The Man Behind the Cop Page 2

  “You talked to him?”

  “He asked about school ’n stuff. Like you do.”

  “You tell him about that A in social studies?”

  Trevor nodded but also hunched his shoulders. He stabbed at his lettuce with the fork and exclaimed,

  “Mom and me don’t need him. I don’t know why he keeps calling.”

  “He’s your dad.”

  Ironic words from him, since he hadn’t spoken to his own father in years and had no intention of ever doing so again. But Trevor didn’t share Bruce’s feelings toward his father. The boy tried to hide how glad he was that his dad hadn’t given up, but it shone on his face sometimes.

  “I wish you were,” Trevor mumbled.

  Bruce felt a jolt of alarm. He’d been careful never to pretend he was a substitute father. He didn’t have it in him to be a father of any kind, even a pretend one.

  “If you were my dad,” Trevor continued, “I could tell everyone my dad has a badge and a gun and they better watch out if they disrespect me.”

  Thank God. The kid didn’t want Bruce as a father; he wanted him for show-and-tell.

  Diagnosing the true problem, Bruce asked, “You still having trouble with that guy at the bus stop?”

  “Sometimes,” the twelve-year-old admitted. “Mostly, I walk real slow so I don’t get there until the bus is coming. ’Cuz if the driver sees anything, Jackson gets detention.”

  Bruce had tried to figure out what he could do to help, but he couldn’t walk a middle schooler to the bus stop and threaten a thirteen-year-old kid. A couple of times, he had picked Trevor up at school, making sure to drive his unmarked vehicle, which even an unsophisticated middle schooler would still spot as a squad car. Mostly, his goal was to help Trevor gain the confidence to handle a little shit like Jackson by himself.

  He glanced at his watch and said, “I’ve got to get you home. I’m teaching a self-defense class tonight.”

  Scrambling out of the booth, Trevor chopped the air. “Like karate and stuff? Wow! I bet you have a black belt.”

  Bruce appreciated the boy’s faith, but he laughed. “No, in my neighborhood how we fought didn’t have a fancy name. Anyway, this class is for women. I teach them how to walk down a street and not look like a victim. How to break a hold if someone grabs them.” How to fight dirty if things got down to it, but he didn’t tell Trevor that. He wasn’t going to teach him how to put out an assailant’s eye. Jackson might be a bully, but he didn’t deserve to be blinded.

  Bruce was volunteering his time to teach this class for the same reason he’d signed up to be a Big Brother: his own screwed-up family. If he could help one woman choose not to be a victim the way his own mother was, he didn’t begrudge sparing any amount of time. He couldn’t change who he was, and he’d long since given up on trying to rescue his mother. But he was bleeding heart enough to still think he could rescue other people.

  Trevor lived in White Center, a neighborhood on the south end of Seattle known for high crime and drug use. Bruce had guessed from the beginning that MaryBeth DeShon, the boy’s mother, was using. At twenty-eight, she was pathetically young to have a kid Trevor’s age. She hadn’t finished high school and lacked job skills. Since Bruce had known them, MaryBeth had worked as a waitress, but she was constantly changing jobs. Not by choice, Trevor had admitted. She didn’t feel good sometimes, he said, and had to miss work. Bosses weren’t understanding. Still, she’d managed to bring in something approaching a living wage, and had food stamps, as well.

  Often Bruce didn’t see her when he picked up and dropped off Trevor. The last time he had, two weeks ago, she’d looked so bad he’d been shocked. She’d always been thin, but now she was so skinny, pasty and jittery he’d immediately thought, Crack. He’d been worrying ever since.

  “Your mom—how is she?” he asked now, a few blocks from Trevor’s apartment building.

  The boy’s shoulders jerked. “She’s gone a lot. You know?” Trev was trying hard not to sound worried, but his anxiety bled into his voice. His instincts were good. He might not know why he was losing his mother, but he was smart enough to be scared. “She says she’s looking for work. Sometimes Mrs. Porter checks on me.”

  Sometimes? Bruce’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. A kid Trevor’s age shouldn’t habitually be home alone at night, especially not in this neighborhood. But he was twelve, and leaving him without adult supervision wasn’t a crime.

  Bruce pulled into the apartment parking lot, and noticed that MaryBeth’s slot was empty. “Doesn’t look like she’s home right now,” he observed. Although it seemed possible to him that her piece-of-crap car had finally gone to the great wrecking yard in the sky.

  Trevor shrugged and reached for the door handle. “I have a key.”

  “If you get scared, you call me, okay?”

  “Yeah. Thanks. I’m okay, though.”

  Bruce reached out and ruffled Trevor’s brown hair. “You’re a great kid. But you are a kid. So call me if you need me.”

  He was usually in a good mood after a day spent with Trevor, but this time his eyebrows drew together as he walked back to his car after leaving Trevor at the door and waiting to hear the lock click home.

  I should have asked if the kitchen was decently stocked, he thought repentantly. MaryBeth sure as hell wasn’t eating these days. If she was hardly ever home, would she remember to grocery-shop? Assuming she hadn’t traded her food stamps for crack.

  He’d call tomorrow, Bruce decided. Check to see if she’d reappeared, satisfy himself that Trev was okay. Frustrating as it was for him, a man used to taking charge, there wasn’t much else he could do for the boy.

  It bothered him how much he wished there was.

  BRUCE HAD PREVIOUSLY driven by A Woman’s Hand, the mental health clinic where he was to conduct the self-defense workshop that night. It was in a modern but plain brick building off Madison, the simple sign out front not indicative of the services offered within. He supposed that was because of the clientele, the majority of whom were victims of abuse. A woman cop in the sexual assault unit told him she referred every victim she encountered to A Woman’s Hand.

  “The counselors there are the best,” she’d said simply.

  When he arrived, it was already dark, but the building and parking lot were well lit. The small lot was full. Amid all the cars, he noticed the two plain vans, which he guessed were from battered women’s shelters. He had to drive a couple of blocks before he found a spot on a residential street to park his car.

  When he got back to the clinic, he found the front door locked. Smart. He knocked, and through the glass he saw a woman hurrying to open the door. He allowed himself a brief moment of appreciation. Tall and long-legged, she had a fluid walk that was both athletic and unmistakably feminine. Hair the rich gold of drying cornstalks was bundled up carelessly, escaping strands softening the businesslike effect.

  Her expression was suspicious when she unlocked and pushed the door open a scant foot. He took a mental snapshot: great cheekbones, sensual mouth, bump on the bridge of her nose. Around thirty, he guessed. No wedding ring, a surreptitious glance determined.

  “May I help you?” she asked.

  “I’m Detective Bruce Walker,” he said, unclipping his shield from his belt and holding it out for her to see.

  “I was invited to lead this self-defense workshop.”

  A tentative smile warmed her face, but she also peered past him in apparent puzzlement. “Welcome. But weren’t you to have a partner?”

  “Detective Beckstead will be joining us next week. She’s the labor coach for her pregnant sister, whose water broke this afternoon.”

  He’d been hearing about the birthing classes from Molly Beckstead for the past two months. She was unmarried, hadn’t yet contemplated having a baby herself, and when she was a rookie had been scarred for life, she claimed, by having to assist a woman giving birth in the back seat of a taxicab. All spring, she’d provided weekly reports on the horrors
of childbirth, half tongue-in-cheek, half serious, but he’d noticed she sounded more excited than terrified when she’d called to tell him she was meeting her sister at the hospital.

  “Ah.” The woman relaxed. “That’s an excuse if I’ve ever heard one.” She pushed the door farther open to allow him in. “I’m sorry to seem less than welcoming. Some of the women participating tonight are from battered women’s shelters, and we always keep in mind the possibility that the men in their lives might be following them.”

  “I understand. And you are…?”

  “Karin Jorgensen. I’m a counselor here at A Woman’s Hand.”

  “You’re the one who set this up. Good to meet you.” He held out his hand, and they shook. He liked her grip, firm and confident, and the feel of her fine-boned hand in his. In fact, he let go of it reluctantly.

  “This way,” she said, leading him down the hall.

  “The women are all here. I hope our space is big enough for the purpose. It’s the first time we’ve done anything like this, and if this venue doesn’t work well tonight, we could plan to use a weight room or gym at a school the next time. We’re just more comfortable with the security here.”

  He nodded. “I’m sure it will be fine. For the most part, we won’t be doing many throws. With only the four sessions, we can’t turn the women into martial artists. We’ll focus more on attitude and on how they can talk their way out of situations.”

  She stopped at a door, from behind which he heard voices. She lowered her own. “You are aware that most of these women have already been beaten or raped?”

  He held her gaze, surprised that her eyes were brown, although her hair was blond. Was it blond from a bottle? His lightning-quick evaluation concluded no. She was the unusual natural blonde who had warm, chocolate-brown eyes.

  “I’ll be careful not to say anything to make the women feel they’ve failed in any way.”

  The smile he got was soft and beautiful. “Thank you.” The next moment, she opened the door and gestured for him to precede her into the room.

  Heads turned, and Bruce found himself being inspected. Not every woman appeared alarmed, but enough did that Bruce wondered if they’d expected only a woman cop. Ages ranged from late teens to mid fifties or older, their clothing style, from street kid to moneyed chic. But what these women had in common mattered more than their differences.

  He was careful to move slowly, to keep his expression pleasant.

  Karin Jorgensen introduced him, then stepped back and stood in a near-parade stance, as though to say I’m watching you.

  Good. He had his eye on her, too.

  Bruce smiled and looked from face to face. “My partner, Molly, asked me to apologize for her. Her sister is in labor, and Molly is her labor coach. She plans to be here next week. Tonight, you get just me.”

  He saw some tense shoulders and facial muscles relax, as if the mention of a woman giving birth and another there to hold her hand somehow reassured them. The support of other women was all that was helping some of his audience, he guessed.

  “We’ll work on a few self-defense drills toward the end of the session—I don’t want you to get numb sitting and listening to me talk,” he began. “But we’ll focus more on physical self-defense in coming weeks. It’ll be easier for me to demonstrate with my partner’s help. She’s just five feet five inches tall, but she can take me down.” He paused to let them absorb that. He was six foot three and solidly built. If a woman ten inches shorter than him could protect herself against him, even be the aggressor, they were definitely interested.

  “Most women I know have been raised to believe the men in their lives will protect them,” he continued. “That’s a man’s role. A woman’s is to let herself be protected. How can women be expected to defend themselves against men? You’re smaller, lighter, finer boned, carry less muscle and are incapable of aggression.” He looked around the circle of perhaps twenty women sitting in chairs pushed against the walls of what he guessed was a large conference room. When the silence had stretched long enough, Bruce noted,

  “That’s the stereotype. Here’s reality. Throughout nature, mother animals are invariably the fiercest of their kind. Like men, women want to survive. Nature creates all of us with that instinct. You, too, can fight if you have to.”

  The quiet was absolute. They were hanging on his every word. They wanted to believe him, with a hunger he understood only by context.

  “Do you have disadvantages if you’re attacked by a guy my size?” He ambled around the room, focusing on one woman at a time, doing his best to maintain an unthreatening posture. “Sure. What I’m here to tell you is that you have advantages, too. You’re likely quicker than I am, for one thing. You’ve got a lower center of gravity. Women are famous for their intuition, for their ability to read mood and intentions. Chances are good you can outthink your attacker. And if you’re prepared, you’re going to shock him. He won’t expect you to fight back. He’ll have the surprise of his life.”

  Murmurs, surprise of their own, but also a gathering sense of possibility: Maybe he’s right. Maybe I can outwit and outfight a man.

  He told them stories of women who’d had an assailant whimpering on the ground by the time they were done.

  “The greatest battle you have to fight from here on out,” he went on, “is with your own attitude. What you have to do is liberate yourself from every defeatist voice you’ve ever heard.

  “Many of you have already been assaulted.” Heads bobbed, and renewed fear seemed to shiver from woman to woman, as if a whisper had made the rounds. “Then I don’t have to tell you submission doesn’t work.” He waited for more nods, these resigned. “I’m here to tell you aggression might. At worst—” he spread his hands “—you’ll be injured. But you know what? He was going to hurt you anyway.”

  Something was coming alive in their faces. They looked at one another, exchanged more nods.

  He had them, from the frail Hispanic woman in the corner, to the overweight teenage girl with acne, to the iron-haired woman who could have been his mother had Mom ever had the courage to seek the means to defend herself.

  And, he saw, he had pleased Karin Jorgensen, who at last abandoned her military stance by the door and took a seat, prepared to listen and learn, herself.

  He didn’t let her sit for long, asking her to help him demonstrate. As he showed how an attacker opened himself up the minute he reached out to fumble with clothing or lift a hand to strike, Bruce was pleased by tiny signs that Karin was as aware of him physically as he was of her. Nothing that would catch anyone else’s attention—just a quiver of her hand, a touch of warmth in her cheeks, a shyness in her gaze—all were a contrast to the confident woman who’d opened the door to him, prepared to face him down if he’d been anyone but the cop she expected.

  She smelled good, he noticed when he grabbed her, although the scent was subtle. Tangy, like lemon. Maybe just a shampoo. Lemon seemed right for her sun-streaked hair.

  He wanted to keep her with him, but finally thanked her and said, “Okay, everyone pair up.” Unfortunately, the numbers were odd and she paired herself with an overweight teenager, which left him partnerless.

  A fair amount of the next hour and a half was spent with him trying to prepare them to grab their first opportunity to fight back and run. They learned some simple techniques for breaking holds or knocking a weapon from an assailant’s hand.

  “Next week,” he said, concluding, “we’ll talk about how to use everyday objects as weapons and shields. Molly will be here to demonstrate more releases, more ways to drop me like a rock.” He smiled. “See you then.”

  Several women came up afterward to talk to him. By the time Bruce looked around for Karin, she had disappeared. When he went out into the hall to find her, he realized that some of the women had brought children. A second room had evidently been dedicated to child care. He spotted her in there, holding a toddler and talking to one of the participants. Karin saw him at the same time,
and handed the toddler to the mother, then walked over to him.

  “I’ll escort you out,” she said. “I appreciate you doing this.”

  They started down the hall, her long-legged stride matching his. “I thought it went well,” Bruce commented.

  “It was amazing. I saw such…hope.” She said the word oddly, with some puzzlement.

  Had he surprised her? Given her job, maybe she didn’t like men much and didn’t think one was capable of inspiring a group of battered women.

  Or maybe she’d just been groping for the right word.

  He wanted to ask whether she was married or involved, but how could he without making things awkward? And, damn it, he was running out of time—the front door stood just ahead.

  “I understand you volunteered for this workshop,” Karin said. “That’s very generous of you.”

  They’d reached the door. Opening it for her, he inquired, “Are you making any money for this evening’s work?”

  He’d surprised her again. She paused, close enough for him to catch another whiff of citrus scent. For a moment she searched his face, as if trying to understand him. “Well…no. But I do work with these women.”

  “I do, too,” he said simply.

  She bit her lip. “Oh.”

  “’Night, Karin,” someone called, and she retreated from him, going outside to exchange good-nights with women on their way to their cars.

  Maybe just as well, he tried to convince himself as he, too, exited the building. He’d ask around about her. They inhabited a small world, and someone would know whether she was off limits. If nothing else, he’d see her next week.

  “Good night,” he said, nodding. He’d finally snagged her attention.

  “Thank you again,” she replied.

  Their eyes met and held for a moment that seemed to bring color to her cheeks. Wishful thinking, maybe. He turned away. Even with his back to Karin, he was aware of her speaking to others in the parking lot. The voices, he was glad to hear, were animated.