Chapter 6

St. Luke’s Hospital. I gathered myself. Too many people, helpless to do anything but wait. I went to Autumn, “Take Walker and Pilar home, I’ll call you the second there’s any news.” My sister, for once in her life, didn’t argue.

I told Bear, “Thanks for coming, but it’ll be hours.”

Mayor Tom Lynch said, “I’m so sorry, Winter. Senseless. Tell me what I can do.”

I smiled wanly, “Go. You have a city to run. Daddy will make it or not.”

Bulldog, put a hand on my shoulder, just as he had when he told me Sister Mary Catherine Parker, 62, had been murdered. “Sorry.”

He left.

Vanessa was sitting with my mother, holding her hand. Both looked years older.

Sergeant Louise Finch stood at attention, full dress uniform, beside my mother and Vanessa.

In almost 30 years on the Job, Homicide Captain Dave Jennings had never fired his gun at anyone. He was ready to, would have been willing to, I knew that in my heart. He practiced, as did everyone under him, at least twice a month at the police range in the old Armory on Main.

I think part of his success was attitude. He remained calm no matter how stressful the situation. No panic shooting out of nervousness.

Could he have shot that punk at QT? Without hitting anyone else? Maybe. He was the furthest officer away, more of an observer. Backup. But I doubt he seriously considered it. The kid was surrounded by armed uniforms.

It was just one of those flukes of nature, an oddity, that Daddy was hit.

At around 6 that evening they wheeled Daddy past us in the hall to one of those elevators large enough to accommodate a hospital bed. Out of the Operating Room after more than 10 hours.

He looked ... deflated. Smaller, diminished. I ignored the tubes -- breathing, IV -- to focus on him. His eyes were closed, his skin ashen. His face less determined.

My mother sobbed quietly. Vanessa rocked her.

Two and a half days later, Thursday, Dr. Millstein told me, “He’s got a chance, Winter. Better than fifty-fifty.”

When I wasn’t at St. Luke’s I was in bed. Curled into a defensive ball. My mind was numb and I didn’t care. I sat up a couple of times and let Vanessa feed me spoonfuls of soup that I didn’t taste. She helped me into the bathroom two or three times. It barely registered.

They were keeping Daddy in a sort of induced unconsciousness because they had to keep going back in to stop the bleeding, re-repair this, double check that.

I learned later that the medical team had been divided on whether to remove the bullet. Eventually they did.

Vanessa woke me up late Friday morning. When she had my attention, she said, “Get up, get moving. You’re scaring Walker. He’s freaking.”

I rolled back over, closed my eyes.

Vanessa came back with my son. She went in the bathroom and adjusted our shower. She and Walker tug-pushed me out of bed, and half carried me into the bathroom.

Vanessa slipped out of her robe and said to Walker, “Help me.” He took off his tee and jeans and the two of them carried me under the hot water.

I breathed deeply for the first time since Monday. Vanessa shampooed my hair while Walker used a newly unwrapped loofah on the rest of me. I felt something -- maybe some energy -- starting to flow back into me. Maybe hope. A little determination. I guess it’s called life.

And I was coming out of my trance. I could tell because I was thinking of my last threesome shower. It had been with two boys, not my wife and son. Thinking a silly, distracting thought was, I decided, healthy.

Walker had been so distressed about me that he didn’t even become erect. Another healthy, distracting thought.

Daddy would make it. He would probably never be quite the same, never regain the vitality he once had. My mother didn’t care, her husband, her life really, was still alive.

They wanted to put Homicide Captain Dave Jennings behind a desk so he could finish out his 30. Daddy turned in his papers.

Somebody, maybe Bulldog, maybe the mayor, made a call and Daddy was now a contract consultant, still on the Job. It was a no-show assignment, but of course he would show up anyway, somehow earn those last few paychecks.

It made me ache to see the physical changes. He was sort of hunched, just a little. His eyes weren’t dull, not exactly, but they didn’t have that Jennings twinkle. Or maybe my imagination had put in for some overtime.

FBI Special Agent in Charge, Hank Morristown, invited me to his office on Summit Street. It looked like a low-rise ball bearing factory. Undistinguished, could be anywhere. Except for the imposing wrought iron fence.

Agent Morristown was as nondescript as his building. In his 50s, balding, round tortoiseshell glasses, navy blue suit.

He had worked with Daddy for years. Homicide Captain Dave Jennings was one of the few local officials who willingly cooperated with the Feds. Daddy had told me, more than once, “The FBI is a resource, a useful tool. Fuck who gets the credit, solve the fucking case.”

Morristown had personally, against regulations, gotten Daddy an FBI profile of a vicious sadist, Hugo Blenheim, a couple of years earlier. I had met Morristown a few times at my parents’ house, but he did the favor for Homicide Captain Dave Jennings, not me.

Morristown seated me, corner office with all the charm of a parole officer’s cubicle, and said, “We’re signing your father on as a consultant. He’ll work with us at J. Edgar.”

Washington DC headquarters, everyone knows that.

“We’ll work out some plausible rationale -- Dave will lecture on, say, local law enforcement cooperation with Federal agencies. Something bland that will have people yawning. Nothing to alarm the top floor.”

“But?”

“I want our people on the ground to hear the real story. What works, with actual examples. Real-life examples. But more than that, what doesn’t work. Which of our policies, our procedures, are so screwy that they actually hinder an investigation.”

He smiled at me, “Your father and I know when to ignore the bullshit. And which regulations to overlook.”

“I guess that wouldn’t hurt his recovery.”

The smile drifted away, “I wasn’t asking permission, Winter. I’m doing this for my friend.”

“I was just musing out loud. He can’t fly though.”

“I know. We’ll handle the transport. I’m just giving you a courtesy heads-up. I want that old warhorse to smell the cordite.”

Half Nelson: Organs, the inside-the-body kind. Involuntary transplants? Harvesting? Sales to rich patients?

So, back to work.

Still splitting my time between KC and the Valley. Around 60% in California. Where my progress seems to be regress. I should have remembered to bring my decoder ring. That could do the trick.

The less I learned, the more optimistic Robert ‘Bobsy’ Atwater seemed to become. I mean he still has the social graces of a warthog, but he was encouraging, “I know you’ll get there, Winter. Have you looked into that gene mutation of the nematode worm?”

Maybe I had insulted warthogs.

There was a sudden flurry of gossip regarding organ replacement. Rumors of an experiment on a man, not a naked fucking mole-rat, where organ after organ was replaced whether it was failing or not.

This counterfeit intel was eventually traced back to Cal, a kegger where tipsy life-sciences students were tossing out ideas for a television pilot. Hey, if Caltech physics can be a hit, why not?

Meanwhile, my sex life was in the doldrums. On vacation. Missing in action. I’d gone through dry spells before, who hasn’t? Too busy, too preoccupied, between lovers. But since Daddy ... well, fuck.

My boon companion, Le Wand, could get me off, I’ve always been easy that way. But it wasn’t skyrockets at night. More, just take the edge off and go back to reading surveillance reports.

But my lack of ... intensity didn’t really bother me. I have a healthy libido and it’ll come knock, knock, knocking one of these days. Or, more probably, nights.

I was back to random tailing. Since the Nelson-Eamons lab in Fremont had closed, I now picked up the former employees at their homes. I had learned long ago, and it was now being reinforced on a daily basis, that most people lead boring lives. There are meals, laundry, friends, chores. And, at the center of everything for most of us, is work.

Even many non-tech folks spend more waking hours with coworkers than family and friends. I’m not sure what that says about the American way of life, but there it is.

Except most of the Nelson-Eamons guys I followed weren’t working.

My Southern Cal sleuths and I continued to surveil. I coordinated and studied all of our notes. Bunny Carville continued to write checks. I paid my private detectives. And made a Friday electronic deposit into my own damn account.

Vanessa was scheduled to come out for a couple of days, but had to cancel. Work.

She told me that Walker is doing fine. Spending more time with Daddy in his Meyer Boulevard home. Probably good for both of them. Pilar continues to be a little force of nature.