The Meridians(18)

Of course the journalists got a hold of the story and ran with it, running exposé after exposé on Scott Cowley, asking the question of whether he was a good cop, but asking it in such a way that it was never really in doubt what the answer was: no, he was not a good cop.

For those journalists who ran the pieces, after all, there was no such thing as a good cop. It didn't matter to them that Scott and people like him were the reason that they could write their drivel without having to look over their shoulders at night for fear they'd be attacked. It didn't matter to them that freedom of the press existed because of the blood of men and women who kept the peace and who provided a community safe enough that such freedoms were even possible.

It just mattered to them that there was a shooting, and that there was a cop involved. So it was only a short leap from "Cop Involved in Shooting" to "No Suspects Found" to "Cop Under Investigation."

So no, Scott couldn't blame his superiors on the force, who were under pressure from the mayor's office, which was under pressure from the voters, who were being spoon-fed a load of crap about Scott being an irresponsible and perhaps irrational, gun-toting lunatic.

The trial itself wasn't termed a trial, of course. It was an "inquiry." He told his story over and over, to police commissions, to civilian oversight committees, to Internal Affairs, and to anyone and everyone else who asked. Even though he knew it was going to end up as a public flogging sooner or later, he answered the questions, and answered them truthfully.

But yes, eventually it became clear that though there was no real dirt on Scott - he had a record as spotless as the floors that Amy had kept in their home - even so, there was also no real evidence to support his story. Just bullets and casings and some "friends" who had come upon a scene where, ultimately, there was no suspect to be found.

Eventually, he was reprimanded and demoted several levels. His career as a cop - at least, as a cop who had a chance at any serious vertical movement in the department - was over.

And Scott didn't mind.

In fact, on the day that the letter was delivered to him at his home, he was almost relieved. It was over. The people had their scapegoat for a crime that had "likely never occurred except in the mind of an overstressed officer." Indeed, he was aware that it could have been much worse; that there were those in the department and in the journalism sector who quietly whispered about the possibility that Scott had staged the whole event for the sole purpose of covering up the real crime: his murder of his own wife and child.

The day that he was demoted, he came home early from work, feeling like hell. What were they going to do, demote him again? he reasoned. So he said goodbye to the few remaining friends he had on the force and came home, reasoning that he might take a nap.

Or he might kill himself.

It was a tossup. On one hand, a nap sounded damn fine.

On the other hand, you had to wake up from a nap, and Scott didn't know that that sounded so very good to him these days. What did he have to wake up to? An empty apartment. A room full of toys that would never be played with again. Presents that had not quite been unwrapped for his child's last birthday, and never would be unwrapped, for the child for whom they were intended was gone forever.

So Scott walked through the place, looking at the rooms, at the evidence that once he had been alive, and wondered if he wouldn't be better off just ending it all. It wouldn't be hard, he knew. He could cut his wrists in the tub and sink into a warm oblivion, leaving the world as he had come into it: in blood and water and pain. Or he could just throw back a couple dozen of the OxyContins that he had been prescribed in the aftermath of his ordeal, to help him cope with the almost daily pain he now suffered.

Either way, it would be easy, quick, and final.

All good things.

He actually got as far as filling up the tub for a final bath when it happened.

There was a sound.

Immediately, Scott was transported back to the alley, to the sound he had heard when the hitter - the man Scott called Mr. Gray, a man who had never been identified, though Scott had spent countless hours and even entire days looking through various photo files of criminals and killers - had crept up behind him with the intention to end his life.

Scott froze. He turned off the water, which dripped for a moment and then was silent.

He listened. Waited.

He watched the doorway to the bathroom, wondering if what he had heard had been real, or simply some post-traumatic hallucination dredged up from his subconscious to torment him.

The sound did not repeat.

Even so, Scott went from room to room in the small apartment, clearing the area with the precision of a Delta Force member sweeping for hostiles.

Nothing. The apartment was empty, save only him.

Even so, there had been a sound. He was sure of it. It was the sound of a shoe scuffing on the floor, the sound of someone trying hard to be stealthy and not quite succeeding.

The sound of a killer, of a predator, laying in wait for its prey.

Scott went through the apartment one more time, this time more carefully. He looked not only in each room, but in each possible hiding place in each room. He opened every closet. He looked under every bed and table. He even opened the cabinets under the kitchen sink on the off chance that a very small intruder might be hiding there.

Nothing. Still nothing.

But then the sound came again. The soft scrape of leather on wood, the murmur of a shoe on the floor.