"All right, so hang up." Mace shrugged at Rico, then redialed the phone and asked to be connected to the command center. The receptionist asked for his name.
Captain Earl came on the line within thirty seconds.
"Where the fuck have you been?" he asked.
Why is it, Mace wondered, that no matter who the guy is, once he puts on the brass, he becomes an asshole? Even Earl the pearl, who'd been a good investigator and a stand-up guy when he was a D3, was a shining example of this phenomenon. "You wanted to talk to me, Captain?"
"You still working the double in Hollywood?"
"Yes, sir. I believe it's the work of the Band-Aid Killer."
"You haven't spoken to the press?"
Mace's hand tightened on the receiver. "No, sir. On your orders."
"Why haven't I been apprised of your progress?
"I'll file a report this evening," Mace said, wondering what the real problem was.
"Do you have any solid suspects?" Earl asked.
The use of the word "solid" put Mace on guard. "I have some possible witnesses I've been trying to locate."
"Come in," Earl said. "Do you understand me? Come directly back to Parker Center. Do nothing else. Am I clear?"
"Yes, sir. I'm en route now." Mace waited a second, then called Cassiletti back. "What's up with the captain?"
"I don't know," Cassiletti said. "He wanted all my case notes. We must have stumbled into something?"
"I'm on my way," Mace said.
"What did Steve Brown want?" Cassiletti asked.
"I haven't had a chance to call him. I'll see you in a couple of hours."
Mace hung up the phone and turned to Munch. "I need to go back to Parker Center. We'll leave the limo at the crime lab, then I'll take you to your little girl. I just have to make one more call." He looked at Chacón. "Do you mind?"
"Help yourself, compadre," Chacón said. He turned to Munch while Mace looked up Steve Brown's beeper number.
"Did you find your friend?"
"No, it wasn't her after all," Munch said.
"You must be very relieved."
"I'd be more relieved if I knew where she was," she said. The phone rang. This time Mace answered, "Narcotics."
"This is Steve Brown, anybody there page me?"
"Yeah, Steve. Mace here. Cassiletti said you called."
"We have to talk," Steve said.
"You're going to have to stand in 1ine," Mace said.
"Yeah," Steve said, "I imagine you're feeling some heat just about now."
"Where are you going to be later?"
"Page me," Steve said. "We'll work something out."
"A1l right," Mace said, and hung up. He turned to Munch, "You ready?"
"Yeah."
He shook hands with Chacón, saying, "I owe you."
Munch and Chacón shook hands and exchanged "nice to meet you."
As they walked down the hallway on the way to the elevator, Munch held up a cassette. "You got a tape player in your car?" she asked.
"No. What is that?"
"It would be easier if I showed you."
* * *
Raleigh called the number he'd committed to memory. The voice on the other end of the line answered the call, saying, "Four one three eight."
"Two bravo echo six," Raleigh replied.
"Confirmed."
"Gameboy deviated from the program," Raleigh said. "Any problems?"
"Some wet work was involved."
"Is the situation contained?"
"Actually, better than contained. This is going to work out to our advantage," Raleigh said. A hot belch erupted deep in his throat, leaving the burning aftertaste of bile. He wondered if his duodenal ulcer was acting up again.
"So we're still on schedule?" the voice asked.
"Yeah, Gameboy's in our pocket."
"Excellent."
"There is one loose end," Raleigh said, popping his sixth Altoid in an hour.
"Go on."
"First name: Ellen. Caucasian female, mid-twenties, five feet six inches, one hundred and thirty pounds. Green eyes, light brown hair, but wears wigs. She works for A&M Limousine."
"Recommendation?"
"Silence her," Raleigh said.
CHAPTER 17
Ellen's ride dropped her off in front of Farmer's ground-floor apartment on the corner of Brooks and Main in Venice. Farmer had lived there for twelve years. The landlord had given up hope of ever raising the rent as long as Farmer chose to stay there. The only windows in the narrow, dungeonlike apartment faced Main Street. A twelve-year build-up of grime provided the privacy and darkness Farmer craved. He'd also nailed thick wire mesh between the wood sashes to further ensure his security.
Somehow, even though all his cash went to drugs, Farmer still managed to own a '69 Panhead, which he parked inside his apartment. The Harley-Davidson oil spot on his carpet was a source of pride.
Ellen rapped on his door, and called out, "Farmer," so he wouldn't think she was the cops. She knew Farmer was a night person. His displeasure at being disturbed would not last, not when she flashed her cash in front of him.
"The fuck you want? " he called out.
"Open up." She looked nervously up and down the street while she waited for him to undo the multiple locks on his door. "C'mon," she said.
At last the door opened, and Farmer stood before her, squinting at the bright light of day and looking like Willie Nelson after a two-week bender. He wore a dirty white T-shirt and grimy jeans. The skin of his bare feet was white. "The fuck you want?" he asked again.
She slid past him. "Shut the door," she said. "You holding?"
"You got money? "
"Yes."
"How much you want?" he asked.
"A dime," she said.
He lit a cigarette and appraised her. "Only a dime?"
"Ive been clean a while," she explained.
He nodded. "When did you get out?"
"A couple weeks ago. You holding or not? " she asked.
His apartment smelled of raw gasoline, dirty socks, and decaying produce. Farmer told her once that a man could live very easily on what markets threw away. Obviously he was still making the Dumpster circuit. She wondered if he ever washed his clothes or just wore them until they fell apart The sheets on his unmade bed showed the imprint of his body like some greaser's version of the Shroud of Turin.
"I'm out of pocket right now," he told her. "Donna Dumb Cunt has D's, but she only sells three for a quarter."
She knew he was referring to Dilaudids, a pill form of synthetic morphine. One of the drug's prized features was that it was water soluble and easily rendered into injectable liquid. Donna Dumb Cunt had a lucrative business forging prescriptions and filling them at select pharmacies. No one called her anything but Donna to her face, especially when she was holding.
"Are they the yellow ones?" Ellen asked. Dilaudids came in three different milligram dosages. The yellow were ten milligrams and the strongest.
"Yeah, of course," Farmer said. He scratched a scab on his arm. "You want me to cop for you?"
"I know Donna. I can go over there myself."
"Yeah, but she don't like foot traffic, and she won't let you fix there."
Ellen didn't see that she had many options left, not if she wanted to medicate her hangover. "All right. Take me over there, let me use your works, and I'll split the dope with you."
Farmer snuffed out his cigarette on the badly scarred carpet and pulled on his boots. She stood aside while he straddled his bike and kick-started it. The sound of the Harley roaring to life reverberated off the walls of the apartment. Ellen held the door open while Farmer wheeled the motorcycle out to the sidewalk, leaving behind a spotted trail of dark oil. She pulled the apartment door shut and jumped on the back of the Harley. Farmer took off toward the canals by the boardwalk. At the top of Dudley Way, he shut off the engine and rolled down the alley.
There was a carport behind Donna's building. Farmer secured the bike
with a heavy chain and padlock to one of the support columns, then he and Ellen climbed down through a cement planter and knocked on Donna's kitchen door. After what seemed an interminable pause, Donna came shuffling to the door. Donna had been around Venice forever. She had dropped acid with Jimmy Morrison and had smoked dope with Janis Joplin. She still wore her dry, frizzy gray hair long down her back, like the beatnik she had been too many years ago. She peered at them through her thick, smudged glasses, tilting back her head so she could see under her bangs.
"Yeah?" she asked. The pupils of her gray eyes were the size of pinpricks, indicating that she had recently partaken of her own goods. Constant drool had left chapped trails on either side of her mouth. Her teeth were yellowed.
"Hey, Donna," Ellen said. "How have you been?"
Donna laughed her throaty "Ha, ha." The same imbecilic chuckle that had helped her earn her nickname. "Well, I'm fatter, " Donna said.
"Oh, no, you're not," Ellen said immediately, even though that was the first thing she'd noticed. The flowing kaftan Donna wore couldn't disguise the width of her hips. "You look great."
Donna regarded them both suspiciously. "I'm not fronting you."
"I've got money," Ellen said.
Donna turned from them and lumbered back into her cluttered apartment. "How much you want?"
"Three," Ellen said. She felt the anticipation building inside her. There was no stopping now. The thought of getting down had carried her since waking up in La Jolla. How she was going to handle the rest of her life was all safely on hold. Everything but the dope was secondary.
Donna poked absentmindedly through her junky collection of bottles and books, opening each one and mumbling all the while, "Now where did I hide it?"
Ellen and Farmer exchanged looks. They'd been through this before with her. Donna said the neighbors noticed if there was a lot of in and out traffic, so she slowed things up with this game of hers. Ellen knew better than to volunteer to help search. Donna might be a dumb cunt, but she was smart enough to know that a dope fiend would keep searching long after they'd already pocketed your stash. An alcoholic would rip you off, too, but when they sobered up the next day they'd come back crying and beg forgiveness. An addict would rip you off, help you look for your stuff, and vow on their mama's grave to get the dog who did you dirty.
Donna was standing on a stool, going through the food-stuffs stacked on the open shelves in her kitchen. Waiting for Donna to finish her ritual torture was giving Ellen too much time to think. With thinking, came worrying. Just being here, consorting with known drug users, was enough to violate her parole. And what about Munch, who had only tried to help her? What was she going to tell her? Even worse than the thinking and worrying, Ellen realized, were the feelings. Either the hangover was making her oversensitive, or she had forgotten how bad it felt to grovel.
"How can you not remember where you stashed your dope?" she asked.
"Everybody's always in a hurry," Donna mumbled, and climbed down from the stool. Farmer held out a hand to help her down and frowned at Ellen. Hurrying Donna always had the opposite desired effect.
"Here they are," Donna said finally, producing a vial of pills from her pocket. "They were here all along." She laughed again, and Ellen wanted to punch her, but you never had that luxury with the connection. There was no saying, "Fuck you," and stomping off. Everybody understood this.
Ellen reached in her pocket for the cash. "Is this the best you can do?" The question entered Ellen's mind unbidden. She hadn't meant to even say it out loud. An unexpected tear trickled down her face. She wiped it away with the back of her hand.
'"Three for a quarter," Donna said, answering the question as if it had been directed to her. "That's a good deal."
Ellen couldn't speak as she counted out the money. Donna dropped the three little yellow pills into Ellen's palm. Farmer slipped the cellophane off his pack of Marlboros and handed it to her. The volume of tears rolling down her cheeks surprised her.
"What's the matter with you?" Donna asked.
"It's been a long time," Ellen said.
She rolled the cellophane around the pills and held the package in her hand for the short trip back to Farmer's. Farmer and Donna exchanged shrugs, unable to fathom her strange reaction. For them, it was all business as usual. But she understood. Her new life had already failed. And coming back to where you've left is always the end of the road.
* * *
Mace and Munch listened to the tape together. The first time, Munch said nothing. Then she rewound it and Mace paid close attention as she explained what she thought they were hearing.
"What's Ellen's last name?" he asked.
"You're not going to arrest her, are you?" Munch asked.
"Do you want to press charges?"
"No, of course not. "
"I need her full name for my report," he said, not telling Munch that he planned to issue an APB. It was as much for Ellen's safety as anything else, but he didn't want to spook Munch.
"lt's Summers," she said. "Ellen Summers."
He had her wait in his car while he booked the limo into evidence and explained to the Parker Center criminalists that he wanted the back of the limo searched for evidence. Mace secured another visitor's badge for Munch, took her upstairs, and had her wait at his desk.
"I shouldn't be too long," he said.
His desk was in the corner by the window with a view that encompassed the Federal Building and the massive office complex of Immigration Services. Pictures of various crime scenes and mug shots of career criminals were spread across his desk.
"Don't mind the mess," he said, shuffling to the bottom of the pile a death-scene shot of an elderly woman who had been shot in her sleep and bled out on her white pillowcase.
Munch pointed to the photograph now on the top. "Hey," she said, picking up a picture of someone's living room. "I've got the same hide-a-bed."
Mace took the picture from her. "What are you talking about?"
"This sofa," she said, pointing. "I've got the same one."
Mace studied the photograph and again noticed the turned-around cushion. Now it took on a whole new meaning. Cassiletti came through the doorway, relief evident on his face when he saw Mace. The big man nodded a hello to Munch, then said, "Captain Earl is waiting for us." Mace showed him the photograph. "This is a hide-a-bed. Let's call the SID crew and get them back over there."
"The captain?" Cassiletti asked.
"What are you? My conscience? Just make the call. I'll deal with Earl."
"He's waiting? " Cassiletti said.
"All right, forget SID. I'll stop over there myself." Mace looked down at the seated Munch, and said, "I'll try to be quick." He turned back to Cassiletti, extending his hand toward the doorway as if he were an usher, and said, "Lead the way."
They walked down the hallway to the captain's office. Earl's secretary, Brenda, stopped typing and pushed the intercom button. "Sir?" she said. "Detectives St. John and Cassiletti are here."
"Finally," came the reply
She let go of the button and smiled only at Mace. "He'll see you now."
"Thanks, Brenda," he said. "Don't you ever get any time off?"
Her smile grew bigger. A touch of pink highlighted her cheeks. "Seems that way I haven't even had lunch, and I don't know what I'm doing for dinner."
"He doesn't pay you enough," Mace said, letting the opening slide. He and Cassiletti entered the spacious office. "You wanted to see me, sir?" Mace asked.
Earl was seated behind his desk and didn't rise when the two men entered. He was wearing a polo shirt and chinos, as if his day off had been interrupted. "It's come to my attention that you've been requesting information on a Raleigh Ward."
"Yes, sir."
"You're looking in the wrong place," Captain Earl said.
"He is not a viable suspect."
"I'm not ready to rule him out, sir."
"This isn't open for discussion. I don't want you going to this man's
home, making any more inquiries, or conducting surveillance of any type."
"Who is this guy?" Mace asked.
"That's strictly need-to-know," Earl said, looking out the window at his own view of the federal court building. "Let's just say he's covered at a high level."
So thats it, Mace thought, the feds are involved. "I don't care if he works for God himself. If this guy did those girls, I'm bringing him down."
The captain looked only at Mace. "I'm giving you a direct order. You are to cease all inquiries regarding this man. Look elsewhere. Am I making myself clear?" '
Mace knew he'd come as close to the line as Earl would tolerate. Now he flirted with serious insubordination. But he was pissed, and he hoped that somewhere in Earl's brass-studded little heart he was feeling it, too. Almost nothing felt worse than caving in to the feds. The only feeling that surpassed it was letting a murderer go..
"Anything else, sir?" Mace asked through gritted teeth.
"I want your case notes."
"I haven't typed them up yet," Mace said.
"Give me what you've got, then," Captain Earl said.
"It's all in my head, sir," Mace said, knowing there was no argument for that. He thought of the roll of film in his pocket, the tape of Munch's, and the limousine parked in the back lot of the sheriffs crime lab. "But as soon as I get the chance, I'll type them up for you."
"How do you plan to proceed with your investigation?
Captain Earl asked.
"Just good old honest police work, Captain." Mace was gratified to see a small wince cross Earl's countenance.
* * *
Munch spent her time at Mace's desk idly reading whatever reports were visible. Then she saw her own handwriting on a Xeroxed sheet of paper under the picture of the hide-a-bed. This was the report she had written for Mace. Someone had made notes in the margin with a red ink pen. She casually slid the paper out to where she could read the addenda. Next to the phone number Raleigh had called from the limo at the end of the run, someone had written a name in blue ink: Pamela Martin. Written under the name was an address in Santa Monica. Now she had a name and address to go with the phone number.
* * *
Mace drove Munch to Digger's house on the Venice canals. Since his father's death, Mace had only been back twice. The place looked different since Caroline had cleared away the thick bramble of ivy and bougainvillea that previously shadowed the front windows. This place has known too much darkness, she claimed. Time to let in some light.
Unwanted Company - Barbara Seranella Page 14