I caught myself midstare, and glanced away “Agent Cross. Have I kept you waiting?” she asked. “Not very long,” I told her. I'd been in Galletta's position before. When you're a lead investigator on a high-profile case, everyone wants a piece of your time. Besides, my day was almost over. Detective Galletta would probably be up all night. This case warranted it.
The mess had landed in her lap about twelve hours ago. It had originated at the West Bureau, in Hollywood, but serial cases were automatically transferred downtown, to the Special Homicide Unit. Technically, “Mary Smith” couldn't be classified as a serial killer until there were at least four attributed murders, but LAPD had decided to err on the side of caution. I agreed with the decision, not that anyone had asked me for an opinion.
The media coverage on this one, and the subsequent pressure on the department, was already intense. It could go from intense to insane soon, if the c-mails to the Times got out.
Detective Galletta led me upstairs to a small conference room turned crisis room. It acted as a makeshift clearinghouse for all information related to the murders.
One entire wall was already covered with police reports, a map of the city, sketches of the two crime scenes, and dozens of photographs of the dead.
A wastebasket in the corner overflowed with empty cups and greasy restaurant takeout bags. Wendy's seemed to be winning the battle of the burgers at this precinct.
Two detectives in shirtsleeves sat at a large wooden table, both of them bent over separate piles of paperwork. Familiar, depressing.
“We need this space,” Galletta said to the detectives. There was nothing overly aggressive about it. She had the kind of unassuming confidence that made bullying unnecessary The two men cleared out without a word.
“Where do you want to start?” I asked her.
Galletta jumped right in. “What do you make of the sticker thing?” She pointed to an 81/2 x 11 black-and-white photo of the back of a movie seat. It had the same brand of kiddie stickers on it as the ones left on Antonia Schifman's limo. Each sticker was marked either A or B.
One of the stickers showed a wide-eyed pony, and the other two a teddy bear on a swing.
What was with the killer and children? And mothers?
“It feels awfully heavy-handed to me,” I told her. "Just like everything else so far. The overwrought c-mails. The shootings at close range. The knife work. Hell, the celebrities.
Whoever's doing this wants to go big. Very high-profile."
"Yeah, definitely But what about the kiddie stickers themselves? I mean, why stickers?
Why that kind? What's with the A's and B's? Must mean something."
“She's mentioned the victim's kids both times. In the e-mails. Kids are a part of this puzzle, a piece. To be honest, I've never come across anything even remotely like it.”
Galletta bit her lip and looked at the floor. I waited to see what she would say next.
“We've got two threads here. It's all film industry, Hollywood, at least so far. But there's the mother thing. The kids. Never mentions the husbands in either e-mail.” She spoke slowly, mulling it over, the way I often did. “She's either a mother herself or has a thing for mothers. Mommies.”
“You're assuming Mary Smith is a woman?” I asked.
Mary, Mary
Chapter '1 9
DETECTIVE GALLETTA ROCKED back on the heels of her Nikes, and then she looked at me quizzically “You don't know about the hair? Who's been briefing you, anyway?”
I felt a pang of frustration about my own time being wasted again. I sighed, then asked Galletta, “What hair?”
She went on to tell me LAPD had found a human hair under one of the stickers at the movie theater in Westwood. Testing indicated it was Caucasian female, and it was not Patrice Bennett's. The fact that it was trapped on a smooth, vertical surface under the sticker gave it some pretty good weight as evidence, though certainly not ironclad.
I juggled this new information with what I already knew as I gave Galletta my own take on Mary Smith. It included my gut feeling that we shouldn't rule out either sex just yet.
“But you should take everything I tell you with a grain of salt. I'm not an all-science kind of guy“ She smirked, though the effect was pleasant enough. ”I'll take that into account, Agent Cross. Now what else?”
“Do you have a media plan?”
I wanted to emphasize it as her plan, completely her show, which it was, of course. This was going to be my first and last day on the Mary Smith case. If I played it right, I wouldn't even have to say that out loud. I would just walk away “Here's my media plan.”
Jeanne Galletta reached up and flipped on a wall- mounted television. She punched through several channels, stopping wherever there was coverage of the two murders.
“The shocking double murder of actress Antonia Schifman and her driver.. .”
"We're taking you live now to Beverly Hills . .
"Patrice Bennett's former assistant on the line .
Many of them were national broadcasts, everything from CNN to F! Entertainment Television.
Galletta pushed a button that muted the sound.
“This is the kind of crap that some reporters live for. I've got a twenty-four-hour detail on both crime scenes just to keep these assholes away, plus the damn paparazzi. It's totally out of control, and it's going to get much worse. You've been through it. You have any suggestions?”
Did I eva We had all learned a few painful lessons about the double-edged sword of media coverage with the D.C. sniper case a few years back.
"Here's my take on it - for what it's worth, and I hope it's something. Don't try to control the coverage, because you never will,“ I told her. ”The only thing you can control is what crime-scene information gets out there. Put a gag order on everyone connected to the case. No interviews without specific permission from the department. And this might sound a little crazy, but get a couple of people onto a phone detail. Call every retired officer you can find. Tell them not to make any comments to the press, nothing at all.
Retired cops can be one of your biggest problems. Some of them just love making up theories for the camera."
She gave me another sly smile. “Not that you have an opinion about all this or anything.”
I shrugged. “Believe me, most of it was learned the hard way”
While I spoke, Detective Galletta paced slowly in front of the big wall board. Absorbing the evidence. That's the way to do it. Let the details gather in the corners of your mind, where they'll be when you need them. I could already tell that she had good instincts.
Healthy cynicism for sure, but she was also a listener. It was easy to see how she'd come into her position so young. No could she survive this?
I said, “Just one more thought. Mary Smith is probably going to be watching what you do. My suggestion is, don't disparage her or her work publicly, at least not yet. She's already playing it as a media game. Right?”
“Yeah, that's true. I think so.”
Detective Galletta stopped and looked up at the silent TV images. “She's probably eating this all up with a spoon.”
My thought, too. And this monster needed to be fed very very carefully.
This lady monster?
Mary, Mary
Chapter 20
IT WAS JUST AFTER MIDNIGHT when I finally got back to the hotel at Disney and received some more bad news. It wasn't just that Jamilla had flown back to San Francisco. I already knew that much and figured I was in the doghouse again with Jam.
When I entered the hotel room, I saw that Nana Mama was fast asleep on the sofa. A cluster of pale-blue crocheting was still wrapped around her fingers. She slept peacefully, like a child.
I didn't want to disturb the poor girl, but she came awake on her own. It had always been that way with Nana. When I was little, all I had to do was stand next to her bed if I was sick or had a nightmare. She always said that she watched over me, even while she was sleeping. Had she been watching over me tonight? I stared at the old woman for a quiet moment. I don't know how most people feel about their grandparents, but I loved her so much it hurt sometimes. Nana raised me from the age of nine. I finally leaned down and kissed her on the cheek.