Running Cold (The Mick Callahan Novels)

by Harry Shannon

  Callahan finished his coffee and walked down the street. Music was drifting seductively through the plate glass window of a small, high-class Mexican restaurant. He heard a guitar picker with some talent and a voice. Callahan stopped at the corner of Laurel Canyon and Ventura to wait for the light to change. Two pretty girls passed. One tried to catch his eye. He studied his worn boots. The music wove in and out of the country music still playing in his head. Callahan licked his lips and thought again of how simple it would be to just walk in that door, go right to the bar. Those glasses sweating beads under neon, rose-colored lights. A cool, familiar darkness built to cuddle away the guilt, make the worn down pretty, and the worn out young again.

  "She can't save you." Callahan startled himself by saying it aloud. A plump woman crossing the street clutched her handbag close and hurried away from him, her high heels clicking on the pavement like the hands of a huge grandfather clock.

  Getting beaten when you're a kid, that wasn't the worst thing in the world. It also wasn't being forced to fight other kids for money, or all the unpaid hard work on Uncle Danny's spread. Even losing his mother young, that was just something that prepared him for the real world, for the fact that we all lose everything sooner or later. No, to Callahan the worst thing had been the not knowing. How sometimes it could be okay, with hot meals and a decent bed and some joking around. And then sometimes a fist could come out of nowhere and knock him onto the kitchen floor just . . . because. Whatever. The not knowing. That same history that had taken down many alcoholics before, ruined his half-sister Mary Kate, a woman who could now be waiting on the other side of this chasm, in some small town, saving Mick a spot at the bar.

  Get a grip.

  Further down the same street was the Radford Hall AA group. Salvation was almost walking distance, but not quite. Maybe not in boots, unless Callahan wanted to limp for a couple of weeks. Or he could just walk in that door, request a beer and a shot—guaranteed to raise a few eyebrows in a classy joint—and soon all hell would break loose . . .

  Or he could just turn around and go back to his car and get the hell out of Purgatory. He had a choice.

  Callahan opted for the latter. Stepping back from that doorway, from the sweating booze and the high, thin laughter inside, from his tall, grim reflection in that tinted glass, was like soundlessly separating two six foot two inch strips of Velcro. He bumped into an elderly couple. The old man scowled when Callahan failed to apologize.

  Callahan was still obsessed with himself and his own isolation, what Hal called the hole in the belly with the wind blowing through. This was a deep well, near bottomless. Callahan knew that if he didn't mentally change the subject and soon, something bad was going to happen. He took out his cell, turned back the other way and started punching numbers.

  Calvin McCann still didn't answer his phone. Callahan was jacked on adrenalin, scared of his shadow and angry at the world. He told himself he was doing Calvin a favor, that he should know right away that Callahan had struck a deal with Roth about his marker. That this wasn't about his own issues. Told himself he was a noble and thoroughly decent human being. But the truth was a bit more complicated than that. AA says when all else fails, work with a newcomer. Callahan needed to do something for McCann in order to save his own life.

  He walked back across the street, tossed the coffee cup in a mesh trash can. He gave ten bucks to a homeless dude and told him to use it for food. And then Callahan got back in his car and headed up Laurel Canyon. The onramp was packed, everyone waiting for the timer light to give them permission to get onto an even more crowded freeway. The Diamond Lane was open. Some people were cheating, speeding ahead with furtive glances left and right. Callahan almost joined them. With a wry small, Callahan diagnosed himself as edging closer to a Multiple Personality Disorder, at least at that moment. If the cops stopped him, maybe he could claim to be two different people.

  A lot of people were giving up on the mobbed freeway and turning off onto the surface streets. Callahan exited and took Woodman up to Burbank, continued west. The windshield danced with reflected light. Night pushed the mountains down into black velvet. Callahan rolled the window down and let the warm wind slap him around for a while. The air stank of gasoline and smoke from a distant wildfire. The road ahead looked like black ribbon flecked with winking turn signals and red brake lights, a kind of endless Halloween tree.

  Callahan began to make better time. Night had fallen all over the Valley. He entered the barrio. The cops were cruising slowly now, far more cautiously, their eyes wide, heads on a swivel. As he sped up Sepulveda past Sherman Way the road dipped down beneath an overpass splattered with gang signs. Traffic lightened up and the street lights seemed to pass quickly as if ushering civilians through a battlefield. Callahan entered Panorama City, took one wrong turn, then remembered the correct street.

  This was it, the right neighborhood. A group of kids on the corner were well into several quarts of malt liquor, two bottles like dead soldiers on the cracked cement. They were kneeling in a large circle and doing something on the ground, playing dice or cards. No one looked up.

  The street light was out. In the heated, heavy dark the white duplex seemed to hunker down and whimper like an abused animal. Callahan parked and sat there for a moment. What had triggered this? And then he knew. His sister Mary Kate had sent Callahan an email. His refusal to respond had been chewing on him. Mary Kate said she felt terrible for being disloyal to Mick. That she was working a casino in Reno, dealing blackjack, and just wanted to apologize for having tried to con him. She'd left out the part where she had almost gotten him killed. Callahan couldn't get right with that situation either. He didn't want to talk to her, but felt guilty about blowing her off. He reminded himself not to think of himself so damn much. Talk to Calvin, distract yourself.

  Callahan got out of the car and looked both ways. He didn't see anything or anyone, which seemed strange. One TV set flickered in the front window of a house at the end of the block. The air was thick and the sky smothered with smog, not a visible star in the sky. That stung and made Mick miss the desert at night. Again. He shoved the past away.

  Callahan's boots thwacked the sidewalk as he approached Calvin's duplex. The building on the right was dark and closed up tight as a gnat's ass, like a virtual fortress. Julius the fat kid lived there, the Jerry type who was a whiz at computers. If he was home, it didn't show. As Callahan approached Calvin's house the stillness began to bother him. Calvin hadn't answered. Maybe he wasn't even home, but then where was he? At a meeting? Somehow it was hard to imagine him showing that much initiative.

  Callahan knocked on the screen door. Jumped when something rattled. A tiny creature scuttled away into the night, a rat or small possum living under the porch. Callahan knocked again. He called Calvin's name. After the third attempt, he shrugged and turned to leave. He looked up at the night sky. She can't save you . . .

  From where Callahan was standing, he could see the moon. The empty feeling returned. Out of pure selfishness, Callahan spun around and tried the door handle once, just in case McCann was watching the tube or locked in the john. Just to try every damn thing he could to avoid standing there in the dark all alone.

  The screen was unlatched. Callahan turned the handle and opened it to try the door. It wasn't locked. The hinges screeched faintly but urgently, like a far away wail of pain. Callahan's instincts took over. Something was wrong. He ducked down, peeked inside. Papers on the floor, a chair tipped over. Someone had left in a hurry. Callahan resisted the urge to announce himself again. To his shame, he also gave serious thought to a dignified retreat. Why not just turn and walk away, get in the damned car and drive home? Why not? Why go one inch further when your gut is telling you something is very, very wrong?

  Because of that stench. Death was hiding inside, rustling and giggling like an evil child playing hide and seek. And now Callahan could also hear the greedy, busy buzzing of the flies.

  Callahan used the back of his ri
ght hand to edge the door the rest of the way open. A nightlight was on in the hallway, perhaps one that turned on automatically. Callahan could just make out the shapes and shadows of lamps and furniture in the living room. Things seemed different. That smell clenched his stomach tight and flipped it sideways. If anyone was still inside, Callahan would be an easy target there in the doorway, perfectly framed and backlit by the moon.

  Two steps to the right, Callahan used the back of his hand to flip the lights on and even the odds. He closed his eyes and sank down to buy an extra couple of seconds. Then Callahan opened his eyes slowly and took it all in. The rest of the furniture shoved around, the chair turned over, things dragged away as Calvin had tried to escape. He was there, of course. Silent forever. A flash of heartbreakingly alabaster skin, cheap pants ridden up above the ankle on one leg, white tufts of hair, a splash of blood on the carpet. And the damned flies.

  Ah, Jesus, Calvin. Over a couple of thousand dollars?

  Callahan had left his cell on the car seat. He knew better than to walk further into a crime scene. He looked down at the carpet and risked one step to the right, then craned his neck for a better look. Calvin with his eyes wide and staring. The blood flow had stopped. He looked so frail and small.

  It looked like Calvin had taken more than one bullet. Perhaps the shooter had walked close enough to put two in the back of his head. A classic double tap. A mob hit. Callahan took everything in instantly. Several feelings competed for prominence, fear and grief and even a twinge of guilt. But the most powerful of all was anger.

  He left everything as it was, lights on, and backed out of the room. Didn't touch the doorknob or the screen door handle, though he was already certain there would be no prints from a killer this professional. Callahan went out on the porch and turned around. He was instantly blinded. A bright white light punched him in the nose. Callahan threw his hands up instinctively and ducked down and to one side.

  "LAPD! Freeze. Don't you fucking move!"

  Callahan stopped moving. "I'm unarmed."

  "Keep your hands where I can see them. Step slowly out into the open. Slowly. Don't breathe unless we say so."

  "You got it."

  Callahan followed those instructions to the letter. Two cops. They quickly fanned out on either side of him. One was a woman, hair tight in a bun. She kept her 9mm right on the sweet spot at the center of Callahan's chest, where his heart was currently kicking like a bronco. The male was African-American with short hair. Flashlight up, he came around Callahan's side. Then patted him down without asking for permission.

  "Did you enter the house, sir?"

  "Yes. A yard or so. There's at least one body in there, the occupant, a man named Calvin McCann. I didn't go any further inside."

  "Walk down the steps slowly." The woman. Callahan did as she told him, while her partner checked out the house. Callahan gave her his name and address and other information and a terse account of what had just happened. The man came out and Callahan asked if he could sit down. By then neither one seemed to give a damn, they were jacked about stumbling upon their first murder scene. He watched as they rolled some yellow tape. He hadn't known the street cops carried that stuff. Maybe just in hairy neighborhoods.

  Callahan sat on the porch steps. He rubbed his temples and felt really sorry for Calvin. Wondered how the son would react to this news. Calvin described Wes as a real hothead. I know how I'd feel . . .

  Two new detectives rolled up a few minutes later. Callahan figured they must have caught the case. Callahan knew them vaguely through his friend Donato. These clowns were pretty sleazy. The fat, chain smoking one was Orville Penzler, a fifteen-year veteran with halitosis and the alarming habit of constantly scratching his testicles. Stapled to him was Harry DeRossi, a confused looking man pushing his twenty years, the kind of guy who's always asking the same question over and over because his short term memory circuits got fried out from too many Bloody Marys with breakfast. Donato had called them both lowlifes. They looked it.

  "It's Mr. Callahan," Penzler said pleasantly. He had an oddly melodious baritone. The guy should have been doing voice over commercials instead of looking at dead human flesh. "What brings you here? Is the deceased one of your peeps?"

  Callahan explained that Calvin had been a sometime client, sometime AA friend. And it was now the fifth time Callahan had told the same story in so many words. Harry DeRossi studied Callahan intently. Nobody home behind the calloused eyes. Callahan could tell what was coming, but it still annoyed him.

  "So," DeRossi said, "does that mean you knew the guy?"

  "Why don't you guys go inside," Callahan said. "I'm sure they need your expertise." Neither one of the detectives appeared to catch the irony.

  Flickering and blinking shadows and forms in constant motion. Time clicked by in hallucinogenic chunks. Camera flashes, busy people working non-stop with expressions that said they'd rather be somewhere else and soon.

  Murder was a magnet. Some half-clothed neighbors appeared as if by magic, strolled down the block to stand behind the tape and gossip in Spanish or Armenian. The house to the north seemed condemned, and the one on the right, where Julius the computer geek lived, remained as dark and shuttered as the castle in a horror movie. Callahan wondered if he'd seen anything, knew anything and was just hiding out. Julius didn't seem like the kind of dude who had much of a social life. Callahan had already decided not to mention Julius under questioning. That would give him a bit of extra time. Let the cops canvas the neighborhood. They'd figure it out eventually.

  The meat wagon arrived. The assembled mob released a soft, almost erotic "ahh" at the sight of the men in white unloading a gurney.

  More time sped by. The coroner worked rapidly. Callahan overheard there were no shell casings, none of the neighbors heard a sound. Double tap. Check. Absolutely no evidence. Check.

  Out in the meat wagon the EMT in charge smoked a cigarette and gabbed with Penzler and DeRossi. The other one, most likely a med student, sat in the back of the vehicle reading a textbook. Callahan pondered about his propensity for stepping in deep piles of excrement. He'd been trying to do the right thing and get his mind off his own misery. Had he gotten Calvin killed instead? Had confronting Roth and Quinn started the ball rolling? Was this my fault?

  Callahan went to the car. He called Jerry from his cell. As the phone rang, he noticed that DeRossi and Penzler still hadn't done much more than badger him and peek through the front door at the crime scene. Guess it wasn't their case after all.

  "Yo, Mick?" Jerry answered.

  Callahan filled him in. "Whoever did this was a pro, Jerry. So I want to know everything Quinn did tonight. Track his smart phone GPS, loot his computer, whatever you have to do."

  "Already on it."

  "This shouldn't have happened, Jerry." Callahan felt his eyes sting. He blinked away water, rubbed his face on his shirt sleeve.

  "I'm sorry man, sounds like Calvin was a nice dude the way you described him. But Quinn seems a little too obvious to me, you know? Like, wouldn't he at least have farmed it out? Something don't seem right." Jerry started typing furiously. Callahan had seen him do his magic often enough to imagine three or four computer screens blasting synchronized holes in cyberspace.

  "I'm trying to put that together right now. And I'm going to need your help."

  "We dig it up and turn it over to Darlene or somebody, right?"

  "Well, maybe not this time."

  Jerry stopped typing. Let out a long breath. "Hold on a second, bro. I hear you, but I'm not so sure we want to be digging around in something that cuts this close to the bone."

  "What do you mean? I'm already in the middle of the situation."

  "This could get even more wonky. Think about it, man. Instead of heroes, we could easily end up looking like a bunch of guys trying to muddy the water to cover something up."

  Callahan wanted to tell him more, say something about the despair he was feeling, but guilt and grief rendered him mute.
<
br />   "Just do it, and watch your ass. Don't leave a trail some other brainiac just like you can follow. You know what I mean. I don't want to have to worry about you."

  "I'll be careful, Mick," Jerry said. "Will you?"

  "Always."

  "Call you later."

  Callahan watched. The dreary functions of death proceeded with solemn precision. The meat wagon boys had already rolled a gurney into the house. The front end appeared in the doorway, behind the torn screen. Cameras flashed, but the gurney backed up for some unknown reason, and more time passed. Then the front door opened all the way and one EMT held the screen door open. So the crowd murmured again.

  They brought Calvin out. An obscene squealing pierced the night air as the now-weighted metal wheels crossed the porch and thumped down the steps. The sheet was already showing signs of reddish brown seepage. For some reason the top quarter was still turned down, perhaps because someone hadn't finished taking digital photographs. Yet another collective gasp from around the front lawn. This time genuine shock and horror.

  Calvin's face was a gory ruin. His jaw was shattered. It angered Callahan that they allowed Calvin's neighbors to see him this way. Mick hadn't wanted to see him this way. Oh, man. I'm so sorry . . .

  A beat up Chevy crawled down the block and passed the house. Callahan barely saw it. The young man driving took in the scene, looked away and kept going. No one noticed that the driver of that vehicle was Calvin's son, Wes McCann. Or the dark, furious look that crossed his face when he saw Callahan standing there, staring at his father's body.

  Callahan surveyed the madness for a while. Voices babbled all around him, a solid wall of sound passed through damp cotton. Detectives Penzler and DeRossi were debating the relative merits of trying an on-sides kick before the end of the first half of a championship NFL game last season. Penzler figured if you got away with that you were brilliant but if you didn't you were a fucking putz. Their conversation was heated and on the face of it calloused and ridiculous. Neither one of them mentioned Callahan's dead friend. Calvin was just another pile of waste. Mick felt his mind spinning, and that black hole tore through his middle, but this time he answered it with a force just as powerful. The two cops listened as if going through the motions, bored beyond belief, kissing up a bit. Nobody gave a damn. That much was clear. Callahan's blood rose up, finally boiled.