Waves rolled up the shoreline, crashing against the massive rocks, dragging lighter ones back into the deeper water. The Pacific Ocean smells of sand, salt, and fish oil hung heavy in the morning air. Lacing up his shoes, checking his watch, and sliding his sunglasses up his nose, he started to run. The sunshine and cool morning air made fifty-eight degrees feel spectacular. Brock smiled, running towards the paved beach trail parallel to the coastline after crossing Pacific Coast Highway, affectionately known as P.C.H. to the locals. Brock was a single man, living alone sans a dog or cat. He did have a small goldfish that he replaced every few weeks, not because he intentionally killed it, but because work took him away from home, sometimes days at a time. Feeding a dog or a cat would’ve been worse, so after the first goldfish died, he decided that having a pet wasn’t worth it. But two dollars for a couple of goldfish? He could afford that on his detective’s salary.

Detective Brock Myers, a newbie to the Newport Beach Homicide Unit, ran six miles to the Huntington Beach pier and back, part of his daily running regimen. His partner, Nate Bianco, couldn’t have run that far if his life depended on it. Nate was fifteen months away from retirement and let everyone know it.

Newport Beach Detective Unit

“No way am I running after any perp,” Bianco tried to say, his mouth full of a Krispy Kreme glazed donut. He finished all but three of the dozen on his desk. “You know you can have one if you want.” His pudgy finger, slick and sticky with the glaze, pointed at the box. Bianco’s chair creaked under his massive frame. Sweat pooled under his chin, and his balding head shone in the light, a small ring of hair creating a halo, resembling a Byzantine monk. All that was missing was a burlap robe tied with tan rope. Readers perched on the end of his nose helped him see the Orange County Register’s crossword puzzle. Only four answers were unsolved, but not because he didn’t know the correct answers; he was waiting for someone to read over his shoulder, then Bianco would write in the correct answer, proving to everyone in the room that he was more intelligent than everyone else.

“You do know those things will eventually kill you, right?” Myer stood over him in a pair of Levi’s, his badge tucked into the waistband next to his Smith & Wesson M&P 9mm. Myer also wore a pair of well-loved Reeboks, shoes he could run in if need be. He loved his Hoka’s but couldn’t justify wearing them to work.

“Yeah. But until then,” Bianco licked the glaze from his fingers, “I’m gonna enjoy each and every last one.” Winking at Myers, he opened the box, offering him to take one. “You can take one, kiddo. It ain’t gonna kill you, not with all the miles you run.” Bianco eyed Myer’s button-down shirt, a loud Hawaiian floral print, looking disgusted.

“I run to keep that,” he pointed at Bianco’s fingers, “from happening to my body.” Myer wasn’t the kind of person to poke fun at people, being rather matter-of-fact about everything. The last thing he would do was make fun of his partner, considering he lost more than fifty pounds between his sophomore and junior high school years.   

Bianco didn’t know Myer all that well. It was no surprise to the junior officer that Bianco took offense at Myer’s comment. Bianco jumped up from the cheap office chair, no easy feat. It thudded against the cubical wall, rattling the windows of the three-story building. “Are you calling me fat, frat boy?” Bianco’s worst comeback, especially to the fittest of the young detectives and beat cops, was frat boys. He tried to join a fraternity in college and handled drinking copious amounts of beer just fine. But he couldn’t do it. Forget the service projects or trying to keep up physically with the rest of the young, more athletic guys. The names they called him are why he dropped out during pledge week. He passed the first physical after graduating from the academy but had to have waivers for physical activities ever since. His captain moved him into homicide because cases were nonexistent. But he was a hell of a detective, so he was shifted to work on intricate theft cases or missing persons. His sleuthing skills were unmatched. Bianco solved all the Where’s Waldo books long before anyone else could find him. Solving puzzles, like crosswords or word searches, was easy for him. But pushups or pullups? Forget it.

“No, Bianco,” Myer held his hands in surrender, “your body is a temple. Right?” He said it with a straight face, believing it wasn’t a hateful comment but one Bianco made in mixed company years earlier. Evidently Myer didn’t know he forgot he was the one who said it.

“Yeah, a Buddist temple!” shouted one of the other detectives, a frat boy in Bianco’s book.

Bianco’s eyes narrowed in the direction of the loud-mouthed detective. “Oh yeah, frat boy?” he yelled back at Johnson, another young guy like Myer. “Why don’t you come here and say that to my face?”

“Come and get me, Bianco. Better yet,” he shouted across the room, “meet me out on the beach. We’ll go for a run, a short quarter mile. You make it that far without passing out,” he winked at the other muscle-bound cops standing nearby, “and I’ll let the frat boy comments go. You in or not?”

Captain Reeves banged his fist on the wall, “Knock it off, you two! Myers! Bianco! In my office.”

“Better get going,” Johnson yelled at Bianco. “You probably need a head start, eh Bianco!” Johnson yelled.

“Johnson!” The captain shouted. “The Verona case best be on my desk in an hour, or you’ll find yourself working the pier for the next three graveyard shifts.” The open office space, holding twelve detectives and their desks, went quiet; the only sounds to be heard were ringing telephones, a few officers taking notes and details from their questions, and a lone typewriter used only for old-style fingerprint cards and identification badges. The typewriter prevented forgers from faking any of these official documents.

“I’m on it, boss,” Johnson shouted back, sitting at a desk in the middle of the room. Homicide shared the space with other detectives, specifically from the criminal investigations unit and all the cops handling everything from robbery, arson, and property crimes. Narcotics and fraud also shared the space. Johnson was part of the criminal investigation unit and a terrible detective. Johnson managed to keep his job because of his ability to physically outperform his coworkers. The only one to come close was a woman. Detective Heather Becks couldn’t lift more than him, but she could outrun him. The longer the distance, the better for Becks. She worked in narcotics, but her desk was close to Johnson’s. But Captain Reeves could beat both of them without sweating. He wasn’t like the other frat boy officers, picking and choosing his battles.   

“Yeah? Sounds like you are dishing out more than you can take. Wanna take me to the shoreline and see who can beat whom?” His eyes narrowed on Johnson, then glanced at Becks, who was on the phone. She winked at the captain, knowing he could take her. She didn’t mind being bested by her captain. But the frat boy, Johnson? That bugged her.   

“No, sir.” The last time the detectives had a competition, Johnson was taken to the emergency room for observation. His heart rate was above 190 bpm, too high for his young twenty-seven-year-old body. His resting heart rate was around 60 bpm. Reeves worried he pushed the young man too hard, forcing his heart to take on too much, too fast. Once there, he was admitted to the hospital for observation and discharged the following day after getting IV fluids for more than half a day. The doctors said it was heat exhaustion, not a surprise considering the amount of alcohol the young man consumed, but only when off duty.

“Then get back to work.” Myer was inside Captain Reeves’ office, Bianco finally waddling himself inside. Myer stood. Bianco plopped down on a small loveseat in front of the captain’s desk, sinking so low it took every bit of energy to sit on the edge of the couch. Myer stifled a laugh, knowing it was inappropriate. He thought Bianco looked like one of those woodpecker executive desk toys, you know, the ones that slowly fill up with liquid, then bob back and forth until it fills up again. Bianco looked like he was going over.

The door shut with a loud thud. Reeves had to make a concerted effort, stepping around Bianco, coming close to knocking him on the floor. “I need you two to stop pushing each other’s buttons. You got me?” Reeves glared at Bianco. It wasn’t the first time he had to reprimand him. “And you,” he pointed at Myer, “you are brand-spank-me-new, kiddo. You can’t afford one mistake, you got me?”

“Yes, captain.”

Myer’s first assignment was working as a beat cop, and his supervisor graduated from the academy with Reeves. Both competed regularly for assignments, Reeves being a little better each time, Andrews not entirely up to the challenge of leading or taking responsibility for his assignments. Andrews stayed on the beat, not wanting to move up and after the first three times of getting passed over for promotion, he gave up trying. When Reeves sought a new homicide detective, Andrews told Myer to go for it.

“He’s tough but fair. I’ve known him my whole life. Well, my whole ‘cop life.’” Andrews told him what to watch out for, and it was the only reason he was in Reeves’ office now, getting his butt chewed. Reeves didn’t tolerate fighting with his detectives, whether or not they deserved it. The ones who couldn’t handle it were passed over for promotions, like Andrews, or they quit. “Best if you don’t say snarky things, kid.”

“I don’t say snarky things. I call it like I see it.” While his statement was true, it wasn’t tactful.

“Yeah. Don’t do that,” Andrews told him. “Otherwise, you’ll get an ass-chewing like you’ve never had before. He probably won’t yell, but it doesn’t mean he can’t. Just keep it to yourself. Or get chewed out by him, your choice.”

“I’ll take my chances,” Myer said. And now, here he was, in Reeves’ office, getting chewed out for stating the obvious. Anyone else would’ve seen it that way.

“I need you two to get along because we have a homicide case.” Reeves was watching Bianco struggle to keep his balance. “Would you stand up already? You look like this,” he pointed at his woodpecker desk toy. It stopped rocking sometime ago. Bianco pushed himself off the couch, falling over. Myer rolled his eyes and reached down, helping up his partner.

“Better?” Myer asked him once he was upright.

He brushed his hand away from him.

“You two need to get to this address on Brookhurst. Start canvassing. The medical examiner is on her way, and we have ten units on the scene, setting up barricades and ready to help in any way they can. I’m unsure if we are dealing with one body or two. But you two?” He pointed to both men. “You need to solve this case as fast as you can, without contaminating evidence,” Reeves wagged a finger at Bianco, “or upsetting witnesses,” he pointed at Myer. “You,” Reeves pointed at Bianco, “aren’t driving. Kid? You are.”

“But captain,” Bianco whined, “I have seniority.”

“Yeah, but the last time I trusted you with a vehicle? You managed to crash it into Krispy Kreme, didn’t you?”

“It wasn’t my fault.”

“It’s not happening again.”

“That was you?” Myer whispered.

“Shut it,” Bianco hissed.

“Out. The both of you. Bianco, show the kid the ropes. Myer? Pay attention to Bianco. He may be big, but he’s the sharpest man in our department. You can learn a lot from him.”

“Yes, captain.”

“Good,” he replied. Bianco and Myer didn’t move. “Oh, yeah. Right. Dismissed or something,” he said, waving them out of his office.