“No,” he said, his hand on the door handle. “I can handle it. Are they about to arrest the man who killed my mother? I picked out this guy last night from a bunch of pictures. I saw him coming down our street that day…the day it happened. But Detective Rickerson told me the man was dead, that someone else was behind what happened to my mom and Sam.”
“We’re close, honey. Everything is getting close. We just don’t have quite enough evidence yet to make an arrest, but soon.”
After stepping outside, he turned back and gave her a weak smile that moved only the corners of his mouth. She watched as he walked away. Kids were congregating, laughing, jostling with one another. How could they be that cruel? she thought. Then she saw Josh walking back to the car and her heart jumped. Was there a problem? Did one of those stupid kids say something else to him? He opened the car door and climbed back in. “What’s wrong?” Lara said, her voice full of concern.
“Nothing,” he said. “I forgot something.”
Lara tried to remember if she’d given him money for lunch. She had. “What? I gave you lunch money. Did you forget your books?”
For a long moment he looked straight ahead. Then suddenly he jerked his head to the side and leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “That…” he said, smiling nervously.
Lara blushed. She felt her entire body surge with pleasure. Here—he had kissed her right here where all the kids could see. Teenagers didn’t do that type of thing.
No man in the world could make her feel the way she felt right now, infused with such pride and joy—not even Rickerson.
She didn’t say anything. She was lost in the moment, flooded with warmth. “I-I…Josh,” she started stammering.
He got out and leaned back in the window, a wide smile on his handsome face. “In all my life,” he said, the smile vanishing as he spoke, “my mom never once drove me to school.”
Then he pulled his head out of the window and disappeared into the crowd of kids.
When Lara got to the courthouse and parked, she saw something white lying on the passenger seat. It must have fallen out of Josh’s notebook. It was a piece of paper. She opened it and read. “I wanted to tell you about the T-shirt,” it said in his small, neat handwriting. “I was too embarrassed to tell you before, but I want you to know. Sam made me eat a TV dinner. He made me eat the foil tray. I tore it up in little pieces and ate it with the mashed potatoes. The next day I started bleeding at school. I didn’t know what to do, so I put my extra T-shirt in my pants. I didn’t want the kids to see blood on my pants. They would have teased me. They would have said I was a girl. You know, having what girls have every month. So that’s it. Don’t worry. I’m fine now. Foil isn’t that good to eat, though. In case you ever wonder.” He signed it, “Josh. Your nephew.”
Lara put her head on the steering wheel and cried. In his short life this young man had suffered more than she had in all of her thirty-eight years. And he had suffered alone—just as Emmet suffered alone. She would never complain again. Last night Ted had given her more love in one night than Nolan had in their entire marriage. And today Josh had kissed her, a clear indication that he cared. Even if they tossed her off the bench, she decided, she would just have to deal with it. That was her commitment.
Chapter 24
Detective Rickerson arrived at the San Clemente police station at eight o’clock that morning. What with the evening with Lara, apprehending Frank Door, the pending investigation, he’d had less than three hours of sleep, but he was infused with energy. A natural at stalking his prey, he had the scent of the kill in his nostrils.
Pouring himself a cup of black coffee in the detective bureau, he thought of the magnitude of their undertaking. It was one thing to haul in small-time hoodlums. Arresting a man like Evergreen was a real coup. As he saw it, it was his one chance to climb the mountain all the way to the top. It was the chance he’d been waiting for all his life.
His task force had risen dramatically since the onset of the investigation. He had several officers from patrol working full-time on the case in plainclothes, baby Bradshaw, who did more harm than good, along with numerous reserve police officers. Reserves were men who wanted to be cops but had been smart enough to pursue other, more lucrative occupations. They were trained, given uniforms, weapons, and allowed to ride with regular officers so many days per month. If they ever had a disaster such as an earthquake, a flood, a major fire, they called on these men. Some of them were professionals, like doctors, dentists, accountants. And some of them were outright fools, wanting to play cops and robbers like children.
He couldn’t afford to be picky. He’d taken whatever he could get, and the extra help had paid off.
Even though there were many leads left to follow and the investigation was in no way complete, he felt time was of the essence. Lara had already been attacked once. The next time she might end up in the morgue. He couldn’t take the chance. They had to make their move.
He’d informed Lara that she should set up a meeting with Judge Rodriguez for twelve o’clock the next day. He didn’t want to do it at the courthouse right under Evergreen’s nose, so the meeting would take place at the police station. He contacted Gail Stewart at the lab, and she agreed to drive down and make a presentation.
Now that Frank Door had been arrested, they had to move fast. They had him in isolation at the jail, but they couldn’t deny him phone access. The first person he’d more than likely call to spring him would be the good judge himself.
Lara made an appointment to see Judge Rodriguez during the lunch-hour recess. As soon as she got out of court, she called Evergreen’s office and his secretary advised Lara that the judge had suffered a relapse of the flu and was out ill again. She was beginning to get frightened, afraid he was going to skip town. “Did he tell you when he thought he would be back?” she asked the woman. “I have something important to discuss with him. Is he at home?”
“Well, yes,” she said curtly. “Where else would he be? He’s sick.”
Maybe on a plane to New Zealand, Lara thought, replacing the phone in the cradle and heading down the corridor to Judge Rodriguez’s chambers. Either that or he was at home watching the shopping network, maybe looking for a few new goons.
“Hector?” she said at the door. The small man stood and waved her in, indicating she should take a seat.
Hector Rodriguez was far from neat. His desk was covered with papers, open files, law books, coffee cups. The credenza behind him was even worse, with periodicals and files stacked at least two feet deep.
Cardboard boxes with personal effects he’d never got around to unpacking stood gathering dust in the corners of the room. Only three months ago, he’d been appointed to a position on the Superior Court. Prior to that, he had been in Municipal Court—traffic court, to be specific. And he was already looking to get out, transfer to L.A.
Lara went over everything with him slowly, repeating many facts several times. Rodriguez listened, nodded, made notes on a yellow pad of paper. If he was shocked, he was keeping it under wraps. The telling over, Lara leaned back in the seat and waited. The next move was his.
“Tomorrow?” he said tentatively. “You want me to go to the police station?”
“Yes,” Lara said, sitting forward in her seat. “I don’t expect you to make a decision on the basis of my statements. Detective Rickerson is preparing a presentation, bringing in experts to outline the evidence. I want you to see it all with your own eyes.” It was really more than that, Lara thought. She wanted it to be Rodriguez’s call instead of hers. If he thought the detective had compiled enough evidence for a warrant, then so be it.
He swiveled his chair sideways, staring at the flag by his desk. “I think we should call the Judicial Counsel, have someone fly down for this presentation. This is serious business, Lara. Extremely serious business…and it affects all of us. Think what the press is going to do with this when we go public. It won’t just be Evergreen who suffers. Public opinion of the leg
al system is at an all-time low. We’ll all look bad.”
“That’s fine with me,” she said. “You can have the pope come if you want. I just want to get this thing moving, get a warrant and serve him with it before he leaves town.”
Judge Rodriguez turned his chair back to his desk and opened a law book, bending down and flipping the pages until he found what he wanted. “If you review section 1029 of the penal code, it states clearly that the Judicial Counsel must be notified whenever a judge is charged with a criminal act. And, of course, if the D.A. agrees to prepare the case, file a complaint, it will have to be transferred to another jurisdiction. None of us can sit the trial.”
“Okay,” Lara said, standing. “I’ll call Lawrence Meyer and advise him, have him come tomorrow, and you contact the Judicial Counsel.”
When Lara was at the door, she looked back. Rodriguez was still deep in thought. “Listen, Lara, maybe we should even call the FBI in on this due to the child pornography. They have extensive records on this type of thing.”
“Good idea. I’ll handle it. And Hector,” she said, “thank you for being so receptive. Some people would back off, want to keep their hands clean. They’d be afraid to go head to head with Evergreen.”
The little judge smiled. His front teeth were crooked. Obviously, his family couldn’t afford an orthodontist when he was a child. “Where I come from,” he said, “basically the streets of south central L.A., the barrio, going up against anyone without a gun or knife in their hand is nothing.” He paused and smiled again. “Besides, I never liked Evergreen that much. Something about him just rubbed me the wrong way. I think underneath that slick veneer, he’s prejudicial against minorities. That’s one of the reasons I want out. I think when the slot is eliminated next year, I’ll be the one to go.”
Lara smiled back and left. He might be small in stature, but Judge Hector Rodriguez looked pretty big right now.
Josh got a ride home with Ricky Simmons’s mother. The first thing he did was drop his books in the condo and head to Emmet’s, grabbing a bag of cookies on his way out the door and the cellular phone in case Lara called him. He knocked, but Emmet didn’t answer. He had a key. Emmet had told him he could come over any time he wanted. Then he remembered. Today was the day Emmet went to the physical therapist. They were trying desperately to maintain his condition, keep the strength he had in his muscles from deteriorating further.
Josh sat down in the bedroom and loaded up the computer. He munched cookies and played video games. He was playing Wanders from Y’s. He couldn’t seem to get the hang of it and his points were low. The following night he was spending the night at Ricky’s, and he wanted to beat him. Of course, Ricky was much better. He had his own computer and tons of games. Never once had Josh beaten him. On a piece of paper by the console was the number to the game man. On a lark, he dialed it and a man answered.
“Hi,” he said. “Uh, this is Ricky Simmons. I called you the other day. I thought you could give me some pointers on Super NES’s Wanders from Y’s.”
The man began talking and Josh listened intently. He blanked the screen and started over. He repeated the man’s instructions. “Okay, I have the manufacturer’s name up. It’s American Sammy. Press up, down, up, down, select. I did that. Now what?” Josh had the phone clamped between his ear and his shoulder. “Start on the second controller? Okay. It looks just the same. This is just the beginning of the game.” He was a little disappointed. The man continued giving him instructions. “Okay,” he said, “I have the status screen. Press select on the second controller? Yeah. Did it. It says ‘Debug.’”
“Now when you’re damaged,” the man’s voice said, “and your hit points drop to zero, you can still come back to life.”
“Cool,” Josh said. He couldn’t wait to show Ricky. ‘Thanks.” He was staring at the computer screen, ready to hang up when the man began speaking again.
“I have all those demos for you,” he told Josh. “They’re new…all the newest games.”
Josh was getting nervous. Lara had told him not to call this man, but he couldn’t see what harm it would do, not just one quick phone call. But if she found out some way, he thought, she would be angry. “Hey, I have to go. I have homework.”
“Wait,” the man said, a tinge of panic in his voice, “don’t go yet. Let’s talk a few minutes. You called me, remember, and I helped you. It’s not very nice just to hang up on me.”
“Sure,” Josh said. “Sorry. We can talk.” He had no idea what the man wanted to talk about.
“Do you have a girlfriend, Ricky?” he said in a wispy voice, almost childish.
“I like this one girl in my math class, but she won’t even talk to me.” He thought of Heather Reynolds with the long blond hair and the big blue eyes. He’d almost fallen over his shoelaces when he’d seen her this year. During summer vacation she’d grown breasts. It was incredible. Heather Reynolds had been great just the way she was, but Heather Reynolds with tits was heaven on earth.
“I see,” the man said slowly, a little smacking noise coming over the phone line.
“Look, I said I have to go,” Josh said.
“Will you call me again, Ricky? Don’t you want those demos?”
“Yeah, sure,” he answered. Then he quickly hung up the phone and left Emmet’s condo, crossing the grassy courtyard to Lara’s place and beginning his homework.
Once he had done his math and his English, Josh called Ricky and made sure they were all set for tomorrow night. “I could get you some free games,” he told him. He was certain the game man didn’t have anything to do with his mother’s murder. The man was really pretty cool. He knew everything there was to know about video games, even more than Emmet knew.
“And how are you gonna do that?” Ricky asked. “Hey, are you gonna rip them off from the store?”
“Do you want Smart Ball?”
“Shit, yes. I’ve been saving my allowance to buy it.”
“I’ll see if I can get it.” Josh clicked off the phone. He was bored. Emmet had taken his TV to the model condo. Once his homework was done, he usually went over to Emmet’s and stayed there until Lara got home. He thought about going out on his bike and then decided against it. After about an hour of sheer monotony, he called the game man back.
“I’d like those games, man,” he told him. “What do I have to do to get them? I don’t have any money. You said they were free.”
“Yes, Ricky, they’re free just like I said. All I have to do is fill out this questionnaire about you. The company I represent likes to know what their buyers are like…sort of a profile.”
He started asking Josh questions. Some of them he’d already asked, like where he lived, if his father was alive, where he went to school. Then he asked him physical things: what color was his hair, his eyes, did he have bad skin? Josh answered them all. Some of them he lied about. He felt bad about that, but he had lied the first time he’d called him. He couldn’t tell him the truth now.
“Do you like movies, Ricky?”
“Sure,” Josh answered.
“Do you like to play miniature golf?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“What about bowling? Do you like to bowl?”
“I don’t know how.”
“I see,” the man said. “Have you ever had sex with a girl?”
“What?” Josh asked. He didn’t know what this had to do with video games.
“You know, put it to her, stuck it to her.”
“No,” Josh said, completely mesmerized, lulled by the man’s soft voice, thinking what it would be like to do that to Heather, to actually touch her breasts. She had this one white blouse. Every time she wore it to school, he could see her bra through the thin fabric. Last year she hadn’t even had a bra. This year it was filled.
“I have some movies at my place,” the man said in that same funny voice. “You know, dirty movies. What does this girl look like?”
Josh felt himself perspiring. He moved around in his
seat. His jeans were pinching between his legs. He was getting turned on. Normally, this only happened to him late at night, in his bed. Sometimes he touched himself, had nasty thoughts. This guy on the phone didn’t even sound like a grown-up anymore. He sounded like Bart Miller at school. Bart always had dirty pictures of girls ripped from his father’s Penthouse magazine. “She’s got this long blond hair. It’s really shiny.”
“You should see this movie, Ricky. I’m looking at it right now. There’s this girl in it with long blond hair and huge tits.” The man giggled like a child. “She’s touching herself. You should see her. She’s putting her fingers right inside there. I bet she looks just like your girlfriend.”
Josh snapped out of it. He felt dirty and disgusting. What was wrong with this man, anyway? He shouldn’t be saying these things to him, offering to let him see dirty movies and all. That just wasn’t right. “I’ve got to go, man,” he said quickly and slammed the phone back. Now he’d have to tell Ricky he couldn’t get the game. Ricky would be pissed. He looked out the window and saw Emmet’s wheelchair at the front door of the condo.
He crossed the courtyard and waited while Emmet said good-bye to the lady who always drove him, and then called to him. “Hey, Emmet. Can I come in?”
Josh and Emmet played video games for about an hour. Josh couldn’t concentrate and Emmet beat him every time. All he could think about was the man’s funny voice, how he’d giggled so silly like a kid or something, the things they had talked about. Finally he turned and faced Emmet. “I’m going to tell you something, Emmet, but you have to promise you won’t tell Lara. If you don’t promise me, I won’t tell you.”
“I…promise,” Emmet said.
Josh related his experience with the game man, and Emmet listened quietly. Then Josh told him what he thought. “This is a sick man, you know. I’m not a retard. Adults aren’t supposed to talk about sex and stuff with kids. He’s a pervert, isn’t he? One of those child-molester people everyone’s always talking about.”
Interest of Justice Page 36
