Thin Luck

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Detective Joseph Turner

DETECTIVE JOSEPH TURNER put the finishing touches on his final report for the week. His hunt and peck method at the keyboard could type faster than the squad's administrative assistant could touch type. But she was young, sexy and had ambitions that didn't involve words per minute.

His reports always caught the attention of the Lieutenant, for their attention to detail. This report, he knew, would tickle the man's funny bone, but not until he came in on Monday morning.

A string of pizza shop robberies in the Farmington and Avon areas had been committed over the last seven weeks. All of them had the same M.O.: Two men would walk into the pizza place, one man holding a rifle, the other emptying the cash register and safe. Turner had visited the scene of three of the robberies. Over the next week, he went to seventeen more pizza shops looking for information. Had anyone matching the description cased the place in the last month or two? Did they look familiar? What security do you have in place?

The owner of Pizza Heaven, in his late fifties and looking like he spent every one of those years in the kitchen, pulled out his Glock in response to the last question. "Haven't had a chance to use this yet," he said holding up the shiny gun. "I hope those fu-I mean idiots, excuse my language-come around here next. I'll be ready for 'um."

Turner asked for the man's permit and gun license, to make sure the handgun was legitimate. The paperwork was in order, and Turner visited a few more pizza joints. None of them was as prepared as the man from Pizza Heaven.

Sure enough, yesterday the robbers held up Pizza Heaven. Everything went as planned for the robbers until the men ordered the owner to open the safe in his office. Behind the door was the owner's shiny gun. His first shot passed through the arm of the man holding the rifle. The second shot hit the other man's thigh.

The owner didn't call 9-1-1. He calmly picked up Detective Turner's business card from the pile on his desk. "I got those fuckers you've been looking for right here," he said. His voice was calm. Turner could hear the robbers wailing in the background.

Detective Lena limped over to Turner's desk. As thirty-year veteran with the force, he counted down the days to his retirement on his desk calendar. The countdown helped him answer the phone, "Detective Lena, fifty-six days left." He was sick of sitting at his desk since the accident. He knocked his knuckles on Turner's desk as Turner hit send on the computer. "Hey. I've got a favor to ask."

"Favor, huh? I thought you already owed me a few of those."

"I know, I know. But I'm good for it, I swear," Lena said with a smirk. "So, I got a call from a PO earlier. They say a woman who's testifying for a state prosecutor is missing. She just got released yesterday and didn't show up for her meeting this morning."

Turner raised his eyebrow. Parole officer calls were in Lena's purview. He always dealt with them, since he had experience being one.

"The PO has some black and whites tracking down her known associates," Lena said. "They think she may have broken into her house. And I think maybe she got involved in an assault in Manchester yesterday. The man from Manchester, or actually his husband, recognized her from a picture I had up on my computer."

"She assaulted a man?"

"Yes, and his husband brought him in."

Turner didn't want to talk about gay marriage with Lena. Lena was an Italian Catholic and had already made his position entirely clear.

"I don't know what either fags' connection to the fugitive is," Lena said.

Turner cringed and changed the subject. "Wait, how do you break into your own house?"

"Her husband was renting it, but he moved out in a hurry. The owner of the house already changed the locks. He didn't return the security deposit. There were some holes in the wall."

Holes in the walls were classic warning signs for domestic abuse, and domestics were the most dangerous situations for uniform police officers. People were passionate about their spouses, and if a man moved in the middle of the night before his wife was released from prison, there was probably pretty good justification. Men didn't like to call in the police for spousal abuse. They always thought they could handle the situation until it spun out of their control and someone usually ended up in the hospital, or worse, dead.

"Do they have a history of domestic calls?"

"There were no reports of calls to their house." Lena continued, "If you could just look into it?"

"Yeah, I'll look into it," Turner said. Another weekend he'd be spending at his desk, or hunting down a fugitive, and there were only so many weekends left before the golf courses closed for the season.

"Good, because my mother-in-law is in town, and Penny is going crazy. She just called saying that her mother was cleaning the kitchen and broke half of our wine glasses. If I don't get back home in the next half hour my mother-in-law is going to break the rest." Lena leaned into Turner's desk. "Look, ninety percent of these cases get cleared up without me intervening at all. Women-most are found right away. I just need you to cover this case until my mother-in-law is back home safe in New Jersey. Otherwise my wife is going to be under arrest for murder."

Turner laughed. "All right, Lena. For Penny," he said. "I wouldn't want to have to bring her in on homicide charges."

Lena slapped Turner on the back. "Thanks. I'll have Penny bring you in some of those goodies she makes."

He turned to go, but Turner stopped him, "Wait, you haven't told me this woman's name."

"Oh, you'll get a kick out of this. Her name is Robyn Hughes."

"Like that actor?" Turner said. He put his hand to his chin. "What was the name of that show?"

"Windless." Lena said. "Remember they kept going to new planets? And then Robin Hughes would walk out..." Lena put his hands up to his heart.

Turner and Lena recited the famous line together: "Dude, let's create a better world."

Turner shook his head, "Did he ever do another show?"

"Yeah, they made some space cowboy movie based on the TV show, but it flopped. I think he gained a hundred pounds after that. Rags at the checkout line have pictures of him bloated and sweating all over hot chicks."

"Could be worse, I guess. Maybe he can go on one of those reality shows for celebrities needing to lose weight?"