The Two Minute Rule

by Robert Crais

  Holman crabbed backwards away from the boat, then slipped across the backyard in the direction from which he had come. They were fanning away from the house and wouldn’t expect him to double back, but this was an old trick he learned as a teenager when he first started breaking into apartments. He jumped back over the fence into the next yard and saw a stack of patio bricks. He took one, and he would need it for what he had planned. He continued across the yard, not crashing across as he had before, but moving quietly and listening. He eased over the fence and was again behind the yellow house. The backyard was empty and quiet. He slipped along the side of the house toward the street, stopping, starting, listening. He couldn’t take too much time because Vukovich and the others would return when they couldn’t find him.

  Holman slipped along the side of the yellow house, staying beneath the windows. He could see the Highlander sitting in the street. They would probably see him when he made his move, but if he got lucky they would be too far away to stop him. He edged closer, and that’s when he heard a woman’s voice coming from inside the house.

  The voice was familiar. He slowly raised up enough to see into the house.

  Maria Juarez was inside with Random.

  Holman should never have looked. He knew not to look from years of breaking into houses and apartments and stealing cars, but he made the mistake. Random caught the movement. Random’s eyes widened, and he turned for the door. Holman didn’t wait. He lurched to his feet and crashed through the shrubs. He only had seconds, and now those seconds might not be enough.

  He ran for the Highlander as hard as he could and heard the front door open behind him. Vukovich was already on his way back and broke into a run. Holman shattered the Highlander’s passenger-side window with the patio brick, then reached in and unlocked the door, Random screaming behind him.

  “He’s here! Vuke! Tommy!”

  Holman threw himself inside. Chee had given him two keys, and Holman had left the spare in the console. He jacked it open, fished out the key, then pushed himself into the driver’s seat.

  Holman ripped away from the curb and didn’t look back until he was gone.

  41

  HOLMAN WANTED to dump the Highlander as quickly as possible. He turned at the next intersection, punched out of the turn, and powered up the street. He resisted the urge to turn again at the next cross-street because turning and zigging were sure ways to lose a pursuit. Amateur car thieves and drunks fleeing arrest always thought they could shake the police in a maze of streets, but Holman knew they couldn’t. Every turn cost speed and time and gave the police an opportunity to draw closer. Speed was life and distance was everything, so Holman powered forward.

  Holman knew he had to get out of the residential neighborhoods and into an area with businesses and traffic. He hit Palms Boulevard on the fly, turned toward the freeway, and jammed into the first and largest shopping center he found, a big open-air monster anchored by an Albertsons supermarket.

  The Highlander was large, black, and easy to spot, so Holman didn’t want to leave it in the main parking lot. He turned into the service lane behind the shops and stores, and drove along the rear of the shopping center. He pulled over, shut the engine, and looked at himself. His face and arms were scratched and bleeding and his shirt was torn in two places. Streaks of dirt and grass stains striped his clothes. Holman slapped off the dirt as best he could, then spit on his shirt tail to wipe away the blood, but he still looked like hell. He wanted to get away from the Highlander, but the remaining plastic restraint was still attached to his left wrist. Holman had cut the right loop on the boat’s propeller, and now the strands from the severed loop dangled from his left wrist like two strands of spaghetti. He studied the clasp. The restraints worked like a belt except the buckle only worked in one direction. The tongue of the belt could be slipped through the buckle, but tiny teeth prevented the tongue from being withdrawn. The plastic ties had to be cut, only now Holman didn’t have a blade.

  Holman started the engine again, turned the air conditioner on high, then pushed in the cigarette lighter. He tried not to think about what he was going to do because he knew it was going to hurt. When the lighter popped out, he pulled the tie as far from his skin as possible and pressed the glowing end onto the plastic. Holman clenched his jaw and held firm, but it burned like a sonofabitch. He had to heat the lighter three more times before the plastic melted through.

  Vukovich had taken his keys, wallet, money, and cell phone. Holman searched the floorboards and console, and came up with seventy-two cents. That was it. That was all he had.

  Holman locked the Highlander and walked away without looking back. He made his way through a pet store filled with cages of chirping birds and found a pay phone outside the Albertsons. He wanted to warn Pollard and he needed her help, but when he reached the phone he couldn’t remember her number. Holman stood with the phone in his hand, drawing a total blank. He had programmed her number into his cell phone’s memory, but now his phone was gone and he couldn’t remember the number.

  Holman started to shake. He slammed the phone into its cradle and shouted.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?”

  Three people entering the store stared at him.

  Holman realized he was losing it and told himself to calm down. More people were looking. His cuts were bleeding again, so he wiped at his arms, but all that accomplished was smearing the blood. Holman scanned the parking lot. No patrol cars or anonymous Crown Victorias crept past the store. Holman began to calm down after a few minutes and decided to call Chee. He didn’t remember Chee’s number, either, but Chee’s shop was listed.

  Holman fed in his coins, then waited while the information operator made the connection.

  Chee’s phone rang. Holman expected someone to answer on the first couple of rings, but the ringing went on. Holman cursed his lousy luck, thinking the operator had given him the wrong connection, but then a young woman answered in a tentative voice.

  “Hello?”

  “I’m calling for Chee.”

  “I’m sorry, we’re closed.”

  Holman hesitated. It was the middle of the day during the work week. Chee’s shop should not have been closed.

  “Marisol? Is this Marisol?”

  Her voice came back, even more tentative.

  “Yes?”

  “This is Max Holman—your dad’s friend. I need to talk to him.”

  Holman waited, but Marisol didn’t respond. Then he realized she was crying.

  “Marisol?”

  “They took him. They came—”

  She broke into full-blown sobs and Holman’s fear level spiked.

  “Marisol?”

  Holman heard a man saying something in the background and Marisol trying to answer, and then the man came on the line, his voice also guarded.

  “Who is this?”

  “Max Holman. What’s she talking about? What’s going on over there?”

  “This is Raul, man. You remember?”

  Raul was the kid who put together Holman’s driver’s license.

  “Yes. What was she talking about? Where’s Chee?”

  “They hooked him up, man. This morning—”

  “Who?”

  “Fuckin’ cops. They arrested him.”

  Holman’s heart started pounding again and he once more scanned the parking lot.

  “What the fuck happened? Why did they arrest him?”

  Raul lowered his voice like he didn’t want Marisol to hear, but his voice became strained.

  “I don’t know what the fuck happened. They came in this morning with warrants, dogs, fuckin’ assholes with machine guns—”

  “The police?”

  “LAPD, FBI, SWAT, even the fuckin’ ATF—if it’s in the alphabet they were here. They ate this shit up and took his ass in.”

  Holman’s mouth had grown dry, but the phone was slippery in his grip. He watched the parking lot and forced himself to breathe.

  “Was he hurt? Is
he okay?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Holman almost shouted.

  “Why don’t you know? It’s a simple goddamned question.”

  “You think they let us stand around an’ watch, muthuhfuckuh?! My ass was proned out! They brought us here in the fuckin’ office!”

  “Okay, okay—take it easy. Warrants for what? What were they looking for?”

  “Assault rifles and explosives.”

  “Jesus Christ, what was Chee doing?”

  “Nothin’,bro! Chee’s not into anything over here, fuckin’ explosives! His daughter works here. You think he’d keep explosives? Chee won’t even let us deal stolen air bags.”

  “But they arrested him?”

  “Hell, yes. They put him in the car right in front of his daughter.”

  “Then they must have found something.”

  “I don’t know what the fuck they found. They loaded some shit into a truck. They had the fuckin’ Bomb Squad here, Holman! They had those fuckin’ dogs sniffin’ everywhere, but we didn’t have anything like that.”

  A computerized voice came on the line, telling Holman he had only one minute left. Holman was out of quarters. His time was running out.

  Holman said, “I gotta go, but one more thing. Did they ask about me? Did they try to connect Chee with me in any way?”

  Holman waited for the answer, but the line was already dead. Raul had hung up.

  Holman put down the phone and studied the parking lot. He believed Chee had been set up, but he didn’t understand why. Chee didn’t know anything of value about Holman that couldn’t be learned from Gail Manelli or Wally Figg or Tony Gilbert. Holman hadn’t even told Chee about the missing sixteen million and his growing suspicions of a police conspiracy, but maybe someone thought he had; maybe someone thought Chee knew more than he did, and this was their way of trying to make him talk. Thinking about it made Holman’s head hurt. Nothing made sense, so Holman stopped thinking about it. He had more immediate problems. No one was coming to give him a ride and more money and a car. Holman was on his own, and his only hope now was to reach Pollard. Reaching Pollard might be her only hope, too.

  Holman went back to the Albertsons. He searched out the produce section, then headed for the rear of the store. Every produce section in every market in America had a swinging door in the back, through which produce clerks could push their carts laden with fruits and vegetables. Behind the door was always a refrigerated room into which the perishables were delivered and stored, and all such rooms had still more doors that opened onto loading docks.

  Holman let himself out and was once more behind the shopping center. He returned to the Highlander, opened the rear cargo door, and pulled out the floor mats. The emergency tool kit had a screwdriver, pliers, and a jack handle. Holman hadn’t stolen a car in a dozen years, but he still remembered how.

  Holman went back to the parking lot.

  42

  WHEN POLLARD left Holman at the cemetery she climbed onto the freeway in a confused daze and headed for Chinatown, her head so busy she barely noticed the surrounding cars.

  Pollard hadn’t known what to expect when she followed Holman from Hollywood, but he had surprised her yet again. Here was Holman, who allowed himself to get pinched for bank robbery rather than let an old man die. Here was Holman, apologizing to his dead girlfriend for screwing up their son. Pollard hadn’t wanted to leave. She had wanted to stay, just hold his hand and comfort him and lose herself to her feelings.

  Pollard’s heart broke when Holman started crying, not so much for him as for herself. Here was Holman, and she knew she could love him. Now, driving away, she fought the frightening suspicion she already did.

  Max Holman is a degenerate career criminal ex-con and former drug abuser with no education, no skills, and absolutely no legitimate prospects short of an endless series of minimum-wage jobs. He has no respect for Black Letter law and his only friends are known felons. He will almost certainly end up back in jail within the next year. I have two little boys. What kind of example would he set? What would my mother say? What would everyone say? What if he doesn’t find me attractive?

  Pollard arrived at the Pacific West Building in Chinatown forty-five minutes later where Alma Wantanabe, the Pac West operations officer, showed her to a windowless conference room on the third floor. Two institutional blue boxes were waiting on a table.

  Wantanabe explained that the LAPD summaries were divided into two distinct groups. One group consisted of divisional files specific to the robberies within those divisions—Newton Division Robbery detectives investigating robberies that had occurred in Newton. The second group of files was compiled by Robbery Special, who had synthesized the divisional reports into their larger, citywide investigation. Pollard knew from experience this was a function of resources. Though Robbery Special had been in charge of the citywide investigation, they employed divisional robbery detectives to pound the pavement on robberies in their local divisions. The divisional detectives then shipped their reports up the food chain to Robbery Special, who worked across divisional boundaries to coordinate and direct a Big Picture investigation.

  Wantanabe cautioned her again not to remove or copy any material from the files, then left Pollard alone to work.

  Pollard opened her own file for the cover-sheet copies Holman had made before Random confiscated the reports. The cover sheets told Pollard nothing except the case and witness numbers, and the witness numbers told her nothing without the identifying witness list:

  Case # 11-621

  Witness # 318

  Marchenko/Parsons

  Interview Summary

  Pollard hoped to identify the witnesses through the witness lists, then see what they had to say. She didn’t know the source of the cover sheets, so she started with the box of divisional reports. She emptied the box, then methodically searched for witness lists. She found three lists, but it soon became apparent that the divisional numbering system did not match with her cover sheets. She put the divisional files aside and turned to the Parker Center reports.

  Her interest spiked the instant she opened the second box. The first page was a case file introduction signed by the commander of Robbery Special and the two lead detectives in charge of the case. The second lead detective was John B. Random.

  Pollard stared at his name. She knew Random from his investigation into the murder of the four police officers. She had assumed he was a homicide detective, yet here he was in charge of a robbery investigation. The same robbery that now overlapped with the murders.

  Pollard flipped through the following reports until she found the witness list. It was a thirty-seven-page document listing three hundred forty-six numbered names beginning with witness number one, who was identified as a teller employed at the first bank Marchenko and Parsons robbed. The lowest witness number on Pollard’s cover sheets was #318, followed in consecutive order by 319, 320, 321, 327, and 334. All of her witnesses had come late in the case.

  Pollard began matching the numbers on her cover sheets to names, and immediately saw a pattern.

  #318 was identified as Lawrence Trehorn, who managed the four-unit apartment building in Beachwood Canyon where Marchenko and Parsons lived.

  The next three witnesses were their neighbors.

  #327 was an attendant at the West Hollywood health club Marchenko visited.

  And #334 was Anton Marchenko’s mother.

  Pollard located the individual summaries, but did not immediately read them. She checked for the names of the detectives who conducted the interviews. Random had signed off on Trehorn and Mrs. Marchenko, and Vukovich had signed off on one of the neighbors. Vukovich had been one of the officers with Random who confronted Holman outside his daughter-in-law’s apartment—another detective investigating the murders who had also investigated Marchenko and Parsons.

  Pollard thought about Fowler and the fifth man going to see Mrs. Marchenko. She wondered if Fowler had gone to see these other five people,
also.

  Pollard copied the names and contact information of the five new witnesses, then read through the summaries. She half suspected that at least one of the summaries would reference Alison Whitt, the Hollywood Sign, or the Mayan Grille, but the reports provided nothing except a list of people who were personally known to Marchenko and Parsons. Pollard decided this was the key. None of these summaries were specific to the actual robberies, but all were potentially relevant to establishing what Marchenko and Parsons had done with the money. This would have been why Richard Holman had them, but the questions remained: How had he gotten them and why had Random removed them from Richard’s apartment? It was as if Random didn’t want anyone to have proof that Fowler and his little group were trying to find the money.

  When Pollard finished, she returned the summaries to the file in their proper order, then placed the files in their boxes. She kept thinking about Random taking the files. Pollard considered the possibility that Richard had gotten the files from Random, but something about this bothered her. Random knew what was in the summaries. If he was involved with Richard and Fowler, he could have told them what he knew—he didn’t have to give them the files.

  Pollard left the boxes on the table, then thanked Alma Wantanabe, who walked her to the elevators. As Pollard rode down, she checked her messages, but Sanders hadn’t yet called. She felt a flash of frustration, then realized she had something almost as good with which to work—Mrs. Marchenko. If Random was the fifth man, Pollard did not need to see the informant list—Mrs. Marchenko would be able to identify him, which would put Random together with Fowler. Finding Alison Whitt’s contact officer would then be icing on the cake.

  Pollard decided to call Holman. She wanted to tell him what she had found, then go to Mrs. Marchenko. She was dialing his number when the elevator opened.

  Holman was in the lobby, filthy and streaked with dried blood.

  43

  HOLMAN REMEMBERED she was going to the Pacific West Building, but he didn’t know if she was still there or how to reach her and he had no money left to make a call. He didn’t want to go to the building. If someone had followed Pollard from the cemetery Holman would be giving himself back to them, but he didn’t know how else to reach her. Holman circled the building until he was scared he would miss her, then waited in the lobby like a nervous dog. He was about to leave when the elevator opened and Pollard stepped out. In that double-take moment when she saw him, her face went white.