Superbia (Book One of the Superbia Series) (6 page)

***

An hour later,
Frank untied a small white kitchen trash bag in the station’s parking garage and
recoiled.
 
“Oh my God, I’m gonna puke.”

“If you puke on
my evidence, I will kick you in the knee,” Vic said.
 
“Put your gloves on and don’t breathe in when
you open the bag.”

“There cannot
possibly be anything we need in here.
 
It’s full of…ulk…dirty diapers…
 
I’m gonna yak.”

Vic grabbed him
by the arm and pulled him back.
 
“Hey,
calm down.
 
We’ll take the bag out into
the fresh air.
 
Listen, you’re going to
smell things a whole lot worse than this if you stay in detectives.
 
Trust me.”

Frank wiped his
face on his shirt sleeve and groaned.
 
“What the hell are we doing this for anyway?”

Vic slid his
hands into leather gloves, then pulled a pair of latex gloves over the top of
them.
 
“I can touch anything in the world
if I’m set up like this, okay?”
 
He
picked up the trash bag and took it outside, making sure to set it down beneath
the overhead light.
 
He pulled out a
knife from his pocket and flicked it open with one hand, then slit the bag
lengthwise.
 
“Bring another bag over here
and hold it open.”

Frank put on his
gloves the same way that Vic had and held the bag open, keeping his face as far
from the bag as possible.
 
Vic reached
into the first trash bag and pulled out a rolled up diaper that was leaking
brown fluid onto the asphalt.
 

“Nobody in their
right mind would open this.
 
Drug dealers
count on that.”
 
Vic peeled off the
sticky tape holding the diaper together and unrolled it.
 
“Oh boy.
 
What did they feed this kid.
 
That’s disgusting.”

Frank looked down
and gagged.
 
“Hurry up, roll it back up
and put it in here.”

Vic dropped the
diaper in and reached back for another.
 
“Only four more to go.”

Frank buried his
face into his bicep and tried crushing his nostrils against the fabric.
 
His eyes watered from the fumes and odor of
liquid feces.
 
The sticky side of the
tape got caught on Vic’s rubber glove and he struggled to get it open without
spilling the contents of the diaper onto the two of them.
 
He slowly unrolled the diaper and said,
“There.
 
You see that?”

Frank opened one
eye and looked sideways down at the diaper without moving his face away from
his arm.
 
“What is that?”
 

“It’s a plastic
bag.”
 
Vic laid the diaper down and
spread it out on the ground.
 
He picked
up a stick and poked the brown liquid inside, using the tip of the stick to
hoist a glassine sandwich bag out of the soup.
 
“Here, take a look at this.”
 

Frank pinched his
nose and squatted down beside him.
 

“This is a source
bag,” Vic said.
 
“It’s the one the
cocaine comes in.
 
If you look close, you
can still see chunks of it at the bottom.”

“The only chunks
I see are baby corn shit.”

Vic squeezed the
bag flat between his gloved fingers to show him the miniscule pieces settled at
the bottom of the bag.
 
“This is big
enough for an ounce of raw coke.
 
The
dealer probably stepped on it enough to turn that into two or maybe two and a
half.”

“What does
stepping on it do, squish it?”

Vic turned to
look at him.
 
“Are you serious?
 
Didn’t you ever watch
The Wire
?”

Frank
shrugged.
 
“I don’t watch TV.”
 

“It’s the single
greatest cop show since
Homicide
or
NYPD Blue
.”

“Never saw them
either.”

Vic flinched and
said, “How the hell can you be a cop and not have watched them?
 
It’s basic training.”

“What do they
have to do with what I do out here?”

Vic shook the bag
and said, “Maybe if you watched them, you’d know what this…” he stopped
speaking and his voice turned into a small squeak in his throat.
 
His eyes widened in horror.
   
   

“What?” Frank
said.
 

“Dude, don’t
move.”

“Why?”

“It’s
nothing.
 
Just don’t move.”
 
Vic set the bag down and said, “I’ll be RIGHT
back.
 
Just stay there.”

Frank grabbed him
by the arm, “Tell me what’s happening!”

“Get your hand
off my shirt!
 
You were just digging
through trash!”
 
  

“Tell me and I’ll
let go.”

Vic lowered his
voice and said, “You have a small, teeny, tiny piece of baby poop on your
cheek.
 
Real close to your lip.
 
For the love of God, don’t move.
 
I’ll get a towel and we’ll wipe it off.”

Frank’s eyes
widened and his jaw quivered slightly.
 
The quiver turned into a full blown spasm as he leapt to his feet and
screamed, “You son of a bitch!
 
You got
shit on me!”
 
Frank grabbed the wet
diaper off of the ground with his hand and cocked it over his shoulder like a
football.
 
 

“It was an
accident!” Vic shouted as he jumped back and threw his hands over his
face.
 
“Hey!
 
Hey!
 
That diaper is evidence!
 
Do not throw it, Frank.
 
It has evidence and I am giving you a direct
order to put it down.”

“You are
so
dead,” Frank hissed.

“Put it down,
Frank.
 
Let’s both calm down.”

“That is easy for
the guy with no shit on his face to say!”

“The more you
talk the closer that shit gets to falling right into your…oh Jesus.
 
Where did it go?”

“What?” Frank
said.
 

“I don’t see it
anymore.
 
Christ…I think with all your
moving and yelling it might have…we’d better get you inside.”

“In my mouth?”
Frank shrieked.
 
He dropped the diaper
and stuck his tongue out and wagged it like a dog, spitting everywhere.
 

Vic watched Frank
take off running around the parking lot, screaming.
 
“Frank?
 
You okay buddy?”

Frank bent over
and clutched his stomach, ready to dump its contents.
 
“Get the hell away from me!”
  

“Ok,” Vic said,
patting him on the back.
 
“Just let it
out.
 
There you go.
 
That’s better, buddy.
 
That’s right.”

***

He found Frank
leaning against his car a half hour later, not looking up when Vic put a
six-pack of Budweiser on the hood of the car.
 
Vic cracked open the first can and handed it to Frank.
 
“Here.
 
Alcohol kills infections.”

Frank took the
can and emptied it in one long drink.
 
He
smirked and said, “Thanks.
 
Where’d you
get this, out of evidence?”

Vic took a long
sip and said, “Yeah.”
  

Frank spit the
beer straight out of his mouth and shouted, “We can’t drink evidence.
 
What the hell else are you going to do to me
tonight?”

“Relax,” Vic
said.
 
He opened a can and leaned back
against the car.
 
“This is from some
underage drinking party and they already went to court.
 
It’s marked for destruction.
 
They don’t say
how
to destroy it.”

Frank took
another can and opened it.
 
“Working with
you really sucks.”

“I know,” Vic
said.
 
“Hey, tell me again what you said
about needing the Staff Sergeant’s permission to use an unmarked car?”

“He said if I
need it, I have to contact him directly and request his permission.
 
I’m not allowed to ask anyone under
him.”
  
 

“That’s what I
thought,” Vic said.
 
He reached into his
pocket and pulled out his cellphone.
 
He
started scrolling through his phone.
 
“Let’s see…what the hell did I put him under.
 
It’s not under ‘Erinnyes.’
 
Not under ‘Staff Infection.’ Where could it
be?”

“What are you
doing?” Frank said.
 
“It’s four thirty in
the morning.”

“Ah.
 
Here it is.
 
Under
Festering Sore
.”
 
He pressed a button and held the phone to his
ear.
 

“Hang up, you
crazy prick!”

Vic covered the
mouthpiece and said, “Shut up!”
 
He held
up his finger and spoke into the phone, “Hello?
 
Mrs. Erinnyes?
 
Did I wake you?
 
Yes, ma’am.
 
Did I wake you?
 
Oh dear.
 
Is the Staff Sergeant home?
 
May I speak with him?”

“Thanks a whole
freaking lot, Vic.
 
I’m going to be
handing out parking tickets for the rest of my career now!” Frank said.
 

“Staff Sergeant Erinnyes?
 
Good morning, sir.
 
I need Frank to use the unmarked car for a
trash pull, but he said he needs your permission first.
 
So is that all right with you?”
 
Vic nodded and said, “Uh huh, uh huh,”
several times.
 
“Well, will they be using
it for traffic enforcement at four thirty in the morning, sir?”

Vic ended the
phone call and chuckled as he put the phone away.
 
“He said you can use it, Frank.
 
Where you going?
 
What?
 
You
mad bro?”

5.
 
The next morning Frank limped into the office,
squinting at the harsh fluorescent lights.
 
Vic was sitting at his desk, dressed in the same clothes from the night
before.
 
Frank limped in, smelling baby
shit.
 
“This place stinks.”

“Don’t look at
me, you’re the one who ate babyshit,” Vic said.
 
“You ready to get to work?
 
We’ve
got a busy day ahead of us.”

“Didn’t you go
home yet?”

“Nope.
 
I stayed here and typed up the search
warrant.
 
Of course, my eyes started
crossing halfway through it and I’m pretty sure I was asleep when I typed the
last page.
 
I need you to look it over before
I give it to the judge.”

Frank took the
papers from him and sat down at his desk.
 
He heard a pair of shoes squeaking by the staircase, the ominous sound
of a hippopotamus laboring onto the land in search of more food.
 
“I think Staff Infection is coming.”

“Shit!”
 
Vic stuck his head under his desk and started
searching for something.
 
“Where the hell
did I put it?”
 
He scanned the room,
spying a large laminated poster facing the wall behind Frank.
 
“There!
 
Hang that on the hook behind you.
 
Hurry!”

Frank picked up
the poster, glanced at it and said, “What the hell?
 
Dude, what’s this?”

“Just hang it up,”
Vic whispered.
 

The squeaking and
breathing and grunting was close enough that Frank barely had time to drop the
poster on the hook and get back into his seat before the bulky frame of Staff
Sergeant Erinnyes appeared in the doorway.
 
“Good morning, gentlemen,” Erinnyes said.
 
He glanced at the poster and winced, “Why in
God’s name do you still have that on your wall?”

“It’s evidence,
sir.”

“I don’t
care!
 
Why do you need a laminated
photograph of a humongous black penis hanging up in the detective’s office?”

“That penis broke
the Jeffries case,” Vic said.
 
“It was
found on the suspect’s phone, clearly linking him to the crime.
 
When I show the judge that photograph, it’s a
sure victory.”

Erinnyes grimaced
at the photograph and shifted away from it, trying not to look.
 
“I still don’t see why it needs to be on
display.”

“It’s an
important evidentiary court display.
 
Do
you know how much money we paid to have that laminated?
 
I can’t risk losing it.
 
The wall is the only safe place for it.”

“I don’t want to
look at it,” Erinnyes said.
 
“I’ll talk
to the two of you about last night later.”

Vic frowned and
said, “We’ll stop up and see you after we get finished all our work today.”