LITMIR.BIZ

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I know you went through the academy ten years after I did, but they had to still be preaching it. ‘Is today the day that changes the rest of your life?’” He glanced back across the two blocks to the monstrous crack dealer, with a neck like a spare tire, in front of the hotel. When he was sure no one had moved, Stallings turned his attention back to Patty. “It’s a way to stay focused on the job. I’ve said it before every assignment, and it keeps me alert.”

      Patty said, “What if I don’t want a change today? What if, and I know this sounds crazy to you, we call for backup before we tangle with a drug dealer who looks like a brown Incredible Hulk in a cheap vinyl jacket?”

      Stallings let out a quick laugh. Patty was a great partner: smart, tough, and knew when to crack a joke or two. It had been hard to be around him the past few years, but she never complained or let him down. He hoped he could return the favor. But right now he was on a mission. Keeping his eyes on the mountain of dark flesh and the young lookout at the base of the stairs, Stallings untucked his shirt to cover his Glock and gold badge clipped on his belt.

      Patty flipped over the cover of the battered gray metal notebook case she carried everywhere that stored all aspects of their work and her life, including her schedule, to-do lists, her family’s birthdays, and a complete schedule of the University of Florida’s sports teams games. She slid out a small photograph of a fourteen-year-old girl with bright orange hair holding a small black dog.

      Stallings glanced at the photo. “I saw her picture before. If there’s a girl in that room she’s coming with us. I don’t care who she is.”

      “And if there’s a man with her? We got no PC or warrant. Just a shaky tip.”

      “Jail is the least of that creep’s concerns if he’s in a hotel with an underaged girl.” He looked down the empty street again. They’d have to walk down there, because the Impala the county issued him was too obvious. “Can you handle the guy by the stairs?”

      Patty gave him a sly smile. “No sweat.”

      Stallings never had to worry about Patty having his back. She could kick just about anyone’s ass and moved like a leopard in a fight. Her looks sometimes lulled men into thinking she wasn’t a threat. They were always wrong. He gave no more thought to the smaller thug by the stairs.

      He was about to start walking when he saw someone at the base of the stairs of the little hotel. Stallings paused, then slowly ducked back into his car and retrieved a small set of Bushnell binoculars with the logo for the Ponte Vedra Inn and Club on the side. He surveyed the area under slightly more magnification and then said, “Shit, hold on.”

      “What is it?” Patty held a closed ASP expandable baton in her small hand.

      “A family is gettin’ ready for a trip to the pool. Looks like an Asian family with three little kids.” He checked again and saw one small girl holding a bright pink plastic tube as her mother bent to adjust her tiny suit.

      “Who’d go swimming in this weather?”

      “Let’s wait a minute. I don’t want to ruin these kids’ vacation if this is the only place their parents could afford.”

      Finally, after several minutes of waiting, the little troupe moved down the walkway toward the pool at the rear of the building, and Stallings watched as Patty slipped down onto the beach across the street to approach from another direction.

      Stallings crossed the two-lane road and then started strolling toward the hotel and the giant sentry out front. He didn’t hurry; that way Patty had time to set up. He also didn’t want this monster to have any reason to suspect that Five-0 was in the area. This wasn’t downtown; he probably expected a more polite police force. That assumption would be shattered in the next minute.

      Stallings wasn’t cocky. He knew he could be the one on the wrong end of a fist or a cheap pistol, but he had surprise on his side. He focused on the academy mantra: “Is this the day that changes my life?” It really was something he’d said his whole career. The hell of it was now he really did need a change. He needed a miracle to get back all he had lost.

      There were cops he knew who were quick to mix it up with a suspect. They liked the thrill and violence. Violence accomplished a goal, whether it was an arrest or a lesson; physical aggression was just another tool in a good cop’s bag of tricks. If you took it too far you had to be prepared to explain yourself. He could admit, at least to himself, that he enjoyed confrontation with the right thug. Bullies, pimps, and predators often didn’t understand anything but a good thumping. And sometimes he didn’t know how to deal with them except with a good thumping.

      A Ping-Pong ball bounced around inside his stomach as he got closer to the hotel. He drifted to the inside of the sidewalk so the bulky dealer wouldn’t see him until he was at the next building. His heart picked up a few beats as he nudged his pistol under his shirt and hoped he didn’t have to use it. Through this entire ritual of checking his gear and his attitude he didn’t lose sight of the mission: save the girl. He knew if he could grab her before anything serious happened up in the room, he might not have to look for her as a runaway later. That was the key, identifying a problem early and acting. He only wished he’d been that smart for his own daughter’s sake.

      Now he was near the hotel and visible. A small smile crept across his face when he saw Patty step up next to the skinny lookout near the stairs. The dumbass didn’t even know she was behind him. Patty was letting him focus totally on the giant man leaning on the battered and rusting chain-link fence. He was younger than Stallings, maybe thirty-five, and taller by at least five inches. The monster had to go six-five and over two-fifty without as much fat as Stallings had originally thought.

      Stallings gave him a casual nod as he came closer but kept looking down the street like his destination was another cheap-ass hotel or maybe one of the ancient, beat-up condos that mostly housed aging snow-birds. That little maneuver allowed him to walk right past the man without telegraphing his intentions. Just in front of the giant man, he spun and threw an elbow under a prominent chin, then a knee into the side of his leg. The man crumpled as Stallings’s knee connected with the common peroneal nerve.

      Stallings turned toward the stairway as the surprised lookout stood, prepared to rocket up the stairs and sound the alarm. Instead, Patty popped open her ASP with a flick of her wrist and tripped him as he started to take flight. She had a size-six Rockport boot on his chest before he knew what had happened. The twenty-eight-year-old detective looked like a big game hunter posing with an unfortunate antelope.

      Stallings wasted no time with his man on the street, thumping his head against a metal fence post, then reaching to his waistband to retrieve a Taurus nine-millimeter from the dazed man.

      The dealer gasped, “I ain’t holding. You got nothing on me.”

      “I got this gun, you dumb shit.” He tucked the cheap pistol in his belt, then shook the man by the collar to make sure he had his full attention. “This is just a warning. Leave this hotel alone and head back over to Phoenix Avenue or this shit will happen to you every fucking day.” He wrapped his hand in the front of the crack dealer’s shirt and jerked the man’s face up to him. “Are we clear?”

      The crack dealer’s shiny head bobbed as he caught his breath and tried to regain some composure. The thug may have weighed more than 250 pounds, but right now he was looking up into blue eyes that conveyed the threat of violent injury better than any pistol ever made by Smith & Wesson.

      Patty led the other young man over, tugging him by his ear, then thrusting him into his cohort. She said to them both, “Give up your cell phones.” Her voice left no room for argument.

      “What?” asked the skinny lookout.

      She snapped her fingers. “Phones, hotshot. Then you can scurry off.” She paused and added, “If you behave.” She took the BlackBerries from the men, then casually dropped them onto the asphalt and crushed them under the heel of her boot.

      There was no protest.

      A few minutes later, Stallings and Patty were on the stairs

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