“Yeah, we had a break-in a while back, and they damaged the cameras. The boss never got them fixed.”
“You probably need to get on that,” Bill said. “Otherwise, if it happens again, the insurance company will be all over him.”
“I think that’s partly why he didn’t bother getting it fixed. The insurance wouldn’t cover it in the first place, so then he figured, why bother? They wouldn’t cover it anyway, so it was just more money out the window for nothing.”
At that, Bill nodded. “Once you start getting into a scenario like that, it’s pretty damn hard to convince yourself that it’s worth the money.”
She watched the two talk. “So, back to the accident.”
Bill snatched up the pizza the kid held out for him, grabbed his coffee, and walked over to his preferred table. “As you can see, I had a good view. But, when I came in that day, I wasn’t looking out the window. I was studying the newspaper.”
“So you didn’t see anything?” Her heart sank.
He nodded. “Exactly. I saw it afterward, when the woman was already on the ground.”
“Did you rush out to help her?” she asked curiously.
“Nope, I’m not doing that shit no more. Besides, a crowd had already gathered.”
“How quickly? Too quickly?”
“Now that’s a good question.” He stopped to consider her. “That’s a really good question.” He thought about it and shook his head. “I don’t think you’re right though. It happened fast, and the driver of the car got out. But he took off soon enough, and she didn’t look like she was all that badly hurt.”
“So he did get out?”
He frowned, thought about it. “The second one, not the first one.”
“You saw the first one?”
“I did but not for long. And I didn’t hang around. A ton of people were gathering fast. I knew the cops were on the way, and it would just be chaos.”
“And you didn’t want to get questioned, I suppose,” she said in a dry tone.
“Hell no,” he muttered. “I know how long that takes.”
“And you don’t want to be a good citizen now, huh?”
“Nope, don’t feel any incentive for that at all, nothing in it for me.”
“You only do what’s in it for you now?”
“Yep, pretty much.”
“What happened to you?” she asked, frowning.
“Not all cops end up retiring, being all good ex-cops.” He sneered. “I didn’t leave on good terms, so I don’t really have a whole lot of fond memories.”
She winced at that. “I guess that’s everybody’s worst-case scenario. When you put in that many years, you do want to get your pension and hope there’s something else to do when you leave.”
“There is. You rot at home. You can’t get other jobs.”
“You’re still young,” she said.
“Yeah, but with a disability.”
“On the job?”
He shook his head. “No, that was the worst part because I would have gotten a better pension if it had been.”