by Tami Hoag
“I don’t want anything from you,” Jace said. “And I sure as hell didn’t want what’s happened.”
He started toward The Beast.
Mojo got in front of him. “Where you going?”
Jace didn’t answer, but tried to step around him. Mojo blocked him, shoved him back a step with a hand to Jace’s shoulder.
Jace pushed him back. “I wouldn’t want to make you an accessory after the fact, Mojo. Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.”
“I’m not worried about you. I care about Eta. I care about what happened to Eta. Police come looking for you, now Eta’s dead. I’m thinking you should talk with the police.”
“I’ll pass.” Jace pulled his helmet on, put his left foot on the pedal, and pushed off, swinging his right leg over as the bike moved slowly forward.
“You don’t care someone cut her throat?” Mojo said, his voice growing stronger, angrier. He mounted his own bike and came alongside Jace. They went over the curb and crossed Flower. “Someone has to pay for that.”
“It’s not going to be me,” Jace said, picking up speed. “I don’t know who killed her, and I can’t go to the cops.”
He kept his eyes on the road as he said it, not wanting Mojo to see the lie. He knew damn well who killed Eta. If he went to the cops, he could get with a composite artist and describe Predator down to the mole on the back of his neck. The guy probably had a record a mile long. His face was undoubtedly in the mug books. Jace could pick him out in a heartbeat. He could pick him out of a lineup.
The trouble was, if he went to the cops, he’d be tossed into a cell, and they wouldn’t want to listen to anything he had to say about anything. They wanted him for Lenny, and he had no alibi for the time of the murder that could be corroborated by anyone other than the man who’d tried to kill him. They wanted him for Abby Lowell’s break-in. She would happily identify him. Now Eta. He didn’t know what time she’d been killed, didn’t know whether he had an alibi or not. But he did know that the one thing all three people had in common—besides Predator—was him.
“You won’t go,” Mojo said angrily, keeping abreast of him. “Eta’s dead. She has family, children—”
“And I don’t, so what’s the difference if I wind up in prison,” Jace said, glancing over. He sat up straight, let go of the handlebars, and pulled his swim goggles up from around his neck and settled them in place.
“You don’t care about no one but you.”
“You don’t know shit about me, Mojo. You don’t know shit about what’s going on. Stay out of it.”
Jace raised up on his pedals and sprinted ahead, wanting to distance himself from Mojo, and from the guilt he was trying to impose. He wanted to outdistance the image in his head of Eta Fitzgerald with her throat cut, her life running out on the oily, filthy ground behind Speed. He wanted not to think about what her last moments must have been like, what her last thoughts might have been.
The Beast swayed hard from side to side as he pumped. The new rear tire grabbed the road and propelled him forward. He took a right on Figueroa, where traffic was picking up. Produce delivery trucks, and Brinks trucks, and commuters coming into the city early to beat the worst of the crush on the freeways.
The smell of exhaust, the sounds of squeaking brakes and diesel engines were familiar, normal. As was the feel of speed beneath him. If nothing else in his life was normal, there was the smallest comfort of being in his element: feeling, seeing, hearing, smelling things he understood.
He glanced back to see if Mojo had taken the hint and backed off, but the other messenger was coming up on his left. Jace touched the brakes and dove around the corner, right onto Fourth, where his day had begun. Messengers had started to gather under the bridge. They registered as a blur of colors as he flew past.
Mojo was stuck at his left flank, his face grim. He motioned angrily for Jace to pull over. Jace gave him the finger and pumped harder. He was a decade younger than Mojo, but he was injured and exhausted. Mojo was sound and determined, and came up even with him, his U-lock in his right hand. He pointed with the lock for Jace to pull over, tried to crowd him over toward the curb, reached down and made to jam the lock into Jace’s spokes.
Jace dipped right and jumped The Beast up onto the sidewalk as they crossed Olive, drawing a blast of horn from a car trying to make a right-hand turn onto Fourth. Pedestrians on the sidewalk jumped back, cursed him. He clipped the arm of a guy with a Starbucks cup in his hand, and coffee went into the air like a geyser.
Mojo was still in the street and pushing ahead of him, his eyes on the next intersection.
A million tiny, instant calculations went through Jace’s brain like data in a computer—speed, velocity, trajectory, angles, obstacles.
A siren pierced his thought process. A black-and-white was coming up on Mojo, lights rolling. A voice cracked over a bullhorn: “LAPD! You on the bikes! Pull up!”
As they made the corner of Fourth and Hill, Mojo turned hard right, into Jace’s path. Jace angled his front wheel to the left. The light on Fourth had turned yellow. The intersection was almost clear.
The Beast rocketed off the curb, just missing Mojo’s rear wheel. Airborne, Jace shifted his weight, turning the bike.
The cop car was at the corner, turning right from the outside lane, cutting off a truck. The Beast’s rear tire landed just past the black-and-white’s left front headlight. A loud crash sounded, and the cop car jumped forward as something hit it from behind.
Jace took the jolt from the landing, jumped on the pedals, and gunned the bike straight into the oncoming one-way traffic from Hill Street.
A chorus of horns. Tires screeching on pavement. He split the two lanes like a thread through the eye of a needle, just missing side mirrors and running boards. Drivers shouted obscenities at him. He prayed no one opened a door.
He kept going, turning, cutting through alleys, turning, moving. Not even a heat-seeking missile could have followed him. He was one of the fastest messengers in the city. This was his turf. He didn’t even think. He just rode, burning off the adrenaline, sweating out the fear shaking down his arms and flailing in his chest.
Fucking Mojo, chasing him. Jesus H. One wrong move and they might both have ended up in a hospital, or in the morgue. Jace could have ended up in jail, hauled in for operating a bicycle in a dangerous manner, or something more serious, depending on how pissed off the cop had been. And it would have taken only a few minutes, maybe an hour, before they figured out they had the guy every cop in the city was looking for—if Mojo hadn’t volunteered the information first.
That’s what you get for trusting someone, J.C.
And what about what other people got for having him come to them? He thought again of Eta, and wanted to be sick.
Cruising through a green light, Jace checked the street sign, and might have laughed if he’d had it in him. Hope Street.
He pulled off at the Music Center Plaza, situated amid a trio of entertainment venues: the Mark Taper Forum, the Ahmanson Theater, and the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, home of the Oscars until Hollywood had rejuvenated itself and reclaimed the awards.
The plaza was deserted. Nothing opened for another hour or so. Jace parked The Beast and sat down on a bench, trying to let go of all the tension in his body. He stared at the rise and fall of the many waterspouts around the Peace on Earth sculpture, and tried to clear his mind for just a moment.
The sculpture was allegedly famous. To Jace it looked like a monkey pile of people trying to hold up a giant artichoke that a dove had dive-bombed nose-first. All he could think looking at it was that the man who had created it had not lived in the same world he did, or the same world Eta Fitzgerald had lived in.
The sculpture was timeless. A thing without life that would live forever. A thing without emotion, meant to evoke emotion. It would sit on this spot forever, barring nuclear attack or the Big Quake.
Jace couldn’t imagine that anyone would really care if it was there or no
t, but there it would remain. Instead, people would come and go, live and die, and years would pass, and some would be missed and some would never be thought of at all.
He tried to imagine what Eta would have had to say about Peace on Earth, but he couldn’t hear her voice, and he would never hear her voice again. He could only put his head in his hands and cry for the loss of her.
29
Chen’s Fish Market was five minutes from Parker’s loft. According to the DMV, one of the Mini Coopers that may have fled the scene of Abby Lowell’s break-in lived here. Parker pulled up in front and went to the public entrance first, finding the place hadn’t yet opened for business. But in the loading bay two men were shoveling shaved ice for the coolers that would chill the day’s deliveries.
Parker held up his badge. “Excuse me, gentlemen. I’m looking for a Lu Chen.”
The men straightened immediately, one wide-eyed with fear, the other narrow-eyed with suspicion. The first had the round, doughy features of someone with Down syndrome. Parker addressed the other man. “I’m Detective Parker, LAPD. Is there a Lu Chen here?”
“Why?”
Parker smiled. “That was a yes or no question. Unless your name is Lu Chen.”
“Lu Chen is my aunt.”
“And you are?”
“Chi.”
“Just Chi?” Parker asked. “Like Cher? Like Prince?”
The steel-eyed stare. No sense of humor.
“Is your aunt here?”
Chi stabbed his shovel into the pile of ice. Anger management issues. “I’ll go see if she’s in her office.”
“I’ll come with you,” Parker said. The guy looked offended at the suggestion. Hell of a lot of attitude from someone who shoveled ice for a living.
Chi climbed up on the loading dock, then stood there with his hands on his hips, glaring at Parker. Not the day to have worn the Hugo Boss suit, Parker thought, but there it was. The gauntlet had been thrown down.
Parker boosted himself up onto the dock and dusted himself off, trying not to grimace as he looked at a streak of black dirt on the front of his jacket. His sour-faced tour guide turned and led him through part of the small warehouse space, down a narrow hall to a door marked OFFICE.
Chi knocked. “Aunt? A police detective is here to see you.”
The door opened and a small, neat woman in a red wool blazer and black slacks stared out at them. Her expression was as fierce as her nephew’s, but in a way that was strong rather than petulant.
“Detective Parker, ma’am.” Parker offered his ID. “If I could have a moment of your time, please. I have a couple of questions for you.”
“In regards to what, may I ask?”
“Your car, ma’am. You own a 2002 Mini Cooper?”
“Yes.”
The nephew made a huff of disgust. Lu Chen looked at him. “Please leave us, Chi. I know you have work to do.”
“More than usual,” he said. “Being shorthanded.”
“Excuse us, then,” she said pointedly, and the nephew turned and walked away. She turned to Parker. “Would you care for tea, Detective?”
“No, thank you. I just have a few questions. Is the car here?”
“Yes, of course. I park in back.”
“Do you mind if I have a look?”
“Not at all. What is this all about?” she asked, leading him from the cramped office out the back to the alley.
Parker walked slowly around the car. “When was the last time you drove it?”
She thought for a moment. “Three days ago. I had a charity luncheon at Barneys in Beverly Hills. Then, of course, it rained.”
“You didn’t take it out yesterday?”
“No.”
“Did anyone else take it out? Your nephew, maybe?”
“Not that I know. I was here all day. Chi was here all day, as well, and he has his own car.”
“Does anyone else have access to the keys?”
Now she began to look worried. “They hang in my office. What is this about, Detective? Have I violated some traffic law? I don’t understand.”
“A car matching the description of yours was reported leaving the scene of a crime yesterday. A break-in and assault.”
“How dreadful. But I can assure you, it wasn’t my car. My car was here.”
Parker pursed his lips and raised his eyebrows. “A witness copied part of the license plate. It comes pretty close to matching yours.”
“As do many, I’m sure.”
She was a cool one, he had to give her that. He strolled along the driver’s side to the rear of the car and tapped his notebook against the broken taillight. “As the car was leaving the scene, it was struck by a minivan. The taillight was broken.”
“Such a coincidence. My car was struck while I was at my luncheon. I discovered the damage when I went to leave.”
“What did the lot attendant have to say?”
“There was none.”
“Did you report the incident to the police?”
“For what purpose?” she asked, arching a brow. “To garner their sympathy? In my experience, the police have no interest in such small matters.”
“To your insurance company, then?”
“File a claim for so little damage? I would be a fool to give my insurance company such an invitation to raise my rates.”
Parker smiled and shook his head. “You must be something on the tennis court, Ms. Chen.”
“You may call me Madame Chen,” she said, her back ramrod straight. Parker doubted she topped five feet, and still she somehow managed to look down her nose at him. “And I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“My apologies,” Parker said with a deferential tip of his head. “Madame Chen. You seem to have an answer for everything.”
“Why would I not?”
He touched the scratch marks on the Mini Cooper’s otherwise impeccable glossy black paint. “The minivan that struck the car leaving the crime scene was silver. The car that damaged your car was silver also.”
“Silver is a popular color.”
“Interesting thing about paint colors,” Parker said. “They’re particular to make. Ford’s silver paint, for instance, is not Toyota’s silver paint is not BMW’s silver paint. They’re chemically unique.”
“How fascinating.”
“Do you know a J. C. Damon?” Parker asked.
She didn’t react to the sudden change of subject. Parker couldn’t decide if that was genius or a miscalculation. An overreaction would have been more telling, he supposed.
“How would I know this person?” she asked.
“He’s a bike messenger for Speed Couriers. Twentyish, blond, good-looking kid.”
“I have no need of a bicycle messenger.”
“That wasn’t actually the question,” Parker pointed out.
No response.
“J. C. Damon was the person driving the car that was leaving the scene of the crime.”
“Do I seem like the sort of person to consort with criminals, Detective?”
“No, ma’am. But once again, you’ve managed not to answer my question.”
Parker tried to imagine what possible connection this dignified steel lotus blossom might have to a kid like Damon, a ragtag loner, living on the fringes of society. There didn’t seem to be any, and yet he would have bet money there was. This was the car. There were too many hits on crucial points for any of them to be coincidence, and what Madame Chen wasn’t saying was a lot.
Parker leaned a hip against the car, making himself comfortable. “Between you and me, I’m not so sure this kid is a criminal,” he confessed. “I think maybe he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and now he’s up to his neck in a serious mess and he doesn’t know how to get out. Things like that happen.”
“Now you speak like a social worker,” Madame Chen said. “Is it not your job to make arrests?”
“I’m not interested in arresting innocent people. My job is to find the truth. I think
he might be able to help me do that,” Parker said. “And I might be able to help him.”
She glanced away from him for the first time in their conversation, a pensive shading to her expression. “I’m sure a young man in such a situation may find it difficult to trust—particularly the police.”
“Yes, I’m sure that’s true,” Parker said. “A young person with a happy background doesn’t come to be in a situation like that. Life is tough for more people than not. But if a kid like that has someone in his life who can reach out to him . . . Well, that can make all the difference.”
A small worry line creased between her brows. Parker figured she had to be pushing sixty, but her skin was as flawless as porcelain.
He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a business card. “If for any reason you might need to reach me, ma’am, feel free to call me—anytime, day or night,” he said, handing the card to her. “In the meantime, I’m afraid I’m going to have to impound your car.”
Anger sparked her to attention again. “That is outrageous! I have told you my car has not left this spot in three days!”
“So you have,” Parker conceded. “The thing is, I don’t believe you. It matches the description, the plate number, the damage to the car I’m looking for. I’m afraid you’ve got the trifecta there, Madame Chen. A tow truck will come and take your car to be a guest of the LAPD until lab tests can be run.”
“I’m calling my attorney,” she declared.
“You have that right,” Parker said. “I should also tell you that if the results of the tests come back the way I believe they will, there is a chance you could be charged as an accessory.”
“That’s ridiculous!”
“I’m just letting you know. It’s not up to me. I wouldn’t want to see that happen, Madame Chen. You strike me as a person who takes her responsibilities very seriously.”
“I’m glad you think so highly of me that you would treat me like a common criminal,” she snapped, turning on her heel and marching toward her office.
