by Thomas Perry
“Simple,” he said. He opened the two disks, removed the flat coin-like batteries, and threw them into the waste receptacle, and then lifted the hammer on his workbench and crushed the plastic disks and swept them into the trash too. He hammered the flat black transmitter, tugged the wires off, and dropped it into the trash with the others.
“Thanks,” she said.
He looked at her, squinting slightly for the answer to come. “I don’t suppose you’d like to go to breakfast before you take off?”
She smiled but shook her head. “I’m sorry. Maybe next trip.”
“Yeah,” he said. He pulled the car out of the garage and left it running with the driver’s door open. “Good luck. Drive carefully.”
She pulled back onto Main Street and then returned to I-15 North toward Las Vegas. She turned onto Route 58 and drove across the desert through Hinkley, Four Corners, Boron, and Mojave as though she were headed for Bakersfield, and then down the Antelope Valley Freeway into Santa Clarita. From there, it was a thirty-minute drive into the northern San Fernando Valley and down into her neighborhood in Van Nuys.
There had definitely been people after her, but who were they? Were they just guys from Stubbs’s trucking warehouse watching her for a chance to steal back the purchase money from the last haul, or a couple of L.A. cops? It wouldn’t be the first time L.A. police had followed drivers across the state line just to see what they were up to. What she was hoping most fervently was that it didn’t have anything to do with the murders at the Kavanagh house.
She weighed possibilities. If the cops had become aware of Elle Stowell, they would certainly try to find her. They would begin showing people her photograph, probably the one on her driver’s license. Since she’d never been arrested they wouldn’t have another. Maybe somebody would say to the cop, “Yes, I know her. Her name is L,” short for whatever Elle had told the person. Would any of them know her real last name? Very few. And none of them would know the false name she had used to buy her house in Van Nuys.
The car she was driving was a problem, no matter what. Somebody had seen her car the night after she’d found the three bodies and followed her. The followers had waited for her while she had tossed a house. She had led them on a chase to Studio City, where they’d gotten stuck in the alley. And her car was where somebody had just planted transponders in Las Vegas.
When she reached her house she opened the garage door with the remote control, drove into the garage, and closed it behind her. She walked around to the back of her car to retrieve the money she had hidden in the battery compartment under the trunk. The sudden attention worried her. Somebody seemed to be stalking her.
It was time to get started on her long vacation.
7
Elle was exhausted, but she didn’t sleep in her bed that night. She built an effigy woman out of a stuffed sweatshirt, a wig, and a plastic skull she’d bought for a Halloween party and arranged the sheets and pillows to make the effigy seem to be asleep. She went from room to room in her house placing things in particular positions so she would be able to tell later whether anyone had visited while she was away. She balanced hairs on the tops of doors as she shut them. She poured a little hill of baby powder on the palm of her hand and blew it into a film on the hardwood floor at the foot of each doorway.
She put everything she believed she would need—the money from her sales trip, the Rohrbaugh R9 and its spare loaded magazines, her three sets of identification, her passport, and her second phone—into a black shoulder bag, locked the doors and windows, and walked out the back door.
Elle left her car in her garage, walked to an office building on Ventura Boulevard full of doctors’ offices, and used her phone to signal for a Lyft ride. Her driver, Kassim, was polite, and he was quiet. He took her to Wilshire Boulevard near Sharon’s apartment building.
Sharon lived in a brownish brick building about three blocks east of the tall towers of Park La Brea. It was a place that appealed to young people who didn’t mind paying too much rent so they could live in this central, relatively safe, and pleasant neighborhood.
She went to the door and pressed the button for Sharon’s apartment a couple of times, but Sharon didn’t spring into action to let her in. She dialed Sharon’s phone number, but Sharon didn’t answer. Elle left a message.
Elle went down the front steps and walked along the sidewalk, studying Sharon’s building. The functional structures of modern buildings were largely the same, from the concrete-and-rebar foundations to the plumbing, heating, and cooling to the roof. A burglar didn’t see a building the same way other people did. Every building had ways in and out that a thief could find and exploit. Nothing was impenetrable or invincible. These buildings weren’t designed to be. She only had to look at a building closely and the barriers seemed to fall away.
If there was glass, Elle could remove, cut, or break it. Even if there were bars, some of them were too far apart to keep her out, and others had safety mechanisms intended to release them in case of fire that she could reach and a larger person couldn’t. She could open most door locks with a bump key, she could pick a lock or a padlock in a minute or two, and she could jimmy most latches with a pocketknife. Many vents and air-conditioning systems on big buildings had air ducts that she could open and enter. And she knew that no opening that wasn’t intended to accommodate a person was wired into an alarm system. She knew that roofs of large buildings often had hatches and openings that weren’t well protected from a person who was limber enough to climb a fire escape or a drainpipe.
The apartments between Wilshire and Third Street were all within easy walking distance of the La Brea Tar Pits, the Page Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Farmers Market, and rows of shops and restaurants, so there were usually plenty of people on foot during daylight, but in the evening most people were in cars, so she kept close to the lighted entrances of apartment buildings as she explored.
During her walk-around she enumerated practical ways into Sharon’s building—the laundry room’s badly fitted utility door, a balcony she could reach from the thick limb of a tree, a hall window left unlatched, an underground garage gate that didn’t close fully—but then she saw something better, a group of five people, a carload, arriving at the curb near the front door. They were all in their twenties, three women and two men. One of the women punched the intercom button that Elle had tried, said something, and grasped the door handle. As the lock buzzed and she tugged the door open, Elle began to move.
She timed her arrival to coincide with the entry of the last two people, a man and a woman who had hung back two steps to end a conversation. Each one’s eyes were on the other’s. She slipped in, nearly touching the back of the man as she sidestepped in past the closing door. They were still talking and distracted, so nobody wondered about the woman who came in behind him.
While the others gathered to wait for the elevator Elle stepped to the stairwell and was gone. When she reached Sharon’s door she already had the right bump key out and opened the door faster than Sharon could have with a key that had all the proper teeth.
She turned on the lights, took off her jacket, hung it up, turned the lights off again, and lay on the couch. She had come with the idea that the two of them would launch their trip from here. She had traveled with Sharon before, but not often, and never for any business reason. She was a burglar, and burglars who didn’t work alone tended to get caught. The only human endeavors she could think of that worked better with a partner were riding a teeter-totter and sex. They would have to talk about risks and plan carefully before they left.
As she lay in the silence and darkness, her day caught up with her. Driving home from Las Vegas after half sleeping in her car had left her tired, so she allowed herself to sleep.
Hours later she heard footsteps in Sharon’s stretch of hallway. She was alarmed for only a second, until her ear for interpreting movement in the dark told her the person’s weight was closer to 120 than 240 and that the new a
rrival was alone.
Sharon swung the door open, flipped on the light switch, jumped, and gave a squeak that had probably been the start of a scream that she stifled when she recognized Elle. “It’s you. You scared the hell out of me.”
“I’m sorry,” said Elle. “I called you, but you weren’t answering. I hoped you’d get my message.”
“What are you up to?”
“I seem to have picked up a couple of followers in Las Vegas, so I needed a safe place to sleep tonight. Nobody knows I’m here and I left my car at home, so we can sleep without worrying.”
Sharon moved away from the door. “I wasn’t worrying until you said that. If you’ll give me a few hours to sleep, I’ll pack when I get up and we can go right away.”
“Good night.”
They didn’t see each other again until afternoon. When Sharon padded out into her living room barefoot and in pajamas, Elle was sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee and reading news on her telephone. She smiled at Sharon, who frowned and held up a finger in a “wait” sign, found herself a cup, poured coffee into it, and sipped. Then she sat down and sipped it again. “Good morning.”
Elle said, “Good morning. Have a nice evening?”
“Not really. I had a date with Andrew Horan. You know him, right?”
“Slightly. I see him around. I’ve never dated him, maybe because he never asked.”
“He’s a guy who keeps buying drinks every five minutes, so they line up like soldiers until you’d die if you tried to drink them. I told him to stop. He said, ‘Alcohol makes you less inhibited.’ I said, ‘I’m not inhibited, I just don’t like you enough to want to do anything with you.’ I guess alcohol makes you more honest too.”
“I guess,” said Elle.
“So I guess I’d better get packed up to flee the city.”
“We’d better think this through,” Elle said.
“Any thoughts you can share?”
“I was thinking about the City and County of Los Angeles.”
“What about it—or them?”
“I’m as much a part of the fauna of L.A. as the ants and the coyotes. I know more of it than anybody but some old man retired from the post office.”
“You’re right,” said Sharon. “You’re like every one of those things.”
“What?”
“Pests and cranky old men.”
“I’m serious. I have advantages here. I know my way around. I’ve been plundering the residential neighborhoods of this city for half my life. Being comfortable here might have made me overconfident. We need a plan.”
“Are you saying you’re not quite ready to leave?”
“I don’t know. There are ten million people in Los Angeles County. It’s got more people than any of the forty-two least populous states. It’s bigger than Sweden or Hungary or Austria or Switzerland.”
“You carry that info around in your head?”
“No, I carry a phone around in my pocket. It helps to have facts when you want to know something.”
“What are you saying?”
“Since I got up this morning I’ve admitted to myself that I’m in worse trouble than I had allowed myself to believe. I had been clinging to the concept that since I don’t know anything and didn’t do anything, nobody would track me down and hurt me. But some people already chased me from a house in Trousdale Estates and other people chased me home from Las Vegas.”
“Those sound like two good reasons to leave town.”
“I think they are,” Elle said. “I think I’ve got to go. But I’m not sure it’s a good idea for you to go with me. I don’t want to drag you into danger. I can’t do that to anybody, let alone my best friend.”
“I’m not afraid,” said Sharon. “We can do it carefully. We’ll pick out a destination that’s even safer than L.A. We’ll get reservations for everything we do, pack smart, and make sure it’s not too obvious that we’re running away. Maybe we could fly out of another city.”
“That sounds smart.”
“Perfect,” said Sharon. “We’ll stick with Australia as the main destination, and we’ll spend a day just thinking and planning how we’re going to get there and where we’ll go.”
“A whole day?”
“Well, I was just thinking your new cautious attitude was better because I have a date with Peter, and I like Peter.”
“When? Tonight?”
“I’m meeting him at the Pity when he’s off work. We’ll go in my car, and when he and I are ready to leave, you can drive my car back here and go to sleep. I’ll be home later.”
“Sharon, I wasn’t kidding about my problem. I’m really starting to get worried about whatever’s happening. Having people see you and me together could get you in trouble.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. If people are after you, they’ll be looking for you in your car, not mine, which they’ve never seen. And they won’t be looking in the Pity—one of a million bars in L.A., and not a nice one. New customers only come in if their cars break down and they want to use the phone.”
“There isn’t any phone. The booth is still there because it’s a quaint relic.”
“To use the bathrooms then,” Sharon said. “Either way, we’re perfectly safe. Newcomers to the Pity are rare, lost, and clueless.”
8
That night when Elle arrived at the Pity with Sharon, there were already a few people she knew. Desiree, who served as barmaid only when things were busy, was tending bar.
She said, “L, I need to talk to you as soon as I get your drinks.”
Elle ordered the drinks for herself and Sharon, and then Alan Grober appeared at Elle’s elbow.
He said to Desiree, “I’ll have a Corona.”
Elle said, “You might as well put that on my tab too, Desiree.”
Grober said, “Thank you, L.” He leaned close to her to say it, something Elle didn’t like much, because like everyone who did that, he towered over her so she had to look up. He said, “Does paying mean you like me?”
“No, it means I’m talking to somebody, and if I pay, you don’t have to stick around to do it.”
When he moved off down the bar, Desiree said quietly, “You know, L, I think some people have been looking for you the past couple of nights.”
“What kind of people?”
“Two guys and a woman. Late thirties or early forties, but trying to give off a younger impression. All three tall and in shape. The men had hair that was like the same haircut twice—short but not shaved or anything. The woman’s was dyed blond, cut just at the bottom of the neck, so it looked kind of mannish too.”
“Why don’t you just say cops?”
“I can’t be sure. Cops are dressed like they bought four suits for one amazing low, low price in a closeout sale, or they slouch around in slob disguises. These weren’t like either. They were neat and pressed, so it was like it was two guys on a date, but with one woman. And it’s still the shoes that give cops away. She was wearing high heels.”
“Interesting,” said Elle. “They just came in and asked about me? Did they have a picture of me?”
“No. They asked and then went outside. They were watching the parking lot last night. I saw the woman shoot a few pictures with her phone out there.”
“Of what?”
“The parking lot, about the angle of the license plates, but with special attention to small dark gray cars.”
“And because of the gray cars, you think they were looking for me?”
“Not entirely. They were describing you to people and asking who fitted the description. They cornered me while I was tending bar. They were asking me, they said, because the woman they wanted to find looked small and young. They were sure I must have checked your ID before I served you anything. Did I happen to remember the name on your license?”
“That really does sound like cops, though. When were you going to tell me this?” Elle asked.
“After I got your drinks,” Desiree said. “No sense i
n giving you unpleasant news before you’ve even had a drink.”
“Very civilized,” Elle said. “I should get out of here.”
The door at the back opened and three young women filed in. They were attractive, black-haired, and slim. Their faces shared a similar triangular shape, and they all had the same light green cats’ eyes. “Hey,” said the first one. “L. There were some friends of yours in here asking about you last night. Did they find you?”
“It turned out they wanted somebody else,” Elle said. Elle had always had a good time with the Simmons sisters, but she never quite trusted them. She had seen them in another bar one night when a male friend they’d been flirting with passed out. They had gone through his wallet to get money for their next round of drinks. Elle was a thief, but she didn’t steal from friends.
A moment later, Sharon’s date Peter came in the front door, strode across the wooden floor to Sharon, and kissed her on the cheek before he looked at the others. “Hi, everybody.” He was tall and thin with coal-black hair and a smile that was open and sincere.
Sharon and Elle smiled and said, “Hi,” in a tone that to Elle sounded disturbingly similar, and Peter edged his way to the bar on Sharon’s other side. Elle tipped her head close to Sharon’s ear. “Time to give me your keys.”
“Really?” said Sharon. “This early?”
“That was the deal. Peter will take you home.”
“Absolutely,” Peter said. “Not right away, though. I just got off work.”
Sharon fished for the keys in her purse. She slipped them to Elle. “See you later. Don’t wait up.”
Elle slipped money to Desiree, patted Peter’s arm, and kept going out the back door. She went out to the parking lot and got into Sharon’s car. It occurred to her that if she and Sharon left in the next couple of days she didn’t want to leave her fingerprints in the car, so she wore gloves while she drove back to Sharon’s apartment. She parked Sharon’s car in the underground garage and then went upstairs to watch movies on television. Elle hated crime stories because they seemed too much like work and hated horror because her livelihood depended on not being afraid of the dark, but she liked romantic comedies. After two A.M., when the bars in L.A. had closed, she decided that Sharon and Peter weren’t coming to the apartment, so she felt justified in sleeping in Sharon’s bed instead of on the couch.
