Chasing Darkness (12 page)

MADDUX PULLED
into the shade of an enormous elm, but left the engine running with the AC on high. Darcy was the larger of the two, with fleshy hands and the slow moves of a man who thought things through. Maddux was different. He flicked and fluttered like a man wound tight by a grudge. Once we were parked, they hooked their elbows over the top of the front seat, propping themselves sideways. Darcy faced me, but Maddux glanced everywhere as if he was worried someone might see us.

Darcy said, “Nice set of lumps there, bro. Those brothers are something, aren't they?”

“It's an acne flare-up.”

“Sure. Mrs. Repko called us this morning. She wanted us to do something about you.”

“So this is you, doing something?”

Maddux stopped squirming long enough to glare at me.

“This is us sticking our necks out. One day we're ordered to give up our work, a week later, Marx and his asshats clear seven cases.”

“Maybe the asshats are better than you.”

“And maybe they pulled Byrd out their ass.”

Darcy and Maddux were watching me. We were under an elm tree in Pasadena, and they shouldn't have been here and they shouldn't have been talking to me. They were probably detective-twos, but they probably hadn't been on the bureau for more than six or eight years. They might be guys on their way up or they might be guys who had already topped out, or maybe they were working for Marx. If they weren't, they were hanging out over the edge just by talking with me.

I said, “You have a problem with what the task force is saying, you should take it up with them.”

“We tried. They told us to eat it.”

Darcy smiled at his partner.

“Actually, they told us the case was no longer our concern. We didn't like that. Then they refused to return our case files. We liked that even less.”

“So this is what we call an off-the-record conversation?”

“Something like that. Either way, we don't think they should have closed the case.”

Their curious cop gaze rested on me, content to wait beneath the elm for the world to turn and the seasons to change and the sun to cool.

I said, “What if I told you the case isn't closed? What if I said the task force was here pulling fibers off the girl's clothes at the same time Marx went public about Byrd?”

Darcy's eyes narrowed to tiny slits.

“I'd tell you to keep talking. I'd say if we like what you're doing, we might be willing to help.”

I walked them through Bennett first, then sketched out Byrd and what I knew of the other murders and how Debra Repko was different. I told them about Ivy Casik and the reporter who might or might not be a reporter. Darcy and Maddux knew almost nothing about Byrd or the previous five murders, but they had worked on Debra Repko's case for almost five weeks before it was taken, and were willing to tell me about it.

Debra Repko had spent the day performing her duties at Leverage Associates, then accompanied five other Leverage employees to an evening political event where she assisted with media interviews. Once the interviews ended, Debra and her supervisor, a woman named Casey Stokes, walked to their cars together. Casey Stokes was the last person known to have seen Debra Repko alive.

Darcy and Maddux caught the case the following morning, and thought they lucked into a game-winning break right away.

Darcy said, “One of the shop owners where her body was found called, saying he had a security video of the murder. We thought we had the killing on disk.”

“Waitaminute—you have something on tape?”

“DVD. It was digital.”

Maddux waved his hand like he was chasing away a fly.

“It was nothing. The guy rigged up a do-it-yourself surveillance kit because kids were tagging the building, only the cheap fuck set it up wrong. All he got were shadows.”

“Could you see any part of the incident?”

“Not even. SID dicked around with it for a couple of weeks, but said the digital information just didn't exist, so Darcy here gave it to his brother-in-law.”

“My brother-in-law works for a CGI house in Hollywood. You know what that is?”

“Sure.”

Computer-generated images were a mainstay of Hollywood special effects.

“He offered to take a look, but it was a long shot. By that time, we had other lines—”

Maddux interrupted.

“The manager at her apartment house looked pretty good, a dude named Agazzi. I'm all over this guy. I still think he's good for it, and he could have gone into her apartment any time he wanted. If Bastilla and Munson were out here looking for fibers, they might have been looking for him.”

Darcy shook his head.

“Maddux and I don't agree. He likes Agazzi, but one of Repko's neighbors at the apartment, a woman named Sheila Evers, told us Repko was seeing a married man.”

Maddux shook his head.

“
If
there's a boyfriend. Personally, I think the broad made up that stuff. We couldn't find anyone who confirmed a boyfriend.”

I showed them the names Mrs. Repko had given me.

“You check with her friends?”

Darcy glanced at the names, then passed it to Maddux.

“Yeah. They didn't know anything. Said Debra never mentioned a boyfriend or lover or seeing a married guy, but here's this good-looking young woman, it's easy to think we're talking about someone she met at work.”

It was reasonable, especially considering the amount of time Mrs. Repko complained her daughter had worked. If Debra was always working, then her only opportunity to meet men was through work.

I said, “Mr. Repko told me Bastilla and Munson were asking about Leverage. They made out they were just making conversation, but they were asking about the people Debra worked with.”

Darcy and Maddux traded another glance.

Darcy said, “When we talked to Leverage about Debra's evening, they were cooperative. Then the boyfriend angle presented itself. When we told them we wanted to interview the male clients she worked with, they hit the brakes.”

“They wouldn't tell you who she worked with?”

“They didn't have a problem letting us talk to the male employees at Leverage, but they dug in hard when it came to naming their clients. We pushed, and we were told to lay off.”

“Their clients are politicians, Cole. We got a call saying the brass would review the matter and get back to us.”

“The brass. Parker Center?”

“It came through Parker, but who knows where it started? Couple of weeks later, Leverage got back to us, but they basically chose who we could talk to.”

“You think Leverage is hiding something?”

Maddux smirked automatically, but Darcy was more considered.

“I don't know, Cole. Maybe they just didn't want their clients linked to a murder investigation. I get that. But most people are murdered by people they know. A wife gets murdered, the first person you look at is the husband. Doesn't matter if he's the greatest guy in the world, you look at him because that's how it works. You clear the people who were the closest to the vic first, then work your way out. We weren't allowed to clear Leverage.”

Maddux said, “Agazzi was close. He lived right down the hall.”

Darcy sighed, tired of hearing about Agazzi. He had probably been sighing like that for as long as they were partners.

“We know she left the dinner event alone, but we don't know if she stopped on her way home. It's possible she picked up someone, but I'm thinking this guy was waiting for her.”

“Because they went for a walk.”

“That's right. If she asked some dude back to her place, they're going inside. So I'm thinking she got home and found someone waiting. Then one or the other of them says let's take a walk. Probably the male because he already has it in his head to kill her and wants to lead her in the right direction. There was no reason for them to walk south that time of night. Maddux and I made the walk, man. All the action is north on Melrose. I think she knew the guy, she was comfortable with him, and he led her into the kill zone.”

The corner of Maddux's mouth curled.

“You see this woman going for a stroll with a creep like Lionel Byrd?”

I smiled.

“No, Maddux. I don't.”

“Which means if Byrd did the deed, he stalked her or the whole thing was a chance encounter. If you buy either one, you have to buy she went for a walk that night by herself, in the bad direction with no open shops and nothing but darkness, in heels. In heels, for Chrissake. That's bullshit.”

Darcy stared at his partner as if he was thinking it through for the thousandth time, then finally shrugged.

“That's where we were when they pulled the plug, Cole. We believe she knew the killer. I believe she was seeing someone on the sly. If we were still on it, we'd be all over Leverage. Especially now with what you've told us.”

The three of us sat in their car under the elm in silence. I thought through everything and tried to put their information in some kind of usable order.

“What happened with the video?”

“Don't know. Some task force douche picked it up before my brother-in-law could get to it.”

“Why'd they pick it up?”

Darcy shrugged.

“Don't know.”

“What did they do with it?”

“Don't know. We asked, but they wouldn't tell us.”

Maddux said, “They wouldn't tell us anything, Cole.”

Darcy checked the time, then nudged his partner's arm.

“That's it. Let's take him back.”

Maddux dropped the car into gear and pulled a slow U-turn. We headed back toward the Repkos'.

Darcy still had his elbow hooked over the seat, staring at nothing. I could see the passing houses and trees crawl across his sunglasses like a film strip. It was a nice film. It looked like the American dream.

I said, “Why'd you guys bring me in?”

Maddux glanced in the rearview. Darcy came out of his film.

“The Repkos deserve to know what happened to their daughter.”

“Meaning you've taken the case as far as you can.”

“Man says we're off, we're off. You, on the other hand, can do whatever you want.”

Maddux glanced again.

“I just wanna fuck that prick Marx.”

Darcy unhooked his arm.

“That, too.”

They dropped me outside the Repkos' home, then melted through a tunnel of dappled shade.

DARCY AND
Maddux had been cut out of the loop. Poitras, Bobby McQue, and Starkey had been cut, and Chen and the criminalists had been forced to work in the dark. People who should have been collaborators with Marx and his task force had been treated as if they couldn't be trusted. I wondered what Marx didn't trust them with.

I sat in my car outside the Repko house, thinking about the video and why Marx pulled it before Darcy's brother-in-law finished trying to recover whatever was recorded. LAPD had a long history of using local special-effects houses to examine and enhance film and video. If you had state-of-the-art specialists available, it made sense to use them. Marx pulling the DVD bothered me because SID was good, and if they said the DVD was junk, then it was probably junk, which was why Marx's play didn't make sense. If the DVD was useless, there was nothing to lose by letting a cutting-edge CGI house see what it could do and everything to gain.

I paged through my notes until I found Lindo's number, then gave him a call. He didn't seem as nervous as when we spoke before. Maybe because he was back to investigating bomb-kook conspiracies.

He said, “What's up, Cole?”

“Do you know what happened to the security video of Debra Repko's murder?”

The surprise in his voice was clear.

“There was a video?”

“One of the shopkeepers where Repko was murdered turned in a recording. How could you not know about this?”

Lindo was silent for a moment.

“Waitaminute—maybe I heard something. It was blank or something was wrong with it?”

“That's the one. A CGI house was working on it when you guys took over.”

“Didn't SID say it was no good?”

“The case dicks took a shot with a CGI house. Marx pulled it before the CGI people finished. I'm trying to find out what he did with it.”

“No idea, man. Like I told you, my team worked on the book. Wasn't in the book, I don't know about it.”

“Who worked on Repko?”

“That was Bastilla and Munson. Yeah, I'm pretty sure Munson was on it.”

Munson again.

“Who's Munson?”

“One of the Homicide Special guys, up there with Bastilla. He and Marx go back. I think they used to work together.”

“Can you ask them what happened with the disk?”

“Uh-uh, man, no way. I'm not going there. They were the inner circle.”

“Just tell them you were wondering about it. No big deal.”

“Cole, you don't get this at all. Those people were the people who gave us our orders, and one of our orders was to mind our own business. I ask about this DVD, they'll wonder why. We weren't even allowed to ask about each other's work when we were working together.”

“I thought Marx gave the orders.”

“Our work went up to the senior supervising detectives, and they brought it to Marx. That's why we called them the inner circle. You had to go through them to get to Marx.”

“So each team only saw its own part of the case, but the guys up top put it together.”

“It was the only way to keep so much parallel work coordinated. Look at how much we accomplished in just a week.”

“Was Crimmens part of that crew?”

“Nah. He was an add-on like me. We had a ton of people in here, man. I heard it was thirty-two people, though I couldn't say. I never met most of them.”

I kept thinking about the DVD. It was a piece of physical evidence. Like every other piece of evidence, it would have been numbered, documented, and preserved in a chain of custody. Even if it was only a useless piece of plastic, its location and uselessness would be a matter of written record.

“Okay. Forget asking. How about you take a peek in their evidence file and tell me what it says?”

“No way. I can't.”

“Thirty seconds and you're gone. Just tell me what Marx did with it.”

“I physically cannot. They keep the files in an evidence room. It's locked. We could only sign out material specific to our assignment. Since I didn't work on Repko, I don't have access to that material. One of the commanders would have to sign off.”

“Don't you find that extreme, Lindo?”

“I find it anal and corporate, but nobody asked me. Use your head. If this disk mattered a damn, we would have seen the video on the six o'clock news.”

“It doesn't make sense they would pull it before the CGI house finished their work.”

“Maybe that's
why
they pulled it, Cole. How long did that place have it and still hadn't finished? Marx or whoever probably had the FBI do an overnighter. That's what I would have done.”

I didn't like it, but Lindo was making sense. The LAPD couldn't make demands on a civilian firm unless they were paying for a service, and Darcy hadn't been paying—he had leaned on his brother-in-law for a favor.

I put down the phone, then tried to decide on a game plan. The next obvious step was to pick up where Darcy and Maddux left off at Leverage, only the people at Leverage had no reason to be cooperative. If they sandbagged two LAPD detectives, they probably wouldn't even bother to return my calls.

I was still thinking about it when I noticed Michael Repko. He was standing in the front window of his house, watching me. He stood as if he had been there a while.

I called him, and watched him fish his cell from his pocket to answer. I could have walked the fifty feet up his drive, but I didn't want to face his mother again.

He said, “Was that Darcy and Maddux?”

“Yeah. Your mother called them.”

“Shit, man. I didn't know.”

“They told me some things I want to check out, but I'm going to need your help.”

“Okay.”

“I need to talk to Casey Stokes about your sister, but she's not going to talk to me if I just show up.”

“Uh-huh. Sure, I understand.”

“I want your father to tell her I'm working for your family. He should keep it vague. All he has to say is he and your mother have some unresolved questions. Will he do that, Michael?”

Michael raised a hand to his head. It was a gesture indicating his anxiety, and he glanced at something or someone deeper inside the house before turning back.

“I could call her. She was really nice at the funeral.”

“Not you, Michael. It has to be your father. When she gets this request, she has to feel the weight of Debra's family behind it. Debra's family will be asking the questions, not me. That's the only way she will talk to me.”

“I don't know. I could ask.”

“He needs to do this, Michael. If I'm working for Debra's family, then I'm representing Debra. If not, they won't talk to me.”

Michael stared at me with his hand on his head.

“I guess you are kinda working for us.”

“Yes. I'm working for Debra.”

“You aren't what I expected.”

“Have him call.”

“I'm sorry my mom called those guys. I didn't set you up, man.”

“Tell your mother something. She was right about Darcy and Maddux. They're good guys. They did a good job for your sister.”

“Do they think Byrd killed Debbie?”

It was the first time I had heard her called Debbie.

“Have your father call Casey Stokes. I'm driving there now, so let me know after he speaks with her.”

“I'll try.”

“One more thing. Were you and your sister close?”

“Well, sure, I guess. What do you mean by ‘close'?”

“If she was seeing someone, would she have told you?”

Michael stared at me for another moment, and finally lowered his hand.

“My sister didn't share.”

He was still in the window as I drove away.