Dead Wrong Read Online Free PDF

his hands as though working the feeling into numb fingers.
    It was bad enough he had to go through all these interviews with IAD. Six weeks or more of counseling with a psychologist. Anger management classes. Now this? He balled up his fist and slammed it on the table.
    “Hey, man. You got a problem?”
    Carl jumped at the sound and looked toward the kitchen door. A street kid leaned against the doorjamb. A Puerto Rican. Maybe fourteen, fifteen years old. Red bandanna wrapped around his head. Small tat of a snake on his neck. Straggly beginnings of a moustache and goatee. Not someone Carl would expect to see in his own house, on his street. He faced the kid, his hands empty and in the open. “What are you doing here? How did you get in?”
    “You left that big door unlocked, man.”
    “What do you want? You want to take stuff? Take it. I don’t give a shit.” He reached for his billfold.
    “Nah. Don’ do that. I don’ want your stuff.”
    Lynnette would have been home if they hadn’t fought. He wondered why she’d turned off the air conditioner, why she’d left the patio door unlocked. “Then how come you’re here?”
    “Look at me. You know me?” the kid said.
    “Should I?”
    The kid raised his right arm and motioned into the darkened living room behind him. Two more punks stepped into the hallway and strolled into the kitchen with insolent purpose. Carl sucked his breath in alarm. The boys smirked. With all the force his arms possessed, Carl tried to upend the kitchen table and hurl it toward the doorway, but he didn’t move fast enough. They caught the front side of the table and shoved, pinning him against the counter.
    There were knives in the kitchen. He had a loaded gun in the bedroom. But he was trapped. He had to wait, bide his time, try to look fearless.
    Carl unbuttoned and rolled up his sleeves, then sighed. “Okay. What do you want?”
    “You sayin’ you don’ remember me?” the first boy said.
    Carl looked him over, shook his head. “No.”
    “Think ’bout last night. Think ’bout when you and your buddy beat my li’l brother.”
    Carl felt the weight of his heart on top of his stomach, pressing down. How had they found him? Followed him home? “You don’t have to do this,” he said, his voice shaky.
    The first kid raised his arms as if he had no idea what Carl was talking about. “Do what?”
    “Anything. To me. I’ve already been suspended from the force. My partner, too. They’re doing an investigation. I’ve got to take classes so I don’t lose my temper.”
    “That sounds good,” the first kid said. “But, see, we done our investigatin’ before we even come here. That’s like takin’ the law into our own hands. Right? Kinda like you did when you kicked my brother in the face instead of taking him to juvie. He’s gonna be blind in one eye now. You know about that?”
    Carl tried to look sympathetic. But then he made eye contact with the first kid and realized from the dead gaze that the kid didn’t care what Carl felt or said. Sweat beads pooled in the hollow at the base of his throat and trickled down his chest. He glanced toward the door to the garage, willing himself to shove the table hard, then run into the garage and out the side door to his car.
    The first kid looked at the door, looked at Carl, and chuckled. “You ain’t got the guts, man.” He wandered into the hall and disappeared from Carl’s view.
    The other boys pulled the table back so Carl was no longer wedged in place, but one stepped between him and the door to the garage. The other stood in the hall just outside the kitchen and watched him with a menacing stare.
    Sweat trickled down Carl’s sides from his armpits. He tried to take a deep breath but couldn’t. He knew what they were thinking. He knew what they were going to do. Paralysis seized his brain. His body took over.
    With a sudden lunge, he rushed around the table toward the boy in the hall and knocked him off his feet. Carl ran