A Good Bunch of Men

by Danny R. Smith

  “The guy I caught the case with, Hispanic guy, Martinez? It was his case. I was just out there while his partner was in court. I assisted him with the scene, helped out with a few interviews, and that was about it. I personally didn’t have much to do with it after that and haven’t heard any more about it.”

  “It was a wicked hole,” he said, his eyes wide now, “side of his head.”

  Virgil listened, taking it in, two cops casually speaking about a guy who’d been whacked in a parking lot, a gunshot to the head in his Ford Mustang, another statistic in the county, another coroner’s case number issued. Virgil seemed to forget, if only for a few moments, his wife of forty-five years who sat nearby, having a cigarette in the afterlife.

  It occurred to me to change the subject.

  “You need anything,” I said to the deputy, “I’ll be home another hour or so.”

  The leather creaked when he stuffed his thumbs into his police belt holding a 9mm pistol, ammo pouches, two sets of handcuffs, and a police radio. “We’ve got it here, Detective,” he said, rocking on his toes.

  “Virgil, I’m real sorry about May. I’ll be working today, but you have my pager, so don’t hesitate if you need anything at all.”

  “Thanks, uh, Rich,” he said, fumbling with the words. “I appreciate you taking care of all this.”

  I nodded and stepped out of the garage, headed home. I glanced at the sun rising over my left shoulder as I crossed the street, thinking here we go, another hot one in Southern California. Thinking about the busy day ahead of me, how I’d better get moving, already lost an hour spending the morning with Virgil and having my final visit with May. Then thinking maybe Virgil could have her stuffed, keep her sitting there in the garage, and we could continue to visit from time to time, her and Virgil memorialized in time. Put a cigarette in her hand and prop her up right there with a view of the street.

  And then right away thinking, Jesus, there I go.

  “May’s gone to see the Lord,” I told Floyd when he answered his cell phone.

  “Who’s May?”

  “Neighbor lady.”

  “Not the hot one, two doors down?”

  “No, dipshit, Virgil’s wife. Virgil’s the old guy across the street, helps me with electrical work. You’ve met them.”

  “Thank God. I thought you meant—”

  “Katie, the soccer mom.”

  “Yeah,” Floyd said, “you had me worried.”

  “Nope, the old couple right across the road, blue house. I feel bad for him, poor old bastard.”

  “Well, God bless Virgil and May,” Floyd said, “and the 82nd Airborne Division and Miss America too while you’re at it.”

  “My sentiments exactly. What are you doing?”

  “Fighting traffic, headed to the office. About ready to kill this asshole behind me,” Floyd said and then yelled, “Get off my ass, dickhead!”

  “I’m not on your ass,” I said.

  “Not you, dickhead, the dickhead behind me.”

  “You’re headed to the office?”

  “Yeah, aren’t you?”

  “You forget we have court today?” I asked.

  “On what?”

  “Prelim on the Grover case, Compton Court.”

  “Ah, Christ. Yeah, I forgot. I’ll see you there, Dickie.”

  Waiting for our case to be called, Floyd and I sat in a vacant jury room dictating the case of Shane Clayton Wright, managing our time in a futile effort to keep from falling further behind on reports. We passed the recorder back and forth to maintain the chronological order of events memorialized in our respective notebooks. We preferred that method over the cut-and-paste method some detectives used to organize a dictated report. We felt it was a more proficient way to prepare our reports, plus dictating together seemed more enjoyable than apart. After all, we were partners.

  “So what happened to May?” Floyd asked, after pausing the recorder and handing it to me.

  “Well . . .”

  Floyd grinned, my expression probably giving it away, telling him this would be one of those stories.

  “Virgil left her out in the garage last night, smoking—”

  Floyd chuckled. “Ah Je-sus . . . here we go.”

  “—this morning, he can’t find her cause she isn’t in the kitchen, making coffee, cooking breakfast, whatever—”

  “She’s in the garage,” Floyd guessed, his face now wrinkled, his eyes beginning to water.

  “—still smoking.”

  Floyd let out a burst of laughter.

  “Serious, man.”

  “She’s dead?” he asked.

  “Yeah, but she’s smoking.”

  “Ah Jesus, Dickie,” Floyd said, wiping his eyes. “You’re killing me. You know, only you can have all this weird shit in your life, you do realize that, right? Well, me and you. No one else though, I’m convinced of it. This kind of shit doesn’t happen to normal people.”

  “She still had the cigarette in her hand, burned out at the filter.”

  “See,” he said, “that’s what I’m talking about. That’s exactly what I’m talking about!”

  “I could hardly believe it.”

  “No,” Floyd said, “I mean that’s the way to do it, you have to go out enjoying life.”

  “Smoking cigarettes?”

  “Whatever, Dickie. Smoking, skydiving, snorkeling, dancing on tables, anything that floats your skirt—”

  “Your boat.”

  “—you might find me buried under three dozen empty beer cans in my garage, an empty beer box on my head for a hat.”

  “Cell phone in your hand—”

  “Hell, yeah.”

  “—cause you always call me when you’re drunk.”

  “That’d be cool,” Floyd said, “I’d make the call, then stiffen up, flat-line right there between my Jeep and the fridge, you on the line going, ‘Are you there, asshole?’ . . . all pissed off cause I’m not answering you.”

  “Shades on.”

  “Exactly. That’s the way to go.”

  We had almost finished dictating when they called our case. The district attorney decided he would only need Floyd to testify. I would be his Investigating Officer, meaning I would sit at the counsel table with the D.A., there to answer any questions he might have of the investigation. This was a common practice in murder trials, less common in preliminary hearings. I got the feeling the D.A. just wanted an additional buffer from the lunatic in chains.

  The defendant, Nathaniel Grover, had killed his mother, two sisters, a niece, and a nephew, just days after being released from the California Department of Corrections. He had been rehabilitated.

  The fact we were even having the hearing astounded me. The defendant had confessed to the murders, a two-hour interrogation videotaped and submitted as evidence, then he pled not guilty at the time of his arraignment. Floyd had said we should have shot him when we had the chance. I reminded him we didn’t actually have a chance, the guy being handcuffed and in the back of a patrol car when we arrived at the scene. That wasn’t the point, he had said.

  The hearing went without a hitch and the defendant was held to answer. Walking to the parking structure after the hearing, the two of us in suits and shades, two white guys comfortable in the City of Compton, Floyd said, “Ought to be a fun trial.”

  “I’m looking forward to it,” I said. “Maybe he’ll get killed before then, the asshole not likely real popular at the county jail.”

  “Where’re you parked?” he asked as we reached the entrance to the structure, a staircase on our left.

  “Up on three, you?”

  “Right here,” he said, nodding into the dark garage. “I meant to tell you, the trace on the implants?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Came back to a medical distribution company in Dallas. Their number one product? Breast implants.”

  “They give us the name of a doctor?”

  “Still working on it,” Floyd said as he brought a can of Copenh
agen out of his suit pocket, looking past me for a moment and then coming back. “You ever wonder if we’re in the wrong business, Dickie?”

  “No.”

  The evening L.A. traffic stood still as I hit the Harbor Freeway in the Ford Tempo with its broken air-conditioner. I merged into traffic while wiping the sweat from my forehead, seeing miles of brake lights ahead of me. I decided to check in with the office, see if my car was back from the shop, or if there had been any news on the search for Elmer Fudd.

  “Not a word,” Lieutenant Jordan said, “but you might be interested in a murder Team Four is handling out in Hollywood.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, they picked up a case involving a cross-dresser, or drag queen, whatever you call it.”

  “Transsexual?”

  “Whatever. All I know is it’s at a club on the strip, known for that type of thing, apparently.”

  Jesus.

  “All right, LT, give me the address.”

  13

  AFTER SIGNING IN on the crime scene log maintained by a deputy at the edge of the parking lot, I ducked under the yellow tape and made my way to the front door of Club Cabo on the corner of Sunset and La Cienega. The putrid smell of urine and beer wafted from the sticky asphalt as I walked across the lot, noticing about six low-budget economy cars and a black convertible Corvette parked outside the building.

  The front door of the lounge flew open as I reached for the handle, and Kenny Hollis charged through it, his latex-gloved hands holding large paper bags away from his body.

  “Whoa, sorry, dude,” he said, catching the door with an elbow.

  “No problem, Kenny. You in a hurry?”

  “Little bit. I’d like to get home before midnight, got a fishin’ trip planned for tomorrow. What brings you here, Dickie?”

  “Just wanted to have a look, see what you guys picked up. Where’re you going fishing?”

  “We’re going out of Long Beach, headed toward Catalina, just a one-day gig. Hey, let me throw this shit in my trunk,” he said, lifting the bags of evidence for clarification, “I’ll give you a tour inside.”

  I stepped aside, holding the door as Kenny crossed the parking lot to a dark brown Caprice parked outside the yellow tape, half in the driveway, half on the sidewalk. He dropped the collection of evidence into the trunk, along with his gloves, and then closed the lid and ducked back under the tape, wiping the sweat from his head as he made his way back to the front door where I stood waiting.

  “It’s still hot out here,” he said, arriving back at the door, “I’m sweating like a pig.”

  “Did you know that pigs don’t actually sweat?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “True story. Don’t remember where I heard it, but it’s true. Now when someone says that, sweating like a pig, it seems funny to me.”

  “No shit, uh?”

  “Yep. Apparently, it’s why they wallow in mud, to cool themselves. So really, when you say, ‘sweating like a pig,’ you’re actually saying you’re not sweating at all. You’d be better off saying you were sweating like a borrowed mule—that’s one I like—or you can say a rented mule. You could also say you were sweating like a whore in church, or you could say sweating like a brotha at a free dance. That one’s pretty funny too, I’m not going to lie.”

  Kenny grinned. “Now, do you actually say, brotha, when there ain’t no brothas around?”

  I grinned and said, “I try to, Kenny.”

  He chuckled and said, “I bet.”

  “It is warm this evening though, I’ll give you that.”

  “Not much better inside either, brotha,” Kenny said, grinning a bit.

  We both chuckled, comfortable in the absence of political correctness.

  Kenny wiped the sweat from his head again.

  “You need a cover,” I said.

  “I can’t hide this bald head, man, all this beautiful brown skin.”

  “Looks good too,” I told him, “you’ve got that shine going on. It never looks as good on us white guys, the bald and beautiful look. Now a hat, on the other hand . . .”

  Kenny smiled. “Yeah, you could stand to get your dome tanned a little bit, get that glare off it. Maybe you could get out and do some fishin’, play some golf or something. For Christ’s sake, man, all you do is work.”

  “My head would fry, Kenny, if I didn’t wear a hat. I’d have to lather it up in sunscreen, and I mean some hardcore shit, Peckerwood-99.”

  Kenny chuckled. Then he grabbed the door and gestured for me to step inside.

  “Scene’s in a dressing room, back there in the back. Nothing to worry about up front here.”

  “What will you guys be fishing for?” I asked, pausing after I stepped into the dimly lit room. There were black leather chairs and wood tables scattered over the red-carpeted floor. A raised, half-circle shaped stage with two brass poles sat along the back wall. Just off the stage was a doorway covered by a red velvet curtain. The entire building reeked of cigarettes, stale beer, and cheap perfume.

  “Calico bass, white sea bass, yellowfins, anything that gets on my hook, really,” Kenny said, now at my side, two big guys standing shoulder to shoulder in the narrow entry.

  Kenny’s partner, Ignacio Ramirez, stood just this side of the curtain next to the stage, his back to the main room. Kenny began walking that way and I followed, Kenny saying, “Last time out, I brought home about fifty pounds of tuna filets.”

  “That’s a lot of fish,” I replied.

  “Guy across the street traded me some of his elk, and that worked out just right. The wife loves fish, but I am more of a red meat kind of guy. Elk is good, if you’ve never tried it.”

  “I have,” I said, “couple of times.”

  Kenny said, “I’m thinking of taking up hunting.”

  “In all our spare time.”

  We were just behind Ignacio now, having moved slowly through the main room. Kenny was back to telling fish tales, mentioning the name of the boat they had chartered and what time they were leaving, obviously excited about the trip. I had barely paid attention, too busy in my head wondering what kind of freaks came to this joint and paid to see ugly men dressed as uglier women. I pictured the action in my head, some hairy-legged dude in a red mini, on stage, blowing kisses to some weirdo wearing women’s underwear beneath his Dockers, the wife at home thinking he worked late again.

  Kenny stopped, held a hand across my chest, and said, “You ever go?”

  “Deep sea fishing?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Never have,” I said, “though I wouldn’t mind trying it. I’ve got a buddy who—”

  “Take the day off, come along. You know Jake Helmouth, Bobby Bryant, both from Narco, right?”

  “Know who they are.”

  “Good guys. Them and a couple buddies of theirs from DEA are all going. Seriously, man, it’ll be a good trip, you really should come along.”

  “I appreciate the offer, Kenny, but man, I’m buried.”

  “Gotta make time for the good stuff, my man. Life’s too damn short to be killing yourself over this job.”

  “Maybe next time,” I said.

  I stepped alongside his partner. “Hey, Iggy.”

  “Hey man, what brings you here?”

  I tilted my head and peeked around the curtain. “I was telling Kenny, I heard about your murder, thought I’d better have a look at your victim. We’ve got a dead prostitute who turned out to be a transsexual. It’s probably related to a case Sandy Landers and that new guy have, the guy that came here from Lancaster. They handled a dead prostitute who shared a motel room with our victim, a murder me and Floyd stumbled onto while working our case.”

  “Where’s that asshole, Floyd?” Kenny asked and chuckled.

  “I fired him,” I said, “conduct unbecoming.”

  Iggy smiled and said, “Seems reasonable enough to me. He is definitely unbecoming at times.”

  “So your victim and Sandy’s,” Kenny chimed in, “the
y were actual transsexuals, had the operations and everything?”

  “The case Sandy and the new guy picked up, the hooker in the motel room, she was only half done, just the breasts. Ours had the entire package.”

  “You’re shittin’ me?” Iggy said, “like, everything?”

  “Complete retrofit,” I said, “saw it with my own two eyes.”

  “I’m not sure I’d want to see that,” Iggy said, then seemed to think about it for a moment. “Maybe just out of morbid curiosity.”

  “Kind of wish I hadn’t seen it myself,” I admitted. “Anyway, our case and Sandy’s case are likely connected, so when I heard about this one, with the similar theme of this joint, I figured I’d better see if anything connects up.”

  Ignacio asked, “Yours happened down in Lynwood?”

  I nodded. “Long Beach Boulevard.”

  “I thought you guys solved that one, had a big shootout with the suspect?”

  “He got away,” I said, “broke containment or maybe he was gone before the troops arrived. Either way, we don’t know if that shooting has any connection to our case or not. Maybe just a nut job gone off the deep end.”

  “Why else is a guy going to take shots at the police?” Kenny asked. “It’s got to have something to do with it, you’d think.”

  I shrugged, “Unless he’s just crazy.”

  Kenny shook his head. “Neighborhood where I grew up, you’d have to be insane to shoot at the cops. I mean, it happened, but only when a guy was cornered hard, didn’t want to go back to the joint. You didn’t just shoot at the po-lice for shits and giggles. Of course, back then, a brother shoots at the cops, he didn’t ever make it to court. There would always be some kind of furtive movement or some other shit to justify killing the asshole, or so it seemed.”

  I thought about Fudd getting gunned down by the surveillance guys, thinking it wouldn’t be a bad thing.

  “I don’t know, Kenny, none of this makes any sense to me. It’s not like we put any pressure on the guy, never even questioned him. We spoke to him one time on the sidewalk, asked him what he knew about some people living in this house, a place we later find out our victim had been to the night before she was killed. This guy—Floyd named him Elmer Fudd—goes off, talking trash about all of them. The girl we’re looking for because she’s black, her friends because they’re Mexican, the lot of them screwing up his neighborhood, blah, blah, blah.”