The Death File

by J. A. Kerley

  “I’m in this office,” Klebbin said slyly. “But where are my résumés?”

  The door of the meeting room opened. “Candace,” the Compulsive Egotistical Osshole barked, “could you come here a moment?” He looked peeved and I figured it was because Klebbin was speaking with us.

  “Busted,” Klebbin said. “Gotta go.”

  “CANDACE!”

  “Good luck with the résumés,” Novarro whispered.

  28

  The afternoon was waning so we grabbed a couple of tortas and returned to HQ, Novarro having an angle she wanted to check out. A marked cruiser with a two-uniform crew was pulling away, the driver a broad-shouldered officer in his early thirties. He was staring at me from behind mirrored shades as he pulled toward the street, then studying me in the rear-view.

  “That’s Burton Claypool,” Novarro explained. “A good buddy of Merle Castle. Or maybe acolyte. Merle’s probably got Claypool feeding him information about my whereabouts.”

  “Castle’s really got it for you.”

  She sighed. “Castle got bounced. It bruised his ego. Forget about it.”

  Fishbach was sorting through reports as he tapped his keyboard, missing the chance to trumpet Novarro’s arrival. He turned his head just as we walked up, pushing the pages aside. “There she is, folks,” he grinned. “The woman of the second.”

  “Question, Doctor Fish,” Novarro said. “You know any woman around Escheverría?”

  Fishbach put the heavy brogans on the desk, shaking his head. I saw that he was linked to a PPD page, more reports for Solero, I figured.

  “A changing cast, Tash,” Fishbach replied. “Ramon likes them young, just past eighteen. He’d like ’em younger, I’ll bet, but knows we’d nail his ass on something we could prove for a change. He lures them into his nasty web with dope and restaurant trips and cheesy bling, screws them until they become boring, then tosses them out the door. They’re not human to him, they’re a commodity, like toilet paper.”

  Novarro jogged to a departmental locker and removed a long-snouted digital SLR, and we were hustling back outside. Keeping up with Novarro was like following a tornado.

  “Where we going?” I asked, moving fast to keep up with her long-legged stride.

  “To a photo session. If we get lucky.”

  We ended up on the street outside the reeking gym, slumping low in the vehicle as Novarro produced her phone.

  “Is this Ortega’s Gym?” she said in nasal voice. “This is Kayla Smith with the gas company. We’ve had a complaint about a leak on the block. Could you please vacate the premises for at least an hour while our workers locate the source of the problem? And please,” she said, winking at me “whatever you do, don’t light a cigarette.”

  Twenty seconds later the doors opened. Escheverría wasn’t inside, just two of his hulking crew and both of the women from the other day. Novarro set the zoomed-in SLR on auto-fire and captured ten shots in the span of a couple breaths.

  With the anxious quartet hustling away and sniffing the air, we ping-ponged back to HQ; the Juvenile Division.

  Lieutenant Richard Pickett ran Juvenile, “Juvie” for shorthand. Juvie in a major metro area was a tough gig that drew cops into a world of hideous dysfunction, where the word “family” was often close to meaningless, implying only a genetic bond. I figured most of Pickett’s charges were low-income kids set loose in the streets at an early age and who turned to thievery to survive.

  “I see kids who are in their mid-teens,” a Juvenile officer in Mobile once told me, “that have never in their lives seen an adult get up and go to work.”

  Novarro downloaded the shots to Pickett’s computer and he expanded them, studying and nodding as he indicated faces with a forefinger. “I don’t know this one. Looks a bit older. The young one—” He pointed to Escheverría’s alibi girl. “That’s Gloria Sparza. She was here a couple years back, briefly.” He shook his head. “And now she’s hanging with Escheverría; Jesus, what a freaking pity.”

  “Why?” Novarro asked.

  “Gloria’s actually pretty bright. Of course, maybe too much doping burned up the wires. Hard home life. Now and then you get someone who gives you a breath of hope – what you live on here. If Gloria’s with that psycho, it didn’t take.”

  “Bright, though?”

  “According to several teachers she had smarts and, even better, a touch of common sense. Didn’t stop her from dropping out, though. Probably thought her looks would make her the next Cindy Crawford or whatever. She got busted for shoplifting, couple joints back in high school. Went to Juvie for a couple months of rehab.”

  “She’s damn pretty,” I noted.

  “Good looks are a drawback in the inner city, Detective,” Pickett said. “They attract attention from pimps and people like Ramon Escheverría.”

  “What’s she like, Rich?” Novarro asked.

  “Plays the tough girl. Maybe she is by now. But there might actually be something still alive inside her. If she stays with Escheverría, it won’t be there long. He’ll use her up, hook her to the hard stuff and sell her off to a pimp.”

  “Why you think Sparza took up with Ramon, Lieutenant?” I asked.

  Pickett gave me eyes that had seen it all. “Simple, Detective Ryder. Escheverría told her the lies that she wanted to believe; so she did.”

  It was heading onto six and Novarro wanted to scope out the gym for a bit, hoping to get lucky and see Sparza leaving, maybe follow her to her digs and strike up a conversation.

  Instead, we got lucky on the way over, cruising past a tacqueria until Novarro did a double take, checking the rear-view as we passed by.

  “It’s Sparza! She’s back at the taco stand.”

  “Alone?” I said, craning in the seat, too late to catch a look.

  “Be still my beating heart,” she said, turning around.

  We parked. Gloria Sparza was sitting at a table with a single taco on the paper before her and a cup of pop at her elbow. She was taking little bird-bites, careful not to drip on the outfit: a spangly silver low-cut blouse and black designer jeans so tight they could have been a tattoo. She wore her gloss-black hair piled high and hoop earrings I could have put my fist through. We parked, walked to the counterman behind the window, ordered a pair of soft drinks.

  Novarro turned when the drinks arrived, feigned surprise at seeing Sparza, who was busily ignoring us. “Yo … how’s the taco, Gloria?”

  The pretty eyes went hard. “How you know my name?”

  “I’m the po-lice, Gloria. I see all and know all.”

  “The tacos are muy bueno. Even better when you get them to go.” A tough girl.

  Novarro stepped closer. “You’d better load up on those tacos, Gloria. Won’t be long until you’re eating lots of creamed chipped beef.”

  “Que?”

  “Creamed chipped beef. Learn to love it.”

  A frown, unsure of what Novarro was talking about. “I don’t eat no creamy whatever.”

  Novarro put her foot on the bench beside Sparza. “It’s prison food, girlfriend.”

  “What you talking about, crazy lady?”

  “Slammer chow. Like grits with bugs and wet white bread.”

  “Why you telling me about prison food, lady?” Sparza pushed the last bite of taco between her bright red lips with a forefinger. “I ain’t goin’ to no prison.”

  The surrounding tables were empty. We sat with Sparza, Novarro at her elbow, me across the table. Sparza rolled her eyes and collected her paper.

  “No, Gloria,” Novarro said. “You won’t go directly to prison. First you’ll get arrested, then you’ll go to court, then the judge sends you to prison. That’s how it works.” Novarro paused, studied the blue sky. “I’m thinking you’ll get twenty years in the joint.”

  Chin-jutting defiance. But behind the flashing eyes, fear. “Yeah? How the fuck that gonna happen, lady? I ain’t done nothing.”

  Novarro sighed, long and dramatic. “Yes, Glori
a, you have done something very wrong. But it’s out of my hands now.” We started to stand.

  “NO!” Sparza snapped. “What have I done. What … are you lying about?”

  Novarro slowly re-sat and I followed her lead. She looked Sparza in the eyes, her voice set on Maximum Truth. “We both know Ramon wasn’t with you last night, Gloria … no, hear me out. He was murdering a man in Tucson. Wanna know why? The dead guy said he’d lent Ramon his car for a few days.”

  A two-beat pause. Sparza looked shaken. “I don’t know nothing about that. Ramon was with me all night.” The strident voice had become a whisper.

  “And there’s the problem, Gloria. You’re lying about Ramon’s whereabouts in a murder case. You’re now an accomplice. That means you share the murder. Like I said, I’m thinking a double dime … twenty years inside. You’ll be out when you’re forty, right?”

  Novarro shot me a glance. Sparza was considering what was being said and she wanted me to spread a little more dread on the prison pastry.

  I shook my head. “That’s only if the dykes don’t tear her apart,” I said. “Some of those girls are the size of Ramon, and just as crazy.”

  “I hate them,” Sparza said, more to herself than us. “They were always at me in Juvie.”

  Another glance from Novarro; we’d found something to work with.

  “They run the prisons, Gloria,” Novarro said. “The lesbians, the dykes. Diesel-dykes, the big ones.”

  Sparza shuddered.

  “You’re a beautiful woman, Gloria,” I said. “They’ll fight over you from the first day, and the winner will be the biggest, meanest, stinkingest dyke of them all, an animal.”

  “She’ll own you your first few days in,” Novarro said as Sparza began looking pale. “Every night she’ll wrap you in her thick hairy thighs and make you satisfy her a dozen times.”

  Sparza pushed from the table and ran to a garbage pail beside the restaurant, bending her head over it and vomiting. And then Novarro and I were beside the depleted girl, Novarro shaking her head.

  “What’s Ramon ever done for you, Gloria … buy you food? Clothes? Jewelry? He uses your body whenever he wants. Is he so good that you’ll take a twenty-year fall for him?”

  “HE WAS WITH ME ALL NIGHT!” Sparza howled, her fear of Escheverría even stronger than her fear of prison. She started away, escaping what she didn’t want to hear.

  Novarro jogged up, took Sparza’s arm and angled her to the window of a closed store beside the tacqueria. It was lightless inside and the window was a dark mirror.

  “Look at you, Gloria,” Novarro said, pointing to the reflection in the window, “you’re pretty enough to be a model. But Ramon will use up your beauty and throw you away. How many women has he thrown away since you’ve known him? How many are selling themselves on the street?”

  Sparza snapped her face away, like it would make Novarro disappear. “I ain’t like the others.”

  “I work with a guy who says Ramon thinks his girlfriends are toilet paper. Use ’em and flush ’em. You like being toilet paper, Gloria?”

  “Fuck you. I’m outta here.”

  But her feet didn’t move. We’d gotten inside her head and were making her confront things she’d been avoiding. Sparza suddenly looked as deserted as the empty storefront she leaned against, her eyes shut against the horrors of her world.

  “We won’t say anything, Gloria,” Novarro said quietly. “It goes no further, I promise. Was Ramon Escheverría with you last night?”

  Gloria Sparza dropped her head. The earrings swung almost imperceptibly.

  They said No.

  Having confirmed that we weren’t running down a complete wrong track, we returned to HQ where Novarro wrote and filed the daily report. The place was pretty much deserted, desktop terminals staring blankly into the overlit room.

  “You up for a decent meal?” Novarro said.

  My stomach had been growling as she’d worked. “What you thinking?”

  “How about we grab a couple steaks and we go to my place and fire up the grill? I’ll even let you turn the steaks, since that’s what guys like to do, right?”

  Her eyes were warm and inviting and my heart and stomach were on the same track until my mind spoke.

  “I, uh … that sounds great, but I’ve got to call some folks back in Miami and, uh …” My mouth went dry.

  She smiled softly. “The girlfriend, right?”

  “That’s one of the calls.”

  She reached to touch my arm. “That’s all right. We’ll get it another night, Carson. Rain check and all that.”

  I left the station – Novarro claiming she wanted to touch up the reports – and wandered to my car. The sky was fading past twilight and seemed to cling to the city dazzle like a shimmering, translucent vapor. My breath seemed short and twice my legs turned back to the station, but after a loose few steps aimed back at the car. It seemed to take a long time to get there.

  And then, without recalling the trip, I was in my rental home, somehow not hungry after hours without a meal, pulling a chair into the backyard to sit in the night’s cooling air and stare at the sky. I twice pulled my phone, but when I started to dial, put it away.

  And then it called me. Harry.

  “Hi, Cars,” he said. “What’s up? Making headway?”

  I looked at my watch and realized it was midnight in Miami. “Like slogging through mud, brother,” I said. “If we can keep from drowning in the muck, we might get somewhere.” I paused and added: “Someday.”

  He cleared his throat. “Roy’s got me on this case. A pharmaceutical rep moving large amounts of opioids to pain clinics, a drug dealer in Bill Blass suits. I was shadowing him to various haunts the past few days.”

  “Yeah?”

  “He likes upscale places where he can order $15 cocktails and look legit while pedaling his wares. These aren’t cheesy doper nightclubs, Carson. They’re watering holes for stockbrokers and bankers. And since they’re near the downtown medical complexes, lots of physicians and medical types.”

  “So I take it you’re eating a lot of steak while on surveillance.”

  “First couple nights. Now I’m chomping salads. Gotta keep my girlish figure.”

  Like a 6’4” refrigerator was girlish. I still felt something odd in his voice. “I’m still not sure why you’re telling me this,” I said. “Does it have anything to do with Bowers and Warbley?”

  A two-beat pause. “Twice now I’ve been in fancy-ass places and seen Miss Morningstar.”

  Vivian Morningstar, my girlfriend. The longest relationship I’d ever maintained.

  A pause on my end. “Oh? And?”

  “She’s been with the same guy. Looks like a doctor type.”

  “She works with a lot of physicians,” I said cautiously.

  “They’re having a good time, Carson. Lots of smiles and clinking of glasses. There’s some touchy-feely.”

  “And when they left the restaurant?”

  “I didn’t follow them, Carson.”

  “Of course not. Thanks for telling me, brother. I know it was tough.”

  “I, uh …”

  He left it there and rang off.

  I went into the house and lashed together a sandwich, grabbed a beer, and returned to the backyard to watch the night as I ate, wondering what I felt, until realizing I had no idea. I didn’t feel down, nor up, nor spinning unhinged in the middle.

  No idea.

  29

  Kubiac awakened at seven. He drank a Red Bull and played a few games on the net before checking coding sites for new hacks. He’d started a game, but found himself too distracted by thoughts of his new friend and had called her.

  “Uh, hello? Cat? You up?”

  “Adam?” Catherine Maruyama had said. “Good morning. What a wonderful surprise. What you doing?”

  “Gaming.”

  “You like games, don’t you?”

  A smile crossed Kubiac’s face. “I love games, Cat. You do too, d
on’t you?”

  “I do, Adam. I wish I had more time to play them.”

  “Wanna meet somewhere?” Kubiac asked, trying for nonchalance. “Like, uh Hashtag: hashbrowns?”

  She’d laughed. “You mean breakfast? Cool!”

  Zoe always slept until at least ten. He’d likely be back while she was still snoring.

  Twenty-five minutes later they were at a small café down the street from Maruyama’s apartment, sitting in the new morning sun and nibbling at pastry. She ordered tea, and Adam opted for the same, clearly flustered when the waiter had offered several choices: Darjeeling, Earl Grey, Chamomile, Hibiscus …

  “What do I want?” he asked Maruyama.

  “Tell you what,” Maruyama said, “let’s both get Darjeeling. It’s a favorite.”

  “Did you tell your girlfriend about me?” Maruyama said after their orders had arrived, studying Adam over a plate of French toast and sipping her Darjeeling. “I’d love to meet her. Zoe, right?”

  Kubiac studied his fork. “Uh, yeah. Zoe.”

  “Did you tell her about me?”

  “I told Zoe I met someone who went to Meridien. But not that we were meeting now. Or, uh, yesterday. I mean like … it’s kinda hard to explain. Zoe’s possessive.”

  Maruyama waved it away with a smile. “At least tell me about her. She must mean a lot to you.”

  “She’s almost skinny, but not quite. Dark hair that puffs out. She has big eyes, brown. She’s real pretty. She likes shopping more than anything.”

  Maruyama sighed. “I wish I was pretty.”

  “You are, Cat. You’re cool, too. Hashtag: coolest.”

  A gentle smile. “Was Zoe a patient of Dr Meridien?”

  “No. Zoe’s, uh, more regular. She’s smart, though.” He paused. “Just not like us, upgrades.”

  “I’ll bet she’s way smart and super extra pretty.”

  Embarrassment colored Kubiac’s face. He smiled past it. “You’re talking a lot better today, Cat.”

  Maruyama set down her tea and put her fingertips over Kubiac’s wrist. “I feel comfortable around you, Adam. Safe, because I know I can trust you. I’ll bet Zoe’s the same way. How long have you known her?”