Homicide - Hussey: Afternoon Delight

Detective Mark Hussey continues to entertain with stories from his early days in law enforcement. In "Afternoon Delight" prankster Billy Hyatt returns. If you haven't met Billy yet, check out the posts on March 6, 13, and 20th.

One Friday afternoon in late September, the first signs of autumn were creeping into Lakeland. The days were getting shorter and residents were enjoying their first break from the hellish heat of summer.

Detectives Billy Hyatt and Kenny Wnuk were working an under cover assignment at the Holiday Inn on Memorial Boulevard. They'd been on a stakeout looking for drug dealers for nearly eighteen hours. "The Great Pooh Bear" (aka Ken Wnuk) was seriously getting on the nerves of his partner, Billy Hyatt.
The two were discussing whether or not cops should have the power to administer roadside executions for traffic violations, when they noticed a very new red Mercedes convertible, driving slowly through the parking lot.

"I think if there's two cops, and both agree, we should be able to shoot the asshole right there," Billy said, picking a piece of "Jimbo's Barbecue" from his teeth with a toothpick.


"I think you'd have to at least have a Sergeant or above as the executioner," Pooh said thoughtfully. Both men stopped talking and watched as the Mercedes went by them slowly, with the middle-aged, balding driver looking up at the room numbers.

"Think he's our boy?" Billy asked as he slid down in the seat of the dilapidated old Camero.

Keep Reading...

"Nah, guy we're lookin' for is a kid, 18, 19 years old."

The pair watched as the convertible parked, and a well dressed "businessman" got out of the car and went to a room on the second floor. He unlocked the door to 214 and went inside. Though the car and the guy were kind of out of place, the detectives soon lost interest.

The two cops continued their conversation, but were soon interrupted by a second strange visitor. A white BMW drove slowly past. The driver was a knockout blonde, and was also looking for room numbers. The Beemer parked next to the Mercedes and the woman, whom Pooh noted had "legs all the way up to her ass," knocked on the door of room 214, and after looking around suspiciously, quickly entered.

Billy was the younger of the two detectives, by two years, but he actually looked a little older. He was 5'9" with a thin, wiry build. He was mostly bald, but had let the wisps of hair grow long at the sides of his head, and looked for all the world like Bozo the Clown. The Pooh Bear, aptly nicknamed by his throngs of lady friends, was Billy's exact opposite. He was "Mutt" to Billy's "Jeff." The bear was short, about 5'4" and weighed about 185 pounds. He was an avid power lifter and his muscular tanned build rippled around his tank top shirt. With his bushy beard and his long, coal-black hair combed straight back over his head, he resembled Lon Cheney in the Wolfman movies.

As the woman disappeared inside the hotel room, the two detectives looked at each other and it was Hyatt who grinned first.

"Are you thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?" Ken asked as he slapped his knee.

"Probably," Hyatt said. He fished for the handheld police radio. "Lakeland, I need twenty-eight on a Florida tag, 7-5-4-3-1-7."

A few minutes later, the information crackled across the radio. "That tag appears on a 1983 BMW, registered to Paul and Eileen Collins, 314 Palmola Drive in Lakeland. "Wonder if Paul knows that Eilene is bumpin' uglies with the boss?" Billy said.

"Just a little afternoon delight," Pooh said.

Billy ripped the page with the registration information from his notebook and bounded out of the car, heading toward the motel office. "Listen for me on your radio and let me know what happens," he said as he jogged away.

The Pooh Bear nodded and turned on his handset.

In the hotel lobby, Billy quickly found the house phone and dialed room 214. When a male voice answered the phone, Billy screamed into the receiver, "You no good son of a bitch, this is Paul and that's my wife you're fuckin' in there. When you come outa' there, I'll kill ya." Billy then hung the phone up and called the Pooh on the radio. "Anything happenin'?"

"No, not...wait a minute, holy shit, the girl's comin' out carryin' her clothes." Eileen, clad only in turquoise panties and matching brassiere, and carrying the rest of her clothing, was running down the stairs for the parking lot. After some difficulty and dropping several things, she managed to get the car door open and throw the rest of her things inside. The BMW's engine roared to life, and as she squealed past the startled detective, she lost control and glanced off a VW bug which was parked next to the surveillance vehicle.

A grinning Billy Hyatt came back to the car and slid in behind the wheel.

"What the hell did you do?" Pooh asked.

"I just told the old geezer I was Eileen's husband and I was on my way to kick his ass."

The two detectives roared with laughter at the thought of the lady rushing home half-naked and confronting the unsuspecting husband. What a hoot.

Now they waited for the second half to come out. They waited and they waited. After about two hours of silence, Hyatt nervously said, "I sure hope the old bastard didn't have the big one in there."

"Yeah, could be bad," Pooh said as he watched a uniform cop investigating the hit and run to the Volkswagen.

Just then, the door to room 214 opened and a still frightened, balding head peered out. After looking in both directions, the man with his suit coat draped over one arm, rushed from the room and scurried to his red Mercedes.

"He's a little nervous," a relieved Wnuk said.

"Yeah guess he'll be lookin' over his shoulder for a while."

The dope dealer never did show up, but the stakeout certainly wasn't a total loss. Detectives Hyatt and Wnuk learned that sometimes, the phone can be a valuable tool in the fight against boredom.