The interior of Zeus sounded like a stack of bricks going around in a clothes dryer. There was noise, flashing lights, a mass of dancing, shifting youth high on their own chemistry and aided and abetted by alcohol, Ecstasy, coke, and whatever new drug had become novel and available.
Will made his way to the bar under a wall that was illuminated by videos of bolts of lightning flashing over an open field. He ordered a drink, paid for it with a ten, and left the change; he took his drink to the edge of the dance floor. Clubs with live bands attracted kids and night-scene lovers of all ages.
Watering holes brought in gazelles and lions. Where kids congregated, drug dealers followed. Will watched and classified the people in the surging crowd, the schoolkids, rogue males, and out-of-towners, and he saw money changing hands near the bar.
As he watched, a dealer who went by the name of Stevie Blow turned and saw Will staring at him. Blow was one of hundreds of drug dealers on Will’s hit list. He wasn’t number one, but he was up there in the top ten.
Will nodded his head; a signal sent, a signal received. His pulse quickened as the dealer made his way toward him through the throbbing gloom.
Chapter 87
THE TALL KID with pink-blond hair falling over his face and wearing threadbare jeans and a glittering T-shirt came over to where Will was standing with his back to the wall. He asked Will if he wanted to get high.
Will didn’t know this kid personally, but he knew a lot about him. His given name was Steven Sargent, but the name Stevie Blow had stuck. Blow was twenty-five, looked younger, and liked to patrol school neighborhoods during the day and clubs, especially Zeus, at night.
Will said that he wanted to buy some coke, and Blow said sure, and then he wanted to tell Will about his own brand of “bath salts.” This drug was highly addictive; it contained MDPV, a chemical that caused intense hallucinations and sometimes bad trips that made the user violent or even suicidal. Bath salts were generally available but Blow was pushing his own blend, Peach Bliss.
He shouted into Will’s ear, “I guaran-damn-tee you, Peach is a smooth high. Only twenty bucks for a trial sample.”
Stevie reached his hand into his back pocket and Will said, “Not here.”
Some Other Mother was saying thank you, waving off an encore, taking in the storm of applause, and then leaving the stage. The crowd went crazy again as the favorite house DJ took his place in the booth.
Will turned his head once to make sure Blow was behind him, then moved along the fringes of the crowd, looped around to the back, pushed the doors open, and entered the kitchen.
The kitchen was in chaos. Orders were shouted, cooking oil sizzled, pans clashed against the burners, dishes clattered in the large sinks. The rear doors were propped open to vent the hot air outside.
No one looked at them as Will and Blow made a swift exit through the kitchen and out to San Bruno Avenue. There was a gap in a fence leading to an area just under the freeway overpass, where it was dark and noisy.
Blow was saying, “Man, you’re too paranoid. I could sell you this shit inside a police station and there’s nothing anyone could do about it.”
“I like privacy,” Will said.
“To each his own,” said Stevie Blow. “Anyway, you’re gonna love this stuff.”
He was sorting out his packets when Will took his gun from his waistband. He held the gun by the grip, stuck the barrel into an ordinary plastic shopping bag, a plastic sleeve that would contain the shell casings and GSR.
Will aimed and then fired twice.
The sound was muffled by the suppressor; two little puffs, like popcorn kernels exploding in an air popper.
Stevie Blow dropped his merchandise, flattened his palms to his chest. He looked at the blood on his hands, then brought his eyes to Will. He said, “Whaaa?”
“You’re guilty and you’re dead, that’s what. I feel bad for your parents, though. I’m sorry for them.”
Will put a shot into Stevie’s forehead, watched him fall, then dragged the body over to the wall and propped it in a sitting position between piles of bagged garbage.
As he headed toward his wife’s car, Will felt no sadness for Stevie Blow. He was thinking about his own boy, how in twenty minutes he’d be turning off Link’s TV and then getting into bed beside his dear wife.
He wasn’t going to lose any sleep tonight.
Chapter 88
I HEARD A phone ringing from far, far away, then someone was shaking my arm, saying, “Lindsay, wake up.”
I was jerked out of a deep well of sleep.
“What’s up?”
I was in the passenger seat of the unmarked car two hundred yards from Will Randall’s yellow house. The house was dark and Randall’s SUV was still in his driveway.
“What time is it?”
“Just after one thirty,” Conklin said. “Brady called. There’s been a shooting in the alley behind Zeus. A drug dealer took some shots to the head and chest.”
“Randall couldn’t have done it. Could he?”
Conklin repeated what Brady had told him: a busboy had seen two men pass through the kitchen. The one identified as the victim was known to the busboy as a dealer. The second man was six feet tall, dark-haired, and looked like the narc who’d busted the busboy’s cousin five years before.
“The busboy was shown a photo array,” Conklin told me, “and tentatively identified Randall. He couldn’t be a hundred percent sure.”
William Randall was dark-haired, six one, and had spent five years in Narcotics — but I was staring at his car. It hadn’t moved.
Randall must have left the house by the back door, taken some other vehicle to Zeus, and shot the dealer while I was taking a snooze. It was quite possible.
We had agreed not to use the radio, so I called Brady on his cell, told him I wanted to go into Randall’s house, see if our man was missing or if he was asleep in his bed.
Brady said, “If Randall is home, treat him with all due respect. He’s Meile’s pet.”
What if William Randall was home and had committed tonight’s shooting? That meant he had most likely committed all of the shootings we attributed to Revenge.
The Randall house was full of kids.
What if Randall took his children hostage?
What if he decided to make a stand?
If I had been wearing boots, I would have been shaking in them, thinking about all of the truly bad things that could happen if we went into Randall’s house. But I saw no choice. If he knew he was being watched, there was no telling what he would do. We had to get him away from his children.
“Screw Meile’s pet. Send backup,” I told Brady. “Send everything you’ve got. If I’m right, I don’t want to play patty-cake with this guy. If I’m wrong, I’ll apologize to him. Profusely.”
Two unmarked cars arrived within minutes. I told the officers to park on Golden Gate, then proceed to the back of the Randall house on foot and cover the exit. And I told them that the suspect was a cop.
“If you encounter him, he could be wearing a uniform or he could ID himself as a cop. Treat him as you would any suspect who is armed and dangerous.”
More cars streamed silently onto Elm, their sirens and headlights off. I briefed six more unis, told them that we had a murder suspect inside the house, that he was armed and dangerous, that there were five children and at least two other adults inside.
I sketched out a plan, and then Conklin and I went up the long flight of outdoor steps that led to the front door. Conklin stood back with his gun drawn.
I rang the bell and then knocked, calling out, “Sergeant Randall. This is the police.”
I prayed that we could reason with William Randall.
I prayed that bullets weren’t going to come flying through the door.
Chapter 89
A HALL LIGHT blazed inside the house, then the main floor lit up. Someone peeked through the fan light in the door. The door opened and a woman in a thin yellow robe, her face lined wi
th sleep, asked, “Can I help you?”
I showed her my shield and introduced Conklin, who holstered his weapon. I asked the woman if she was Becky Randall and she said that she was. I told her in a few words that we were investigating a shooting that had taken place in the last hour.
“I don’t see how I can help,” she said, “but my husband is on the force. William Randall. He’s with Vice.”
“Where is your husband now, Mrs. Randall?” Conklin asked.
“He’s upstairs, sound asleep.”
“We have to talk to him.”
“Sure. Please stay here. Lots of sleeping kids and I want them to stay that way. I’ll go and wake Will up.”
More squad cars were streaming onto the block from both directions. Becky Randall understood suddenly that we weren’t conducting a routine canvass.
She said, “What’s going on?”
“Please come with me, Mrs. Randall,” I said. I took her arm and guided her firmly onto the outside landing, after which Conklin put his big foot between the woman and her front door.
I said, “An officer will stay with you until we’ve spoken with your husband.”
I walked the loudly protesting Becky Randall down the steps and turned her over to Officer Cora. I used the time to get myself together.
It didn’t matter how many people were going through Randall’s front door. We were all at risk: my baby, my partner, the Randall kids, and the guys who were taking orders from me.
I followed Conklin across the threshold with my gun in hand, switching on lights as we went through the house. I signaled to the uniforms to fan out on the second floor, and after the main floor was cleared and contained with a cop standing outside every bedroom door, Conklin and I proceeded upstairs to the attic.
As I had thought, there were two rooms on the attic floor. One of the bedroom doors was open. I could see the entire room from the hallway: there was a young man lying in a hospital bed, a mobile of mirrored stars gently swaying above him.
He turned his eyes to me, said, “Ahh.”
I threw on the lights, searched the room, then waggled my fingers at the boy and shut the door.
The door to the second room was closed.
Conklin and I flanked the door and then I knocked.
“Sergeant Randall? This is Sergeant Lindsay Boxer, SFPD. Don’t be alarmed. We just have some questions for you. Please come to the door and open it, slowly. Then step back and put your hands on your head.”
He said, “Who is it?”
I repeated my name, heard floorboards creaking, and then the voice came through the door again.
“I’m not armed,” he said. “Don’t shoot.”
The door swung open, and standing a few feet inside the doorway was William Randall. He was wearing blue boxers and his hands were folded on top of his dark hair.
There was a tattoo on his chest, an eagle with wings spread and two-inch-high letters inked under that emblem. I knew the words, of course. It was the motto of the City of San Francisco, and also of the SFPD.
Oro en paz. Fierro en guerra.
Gold in peace. Iron in war.
Apparently it was William Randall’s motto too.
Chapter 90
IT WAS A grim scene in the squad room that night.
Randall’s superiors, past and present, stamped their feet and yelled at Brady for the way Conklin and I had extracted Randall from his home.
Brady shouted back, “If he’s the doer, he’s killed six people this week. Do you get that?”
Brady defended us and said that we had done the job right.
But I was starting to wonder.
While we were walking Randall out of his house, the busboy had retracted his tentative ID, saying he wasn’t sure he’d picked the right guy out of the six-pack. So while the busboy’s memory was still fresh, Brady called for a lineup.
Conklin fit Randall’s general description so he was drafted to stand with Randall. Four random justice department workers filled in the ranks.
I stood behind the glass with the busboy as six men filed across the room and took their places at the height board. Each man stepped forward, turned left, turned right, and stepped back.
I held my breath as the busboy asked for Randall to step forward again. The busboy ID’d him — then when Meile said, “Are you absolutely sure?” the kid changed his mind and positively ID’d Morris Greene, an assistant DA who’d been pulling an all-nighter before we’d drafted him for the lineup.
What now?
Brady’s expression was resolute.
He said to me, “Pretend he’s David Berkowitz. Pretend he’s Lee Harvey Oswald.”
The observation room behind the two-way mirror was packed with brass: Brady, Meile, and Penny were there, and a few guys from the top floor I didn’t know.
I brought coffee for three into the interrogation room, apologized again to Randall for the one-thirty wakeup call with drawn guns as well as the solitary two-hour wait in the box.
He said, “Look. I’m innocent of any crime. Do your job, but let’s speed it up, okay? My wife and kids are in hell right now. And I’m about two minutes away from turning in my badge and telling all of you to take a flying leap.”
What had we done by bringing Randall in?
What could we possibly accomplish?
We had no witness, no evidence, just a career cop who’d been asleep in his undershorts when we crashed into his house.
Had Sergeant William Randall killed six people in seven days? Did we have a committed spree killer under lock and key? No pressure at all. With the top floor watching from behind the glass, Conklin and I had to ask the right questions and either clear Randall — or get him to confess.
Chapter 91
RANDALL LOOKED TIRED and irritated. Conklin and I pulled out chairs and sat across from a man who might have set a new record for murders by a cop.
I pushed a container of coffee toward him, waited for him to stir in his sugar, then said, “The more you cooperate, the faster this will go, Sergeant. Where were you for the last eight hours?”
“I arrived home after my shift at approximately six o’clock p.m. I was home all night, as my wife told you.”
“Do you have another car, Sergeant Randall?”
“No. My wife has a car.”
“Do you have a gun?”
“Department issue only. I don’t want guns in a house with kids and a father-in-law who has no short-term memory.”
“Did you drive your wife’s car or any car between the hours of six last night and one this morning?”
“No, I did not.”
“Did you fire a weapon in the last week?”
“I like how you ask me that with a straight face.”
“Did you?”
“Hell no. You tested my hands, Sergeant. Negative for GSR.”
That was true.
Randall’s hands had been negative for gunshot residue, although he could have washed up and probably had. We had had no warrant to search his house or bring in his clothes for analysis. I got up, walked around the room, came back to my chair, and leaned across the table.
“We have a witness who saw you at Zeus.”
“I guess he failed to identify me in the lineup.”
“Others may come forward. When the ME does her post on the body, when CSU finishes processing the alley, we’re going to find physical evidence. You can count on that.”
“Knock yourself out, Sergeant. I’m not worried.”
Conklin took his turn.
“Sergeant. Will. I don’t have to remind you, now is the time to tell us the truth. We’re going to be sympathetic. We’re going to go out of our way to help you. Your victims are criminals. You’ve got friends in high places.”
“I didn’t do it.”
I sighed, said, “Any idea who the shooter might be?”
“No idea in the world, but I admire the work he’s doing. He’s cutting through the red tape and putting the scumbags down.”
>
Randall looked at me as though daring me to confuse his attitude with an actual confession.
He said, “I’ve got nothing for you, Sergeant. My kids are scared. My wife is going crazy. Lock me up or let me go.”
We kept at it for another hour, Conklin and I taking turns, drilling down on his activities of the week before, going back over the same ground, but never tripping him up. Randall was smart and had as much interrogation experience as I had.
We’d done a good job and so had Randall. He hadn’t given us a crumb and I couldn’t think of anything else to ask him.
“You’re free to go,” I said. “Thanks for your cooperation.”
Randall stood up and put on his nylon windbreaker.
“I need a lift.”
Then, as an afterthought, he said, “You should be careful, Sergeant Boxer. You don’t want to take chances with your baby.”
I took it as a sincere remark.
Conklin walked Randall out, and when he came back, I was still in the interrogation room. I hadn’t moved.
“Did he do it?” I asked.
“I can’t tell.”
“You know what, Rich? I kind of like the son of a bitch.”
“He’s a hard-ass,” Conklin said. “Kind of reminds me of you.”
Chapter 92
I BROUGHT MARTHA with me to breakfast at a great neighborhood bistro out in Cole Valley called Zazie. Zazie had scrumptious food and a patio garden out back. We came through the front door and the hostess told me she was sorry, but dogs weren’t allowed.
“Martha is a police dog,” I said.
“Is she really?”
The hostess held on tight to her menus, looked down at my small, shaggy border collie, and showed by her dubious expression that she couldn’t believe Martha was in the K-9 Corps.
I’ve got to hand it to Martha. She looked up, made direct eye contact with the hostess, and conveyed professionalism and sharp canine wisdom with her deep brown eyes.
I backed her up.
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