I realize that the cheerful voice belongs to my “loyal and lethal” bodyguard and possible ex-assassin.
“Oh, right. Sorry,” I fumble. “Tommy didn’t give me your name.”
Kirby chuckles. It’s a chuckle that matches the rest of her voice: light, a little melodic. The sound of someone without a care in the world, someone who’d been happy to wake up that morning, who hadn’t needed any coffee when she woke up, who probably went on a five-mile jog straight out of bed, smiling the whole way.
I’m considering not liking her, but that’s the problem with cheerful people. You feel obligated to give them a chance. I’m also intrigued. The idea of a Pollyanna-assassin appeals to the perverse side of my nature.
“Well,” she says, a juggernaut of good cheer, “no harm done. Tommy’s great, but he’s a guy, and guys forget the details sometimes, it’s a man thing, I think. Tommy’s better than most, and a hunk to boot, so let’s forgive him, okay?”
“Sure,” I reply, bemused.
“So, when and where would you like to meet?”
I glance at my watch, thinking. “Can you meet me in the reception of the FBI building at five-thirty?”
“FBI building, huh? Coolness. I guess I’d better leave all my guns in the car.” A melodious laugh, somehow amusing and disturbing at the same time, given the context. “I’ll see you at five-thirty, then. Bye!”
“Bye,” I murmur. She hangs up.
“Who was that?” Alan asks.
I stare at him for a moment. Shrug. “Possible bodyguard for Sarah. I think she’s going to be a hoot.”
Coolness.
Terry Gibbs ushers us into his office with a smile. It’s a small office, with his desk in the front, and file cabinets along a far wall. Everything has a used but sturdy look to it.
I take stock of the lawyer as he motions for us to sit down in the two padded chairs facing his desk.
Gibbs is an interesting mix of a person. It’s as though he couldn’t decide who he wanted to be. He’s a tall man. He’s bald, but he has a moustache and a beard. He has the broad shoulders and athletic moves of a fit man, but he smells of cigarettes. He wears glasses with thick lenses, which highlight intense, almost beautiful blue eyes. He’s wearing a suit without a tie, and the suit looks expensive and tailored, a mismatch with the office furniture.
“I can see what you’re thinking in your eyes, Agent Barrett,” he says, smiling. He has a nice voice, smooth and flowing, not too deep or too high. The perfect voice for a lawyer. “You’re trying to match up the thousand-dollar suit and the crappy office.”
“Maybe,” I admit.
He smiles. “I’m a one-man band. I don’t make the big bucks, but I do okay. It forces compromise: flashy office or flashy suit? I decided on the flashy suit. A client can forgive a messy office. They’ll never forgive a lawyer in a cheap suit.”
“Kind of like us,” Alan says. “You can show them the badge, but all they really want to know is if you got the gun.”
Gibbs nods, appreciative. “Exactly.” He leans forward, resting his arms on the desk, hands clasped, serious. “I want you to know, Agent Barrett, I’m not being intentionally uncooperative on the Langstrom trust. I’m bound, ethically and legally, by the rules of the bar.”
I nod. “I understand, Mr. Gibbs. I assume that you have no problem with us getting a subpoena?”
“None whatsoever so long as it legally sets aside my obligations to comply with the rules of privilege.”
“What can you tell us?”
He leans back in the chair, looking off at a space over our heads, thinking.
“The client approached me approximately ten years ago, wanting to set up a trust to benefit Sarah Langstrom.”
“Man or woman?” I ask.
“I’m sorry. I can’t say.”
I frown. “Why?”
“Confidentiality. The client demanded absolute confidentiality in every way. Everything is in my name for that reason. I have power of attorney, I administer the trust, and my retainer is paid from the trust.”
“Did you consider that someone wanting that much confidentiality might not be up to anything good?” Alan asks.
Gibbs gives Alan a sharp look. “Of course I did. I made some inquiries. At the other end of those inquiries I found a child orphaned by a murder-suicide. If Sarah Langstrom’s parents had been killed by an unknown intruder, I would have refused to take on the client. As it was, with the mother ruled the murderer, I couldn’t think of a reason to refuse.”
“We’re looking into the possibility that it wasn’t a murder-suicide,” I say, watching his reaction. “It may have been staged to appear that way.”
Gibbs closes his eyes for a moment and rubs his forehead. He seems distressed. “That’s terrible, if true.” He sighs and opens his eyes. “Unfortunately, I’m still bound by attorney-client privilege.”
“What else can you tell us without violating that?” Alan asks.
“The trust is a fund, designed to keep up the family home, and to provide Sarah Langstrom with means. It’s to be released to her control on her eighteenth birthday.”
“How much?” I ask.
“I can’t give you an exact amount. I can say that it will let her live comfortably for many years.”
“Do you report to your client?”
“Actually, no. I assume there’s some form of oversight in place—a way for the client to keep an eye on me, to make sure I’m not emptying out the cookie jar. But I haven’t had contact with the client since the formation of the trust.”
“Isn’t that unusual?” Alan asks.
Gibbs nods. “Very.”
“I noticed that the exterior of the home is well kept up. Why not inside? It’s a dust farm,” I say.
“One of the conditions of the trust. No one was to enter the home without Sarah’s permission.”
“Strange.”
He shrugs. “I’ve dealt with stranger.” He stops speaking for a moment. A pained, almost delicate look comes across his face. “Agent Barrett, I want you to know, I’d never have knowingly participated in anything that would bring harm to a child. Never. I lost a sister when I was younger. My little sister. The kind big brothers are supposed to protect. You understand?” He looks miserable. “Children are sacred.”
I recognize the guilt I see rising in his eyes. It’s the kind of guilt that comes with feeling responsible for something you couldn’t have done anything about anyway. The kind that appears when fate is at fault but you’re the one left holding the bag.
“I understand, Mr. Gibbs.”
We’d spent an hour fencing with the lawyer, trying to extract more information from him without any luck. We’re back in the car, and I’m trying to decide on my next move.
“I got the idea that he wanted to tell us more,” Alan says.
“Me too. I agree with your original assessment. I don’t think he’s trying to be a jerk. His hands are tied.”
“Subpoena time,” Alan says.
“Yes. Let’s head back to the office and get in-house counsel on it.”
My phone rings.
“An update on other fronts,” Callie says.
“Go ahead.”
“As it turns out, the files on the Vargas case—both ours and the ones at the LAPD—are missing.”
My heart sinks.
“Oh, come on. Are you kidding?”
“I wish I was. The best guess is lost over time, although I suppose we could theorize that they’d been stolen, all things considered.”
“Whichever one it was, we don’t have the files.” I rub my forehead. “Fine. I know you’re working on processing the Langstrom home—but do me a favor. Call AD Jones and see if he can give you a list of names of the agents and officers who worked the case.”
“Will do.”
I hang up.
“Bad news?” Alan asks.
“You could say that.” I relate the substance of the call to him.
“Which do you think
? Lost or stolen?”
“My vote is on stolen. He’s been planning for years, and he’s been manipulating things to allow discovery at his pace. That makes this too much of a coincidence.”
“Probably right. Where to now?”
I’m prepared to answer when my phone rings again.
“Barrett,” I answer.
“Hey, Smoky. It’s Barry. Are you still in Moorpark?”
“We’re just leaving.”
“That’s good. I did some checking into the detectives originally assigned to the Langstrom case. Get this: One’s dead. He ate his gun five years ago. Not particularly probative, to be honest—the guy had been on the ragged edge for years, apparently—but what is interesting is that his partner retired two years later. Just quit, four years short of his thirty.”
“That is interesting.”
“Yeah. It gets better. I got ahold of this guy. His name’s Nicholson. Dave Nicholson. I told him what was up and get this: He wants to see you. Now.”
Excitement thrills through me. “Where does he live?” I ask.
“That’s why I asked if you were still in Moorpark. He’s close. He retired to Simi Valley, just up the road.”
38
DAVID NICHOLSON, BARRY HAD FILLED ME IN, HAD BEEN A GOOD cop. He came from a family of cops, starting on the East Coast in New York with his grandfather, migrating westward in the sixties with his father. His dad had been killed in the line of duty when David was twelve.
Nicholson had made detective in record time, apparently deserved. He was known to have a sharp mind and a meticulous nature. He was given to flashes of insight and was a feared interrogator. He sounds like Alan’s long-lost white brother.
None of which reconciles with the loose ends left in the Langstrom case. This fact, and the fact that he wants to see me—now—fills me with hope.
“This is the place,” Alan says as we pull up to the curb.
The home is on the outer edges of Simi Valley, on the LA side, where many of the older homes lie. Not a house on the block has more than one story. They’re all ranch-home layouts, built in the unimaginative style of so many homes of the sixties. The yard is well kept up, with a plain concrete path leading to the front door. I see a curtain in a window to the right of the door move aside and catch a glimpse of a face, peering out.
“He knows we’re here,” I say to Alan.
We get out and walk toward the house. Before we get there, the door opens and a man comes out, standing on the concrete block that forms the porch. He’s barefoot, wearing jeans and a T-shirt. He’s a tall, big man, about six foot three. He has broad shoulders and a big chest. His hair is dark and thick, he has a square-jawed, handsome face, and he seems younger than his fifty-five years. His eyes, however, lack vitality. They are dark and empty, full of echoes and open spaces.
“Mr. Nicholson?” I ask.
“That’s me. Can I see some ID?”
Alan and I pull out our respective badges. He inspects them and inspects us in turn. His gaze lingers on my scars, but not overlong.
“Come in,” he says.
The interior of the home is a throwback to the late sixties/early seventies. There’s wood-paneling on the walls, a flagstone fireplace. The one nod to the present is the dark hardwood flooring that runs through the home.
We follow him into the living room. He indicates a plush-looking blue couch and we sit.
“Get you anything?” he asks.
“No, sir.”
He turns away from us and stares out the sliding glass doors that lead into his backyard. It’s a small yard, longer than it is wide, more dirt than grass. A wooden fence encloses it. I don’t see any trees at all.
Moments pass. Nicholson continues to stare, frozen in place.
“Sir?”
He starts.
“Sorry.” He comes over and seats himself in an armchair that’s been placed kitty-corner to the couch. The chair is an ugly green, but it looks comfortable and weathered and well-used. Faithful furniture, quietly loved. It faces a twenty-inch television. A foldable dinner-tray stands next to it.
I can imagine Dave Nicholson sitting here at night, watching television, a microwave meal placed on the dinner-tray in front of him. Normal enough, but for some reason, in this place, it’s a sad picture. An undercurrent of waiting and depression layers everything. It’s as though the furniture should all be draped with sheets, and the house should have a wind blowing through it.
“So listen,” he says, before I can ask him any questions. “I’m going to tell you something I’m supposed to tell you, and then I’m going to tell you something I’m not supposed to tell you. Then I’m going to do what I was supposed to do.”
“Sir—”
He waves me off. “Here’s what I’m supposed to tell you: ‘It’s the man behind the symbol, not the symbol, that’s important.’ Got that?” His voice is monotonous and matches the hollowness in his eyes.
“Yes, but—”
“Here’s the next thing. I threw things off on the Langstrom investigation, steered the conclusions. He told me that the evidence would point to a murder-suicide, as long as I didn’t look too hard. All I had to do was accept what was on the surface. So I did.” He sighs. He seems ashamed. “He needed the Langstrom girl—Sarah—to be left alone. Said he had plans for her. I shouldn’t have done it, I know that, but you have to understand—I did it because he has my daughter.”
I freeze, shocked. “Your daughter?”
Nicholson stares at something above my head, talking almost to himself. “Her name’s Jessica. He took her away from me ten years ago. He made me helpless and he told me what to do, yes he did. He told me that someone would come asking questions, years down the line, and that I was to give them the message I just gave you. If I did all that, and one final thing, he said he’d let her go.” His eyes plead with me. “You get it, right? I was a good cop, but this was my daughter.”
“Are you saying he took her hostage?”
He points a thick finger at me. “You make sure she’s okay. You make sure he keeps his end of the bargain. I think he will.” He licks his lips, nods too fast. “I think he will.”
“David. You need to slow down.”
“Nope. I’ve said enough already. I need to finish up now. One last thing.”
He reaches a hand behind his back. It comes out holding a large revolver. I jump up, followed by Alan. I reach for my weapon, it finds my hand, but I’m not the one Nicholson wants to kill. The barrel finds his own mouth, a brutal thrust, it angles up. I reach toward him.
“No!” I yell.
He closes his eyes and pulls the trigger, and his head explodes in a “bang” and I am showered in his blood.
I stand there, gaping, as he topples forward from the armchair.
“Jesus!” Alan yells, rushing toward Nicholson.
I stand there and watch, dazed. Outside, the clouds open and the rain begins to fall again.
39
ALAN AND I ARE INSIDE NICHOLSON’S HOME. THE LOCAL COPS are here, wanting to take charge, but I ignore them in my fury.
A man—a cop—is dead, and I know his death is much more than a suicide. I want to know why.
I had washed my hands and gloved them, and I can still feel the spots where I scrubbed his blood from my face.
I stalk through the living room, down the hallway, into Nicholson’s bedroom. Alan follows.
“What are we looking for, Smoky?” he asks, his voice cautious.
“A God damn explanation,” I snap, my voice hard and furious and cracking around the edges.
The suddenness of it, the awfulness of it, had shocked me like a backhand across the face. My stomach was queasy from the rush of adrenaline. I couldn’t get my mind around the death yet, not fully. I only knew that I was enraged. He had done this. It was his fault.
The Stranger. I’m sick of his games and his puzzles and everything else.
I want to fucking kill him.
Nicholson’s
bedroom is like the rest of his house, careless and Spartan. Things are clean enough, but the home has no soul. The walls are bare, the window coverings are cheap and mismatched. He slept here, he ate here, it kept the rain off his head. That was all.
I spot a photograph in a frame, on a table next to the bed. Nicholson is in it, smiling, his eyes alive. He has his arms around a young girl, who looks to be about sixteen. She has her father’s thick, dark hair. The eyes belong to someone else. A mother’s ghost?
Alan looks at the photo as well.
“Looks like a father/daughter picture to me,” he says.
I nod, still not speaking.
Alan opens the walk-in closet and begins to rummage around on the shelves. He pauses, a lack of motion, silence.
“Wow,” he says. “Check this out.”
He walks out of the closet. He has a shoebox in his hands, the top off. I catch a glimpse of Polaroid photographs. Lots of them. Alan takes one out and hands it to me.
The girl is pale and she is nude. In this photograph she appears to be in her early twenties. The photo was taken full-frontal. She stands with her hands clasped behind her, her feet slightly turned in, her gaze averted and despondent. She has large breasts and an unshaven pubic area. She looks exposed and emotionally numb.
I compare this photograph to the one in the frame.
“It’s definitely the same girl,” I say.
“This box is full of them.” Alan speaks as he rummages. “Looks like they’re in chronological order. Always nude. Different ages.” He rummages some more. “Jesus. Based on changes in her face and body, these go back a lot of years.”
“Over ten, I imagine.” I feel deflated. My rage has dissipated, leaving emptiness behind.
Alan stares at me, taking this in. He taps a foot and jiggles the shoebox in one giant hand. “Okay. Okay. Makes sense. He takes Nicholson’s daughter hostage. But Nicholson’s not just a dad, he’s a cop. The perp needs a way to keep Nicholson on a leash, so he provides him with regular proof of life.” Taps his foot harder. “God damn. Why didn’t Nicholson go to the FBI? Why leave his daughter in this guy’s hands for that long without doing something?”
The Face of Death Page 31
