At What Cost

by James L'Etoile

  “We’re investigating a murder,” John said.

  “Murder? Here? Man, I don’t know nothing about nobody getting themselves offed around here.” The guard turned to Paula and said, “Lady, I’m sorry . . .”

  “That’s Detective,” Paula said, accompanied by a glare.

  “I’m sorry, Detective lady . . .”

  “Never mind,” she said. She rekeyed the microphone as she turned away from the security guard. She spoke over the radio, “That’s enough. Shut it down. Pull your crew off the field.”

  A figure popped out of the first-baseline dugout. He was a man in his fifties, dressed in pressed khaki pants and a green River Cats team polo shirt. He held a radio in his hand and looked up toward the concourse.

  “There he is,” Paula said.

  “Who is he?” John asked the security guard.

  “That’s Mr. Rosedale, assistant head of operations. He don’t look none too happy.”

  Paula handed the radio back to the security guard. “That will be all.” She made a course down the bleachers in Rosedale’s direction, skipping every other step along the way.

  “Man, she always like that?” the security guard asked.

  “No. Usually, she’s pissed,” John said as he followed his partner to the field.

  When he reached Paula, she stood on top of the dugout, hands on hips, a vision of warrior princess.

  “Mr. Rosedale, we need to talk to you,” she said.

  “Not a good time, sweetheart. I got a game to get ready for,” Rosedale complained.

  John saw his partner’s fists clench with the “sweetheart” comment. For a split second, he thought Paula was going to launch her body off the dugout at the creep.

  Up close, Rosedale had the ruddy complexion and red, bulbous nose of a heavy drinker. Once out of the dugout, in the sunlight, he squinted like a mole who found himself suddenly above ground.

  “We need a couple minutes of your time, and then you can get on with whatever you do here,” John said.

  Rosedale shielded his eyes with one hand, blocking the sun. “What do you want? Make it quick.”

  “We need to find one of your employees, Mario Guzman,” John said.

  “I don’t know any Guzman. What gives you the idea he works for me?”

  “He said he was a grounds keeper here.”

  “I can’t keep track of every one of the grounds crew. That’s what I pay my crew boss for.”

  “Then we want to talk to your crew boss,” Paula said with an icy tone.

  Rosedale turned to home plate, where three men lined up the batter’s box frames for chalking. “Johnson! Over here!”

  A man looked up when Rosedale called, said something to the men working with him, and walked over to the dugout. He looked as if he was used to getting an earful from Rosedale and figured this was one more brick in that wall.

  “These police officers want to talk to you about some Marco Grozman,” Rosedale said.

  Johnson’s faced pinched up in confusion.

  “Mario Guzman,” John reminded.

  Johnson nodded. “Oh sure, right. What about him?”

  “Where is he?” Paula asked.

  Johnson looked to his crew on the field and then turned back. “He came in this morning, started work, and then he got a phone call, said he had to leave. He didn’t say what was up, but he was in a real hurry. Doesn’t look like he made it back yet.”

  “You recall when he left?” John asked.

  “About eight thirty,” Johnson said.

  John pointed to the men working in the outfield, watering the warning track. “Is that what Mario was doing before he left?” The men lugged heavy, red rubber hoses and sprayed down the dust. They all wore knee-high rubber boots, gloves, and matching ball caps.

  “Yeah. Hey, is Mario all right?”

  “Don’t know. He may have got himself involved in something,” John said.

  “The gang?”

  “You know that Mario is a West Block Norteños gang member?” John said.

  Johnson shrugged. “This is one of the few places in the city they can work, because of the injunction. Here or the Highway Patrol Academy, and that ain’t very likely. For the most part, they don’t give me any trouble. They take care of any beef they have amongst each other, away from this place. Kinda like neutral territory.”

  Rosedale interrupted, “You have who working here? Gang members?”

  “They do their job and don’t cause any problem. Besides, for the pay you’re willing to give, you’re lucky to have them.”

  Rosedale’s face grew ashen, and he backed toward the dugout. “We’ll discuss this later,” he said, then disappeared off the field.

  “Sorry about that,” Johnson said.

  “Did you notice anything different with Mario in the past couple of months or so?”

  “No, not really. He started missing work a bit. You know, a day here, an hour there. I talked to him about it, and he said it was family stuff. I didn’t press him on it.”

  “How did he seem today, after he took that phone call?” Paula said.

  “Different. Usually, the guy is laid back, kinda slow, but gets his work done. Today, he seemed on edge, even before the call. Then after he hung up, man, he was on fire. He couldn’t get out of here fast enough. I never had a chance to ask him about it. He yelled, ‘I gotta go,’ like he was shot out of a cannon.”

  “Did he get the call on his cell phone?” John said.

  Johnson shook his head. “No. He took it on the phone in my office.”

  “Your office? Did whoever talked to Mario say anything to you?” John pressed.

  “Well, yeah. He asked to speak to Mario. Asked for him by name.”

  “What did he say, exactly?” John asked.

  “The man said he needed to talk to Mario Guzman. It was very urgent.”

  “He didn’t say who he was? You didn’t ask?” John said.

  “No. I figured it was his parole agent or probation officer.”

  “Why did you think that?”

  “I don’t know. The guy had that authority vibe on the phone. Like he doesn’t have time to waste, you know? That and all the chatter in the background.”

  “Like what?” Paula said.

  “It was people talking. I could hear voices over an intercom, beeping noises, and you know, office sounds. Busy sounds.”

  “Could you make anything out in the background?” John asked.

  “No. Nothing. The sound of it all made me think of a busy place. Most of these guys are on probation or parole, so I thought it might be a parole office. You know, where a lot of people come and go at the same time.”

  John nodded. He changed tactics. “Could Mario have taken a wheelbarrow with him?”

  “A wheelbarrow? Yeah, I suppose he could have. It’s not like we have them locked down to a bike rack or anything.”

  “Can we have a few words with the guys he works with?” John said.

  “Sure, why not. You mind doing it out here on the field? That way they won’t think that you’re here to arrest them.”

  “That happen often?” Paula asked.

  “Often enough. They get called in to the office and get cuffed up. They joke that it’s like they’re getting called up to the majors,” Johnson said.

  As soon as Paula and John stepped onto the field with Johnson, the grounds crew thinned out. A few hid their faces, while others ducked out back gates. Johnson pointed to a group of three men at the center-field wall, all of whom stopped working and watched Johnson lead the strangers in their direction.

  Well before John reached the group, he saw arms sleeved with tattoos, heads shaved, and a chesty, defiant posture that identified the men as Mario Guzman’s brothers-in-arms, West Block Norteños gang members.

  “These detectives want to talk to you,” Johnson told his crew.

  The gang crew held their ground, and the oldest of the three, with a wicked scar that ran across his forehead, said, “We don
’t have to talk to you.”

  “No, you don’t. But we aren’t here for you. Where is Mario Guzman?” John said.

  “Why?” the group’s spokesman replied.

  “Can’t really tell you that.”

  “Then we can’t tell you nothing either.”

  Paula stepped forward, closed the space between the two groups, and said, “I think Mario got involved in something way over his head. He could be in trouble. We want to help him.”

  “Don’t give me that bull, chica. No cop cares what happens to one of my brothers. If Mario got into something, then he’ll find a way out,” the oldest gangbanger said.

  The youngest-looking member of the crew shuffled his feet, looked away from the leader, and seemed very uncomfortable. Paula picked up on the cue and pressed him.

  “What was Mario into?”

  “Does this have anything to do with what happened to Danny C.?” the man asked.

  “Maybe,” Paula said.

  “Oh man, that’s messed up.”

  The older gang member cut off his younger compatriot and said, “Mario didn’t have nothing to do with that. ’Sides, if Danny hadn’t turned his back on his brothers, then maybe he’d still be alive.”

  “You saying that Cardozo’s problems with the boys led to his death?” John asked.

  “I’m not saying anything like that,” the gang leader said. He turned to the younger man who had spoken out of turn and said, “None of us are saying that.”

  The younger man bowed his head and avoided eye contact with anything except the dirt under his feet.

  “Any of you know why Mario had to leave work this morning?” John asked.

  That question elicited no response from the group. The crew leader expressed nothing more than a shrug of indifference, but the younger gang member fidgeted with his gloves and picked at a spot in the dirt with his toe.

  “Why would Mario take a wheelbarrow from here?”

  “We’re done here. You got questions, you need to talk to our attorney,” the older gang member said.

  “Let me guess, Joseph Morrison,” John said.

  “That’s right.”

  “Play it that way if you want.” John looked to Mr. Johnson. “You have the employment files on these guys, right?”

  “Sure,” Johnson said.

  “Good. I’ll need copies so I can make sure West Sac. PD parks a car at each of their homes all night long. Some of the games get out late, don’t they?”

  “We have some late games, sure.”

  “That means these validated gang members violate the gang injunction curfew each and every time they leave after a night game.”

  “The terms of the injunction say we can go to and from employment,” the gang leader said.

  “Which brings me back to employment records. You paying these guys under the table?”

  Johnson put up both hands. “Whoa. These guys are temporary contract workers. We pay them that way, and it’s all legit.”

  “I bet they didn’t report that income or pay taxes like good, upstanding citizens,” John stated.

  “You’re not right. You’d really threaten us with the IRS and cops staking out our homes? That’s harassment,” the older gang member said.

  “I call it active policing.”

  “Chickenshit is what it is.”

  “Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.”

  The gang member’s face flushed, and his shoulders flexed for a moment. He then relaxed, considered his words carefully, and said, “Mario had a problem with his family, something he had to go rush and take care of. That’s all we know about it.”

  “Family problems? Like what?” John said.

  “Don’t know, but he was in a hurry to leave. Now that’s it. We cool?”

  “Yeah, cool.” John walked away and whispered to Paula, “What kind of family emergency would make you go dump a body?”

  “Not a good one.”

  NINETEEN

  A squalid, two-bedroom bungalow on the southern edge of West Sacramento was the place Guzman called home when he wasn’t in jail. Yellowed paint chips littered the dirt at the foot of the worn wooden siding. Rusted rain gutters, dead remnants of a front lawn, and cardboard taped to a broken front window testified that the home’s best days were distant memories. It was a sad backdrop for a half dozen brightly colored children’s toys scattered about the yard.

  John pulled the sedan behind a mideighties Chevy pickup truck parked in front of the place. Paula ran the license plate number through a tablet computer and verified that the vehicle registration came back to Guzman.

  John got out of the car, walked to the front of the truck, and placed a hand on the hood. It was cool to the touch. “He’s been home for a while.”

  “How do you want to play this?” Paula asked.

  “He talked to us once. We tell him we have some routine follow-up questions.”

  “That was before we had witnesses who saw him dump a body in the river.”

  “So why not run? Why did he come back here? Let’s see if we can get him to talk.”

  “I’d feel better with backup,” she said.

  John walked around the front end of the truck and stepped around a toppled tricycle on the path to the front door. The narrow wooden porch creaked under his weight and announced their arrival as sure as any doorbell.

  From behind the front door came the unmistakable metallic sound of a shotgun racking a round into the chamber.

  John broke left, and Paula dove on the right side of the doorway a split second before a blast sent shards of wood and shotgun pellets through the door. Slender tendrils of blue smoke hung from the ragged edges of a basketball-sized hole in the door.

  “Guzman! It’s Detective Penley.”

  Another shell chambered in response. The shotgun round readied, and a raspy warning followed. “Get away! Leave me and my family alone!” The voice quivered to the point of cracking like a teenaged boy at the prom.

  “Guzman, it’s us, Detectives Penley and—”

  “He sent you!”

  “Guzman, come out and let’s talk.”

  “Go away! I won’t let you hurt my family.”

  “Call it in, Paula.” John pulled his weapon, and Paula followed suit.

  Paula pointed to the back of the house and crept around the dry planter bed to the corner where the cardboard covered the broken front window. She pushed back a cracked section of tape and with a finger, pulled the cardboard out an inch so she could peek inside. She shook her head.

  John understood that she had no visual on Guzman. “Hey, Mario, why would we hurt your family? Are they all right?” John asked.

  Paula saw the barrel of the shotgun poke around an overturned kitchen table that served as a barricade. The barrel shook as it punctuated Guzman’s reply.

  “He sent you! You won’t get them. You won’t touch my family!”

  Paula slipped around the side of the house, out of sight.

  “Who are you talking about? No one sent us. Who is trying to hurt your family?” John said.

  “You’re a liar. He sent you. Stay back.” Guzman let loose another shotgun blast through the front door. The blast tore the doorknob off the frame and scattered bits of wood and shrapnel on the front-porch landing. Splinters rained down on John’s head. Another shotgun round chambered with a clack-clack of the slide.

  “Dammit, Guzman! Knock it off. Tell me what’s going on,” John called out from his perch outside. “Guzman! Talk to me.”

  “I shouldn’t have talked to you about Cardozo. I know that now. You told him.”

  The abrupt crash of shattered glass preceded a loud thump and Paula’s voice. “Drop it!”

  John leapt to the porch landing and quickly peeked inside the shattered front door. The front room was largely empty, except for a thrift-store coffee table and end stand tucked between a pair of threadbare chairs. Farther inside, an overturned, Formica-covered kitchen table lay on one side, blocking the path to the kitchen.
r />   “On your knees! Now!” Paula commanded from somewhere deeper in the residence.

  John covered the distance from the front door to the makeshift barricade in three steps. In the center of the kitchen, amid a sea of broken glass, Mario Guzman knelt, hands stretched overhead. Blood trailed from a deep gash on his forehead. The man blinked as the blood stung his eye. On the floor, inches from Guzman, the shotgun rested against an overturned chair. Paula stood in the open rear doorway, gun drawn.

  “Hands behind your head,” she said.

  Guzman complied and laced his fingers together behind his thick neck.

  John stepped in and grabbed Guzman’s left wrist, applied a wristlock, and pulled it down behind the gunman’s back. Guzman didn’t resist while John snapped a handcuff on his wrist, followed by the same to the right wrist.

  Once Guzman was in cuffs, Paula secured her weapon, came across the kitchen, and grabbed his shotgun. She pumped three shells from the gun in quick strokes, ejecting them onto the floor.

  “What the hell were you thinking?” John said to her. “What were you trying to prove?”

  “I gotta prove myself everyday around you guys,” Paula said.

  John pulled Guzman up from his knees and with a foot, righted a kitchen chair. He plopped the bleeding gangster into the seat. “You want to tell me what this was about?”

  Guzman clinched his jaw and looked away. He nodded toward Paula and said, “You could have shot me. Why didn’t you?”

  Paula leaned back on a counter and kicked away broken window glass with a toe. “I should have, but then we wouldn’t be having this little conversation.”

  “What did you hit me with?” Guzman asked.

  “A brick from your broke-ass patio.”

  He grinned and shook his head. “You ain’t right.”

  “I’ve heard that before,” she said.

  The grin faded, and a weighty concern replaced it. “He didn’t send you, did he?”

  “For crap’s sake, who are you talking about?” John pressed.

  “The news is calling him the Outcast Killer.”

  “He told you to dump the body over in Old Sacramento?”

  Guzman slumped back in the chair and nodded. “He said if I didn’t do exactly as he told me, he’d kill my wife and kids.”