by Robert Ellis
She paused a moment to compose herself. When she finally spoke, Matt had to lean forward to hear her.
“I was going to school in Westwood,” she said. “I had a single room in a dorm that was being renovated. I saw him every day. He was nice to me. He seemed like a good guy. Jamie always had a smile. I used to talk to him. Once or twice we went out for coffee. I kind of liked him. Then one night I came back to my room after dinner and he was waiting for me. He tied me to the bed. He took off my clothes. He cut them off with a box cutter. A razor blade. And then he raped me. He didn’t stop until the next morning.”
Matt traded looks with Cabrera again. As difficult as it was to listen to, Reynold’s story seemed to mirror the events leading up to Millie Brown’s murder.
His phone started vibrating and he reached into his pocket. When he saw Lieutenant McKensie’s name blinking on the face, he looked back at Reynolds.
“I’m sorry but I have to take this.” Matt turned to Cabrera. “It’s Frankie’s supervisor. It’s McKensie.”
Cabrera’s eyes widened a little. Matt got up, opened the slider, and stepped onto the deck as he punched in the call. McKensie didn’t sound very happy.
“We need to meet, and we need to meet right now, Jones.”
Matt hesitated, feeling another wave of paranoia sweep over him. “Why can’t we talk over the phone?” he said. “What do you want?”
“In case you haven’t noticed, I lost two homicide detectives this week. My office, Jones. Not later. Now. Or I swear I’ll nail your sorry fucking ass to the cross.”
The call ended, but not with a hang-up. Instead, it sounded more like McKensie had thrown the phone against the wall. It sounded like he was in a real bad mood.
CHAPTER 37
Matt pulled into the visitor’s lot at the North Hollywood station and found a place to park where he could keep an eye on the front entrance. Releasing his seat belt, he pried the lid off a cup of coffee that he’d picked up at the 7-Eleven next door and took a quick sip. The coffee was strong and piping hot and tasted like it had just been brewed. He took another sip through the steam, trying to force himself to relax and stay focused.
Cops were walking in and out of the building. Patrol units were passing through the lot and making the turn onto Burbank Boulevard. Few looked his way, and those who did didn’t seem very interested. Everything appeared casual enough. Through his windshield, everything he saw looked ordinary and true.
Matt didn’t know what to make of it.
He wondered if all the paranoia and dread wasn’t blowback from the war. While he had never experienced any issues in the past, he wondered if seeing Brooke Anderson’s body, or even the anticipation of seeing her body, had triggered something so deep inside he couldn’t find it or even name it.
He thought about his father. Or maybe it was just the idea of having a father. Someone he could talk to, and—
He tried to clear his mind.
He was disappointed that he couldn’t stay with Cabrera and see the interview through with Leah Reynolds. Still, they had talked it over before he’d left, and he felt confident that he and Cabrera were on the same page.
Unlike Millie Brown, Reynolds was alive and had seen Taladyne every day before the rape. They had talked, and as she said, they had something going on. It didn’t matter how casual it might have been. Matt knew that there was still the chance that Taladyne had spoken about himself—the things he liked to do and the places he liked to go. Still a chance that he might have said something that could point them to where he had been hiding since Ron Harris hung himself in his jail cell. But just as important to Matt were questions he knew that Grace and Rodriguez couldn’t possibly have covered, given the fact that they had been investigating a single murder. Did Taladyne ever mention that he had a problem with people who had money? Did he ever talk about greed or religion? Did Reynolds sense that he was bitter or angry? Did he ever say anything about hating something or someone for whatever reason? Did Taladyne ever talk about seeking revenge?
Matt took a last sip of coffee and got out of the car. As he walked toward the entrance, he could feel the butterflies working his stomach. He thought that he might be shaking, but when he checked his hands they looked steady.
He entered the lobby, his ID out and ready for the desk sergeant. They must have been expecting him, because a cop escorted him directly to McKensie’s office and asked if he’d like anything while he waited. McKensie was in a meeting that should have ended fifteen minutes ago, the cop said. Matt thanked him but declined and sat down facing the glass walls and door. When the man vanished around the corner, he got up and moved straight to the lieutenant’s desk. There were two files on top, and Matt could read both Hughes’s and Frankie’s names on the tabs. A black-and-white snapshot of the two detectives was leaning against a framed photograph of McKensie’s wife and children. Matt checked the hall, then flipped open the file with Frankie’s name on it and took a quick glimpse inside. A preliminary report of the accident in Mint Canyon had been drafted and sent over by the Sheriff’s Department. Matt heard footsteps in the hallway, saw McKensie turn the corner, then closed the file and rushed back to his seat.
McKensie must not have noticed, because he entered the room without saying anything or even acknowledging Matt’s presence. Kicking the door shut with his foot, he tossed a file folder on his desk and sat down.
“What is it, Lieutenant? What do you want with me?”
McKensie didn’t respond, and Matt looked him over. Even though his hair had turned white, Matt knew from Hughes that McKensie was only in his midfifties. His skin was tanned and heavily lined, and he had the look and gravelly voice of a man who drank more nights than he should. His eyes were a brilliant green, with heat and fire in them, his body thirty to forty pounds overweight but hard and tough, like a street fighter’s. As Matt sat there trying to interpret McKensie’s silence, his dead stare, he thought about getting up and making a run for it. He wondered how far he’d get down the hall.
“You asked me to come here, Lieutenant. I’m here.”
A moment passed, and then another, before McKensie spoke in an exceedingly quiet voice.
“I hate you,” he said.
Matt froze. The man’s eyes were drilling him, and he appeared to be seething. He was sipping something from a coffee mug that Matt didn’t think was coffee. The weight of the air in the small room turned heavy and felt oppressive.
“I really hate you,” he went on.
“You’re not my commanding officer. Am I supposed to care?”
“I told you that I needed to see you. That it was important, Jones. It took you two fucking hours to get here.”
Matt shrugged. “I was in Playa del Rey.”
“Doing what? Getting laid after a long breakfast?”
Matt got up. “Listen, Lieutenant, I don’t know what’s going on, and I don’t have time to figure it out.”
He started toward the door.
McKensie lowered the mug and leaned forward. “Sit down, tough guy. I’ve got something to say to you, and I’m not finished. If you walk out now, you won’t make it to the lobby. I’ll have you arrested. I swear to God I will. I’ll have you locked up, and I won’t tell anybody about it for twenty-four hours.”
Matt stopped as he reached the door, wondering if McKensie was crazy enough to do it. He turned and gazed at the man sitting behind his desk. The fierce, wide-open eyes, the face cut in stone, the clenched teeth, his hands balled up into fists. The answer was undoubtedly yes, he would spend the next twenty-four hours in jail, and no one would know. Matt grimaced, then returned to the chair.
“That’s better, Jones. Take a seat. Pull yourself together.” McKensie took another sip from his mug, then met Matt’s gaze. “I gave you a call,” he said finally, “because I got a heads-up from the Sheriff’s Department this morning.”
“Okay,” Matt said. “You got a heads-up. What is it?”
McKensie opened the file that he had wa
lked in with, leafed through several sheets of paper until he found the one he was looking for, then slid it across his desk. It was an e-mail from the Sheriff’s Department that included a driver’s license and a blowup of a young man’s face printed on a single sheet of copy paper. Matt had no idea what it meant and looked back at McKensie.
The lieutenant nodded. “The three-piece bandit was killed last night, Jones. He tried to rob an off-duty deputy sheriff in a parking lot in West Hollywood, and it didn’t pan out.”
Matt took a deep breath. “Who is he?”
“He’s been identified as Sean Hudson, a twenty-five-year-old kid who had been out of work for more than a year. He had a wife and a newborn son. The Sheriff’s Department has his piece, a Glock 20, but the mag was empty. They finished searching his apartment three hours ago. No ammunition was found, and a preliminary examination of the pistol indicates that it’s never been fired. Hudson’s wife claims that he never bought any ammo, because he didn’t want to hurt anyone. That means that the kid was telling the truth when he released those text messages to the media. He couldn’t have killed Hughes. The Sheriff’s Department will be holding a press conference sometime this afternoon, or before that if the story leaks. The kid didn’t kill Hughes, but you and your partner knew that a long time ago—just like you know that Frankie Lane didn’t die in a fucking car accident.”
A long moment passed, the entire office charged with electricity. Matt’s hand automatically went for the pack of cigarettes in his pocket. McKensie shot him another hard look.
“This building’s a smoke-free environment, Jones.”
It didn’t matter anymore. He lit a cigarette and took a deep pull, then watched McKensie grab the pack out of his hand and light one, too. McKensie leaned closer, waving the smoke away from his eyes in a lazy arc.
“Here’s my problem, Jones. Here’s what keeps me up at night. When Hughes got all shot up, why didn’t his case go downtown with his fucking body? A cop gets knocked off, the best and brightest usually take over and all the troops rally. When two cops get knocked off, the rally gets even bigger. I’ve lost two of my best, you hear what I’m saying? Downtown isn’t investigating these cases. You are. Matt Jones. Just bumped up from busting thirteen-year-olds for selling weed in the school yard. It’s bullshit, and it stinks.”
Matt listened and took it, but held on and didn’t say anything. Sliding the wastebasket closer, he flicked the ash from his smoke into the can and took another pull. McKensie was still staring at him with those green eyes of his. Still breathing fire.
“What the fuck is wrong with this picture, Jones? What the fuck is up with Bob Grace? I never liked that guy. I never liked anybody who liked that guy. I always thought Bob Grace was a piece of shit. This has something to do with the Faith Novakoff murder and that girl you guys found up by the Hollywood sign the other night. And guess what, Jones? This morning’s e-mail from Missing Persons included someone new. Another coed. Nobody’s seen her for seventy-two hours.”
McKensie flashed a brutal grin, took a last drag on his smoke, and ground it out on the tiled floor with his heel. Then he pulled another e-mail from his file and slid it across the desk. Matt looked at the girl’s face, her dark hair and dark eyes, her round cheeks. She could have been someone’s sister or cousin, smiling from across the dinner table at Thanksgiving.
“You’re not saying much, Jones, so I’m gonna make a wild guess that whatever’s on your mind is pretty fucking bad.”
Matt remained quiet. Another girl had gone missing. Another victim. He scanned through the e-mail. Anna Marie Genet. A freshman at a private college on the Westside. She had just turned eighteen. She looked so normal. So innocent and young.
McKensie leaned even closer and lowered his voice. “Who were the two guys that met up with Frankie at the gas station, Jones?”
“I can’t really say, Lieutenant.”
“But Frankie was murdered, right?”
Matt nodded. “I think so.”
“By the two men at the gas station. The two men driving a Ford sedan. They knew Frankie, and Frankie knew them.”
Matt took another look at the photo of the girl, then turned back. “Yeah,” he said. “There’s a good chance they knew each other.”
McKensie’s eyes were on him, hard. After a while he cocked his head, as if a new thought had just surfaced in his mind.
“Are you in danger, son? Is that why you won’t talk to me? You and your partner think you’re next?”
Matt hesitated, but only briefly. Still, he could tell from the expression on McKensie’s face that his eyes had given him away.
A moment passed. Then another. Was it light, or was it darkness?
“What did you find at Frankie’s apartment?” Matt said finally.
McKensie shook his head and shrugged as he considered the question. “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing out of the ordinary.”
“What about his files on the Faith Novakoff case?”
“He must have had everything with him in the car. They burned up in the fire.”
Matt shook his head. “Nothing burned up in the fire except Frankie, Lieutenant.”
Another stretch of silence passed as Frankie’s death settled into the small glass room. Matt got rid of his smoke, glanced at the files on the desk, then looked back at McKensie.
“Any chance I could get into Frankie’s place for another look?”
CHAPTER 38
Matt had never been to Frankie’s apartment before. When McKensie told him that it was only a ten-minute drive from the station, he decided to ride with the lieutenant and grabbed his cell phone charger out of the car. Not much was said along the way, and Matt spent most of the time worrying about Cabrera. Before they had left the station, before the battery on his phone died, Matt had tried to check in. When Cabrera didn’t answer, Matt sent him a text message and waited for a reply, until his phone finally lost power and shut down. He remembered his confrontation with Orlando last night, then thought about his partner, alone in Playa del Rey with Reynolds.
He never should have left him behind. They should’ve backed out together and rescheduled the interview with the young woman for later in the day.
Matt glanced at McKensie, then looked out the window. They were heading west on Riverside Drive, about three or four blocks from Laurel Canyon Boulevard. McKensie pointed at a two-story apartment building on the other side of the street, made a U-turn, and parked at the curb. He left the engine running and rolled down the windows. The winds had shifted, the Valley warming in the bright sunlight. McKensie settled into his seat, like he had something he wanted to say.
Matt gazed at the apartment building while he waited. He was surprised by its sterile appearance and wasn’t sure why. The place must have been built thirty-five years ago, yet it still had a modern feel about it—large glass windows, vaulted ceilings, and clean lines. He looked through the grove of palm trees at the entrance. It seemed quiet and tranquil, the building well maintained. For whatever reason, he couldn’t see Frankie living here.
“It stays with me,” McKensie said finally.
Matt turned. McKensie was staring at him again.
“What stays with you?”
“Everything you just said to me in my office, son. And everything you didn’t. It stays with me, Jones. I wanted you to know that. I want you to be able to count on it.”
Matt nodded but didn’t say anything. He still wasn’t sure that he could trust the lieutenant. As he played it through in his mind, there was the chance that McKensie really was clean and had put it together on his own. Frankie was a cop. Cops know cops. The two men who killed Frankie drove a Ford sedan. Lots of cops drive Ford sedans. There’s a problem, and it’s in Hollywood. There’s a problem, and it has something to do with the investigation of a serial killer.
But no matter what McKensie had just said, there was still the chance that he didn’t hate Grace but went way back with him. There was still the chance that they were friends. S
till the chance that McKensie was trying to bullshit Matt into saying how much he knew and play him for a fool.
As a soldier in Afghanistan, Matt had learned all too quickly that if he didn’t see the chance, if he didn’t see every risk and possibility all at once, he would’ve come home early. He would’ve come home in a box.
At the same time, Matt knew that he couldn’t afford to let himself stand still. He needed to get inside Lane’s apartment, and taking the risk by getting McKensie to open the door seemed like the only way.
McKensie grabbed his file folders off the dash, and they got out of the car. Entering the lobby, Matt watched the lieutenant fish a key ring out of a small manila envelope. There were only two keys—both marked with tags, both shiny and new—and Matt guessed that the keys in the ignition of Frankie’s car had melted in the fire and couldn’t be recovered. The thought faded as McKensie swung open the door. Once they were inside, the lieutenant pointed at the staircase across from the elevator.
“Second floor,” he said. “Number twenty-six, halfway down on the right.”
Skylights led the way through the narrow hallway. An eerie silence followed in their wake. When they finally reached the door, McKensie inserted the key and gave it a turn, but the dead bolt slid only halfway and stopped. He passed his files over to Matt, made sure he had the right key, and gave it another try. The dead bolt began to turn, then froze up again. Frankie’s door wouldn’t budge.
“There’s something wrong with the lock,” he said.
“Was there anything wrong with it before?”
“I don’t know. By the time I got here, the guys were already inside.”
The door across the way snapped open and a hard light flooded the hallway. Matt turned and saw a middle-aged man standing in the threshold, his face shadowed from the glare.
“You’re back,” the man said.
McKensie glanced at him, still straining to turn the key. “That’s right, Mr. Kay. We’re back.”
