Dying For LA

by Ian Jones

  Voorhees spoke calmly and quietly.

  ‘But actually, it gets worse. I made a call to check on the progress of the rest of the recruits who will be joining us, and I was told some very grave news.’

  Sal and Rico looked at him expectantly, bad news was not what was needed that was for sure, at least he wouldn’t blast their heads off in here. Probably. Maybe.

  ‘Karl Weiss had a cellphone.’

  ‘What?’ asked Rico, genuinely aghast despite himself.

  Voorhees nodded.

  ‘He did. And of course I asked him, told him to give it to me, we would have to switch it off and lock it away, but he said he didn’t have one, he told me there had been some issues and he had to get rid of it. And I accepted the lie, another failing on my behalf.’

  ‘How the hell did you find out?’ Sal asked.

  And Voorhees smiled. Another first.

  ‘Because the asshole sent a text to the guy that introduced him to us. He must have sent it when he was in the car, not your fault. He told him he was on his way, there was a hit already. Of course, the guy was very shocked, and the news that Weiss is no longer around forced his hand to come clean.’

  ‘The cops will have the phone,’ Rico said.

  ‘Correct,’ Voorhees confirmed. ‘I now also know that he was shot by an off-duty cop, so there will be even more heat.’

  ‘What does this mean Yann?’ asked Sal.

  ‘Well, we need to take action. The police can track the phone, I understand they can go back several days, maybe more. They will find out he came by train, and he was at the apartment. It will take a while, but it can be done. And I also wonder what else he might have on the phone, you know how it is; messages, contacts, pictures, could be anything.’

  ‘Shit,’ Rico swore quietly.

  ‘Look, all we can deal with is what we know. There may be nothing on it at all. But we must assume the worst and prepare for it. I have been busy and already have alternative accommodation I think will be perfect.’

  ‘So, we are still on?’ Sal asked, confused.

  ‘Of course. I should have been more open with you. I apologise. It is force of habit, but as you rightly said, we have been together for a while now, and you should know what we are doing. What we are after is a document. Just a few sheets of paper I understand. Now as Sal alluded to; the intelligence has not been, well, very intelligent to put it bluntly. And it was not in the briefcase. There has been some additional work by others and it is also nowhere to be found in the briefcase owner’s home. But there is a theory, and we are getting a resource that should be of great help, although he is not one that I am personally comfortable with. The others will not be joining us today, I have been advised to wait until we are set up in our new premises.’

  ‘Right. So, er … we better pack, right?’ Rico said.

  ‘Indeed. At least that will not take long. Our destination is in fact not so far from here, but we must be careful from this point on. And we will need to get the vehicles moved, which I imagine will take some time.’

  He looked down at the tray, realising that he had eaten the last of the muffins.

  ‘Come on, let’s get started.’

  He smiled again, which he clearly wasn’t practiced at doing, and then eased himself upright. They left together and walked back to the apartment, which both Rico and Sal were pleased to be leaving but unsure what was coming next.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Reed called Keane a couple of hours later. They were back in Judy’s room, Warner slowly getting more information on Sung-Min Byeon. Judy and Keane were working through the women’s backgrounds, while John was getting everything possible on 1-Too.

  When his phone rang, Keane stood up, relieved, and rubbed his eyes.

  He talked for a while, nodding and then gave the address of the hotel and room number.

  ‘OK, Captain Reed is coming back. It seems like he belongs to us for a couple of days; the army want to make sure they aren’t going to be dragged through the shit. Terrorist attack on the subway, then one of their own officers gets shot by what appears to be the same people, the press are already onto them. So Tom Reed has been told to help.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Judy.

  ‘Handy if we have to change a lightbulb,’ John said, looking up at the ceiling and smiling.

  ‘Really useful if we have to kick the shit out of someone,’ Warner agreed, giving John a high-five.

  They went through what they had found out so far.

  John had been told that it appears that 1-Too were born out of Beirut initially, but there had never been any arrests or even detainment of note since they first appeared close to ten years ago. Very mysterious but deadly, no real leads on the people behind it.

  Warner reported that Sung-Min Byeon came from a rich family, and had an expensive education. He ran into trouble with the police at an early age, and there are several warrants out on him in Korea. It had been thought originally that he had fled to North Korea, in which case he would have to be forgotten about, not a hope in hell of getting him back to stand trial.

  Judy had some good information on the women. Deanne and Madeline shared an apartment in Vegas, they both had the same address on Walt Drive in Paradise, it seemed like they had been sharing for a long time. Madeline had been in rehab on two separate occasions, both times for heroin addiction, the last time ten years ago when she was twenty-nine. Both women had made recent forays into the porn industry around five years earlier, and had appeared in at least one movie together, and it was possible that was why they could have been in LA. Judy was getting more information on that, and was still waiting for the financial reports.

  She passed around her mobile phone, there was a picture of Madeline, who had long dark hair and was very striking.

  Jane Elliot had no record. She was a member of her local church, and dating a teacher. She was said to be very quiet, and had only moved out from her parent’s house in the past year. She was recently diagnosed with diabetes, and had been unwell over the weekend.

  Keane had the statements from Captain Bryant and David Mays.

  Mays who was forty-five, was suitably vague, considering his tricky relationship with the police. Hayter had been placing bets with him for some time, and had a debt that needed paying. Mays was keen to work with him to resolve it.

  ‘Yeah, I’m sure,’ added Warner.

  Mays stated they had been there about an hour when the two men walked into the bar and he saw one of them had a gun. Originally, he had believed he was the target as currently quite a lot of people owe him money, but Major Hayter was shot. Mays was still very shocked and upset by what had happened, he was keen to tell all to the police. He said repeatedly he had nothing to hide. He had never met James Bryant before, he believed he was there because Hayter was a pussy and scared, but all he had wanted to do was work out how to get paid. He knew Hayter from the days when he was in the army and based at Indigo, but he had been out over ten years and they had never been exactly friends. Deanna Hayter had not been mentioned once, he had never heard of her, had no idea he was even married, in fact didn’t know anything about Hayter’s personal life at all. Neither Hayter or Bryant had mentioned anything, he didn’t know why they had met in that particular bar, Mays believed he had never been there before; it had been Hayter’s suggestion.

  Captain Bryant stated he had known Hayter for about six years, ever since he had been posted to Indigo. His position with the military was also supply, but in requisition, dealing mostly with ammunition. His previous posting was in Alabama, and prior to that Germany. Bryant had seen active duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, he was thirty-nine, and been in the army sixteen years, moving into supply from infantry when posted to Indigo.

  He backed up Mays’ version of events, also stating they had been in the bar for about an hour but saying he had no idea why they had met up there, Hayter had just told him that’s where he would be. He arrived about five minutes before Mays, and drove straight there
from the base. Hayter said nothing to him at all about Deanna’s death, but he seemed very quiet. He didn’t know if Hayter had been anywhere else before the bar. The two men had not seen much of each other in the past week, but when he was pressed Hayter had said that he was fine. Mays had been talking about a debt, which was the reason for the meeting. Hayter had been worried, he asked Bryant to come along, it had been arranged the week before.

  Bryant had become friendly with Hayter only really about three years before, as they both had an interest in online poker. He had been to Vegas with him on a couple of occasions, and had in fact been there when Deanna first appeared. She had made a beeline for him, Bryant said. They had been at a table in the Stratosphere, but both losing; Hayter by some margin. Deanna had appeared and made a ‘serious play’, but Hayter had shunned her. This was probably six weeks or so ago. Maybe more. The two men had returned a couple of weeks later and she had made the same move, to be knocked back again. After that Bryant didn’t go to Vegas for a while, his wife had not long ago had a baby and he was needed at home, he had been busy at the base and neither man had really spoken for some time. Then out of the blue Hayter had told him that he was married, but initially said the same as he had told the others, he had just met Deanna. Bryant had gone to Vegas with him just two weeks ago and saw Deanna. He recognised her immediately and asked Hayter, who brushed it off. He knew she wasn’t living on the base, which was odd, but Hayter told him they were looking at houses so he had never pursued it. He did think it was strange his friend refused to confirm that he had met Deanna previously. Then Bryant said something interesting, that Deanna always had a friend with her, dark haired, quite pretty but real unfriendly.

  Bryant also told them that on many occasions he had loaned Hayter money, but had stopped when he had to be persistent to be repaid and it had got awkward. Lately, Hayter had boasted that he had some cash, which Bryant believed must have come from gambling. Presumably he would be paying what he owed to a lot of people, including Mays.

  They all read the statements and looked at each other.

  ‘It’ll be interesting to see what Tom says about this,’ John said, ‘There isn’t really much to go on.’

  Keane wandered across to the window and looked out into the street.

  ‘I know a few people who are in with Mays, I’ll check in with them, see what they say,’ Keane told them without looking round, still staring outside.

  Warner stood up.

  ‘Any chance we can speak to this Captain Bryant?’ he asked Keane, who shrugged.

  ‘Maybe. I’ll have to check in with Hollywood PD.’

  Reed arrived, immediately filling the small room. He was on his own this time and carrying a couple of folders, and looked pleased to be there.

  They all said hello, and Judy offered to go out and get coffee. After all, she reasoned, she was a mum. John suggested they all go back over to the diner, there was nowhere in the room for them all to sit anyway so they walked across the street, and made themselves comfortable in the same corner they had been in earlier.

  Reed put the folders down on the table.

  ‘So, Major Hayter’s billet was ransacked, somebody was looking for something. This is strange as they would have known we searched it earlier, so anything incriminating or even interesting we found would have been taken away.’

  He opened a folder and spread out some photographs, they all showed a small room in disarray. Narrow bed, wardrobe, chest of drawers, footlocker and a small table and chair. All overturned, belongings everywhere.

  ‘We believe it was rushed. These rooms are real basic, there’s no place to hide anything, no floorboards or hollow walls and of course we checked all the usual places.’

  ‘So, a waste of time then?’ Warner asked.

  ‘That’s what we think. We wouldn’t have missed anything, there was nothing there. Not even any porn.’

  ‘So not a whole real point in you tearing back there then?’ Keane pointed out.

  Reed shrugged and continued.

  ‘We know there were no visitors for Major Hayter over this weekend, in fact he hasn’t had any on base at all in over a year. I can go back further but I’d guess it’s the same story.’

  ‘Is that normal?’ John asked.

  ‘Well, yes and no. It’s common for serving soldiers to not bother having guests, they want to get off base, but not so much for officers, especially of Major Hayter’s age. Then we would expect to see family, but it turns out that he doesn’t have any really, just a brother he has no contact with. But guests on an army base aren’t exactly free to come and go as they feel like. I guess he spent all his free time in Vegas.’

  Warner and Judy explained all they had found out about Deanna, and Keane went through David Mays and Captain Bryant’s statements.

  ‘So, what can you tell us about Captain Bryant?’ John asked.

  Reed opened another folder.

  ‘Ah, well I know more about him. Forty-three. Career soldier, and a good one by all accounts. He’s served all over, and been in action. The word is he would be further along the chain by now, but he wanted to be where the bullets are. Anyway, he got injured in Afghanistan, lost a big chunk of his left leg. He wanted to carry on so they made him a Captain and set him up in supply, probably to see how well he heals. My guess is he will be moved somewhere else in time. I have spent some time with him, he’s a good guy. Liked by everyone tell the truth.’

  ‘His statement says he’s a gambler,’ Keane said.

  ‘Yeah, but that’s not uncommon. Everybody seems to have laptops, tablets and whatever these days, lot of them get online; blackjack, poker, etc., it’s kind of frowned upon I guess but nobody has said anything about outlawing it. Captain Bryant is real open about it, makes jokes about doing it. He never said anything about Major Hayter to me, but they worked together, so I believe that’s how they became buddies. Turns out it was down to online poker. The officer who runs supply at Indigo is XO operations Colonel William Carter, Bill to his friends. I spoke to him this morning and I found out something interesting that I didn’t know. He was also at West point with General Morgan and was there later doing some training and met Major Hayter, in fact it was him not Morgan that got Hayter the posting at Indigo.’

  ‘How in the hell is that interesting?’ Keane grumbled.

  ‘Forgive him, he’s been in a shitty mood all day,’ Judy told Reed, waving her hand at Keane.

  ‘Well,’ Reed continued, ‘it’s interesting because I never once saw Colonel Carter and Major Hayter together. Not ever, and they were often in the officer’s club or the mess at the same time. Colonel Carter seemed very sorry about what happened to Major Hayter, genuinely upset about it, but he was also bothered about himself. I know this sounds like bullshit, but he was saying he needs protection. I couldn’t get any more information, he was going on and on, not making a whole lot of sense. I got one of my guys to get a statement, but I’m not holding out much hope. Of course, it’s possible they were stealing a fortune from the stores together but I don’t think so. Whole thing was weird from start to finish. And one more thing, I went over to supply, that place is huge. Anyways I spoke to the sergeants there, if you want facts, go to those guys. They know everything. And nobody had a problem with Major Hayter, but nobody really liked him neither. In fact it seems to me that nobody really knew him, and he was there all those years. The joke was he was the office boy; clock on, shuffle papers, eat lunch, shuffle more papers, clock off, leave. He was in charge of the rota, and he never worked a weekend, and even when there was some big inventory inspection on he would still just work the same hours. So, they all kind of laughed behind his back, but it was no big deal. The one thing they all said they were done loaning him money, and that all fits with what we already heard. I don’t know if this is any help, but there you are.’

  ‘So you’re on the team now then?’ Judy asked him with a smile.

  Reed grinned back.

  ‘Yeah. I spoke to my CO this mornin
g, who went straight to the top. Things like this don’t happen very often, thank God. I think Major Hayter’s room getting spun was the last straw, so they asked me to stick with you guys for a couple of days, try to help. It happened real fast, and I never seen that before. I got back and within an hour or so ordered to pack some civvies and set up with you guys. As long as it takes.’

  ‘What they really want, is to know first what, if anything, we find,’ John said drily.

  ‘Of course. Always out in front. But it suits me, makes a change from dragging AWOL guys back from the bus station. I checked in here, on the army’s dollar. I got the room at the end.’

  ‘It’s good to have you here,’ Judy told him.

  ‘Sure. So, where are we?’

  ‘We think that Deanna is the key, that she was the actual target. Maybe she was supposed to be carrying something which wasn’t there, so next one down the line would be her husband,’ Warner replied.

  ‘OK, but target for what?’ Reed asked.

  ‘We have no idea, not a fucking clue,’ Keane said, staring out the window again.

  ‘It could be anything. Cash maybe, drugs, guns, bearer bonds, hell, literally anything,’ Warner said.

  ‘Well one thing I can say is that the stores at Indigo are one hundred percent. There ain’t nothing serious missing, no weapons or ammo, no equipment. I checked on that too,’ Reed told them.

  ‘The problem is, we don’t know anything about Deanna, other than she seems to have hunted Hayter down but they weren’t living together,’ John said morosely.

  ‘Bryant said they had a honeymoon; two nights in the MGM Grand,’ Keane interjected.

  ‘Busman’s holiday,’ John said.

  ‘What?’ Keane asked.