Chapter 22

“Welcome back, honey,” David Howard heard Denise’s voice as she kissed him repeatedly and he struggled to rise.

“No, stay put! Doctor’s orders. Doctor Clement in this case. Or should I say, Captain Nishanyan’s orders? I don’t know if you were conscious enough to hear that part, but Clement’s been holding out on us a bit. He’s actually a former Soviet naval officer, spy ... and Russian as well as Armenian gangster. Oh, and Sergeant Gonzalez ... Narciso, joined us. As did the bank manager, Orville Watts, and two bank tellers. Lena Eriksen and Jordan Tempest,” Denise informed him with more kisses to his face.

“So ... there are thirty of us now. Wow! I feel bad for the cop who got killed, but he was clearly a hair-trigger kind of asshole. Had no business being on the Force, even nowadays. What was his name, anyway?” David asked with a still groggy voice, the morphine having not fully worn out yet.

“Officer Lionel Calvin, but everyone called him ‘Slim.’ Apparently, a bit quick-tempered, to put it mildly. A hothead, plain and simple. Past incidents of police brutality were enough to warrant at least two internal probes, but he was only demoted downward from corporal. Not exactly stellar cop material, by any means. Brave, but short-fused ... and reckless. Narciso was apparently trying to instill some better judgment in him, but proved to be too late to make it work,” Denise explained further as she caressed him.

“We’ll have to be careful to limit your morphine intake and avoid addiction, babe. Oh, and allow me to introduce Elena Gonzalez ... Narciso’s wife. Evidently, she decided to take the man back after he quit the Force,” Andrea revealed a plump, sultry Latina with a very friendly smile on her face.

“I ... only moved out because he let that pendejo Slim into our lives. He told me that it was that or quit the Force, so I asked him to quit the Force. Now he finally has and Slim is rotting in Hell where he belongs!” Elena spat in her frustration, “it’s great that he’s gone. I miss my Filipino stud. I’m half-Filipina myself, you know. The other half is Dominican.”

“What ... happened so much to turn you against Slim?” David asked with a raspy voice.

“He ... bent me over one day, pulled up my dress, and started swatting me with his hand. I told him to stop, so he called me a ‘dirty ... puta,’ well, you can guess what word he used. It’s very unflattering to Asian and Pacific Islander folks. Then he ... tried to ... force my mouth open so he could kiss me. Then he bragged that he had friends in high places in the Mafia, you see, so I didn’t tell a soul ... that he ... put his hands on my breasts to grope me like that.

“I just wanted him out of our lives, but Narciso wouldn’t listen, and I didn’t dare tell him why. I just told him now, so he’d feel a lot better about Slim being a dead jerk rather than a living one,” Elena spilled the beans, making it obvious that she meant business.

“I ... was a fool. I’m sorry. I should have believed you. I just didn’t want to stop ... doing what I loved. Thanks for coming back. I knew that you’d understand why I left the way that I did. Especially since I don’t want to risk being a victim of Mafia vengeance. So, now there are thirty-one of us in this group, I see,” Narciso apologized to his wife for not believing her and for siding with Slim.