Dirty Laundry

by Rhys Ford

  “What do you think? Was their marriage good?” I poked a hole at the husband’s grief. It was easier without him standing in front of me, a faceless man who possibly ordered his wife’s death.

  “Seems like it,” Wong surmised. “Once again, hard to tell. Both came from Seoul. He’s older than she is by about eleven years, and she was young—barely twenty. He works the American end of his family’s import business. Choi’s lived here for about three years but went back over to Korea to get married.”

  “Choi? She took his name?” I frowned when Wong confirmed it. “That’s odd. Thought most Korean women kept their names.”

  “Could be because she’s living over here? Acclimating and all that,” he replied. “Her maiden name was Gangjun. That’s about it. If I get a break in this, I’ll let you know, but nothing much else to tell you.”

  “Got anything on the other one? Eun Joon Lee?” I flipped through my notes. “The third name I got is Bhak, but he was a heart attack.”

  “Someone else caught Eun Joon Lee.” Wong’s keyboard sounded like it was getting a workout. “There’s not much there either. Home invasion a few blocks away from Choi’s carjacking. They got some small electronics but no cash, and they left the jewelry. Husband thinks she walked in on them. We don’t have ballistics yet, but it looks like the same caliber as Choi’s. A nine millimeter, but that’s common.”

  “Think anyone would look at you funny if you asked for a cross-reference between Choi and Lee?” It was a long shot. There were a lot of 9 mm handguns out on the streets of Los Angeles, and the odds of them being the same weapon were very slim.

  “Wouldn’t hurt to ask. The lab usually looks out for that kind of thing for us, but it’s hit and miss. They’re overloaded.” Wong cleared his throat. “Look, I’ve got to bail. If you hear anything on your end, give me a call. If these two are connected, then we’ll have something to go on. I’ll look at the Madame Sun angle from my end, okay?”

  “Thanks. I owe you a dinner.”

  “Can I bring my girlfriend?” Wong teased. “You know, so you don’t get any ideas that it’s a date.”

  “Sure, so long as I can bring Jae. You know, so you don’t get any ideas that you actually have a chance with me,” I countered.

  “Great, now I’m going to really be the ugliest one at the table.”

  “I’ll pick up the tab and buy you a beer.” I hung up after we made tentative plans for Korean barbeque. I sent Jae a text asking him about what days he was free, promising him he could pick the restaurant, so long as it was Korean.

  Oddly enough, I wasn’t quite ready to put a pin in Madame Sun’s paranoid butterfly. The three deaths occurred in quick succession, spaced out over a few days, and from what I could see on an area map, very close together. It was odd for the jacker to leave a new BMW behind, and I wondered if he’d not planned on killing Choi. Wong’s eyewitness reports were pretty clear. The shooter walked up and shot Choi nearly point blank, then booked it through K-Town’s jungle of buildings.

  “He knew she’d be there,” I mused, wheeling over to the coffee machine. “Someone knew her schedule. It feels more like a hit than something random.”

  Not wanting to make a whole pot, I doctored up another cup of instant Vietnamese, then scooted across the floor to my desk. I was only able to wheel around the office when Claudia wasn’t there. I’d have to break the habit before she came back or I’d feel the flat side of her hand on the back of my head when I rolled past.

  “Okay, so we’ve got a carjacking that leaves the car and takes only a purse.” The back of my leg began to itch, and I lifted my leg to lightly scratch at the denim over the bandaged area. “And a home invasion that leaves behind a shitload of jewelry but takes what’s out in the front rooms. Something stinks here, McGinnis.”

  It got even stinkier when I heard my older brother Mike yelling my name as he came up the walk toward the office door. The porch rattled a bit from his stomping feet, and the screen door screeched in protest when he yanked it open. As usual, his hair was a prickly cactus of black spikes, and the glower on his face was an impressive display of curved lines and gritted teeth. Much like my feelings on Madame Sun predicting the future and telling fortunes, I wasn’t that impressed by my older brother’s displeasure.

  Only a few years separated us. Well, a few years and quite a few inches. Mike took after our mother, a small Japanese woman named Ryoko our father met while stationed overseas. Stocky and broad shouldered, Mike fended off any short jokes growing up with hard fists and an even harder head. I simply grew taller, had longer legs, and could outrun him until he gave up. I might have been the only one of us to get my dad’s brown hair and green eyes, but we’d both inherited his hot temper.

  Since I wasn’t going to be running any time soon with the punctures in my thigh, Mike was going to have a distinct advantage, even if I wanted to walk away from his shit. I took the easy way out and stood up, using my height to intimidate my ruffled brother. Picking up Madame Sun’s coffee cup, I turned my back on him, then hobbled over to the sink to wash up.

  He followed, an infuriated duckling trailing behind me.

  “Why didn’t you call me?” Mike came up about a head short of being able to stare me down, but his nostrils flared with the intensity of rabid sunspots. “I told Jae—”

  “Let’s agree on something, brother. You don’t tell Jae anything.” I shook off the excess water from my hands and wiped them on my jeans. I’d forgotten about the dog bite on the back of my thigh, and the press of my fingers on the thin bandage nearly made me yelp. “He was nice enough to pass along the message, but he’s not one of your peons. Neither am I. I’ll call you when I call you.”

  “I wouldn’t have to contact Jae if you’d returned any of my calls.” Mike circled around me and helped himself to a tea bag and a cup. He filled the cup with hot water and turned around to find me already at my desk. “We need to talk.”

  “We don’t need to talk.” Finally turning on my computer, I waited a few seconds for it to boot up so I could begin a case file for Madame Sun. Sure, she was a free ride, but that didn’t mean her case deserved any less attention. Also, Claudia would ship me to Siberia if she came back and the files weren’t in order.

  After setting his mug down on Claudia’s computer table—well out of my reach—Mike hitched himself up onto the edge of my desk and poked me in the shoulder. I flinched, the residual pain from a gunshot wound pulsing along the point of his finger, and he had the good grace to look slightly apologetic.

  “I talked to Ichiro again this morning. He wants to know how you’re doing.” Mike offered up a shrug. “I didn’t know what to tell him.”

  “Dude, we’ve gone over this.” I wasn’t in the mood to go a round with Mike. My night’d run long, and my sleep was too often disturbed by the aching skin on my thigh. “Why do you have to tell him anything?”

  “Because he asked about you. He’s our brother, remember?”

  Ichiro. Our half brother. The one our mother raised in Japan after she supposedly died while giving birth to me.

  Jesus had nothing on Ryoko McGinnis Tokugawa.

  Mike’d been trying to shoehorn me into a relationship with Ichiro ever since we’d found out he existed. I wasn’t interested. Not now. Maybe not ever. I needed time to wrap my head around being tossed out by not just one mother but two. It hurt too much to think about, so I did what I usually did when I didn’t want to get hurt.

  I avoided thinking about it.

  “I’m working a case here, Mike. Do I bunny rage into your office whenever I feel like it?”

  “Bunny rage?”

  “Never piss off a jackrabbit,” I said, turning back to the mess of papers I’d left on my desk. “They’ll cut you.”

  “Cole, Ichiro—”

  “Mike, do you know what Ichiro means?” I turned in my chair and glared at him. “You follow enough baseball to know. It means first son. That’s what he was to her. She left us, Mike. She fucking left u
s with our asshole father and walked away.”

  “We don’t know what happened between them.” It was a weak protest but the best one Mike had. Neither one of us knew what went on between our parents. Ichiro might, but he wasn’t on my buddy list at the moment.

  “We happened between them.” I shoved the chair back, its wheels squealing across the floor. “Her sons. And now you want me to go sit around a fire and make s’mores with the kid she had after us? The kid she raised but couldn’t be bothered to drop us a fucking letter about?”

  “That wasn’t his fault.” Mike’s chin came up, thrusting forward to challenge me. “He’s our brother, Cole.”

  “Don’t want the one you got? I’m not good enough? Too gay? Too fucked-up?” I shot back. “So you’re going to go with the new one? What? He’s straight? Got kids? Has his shit together? Maybe he plays golf and can hook you up with some connections in Tokyo.”

  I’d gone too far. Even as the words left my fucking mouth, I knew I’d gone too far. Mike reeled back a step, as if I’d punched him in the stomach, and all of the emotion drained from his face.

  “Fuck you, Cole,” he said, not without some heat. His words were a calm, thin line, drawing something firm between us. “I didn’t deserve that.”

  “No, you… fuck. Mike….” I reached for my brother and winced when he pulled away. “Dude, I’m sorry. Fuck, I just… this is too fucking much for me to deal with. You knew her. All I got were a couple of fucking pictures and a middle name I couldn’t pronounce. What the hell am I supposed to do with a guy who had her around? Especially after—”

  “Barbara? Our stepmother?” Mike crossed the distance between us and placed his hands on my shoulders. Pushing me back down into my chair, he leaned over to look me in the eyes. “Baby brother, I know what she did was shitty and Dad fucked you up something bad, but none of that’s Ichiro’s fault. He didn’t know we thought Mom was dead.”

  “I have a hard time believing that, man.”

  “Cole, it’s true. He’s as pissed off about this as we are. He wanted to reach out to the brothers no one would talk about. You’re the one who’s always on my case to be more tolerant. Why can’t you find some of that shit for him?”

  “Maybe.” I ground my teeth. “I’m just not fucking ready for this. For him. I need some time, Mike. Just some fucking time.”

  “Time I can give.” Mike slapped me lightly on the face, stinging my cheek. “Just stop being a damned asshole about it.”

  Chapter 4

  I GOT nowhere closer on the Madame Sun case, having only the shreds of information I’d gleaned through what I could find on the computer. Until Wong could e-mail me a few reports on the sly, I wasn’t going to find a connection between May Choi and Eun Joon Lee on the Internet. Setting aside my notes, I stared at Claudia’s empty chair and chewed on my lip.

  She’d insisted I hire someone to cover the phones for the few more weeks she’d be out, but seeing someone else in her chair would feel like a betrayal of some sort. But, I needed someone in that chair if I was going to hit the streets or needed to go on a run.

  But I wanted that person to be Claudia. I needed that person to be Claudia.

  Lacking that, I reached for the phone and dialed up the next best thing, her oldest son, Martin.

  “Hey, man,” Martin’s voice rumbled, lightening slightly when he realized it was me. “Mama’s asleep. I got her to take one of those pain meds.”

  “Actually, I called to talk to you. I need some help.” I outlined what I needed, and he listened, murmuring every once in a while. “I’m hoping someone in your family might want to answer phones for me. Maybe even a couple of the kids? Even if just in the afternoon.”

  Halfway through the conversation, I realized Martin might have reservations on sending another of his family to the exact same spot his mother’d been shot. Something with sharp teeth began to gnaw on the inside of my stomach. I’d be lucky if Claudia wanted to return.

  “It’ll just have to be until Mama feels better.” Martin interrupted my panic attack. “She’s going to come back to work. You can lay money on that.”

  “I’d understand if she—” I couldn’t get the words out. The bossy woman who’d moved into my life was too big a presence for me to let go. I’d bribe her with more money and a hot limousine driver if I had to, to get her back, but I couldn’t be certain she’d be safe. Swallowing my reluctance, I said as much to Martin.

  Martin was definitely his mother’s son. “Bullshit, Cole. No one’s ever safe. You did your damned best for Mama, and she’s coming back. She’d kick my ass out of the way if I ever even tried to stop her. If any of the kids want to work for you, we’re okay with it. You hear me?”

  “Got it,” I murmured, rubbing at my face. “Just until she comes back, then?”

  “Just until she can come back,” he reassured me. “Let me see what everyone’s schedule is. I’ll get back to you later, okay?”

  I hung up and leaned back in my chair. It squeaked once, then again when I rocked back and forth. It took me about five seconds before I was stir-crazy. My phone still didn’t have any messages from Jae, but that wasn’t unusual. If I wanted some attention, I was going to have to beard the lion in his den.

  “’Course, I probably want to do things to my lion that never crossed David’s mind,” I mumbled to myself. It was too early to drop in on Jae. He’d growl and shove me back out the door if I crawled into his space this early in the afternoon. Armed with addresses of the crime scenes, I made the decision to sniff around the areas in case someone felt like talking. Even after a couple of weeks, something like a shooting was juicy gossip for a neighborhood.

  I closed up the office, made a quick stop into the house, where Neko was appropriately worshiped, then left with a helping of tuna and egg. The arrival of cat food rendered me useless in her eyes, and she ate noisily, growling over her food.

  “You’re welcome,” I said to the cat.

  She did not deign to give me a reply I could understand, but it was pretty clear from the abrasive snarl she gave me, a coarse fuck off was somewhere in there. I locked the door behind me, leaving her eyebrow deep in the stench.

  THE City of Angels operated mostly on a grid pattern, with a few winding streets tossed in to fuck up a tourist trying to get from Hollywood to downtown. Adding to the confusion are three of the worst intersected freeways known to mankind. An innocent stranger to the molasses gridlock around the downtown exits could unsuspectingly take the wrong course among the five hundred options available amid the endless construction and find himself circling the area, hopelessly lost until he either ran out of gas or went mad from the hell he couldn’t escape.

  Bobby was dead certain many of the street people trudging through downtown muttering to themselves were actually motorists who finally abandoned their cars and set to walking the cement and steel desert until the end of their days. I wasn’t all together certain he was wrong.

  With this in mind, I kept to surface streets to head to Koreatown. The Wilshire area is ringed by a predominantly Hispanic zone on three sides with an affluent upper-class district to the North. Unlike most of LA’s neighborhoods, where the lines of demarcation were clear, rich on one side, poor on the other, Koreatown is a mishmash of middle class and poor, dotted with high-end stores and fantastic restaurants. The best hole-in-the-wall food can be found in the oddest corners, but getting there is always tricky.

  I cut through Beverly Boulevard, turned down Western, and hunted down the address closest to me, the townhouse where Eun Joon Lee allegedly surprised her murderers. The townhouse was located near an all-you-can-gorge Korean barbeque place Jae took me to once to meet his friends. A space opened up and I parked on the street then strolled down to get a feeling of the place. Like much of Koreatown, residences ran mostly to apartment buildings, with the occasional complex of condos to ease the monotony. The Lees lived in one such rabbit warren.

  It was a sans-serif U-shaped beige building formed around a
garden courtyard with tall trees, thick flowering bushes, and spots of lawn mounds green enough to look fake. To call the place condos was misleading. They were converted apartments sold as individual homes and probably now governed by a rabid homeowners’ association to dictate the height of the greenscaping. From the looks of the courtyard, someone on the HOA was hoping someone would stop by and film a scene of Jurassic Park V in its murky green depths.

  The Lees purchased a corner unit, giving them the spacious view of the complex’s parking lot. It was one of the places farthest from the archway entrance I’d walked through, and I got halfway past the courtyard before I was apprehended by a plump, older Korean woman wearing a floral housedress bright enough to blind someone wearing a pair of night-vision goggles. Her short salt-and-pepper hair was permed into loose curls around her mischievous face, and I gave her a short head nod to greet her.

  “An nyoung ha seh yo, nuna.” I slaughtered the hello, but she dipped her head down and grinned at me. Jae at least would have been proud I tried, even as he winced and tried not to throw up at my pronunciation.

  “Aish, halmeoni more like it.” I didn’t know the word but murmured something negative, and she tittered. She glanced toward the Lee place, then back to me. “You are another policeman?”

  “No, nuna. I’m a private investigator. I was asked to look into what happened here.” Schooled by Jae’s admonishments, I avoided saying the word murder or death, letting my new companion lead the conversation. “You lived near to her?”

  “Over one. Next door.” She nodded toward an orange and yellow door. “We have almost the same names, so sometimes it confused people. She was Eun Joon Lee but I’m Joon Eun Yi. The postman always gets our mail wrong. My sister is scared the thieves were looking for me, but I told her she was silly. What do I have? No, Eun Joon had much more to take, and that is why they were there.”

  “Have the police been back since… the first time?”