by Ace Atkins
“How long has she been out?” Charlotte said.
“About twelve hours.”
“Any change?”
“Has she rebuked all things Joe Haldorn and HELIOS?” I said.
Charlotte nodded and toyed with some fringe on the shawl.
“Nope,” I said. “She’s intent on getting back to the party.”
“Shit on a stick.”
“That’s about the tall and short of it.”
“Oh, God,” she said. “I don’t know if I can do this. This is a hell of a bad place to go back to. Thinking about Bailee. I don’t want to cry. But I will. Especially when I’m mad. And if she sticks up for that son of a bitch—”
“Which she will.”
“Goddamn waterworks.”
I tugged at the brim of my ball cap. I smiled. I waited. Finally, I reached out and offered my hand and stood. I pulled Charlotte Scott, star of Star Chasers 2 and 3, to her feet. She followed me upstairs and into the condo. Susan was waiting for us.
I closed the door with a soft click and introduced them. Susan leaned against the couch. The door to the room that held Gabby was closed. Z was not there, but I knew he was around, walking the edge of the apartment and keeping a close eye. No one besides Chollo and Bobby Horse knew where to find us.
“It won’t work,” Charlotte said. “I tried and tried. I know you’re a pro. And I respect that. But I hired two professional deprogrammers that didn’t help a damn bit. They only ended up leaving me broke. The cult business is a shady fucking racket.”
“She promised to at least listen,” Susan said. “She knows I can’t keep her here any longer. I told her that we’d let her go as soon as you both talk.”
I hadn’t heard this part of the plan. I looked over at Susan. Susan stared back at me and nodded, ever so slightly.
“It’s got to be their decision,” Charlotte said. “If not, it’s not worth a damn. They’d rather bite though their tongues than to dismiss the great and glorious shithead, Phaethon.”
“Are you ready?” Susan said.
“Why the hell not?” Charlotte said.
Susan stayed and I walked with Charlotte back to Gabby’s room. We knocked, didn’t hear anything, and I turned the knob. Gabby was in bed, under the covers, with her back turned to us. She had on one of my old T-shirts. Karl’s Sausage Kitchen in Peabody. After decades of patronage, they’d given me a freebie.
“Gabby?” I said.
She turned her head from the pillow and opened her eyes. She looked like the teenager she’d been not that long ago. Charlotte found a big plush blue chair next to the bed and took a seat. She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her thighs, and looked up at me for some kind of sign.
I introduced them. I called Charlotte a friend. It wasn’t much, but I figured Charlotte would be best to ease into the particulars.
“It’s all bullshit, you know,” she said.
Or not.
Gabby didn’t speak, only turned onto her back and placed her hands under her head to stare at the ceiling.
“Ever hear of a girl named Bailee Scott?” Charlotte said. “She was mine. My little girl. She got a little lost, turned around, and ended up at some strip mall in the Valley. God knows why or how. But they did it. They fucking did it. They gave her some just-add-water purpose and meaning to her life. Her show hadn’t been off the air for three years and they told her they could help her reboot her life as a pop star. They knew all the best producers, industry players, and all that crap. She was told the only barriers she had were within herself. Does that crap sound familiar?”
Gabby didn’t answer. But she blinked.
“And shockingly, one of her biggest life barriers was her own mother,” Charlotte said. “She hadn’t been in with Joe Haldorn three months when she met with me for lunch in Venice. We sat, we ate, we talked about the weather and some hard times when she first started out. She gripped my hand, looked me in the eye, and said I was a negative force and that she hoped I understood why she never wanted to see me again.”
Gabby threw off the covers and sat up in bed, her feet dangling from the floor. Her long, wiry legs oddly pale and skinny. She cut her eyes to me and back over to Charlotte Scott in the giant blue chair. “Suppressive,” she said.
It sounded like a hiss.
“No,” Charlotte said. “Like Spenser said, I’m a friend. You remember those? Friends tell you the truth. Friends don’t lie to you and keep you from your goddamn family. You see?”
Charlotte’s voice had grown in intensity. I held up the flat of my hand.
“What did he give you?” I said. “To make you sleep?”
“Nothing,” she said. “I just took a couple of pills. It wasn’t a big deal. Thanks for checking up on me. But can I please have my clothes back?”
“What about your arms?” I said. “Why’d he tie you up?”
“You’re not leaving here,” Charlotte said. “No way you’re going back to them. If I’d done the same for Bailee, she’d still be alive.”
Gabby looked to me with an open mouth. She shook her head over and over.
“We can’t keep you here,” I said. “But you’re not leaving until you understand exactly who you’ve thrown in with.”
“‘Thrown in with’?” Gabby said, laughing. “I didn’t throw in with anybody. I am a grown woman who made some major lifestyle changes. And I’m sorry, lady, but sometimes family is poisonous. Sometimes you need to get out from under them to reach your full potential. It’s hard. It’s ugly. But sometimes it’s the goddamn truth.”
“It’s bullshit,” Charlotte said. She leaned back into the thick cushion of the chair. “Everything about that man is bullshit.”
“You wouldn’t know,” Gabby said. “You couldn’t know.”
“Have you slept with him yet?” Charlotte said.
Gabby stared at her. She shook her head. Her breathing had intensified out of her nose. I noticed a small vein in her temple started to pulse.
“That’s none of your goddamn business.”
“Well,” Charlotte Scott said, pushing herself up from the chair and staring down at Gabby. “I hate to break it to you, kid. But the path to enlightenment isn’t at the end of Joe Haldorn’s pecker.”
Gabby ran to the door. I blocked her as she reached for the knob. She tried and tried but couldn’t open it. I was a much larger person who took no pleasure in blocking her path. When Susan and I agreed, we’d let her go. Not a minute before.
“Assholes,” Gabby said. She was crying and pacing. “You fucking assholes. You’re all going to be sued for this. All of you.”
I stayed at the door. As Gabby walked across the wooden floor, she turned her head to Charlotte Scott and spat in her face. Charlotte moved fast, backhanding Gabby and pushing her onto the bed. Before I could make it over, Charlotte had her pressed down on the mattress, pulling down the girl’s underwear from her hip bone. When she found when she was looking for, she let her go.
Charlotte Scott looked at me and nodded. “Son of a bitch branded his sun mark on my Bailee, too,” she said. “Is that about love and trust? A brand right near your privates? You let that man burn your skin to mark you. Like goddamn cattle.”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“And you won’t understand until Haldorn uses you all up,” Charlotte said, crying now. “And is done with you. When he finished with Bailee, all that was left was her body, shot full of drugs and branded like you. How much longer do you figure you have left?”
I touched Charlotte Scott’s arm. We weren’t making any progress.
“I want my things,” Gabby said. “I want to go now. You hear me?”
Charlotte followed me and I shut the door behind us. Z was back in the chair in the hallway. He pressed his lips together in a silent whistle as we walked past.
Susa
n was in the kitchen, standing at the counter and drinking hot tea. “How’d it go?” she said.
“Terrific,” I said.
“It’s gone too far,” Charlotte said. “Gabby is deep within his circle. She’s got the sun brand on her hip and everything. Just like Bailee. I’m sorry, Susan. But you’d have to cage her to keep her.”
44
The next morning, I met Samuelson downtown at The Pantry.
He was seated at the counter this time and looked up from a short stack of pancakes, motioning me to join him.
“Your sweetheart Gabby Leggett is missing again,” he said. “You wouldn’t know anything about that?”
“No, sir, Captain.”
“Bullshit,” he said. “You do know we’d like to speak with her, too. If it’s not too much trouble.”
I studied the menu, scanning through several items I had yet to sample. I scratched a place I’d missed shaving along my jaw. “How’s the hash?”
“Some woman named Nancy Sharp reported her missing,” he said. “Know her?”
“I just might,” I said. “She told me she had a thing for men who liked dogs and good beer.”
“Watch yourself,” he said, stabbing a good bite of pancakes. “She also works with those whackjobs on West Adams. They claim the girl was taken against her will by a large, imposing white dude with a busted nose and a tall, skinny Mexican with a shiny pistol.”
“Have any leads?”
“For Christ’s sake.”
I looked up to the waiter. I ordered the hash and eggs, rye toast, and black coffee. I’d been trying to cut down on the sugar lately.
“How’s it coming along on Jimmy Yamashiro?” I said. “I saw some of your press conference. You identified Yamashiro’s bodyguard and the Armenian shooter. But no arrests have been made.”
“Why would I lie?”
“Want me to draw you a map to Furlong?”
“I’ve been down there,” Samuelson said. “Twice. That son of a bitch has a nice little import/export business going.”
“Among other things.”
“No shit,” Samuelson said. The waiter moved down the counter, refilling coffee. When he got to us, he spilled a little bit on Samuelson’s hands. Without a word, Samuelson reached over, snatched a napkin, and wiped off the droplets.
“We had plenty to get his tit in a ringer,” he said. “Never would admit a damn thing about Yamashiro. Says you were the one who was harassing his people in Hollywood and again at Griffith Park.”
“Ah.”
“Sarkisov’s lawyer claims the whole fucking thing was a setup,” Samuelson said. He took a sip of coffee and pushed away half the stack of pancakes. “Sarkisov said Yamashiro and him did a little business but wouldn’t qualify what kind. He said when his people couldn’t find him, they searched the shitter and the son of bitch was already dead.”
“A claim of which you were dubious.”
“You’re goddamn right I was dubious,” Samuelson said.
He drummed his fingers on the counter as if mulling something over. He looked to me, about to speak, just as my hash and eggs arrived. The platter was so hot steam rose from the eggs and butter melted down the triangles of toast. Perfection.
“What do you know about Leggett and these HELIOS people?”
I explained half of what I knew. When Samuelson looked satisfied, I cut into the eggs. The yolk spilled out into the hash and I took a bite. With my mouth full, I couldn’t say any more without fear of being rude.
“They brand their what?” he said.
I wiped my mouth and whispered the answer to him.
“Christ,” he said. “Fucking Los Angeles.”
“It’s pretty much an all-girls club,” I said. “Your appendage would be safe.”
“Then how the fuck did you break into that big mansion with that tall spiked fence?”
“Would you believe I hopped it?”
“At your size?” he said, snorting. “No.”
“Gabby is safe,” I said. “And she’s free to come and go as she pleases. I’ll tell her that you want to speak with her.”
“It ain’t a request, Spenser,” he said. “Will she say what she knows about Haldorn?”
“Apparently, he’s a really swell guy,” I said. “Wants to teach the world to sing and buy everyone a Coke.”
“I got a fucking Coke bottle for him,” he said. “To ram up his ass. Did you know he did a five-year stretch at Folsom for armed robbery?”
“No, sir. I did not.”
“Maybe because he’s worked under a half-dozen aliases,” he said. “Haldorn isn’t even his real name.”
“What’s his real name?”
“Ernie Sadowski Junior,” he said. “From Belle Isle, Illinois.”
“He should stick to Joseph Haldorn,” I said. “Sounds more cultish.”
I ate a little more, lifting up my thick china mug of coffee. The early-afternoon light filtered through the blinds and covered half the tabletops and the old, broken linoleum floors.
“You know how to break him?” Samuelson said.
“Working on it,” I said. “What’s it to LAPD?”
Samuelson broke off a piece of bacon and popped it in his mouth. He chewed as he thought a bit on the question. He cut his eyes over at me. “Sarkisov wasn’t lying,” he said. “They didn’t show until an hour after Yamashiro got beamed up to that big casting couch in the sky.”
“That’s hard-boiled,” I said.
“Yes,” he said. “I know. I can’t take credit for it. One of my young detectives broke us all up during the morning meet. Really hit at the right time.”
“Good for morale.”
“You were a cop,” he said. “You know what happens to the ones who can’t laugh at this fucking circus.”
I nodded.
“Coroner has a time of death,” he said. “We got GPS coordinates for the cell phones we took off his people. They were fifteen miles away. Traffic camera verified them coming on scene after the time of death, not before.”
“Then why were they there at all?”
“Sarkisov told us it was Big Swingin’ Dick Haldorn who told him and his boys to go to the park,” Samuelson said. “They expected a payday from Yamashiro. Not his fucking corpse.”
“And what does Haldorn say?”
“We’ve been looking for him for the last twenty-four hours,” Samuelson said. “And I have a feeling you might know just where we might find him.”
“I don’t,” I said. “But I do know someone who just might.”
45
Imet Nancy Sharp at Echo Lake Park.
She’d been hesitant at first. But then I assured her that Susan Silverman wouldn’t be joining us. I had the feeling she harbored few good sentiments for Susan after the grandma comment.
“Thank God,” Nancy said. “You’re alone.”
She walked up to where I stood by the boathouse. Nancy Sharp was dressed for working out, in yoga pants and a jogging bra, overlain with a threadbare flannel shirt. She had on leather sandals and wore her silver hair up in a bun.
“Good to my word.”
“I shouldn’t be here,” Nancy said. “You kidnapped one of our members.”
“Kidnapping is a strong word,” I said. “And hard to define. Shall we walk and talk?”
“After everything you’ve done?” she said. “You really expect me to take a leisurely stroll around the lake?”
“Yes,” I said. “I do. You want to know what I know.”
We began to walk away from the boathouse and toward the bridge that spanned the lagoon. Out on the water, people pedaled small boats, the light turning a hazy purple orange through the palm trees planted around the edge of the park. To the south, downtown Los Angeles shimmered in the late-afternoon light.
“How
is she?” Nancy said.
“Better,” I said. “After she woke up. She was a little groggy after you guys drugged her. And sore from where you tied her up.”
“That’s a lie.”
“No,” I said. “She had rope burns on her wrists and ankles. Mallory Riese had also given her some kind of sedative that would’ve made a grizzly bear comatose. I’m no doctor, but I don’t think any of this was in my client’s best interest.”
“Gabby isn’t your client.”
“No, but her mother is,” I said. “And you drugging, tying up, and brainwashing her daughter isn’t exactly something she had in mind for her little girl.”
I had my hands in the pockets of my windbreaker. I’d chosen a good place to meet. Few places to hide, although plenty of places to park and watch from cars. I had no doubt Nancy had been followed by some friends from HELIOS. There was too much at stake.
“You have absolutely no fucking idea what you’re talking about,” she said. “You make these broad accusations without any proof.”
“I have proof,” I said. “And I’m happy to share everything I know about you and your work for HELIOS. Especially what happened with your empowerment group and Bailee Scott.”
“What happened to Bailee was unfortunate.”
“You bet it was,” I said. “Was she trying to leave?”
“Bailee was mentally ill,” she said. “And so is her mother.”
I shook my head. “Did you know LAPD is looking at your boss for the murder of Jimmy Yamashiro?”
“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”
Before I could answer, we passed two young women walking a dozen dogs. They moved at a clipped pace, waving to us with broad smiles as they held leashes of dogs hungry for exercise, nails digging into the concrete. The dogs were all kinds. Mutts. A Pekingese, two pugs, and a couple big-boned Labs.
“You can’t be that shocked,” I said. “LAPD has been searching for him for days.”
