Chapter 663

December 10th.

Los Angeles, Western Division.

The old rookie John came to the police station a little earlier than usual.

The Superintendent held the usual morning meeting and arranged today’s patrol mission.

Unlike the previous patrol assignments, this time the patrol route was adjusted and he was assigned to the neighborhood of Calthorpe School.

When John arrived at the assigned patrol street, one after another yellow school buses drove by, but more of them were private cars sending children to school.

John got out of his car and kept order while grumbling to his coworker Lucy, “Why am I assigned to patrol here?”

“Maybe the superintendent thought you’d know better how to deal with children since you have them.”

“Come on, my kids are in college, but this is an elementary school. I’ve long since forgotten how to deal with elementary school kids.”

Lucy shrugged, “It’s no use talking to me, if you want to complain go to the ‘big guy’ who’s coming to the school to console the kids.”

John asked rhetorically, “That candidate for governor?”

“Who else but him?”

John sighed, “I don’t think I’d have anything in common with him.”

Lucy laughed, “Cheer up, Henrik Laurie has a full day ahead of him, ours is the first stop, he won’t be staying long.”

“I hope so.”

At 9:20 a.m., a line of motorcades pulled up to the Calthorpe School.

Henrik Laurie stepped out of the car and waved to the crowd around him, before being escorted into the school by the school’s leaders.

John looked at the crowd and asked sideways, “He doesn’t seem to be governor yet, isn’t that a bit of a row?”

Lucy said, “Not only is he a candidate for governor, he’s also a California State Senator and has a lot of influence in the state government.”

John asked rhetorically, “Since when do you care about politics.”

Lucy laughed, “I don’t care about politics, I’m just doing a little research on the subject of our mission.”

There were campus police and security guards inside the school, and the rangers only needed to maintain order outside the school.

John stood somewhat bored for over half an hour, and around ten o’clock, Henrik Laurie walked out of the school surrounded by people, got into his car, and waved as he left.

John watched the car walk away, “Are we done?”

Lucy said, “Yes, the motorcade will make its way through Stephen Street, Salic Road and into Posta Square, where Henrik Laurie will make his speech.”

John thought for a moment, “Why Salick Road, I remember a section of the area in the middle being quite chaotic.”

“It’s the fastest route, there should be colleagues from other departments keeping order, that’s out of our hands.”

Salik Road.

The road was smooth, the sidewalks on both sides were wide, there were quite a few tents set up by homeless people, garbage was everywhere, and there were a lot of unspoken liquids along the walls.

There was a police car parked on each side of the road, with patrolmen patrolling outside the homeless tents.

On a side street on the north side of the road, there were a number of black men wearing bandanas and tattoos, who gathered in groups and did not look like good people in any way.

A black man with his pants loosened at the waist and showing half of his underwear laughed, “I heard that the future governor’s motorcade is going to pass through here, should we go out and race with him?”

“Haha, good idea, if he wins, I’ll vote for him.”

“I’m in.”

“And me.”

“Listen, if we go together, let alone race, he’ll be so scared he’ll turn around and run back to Sacramento to find his mom.”

“Haha ……”

“Wooo……” Just then, a black SUV drove into the street and stopped in front of the group of black men wearing bandanas.

These black men looked at the unfamiliar SUV car and surrounded it with curses on their lips.

The door of the black SUV opened and a white bald burly man got down from the passenger side and fanned himself with his hand in front of his nose: “The whole street stinks, don’t you assholes know how to clean it up?”

The surrounding black men revealed angry looks, but didn’t do anything overly aggressive because the white bald burly man had a police badge around his neck and was followed by two rifle-wielding detectives.

“Yo, if it isn’t Lieutenant David from the Gang and Narcotics Control Division.” A black man smoking a cigar pushed his way through the crowd and walked out.

“Marcio, if I remember correctly, you should be in charge here.”

“That’s right, why are you guys on my turf?”

“Come here, let’s talk.”

“Haha, make it seem like we know each other well. ok, I’d like to hear what you’ll say too.” Marcio laughed and walked with David a little farther away.

David lowered his voice, “I’m here today for a simple reason, keep your men in check and keep them out of trouble.”

Marcio shrugged, “I don’t understand what you mean?”

“Then I’ll make it clear, lead your men to stay home today and don’t go anywhere. Just do me a favor.”

“I give you face, who gives me face?”

“If I didn’t give you face, I wouldn’t have called you here to speak alone.”

“What do I tell my men?”

“That’s your business. If your men make trouble today, I promise you, you won’t have a good time for the next while, understand?”

Marcio licked his thick lips, “A day is too long, three hours at the most.”

David extended his hand and made a handshake gesture, “Deal.” Same time.

Posta Square.

A lot of people had already gathered on the square, all citizens who had come to listen to Henrik Laurie’s speech, and some of them were holding signs in support of Henrik Laurie.

Several police cars were parked on the east side of the square, and patrolmen were maintaining order around the square.

Luke mixed into the crowd with agents from the Robbery and Murder Division to prevent any radicals in the crowd who might turn against Henrik Lawley.

Blackie bristled with some dissatisfaction, “Isn’t this protection a bit much, it’s catching up to the President.”

Luke shrugged, “Maybe there’s something we don’t know about.”

Blacky speculated, “Could it be that Henrik Laurie guessed that someone was going to assassinate him, but had to come in order to get votes, that’s why he made such a big show.”

Luke gave Blackie a look, and although he knew that the odds were that he was just guessing, there were some real possibilities.

Luke urged the agents through their headsets to be careful and cautious, and that they would be held accountable if anything really went wrong.

At ten-twenty, a motorcade pulled into Posta Square.

The surrounding crowd got excited as well, chanting slogans in support of Henrik Laurie.

There were also quite a few reporters mixed in the crowd, and Luke saw Inoue Naomi’s figure among them, however, he did not take the initiative to greet the other party.

Henrik Laurie stepped out of the car, waved his hand to the surrounding crowd, and then climbed onto the temporary speaker’s podium in the plaza surrounded by bodyguards.

With a smile on his face, Henrik Laurie picked up the microphone next to him and said to the crowd under the stage: “Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. It’s a pleasure to see you all here.

I love L.A. I come here every year for a little while and it’s like a second home to me.

I love the people who live here even more, warm and cheerful, tolerant and helpful ……”

A cheer was elicited from the floor.

Luke squeezed his way to the front of the crowd and looked over at the podium gubernatorial candidate, who was thin, tall, and appeared to be in his mid-forties, dressed in a sharp suit and with meticulously groomed hair.

Needless to say, this one was not a bad seller, and even if he didn’t make it in politics, he could be considered for Hollywood.

Luke then looked into the crowd.

Suddenly, he saw a lanky black man squeezing through the crowd in the direction of the podium, and he seemed to be holding something in his hand.

Luke said into his headset, “Porter, there’s a black man at your three o’clock heading in the direction of the podium with an unknown object in his hand.”

“Understood.” Porter answered and walked towards the black man not far away, only that there were too many people around and it was too crowded, making it difficult for him to get there in the first place.

Just then, the black man stopped and held up something in his hand, unfolding it to be a banner with Henrik Laurie’s name on it.

There was a false alarm.

Luke, however, did not let his guard down; as long as the speech was not over, their mission was not complete.

A few minutes later, Luke’s headset rang with Ramon’s voice, “Captain, there’s a man in a black baseball cap at your eight o’clock who looks a little suspicious.”

Luke twisted his head to look and quickly found the man wearing a baseball cap that Ramon was talking about, the man had been leaning towards the lectern, looking at the posture he should be carrying something in his hand.

Blackie and Jackson were not far from the man in the baseball cap, Luke immediately instructed the two to keep an eye on each other.

The man wearing a baseball cap kept pushing forward, Luke felt that the situation was a bit wrong, his right hand was already pressed on the gun.

Just three or four meters away from the lectern, the man in the baseball cap stopped, and then, waving his right hand, threw a round object at the lectern.

Luke instinctively pulled out his pistol and was about to shoot when he realized something was wrong.

It was a red vegetable, a tomato to be exact.

The tomato smashed into Henrik Laurie’s body and he froze for a moment as the bodyguard who arrived later immediately shielded him.

“You lying liar, get off the stage right now.” The man in the baseball cap threw another tomato, but this time it was blocked by the bodyguard.

Just as he tried to continue throwing, Jackson and Black rushed over and held him down, “LAPD, freeze!”

There was some commotion in the crowd, but it quickly subsided again with the police maintaining it.

Luke also breathed a sigh of relief, luckily he didn’t shoot just now, otherwise it would have ended badly.

“Let’s get this damn speech over with sooner rather than later.”

However, Henrik Laurie had no intention of ending his speech, he pushed the bodyguard away, wiped the tomato juice stuck on his clothes with his right index finger, and put it into his mouth, “It tastes pretty good. I love LA tomatoes.”

“Oooooh ……” instantly drew another cheer from the stage.

Not only did this little hiccup not bring the speech to an early end, but it made the public at the venue even more enthusiastic.

Half an hour later.

The speech ended. Henrik Laurie boarded the car surrounded by bodyguards and waved goodbye to his supporters inside the car.

Blackie complained, “This damn mission is more stressful than investigating a case.”

Luke echoed the sentiment, “Let’s all have a drink tonight and relax.”

Blacky laughed, “That’s a good idea, I’ve found a new bar, I’m told they have superb beer there ……”

The next morning.

Luke’s house.

He got up a little late last night after drinking a lot with his coworkers.

It wasn’t the first time he’d been late anyway, so he wasn’t in a hurry and was going to have breakfast before going to work.

“Ding Ding Ring ……”

The cell phone on the table rang.

He picked up the phone and saw that the number displayed on the screen was Inoue Nami’s number.

“Hey, it’s Luke.”

“Luke, weren’t you there at the Perseus Square speech yesterday?”

“That’s right, I wanted to give you a shout out, but the place was too crowded.”

“I have news for you.” Nami Inoue sounded a little excited.

“What news?”

“Henrik Laurie is missing!”