by Robert Crais
I thanked her, hung up, and called the North Hollywood PD. The same tired voice said, “Detectives.”
“Lou Poitras, please.”
“He ain’t here.”
“How about Griggs?”
There was a pause, then Griggs came on. “Griggs.”
“It’s Cole. You guys got anything on a guy named Barry Fein?”
“You got some nut, you know that. We don’t run a goddamned library service here.”
“Considering what I saw this morning, it ain’t much of a cop house, either.”
He hung up. I took a deep breath, let it out, called back. A different bored voice answered this time, “North Hollywood Detectives.”
“Let me have Griggs, please.”
“Hold on.”
A minute, then Griggs picked up. “Griggs.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have said that. It was dumb, and I apologize. I know you guys don’t like it any more than I did, and I know it’s tougher for you than it is for me.”
“You’re fuckin’-A right it is, bubba. Lou’s downtown raising hell right now, goddamnit. Even Baishe is down there, that sonofabitch. So we don’t need any bullshit from you.”
“Can you give me an address on Fein?”
“Hold on.”
While I waited, the counter girl gave one cup of something light-colored to one of the women and a cup of something so brown it was almost black to the other. They took their gelato to a little table at the front of the shop and spoke to each other in Farsi. Two men entered, one wearing a conservative gray Brooks Brothers, the other something resembling a pale orange pressure suit. The spaceman looked intense, and snapped his fingers at the girl. I didn’t like that.
Griggs came back on the line. “Fein’s a goddamned dope dealer.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re supposed to stay the hell away from this Duran thing.”
“I know.”
I could hear him breathing into the phone. In the background, I could hear other cops talking and phones ringing and typewriters tapping and a deep, coarse laugh. Cop sounds. The sort of sounds Griggs would miss if he had to stop hearing them. Griggs said, “Try 11001 Wilshire, Suite 601. That’s in Westwood.”
“Thanks.”
“Cole, the wrong people find out I gave you this, it’s my badge.”
“Gave me what?”
Griggs said, “Yeah” and hung up.
The counter girl was holding a cup in one hand and a scoop in the other, waiting for the guy in the pressure suit to make up his mind. He kept asking to taste the different flavors, then making a big deal about a place in Santa Monica that made this place look like shit. The two Persian women glanced at him.
The counter girl put down her scoop, looked my way, and chewed her fingernail. I hung up, walked over, smiled at the counter girl, and said, “The double chocolate banana was excellent, thank you.” Then I turned to Captain New Wave. I was very close to him. “Do you dance?” Smiling.
He had a healthy tan and coarse black hair and a gold Patek Philippe watch. There’d be the health club and handball and somewhere along the way he would’ve taken judo and been pretty good at it. His eyes flicked to the guy he’d come in with, wondering, what the hell is this?
“Not with boys,” he said. Tough, but uncertain. In over his head and just beginning to realize it. He had walked through a door and now he was in something and it could go in any direction, and in any direction he’d lose.
I put my hand in the small of his back and pulled him close. He should’ve stepped back sooner, but he hadn’t because he was tough. Now he couldn’t. One of the Persian women stood up.
“Try the double chocolate banana,” I said softly.
He wet his lips, again glancing at the man he’d entered with. The man hadn’t moved. I pulled him tighter, letting him feel the gun.
“The double chocolate banana,” I said.
“The double chocolate banana.”
“To her.”
“Chocolate banana.” To her.
“Please.”
“Please.” To her.
“Good. You’ll like it.”
I let him go. He started to say something, wet his lips again, then stepped back.
The counter girl was frozen with wide bumblebee eyes. More scared now than when it started. Some days, you can’t win.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s been hell the past few days.”
She nodded and gave me a shy, quiet smile, more young girl than grown-up woman, which is the way it should be when you’re sixteen. Everything’s gonna be okay, the smile said.
I leaned over the counter and put one of my cards by the cash register.
“If anyone ever bothers you,” I said, shooting a glance at the guy in the spacesuit, “let me know.”
I walked out the door, went to my car, and drove west along Sunset toward Westwood and Barry Fein.
27
11001 Wilshire is a nine-story high-rise done up quite nicely in gray and white and glass, what the big ads in the real-estate section of the Times call “a luxury address.” There is a circular drive of gray cobblestone running up beneath a tremendous white and gray awning to the large glass lobby and two waiting doormen. A Rolls and a Jaguar were parked by the glass doors. In the lobby was a security officer behind an elaborately paneled security station who probably took great pride in collecting the mail and calling the elevator and giving the arm to peepers and process servers and similar social debris. It was not a place where you could go to a call box, press a lot of buttons, and count on someone buzzing you in.
I turned up one of the little side streets that ran north through a pleasant residential section, parked by a sign that said Permit Parking Only, and walked back to the high-rise. On the east side of 11001 there was a parking garage with a card key gate leading down, elegantly landscaped with poplar saplings and California poppies. I sat on the ground by the poplars. It was getting hotter, but the smog was manageable. After about ten minutes, the gate groaned to life, folded up into the roof of the building, and a long forest green Cadillac nosed out onto the street. By the time the gate closed, I was in the garage.
There were two cars parked in the slot for 601, a powder blue Porsche 928 and a steel DeLorean. Barry Fein was home. I looked for the elevator and found it on the other side of the garage, but it was one of those security jobs that didn’t have buttons down in the garage, just another card key slot. There would be stairs, but the stairs would go up to the lobby and the guards and I wasn’t ready for them yet. I went back to the gate, pressed the service switch, and let myself out.
It was a six-block walk to Westwood Village along elm-shaded sidewalks.
If you ignore the surroundings, Westwood Village could be the center of a college town in Iowa or Massachusetts or Alabama. Lots of fast food vendors, restaurants, collegiate clothing stores, bookshops, art galleries, record stores. Lots of pretty girls. Lots of young guys with muscles who thought playing high school football and being able to lift 200 pounds made them memorable. Lots of bicycles. In a drugstore next to a falafel stand I bought a box of envelopes, a roll of fiber wrapping tape, a stamper that said PRIORITY, an ink pad, and a Bic pen. On the way out I spotted a little sheet of stick-on labels that said things like HANDLE WITH CARE. I bought that, too.
Back at the car I tore an old McDonald’s Happy Meal box into strips, put it in an envelope, sealed it, and wrote Mr. Barry Fein on the front. I put the wrapping tape along all four edges, then across the flap on the back, making sure to keep the fiber bands even. Even in crime, neatness counts. I stamped PRIORITY twice on the front and twice more on the back, then put a sticker that said DO NOT BEND where you normally put the stamp. I looked at it. Not bad. I bent it twice, then put it on the ground and stepped on it hard. Better.
I walked back to 11001 Wilshire and went in to the guard at the reception desk. “Got something here for Mr. Barry Fein,” I said.
The guard looked
at me like I was somebody else’s bad breath and held out a hand. “I’ll take it.” He’d crossed the line into his fifties a couple years back. He had a broad face and a thick nose that had been broken more than once, and eyes that stayed with you. Ex-cop.
I shook my head. “Unh-unh. Hand delivery.”
“Hand deliveries are made to me.”
“Not this one.” I waved the envelope under his nose. “My ass is in the grinder as it is. Guy tells me, get this to Mr. Fein and be careful with it, right? Like a dope I drop it and some asshole kicks it and the wind picks it up and I gotta chase it half across Westwood against the traffic.”
He was impressed. “This is as far as you go.”
I put the letter in my pocket. “Okay, you’re a hard ass and you don’t give a shit if I get chewed. Call Fein. Tell him it’s from Mr. Garrett Rice. Tell him that even though he wants this you’ve decided that he shouldn’t have it.”
The guard’s eyes never moved.
I said, “Look, Sarge, either you call Mr. Fein now or Mr. Rice is gonna call him when I bring this thing back, and then my ass won’t be the only one in the grinder.”
We stared at each other. After a while his mouth tightened and he picked up the phone and pressed three buttons. One of the doormen had come inside and was looking at us. The guard put down the phone and scowled at me, not liking it that I’d showed him up.
He said, “You think I’m letting you upstairs with the piece, forget it.”
He was good. The way I’m built, most people never see the gun under the light jacket I wear. I grinned and spread the jacket. He reached across, fingered it out, and put it under his desk. “It’ll be here when you come down,” he said.
“Sure.”
“When you get out of the elevator, turn right, then right again.”
I took the elevator up to six, got out into the H-shaped hall, turned right, then right again by a little gold sign that said 601 & 603». Blue-gray carpet, white walls, cream light fixtures, Italian moderne artwork. It was so hushed and so clean and so sterile, I wondered if people really lived there. Maybe just androids, or people so old they stayed in bed all day and fed from tubes. I thought of Keir Dullea as an old man in 2001.
At the end of the hall a blond man stood in the door to 601 waiting for me. He was blond the way straw blonds are blond, so light it was almost white. He wore a white LaCoste shirt and white slacks and white deck shoes, all of which made his dark tan look even darker. On the young side, maybe 24, with a boyish face, and built the way you’re built when you lift for strength rather than bulk. Like Pike. Unlike Pike, he was short, not over five-eight.
“Mr. Fein?” I said.
“I’m Charles. Are you from Mr. Rice?” His voice was higher pitched than you would’ve guessed, and soft, like a sensitive fourteen-year-old’s. Five-eight was short for this kind of work.
“Yeah. I’m supposed to give this to Mr. Fein.”
Charles took the envelope, opened the door, and stepped to the side to let me in. The first two knuckles of each hand were large and swollen, the way they get doing push-ups on them and pounding sacks of rice and breaking boards. Maybe five-eight wasn’t so much of a problem for him.
We went through a blue-tiled entry, down two steps, and into a room not quite the size of Pauley Pavillion. It was very bright, the outer wall all glass and opening out on a balcony lush with greenery. The glass was open and, very faintly, you could hear the cars below like a whisper. The place was done in pastels: gray and blue and raspberry and white. The tile gave way to carpets, and ultramodern Italian furniture sprouted up out of the carpet. Barry Fein was sipping cognac at a hammered-copper bar. The copper clashed horribly with the pastels. So did Barry. He was short and skinny and dark, with close-to-the-skull hair and furry arms and furry, bandy legs. He was wearing red plaid Bermuda shorts and a dark blue tee shirt that said RKO Pictures. There was a hole in the shirt on his left shoulder. He was barefoot.
He said, “You the guy from Gary?” Charles gave him the envelope.
“Indiana?”
He looked at me, cocking his head. “Garrett Rice, stupid. Gary. Jesus fuckin’ Christ.”
“Well, not really.”
“Whattaya mean, not really?” He finished the cognac, then refilled the snifter from a bottle of Courvoisier. There was a hard pack of Marlboros and a heavy Zippo lighter beside the bottle and a large marble ashtray filled with butts. Maybe I could introduce him to Janet Simon and they could have a smoke-off.
Barry Fein opened the envelope and looked in and saw Ronald McDonald. “What the fuck is this?”
I said, “Can I get my wallet out and show you something?”
Charles put his fists on his hips and stared at me thoughtlessly. Barry said, “Aw, shit, you ain’t a cop, are you?”
“Unh-unh.” I got out my wallet, went over to the bar, and showed him my license. “It’s very important that I find out if Garrett Rice has tried to sell you two kilograms of cocaine.”
Barry grinned at me and looked at Charles. “Is this guy serious or what?”
Charles smiled benignly. Perhaps repartée was beyond him.
I said, “Listen to me. I’m sorry I used a ruse to get up here, but I didn’t think you’d see me if I played it straight. I’m not here to bring you trouble. Garrett Rice may have stolen two kilograms of lab-quality cocaine from a very bad man. Now that man wants it back and he’s holding a little boy hostage. I think if Garrett stole the dope he’ll try to move it. You’re a guy he might move it through.”
Barry Fein shrugged and jerked his head at Charles. “Get rid of’m.”
I looked at Charles. “I’m in a rush here, Barry. He won’t be able to do it.”
Barry shrugged again. Charles whistled sharply between his teeth, and a moment later another Charles walked in from the balcony with a watering can. Five-eight, blond, muscled, white shirt and pants and shoes. Twins all the way down to the big knuckles.
Barry said, “Jonathan, we got some trouble here.”
Jonathan set the watering can down and came over to stand a little in front of me, Charles a little behind. They stood with their feet spread for balance and their hands loose at their sides. Jonathan had the same perfect skin and vacant eyes as Charles. Idiot angels. The two of them reminded me of the kids down in Westwood who thought they were tough. Only these guys weren’t down in Westwood. And they probably were tough.
“Attractive, Barry,” I said. “Bet they’re great in bed, too.”
Charles said, “It’s time to leave,” and stepped in to take my arm. I threw Barry’s snifter of Courvoisier on Charles. Jonathan hit me hard twice, not as hard as he should’ve because I was moving, but hard enough to hurt. I shoved Barry off his stool, making Jonathan hop back to keep from getting bowled over. Charles was coming at me sideways and planting for a spin kick when I grabbed the big Zippo and set him on fire. The Courvoisier went off with a blue alcohol whoosh. Charles screamed and slapped at his face and dropped to the carpet. Jonathan yelled, “Hey!” and forgot about me. He tried to turn Charles onto his belly to smother the flames. I broke one of the barstools across Jonathan’s back. He was tough. He tried to get up, tears leaking down along his nose, then fell over and moaned.
Barry was down on his hands and knees where he’d fallen, staring at me, saying, “Jesus fuckin’ Christ” over and over. I grabbed his hair and pulled him up. He said, “Jesus fuckin’ Christ.”
I shook him. “You think I’m playing with you, Barry? Tell me about Rice.”
Barry looked at me with eyes like pissholes in fresh snow and tried to scramble away. I slapped him. “Stand still!”
“Jesus fuckin’ Christ, you set the sonofabitch on fire.”
“What about Rice?”
“No, no. I ain’t heard from Rice in a couple of weeks.”
“He hasn’t tried to sell any dope to you?”
“I swear to Christ.”
“He ask you where he could?”
“No. N
o.” He looked over my shoulder at Charles, then at me, then back to Charles again. “Jesus fuckin’ Christ.”
I shook him again. “Your card key.”
“What?”
“Your card key. What you use to open the gate downstairs. Give it to me.”
We went to the near end of the bar and took the card key out of a brass tray where it sat with keys and change and a black alligator wallet.
I said, “Rice had two keys of lab-quality cocaine. Not all that common, so if he tried to shop it around, people would remember. Ask around. I’m going to come back here tomorrow, and you’re going to have something for me. Right, Barry?”
“Jesus fuckin’ Christ.”
I bent down and checked Charles. His shirtfront was browned and his hair was singed and he was starting to blister in a couple of spots, but that was about it. Cognac burns off fast. His eye flickered open and he looked at me. His lashes were gone.
“You’ve got to be a lot better than you are to get away with a spin kick, Charles. They look great on the mat, but in real life they take too long.”
I stood up.
“Remember this, Barry,” I said. “Don’t fuck with the Human Torch.”
Barry said, “Jesus fuckin’ Christ.”
I went back along the hall, down the elevator, and collected my gun from the guard, who nodded and told me to have a nice day.
28
Until I heard from Barry Fein, there weren’t a whole lot of options left for me to pursue. I could go back to my house and brood about things there. I could cover ground I had already been over and brood. Or I could go to my office and brood, and maybe be there when the Eskimo or Duran called. I drove to my office.
The fourth-floor hall was empty. Office doors were closed the way they always were; none was cracked open, no one peeked out of the broom closet. I went down the hall as quietly as I could, not even making the little shushing sound shoes will make on carpet. I took my gun out, held it down along my thigh, and keyed the office lock with my left hand. Wouldn’t this be a sight for the insurance secretaries across the hall. Oh, look, Elvis is scared someone’s going to shoot him again! When the knob turned I pushed open the door and went in low. No one shot me. No one was pressed along the ceiling, waiting to drop down. The Eskimo wasn’t crouching under the desk. Safe again.
