“Mr. Swartz?”
“Your Honor, I intend to establish that Detective Spaulding has arrested many people on suspicion of methamphetamine intoxication who were later convicted of possession. I will also introduce evidence that the white crystals found in the defendant’s possession were indeed methamphetamines.”
“Mr. Baronholtz?”
“Your Honor, if the People insist on trying to prejudice the jury by pretending that my client—who is innocent—was under the influence of drugs, I intend to introduce evidence that Detective Spaulding put the drugs into my client’s pocket before arresting him.”
Judge Anthony clamped her mouth shut to prevent herself from screaming at Baronholtz.
“We’ll continue this in chambers,” she said and turned to the bailiff. “Deputy, please remove the jury.”
Anthony looked at Baronholtz. “Bring your client.”
Twenty-eight
Chelmin had spent the early morning flying over the Marine base and had found three areas where someone might have accessed a boxcar with little chance of being seen. Around ten a.m., Swartz’s assistant called and told him to be available as a rebuttal witness after the noon recess.
Chelmin rented a Ford Focus from a Barstow agency and then got on the freeway south toward San Bernardino. As he approached the downtown area, he got off the freeway and turned west. After about two miles, he realized that he was heading the wrong way. He made a U-turn, retraced his route, and stopped west of the freeway for coffee and a tuna sandwich at a 7-11 convenience market.
Twenty minutes later, he was eastbound on Second Street. He knew that, if he stayed on Second, he would pass the Criminal Courts Building on his left.
That must be it, he thought, looking at a multistory building on the far side of a grassy park studded with young trees. He drove to the end of the block, turned left and drove through the park toward Third Street.
And saw to his amazement the man that he and Spaulding had arrested the previous day, the one with a machine gun who had later escaped from a locked squad car—that man was sitting at a picnic table with two other Latinos.
Chelmin turned right at Third Street and stopped. He pulled out his phone and dialed 911.
“What is the nature of your emergency?” the operator asked.
“Officer needs assistance. Three armed and dangerous men in the park between Second and Third in San Bernardino, a block from Criminal Courts. No sirens.”
Breaking the connection and dropping his phone into a pocket, Chelmin got out of the car and crouched behind the front end, out of the bank robbers’ sight, and waited for police.
Twenty-nine
Judge Anthony sat behind her desk in chambers. The two lawyers and the defendant took chairs facing her.
“Mr. Baronholtz,” she began. “You indicated that you have evidence that Detective Spaulding planted drugs on your client. Your client is charged with homicide, not drug possession. Aside from prolonging the trial, to what end will introducing such evidence serve?”
“It’s all of a piece, Your Honor. It goes to prove that my client was framed. I will introduce evidence that shows my client stopped to help a poor child who had been run over and left to die, evidence that will show that this entire proceeding is nothing more than an elaborate frame constructed by Detective Spaulding with the assistance of his father, Barstow Chief of Police Arthur Spaulding.”
“Your Honor,” Swartz interrupted. “The defendant’s blood tested positive for amphetamines—"
Baronholtz jumped to his feet. “The police lab falsified that test, and Swartz knows it,” he said.
Swartz said, “Counsel has no evidence of that, or of any conspiracy to frame his client, and he knows it.”
Judge Anthony said, “Mr. Baronholtz, will you now disclose the evidence you intend to offer?”
Baronholtz shook his head. “Not at this time, Your Honor.”
Swartz said, “We should discuss a plea.”
Judge Anthony peered at Prinze. “Is your client open to a plea, Counsel?”
“I doubt it. But what are the People offering?” Baronholtz replied.
Thirty
Will climbed down from the witness box and moved to the Prosecution table, where Cynthia Brennamen, a comely young deputy DA, sat reading.
“How long are they going to be in there?” he asked.
“Hard to say. A few minutes to a few hours. Do you want to get a cup of coffee or use the restroom?”
“Coffee sounds good,” Will said. “Bring you back a cup?”
“Judge Anthony doesn’t allow food or drink in her courtroom.”
“Why don’t you come with me?” he said.
“Why don’t I,” she said, smiling.
Thirty-one
From behind his car, well out of handgun range, Chelmin saw the man he knew as a bank robber take a phone from his pocket. Instead of putting it to his ear, he held it for the other two to see, each in turn. Each nodded, and the robber put the phone away.
Chelmin watched all three get up from the table. The bank robber bent to pick up a duffle bag that had lain hidden beneath the table. He fumbled in the bag and pulled out a rifle with something black affixed atop the barrel—a scope or a laser sight, Chelmin decided. The robber handed the rifle to one of the others.
Chelmin pulled his .357 from its holster, checked to see that it held six rounds. Holding his revolver at his side, he began walking toward the trio at the table.
Thirty-two
Swartz said, “Murder Two, twenty-five years, with the possibility of parole after fifteen.”
“My father said that I would never go to jail,” Prinze said.
“Taylor, shut up,” Baronholtz said. “Manslaughter, ten years, parole after five.”
Thirty-three
Chelmin was almost 200 meters away and on a grassy expanse with no place to hide. He nevertheless attracted no attention until the robber pulled an RPG launcher from the bag. He took a rocket from the bag and affixed it to one end of the weapon.
Chelmin raised his pistol, shouting, “Police! Policia! Drop your weapons.”
The third man whirled and leveled a MAC-10 machine pistol at Chelmin.
Chelmin went prone.
Dozens of bullets snapped by his head or ricocheted off the ground nearby.
The gunner ducked behind the picnic table to change magazines.
Gripping his .357 with two hands, Chelmin took a deep breath.
The escaped robber hoisted the RPG to his shoulder and turned toward the nearest building. The rifleman raised his weapon.
Chelmin let half the breath out, stopped breathing, and drew a bead on the rifleman’s head.
A tiny, brilliant ruby appeared on an upper floor window of the Criminal Courts Building.
Slowly, slowly, Chelmin squeezed the trigger.
thirty-four
“Shoot,” Cynthia Brennamen said. “I left my purse on the table.”
Will had been about to step into an elevator. “Wait here,” he said. “I’ll be back in a flash.”
Thirty-five
The rifleman and Chelmin fired at almost the same instant.
A tempered glass window on the tenth floor of the Criminal Courts Building shattered.
The rifleman pitched forward, dead.
The RPG gunner fired.
Chelmin dropped him with another shot.
The third man rose from behind the table, his clothing afire from the RPG’s backblast, staggered a few paces and fell, screaming.
The rocket-propelled grenade flew through the shattered window and struck the wall opposite Judge Anthony’s desk. In a fraction of a second, its thermobaric warhead filled the room with a mist of highly explosive fuel, which detonated as it mixed with oxygen in the air.
The chamber and everyone in it were vaporized.
The blast leveled the adjacent courtroom and filled the corridor outside with flying debris.
Thirty-six
Spaulding was d
reaming, dreaming that he was flying, all the while knowing that it was a dream because as much as he yearned to fly, he knew that humans couldn’t fly without a lot of expensive machinery.
In his dream, he watched himself fly down the corridor outside Division Four on the tenth floor of the Criminal Courts Building.
He dreamed that he would soon be at the elevator, where that pretty assistant DA was waiting. She was short and curvy, with natural blonde hair and a great smile, and he wanted to show her that he, too, was accomplished, that he could fly, and that although she was at least thirty, that he wasn’t too young to impress a deputy district attorney. And that he was well and truly over the disappointment that had been Nancy.
Then everything went black.
Thirty-seven
The first firefighter to complete the ten-story climb to Division Four found a petite woman covered with contrasting layers of soot and plaster dust. She was barefoot and tugging on a thick wooden courtroom door covered with shattered and splintered wood, sheetrock, twisted fragments of girders, broken window glass, and other debris. When the fireman appeared, she gestured to him.
She shouted, “There’s a man under there! He might be alive. Hurry!”
The fireman attacked the pile of debris until he could manhandle the big, heavy door to one side, revealing the unconscious body of a man with a big purse clutched in both hands.
§
Chelmin waited near the back entrance to the building until a firefighter appeared, leading a small, barefoot and incredibly dirty woman.
“Did you find Spaulding?” he asked the firefighter.
“Paramedics are bringing him down now,” he said.
Thirty-eight
What was that sound? Will wondered. For some undeterminable time, he had existed in a place between worlds, unable to see or smell or hear but able to think, to feel periodic spasms of pain. Now, for the first time, he could hear something. It was faint but clear. He concentrated all his energy on the sound, a high-pitched beep that lasted a fraction of a second. He recalled his dream, that he had flown through the corridor outside the courtroom, clutching Cynthia Brenneman's big purse. And he remembered, with a thrill, how cute and pretty she was.
I wonder if she survived, he said and opened his eyes.
“He’s awake,” a familiar voice said, and Will turned his head to look at his father, grinning like a particularly ravenous baboon.
“Dad,” he said. “Where am I?”
“Hospital in San Berdoo.”
“How long have I been here?”
“Almost a day.”
“What about that lawyer?”
Arthur Spaulding’s face turned grim. “The district attorney, Judge Anthony, Taylor Prinze, and his lawyer, Baronholtz—all killed instantly.”
“No, I meant the woman. Cindy something?”
“Cindy Brennamen. Probably saved your life. She got the firemen to pull you out of a pile of debris.”
“So, she’s okay?”
“She’s fine. And by the way, you’re the luckiest man alive. Her purse protected your head when you were blown down the corridor. Then a big door landed on top of you and protected you from all the sharp-edged rubble that fell on top of it.”
“What about Mr. Chelmin?”
“He nailed the guys with the RPG who did this. Unfortunately, he was a half-second late.”
Thirty-Nine
Chelmin was the first to arrive, with Malone. Within a few minutes, the small hospital room was almost filled with Chief Spaulding, the FBI’s Hollingsworth and Blair, and then Shawcross and Finklestein, from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
And Will Spaulding, wearing a hospital gown under a robe, sitting up in bed.
“Let’s get this done,” Shawcross said. The room quieted.
Shawcross said, “I’ve told Homeland Security to back off, and they have agreed for now, based on Special Agent Chelmin’s testimony that the man who fired the RPG was one of the Barstow bank robbers. And, again thanks to Chelmin, we’ve recovered that RPG and two live rounds.”
“All stolen from the Marine museum about two days ago,” Malone said.
“Anyway,” Shawcross continued, “It’s plain now that the sniper attack, the gas station explosion in Barstow and the criminal courts attack had no connection to the Prinze family, and were therefore not about stopping Spaulding from testifying against Taylor Prinze.”
Chelmin looked at Malone, who nodded. “We think—Malone and I—that those attacks were connected to the murder of Kendra Farrell. We think that the shooters were Salvadorans, based on their tattoos, and members of the Cascabel Salvadora, commonly known as the M-9 gang. They were formed in the Eighties in Los Angeles and now operate internationally. They are in gun-running, high-level drug smuggling, human trafficking, and murder-for-hire.”
Hollingsworth spoke up. “We are familiar with M-9. First time they’ve had a visible presence in this part of California.”
Malone nodded. “I’ve been working some leads down in the San Diego area. An NCIS undercover operation is ongoing there, and I believe that the RPG was stolen from the Barstow base with the aid of at least one Marine. I’m pursuing that now.”
Chelmin said, “The man I wounded in Barstow should be transferred to federal custody, and I want to talk to him as soon as possible.”
Blair nodded yes. “I’ll arrange that today.”
“What about the one that got burned?”
Blair said, “He’s in a medically-induced coma. Doctors say it’s fifty-fifty he lives.”
“The upshot,” Shawcross interjected, “is that we believe that we have wiped out the San Bernardino cell. By we, I mean Special Agents Chelmin and Spaulding, who between them killed, wounded, or captured all five known members of the cell.”
Everyone except Will and Chelmin applauded.
“And so, with this, our little unofficial task force is disbanded. We will leave the investigation into Mrs. Farrell’s murder to the Army and the Marines.”
Forty
“My two best suits were ruined,” Will said.
Chelmin, who had remained in the hospital room, nodded.
“Very nice suits. Good material,” he said. “When we get back to Fort Fremont, I’ll show you how to fill out the forms, and we’ll get you reimbursed for those. It would help if you had receipts, but I’m guessing you probably don’t.”
“I’ve got credit card statements, with the charges for those suits,” Will said. “Not the shirts or the ties, but I don’t sweat the small stuff.”
Chelmin said, “I hope I’m not hearing that those were tailor-made?”
“Hong Kong. They take the measurements here, send them to Hong Kong by email. They tailor them over there, ship them FedEx, then do the final fitting here. In Beverly Hills, actually.”
“Come on. What’s this going to cost the government?”
“About $1,200 each.”
“I think we can pull that off.”
“What about my phones? Two phones: one shot by the sniper and one was ruined in the courthouse attack.”
Chelmin nodded. “Same deal—no problem. Now let’s talk about Kendra.”
The phone next to Will’s bed rang. He picked it up and said hello.
“Will? It’s your Dad,” Arthur Spaulding said. “We found Chief Bainbridge.”
“Is he okay?”
“He’s dead.”
Forty-one
“Chief Bainbridge—they found him,” Will said after he had hung up.
“Dead?” Chelmin asked.
“He was in his car under a bridge along Irwin Road, about ten miles out of Barstow. The bridge was over a dry wash. The rain brought a flash flood that washed the car quite a ways downstream. Couple of Japanese rock climbers found it this afternoon.”
“Were you close?” Chelmin asked.
“My dad was.”
A rap on the room door ended the conversation.
“Everybody decent?” a woman’s voice called.<
br />
Will smiled. “Come on in, Mom!”
The door opened, and a plump, pretty woman with gray-streaked blonde hair entered and laid a bulging suitcase on the bed.
“Mom, this is Special Agent Chelmin,” Will said.
“Rudy, please,” Chelmin said, rising to take her hand.
“Beth.” She eyed Chelmin for a long moment.
“Not what you pictured?” he said.
Beth Spaulding laughed. “Not at all. I imagined you a big, rawboned cowboy, the fastest gun in the West, to hear my husband tell it.”
“Hardly,” Chelmin said. “And after yesterday’s dust-up, the sniper and the bank robbery, I’ll be writing reports for the next two weeks.”
“Get Will to help,” Beth said. “He writes articles for police magazines. Last year, he taught report writing at the San Berdoo Sheriff’s Academy.”
Will’s face was bright red.
“Interesting,” Chelmin said. “I learn something new about your boy most every day.”
“You two are coming to dinner tonight. No excuses. I’ll expect you about 7:00,” Beth said.
“Will I need one of those Hong Kong tailored suits?” Chelmin asked, deadpan.
Beth looked shocked. Then she laughed.
“Come as you are, Rudy.”
Forty-two
“Dinner will be ready in a little while,” Beth Spaulding said after greeting her visitor and kissing her son.
Arthur Spaulding offered his hand, and Chelmin shook it.
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