Flipping Out (13 page)

She exhaled long
and slow, and the smoke, backlit by the floodlights in the trees, wafted
upward. Within seconds the nicotine pleasure molecules had reached her brain,
and a calm spread over her face.

'Where I grew
up, the cops broke more laws than they enforced,' she said. 'They were corrupt.
They were sadistic. One Sunday morning when I was eight years old, my brother
Joaquin was taking me and my brother Manuel to church. Manuel was eleven.
Joaquin was sixteen. We were poor, so he did what lots of poor kids did. He
worked as a runner for one of the local drug dealers. Three cops pulled up in a
car and started to shake him down. I'm not sure if they wanted drugs, or money,
or names of people he worked for, but Joaquin spit in one of their faces. They
started beating him, so Manuel jumped in to protect his big brother. They beat
him too, and when the two of them were lying on the ground, the cops handcuffed
them together and started kicking them. In the head, in the balls, everywhere.
I screamed and screamed, until one of them took out his gun, pointed it at me,
and pulled the trigger.'

'Jesus,' Terry
said.

'The bullet
bounced off the house behind me, and pieces of cement and glass were flying
everywhere. Then the others took out their guns and started shooting. Some of
the bullets came real close. Some they just fired in the air or at my feet.
They could have killed me, but they didn't want to. They were just trying to
scare the shit out of me. And they did. It ran down my legs. I fell to the
ground crying, my little white church dress covered with shit, and they just
laughed.'

Tears ran down
her cheeks. This was much more painful for her than the murders that happened
earlier this evening.

'That's
horrible,' I said. 'What happened to your brothers?'

'Joaquin never regained
consciousness. A week later he died from a brain haemorrhage. Manuel lost a
spleen, and he's got so much nerve damage on his left side, he'll walk with a
cane for the rest of his life.'

'I'm sorry,' I
said. 'Not all cops are like that.'

She shrugged.
'The fact that I married one is proof that God has a sense of humour. But I'll
tell you boys, I'd rather have some
Cabrón
with a gun stalking me, than be followed around the clock by LA's finest. Any
more questions?'

'One,' Terry
said. 'These illegals who do a lot of the work for you at the flip house - you
got names?'

She laughed.
'Yeah. Names, home addresses, social security numbers...you want photo IDs
along with that? C'mon Terry, which part of
illegal immigrant
are you having
trouble processing?'

'Which part of
"I'm trying to find the person who killed three of your partners and might
be looking to do you next" are
you
having trouble processing? They're illegal, not invisible. Do you know where to
find any of them?'

She looked away
and exhaled two lungs full of smoke. 'Jesus, you guys live in LA. You know how
it works. I drive down to the parking lot at Home Depot or one of the other
day-labourer pickup spots, and I grab a bunch of guys. Most of them still have
border dust in their boots. I pay them cash, and when they make enough money,
they go back to the wife and four kids, and they live like Mexican royalty.'

'You said
they've got knives, and shovels, and hate your guts. How did they feel about
the three victims?'

'You don't get
the same workers every day, but we had our regulars. They liked Nora. Even the
most illiterate among them knew she was a famous writer. Plus she spoke a
little Spanish. Julia was
la silenciosa,
the
silent one. I don't think they saw much of Jo. They don't like me because I'm
el jefe del infierno,
the boss from
hell. If one of them was going to commit murder, he'd get drunk and put a
screwdriver through my heart. He's not going to make house calls and cut off
locks of hair.'

'How'd you know
about the hair?' I said. 'We didn't release that.'

'Tony released
it. He told me what the killer did to Jo. I'm betting he did it to the other
two.'

'Tony told you
more than he should have,' I said. 'What happened to Jo's hair is something
we're keeping under wraps. You may be right about the illegal workers, but they
may know something. You mind driving down to Home Depot with us and picking out
a few that you recognise?'

'Sure. How's
tomorrow morning?'

'Make it
Monday,' I said. 'We have to see Charlie in the hospital first thing tomorrow.'

'Chest pains.'
She said it like she doubted it.

'And half a bag
on,' I said. 'He must've gotten to the party and started drinking early.'

She shook her
head. 'Charlie wasn't at the party. I don't know where he got drunk, but he
never showed up at the flip house.'

'The obligatory
question,' I said. 'What time did you get there?'

'I got to the
house at seven in the morning, and I was working like a crazy woman, prepping
the place for the party all day. But I understand that you have to ask.' She
took another drag on her cigarette.

'Thanks,' I
said. 'We'll meet you Monday morning at the Home Depot parking lot. Which one
and what time?'

'The one on
Sunset near the station. Six a.m.'

'We'll see you
there,' I said. 'Thanks.'

'In the meantime,
do us a favour,' Terry said. 'Stick close to Tony. There's still a killer out
there, and you really may be on his list.'

'I have a gun at
home,' she said. 'I learnt how to use it when I was eight and a half.'

We watched her
walk away.

'Hell of a story,'
Terry said. 'No wonder she hates cops.'

'Yeah,' I said.
'I just wonder if she hates them enough to kill their families.'

Reggie Drabyak
showed up ten minutes later, drunker than Charlie and more pissed off than
Marisol.

He slurred a
bunch of trash talk about how he and Charlie would get the muhfuhs who shot
their wives. Kilcullen took his car keys, tossed him in the back of a black and
white, and shipped him home.

'The fun never
stops here in Margaritaville,' Terry said. 'Who's next? Lindsay? Paris? Nick
Nolte?'

By 10:00 p.m.
Terry and I had done as much as we could at the scene. After about half a dozen
tries Terry finally convinced Marilyn that the girls were safe and sound and
that they'd be much happier if their parents came home calm, collected, and
well-fed. He suggested we all go out to a late dinner. Terry wanted Chinese, I
wanted Italian, and, as usual, Diana was flexible.

'I think whoever
is under the threat of death gets to pick,' Marilyn said. 'I vote for Doughboys.'

Doughboys
started out as a bakery. Their red velvet cake is a magnet for locals and
tourists alike. They expanded into a cafe, and I've never walked out of there
without having to loosen my belt a notch.

Marilyn
is one of those people who eats when she's under stress, and nothing makes you
hungrier than thinking someone is planning to shoot you in the back of the
head.

'This
may be my last meal,' she said when we sat down. 'In which case I want a stack
of pineapple, coconut, and macadamia nut pancakes, swimming in hot caramel
sauce.'

'Hey,
add a side of sausage,' Terry said. 'That way if the shooter doesn't kill you,
your dinner will.'

'It's
not your last meal,' Diana said. 'Nothing's going to happen.'

'Especially
if you and the girls leave town for a few days,' Terry said. 'Maybe you could
fly to—'

'No,'
Marilyn said. 'Absolutely, positively, definitely not. And if I'm being too
vague, allow me to add, "No fucking way.'"

'Do
you mind if I ask the logic behind your decision?' Terry said.

'Sarah
just started college. Emily just started tenth grade. You want me to pull them
out of school?
For a few days?
Are you telling me it will be solved in a few days?'

'Fine,'
Terry said. 'Just wait till this maniac pops you, then the girls can take off
school for the wake and the funeral.'

'Maybe
he's not killing off our little real estate cartel,' Marilyn said. 'Maybe he's
just killing random cop wives.'

'Then
you're still a target.'

'But
it wouldn't be down to me and Marisol. He'd have thousands to choose from.'

'Jesus,
I hope you're wrong,' Terry said.

'You're
hoping
I'm next on the hit list?'

'No,
dammit. I just convinced Kilcullen not to issue a department-wide warning. What
if I'm wrong? What if this killer is after all cops' wives and families?'

'Well,
if he is,' Diana said, leaning over and stroking my cheek, 'that's another good
reason not to marry you.'

'I
don't remember asking,' I said. My cell phone rang. 'Can we discuss this some
other time?'

'Sure,'
she said. 'Marilyn, don't let me forget. Discuss marriage with Mike some other
time.'

I
answered the phone. 'Hello.'

'Sorry
to bother you so late, mate, but I've been interviewing Nora Bannister's
neighbours, and I've got something you and Biggs might fancy hearing.'

It
was Chris High.

I
glanced around the table. Marilyn and Diana were chatting it up about weddings.
Terry was sitting quietly, focused on me.

'Chris,
if you've got something, mate - anything - it's never too bloody late to call.'

Terry
nodded. He was locked in to my half of the conversation.

'It
may be nothing,' Chris said.

'Try
me.'

'Well,
it's a quiet neighbourhood. Not too many people around. And the folks who are
home are locked up in these big houses, completely isolated from the outside
world. Nobody hears or sees anything because they're either at the pool, or
watching Dr Phil, or working on their next martini. But this one woman who
lives two houses up the road from Bannister said that she left a FedEx package
at her front door for pickup at three, and it was gone when she checked at
five. So I thought, maybe the FedEx driver saw something.'

'And
you tracked down the FedEx guy,' I said.

'It
took a bit of time,' High said. 'FedEx was cooperative, but I still had to jump
through hoops before I found someone who could give me his name and home phone
number.'

'And?'

'The
driver's name is Joe Price. According to FedEx he picked up the package at 4:04
p.m., and according to Price, that's when he saw a black BMW convertible pull
out of Bannister's driveway, and take off in a big hurry.'

'Did
he see the driver?'

'Nothing
we can use,' High said. 'Back of a head through tinted windows. But he did get
a partial on the plate. He says it caught his eye because his name is Joe, and it
was a vanity plate that started with
JO.'

'It
started with
JO,'
I repeated, and Terry's eyebrows went up.

'Right.
And there's only one car in the state that's a match. It's registered to our
boy Tony Dominguez's wife, Marisol.'

'Chris,
that's damn good police work. Why do you say it may be nothing?'

'As
I recall from our little go-around on Monday, Tony's wife works with Nora
Bannister. One writes the books, the other sells the houses. So it wouldn't be
unusual for Marisol to be parked outside Bannister's house.'

'Except
for one thing,' I said. 'She just told us she was at the flip house all day.
You just put her at the victim's house at the time of the murders.'

'Well,
then, I guess you were right, mate,' Chris said. 'It looks like I have been
doing some damn good police work.'

I
hung up. 'You get all that?' I said to Terry.

'Yup,'
he said. 'It's a two-way street, mate. She doesn't trust us. And now we don't
trust her.'

It
was almost midnight by the time we got back to Terry's house. As the car pulled
into the driveway, Emily came running out the front door, followed by Sarah and
three barking dogs. The girls threw their arms around their mother, and Terry
quickly ushered them into the house, stopping in the doorway just long enough
to shake hands with Big Jim.