Blood of Others by Rick Mofina Read Free Book Online Page B

keyboard clicked. She
bypassed Caselli’s Web site, which was her homepage. She didn’t mind doing some
work at home for Mrs. Caselli during the busy periods. Now it was all coming
back to her. Olivia thought maybe the chat sites would teach her how to play
the field, how to talk to guys from a safe distance, a place to prepare herself
to pursue dating. Let’s see. She had been very careful not to offer her
real name or specific personal details. Playing on Olivia, she chose liv and came up with the name livinsf, for Liv in San Francisco. She felt
comfortable with that. Her computer whirred and one of the sites popped up on
her monitor. A few keystrokes and she found her introductory bio.
    Thirty-something. SWF. Retail
manager. Hopelessly shy, a good listener. livinsf.
    Olivia’s slot showed she had a
few new responses, unread since the last time she visited this site. Nothing
special, a few welcomes, a few descriptions of bad dates, boyfriends who were
jerks, men complaining about women. Olivia went to another site, where someone
-- a woman -- took the time to advise livinsf not to be shy. To get out and
meet real people. Another site member chimed in with lists on how to meet men.
One member actually had wondered where livinsf had gone.
    After a long, thoughtful walk,
I’m back, Olivia typed, then reached for her teacup. It needed refilling,
so she went to the kitchen. By the time she returned, she had received a new
response.
    What exactly do you look for
in a man?

NINE

     
    Ominous rock music hammered in the hallway of
the inner-city apartment building. Garbage was strewn on the floor, obscene
graffiti violated the punctured walls, screaming along the scar-like crack that
led to the shouting coming from unit 832, where San Francisco Police Inspector
Ben Wyatt had business. He was about fifteen yards away when the door burst
open, ejecting a woman in her twenties, torn dress, bloodied face, sobbing,
running to him.
    “He’s going to kill me! Please
help me! He’s going to kill me!”
    A large male appeared at the
darkened doorway. “Come back here!” Stained sleeveless T-shirt, rope-like veins
in muscular tattooed arms, one rising, outstretched hand holding a handgun
aimed at the woman.
    Wyatt had no time. “Police
officer! Put your weapon down!” The man, his face contorting into a malevolent
mask, yelling: “Woman, you are going to die!” Wyatt’s eardrums throbbing,
music, shouting, stress, he sidestepped, crouched, feeling the smooth trigger,
training his .40-caliber Beretta on the suspect. “Police. Drop it!” The man
refused.
    Wyatt squeezing one, two, three,
times. The suspect went down. In four point two seconds, Wyatt had saved one
life and taken another. He lowered his gun. Exhaled. Each time he killed a
suspect now, his pulse rate peaked a little lower than it used to. He had lost
track of the number of dead now.
    “You made the proper decision,
Ben.” Sergeant Elmer Gruzzio , a firearms instructor at
the SFPD Academy, checked the cable attached to Wyatt’s Beretta, the C02 tank,
and the line connecting it to the air pack attached to Wyatt’s belt. Gruzzio
replayed the “deadly domestic” scenario on the full screen, both men studying
the three dots in a tight cluster grouping over the suspect’s left upper chest.
All three dots were green. “All mortal,” Gruzzio said. “Want to go again?”
    One night a month for over a
year, Wyatt had arrived at Diamond Heights Park after regular classes ended to
take a private session on F.A.T.S., the SFPD’s Firearms Training System. It is
a computerized laser shooting simulator, a high-tech tool used to sharpen the
stressful mental process any cop can face in a heartbeat. It confronts them
with realistic “shoot, don’t shoot” scenarios allowing a split second to make a
life or death decision.
    Then you drop into hell, Wyatt thought. Where’s the scenario for that?
    Since Wyatt’s ex-partner Reggie Pope
had gotten shot, Gruzzio was the