"Listen, Shane. Nobody knows what goes through another guys mind. You remember Richard Jeni?"
"The comedian?"
"Yeah. I did his postmortem. One of the funniest comics ever. Seemed like a happy guy. Sense of humor like you wouldn't believe. The guy was a total rip, but, despite that, he did himself. Tragic. You can't judge by outward appearances. I've seen too many of these that seem wrong on the surface but aren't. You and your friends should let it go."
"Yeah," I finally said. "You're probably right."
After breakfast, I drove Ray back to Mission Road and dropped him.
I kept Walt's death report on the seat beside me.
Chapter 11
Of course, I wasn't going to just let it go as Ray had suggested. The LAPD is worse than a sewing circle when it conies to gossip, so I didn't tell him what I was really thinking. I didn't want anybody to know yet, but I was on a mission.
I drove the short distance to Parker Center, parked in my assigned space in the underground garage, then took the elevator up to five.
"What are you doing here? You're supposed to be pulling little umbrellas outta fruit drinks," my partner, Sally Quinn, said as I draped my jacket over the back of my chair and sat behind the desk opposite her in our cramped cubicle at Homicide Special.
Sally doesn't look anything like a cop. She looks like she should be teaching kindergarten or first grade. Short, bobbed, reddish-brown hair, a pixie nose. But she's a no-nonsense hard charger. We've only-been partnered for a couple of years, but despite one rough spot last year, we were turning into a good team because she's smart, diligent, and follows the rules, which helps balance out my long list of negative traits.
"Not going," I told her as I turned on my computer and waited for it to boot up.
"Not going?" She leaned forward. "Everything okay? Alexa's not sick or anything?"
"Something came up. A business problem. Unfortunately I gotta stick around to deal with it."
"You know once you put in, you can't move vacation time, Shane," fighting to protect my two weeks off. "If you don't go now, you lose it. You can't push it back or change it."
"Don't want me around, Sal?" I said, grinning. "Gonna get a gold shield by clearing all our head-scratch whodunits without me?"
"Come on, that's not it and you know it. Homicide can dark you out. You need to get some fresh air, hear some music."
"How 'bout if I promise to take a quick trip down to Disneyland and listen to some elves singing?"
"Shane, what the hell is going on? And don't give me this 'something came up, business problem' bullshit. I'm your partner, man. I can read you."
She studied me over the top of her computer screen as I logged onto mine, went into the department assignment roster, and found the two primaries who had handled Walt's death call.
Cassie Kovacevich and Burtram Cole were not from Newton, as I suspected, but were detectives out of the Harbor Division in our South Bureau, which patrols Harbor City, where Huntington House is located. I wrote down their badge numbers and logged off the computer. When I looked up, Sally was still staring at me.
I knew she wasn't going to go away. She knew I was up to something and wasn't about to let it drop. An unhealthy moment of distrust festered between us. Since I knew she wouldn't leak and I was probably going to need somebody who could handle the inside if this got rolling, I decided it was better to confide in her.
I stood and motioned for her to follow me out into the corridor. We walked across the crowded squad room, past the cubicles of paired detective teams. I finally stopped in a nook by the windows out in the lobby, just around the corner from the elevators.
"Okay, look, you're right. Its not a business problem. I'm not going to Hawaii because a guy who was very close to me, a father figure growing up, committed suicide four days ago. The funeral was yesterday."
"I'm sorry to hear that, Shane. But if he's buried, what's to keep you from taking your vacation?"
"I'm not reading his death as self-inflicted."
"Murder?"
"I don't know."
"Shane, it's not your case. You can't work it. You'll piss off the primaries. You'll take a write-up from their captain. You know how territorial this place is. Where'd this happen?"
"Two detectives out of Harbor got the squeal, but they didn't look at it too hard and put it in as a suicide. Coroner agrees so nobody's got it now. There's nobody to piss off 'cause it doesn't even have a case number. A perfect vacation murder project," I joked.
She wasn't laughing but had rocked back on her heels and was looking at me like I'd just grown antlers.
"I know, I know. But you had to know this guy," I said. "He wouldn't a killed himself."
"Shane, I don't. . ."
"Sally, you can either help me, or you can get in my way. I've already decided to peel this wrapper. I may need somebody in here to lob information out to me if I can't get in. Wanta sign up to be my inside guy?"
"You mean you don't want to show up here and leave a computer trail alerting anybody to what you're doing," she correctly surmised. "You want me to blind screen it for you."
"Yeah ..." I said and smiled. "You up for that?"
"I guess," she said, not putting too much energy into it. We both knew if I had a suspicion that something wasn't right and had anything solid confirming that suspicion, I should take it back to Kovacevich and Cole and let them investigate it. Working without portfolio was not professional, and if she got caught doing my unauthorized computer runs, she could end up in the bag with me.
"Tell you what. Use my computer password. I'll deal with the fallout. I don't want this to land on you."
"That's okay. I know how to finesse it." She smiled ruefully. "I've been your partner just long enough to become a devious cheat."
"You're the best, kid. Gotta go," I said, to get her to stop clocking me.
I led her around the corner and was heading toward the elevators when I saw a tall, imposing, six-foot woman in a polo shirt and slacks standing outside Homicide Special with a large purse over her shoulder, looking for a cubicle number on the listing board.
"Seriana?" I said.
She turned and spotted me.
"There you are," she said. No smile. Intense eyes. Just like yesterday.
"Wait here while I get my stuff. I was just leaving." I indicated Sally Quinn. "Corporal Cotton, this is my partner, Detective Quinn." When Seriana shook her hand, it was so large that Sally's slender one disappeared like a hard ball into a fielder's mitt.
"Be right back," I said to Seriana. "I gotta get my jacket." We left her by the elevators and walked back into the squad room.
"That's some imposing woman," Sally said. "What Amazon tribe did you get her from?"
"Third Cavalry, U. S. Army. She's a Ranger heading back to Iraq for her second tour in a week or two."
"Is she part of this thing too?"
"Yeah." I grabbed my coat and my briefcase with Walts autopsy report. Then I faced Sally. Concern for me was spread across her freckled face. Til be okay, Sally. I've quit rolling gutter balls." "Since when?" she said.
I left her and headed back to Seriana Cotton and the ghost of Walter Dix.
Chapter 12
It was my second breakfast of the morning. I still wasn't hungry, so I just ordered coffee. Seriana had a bagel and orange juice. We were at a little coffee shop across from Parker Center called the Time Out. The place was full of day-watch officers on Code Seven and the background noise was somewhere between a din and a roar.
"Jack Straw said you didn't want to help us find out what happened to Pop," she said.
"Jack Straw may not be the most reliable person to listen to."
"Mr. Scully, I go back to Iraq in about two weeks. That means I've got to look into this right now, because I need to find out who did it. I know Pop didn't kill himself, but when I was a kid he did keep me from killing myself. I loved him. I owe him. Now I've got to do right by the man."
"You're su
re he didn't kill himself?"
"Absolutely certain, sir. For one, it just wasn't something he'd do.
He was religious. A Catholic. He believed suicide was a sin. For another, he promised to be at my going-away party before I redeployed. It's at my foster parents' house in South Central next Wednesday. When he made me a promise, he never broke it. Not once since I was eight years old. He wouldn't miss my send-off. You know how-Walt was."
"Yes, I do."
"In my unit, we've got this rule. We always get everybody home. Dead bodies included. You don't leave a teammate or his remains in the field. I gotta be sure I get Pop home."
She was looking at me with those intense ink-black irises, her handsome ebony face showing almost no expression. I was beginning to realize this was her way. Her look. Her features rarely varied, but there was no lack of emotion. In her eyes, I could see pain and sorrow. T he eyes said it all.
"You're a cop," she said. "You knew him like the rest of us. He had to have made a huge impact on you. Look how you came from nothing and made something of yourself."
It was exactly what Jack Straw had told me yesterday. Seriana continued. "I know firsthand how hard that had to be. I know Pop helped you get there, just like he helped me. Jack said you agree he wouldn't kill himself. So why won't you help us find out what really happened?"
I reached into my small briefcase and pulled out the ME's report but left the copies of the gruesome autopsy photos behind. I shoved the file across the table to her.
"What's this?" she asked, opening it up.
"Pop's autopsy findings. I went to the coroner's office this morning and got a copy."
"Then you are working on it."
I shrugged, but didn't answer. Then I sat back and watched her as she scanned the lead paragraph, which, once you got through the medical babble, said it was death by his own hand. She finished and looked up at me.
"This is a lie."
"No, that's a legal finding. Done by a competent medical examiner. No evidence of a beating. He had no drugs or unusual substances in his blood, and he left a suicide note."
She studied me for a long moment. Her strong gaze was frank, unrelenting, and unsettling. I could see exactly what Alexa had been talking about. Seriana Cotton was definitely somebody who made up her own mind about things.
"Are you saying you agree with this, sir? You agree with this medical examiner that Pop killed himself."
"I didn't say that. I said the ME report said that."
She looked at me, trying to figure me out. "I guess I don't understand," she finally said.
"I'm going to devote a little time to it and shake this tree. See what falls out."
"Good." Her mouth shifted slightly. It was probably as close as she usually got to a smile. "We're having a pallbearers' meeting at six tonight," she said. "We've also all decided we're going to work on this. I want you to attend it with the rest of us, sir."
"The Pallbearers' Murder Club. Slick. Who's got the movie rights?"
"Don't make fun," she admonished.
"You're all amateurs, Seriana. You're just going to slow me down."
"You weren't the only one who loved him, sir," she said without expression.
"Who said I loved him?" I shot back. "When I was at Huntington House, I wasn't capable of love. Back then, and for most of the last twenty-five years, I was running from my past. I barely ever went over there to see what he was up to. I never helped him. I have no idea why he wanted me to carry his coffin. But I'll grant you one thing, Corporal. I sure do owe the man. So I'm going to take some time and see if I can put a case on somebody. If not, then it's like that report says. Suicide. We suck it up and all go on with our lives."
"Bullshit," she said softly.
"What about that sounds like BS?"
"You loved him, sir. I can see the truth in your eyes. I see the pain and loss."
Of course, she was right. But admitting to her that I loved Walt made my betrayal seem even more devastating.
Til tell you why he picked you to be a pallbearer," she continued. "It was because he also loved you. He saw past the cruel stuff we all did. He understood our selfishness. That's what made him so special."
I felt about six inches tall. I knew all this. Its why I had already decided to look into his suicide. But I didn't need their help. Didn't want it. The idea of doing this with my fellow pallbearers was way too Agatha Christie for me.
"Come to the meeting at six tonight," Seriana said. "It's at Sabas Vargas's office in East L. A. Here's the address." She slid a piece of paper across the table. I glanced down at it.
She had neat, careful handwriting. Sabas's office was on Whittier Boulevard in the twelve hundred block in Boyle Heights. The Hispanic hood.
"I'm not sure. I've got a lot to do," I said.
Seriana leaned forward and studied me. "Please come, sir," she said. "I promised the others I would convince you because you're a homicide detective. You're the only one who knows how we should go about this."
I sat there looking at her. A very imposing woman. I don't know exactly why, but my resolve suddenly weakened. "Okay, but you have to stop calling me sir."
"Shane, then." She finally smiled. It came and went so quickly I almost missed it. But it lit her face, turning it beautiful for a brief second before it fled.
Chapter 13
Homicide detective Cassie Kovacevich was a pretty, thirty-year-old blonde who looked like she should be employed as a party planner, not a cop. Her partner, Burt Cole, was your standard old-school LAPD burnout--a hammered-down skeptic from his bad crew cut and exploded face capillaries to his orthopedic shoes. He looked twenty years older than his partner and about half as smart, which turned out to be an elaborate disguise.
"There was nothing to investigate," Detective Cole said, after Yd asked them about Walts death.
We were standing in the lobby of the brand-new, forty-million-dollar Harbor Community Police Station. I'd waited for almost half an hour for them to appear. The clean cop-shop lobby was a sharp contrast to the victimized people who came and went, dragging improbable tales of violence, their faces etched in misery.
"Nothing to investigate?" I asked, sounding concerned and judgmental. I was trying to get them to defend their conclusion so I could draw out more facts.
"Shotgun blast, so there were no ballistics," Detective Kovacevich said, taking the bait. "Suicide note left on his computer, no forced entry, no sign of a struggle. Just a wooden chair tipped over on the back porch with him still in it. A small lawn painted red with blood, brain splatter, and cerebrospinal fluid.
"We get ten rollouts a week and we re short handed. We gotta put the easy ones down fast or we'll choke on the caseloads." She sounded defensive and a little angry. My party-planner take quickly shifted. Kovacevich was as hard and cynical as her slumping, ready-to-retire partner. Just better hair, legs, and posture.
"You got the suicide note?" I asked. "I'd like to see it."
Cole looked at Kovacevich and the two of them had a silent conversation. They had a good rhythm like most seasoned police teams and had learned to communicate without talking. You struggled to get to that place with a partner. I'd just recently reached the plateau with Sally Quinn.
"Okay, why?" Cole asked. "What's going on here?"
Kovacevich stood with her arms crossed, waiting for my answer.
"Look, you guys. I do this same job. I'm not trying to embarrass anyone. This guy was my friend." Then I went through the same "some of us at the group home need closure" story and waited while they processed it.
"We must look like a couple of slow, fat Guernseys to you," Kovacevich said. "You're not down here looking for closure. You're looking for clues. You want to reverse this finding, 'cause you don't think your dearly departed friend could have possibly capped himself."
"She's right," Cole agreed. "If we give you our case file and you find a way to reopen this, we look like a couple of enema bags."
Tm not gonna do anythin
g but try and convince my friends there's nothing wrong here. I know you got it right," I lied. "It's just so they can get over this, mourn his passing, and move on."
They exchanged another look. More telepathic information passed between them.
"Okay," Cole answered. "Out of professional courtesy, we'll show it to you because we're dead certain we got it right and Dix was a suicide just like we wrote it up. But on the off chance you kick up something we missed, you gotta promise to bring it back here first and don't put me and Cassie in the blender."
"Fair enough. But I won't find anything. I agree with you. I just have these other people who . . ."
"Save it for The Today Show" Kovacevich interrupted.
We went to their homicide cubicle. It was a lot like mine. The desk was newer, the chairs softer. "Wanted" flyers covered every available surface. "Asshole wallpaper" we called it. Cole found the folder in his desk's bottom file drawer, pulled it out, and handed it over to me.
"We dusted the victim's personal computer," he said. "Only his prints on the keyboard, so he typed the suicide note himself."
The case file was thin. They'd worked it fast, closed it in twelve hours, just like they'd said. There was nothing in the folder I didn't already know. Just ten short entries along with some crime-scene photos that showed Pop sprawled on the lawn in a tipped-over chair with that brutal head wound, the shotgun on the grass behind and just to the right. I forced myself to study them. There was a copy of the ME's report, which I already had, and Walt's suicide note, which I didn't. I pulled it out. Walt's last earthly communication was only seven lines. Short and sweet.
To Whom it may Concern, I caught a bad wave. Got pulled down by leash drag.
I wasn't trying to hurt anyone.
Sorry about the yard sale, but it was the only way off the ride.
Don't hate me for what I did.
If you need the reason, tap the source, Walt.
I looked up from the note, into the stone-cold eyes of the two detectives.
"We had to get somebody who surfs to translate," Kovacevich said. "Leash drag is like getting held under by the ankle leash. A yard sale is a brutal wipeout. 'Tap the source' was painted on his board and his surf stuff. Apparently, it's the place where good waves come from."
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