Chapter 1

“He’s gonna run, Ray.” Officer Dwayne Parrish murmured under his breath.

“No, he’s not, Camarada, ” Officer Ramone Sanchez, better known as Ray, retorted back. Once again ordering the suspect to get down on the ground as his breath blew out puffs of wintry air. “I got two hours before my shift ends. He’s not going to make me run this close to the end of the night.”

“Dumb cops!” the suspect, LaJuan Homer approximately nineteen years old, mixed ethnicity, five feet, ten inches tall with a tear tattoo under his right eye, snarled at them from underneath the hoodie. It framed a face masked in a belligerent rebelliousness which Ray had seen many times before. “You can suck my—”

Without warning, the boy dashed way, running like a dog chasing a squirrel.

“We got a runner!” Ray shouted as he shoved his gun into his holster and started after the suspect.

“We getting too old for this bull!” Dwayne yelled as he raced to the car. Ray knew he was calling for back-up.

Ray’s heart pounded in his chest and his blood rushed through his head as he pursued the suspect. Cold February air dove into his lungs, making him wish he’d worn a scarf. The boy dashed to the side, nimble as the character in that stupid nursery rhyme, ‘Jack be quick’. LaJuan jumped over fences and tipped over garbage cans as if he were filming for a parkour video. Ray couldn’t help but admire the boy’s agility for a split second. Had he only used that speed to race in the Olympics rather than stealing from party stores, Ray could have been on his way back to the station to fill out his paperwork and then head home to Jessie.

Instead, he darted through the semi-darkened streets of the usually quiet suburb of Troy at two o’clock in the morning, about to kill himself trying to chase some nineteen-year-old punk who seemed hell-bent on being the fifth man in his family to get jail time.

With a leap that made his eyebrows perch on his forehead, the boy scaled a ten-foot metal security fence that ran alongside one of the big industrial buildings. The boy landed on his feet and attempted to continue running when he hit a slick of ice that made him lose his footing and smack face first into the ground.

Ray swore again, knowing there was no way he could do the same. Didn’t want to, either, from the sound the boy hollered out.

Swiftly, he searched for another entry point and saw the gate had either been left unlocked or left open. The ‘No Trespassing’ sign glared in angry red letters against its stark white backboard. He ignored it as he kicked open the gate, feeling the slick of frost slide against the sole of his shoes. He raced toward where the suspect, grunting in pain, was scrambling to his feet.

“Don’t you move!” He drew his gun out, aimed at the boy’s retreating figure. “Don’t you move!”

LaJuan groaned, defiantly flipping him the finger as he limped away. Ray guessed falling down, flat on icy concrete on ice would slow down the nimblest runner.

He could easily shoot the boy, but that wasn’t his style. Why couldn’t these little punks obey the law? Why did it have to come down to this?

“I’m not going to tell you again, LaJuan Homer!” he warned. “Stay where you are!”

The boy turned down an alley. Cursing, Ray holstered his gun, again, and dashed after him albeit slower so as to avoid any black ice. It was this scenario right here that John Q. Public never understood. This blatant disregard for the authority he represented. If he’d shot the boy, everyone would be in an uproar. Would anyone even care that this little punk had beaten the stuffing out of a seventy-year-old store owner, before stealing his money?

He came to the industrial building parallel to the alley. It would be so easy to end this the ‘easy’ way: shoot this worthless scum in the leg and call it a night. But with all the bad publicity going on between police and the public, he had to tread carefully.

Cheek pressed against the cold, wet surface of the brick wall, he peered around the corner. LaJuan Homer still limped on foot towards a car waiting at the other end of the alley.