The little gray car raced for escape. One block shy of its goal, an obstacle rolled into view.
Massive, unpleasantly green steel hulk lumbering from the right on six wheels.
City garbage van. But no cans out at the curb so this wasn’t pickup day.
Yet there it was edging along at fifteen per.
I made out a sign on the truck bed’s ridged flanks: tree clearance program, credit to the district’s councilman.
No sound of sawing, no evidence of arboreal work, no foliage sprouting in the bed.
Let’s hear it for sweetheart contracts.
The driver, oblivious, was doing something that caused him to look down.
Texting.
The Toyota hit the rear of the truck head-on, full speed. The sound was surprisingly restrained. Dull and squishy, heavy-on-the-plastic Japanese engineering surrendered to heavy metal.
By the time we got out of the unmarked, the truck’s driver, a paunchy guy with a drooping white mustache, his phone still in his hand, was on the pavement staring at the upended accordion that had once been a vehicle.
Milo checked the Toyota’s front seat but there was no need to. The car had compressed to half its normal length, the entire front section now shared space with the rear.
What remained of Willa Nebe was curly gray hair flecked with pink pudding above a sodden lump of something that might’ve been chuck steak had it been able to hold itself together.
“I couldn’t stop,” said the driver, to no one in particular.
Milo glanced at me. “You wanna do therapy, be my guest.”
CHAPTER 42
Processing the Toyota would take a long time, beginning at the crash site and ending at the motor lab. But inspecting the car’s trunk was instant gratification: the hatch had shot open on impact.
Inside were three weapons: Housed in canvas cases were a semiautomatic 9mm Sheriff’s Department duty-authorized Heckler & Koch P2000 subsequently tied to the shell casings left at the Bernard Chamberlain shooting scene, and a similarly sanctioned 12-gauge Remington 870 pump shotgun.
Wrapped in a white tea towel embroidered with pink roses, and wedged into a blood-pooled corner of the crash-distorted compartment, was a smaller handgun with a short nose that made it appear more grip than barrel.
Taurus PT25, later I.D.’d as the firearm used to shoot William Melandrano in the head.
No current registration for the little gun but its serial number was traceable: wrested from a mentally unstable man attempting to smuggle the pistol and a hunting knife into the Mosk Courthouse, presumably to inflict damage upon the ex-wife who kept dragging him back to family court for more child support.
Following confiscation, the gun had been placed on a shelf in a basement storage room, part of a cache destined to be destroyed in an official county meltdown. Among the bailiffs given access to that room was Hank Nebe, who’d earned a month’s worth of taxpayer-funded overtime by supplementing his courtroom chores with yawn-inducing sentry duty.
On advice of counsel Nebe had nothing to say about that, or anything else. Fifty-six days into his incarceration at County Jail he was beaten severely and raped by fellow prisoner(s) unknown. That, despite being sequestered in a high-power, protective security cell.
Kiara Fallows remained equally mute. So far, her stay in the women’s wing at the jail’s Twin Towers had been uneventful, but for a report that she was “making friends quickly.”
Ree Sykes had plenty to say.
CHAPTER 43
Statement of Cherie Sykes (victim)
re: Defendants H. W. Nebe and D. K. Fallows
Penal Codes
182 (Conspiracy);
187 (Murder);
664/187 (Attempted Murder);
206 (Torture);
207 (Kidnapping);
236 (False Imprisonment);
273a (Abusing or Endangering Health of Child)
Location: Undisclosed
Present: Deputy D.A. John Nguyen
LAPD Lieutenant Milo B. Sturgis
Dr. Alexander Delaware (victim’s psychologist)
Court Reporter Deborah Marks
Mr. Nguyen: So why don’t you just tell us everything in your own words. Take your time.
Ms. Sykes: It all happened quickly. I knew him — the husband bailiff, Nebe — from the court and he always seemed kind of mean. But I never thought he’d — anyway, him I knew, her I didn’t. The wife. So when she showed up at my apartment at night wearing a bailiff uniform and saying I needed to sign court papers I had no reason not to believe her. Even though it was late, I figured they worked all kinds of shifts, I mean what did I know, she seemed nice, she had a uniform. And a gun … Anyway … I went looking for my glasses, I’m always misplacing them. So I could see what I was signing. Because after all that time in court, listening to lawyers I learned one thing: You have to dot your i’s and cross your t’s. I’d left them in the bathroom. For putting on my makeup. So when I was looking for them in there, she waited out front and she seemed nice and friendly and Rambla seemed to like her and while I was looking for my glasses she asked if she could pick Rambla up and I said sure and then when I finally found my glasses in the bedroom and came back out, all of a sudden there’s two of them. Her and the younger woman and now it was the younger woman who was holding Rambla and Rambla didn’t like her, she must’ve had a bad feeling about her, kids are like that, they can tell.
(23 second pause for Ms. Sykes to compose herself)
CS: Sorry. Okay. So the young one had Rambla and Rambla was struggling and then all of a sudden she puts her hand over Rambla’s mouth and on top of the shock about everything I got scared that she was pinching off Rambla’s nose so I yelled at her to let Rambla breathe which I know sounds kind of strange, I should’ve had a problem with her having Rambla in the first place but I was just thinking my baby needed to breathe. So she shows me Rambla’s nostrils are clear but she doesn’t let go of Rambla and I make a move to get Rambla and the older one — Willa — she’s shoving me back and pointing a gun at me and then before I know it she spins me around and handcuffs me and puts a gag in my mouth.
(32 second pause, Ms. Sykes drinks water)
CS: So … we all leave the apartment, this is like a nightmare, I’m thinking it can’t be happening. But it is, it’s crazy, it’s like a bad dream out of nowhere and I’m figuring my sister’s behind this, at that point I didn’t know, I mean I never knew — what had happened to my sister — until you guys told me after you … liberated me. Us. So at that point … anyway, we get outside I’m still figuring I can alert someone but it’s late, it’s dark, no one’s out there and they parked their car real close to my building so it doesn’t take long to get to it. They shove me in the trunk and I’m thinking you’ve got no car seat for Rambla, Rambla needs a car seat.
(14 second pause)
CS: Where was I—
Dr. Delaware: A car seat.
CS: The drive took, I don’t know … it seemed like forever … I worried the whole ride, then we got home — their home, not mine — I saw them take Rambla out of the car seat. So they brought it. Which was good, at that point I just wanted anything to be good. They had diapers, too. Mine. My baby stuff. So. Okay. I thought they were going to take her and kill me but at least they cared enough about my baby … then they put us in the garage. So they didn’t kill me. So at least we’re together. So what’s the point? They uncuff me and chain me up to the wall with this like animal trap thing but they let me hold Rambla the entire time they’re doing it and I can reach Rambla’s crib but if I put Rambla down and she decides to crawl far from me there’s nothing I can do.