Cicero's Dead

by Patrick H. Moore

  “I dunno. Never had one.”

  “In any event, you don’t happen to have a bed around here, do you?”

  We pulled an air mattress and a couple of blankets out of the closet behind my desk, and Brad sacked out on the floor.

  I called Tony, leaving a message that I was in the office and available to meet, and then extracted a 24” by 36” inch piece of white poster board from the closet. Clearing some desk space, I went to work creating a red ink time line.

  Late summer 2006: Ron Cera meets Richard and Jade Lamont.

  Summer 2006 to July 2007: Ron and Jade engage in sexual relationship.

  July 2007: Jade disengages from Ron. Ron remains friends with Richard.

  August 2007: Ron spurns Richard’s advances.

  August 16, 2007: Cicero Lamont killed in hit-and-run on Sepulveda Boulevard in Mission Hills.

  August 28, 2007: Dominique Dominguez Lamont commits suicide in San Francisco.

  Late September/October 2007: Richard vanishes out of Jade’s life.

  October 24, 2007: Richard and Arnold Clipper confront Ron. Jade contacts N.C.

  I had just finished the dates when the phone rang. It was Tony. “Nick, meet me at Philippe’s.”

  “When?”

  “In 30.”

  “Okay.”

  Brad was stretched out on the air mattress with the blankets pulled over him but was apparently awake. “Where are we going?”

  “I thought you were sleeping?”

  “I was until the phone rang.”

  For the next 25 minutes I wrote notes below each date and connected them with arrows.

  August 16, 2007: Cicero Lamont…

  Obvious Perps:

  1) Unconnected bad driver who panicked or didn’t want to be caught.

  2) Rival narcotics crew.

  3) Traitorous member(s) of Cicero’s crew.

  4) Enemy unconnected to drug trade.

  Question: Why was Jade not notified until three days after Cicero’s death? Why was Jade contacted by Halladay, rather than by her mother or Richard?

  There were lots of possible explanations but I didn’t like any of them. A strong woman like Dominique would certainly have contacted her daughter. Furthermore, someone had located Richard or he couldn’t have been at Cicero’s memorial. I made a mental note to talk to James Halladay. If it pointed at a cover-up, the question would be why? Arnold Clipper could easily be involved with Richard, for any number of bad reasons, but might have had nothing to do with Cicero’s death. The extreme mangling of the body, though, was weird and could be the work of a psychotic.

  I moved on to Dominique’s death.

  August 28, 2007: Dominique: Suicide or murder? If suicide, why? Jade is skeptical of suicide theory.

  If murder, why? Obvious motivation is “the money.” With Cicero out of the way, the list of heirs grows shorter. Perp could be the same as in the death of Cicero. Could Arnold be responsible for both deaths? Seems unlikely. Psychotic killers, on the other hand, can be fiendishly clever. No reason to believe Arnold is a psychotic killer, other than Ron Cera’s observations. Where is Richie?

  Brad had brewed coffee in the kitchenette, and was staring at the whiteboard. “Any conclusions?”

  “No, it’s foggy and I’m worried because if Jade and Richard are not involved in the deaths of their parents, and I certainly don’t believe they are, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that they could be next.”

  “What do we do?”

  “Find Richie, and figure out who killed his dad.”

  “How?”

  “We shake the trees.”

  He nodded.

  “Let’s go.”

  We sat in our usual booth on the lower level of Philippe’s.

  “Tony, this is Brad.”

  Tony grinned as he looked Brad over. “Doesn’t surprise me. Another one of Nick’s weird-ass friends. I don’t know why I hang out with you.”

  Brad took it in stride and as they shook hands, I replied, “’Cause you love me and you love my friends.”

  “That must be it.”

  “Tony collects weapons. He’s got the best collection of obscure instruments of destruction in all of Southern California.”

  “Yeah, but I’m getting worried about Mary; I couldn’t get her off me this morning.”

  “That worries you? Give it time. You won’t be able to get her on you.”

  “I’m not kinky, like you fools.” He made spanking motions and looked pained. “I don’t want that kind of responsibility. I don’t even want a serious relationship.” He turned to Brad as if for sympathy. “What do you think? You look like a lady’s man.”

  Brad took a swallow of coffee, shrugged and thought about it.

  “Brad’s depressed,” I said. “His ol’ lady gave him the boot.”

  “She did, yeah? Why?” asked Tony, all ears.

  “I developed a little drinking problem.”

  “No wonder you look like shit.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Just kidding, but you do look a little ragged out.”

  “So,” I interjected, “in your email, you said something stank.”

  “Beyond rancid.”

  “You gonna tell me or do I have to bribe you?”

  Tony grinned. “I checked out Cicero Lamont and you were right, he was into weight. Heroin. He did a four year bid in Soledad, back in the early 90s. Didn’t seem to phase him. He came out the same swinging dick as he went in, but with one big difference; he was a whole lot smarter. He got involved in legitimate business. Warehousing for the produce industry, refrigeration and had warehouse facilities all over the South Bay. Word is that while he was cooling his nuts in stir, he studied refrigeration. You know, big industrial refrigeration units?”

  “Yeah and?”

  “Imagine you walk in and there’s a mountain of cabbage crates. It’s a good place to stash drugs or bodies. Problem is, we could never get probable cause. His lieutenants would do 20 and not even think about rolling. What made it even harder was that Cicero had connections with the spooks. They’d help him fly shit in from Afghanistan and take a hefty slice. If I could do one single thing, it would be to bust those fuckers. How can we make real inroads into the narcotics trade, when the goddamned CIA is bringing it in? Pisses me off.”

  “Yeah, but proving it’s another matter.”

  “And people that poke their noses into government shit, usually get ‘em cut off,” added Brad.

  Tony nodded as anger flashed across his eyes. “To make it worse, Cicero had a real smart lawyer, James Halladay. I’d like to garrote the son of a bitch. Anyway, in the summer of 2002, Cicero sold Lamont Refrigeration to an investment group out of Atlanta.”

  “What did he do with the money?” asked Brad.

  “You tell me.”

  I said, “You would have got Cicero, if you hadn’t been stuck busting meth dealers.”

  Tony shook his head. “Nice thought but truth is he was ironclad. I’m sure we’ll pop some of his lieutenants, although it’s almost a waste of time, as most of ‘em have moved on. It wouldn’t be the same as if we’d put the blade to Cicero at the height of his operation.”

  Brad chewed absently at a hangnail.

  I sipped my coffee. “I don’t see how anything can be rancid when it’s refrigerated.”

  “You’re a real wit,” said Tony. “Anybody ever tell you that?”

  “Never.”

  “Why are you interested in him?”

  “I’ve been hired by his daughter to find her missing brother, who just might be using daddy’s product.”

  “Sounds like a genius,” said Tony. “Anyway, there was an unsolved hit-and-run on Sepulveda, on August 16th. Only problem is the victim wasn’t Lamont.”

  The earth shifted and a cold flush ran through my body.

  “The victim was a gangbanger out of Sun Valley, Mario Cantrell. The blood trail was over 200 feet, making him, as you can imagine, very hard to ID. How
ever, they matched him because most of his teeth were still in what was left of his mouth.”

  “Were there any other hit-and-runs on Sepulveda that night?”

  Tony shook his head. “No.”

  “Damn.”

  “Mysterious, ‘eh?” He stood up and looked at Brad. “Nice meeting you.”

  “Yeah, you too.”

  “Don’t let this guy talk you into anything I wouldn’t do.”

  Brad and I stepped outside, and braced ourselves against the wind that was blowing even harder. We drove toward City Terrace, in East Los Angeles, which is where Bobby Moore had chosen to make his last stand, in a ramshackle house built into the side of a hill. He keeps goats and has secured his property with an electrified, eight foot high, cyclone fence. Woe to the foolish man who wanders onto his land without an invitation.

  I met Bobby in 1986 in a Criminology class at S.F. State. 225 pounds of rock-hard Vietnam vet, with an in-your-face attitude, who wears shorts 300 days a year showing off thick hairy thighs, and a titanium prosthesis, courtesy of a Vietcong Dole pineapple mine. When he really wants to scare people, he wears a lime green muscle tee with the word FEAR emblazoned across the front, and a baseball cap bearing with the words, LONG RIFLES. He keeps his bullet head shaved clean, and speaks in a soft southern drawl.

  A few days before his 1970 tour of duty was up, he’d subbed in for another paratrooper who had the flu. That was the day the mine blew up at his feet, and his life became a nightmare. Before that, he might have made the Big Leagues. Now PTSD fueled rage become the monkey on his back. Years melted into one another, and Bobby roamed the country in a black Dodge Daytona which he’d bought with his military disability money. He also smoked crack and meth, which only increased his paranoid anger. Between 1968 and the present, he’d had any number of psychotic breakdowns. I try not to count the number of times I had to go out and rescue him during those lost years. Like a lot of PTSD vets, he’s a news junkie, has a satellite dish and can even pick up Al-Jazeera. He’s on a batch of psychiatric drugs now which keep him halfway stable, but the pain is never completely gone from his sad brown eyes. To this day, he sometimes asks me if I think the CIA was really after him. I tell him, ‘you never know for sure.’

  Bobby met us out front and I introduced Brad. He gave him his meaty grip, and we climbed his hillside, parting his goats who nuzzled our sides. We sat in his living room on thrift store furniture, amongst stacks of newspapers. CNN was on the huge flat screen T.V. that Bobby kept staring at.

  He wrenched himself away and scrutinized Brad. “Where’d you meet homeboy?”

  “Same place I met you,” I replied.

  “How come I never met him?”

  “I was too busy drinking,” said Brad dryly.

  “Brad’s staying with Cassady and me, for the time being.”

  “Same as me when I first moved here. Cassady’s a saint and I love that woman. Don’t know how she put up with me, ‘cause man, I was delusional. I’ve been getting so bored I’ve been thinking about eating my goats, and that’s not me. Not really.”

  Brad had this mesmerized half-smile.

  “So what,” asked Bobby, “is our plan? I assume you’re here for a reason.”

  I ran down the basics while Bobby listened carefully.

  He asked, “How we gonna find this kid who apparently has been bewitched by this Arnold psycho?”

  “We’ve gotta hit the bars in West Hollywood and the clubs on Sunset.”

  “In the event I find them, do I have your permission to impale Arnold?” asked Bobby earnestly.

  “We need to keep him alive, at least until we find Richie.”

  Bobby looked crestfallen. “Okay, tell you what, I won’t hurt the asshole unless you give me the green light. What I do get, however, is to have sex with Boytoy’s sister.”

  “In your dreams. She’s the one paying us.”

  Bobby sighed. “What do I get then?”

  “Money.”

  “I’m in. Just one rule. You,” pointing at Brad, “kick my ass if I show any signs of getting a hankering for any nose candy, and I kick your ass if you start reaching for the bottle.”

  “How,” said Brad, “am I going to kick your ass?”

  “Easy. You just sneak up behind me with a sledgehammer.”

  Chapter III – James Halladay

  Like a lot of people, Audrey is scared of Bobby. The fact that he’s been in therapy off and on for three decades, and has shown no signs of improvement, disillusions her. He’s indifferent to her, but not her boobs, which he stares at like they were CNN. With Audrey and Brad, however, it was a different story. When we walked in, they both perked up immediately at the sight of one another.

  We kicked around various possibilities and came up with a plan. Bobby and Brad would work together. They would comb West Hollywood and Sunset, hit the bars and clubs and ask questions. Audrey would concentrate solely on the West Hollywood clubs, places like I Candy and Mickey’s. These joints have become more preference-mixed in recent years.

  I gave them cash for expenses and they hit the street. I phoned Jade and set up a meeting at 1:00 p.m. at Rubio’s, next to the downtown library. Then I got on the internet and brought up Vital Chek, which contracts with the California Department of Public Health Office of Vital Records. In California, like most states, you cannot be buried or cremated without a death certificate. In cases of foul play or traffic accidents, the coroner’s office does its investigation and signs the death certificate, but, if death is by natural causes, all that is required is that a physician, or in some cases a peace officer, sign the death certificate. Everybody who’s died since 1905 is theoretically on record.

  I ordered an informational death certificate for Cicero Lamont. Vital Chek will usually spit one out in four or five days. Then I phoned the coroner’s office just to make sure. They put me through the usual interminable robot menu but eventually directed me to the right person who assured me that they had no record of Cicero Lamont.

  I studied the time line. Nearly everything about this case bothered me. I’d been hired to find Richard Lamont, but was obsessed with the death of Cicero Lamont. Killers may appear to be smart because they have endless time to plan and execute their crimes, but still they often leave clues. The tough part for the guy trying to put the pieces together is working against the clock, because he has only days, and sometimes only hours to recreate what happened.

  At a crime scene, the homicide squad secures the area and goes over everything with a fine-toothed comb. The coroner does the same with the body. A victim can have a big hole in their forehead, but the coroner checks everything, and often performs internal tests. And things are not always what they seem. I still had very little to go on, though the death certificate could change that dramatically and in the interim, I kept coming back to the same question: ‘Why had James Halladay contacted Jade with the news of Cicero’s death, and why had he waited three days?’ In this era of modern communication, Jade could surely have been found more quickly, and it shouldn’t have taken more than 24 hours to locate her. It would not be so suspicious if the cause of death had really been hit-and-run. But if Cicero had been killed by other means, it could signal that the killers had been buying time to get their ducks in order.

  I slapped myself gently. James Halladay was a giant, and a legend in the legal field. He would never risk his career and freedom to cover up a murder, so I was barking up the wrong tree. Still, I couldn’t get it out of my mind.

  I called Tony who was in no mood to talk. “Make it quick. I’m tailing a banger in Sun Valley. A six pound deal is about to go down.”

  “Good work. I need you to run a check on two LAPD officers out of Mission Hills. I think they might be dirty.”

  “What if I were to tell you I don’t give a fuck?”

  “I happen to know you do give a fuck.”

  “Damn. The perp just walked out of a liquor store carrying a monster energy drink. This guy’s gonna be caffeinated fr
om here to Venice Beach.”

  “Wonderful. Listen, their names are Jim Fishburne and Stanley Koncak.”

  “You’re an idiot. I know both those guys. They happen to play in our Saturday afternoon football league. I’ve even ridden dirt bikes with them a few times. They’re good people.”

  “Lots of guys seem like good people. Doesn’t mean a thing.”

  “I’m getting pissed, the Perp is heading toward Pocoima. Fucker’s leading me in circles. I’ve been made.”

  “What do Jim and Stanley look like?”

  “Jim’s a tall black guy who has never gotten over the fact the Raiders moved back to Oakland. He thinks Tim Brown was the most underrated receiver of all time. Stanley is stocky, has one of those lame spiky haircuts white guys have these days. I always tell him to put his hat on.”

  “Do me a favor, ask Jim and Stanley if they were the officers who informed Jade Lamont that her father had been creamed in that hit-and-run.”

  “I guarantee you they weren’t for the simple fact he wasn’t killed in a hit-and-run.”

  “That’s why I want you to verify it for me.”

  “Buddy, you got way too much time on your hands. Get a real job.”

  “Like yours?”

  “Yo’ momma.”

  I still had an hour before my meeting with Jade, so I ran a Merlin check on Arnold Clipper. Bingo! Two Arnold Clippers came up in southern California, both in the Los Angeles area. One was 60 and lived in Orange County, but the other was 35 and lived in the Hollywood Hills. I copied down both addresses and phone numbers on separate sheets of paper and attached them to the whiteboard.

  I left the office, drove downtown and parked under the library. Five minutes later I met Jade in front of Rubio’s. She was wearing some kind of dress-for-success business suit with a lavender blouse and some sexy high heels. She was still stunning, even with no visible butterflies.

  “Let’s talk outside in the library garden. I think it’s a bit more discreet.”

  She gave just the slightest shrug. The downtown branch of the Los Angeles Public Library is surrounded on three sides by idyllic gardens where stately oaks and wrought iron benches afford a resting place to both the homeless and the literary. We found a secluded area and as we sat down, I tried to ignore her knees and the three inches of fishnet encased thigh displayed above them. Problem is, she kept crossing and uncrossing her legs, which only made it worse.