“No,” said Sal. “I’d give them the nice, soft triple knock. Then when I took them back home, that’s when I’d give them the hard one.”
“Damn, Sal, I didn’t know better, I’d say that was Johnny talking.” Hart shot me a look.
Mrs. Desmond opened the door. “How many years have I been hearing that dreadful knock of yours? I hope this is the last time.”
Mr. Desmond appeared behind his wife, his bloodshot eyes peering over her shoulder and straight into my face.
“You two know Michael Lyons.”
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence. Then I spoke. “Mr. and Mrs. Desmond, I was very sorry to hear about what happened to Bobby. I’m sorry for your loss.”
Mrs. Desmond said nothing. Her husband nodded and opened the security door. They all settled on a couch and three chairs. The fifty-inch Panasonic plasma HDTV Terminal had bought for his parents was tuned to the Today show, but the sound was off. The house was hospital-operating-room clean. It would have taken an elite team of Salvadoran housekeepers an hour to find something in need of wiping.
Hart opened up. “We are trying to see if there is any connection at all between Bobby’s death and the shooting of Lyons here.”
“What could possibly be the connection?” asked Mr. Desmond.
“Cleamon,” said Hart.
“I don’t understand,” said Mrs. Desmond.
“We,” Sal said, “are working on a few theories. Now, of course, it would be productive if someone in the neighborhood stepped forward with some information, but so far nobody has. No surprise there, but, with all due respect, your son had more than his share of enemies.”
Silence from the parents.
“One of the theories we are exploring, and I have to emphasize this is only a theory, is that the shooter is trying to get back at Big, uh, at Cleamon, by hurting people close to him.”
“This here so-called reporter here wasn’t close to my son,” said Mrs. Desmond, the sound of indignation clear. “He wrote those lies that my son was a mass murderer.” LaBarbera, Hart, and I all resisted the urge to say, “He was.”
Sal went on. “This theory is that the shooter hated Cleamon. Maybe Cleamon hurt a loved one of his or hers and that person is fixated on getting back at him by killing anyone associated with him, like his younger brother Bobby and Lyons here, who wrote an article that kind of made him famous.”
“Infamous,” said Mr. Desmond.
“Okay,” said Hart. “So let’s talk about the man that came to see you. We just want to eliminate him. First, Mike, describe the man who shot you.”
“I’ve told you this before.”
“Tell Mrs. Desmond.”
“He was black.”
“Of course, he was,” said Mrs. Desmond with a sneer. “White people do not shoot.”
Hart couldn’t resist. “That’s true. But, you can’t rule out those crazy Mexicans.”
Even Mr. Desmond laughed briefly.
I continued, “He wasn’t noticeably tall or short. Wasn’t really dark or light-skinned. I do remember thinking he was kinda old for a banger. Not that I don’t know some older gang members. Wild Cat from the Rollin Sixties, for example.”
“Listen to him. Knows Wild Cat,” Mrs. Desmond mocked. “From the Sixties. Very impressive. Good for you, street.”
Though annoyed, I went on. “He was maybe forty-five, fifty. No tats or facial scars that I noticed. He had a purple scarf covering most of his head and forehead. That’s Grape Street Crips, Betty.”
“Oh, really?” asked Mrs. Desmond sarcastically. “He knows what purple stands for. Very street. Let me ask you something. Are you one of those white guys who wishes they was black so they can join a tough street gang? Or are you the white guy that got his ass kicked by African Americans in school and now is trying to get even? I bet you’re one of those white boys use the word ‘nigga’ all the time.”
“Settle down, dear,” Mr. Desmond urged.
“Yes, let’s move on,” Sal said. Hart said nothing. He was enjoying the exchange.
Mrs. Desmond continued, “Actually, I think you are just some little white guy making a living being a parasite on the misfortunes of black folks in the neighborhood. I bet there are no black folk in his lily neighborhood.”
“Look, I know you didn’t like the story I did on Big Evil—”
“Cleamon is his name,” she interrupted firmly.
“To you. To me, he’s Big Evil,” I said getting tired of her pompousness. “Always was, always will be.”
“He is Cleamon Desmond here, you understand?” said Mrs. Desmond.
“Tell that to the families of all the people he killed,” I said, unable to keep my calm.
“Get out of my home. Now!”
“Honey, relax,” said Cleveland Desmond. “We need to do this. Get it over with.”
“Okay, okay, everybody calm down,” said LaBarbera. “Let’s get back on point. What else?”
“That’s really about it, Sal. I know that’s not much. I only saw him for two seconds, and he was coming at me with a gun. Black guy, forty to fifty, purple scarf, medium height.”
“Very descriptive,” said Mrs. Desmond. “Narrows it down to only about a hundred thousand people. You call yourself a reporter? I thought reporters were supposed to be good at describing people.”
“Not when they are shooting at me.”
Johnny turned to Mrs. Desmond. “Does that go with the man who came here when Terminal showed up?” He instantly regretted that.
“Detective Hart, I did not christen my son with that name. In this household, his name is Bobby. I know this person here does not respect our house, but I would appreciate it in this home that you refer to him by his Christian name. Not some name the LAPD probably gave him.”
Mrs. Desmond continued, “The person that came here fits that vague description. I would add that he was extraordinarily nervous. Even when Bobby did not threaten him. But, it didn’t seem like that meek man would or could shoot anybody.”
“He did have a gun,” said Hart.
“Yes, until Bobby took it off him. I think maybe he did want to thank us for Cleamon helping him out. Yes, it took five or ten years, whatever. But how many times do we want to thank someone and put it off or forget it all together?
“Just two weeks ago, I was thinking about a dear family friend and thought to myself, I’m going to write her a letter. An actual letter. How much would she enjoy that? But, I put it off, and last week she had a stroke and died. We put things off we shouldn’t.”
“That’s true,” said Sal. “Okay, you mentioned the football comments between the guy and Bobby. Do you remember hearing the name Walter Payton, the football player?”
“I don’t remember.”
“How about Sweetness?” I asked.
Mrs. Desmond said with a nod, “Sweetness. Yes, yes, sweetness. That was it. I remember because in the middle of all this commotion, I thought it odd for someone to mention the word sweetness. What does that mean, sweetness?”
“That was Walter Payton’s nickname,” said Sal.
“So,” she asked, “is that of any significance here?”
“I don’t know yet, but I kind of doubt it,” said Detective Hart.
At that moment, Hart switched his attention to what was being aired. The Today show’s Al Roker had been replaced by a pretty blonde with an umbrella and large breasts with a “Breaking News” banner across the upper part of the screen. On the bottom of the screen was “Rustic Canyon Santa Monica.”
“Can you turn the volume up?”
News of the killing traveled fast though law enforcement. The lead homicide detective in Santa Monica had called a friend at LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide division, Detective Rosemary Sanchez, who was stunned and deeply disturbed by the news. She had worked with Harrington on the Big Evil Task Force. Sanchez made some calls. The first one was to Sal LaBarbera, Sally LaBoo, as she affectionately called him.
LaBarbera, Hart, and
I had left the meeting with the Desmonds and were on the cracked, graffiti-splattered, weedy, uneven 89th Street sidewalk when Sal’s cell rang.
“Sal, it’s Rosemary Sanchez.”
“Rosemary. Oh, no. You didn’t call me Sally LaBoo, this can’t be good news. Is this about Rustic Canyon?”
CHAPTER 26
An hour later, the detectives were meeting with their superiors, including Chief Miller, Commander Kuwahara and Captain Tatreau. “First of all, we do not need, want, or even have a new serial killer in town,” said the chief. “There’ve only been two killings that can possibly be tied together, so, by definition, that doesn’t make it up to serial killer. At best, it is just a double murderer.”
“Well, sir,” injected Hart, “there would be three if you count the attempted murder of the reporter Lyons. Not that we even mentioned the term serial killer.”
“I am not counting Lyons. Who knows who shot him? He, apparently, had lots of enemies, too. And I am still not convinced that that gang-member loving asshole didn’t have himself shot.”
Kuwahara spoke up. “Could any of this be related to the killing of King Funeral?”
“No,” said Hart. “That’s looking in-house. The common thread between Terminal, Leslie, and Lyons is Big Evil.”
“Are you familiar with Big Evil, Chief?” Sal asked.
“He was around before I got here, but I am familiar with his legacy. Where is he? San Quentin. Death Row, right?”
“No, he didn’t get death. He got LWOP. Pelican Bay.”
“Go see him.”
“Chief, how about we arrange to get him on the phone? We’re kinda busy.”
“Go now. I’ll have the visit set up, the flights. You’ll be back here by four. You need to see this guy in person.”
• • •
Eighty-five minutes later the detectives were on a plane heading to Eureka, where a rental car was reserved for the seventy-mile drive to the prison.
That morning, Don Ball, the one guard at Pelican Bay who had a good rapport with Big Evil, went down to the hole. Ball, a large, pumped-up, red-haired white man, went into the cell alone, a major violation of prison rules and a rather stupid thing to do, though he had warned three guards to stand by.
Ball laughed out loud when he thought of the scene in Young Frankenstein when Gene Wilder is about to go into a locked room where the monster is and orders his cohorts not to open the door no matter how much he screams. Three seconds later, Wilder is yelling “Mommy!” Ball was still laughing as he went into Evil’s cell.
“What’s so funny, Big Red? Let a brother in on the joke. What up?” Evil was only slightly puffed up and bruised, but still sprouted a huge smile when he saw Ball.
“I’ll tell you later, Cleamon. How you feeling?”
“Little sore is all. Red, I’m glad you came down. I ’preciate. What brings you down to paradise?”
“You’re getting a visit from LAPD. Ever heard of, let’s see,” he took out a sheet of paper. “Sal LaBarbera?”
Evil revved up his laugh. “Sally LaBoo! Coming to the big house.”
When he saw LaBarbera and Hart he flashed his bright smile. You couldn’t help but like that smile, even if you knew it was the last thing many people ever saw. “Sally and Johnny up in the bay,” he rumbled.
“Hello, Cleamon. Long time,” said Sal. “Looks like you been fighting again.”
“Six guards.”
“Fair fight,” said Hart. “Sorry to hear about your brother.”
“Me too,” said Sal. “Sorry ’bout Term.”
“Yeah, it’s hard. ‘Specially not being able to do a fuckin’ thing about it. But, fuck all that. Sal man, I’ve been trying to get hold of you. That’s why I fought the guards. Why I was in the hole. This guy came here to visit me and said he was a friend of Term’s and all and then he says he was the one that killed Terminal.”
“What?” both stunned detectives said.
“Said like too bad I wasn’t there when he killed him. And shot him. Ran over him.”
“Holy fuck. Sal, we never released anything about the tire marks.”
“What did he look like?” Sal asked.
“Man, he kinda nervous guy. Black. About I don’t know, maybe fifty, maybe less. Look kinda plain, you know what I’m saying?”
“I’m thinking I do. But what else? How tall? Any marks? Scars? Weight? You know the drill.”
“Well, he was sittin’ down so don’t know how tall he was, but he wasn’t big, that’s for sure. I could tell that. Thing I remember about him was that he was nervous, and I could tell he was lying.”
“What do you mean? Lying about what? That he was the one that killed Term?”
“I don’t know about that, but he was lyin’ before he said that. Lyin’ about how he was a friend of Term and that he was just up this way and knew I was here and wanted to say, you know, condolences. Plus, he called him Bobby. None of his homies called him that.”
LaBarbera looked around the room and at the guards behind him. He was looking for a video camera in the visiting room. There was none visible. “Say, fellas, are there video cameras here to record the visitors or inmates?”
The detectives were in the same room with Evil and the six guards, not on the outside looking in as Eddie Sims had been. “None in here, sir,” said a guard with sergeant stripes. “There are some video cameras outside this wall that film the visitors that come in here.”
“Do you know how long they keep the tapes or film or whatever it is? Is it digital and logged to a computer?”
“I’ll check, sir. But I kind of doubt it. We are very low tech here, sir.”
“I’m Detective LaBarbera. This is Detective Hart. LAPD. All this ‘sir’ stuff, you’re making me feel like I’m an asshole under arrest.”
Polite laughter from the guards.
“You think this guy was for real?” Evil asked.
“I don’t know, but he fits a very vague description that both Michael Lyons, the reporter, and your mother gave about a man who came to her house.”
“That mothercuntin’ fucker.”
“Okay, anything else you can remember about him?”
“Only that he’s a dead man.”
“Cleamon, just help us find him. Had you seen or talked to Bobby lately?”
“I ain’t seen him since my trial.”
“He never came to visit you up here?”
“No. Kinda bothered me at first, but it’s a long drive. Plus, I guess he was trying to get out the ’hood and all. It’s almost funny, man. I get sent to Pelican Bay, get life without, and it saves my life. He stays out and gets the real death sentence.”
“Yeah, life’s a funny thing,” said LaBarbera.
“You have any idea at all who would want to kill Bobby?” asked Hart.
“What’s with the Bobby shit? My moms called him that, but he was always Terminal or Term to me. I gave him that name. But, yeah, the boy had his enemies. Shit, even beefed with some Bloods, guys in Swans, Blood Stone Villains, Pueblos. But, Sal, you know that already. That ain’t no news.”
“You want some news?” Sal asked.
“Talk.”
“Remember Leslie Harrington?”
“Of course I remember that fox.”
“She’s dead.”
“Murdered dead?”
“Yeah, found her body yesterday morning.”
“Shot?”
“Stabbed.”
“Damn, that’s too bad.”
“For some reason I wouldn’t think you would be disappointed she was dead. She did send you up here.”
“Her and you and about twenty other motherfuckers sent me up here, but, you all just doin’ your job. I don’t hold it against you guys or her. That’s all part the game. Still, she was kinda special to me, even up here.”
“How so?” asked Hart. “She visit? She write?”
“No. But lotta times I close my eyes and imagine it be Leslie suckin’ my dick. Now, how I gonna imag
ine a dead girl sucking my dick? It ain’t gonna be the same. I mean I can do imagination as good as anybody, you feel me, but even I don’t want a dead girl suckin’ on me.”
“You always did have your principles, Evil,” Hart said. “Anyway, with Terminal and Leslie both killed, and Michael Lyons shot—you knew about that, right?”
“Yeah, I heard about that nut Lyons. You know, I was pissed at his ass after that magazine story he did on me, ’member that? I told him so on the phone. My moms didn’t like that story, about I killed so many people and admitted it, so I lighted him up. But, he came to me like a man. We straight. He even writes a letter every now and then, sometimes even throws in a twenty. He bool. I think the boy got a past his own self. They wouldn’t let him visit me here ’cause he got some felony. I think he even got two felonies.”
“He does. You have any ideas about him? Who shot Michael Lyons?”
“Nah. Like I said, I had a green light on him, but I cancelled it about, what, shit, I don’t even know. Maybe five years ago. This time wasn’t from me.”
“See, the only connection between the three shootings that we can come up with is you. Lyons wrote about you. Made you famous. Leslie prosecuted you. Put you in here for life.”
“Pending appeals, Detective,” said Evil.
“Pending appeals.”
“But, Sal, man, maybe they ain’t even connected. Lyons, I know that crazy fool had a lot of enemies. Plus he be goin’ out at night to the Nickersons, to Jordan Downs like he askin’ to get shot. And my brother sure did have some enemies. He was fuckin’ half the girls in town. And maybe Leslie, maybe it was just random or maybe an old boyfriend. What you people call a crime of passion. Was her pussy jacked-up? Mutilated and shit.”
“Autopsy today,” said Hart.
“Well, you get a jacked-up pussy or butter hole, then you’ll know. Like Term sounds from what the homies tell me, he was all jacked-up. Oh yeah, that guy that came here? He even said something about they gonna have a closed casket. That’s personal.”
“But, still the three all had ties to you,” said LaBarbera. “And now this guy that loosely fits the description that Lyons gave comes here. I don’t believe in coincidences,” said Sal. He left his card. “Call me collect any time. Cleamon, if I owned a gang, I’d draft you number one. But, Evil, I need you to get word to your boys to somehow cooperate with this.
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