Suspect

by Robert Crais

He glanced at Scott’s shoulder, but the scars were hidden.

  “Was that you, left for dead?”

  Marshall was so genuine and natural, Scott knew he was telling the truth. The poly wasn’t necessary.

  “I lost someone close that night. Last night, you lost your brother. The same people who did this to me killed Daryl.”

  Marshall sat there, staring, his face pinched as he struggled to get his head around it. His eyes shimmered, and Scott thought, if Budress was right, if a dog saw a person’s heart through their eyes, Maggie would see a heart broken in Marshall.

  “Help me out here, ’cause—”

  “Was Daryl with you that night?”

  Marshall leaned back again, and seemed irritated.

  “What the fuck? I don’t take Daryl with me to do burglary. What are you talkin’ about?”

  “Up on the roof. Your lookout.”

  “No fuckin’ way.”

  He meant it. Marshall was telling the truth.

  “Daryl was there.”

  “Bullshit. I’m telling you, he wasn’t.”

  “What if I told you I could prove it?”

  “I’d call you a liar.”

  Scott decided to leave Maggie out of it, and tell Marshall they had a DNA match. But as he took out his phone for a picture of the watchband, it occurred to him Marshall might remember his brother’s watch.

  He held out his phone so Marshall could see.

  “Did Daryl have a watch with a band like this?”

  Marshall slowly sat taller. He reached for the phone, but the manacles stopped him.

  “I got that watch for him. I gave it to him.”

  Scott thought carefully. Marshall was with him now, and Marshall would help. Luck was better than DNA.

  “This was found on the sidewalk the morning I was shot. These little smears are from a fence on the roof. I don’t know when he was up there that night, or why, or what he saw, but Daryl was there.”

  Marshall shook his head slow, trying to remember and asking himself questions.

  “Are you saying he saw those murders?”

  “I don’t know. He never mentioned it to you?”

  “No, ’course not. Not ever. Jesus, don’t you think I’d remember?”

  “I don’t know if he saw them or not, but I think the shooters were scared he had seen them.”

  Marshall’s gaze shifted, searching the little room for answers.

  “Y’all thought I saw the shootings, and I didn’t. Maybe Daryl was long gone like me, and didn’t see shit.”

  “Then they killed him for nothing, and he’s still dead.”

  Marshall wiped his eyes on his shoulders, leaving dark spots on the blue.

  “Goddamnit, this is bullshit. Fuckin’ bullshit.”

  “I want them, Marshall. For me and my friend, and for Daryl. I need your help to get this done.”

  “What the fuck, if he saw something, he didn’t tell me. Shit, even if he didn’t see anything, he didn’t tell me. Probably scared I’d kick his ass!”

  “Something crazy and exciting like this? Let’s say he saw it. Let’s pretend.”

  Because if Daryl left the roof having seen nothing, Scott had no place to go.

  “It’s a big thing to hold. Who would he tell? His best friend. A person he might tell even if he was too scared to tell anyone else.”

  Marshall’s head bobbed.

  “Amelia. His baby mama.”

  “Daryl has a child?”

  Marshall’s gaze flicked around the room as he sorted through memories.

  “Be about two, a girl. Don’t really know it’s Daryl’s, but she says it is. He loves her.”

  Then Marshall realized what he’d said.

  “Loved.”

  Her name was Amelia Goyta. The baby’s name was Gina. Marshall didn’t know the address, but told Scott where to find her building. Marshall hadn’t seen the baby in almost a year, and wanted to know if she looked like Daryl.

  Scott promised to let Marshall know, and was leaving to find the deputy when Marshall twisted around in his chair and asked a question Scott had been asking himself.

  “All this time later, why they all of a sudden get scared Daryl seen’m? How’d they know Daryl was up there?”

  Scott thought he knew, but didn’t share the answer.

  “Marshall, the detectives will probably come see you. Don’t tell them about this. Don’t tell anyone unless you hear that I’m dead.”

  Marshall’s red eyes grew scared.

  “I won’t.”

  “Not even the detectives. Especially not the detectives.”

  Scott took a right turn out the door, collected his handcuffs and gun, and left the jail as quickly as he could.

  He waited on the sidewalk by the parking lot for almost ten minutes before Budress and Maggie rounded the corner. Maggie bounced and yelped and strained at her lead, so Budress let her go. She raced toward Scott with her ears back and tongue out, looking like the happiest dog in the world. Scott opened his arms, and caught her when she plowed into him. Eighty-five pounds of black-and-tan love.

  Budress didn’t look as happy as Maggie.

  “What happened in there?”

  “I’m still in the game.”

  Budress grunted.

  “Okay, then. Okay. I’ll see you later.”

  Budress turned to leave.

  “Paul. Marshall recognized the watchband. It was Daryl’s. Maggie pinned him, man.”

  Budress glanced at the dog, then the man.

  “Never doubt.”

  “I didn’t.”

  Scott and Maggie climbed into their car.

  32.

  Scott found Amelia Goyta’s prewar apartment house on a shabby run-down street north of the freeway in Echo Park. The old building had three floors, four units per floor, an interior central stair, no air-conditioning, and was pretty much identical to every building on the block except for the Crying Virgin. A towering Virgin Mary crying tears of blood was painted on the front of her building. Marshall told Scott the painting looked more like an anorexic Smurf, but he couldn’t miss it. Marshall had told it true. The Virgin Smurf was three stories tall.

  Marshall didn’t remember which was Amelia’s apartment, so Scott checked with the manager. Wearing his uniform helped. Top floor in back, 304.

  Scott wondered if news of Daryl’s death had reached Amelia. When he and Maggie reached the third floor, he heard crying and knew it had. He paused outside her door to listen, and Maggie sniffed at the floor jamb. Inside, a child wailed between whooping breaths, as a sobbing woman alternated pleas to stop crying with reassurances they were going to be okay.

  Scott rapped on the door.

  The child kept wailing, but the sobbing stopped. A moment later, the wailing stopped, too, but no one came to the door.

  Scott rapped again, and gave her his patrol officer’s voice.

  “Police officer. Please open the door.”

  Twenty seconds passed without a response, so Scott knocked again.

  “Police officer. Open the door or I’ll have the manager let me in.”

  The wailing began again, and now the woman’s sob came from the other side of the door.

  “Go away. Go AWAY! You’re not the police.”

  She sounded afraid, so Scott softened his voice.

  “Amelia? I’m a police officer. I’m here about Daryl Ishi.”

  “What’s your name? WHAT IS YOUR NAME?”

  “Scott James.”

  Her voice rose to a frantic scream.

  “TELL ME YOUR NAME.”

  “Scott. James. My name is SCOTT. Police officer. Open the door, Amelia. Is Gina safe? I’m not leaving until I
see that she’s safe.”

  When he finally heard the deadbolt slide, Scott stepped away to appear less threatening. Maggie automatically stood by his left leg as she’d been trained, and faced the door.

  A girl not more than twenty peeked out when the door opened. She had long, straw-colored hair and pale, freckled skin. Her eyes and nose were red, and her lips quivered between gasps, but nothing about her expression suggested a broken heart or mourning.

  Scott had seen her expression on the faces of women who were punching bags for their husbands, hookers on the run from pimps out to cut them, and the shell-shocked faces of rape victims. He had seen it on mothers with missing children—an expectation that something worse was coming. Scott knew the face of fear. He saw it on Amelia Goyta, and instantly knew Daryl had witnessed the shooting, and told her he would be killed if the shooters found out.

  She wiped away snot, and asked him again.

  “What’s your name?”

  “I’m Scott. This is Maggie. Are you and Gina okay?”

  She glanced at Maggie.

  “I gotta pack. We’re leaving.”

  “Can I see the baby, please? I want to see she’s okay.”

  Amelia glanced toward the stairs as if someone might be hiding, then threw open the door and hurried to her child. Gina was in a playpen, her face pinched and smeared with snot. She had dark hair, but looked nothing like Daryl. Amelia lifted her, jiggled her, and put her back in the playpen.

  “Here, you see? She’s fine. Now I gotta pack, I got a friend coming. Rachel.”

  A faded blue wheelie carry-on was waiting by the door. A Samsonite suitcase older than Scott was open like a giant clam on the floor, half-filled with toys and baby supplies. She ran into the bedroom, and returned dragging a brown garbage bag fat with clothes.

  Scott said, “Did Daryl say they would kill you?”

  Amelia dropped the bag by the door, and ran back to the bedroom.

  “Yes! That dumbass piece of shit. He said they’d kill us, and I ain’t waiting.”

  “Who killed him?”

  “The fuckin’ killers. You’re the policeman. Don’t you know?”

  She ran back with a wastebasket filled with combs, brushes, hair spray, and toiletries. She upended it into the Samsonite, tossed the basket aside, and pushed a small velvet pouch into Scott’s hands.

  “Here. Take’m. I told the dumb fuck he was an idiot.”

  Scott caught her arm as she turned for the bedroom.

  “Slow down. Listen to me, Amelia. Nine months ago. What did Daryl tell you?”

  She sobbed, and rubbed her eye.

  “He saw these masked dudes shoot up a car.”

  “Tell me exactly what he said.”

  “He said if they knew he saw, they’d fuckin’ kill us and the baby, too. I want to pack.”

  She tried to twist away, but Scott held her. Maggie edged closer and growled.

  “I’m here to stop them, okay? That’s why I’m here. So help me. Tell me what Daryl said.”

  She stopped fighting him, and gazed down at Maggie.

  “Is that a guard dog?”

  “Yes. A guard dog. What did Daryl tell you?”

  Scott felt her relax as she considered the guard dog, and turned loose her arms.

  “He was on some building somewhere, and heard a crash. Stupid Daryl went to see, and here’s this truck and the cops and these men were around this Rolls-Royce, shooting the shit out of it.”

  Scott didn’t bother to correct her.

  “He said it was crazy. He was, like, fuck, it was Tarantino, these masked guys shootin’ the cops and the Rolls. Daryl freaked, and slammed down off the roof, but it was all quiet when he hit the ground, and they were yellin’ at each other, so idiot fuckass Daryl goes to see.”

  “Did he tell you what they were saying?”

  “Just bullshit, hurry up, find the damned thing, whatever. They were scared of the sirens. The sirens were coming.”

  Scott realized he had stopped breathing. His pulse had grown loud in his ears.

  “Did Daryl say what they found?”

  “This one dude gets in the Rolls, and jumps out with a briefcase. They piled into this car and tore out of there, and stupid Daryl, he’s thinking, rich people in this Rolls, he might get a ring or a watch, so he runs to the car.”

  Scott thought Daryl had embellished his story.

  “With the sirens getting closer?”

  “Is that fuckin’ damaged? These two people are shot to shit, blood everywhere, and my moron boyfriend risks his life for eight hundred dollars and this—”

  She slapped the velvet pouch.

  “I said, you stupid shit, are you crazy? The money had blood on it. Idiot Daryl had blood all over, and he’s freaking. He made me promise, we can’t tell, we can’t even hint, ’cause these maniacs would kill us.”

  “Did he see their faces?”

  “You didn’t hear what I just said? They had masks.”

  “Maybe one of them took off his mask.”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “How about a tattoo, hair color, a ring or a watch? Did he describe them in any way?”

  “All I remember is masks, like ski masks.”

  Scott thought harder.

  “You kept asking my name. Why were you asking my name?”

  “I thought you were them.”

  “Meaning what? He heard their names?”

  “Snell. He heard this one guy say, ‘Snell, c’mon.’ If your name was Snell, I wasn’t going to let you in. Listen, man, I gotta pack. Please. Rachel is coming.”

  Scott looked at the pouch. It was lavender velvet, closed by a drawstring, with a dark discoloration. Scott opened it, and poured seven gray rocks into his palm. Maggie raised her nose, curious about the pouch because Scott was curious. This was something he had learned about her. If he focused on something, she was interested. Scott poured the stones back into the pouch, and slipped the pouch into his pocket.

  “When will Rachel be here?”

  “Now. Any second.”

  “Pack. I’ll help carry your stuff.”

  She was ready to go when Rachel arrived. Scott carried the Samsonite and the garbage bag stuffed with clothes. Amelia carried the little girl and a pillow, and Rachel carried everything else. Scott unclipped Maggie, and let her follow off-leash. At Scott’s request, Amelia left her apartment unlocked.

  When everything was in the car, Scott asked for her and Rachel’s cell numbers, and took Amelia aside.

  “Don’t tell anyone you’re with Rachel. Don’t tell anyone what you think happened to Daryl, or what Daryl saw that night.”

  “Can’t a policeman stay with me? Like in witness protection?”

  Scott ignored the question.

  “You hear about Marshall? He’s in Men’s Central Jail?”

  “Uh-uh. I didn’t know.”

  Scott repeated it.

  “Men’s Central Jail. I’m going to call you in two days, okay? But if you don’t hear from me, on the third day, I want you to go see Marshall. Tell him what you told me.”

  “Marshall don’t like me.”

  “Bring Gina. Tell him what Daryl saw. Tell him everything just like you told me.”

  She was scared and confused, and Scott thought she might get in the car and tell Rachel to never stop driving, but she looked at Maggie.

  “I get a big enough place, I want a dog.”

  Then she got into Rachel’s car and they left.

  Scott let Maggie pee, then picked up his dive bag, and lugged it up to Amelia’s apartment. He found a large pot in the kitchen, filled it with water, and set the pot on the floor.

  “This is yours. We may be here a few days.”

&
nbsp; Maggie sniffed at the water, and walked away to explore the apartment.

  Scott sat with the dive bag on Amelia’s couch in Amelia’s living room in Amelia’s apartment, and stared at the wall. He felt tired, and wished he were living on the far side of the world under an assumed name, with a head that wasn’t filled with anger and fear.

  Scott opened the velvet pouch and poured out the pebbles. He was pretty sure the seven little rocks were uncut diamonds. Each was about the size of his fingernail, translucent, and gray. They looked like crystal meth, and the irony made him smile.

  He poured them back into the pouch, and the smile went with them.

  Interpol had supposedly connected Beloit to a French diamond fence, which led Melon and Stengler to speculate that Beloit had smuggled diamonds into the country for delivery, or had come to the U.S. to pick up diamonds the fence purchased. Either way, the bandits learned of the plan, followed Beloit’s movements, and murdered Beloit and Pahlasian during the robbery. Melon and Stengler used these assumptions to drive the case until the same person who tipped them to Beloit’s diamond connection later told them Beloit had no such involvement.

  The I-Man. Ian Mills.

  Scott thought it through. Melon and Stengler knew nothing of Beloit’s diamond connection until Mills brought it to their attention. Why bring it up, and later discredit it? Either Mills had bad information when he cleared Beloit and made an honest mistake, or he lied to turn the investigation. Scott wondered how Mills knew about the connection, and why he later changed his mind.

  Scott searched his dive bag for the clippings he collected during the early weeks of the investigation. Melon still ran the case at that time, and had given Scott a card with his home phone and cell number written on the back, saying Scott could call him anytime. That was before they reached the point Melon stopped returning his calls.

  Scott stared at Melon’s number, trying to figure out what to say. Some calls were more difficult than others.

  Maggie came out of the bedroom. She studied Scott for a moment, then went to the open window. He figured she was charting the scents of their new world.

  Scott dialed the number. If his call went to Melon’s voice mail, he planned to hang up, but Melon answered on the fourth ring.

  “Detective Melon, this is Scott James. I hope you don’t mind I called.”