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The Shield


by Christopher Grant


The girl has big tits for only being fourteen. She leans in the passenger side window of my car and asks me for a bag of ten Oxycontin.

She has no clue what I could do to her right now, that I'm a cop and could bring her ass up on charges if I wanted to. I want to do something else with her right now.

Instead, I tell her to drop the cash on the passenger seat, even as I hold the bag out to her. She does as she's told, takes her product and walks away. I watch her ass sway side to side and get a hard-on.

Before you go criticizing me for what just happened here, think about two things.

One, I'm providing a service. These kids are gonna get their fix any way they can anyhow. Who you gonna trust more with your kids, a cop or fucking Tyrone with who knows what kind of poison mixed into what he's slinging?

Second thing is the fact that I don't want to be out here, despite the scenery. But I got bills to pay, a sick kid that needs treatment every couple weeks, it seems, and an ex-wife that crawls up my ass anytime the alimony and the child support is late.

So criticize if you want but...

Shit, here comes the aforementioned Tyrone.

I roll up the windows and start the car but he's a fast motherfucker and he's busting out the passenger window with a ball bat before I even get the car in gear.

I floor the pedal, trying to escape the parking lot, and wind up flooding the engine.

Fuck!

Here he comes and he's got some of his crackhead friends with him.

I pull my nine and get out of the car quickly. Two shots go through the back window as I hit the pavement.

I come up and fire off a couple rounds, clipping one of the guys, dropping another.

I don't feel the slug when it shatters my knee. It's like my knee's there one moment and then it's nothing but white hot pain. My gun clatters to the ground and Tyrone is standing over me.

"You know who I fucking am?" I ask him through clenched teeth.

"Yeah, dead," Tyrone says.

I hear the gun rack as he cocks it. There's hesitation.

"Let's get outta here," Tyrone says to his friends.

My bladder finally lets go and I feel the piss trickle down my ruined leg. I look down. Laying on the ground in front of me, the gold shield that used to mean something to me once.
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