Deadly Lullaby

by Robert McClure

  Cyril and I sign off with our usual juvenile insults, and seconds later the email indicator pings on my MDT. Driving on the 5 now, rolling slow in midmorning traffic, I open it, scan the jail incident report, and find nothing Cyril didn’t mention. I run Oliver’s cellies, Vann Phan and Peng Vannak, through COPLINK. Both are in their early twenties and have baby rap sheets, minor drug-related crap; Phan also has a minor assault beef that was conditionally discharged a little over a year ago. Both were placed in Central yesterday afternoon within minutes of each other—Phan for shoplifting in a trinkets shop in the Galleria Market in Little Tokyo, Vannak for dealing blunts in Bunker Hill at the corner of Grand and Second. Both arresting officers were uniforms out of Central Station—Davenport and Montalban. They aren’t partners, but off duty they’re as inseparable as finger and thumb, and rumors have been flying around for months that the only thing these guys won’t fix for a buck is their bent schemes.

  Driving with my left hand and drumming a military tattoo on the base of the MDT with the fingers of my right, I find scenarios sifting through my head, blending and congealing. The resulting concoction smells as rotten as week-old fish, and my hope is that Abel isn’t so fucking steamed at me that he bars me from paying my compliments to the chefs.

  —

  No one has to tell me to proceed directly to Abel’s office. The desk sergeant tells me to do it anyway when I rush by him, and the fucker’s shit-eating grin reminds me of a sibling who knows his brother’s about to receive a good spanking.

  Walking through the squad room to my cubicle, blood pulsing in my ears, I see Abel through the glass wall of his office, poring over papers at his desk. He must notice me from the corner of his eye, because he gestures me inside with a single, terse wave of his hand without taking his eyes from the papers.

  My cellphone vibrates in my pocket when I get to within a few steps of his office; I let the call roll to voicemail without checking the display to see who it is. As expected, Abel’s bombardment begins as soon as I close the door to his office behind me. His arms folded before him on the desktop, he says, “Did you get my messages?”

  “Yes…finally.”

  “All right, let me have it, your excuse for not calling.”

  “I only have reasons, no excuse.”

  He rocks back in his swivel chair, extends his arms grandly. “Oh, c’mon, damn it, your excuses are always so creative. I’ve been waiting since five fucking hundred hours to hear this one.”

  “Lieutenant, look, we can talk about the four bottles of wine I shared last night with the blonde I ended up sleeping with, or we can talk about how Khang got Vann Phan and Peng Vannak assigned to Taquan Oliver’s cell last night—your call.”

  Abel blinks and shakes his head as if recovering from a right cross, says, “How did—”

  “There was a story about Taquan’s suicide in the Times this morning, and I called the jail and got the scoop when I couldn’t reach you.” I allow myself a small smile. “How did Phan and Vannak’s interrogations go? They take the Fifth?”

  “You—” he says, clamps his lips into a thin line, and looks away, sighing through his nose and tapping his desk blotter with the eraser end of his number-two pencil. It takes awhile for him to get over my theft of his thunder, but when the pencil-tapping finally slows down he says, “No. To my surprise, they answered every question I had without blinking. Their story was solid, and they laughed at me when I hinted that someone hired them to kill Oliver.”

  I nod. “I’ve read the sheriff’s reports.”

  He shakes his head. “Of course you have….Then you know there was no sign of a struggle, nothing to hold them on. I just had them transported back to the jail to get ready for their arraignments on the petty shit they got arrested for yesterday.”

  “Where they’ll be released and FTA future court appearances.”

  “Of course.” He leans forward in his chair. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to write off Oliver’s death as a suicide or C-BEM the Khemra case,” which he pronounces see-bem.

  C-BEM is the department acronym for Cleared by Exceptional Means, which indicates elements beyond the officer’s control prevented him from arresting and formally charging the known offender—usually because said offender is dead—and the case jacket is closed for good. Some LAPD lieutenants have taken heat lately for overusing the C-BEM tag as a handy trick to pump up their closure numbers. Abel’s not the kind to do that. Abel’s a true believer.

  Which is currently reflected in the way his face is turning beet red. He says, “Khang’s taken matters in his own hands and we’re going to nail him for it, and we’re going to find out if somebody other than Oliver did that girl. Now, I’m not going to get into a turf war with the sheriff’s department, so I filled them in on the Khang connection and am going to let them run with investigating how Oliver got celled with two fucking Oriental Boyz assassins.” He points his finger at me. “After those two gook fuckers are released from custody, my friend—today, understand, today—you are tracking them down and questioning them in a way I couldn’t with the cameras rolling.”

  “I understand.”

  “Of course you do.”

  “What about the blue fuckers who arrested Phan and Vannak, Davenport and Montalban?”

  “Let me worry about those bent bastards,” he says, and scoots a file across the desk to within my reach. “For what good it will do you, these are the cell-data records from Monique Lefler’s phone. They’re worthless, in my opinion, but make that determination for yourself.”

  Frowning, I grab the file. “What do they show?”

  “Almost all the calls and texts are to and from her father, the rest are to restaurants, hotels, and beauty and nail salons. If she’s playing the call-girl game, she’s using another phone to conduct business.”

  “Her father said she’d do that. No recurring numbers on the call list that could be Sonita’s?”

  “Don’t you think I’d tell you if there were?”

  “I guess your answer would be the same for cell-tower hits close to MacArthur Park on the night in question.”

  “You’re quick today, Crucci.”

  Seemingly on cue with our cellphone discussion, my iPhone vibrates again, this time indicating an incoming text message. I take the phone from my pocket and see that the text is from the old man. In the process I notice that the earlier call I received was from Terry Lee Lefler. I say to Abel, “Monique’s father called me as I walked in here and left me a voicemail. I better find out what he wants. He may have tracked Monique down for us.”

  “Call him out of my presence,” Abel says, pointing dramatically to the door. “I’m tired of looking at your ass and have other alligators snapping at me. Take this jail file; it has Phan’s and Vannak’s records, the suicide follow-up reports, all that. But you’ve probably already received it all under the table.” He flips the file across the desk. “Keep me informed. And damn it, stay available.”

  I give him a casual two-finger salute on the way out, and he doesn’t even look up to acknowledge it.

  When I get to my desk, I open the text from my father: sorry cant make it for lunch. girlfriend sick. drinks later this p.m.?

  Feeling little disappointment over his cancellation, since I was probably going to have to cancel myself, I text him back: No prob. Will call five-ish. Stay out of trouble.

  Thumbing the iPhone icon to retrieve Lefler’s voicemail, I begin to smile as I think back to when I was a kid, remembering that the last thing the old thug always said to me when I walked out the door for elementary school was, “Stay out of trouble.”

  Babe

  Within my view from the parking lot is the Keystone Community Bank, a small independent located in the left corner of a strip mall. Also within view to my left is the traffic light at La Brea and Beverly. To this point I have sat through eight changes of the light facing east on Beverly, meaning I have sat in this cramped Ford Tempo (one Chief stole) for sixteen minutes and eighteen seco
nds according to the digital dashboard clock…nineteen seconds…twenty seconds…twenty-one seconds…

  I do not sit still in cramped spaces very well.

  Sitting still in a cramped space makes me think of my time at Atwater and San Quentin, and also of my time at East Lake juvie hall and Saint Joseph’s Center for Abused and Neglected Children, all of which accounts for well over half my time on this planet. No radio station can suit me at the moment, and I have tried every one in the last sixteen minutes and twenty-four seconds, repeatedly punching the Seek button, punching punching punching…

  …twenty-six seconds…twenty-seven…twenty-eight…twenty-nine…

  Chief sits in a stolen Chevy van he parked in the service alley that runs behind the bank and other businesses in the strip mall.

  Forty-five…forty-six…forty-seven…forty-eight…forty-nine…

  The elderly woman who entered the bank six minutes and thirteen seconds ago finally exits. The fact she was the last customer in the bank is confirmed when my disposable phone vibrates once; a text message, a single asterisk, appears on the display screen. I raise my head in time to see the bank door swing open just long enough for our accomplice inside to hang a Closed sign on it.

  Relieved that I can now make a break from this coffin masquerading as an automobile, I signal Chief by texting him an asterisk.

  Pulling the brim of my Dodgers cap low, my eyes to the pavement, I stroll into the bank.

  Inside, the lobby is deserted and cramped, with only one reception desk and three teller windows. My research reveals that this little bank building has been here for years, once housing branches of the Security First National Bank of Los Angeles, Security Pacific Bank, Bank of America, and Pacific Western Bank, and its interior is what you might call ’80s wood-paneling passé. I stand here in complete silence, only slightly concerned with the security camera mounted in the corner, because our accomplice is supposed to have disabled it.

  The silence is broken by muffled voices which emanate from behind the closed door in the left corner, the one guarded by the reception desk. Said door has a bronze nameplate on it that says, “Errol Ovando, President.”

  A young babe exits Ovando’s office. She is a smallish, shapely young lady of South American heritage, a nice slender nose, long, wavy hair and clear, olive skin. Big black eyes. She is dressed professionally in a black skirt, white blouse, practical black heels. Smiling meanly at me, her eyes on fire, she softens her expression when she turns to stick her head back inside the door to singsong, “Bye-bye, Errol. See you to-mor-row.”

  “Right on, Carmelita, thanks,” the voice says from inside.

  I have no idea what her real name is, but rest assured it is not Carmelita.

  She turns her back to Ovando, snatches her purse from the reception desk, and flips him the bird over her shoulder, holding it triumphantly above her head as she walks toward me, giving me a collegial wink. She slows down when she reaches me, whispers in my ear, “I left the vault open. He packed all the cash in the leather satchel in the corner.”

  I nod, whisper in her ear, “Did you remember to turn off the surveillance cameras?”

  A quick nod. “I never turned the recorders on, and just now disabled the interior cameras and the interior and exterior recorders in the vault. The exterior cameras remain operative”—gesturing with her head toward her desk—“so you can use the monitor on my desk to check the parking lot and back alley before you leave.”

  “And you are sure there will be no recording of anything, inside or out?”

  “Positive.”

  I smile. “Perfect.”

  She smiles back and winks again before strolling through the back hallway to the rear door. The plan is for her to let Chief in the back, then act as our lookout out front from inside her car.

  Chief joins me in the lobby in a matter of seconds. He mentally undresses Carmelita’s backside as she hustles by me, dropping his jaw and shaking his hand in a va va va voom gesture.

  She exits the door and the latch snaps when she locks it.

  While we don surgical gloves, I tell Chief to double-check the recorders in the open vault to make sure they are disabled. He does so in under ten seconds, returns nodding and flashing the A-OK sign with his thumb and forefinger.

  We invade Ovando’s office:

  Ovando is seated behind his desk, tapping the keys on his computer and apparently pleased with what he sees on the screen. He is a short Hispanic, late fortyish with a thin build, thinning hair, bushy eyebrows, a thick mustache, all dyed so black they are blue. He is dressed casually in a maroon polo shirt and khakis, and his eyes are bloodshot. Resting on the desk blotter before him is a tumbler of liquid that could be brandy.

  He looks up, jarred by our presence, and neither stands nor offers his hand in greeting. “What the hell are you doing here? We’re closed.”

  I quietly shut the door and stroll to the front of his desk, leaving Chief to stand at ease behind me. “From what I hear, you are secretly planning to close this place for good today.”

  He hesitates, his eyes reflecting disbelief.

  I continue. “I also hear that you have booked a flight to Rio de Janeiro that leaves this evening.”

  Now the asshole decides to stand. “What the—Get out of my bank, you sonofa—”

  “What you call a bank,” I say loudly enough to cut him off midobscenity, “I call a Laundromat in disguise. A Laundromat even a crook would call crooked.”

  This gives him more pause.

  “Are you police?” he finally asks.

  “Uh, no.”

  His face drains of all color. He gives his head a little shake, as if the cold reality of the situation just jarred him awake. “Did Jorge send you?”

  “Ah, excellent deduction, Errol. From the look on your face, I bet you have also figured out the reason we are here.”

  He snatches his desk-phone receiver from its cradle, in full panic mode, but feigning defiance. “I’m calling Jorge.”

  I have to lean over the desk to smack the receiver from his hand. “Allow me to dial the number for you,” I say as I walk around the desk behind him.

  I punch Alvarez’s cell number into the keypad, hand Ovando the receiver, and calmly withdraw a sheath of documents from inside my sport coat.

  The defiance that initially masked his fear gradually withers away with each unanswered ring. After about ten rings, he gently replaces the receiver back on its cradle, a man sensing his fate, but not yet resigned to it.

  I hand the papers to him, which document the two-year skim scam he has been running with the money he launders for Alvarez. He barely examines the documents before slinging them on the desk in feigned disgust. “These are fakes.”

  “Errol, I know better and so do you. Your secretary pulled them from your computers and gave them to Mr. Alvarez.”

  A man betrayed: “Carmelita?”

  “We can continue to refer to her as Carmelita, but that is not her name. She is a subcontractor for Mr. Alvarez.”

  This digests badly. He appears ready to vomit.

  I say, “Remember, what, two, three weeks ago, your previous assistant got a better job? Mr. Alvarez had an old friend extend the job offer to her, one she could not refuse. Then he sent Carmelita in to interview with you. As pretty and smart as she is, it was impossible to turn her down, right?”

  He says nothing.

  I continue. “She was even more qualified than her phony credentials suggested at the time. She has an accounting degree and a computer-science degree. And I hear she is one crackerjack computer hacker.” I gesture at the documents on his desk. “But there would be proof of the latter fact, right?”

  He clenches his fists on the desk to stop them from shaking, his face growing pale with terror. “Please, get Jorge on the line for me. I can explain this.”

  “No, you cannot explain enough for him to let you off the hook. The decision has been made.”

  For fun, I reach under my sport coat f
or the .22-caliber pistol tucked in my belt.

  “Don’t!” he says, throwing up his hands defensively. He snaps up the papers from the desk. “Give me some time to analyze these entries. They’re accounting errors! Mistakes!”

  “Errol, Mr. Alvarez had Carmelita run the numbers with every plausible possibility in mind. It is beyond dispute that when you transferred his funds back into the US from their offshore accounts, you skimmed them by underrepresenting the interest earned overseas and overrepresenting the transfer fees. It is all there in black and white.”

  His treachery laid bare before him in stark terms, Ovando stares at the desk blotter for a long moment before he quietly says, “Just shoot me, then, goddammit,” a solitary tear rolling down his cheek.

  “You are jumping to conclusions, Errol.”

  Pitifully, as I expect, hope rises within his eyes. “What?”

  “There are two favors me and Mr. Alvarez want you to bestow upon us that will save your life. Carmelita said you threw her a curveball yesterday. You transferred all of the money to a new account, then spread it out to many other accounts?”

  He nods.

  “She was unable to trace them all before you were to skip town today.” I take a slip of paper from my breast pocket. “So, first, before I leave here I want you to transfer all the money, minus the amount I have written on this paper, back into Mr. Alvarez’s main account. That’s the favor to Mr. Alvarez.” I hand him the slip of paper. “The amount I have written here I want you to transfer into the account noted below it. This is the favor to me.”

  “Your fee,” he says, something resembling envy putting a passing gleam in his eyes.

  “Yeah.”

  “So I make the transfers, then you will let me go?”

  “So long as you take your flight to Rio, you will be as free as a bird.”

  This is not a true statement.

  He jerks upright in his chair and seems ready to blurt out his agreement before second thoughts lock him up. Doubt shrouds his eyes. A twisted smile deforms his mouth, his lips quivering and bloodless. “You’ll kill me no matter what I do.”