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eBook Category: Mystery/Crime
eBook Description: Elena Jarvis, a police officer from Los Santos, Texas, has succeeded against all odds. Now she confronts possibly the biggest, most politically charged mystery ever. When a volunteer with the Citizens on Patrol (C.O.P.) program, last seen patrolling with a rookie officer, is found murdered, Elena must work fast to find the true murderer or take the heat with the rest of her department. Elena is not comforted by the fact that the victim was the wife of one of the mayoral candidates--who is of course using his wife's death to turn the polls around. Only the sharp-witted Elena Jarvis can succeed at such a complex case--and if she doesn't, she is the next suspect.

eBook Publisher: E-Reads, Published: 1998
Fictionwise Release Date: November 2001

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Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: eReader (PDB) [284 KB] , ePub (EPUB) [225 KB] , Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [255 KB] , Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [893 KB] , Palm Doc (PDB) [287 KB] , Microsoft Reader (LIT) [259 KB] , Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [293 KB] , hiebook (KML) [674 KB] , Sony Reader (LRF) [322 KB] , iSilo (PDB) [236 KB] , Mobipocket (PRC) [296 KB] , Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [329 KB] , OEBFF Format (IMP) [385 KB]
Words: 82678
Reading time: 236-330 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

Tuesday, October 22, 10:10 a.m.

On the day the road to the future collapsed under her, Monica Ibarra was twenty-three years old, eight months out of the Los Santos Police Academy, and still relishing her new assignment. Monica had spent her first half year of probationary duty in a patrol car with the Westside Regional Command, answering calls from strangers. Then she'd been transferred to the foot patrol at Central Command.

Walking a beat in the downtown area made her feel more invigorated, more a part of the community. She'd come to know the business owners--Koreans and Vietnamese, Mexican-Americans and Anglos--who ran stores that catered to shoppers from Mexico. She recognized secretaries and men in suits who worked in the high-rises. She knew the nicknames of transients who culled the Dumpsters behind restaurants and the names and arrest records of prostitutes, drug addicts, and small-time dealers.

As she walked the streets and alleys and talked with her partner or with someone from the Citizens on Patrol program, she admired the ornate facades of the older Deco buildings, watched the reflections of clouds in the green glass walls of the courthouse, inspected the second-story balconies on adobes in the barrios--a poor man's New Orleans, she thought. She waved to the Border Jumper trolley drivers in their green-and-red vehicles, directed tourists, chatted with waitresses and owners in the places where she ate lunch--burritos, pizza, tacos, pitas--the offerings of downtown Los Santos affordable to a cop.

She listened and spoke in Spanish and English, savored the swing of her own stride as she covered her beat, the uniform that made young men do a double take as she passed, the weight of her belt with gun, radio, and cuffs. She called out "Qué pasa?" to the men on Bike Patrol and considered the possibility of applying to the unit herself. Good for the thighs and hips, she figured. Monica liked to keep fit. A couple of times a week she visited the weight room at Central Command when her shift was up, shrugging off the teasing of fellow officers who liked to say, "Watching Ibarra work out's as good as a wet-T-shirt contest."

By next spring Monica hoped to have her degree in criminal justice from UT Los Santos. Before she was thirty, she'd have a husband and one baby, maybe a sergeant's stripes, if she was lucky and stayed on track. She wanted to be a lieutenant someday, just as her novio, Eddie Diaz, a deputy with the county, wanted to run for sheriff someday. They were saving for a wedding at San Ysidro del Valle, a big reception in the church basement, and a down payment on a house in the Lower Valley, somewhere near where their parents lived, a place with some land around it.

These things she had confided to Mrs. Hope Masterson Quarles, a very nice lady from the C.O.P. program who was accompanying her on a two-hour morning stint. In turn Mrs. Quarles confided that her husband, Wayne, had talked her into applying for the program because, as he said, citizens should support the police. A builder and developer, Wayne Quarles was running for mayor and too busy to patrol with the police himself. "That's why he volunteered me," said his wife, laughing. "Not that I wasn't glad to do it, but I don't know what possible good I can do you, Monica."

"Four eyes are better than two," Monica replied diplomatically. That's what the program leaders said, that and the importance of public relations and citizen support for the department. "If you see something suspicious, just tell me," she said, then added hastily, "but then, of course, you back off."

"They told us that at orientation," Hope Quarles agreed, "along with the request that we not bring a weapon or wear provocative clothing or T-shirts with lewd messages. As if I had any of those." She laughed again. "But doesn't my being with you put you at risk? You've got me instead of a real partner."

"Bert--my partner--he's in the same area," Monica replied. "All I have to do is radio."

"Is there much crime this time of day?"

"There's usually something going down," Monica answered. In truth, she was a little nervous about patrolling with Mrs. Quarles, but only because everyone in town knew her husband, the candidate. Still, nothing was going to happen. She could take care of them both. No problema.

Pointing to a cambio where people changed dollars for pesos and vice versa, she entertained Mrs. Quarles with the story of a burglar who had gotten stuck in Mr. Rafael "Peso" Fajardo's air-conditioning ducts during an attempted heist. She told tales about illegals stealing Nike knockoffs in border stores. "Hey, Mr. Chang," she called at one point, ducking her head into the open door of Ropa Frontera with its yellow-and-red sign and sale announcements in Spanish. "How's business?"

"Velly bad," Mr. Chang answered from behind his cash register. He wore dark glasses and a glum expression, as always, but he saw a prospect in Mrs. Quarles and asked if she wanted a special deal on a genuine Laura Ashley bedspread he had in the back room. "Thirty-nine dorrars onry." Mrs. Quarles refused his offer graciously but with a puzzled expression. Very likely she hadn't been able to translate "Raura Ashrey." They passed the flea market on Paisano, where, Monica explained, shoplifters from JCPenney downtown and stores like Mr. Chang's stashed their loot, where drug dealers sold to hypes.

Monica stopped a drunk and confiscated his bottle of cheap wine, reminding him that he couldn't drink on the streets. "The jail's full," she told Mrs. Quarles. "They're not taking Class C's unless they have over a thousand dollars in warrants." She called "Hola, Señora Benes," to a woman in an all-enveloping apron who was tugging a small girl down the street. The child hugged a bald-headed doll that was almost as large as she was. They had entered El Segundo Barrio, the Second Ward, so Monica told Mrs. Quarles about the after-dark battles with rocks and bottles that were waged by rival gangs in the area. Mrs. Quarles glanced around as if she expected to see tattooed youths erupting from alleys with weapons in hand. "The gang members challenge each other by tagging traffic signs." Monica pointed to a stop sign embellished with the initials of the Southside Locos, a gang that was evidently trying to start something with a rival, Los Reyes Diablos.

"Then what happens?" Mrs. Quarles asked.

"The best-case scenario is that we take off the graffiti before things heat up. Worst-case, someone gets hurt in a drive-by; then someone retaliates, and so forth." She spotted a guy heading north from the border and put him up against the wall, feet spread, while she patted him down and called in on her shoulder mike for outstanding warrants, not forgetting to check the paper bag he'd dropped into the gutter when they spotted each other. Monica knew him for a guy who smuggled roche, the date-rape drug, across the border. The bag contained only a candy-bar wrapper--this time. Since she had him on nothing but littering, he walked.

They headed back to Paisano past Sagrado Corazón, the church of the Sacred Heart. "We get calls from the priests to come and clear out the drug dealers and junkies," she told Mrs. Quarles, who looked shocked. They checked out an alley and found nothing but a slashed, discarded sofa and rows of utility meters sprouting from the brick walls. "Illegal kids from Mexico used to come over and sleep on the fire escapes here," Monica said to her companion. "You had to pick your way through the syringes."

They checked out a bar where at least twelve disheveled people were drinking, many of whom greeted Monica by name. "We know their names; they know ours," said Monica. "Everyone trades information."

At Chihuahua and Oregon she stopped a prostitute and called in for warrants, asking the girl while they waited how she'd lost her front teeth. "Fell down," the girl answered.

Once the prostitute moved off, Monica said, "A john probably knocked them out. She's a heroin addict. Got three kids across the border and hepatitis."

Hope Quarles shook her head and frowned. "I never imagined how terrible things were here in Los Santos."

Monica reflected that this was a lady who didn't know the score and needed to wise up. Maybe she'd tell her husband, the candidate, how things were, and he'd do something about it--get the department more money, get the poor more jobs.... Monica's brother had just been laid off.

"What's that man doing?" Hope Quarles asked curiously. She was looking to her right down the alley beside Felipe's House of Fajitas.

Monica glanced past the Dumpster and spotted a guy in T-shirt and baggy pants held up by a rope. He had a shaved head and tattoos--gangbanger, she judged from the outfit--and he was drilling out the lock of a metallic tan '84 Mercury. "Car thief," Monica whispered happily. "You stay here, ma'am."

"Oh, my goodness," Hope Quarles murmured.

"Move behind the Dumpster if he shows a weapon." Eyes on the thief, hoping to get to him before he could run, Monica's last glimpse, peripheral, of Hope Masterson Quarles was of a middle-aged lady with curly blond hair, wearing her C.O.P. T-shirt under a silk jogging jacket. Her mouth with its pale lipstick formed a perfect O of surprise.

Monica drew her semiautomatic, called in her position and the crime in progress, and asked her partner for backup. Then she padded silently down the alley, wishing Mrs. Quarles would be a little quieter. She heard the scrape of shoes on the cement, the rustle of paper. Mrs. Quarles had evidently taken shelter behind Felipe's Dumpster.

There was a low whistle, someone out on the street maybe, and before Monica could say, "Police. Put your hands up," the punk turned from the lock he was drilling and dropped sideways to the dusty, cracked surface of the alley. At the same moment Monica felt a terrible burning pain in her back. "Run, Mrs. Qua--" she gasped, and, falling, got off one shot as excruciating pain, then blessed unconsciousness closed over her. She never felt the hard landing.