BULLETS by Elijah Drive Read Free Book Online Page B

All I have to do is step outside, use my lawyer’s cell to trace it and find out EXACTLY where my phone is. I could do that, you know. I could stand out there with your ADA and PROVE to her, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that you’re a lying scumbag, I could.”
    Brower swallowed, but held his gaze steady. Slick grabbed the rest of his items.
    “But I’m not going to do that,” Slick said. “I’m not. Keep the phone, I don’t need it. And I want you to think about that right up until my trial. Let’s go, Melvin.”
    Slick walked out, lawyer in tow.

7
    “H old on,” Camilla said as she caught up with them outside the station. Slick and Melvin waited for her on the steps. Slick blinked in the sun.
    “Ms. Leon, we’ve answered all your questions, and my client—” Melvin began.
    “Cool your jets, counselor, this is off the record.”
    “It’s okay, Melvin, I got this. What do you want to know, counselor?”
    “If you can prove they’re lying about taking your phone, Mr. Elder, then why don’t you? Why let them keep it?”
    “Call me Jon.”
    “Mr. Elder—”
    “Jon.”
    “Okay, Jon. Can you really GPS your phone and prove it’s inside?”
    “Absolutely.”
    “So do it. Right here, right now. Do it and let me go in and wipe that big shit-eating grin off of Brower’s face.”
    “First of all, that phone is at this moment probably fast on its way out the back door of the station and into an incinerator. But really, that’s not the question you should really be asking. The question you should be asking is the same one Brower asked. Why would he take the phone?”
    She thought about that. Nodded.
    “You recorded your arrest. That’s why you wanted them to take the stand and testify under oath. You have it recorded. And when they heard you say you wanted them to perjure themselves in interrogation, they figured it out and yanked the phone.”
    Big Slick just smiled at her, but said nothing more.
    “Or maybe that’s only what you want them to think. You could be playing them, too. And me. If you had it recorded, why let them keep it then? If it’s destroyed then there’s no evidence against them, it’s still your word against theirs. Why?”
    “Why indeed?”
    “Are you playing me?”
    “No more than anyone plays anybody else.”
    “Listen, no one has time for these games. This is taxpayer money, time and expense that could be used elsewhere—”
    “Then get a better sheriff and department. I didn’t ask to be arrested.”
    “He’s an elected official. I’m not and therefore have a responsibility to my office and the people who depend on it for fairness. I don’t like being played like this.”
    “Come on. You played me, to a certain extent, offering to drop the charges down to battery then to obstruction. That’s not playing? You know who these guys are, what they do. That makes you part of it.”
    “Don’t you fucking dare lump me in with them!”
    “Why shouldn’t I? You’re telling me you’ve never sent someone to jail who you knew was innocent on the word of those men in the station? You’re telling me that you’ve never seen people falsely arrested, falsely charged and sent to jail in the name of law and order?”
    Camilla didn’t speak at first, didn’t trust herself not to scream, but she was pissed. She took a deep breath, let it out, and then let him have it in measured tones that gained momentum until her words flamed at the end.
    “You know what they call me, here and in my office? Dubya Dee, which is short for Window Dressing. To my face. My boss doesn’t do anything, he’s a basically a decent man but to him I’m only a quota fulfillment, so he can point to me and say, ‘Hey, I love brown people, I even have a Hispanic on staff.’ I know he’s full of shit, show me a politician who isn’t and I’ll sign up for his or her staff immediately. I don’t have that option, I only have George and his good old boy network here in Bendijo.
    “They don’t let