"Yes."
"You have hereby been served a restraining order against you, including stay-away locations, in regards to Ms. Chelsea Shore for physical and mental abuse. Have a nice day."
The man handed him the papers and strode off.
Tomas looked around. The floor was between shifts, so it was packed with people coming on and going off, and most of the people in the area were now looking at him. They shifted their gaze as he scanned the room, but they all heard what the man said.
"Motherfucker," he hissed as he walked to his desk. Slamming down into his chair he opened the papers and, sure enough, there was the restraining order, and five addresses that he was not to come within five hundred feet of. Also, he was not allowed to call, write, or contact those places in any way, or have them contacted on his behalf. The order was for thirty days, at which time a hearing would be held to see if there was cause to extend the order for a year.
"If that bitch thinks this paper means shit, she's got another thing coming," he spat.
His partner, Mike Wilson, briefly looked up from his reading and then back down at the case notes he was going over.
"What?" Tomas asked him.
"You break that order, and I'll probably have a new partner the next day. Don't be stupid."
Tomas was about to cuss him out, but snapped his mouth shut. This wasn't the place to lose his cool, and his partner was right—in a way. In another way, he was dead wrong. That bitch is dumber than I thought, he hissed to himself.
If he could talk to her, then maybe he could get her back and work things out. But since that wasn't an option now, well, she couldn't just walk around with the stuff she had in her head and the fifty grand she stole from him when she left, now could she? No, she couldn't. So… that didn't leave very many options open did it? Nope, not many at all.
On top of that, despite all he had told her about man-hunting, she gave him five addresses—all in the North Huston area—telling him exactly where she was. Where she was living, where she was working, where her doctor was, and whatever this other place was. Gynecologist? Whatever, it didn't matter. One address was all he needed.
He knew she was still in the area. The black and whites picked up her car this afternoon, and she didn't leave on a plane or train. With her sweet ass, she might have hitchhiked, but that was unlikely. She was a mouse. She would have been too scared to hitchhike.
The closest public bus line stop to her car was the 108, which went up to North Houston. So he already had a feeling for where she was held up. She wouldn't stay outside on the street. Checking the hotels would be the first thing he would do, though he doubted that he would find her in one of those. From the looks of things, she shook her pretty sweet ass and hooked a cowboy to take her in. Selling pussy was easy enough, and it seemed she took to it without hesitation. It was probably this cowboy's idea to get the restraining order.
Her car was impounded as a possible getaway vehicle for a drug deal gone to murder case on his desk. So, she was on foot. Of course, with fifty grand of his money she could easily buy another car. But it gave him some satisfaction to take from her the thing she valued most: her Shelby. It was like yanking off one of her tits.
"Get some coffee and calm down. We got a new one, just came in. We roll in fifteen," his partner told him.
Mike Wilson was coming up on retirement. He had twenty-four years in Narc, and was basically famous on the floor. He knew his shit. Damn good detective. Well, not so good that Tomas couldn't work around him, but he was good at catching drug dealers and closing cases. His only real flaw was that he believed. Mike believed in the system, in the brotherhood, and in his partner. All of which was complete bullshit. So, if a few kilos of coke didn't show up at the locker out of fifty, well, Mike figured the count was right, because after all, his partner counted the haul. If a few thousand in bills didn't make the same trip, well, same logic, same belief.
"Yeah, alright. I'm going to get a coke—you want one?" Tomas asked.
"Naw, I'm good. Just walk it off. You ain't the first with bitch problems. Hell, I've had three of those things delivered to me in the last twenty years. Do what I do. Pin it up in the bathroom so you can look at it during those special moments on the shitter and forget about it," Mike told him.
Tomas got up and threw the papers on his desk. "Sounds like good advice. I'll do exactly that. Fuck her. Wasn't going to go near her anyway."
"Exactly," Mike agreed.
"I'll be back in ten," Tomas told him, and walked toward the break room. Inside he pulled out his phone while buying a cola and called his real partner, James Stewart—probation officer and fellow criminal.
"Hey, what's up?" James asked.
"Bitch sent me a restraining order. Can you believe that shit?"
"Wow. That's ballsy. Didn't think she had it in her."
"Well, I'll take care of her. We're going to need a new mule. Anyone with a nice ass on your docket?"
"Got a Mex with a cute butt. Not like Chelsea's, but cute enough to fuck. I think we can bring her in. She even feels like she would get into it," James told him.
"Good. Feel her out, but don't make any moves until I deal with Chelsea," Tomas told him.
"Sounds good. Later partner."
"Later."