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Zinfandel and she'd chill out; I'd fucking kiss you that worked."
    Park didn't say anything.
    Hounds held out his hand.
    "Fuck it, give me the fucking things."
    His partner passed him the bottle of Valium.
    "Yeah, you should give it a try. Got nothing to lose."
    Hounds pocketed the pills.
    Park looked away, and Hounds caught it in the rearview.
    "What the fuck? This a problem for you, asshole?"
    Park didn't say anything, just watched the crowd around the Red Cross truck start to roil as people realized there weren't enough bags of rice to go around.
    Hounds drove.
    "Worst can happen to the old lady is she can die."
    He rubbed the back of his neck.
    "Fucking real worst thing is that she could live another six months. Jesus. I get it, I go sleepless, I'm eating the bullet. Soon as I know it's for real, I'm out. My wife's mom, she gave us the money to put the down on our first place. Found out her daughter was marrying a black guy, she started reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X. I mean, that was bullshit, but I appreciated the thought. Now? Watching that, watching someone rot in front of you? I thought I could get my wife to go along, I'd put the bullet in her brain. And swear to God, she'd fucking love me for it. Aw, this fucking shit, what now?"
    A SWAT in full body armor, visored Kevlar helmet, a belt of 5.56-mm draped over his shoulder feeding the M249 Squad Auto in his arms, waved them to the side.
    Hounds stuck his head out the window.
    "What the fuck? We got a perp in here."
    The SWAT walked over, shifting the machine gun's butt to his hip and pulling off his helmet.
    "Easy, man, just trying to cut you through the line. Roll up here on the side."
    He pointed at the empty traffic lane, bordered by spools of razor wire, kept clear for military and emergency traffic.
    Hounds nodded.
    "Thanks, G, my bad with the attitude. Just someone up the chain put something in my captain's ass and we spent the day tracking down some fucking dealer."
    The SWAT set his helmet on the roof of the car, looked in the back at Park.
    "Dreamer?"
    Hounds grunted.
    "Right, you'd think that, make us roll for this shit when there's real police work to do. Fucking recreationals is what he's selling."
    The SWAT ran a hand over the top of his crew cut, a fine spray of sweat getting caught in the halogen glow of the generator-driven spots lighting the checkpoint.
    "Any ups? I'm about to fall over here."
    Kleiner showed the remaining bottle and Baggie.
    "Demerol and X."
    The SWAT stuck out his hand.
    "Hit me with a couple tabs of X. Might keep me from shooting some of these fucking spics."
    Kleiner poured some pills into the outstretched hand.
    "What's the go-down?"
    The SWAT shook two of the pills into his mouth and started to chew, tucking the others into a pouch on his tac belt.
    "Avenues are burying one of their warlords. Guy started his Impala the other day and it blew up under him. Fucking Cyprus Park psychos. Anyway, funeral cortege is gonna roll at midnight tonight, and they want to run it right through Cyprus Park turf and over to Forest Lawn. Send some kind of I-don't-know-what-the-fuck message."
    Hounds pointed east.
    "Fuck that. Tell them no fucking way. Blockade the street."
    The SWAT nodded.
    "Where you out of?"
    Hounds took off his sunglasses.
    "West Bureau, Hollywood Community. Something to say?"
    The SWAT held up a hand.
    "Nothing to say, police is police. But we got a treaty on with Avenues right now. They're doing neighborhood enforcement east of San Fernando. All it really means is we can hit their turf without worrying too much about taking fire. But we come down on them about how they bury their dead? Next thing you know, cop can't come out from behind the wire without a sniper taking potshots, getting shrapneled by a garbage can IED."
    Hounds put his shades back on.
    "Yeah, I get it. Keep some of the scumbags on our side while we deal with the worse scumbags."
    The SWAT picked up his helmet.
    "Hey, that's a nice way of looking at