Both surfer cops patted him on the shoulder in yet another show of solidarity and slowly made their way into the roll call room, where everyone was already seated in attentive poses, faces to the front. Both Sergeant Lee Murillo and Sergeant Miriam Hermann looked as serious as the troops. He couldn’t figure that out either.
The surfer cops sat quickly and nobody paid the least attention to R.T. Dibney, who was the last man in, and he made his way to his usual seat.
But as he prepared to sit, Sergeant Murillo said, “Today, roll call training is about… swimming pool safety.”
And there on R.T. Dibney’s chair was a child-size, plastic life preserver with a little toy whistle attached to it, and a tag that said, “Next time, just whistle.”
After the dozen cops and two supervisors got their laughter under control, R.T. Dibney, with mustache twitching, said to all, “I’m gonna find that guy. And when I do, I just might not be taking prisoners.”
“You’re a knockout!” Dewey Gleason said to Eunice when she emerged from her bedroom in a knee-length, wraparound, black-and-white flower-print dress from Macy’s. Her strawberry-blonde hair was dyed and highlighted, making her more of a taffy blonde this time, and cut in a chin-length bob. Her nails were coated in clear polish, with the tips whitened for the more natural look, and she wore black, strappy heels that he figured must have set her back a few Franklins.
“I love your new shoes,” Dewey said.
Eunice said, “Yeah, well, if I bought shoes to fit the occasion, Musso’s would deserve old leather bedroom slippers.”
“Anyway, you look terrific,” Dewey said with less enthusiasm.
Eunice hadn’t had a compliment from Dewey in so long, she didn’t know how to respond. She removed the cigarette protruding from the left side of her freshly glossed lips and said, “A girl has to get gussied up once in a while to feel like a girl.”
Waxing theatrical, Dewey said with a flourish, “Her flesh is luminous in velvet shadows. A figure from Rembrandt, who will turn all heads in Musso and Frank!”
Eunice looked at him and said, “Don’t overact and go all burbly. When your chirp level gets elevated, you make me think you have ulterior motives, Dewey.”
That wiped the smile off his face and gave him a jolt of alarm. The goddamn woman had a sixth sense! He’d have to watch every word he said tonight if he was to get her to that storage room in Reseda. The booze would help if he could entice her to swill it while she was busy flirting with the kid. Suddenly, the whole elaborate plan seemed half-baked, and he felt the confidence leaking out of him. But then he only had to think of that meth demon and his sly little partner and remember that they owned him now. That was enough to give him the resolve to get through this gag and hope that he really was the actor he’d always believed he was.
Malcolm Rojas was showered and shaved and wearing a lemon-yellow, long-sleeve shirt that his mother had ironed. He arrived early and was standing nervously in the parking lot behind Musso & Frank when Dewey drove the Honda in. Malcolm wondered why someone as successful as Bernie Graham didn’t have a better car, but he figured it must be part of doing what the man always referred to as a gag, and not wanting to draw attention in any way. Malcolm couldn’t understand the relationship that Bernie Graham had with his secretary, Ethel, and wondered if it was romantic. All Malcolm knew for sure was that he didn’t like the way Ethel looked at him and smiled at him, as though she wanted to put her hands in his hair the way his mother had done until he’d put a stop to it. And then, when they got out of the Honda, there was something about Ethel, all dressed up with her hair really blonde now, something that made him think of his mother.
“What’s wrong, kid?” Dewey said as he and Eunice approached Malcolm.
When they shook hands, Malcolm’s palm was wet and clammy. “Oh, nothing,” Malcolm said, and the image vanished.
Eunice smiled coquettishly and said, “Are you hungry, Clark?”
“Not real hungry,” Malcolm said, “but I’m sure it’ll happen when I smell the food in there.”
Five minutes after they cleared from roll call, Dana Vaughn had a surprise for Hollywood Nate.
“What was it that the Oracle always told you about police work?” she said.
“He said that doing good police work was the most fun we’d ever have in our entire lives. He was nearly sixty-nine years old when he died, so I think he knew a few things about the Job.”
“How would you like to do some pretty good police work tonight?”
“Like what?”
“Popping the guy who pushed R.T. Dibney into the swimming pool.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“The kid, Naomi Teller? She called me. I think she wants to give up the person who tossed the rock. I’m betting it’s some little jerkoff from school that she doesn’t want her mom to know about.”
“You haven’t told anyone about the phone call?”
“No, I thought it’d be cool to bust the kid ourselves and let you come up with something funny when R.T. Dibney finds out about it.”
“Yeah!” Hollywood Nate said eagerly. “Maybe I’ll text him and offer to trade the kid for the keys to his new Acura. Something like that.”
“I thought you’d enjoy it, honey,” Dana said.
Naomi Teller was standing on the west side of Ogden Drive just south of Sunset Boulevard at 6:10 P.M., as promised. She looked especially young in low-rise jeans, a cutoff “Pink” jersey, and tennis shoes, especially since she was still a year or more from acquiring the womanly curves that the style required.
Dana pulled to the curb and said to Nate, “You better take a short walk and let us girls talk it over.”
“Roger that,” he said, getting out of the car and holding the passenger door open for the girl to get in.
When Naomi was in the passenger seat next to Dana, she said, “I was wondering if pushing the officer into the swimming pool is real serious?”
“It’s an assault on a police officer,” Dana said. “People don’t do it every day, that’s for sure. Are you worried about what’ll happen to the rock thrower?”
“No, I’m kinda scared about what might happen to me if I snitch. ’Cause I’m pretty scared of him. I think he’s not quite right up here.” She tapped her temple with a fingernail decorated by a little Walk of Fame star.
“Tell me about him,” Dana said.
“I met him when I was walking home last week, and I gave him my number. And I went and had a burger with him yesterday when he called me after he got off work. That’s all I did with the guy, but he’s, like, nineteen years old. My mom’d have a fit if she knew I got in a car with a guy his age that I didn’t even know.”
“Did he say where he worked?”
“No.”
“What kind of car?”
“A red Mustang. A real old one.”
“What’s his name, Naomi?”
“Clark. He says it’s Clark Jones, but I don’t believe he’s a Jones. He looks like a Gomez maybe. He’s real cute with great teeth and big dimples.”
Dana smiled at that and said, “Why’d he throw the rock through the window?”
“Because after he bought me the burger, he thought I was his girlfriend or something. There was stuff kinda weird about him, and I got scared and wished I’d never got in his car. When he called me later, I told him he was too old for me. I did it, like, real nice and all, but he got way mad. He called me a bitch, and I hung up on him.”
“Do you know where he lives?”
“No, he never said.”
“When he called you at home, was it on your home phone?”
“No,” Naomi said, “on my cell.”
“Bingo!” Dana said. “You’ve got his cell number in your phone, then?”
“Oh, yeah,” Naomi said. “In fact, I put it in the list the first time he called.” She pulled her phone from the pocket of her jeans, scrolled to “Clark,” and said, “Here. You can write it down.”