Lindstrom said, “This one we call the electric thong.”
“Ouch,” said Milo.
“Not necessarily.”
At seven fourteen, Carlo Scoppio left the gym looking tired, slightly flushed.
Before he reached his truck, a young woman in a peach hoodie walked up to him, smiling but conspicuously nervous.
“Excuse me?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I think I’m lost. Is this a bad neighborhood?”
“It can be. Where are you from?”
“Tempe. That’s Arizona. I was supposed to meet someone at Hollywood and Vine. Is that close to here?”
Derisive laughter. “Not exactly.”
“You’re kidding.”
‘You’re pretty far from there—do you have a car?”
“I took the bus. From Union Station. They said get off at Jefferson then transfer to the... I forget. So it’s nasty around here?”
“I wouldn’t be out here alone after dark.”
“Oh, man ... can you point me toward Hollywood?”
Laughter. “I can point—it’s that way. North. But you can’t walk it.”
“Is there a bus?”
“No idea—what the—”
Carlo Scoppio stiffened as Milo and six other large men ran toward him shouting. Gayle Lindstrom had her cuffs out, told him he was under arrest. Scoppio swatted the cuffs, made contact with Lindstrom’s forearm, threw her off-balance.
A bass chorus of commands filled the strip mall as Scoppio dropped his gym bag, assumed a pugilist stance. Fists up, ridiculously quaint.
“Policepolicepolice putyour hands where they can be seen hands up yourhands hands up!”
Scoppio blinked. Raised one hand.
Dropped the other to the waistband of his hoodie, reached in, brought out something long-barreled and shiny.
The choir switched hymns: “Gungungungungun!” Scoppio straight-armed his weapon. Milo aimed his Glock.
Same instincts as a few days ago at Moghul, where’d he’d taken years off Officer Randy Thorpe’s life expectancy.
Thorpe had been smart.
Scoppio squinted. His finger whitened.
Milo fired.
So did everyone else.
CHAPTER 44
Dr. Clarice Jernigan said, “This autopsy was fun.”
“Real hoot,” said Milo.
The pathologist’s office at the crypt could have been anywhere.
No specimens swimming in formaldehyde, no morbid humor. Potted Peruvian lilies and cactus sat atop a low, white bookshelf, along with cheerful family photos. Jernigan and five healthy-looking kids and a husband who looked like a banker.
She said, “I mean fun from an intellectual puzzle perspective. Your Mr. Scoppio had twenty-eight bullets in him from five different firearms, with at least four wounds theoretically fatal. I don’t need to pinpoint which one did him in, because frankly, who gives a damn, he’s a sieve. But if I was writing this up for Journal of Forensic Science, I’d tag the frontal head wound. Big-caliber bullet, went straight through the cortex and dipped down into the brain stem.”
“Three five-seven?”
Nod. “Yours?”
“Mine’s nine-millimeter.”
“Like two other shooters. No rifle fire. How come? Fugitive guys always bring assault rifles.”
“The officer didn’t have a clear shot.”
“Shootout at the O.K. Mall ... well, if your nine-millimeter impacted anywhere above the rib cage, you can award yourself honorable mention. If you got him in the legs?” Shrug.
Milo didn’t fill in the blank.
Jernigan said, “In terms of why he faced off against such heavy firepower, that’s Dr. Delaware’s bailiwick.” To me: “I’m comfortable with suicide by cop. How about you?”
I said, “Works for me.”
“I’m going to write that his inherent psychiatric issues were helped along by amphetamine intoxication, ’cause we want to lay everything at this bastard’s feet, make sure no ACLU types start bitching and moaning.”
Milo said, “He was tweaking big-time?”
“I’m surprised he didn’t jump out of his skin, Lieutenant. Anyway, I don’t see a problem, hopefully the pencil-pushers won’t, either.”
“I’ll find out soon enough. Meeting with the chief in an hour.”
“That should be fun.” She walked us to the door. Milo said, “Thanks, Doc.”
“Thank you. For what you did on Bobby. Bobby was a great kid. I know I’m supposed to be objective but when I found out the bastard ambushed him, I allowed myself a little pleasure when I peeled his damn face off his damn skull. And by the way, I remember my pledge about autopsies. Long as you don’t push it.”
CHAPTER 45
Milo drove to the chief’s office and I returned home.
Detouring, I drove past the lot on Borodi. All the embers gone, bulldozed clean and level, surrounded by a new, substantial fence. Doyle Bryczinski sat in his car by the curb. He seemed to be snoozing, but as I drove by, he waved.
I backed up. “Back on the job, huh?”
“Company finally got their act together,” he said. “Realized they better have me every day, all day. Sometimes they give me a double. When Mom doesn’t need me, I’m here.”
“Keep up the good work.”
He saluted. “Only way I know how.”
Milo didn’t phone after the meeting with the chief and I wondered if it had gone badly.
Probably on his way to Southwest Division. Maybe that rib joint was still operative and he’d dive into seven courses of trans-fat bliss.
He dropped in the following morning, wearing a puce aloha shirt, baggy brown pants, desert boots. I’d been working on custody reports, Blanche curled on my lap.
She bounced off, smiled up at him.
He said, “I gotta bend? Next time get a Great Dane,” but patted her head far longer than mere courtesy called for.
I said, “Vacation or wishful thinking?”
“Two weeks of sun and fun, Rick managed to finagle some time, we’re headed for the Big Island tomorrow morning.”
“Think of me at the luau.”
“What I think of at a luau is more luau.”
He walked to the kitchen, took a half pint of orange juice out of the fridge, put on glasses and read the expiration date. “A week past, I’m doing you a favor.” He upended the carton, guzzled.
Blanche watched, fascinated. His eating habits have never stopped puzzling her.
I said, “Two weeks. No Southwest gig?”
Crushing and tossing the empty carton, he took out a plate of cold roast beef, brought it to the table. “Change of plans.”
“Gunrunners off the radar?”
“Still on the radar but I won’t be watching the screen.”
“Chief’s happy.”
“Not a relevent concept for him. What I did was bring up the fact that I’d closed Backer and Doreen well before his deadline, in addition to preventing a potential arson disaster by nabbing Helga. But that I wasn’t happy, because of two skeletons in a Prius. Yeah, it was Van Nuys’ case but I’d checked and Van Nuys wasn’t working it, no one was, and I thought that was a crying shame. I also informed him that when I drove out to Van Nuys Airport a few nights ago, Hangar 13A was totally cleared. No jet, no cars, no gazillion dollars’ worth of gold and furs and diamonds and art. No accounting of the skeletons ever being taken to the crypt and the FAA had no record of the jet ever taking off. Not to mention the absence of a single letter of press ink. His Exaltedness’s response was his brand of empathy.”
“I know what you’re going through?”
“‘Don’t bitch, Sturgis, we’re both victims of the politicians and the diplomats, they’re all Ivy League faggots compensating for short dicks—and don’t get touchy about “faggot,” I’m talking generically.’ Then he ushers me out of his office, informs me I need to concentrate on West L.A., not stick my nose in any other sectors’ cases. I say, ‘C
an I take that to mean Southwest as well as Van Nuys, sir?’ He says, ‘Don’t make me explicate, Sturgis. It saps my prostate.’”
CHAPTER 46
During his interview of Lara Rieffen, Milo had used John Nguyen’s relentless approach to prosecution as a scare tactic.
A bit of performance art, but part documentary, as well.
Rieffen’s defense lawyers filed motions to dismiss; Nguyen countered each with growing ferocity, won every time.
Their next step was to attack the admissibility of various pieces of evidence. As part of that, I was deposed to testify about Rieffen’s mental state during “Detective Sturgis’s clearly intimidating and abusive interrogation.”
Nguyen said, “Don’t respond, I’ll handle it,” and when the defense team tried plea-bargaining down to a series of lesser charges, Nguyen threatened to go for the death penalty, pointing out that Rieffen’s prints on the murder weapon made it a no-brainer, special circumstances due to multiple victims, lying in wait, extreme cruelty and depravity, murder for profit.
Rieffen pled guilty to one count of second-degree murder in exchange for the theoretical possibility of parole.
Nguyen said, “I’m happy with it, anyone else isn’t, that’s their problem.”
I kept checking the Internet for some mention of Dahlia Gemein or Prince Teddy.
Her name never came up, but four months after the turret murders, an Asian news service reported the “tragic death of Prince Tariq Bandar Asman Ku’amah Majur in a diving accident off the coast of Sranil.” The sultan, “grief-stricken and dismayed,” had declared a week of national mourning and announced that the pediatric cancer center crowning the world-class medical center planned for Sranil would be named after the prince.
“My brother was a selfless man with a special place in his heart for children.”
One week later, insurgents attempted to storm the island’s southern beaches. The sultan’s troops turned them away but several commentators believed this was only the beginning.
Logging off, I got into running clothes, jogged south on the Glen, made a few well-practiced turns, ended up on Borodi Lane.
Doyle Bryczinski was gone. Men in hard hats were busy nailing up the framework of an enormous house. Three stories, subterranean parking lot, multiple gables, and adventurous windows. A style that couldn’t be pinned down beyond Look At Me!
Where a sidewalk would be, if this was that kind of neighborhood, a couple stood, pointing and talking.
Stunning blonde, mid-to late thirties, well-toned body, sculpted face. She wore pink cashmere, a pale blue silk scarf, brown croc pumps, big diamonds. The man with his arm around her was closer to sixty, a little thick around the middle, with wavy silver hair of a tint that required effort. Soft blue blazer, white linen pants, a red pocket handkerchief that tumbled from his breast pocket like blood from a gunshot wound.
Designer sunglasses on both of them.
As I ran past them, the woman said, “Oh, it’s going to be gorgeous, honey.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JONATHAN KELLERMAN is one of the world’s most popular authors. He has brought his expertise as a clinical psychologist to more than thirty bestselling crime novels, including the Alex Delaware series, The Butcher’s Theater, Billy Straight, The Conspiracy Club, Twisted, and True Detectives. With his wife, the novelist Faye Kellerman, he co-authored the bestsellers Double Homicide and Capital Crimes. He is the author of numerous essays, short stories, scientific articles, two children’s books, and three volumes of psychology, including Savage Spawn: Reflections on Violent Children, as well as the lavishly illustrated With Strings Attached: The Art and Beauty of Vintage Guitars. He has won the Goldwyn, Edgar, and Anthony awards, and has been nominated for a Shamus Award. Jonathan and Faye Kellerman live in California and New Mexico. Their four children include the novelists Jesse Kellerman and Aliza Kellerman.
[http://www.jonathankellerman.com] www.jonathankellerman.com
Evidence is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2009 by Jonathan Kellerman
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks
of Random House, Inc.
eISBN: 978-0-345-51814-9
[http://www.ballantinebooks.com] www.ballantinebooks.com
v3.0
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
Evidence Page 36