by Don Winslow
But that was a long time ago.
“Buy you a drink, Corky?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
Corky was never a big man, but he seems to have shrunk, Frank thinks as he signals Benny to bring another. And his hair is thin and dry, his skin yellowish, drawn tight over the bones in his face.
“I need your help, Corky.”
Corky finishes his old drink, then takes Frank’s and knocks it back. “What can I do you for?”
“Summer Lorensen.”
Corky looks at him blankly and shakes his head.
“Back in ’85,” Franks prompts him. “You were Homicide then. All those prostitute murders.”
“‘No humans involved.’”
“‘No humans involved,’” Frank says. “That’s right. Her body was found up on Mount Laguna, in a ditch off the road.”
Corky sits there thinking about it for a long time. Just when Frank thinks the old cop has drifted back into the Enchanted Forest, Corky says, “She had rocks in her mouth.”
“That’s right,” Frank says. “It went unsolved, but the department later laid it on the Green River Killer.”
Corky pulls a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and lights another. His hands tremble. “Wasn’t no Green River Killer. We laid everything on that fucking guy. He was a one-man clearance sheet.”
“How do you know?” Frank asks. “How do you know it wasn’t him?”
Corky shifts into that crystal clarity that winos sometimes get. They don’t come often and they don’t last long, but he’s in one now, and Frank hopes he stays there long enough.
“First,” Corky says, “she was beaten to death, not strangled. The Green River Killer strangled his victims. She had trauma marks on her throat, but they were made postmortem. Two, there was no sign of intercourse. He raped his girls. Three, she wasn’t killed out there along the road.”
“How do you know?”
“No blood smears, Frankie. She’d stopped bleeding a long time ago.”
“But she had rocks in her mouth,” Frank says.
“So fucking what?” Corky asked. “Her real killer couldn’t read a newspaper?”
“So if you knew—”
“The department shut me down,” Corky answered. “It came down from on high—‘Lay off the Lorensen file. Move on. No humans involved.’”
Corky takes another long pull from his cigarette.
“Beginning of the fucking end for me, Frank,” he says. “The top of the slippery slope.”
Frank reaches into his wallet, pulls out two one-hundred-dollar bills, and presses them into Corky’s hand. It brings back old times.
“Stay out of sight,” Frank says. “Don’t let anyone know you were talking with me.”
Corky stares at him. “You gonna take them on, Frank? Take my advice. Don’t do it. You don’t want to end up like me.”
“You’re okay, Corky.”
“I won’t see another summer, Frankie.”
And then he’s gone. Eyes sunk back in his head with the thousand-yard stare, and Frank realizes that Corky Corchoran is in a place where he lives alone—somewhere in the past, maybe, somewhere in the future, nowhere in the here and now.
And he’s right, Frank thinks—he won’t see summer.
And neither, probably, will I.
He pats Corky on the shoulder. “I’ll see you.”
“Not if I see you first.”
Frank turns to leave. He’s almost out the door when he hears Corky say, “Hey, Frank!”
Frank turns around.
“We had our day, didn’t we?” Corky’s smiling.
“Yes, we did.”
Corky nods. “Damn right. We had our fucking day.”
Frank walks back out into the foggy morning.
All right, think, think. Who else was there that night? Donnie Garth, for one, but that’s not going to get you anywhere. There was another girl, the redhead. What was her name?…
Alison.
But it was over twenty years ago.
Who would know where she is now?
78
He finds Karen Wilkenson on the polo grounds.
They sit in the valley where Rancho Santa Fe meets Del Mar, the grass unusually green and lush in this wet winter, beautiful now as the early morning mist rises off the flats.
She’s in the stables, inspecting her horses.
They’re actually ponies, Frank thinks, not horses.
The last time he saw her was in a Price Club parking lot, twenty-one years ago, when a bank vice president was handing her an envelope of cash to provide girls for the party. Karen eventually served two years in some Camp Fed, but she landed on her feet when she married a Rancho Santa Fe Realtor with old San Diego money.
Whores land on their backs when they fall, madams on their feet.
She’s still attractive in her late fifties. The face-lift was skillful—her skin looks young and taut, and her eyes still have a shine.
“Ms. Wilkenson?” Frank asks.
She’s standing outside a stall, stroking the pony’s nose, softly talking to the animal. She doesn’t turn around. “It’s Mrs. Foster now,” she says, “and I no longer do interviews. Good-bye.”
“I’m not looking for an interview,” Frank says.
“Then what are you looking for?” she asks. “Whatever it is, I’m sure I can’t provide it. Good-bye.”
“I’m looking for a woman I knew as ‘Alison’ twenty years ago,” Frank says.
“Nostalgia or obsession?” Karen Foster asks, and now she turns around to get a look at Frank.
“Neither,” Frank says. “I want to ask her about Summer Lorensen.”
Karen says, “You don’t look like a police officer.”
“I’m not.”
“Then I don’t have to talk to you,” she says. “Good-bye.”
“Then you don’t care who murdered her?”
“I loved that girl like a daughter,” Karen says. “I wept for days. As I did for Alison.”
“What do you mean?”
“If you are looking for Alison Demers,” Karen says, “you will have to go to a cemetery in Virginia. Alison moved back east after Summer’s murder. She died in a horseback-riding accident.”
“When?”
“A month ago,” Karen says. “Who are you? What do you want?”
“I want to find who killed Summer Lorensen.”
“The police said that they found that man,” she says.
“But we both know better, don’t we, Mrs. Foster?” Frank asks.
She glares at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“No?”
“No,” she says. “And if you persist in harassing me, I’ll call some men and have you tossed out of here.”
“Don’t bother,” Frank says. “I’m leaving. And Mrs. Foster?”
“What?”
“When you call Donnie,” Frank says, “tell him Frankie Machine says hello.”
79
“He’s in San Diego.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Tell that to Karen Foster. He was just there.”
“Where?”
“Rancho Santa Fe.”
“Shit.”
“It gets worse. He was asking about Summer Lorensen.”
Silence for a few seconds.
“This shit has to stop,” Garth says. “You don’t shut this down, our end of the deal is off.”
“You said you could shut down G-Sting….”
Dave sits in a van outside of Garth’s house, tapping into a conversation he’s having on the phone.
The other voice is unmistakable.
Teddy Migliore.
Dave goes back to the office. He feels sick to his stomach. Troy talks to Garth. Garth talks to Teddy. Teddy sends Detroit hitters out to whack Frank. Because of something Frank knows about a Summer Lorensen.
Summer Lorensen, Summer Lorensen…
There’s something there,
lurking deep in the back of his head.
But it won’t come to him.
He gets on the computer. It only takes a few minutes to get a hit—Summer Lorensen was a prostitute murdered back in the summer of 1985. But what could that have to do with Donnie Garth? Or Frank Machianno, for that matter.
Dave goes back at it, searching for a nexus between Garth and the Lorensen woman.
Nothing comes up.
Then he searches for a connection between Garth and the date of Lorensen’s killing….
Bingo.
Hammond Savings and Loan. A boat party with prostitutes had ended up in the conviction of a savings and loan officer named John Saunders for misuse of bank funds. A madam named Karen Wilkenson got a couple of years for pandering. It was all part of the whole savings and loan scandal, and the party had occurred the night before the Lorensen murder.
He types in the name Karen Wilkenson and in a few seconds finds out that she married and is now Karen Foster.
Tell that to Karen Foster. He was just there.
Where?
Rancho Santa Fe.
Shit.
It gets worse. He was asking about Summer Lorensen.
Is it possible? Dave thinks. Donnie Garth killed this girl, somehow Frank knows about it, and then Garth goes to his old mob connections to kill Frank? Offering the shutdown of G-Sting in exchange?
But what makes Donnie Garth think he can shut down a federal operation?
Maybe the reason that a young FBI agent is feeding him information?
Dave looks over his shoulder and doesn’t see Troy. He walks down to the men’s room and spots the rookie’s pressed trousers underneath a stall. He waits until he hears a flush, then sees the trousers come up.
When Troy opens the stall door, Dave Hansen’s fist slams him back in. Blood from the kid’s broken nose sprays over his white shirt and his French cuffs. Dave grabs him by the throat, turns him over, and pushes his head into the toilet.
“Donnie Garth,” Dave says, jerking Troy’s head up.
“What—”
Dave forces his head back down and says, “Donnie Garth, you little shit. Is he paying you? How much?”
He lets Troy up again.
The young agent gasps for air.
Then he says, “I’m not working for Garth! I just report to him.”
“Who are you working for?” Dave asks.
Troy hesitates.
Dave starts to force his head back down.
Then Troy gives it up.
80
Donnie Garth has the shower blasting. He’s standing under the spray, looking out through the glass at the ocean, when suddenly Frankie Machine’s standing there with a pistol in his hand.
Garth shuts the water off.
Frank hands him a towel. “Remember me?”
Garth nods.
“Wrap yourself up,” Frank says.
Garth wraps the towel around his waist. Frank gestures for him to get out and sit down. Garth takes a chair by the window; Frank sits down across from him.
“I put two people in the dirt for you,” Frank says.
Garth nods again.
Frank smiles. “I’m not wearing a wire. You’re the rat, not me. You know, I always wondered how you got a pass on all that. You get a pass on everything, don’t you, Donnie?”
Garth doesn’t answer.
“Well,” Frank says, “you’re not getting a pass on this.”
“On what?” Garth asks. He looks small and old, sitting there in the towel, water dripping down his skinny legs into the thick carpet.
“Summer Lorensen,” Frank says.
He raises the gun and points it at Garth’s chest.
“It wasn’t me!”
“Then who was it?”
Garth balks, as if he’s trying to decide who he’s more afraid of.
“Whoever it is,” Frank says, “they’re not sitting here about to put one in you, Donnie, and I am. I saw you through the window that night, the little act between Alison and Summer. Then I walked away. What didn’t I see?”
“The senator,” Garth says, “couldn’t…perform. It was all set up—the Lorensen girl was begging for it, part of the act, but he couldn’t get it up. She did everything to him, believe me, but it was a no-go.”
“Then what happened?”
“She laughed.”
“What?”
“She laughed,” Garth says. “I don’t think she meant anything by it. I think it was just her, you know, but he got mad. He just went off.”
“Go on.”
“You were there! You know!”
Because you can’t tell one janitor from another, can you, Donnie? Me or Mike, cleaning up your messes for you, what’s the difference? Your shit gets cleaned up. You don’t have to look at it.
It’s clear to him now what happened. They carried her body out to the car and Mike drove her out on that lonely road and dumped her. Had the afterthought to “strangle” her and stuff the rocks in her mouth.
And Fortunate Son walks away clean.
It would have been manslaughter. He would have done what, two or three years, tops? Maybe nothing at all?
But his political career would have been ruined.
We couldn’t have that, could we?
Not over some whore.
No humans involved.
And everything stays quiet until Mike starts to take heat over the Goldstein murder, so he starts looking for something to trade. And he’s got a big one—except he’s not going to put himself in the bull’s-eye, so he puts me.
Thanks, Mike.
So Fortunate Son starts to clean up his past, and reaches out to Donnie, who reaches out to Detroit to do it for him.
Because these guys never do their own dirty work.
They have people like me to do that.
What did Fortunate Son offer the Combination?
Hell, he’s going to be president—what couldn’t he offer them?
“Did he use you as a go-between?” Frank asks. “Tell me the truth, Donnie.”
Garth nods.
His eyes are wide with fear, he’s quivering and sweating, and Frank’s disgusted that he sees the front of the man’s towel stained yellow.
Frank pulls the hammer back.
Hears Garth whimper.
Frank eases the hammer down and lowers the gun.
“Look,” Frank says, “they’ve already tried to kill me and they did kill Alison Demers. They’re going to clip anyone who knows anything about what happened that night, including you. Or do you still think you’re going to get a pass?”
Why shouldn’t you? Frank thinks. You always do.
“If I were you,” Frank says, “I’d run.”
But he knows he won’t. The Donnie Garths of the world don’t believe that people kill them; they believe that people kill for them.
81
Frank calls information and gets the number of the senator’s office.
“I’d like to speak to the senator, please.”
“May I ask who’s calling?”
“Tell him it’s a buddy from his Solana Beach days.”
“I don’t think he’s going to be available, sir.”
“See, and I think he is,” Frank says. “Why don’t you tell him it’s about Summer, and we’ll see who’s right.”
A minute later, Fortunate Son gets on the phone.
“If you record your calls,” Frank says, “I suggest you shut the machine off.”
“Who is this?”
“You know who it is,” Frank says. “I’ll wait.”
Fortunate Son comes back on the line a few seconds later. “Okay. Speak.”
“You know who this is.”
“I have a pretty good guess.”
“You have the wrong guy,” Frank says. “The wrong chauffeur. I know it’s hard to tell the little people apart, but it was Mike Pella in the limo that night, not me. If it had been me, none of this would have happened, because I wouldn’t have le
t you beat a girl to death and get away with it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Frank holds the little dictaphone up to the receiver and plays Donnie Garth’s narration.
“He’s lying,” Fortunate Son says.
“Yeah,” Frank says. “Look, I don’t care. I should care that you killed that girl and now you killed that other one, but the point is, I have a life I want to live and a family to take care of. So here’s the deal, Senator. I want a million dollars in cash, or I go public with this. I know I can’t go to the cops or the feds, because you own them, but I’ll go to the media, and then, at the very least, your career is over. Maybe we can’t make you for the girl’s murder, but we can put you at the scene, and that’s all it will take.”
“Perhaps we could take the position that—”
“A million dollars, Senator, in cash,” Frank repeats, “and I want you to deliver it personally.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Fortunate Son says.
“Which?” Frank asks. “The cash, or you?”
“Me,” Fortunate Son says.
“Then send your pimp, Garth,” Frank says, and tells him where and when.
A long silence, then: “How do I know I can trust you?”
“I’m a man of my word,” Frank says. “Are you?”
“I am.”
“Then we have a deal?”
“We do.”
Fortunate Son hangs up the phone.
Frank turns off the tape recorder.
He’s not a child—he knows they’re not coming with any million dollars.
They’re coming to kill him.
I could run, Frank thinks. And I could make a good run of it. I could stretch it out for years, maybe. But what kind of life is that? Watching myself slowly become poor Jay Voorhees, until I’m relieved when they finally catch up with me?
No kind of life at all.
So let them come.
Let’s get this thing done.
82
“It isn’t right!” Jimmy the Kid yells. “I’ll go. I can take him out.”
“He says, despite ample evidence to the contrary,” Garth says. “Look, this has been decided.”
“By who?”
Garth doesn’t say anything.
Which pisses Jimmy off. “Look, I know who we’re working for. I know the whole fucking thing, how your senator couldn’t get his macaroni al dente, how he killed the girl, how Frankie M. dumped her body….”