LA Requiem ec-8

by Robert Crais

  Yet here was this picture of her former husband and the man who had killed him.

  Smiling.

  Paulette Renfro said, "Here's your water."

  I took the glass. She'd brought water for herself, too.

  "That's Abel on the left. We were living in the Simi Valley."

  I said, "Ms. Renfro, Joe Pike is a friend of mine."

  She stared at me for a moment, holding her glass with both hands, then went to the couch. She sat on the edge of it. Perching.

  "I imagine you find it odd that I would keep that picture."

  "1 don't find anything odd. People have their reasons."

  "I've been reading about all that mess down in Los Angeles. First Karen, now Joe being accused of murdering this man. I think it's a shame."

  "You knew Karen Garcia?"

  "Joe was dating her in those days, you know. She was a pretty, sweet girl." She glanced at her watch again, then decided something. "You say you and Joe are friends?"

  "Yes, ma'am. We own the agency together."

  "Were you a police officer, also?" Like she wanted to talk about Joe, but wasn't sure how to go about it.

  "No, ma'am. Private only."

  She glanced at the picture again, almost as if she had to explain it. "Well, what happened to Abel happened a long time ago, Mr. Cole. It was a terrible, horrible accident, and I can't imagine that anyone feels worse about it than Joe."

  Evelyn Wozniak said, "Your child feels worse about it, Mother. Since he killed my father."

  She had come through the kitchen carrying a large cardboard box.

  Paulette's face tightened. "Do you need a hand with that?"

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  Evelyn continued on through the living room to disappear down a hall without answering.

  Paulette said, "It was hard on Evelyn. She's moving back home now. This boyfriend, the one who just left her, took their rent money and now she's lost her apartment. That's the kind of men she finds."

  "Was she close to her father?"

  "Yes. Abel was a good father."

  I nodded. I wondered if she knew about Krantz's investigation. I wondered if she knew about Reena and Uribe and the burglaries.

  "I really do have to be leaving soon. What is it that you want to know?"

  "I want to know what happened that day."

  Paulette stiffened, not much, but I could see it.

  "Why do you want to know about that?"

  "Because I think someone is trying to frame Joe for Eugene Dersh's murder."

  She shook her head, but the stiffness remained.

  "I couldn't even guess, Mr. Cole. My husband didn't talk about his job with me."

  "On the day your husband died, he and Joe were tipped to the whereabouts of this man DeVille by one of your husband's informants. Would you know who?"

  Paulette Renfro stood, and now she wasn't looking so much like she wanted to help. Now she was looking uncomfortable and suspicious.

  "No, I'm sorry."

  "He didn't talk about that kind of thing with you, or you don't remember?"

  "I don't like to talk about that day, Mr. Cole. I don't know anything about it, or about my husband's job, or any of that. He never told me anything."

  "Please take a moment and think, Ms. Renfro. It would help if you could come up with a name."

  "I'm sure I never knew."

  Her daughter came back through the room then, carrying empty boxes and clothes hangers.

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  Paulette Renfro said, "Do you have all your things?"

  "I'm going back for the last of it."

  "Do you need money?"

  "I'm fine."

  Evelyn Wozniak stalked on through the living room and slammed the door. Again.

  Paulette Renfro's jaw knotted. "Do you have children, Mr. Cole?"

  "No, ma'am."

  "You're lucky. I really do have to be going now. I'm sorry I couldn't be more help."

  "Could I call you again if I think of something to ask?"

  "I don't think I'll be any more help then than now."

  She walked me to the door, and I went back out into the heat. She didn't come out with me.

  Evelyn was waiting by her Beetle. She'd put on little sunglasses, but she was still squinting from the glare. Waiting for me in this insane heat. The boxes and hangers were in her car.

  "She wouldn't talk about him, would she? My father."

  "Not very much."

  "She won't talk about that day. She never would, except to defend that guy."

  "Joe?"

  Evie glanced toward the windmills, but shrugged without seeing them.

  "Can you imagine? The bastard kills her husband, and she keeps that goddamned picture. I used to draw on it. I've broken that goddamned thing so many times I can't count."

  I didn't say anything, and she looked back at me.

  "You're his friend, aren't you? You came out here trying to help him."

  "Yes."

  "Do you know that they were investigating my father? The Internal Affairs?"

  "Yeah. I know."

  "She tried to keep it from me. And so did Daddy." Daddy. Like she was still ten years old. "Men came to the house and questioned her, and I heard. I heard her screaming at my fa-

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  ther about it. Can you imagine what that's like when you're a child?"

  I thought that I could, but I didn't say anything.

  "She just won't talk about it. She'll talk about anything else, but not that, and that's the most important thing that's ever happened to me. It ruined my whole fucking life."

  Standing on the cement drive was like standing on a bright white beach. The heat baked up through my shoes. I wanted to move, but she seemed about to say something that wasn't easy for her to say, and I thought that if I moved it would break her resolve.

  "I want to tell you something, you're his friend. That man killed my father. It was like my world ended, I loved my father so much, and there is nothing I would love more than to hurt the goddamned awful man who took him from me."

  Pike.

  "But there's something I want more."

  I waited.

  "She's got all Daddy's things in storage somewhere. You know, one of those rental places."

  "You know where?"

  "I'll have to find out. I don't know if there's anything there that will help, but you're trying to find out what happened back then, right?"

  I told her that I was, but that I also wanted other things. I said, "I'm trying to help Joe Pike. I want you to know that, Evelyn."

  "I don't care about that. I just want to know the truth about my father."

  "What if it's bad?"

  "I want to know. I guess I even expect that it is, but I just want to know why he died. I've spent my whole goddamned life wanting to know. Maybe that's why I'm so fucked up."

  I didn't know what to say.

  "I don't think it was an accident. I think your friend murdered him."

  Exactly what Krantz had thought.

  "If I help you, and you find out, will you tell me?"

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  "If you want to know, I'll tell you."

  "You'll tell me the truth? No matter what?"

  "If that's what you want."

  She wiped at her nose. "It's like if I just knew, then I could go on, you know?"

  We stood there for a time, and then I held her. We had been in the sun for so long that when my hands touched her back it felt as if I'd gripped a hot coal.

  I watched the windmills stretching across the plain of the desert, turning in the never-ending wind.

  After a time, Evie Wozniak stepped back. She wiped her nose again. "This is silly. I don't even know you, and here I am telling you my life's secrets."

  "It works like that sometimes, doesn't it?"

  "Yeah. I guess you'd better give me your phone number."

  I gave her the card.

  "I'll call you."
/>   "Okay."

  "You can't tell her, all right? If she knew, she wouldn't allow it."

  "I won't tell."

  "Our little secret."

  "That's right, Evie. Our little secret."

  I drove back down off the mountain, Palm Springs far in the distance, shimmering in the heat like a place that did not exist.

  Man of Action

  The cell was four feet wide by eight feet long by eight feet high. A seatless toilet and a lavatory stuck out from the cement wall like ceramic goiters, almost hidden behind the single bunk. Overhead, bright fluorescent lamps were secured behind steel grids so the suicidal couldn't electrocute themselves. The mattress was a special rayon material that could not be cut or torn, and the bed frame and mattress rack were spot-welded together. No screws, no bolts, no way to take anything apart. The single bunk made this cell the Presiden-

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  tial Suite of the Parker Center jail, reserved for Hollywood celebrities, members of the media, and former police officers who had found their way to the wrong side of the bars.

  Joe Pike lay on the bunk, waiting to be transferred to the Men's Central Jail, a facility ten minutes away that housed twenty-two thousand inmates. His hair was still damp from the lavatory bath he'd given himself after exercising, but he was thinking that he wanted to run, to feel the sun on his face and the movement of air and the sweat race down his chest. He wanted the peace of the effort, and the certain knowledge that it was a good thing to be doing. Not all acts brought with them the certainty of goodness, but running did.

  The security gate at the end of the hall opened, and Krantz appeared on the other side of the bars. He was holding something.

  Krantz stared at Pike for a long time before saying, "I'm not here to question you. Don't worry about your lawyer."

  Pike wasn't worried.

  "I've waited a long time for this, Joe. I'm enjoying it." Joe. Like they were friends.

  "You look bad, being wrong about Dersh."

  Pike spoke softly, forcing Krantz to come closer.

  "I know. I feel bad about Dersh, but I've got the Feebs to share the blame. You hear Dersh's family already filed suit? Two brothers, his mother, and some sister he hadn't seen in twenty years. Bellying up to the trough."

  Pike wondered what was with Krantz, coming here to gloat.

  "They're suing the city, the department, everybody. Bishop and the chief can't fire me without it looking like an admission that the department did something wrong, so they're saying we just followed the FBI's lead."

  "They should win, Krantz. You're responsible."

  "Maybe so, but they're suing you, too. You pulled the trigger."

  Pike didn't answer that.

  Krantz shrugged. "But you're right. I look bad. A year from now when everything's calmed down, that's it for me. They'll ship me out to one of the divisions. That's okay. I've got the

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  twenty-five in. I might even make thirty if I can't scare up something better."

  "Why are you here, Krantz? Because I humiliated you?"

  Krantz turned red. Pike could tell that he was trying not to, but there it was.

  "I didn't ruin you, Krantz. You took care of that yourself. People like you never understand that."

  Krantz seemed to think about that, then shrugged. "For the humiliation, yes, but also because you deserve to be here. You murdered Wozniak and got away with it. But now you're here, and I like seeing it."

  Pike sat up. "I didn't murder Woz."

  "You were right in with him on the burglaries. You knew I was going to nail him, and you knew I would get you, too. You were a chickenshit, Pike, and you decided to take out Wozniak because you're an amoral, homicidal lunatic who doesn't think twice about snuffing out a human life. Which is about as much thought as you gave to Dersh."

  "All the time you spent investigating, and that's what you came up with. You really think I murdered Woz in that room to keep him quiet?"

  Krantz smiled. "I don't think you killed him because you thought he'd give you up, Pike. I think you killed him because you wanted his wife."

  Pike stared.

  "You had something going with her, didn't you?"

  Pike swung his feet off the bunk. "You don't know what you're talking about."

  Krantz smiled. "Like your asshole friend says, I'm a detective. I detected. I was watching her, Pike. I saw you with her."

  "You're wrong about that, and you're wrong about Dersh, too. You're wrong about everything."

  Krantz nodded, agreeable. "If you've got an alibi, bring it out. If you can prove to me that you didn't do Dersh, I'll personally ask Branford to drop the charges."

  "You know there's nothing."

  "There's nothing because you did it, Pike. We've got you on tape casing his house. We've got the old lady picking you

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  out of the line. We've got the residue results and your relationship with the girl. We've got this."

  Krantz showed Pike what he was carrying. It was a revolver wrapped in plastic.

  "This is a .357 magnum. SID matches it with the bullet that killed Dersh. It's the murder weapon, Pike."

  Joe didn't say anything.

  "It's a clean gun. No prints, and all the numbers have been burned off, so we can't trace it. But we recovered it in the water off Santa Monica exactly where you said you talked with the girl. That puts you with this gun."

  Pike stared at the plastic bag, and then at Krantz, wondering at the coincidence of how the murder weapon turned up at the very place where he admitted to being.

  "Think about it, Krantz. Why would I admit to being there if that's where I threw the gun?"

  "Because someone saw you. I think you went there to ditch the gun, and did, but then someone saw you. I didn't believe you about the girl at first, but maybe you were telling the truth about that part. Maybe she saw you there, and you were worried we'd find her and catch you in a lie if you denied it, so you tried to cover yourself."

  Pike looked at the plastic bag again. He knew that cops often showed things to suspects and lied about what they were to try to elicit a confession.

  "Is this bullshit?"

  Krantz smiled again, calm and confident, and in an odd way Pike found it warm. "No bullshit. You can ask Bauman. The DA's filling him in on it right now. I've got you, Joe. I couldn't make the case with Wozniak, but this time I've got you. Branford's making all this noise about Special Circumstance, but he's full of shit. I couldn't get that lucky, Pike, you getting the needle."

  "I didn't put the gun there, Krantz. That means somebody else did."

  "That's some coincidence, Joe, you and the gun just happening to be in the same place."

  "It means they knew my statement. Think about it."

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  "What I think is that we've got plenty for a conviction. Charlie is going to tell you the same thing."

  "No."

  "Bauman's already floating plea arrangements. Bet he didn't tell you that, did he? I know you're telling Bauman no plea, and he's saying sure, like he's going along with it, but he's not an idiot. Charlie's smart. He'll let you sit in Men's Central for six months, hoping you're telling the truth about this girl you claim you saw, but when she doesn't turn up he'll deal you a straight hand about taking the plea. My guess is that Branford will let you cop to twenty with the possibility of parole. Saves everybody looking bad about how we fucked over Dersh. Twenty with time off means you serve twelve. That sound about right to you?"

  "I'm not going to prison, Krantz. Not for something I didn't do."

  Krantz touched the bars. He slipped his fingers along the steel like it was his lover.

  "You're inside now, and you're going to stay inside. And if you're dumb enough to go to trial, and I'm thinking you might do that because you're such a hardhead, you'll be in a cage like this for the rest of your life. And I did it, Pike. Me. You're mine, and I wanted to tell you
that. That's why I came here, to tell you. You're mine."