The Night Beat

The fog rolled in off the bay, thick as cigarette smoke, curling around the warehouses at Hunters Point. The streetlamps cut narrow cones of light through it, leaving most of the dockyard in a smear of gray. Sam Holden sat behind the wheel of a city-issued Ford sedan that rattled every time the wind shifted.

Ray Delgado slouched in the passenger seat, unlit cigarette between his teeth, drumming the dashboard with two fingers. “You ever think about how many hours of our lives we’ve wasted in parked cars, watching nothing happen?”

Sam adjusted the binoculars, ignoring him. A pair of headlights cut through the mist, bounced off the corrugated walls of a warehouse. He tracked the car as it slowed near the gate. “That’s one of Caruso’s.”

“Could be. Could also be a guy delivering Chinese takeout,” Ray muttered.

The vehicle idled. A tall figure stepped out, wrapped in a long coat that caught the fog like a shroud. Even at a distance, Sam knew the gait. Vincent Caruso walked like he owned every square foot of pavement in San Francisco.

Sam snapped a photo with the long-lens camera.

Ray sighed. “We’ve tailed this guy for six months. You know what we’ve got? Grainy photos of him shaking hands with half the city council. The brass doesn’t care. IA doesn’t care. Hell, I’m not even sure I care.”

Sam lowered the camera just enough to glance at his partner. “Somebody should.”

“That somebody doesn’t have to be you.” Ray cracked the window and spat the cigarette out into the fog. “You keep pressing this, they’ll hang you out to dry.”

Sam didn’t answer. The warehouse door opened, spilling a rectangle of yellow light across the dock. Caruso stepped inside, trailed by two men with shoulders like bulldogs. Another man emerged to greet him. He was short, balding, with a familiar face from City Hall. An envelope changed hands.

Sam’s camera clicked. Once, twice. The sound felt too loud in the silence.

“Jesus,” Ray muttered, sitting forward. “That’s Councilman Vickers. If this ever sees daylight…”

“It won’t,” Sam said flatly, still taking photos.

Ray leaned back, rubbed a hand over his face. “You’re a stubborn bastard, you know that? I’m trying to help you. Nobody wins this fight.”

Sam let the camera rest in his lap. Through the windshield, Caruso laughed at something Vickers said, a soundless grin in the fog. Then they disappeared inside. The door shut, leaving only the hum of the bay and the rattle of the Ford’s heater.

The silence stretched. Ray finally spoke again, quieter this time. “You keep chasing Caruso, you’ll end up with nothing but enemies. And enemies don’t care about truth, Sam. They just care about survival.”

Sam started the engine. The fog pressed in close, as if the night wanted to swallow them whole. “Then let’s make sure we survive long enough to do something about it.”

They drove off, headlights cutting through the mist, leaving the warehouse swallowed again in gray.

The fog thickened as they pulled away from the dockyard, muffling the sound of the engine. Sam kept his hands steady on the wheel, eyes fixed on the slick ribbon of asphalt cutting through the shipyard.

Ray lit his cigarette this time. “All right. I’ll bite. Why Caruso? We got a dozen mob outfits in this city, all carving each other up. Why’s he the one that keeps you awake at night?”

Sam didn’t answer at first. He guided the sedan through an intersection, windshield wipers dragging back and forth against a mist that wouldn’t quit. Finally, he spoke.

“Two years ago, I worked a double homicide in the Mission. Married couple, corner grocery. Shot point blank after hours. Their seven years old kid was asleep upstairs. He called it in when he woke up and found his parents cold on the floor.”

Ray stared at him, a cigarette hanging forgotten between his fingers.

“Caruso’s crew did it,” Sam went on. His voice was flat, a man reciting something branded into memory. “Shakedown. They wanted protection money, the couple said no. Witnesses disappeared. Evidence went missing in lockup. Case went nowhere.”

Ray exhaled smoke slowly. “And you’ve been carrying that weight ever since.”

“Somebody has to,” Sam said.

Ray shook his head. “Sam, the city’s crawling with these guys. You can’t fight all of them.”

“I don’t need to fight all of them. Just the one who thinks he’s untouchable.”

They drove the rest of the way in silence.

* * *

The precinct was nearly empty when Sam walked in, the kind of dead hour where the night shift runs on coffee and apathy. A custodian pushed a mop down the corridor, barely looking up.

Sam dropped into his desk chair, the springs groaning under his weight. He set the camera down, pulled the roll of film free, and laid out his notebook. Streetlight leaked through the blinds, striping his desk in bars of pale gold.

He scribbled notes in his tight, deliberate handwriting: Caruso. Hunters Point. Envelope exchange with Councilman Vickers. 9:47 p.m.

He paused, pen hovering, then flipped to the back of the notebook. A photo was tucked there, creased from being handled too often: a smiling family in front of a grocery store. The couple with their arms around each other, their son grinning at the camera. Sam had kept it. Quiet penance.

He stared at it for a long moment before slipping it back into place. Then he returned to the page, writing until the words blurred in the haze of fatigue.

The city outside kept humming, indifferent. But Sam Holden had his eyes fixed on Vincent Caruso, and he wasn’t about to look away