Sunset Express

Rossi showed the badge. ' West L.A. robbery,'homicide. I called to see an inmate named LeCedrick Earle.'

The receptionist jotted down the badge number, then said, 'Sure. Hold on.' He flipped through the loose-leaf book until he found Earle's name, then told someone on the phone that he wanted prisoner number E2847 in the interview room. When he hung up he said, 'Guns?'

Rossi said, 'Left'm in the car.'

'Great. Someone will be right out for you. Wait by the sally port.'

Rossi said, 'Would it be a problem to check your logs for the visitors that Mr Earle has had over the past two weeks?'

'No sweat.' He turned to a computer and typed something. 'We enter the log into the computer at the end of each day for the record. You want a hard copy?'

'Yes.'

It took maybe sixteen seconds, and then a laser printer spit out a single sheet. Modern crime fighting at its finest. He said, 'Here you go.'

Rossi took it and we looked at it as we went to the sally port. The only visitors that LeCedrick Earle had had in the past two weeks were Elliot Truly and Stan Kerris. How about that?

A second guy in a blue blazer opened the sally port for us and said, 'This way, please.'

We followed him through and turned right. He was a couple of years younger than Rossi and he looked her over. 'You guys down from L.A.?'

Rossi said, 'That's right.'

'What kind of case?' Rossi was trying to ignore him, but the guard was giving her the grin.

'Don't know yet.'

The guard grinned wider. 'How long are you going to be down here? Maybe we could get together for a drink.'

Rossi never looked at him. 'Do yourself a favor, sport. I just tested positive for chlamydia.'

The guard's grin faltered and he moved a half-step away. Talk about a conversation stopper.

He brought us to the same interview room that I had used before and opened the door. He stood kind of bent to the side so that Rossi wouldn't brush against him when she went by. 'I've got to lock you in. Your guy will be here in a minute.'

Rossi said, 'Thanks.'

He locked the door behind us and we were alone. I nodded at her. 'Chlamydia. Nice.'

Rossi shrugged. I guess it was something she'd had to do ten thousand times.

We had been there less than thirty seconds when the rear door opened and a third guard led in LeCedrick Earle. His eyes widened when he recognized us, and he shook his head at the guard. 'Forget this shit. I don't wanna see'm.'

The guard shoved LeCedrick toward the table without acknowledging him and said, 'Just punch the buzzer when you're finished.'

LeCedrick Earle said, 'Hey, fuck this shit. Take me back to my cell.'

Rossi said, 'Thanks, officer.'

The guard closed the door and locked it, and Rossi smiled. 'It's my favorite perp. How're you doing, LeCedrick?'

LeCedrick Earle glowered at us and stood with his back to the door, as far from us as possible. He said, 'I don't have anything to say to you.' He wiggled a finger at me. 'I said everything I had to say to you before. I ain't gotta see you without my lawyer.'

I said, 'Stan Kerris is trying to kill your mother.'

He blinked twice, and then he laughed. 'Oh, that's right. You drove all the way down here for that?' He laughed some more.

Rossi said, 'Jonathan Green's scam is falling apart, LeCedrick. He's falsified evidence and suborned testimony, and now he's scared that it's coming out. We believe that he ordered the death of a man named James Lester, and we believe that he's after your mother, too. If he is, then he'll probably come after you as well.'

'Bullshit. You just talkin' trash.' He wiggled the finger at Rossi. 'You just worried cause your ass is in a crack. You know I'm gonna get your ass for puttin' me in here.' He went to the near chair, plopped down, and put up his feet. 'I ain't sayin' nothing without my lawyer.'

'You want Mr Green?'

LeCedrick smiled wide. 'I think you'll find that he represents me in all matters criminal and civil. Especially in the civil case where we whack your ass for every nickel in your pension fund for planting bullshit evidence on me.'

I stepped past Rossi and slapped LeCedrick's feet from the table. He said, 'Hey!'

I said, 'We've got to get past that right now, LeCedrick.' He tried to get up but I dug my thumb under his jawline beneath his right ear. He said, 'Ow!' and tried to wiggle away, but I stayed with him.

Rossi pulled at me from behind. 'Stop it. We can't do that.'

I didn't stop it. I said, 'You didn't call the hotline about this, they called you. That's the way it started, isn't it?'

He grabbed at my hand, but he couldn't pry it away.

Rossi said, 'Stop it, dammit. That's over the line.'

'Kerris and Truly came to see you and convinced you to speak with your mother, didn't they?'

He was finally listening.

'What did they say, LeCedrick? You hadn't spoken to the woman in years, but you called her and convinced her to change her story. They offer you money? They say they could get you an early release?'

He stopped trying to pull at my hand, and I relaxed the pressure. Rossi said, 'Jesus Christ, they could arrest us for this.'

I said, 'Think about it, LeCedrick. Jonathan and Truly and all those guys went to see her and probably told her what to say and how to say it, and that means she could testify against them.'

Now he was squinting at me, hearing the truth of it, even though it was masked by his suspicions.

'I uncovered a connection between Lester and Green, and two days later Lester went through his shower door and damn near cut off his head. You see that in the papers?'

He nodded.

'The day after that I went to your mother's house to ask why she changed her story, and she was missing. You know Mrs Harris next door? Mrs Harris told me that Kerris had cruised your mother's house three times, that he'd walked around the place and tried to get in.'

He said, 'Mrs Harris?'

'At six this morning Kerris and two other guys went back to her house and turned the place upside down. Why would they do that, LeCedrick?'

Now he was shaking his head. 'This all bullshit.'

'Would Mrs Eleanor Harris bullshit you? You grew up next door to her. Would she bullshit you?'

He made a little headshake. One so tiny that it was hard to see. 'Lady 'bout raised me. Like a second mama.'

Rossi pushed the buzzer, and when the guard came she asked if we could have a phone. He said no problem, brought one, and when he was gone again I turned it toward LeCedrick Earle and said, 'Call her. I've got the number, if you need it.'

He stared at the phone.

'We have to find your mother, LeCedrick. If we don't find her before Kerris, he'll kill her. Do you see?'

He wet his lips.

Rossi said, 'Goddammit, you piece of shit, call the woman.'

LeCedrick Earle snatched up the phone and punched the number without asking for it, and spoke with Mrs Eleanor Harris. When she answered his manner changed, and he hunched over the phone and spoke in a voice that was surprisingly young and considerate. I guess the lessons we learn when we're small stay with us, even as we harden with the years. They spoke for several minutes, and then LeCedrick Earle put down the phone and kept his eyes on it, as if the phone had taken on an importance that dwarfed everything else in the room. He crossed his arms and started rocking. He said, 'Why they do that? Why they go there so early?'

Rossi said, 'They want to kill her. And after they kill her, they will almost certainly arrange to have you killed, and then no one can implicate them in the manufacture of false evidence. Do you see that?'

He didn't say anything.

I said, 'She left the house with a bag. She has a gentleman friend named Mr Lawrence.'

LeCedrick Earle nodded dumbly. 'That old man been chasin' her for years.'

'Would she go there?'

'Sure, she'd go there. She ain't got nobody else.'

I felt something loosen in my chest. I felt like I could breathe again. 'Okay, LeCedrick. That's great. Just great. Do you know where he lives?'