L. A. Heat (13 page)

Des answered on the third ring. “I got trouble. I
need a lawyer.”

“What’s wrong?”

Chris scrubbed his face with one hand, feeling the
rasp of early morning beard. “I don’t know.” He told Des about the subpoena.

“A lineup?” Des sounded agitated. That didn’t
help. “He sure didn’t let any grass grow under him, did he?”

“What? Who?”

“That cop, David, came by our place last night,
asking all kinds of questions.”

“David?” Chris’s gears did a rapid shift. “What
the hell did you tell him?”

“Nothing!”

“The fuck. You must have said something—”

“I swear I never said anything.”

“Goddamn it, Des—” Chris pressed the fingers of
his left hand against his eyelids, flashes of light exploded behind his eyes.
“I need a lawyer. You gotta help me.”

“S-sure. I’ll find somebody, I got some
connections.”

“Good.” Chris hung up before he said something
he’d regret. He slumped down in the nearest chair, cradling his head in his
hands.

Now what? Go to work like nothing was happening?
What the hell was he supposed to do? Put his life on hold while he sorted this
mess out?

What did David think he had done?

*****

Simon Weiss didn’t look like a
Beverly Hills lawyer. He was a short, balding man with a pronounced gut and a
fringe of white hair that stuck up on either side of his round head like a pair
of soft horns.

But he dressed the part. A
twenty-five-hundred-dollar Versace suit worn with Italian leather shoes and a
tie that would have set Chris back a day’s pay. He sat behind an acre-sized
desk of granite and steel that held nothing but an off-white phone, an ornate
letter opener that looked like it dated back to Washington’s day, and an
exquisitely framed, professional studio shot of an unsmiling woman and two
unsmiling children, a boy and a girl. The rest of the office held only framed
prints of a Stanford law degree and a couple of pictures of presidents, past
and present, and of the current California governor.

Simon held out his hand. They shook and Simon
pointed to an oxblood leather chair.

“Please, Mr. Bellamere. Have a seat.” Chris sank
into the supple leather. He set his laptop case beside him on the Berber rug.
“I think I’m about to be screwed,” Chris said, ignoring the startled look the
man gave him. “I want you to stop them.”

Friday,
4:40 pm, Northeast Community Police Station,

San
Fernando Road, Los Angeles

DAVID LED LEROY Gillie into
observation room 2. Martinez was already there, along with Simon Weiss,
Bellamere’s lawyer, and Barry Lords, the assistant D.A.

Leroy bobbed nervously in place, his Adam’s apple
convulsing when he caught sight of the polarized-glass window separating them
from the room next door.

From his vantage point behind Leroy, David watched
a uniformed cop lead six men into the room beyond the glass.

There were lines on the wall to mark off heights
and more marks to tell members of the lineup where to stand. It still took the
uni a few minutes to get them all in place and facing the mirror. David
recognized a couple of beat cops picked to be in the lineup because they bore
enough of a resemblance to Bellamere’s overall coloring and body shape to
satisfy the high- priced legal help Bellamere had shown up with less than an
hour ago.

“No one inside the room can see us in here, Mr.
Gillie,” David said. “You’re quite safe.”

Leroy puffed out his skinny chest, a pouter pigeon
determined to show how tough he was. “I know that. I watch
Law ’n’ Order
.”

David suppressed a grin at the indignation in the
young man’s voice. “Okay, Mr. Gillie. Take your time. We’ll have each man step
forward in turn. Look them over and tell us if any one of them looks like the
man you saw Jason Blake with. It’s important that you be sure of your
identification, so again, take your time.”

“Please, Detective Laine,” Bellamere’s lawyer
said. “No coaching of the witness.”

David didn’t bother protesting. Instead he reached
forward and depressed the intercom button. “Put ’em through their paces,
Officer Larch.”

Then he stepped back, leaving Leroy at the window.

Each man’s number was called and he stepped
forward, into the light. Bellamere was third in line. He wore the blue jeans
he’d been told to wear. Eight-hundred-dollar jeans? David wondered. Even in
this crowd of look-alikes he stood out, like a diamond among pieces of colored
glass.

He turned to find Bellamere’s lawyer watching him
with cool eyes. David felt as though his desires were written all over his
face. A warm flush crept up his neck.

“Number three, step forward,” Larch’s voice could
easily be heard over the intercom.

Bellamere stepped into the full light. David held
his breath. Then, rather than risk betraying more than he already had, he
focused all his attention on Leroy.

The young man leaned forward, looking for all the
world like a little kid staring at a roomful of puppies. And Bellamere was
clearly his favorite.

“Turn to the right, number three,” Larch said.
“Now step back. Number four, step forward.”

Leroy suddenly bolted forward, his finger stabbing
at the window. “That’s him. That’s the one I saw Jay with.”

“Which one is that, Mr. Gillie?” Ice settled in
David’s gut. But he had to hear the words. “I need you to say the number, sir.”

“Three. It’s number three. That’s the guy you
want, isn’t it?”

“Thank you, Mr. Gillie.” David clamped down on his
own disappointment. He glanced at Bellamere’s lawyer. “As I see it, that’s two
for two. We can now place your client with two of our deceased victims.”

Martinez’s smile was wolfish. “We’ll see you in
court, counselor.”

The lawyer glanced at Leroy, then at David. His
face held only boredom. “I doubt it, detective.”

Once Weiss was gone, Martinez’s grin threatened to
split his dark face in half. “You did great, kid,” he said to Leroy. Then to
David: “Let’s go get those warrants.”

Monday,
10:15 am, Lincoln Boulevard, Venice, Los Angeles

CHRIS SPENT MONDAY morning
trapped in the subbasement of the Venice Savings and Loan, where he had
struggled for hours to fix a mysterious software glitch that had invaded the
bank’s main database, threatening their data integrity. Thank God for backups
and redundant systems. They hadn’t lost a single byte of customer information.
Chris had tested it a half a dozen times against their latest backups and found
no corruption anywhere. Finally he was able to have the bank manager sign off on
the work and could crawl back to DataTEK to find out what new disasters
awaited. He knew it was going to be that kind of week.

He climbed back into daylight and blinked at the
midmorning sun burning through the sullen layer of smog hanging over the beach
town. The man who had envisioned Venice a century ago had seen something that
would rival the Italian city of the same name. A Venice West with canals filled
with boats and pretty people riding upon the placid waterways. Well the canals
were still there, but the only thing floating on them was refuse and the people
were anything but pretty.

His BlackBerry vibrated as he stepped off the
elevator at DataTEK. “Chris here.”

“Chris!” It was Des, panic-stricken and frantic.
“What’s going on? Two cops were just at the store looking for you. Kyle called
and said there was someone at our place too.”

“What—”

He lapsed into uneasy silence when two uniformed
cops stepped out of his cubicle. Behind them stood a pale-faced Becky and
someone he wouldn’t have wanted to see under any circumstances, and especially
not these: a smug-looking Tom Clarke.

“Christopher Bellamere?” the older of the two cops
said. He nodded slowly, wondering whether even that admission might be too much
information.

“We need you to come with us, sir,” the older cop
said. “Right now.”

The younger one, a huge, burly guy who looked like
his hobby was lifting refrigerators, closed his hand over Chris’s wrist,
pulling the BlackBerry away from his ear. Chris could faintly hear Des
screaming something about David, then the device was wrenched away from him and
the voice stopped.

Weakly he tried to shake off the fridge lifter.
“Hey, I was talking to someone.”

“You can call anyone you want later, sir. Right
now we need you to come with us.”

“What is this about?”

“You’ll find out everything you need to know at
the station.”

Chris was tempted to refuse. If he put up a fight
would they drag him out? No one had said anything about arresting him and they
seemed polite enough. What if he insisted on calling Simon?

“What station?” he asked, hating that his voice
still sounded weak. God, they probably already had him pegged as some kind of
pansy faggot.

“Northeast,” the older one said, his voice still
polite, despite the contempt that radiated off him.

They steered him back into the elevator. Chris
stared at the silver-paneled door, embroiled in his own thoughts, only
belatedly realizing the fridge lifter was talking to him.

“Do you have your car keys, sir?”

“Car keys? What for?”

The other cop handed over a folded legal-sized
piece of paper. Chris stared at it like it might open up and bite him.

“We have a warrant to impound you vehicle. Please
give me your keys, sir.”

Chris could almost hear the unspoken “faggot” in
his words. He resisted arguing, and held his silence all the way down to the
Northeast Community Police Station. Simon would have been proud.

They put him in a room with a single, scarred
table surrounded by four equally battered chairs. A large, fingerprint-smeared
window took up one wall; Chris watched enough TV to know it was two-way glass.
Who was on the other side? David? He stared at the metal bolts on the table. It
added a grim overtone he didn’t like one bit. What the hell did they do with
those? Handcuff people to them?

He kept waiting for David to appear and tell him
it was all a mistake. But when the door opened it was to reveal a stout, florid
Latino man in a muddy green jacket and a lemon-yellow shirt over blue-and-green
checkered pants.

David’s partner.

Chris couldn’t remember his name. He watched the
fashion-challenged man set a briefcase on the table and pull out a chair,
glancing only briefly at Chris before opening the case and shuffling through
some papers in it.

Chris could stand it no more.

“Who are you?”

David’s partner blinked at him. Surprised he’d
speak up? He went back to shuffling paper, then slid his oversized rump into
the chair. Before Chris could speak again he drew out a tape recorder and set
it on the table between them.

“You mind if we record this session?”

“Why?”

“For your protection, as well as ours. This way no
one puts words into anyone’s mouth. Fair enough?”

“Tell me who you are, first.”

“I’m Detective Martinez Diego of the Los Angeles
Police Department. That answer your question?” Martinez indicated the recorder.
“Shall we continue?”

Chris debated telling him to go to hell. But he
was sick of not knowing what was going on. If this guy could tell him anything
it would be worth the hassle. Hell, Chris hadn’t done anything. He had nothing
to hide.

He temporized. “I want to call my lawyer.”

“Fair enough,” Martinez said. “Call him.”

But when Chris connected with Weiss’s law offices
a placid-voiced woman told him that Mr. Weiss was in court all day and would
not be available until much later. Did he wish to leave a message?

What Chris wanted was to talk to his damned
lawyer; instead all he said was, “Sure, tell him Christopher Bellamere called.”
He fixed Martinez with a jaundiced eye. “And the cops have dragged him back
down here. I want him to find out why they’re still hassling me.”

He hung up and glared at the fat cop. “Go ahead.”

Martinez flipped on the recorder and immediately
repeated his name, rank, and the day’s date and time.

“You want some coffee while we wait for your
lawyer?”

“No. Why am I here?”

Martinez smiled politely. “Would it be breaking
confidence if you were to tell me your full name and current address?”

Chris hesitated then recited both.

“Where do you work, Mr. Bellamere?”

“You ought to know that, you had your men drag me
out of there just now.”

“It’s for the record. Don’t worry, your lawyer
will get to hear the whole thing once he gets here.”

Chris sighed. “I work for DataTEK Systems, in
Studio City, on Moorpark.”

“And how long have you worked there, sir?”

“Six years.”

“And what exactly do you do at DataTEK Systems?”

Something niggled into Chris’s mind. Martinez was
being too nice. What was up? “What is it you people think I did? I’m telling
you right now, you’re wrong—”

“Don’t worry about that right now.” As well as
recording the conversation, Martinez took notes. “Demanding job?”

“It can be...”

“What sort of hours you keep in a job like that?”

“I’m on call,” Chris said. “Someone wants me, they
call.”

“Doesn’t leave much time for a social life.”
Martinez’s muddy brown eyes met Chris’s, measuring, weighing. “Or girlfriends.”

Chris cracked a smile. “Sorry, wrong sex. Didn’t
we do this already?”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m gay, remember? I have boyfriends.”

Without changing expression Martinez scribbled
something down. “Got one now?”

“No.”

“Playing the field?”

“You could say that.” Chris thought of David and
wondered if this guy even had a clue about his partner. “You didn’t bring me
down here to ask about my work habits or my bedroom partners, so what is it,
Detective?”