Free Crystal Meth Cowboys by John Knoerle

top of the driver's side window. Bell winced and growled and reached under the seat to grab his road rag. He patted his left breast pocket carefully though it was scarcely wet.
    "Frank 12 - Control."
    "This is Frank 12."
    "We have an ADW, with a knife, 6-4-9-3 T-Tom Street."
    "Copy."
    The LTD plowed eastbound down Playa Road, code 3. Renaldo popped up on the chat frequency. "Surf's up, dude," he said.
    ------
    It looked like a neighborhood where cars lived. The dimly-lit residential street presented nothing to the public but garage doors and cement driveways. No trees, no picture windows, postage stamp lawns. The roofs of the one-story homes were pitched low, some fringed with pieces of orange plastic molded to look like tile. Bell gunned the unit down the block, splashing through puddles from the brief squall. He flicked the siren switch from the cruising-down-the-highway cadence of 'hi-lo' to the closing-in-on-the-prey-and-about-to-pounce rhythm of'yelp'. Another unit sat parked in front of a house a short distance ahead, its headlights wig wagging back and forth.
    "It's Reese, that claim jumper," said Bell. He pulled up to Reese's unit, which was parked sideways in front of a garage door taped with half a dozen heart-shaped mylar ballons. He and Lyedecker jumped out. Cyril Reese was inspecting a clump of oleander with his Kel light.
    "You know anything?" said Bell.
    Reese holstered the Kel light in his sap pocket. "No more than you do."
    "Then let's went," said Bell and led the officers to the left of the dwelling on flagstone steps.
    The front door was actually a side door that was open except for the screen door. Wes could see an animated group of Latinos clustered around one man in the kitchen. There was a Latin strain in the Mediterranean culture or a Mediterranean strain in the Latin culture, thought Wes, because all the men in their short-sleeved dress shirts would have fit right in with the crowd at
Pizzeria Regina
in Boston's North End.
    "Police officers," called Bell through the screen door. The men in the kitchen quieted quickly. "Que paso?"
    Wes turned to the far wall of the living room.
Feliz Aniversario Miguel y Lupe
was blue magic markered across the top of a piece of posterboard. A black and white wedding portrait was glued to the middle of the posterboard and "15!" was red magic markered along the bottom.
    The man in the middle of the circle crossed to the screen door and opened it. Wes guessed he was the man in the wedding photo, though he had put on a lot of weight. His ruffled white shirt was rent down the middle, the top three buttons gone. A long, ripe flesh wound sliced through his left cheek. "There has been an estabbing," said the man.
    The cops shuffled inside. Bell looked at the man's wound, then down at a fresh pool of blood coagulating on the entry tile. "Yeah, no shit," he said.
    The flecks of mica in the pink decorative gravel gleamed wetly in the halo of two Kel beams. Bell and Lyedecker crunched their way down the side of the house toward the back yard. Wes saw female silhouettes moving behind the drawn curtains of a back window.
    "It musta been one of the women that called it in," said Bell. "Your
vatos
generally like to settle these matters between themselves."
    Wes squeezed past a thirty gallon Rubbermaid garbage can. His flashlight picked up nothing of interest in the ten yards of gravel and stunted bushes ahead. The man with the slashed cheek had said a very excitable party crasher downed a bottle of Mescal and attacked him with a knife. When Bell asked 'You stab him back?' the man had looked offended. Wes took this for a no until the man said, 'Of course.'
    "Will Reese be OK in there?" asked Wes.
    Bell stopped and crossed behind Lyedecker. "Reese is code four." He pried the lid off the Rubbermaid can and shined his light inside. "Mexican's are scared of niggers."
    Bell replaced the lid and resumed tromping down the gravel. Wes followed, thinking of the open gash on the man's face. It