The Night Crew

'What're you doing?'

'Shhh.'

The tape started with a womana porn consumer's idea of a classy businesswoman, in a suit, with long, shoulder-length hair, and a skirt that ended a quarter-inch below her hipsapproaching the stoop of a New York brownstone. From the look of it, the plot would be thin. Anna fast-forwarded for ten seconds or so, getting the woman on her knees, giving head to a man with what appeared to be a hair transplant on his chest.

'All right,' she said. 'Just checking.' She ran the tape back to the start, let it run, and said, 'Let's goand leave f the lights on and the door open. And let's leave the door open downstairs.'

'What was that all about?' Harper asked, when they were back in the car.

'Well, we wanted a look at Harnett,' Anna said. 'Now we'll get a look.'

She punched a number into her cell phone and said, 'I want to report a burglary in progress, in Burbank, yes, right now.'

When she finished, she hung up and said, 'Okay, so now the cops'll come. They'll find the break-in, and the tape going, so they'll stay a while.'

'And now we call Harnett,' Harper said.

'Exactly.'

'Better let me,' Harper said. 'If he's the guy, he'll know your voice.'

Harnett answered on the third ring, sounding sleepy. Harper said, 'Mr Harnett, this is James T. Peterson with the cleaning company. Mr Harnett, there's been a big break-in at your office, we called the police, but I think you better get up here.'

Harnett arrived in a year-old Buick, the back end of the car making a T-shirt frowny face at them as it bounced over the curb into the parking lot. Norden said, 'Here we go.'

A cop was standing by a squad car, talking on a radio. When Harnett got out of his car, the cop held a hand up to slow him down.

Anna, Harper and Norden were sitting on a concrete picnic table at the Foster's Freeze down the street, licking chocolate-dipped soft vanilla cones. Harnett caught Anna halfway through a lick and she almost choked: 'I know him, I've seen him,' she said, excited. Harnett's white hair stood up in a mane, as though he'd been running his hands through it; he was a heavy-set man with a rounded chin that once might have been square, wearing rumpled khaki chinos and a nylon windbreaker. 'That club on Sunset, the topless Polynesian one where they had the harp player who was shot by her girlfriend.'

'Yeah, the LoBall,' Norden said. 'It's closed.'

'Yeah, but we were there to look at the shooting. He did an interview with somebody else, and I grabbed him and we did a couple of minutes. He was pretty good. He wouldn't give us his name, that's why it didn't ring a bell. I remember him saying he'd rather not give his name. I thought he might have done TV.'

'White hair,' said Harper.

'Yeah, but he's kind of fat. That guy in the parking lothe was soft, but he wasn't fat, exactly.'

The cop slammed his car door and led Harriett into the building and out of sight.

'How long ago?'

Anna looked at Norden: 'Must've been, what, a year? Since the shooting?'

Norden nodded: 'About that. The guys who ran the place were always in trouble with the cops, and the shooting was the last straw. I think they were open for a couple more months, and then they were out. There's another place there now.'

Anna said: 'Well. When he comes out, I'm gonna let him see me. See how he reacts.'

Harper frowned: 'If he's the guy, he's nuts.'

'But there're cops all over the place. What's he gonna do?'

The phone rang in her pocket, and she fumbled it out. 'And if he's the guy, it'll freak him out. He'll show us something.'

She pushed the button on the phone and a woman's voice squeaked, 'Anna Batory?'

'Yes?'

'I'm dying.'

'What?' She looked at the phone. 'Who is this?'

'China Lake.' The voice seemed distant, weak. 'I'm dying.'

'What.' She was sputtering, and Harper and Norden were looking at her curiously.

Then a man's voice, rougher, familiar: 'She's dying, Anna. And it's your fault.'

Anna closed her eyes and squeezed the phone. 'Nono.'

Harper, alarmed, said, 'What?'

'It's him.'

Chapter 21

'Listen to her.' The man's voice was like a snake's, a hiss of pleasure.

Jake had bolted from the car, was running down the street toward the cop car at Harriett's building.

Then the woman in Anna's ear: 'Anna, he stabbed me,' and, less certainly, 'It doesn't hurt much, but I can't move.'

'Where are you?'

'She's around, that's where,' the man said. 'I saw you tonight. What are you doingare you looking for me? If you're looking for me, I'll tell you what, that's not a good idea. I'll cut the top off your goddamn head off and eat your brains.'

The voice was right: the voice was the man in the parking lot, the man who'd shot Creek. Anna listened so hard it hurt, listened for anything in the background that might help her, other voices. Nothing but the hiss of the phone.

'Anna, are you there?'

'I'm here,' she said.

'You're not very talkative.'

'I amlooking for you, you asshole; and this better be a rotten joke.'

'Or what?' He laughed. 'What're you going to do?'

'I'll kill you,' Anna said.

'Oh, you'll kill me? You hear that, China? She's going to kill me. Here, you wanna talk?'

China's voice was a whisper. 'I can't see; I'm getting really cold.'

'Let her go,' Anna screamed. 'Let her go.'

'No. She's gonna die,' the man said casually. 'You know why? Because I needed a woman, especially after what you did the other night. You cut the shit out of me, Anna. I'm all fucked up.' And just off the phone, 'You're gonna die, aren't you China? Look at the blood already.' And back to the phone: 'She's dying; it's draining right out of her. I cut her legs. It's really purple, the blood, you'd think it'd be redder.'

'You fucker,' Anna shouted, and without thinking, she threw the phone like a baseball, and it bounced across the blacktop, shedding its battery, flipping and bouncing along. Norden said, 'What, Anna, what'd he say.?'

But Anna was already running after the phone. She scooped it up, and the battery, jammed the battery back in, said, 'Hello?' Pushed the send button, said, 'Hello, hello, oh, Jesus.'

Nobody there. She stood there with the phone in her hand, looked at Norden, then turned around to look down the street at Harnett's building. A cop hurried out of the building, followed by Harper. As they scrambled to the cop car, Harper turned to look toward her. Anna spread her hands, a gesture that said, Gone.

'Can't be right,' Anna moaned. She was kneeling on the front seat of the BMW while Harper cranked it back down toward Sunset. Wyatt would meet them, way out of his jurisdiction, bringing along a couple of L.A. homicide cops, BJ's was still open, people in black climbing the stairs toward the party room. Anna tore through the main floor, peering at tables; eyes followed as she checked each one, and a bartender said, 'Hey.' and finally she caught a waitress and asked, 'Have you seen China Lake?'

'If she's here, she's probably back in one of the bathrooms, that's where she usually is,' the woman smirked.

Anna burst into the women's restroom, and two women standing by the counter spun to look at her, one still with a touch of powder cocaine at her nose. 'Christ.' One of the stalls was closed, and Anna banged on the door, 'China, is that you?'

'No, go away,' a woman's voice, shrill, not China.

Anna went back out, saw Harper striding toward her, Norden in his wake. She went on down the hall and pushed into the men's room. A guy was standing at a urinal and Anna said, 'Have you seen China Lake?'

The guy tried to shrug, then said, 'What's that?'

'Damn it.' She went back into the hall and Harper caught her and said, 'Nothing?'

'No.'

'She's not upstairs,' Harper said. He put both hands on his head, trying to think, and a bouncer came up behind him and said, 'You guys got a problem?'