Like so many buildings in Los Angeles, the Californian Apartments were ersatz Mexican. Two stories of tan stucco with arched windows and a red-tiled roof-Ole. I could see Zack's maroon department-issued Crown Victoria in the garage, but his personal car, a white, windowless Econoline van, was drunk-parked, blocking most of the driveway, which would make it impossible for his neighbors to leave in the morning.

I walked toward his downstairs unit and found the front door ajar, stepped inside and called his name loudly, afraid he would come out of an alcoholic stupor, pull the oversized square-barreled cannon he recently started packing, and park a hollow point in my hollow head.

"Zack? Hold your fire. It's Shane."

Nothing.

The place had the odor of neglect. A musty mildew stench tinged with the acrid smell of vomit. The room were littered with empty bottles and fast-food wrap pers. Faded snapshot memories of my old life flickered on a screen in the back of my head.

I found him in the kitchen, out cold, sprawled on the floor. Zack was almost six-three and well over three hundred pounds, with a round Irish face and huge gelatinous forearms shaped like oversized bowlin pins.

He was face down on the linoleum. It looked as ii he'd been sitting at the dinette table, knocked down one too many scotch shooters, passed out, then hit the table tipping it as he rolled.

How did I deduce this? Crime scenes are my thing and this was definitely a crime. There were condiment scattered on the floor and blood under Zack's right cheek, courtesy of a dead-drunk bounce when he hit.

"Hey, Zack." I removed his gun and rolled him over His nose was broken, laying half-against his right cheek. Blood dripped from both nostrils. I got a dish towel, went to the sink, wet it, then knelt down am started mopping his face, trying to clean him up, brink him out of it.