Alien Blues

by Lynn Hightower

  The Elaki’s image faded from the screen.

  David stood up and kicked his chair over.

  “This,” said the voice from the TV, “is the scene outside the office of the Elaki ambassador.”

  “Nothing,” David said. “All for nothing.”

  The phone rang. Halliday turned the sound down on the television.

  “Halliday. Yes.” Halliday rubbed the back of his neck. “When? What do you mean you’re not sure? Don’t waste my time with excuses. Find him before Santana does.”

  David closed his eyes. “Winston’s gone.”

  Halliday nodded.

  David looked at String. “And suddenly Project Horizon’s got diplomatic status.”

  “Unidentified sources,” Della said.

  “String.” David glared at Mel. “Got to be.” David turned to the Elaki. “My friend, the Elaki cop. Working with Project Horizon the whole time. The mind probe, String, that was a good stroke. That way I knew Puzzle was afraid of you. I knew you weren’t in with him. Just plant what you want me to know—”

  “But, no, Detective—”

  David grabbed him. String was slippery and zipped backward, but David was expecting it. The mind probe would backfire on String after all—it had taught David to wrestle, Elaki style.

  David grabbed the Elaki beneath his fins and butted him with his head. The Elaki would sag and fall and—

  String contracted and slid out from under David’s grasp. Someone grabbed his shoulder and David swung wildly, clipping Mel’s ear.

  “Ow. David. It ain’t him.”

  “It is him.”

  Halliday stood up. “Sit down, Silver!”

  “Tell me, Mel, how do you know it isn’t String?”

  “You know it’s not him, David. And you know who spilled it. Rose did.”

  “Rose?”

  “Think, will you?”

  “Rose wouldn’t do that, Mel. She promised me …”

  “David, she won’t even talk to me when I call. She’s in trouble, she—”

  “Rose is fine.”

  “No, David, she ain’t fine. I never known my sister to crap out like that. Like she did down in that tunnel.”

  David took a deep breath. “Crap out?”

  “She freaked, David, you were there. She damn near got Haas killed.”

  “Are you blaming Rose for that?”

  “Face it. She got scared. It ain’t like her, I know, but this Santana has a weird effect on her.”

  David stepped close enough to feel Mel’s breath on his face. “You got a big mouth, Mel, you know that?”

  “Take it easy, David. She’s my sister.”

  David hit Mel as hard as he could. Mel fell backward across the desk.

  “Out, Silver.” Halliday’s fists were clenched. “Walk it off.”

  Della crouched beside Mel. “You okay, Burnett?”

  Mel staggered to his feet and Della steadied him. He wiped blood off his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “I’ll give you one, David. Touch me again, and I’ll wipe the floor with your ass.”

  “Please, Detectives.” String swayed from side to side. “I do not wish to cause these tensions. I did not betray the confidence. I have been in the area for Los Angeles—grey cloudy skies and short smiling humans. I must tell you—”

  “This ain’t about you, String.”

  “Both of you sit, or get out,” Halliday said.

  David looked at Mel. “You always have so much to say.” He spoke softly, barely a whisper. “What can you do?”

  String moved to Halliday’s desk. “I must inform you, sir …”

  Mel watched David warily. “You want this, David, okay. Come back when your bones are solid, the glue gets absorbed, and you got all your bandages off.”

  David scooted forward and slammed a fist into Mel’s belly. It didn’t connect. He had a glimpse of Mel’s knuckles before they smashed his nose. He hit the wall, jamming his sore shoulder. The pain in his nose made his eyes tear. He staggered forward, swinging. Someone grabbed his collar and pulled him back.

  “Enough.” Halliday’s voice.

  David surged forward halfheartedly. Pain took the edge off intent. Halliday pushed him into a chair. David held his nose with one hand, and kept his left arm close to his body. His shoulder throbbed.

  Halliday loosened his tie and sat down behind his desk.

  “Detective Silver, have you compromised this investigation by providing your wife with confidential information?”

  “No sir.” David held his head back and blood trickled from his nose. “Any information my wife had, she found out without any help from me.”

  “And how is your wife involved?”

  “She was once employed by the DEA. She’s run into Santana before.”

  “I think it’s time I talked to her.”

  “Good luck. She’ll stand mute.” David closed his eyes.

  “Then you and I will talk. In depth.”

  The phone rang.

  “Yeah,” Halliday said. “Yeah, he’s here. David.”

  David picked up the phone. “Silver.” His nose hurt. “Yeah, it’s me. Who is … Winston?”

  Halliday hit the speaker option and Winston’s invective filled the office.

  “… scummy son of a bitch. You promised me. You promised! I don’t care if you put me in jail for the rest of my life, I wouldn’t help—”

  “Winston. Dennis. I didn’t know this was going to happen. Look, you’re a target. Think, will you? Santana will come for you. Tell me where you are, we can talk.”

  “Yeah, and then I can go to the john in handcuffs!”

  “Winston?”

  The dial tone buzzed.

  Mel handed David a handkerchief. “Your nose is bleeding.”

  “You bastard, I think you broke it.”

  “Good.”

  “Get him some ice,” Halliday said.

  Mel went for the door.

  “No, wait.” Halliday looked around the office. “Before we clear this room, you better all know what we’re up against. According to Mr. String, Santana is branching out. He’s sent out feelers to West Coast associates—Elaki associates. Black Diamond is going national.”

  FIFTY-ONE

  Gravel crunched under david’s feet. The lights of Saigo City glowed and sparkled on his right. Someone had been burning leaves—illegally—and the dark smokiness was strong in the air. It was a clear night, the moon nearly full. They were far enough out of the city to see a few stars.

  He was wearing his favorite jacket for the first time since last spring. He’d lost weight and the jacket hung loosely from his shoulders. Years of wear had softened the brown leather to butterlike pliancy. The silken pockets were tattered with holes. There was a deep scar over the right shoulder, where one of Mickey Sifuente’s hired pistoleros had shot at him. That had been over on Bell Avenue, behind Ollie Ramey’s little bar and restaurant.

  He walked through purple darkness toward the floodlit wreckage.

  A Jeep, front end broken and crumpled, was smashed into a walnut tree. David had seen the Jeep before, parked in Dennis Winston’s driveway.

  David, careful of broken glass, squatted down on his haunches, studying the stretch of road in front of the tree. One of the uniforms started to say something, then noted the ID hanging from David’s belt. David crooked a finger.

  “Find any skid marks?”

  “No sir.”

  David nodded. He stood up slowly. Quick movements still hurt.

  Mel was bent over a body on a stretcher. He had the sheet pulled up at the bottom. A naked white foot dangled over the side, the elastic cuff of the sweatpants soaked in blood. David noted the medics leaning against the van, one of them smoking. No live ones here.

  One of the uniforms, a woman, held a running shoe out to Mel. She pointed behind the walnut tree. Mel studied the bottom of the shoe and grimaced. He motioned David over.

  “Look at this.”

 
David took the bloodstained shoe. The webbed imprint of a car accelerator was molded into the sole.

  Mel scratched the back of his neck.

  “Okay, good,” he said to the uniform. “I want that accelerator. Better collect all the floor controls—brake, dimmer switch, whatever. And go to the hospital with him. Make sure we get the clothes.”

  “Yes sir.”

  Mel turned to David. “What you think? Suicide? He kept his foot on the gas all the way.”

  “No skid marks.”

  Mel rubbed his chin. “Went right for the tree. Never tried to stop.”

  “Could have been murder,” David said. “Santana. Or Myer.”

  Mel shrugged. “There’s easier ways, David. I don’t doubt they’d have got him eventually. But you and I both know he was being pulled apart.”

  “You think he was consumed with guilt over the way things turned out? And decided to end it? It is Winston, isn’t it? You ID’d him?”

  Mel pulled back the top of the sheet. Winston had gone through the windshield. David had to study the face before he was sure.

  “He wasn’t finished, Mel. With his work.”

  “Santana had him coming and going, David. There wasn’t going to be any more work.”

  David looked away from Winston to the dark field on the right.

  “One way to make sure,” he said.

  A month ago it would have been unthinkable for Mel not to have asked what that way was.

  “I got some things to finish up here,” Mel said. “Let me know what you come up with.”

  David headed up the gravel road toward his car.

  Winston’s townhouse was locked up tight. David kicked in the bottom panel of the door. An alarm went off.

  David went back to the car and called Halliday, requesting that he be squared away with the local precinct. Halliday agreed, but David felt his disapproval.

  The apartment was silent now, dark. One light blazed in the kitchen. David checked the home programmer. Winston had not made any recent changes. Alex’s food bowl was empty and sticky with saliva. Licked clean. There was no more than an eighth of an inch of liquid in the water bowl.

  David felt a presence.

  Alex stood in the doorway, muscles tense, tail high.

  “Hello, kitty,” David said.

  Alex flitted across the floor and rubbed against his legs.

  “Hungry, boy? Hungry?”

  Alex purred.

  David rinsed and filled the water bowl. Alex sniffed it and looked back at David. David found a piece of cooked fish in the refrigerator. He sniffed it, gagged, and set the dish back on the shelf.

  David went through the cabinets. In a low corner compartment he found three kinds of cereal, saltine crackers, a jar of peanut butter, a can of peaches that looked decades old, and a new box of dry cat food. David poured some on a plate and set it down beside the water bowl.

  Alex wound in and out of David’s legs, his furry back rippling like an accordion under David’s palm.

  “Good kitty,” David said. “Lonesome huh? Missing your buddy?”

  Alex purred and crunched delicately. David stretched. No doubt, then, that Winston’s suicide was contrived. Winston would have seen to Alex, no matter how desperate he was.

  David chewed his lip. The method was more Myer’s style than Santana’s. And Myer had a lot to gain. Without Winston’s testimony, Myer would be next to impossible to prosecute.

  David knew what would happen. They would go through the drill, sweat the physical evidence, but in the end, they would cut Myer a deal. He was going to have to turn Myer loose to get Santana.

  David poked through the apartment while the cat ate. The unmade bed was coated with cat hair. He was fighting the urge to straighten the sheets when Alex appeared in the doorway.

  The cat regarded him seriously, then lifted a paw, licking, with practiced dexterity, the rough pads on the bottom.

  “I guess you better come home with me,” David said.

  Alex looked at him with sad, intelligent eyes.

  “No handcuffs,” David said. “You’ll come peacefully, won’t you?”

  He lifted the cat and tucked him under his arm. Alex shifted and settled in comfortably.

  “I hope you like children,” David said. “Not to mention dogs, bunnies, and God knows what else.”

  He went through the kitchen on his way out, picking up the cat food and the water bowl.

  FIFTY-TWO

  The cooling system in the office was flubbed. It was late Sunday afternoon, and the electrician had gone home. Mel, Halliday, and Myer were crammed into interrogation room one. Halliday had refused to let David conduct the interview.

  “You’ll lose it, David,” he had said. “Don’t even ask.”

  Halliday being right didn’t make David any the less angry. He sat out in the hall, perched on a stepladder the electrician had left behind.

  The precinct was boiling. The weather had turned hot and humid—the last punch of summer. The windows were open, but covered by Venetian blinds. Bars of sunlight baked the tile floor and the empty desks.

  David ran a finger around the collar of his T-shirt. A waft of hot air from the open window blew across his face.

  Roger had shed his coat and tie, as had Myer. Sweat ran down their flushed cheeks. Myer was laughing, Mel smiling.

  They were getting it—everything they needed. And Myer would go to jail, but not for long. Not bad, for a guy who had committed murder and protected drug dealers.

  Myer waved at David through the two-way glass.

  David took a deep breath and looked away. Mel came out in the hallway, shutting the door behind him.

  “I’m going to get some hot dogs, David. What you want?”

  “I’ll get them.”

  “Naw. I want out for a while. What can I get you?”

  “I don’t want a hot dog. I want a taco.”

  “Okay. I’ll be going by Hoi’s place anyway.”

  “I don’t want it from Hoi’s place. I want one from that place on Mill.”

  “Mill’s all the way across town, David.” Mel pulled his shirt up and wiped the sweat off his face. The hairs on his stomach glistened with dampness.

  “Tacos on Mill are better.”

  Mel dropped the shirt and it hung in a wad over his belt. He scratched his neck.

  “They’re not so bad at Hoi’s place.”

  “God damn it, Mel. Will you quit?”

  “Quit what?”

  “Quit being so nice to me. Just stop it, okay? Quit pretending you don’t know what I did.”

  “What, David?” Mel frowned and leaned against the wall. “It’s not just this business with Rose, is it?”

  David applauded. “You’re good at it, Mel.”

  “Good at what?”

  “Playing dumb.”

  “Jesus Christ, this is just the kind of stupid ass conversation I have with women.”

  “Don’t you ever think, Mel, about why I laid in that tunnel and kept my mouth shut, while you and Rose and Haas walked right into Santana.”

  “That’s what’s bugging you? You were hurt, David. Guy beat the crap out of you. You probably blacked out.”

  “No. Not blacked out. I laid there and I heard you coming. I heard you and I didn’t yell.”

  “So that’s it. Jesus. Okay, David. Why didn’t you yell?”

  “He had me pinned down.”

  “Okay then. You couldn’t.”

  “But I could.” David rubbed his eyes. “I’d already had one hit. And he gave me a choice. Call out … or take the Diamond. And I was hurting and I wanted just to fade away; so I … took it.”

  “That’s it? That’s your big sin?” Mel put a hand on David’s shoulder. “Forget it, pal. You weren’t thinking straight. You were out of it, David.”

  “Don’t you do that, Mel. Treat me like I’m some kind of junkie. I could have warned you.”

  Mel tightened his grip on David’s arm. “You know better than th
is, David. Now look it. I’ve seen you pick those junkies up in alleys, sit them up, try to feed them, go after the little pricks that beat them bloody. I’ve seen you give them money that they say they need for their kids, and I know you knew better. Think who you’re talking to. I’ve seen you. All these years, you watch their nasty, desperate lives, and you never get so hard you see them anything less than human, even though every hit they take might be a bullet in your back.” Mel took a breath. “You’re good at cutting other people slack. Cut some for yourself.”

  David sat down on the ladder.

  “Now I want to know something.” Mel scratched his thigh. “You taken any hits since Santana?”

  David glared at him. “No.”

  “Thought about it?”

  “Maybe.”

  “But you haven’t?”

  “I said not.”

  “Good. I been wanting to ask you that.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Why didn’t you bring this up earlier? Tell me what was wrong? All these years we been partners, we been friends, you couldn’t bring this up? Would have saved your nose.” Mel turned away, then looked back over his shoulder. “Haas any better?”

  David shook his head. “Still on critical hold, and getting worse. No neural response now, from the waist down.”

  FIFTY-THREE

  The weather had turned suddenly chilly, as if the sun had worn itself thin with the last wave of heat. David’s eyes watered. The wind made his ears ache.

  He took out a handkerchief. “Nothing more irritating than a runny nose on a stakeout.”

  Mel cocked his head. “Lots of things more irritating. Take, oh, take diarrhea for instance, or just plain … you know Ridgway? I was in a car with Ridgway all night one time and—”

  “Mel, would you shut up?”

  “This reminds me of an incident,” String said. “We too are similar, in our jobs the stake up.”

  “Stakeout,” Mel said.

  “Yes. There are times when an Elaki must …”

  David focused on the pavement as it disappeared under the wheels of the shuttle.

  Rose was leaving him.

  He had gone home early yesterday to a silent house, and wandered from room to room, looking for his children. Their beds were made. The animals that usually lounged among the pillows were gone. The night-light was missing.