Three Shirt Deal (2008) (6 page)

"Near as I can tell, it was over a six-pack of Bud Light that Church and Hickman bought that afternoon."

I told her about the trip to the mini-mart, the two arguments with Olivia, and about Tru being on Antabuse. I ended by explaining how Mrs. Hickman threw a rock and hit Church in the chest, and how they left because the cops were called.

"It sure ain't Leave it to Beaver," she said as she finished the last of her margarita and looked up. "A six-pack of beer, huh? Not much of a motive."

"Rage was the motive," I said. "The six-pack of Bud Light was just a trigger. I've been worried about the twenty knife wounds. That kind of extreme overkill would seem to indicate a close relationship like with a son, but Tru said Church was on anabolic steroids. If he was popping Amies and having 'roid rage, then maybe the overkill actually fits him as well. I don't know."

Our combo plate dinners arrived, along with a second round of margaritas. I love margaritas, but two is definitely my limit, especially when I'm with a beautiful woman who isn't my wife.

Secada smiled and took a sip. "Mamacita, yo amo Cuervo Gold."

"Aye, Chihuahua," I smiled back.

We both dug into the huge enchilada-taco-burrito-and-bean dinners. She ate like it was serious business, holding her knife and fork like instruments of war--nothing dainty about Secada at meal time.

"So, what're we gonna do with this buncha pendejos?" she asked between bites.

"We got two doors here. Door One is we go check out Mike Church. See what kind of slime trail he's leaving behind him these days. Or we can go talk to the District Attorney who pled the case. Get the state's version of what happened."

She thought about it for a minute. "How much cover is your wife going to give us?" she asked.

"I haven't talked to her."

"Don't you think you should? I mean, Captain Sasso took this off the board. If you and I ask the wrong questions of the wrong guy, this could snap up on us and we'll both be facing an internal review. If that happens we'll need Lieutenant Scully to shut it down."

"I'll tell her when or if I feel we need to."

"Look, Shane, I don't mean to tell you how to deal with your wife, but that's a mistake."

"Drop it, okay?" Our eyes locked for a moment. I wasn't about to get into Alexa's problems with her.

"The only real reason I came to you was because of her."

"I thought it was because of my huge cajones."

"I've been ordered off this case. If we go to Tito Morales and he makes a call to check on why, we'll be in deep grease."

"Tito who?"

"Morales. He's the D
. A
. who pled the case out for the State."

"The Tito Morales?"

"Yeah. But don't let it panic you. He's my carnal." She grinned and pointed to my plate with her knife. "The guy eats burritos just like us."

"We're talking about the lead prosecutor for the whole damn Valley? Tito Morales? The guy who runs the Van Nuys D
. A
.'s office?"

"It's why I think it's a good idea to have your wife riding shotgun."

"Why didn't you tell me that up front? According to the L
. A
. Times, he's planning a run at the mayor's job in two months and has a great chance of winning."

"Mexicans are eventually gonna run everything around here." She grinned at me. "Look out, Scully; you might have to get a Green Card yourself one day soon."

I sat looking at her for a long time, trying to digest this.

"Don't worry. Yo hablo espanol. Better still, I understand the culture." She was still smiling.

"I'm glad you find this funny," I said. "It kinda explains a lot of this other stuff though. It explains why Jane Sasso pulled Townsend and Summers into that meeting to convince you to drop the case. Since Tito Morales cut the plea deal, and since he's the front-runner for the mayor's office, he undoubtedly won't want it to come out two months before the election that he sent a guy up on an incomplete investigation. He probably called Sasso when he heard you were looking into it."

"Shane, I don't think the pressure is coming from him. He's a Democrat. Cops are mostly all Republicans. It's Plain Jane's doing. She's from the Dark Side. That woman is Darth Vader in sensible shoes. For all we know, Townsend and Summers were in her office on something else and for sport, she just let 'em sit in on my beat-down."

"Get some rearview mirrors, lady, or you're gonna get run over by an I
. A
. dump truck."

"This Hickman one-eighty-seven is a nothing case. Even if Church was the doer, it's still just some gang-affiliated tow truck driver who killed a supermarket checker. Despite Morales, this isn't the kind of case that gets the sixth floor's attention."

"But even still, you think my wife needs to be involved to protect us? You're not being honest with me." She shrugged. I continued. "Brian Devine's head of Van Nuys Homicide. Tito Morales is head of the Van Nuys prosecutor's office. This is starting to sound like a lot more than some tweaker murder over a six-pack of beer."

"I thought you were supposed to be a White Knight--a walk-alone who wants to get it right and doesn't sweat the fallout."

"That's the Disney movie," I said. "In the Miramax version I shit my pants and run like a rabbit."

"Okay, look. You don't want to alert Morales. I think you're wrong, but let's say I buy into that for the moment. So let's finish dinner and then go check door number one. Mike Church is a criminal dirtbag, so he won't call the police to complain."

"How did you last in PSB for three years being this naive?"

She looked angry, almost fierce. "My parents came from a country where the government is basically corrupt. My uncle disappeared into prison and never came out. My papa calls the Mexican government a criminal organization posing as a government. There's graft and corruption everywhere. My parents came across the border as braceros. They got their citizenship status under the Reagan eight-one amnesty. This country is a much, much better place than anywhere else. Better because Americans don't look the other way when there's injustice. Remember what Edmund Burke said. 'All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.' "

"Let me write that down. It might work on my IRS review." "Make fun if you want, but I love this country. I love what it stands for. I love police work because I believe in the principles of the law. I know that sounds corny, but my family came from a place where evil reigns and good people did nothing. I don't want that to happen here. If you want to preserve what we've got, you gotta take on the shitty ones, Shane. You gotta fight evil one case at a time."

We sat looking at each other. I wasn't sure whether to laugh, cry, or just give her a raspberry.

"Mike Church," I finally said. "That's what you wanta do?" "Let's go brace the motherfucker."

Chapter
7.

ON THE WAY OUT TO CHURCH'S HOUSE IN NORTH VAN NUYS, Secada and I reviewed his five-page rap sheer, which she'd just handed me. He'd been raised in the north end of the Valley, but a lot of his early crimes took place at "Tragic Magic," which was LAPD speak for Six Flags Magic Mountain, a notorious gang hangout. At the tender age of eleven, this guy was already getting busted for aggravated assault, throwing down on line-cutters out there.

The Gang Squad had him getting jumped into the Vanowen Street Locos at fifteen. The VSLs were a particularly violent, Hispanic gang that worked the corners around Vanowen Street and Gloria in Van Nuys. That neighborhood was a drug corridor and the Locos sold more bags of rock than McDonald's sold bags of fries. According to his rap sheet, Mike Church had been doing more than just making Tru Hickman's life suck. He made everybody's life hell.

Most gang members are in it for the relatively easy money or to clique up for protection. The membership quickly separates into several criminal levels. At the low end are the 7-El
even beer run bandits who clout refreshments for weeken
d p
artying and chase girls. Next come the purse snatchers and car jackers, then the narcotics dealers with their crew of lookouts and runners. The very top of the criminal pyramid was where you found the designated hitters--guys who were called in to make blood flow--retribution killers and assassination shooters.

By the age of seventeen, Miguel Iglesia, aka Mike Church, had been busted three times on aggravated assault and twice for suspicion of murder, but the Van Nuys D
. A
. had been unable to put either murder beef on him. All of this court and street action had only resulted in a short stretch at the California Youth Authority.

In his file under "Unusual Hobbies" the gang squad had noted that he liked to ride Colossus, the big wooden roller-coaster out at Magic Mountain.

His booking photo showed a glowering, thick-necked, twenty
-
five-year-old with pockmarked skin and a black Brillo pad-textured moustache and beard.

We pulled up in front of Church's house on Califa Street in Van Nuys, a mostly Hispanic neighborhood. The houses were old and half the residents had elected to park the family cars on their front lawn.

Scout and I sat across the street in my Acura, which was beginning to feel like a pearl button on a work shirt. Young men in lowered vintage Fords and Chevys drove by and hungrily scoped my ride.

"Whatta we do?" Secada asked, looking at Church's rundown house, which was old and large, with weed-choked flowerbeds.

"Let's run some of these plates," I replied. "I always like to get the player roster before getting in a game."

We started picking out tag numbers from the five or six cars parked in front of Church's house and on his lawn. I fe
d t
hem to Scout who had the dash mike from my Rover in her hand.

"Wants, warrants, and DMV on Adam-Sierra-Ida-six-six-five." Seconds later the records division spit back a name.

"Jose Diego," the RTO said. "Six-sixty-four Woodman Avenue, Van Nuys. Jose Diego has outstanding warrants for failure to appear, unlawful detention, and assault."

The RTO went on to report that Diego's gang name was "Torch." His gang affiliation, the Vanowen Street Locos. It went on like that. Most of the cars that we ran showed owners with paper pending. One belonged to a guy named Tyler Cisneros who our records department said was a VSL shot caller with the street name "Little Loco." It seemed Mike Church's crib was a gang hookup. I didn't want to just call for more cops and arrest these people, even though some had outstanding warrants, because that would put both of us in big trouble with Jane Sasso. It would also close down this thread in our investigation. So it seemed this teepee full of veteranos was going to get a temporary pass.

Some kind of sports car was parked in the drive under a car cover. It looked low and expensive. The cover couldn't quite hide the vehicle's wide stance and elegant design.

"Wonder what the hell that is?" I pointed at the car. "Looks expensive. Whatta ya bet it's stolen. Can you make out the plate?"

"Nope. Want me to go ever there and check it out?"

"Better let me do it."

"This is a Mexican block. Your Wonder Bread ass won't last ten seconds. I'll do my homegirl thing."

"In a designer pantsuit. Good luck with that."

She started to roll up the legs on her expensive tan pants and took off her scarf. Then she stripped off her tan jacket, showing a white silk shirt with a pointed collar. "You got a raincoat or anything in the back?"

"Yeah, but its EPA rating is beyond biohazard."

"The grimier, the better."

I went around back and got it while she folded her scarf into a bandana then tied it over her head. She put on the rumpled raincoat I gave her, then leaned over the seat and started digging around in the back. I had a paper shopping bag back there that we'd used when we bought Chooch's school books from USC last week. She took it and stuffed her suit jacket inside.

Then she turned and looked at me. "Te gustan mis ropas, sehor

It was an amazing transformation. In seconds, she had turned herself from Jennifer Lopez into a Mission Street cholla.

"See ya in a minute. Stay in the car," she cautioned, then crossed the street and limped down the block. I watched her sneak onto Church's property, and slip across his brown lawn toward the low car in the driveway. She knelt down behind the vehicle and pulled up the car cover, exposing the plate. As she was writing down the tag number, the front door to the house was suddenly thrown open, and four tattooed guys wearing wife-beater tees and head-wraps ran out, screaming at her.

The lead guy had to be Mike Church. He was a hulking six
-
foot-three steroid case who weighed over three hundred pounds. His basketball-size head sat low on water buffalo shoulders.

"The fuck you think you're doin'?" Church screamed and grabbed Secada by the collar of my grimy raincoat, yanking her to her feet.

"LAPD. Back off, asshole!" I heard her scream, but in the next second they had thrown her to the ground. Her prop bag with her wadded-up suit jacket fell open as they proned her out face down in the dirt.