Close To The Bone

An early fall morning....The sun had just come up....a nice warm breeze blew through the window in the temporary complex we were staying in...It woke me up immediately....I got up and pulled the window down.I looked over at Carlotta...She was sleeping so peacefully....Or so it seemed!

 Detective Carlotta Rodriguez-Wallace , the love of my life...Who am I?..Assistant District Attorney, Keith Porterhouse Wallace...

I leaned over and kissed her on the cheek softly....She awoke, smiled at me sweetly and motioned for me to come closer...I leaned in closer and she put her arms around my neck and kissed me slowly, softly, sensuously....

It was 5:00 am...It was a work day...We kissed passionately like that for a good while...
I rolled over on top of her...I eased her nightie up and slipped her panties down. and slipped my pajama bottoms down...

I entered her slowly....

''Ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu papi, you feel so gooood ,Aye Mios Dios...." she moaned..

"I love it when you speak spanish!" I said, continuing to move in and out of her warm center....

"Oh you love it when I speak anything." she said....

"YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS.." I exclaimed... I moaned as we continued to make sweet love...

After a night of furious lovemaking, we didn't usually make love the next morning like this...but this was a welcome surprise..We made love for another hour or so...coming furiously and laughing and holding each other tightly....

I'm sure beds were sqeaking all over this complex...Sissy and Eddie C. ,down the hall from us..

.Duke and Hazel on one side of us .

and Tyriq and Sirena on the other side of us.

and especially, Hop and Sharon down the hall from us...

It was really a former apartment complex....A complex the government had taken from a now deceased gangster and converted into a makeshift headquarters...On the first floor was offices...In one office, U.S. Attorney Brendan Burnside and I worked on the legal aspect of our case against Russian Mobster, Little Nikita...

In the middle office was the command center where FBI SAC,Sharon Hopkins, DEA SAC,Carol Redding, Lt. Sissy Van Buren and Detective Edwin "Duke " Baylor collected evidence and manned the phones..keeping communication and strategizing with the various street pieces in this major investigation...

They had a staff of trusted administrators , sworn to scerecy who took the calls and listened to wiretap and video evidence and who helped survey the traffic, ATM and Crime Stopper cams in the areas we had targeted...

This office was equipped with fax machines, laptop computers and flat screen video monitors as well as phones....A nice operation...

There was even a make shift Medical examiners office in the back where Hazel could work..

The parking lot was indoor and off the street....

Detectives Tyriq Pile and Antonio Hopkins were operating out of a Food truck that serviced the area of Little Norway near the hotel where Little Nikita was running a sweet prostitution ring..  While real food was actually served...There was a small section unseen to the public that housed Sniper rifles, Kevlar vests and pistols as well as smart phones, a fax machine and one flat screen monitor...

The "cooks" were actually male and female FBI agents and plain clothes police...Tyriq and Hop were running the show..All of our plain clothes cops and undercover FBI agents in the operation reported to him and hop...Left off whatever information they had...This way..It didn't look suspicious...

Jimmy had gotten in good with Little Nikita's crew...He had said that he'd done five years in a federal prison out west...We had built him a whole new identity that substantiated this story...and then he had lived in Chicago awhile...One of our Undercover FBI agents posing as a low level hood had substantiated that story....
Pretty soon, Jimmy was driving Little Nikita around town and making his collections for him, both from the hotel where the women were and from the warehouse where the drugs came in...

My wife, Carlotta and Tyriq's wife, Sirena were the only two people on our team who didn't have to hide or pretend to be anything other than what they were...Homicide detectives...With three uniformed policemen, They went about investigating the murder which had brought us in this case in the first place...

Jimmy never met with us personally..he sent messages by way of a female  plain clothes cop who was posing as a barmaid in the bar where clients to the hotel checked in...

He gave us the dates and the location of the next drug pick ups...and he gave us the breakdown of the entire operation...

Carol didn't want to bust the warehouse just yet...She,Duke and three DEA agents photographed people going in and coming out of the warehouses and took the license plate numbers of the cars...They could take the warehouse at anytime..We had at least two people inside the warehouse...a plain clothes cop and an undercover DEA agent.

Our barmaid, Plain Clothes Officer, Megan Stewart and about three plain clothes cops and three undercover FBI agents observed as men came into the bar , wandered to the back where they were shown photos of women in a book...They picked a woman and paid another woman and then a man drove them to the hotel...

We had FBI and Plain clothes cops on the hotel taking photos and hanging around...they looked like bums..smelled like it too....They were good..In each case , we caught glimpses of Jimmy picking up money and turning it over to Little Nikita who was putting the money in a safe...

He had meetings at Penns Landing with his inner circle every Friday morning...They stood in a circle at Penns Landing and talked..Jimmy and another man stood away from them, but close enough to hear what they were saying...Shame he wasn't wearing a wire...

II-

Night time was kind of fun...We were like college kids hanging out....Sissy,Eddie C. ,Tyriq,Sirena, Duke,Hazel, Hop,Sharon ,Carlotta and I all had Pizza and Cokes, watched movies...or Cable...or sat around in someone's room and played cards, laughed and talked until it was time to turn in...All of our room doors were open and we were in and out of each other's rooms all the time..

No one suspected we were cops...We looked like young people hanging out...Which was what we wanted.

The plain clothes cops and undercover federal agents who actually were a little younger ,as well as the administrative staff had the other floors.. and as you can imagine..there was a lot of socializing... We all were really enjoying living in such close quarters...All of our cars were parked in the indoor parking lot and Tyriq and Hop parked their Food Truck, three blocks away...Everything was pretty tight and un assuming..Close to the bone as Brendan Burnside would say.

Only U.S. Attorney Burnside and DEA Agent Carol Redding went home...

For the rest of us...This was like Summer camp...It was kind of fun...These were my favorite people and I knew I'd never be this happy or this comfortable working with anyone else...We were more than detectives...We were family!Tyriq,Duke, Hop and even Eddie C., the only non-cop amongst us.. were my brothers and Sissy, Sharon,Sirena and Hazel were my sisters...Carlotta felt the same way...This was almost not like work..

I felt sorry for Jimmy...He was the only one that wasn't with us..He was deep undercover..and his fiance, Angie..I had to wonder what she was thinking about now.

I decided to go pay her a visit the next day...

III-

 The next day I went to Sam Mother's Diner...Where I found Angie eating breakfast alone...

"Hey Lady...How are you?" I said.

Angie was surprisingly in good spirits and glad to see me..

"Heyyyy Keith...How are you?  How is my baby?" she asked.

"He's as good as he can be...You know how that is...We have eyes on him...We are not going to let anything get out of hand...He's been doing good work.."I said.

"I miss all of you guys...Sissy, Carlotta,Hazel, Sharon...and Sirena...I haven't hung out with my girls in a couple of days.."she said.

"They miss you too...This will be wrapped up soon...We are close to making an indictment.."I said.

"Oh."she said.

"Jimmy misses you..He sent a message to us through his contact..that he misses you and to just hold on...this won't be long..He says he can't wait to marry you." I said.

"Did he really say that?" she asked.

"In so many words..He did..." I said.

"You're sweet...I miss him and I'm worried about him." she said.

"Believe me...He is showing us a side of him we didn't know existed...He is a good undercover guy...but I promise you...This is his last undercover assignment...After this he'll be above ground as a homicide detective." I said smiling..

"Well, if you hear from him...Tell him I love him and I'm waiting for him." she said.

"I will.." I said..

I hugged her....She teared up a little...

"Now ,now...stop that...No tears.....He'll be fine.." I said.

I hoped I was right.

IV-

And in a bar in Northeast Philadelphia...Jimmy sat at a booth with Little Nikita and two burly bodguards....

"I like this bar boychick...Nobody knows that I come here...No cops, no federallis...."said Little Nikita...Who's real name was Nikita Arkady....Born here in Philadelphia to parents who were naturalized citizens from the former Soviet Union...

His younger by one year , brother, Vladmar ran the bar and the hotel where women who came over on boats to New York and then to Philadelphia from various points in Eastern Europe worked off a "huge debt" they could never repay as prostitutes..

We had dealt with this so called "White Slavery" once before...Our second big case as a unit...It was ironically the case which introduced us to Carlotta's old partner, James "Jimmy" Barlow..Here we were dealing with it on a larger basis..

"My brother didn't trust you at first Boychick."said Little Nikita...

"He doesn't? And I thought we was pals?" said Jimmy cooly..

"He didn't so we checked you out... Apparently you did time in Lompoc...Three years to be exact...Then you got arrested in Chicago and did a year in Cook County...You've made quite a name for yourself..These cowboys in Chicago you were running with...We contacted one of them...They say they have major weight..." he said.

"Major weight Nicky.....and I can have it to you in two to three days..They know me."said Jimmy..

He smiled...

"Good...but I have a shipment coming in and I have buyers.....If you say this stuff is good..and can vouch for it...I'll cut you in for a percentage.." he said laughing..Then he turned somber...

"But I bought you here to discuss other business...." he said.

"Other business?" asked Jimmy....

"Somebody hit my former driver and number two man..Leonid Zharkovy.."he said.

"You mean you didn't have him hit?" asked Jimmy..

"No..Why would I? He made his collections and he kept order very, very efficiently...People feared him on the streets...If I needed someone disciplined  or to simply vanish...Leonid was very good at that.. I know 12 people ,who if they were still alive would attest to that...He was the best and I want you to find out who did it." he said.

"You think it was a rival crew?" asked Jimmy...

"No...more close to the bone as they say...The way it was done.....Take a couple of guys with you..Find out who it was...and eliminate them...This has brought a lot of attention to me..Attention I don't want or need..Two  female detectives have been going around talking to my customers in my brother's bar and to people on the streets...One of them is quite attractive...If she wasn't a cop I'd think of dating her...She's a spanish girl.." he said thinking wistfully about Carlotta who had interviewed him a day before...

Jimmy smiled..

"I'm on it boss...You want me to cancel their contract?" he said sinisterly...

"Yes...I want you to do it publicly..to send a message." he said.

"Got'cha." he said smiling...
V-

Later that night...Jimmy met with me on the rooftop of our complex...

"Hey man...How you doin? Why don't you come on downstairs...Everybody would love to see you. We got some food...We are playin cards..." I said.

"I'd love to chief...but I can't..I can't be in here or around too long...I'm taking a risk being here now...Tell Carlotta and Sirena they are on the right track...Little Nikita didn't order this murder as we originally thought...but that it's somebody within his organization...." said Jimmy.

"Somebody looking to move up?" I asked..

"Could be....or petty jealousy...just tell em to steer their investigation that way.He's got me lookin in on it..Aint that a kick?" said Jimmy...

"Okay I will...Rico and Hop have that hotel and the warehouse on lock..Burnside and I are preparing indictments right now...we'll be moving in anyday now...I'm trying to give Carlotta and Sirena enough time to crack this murder case.. That information you gave us was solid..Sissy said thanks..We can clear up 12 open and cold murder cases now." I said.

"You hear from Angie?" he asked..

"I did...I saw her yesterday...She said that she's worried about you and she's waiting for you.." I said.

"Tell her it won't be long...Won't be long...I'm waiting for her too." he said.
"I gotta go....No more meetings..." he said.

"Keep it close to the bone Jimmy." I said.

"Always chief." he said as he walked off......

(TO BE CONTINUED)