“When you came in, you mentioned traffic slowing you down. But you didn’t say anything about calling around for my address.” I smiled at her. “But then, you’d already been to my office. The police lifted your prints on Wednesday.”
“Oh damn.” She buried her face in her hands.
“You’re not very good at skullduggery, counselor. What were you looking for, anyway?”
“Whatever I could find. I had to know what you had and try to figure out why you got so involved.”
I was incredulous. “No one told you?”
When she said, “No,” she sounded betrayed and angry.
“Someone used you, big time.” I was still watching the street, slowing to let cars pass me. “Who?”
“Tell me first. Why do you care if this degenerate gets out of prison or not?”
“I don’t care, as long as he stays away from me and mine.”
“Then what is it with you?” Finally, some heat from her. “It was all going really well. You fucked it up.”
“I could say I’m a newsman. It’s my job to expose idiots who will foment a riot to get a few more votes or a big money judgment. But that would be a lie.” I slowed when she pointed to the Third Street sign, signaled my turn. “The truth is this: Every morning when I wake up, the face I see on the other side of my pillow belongs to Mike Flint.”
She spat, “Shit,” as she hunkered down in her seat, turning away from me.
“I gave you all the clues, counselor. You should have figured it out. Someone should have told you; Marovich knows.”
I turned right on Third. The open, dark expanse of the Wilshire Country Club golf course was ahead on the left. “Is anyone home at your house?”
“No. My son is with his dad. Turn there, on Hudson.”
As I made the left onto Hudson, I leaned forward enough to slide Mike’s little.38 with the filed-off hammer all the way out of my waistband without her seeing it. I held it down in the space between the seat and the door, with the hammer cocked. Jennifer I could deal with-a good elbow shot would take out a creampuff like her. I was more concerned about outsiders.
“There,” she said, pointing to a gated estate that backed on the fairway. The houses around it were enormous; not the sort of neighborhood where people walked around or hung out behind screen doors. Mature trees interfered with the streetlights. Overall, dark and deserted.
I pulled to the curb but crept along ten or so yards beyond the gate she had pointed out, moving so slowly my speedometer didn’t register.
“Back there,” she said. “You went too far.”
I was watching both the windshield and the rearview mirror, checking out the sides. “You can walk from here.”
You know about curiosity and the fate of the cat? When I told my mother, years ago, that I was abandoning my degree in philosophy to go into the news, she thought it was a natural move.
“Go poke around someone else’s closets,” she had said. “Get paid for it.”
That’s why I didn’t push open Jennifer’s door on the move, roll her out onto the pavement, and drive on. I had to know who was there waiting for us, whose patsy Jennifer was.
He came from behind, out of the landscaping like a dark current in the shadows, stayed low as he moved around to my side of the barely rolling car. I heard the snick of the latch on my car door, felt the first sliver of night air as he opened the door.
My right foot hit the brake as my left hit the door, ripping it from his grip. I saw the shiny muzzle of the gun he held in firing position, used the instant of his confusion to bring up my.38 and aim it, using that shine as my target. My aim was low-the bullet ripped through his Adam’s apple and threw him backward. Made him bounce on the black asphalt.
All around, porch lights snapped on. With my little gun held ready for a back-up shot, I screamed, “Call the police.”
Jennifer was fast. She was out her door and running before the man stopped twitching and gurgling.
“Freeze, Jennifer,” I said, but not too loud. Just in case she wanted to do the rabbit-in-the-rifle-sights routine, I was ready to oblige. She stopped, collapsed into a heap, and began to weep. That’s when I really wanted to take her out.
It was a good neighborhood. I heard sirens within twenty seconds. When the first black and white rumbled up the street, Mike’s little revolver was on the car seat and I was six feet away from it, standing over Jennifer.
Roddy O’Leary still held his Luger in a death grip.
Chapter 31
“I picked the lock.” The only good part about what had happened was where it happened: within the jurisdiction of Hollywood Division. When the police took me in for questioning, I told them I needed Detective Hector Melendez, now. He sat on the near end of the table in the interrogation room during my grilling.
“The.38 was in a locked case in the closet,” I said. “Because there had already been two deaths related to this mess, I was afraid to go out, alone, unarmed. I picked the lock on Mike’s gun case and took his gun. He wasn’t home and he knew nothing about it.”
The hardnose, Detective Valenti, had one leg up on a chair, rested his arm across his knee showing a lot of starched shirt cuff. I thought he was posturing for my benefit. So did Hector. When no one could see him, Hec would roll his eyes or wink at me, as if we were co-conspirators. I could have kissed him.
“Do you realize,” Valenti said, “that the weapon was not to code?”
I had answered the same question three times. I looked Valenti in the eye and said, “All I know is, it fit in my belt and it kept me from getting my face blown off.”
Hector stood up then, took a step to put himself between me and Valenti. “It’s a straight case of self-defense. Let the lady go home, get some rest. If you think of any more stupid questions, you can call her tomorrow.”
Valenti started to get his back up, but when Hector faced him down, he shrugged it off. “Go on home,” he said. “We’ll be in touch.”
Mike was waiting for us in the detective room. He had his feet on Hector’s desk, snoring into his chest. I knocked his leg, caught it in mid-air as he startled awake.
“Take me home, sailor,” I said, letting his leg drop.
“Why didn’t you wait for me?” was all he said.
“And get you into more trouble? Put your pension at risk? No, big guy. I thought it better to sacrifice myself.”
He got rid of a lot of saved-up air.
“Take me home,” I said, feeling so weary I was weepy.
I walked down the hall of movie posters between Mike and Hector, fighting the urge to give in to the shakes that had threatened to seize me ever since the shooting. Maybe I would have let go if Baron Marovich hadn’t come in the back door just then, walking between his own pair of police escorts. He blanched when he saw me and his reaction brought me up straight, made me angry.
“Look, Baron,” I said, doing one of Casey’s pirouettes for his benefit. “Two arms, two legs, all her faculties intact-you big dumb fuck.”
The D.A.‘s escorts both took an arm, held him back when he seemed ready to charge at me. He said, “Never know when to stop, do you, MacGowen?”
“It’s all over now.” I gripped Mike’s arm. Holding him was the only way I felt strong enough to face Marovich. Later, I knew there would have to be tears, when realization replaced adrenaline. When it happened, I didn’t want Marovich to see it. I made myself smile at him. “Be interesting to see your polls after this news gets out.”
The district attorney’s handlers began moving him forward again. I didn’t want to get within striking range-either his or mine-so I broke from my handlers and ducked out of the hallway, headed up a flight of stairs that opened on the left. At the top of the stairs I saw the door to the female officers’ locker room. I went in.
The floor of the locker room was cluttered with big, blue equipment duffels overflowing with body armor, batons, helmets, riot-size sacks of plastic wrist restraints marked with the owner’s badge number; ready for the riot that wasn’t going to come, this time. I grabbed a handful of rough paper towels, went over to the rank of sinks, pushed aside the baskets of hair dryers, curling irons, gels, mousses, sprays, and wet the towels.