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the car, turning it around and radioing in at the same time, looking for backup, and I catch a glimpse of Steve turning down this alleyway, elbow bent, gun drawn.”
    Lawrence licked his lips, like his mouth had gone dry. “What we didn’t know, till later, was that this kid had just come from a deal gone bad, well, not from his point of view until we showed up. He’d gone to make a buy, and rather than hand over the money, shot his supplier. Gets his coke, keeps his cash. I try to head the kid off, so I drive around the block, and he’s coming out the other end of the alley when I get there. Steve comes right out after him.
    “I end up cornering him up against the wall with the car. The car’s not actually touching him, I’m back a good thirty feet, but I’ve got the lights on him, and he’s got nowhere to go, and Steve moves into the frame. We’re both yelling at the kid, that we’re cops, to drop his gun.
    “I’m getting out of the car, and with the headlights on, we’ve both got a good look at this kid, and we can see he’s got a gun held down at his side. And I still don’t have mine drawn, I just got out of the car, and the kid decides he’s going to shoot it out with us, I guess, and he raises his weapon to take a shot at me, and I figure, okay, this could be it, but Steve’s already got him in his sights. And then the kid fires.”
    “At you.”
    “Yeah. He gets off a shot, which hits the window frame of the car door. A chance in a million he doesn’t hit me. What I did next happened so fast, but it’s like slow motion when I replay it in my head. I draw my gun and take aim and drop him, one shot right in the chest.”
    “He died.”
    “He died.”
    “And you’re wondering why it was you that had to bring him down. Because your partner must have had him in his sights, and didn’t fire.”
    “It did kind of occur to me.”
    “What did Trimble have to say for himself?”
    “Comes over, says he was just about to shoot, but I beat him to it.” Lawrence shook his head, about an eighth of an inch in either direction.
    “You didn’t buy it,” I said.
    “He froze. The fucker froze. And I nearly bought it. And I had to kill that kid.”
    “Who was he?”
    “His name was Antoine Mercer, and he was seventeen, and he was a gofer, if you can believe it, for Lenny Indigo back then. And after that, I started thinking that maybe I didn’t like being in a job where you had to depend on others to watch your back. Figured I was better off looking out for myself.”
    “What was the fallout?”
    “Ah well, there was the usual lynching in the press. Cop kills kid. Your paper played a leading role.”
    I felt my cheeks go hot.
    “But that died down. Steve and I were still partnered together, but I couldn’t work with the guy. Couldn’t trust him to be there for me. And I started wondering whether I could trust any of them. Decided the only one I could trust to cover my ass was myself, and that’s when I decided to go it alone.”
    “You quit.”
    “I quit. I was good at being a cop, for the most part. Liked solving things, figuring stuff out, doing what’s right. But I figured I was better working alone.”
    “Thanks for telling me.”
    A shrug. “Well, you asked, and I don’t know. I don’t talk about it all that often. You seem a bit of an asshole, but you’re a likeable asshole, so what the hell? It’s a long night out here without something to talk about. Speaking of which, black Annihilator up ahead, doing more reconnaissance.”
    The SUV, with its lofty military stance and blacked-out windows, looked every bit the predator as it rolled down the street, its headlights, set high amidst a massive network of metal crisscrosses that looked more like a set of shark’s teeth than a grill, shining toward us. Again, in front of Brentwood’s, it slowed.
    “They like what they see. They’re getting ready, I guarantee it.”
    And then, from the other direction, that same city police car,