Last Shot (2006)

by Gregg - Rackley 04 Hurwitz

  As good a way as any to reduce someone's life into one and a half column inches. Tim remembered how his father always worded those he placed, rarely, for old associates to come in under the six-line minimum.

  Bear, reading over Tim's shoulder, remarked, "Regular hotbed of journalistic panache, the Littlerock Weekly."

  It also was a publication of insufficiently wide circulation, Tim figured, to be taken by the Terminal Island library. He tilted the worn rectangle of newspaper and picked up faint indentations in the corner. Maybe a return address from the envelope it had been mailed in, written after the clipping had been enclosed. Bear opened his notepad, and Tim slipped the piece of paper in; they'd have it looked at later.

  Bear glanced at it a moment longer before shutting the pad. "Least we know he didn't break out to attend her funeral like that jackass we bagged at his granny's wake in Chino Hills."

  The letter proved to be from Theresa, though it was dated a couple years prior, a few months after Walker's term at TI began. Feminine handwriting crossed the page at a slight downward tilt. The cheap, lavender-tinted stationery, torn from a pad, hadn't held the ink well; some of the letters' upstrokes were smudged.

  Walk, So I started going to a free counseling center out here. The shrink's younger than I am, so we'll see how that goes. I've been doing a lot of work on myself in therapy for Sammy's sake--shit, there I go again. For both our sakes, for Chrissake (I suck at this). And I figured out all these ways I can't hold my boundaries to protect maybe what's best for me and for Sammy. I don't think I'm strong enough to say no to you, Walk, for much of anything, so the best thing I can do right now is to take some time off. Please, please, please don't be upset with me. I know you just got in there and I know you've got no one, but please remember this is me. I love you and I think of you still and always as my baby boy. We went through some times, me and you, didn't we? I know we haven't been in touch much since you went to Iraq. I always thought it's a shame you never got to know the little guy. He's tough as nails, but he's got heart. He reminds me of you when you were younger, before I lost you to the Marines. I bought you this cross, in place of me, I guess. I bought it in titanium, so even you can't break it (kidding). Love you always, Tess

  Tim offered the note to Newlin, who read it before handing it off to Bear. After perusing it, Bear slid it also into his notepad. "Why would he leave this behind? I mean, obviously, it's highly personal. He could have at least flushed it."

  "Points to a rushed escape," Tim said. "Just because it was smartly planned doesn't mean he didn't swing into action quickly when he got set off."

  "So Walker finds out something awful about Senor Hahn at dinner, gouges him that night, knows he's in deep shit unless he flies the coop?" Bear's tone made clear he wanted more to tie down the theory. Like Tim, Bear had started thinking of the man they were pursuing by his given name. A good sign--they were starting to build a relationship with him.

  They stood in silence in the cramped space. It smelled of metal, virile and unforgiving. A familiar smell. Tim tasted it back by his molars, as if he were chewing a piece of foil. He crouched before the Coke-bottle cups, taking in the cell with a long, slow sweep of his eyes.

  One of the COs at the door said, "So what you got, Sherlock? What's mouthwash and piss got to do with the breakout?"

  "Nothing," Tim said.

  Newlin now: "Nothing?"

  "They don't mean anything. They can't. They're a diversion. He wants to draw our attention away."

  "Away from what?"

  Tim studied the twinning holes in the window. "From what he doesn't want us to see."

  Newlin sounded slightly exasperated. "What does he not want us to see?"

  "I haven't figured that out yet."

  Chapter 6

  Tim, Bear, and Newlin sat on frail rolling chairs in the control center, shoulder to shoulder before the TV, watching Walker Jameson work his way through a slab of meat loaf. On the way back, they'd stopped by the infirmary to speak to Jameson's cellie and gotten little from him save a sullen indifference that Tim had found credible. From the tape they'd confirmed that Walker appeared to be wearing no other layers under his tan button-up at dinner. Now a hulking black prisoner whom Newlin identified as a BGF leader cruised up to Walker's table. They spoke briefly, and then, judging by the man's expression, he left displeased.

  Walker ate hunched over his tray, shoulders rounded, a man used to guarding resources. Another inmate hustled over to him and whispered urgently in his ear. Walker's body stiffened. The inmate patted his back almost regretfully and headed off. He was a wiry man who walked with a forward lean. Head down but eyes flashing--very alert.

  Walker sat for a long, stunned time, then rose slowly and strode to the exit.

  "Who's the whisperer?" Tim asked.

  "Tommy LaRue. He's the go-to guy for the prisoners. We turn him upside down now and then just to see what'll fall out. Porn, dime bags, unlisted numbers of guys' ex-girlfriends. You'd be amazed. I found him with a wedge of wrapped Brie once, I shit you not. He's well respected. A nice, gentle guy."

  "What's he in for?" Bear asked.

  "Double homicide."

  They inched the recording forward, frame by frame. LaRue had cupped his hand by Walker's ear, so there'd be no lip-reading magic. He'd had time to deliver a few words, tops.

  "Let's see where he's coming from. LaRue." Tim indicated the side door through which LaRue had entered.

  A painstaking twenty minutes passed as the other COs, with reluctance, helped Newlin sort through archived security tape to find the appropriate segments. Slowly, Tim and Bear pieced together LaRue's backward journey. The hall camera caught him flashing by. A breezeway lens captured a stretch of his hurried stroll from the yard. A wide-angle mounted on the roof of C-Unit showed him moving, a dot among dots, to the B-Unit door. And, finally, the last bit of footage traced him to his origin: the phone mounted on the range wall.

  During the call, lasting less than ten seconds, LaRue faced away, blocking the numbers as he dialed. He'd strolled into the building casually but left with an intensity of purpose.

  Something he'd heard had lit a fire under him.

  Tim and Bear had to wait to get clearance to enter the Special Housing Unit, where LaRue would be spending the next few nights in solitary. During the post-escape cell checks, a CO had found a vial of heroin secreted in his pillow.

  Frank Zarotta, the North Yard officer, had the bearing and temperament of a bulldog, a resemblance strengthened in no small measure by his persistent gnawing on a greasy Slim Jim. He studied Tim with wide, dark eyes, as if he were privy to a dirty secret.

  Zarotta's radio crackled, and he pressed it to an ear, and then there was a buzz and the door clicked open. He beckoned Tim and Bear with a sturdy finger. They headed into the trap, an eight-by-twelve-foot chamber. Through a big window to their right, encased in a metal cage, two SHU officers looked up from their game of cards and returned Zarotta's flick of the head. One of them reached under his desk, and the inner door popped open.

  Zarotta led Tim and Bear to the left, down a concrete corridor lined on either side with cell doors. "Now, remember," he said, "no strikes to the head. Maybe he gets a tooth through the lip, some blood on the brain--it's trouble. Aim low for the shin, or catch the floating rib." He paused and leaned back, a broad comic gesture with both arms spread. "Hey, what am I telling you? You guys know what you're doing." His eyes lingered on Tim. "Ain't that right, Troubleshooter?" He enjoyed a good laugh. "I'm just messin'. Shoulda seen you guys' faces."

  He unlocked the steel door and led them in. The concrete cell had the usual stainless steel furnishings, the bed bolted to the concrete. A tiny window on the rear wall, no more than six inches by two feet, peered out on the darkness like a bunker gun slit. The metal reflected the harsh blue overhead light. Despite the scaled-down space, LaRue looked small, sitting with his back to the far wall, knees drawn up. He had a fingernail between two molars, digging at something.
r />   "Deputy marshals are here," Zarotta said. "It's sharing time."

  "Shit, I ain't no cheese eater. Get these jokers outta here."

  "No can do, pal. And watch your mouth or you're gonna catch a case."

  "I want to talk to some rank."

  "Sure thing. I'll get Condi Rice on MSN Messenger." Zarotta closed the door and chuckled his way back down the hall.

  "Real cutup," Bear said.

  "Oh, I get it," LaRue said. "Here's where we establish camaraderie."

  "Nah," Tim said, "let's skip it. Are you a friend of Walker's?"

  LaRue was really working the tooth now, his elbow rising level with his head. "Ain't no one a friend of Walker's. But yeah"--and now a flash of pride--"I'm the only one he'll talk to in here."

  The warden had not put out word of Walker's escape to the population, but inmates were second only to socialites at acquiring and disseminating sensational information. Tim decided to float the obvious to gauge LaRue's willingness to talk.

  "He escaped."

  LaRue's eyes stayed uncharacteristically steady. "Did he, now." He gave up on his fingernail, tugged a strand of yarn from his sock, and flossed out a green fleck. "Walk was short, sixteen-some months to the door. Why would he bust a move like that?"

  "We were hoping you could enlighten us."

  With a flourish of his hand, LaRue made a cigarette appear, and then his fingers fussed in the hair behind his ear and produced a match. Centering his thumbs on the phosphorus head, he carefully tore it and the tinder in half. He flicked one of the half matches against his tooth and lit up, pleasure closing his eyes on the inhale.

  "What do you know about his sister?"

  "Walk has a sister?"

  "How about his wife?"

  "His wife? Shit, that's been years. I'd bet a spoonful of chiva she's put on a sport coat by now."

  "Sport coat?" Bear asked.

  LaRue smiled sourly. "A man your lady slides on to keep her warm while you're doing hard time."

  Tim asked, "Did Walker have a problem with Boss?"

  "Walker didn't have a problem with no one. Not even with the screws."

  "So why'd he kill Boss?"

  "Beats hell outta me."

  "I think you know."

  Same flat stare. "Do you, now?"

  Tim walked over and sank to his haunches so he was eye level with LaRue. "You made a phone call just before dinner. Then you busted ass getting to the dining hall so you could whisper in Walker's ear. You're gonna tell us what you found out."

  For the first time, LaRue looked uneasy, but his composure snapped back, smoothing his face like a mask. "I don't much seem to recall that particular phone call."

  "LaRue. I want an answer."

  LaRue shrugged and showed off a set of clean white teeth. "What you gonna do? Put me in jail?"

  "He's exactly right," Tim said, charging back down the breezeway. "We've got no leverage with him. He's a lifer already. We need the guy he called."

  Bear shuffle-stepped to keep up. "And how are we gonna get to him?"

  Tim moved down the brief hall and through the door into the control center, where Newlin was making decisive gains on a cruller.

  "Do you monitor inmate phone calls?" Tim asked.

  Newlin looked up from the recording--LaRue's whispered pronouncement again--and wiped a smudge of grease from his chin. "Course."

  "Record them?"

  "Only if we're keeping an eye. We wouldn't have recorded LaRue, probably. We're not that concerned about the seamy underworld of Brie."

  "Can we get the number he called?"

  "Yeah, the prisoners have to use a PIN number before dialing. They can only call approved numbers, which we database at Investigative Services. It's just a matter of digging around the records. I'll call over."

  "And see if you can rustle up any information on who LaRue used to run with." Tim tapped Bear on the shoulder. "Let's get Guerrera on that, too. He's probably boring a hole in the phone with the patented Little Havana stare."

  Newlin dialed and said as it was ringing, "Oh, and they sent over an update of the crime-scene log." He handed a printout to Tim.

  Tim perused the already familiar names. COs and sanitation workers.

  His pulse quickened as he sensed--finally--some of the data pulling together. A pattern shifting shape, still eluding him.

  Newlin finished his call, and he and Bear reviewed the chow-hall tape yet again. LaRue's bend at the waist. Cupped hand rising to Walker's ear. Fist tightening around fork.

  "What the hell could he have told him?" Newlin's curiosity had lapsed into frustration. "Some pickup waiting out in the harbor? A green light for Boss's killing?" He snickered at himself. "His Manchurian Candidate activation code word?"

  Tim sank into a chair, glancing at the J-Unit monitor. The wreckage had been largely disposed of, the trash orderlies brought in to mop up the remaining sludge. Walker seized his opportunity in the mayhem?

  Tim closed his eyes, considering the cell. Two severed Coke bottles. Piss and mouthwash. Walker's padding himself with shirt over shirt. One mattress untouched, one missing. Two windowpanes punched through. Nothing beyond the bars but razor wire, palm trees, and Dumpsters. The trash can--Kleenex and bottle caps. But what hadn't the trash can contained?

  Tim flipped to the log's next page. More COs. The frontloader operator. John Sasso. The same maintenance man from before. McGraw again. Sanitation worker.

  Tim stood up abruptly. The chair tilted over with his momentum, clattering on the cheap laminate flooring. He met Bear's and Newlin's startled gazes.

  "I know how he did it."

  Chapter 7

  The crow lurched from one foot to the other on its spongy nighttime perch, its black marble eye shifting in its socket in sudden, awakened alarm. The ground beneath it swelled, and the crow screeched, spooking the roost, which took flight in a grand exodus of flaps and squawks. The dark upsurge lifted out of the San Pedro Municipal Landfill and wheeled south, undulating in the night murk, a few beaks still sounding their agitation.

  The charred mattress bulged again, and then an arm slid from the incision, scattering tufts of ash-streaked batting. A plastic cone protruded from the striped ticking like a snorkel, the Coke label rubbed off from friction. The blackened hand groped the uneven terrain, gauging it eyelessly, grotesquely. A head fought its way out next, red-raw cheeks showing in patches through the soot.

  Walker pulled himself free and collapsed backward, taking in deep breaths between spasms of coughing. He used the still-moist inside of his shirt collar to clean the grime from his swollen lids and opened his eyes. The moonless sky above seemed impossibly vast.

  Aside from a heat-induced ruddiness and a few healthy scrapes along his arms, he was in surprisingly good shape. The mattress stuffing, repositioned to conceal his form and soaked with water from the cell sink, had staved off the fire. He'd dropped the mattress over the railing, then run down to slither through the slit as the ignited trash began raining down. Once inside, he'd had to turn his head to breathe, his lips sealed over the mouth of the upward-facing Coke bottle--his channel to oxygen. When the smoke had been most stifling, in the moments before he'd felt the rescuing scoop of the frontloader, he'd plugged the makeshift snorkel with a finger and sucked what little air he could through a wet rag. The five shirts had insulated his torso from the heat. Though most of the fires, he knew from the last riot, were small and isolated and quickly burned themselves out, he'd had a scare at one point when the heat had pulsed relentlessly through the soaked padding, making him writhe before it backed off.

  He sat up and surveyed his surroundings. Lucky as hell--he'd gotten dumped near the top of a heap within the dug-down pit, though he was still a good ten feet below ground level. He laid the blackened remains of a table on end and used them to gain traction against the dirt wall, the crumbling border giving way as he clawed, then squirmed his way over the brink.

  A dense film of seagull shit coated the ground. Above
the smell of rotted fish and soot, a distant whiff of ocean.

  Walker peeled off his top two shirts and threw them aside. He went with the fourth shirt since the third still bore traces of ash and the bottom one was drenched with sweat. His pants were filthy, but they'd do. They were baggy and low-slung--inmates couldn't be trusted with belts--but prison couture had spread to the outside, so he'd blend right in with the other lowlifes. Retrieving the plastic bag from his waistband, he slid out the last dripping cloth and used it to wipe off his face, his hands, his forearms.

  By the time he cracked his back and began to jog toward the stream of headlights far off to the west, he looked by most accounts like an average citizen.

  Chapter 8

  Bear crouched with his prodigious ass floating above his heels and let his flashlight beam pick over the trash below. At his side Tim watched. It couldn't have been much clearer. The mattress, split like a pita. One Coke-bottle segment pushing clear of the top fabric, the second one smothered in the trash below. Finger furrows up the wall of the pit. And then, a few strides from the lip, a puddle of ruined clothes.

  A B-movie monster hatching.

  Bear spoke with a sharp, wounded intensity. "So he sawed off a Coke bottle, then peed into it just to draw our attention away from the missing bottle tops?"

  Tim said, "That's right."

  They'd raced over from the prison. The garbage-truck driver, a rotund bearded man, had forged over hills and around sunken plots to show them where he'd made the dumps. Now, a scant forty minutes later, flash-lights were visible across the landfill, bouncing like fireflies. Dogs stood slack on their leads, and deputies hollered their frustration over the wind. If there was any amalgam better at killing a scent trail than garbage and ash, Tim didn't know what it was. Bleach and civet, maybe.

  San Pedro PD units were prowling the surrounding streets, but the landfill was close to a number of thoroughfares and the 110, and they weren't working on a time frame that made Tim optimistic. A tech had identified the blood type as O from a streak on the mattress, giving them a match. She was running a DNA to be sure, but Tim already was.