Free Vertical Coffin (2004) by Stephen - Scully 04 Cannell

cues. Christine Bell seemed hard pressed to find an opponent. The feds kept ignoring her, turning away and going for one of the guys, until she stepped up and kicked Grundy between the legs and brought him down like a bag of sand.
    The worst part of this fight was that it was so stupid. Our side was also going to be shamefully easy to identify afterwards, all in our nice police dress uniforms, complete with name plates.
    Two of the feds were now lying on the floor. As I turned to find a new opponent, I caught it from behind with a pool cue. The next thing I knew, I was on my hands and knees under the table trying to remember what continent I was on. That's whe n o ne of the feds put me out of my misery. I caught a shiny, black brogan with the right side of my head. I was done. Down for the count. Gone. Oh well.

    Chapter 8
    BUSTED AGAIN
    Wh at the hell happened to you?" Alexa asked. It was eight fifteen the next morning. As soon as I stepped out of the shower I put on a baseball cap to cover the six emergency - room stitches in the back of my head. But I guess the shower had opened the edge of the cut, and blood was running down the back of my neck.
    "Take off that silly hat," she ordered.
    "Oh, I don't think ..."
    She reached out and snatched the hat off. Then we did a little circle dance where she kept trying to get around behind me. "Shane, have you been fighting?" Sounding now like the horse - faced nun in those old Mickey Rooney movies.
    Busted again.
    Chooch had just hobbled out the door with Delfina, both o f t hem on the way to school. He dropped her at Venice High each morning, then drove out to Harvard-Westlake in the Valley. We were alone, so I couldn't even use the kids for cover. I brought us both mugs of coffee and handed one to Alexa. She sat at the kitchen table and looked unhappy. I knew she couldn't stick around long, because she had a nine o'clock meeting with Tony Filosiani. They were reviewing some detective crime scene tactics in Vernon, where the department had a big public relations problem pending on a bad arrest.
    "Who hit you?" she demanded again.
    "What makes you think I got hit? This was a ... I fell off a whatever--a thing." Great, Shane. "I was leaning back and tipped over in a chair, hit my head." Better.
    "I can spot blunt force trauma. Don't forget who you're dealing with," she said.
    She was right. It's pretty hard to BS a trained street detective. When it came to skirting the edges of the truth, this was not your normal marriage.
    So I told her about the fight that took place the night before at the Pew and Cue. When I finished she was very quiet.
    "Well, say something," I said. I hated it when she went quiet. That was always the worst.
    "What do you want me to say, Shane? We've got major problems going down between sheriffs and SRT. Lawsuits are bound to get filed, so how do you help? You and a bunch of sheriffs go out after Emo's funeral, get plastered, then get into a fight with SRT. Let's see ... What should I say? How about this: Was it fun?"
    "Would it help if I told you I tried hard to break it up before it got started?"
    "That might help."
    "I tried really, really, really hard to break it up before it got started."
    "Y'know, Shane, I love you, but you still have a lotta spots left that need smoothing off."
    "And you're slowly sanding them. I want you to know I'm extremely grateful."
    "Did the LAPD roll on it? Is this disaster gonna show up on a department green sheet downtown?"
    "One of our black-and-whites was called, but Darren talked 'em out of doing anything."
    "Darren. Not you."
    "I was ... in the toilet throwing up."
    "Shit." Now she looked worried. "You got knocked out?"
    "I don't think I was puking because of a concussion. I think it was bad chicken wings. I feel really good this morning. Tip-top. The E . R . docs didn't even want to hold me."
    "Because you didn't tell them you were throwing up."
    "A lot of it is kinda vague. I've got blank spots."
    "Really." She leaned back,