Nowhere Land: A Stephan Raszer Investigation

by A. W. Hill

  “I’ve got trouble, Detective,” he called out. “Gotta go. I’ll call you from the car.”

  Aquino smiled grimly. “Don’t cut me out, Raszer,” he shouted. “You could find yourself very alone up here. And, uh—” He aimed a finger at Raszer’s left pocket. “You’ll return that piece of evidence when you’re through examining it, right?”

  “Right,” said Raszer. “Thanks. I’ll call you.” He turned and strode deliberately to the exit, all the while hearing Harry’s words in his head: A fishing cottage will suit us fine.

  As soon as he’d cleared the door, Raszer speed-dialed #9. It was a direct-dial to the BlackBerry carried by Lieutenant Borges of LAPD Homicide, promoted to that division only two years earlier from the Missing Persons Unit that Raszer himself had briefly served. Borges wasn’t the top cop, but he was the one man on the force who took Raszer at face value and could be counted on not to go procedural on him if the game called for different rules. He was a tall, crater-faced Argentinean with his own sense of the surreal, and he was as familiar with L.A.’s alter-reality as an international port of mayhem and occulted enterprise as he was with its potholed streets.

  Nothing could save Harry Wolfe, and nothing short of light-speed would have gotten Raszer there fast enough, so he drove with due speed by the fastest route he knew, down the 2 freeway’s roller-coaster grade to the 5 North and off at Glendale Boulevard. When he arrived at the scene, he found Sunset barricaded between Hyperion and Maltman, and traffic snarled beyond hope of getting within a block of the building. He parked in a red zone adjacent to the Silver Lake Spanking Parlor, jumped out, and sprinted onto Sunset and past the barricades with his PI card held high.

  “Stephan Raszer,” he called out to the beat cops. “Borges wants me. Can you radio ahead?”

  His legs turned to molten lead. Up ahead, he counted six squad cars with lights flashing and a paramedic van with its stretcher out. Beyond the second set of barricades stood a KTLA news van, and pulling in beside it was the local Fox affiliate. All the street noise played second fiddle to the weirdly phase-shifted beating of three helicopters—two police choppers and a news unit—in the cloudless blue sky overhead.

  Not again, he thought, slowing his pace. Please don’t let her be dead. Because if she were dead, it could only be the result of his having intruded on her haven, breaking the fragile membrane of security that playing possum afforded her. Impractical as it was, Raszer sought to never leave tracks, to leave a scene as he had found it, to not let his zeal for the quest be the cause of pain to any but his adversaries. It was of a piecewith his thirst for anonymity, his resentment of guys who peed all over their turf, his almost Asian desire for lightness of being. In practice, such nonintrusion was a quantum impossibility, no more realistic than expecting an electron to disregard the presence of an observer and a battery of measuring equipment. Still, he hoped.

  He spotted Borges in the midst of a huddle, a head taller than anyone else, and better dressed. All eyes were on the top floor and roof of Layla’s four-story building. At the moment, there was nothing to see there, but when Raszer surveyed the same elevation on the opposite side of the street, he saw the police sharpshooters lined up like tin soldiers. Harry Wolfe’s killer had not left the building.

  “Luis!” he called out to Borges, fifteen feet short of the huddle. “Lieutenant . . . ”

  Borges stepped away from his men and approached Raszer with a slow nod and a tight smile, combing his fingers through a crop of thick hair the color of tarnished silver. He offered his hand; Raszer grasped it warmly.

  “What have we got?” Raszer asked.

  “We’ve got a corpse, a killer, and a hostage,” he replied.

  “The girl’s alive, then,” said Raszer, scanning the building’s facade up to its flat, recessed roof.

  “So far.”

  Raszer squinted, his eyes still on the building. “Where are they?”

  “On the roof, we think,” said Borges. “There’s access from the fourth floor, but there’s also a tunnel canopy extending from the door, and they haven’t come out from under it yet. Ten minutes ago, he was on four, and told us he had a hostage and a gun, and that he’d kill her unless we landed a chartered helicopter on the roof and took him to Death Valley.” Borges grunted. “Strange, eh, compadre? Most of ’em want to go someplace nice—Cuba or Cancun or the Bahamas. This one wants to go to hell.”

  “He wants to get lost,” said Raszer. “Have you gotten a look at him?”

  “No.”

  “How about the voice? American? Middle Eastern? Any accent?”

  “American,” Borges replied. “Young. Scared. Maybe New England.”

  This was not what Raszer had expected to hear. New England? Borges placed a hand on Raszer’s shoulder and walked him out of both hearing and camera range.

  “Now, why don’t you tell me what we’ve got in there?” he whispered. “You mentioned these folks contacted you for a border hop. Said they were scared about some kind of cartel coming down on them. Looks like they had reason to be.”

  “Yeah, but there’s more to it, Lieutenant.”

  “There always is with you, Raszer.”

  “It’s connected somehow to those rave murders up in San Gabriel Canyon last winter. And the abduction that night of a Jehovah’s Witness girl I’ve been hired to track.” Raszer inclined his head to the building. “They were there. At the rave. The dead man was the DJ, and the girl . . . well, she took up with him. She’s Syrian. She’d promised me a lead on the abductors. Then she wanted to get as far away as possible.”

  “And you promised her and her boyfriend a ride,” said Borges. “Tsk, tsk.”

  “I said I’d look into it. I liked them. They seemed . . . caught in the middle. Not clean, but not filthy, either. I think I may have complicated things.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time, would it?”

  “I do my best, Luis.”

  “I know you do, but this is L.A. Your best or my best is always outdone by somebody else’s worst.”

  Suddenly, the phalanx of marksmen above hunkered into position, and the cops on the street moved out of their huddles. The news crews scrambled, racking their zoom lenses to telephoto. All attention went to the roof as the killer’s voice was heard.

  “Five minutes!” he shouted. “You’ve got five minutes to bring me my helicopter before I take her head off!” And then he added tentatively, “And I mean it.”

  Borges motioned to the cop on his right for a bullhorn, and spoke into it without stridency. The sound of the device was harsh enough. “Stay cool. It’s been dispatched. Don’t hurt the girl. If you hurt the girl, we’ll take you out. Do you understand?”

  There was no response, but the voice rang in Raszer’s ears and sent currents into his stomach. It was more a boy’s voice than a man’s. And something else. He turned to Borges. “He doesn’t sound like a pro, does he?”

  “No,” said Borges. “He doesn’t. Not what you thought, eh?” He dropped the bullhorn to his side. “Come with me. Let’s see if we can give him his close-up.”

  Nearby, under a makeshift awning, was a police A/V crew with a direct feed from the TV camera in one of the choppers above. Borges radioed the pilot.

  “Come around and bring it down about a hundred feet,” he said. “Easy. Just enough to make him feel the wind. See if you can get me his face.”

  The pilot complied, and Raszer watched with Borges as the small figures on the rooftop, once again withdrawn beneath the canopy, began to fill more and more of the monitor screen. The image was overlaid with sighting brackets and crosshairs, and these would also appear in the video scopes of the marksmen on the opposing roof. Both Layla and her captor were in shadow, but Layla’s form and face were unmis-takable. She wore a saffron-colored bathrobe and, as far as evident from this distance, , nothing else. All that could be said about the assassin was that he stood behind her, was a few inches shorter, had a gun under her chin, and appeared to be wearing a bill
owing white robe with a bright, blood-red sash. Nothing more was visible until the chopper’s blades drew near enough to lift the border of the green-striped canopy and, for an instant, reveal a smooth, unlined face with a distinctive beauty mark just above the lip.

  Raszer froze, his eyes glued to the monitor.

  “Luis,” he said to Borges. “I know this boy.”

  Borges turned halfway, one eyebrow hiked way up.

  “Is there a hostage negotiator on-site?” Raszer asked.

  “On the way,” Borges replied, waiting.

  “Can I borrow your bullhorn?”

  “Do you know what you’re doing?” the lieutenant asked.

  “I’d better,” said Raszer.

  The two men locked eyes, Raszer nodded, and Borges warily handed him the bullhorn.

  “Scotty Darrell!” Raszer called out. Immediately, on the monitor, they both saw the boy’s head jerk. After a few seconds, the words came, and Raszer knew they would be transformative and final, one way or the other.

  “Well played, Scotty,” he called. “I could use a man like you. A man with a keen mind and a steady heart.”

  Borges looked at him cockeyed, but did not move to take the bullhorn. The other cops on the ground jerked their heads in the direction of the A/V station, and out of the corner of his eye, Raszer saw one reflexively put his hand on the grip of his service revolver. Borges saw it, too, and put his palm up. The chopper hovered in place, bobbing slightly, and the image on the monitor went briefly out of focus.

  “Scotty Darrell!” Raszer repeated. “Nod your head if you can hear me.”

  On the screen, they watched Scotty swivel and poke his head into the light, keeping the gun lodged beneath Layla’s jaw. He surveyed the roof quizzically, then raised his eyes toward the hovering helicopter, connecting with the camera. Layla’s eyes flashed in the brilliant blue reflected from the sky. She had recognized Raszer’s voice.

  Raszer turned to Borges. “Do you have a PA channel to that chopper?” Borges nodded.

  “Can you make my voice come from up there, too?”

  “What do you have in mind, friend?” he asked guardedly. He trusted Raszer’s instincts, but only so far. If he let a freelancer take control of an active crime scene and it backfired, they would have his badge. He knew, however, who and what Scotty Darrell was, and was a step ahead of Raszer’s reply.

  “To make the choice for him,” said Raszer. “To keep him in the game.”

  Borges aimed a finger at the audio console and gave its operator a nod.

  “Open the mic,” he ordered. “And kick up the volume.” He turned back to Raszer. “Make it good, my friend, or I’ll be chasing coyotes in Nogales and you’ll be out of business.”

  Once Raszer saw that the audio man had complied and pushed up the volume fader, he brought the bullhorn back to his lips. He had to lick them. His mouth was bone dry, and got drier with each beat of his pulse.

  “Remember, Scotty,” he said. His voice boomed out over the rooftops of East Sunset. “One more level to go. Number nine. Are you game? Are you ready to ride the big snake?”

  The chopper camera zoomed in on the boy’s anxious face, now half-lit, and the snout of Layla’s gun slipped briefly from its pocket of flesh. She flinched. Raszer’s eyes were on the monitor. He prayed the girl wouldn’t do anything rash, then decided not to leave it to God.

  “Stay put, Layla,” he commanded. “Scotty’s with us. He knows the rules.”

  From the left, an unmarked squad arrived, disgorging the hostage negotiator and a team from downtown. Raszer lowered the bullhorn and pivoted to face Borges nose to nose. He made his bid, knowing it was the last for both Scotty and himself. He had disconcerted the boy, made him question his mission, and if he did not follow through, the sharpshooters would find reason to take him down.

  “Let me go up there, Luis,” he said. “Alone.”

  “No way, amigo,” said Borges. “I’m already way off the map.”

  “Look at me, Luis,” said Raszer. “Look with me. Remember what happened in Barstow. Remember Las Cruces. Fuck . . . remember Waco. What happens when the big guns move in? This is about more than one perp, more than one murder. This kid is the skeleton key to a hundred doors. If he dies—and he will, by his own hand or yours—they all stay locked. Let me go up. Give me fifteen minutes to get the gun.”

  “And if I wind up with your blood on my hands, too?” Borges replied. “How will I sleep at night?”

  “The same way I do, Luis,” said Raszer. “By knowing that the Devil will think twice before playing you for a fool.”

  Borges ran his hand through his hair, took one glance at the approaching hostage team and one look over his right shoulder at the men whose allegiance he would forfeit if he failed, and then picked up his radio.

  “All stations! I’m sending a man up! Cover the roof and the roof egress and take the suspect out only—I repeat, only—if there is clear intent to harm.” He hesitated, then added, “And I don’t want a hundred bullet holes. Stick with the firing order. If Chopper One gets it done, everybody else hold fire.” Then he switched off the radio and muttered, “Madre de Dios, Raszer. Go.”

  When he’d reached the fourth-floor landing, Raszer paused to catch his breath, resting the bullhorn on the bannister. Directly ahead of him was a short set of steps leading to the roof exit. To his left and down the hall, the door of Layla’s apartment stood menacingly open and unattended. Per Scotty’s demands, the cops had cleared out of the building. In the corridor’s ceiling, just outside the flat, a skylight sent a cone of sunlight to the threadbare carpeting nine feet below. The sunlight animated the dust motes into a dervish dance, and for an instant less than time, the motes aggregated themselves into the upright form of Harry Wolfe, arms extended, legs splayed, seven silver-handled knives sunken into his major arteries: biceps, heart, throat, solar plexus, two in the groin. Like an image projected by a camera obscura. Raszer rubbed his eyes, shook it off, and approached the steps.

  Poor Harry, he thought. He’ll never see that cottage.

  Before putting the bullhorn to his lips, he rapped on the door three times and called out. When there was no answer, he switched on the device.

  “Maimonides!” he called, using the name of Scotty’s Internet avatar, the name he had learned from The Gauntlet’s puppet masters. “I’m here to take you home. I am unarmed. I am alone. I am coming through the door. Stay beneath the awning.”

  Raszer pressed his ear to the door. There was some shuffling against the gravelly surface of the roof, then: “Wh-who are you? Who sent you?”

  Raszer anchored his back against the door, hand on the knob, and rested his head. Who sent me? Giving the right answer—if there was a right answer—would be like choosing which wire to clip on an improvised explosive device. The Gamesmasters wouldn’t do. Fraters Vanitas and Ludibrium probably wouldn’t do. He closed his eyes for a count of three breaths, listening only to the rumble of the old air-conditioning compressor on the roof. In the lens at the apex of the triangle whose base points were his closed eyes, he saw the daggers that Layla had said were embedded in Harry’s flesh; he saw Layla’s eyelashes dip in invitation to dance; he saw the old Syrian coin sitting on the squatter’s bureau, felt its chain being snapped by clawing fingers, saw the spray-painted words “Nothing is true. All is permitted.” He saw Johnny Horn’s trailer and smelled the wintergreen.

  “I’m your next guide, Maimonides,” he said. “I was sent by Hazid.”

  Raszer turned the knob and pushed gently. He couldn’t allow Scotty time to reflect. The knob rotated, but the door was jammed or blocked. In that moment’s reprieve, he realized that although he and Scotty had never met face to face and Scotty probably didn’t read the newspapers, he couldnot gamble that the boy hadn’t seen his picture on the Internet. Further, L.A.’s ubiquitous news choppers would soon start buzzing the roof and broadcast his face. He tore off his linen shirt and wrapped it around his head, leaving only a pale blue tan
k top on his torso. He reached into his pocket and found his sapphire-lensed sunglasses. An instant later, he heard something heavy being dragged, and the door was freed.

  Scotty backed Layla to the far end of the arched canopy. He looked more fright-ened than the girl. The boy gave Raszer’s dress and fair features a once-over, probably thinking that his Imam ought to come garbed in something a bit less makeshift.

  “Hello, Scotty,” said Raszer, holding his palms up. “I’ve wanted to meet you. For a few minutes, gametime is suspended. The clock has been stopped, and you’re getting a chance to opt out. After those minutes are up, play will resume, and those men on the roof and”—he indicated the hovering chopper—“up there will kill you. I can bring you out safely and be your guide through the next level, but first we have to send a signal. We need to step into the light, and you need to let the girl come to me. Then you’ll drop the gun and kick it over to me. Do you understand?”