The Lost Witness (31 page)

“Do you live here?” Rhodes asked.

Washington pointed to apartment 101. “Right there,” he said.

“What about Poole’s? What’s the layout like?”

“Same as mine, twelve floors up.”

“Would you mind if we had a look at your place?”

Washington shrugged. “No problem at all.”

Lena realized that Rhodes was anticipating trouble. He wouldn’t have made the request otherwise. Poole was obviously lethal—someone living on the edge who hadn’t just murdered
Jennifer McBride, but cut her up. Mapping the layout of his place before they got there was the smart move. They entered Washington’s apartment and stepped into a small foyer. To the left was
the living room, to the right, a long hallway to what looked like a den. Rhodes held the door open, blocking the view down the hall and turned to Lena.

“The door hinges on the right and opens in,” he said.

Lena got it. Doorways were called
vertical coffins
for good reason. That’s where you were most vulnerable. That’s were the highest risk was. Passing through them.

“He’ll be in the den,” she said. “Behind the front door.”

Rhodes met her eyes and nodded. When he turned to Washington, his voice was calm and easy and didn’t betray his emotions.

“You said you talk to Poole once in a while. You were in Vietnam, right? You trade stories.”

“Not very often, but once in a while, yes.”

“Do you know if he owns a gun?”

“As a matter of fact, he’s got several. So do I. But I think you guys got it wrong. Albert’s a war hero. And he’s the quiet type. Doesn’t bother people and keeps to
himself.”

“I’m sure you’re right,” Lena said. “What kind of guns does he keep, and how many are there?”

“He’s only shown me three or four, ma’am.”

“What kind?”

“He’s got a Spencer Repeating Carbine and a flintlock pistol, but both of them are mounted on the wall and behind glass.”

Lena met the man’s eyes. “What else?”

“A Mossberg shotgun and a Glock .40 pistol with a fifteen-round magazine. The shotgun’s an autoloader. I think he keeps it underneath his bed. The Glock’s in a drawer by the
front door.”

“That’s it?” Rhodes asked.

“He collects knives. Mostly from the Civil War. He’s got a lot of them.”

Lena and Rhodes traded looks, then made a sweep through the rest of Washington’s apartment. The hall to the right led to a den, then turned left. They passed two bedrooms on their right
before the hall made another left, feeding them into the dining area and kitchen, then returning to the living room, foyer and front door. The floor plan was essentially a loop. The only other way
in or out was the slider leading to the balcony off the living room.

“How’s his furniture set?” Lena asked.

“Same as mine and everybody else’s,” Washington said. “The place is built so it only really fits one way.”

Lena glanced at the couch and chairs, noting the walking lanes. Then Rhodes ran out to the car and brought back two vests.

They followed Washington into the elevator. When they reached the twelfth floor, the building manager pointed at apartment 1201 and stepped back around the corner. Lena and Rhodes approached and
took each side of the door. They drew their guns and looked at each other. She could see the fire in his eyes. The life in his face. Through the door she could hear Poole talking with the TV going
in the background. It sounded like he was on the phone. His voice was high-pitched, his cadence awkward and crazy. As she readied herself, she felt the rush of adrenaline swell through her body and
bit her lip.

On Rhodes signal, she knocked on the door.

Poole immediately stopped talking. She could hear the patter of bare feet moving toward the door. She kept her eyes on the light feeding through the peephole, then looked back at Rhodes after it
went dark.

“Who is it?” Poole shouted. “Show yourself. Why are you hiding out there?”

He sounded frightened and pounded on the door.

“Police,” Lena said. “We’d like to speak with you, Albert.”

He didn’t set the phone down. He dropped it on the floor. Then Lena heard him pull open a drawer, followed by the unmistakable sound of the man jacking the slide on his Glock.

“About what?” he screamed. “Why me? Why are you fucking with me?”

It wasn’t going well. Lena watched Rhodes turn back to the building manager peeking around the corner.

“Something’s wrong with him,” Washington said. “That’s not the way he usually sounds.”

Rhodes grimaced. “Toss over the keys. Then go downstairs and call nine-one-one. Don’t come back.”

Washington dug a key ring out of his pocket, removed two and slid them across the floor. When they heard the elevator doors shut, Rhodes spoke up.

“Come on, Poole. Calm down. All we want to do is talk.”

Poole slammed another fist into the door. “How many of you are out there? Why are you whispering? How will I know who you are? Show me your ID.”

“I’m gonna do it, Poole. I’m gonna do it right now. Are you looking through the peephole?”

“Show me your ID.”

Rhodes stayed to the side of the door and didn’t move. “Here I go.”

Lena zeroed in on that peephole, saw the light come back, and heard the sound of the Glock firing. Three rounds burst through the wood, ripping through the wall into the elevator shaft behind
them. She could hear Poole screaming at them and running away.

She grabbed the keys and hit the locks. Still on his knees, Rhodes inched the door open with his gun. Then three more shots rang out, drilling through the wood at chest level into the living
room wall. Rhodes gave her a look and took a deep breath, then scurried into the foyer on his knees. When Lena followed, she slammed the door behind her and caught a glimpse of Poole rushing out of
the den toward the bedrooms. It was more of blur than anything else. And the man was still screaming, still out of his skin.

They raised their guns and started down the hall, pausing at the corner. The two bedrooms were on the right. He could be in either one, or he could have run around the loop, hoping to hit them
from behind. Lena slipped into the den, spotted Poole in the second doorway, and fired two rounds into the near wall, knowing that her .45 would punch out the other side at head level. The sound of
her .45 was louder than the Glock. More menacing and primitive. She met Rhodes’s eyes and waited a beat. If Poole hadn’t moved before she fired, he was dead.

“You there?” Rhodes called out. “You still with us, Poole?”

Poole lunged out of the bedroom doorway, his pistol flashing as he zigzagged down the hall and around the corner. He was laughing now. Cackling. Lena bolted down the hallway, ducking into the
bedroom. As she looked around and turned back to the door, Rhodes slid into the bathroom across the hall. She heard Poole slam another mag into his gun as her eyes flicked around the bedroom. She
had seen something when she first entered, but it hadn’t registered. She found it on the bed. A bag from a pharmacy. She opened it and dumped out the contents, revealing too many meds to
count.

She turned back, eased into the hallway and peeked around the corner. She didn’t see Poole, and figured that he might be hiding in the kitchen. But when she looked behind Rhodes toward the
den, she saw the light change on the wall and ran back down the hall. He was coming in from behind, ready with a full load. Lena started firing before she even turned the corner. Punching out the
plaster in the wall, rounding the bend, holding up.

She could see Poole backing out onto the balcony. She caught the grim smile on his face, his zombie eyes. He lowered his gun, grabbed hold of the railing, and jumped up onto the wall. As he
turned to fire, their eyes met and he started laughing again. Then he lost his balance and began to teeter. His grin vanished, his face flushed with fear. Lena saw his gun drop onto the floor and
then Poole disappeared.

She heard a woman scream. Heard glass shattering followed by a heavy thump. Sirens approaching in the distance.

Running out onto the balcony, she looked over the edge with Rhodes. By all appearances, Albert Poole, aka Nathan Good, wouldn’t be shedding any light on the case. He wouldn’t be
answering many questions, or telling them who had hired him. What was left of his body was lying on the grass twelve stories down. And the ride hadn’t been very easy. It looked like he had
hit the glass ceiling in the lobby and bounced off the steel beams into the front yard.

They rushed downstairs, Lena feeling the heat now. They raced through the lobby and onto the lawn. Washington was already outside, standing over Poole’s body and shaking his head.

“He was a war hero,” the vet was whispering. “A fucking war hero, for Christ’s sake. One of the guys who made it back and got treated like shit. It’s a disgrace.
You hear me? It’s a fucking disgrace.”

Lena moved in and gazed at the body. The ground was soft from all the rain over the past month and Poole had sunk a good six inches into the soil. But as she studied his face—examined it
from less than a foot away—she was overcome with a horrible feeling. She looked at Rhodes, who didn’t seem to understand. Cops were running up the sidewalk. People crowding in to
gawk.

Lena flashed her badge at the cops. “You need to get these people out of here.” She glanced at Washington, then turned back. “Him, too.”

Rhodes nudged her. “What is it?” he whispered. “What’s wrong?”

“You said a doctor made the ID and called it in. Did you talk to him?”

Rhodes shook his head.

“Who brought this to you? Barrera or the sixth floor?”

“Chief Logan’s office,” he said. “Klinger came down while you were in the room with Tremell. He briefed us and gave me those photographs.”

She shook her head and felt the burn. The terror. Then she dug into Poole’s pocket and fished out the dead man’s keys.

“Come on,” she said. “Hurry.”

She led the way down to the garage, ripped the door open and peered through the darkness. There were too many cars. Too many SUVs. Too much gloom to fight through. She hit the clicker, disabling
the car’s alarm, and turned when she heard the chirp. As her eyes locked in on Poole’s car, she knew that she was staring into the abyss again. Tasting its rotten fruit. It wasn’t
a red Hummer. Instead, it was a ten-year-old Toyota Camry parked in the far corner.

Now a war hero was dead.

I
t was just before midnight.
The marine layer had rolled in, low and thick and burying the City of Angels in the clouds.
Rhodes was wheeling the Crown Vic back to Parker Center so that Lena could pick up her car. Forty-five miles an hour on the Hollywood Freeway. It felt like they were alone on the road. Just those
occasional beams of light zipping by like UFOs, the sound dampened by the heavy steam.

“It’s my fault,” Lena whispered. “You were away. You didn’t know.”

“It’s not your fault or my fault. It’s Klinger’s.”

“I should’ve paid more attention,” she said. “I lost my focus.”

“Klinger did this, Lena. And he should pay for it.”

Lena slipped her hand into her pocket and wrapped it around the pack of cigarettes she bought Sunday night. She wouldn’t light one. She’d save that for later. It was enough just to
know that they were there.

She turned and looked at Rhodes. “Klinger won’t pay for this, Stan. The chief won’t, either. That’s not the way it’ll work.”

“Then how the hell is it gonna work?”

She paused for a moment. She had spent the last three hours grappling with it. Seeing what happened for what it was and what it would be. They had searched Poole’s apartment and found
things—medals, honors, remembrances. But it was the letters they recovered from his desk that told the real story and defined the man. Letters written by soldiers whom Poole had risked his
own life to save. Letters from their wives and parents, their husbands and children. A diary that he’d started after a roadside bomb wounded more than a hundred civilians and Poole was the
only one at the scene with medical experience. Poole had been a combat surgeon with enormous talent, but also a medic in the field. He was someone who gave it his all, but then buckled under the
strain. Someone who had given, then given even more until he reached the point where he needed something back. But no one answered the call. No one lent him a helping hand. All they did was write
scripts and feed him more pills.

Lena let the thought go, staring into the wall of fog but not seeing it.

“One of two things are going to happen,” she whispered from a place deep inside herself.

“What things?”

“They’re going to say that we cleared the case tonight. That we got our man. That Albert Poole was Nathan Good and everything ends with him. Poole will take the fall so there
won’t be any reason to pursue Fontaine, or Justin Tremell, or whoever’s put the fix in with the chief and the DA. They’re gonna close the case, Stan. It’s either that or
they’re gonna say that I’m the one who totally fucked things up. That I killed a war hero tonight without justification. A man who helped others and didn’t deserve to die.
It’ll be one or the other or some combination of both. Either way, the chief can do whatever he wants to me now.”

Her voice faded into the muted sound of the Crown Vic cruising through the clouds. Floating in the dark mist. After a long moment, Rhodes broke the silence, his voice barely audible.

“Poole may have been a war hero, Lena. But we didn’t start shooting. He did. And Klinger probably knew enough about the guy to guess that he would.”

Lena didn’t say anything, even though she agreed that Klinger and Chief Logan had done their homework. The setup had been perfect. Barrera had warned her on the first call. She had known
that something was coming all week. And when it finally did, she missed it. Now an innocent man, however troubled, was dead.

“What’s important,” she said, “is that you need to distance yourself from me.”

“That’s not gonna happen.”

“Yes, it is. You’re gonna keep your job and let me take the fall. And you’re gonna stay away from Klinger.”