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  Superbia

  ( Superbia - 1 )

  Bernard Schaffer

  Police Officer Frank O’Ryan’s knee exploded when struck by a bullet from the kid’s gun. It was a junk gun, something with duct tape wrapped around the handle. It worked just fine though and Frank was going down.

  His sergeant squirmed on the pavement, bleeding out from a gunshot to the chest, begging Frank not to let him die. Frank raised his weapon and fired. One round. Center mass of the suspect’s chest. It was just a kid.

  * * *

  Not-Even-Promoted Detective Vic Ajax is the most hated man in his small suburban police department. The kind of cop who spends more time with drug dealers and burglars than he does with other cops, probably because he likes the dirtballs better. The brass keeps Vic down in the basement by himself, until the day Frank O’Ryan returns to work and gets ordered to be his partner.

  Together, they’ll take a journey into the dark heart of The Job.

  Superbia is a world filled with grandfatherly pedophiles and drug zombies who hide their stashes in dirty baby diapers. It’s a place where a group of rogue cops rely on an angry six-foot bunny called the Truth Rabbit for really tough interrogations.

  In Superbia, doing the right thing can be a fatal career move and the bosses are more dangerous than any crook on the street. Superbia is the funniest, scariest, most brutal account of what good cops truly experience and most of the world never gets to know.

  Bernard Schaffer

  SUPERBIA

  WHAT IS SUPERBIA?

  Superbia is any typical suburban community filled with grandfatherly pedophiles and drug zombies who hide their stashes in dirty diapers. It’s a place where rogue cops rely on an angry six-foot bunny called the Truth Rabbit for really tough interrogations.

  Superbia is where doing the right thing can be a fatal career move and the bosses are more dangerous than any crook on the street.

  Superbia is a completely fictional book written by a real-life police detective who lost his badge for telling this story, then came right back to write a sequel.

  Superbia has been called the most subversive police book written since Serpico and its author the 21st Century successor to Joseph Wambaugh and Ed McBain.

  Superbia is the funniest, scariest, most brutal account of what good cops truly experience and most of the world never gets to know.

  * * *

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. No reference to any real person, living or dead, should be inferred.

  * * *

  Read that part again.

  Welcome to Superbia

  Thirty-six thousand police officers protect and serve the citizens of New York City. The five boroughs of New York combined in 1898, creating a citywide jurisdiction of four hundred sixty-eight square miles. Thirty-six thousand cops. One Commissioner. Same uniform. Same directives. More than twice the size of the FBI.

  By comparison, the City of Philadelphia is surrounded by three counties, all of which are broken into small municipalities that operate independently of one another. Montgomery County is four hundred and eighty seven square miles, but contains over sixty individual municipalities. Bucks County and Delaware County are much the same. Different governments. Different police departments.

  It is a world of cul-de-sacs, shopping centers, age-restricted housing developments, diners, and fast-food chains. Big box stores. Apartment complexes. Farms that make more money selling tickets to their Halloween maze than they do on crops. Low-income housing clusters. Absentee landlords.

  Low-budget newspapers with bored, lazy reporters. Movie Theater multiplexes. Rich kids taking pills. Rich kids stealing to get more pills. Rich kids selling pills. Rich kids overdosing on pills. Rich kids dying.

  Small towns. Big towns determined to stay small towns by thinking small, planning small, making campaign promises to keep the budget small.

  The people in charge are the people who have been in charge. They are the people who will remain in charge. Keeping progress down by keeping taxes down.

  Everything is perfect, or at least, better than it would be if you lived in the city.

  Somewhere, at the bottom of the barrel, are the people who show up when the cracks in such a carefully crafted world begin to appear.

  Welcome to Superbia.

  WINTER

  1

  Emergency tones sound like air raid sirens at four in the morning.

  “Seventeen cars, burglary in progress.”

  Frank O’Ryan jerked awake in his patrol car, kicking the pedals, slamming his knees into the steering wheel. He jumped up to look around the parking lot. The industrial building in front of him was empty. The January sky, pitch black.

  Frank rubbed his eyes and waited, trying to decipher what he’d just heard.

  “Seventeen cars be advised the resident is reporting a black male inside of her house. Unknown weapons at this time.”

  Frank threw the car into drive and stepped on the gas, dropping axle onto asphalt as he bottomed out speeding onto the roadway. He floored it through an intersection and took the turn without using the brakes.

  He switched on the lights, reflecting red and blue off stop signs that he ignored, making one car pull so hard to the right that it blew out a tire on the curb. It had been swerving anyway, he thought. “Drunk,” Frank said. “Serves you right.”

  He killed the lights and then the headlights, coasting into the neighborhood toward the caller’s address. He parked a half block from the house and swirled water around his mouth to clear out the taste of old coffee and sleep. He spat on the asphalt and hurried up the sidewalk, seeing Sgt. Joe Hector walking out of the home.

  Heck looked back at the front door as he pointed around the side of the house and said, “He went that way?”

  A middle-aged woman clutched her robe to her neck and said, “He ran out the back and kept going. I saw him in my bedroom. He was going to rape me!”

  Frank’s eyebrows raised. “This a sexual assault, Heck?”

  “No,” Heck said quietly. “She woke up and saw a black guy in her doorway. When she yelled, he took off running.”

  “He was going to rape me, oh my God!” the woman wailed.

  “Hey, calm down, okay?” Frank said. “Go back inside your house and lock the door. We’ll come back.”

  Heck poked his head around the corner of the house, looking into the darkness. Her backyard opened up into a small wooded area that separated two neighborhoods. One cul-de-sac backed up against another. “I don’t see any motion lights going off down there.”

  “We sure this guy’s even real? Any chance she had a bad dream?”

  “Only one way to find out.” Heck pulled out his flashlight and headed across the berm. He stayed low to the ground, walking silently across the grass, sensing where the branches and leaves laid as he stepped. “You go that way and I’ll check over here.”

  Motion lights burst to life the moment they descended, flooding them and the area with pale light. “So much for the stealth approach,” Frank muttered.

  A kitchen light flipped on inside the house closest to Frank and a homeowner came out, tying his bathrobe around his waist. “What’s going on?”

  “Go back in your house,” Frank said. “We’re looking for someone.”

  “What did he say?” a woman said from inside the kitchen

  “He said they’re looking for someone.”

  Frank heard the screen door open again and the woman followed the man outside, both of them falling in behind Frank. “What did he do?” the man said.

  “Would you please shut the fuck up and go back inside your fucking house so I can find this person? Ple
ase!”

  “This… this is my property,” the man sputtered.

  “Good. Fine. Stay there, for all I care,” Frank said. He checked under the car in the driveway and kept going. There were a dozen more parked along the street. He stood up on his toes to see where Heck had gone. There was a figure keeping to the shadows, coming toward him. Walking with his head low. Weaving on and off the sidewalk to avoid being seen in the street lights.

  “Heck? Is that you?” Frank could see his breath in front of his face when he spoke.

  No answer.

  Frank aimed his flashlight straight at him, lighting up the dark brown face of the young man coming toward him. The kid squinted in the harsh light, still keeping his hands inside his jacket pockets. “Don’t move!” Frank shouted. He wrenched his gun out of its holster and leveled the weapon at the center of the kid’s chest. “I swear to Christ don’t you move!”

  “I live around the corner,” he said.

  Heck came running out of a backyard from across the street. He leapt over a small fence, shouting, “You got him? You got him?”

  “I got him!” Frank shouted.

  “I was just coming down to see what was going on,” the kid said.

  “Show me your hands!” Frank shouted again.

  The kid didn’t move.

  Heck snatched the kid by the collar and yanked him forward, trying to throw him face first to the ground. The kid wrenched backwards and broke free, yelling, “Don’t touch me, man. Get the fuck off me!”

  Heck grabbed him again, going for the kid’s jacket, putting himself in Frank’s line of fire as the two of them struggled. Both of them yelling. Heck screaming for the kid to get down on the ground. The kid screaming at Heck that he didn’t do anything.

  Frank ran forward to join the fight when he heard a loud pop and saw a small puff of air escape from the back of Heck’s left armpit.

  The smoke twisted in the air as it climbed toward the streetlights above, toward the dark, starless sky and dissolved into nothingness. Heck’s shoes scraped the pavement as he staggered backwards and collapsed.

  The kid had a small silver revolver with duct tape wrapped around the handle. A junk weapon. The kind that might blow up in your hand if you fired it. Suddenly, the revolver barked and Frank felt something smash into his knee like a baseball bat.

  Joe Hector was sprawled out on the concrete, face contorted in agony as he coughed up clots of black blood. Frank felt himself tipping over, going down on his left side as though someone had kicked his leg out from under him. As he fell his gun came up, and whether it was by accident or some deeply ingrained instinct driven into him since the Academy, he could never say, but Frank fired. He fired and the kid’s hand came up to clutch his neck, screaming as blood spurted between his long, thin fingers.

  Life drained out of that young face as he sank to his knees, staring at Frank in disbelief. Tears spilled down his cheeks even as his eyes lost their light and he slumped forward, striking his head against the concrete.

  Frank struggled to prop himself up, to see the twenty feet of dark distance between him and the two figures laying on the ground. He couldn’t see the suspect. Heck was face down on the pavement groaning, “Help me, man. I’m dying, Frank. I’m fucking dying.”

  Frank tried to get up but his leg wouldn’t work. He dug his elbow into the hard sidewalk and dragged himself forward like a mountaineer scaling a mountain with an ice axe.

  Heck’s sobs filled the night air, “Fuck, oh fuck, I’m dying. I yelled at Andi before I left because the house was a mess and this fucking asshole shot me and, and—” He started coughing again, choking on his own blood.

  “You’re not going to die!” Frank shouted, dragging himself frantically forward, trying to keep his gun up. Trying to get eyes on the kid. Trying to ignore the thousand shards of glass inside his leg.

  “Help me. Please!”

  “Is he dead?” Frank hollered.

  Heck gagged on blood as he turned his head to look back at the body lying next to him. “Aw, Christ. He’s just a kid,” Heck whimpered. “Just a fucking kid.”

  “He still has a gun! Heck! Is the suspect dead?”

  He finally reached Heck and leaned over him to see the kid’s empty hands and the puddle of blood spilling off the sidewalk, into the gutters. He looked down at Joe Hector and shouted his name. There was no response.

  * * *

  Nine hours before the shootings, Detective Vic Ajax stood in the station parking lot, stuffing his hands into his army coat’s pockets, trying to keep warm. Headlights appeared at the end of the driveway and he sighed with relief. The girl looked like she was sixteen years old with her blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail. She parked her beat up unmarked next to where he was standing and got out, adjusting the tank top under her heavy winter coat. Vic looked at the ground as she shifted her boobs around to reach inside her bra and withdraw the heroin. Maybe a brief look, he thought. Just to maintain the chain of custody.

  “How did I beat you back here?” he said. “You were in front of me.”

  Aprille Macariah dropped the bundled wax baggies into the palm of his hand and shrugged. “I got stuck in traffic.”

  “How did it go?”

  “Fine. I still can’t tie him to the house, though. He’s real cautious about the wife and kid.”

  “Damn.”

  She smiled and reached back inside of her bra, sticking her hand inside the cup covering her left breast. “Billy did give me a present though.” She produced a small bag of white powder, the size and shape of a gumball, and said, “Here’s a free eightball for my troubles. Our boy’s moving cocaine now too.”

  Vic took the baggie from her and felt it with his fingers. “It’s warm. You must have hot boobs.”

  She cupped her breasts in her hands and said, “I might as well enjoy them now before they go away. At least I know the next time I get pregnant I’ll have an awesome rack.”

  Vic smiled slightly at the comment and nodded but did not speak.

  “What? Am I supposed to mope about that shit forever? Let’s go,” she said. “I’m freezing.”

  Sergeant Joseph Hector was sitting in the roll room drinking a cup of coffee as Aprille walked into the station. He did not look up. “Hi Sarge,” she said.

  Heck’s only acknowledgement was a grunt as he continued staring at the newspaper. Aprille clicked her tongue and turned to head down the stairs toward the detective’s office. She passed Vic and said, “I’m moving up in the world. At least they grunt at me now.”

  Vic stuck his head into the roll room, “You can’t say hi to a fellow officer?”

  “As far as I know, she does not exist,” Heck said. “The Chief of Police told all of us directly that we are not allowed to discuss the existence of a female officer in this police department, period. Even among ourselves.”

  Vic rolled his eyes, “That’s asinine. You know she’s a cop here.”

  “All I know is a blonde chick with big jugs spends a lot of time with you down in your office. You hitting that?”

  “Nope.”

  “Liar.”

  “I’m being serious.”

  “Gay?”

  “I’m married with two kids, Heck.”

  “Doesn’t mean shit. My cousin was married to a guy, they had a kid and everything. He turned out to be a fag.”

  “All I see is a fellow officer,” Vic said.

  Heck picked up his paper and said, “Well since I’m not allowed to acknowledge the existence of a female officer, I can openly refer to her as the blonde with big jugs. You seen my patrolman anywhere around?”

  “Nobody was in the parking lot. Just you and Frank tonight?”

  Heck nodded and tapped a piece of paper, “Got an important new memorandum from Staff Sergeant Erinnyes. Patrol is hereby ordered and directed to increase traffic enforcement between the hours of four and six AM. This is his big push for Chief, Vic. Numbers go up and he can run and tell the Township how he’s increas
ing productivity and revenue. You mark my words.”

  “Never happen,” Vic said.

  “You better pray it never happens. If he makes Chief you’ll be pushing a black and white faster than shit runs through me after a cup of coffee.”

  “I meant him running anywhere would never happen. More like a wheezing jog.” Vic smiled and patted the drugs in his pocket, saying, “I’ve gotta lock this stuff up and get going. Be safe tonight, Sarge.”

  “Unless some half-asleep asshole runs me over trying to get to work tomorrow morning, I should be just fine,” Heck said.

  Vic went down to his office just as Aprille was shutting the door. She turned suddenly and gave a start as he came around the corner. “Christ, you scared me,” she said.

  “You leaving?”

  She nodded quickly and braced against the hallway wall to let him past. “I’m still having some issues from the miscarriage. Not feeling well at all.”

  He looked her over and frowned, “You look tired and sweaty. You all right?”

  She clutched her stomach and said, “No. I’m gonna go. Take care.”

  “You need to stop hanging out with junkies all the time, you’re starting to look like one of them,” he called out as she hurried down the hall. He pulled out his keys and let himself into the office, tossing the bundle of heroin and eightball of cocaine onto his desk as he sat down. It was five minutes past seven. Overtime was paid in half hour increments only. If he left before seven thirty, it was working for free. His phone rang. He opened it and said, “Hey, hon. I’m almost finished, I swear.”

  “You said you’d be home on time tonight, Vic,” Danni said.

  “It’s not my fault the drug dealer was late to the meet. You know how these guys are.”

  “I had dinner ready at five.”

  “Good, because I’m starving,” he said.

  She sighed and said, “I’ll put it in the refrigerator for you. When will you be home?”