Chapter 9: Moral Turpitude

Sergeant Justin Yamato stepped into the IAD bullpen at 0900 exactly, still sipping from a half-finished Starbucks Pike that had already gone cold. The coffee tasted like failure, but it was Monday—the start of another long week as the head headhunter—and he wasn’t in the mood for the department issue shit that was scooped out of the big red plastic jar.

Detectives Carrillo and Fischel were both at their desks, looking productive at a casual glance—plain slacks, tucked polo shirts, compact Glocks holstered to their belts, badges clipped in front of the guns. Their weapons and credentials could be concealed easily enough under jackets if they needed to go out, but no one was wearing one indoors. Their shoes were civilian issue: sensible, scuffed, comfortable. No one here wore boots unless they wanted to get mocked by the homicide guys for being overdramatic.

Neither detective was actually working.

Carrillo had a golf booking site pulled up on his monitor. Fischel was staring at a second screen that showed hotel rooms and Airbnb rentals for the central coast.

“I’m telling you,” Carrillo was saying as Yamato entered, “we can swing this. It’s steep, but we split the hotel, do one round at Casa de Oceano, maybe dinner at that Italian place in Avila Beach ... It’s not out of reach.”

“It’s definitely in reach,” Fischel said. “It’s just a matter of whether we feel like being grownups and saving the money, or cops and spending it anyway.”

Yamato set his coffee down and dropped into his chair. “As long as the reports get filed on time and nobody bitches about your overtime, I don’t give a shit where you swing your clubs and drop your balls.”

Carrillo smirked. “You ever seen the greens at Casa de Oceano?” he asked his boss. “It’s like a freshly groomed pussy on a hot woman. It even smells good.”

“I don’t golf,” Yamato said.

“What the fuck, Sarge?” Carrillo asked. “You’re a Jap. You people love golf. It’s the fuckin’ law.”

“I’m about as much a Jap as you are a beaner, Carrillo. My fuckin’ family has been here since 1912. My grandfather fought against the real Japs in WWII.”

“None of my family’s ever been to what we know today as Mexico,” Carrillo said. “We’re Tejanos. It’s a point of pride not to have ever been there. We are not Mexicans.”

“But do you consider yourself a beaner?” Yamato asked.

“Oh yeah, of course,” Carrillo said.

Fischel leaned back, arms folded. “So we’re doing it?”

Carrillo shrugged. “I’m in.”

A beat.

Then: “Are we talking wives or chippies here as our plus ones?”

Fischel thought it over for maybe a tenth of a second before replying. “Chippies. Definitely chippies. I want to get laid on the trip. No guarantee of that if I bring my old lady along.”

Carrillo snorted. “True. We just tell the wives it’s a two-day department-mandated police reform seminar and nobody asks questions. Our wives are used to that shit.”

Fischel raised his coffee like a toast. “To institutional trust.”

Yamato didn’t even look up. “And this is the department who received the POST ‘highest standards of professionalism’ last year?”

Carrillo grinned. “Who is being unprofessional, Sarge?”

Before Yamato could formulate a response that wouldn’t wind up on the captain’s desk, the phone on his desk buzzed—line one, internal extension.

He glanced at the caller ID: Reception Desk – IA/BGI/Metro

The all-purpose triage line. Sheila, the civilian secretary (she was the chippie of Pratt from Homicide currently) screened everything. If it was IAD, it came to him. Everything else got dumped into backgrounds or metro. So the fact that it was ringing his desk meant Sheila had decided it was another complaint.

He tapped the button. “Yamato.”

“Hey, Sarge,” came Sheila’s voice—dry as ever. “Got a call from a Judith Linden. She asked for you by name.”

He closed his eyes briefly. “Fuck me,” he said with a shake of the head.

“Not today,” Sheila said without missing a beat. “She says she’s got another misconduct report. Real serious this time. Moral turpitude on the part of one of our cops.”

Yamato exhaled. “Fine. Put her through.”

He leaned back in his chair and waited, already dreading the next five minutes.

The line clicked over.

“Internal Affairs, Sergeant Yamato speaking.”

There was a beat of silence, just long enough to register as performative.

Then Judith Linden’s voice came on—clipped, precise, and brimming with manufactured civility.

“Sergeant, thank you for taking my call. This is Judith Linden from Gardenville. Do you remember me?”

“I certainly do, Ms. Linden. How can I assist you today?”

“I would like to inform you of another case of moral turpitude with one of your deputies.”

“Is this regarding Scott Dover again?” Yamato asked, already pulling up his shitcan form on his computer.

“No,” she said. “It’s regarding his roommate, Maggie Winslow. But since you mentioned Scott Dover, can you give me an update on the status of his investigation?”

Yamato’s fingers hovered over his keyboard like he might take notes. He didn’t. Nor did he bother bringing up Dover’s file.

“The case was thoroughly reviewed,” he said, deploying his calm, neutral voice—the one he used for PTA moms, retired Navy guys, and people who spelled their names in all caps. “Ultimately, there is no department policy prohibiting off-duty, consensual adultery. So I was forced to close the case.”

There was a pause.

Then came the huff. A full-bodied, incredulous huff—like a woman who’d just been told that jaywalking was no longer considered a sin.

“You were forced to close it?” she repeated, voice rising slightly. “Even with my documentation? My logs? My spreadsheets? The community deserves better. The moral character of our officers—”

“I agree,” Yamato said, cutting in smoothly. “But unfortunately, thanks to current legal standards and departmental policy—” he paused just half a second, for effect “—which were put into place by the Biden administration, I had no discretion in the matter.”

Judith went silent.

For three seconds. Maybe four.

Then, as if a switch had been flipped, her tone changed.

“Well,” she said, calming. “That explains a lot.”

Yamato leaned back in his chair, expression unreadable.

“So ... you wanted to talk about Margaret Winslow?”

“Yes,” Judith said, her tone primed with urgency. “It’s come to my attention that she’s been—well, telling people that she’s a homosexual.”

Yamato blinked slowly.

“She’s announcing it,” Judith continued. “Like it’s something to be proud of. Not whispering it. Not keeping it to herself. Just ... saying it. In public. Around other parents. At school. To the children.”

“To the children,” Yamato repeated flatly.

“Yes,” Judith said. “And I wanted to let you know, in case you weren’t aware, that your department has a moral turpitude policy. I Googled it. It’s very clear. Acts that violate community standards of decency. And this qualifies. In our community, this behavior is unacceptable.”

Yamato leaned forward slightly, resting his elbow on the desk like he might actually be interested.

“I am aware of our department’s moral turpitude clause,” he said. “It’s been there since before I joined the agency. But I can assure you, Ms. Linden, that merely being a homosexual is not a violation of that clause.”

A long pause.

Judith sounded personally offended. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Because she’s telling people,” Judith repeated. “Like it’s normal.”

“Ms. Linden,” Yamato said patiently, “it’s 2025. In California. Not 1962 in, say, Salt Lake City.”

Judith huffed. “So you’re saying it’s allowed?”

“I’m saying that homosexuals are considered people now. They can vote. They can marry. They’re counted in the census. They can drive cars and file taxes and, yes, serve as law enforcement officers.”

“I just don’t think it’s appropriate,” Judith said. “She is allowed to just walk into a school zone, for heaven’s sake.”

“And as far as I know, she hasn’t assaulted any schools.”

Silence.

Then, slowly: “I don’t understand how someone like that even made it through your background investigation.”

Yamato sighed. “Once again, it is not 1962, Ms. Linden. We don’t disqualify people for being gay. Or left-handed. Or drinking oat milk.”

Another pause. A frustrated intake of breath on the other end.

“I thought Internal Affairs was supposed to protect the integrity of the department,” she said finally.

“It is,” Yamato said. “And part of that integrity means not treating our own employees like witches in a medieval fever dream.”

Judith didn’t respond to that. Which was fine. He didn’t need her to.

Yamato didn’t open a file. Didn’t take a note. Didn’t even click the “complaint” template.

This complaint did not even qualify as a shitcan.

The air had that crisp, dry bite that only showed up in the first few weeks of November—cool enough to make your breath puff, warm enough to skip a jacket if you walked fast. Maggie liked this kind of morning. Her blood always ran a little hotter than most, and the chill helped cut the edge from the long night shift she’d wrapped up just a few hours ago.

She walked Katie and Christopher up to the gate, same as always. Some moms did the drop-off from their idling SUVs, hair still up in sleep-buns, flannel pajama pants tucked into Crocs. Not Maggie. She parked, walked, showed up like a parent who gave a shit. Not for appearances—because the kids deserved at least that much.

Katie scampered ahead, backpack bouncing, waving goodbye without looking back. Christopher followed slower, more serious, watching the swirl of other kids like he was clocking suspects in a crowd. Maggie gave him a quick squeeze on the shoulder before he crossed the line.

“Be cool,” she told him.

“I’m always cool,” he said, then jogged to catch up with a friend.

Maggie turned to head back to her car, mind already shifting toward whether she had enough time for a nap before the afternoon chaos—

And there was Stacy.

Standing just off the sidewalk, hands tucked into the sleeves of a caramel-colored sweater, boots tight at the calf, hair pulled back into a braid that looked both effortless and intentional. She had a scarf—navy and cream, probably expensive—and black leggings that showed off just enough leg curve to draw the eye without trying. Cute. Very fall. She pushed a sleeping Mikul in his stroller.

Stacy smiled when she saw her. Not a fake smile. A real one. Warm. Immediate. Like she’d been waiting.

“Hey, Maggie,” she said. “How are you doing?”

Maggie smiled back without hesitation. She felt it all the way up her face, which was rare.

She liked seeing Stacy. Liked looking at her. Liked thinking about her. Her instincts, finely tuned from a lifetime of female bullshit and cop-level micro-expression analysis, were halfway to conviction. At minimum, Stacy was bicurious. At most? One of us. They way her eyes lit up when she confessed her own lesbianism to her a few days ago? Not shock or horror. Interest. Keen, unfiltered interest.

From the corner of her eye, Maggie clocked Judith. Still lurking, same as always. Hanging back with her coven of petty bitches, nursing the last of their pumpkin spice lattes out of their Starbucks cups and pretending not to eavesdrop while mentally adding timestamps to her gossip spreadsheet.

Let her watch. She was going to get hers soon. As soon as Maggie figured out how to give it to her.

“Hey,” she said to Stacy. “I’m good.”

Stacy shifted her weight, stroller angled ever so slightly to keep Mikul in the shade. Her smile didn’t fade, but her voice dropped half a notch—low enough that it wouldn’t carry past Maggie’s ears.

“They’re all talking about you now,” she said.

Maggie raised an eyebrow. “Are they?”

Stacy nodded. “You asked me to spread the word. I did. Told everyone it was at your request.”

Maggie glanced past her, eyes sweeping the perimeter. Sure enough, the gaze of the pumpkin spice tribunal was hovering their direction—Judith and her squad pretending to talk about weather and lunch plans, but angled just-so, like news anchors faking casual.

“Judith was incensed,” Stacy added. “Apparently I broke protocol by not telling her first.”

Maggie smirked. “That sounds like Judith all right.”

“She called me,” Stacy said. “Straight-up called me to bitch about it. Said that as the HOA President—and you can tell in her voice that she capitalizes ‘President’—she should be told before anyone.”

Maggie blinked. “What did you say?”

Stacy kept her voice low but steady. “I promised that the next time a neighborhood mom comes out as a lesbian to me and requests I spread that word, I will certainly call her first.”

Maggie let out a short breath—a soft laugh, small and sharp.

“And she accepted that?” she asked.

Stacy shrugged. “She said thank you. Sounded satisfied.”

They shared a look—half amused, half amazed.

Then Maggie glanced down at Mikul, still sound asleep in his stroller, one tiny hand curled into a fist. He really was a cute baby, even if he had been saddled with a fucked up spelling of his name. “Someone didn’t want to get up this morning, huh?”

“He’s not the only one,” Stacy said. “I need some caffeine.” She looked up. “Do you want to go to the Starbucks with me?”

Maggie really didn’t want any coffee right now. All she wanted was to drag her tired ass home, crash out until pickup, and maybe—just maybe—actually sleep now that Dover wasn’t dragging a screaming orgasm machine into the house during her rack time. But on the other hand ... Stacy was inviting her. It would be rude to say no, wouldn’t it?

Feeling a little warm inside—a good warm—she said, “That sounds like a fabulous idea. It’s always good for me to stay up after work on the last day to reset myself.”

“Cool!” Stacy said happily. “But ... uh ... do you mind if we go over to the Starbucks on Cypress? You know the one I’m talking about?”

“I do,” she said, unable to hide a widening of her smile. The Cypress Starbucks was where Dover used to meet up with Sammie with the blonde clammy. Because it was private. Unpopulated by the neighbors. “And that sounds like a great idea.”

While Maggie and Stacy were heading to an out-of-the-way Starbucks, Samantha Belkin was driving home from the auto drop-off.