by Paul Bishop
As Hammer and Nails walked toward the front of the house, birds could be heard, along with the bark of a dog confined in a yard nearby. There were no other people visible. A green Range Rover cruised down the middle of the street, its windows so darkly tinted as to obscure the driver.
“Weird,” Rhonda said.
“Like something out of The Stepford Wives,” Hammer agreed. “Not even a twitching of lace curtains. Far too quiet for normal people.”
“How do you want to play this?”
“By ear, as always.”
While the uniformed officers went around the side of the house, Rhonda assumed a tactical position to one side of the concrete path leading up to the front door. The positioning was second nature. Standing as she did kept Hammer out of her line of fire.
From the opposite side of the door, Hammer rapped loudly on the hardwood finish. Again, his positioning was second nature. Even though neither of the detectives felt they were in danger, too many officers had been shot standing casually in front of doors.
Cops never rang door bells. They always knocked. In the academy, recruits were shown a video of an officer in New York who was blown up ringing the booby-trapped doorbell of a suspect's residence. Although a similar situation had never occurred anywhere in the country again, all cops who saw the video found themselves allergic to doorbells.
Aside from the search warrant in the pocket of his slacks, Hammer had also made arrangements to obtained a pin register of incoming and outgoing calls from the residence. He and Nails felt it might prove interesting to know who Ferris Jackson called immediately after they finished the search and left the residence.
When Ferris opened the door, she looked drawn and gaunt. Dark hollows below her eyes gutted the life out of her pale blue irises, and blurred the edge of her rounded cheekbones. She was short and compact, with spiked hair and a bizarre choice in clothing. Stripes and dots fought with plaids and geometric patterns, making her look like the victim of an explosion in a thrift store.
Hammer introduced himself, displaying his badge in his left hand. He clearly saw the carotid artery on the right side of Ferris Jackson's throat begin to pulse.
“I'm sorry, I can't talk to you now. It's not convenient. You'll have to come back.”
She tried to close the door, but the tip of Hammer's cowboy boot was already blocking the transom. The Society of Fuller Brush men would have been proud. Ferris looked at the boot tip and tried to slam the door on it again.
“Please remove your foot.” Her voice was shaky, her eyes darting all around.
“Ms. Ferris,” Hammer said calmly. Rhonda moved up next to him on the small porch. “I'm afraid this isn't a matter of convenience. We need to come in and talk with you.”
“I'm going out,” Ferris said. She tried to close the door again.
Hammer twisted his foot and levered the door open. This was not the greeting they had expected. Ferris should have been going out of her way to help them catch her roommate's killer.
Anticipate the unexpected. Roll with it and see where it leads.
“You can leave if you want,” Hammer said. He pushed his way through the door, his physical presence forcing Ferris to step back without making contact. “But you may want to stick around while my partner and I search the premises.” He was coming on strong, but it was his gut reaction to Ferris's demeanor. His instinct was to pour on the pressure and see if anything burst.
Rhonda followed Hammer through the door, moving past Ferris and into the residence. Her gun was out, held down by her side. Ferris was making her hinky, and she wouldn't be satisfied until the residence had been cleared.
“You can't do this,” Ferris said.
Hammer shook his head. “Do you realize how many times a week people say the same thing to us?” He stuffed a copy of the search warrant into Ferris' hand. “I try to be nice, do things the easy way, but nobody wants to cooperate anymore. Your roommate has been murdered. Who's going to find her killer if not us?” Hammer was talking mostly to keep Ferris' attention. When Rhonda let him know the house was clear, Ferris could be secured and they could proceed. Until then, he'd keep talking.
“What gives you the right to come in here like Nazi storm troopers?”
“That hurts, Ms. Jackson. Going straight to the name calling. You could at least give us the chance to stomp our jackboots all over your belongings before you go there.”
“All clear,” Rhonda reported, stepping back into the entry. Hammer could see the two Burbank officers behind her.
“Any sign of the kids?” he asked.
Rhonda shook her head. “A few toys, but no actual rug rats.”
Ferris let out a high pitched laugh. “Is that what you're here for? Are you nothing more than bully boys for Mark Ritter? Well, you're just out of luck. You'll never find those kids. They're never going to go back to that pervert!” Her voice was rising to hysterical levels.
Rhonda took the woman gently by the arm and led her to a couch in an expensively appointed living room. Ferris was looking as if she didn't want to do anything Rhonda suggested, but sat down because her legs wouldn't support her anymore.
“Why don't you tell me about Mark Ritter and Bianca?” Rhonda said in her best bedside manner.
Hammer moved silently into the residence, taking the Burbank cops with him.
“I don't have to tell you anything,” Ferris said. “You haven't read me my rights.”
“I don't have to read you your rights. You're not under arrest, Ferris.”
“You don’t fool me. You’re all alike.”
“Why so hostile?” Rhonda asked.
“Because cops are on the side of people who have money. Because cops took my kids away from me and gave them to a man who will beat them like he beat me.” She suddenly tore open the front of her stripped blouse to reveal an expanse of scarred and puckered skin. “My ex-husband did this to me with a pizza cutter six years ago, but the judge didn't believe it. My ex-husband's high-priced lawyers told the judge the wound was self-inflicted. The judge believed them. They told the judge I was mentally unstable, an unfit mother, a threat to my kids. The judge believed them. I tried to run, but you bastards caught me and took my kids. I haven't seen them since. I hate all of you.”
Rhonda didn't like the way the story was going, but she saw the inevitability of it. “Who was the judge in the case?”
Ferris spat onto the plush carpet. “The right Honorable Luther Flynn.”
Searching the house didn't take long. If the mandate had been to find something at any cost, the search could have taken all day. Carpets would have been rolled, floorboards pulled up, medicine cabinets pulled out of walls, closets emptied, attics explored. As it was, the rooms in the house occupied by Bianca Flynn were sterile. The papers scattered across her desk and in the three-drawer metal cabinet were supportive of her cause and in no way evidence of criminal behavior. There were no clues to the location of her children. No evidence relating to an underground railway operation.
Hammer took before and after pictures of the search with a Polaroid camera. This was done to document any damage caused during the search. Too often, citizens did damage after a search, then sued the city claiming the damage was done during the search. Pictures also kept cops from administer street justice by doing more damage than was justified during a search.
After her outburst, Ferris sat quietly, refusing to answer Rhonda's questions. When Hammer reported the search was finished, Ferris gave him a smug smile and demanded the names of the involved officers as she was going to sue. It was another line cops heard several times a week.
“You're going to have to get behind everyone else in the city,” Hammer told her.
***
Back in the van, Hammer pulled around the corner and parked again. From their location, they could just see the entrance to Ferris' residence.
“Did you put the bug on her car?” Rhonda asked.
“When I searched the garage.”
While getting the sea
rch warrant signed, Hammer also had the judge authorize the use of an electronic surveillance device.
“What do you think? Are we wasting our time?”
“Hard to say,” Hammer said. “It depends on who she calls and where she goes. She's definitely hiding something. When we arrived, she was in a big rush to be gone.” He was dialing his portable phone, getting through to their contact in GTE phone security. “I'm betting she blows out of there almost immediately.”
“And where she goes...” Rhonda said, seeing the garage door of the residence open up and Ferris drive out in an older Mercedes coup.
“…we will follow,” Hammer completed the statement.
TWENTY ONE
Freddie Mackerbee pressed Fey hard. He was suddenly all FBI. He wanted the story, the whole story, and nothing but the story, but Fey wasn't about to give it to him.
She had come to Freddie looking for a quick favor, nothing major, just help clearing up an unsubstantiated investigative lead. She hadn't come to turn an entire murder investigation over to the feds, which was exactly what Mackerbee was demanding.
Behind his pillowy image, the L.A. field office SAC was diamond hard, but Fey was no slouch in the immovable-object-meeting-the unstoppable-force stakes. She wasn't about to roll over and play dead.
As the FBI hadn't been able to solve the murder of the two security guards thirty years earlier, they didn't have much standing when it came to appropriating a new lead developed by the LAPD. The Department could handle things themselves, thank you very much. Mackerbee was demanding details. Fey was refusing to come across.
Maybe later. Let's see where we are on this. We don't have all the details yet.
We're talking about two dead here.
We're talking about stolen money from a thirty year old robbery.
This isn't about the money. It's about murder of two good men.
It's also about the fresh murder of a good woman, which takes precedence.
You haven't heard the last of this.
Don't be silly.
Let's see if your chief thinks I'm being silly.
Threats? Come on, Mackerbee.
Things had gone downhill from there. Fey knew she wouldn’t get any further help from Mackerbee. He'd already told her more than he should, certainly more than she'd told him. Mackerbee's threats to go to her chief were negligible. The chief would crow over a chance to rub the FBI's nose in a pile of their own turds. The chief would expect Fey to get on with the investigation, and make sure the feds didn't beat her to the arrest.
“Next time, leave me at home,” Monk said as they walked to their detective sedan.
Monk had been quiet during the dog fight in the cafeteria. Fey had a big bark and a big bite. Monk had no desire to come off as a yappy lap pup by comparison.
They sat inside the warm car with the windows down.
“What do you think?” he asked, referring to the money and the link to Eldon Dodge.
Fey shifted in her seat, uncomfortable under the restraints of the seat and shoulder belts. “Everything appears connected, but I don't understand how or why. There's an inevitability as the pieces drop into place.”
“You think whatever happened thirty years ago involving Eldon Dodge, Luther Flynn, Ellis Kavanaugh, and your father is coming full circle?”
“In a way. But I don't think the thirty-year factor is significant. Whatever is going on is tied to whatever happened thirty years ago, but I think it could have unraveled anytime, a year later, ten years later, twenty, whenever. It needed the right catalyst. The consequences have been lying dormant, and something Bianca Flynn did, or found, has triggered them.”
“She had something, or knew something, important, and somebody else wanted it.”
“We have to go beyond finding out who was torturing her when she died. Most people, especially people with something to lose, don't do their own dirty work. So, who hired the torturer?”
“This is getting complicated.”
“You’re surprised?”
Monk gave a soft chuckle. “What about Kavanaugh leaving you the money?”
“It's all part of it. He and my father arrested Dodge. Maybe they stole the money from him. Maybe guilt kept Kavanaugh from spending the money. I don't know.”
“We can connect Kavanaugh and Bianca Flynn because he underlined her name in the book you found in his room. Perhaps they even knew each other.”
“From all accounts Kavanaugh had turned into an odd duck. Maybe leaving the money to me was his way of making sure the story would all come out.”
“A long shot?”
Fey sighed. “Maybe. We don't have enough information. We need a closer look at Kavanaugh's death. What made him run out onto the track? Was he plain crazy, or was there something else?”
Fey's beeper vibrated, showing a familiar number on the LED readout. She used her cell phone and dialed the detective desk at West L.A.
“Devon Wyatt is here asking for you,” Mike Cahill said, when Fey was put through to him.
“Things are never so bad they can't get worse,” Fey said. “Did you tell him I work RHD now?”
“He knew,” Cahill said. “I think he's trying to make us jump through hoops.”
“Typical. Did he say what he wanted?”
“Nope. Said it was important, and you were going to want to talk to him.”
“If I had a choice, I'd never speak to the maggot again.”
Devon Wyatt was a nationally known defense lawyer whom Fey had tangled with during the JoJo Cullen case. Fey had also been instrumental in convicting Wyatt's son of rape.
For his part, Wyatt had been the force behind tapes of Fey's psychiatric sessions being released to the press, splattering her sordid childhood across the pages of the tabloids. Wyatt was not known for wasting his own time. If he wanted to see Fey, there was something in it for him.
“I should tell you to send him downtown,” Fey told Cahill. “But we're close to the station. Tell him we'll be there in a few minutes.”
“Great.” There was a noticeable relief in Cahill's voice. It was typical of Fey's ex-commanding officer to piddle in his pants when dealing with a self-proclaimed VIP such as Wyatt.
Fey turned the phone off and explained the situation to Monk. He started the car and turned left out of the federal building's parking lot onto Sepulveda Boulevard. West L.A. station was less than five minutes away.
“Where are you going?” Fey asked.
Monk took his eyes off the road for long enough to give her a funny look. “The station, of course.”
“Don't be silly,” Fey said. “I want another cup of coffee first. Head for Starbucks. Wyatt can wait.”
***
Floating on a sea of caffeine, Fey led the way into West L.A. station forty-five minutes later. She hadn't wanted another cup of coffee, but she didn't want Wyatt thinking he could snap his fingers and make everyone jump. He could make Cahill jump maybe, but not Fey.
Even though she and Monk had only been gone for a day-and-a-half, they were greeted in the squad room as if they'd been away for months. There was a feeling of coming home. RHD was enemy territory where they couldn't put their guard down. West L.A. was home ground.
“Croaker,” Devon Wyatt acknowledged when he saw her enter the squad room lobby.
“Wyatt,” Fey said. At least there was no pretense of civility.
Wyatt looked at his watch. “Fifty minutes. I figured you'd make me wait for at least an hour.”
“I must be slipping, getting soft in my old age.”
Wyatt displayed his whiter-than-white teeth in a smile that would have looked at home on a tiger. He was a short, but dapper man in an expensive dark grey suit with a fine chalk pinstripe. He wore a maroon waistcoat, a darker maroon tie knotted tightly under the collar of a starched, white shirt. His pointed shoes were maroon and shone like polished stones.
“What's this about?” Fey asked.
“You owe me a favor.”
“I do?�
� Fey knew it was the truth, as much as she hated it. During the JoJo Cullen case, Fey had been forced to humble herself in front of Wyatt to get something she needed. There had been a method to her madness, a willingness to do anything to solve the case.
Wyatt didn't give a verbal answer. He simply looked at Fey and watched her struggle with her conscious, something he had never experienced for himself.
By the end of the JoJo Cullen case, Fey had triumphed over Wyatt. She had won the game of one-upmanship, but she had been forced to trade Wyatt a future favor in return for the victory, a favor she still owed.
“What does the devil want as his due?” she said eventually. She opened the swing door on the side of the counter providing access to the squad room.
Wyatt's smile didn't falter as he stepped into the inner sanctum. “Don't worry. I'm not going to ask you to sleep with me. It won't be that bad.”
“If you did, at least I wouldn't have to be seen in public with you.”
Wyatt's laugh was deep, throaty, and genuine. Heads turned in the squad room as he led the way to the interrogation rooms. His confidence gave the impression he was the detective and Fey the interloper.
Inside the urine-colored walls of the interrogation room, Wyatt took the chair closest to the door.
“You know you’re sitting in my chair. Move,” Fey said.
Wyatt changed seats with a superior smile. “The chair closest to the door is the seat of power,” he said. “Never let the suspect sit there. Pin him against the wall on the opposite side. Make the suspect feel he can't escape.”
“Been taking refresher courses at the academy?” Fey asked.
Monk stepped into the room and took up a position behind Fey.
Wyatt waved his hands in front of him and shook his head. “I don't want to play games, Fey.” His tone had become serious. “I'm in a position to do both of us some good.”
“Why don't I believe you?”
“Because you're a cop, and cops don't believe anyone.”
“This is true. What do you want?”
“How is Robbery-Homicide treating you?”
Fey ignored the question. “If you knew I'd been transferred to RHD, how come you came to West L.A.?”