by Nick Keller
Mark Neiman.
He turned around and went back through the access door and into the hallway, headed away from Heck’s room. He had to escape, had to flee. The bathroom! He pounded his way through the door to the Men’s Room just as he heard Mark come out of the stairwell from behind.
The guy hauling ass into the bathroom caught Mark’s attention. He looked over, halfway grinning. Someone had to pee, bad. Mark shrugged, went to room 230 and stepped in slowly.
Heck looked up at him and said, “Detective… uh… uh.” He wasn’t good with names.
Mark said, “Neiman, Mr. Delgado. We spoke yesterday concerning the incident in the park.”
“Yeah, that’s right. You just missed your partner.”
“My what?”
“Don’t you people have partners?”
Neiman said, “Was his name Detective Dobbs?”
Heck squinted an eye, thinking. “No, it wasn’t Dobbs. It was… Oh, I don’t remember. Maybe it was Russell or Richard or something.”
“Bernard?”
Heck’s lips tightened. “Nah—not Bernard.”
“How long ago?”
“A minute. Less.”
Mark looked back at the hospital room door, thinking.
The bathroom!
William was sitting on the toilet fully pantsed and reaching for the stall door handle when he heard someone bulldoze into the bathroom. He jerked his hand away.
He heard “Bernie!” It was Mark Neiman again. William could hear the man pacing across the floor, checking for feet under stalls. A second later he pounded on William’s door. “Bernie, goddammit, I know you’re in there. Get your ass out here.”
William wrestled his panic down and said, “You got the wrong guy, pal!”
He heard Mark say, “Shit,” then rush out.
Silence fell, except the pounding of his heart. It had been so sudden, so quick, and now all was quiet. William snatched his phone and speed-dialed Bernie.
It rang once. Rang again. He started to have to pee.
“C’mon, Bernie.”
“Yeah,” Bernie said.
“Bernie, Mark Neiman’s here. Get out of the parking lot. He’s coming down to you.”
“Neiman’s here?” Bernie said.
“Yes, yes. He’s coming down to you.”
“Oh, shit!” The line died.
William looked at his phone, then stuffed it down into his pocket. Hesitating, he cracked the stall door open peeking out with one terrified eyeball. No one was there. He hesitated to leave. Stepping back out into the hospital hallway would be like venturing into no man’s land. He didn’t know where Neiman was. He could be anywhere. He sighed. Had to take the chance.
The hallway was clear, but he couldn’t use the stairwell. He’d have to go another way. He went in the opposite direction, around the corner passing up the elevator bank—no elevators, can’t take elevators—and to the other stairwell. He entered cautiously, listening. There was no one, so he bolted down the stairs and into the lower floor lobby. His eyes hawked back and forth. No Mark Neiman. The exit was directly ahead. He half-jogged over to it and was outside in the east parking lot within seconds. He heard tires. It was Bernie pulling up with a skid.
“Get in, kid!”
William jumped in the passenger side and they hauled ass.
Mark’s eyes scanned the parking lot. To the right an ambulance flashed in the emergency bay. A paramedic sat in the back with his legs swinging out over the bumper, eating a sandwich. Across the lot in the opposite direction an SUV tooled along picking out a spot to park. Mark furled his nose. There was no Bernie.
He went back into the hospital entrance, through a patient waiting room, down the hall and to the opposite exit. Back outside in the west parking lot, he looked again, scanning angrily. He never saw Bernie’s car exit the lot and disappear around the corner.
Unsatisfied, he went back into the hospital and up to the receptionist desk. The frazzled check-in girl looked at him as he approached, her eyes going big. “Room two-thirty,” Mark said, “who just visited?”
“Uh—I.” She pointed to the check-in clipboard. Mark snagged it and scanned the names.
Bernie. Bernie. Bernie.
He sneered to himself. No Bernie Dobbs. “Son of a…” His eyes stabbed at something that made his blood simmer over.
W. E.
William Erter.
“… bitch.”
Back in Room 230, Mark approached Hector looking down at him. He rolled his lips controlling his frustration, and said, “Mr. Delgado, my partner—the man that was just here—what did he want?”
Heck groaned. “Had questions about Bum.”
“What kind of questions?”
“Questions about the bomb that killed my dog. I told you everything I told him. He was asking the same stuff.”
Mark grinned at him and said, “I thought you might say that.”
“Why was Mark Neiman there?” William said, knowing the answer. Old Heck was Mark’s witness. Mark had probably stopped by to ask a few more questions.
Nevertheless, Bernie said, “Because he’s an asshole.”
Good answer, regardless.
Bernie said, “You weren’t in there long. What’d you find out?”
“Well, our guy’s military.”
“Our guy?”
“Yes, the perp. And I think he’s from the First Desert Storm, Nineteen-ninety-one.”
“That puts him in his mid-forties. Why do you think that?”
“Hector knew the type of bomb that killed his dog. He called it a shock bomb. They constructed them in Vietnam. But,” he said with a finger in the air, “they never used them. It was too wet over there, couldn’t control their detonation.”
“Okay,” Bernie said, drawing a blank.
“They’re dry climate bombs—like Kuwait or Saudi.”
“Ah,” Bernie said. “Or Los Angeles.”
“That’s right.”
“Why twenty-five years ago? Why not today, like Afghanistan or Iraq?”
“No way. Bomb technique is too complex nowadays. No one would use a shock bomb today. It’s all laser triggers and IEDs. No—this was the first Desert Storm.”
Bernie grinned, impressed. “So, we got a mid-forties, former military, weapons expert, huh? Not bad, kid. Not bad at all.”
36
Threat
When Jacky opened the door, his eyes went to Bernie, and he looked alarmed. “Who’s he?”
“He’s with us, Jacky,” William said.
“No, no, no. I told you, if they found out, they wouldn’t like it.”
“He’s a detective. He’s on the case.”
Jacky’s eyes bugged. “A what? Oh, hell no!”
“Move it, kid,” Bernie said and brushed past him into the apartment.
“Awe, c’mon. I’m dead. I’m so dead.”
William turned to him. “Relax. You’re not dead. I told you we needed help. He’s our help.”
Jacky moved through the living room giving them a wide berth. “Okay, first of all, you said you needed help. Not we. Second of all, I thought I was your help.”
“You are.” He looked at the TV piped into Jacky’s hard drive, which currently showed a listing of public Google searches. “So, have you monitored anything?”
“Is that it? Are we not going to talk about this?” Jacky motioned to Bernie.
Bernie’s teeth gritted. He jerked his .45 revolver from his breast holster. Jacky froze, eyes as big as dinner plates. Bernie dropped the rounds from their chamber catching them and stuffing them into a pants pocket, flipped the gun closed and plopped in on the table, empty. “You feel better?”
“Ho. Lee. Shit! Are you freakin’ kidding me!”
“It’s going to be fine, Jacky. He’s on our side,” William said.
Jacky had to collect himself. There was a detective in his house of illegal cyber combat. There was a gun on his table. And there was a network of friends that would be
very unhappy with him if they knew. And there was also nothing he could do about it. He made a grandiose whatever gesture. “Alright, fine!” and sat in his command seat.
Bernie looked around gathering his surroundings. This was not his field of study, clearly. He went to the bookshelf and idly started inspecting the manuals.
“What’s the latest?” William said.
Jacky typed bringing up his Spyder Ware. It came up on the screen in a complex chat-room format, all the communications in green dot matrix. “Turns out the L.A.P.D. has all the top pro tech when it comes to comlinking with outside sources. I mean, you should see this stuff. It’s probably proprietary. Shoot, I’ve never even seen it. But when it comes to internal hardware systems,” he said, “they use Front Wave. Looks like a two-point-o generation. It’s archaic, man.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Well, it means I can track their interdepartmental communications pretty easy, not like if they were using an internal Basecamp program. Really all I’m doing is surfing their ports between a collection of sub-nets having their database systems ping me when there’s a change. From there it’s not hard to track the correspondence that caused it.”
“Is that how we broke into the Evidence Catalogs?” Bernie said.
Jacky shot a terrified look at William and said, “You said he was okay with this, man.”
Ignoring the remark, William nudged toward the chat-room screen. “Anything yet?”
“Yeah, hold on.” Jacky typed in a search request. The screen changed to an email string. “Here we go. I don’t know what you chumps are into, but that guy, Mark Neiman, he’s been talking to the Comish—him and some guy named Heller. I thought that was pretty big time.”
“What about?” Bernie said, moving over, and leering over Jacky.
Jacky swallowed and continued. “I don’t know exactly. The Subject Line on their email correspondence is Park Closings. Looks like they’re shutting down the parks? That’s pretty big time.”
“Right. Is there anything else?” William said.
“Yeah, there is. That’s why I brought it up. Remember I said I get a ping whenever something major goes down? Well, get this. The department—or the precinct, or whatever you call it—received a note in the mail today, just a standard Priority Class letter. Came by post. It’s crazy, man. I think it’s somehow connected to all the stuff in that email chain. Anyway, P.D. Admin had the letter scanned and zip-filed to a whole shit ton of email inboxes, I’m assuming everyone that’s on the case. And that’s when I got pinged. Give me a minute. I’m popping it up on the TV monitor.”
William rubbed his face looking up. They could see Jacky operating—moving files and switching text. He hit one last button and the scanned copy of the letter appeared big on the fifty-inch TV screen.
William’s jaw dropped. It was a letter with each word clipped out of newspaper headlines. Whoever sent the letter did not want their handwriting known. It looked like a ransom note out of a seventies cop thriller movie.
Jacky said, “Someone out there’s old school, man. Check it.”
William and Bernie finished reading it at the same time and looked at each other, William groaning, “Oh my God.”
“A soldier?” Bernie grunted, looking at William. “You were right. And the city’s helping him,” Bernie said.
William put his hand on Jacky’s shoulder. “Zip this up and email it to me.”
“Okay, why?”
“For research.”
“Research. I can do that here!”
“No, I can do this from home, Jacky. You’ve done enough.”
Jacky shrugged, typed and clicked at rapid-fire and said, “Done. You sure you don’t want me to do it?”
“No. Databases is your forte. Research is mine.”
“What’s it mean?” Jacky said, looking back at the letter displayed on the TV.
“They closed the city parks. They issued a citywide warning. No one’s walking their dogs. He’s going to start killing people.”
William stared forlornly at the letter on the TV screen:
The Eye watches.
The Eye is hungry.
The Eye is always hungry.
The Eye’s food is stolen.
The Eye must hunt.
No more doggies.
A. SOLDIER
37
Mark, On The Take
Mark had his cell phone held between his shoulder and his cheek steering his car through traffic. “Captain, need a warrant.”
Heller said, “Good. You got something?”
“William Erter. He was at the hospital. He was questioning my witness.”
He heard Heller grumble without saying anything. The implications of having an unstable son of the infamous Oscar Erter prying around in their case, seemingly at random, smacked of something much more ominous than what was on the surface. “What could this mean, Mark?”
“Not sure, sir. But I’m going to find out. Need that arrest warrant. Call it impeding an investigation.”
“Fair enough. What’s the play?”
Mark pursed his lips, thinking. “He’s not at home now. I think he thinks I’m trailing Bernie Dobbs, though. I don’t think he knows I’m on to him. He’ll be at his residence tomorrow. That’s when I’ll make the arrest.”
“Good. I’ll start the issues process. Get to the station.”
“On my way, Captain, but I have one stop to make.”
“Okay. Where?”
“Glendale Jr. College, where he works. Need to get some clarification.”
Mark knocked on the office door of Fred Willis, Dean of Glendale College Department of Psyche, and heard, “Come in.”
Mark entered. Fred was up on his feet shoving class material into a leather case. He looked up and said, “Yes?”
“I’m Detective Mark Neiman, L.A.P.D. I need a few minutes.”
Fred gave him a curious, daunted look and said, “Detective?”
“That’s right.” Mark flashed his badge.
Fred glanced at his watch and said, “I’ve got a class in five minutes.” He shoved a textbook down into a shoulder bag and said, “What’s this about?”
“Do you know a William Erter?”
“Of course. He teaches criminal psyche.” He looked concerned and said again, “What’s this all about?”
“I’m interested in his behavior.”
Fred said, “Oh.” He stared at him, pressed for time.
“Won’t take long, Mr. Willis.”
“Can we walk and talk?”
“No problem.”
Fred threw the shoulder bag over his shoulder, collected the case in one hand, a satchel in another. He looked like a man who was used to being rushed all the time with his hands full. He said, “Can you carry this?”
Mark scrutinized the satchel and took it. “Sure.”
Fred left the office with Mark quick to follow, “So, what’s your relationship to him?”
They moved through the professors’ wing with Fred moving fast, passing doors and windows. “Professional.”
“Friendly?” Mark said, keeping pace.
“Sure. Friendly enough.”
“How long have you known him?” They turned the corner, past the reception desk and to a glass door. Fred bumped it open with a shoulder, “Since he came to the college—almost four years. Came out of SoCal. Seemed qualified to me.”
“How’s his work history?”
“Impeccable,” Fred said, then rethought his words on the fly. “Mmm—Well, almost.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s requested multiple days off lately. Two actually. It’s fine with me, but I prefer to have more time to procure our adjunct for his classes.”
“Last minute?” Mark asked, pacing him easily as they plunged into a large lobby area full of students.
“Pretty much. I didn’t think much of it. I trust my professors. Just a little disruptive to the class schedule is all.”
“W
hat were his reasons?”
They padded up a broad flight of stairs. “Personal,” Fred said over his shoulder. “He’s entitled to them. All my professors are. They get so many personal days a semester. William hasn’t exceeded that.” He let out a chuckle and said, “Some of the other professors—they’re worse. You’d think they were students. It does reflect a distraction, though. I note the requests and bring it up in their performance reviews if I feel the need.”
“How often in the past has William requested personal days?”
Again, he said over his shoulder, “Before a week or so ago, never.”
“A week or so,” Mark said, his interest piqued.
“Yeah.”
“Huh. What’s his state of mind?”
Fred cringed at the question. “He’s clear. Capable. I sense he has a genuine concern for what he teaches.”
“Criminal psychology.”
“That’s right.” They entered a sky bridge, pacing quickly. The picturesque courtyard of the college was below them, the bright L.A. day above. “Yeah, we added the course to our curriculum when we hired him. It’s broadened our enrollment, especially in the psyche program. It’s been a great marriage.”
“Would you consider him an important member of your staff?”
“Everybody’s important.”
Mark didn’t say anything for a few paces. He just walked closely behind, then said, “Are you aware of his history?”
Fred gave a single nod. “You mean his father? Yeah. We were made aware of him by the state when he interviewed for the job. It was mandated.”
“It didn’t concern you?”
They went through another lobby. Turning into a hallway, Fred said, “He didn’t do anything wrong, Detective. It was his father.”
“Does William ever talk about it?”
“Nope. And I don’t ask. I understand he’s seeing a state-appointed counselor. What more can I do?” They came to a door and Fred stopped. It was his next class. He turned to Mark and said, “Detective, you still haven’t told me what this is all about.”