the paucity of responses from the scout cars to the dispatcher’s calls. She picked up the radio.
“Cruiser One rolling in Five D. Cruiser One rolling Five D. Chief out.”
Within seconds the chatter picked up and at least five scout cars were responding to each dispatch. Her driver glanced at her.
“Pays off working your way up from the pavement, Chief.”
“You think?” she answered absently. Beth punched in the number. The ME answered on the second ring.
“How long?” she said.
Cassell said, “Beth, you asked me that not ten minutes ago. If it had been before the new lab opened, I’d say two to four weeks. We had to send it out back then.”
“But not now. Now you have that fancy lab with all those fancy machines.”
“We went back over the chain of custody on the sample found in the deceased and confirmed there was no tampering or alteration. We received the sample from Dockery.” He paused and Beth could almost see his grin across the phone line. “You haven’t used the coffee ploy in a while.”
“I’m getting more impatient in my old age.”
“It’s not that easy pulling DNA off a sperm sample. The sperm heads are hard.”
“As hard as the heads of the guys shooting them into women who don’t want them to.”
Cassell continued, “Then there is the amplification of the DNA and instrumentation. Next comes interpretation of the results. That’s where mistakes are made. I don’t want to blow up your case because of an error.”
“You won’t make a mistake, Doc, you’re too good.”
“Everyone’s human. Normally, the protocols I just described take a full week.”
“On TV the forensics team does it every episode in like ten minutes.”
“Don’t get me started on that.”
“So give me the bottom line time-wise.”
“I’ve put all other work aside and you’ll have it by tomorrow. The next day tops.”
“I’ll take it tomorrow, thanks, Doc.”
She clicked off and leaned back in her seat. A moment later they passed a corner that she instantly recognized. She’d been a rookie beat cop riding solo for only two weeks when a bandit had come tearing out of an alley with a TEC-9 and opened fire at a group of people in front of a shoe shop. To this day no one knew why.
Instantly, Beth had gotten her cruiser between the bandit and the crowd. Using her engine block as cover she’d pulled her sidearm and given him two taps in the head. She hadn’t bothered with a torso shot because she’d spotted the edges of body armor poking out of his shirt. It wasn’t until thirty seconds later, after she’d run over and confirmed the kill, that she discovered that the last TEC-9 round had killed a ten-year-old boy who’d been holding tight to a box containing his new pair of basketball shoes.
The other eight people in the crowd, including the boy’s mother, had been saved by Beth’s swift actions. The city hailed her as a hero. Yet she went home that night and cried until the sun rose. She was the only one who knew the truth. She had hesitated before firing. To this day she didn’t really know why. Civilians could never understand what went through a cop’s mind before they pulled the trigger.
Am I going to die today? Will I be sued? Will I lose my job? Can I get a clean shot off? Am I going to die today?
No more than two seconds went by before she’d ended the nightmare scenario. Yet it was enough time for the bandit to get off one last round. The killing round, as it turned out.
Her most vivid image was the box with the new shoes lying in a pool of ten-year-old blood. After calling in the ambulance she did everything she could to bring the little boy back. Tried to stanch the bleeding using her jacket. Breathed hard into his mouth. Pumped his small chest until her arms felt like they would fall off. But she knew he was dead. The eyes were flat, hard. The mother was screaming. Everything was happening in slow motion. Waiting for help to come; the paramedics pronouncing the boy dead; then the gauntlet of stars and bars, the captain, the district commander, and then, finally, the chief himself. It was the longest wait of her life, and all of it, from beginning to end, barely took ten minutes.
She still could feel the heavy, comforting hand of the chief on her trembling shoulder. He said all the right things and yet all Beth could see