Laura Ortega shrugged. “The neighbors say Steve, that's the husband, he travels a lot. He could be anywhere. The wife is missing."
"What do you mean, missing?” He knew he sounded like a complete jerk. Even this late at night, Doug saw her blush under her olive complexion. Why was he bullying her like this?
"It's what they said, Detective. I don't know what they meant. I think maybe you better talk to them yourself."
The neighbors weren't much help. The Loebs were typical of the neighborhood and well liked. Jordan Loeb, whose reputation was so wholesome she'd been a Rose Court Princess in Pasadena as a teenager, had been seen that afternoon, dressed in workout clothes as if she were returning from the gym, lifting Sebastian out of the child restraint in the back seat of her silver Mercedes-Benz station wagon. The car was missing, but nobody had seen it driven away.
On a hunch, Doug asked if anybody had overheard anything like a quarrel coming from the Loebs’ unit that night. He wasn't surprised that no one had. Villa Escondido had much thicker walls than Ocotillo Park.
* * * *
There was still no sign of the Mercedes, but making it disappear was a simple matter of driving it down to L.A., where such cars were as common as freckles on a redhead, and where chop shops did business on every other corner. Doug was sure they'd never see it again.
Jordan Loeb, though, turned up a week later in a Lancaster motel. Or rather, most of her did, minus her brains and the top of her skull. The note only asked Jesus and Steve to forgive her for being such a coward. She'd used her husband's gun, a Smith and Wesson .40 caliber semi-auto pistol he'd stupidly kept loaded by the bed for purposes of “home security,” and fired a semijacketed hollowpoint directly through her palate.
Deaths in Antelope Valley, even murders, rarely got mentioned in the Los Angeles Times, but Jazelle Samms's tragic death had earned a five-line summary in the “In Brief” column of the California section the month before. Jordan, it seemed, had cut out the article. It was found in her personal NIV Study Bible, near the front, bookmarking Genesis 22, the passage describing Abram's attempted human sacrifice of his son Isaac.
Doug learned from Steve Loeb's sister, Eunice Stein, that Mrs. Loeb had not converted to her husband's faith but had instead hooked up with a charismatic Christian sect operating out of a storefront church. Eunice claimed that Jordan had, in fact, grown steadily and more morbidly religious over the last several months. Apparently this had led to severe family tension. Jordan and Steve had fought bitterly about Sebastian's future religious instruction, until they were almost not talking to each other at all.
The consensus was she'd read about the death of the Samms girl, and in her unhinged state she had seen it as a sign from God, instructing her to offer her own child as a sacrifice. The psychiatrist who examined Karlee suggested that Jordan expected God to miraculously deliver Sebastian from death, then copiously reward her faith. Her subsequent guilt over the child's death had driven her to suicide. Well, whatever had really happened, Doug didn't want to think about it. The last thing he needed was another case of night sweats.
The case was closed. Life settled down to normal. Burglaries, meth labs, convenience store robberies, a parking lot homicide following a barroom brawl. Normal stuff.
Until the wind kicked up again.
* * * *
Doug desperately tried to prevent his chili bacon cheeseburger from disintegrating in his hands and spilling all over the blotter on his desk as the phone rang. He managed to put the sandwich down on the bag it had arrived in before it completely slid apart. He licked some errant chili off his right hand and reluctantly picked up the receiver. Probably his wife. Holly always managed to catch him when he was eating something he shouldn't.
"Detective Bureau. Byrne."
"Hi.” A woman's voice, but not Holly's. He couldn't place it.
"Can I help you?"
"Oh sorry, Detective. This is Officer Ortega."
"Right. What can I do for you, Officer?"
"I was just wondering, like, if you found any connection between Karlee Samms and Jordan Loeb. You know, because they both ... they both did the same thing."
"You mean besides the newspaper clipping in the Bible? No. Why do you ask?"
"No reason. I mean, I was just sitting here at home thinking about it, and I guess I just wanted to know. But if there's no connection, well, that's that. You're the detective."
"That's right. I am. And both cases are closed. What's this all about, Officer?"
He could hear her fidget on the other end, hesitating. “Nothing. It's just—never mind. Some weather, huh? Thanks for your time. Bye."
She hung up, leaving Doug a little bewildered. Some weather, huh? The windows rattled with the smoldering surges of the Santa Ana.
The phone rang again. This time it was Holly, and she was angry out of all proportion—she'd found the Tupperware box with his lunch of celery and carrot sticks still in the fridge. You'd think she'd caught him with another woman. Stop treating me like I'm a baby or something, he mentally screamed, not daring to speak out loud.
It's the wind, he decided. This wind drove everybody crazy.
The thought gave him a strange chill.
Did Ortega know something he didn't? Maybe he'd better take another look at the files.
An hour later, he'd found it. Staring right back at him.
Jazelle Samms and Sebastian Loeb had the same birthday, March twenty-fourth. They'd been delivered at the same hospital, Antelope Valley Memorial. That was no surprise, since most of the kids in Antelope Valley were born there, but just the same, two coincidences too many.
He pulled the tattered AVPD social directory out of his desk drawer and looked up Ortega's home number.
A man answered. “Hello."
"This is Detective Doug Byrne at AVPD. You must be Laura's husband, Leo, right?"
"Yeah, that's me. Why you calling? Has something happened to Laura?” Leo sounded unusually calm if that were the case.
"No, I was just wondering if I could speak with her, that's all."
"Well, she's not here."
"I just got off the phone with her. She said she was at home."
"Then you should try her there."
"I'm sorry, I thought—I didn't know you were separated."
"Ever since Rosa died,” Leo said, and this time the bitterness in his voice was unmistakable.
"Rosa?” Doug felt a little disoriented.
"Our baby. Rosa died and Laura split. You want Laura's number? I got it here somewhere."
"When—?"
"Been four months. What's it to you, anyway?"
Four months—just before the Samms baby's fall. Doug's mouth was dry. “Listen, Mr. Ortega, this might be important. What's Rosa's birthday? And where was she born?"
"Why do you want to know?” Leo asked, his voice suddenly sharp with suspicion.
"I said it might be important. Isn't that enough?” Doug snapped.
"All right, all right! She was born on March twenty-fourth. At Memorial Hospital. What's this all about?"
"Give me Laura's number. Please. It's probably nothing, but I really need to talk with her."
She wasn't home. He got the answering machine.
Doug looked out of the window at the flying dust and failing light and felt angry and hopeless.
* * * *
The wind must be making him slow witted. Of course Ortega wasn't at home—she'd be going on shift. He stood up and jogged down the hall to roll call.
It should have been obvious from the start. She was always the first on the scene. Always. Damn. It hadn't been the mothers at all. It had been Ortega all along.
How had she kept the women from talking?
He ran into the assembly room, puffing from exertion, but too late. All he saw was the desk sergeant giving him a puzzled look. Waving him off, Doug loped off as fast as he could manage toward the garage, only to see the last of the departing cruisers disappear down the street.
Go to the dispatcher and recall her. She couldn't ignore that, could she?
But Captain Craig would want to know why. Not to mention IAD.
He stood in the twilit parking lot, panting, his hands on his knees, feeling sick. Why hurry? What was he worried about? She wasn't brazen enough to try it again, not tonight, not after she'd tipped her hand to him, was she? He had plenty of time, didn't he?
For the second time, a chill flared across his body despite the arid heat. Maybe he was coming down with something. He stood erect and slowly walked back inside to talk to the captain.
When Doug Byrne finished his piece, Captain Tyler Craig looked at him as if he were nuts.
"You're claiming a female officer, one of our own, one with an impeccable record, is—is murdering babies,” Craig said.
"Look at the evidence, sir—"
"What evidence?"
"The birthdays. The hospital. The fact that she was always already on the scene when backup arrived. The fact that she lost her own kid just before it all started. It goes way beyond coincidence, and you know it. Maybe she snapped when her own baby died and decided for some reason the others shouldn't live either, or something. I don't know how or why, but she's involved somehow."
Craig frowned. “Just so this isn't personal, Byrne."
Doug reddened. “What the hell is that supposed to mean? Sir."
"I mean I still remember how your own baby daughter died twenty years ago."
Doug blinked hard. Lizzie. Oh God. Lizzie had been killed by a young woman too.
Child Protective Services first suspected Holly. Because Doug was a cop, it was sensational news. Life became sheer torture, TV reporters everywhere, microphones thrust in their faces like lances, video cameras shamelessly glaring at them behind the actinic lights. Later, when it became clear that the au pair had shaken the child to death in a diseased rage, things had calmed down, but not near enough, and not fast enough. The guilty nanny was a plump little blonde from Holland, but now, trying to remember her face, Doug could only imagine Laura Ortega's.
"That has nothing to do with anything,” he said, trying to contain his fury. “We caught the girl who did it. Bea van Doorn. She spent seven years in prison before she was deported. Anyway, I'm a better detective than that."
"Are you?” Craig didn't look convinced. After a beat, he shrugged. “All right. Let's get Ortega in here and ask her about it. But one of you might be out a career when we're done.” Craig flipped a switch on his intercom and instructed the dispatcher to recall Ortega. “You know, Byrne, little Rosa Ortega wasn't killed in a fall. She died of a congenital birth defect."
"You knew she was dead?"
"Of course I knew. How is that you didn't?"
The intercom buzzed.
The dispatcher's voice sounded embarrassed. “Uh, sir, sorry, but Officer Ortega says she can't comply right now. She says she's sorry, but she can't. Says there's something she's got to do first."
Craig and Doug locked eyes.
"Get her twenty,” Craig snapped, “and get my car ready to roll. We'll reel Officer Ortega in, by God. No damn officer of mine is going to disobey a direct summons."
* * * *
Ortega, surprisingly, didn't balk at reporting she was at Blanchard and Sixth. She also reported that she was leaving her unit.
Buckingham Court, a seventies-vintage apartment complex stacked three floors high and built of painted pine and concrete, comprised eighty-seven one- and two-bedroom units, all accessible from the outside. It was the sort of place designed to appeal to singles, financially modest couples, and newlyweds. Ground floor units had tiny patios or direct access to courtyards. The others had shallow balconies.
Doug spent the time getting there on his cell phone talking to the hospital. When he was at last connected to the administrator, he had a fight on his hands, but eventually he got the data he was after.
"Carol Kim, twenty-four, single, gave birth to a little boy, Austin, last March twenty-fourth. She lives in apartment 114 at Buckingham Court,” he told Craig. “That's the target victim, has to be. I think we'd better get some backup, sir."
"One fourteen? That's on the ground floor,” Craig said.
"Yeah. I don't think they'll stay there."
The captain's car pulled up to the curb right behind Ortega's parked cruiser, and Doug leaped out. The hellish breath of the Santa Ana engulfed him again. Perspiration broke out all over his body, but he couldn't let it slow him.
It took him a few minutes to find Carol Kim's place. The front door, open and swaying with each gust, faced a swimming pool glowing coolly blue with underwater lighting. Not a good place to have a baby, he thought—what if it gets out and falls into the pool and drowns?
The lights were on inside the apartment, but there was no one there.
He ignored the flashing backup units arriving and humped up the stairs two at a time. Without even thinking, he had drawn his gun.
The stairs terminated on the third floor. The apartments there were dark and locked. But a ladder built into the wall on the landing was clearly marked ROOF ACCESS.
He holstered his pistol and climbed up, feeling like he might explode from the sweltering heat. The Windsor knot of his tie tightened like a slipknot in a silk rope.
Finally, he was up. The roof was flat with a tar and crushed rock surface, punctuated with individual central AC units, barely visible in the dark, feeding the residences below. The wind was stronger here, more menacing. It was challenging Doug to remain standing.
He heard the crunch of shoes hurrying away to his left, just audible over the serpent hiss of the wind. He pulled out his gun and followed the footsteps as well as he could run.
He was about to shout out to Ortega when he suddenly tripped over something soft and solid in the dark. The hard fall punched out his breath, and he lost the grip on his pistol, cutting his hands on the sharp little shards of stone. He heard the gun skid away and drop off the roof.
His head turned to the left and he saw what he'd tripped over. Ortega, prone and unconscious. Alive, judging from her shallow breathing, but she had a scalp wound and was bleeding profusely. In the dim light, her blood seemed blacker than her hair.
The Kim woman must have fought back. Doug felt a surge of relief. Maybe he wasn't too late after all. He got to his knees. Then froze.
Limned against the lumen of the lights below, he saw two people standing together on the eaves, a man and a woman. The woman—Carol Kim?—clutched something to her breast. It could've been a baby. It was a baby. The man brandished a bowie knife at least sixteen inches long.
Doug wouldn't have been able to hear the man over the wind if he hadn't been shouting. His voice sounded faint and distant, like the ravings of a ghost.
Even so, there was something weirdly familiar about it.
"The cub must be thrown away! I've explained it. The wind wants him because only the issue of the alpha male is allowed to survive in the pride. So you just drop him now—it's the easiest way. He won't feel anything, trust me. Or else you can watch me kill him, but then I'll have to kill you, too, for being unfit—that's the hard way, so don't make me do it like that. I've explained it."
Doug couldn't quite make out the woman's reply, but it might have been, “You'll have to kill me first!” He was on his feet.
The man grabbed her by the hair and jerked her head back, the knife glistening against her throat.
"Now hold him over the abyss,” he instructed. “No? Here's a little nick.” He sliced a shallow wound just below her jaw. Blood trickled down her neck.
The woman began sobbing hysterically. Slowly, weeping and violently shaking, she stretched out her arms and held the squirming child over the brink.
Doug had no gun. But he couldn't just watch. The energy to act came from deep within him. He damned the heat, damned the wind, damned his own soft and overweight body, and damned the man with the knife—and charged.
He reached the
baby boy just as the woman let go. He pulled the bundle to his chest as he tipped over the edge into space, into the realm of the infernal Santa Ana. Momentum flipped him over, so that he was between the ground and the kid. That was good.
When he hit, he had the strangest sensation. It stung everywhere, he'd never felt such pain, but at the same time, a soothing coolness enveloped him.
He had landed in the pool. He was somehow alive. But he couldn't move.
He was dimly aware of other officers jumping in the water to be with him.
He looked up. Another man was falling, windmilling his arms, one hand gripping a long silver knife in the air like a propeller blade.
This one did not land in the pool. This one struck the concrete.
From where the killer had fallen, Doug saw the distant, vengeful face of Laura Ortega staring back down at him, just before he passed out.
* * * *
Laura came to see him in his room at Memorial Hospital.
"Captain Craig said you thought it was me.” There was no accusation in her voice, but he could see her disappointment.
"I'm sorry, Laura. You should have told me about the birthdays,” he said. “You should have told me about your husband, and about Rosa."
"That's not something ... I can talk about. Not yet,” she replied, looking away from him. She regained her composure and met his eyes with her own. “Anyhow, I didn't know about the birthdays. I'm not a detective."
"Then why did you call me and ask if I'd found anything connecting the Samms and Loeb cases?"
"It wasn't the birthdays. It was the names. I thought I'd heard the names of the babies before. You know, Jazelle and Sebastian. They're not regular names. It made me wonder where I'd heard them. So I thought I'd ask you, and when you said there was no connection, I thought, well, I'm just being stupid."
"And then you remembered."
"That's right. When Rosa was born, we were all in the same ward at Memorial. Carol was in the same room, even. The two of us got to be friends, we were friends, until ... until Rosa got so sick, she..."
AHMM, October 2007 Page 4