her, and eventually to her death, but at least in death Aiden was able to lead Mac and the others to her killer.

But where Aiden's funeral had been small yet intense, Malik Washburne's was large and overwhelming. Besides the huge NYPD contingent, there were also hundreds from the city's African-American community, in particular from the Queens neighborhood of Long Island City, whose lives Washburne had touched. According to one person Mac talked to, the Kinson Rehab Center was down to a skeleton crew today, as everyone who worked there wanted to be present when Malik Washburne was laid to rest.

Several high-profile African-American New Yorkers were there, including Brigham Sinclair, the NYPD chief of detectives and one of Mac's least-favorite people. Mac found a certain bitter amusement in the fact that Sinclair never once made eye contact with Mac during the entire funeral.

The eulogy was delivered by the Reverend Michael Burford, who ran the Kinson Rehab Center.

"The Bible states in the Book of Ephesians: 'Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.' Brothers and sisters, Malik Washburne was a good man. He was not a perfect man. In fact, he would be the first to admit to his own failings. He was cursed by the demon alcohol. The devil tempted him, and in a moment of weakness following a vicious tragedy, he fell. But he knew that he fell, and he took the road to redemption willingly. We may look today at Malik's death and see a tragedy, and a horrible accident. But what I see today is what Malik would want us to see: a life given in service to his fellow man. He determined that he would be subject to others and that he would help them. Malik grew up in the Robinsfield Houses, and like so many young African-American men, he was tempted daily by the lure of drugs and vice. He resisted those temptations and became a police officer, in the hopes of serving his community. Later, he handed in his badge and served his community in other ways. But the important thing, brothers and sisters, is that he served. He devoted his life to the aid of others. Even while serving his penance in prison, he served his fellow man. That, brothers and sisters, is how he should be remembered, and that is how he was subject to others. When you go back out into the streets, do not remember that a good man has died. Remember that a good man has lived, and done service to others. Remember that life, not that death, brothers and sisters, and remember to be subject to one another. Malik and I did not share the same faith, and some of you may question my use of the Bible when eulogizing a man of Islam. But whether you believe in Jesus Christ or Mohammad as your prophet, whether or not you believe in God or Allah as the creator of all things, whether or not you call yourself Christian or Muslim, we all can learn from the example that Malik set. Go with God, go with Allah, go with Christ-but go and be subject to one another, as Malik did."

When the funeral finally let out, Mac came to a decision. He navigated through the throngs of people in an attempt to get to Sinclair. He was going to say hello, shake the man's hand, and wish him condolences on the death of his friend.

It was a nice thought, but unfortunately there was a phalanx of press converging on Sinclair. Mac didn't relish the idea of his gesture being captured on camera-the idea was to mend fences with Sinclair, not put on a show-so he backed off.

A reporter from The Village Voice asked Sinclair if he had requested a departmental funeral for his former partner.

Sinclair snarled, "No comment. Excuse me."

With that, and with the press chasing at his heels, Sinclair left.

Mac sighed. Perhaps another time.

Jay Bolton still hated his job, but for the first time he thought it might actually be useful.

The last week had been pretty miserable. First the two DICs, then the fallout from it. Sure, Jay was one of the COs who gave Washburne a pass on his meds, but what else was he supposed to do? Sergeant Jackson had taken him and a bunch of other guys aside when Washburne first got put in here.

"We're getting a new guy today," Jackson had said, "name of Malik Washburne. He used to be a cop, name of Gregory Washburne, before he quit, became a towelhead, and started doing the Al Sharpton thing, only without the hair." Jay had laughed at that. "He's one of us, people, and we're gonna do whatever we can to make him as comfy as possible without going overboard. That means we give him a pass on things like meds-the guy's a Muslim, he doesn't do drugs, okay?"

"Why'd he let them give him the scrip, then?" Jay had asked.

"He didn't wanna rock the boat."

Thinking back on it now, Jay realized that the answer was a stupid one. Washburne could've just refused the prescription, but instead he played the system. Which wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the allergy.

At the time, though, it had seemed reasonable. And Jay went along with it. What the hell else was he supposed to do? The sergeant told him to do it, and nobody told him otherwise. Jay didn't want to get noticed or cause trouble, he just wanted to show up for work, collect a paycheck every two weeks, and go home and write.

Captain Russell and Uncle Cal Ursitti had been crawling up everyone's ass for the past two days, grilling people in the interrogation room the same way that those two NYPD guys had when Washburne and Barker died.

In the end, everyone was getting a letter of reprimand in their personnel file. They couldn't really do much else, since every CO in the place except for Andros was in on it. If they suspended everyone, they'd be screwed. Russell had made noise about staggering the suspensions, but Ursitti apparently convinced him that that was more trouble than it was worth. From what Sullivan told Jay, "Mostly everyone was just trying to be good to someone who was really trying to reform himself. And he'd done a lotta good in the world 'fore he fell off the wagon."

Jay had privately wondered if the families of the two people Washburne had killed would agree with that sentiment, but he didn't say that out loud.

Besides, he was grateful. If nothing else came out of this whole stupid thing, he'd finally figured out what his next novel was going to be about. He was going to abandon the current one-it wasn't going anywhere anyhow-and start all over by writing a police procedural. He'd learned a lot watching Taylor and his people work in the yard, and that was probably the way to go.

People loved books about crime solving. That would be cool.

The one person who did get supsended was Ciccone, but that was for letting Mulroney get away with making a shiv. Ciccone was appealing the suspension, though. That promised to make things ugly, because Jay just knew that Uncle Cal was going to make Ciccone's life a living hell for as long as the appeal lasted.

At the end of his shift, Jay went to the locker room along with Sullivan and Gibson. Uncle Cal met them at the door.

"Got news," he said. "There's gonna be another ball game."

"You have got to be kidding me."

"Yup. It was Dep Michaelson's idea."

Jay frowned as he entered the locker room, Sullivan, Gibson, and Uncle Cal following. Gordon Michaelson was the deputy superintendent of programs, and he had been the one to call the original ball game between the Muslims and the skinheads "the dumbest idea since Hitler invaded Russia." The notion of having it had come in a memo from Albany that strongly suggested that the ball game was a good idea, based on the reports on tensions between the two factions in RHCF. Of course, that tension was only there because some judge let Karl Fischer be moved to medium security during his appeal, but Albany wanted to "foster a commonality." Jay had taken an informal poll of both the other COs and the cons, and nobody had a clue what that phrase actually meant. Still, according to Michaelson, it was used four times in the memo.

Uncle Cal said, "Yeah, but now the dep's sold on the idea. See, he wants to call it the Malik Washburne Memorial Game."

Jay blinked as he unbuttoned his blue shirt. "That's actually not a bad idea."

"Yeah," Sullivan said. "Fischer actually admitted out loud to respecting Washburne once. Thought I'd have a heart attack from the shock. Who knows, maybe they'll behave themselves."

Smiling, Jay said, "Might even foster a few commonalities."

Uncle Cal barked a laugh. "Let's not push it. Anyhow, the game's tomorrow at one, assuming it don't rain. You three are all on it, along with Andros."

Jay winced. So did Gibson.

Sullivan was more verbal: "Aw, c'mon, LT, that guy's poison!"

"No, he's not-he's a CO just like us. And if you assholes weren't playing your stupid-ass head games, a good man would still be alive. So live with it."

With that, Uncle Cal left. Sullivan and Gibson started bitching about Andros and about Ursitti and about any number of other things. Jay didn't participate, but he did listen.

His novel would take place in a prison and involve a DIC. He'd be able to put all kinds of local color in by having the COs actually talk like COs.

It would be the best book ever. This one, he knew, would sell like gangbusters.