Vertical Coffin s-4 Page 12

  "Look, Shane, I'll give you the keys to the kingdom here, the Rosetta Stone for our partnership."

  I waited. What do you say to shit like that?

  "I have no hidden agendas, no back-channel dog wash. Like Popeye, T yam what I yam.'" Then she smiled. "So don't get your shorts in a bunch just because I want to lay out some ground rules. You got any stuff you want out there, let it fly."

  I didn't have to ask my friends at the sheriff's what Sergeant Brickhouse's department nickname was.

  Had to be Brick Shithouse.

  I found out later I was right.

  Chapter 20

  LAB

  THE "OLD" CRIME

  The sheriff's seventy-five-year-old crime lab is just east of Hollywood in a run-down three-story building near Elysian Park. The place is on its last legs. Since the department has already broken ground on its new, $96 million forensics facility next to the M. E.'s building on the L. A. State campus, this pile of bricks was not getting much attention. When I pulled into the parking lot I spotted deferred maintenance everywhere I looked. The cream-color paint was peeling off brick siding. Cracked asphalt and faded, white hash marks lined the parking lot. Weeds grew in the landscaping.

  But this was still where most crimes were solved. The ultimate revenge of the nerds, where geeks caught cheats. It encompassed all the major crime sections: firearms, biology, DNA, trace evidence, and identifications. In this high-volume facility, LASD criminalists juggled seventy-five thousand pieces of evidence each year, as the criminal justice system chugged merrily along. Getting moved to the head of the line was normally a futile exercise in this overworked battleground of egos and priorities, but our shell casing had been personally hand delivered by the big boss, Bill Messenger, so my guess was, under these circumstances, we'd be first up.

  Jo and I had not spoken for almost half the ride over. She sat beside me, looking out the side window, content to say nothing. Silence can be a weapon in the front seat of a police car. I wasn't sure what game we were playing yet.

  I parked in a visitor's space. We got out and she pushed ahead of me through the double glass doors into the crime lab.

  "You have an evidence number?" she demanded.

  "No, but it came in here through Bill Messenger."

  "That oughta have Doctor Chuck E. Cheese sitting up pretty straight," she said, then went to a visitor phone in the empty lobby and dialed a number.

  I looked around while she talked to somebody in the back. The place really needed help. The linoleum had turned black and was peeling up across the room, exposing the wood flooring underneath. It looked like somebody delivering a gallon of acid base had dropped the load. But I guess it's hard to spend money on a building that you know is going to be bulldozed in twelve months.

  "Scully, you're with me," Jo barked, sounding like my old Marine Corps drill sergeant. A security lock buzzed and she held the door open as we entered.

  "Latents got a four-point hit," she said. "They already sent the brass up to tool marks to graph the striations and impressed action marks. When we found that casing yesterday it looked to me like it also had some pretty good breech and pin impressions."

  She was showing off now. I was tempted to say "Fuck you," but, gentleman that I am, I only muttered, "Bite me."

  She smiled, pushed past, and led the way. "Latent Prints is down here."

  We walked down a narrow corridor, past the weapons library and lab. Through the glass doors, I could see thousands of rifles and handguns of every known manufacturer locked behind metal bars in the armory. These guns could be used to match firing patterns on weapons seized or placed in evidence. They could also be shown to witnesses for the purpose of firearm identification.

  We continued past the GSR and footprint lab, a notorious grunt station for newbies. The youngest criminalists were stuck in there doing footprint analysis or using the electron microscope to perform gunshot residue tests. Then we passed a room housing the protein base analyzer that charted DNA profiles, also known as electropherograms. Next, down the hall was a trace evidence lab devoted to hair and fiber. There was a lot of state-of-the-art equipment in this crumbling facility.

  At the end of the corridor Sergeant Brickhouse swept into the fingerprint bay. The room was empty. Blown-up photographs of fingerprints were pinned up everywhere. Two long benches containing print photographs in labled boxes were pushed against the walls. There was a large, overstuffed chair in the corner. Jo turned around and glanced out into the hall, looking for the criminalist.

  "Chuck oughta be down in a minute. On the phone a minute ago, he told me he was just going to check on our print upstairs. They ran our latent through the federal print index."

  We stood in the lab with the silence between us growing painfully.

  "Answer me one thing," I said to break the awkward spell.

  "Shoot."

  "Did Bill Messenger instruct you to investigate the Hidden Ranch thing? Is that why you were up at Smiley's burned-out house poking around, and over in the apartment on Mission Street?"

  "I've been sworn to secrecy," she deadpanned.

  "Only, when I partner up with somebody there can be no secrets."

  "Scully, grow up. I'm not telling you what I've been ordered not to, but use your imagination."

  "Okay. So Messenger had you up there even after he promised the mayor and Tony he'd leave it in my hands?"

  "I don't wanta talk about this. Let's just move on, okay?"

  I was about to tear her a new asshole, when into the room waddled the fattest, baldest, young man I had ever seen. He even made Ruta look svelte. His appearance was made even worse by his wardrobe. He had on an oversized, bilious, lime-colored Hawaiian shirt that flapped around the thighs of his frayed, tent-like jeans. The effect was startling. His head looked like a pale, medicine ball sitting atop a mountain of green Jell-O.

  Jo said hi and introduced me. "Shane Scully, meet Doctor Charles Gouda."

  Charles Gouda-Dr. Chuck E. Cheese. Got it.

  He lowered himself carefully into the overstuffed chair, letting out a long sigh as he dropped.

  "Just got back the run from the federal print index," he said. "Nada. But it was pretty thin to begin with. Only four identifiers."

  He leaned over and picked up a photograph of the print, then showed it to us. "Whoever fumed this thing saved the print, but with round surfaces like shell casings we rarely get a full ten point match anyway." Chuck pointed to the photograph with his pen. "What it comes down to is, you got two pretty good typicals here, a good core and an okay whorl, half an isle up here. This tent arch ain't too bad. Basically, it's pretty low-yield. Call it four and a half points to be generous. Since it's a sole index finger, there's not enough here for the federal computer. If I had a comparison print to put next to it I could get some eyeballs on it and give you an opinion, but nothing you'd want to take in front of our awesome denizens of justice. In court, you need at least six out of ten identifiers or the defense is gonna feed it to you."

  Then, to make that gastronomic point absolutely clear, he belched.

  "How long till tool marks is finished?" I asked.

  Doctor Gouda belched again, this time more delicately, catching the burp in his baseball mitt of a hand. He opened his desk drawer and took out a half-eaten sandwich. It looked like tomatoes and anchovies, which, in my opinion, ranks right up there with shit on a bun. He took a bite, frowned, then threw it in the trash.

  After all that I really wasn't expecting an answer, but I got one anyway.

  "Beats me," Doctor Chuck E. Cheese said through an ugly mouthful of chewed fish.

  Chapter 21

  MIJARES RESTAURANT

  I met chooch, Alexa, and Delfina at Mijares Restaurant for dinner. Chooch's sports-injury doctor was in Pasadena, and Mijares is one of the best Mexican restaurants on the east end of the L. A. Basin. I arrived last and was led to their table out on an enclosed patio. Chooch was wearing a new white cast and a glum look.

 
I kissed my wife, said hi to Chooch and Del, then dropped into a wood-backed chair and ordered a double margarita. Long day, so screw it. In the other room was a ranchedo duet, two guitarists in traditional dress, picking Malagueha Salerosa on humpbacked Martins.

  "I see you didn't get the plaster off," I said.

  "Nope." Chooch was staring morosely down at a Coke on i 3d the placemat in front of him. Delfina reached out and took his hand.

  "But the doctor said in a week, maybe," she explained. "It's coming along good. The bone is almost healed."

  Chooch nodded bleakly, as if the idea that his foot would ever mend was just too far away to grasp.

  I had the Pop Warner League book with me, and I looked at Delfina and gave her a little eyebrow raise. A silent question. She nodded, so I laid the blue binder on the table, then pushed it over to him. I had called the league on the way over and had received some additional information.

  "What's that?" Chooch asked.

  "Pop Warner League rule book. You're good to go if you want the gig. Emo's team, the Rams, is in the Junior Bantam division." Chooch was looking down despondently at the binder, so I added: "That's twelve through fourteen. The kids can be in the hundred-fifteen-to hundred-sixty-pound range at the beginning of the season, which was August, but nobody can weigh more than one-sixty-nine by the end of the season in December. As of late, they've been holding workouts, but with no head coach they had to forfeit their last game."

  Chooch opened the book and stared at the front page. Then, with no enthusiasm, he started flipping through it. Delfina frowned, as Alexa and I traded looks.

  "iQue haces tuDelfina said angrily. "We talked about this. You said you wanted to do it for Emo Rojas. Now your father has made it happen and you sit here like a troll on a rock."

  "Okay, okay," he said and put the book on the floor by his feet.

  "Honey, if you don't want to coach the team, don't coach it," Alexa said. "It's not going to help these kids to have a coach who doesn't want to be there."

  "You guys-you don't…" Chooch stopped, then put his head down. "Forget it."

  "Do you want me to talk to your coach?" I asked. "Make sure it's okay with him? Is that what you're worried about?"

  "No, Coach Norris said it was fine. He even said he'd look at the playbook and help me with some revisions if I wanted."

  "So, what's the problem?"

  "It's like…" He paused, then took a deep breath. "It's like, by agreeing to do this, I'm saying my season is over. Maybe my college career with it."

  "These Pop Warner teams play on Saturday or Sunday. Harvard-Westlake plays Friday nights. Once your foot heals, you go back on your team and set the Pop Warner practices to fit your schedule," I said.

  "I know, it's just…"

  "Then, don't do it, son," I interrupted. "Mom's right. You have to want to."

  "I'll do it, okay? I said I'd do it, so I will."

  But he sure didn't sound happy about it.

  Then our conversation turned to Delfina's West Side Story rehearsals. She was excited and animated as she told us about the full run-through with music. Chooch remained strangely quiet while she talked.

  # # #

  When we got home I went to my office and booted up my PC. Then I typed in Cactus West.

  A few seconds later a welcome screen came up. There was a window for a password. I punched in: MCAS Yuma TACTS

  A message popped up:

  Access denied. This is a U. S. Marine Corps secure site. Your computer will be scanned if you attempt to reenter.

  I logged off and was still frowning at the screen when Franco yowled to tell me he hadn't been fed. I took him into the kitchen and fixed his dinner while Chooch and Delfina sat in the backyard. She was talking hard at him.

  Alexa and I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood to avoid the fallout of what looked like the beginnings of a teenage quarrel. We strolled along the walkways that bordered the canal. The wedge-cut quarter moon hung low in the night sky. It lit the water and turned the mist-wet edges of the houses and garden gates silver. A late-feeding hell-diver took off out of the water, startling us. He beat his wings savagely, disappearing into the sky.

  "I talked to Tony and Bill this afternoon," Alexa said. "Bill is going to free up your request with his people at CSI. They're going out to Hidden Ranch sometime tomorrow afternoon to look for the dog's remains and check on that basement bomb shelter." She said it like she thought it was a complete waste of county time.

  "I'm not scoring too many points in this family tonight, am I?" I said.

  "It's just, you know how badly this is setting up. The sooner we clear it the better. I won't lie to you. I'm getting a lot of pressure, and I think checking Smiley's background and that house isn't going to get us anywhere, but I'm through arguing about it. It's your investigation, so it's your call."

  "In that case, can I get you to find out what's on this Web site?" I handed her a slip of paper with 'Cactus West MCAS Yuma TACTS' printed on it. "It's some kind of Marine Corps secure site that Smiley hacked into. If we can't find out through the mayor's office, maybe the geeks in our computer division can see if they could hack into it." She didn't say anything, but wrinkled her nose and put the slip in her pocket.

  We walked over and stood on one of the arched bridges that spanned the main canal. I told Alexa that we had a partial print on the shell casing from the apartment, but that it was smudged, with maybe only four identifiers, and that tool marks would look for a match on striations after Sheriff Messenger had his SEB long rifles fired.

  She nodded and we both looked across the water at our house. Delfina and Chooch were still sitting in the yard, heads together, talking earnestly.

  "So, how's your new partner Joe Brickhouse?" Alexa finally asked, changing to a better subject.

  "She's-different," I said.

  "She? Joe is a girl?"

  "Not in the traditional sense."

  "Is she pretty?"

  "Very. But she kills that impression effectively, because she's the most opinionated, in-your-face partner I think I've ever had. Present company excluded."

  "I don't like this. I know how drawn you are to strong women," she teased.

  "And she's gay," I said. "Apparently, I'm not the priceless piece of ass that's going to change that, either."

  "I feel better already," Alexa said and held my hand.

  "But you might qualify. She thinks you're 'a damn fine package,' or something to that effect. She's also a control freak. I'm biting my tongue trying to keep from tangling with her, but it may require more self-discipline than I possess."

  We stood quietly for a long moment. Suddenly a fish surfaced. It's tail slapped the water as it swam away. Both Alexa and I looked down at the spot below us, but our scaly eavesdropper was long gone.

  "Look, Shane, this is what Sheriff Messenger wants, so having her for a partner is a small price to pay. If he can test fire his SEB long rifles and prove that the casing didn't come from any of their firearms, then we've gone a long way toward settling all this down."

  "Right," I said. "And if it did come from one of his long guns, then I have only one question." "What's that?"

  "Who do I have to fuck to get off this damn case?" "Me," she said, then smiled sexily.

  Chapter 22

  PAYBACK

  It was finally cooling off in Los Angeles. By evening the temperature had begun to dip down into the fifties, but around midnight, with an abrupt barometric change, the hot Santa Ana winds had started up again, blowing out of the desert, flaring allergies and tempers. Alexa and I were both sprawled on top of the blankets as the pre-dawn temperature in our bedroom climbed into the mid-seventies. Alexa had been restless, constantly turning over, unable to sleep. The ringing phone brought me up out of a semiconscious steambath. I fumbled it off the hook and glanced at the bedside clock. A few minutes past three in the morning. Alexa said something unfriendly and turned over again as I pushed the receiver against my ear and muttered
my name.

  "Scully? We're on," a female voice commanded. It took me a minute to get there, but then I realized it was Jo Brickhouse.

  "It's three a. M.," I snarled. But as consciousness returned I began to realize she probably wouldn't be calling at this hour unless it was pretty important.

  Just then, Alexa's beeper went off and shot a bolt of adrenaline through me. Uh-oh. Something was definitely up.

  Alexa grabbed her pager off the bedside table. "Damn," she said, reading the LCD screen, "Tony."

  "What's going on, Jo?" I asked, pulling my head further out of the vat of oatmeal I keep it in when I sleep.

  "Spotter on the SEB Gray team just ate a round. Guy's name is Michael Nightingale. Same basic deal. Vertical coffin-dead on the back porch. This should be our case, 'cause he's a sheriff, and there's a damn good chance now it's connected to the Rojas killing, but the way this is falling, who knows? The FBI could even claim it.

  "Right. Title Eighteen. 'Unless the FBI's absence from the case materially effects the course of justice,' or something."

  "Get your ass out to two four six Sherman Way, Van Nuys. It's LAPD turf, so for now, we're up. Take the Cahuenga off-ramp, it's quicker. And let's see some smoke. I'm already rolling."

  "Right." When I hung up Alexa was on the cordless phone with Tony and was walking into the bathroom, talking as she went. I scissor-kicked out of bed and followed her. As I walked in Alexa finished her call and pushed the hang-up button on the handset. She grabbed her hair brush, ran it through her hair once, then threw it on the counter. So much for grooming.

  "Nightingale?" I asked.

  "Yep. Michael. Spotter for his brother Gary on SEB."

  "I know."

  "Tony wants me downtown. Since Nightingale's a sheriff, he's got Bill Messenger on the way in. It's in our jurisdiction, so unless Messenger says otherwise, it's our one eighty-seven. Yours, Sergeant Brickhouse's, and Ruta's."