Calumet City by Charlie Newton Page A

Today’s
Herald
said the mayor’s wife owned the building. Hell, the superintendent lived in it."
    "That a fact?"
    "For real. The Homicide dicks ID’d the body two nights ago, traced her from an old driver’s license in her wallet." He pauses to stare at two street-corner Nike jumpsuits standing face to face. "She was party to some weird shit over there,
plenty
weird for a small town, hell, for a big town." He’s laughing now. "You know her?"
    The radio squawks an all-call. "1812?"
    A uniform car answers, "1812."
    "1812 and all units on city-wide. Kidnapping in progress, two perpetrators, Assistant State’s Attorney Richard Rhodes. 1-7-1-0 Wells, in the alley."
    Before I can say,
Jesus Christ, an ASA,
my partner pulls the mike, "1863 rolling in plainclothes," and we light it up. U-turn, siren, and he’s doing 70 eastbound on Division’s narrow lanes. The neighborhood morphs from projects to yuppies in four fast blocks. We dodge a bus and a van, slip to the wrong side of the yellow line and jam the brakes.
Hooooooorn
. I’m braced into the dash. We miss the truck coming at us, swerve, more brakes, gas, hand-overhand, and we’re sliding onto Wells Street.
    Only the TV police hit an intersection like this. Almost a lock you’ll be T-boned or kill a pedestrian. Mid-block he’s doing 80, using the center stripe, screaming past pedestrians lunging for cover. We miss a bicycle and a parked Baird’s Bread truck that someone else didn’t. The radio squawks again. "All units on city-wide. Suspect kidnap vehicle southbound on 1600 block of Wells. Brown Chevrolet SUV, high rate of speed, officers in pursuit."
    "Comin’ our way." He jams the brakes and turns the wheel to slide-block the street. This means the 6,000-pound SUV traveling at a "high rate of speed" will smash my side and kill us both. The tires on my side buckle and we flip straight. An SUV grille roars up Wells at us like a train. Nowhere to go. I duck and the SUV shears off our driver’s side fender to the door. We spin into parked cars, bang three and our gas tank ruptures. Sirens scream past. Gasoline replaces the air. Disoriented, I jerk the seat belt that saved me.
Stuck
. The gas ignites and takes all the air with it. Hot. Loud. The belt pops; the door won’t open. Flames. I lean into my partner and kick the door. He moans in my ear. I kick with both feet. Flames fill the backseat, smoke everywhere. Can’t breathe, see stars. My shoe catches the handle; the door opens and I’m out, through the flames, rolling on the pavement. The car’s belching fire.
Scream
from inside. I dive back in because I don’t think. My partner comes when I grab through the smoke. Too heavy, can’t breathe, somehow I drag him out to pavement. Somebody slaps us with jackets; more screaming. It gets dark very quickly and everything stops.
     
•  •  •
     
       Heaven has coarse linen bed sheets and perfume I’ve smelled before. Somewhere.
    And strangely enough, a police superintendent. Could be he’s God after all, like he always said. Wish I would’ve listened. God is holding my hand which I take to be a good sign. The crowd behind him is not so good. Over his shoulder is a very pained-looking Sonny Barrett and six strangers in suits, one of them a middle-aged, well-heeled woman. Is she the perfume? Beyond them, uniforms are holding reporters at bay. Chief Jesse lets go of my hand as soon as he notices I’m awake.
    I smile. "Miss me? I can come back from 18 anytime."
    He doesn’t answer and waves Sonny and the other men out of the room. Sonny hesitates like he’s thinking about it, then does what he’s told. I remember the fire. "Oh, shit, tell me the kid didn’t die."
    Headshake, pride in the superintendent’s face but suppressed. "The cop you pulled out of your car…his father was the alderman in the old First Ward, Toddy Pete Steffen."
    Wow.
The old First Ward was the Chicago equivalent of Tammany Hall—guys who could fix murder trials for Outfit