From the back cover:
Circumstances do not look propitious for Dallas Police Detective Sammy Kidman. His longtime partner receives a promotion to sergeant, so Sammy gets a new partner who happens to be a woman.
But this is not just any woman—this is “Rosie the Riveter,” who attained her rank of detective by threats of a lawsuit, and who keeps getting bounced from one investigative unit to another because of her caustic, uncooperative nature.
So on Sammy’s first assignment with Rosie, he guarantees himself trouble by preventing her from shooting an unarmed suspect, and then saying so when she lies about it. But then he picks up a piece of trash that changes his life. . . .
Sammy: In Principle is the eighth in a series featuring the most misunderstood cop that was never on the Dallas police force. Previous books in the series are listed here—but new readers can comfortably jump into the series at any point.


CHAPTER ONE

There comes a time in all men’s lives when they must make the fateful choice of principle versus expediency, being versus doing. This moment of moments came to Detective Sammy Kidman while he watched his partner Dave Pruett receive the congratulations of the entire Special Investigations Bureau of the Dallas Police Department (those who were present, anyway) for his promotion to sergeant.

It had come about with noteworthy ease—weeks after his application, exams were held; barely a month later, promotions announced. After one week of vacation starting tomorrow (Saturday), Pruett would assume his duties as long-range planner in the office of the Chief of Police, Carson Howell. And Sammy would get a new partner.

Sammy stood on the fringe of the group in the break room, watching as Pruett cut into a cake one of the girls in payroll had made for the occasion. She’d always been sweet on Pruett, despite the fact that he was married with children, and despite the fact that he always had trouble remembering her name. None of that mattered as Pruett gamely served up pieces of yellow cake on paper plates to his fans and admirers gathered around the orange-topped table.

Stacked on the table, free for the asking, were 8x10 publicity glossies of Chief Howell congratulating the suave, smiling Pruett, as well as 8x10 head-and-shoulder portraits of Pruett in his new uniform. Most of the detectives who worked in undercover units avoided being photographed, but this job in the Chief’s office required Dave to handle the press. And Sammy, pondering the question of appropriate action, tore off a small piece of paper napkin and stuck it into his mouth.

Masticating, Sammy watched as Pruett posed for a snapshot with his former supervisor Mike Masterson, the sergeant in charge of the Targeted Activity Section in Special Investigations. Tall, good-looking Pruett enjoyed the limelight, which he earned not only with his superior detective work but with his inspired practical jokes. Thus everyone who knew him endeavored to stay on his good side but not get too close, as his best friends were his most frequent patsies. Sammy, the closest of the close, was on the receiving end of approximately one gag per week.

He chewed, eyes unfocused, until the small wad was soft but not mushy, then bent to pick up a rubber band from the linoleum floor. Studiously, Sammy removed the pulp from his mouth, shaped it into an aerodynamic projectile, and set it into the rubber band. He then waited for the ideal moment as Pruett began thanking all of his friends for their support.

Later, Sammy would look back on that incident as the pivotal moment in the day, in his life, when he realized that God had altered the course of the heavenly bodies and with it, Sammy’s destiny. The whole day was supernaturally charged from this instance on.

When Pruett turned to Mike beside him, Sammy aimed the spitwad and fired. Three-quarters of the people in the room watched it arc twenty feet to land atop Pruett’s blond, perfectly combed head. And there it stuck.

“And then there’s Sambo,” Pruett said, turning with a wad of chewed paper on his head. “I know you’ve put up with a lot from me, guy, but there were days I couldn’t ’ve made it through without knowing you were there to take it on the chin for me. So I made sure to have a say in the assignment of your new partner.”

Sammy was the picture of graciousness. “Thanks, Dave. And congratulations.” He did not join in the snickers and whispers going around the room. And although Mike stared hard at Pruett’s head, he did not lift a hand.

“Well, if you’ll all excuse me, I need to get up to the Chief’s office in the new complex for a briefing,” Dave said, clasping his hands in the superior manner of command. He didn’t need to specify where the Chief’s office was; everyone knew that it was in the new Jack Evans Police Headquarters in south downtown Dallas. Only a handful of units, including the Targeted Activity Section, remained here in the old, decrepit building on Main, the Police and Courts Building.

Pruett raised his eyes to sweep the dirty, pock-marked ceiling. “Man, I’m going to miss this place,” he said in ill-concealed satisfaction. “Well. Thanks again.” He waved to the thirty or so well-wishers, who responded with cheery goodbyes.

With Pruett gone, they turned to congratulate Sammy on his adroit shot. He received their accolades with dignity, then in imitation of Pruett, raised a hand. “Please, don’t genuflect.” Having seen the word in a newspaper article commenting on the Chief’s conduct toward a powerful county commissioner, Sammy desired to use it himself at the first opportunity. “I have to get back to my desk now. Thank you.”

Mike’s chocolate-brown face immediately tightened in guilt. “Uh, yeah, I think your new partner’s waiting for you,” he said. He had begun to stroke his bristly cheek, but reached for another piece of cake instead.

Sammy barely nodded as he turned out of the snack room and walked down the third-floor corridor toward the Targeted Activity office. It was a large room of metal desks and computers, crumbling acoustical-tile ceiling and worn-to-the-concrete linoleum flooring.

Someone had started a rumor that this office was haunted after the detectives had come in on several mornings to find papers scattered and trash cans rifled. After all, the cell that had housed Lee Harvey Oswald after the fatal shooting of President John F. Kennedy was only two stories directly above them.

But then they had found out it was only rats.

Entering the office, Sammy saw a woman sitting at what used to be Pruett’s desk. She was stocky and round-faced, with straight, chin-length hair. She leaned back in the chair to shove her thumbs into the waistband of her pants, on which rested the heavy badge of a Dallas Police Detective. “Hello, Rosie,” he said, deducing that the rumors he’d been hearing all week were true.

She eyed the black-haired, blue-eyed man who gazed at her in veiled innocence, his hands resting harmlessly in his pockets, his sports coat hiding a taut, athletic build. She’d heard rumors, too—how Sammy worked only with those he wanted to work with, and deliberately drove everybody else crazy. How he believed women were unfit to be police officers. How he could charm what he wanted out of you and then ignore you until he wanted something else from you.

In that brief moment before she spoke, while all this was going through her mind, Sammy was recalling what he’d heard about her: how she had stood by directing traffic until backup could come to the aid of her partner, who was getting stomped by drug dealers. How she had achieved the rank of detective via threats of a lawsuit. How she had been bounced from two different investigative units because of her caustic, uncooperative nature.

“So you’re Dreamboat? I’m so disappointed. I wouldn’t sleep with you for a million dollars. But hey—Harlan told me that if IAD gets one more complaint on you, you’re a goner. You know Harlan, don’t you? He’s Lieutenant Kerr to you,” she said, rocking back in the old secretarial chair.

Suddenly looking down at the groaning chair, she declared, “This furniture stinks. Whose a— has been smelling up this chair? I’m getting a new desk set next week.”

Sammy blinked. Holding up a finger, he said, “Excuse me for just one minute.” He turned out of the office and strode toward Mike’s door down the hall.

He paused as pudgy, cute Corporal Collins approached from the other direction, waving him down. “Sammy!” “Hi, Carrie,” he said.

“Sammy, I had to thank you for all your help getting me on at the north central bureau. I start Monday in Chief Groebel’s office,” she said.

“Good, Carrie. Great. I know you’ll do well,” Sammy said.

“Anyway—where’s your ID?” she asked, reviving their little game. He pretended to make a frantic search of his pockets, and she laughed. “Well—’bye, Sammy. I’ll sure miss you.” She reached up to kiss his cheek. He squeezed her arm. “Take care.” Then he resumed his walk to Mike’s office.

Leaning in the open door, he saw Mike digging in the hanging files of a bottom desk drawer. Mike glanced up and winced slightly. Uninvited, Sammy came in and shut the door. “Why did you assign Rosie the Riveter to me?”

“Sambo, I—” Mike opened his hands helplessly over his paperwork. “We do what we have to. It was our turn to take a trainee—”

“A problem,” Sammy corrected.

“You can handle her, Sammy. You’ve had tough ones before,” Mike said encouragingly.

Yes, he had. He’d worked through scores of difficult assignments, many of them provided by Mike—like that crazy arenaball stint Sammy had just finished two months ago. But today, all of a sudden, he didn’t care. It was as if something inside him told him he wouldn’t be required to expend much effort with Rosie. After receiving that thought, Sammy left Mike’s office.

He went all the way down to the first-floor snack room to get a cola. It was much more crowded on the first floor, as this was where the public paid fines for tickets, but they were all just part of the scenery today. Besides, the snack room was in the back of the building, away from the ticket lines.

Something in the doorway of the snack room caught his eye, and Sammy bent to pick up a quarter. He idly flipped it as he walked over to the drink machine. Digging in his pocket, he found only 56 cents in change. So he used the free quarter to make up the difference for a 75-cent cola.

He popped the top and leaned back against the machine to take a swig. Officer Pierce, passing by in the hall, caught himself at the doorway and swung into the room. “Sambo! Didn’t think I’d get to tell you goodbye,” he said, approaching with outstretched hand.

Sammy took it. “Are you going somewhere, or am I?”

Pierce laughed. “Don’t know about you, but yeah, the wife and I are moving to Allen.”

“Does that mean you’re leaving the department?” Sammy asked.

“Well, yeah, in my case. I . . . got an opportunity with my brother-in-law’s furniture outlet, and . . . I decided to take it,” Pierce admitted.

“You quitting police work to sell furniture?” Sammy asked mildly.

Pierce shrugged, glancing off. Although at 33 he was a year younger than Sammy, he had predominantly gray hair and bags under his eyes. “In a word—yeah. I just. . . . It’s changed. Everything’s changed so much. The watch commander, you know, and after the inquiry last year. . . .”

“Yeah. You got a bum rap on that,” Sammy said softly.

“A lot of people told me to fight it, but after a while, you start to wonder, like, ‘Is this worth the fight?’ Then after my wife’s surgery, we just kind of sat down to talk about what was important to us. She can’t work, and the expenses after her surgery . . . the house payment’s about to eat us alive. Well, her brother’ll let me draw against my commission, and—against all that, the Job just didn’t stack up, you know?”

Sammy lowered his eyes, nodding. “Well,” Pierce concluded, “have a good one.”

“Tell Tanya hi for me,” Sammy said, looking up. “And good luck.”

Left alone in the snack room again, Sammy suddenly thought, Fifteen years. This fall will be fifteen years since I entered the academy. It hardly seemed possible, and yet—Sammy was sport-ing a few gray hairs to show for it himself.

He drained the can and crunched it with one hand, tossing it into the receptacle marked, “Cans ONLY. Please RINSE first.” He didn’t, because diet cola cans didn’t need rinsing (so he told himself).

He took the elevator back up to the third floor, remembering little incidences that had happened here or there—Here on the elevator is where they had put up the underwear ad he’d done. Over there in the stairwell is where he’d taken that knock on the head. The media room on the first floor is where he had received his Medal of Honor (no photos, please).

Disembarking the elevator into the third-floor hallway, he suddenly felt like a reigning beauty queen taking her farewell walk down the runway. In defiance, he stopped and scratched.

Once again, he passed through the wood-and-glass door with “Tar ete Acti t ” mostly spelled out in black letters. Sad to say, Rosie was still there, on the telephone.

When Sammy came in, Ron Garrett rose from his desk, buttoning his coat. Sammy immediately noticed that Garrett was bucking the detective’s uniform of sports coat and slacks in favor of a sharp three-piece suit.

Sammy blocked his exit. “Tell me where you’re going dressed like that or I’ll punch your face in. Then again, I may anyway.”

“Save your sweet talk for the lady, Kidman,” cool, black Garrett replied with a shuddering glance at Rosie. “I got appointed to a new panel on race relations with the county commissioner. I’m gonna go do lunch and then a press conference with him. Watch the news tonight.”

“Take me with you,” Sammy said, clutching his sleeve. “Get me a place on that panel or I tell the world you listen to the Dixie Chicks.”

Garrett chortled, jerking his sleeve free and smoothing out the wrinkles. “How’d you ever get to be a police when you can’t scare nobody? Hang it up, Kidman.” Flashing his pinky ring, Garrett departed the room.

Sammy sighed, looking after him a moment before heading toward his desk in the back of the room. Rosie hung up her telephone. “Okay, Kidman; I’ve got our assignment.”

“I’m working one already,” he said, nodding to his desk. Not very hard, he might have added.

“Whatever you’re doing can wait. This is straight from the lieutenant,” she said importantly.

Sammy paused beside her desk, smiling. “And what would the lieutenant request of us now?” he asked with an eyebrow elevated in humorous condescension. On second thought, he couldn’t blame Mike for having to play arena football. That was at the request of the lieutenant.

Her jaw jutted out at his cuteness. “It’s an order, funny guy. We gotta sit at Reverchon Park a while.”

Sammy’s smile vanished. Surveillance. He hated surveillance more than anything else in the world. And it was at a park notorious for an illicit sexual activity that Sammy found highly repugnant. “That’s Vice,” he reminded her.

“Harlan asked us to pitch in,” she said, standing with a hand on her holstered gun. “Whatsamatter, you got a sweetie down there you don’t want pinched?”

Sammy regarded her coolly. Trading insults with one’s partner was a time-honored method of building a working relationship, but doing it right required skill and wit. This woman had enough of neither to spit with.

“Tell you what,” he said, stirring, “you go sit. That’ll scare off any sickos looking for love and Vice won’t make any arrests the rest of the day. Then they’ll really appreciate our help.”

Rosie picked up her telephone while Sammy watched. “Just calling Harlan to tell him you’re refusing the assignment,” she explained lightly.

Sammy reached over to press the switchhook. “Rosie, listen to me. Women do not go sit in cars anywhere near that park. If you and I go sit there, they’ll make us as cops.”

Receiver still at her ear, she purposefully met his eyes. They were so blue, fringed by such thick, dark lashes. So she responded, “Get your f——— thumb off my phone.”

Sammy raised his hands in resignation. “Okay, I could use the afternoon off. Let’s go. We’re taking my car, by the way.” On the way out, on an inexplicable impulse, Sammy stopped by the break room to take one of the promotional photographs of Pruett, which he then stashed in the trunk of his car along with all his other emergency equipment.

Sammy’s car was not one of the departmental heaps available to the detectives; it was his very own 1966 lime-green Mustang convertible, rebuilt with a V8 engine. Since they would be surveilling from the car, for today and today only, Sammy left the top up and turned on the air conditioner to cool them off in the steaming July afternoon.

“Where’re we supposed to meet the Vice team?” he inquired of Rosie, watching as she slid into the front bucket seat and glanced around the white interior. He noted everyone’s first reaction to his car. It told him a lot about them. Rosie noticed absolutely nothing about the car. “Uh? We don’t have to meet anybody,” she replied.

With a hand resting on the gearshift, Sammy said, “We have to coordinate with them. We can’t just go sit at the curb somewhere. What would we be watching for?” Part of a rookie’s training was being reminded of the basics, like communication between sections.

When she did not reply, Sammy picked up his car phone and dialed Vice. He identified himself to the secretary who answered the line, then asked about the operation at Reverchon Park this afternoon. “Okay, you’ll need to talk to Sergeant Hamilton. Let me transfer you,” she said.

“Thanks,” Sammy said, stirring. The air conditioner did not cool well when the car was just idling, but it was no use going back into the Big Building—Vice wasn’t housed here, nor in the new complex. It was headquartered in a small, nondescript building across downtown, along with Narcotics. But Sgt. Hamilton was probably not there, either; she was probably already at the sting site.

“Hamilton,” a woman’s voice said.

“Sarge, this is Sammy Kidman, in TAS. Uh, my new partner says Lieutenant Kerr wants us to help you guys out this afternoon at Reverchon.”

“Who’re you with?” the sergeant asked suspiciously.

“Detective Kray,” Sammy replied.

He heard her exhale an expletive. “Sammy, I don’t want that screw-up anywhere around my operation. Take her shopping; take her bowling—anywhere but Reverchon!”

“Okay, Sarge,” he said, and set the telephone back in its base. He put the car in gear and craned his neck around Rosie to see past her, then pulled out onto Main.

“Okay,” he said. “We’re not supposed to go to Reverchon; we go to Pike Park.” This was a small park off Harry Hines Boulevard, far enough away from the target area to placate Sgt. Hamilton, but close enough to give assistance should something go wrong.

The park was only a few minutes away, northeast of down-town. Harry Hines was predominantly one long red-light district, with adult arcades and a brisk drug trade. Sammy pulled up to the park in a conspicuous spot and lowered the top. He wanted everybody to see him here so he would not have to arrest anyone and make the largely futile trip to lock-up. Minutes after posting bond, whoever he arrested would be back out here, doing business as usual.

Sammy cut the engine and made himself comfortable, taking off his coat and tossing it in the back seat. He called Sgt. Hamilton again to advise her of their location (which suited her marginally) and give her his mobile phone number. Then he settled in, reconciled to a wasted afternoon.

Normally, such assignments made him crazy, but now he was just marking time. This weekend he was taking Marni and Sam—his wife and nineteen-month-old son—on the Snake River Train from Fort Worth to Granbury, and he was really looking forward to it. He did not clearly perceive right now how his off-time was gradually eclipsing his work in importance.

“Well?” Rosie asked, and Sammy looked over lazily. “What are we watching for?”

“Any illegal activity,” he said gravely, stretching.

She glanced around dubiously. “Shouldn’t we be in concealment?”

Sammy scrunched up his bottom lip in due consideration of the question. “No,” he finally opined. “Sometimes your best cover is to simply blend in with the environment.”

“Oh.” Remarkably, Rosie accepted that a man in a tie with a woman in his car whom he obviously had no romantic interest in blended with the scenery on Harry Hines.

For a moment she scanned the small park with its halfhearted landscaping and bolted-down benches, then glanced at him again to mention, “I hear you’ve got quite a history of undercover.” Sammy nodded, the wise old man. “Doing much now?” she wondered.

“As little as possible,” he said.

“Don’t you miss it?” she asked.

Like a migraine, Sammy reflected. “Not really.”

She leaned toward him eagerly. “I wanna go undercover. I tried to get on with Narcotics, but they’re not taking letters now. Tell me the best way to get undercover.”

Sammy considered it. “I hear CIU [the Criminal Investigations Unit] is taking recruits.”

She scowled. “They don’t do any of the fun stuff—just warrants and paperwork. Tell me how to get Mike to assign me the undercover operations.”

“Mike? Well, the way to get what you want with Mike is to sit on him about it. I mean, just shadow him. Make sure he never has a chance to forget you’re there and waiting,” he advised. This, of course, was the surest way he could think of to free himself of her.

“Are you sure?” she asked doubtfully.

Sammy made direct eye contact with her, poised to solemnly declare it was so, then sighed and looked away. It was getting so danged hard to keep a good lie going nowadays.

“Rosie, just do every job as thoroughly as you know how, keep up with your paperwork and don’t hassle Mike. A few good assignments will eventually find their way to you.”

She looked as disinclined to believe this advice as the former. “Rosie, I’m telling you—” he insisted, then his telephone warbled.

He pressed on the speakerphone, answering, “Kidman.”

“Sammy, we got a perp heading your way on foot—Caucasian male in blue warmup suit, armed and dangerous. Backup elements are on their way, so just keep him in sight,” Sgt. Hamilton advised.

“Ten-four, Sarge,” Sammy replied, then craned to look down the boulevard as he turned off the phone.

“There he is!” Rosie exclaimed, rising out of the seat. A middle-aged man was pumping it down the street as hard as he could. His lightweight blue warmup jacket billowed back to reveal his paunch. His fists were balled; his face rigid with fear. He veered away from a turning car to head straight toward them.

“Rosie—” Sammy warned, but she had already jumped the car door in pursuit. Seeing her, the suspect veered off the street to run into Pike Park.

“Stop! Police!” she shouted. When he did not stop, she unclipped her holster and pulled her service automatic. Sammy watched in horror as she drew a bead on the fleeing suspect’s back.

“No! He’s unarmed!” Sammy yelled at her, leaping over the seat to grab for her arm. Her automatic discharged and the suspect crumpled.


Buy Sammy: In Principle here


© 2009 Robin Hardy

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