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  “Stop it, or I’ll lose...”

  It is too late to warn Andy any further, as he loses his grip and both men go falling toward the river. Grady thinks fast and keeps his body rigid and straight on his way down. He stays surprisingly calm as the water comes quickly up to greet him. The hipster on the other hand is still in a blind frenzy of fear. He flails his arms wildly half-expecting to sprout wings and fly. All the way down, he screams at the top of his lungs. Grady is the first to hit the water, slicing through it like a knife. His body plunges a hundred feet below the surface. Darkness swallows him up along with the water. Luckily he keeps himself from losing orientation. With only a lungful of air, he starts his ascent back to the surface.

  The black still has him in its grasp after a couple seconds of swimming, but soon a small flicker of light from the surface peeks through the veil. Higher he climbs, ignoring the aching feeling in his chest. He does not stop. The light seems to stay far away, but it gets brighter. Air in his lungs is all used up and his body begs for more. His head becomes hazy. It shrinks his thoughts. Only swim faster runs through his mind. Muscles start to scream at him, aching for oxygen. His lungs are heavy, hurting, burning. Unable to keep holding it any longer, he exhales ten feet below.

  Now airless, he struggles to swim faster. He tries not to inhale again, though his body strains for him to take a breath. Higher he swims, five feet to go. Every inch seems torturous, mocking him. The surface gets closer, but the pain grows. Unable to stop himself, he takes a deep breath. Fresh air fills his lungs and the rest of his body. The haze around his head lifts as he survives. He takes another breath, and then another, sucking in air like it is a shot of his favorite whiskey. Relief comes over him as he bobs steadily up and down along the waves of the Allegheny River. But then, he feels something solid bump against the back of his head. Turning around, he finds a body floating next to him in the water.

  Andy lays face-first in the water. Blood seeps into the blue, his body shattered upon impact. Unlike Grady, the hipster hit the water sprawled out, unable to punch through the surface. It was the same as if he hit concrete.

  Grady curses under his breath, but then he pushes the body into the water. “You’re a complete asshole, you know that. Rot in hell!”

  The corpse sinks into the depths as it fills with water. Unable to do much else, Grady is forced to swim back to shore. With his strength nearly drained, he is dragged along with the current. It takes quite a bit of effort to get close enough to shore. He finds himself along the bank, and pulls himself out of the water. The first thing he does is kiss the concrete like a long lost lover, ignoring the temperature singeing his lips. Ignoring the clothes clinging to his back, he rolls over and lies on the shore for a moment. He never felt so happy to be back on dry land. Even as the muscles in his arms and legs throb in pain, he smiles.

  The heat coming from the sun starts to hurt, forcing him to get up. Every joint in his body aches when he moves, but he tries his best to ignore the pain. Stepping onto the grass buys him some relief. As he is walking, he spots a man standing by the now emptied stage holding a silver square. On a closer look, he recognizes it as a flask.

  “What do you have there?” Grady asks, showing the man his badge.

  “Uh, I,” the man slurs. The stench of alcohol seems to ooze from his pores. “I-It’s nothing.”

  “I’m not going to arrest you,” Grady sighs, “just tell me what it is.”

  The man looks a bit confused at the soaking wet police officer. Still, he answers, “Jack, officer.”

  “Good.” Grady snatches the flask out of the man’s hands. He tilts his head back and drinks deep until there is nothing left. The burning sensation running down his chest brings a small numbing sensation to his body. It will help him deal with the pain for now. Pushing the flask back into the drunkard’s hands, Grady waves him off. “Thanks for the drink.”

  Chapter 2

  In the heart of downtown Pittsburgh, Grady steps out of a taxicab, still dripping water from his river plunge. The cabby is none too pleased with him, but doesn’t complain when Grady hands the guy an extra twenty dollars for the fare. The taxi drives away, heading in the direction of the setting sun. Grady walks through the front door of his precinct, each footstep sloshing. He leaves a trail of shoe-sized puddles behind him. When he steps onto the tiled floor, a tennis shoe lets out a shrill squeak.

  The receptionist hears the cry and looks up from her computer. She sees a sopping wet police officer standing on the other side of her desk. Water drips off the tips of his bangs. It slithers to the bridge of his nose then to the tip of his chin. He looks at her with a smile, but it causes her to shrink away. She can sense the foul mood that he is in. “Lieutenant Rivers, literally.” She looks him up and down. “Rough day?”

  “You’ve no idea, Lenore.” Grady sighs. “I’m bloody soaked, sore, and wiped. I just want to fill out the paperwork for the case, get out of these wet clothes, and then probably pass out in my car.” He goes to the door and stops. After fumbling through his pockets he turns to her. “Could you let me through?”

  “Don’t you have your ID?” She raises her eyebrows and frowns. This isn’t the first time.

  “Probably at the bottom of the river by now.” He shoots her a look. “Or it could be in the belly of some fish, swimming back up the Monongahela. Can you please let me go through?” he says through gritted teeth.

  Lenore rises from her desk. The little receptionist waddles over to the door and slips a keycard through the slot. The light on the electronic lock changes color from red to green. Grady pulls the door open and walks into the precinct. His shoes seem to squeak louder than they did at the entrance. Slightly annoyed by the sound, he pulls his wet shoes off and decides to walk the rest of the way in his soaked socks. He makes his way around a corner, which leads to a long hallway. Walking at double speed, he bursts through the double doors at the end of the corridor. On the other side is a room filled with desks. They are spaced out evenly, creating a grid of four by four in the room. The gap between them is enough for one person to squeeze through at any time. Grady walks three desks in and two deep.

  A small plaque has the name “Lt. Grady Rivers” etched in fine gold upon a black surface. The wet lieutenant reaches into his second drawer. He pulls it open almost until it comes off the track. Pushing aside a few papers and oddities, he tosses a grey t-shirt that has the Pittsburgh Police Department insignia inked on the back. Against his cold and pruned fingers the cloth seems warm to the touch.

  “Did you take a dip today, lieutenant?” He hears someone laughing at him.

  Grady turns to see that he has an audience. In the back of the room, three officers gather around a desk. Two of the policemen stand on either side of the third who sits in his chair with his legs propped up on the top of his desk. The man in the chair is the one who threw the joke, while the two men laugh like obedient lackeys.

  Grady looks at the jokester, finding him sneering like he usually does. It shows off his crooked teeth, yellowed from smoking for fifteen years. His expression always looks as if it is scrunched, with a long nose and a whisker-like mustache sitting on his upper lip. A “weasel face” is the best description Grady ever had for the man. Of course, he never said it to the guy’s face. Even in his sour mood, Grady cannot help but imagine seeing an actual weasel in a uniform. He resists the temptation to laugh as he turns back to his desk.

  Slamming the drawer shut, Grady tries to ignore their laughing as he pulls off the soaked shirt. Wringing it out sends river water cascading to the ground in a torrent. A puddle already forming, sloshes at his feet. In disgust, he tosses the shirt to the floor. It makes a sloppy suction sound as it hits the tile. He reaches for the dry shirt when he hears catcalling and whistling coming from the three idiots behind him. Of course, it’s all to mock him. Ignoring them to the best of his ability, he gets dressed.

  “Aww, no sneak peek at the panties, Grady?” the weasel-faced man laughs. “Are you saving y
ourself for Mario when you see him next?”

  Dry shirt on, Grady looks at the man with wide eyes. “Rick, what did you just say?”

  The guy sneers, “I just happened to hear that Mario was in the neighborhood and needed some mushrooms.” When he sees the fury in Grady’s eyes, Rick laughs harder. “Holy shit, you actually said it. You actually said the informant was Mario. Hah, you got to be some special kind of moron to believe me. What happened? What did—?”

  Rick does not get the chance to finish his sentence as something flies at his head. He does not have time to dodge, as a black box smashes against his face. It knocks him off his chair, sending him flat on his back. Crawling to his feet, Rick knocks the smashed pieces of the telephone off his chest. One of his lackey officers helps him get to his feet.

  “What the hell?” Rick demands.

  Grady has climbed over his own desk and leaps for Rick. The weasel-faced officer tries to stop him, but he’s weaker than Grady. Both men are sent to the ground, with Rick pinned to the floor. He screams as a strong hand wraps itself around his scrawny throat. A fist collides with his face, and then another. Grady continues his onslaught, punching him relentlessly. Even as his knuckles start to break and bleed, he does not stop. “You son of a bitch,” Grady seethes.

  Rick cries, “Get him off of me.”

  One of the lackeys comes up beside Grady and punches him in the temple. It knocks him off Rick, who scurries away, black and blue and smothered in blood. Cowering behind his desk, he watches Grady fight off both of his men. The young lieutenant is able to overpower the two, sending one flying into a chair. One of the lackeys gets up and throws a coffee mug at Grady, but it misses wide right. Instead, it hits the head of another officer who had chosen to stay out of the fight. The glass shatters against the man’s temple, cold coffee spilling down the side of his head along with a bit of blood. He turns to the culprit, looking more enraged than harmed. Standing up, the officer is by far the biggest man in the precinct.

  He trudges over to the lackey who threw the mug and heaves a punch. Unfortunately, it misses and strikes another officer. It creates a domino effect. Chaos spreads across the entire precinct, as it erupts into a brawl. Brothers in blue fight one another to make them black and blue. Fists are flying in every direction. Even Grady gets hit by a few wild fists. He decides to return them, knocking the policemen flat on their backs. In the midst of the scrap, he notices Rick trying to crawl his way out of the fight. Leaping over a desk, Grady throws all his weight onto the weasel-faced man. Both on the ground, Grady continues to pummel, but Rick gets in a few good hits this time. He lands one on an already bruised cheek, causing Grady to wince. Yet rather than back off it only makes him madder. Wrapping his hands together, he brings both fists down on Rick like a hammer. The blow hits him in the temple.

  Somehow over the uproar of the fighting, a door opens with a low screech. All at once the fighting dies. The combaters stop, turning their eyes to a man stepping out of an adjacent room. He’s a tall, but slender figure with wire-framed glasses sitting perfectly on the bridge of an almost perfectly round nose. Under the white florescent lights his bald cranium glints with an oiled sheen as if it were freshly polished. Nothing about the lanky man seems foreboding, but his ice blue eyes make the men freeze. Like frightened children, the officers of the precinct scramble to get back to their desks and sit still as if nothing had happened. Every one of them sits perfectly still, like a group of sentry statues.

  “What the hell’s going on?” he demands, looking about the precinct for someone to speak up. No one does. Then he finds Grady still pinning Rick to the ground. They are the only two that have not returned to their desks. “Richard! Grady!”

  When they hear their names called, both men jump to attention. “Yes sir!”

  “Just what the hell are you two doing?” he shouts.

  Rick wipes the blood trickling off his lower lip before pointing a finger. “Grady started it.”

  “I’m sorry to say, but it’s true,” Grady answers. “I let my anger get the better of me when Officer Mather gave me false information on my case. It jeopardized the undercover sting.”

  “Don’t be so dramatic, Rivers,” Rick sneers. “It was just a joke.”

  Grady shoots him a seething glare. “Well, your joke blew my cover. The drug dealer’s dead, because of it.”

  “It’s not my problem you’re such a shitty cop.”

  “You son of a bitch.” Grady turns to throw another punch.

  “Both of you, in my office,” the chief barks loud enough to make both men flinch. “Now!”

  Like a pair of students being called down to the principal’s office, Rick and Grady walk single file to his office. The Chief of Police is the last to enter, slamming the door shut behind him. His two officers stand on one side of the desk while he takes a seat on the other. On the front is a plaque similar to Grady’s, but it reads “Chief Robert McArthur”.

  Robert sits there for a moment, letting the bitter rage simmer from him. A vein on his bald head throbs as he allows the two policemen to stew in fear. “Now, let me get this straight,” his eyes send a chill down their spines as he talks in a deep baritone, “you gave him false information on an undercover sting…as a joke?”

  Grady can see sweat starting to roll down the side of Rick’s face.

  “Well, yeah, but I told him the mushroom dealer was named Mario. Like the video game character. Come on, Grady, how did you not get that I was joking?”

  “Because I trusted you,” Grady snarls. “You said it was direct word from the chief. Thanks to you and your dumb-ass joke, I was nearly killed!”

  “You’re being dramatic again.”

  “The drug dealer pulled a gun on me! I wrestled it off of him, but then he made an attempt to jump off Clemente Bridge. When I tried to grab him, I went over too. We both fell. I lived, he didn’t.” Grady turns to the chief, “You might want to get ready about the media, because there were a lot of bystanders.”

  The chief turns to Rick. His face has turned a shade of red and the vein has bulged out of his temple. “Rick, I put you on desk duty hoping it would stop you from screwing around while on the job. It seems to me that it only gave you enough time to come up with something really stupid. So, you want to crack jokes while wearing the badge? Then go and find another department. You’re out of mine.”

  “Fired?” Rick says, stunned.

  “Did I stutter?” McArthur says with a tongue as sharp as a knife. “Get your personal belongings out of your desk by the end of your shift. Now, get out of my sight.” Rick angrily looks over at Grady as he steps out of the office.

  Grady turns to follow.

  “Not you, Grady, we are not done talking,” McArthur spits out.

  Too tired to fight back, he submits to the command, closing the door behind Rick. Not one ounce of remorse in his body for the dickhead who just lost his job. “Sir, I understand I messed up today by letting the perp get the upper hand. I’ll accept any punishment you have in store.” He straightens his arms and flexes them, trying to warm his chilled body. He expects the worst. McArthur isn’t a guy to let anyone get away with anything.

  Instead, the chief takes off his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose. He sighs and asks, “Grady, how long have you worked at this department?”

  Grady has to think for a moment. “About eight years. I joined the academy right as I finished college. You were the one who suggested that, remember?” He grimaces. McArthur doesn’t need to be reminded of things. The guy knows everything.

  “Yes, yes, I remember.” McArthur leans back in his cushioned seat, making the springs creak. “You graduated top of your class at the academy, an energetic cadet full of vim and vigor. In eight years you have jumped up to lieutenant. You’re a good cop, Grady, a damn good cop.”

  “Thank you sir,” he says with a hint of pride in the smile he cannot hide.

  “If I had five of you I would never have to hire another jackass like Rick ag
ain,” he shouts, loud enough so the entire precinct can hear him. Then he drops his voice to almost a whisper, “Incidentally, there are other parts of the country that are in need of men like you.”

  “Wait, am I being transferred?” The color drains from his face. “All due respect, sir, but I’d rather stay in Pittsburgh. I’ve put eight years of my life into protecting this city. Hell, I grew up here. I can’t just leave a place I’ve put so much time and energy into.”

  “Relax, kid, no need for the dramatic speech.” The chief grins. “No, you’re not being transferred. I’m just loaning you to the boys up north.”

  “How far north?” He raises an eyebrow, still not impressed.

  Chief McArthur crosses his arms as he smiles. “It’s the big leagues for you, kid. It’s New York-fucking-New York. That’s how far north. A city so nice they named it twice.”

  Grady rolls his eyes to the ceiling before quickly making his face unreadable. “Why would they need a guy like me?” He had an idea. He didn’t mind taking risks. His buddies in high school always called him fearless. Crazy-stupid more than fearless, but still... He knew he had smarts and courage. He should have been a Navy SEAL, but protecting the home front at home seemed more important to him.

  “They need an unfamiliar face for an undercover operation, that’s why.” The chief grabs a manila envelope on his desk and opens it. He spills its contents out.

  Grady watches as the chief sorts through the papers. He separates them into three neat piles. The stack on the left side of his desk has some files, from what Grady can see. It’s information about a rampant spree of drug dealings occurring throughout the Big Apple. The lieutenant looks to the middle pile, finding information about a case relating to the drug dealings connecting to a specific dealer. On the right is a picture instead of documents. It’s an image of an older gentleman judging from the wrinkles on the side of his face. Otherwise, it’s too blurry and the man is covered in shadows to make out anything else distinct.