by John Lansing
As he made a right off Sherman Way a few blocks past Balboa, he felt like he’d been transported back to the sixties. California ranch houses, well maintained, large lots, no sidewalks, lawns toasting in the 101-degree heat. Mandated water rationing generated brown lawns and cracked soil, evoking images of the Dust Bowl. The people who thumbed their noses at the water restrictions had lively border gardens with colorful annuals that thrived despite the unrelenting heat.
Something about the Valley always left Jack feeling a little depressed. He couldn’t put his finger on it. Jack rolled to a smooth stop when the voice on the Mustang’s GPS system alerted him that he had arrived at his destination on the right.
Good-looking home, Jack thought as he walked up the path toward the front door. Modest but well kept, showing pride of ownership. Light-blue stucco, white shutters, and a white gravel roof to reflect the unforgiving sun and mitigate some of the valley heat.
Jack reached for the doorbell, but was stopped by a neighbor walking a reddish-brown dachshund whose belly threatened to scrape the hot sidewalk.
“Not at home,” the spry octogenarian shared. “Erica’s at work, Eva’s been gone since nine.”
“And you know this how?”
“Live across the street. Keep my eyes open.”
A man who took his neighborhood watch seriously, Jack thought.
“Any idea when they’re coming back?” he asked.
“You a cop? You’re not driving a cop car.”
“I was a cop.”
“You look like a cop.”
Jack didn’t want to be rude, but wanted to get off this wheel of conversation. “Any ideas? I need to talk to Eva.”
“What’s your interest?”
“A six-year-old girl was killed in her living room, playing with her Barbie doll. The intended target was a gangbanger who testified against Eva in her trial last year. I’ve been hired by the grieving family to track down the shooter.”
The gentleman gave that some thought while his dog pissed on the sidewalk. Not far to go, Jack noted idly.
“Eva’s a free spirit. A good girl. She was set up. The gangster you’re referring to was scum.”
“You’ll get no argument from me, sir. I’ve seen his rap sheet.”
“He’s got blood on his hands and deserved to die.”
“I’m not a judge and jury.”
The neighbor lightened up a little. “Eva comes and goes. Like I said, she’s a free spirit. Erica works the seven-to-five shift at Costco over on Sepulveda. She’ll know. Mother and daughter, they’re very close. Tight-knit family.”
“Is there a Mr. Perez in the equation?”
“Not my place to say.”
A man who could keep secrets. “Good enough. I’ll reach out to her mother. Thank you for your help.”
“It’s my pleasure to be of service to law enforcement.”
Jack fought the urge to smile. “You have yourself a good day, Mr. . . .”
“Marks. Ralph Marks.”
“Have a good day, Mr. Marks.”
“I’ll do just that. And you’re not the first cop to come calling.”
“Really?”
“A Mutt and Jeff team. Salt-and-pepper. Came an hour ago and left empty-handed.”
“Thanks.”
At least Gallina and Tompkins were on the case, he thought. Jack slid behind the wheel and cranked up the engine as Mr. Marks walked across the street and pushed through his black wrought-iron gate. Jack couldn’t be sure, but he had the distinct feeling Mr. Marks was making note of his license plate number. Jack respected that. He understood one could never be too careful.
* * *
Jack followed on the heels of Erica Perez as she stormed through the cavernous box store. “I’ve got a thirty-minute break and I’m giving you ten. Don’t waste them,” she said over her shoulder as Jack dodged zombie-eyed shoppers pushing ankle-crushing pushcarts filled with massive quantities of paper products, produce, meat, crates of fruit, cleaning supplies, electronic equipment, and booze.
Outside Costco’s main entrance he waited for Erica to pick up a stuffed chicken roll and Coke at the food court. He fought the urge to grab a hot dog, and then followed her to a red metal table with a red umbrella that shaded only half of the table. Erica sat in the shade, forcing Jack to squint directly into the sun. He didn’t think it was an accident.
Erica was a stocky woman, hard but feminine, thick in the waist and shoulders. Deep lines in her face defined a life of hardship; her smoky brown eyes were guarded, but Jack felt an innate compassion. Shadows of florid gang ink on her cleavage and the world-weary visage told the story of a woman who had been to hell and back and lived to raise a daughter outside the ’hood.
“When are you people going to give my Eva a break?”
“I’m not here to jam up your daughter. From the looks of her, she can take care of herself.”
“You were at the wake?” she said, clucking and shaking her head.
“She caused quite a stir.”
“She gets the stubborn from her father.”
“Are you still married?”
“The hell that’s supposed to mean?”
“The shooter feels like a man, but not necessarily. Retribution is on the list of possibilities.” Jack raised his hands in supplication. “But it’s a long list.”
“Fair enough,” she said, relenting. “That one’s got an airtight alibi. Died in Corcoran ten years ago. My father died in Compton,” she added sourly, “shot down on the street like a dog.”
“And you moved out of the neighborhood to give your daughter a better life. I can see you’re a hardworking woman.”
“Yeah, I work,” she said without bitterness, just a statement of fact. “I can’t change my past. It’s written in blood and ink. My grandfather, my father, my husband, but not my daughter. I refused to let that happen.”
“You broke the chain.”
“But I couldn’t save her. You and your kind took care of that. You set her up and beat her down. Hurt my baby good.”
Jack didn’t argue the point, not having looked over the court transcripts yet. He’d reach out to Leslie for those. “I just want to find the shooter. Not for Tomas Vegas, believe me. There’s no love lost between me and the bangers.”
“Why don’t you leave well enough alone then?”
“Tell that to the family of a six-year-old girl named Maria, who also got shot down like a dog in her own living room,” Jack said, using her own words to make the point. “Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez are suffering the kind of pain I think you can relate to.”
Erica didn’t respond to that. She ate politely and drank some of her soda, checking her watch.
Jack let the silence grow before he broke it.
“What was your take on the trial? How did Eva get on the wrong side of Vegas?”
“My daughter is a beautiful woman. A lot of men wanted a piece of her.” She sighed. “Vegas wanted to own her. When she shut him down, he repaid the favor. If he couldn’t have her, he was going to guarantee nobody would.”
“Was there another suitor? Someone else she was in love with?”
She took another bite instead of answering.
“One of Vegas’s cousins seemed to think there was a love triangle at play.”
“And you’d take the word of a snake?” Erica checked her watch again and stood to leave. “Like I said, lots of boys wanted to date her. But no one in particular. She had a lot of friends but liked her freedom. She didn’t deserve what she got.”
Jack could sense a lie, but he wasn’t going to get any more, he could tell. Instead he handed Erica his card. “Tell her I just need a few minutes of her time. Tell her it’s for the little girl. If she’s anything like you, she’ll call.”
Erica looked at the card; her eyes went dark. She
sized him up again, and started to turn without responding.
“Oh, Erica,” Jack said, stopping her, “you have protection at the house?”
“You don’t wanna walk through my door without knockin’.”
Jack’s face creased into a grin as Erica marched back into Costco. He wasn’t surprised her house was heavy. His guess was she inherited her husband’s personal armory. He wanted to ask if there was a long-barrel .22 in the group, but he didn’t want her shutting down or destroying the weapon. He’d save that for another day.
He watched as Erica pulled out her cell and one-hand dialed before he lost sight of her beyond the aisle of sixty-inch, flat-screen TVs.
* * *
Jack was always amazed how much food Nick Aprea could consume without gaining weight. Nick chalked it up to having a two-year-old running around the house. That, and an incredibly active sex life with a woman who was eleven years his junior. Who could argue the point?
Nick was concentrating on his churrasco ribeye steak with chimichurri sauce at Oscar’s Cerveteca Venice, on Rose. One eye drifted across the street watching the comings and goings of the local denizens.
Rose used to be a ganged-up neighborhood, but was now giving Abbot Kinney Boulevard a run for its money with all the new high-end real estate and trendy eateries.
Jack’s stomach finally stopped growling as he destroyed a plate of chicken enchiladas with a green tomatillo sauce, black beans, and rice. He washed down the hearty food with a diet Coke, fully aware of the caloric irony.
Nick took a long pull of Dos Equis. “So, here’s the skinny,” he said, wiping the hot sauce off his mouth with the back of his hand, and then rubbing his eye with the hand with the hot sauce on it, making his eye water, which he finally cleared with his clean napkin. “Duggy, one of my street connections,” Nick went on without blinking, “was waiting on his bimonthly shipment of pot. He buys a half, three-quarters of a pound, sells enough to stay in weed for a couple weeks . . . doesn’t mind talking about it because it’s pot. And if he wanted to pay boutique prices, he could walk down to the corner and buy it legal, like.”
“Yeah?” Jack said.
“Here’s the linkage,” Nick said, knowing the story was getting away from him. “Duggy, up until five days ago, was being supplied by Tomas Vegas.”
That got Jack’s attention.
“Duggy was contacted the day after Vegas was killed by another Lenox Road banger, name’s”—Nick pulled out his pad and flipped a few pages—“Joey Ramirez, who was sliding into Vegas’s spot and assured him that business would go on like normal. They were just experiencing a personnel shift. No worries.
“Only, two days ago, Duggy is standing in his usual spot with a roll of greenbacks, holding his dick because there was no drop-off.”
“Who’s supplying Lenox Road?”
“Has to be the Sinaloa boys. They’re like Wal-Mart’s. They’ve got deep inventory to keep prices low. That, and they struck a deal with the Mexican Mafia to retail their product in L.A. The Mexican Mafia controls the local sets, so Tomas Vegas and his ilk became part of their distribution chain.”
Jack knew there was more to the story and let Nick shovel in a few more mouthfuls before interrupting his flow.
“And here’s the kicker, last night a fisherman off the pier in Redondo—night out with the wife and kid—gets a hit and starts to reel it in, thinking he caught the big one. But it ain’t no fish.”
Nick was about to fork another piece of meat, but Jack prodded him on with, “What was it?”
Big grin from Nick. “It was a forearm with the hand still attached. Fingers swollen like Oscar Mayers. Some fishy had been snacking on them, but he was still sporting a gold pinky ring.”
“Any missing persons reported?” Jack asked.
“Nada. Even put in a call to your Coast Guard buddy Captain Deak, said there’d been no maydays, no bodies, nothing. I ran a missing per through our system, but no hits on a beefy male.”
He noticed Jack’s look: “The arm coulda come off a bear. But Deak did add that there’s been increased activity in drug drops off the coast, from Orange County up to Santa Barbara.”
“Prints?”
“Talked to the Feebs, they’re running them through IAFIS and VICAP now. If the guy has a criminal history, we’ll know later today.”
“Any identifiers on the ring?” Jack asked.
“Couple initials. We’re on it. The ME said the arm had only been in the water twenty-four hours give or take.”
“So, a panga, a single prop, or helicopter, whatever, makes a run across the border and a drop off shore. It’s typically picked up by a local and run back to terra firma. Only this time they’re not the only one with an eye on the prize. So where’s the boat? Where’s the body, the drugs?”
“Captain Deak’s on the case. He’s checking the digital tapes of every boat leaving the marina on Wednesday and not returning. It’ll take some time, but might prove interesting. And his men are eyeballing the waters from here to San Diego. Looking for a floater minus a forearm, a scuttled boat, an oil slick, life vests, any fucking thing.”
“So Vegas’s crew was pushing Sinaloa weed. You think they went outlaw on their supplier. Cut out the middleman?” But Jack didn’t like the sound of that play the moment it left his mouth. “Doesn’t make good business sense,” he went on. “You could only get away with it once. El Eme wouldn’t put up with it.”
“Only way it plays is if there’s a rogue group within Lenox.” Nick didn’t sound convinced. “But they’re probably scared shitless as it is,” he said.
Jack nodded in agreement. “First Vegas, now this. The cartel will put a few heads on stakes to get the natives talking.”
“It’s already in play. My man Duggy was knocking back a few long necks at The Cantina, trying to stay mellow, looking to score, when he was braced by two middle-aged, dead-eye, Indians, Mexicans, he don’t know, but he was definitely chilled. Said they looked like stone-cold killers. The gist of the conversation was if anyone hears about a new source appearing on the scene, said information could be quite valuable. Two hundred grand worth of value.”
“How is Duggy supposed to get the information back to the guys?”
“The Cantina’s bartender.”
“Can we sit them both down with your sketch artist, get a computer-generated photo of the cartel operatives?”
“Never gonna happen,” Nick said. “They’re too afraid of having to testify. Can’t blame ’em. Their lives wouldn’t be worth spit.” Jack was sure that was right.
“My boy Duggy’s hitting the road. The Indians put the fear of God in him. He don’t know how they located him, he don’t know nothing, but he’s heading back to Minneapolis until the temperature in the room changes.
“He did say the short one of the two had a radical scar—his words—on his neck. Ear to ear.”
Jack gave that some thought. “If these cartel guys are going down their list of buyers and sellers, they’re going to have Juan Sanchez in their sights. I’m going to run by the house and make sure the family has the police protection Gallina promised.”
Jack pulled out his wallet, but Nick waved him off. “Later pard, I’ll keep you in the loop,” he said and signaled for another Dos Equis from the waitress as Jack hustled out of the restaurant.
Seventeen
Eva sat on a bench in Balboa Park, cell phone to her ear. She watched a blue heron streak across the lake, circle once, and come in for a heavy touchdown, leaving a wake behind and scattering a noisy raft of mallards, feathers ruffling at the imposition. The sun was low on the horizon, the shadows growing longer. She waited for a trio of bikers to pedal past before continuing.
“Not just the cops showed up. A guy named Jack Bertolino talked to Mr. Marks and my mother today. He wants me to call him about Vegas.”
Toby was si
tting in bumper-to-bumper on I-5, drumming his fingers nervously on his knee. Sean was driving. They’d been making good time until Magic Mountain appeared on the right and traffic all but came to a standstill. In fact, all the optimism Toby had been feeling about the trip and his future turned into a gut clench when he heard Jack Bertolino’s name.
Toby was well aware of the Susan Blake connection, heard about the painting, and knew Bertolino had been inside the family shop. He was also very aware of the ex-cop’s track record and the reason he was connected to Susan. The last thing he needed was some supersleuth on his case.
“Why the hell’s he involved?”
“He’s working for the family of the little girl that got killed.”
Toby shuddered at this news. Karmic payback. The only murder he’d take back if he could. Little Maria could be his ultimate undoing. The only mistake that replayed in his mind and kept him awake till the wee hours, until he was sufficiently anesthetized on pot and beer to pass out.
“Terrence said the cops stopped by the shop today. I’ll call them tomorrow and be done with it. Babe, you have got nothing to worry about. You can talk to Bertolino, or not. It’s your call.”
“It’s not that simple anymore.”
“How so?”
“You really don’t know?”
Toby fought to keep the edge out of his voice. “What? Eva, what’s going on?”
Eva audibly sighed. “Someone shot Dr. Brimley.”
“Brimley?” Toby said, feigning ignorance. The lies just kept coming.
“The doctor . . . Toby.”
“Oh. Holy shit. Is he okay?”
“Shot dead. Police dragged him out of a ditch near his home. He lived up in Reseda Hills. The news said the coyotes made a mess of his face.”
“Fuckin’ prick deserved whatever he got.”
Sean’s head jerked in Toby’s direction and they almost rear-ended the Chevy Volt that had come to a dead stop in front of them. Toby gave him a placating wave of the hand and dug the phone deeper into his ear, staring out at the monster roller coaster at Magic Mountain.