Glass Houses

by Terri Nolan

  Ron’d probably go downstairs and work off the stress with some crazy Marine-stud calisthenics. Maybe he’d punch the bag with Matt’s face on it and get some satisfaction considering he was the only topic they ever fought about. It’d be hours before Ron would return to her bedroom. If at all. He might just spark out in the spare room across the hall. Last time they fought—about a month ago—he didn’t return her calls for two days. At the time, she thought him immature.

  Truth be told, she understood, couldn’t blame him.

  Birdie thought she had learned her lesson after the Big Kahuna fight a month ago. She flinched with the remembrance when—in the effort of good-girlfriend behavior, that open, get-it-all-out-there honesty—she told Ron that she was compiling data and running computer searches. Gathering intel in her quest to find Matt.

  Ron’s response was swift.

  He got quiet.

  Ron’s quiet expelled out into the air in wavelengths of rage like a dangerous animal. Crouched, watchful, ready to pounce with deadly results.

  Ron and Matt had been great friends once. The like of which gave Ron leave to willingly help his friend fake his own death. Not an illegal act of itself. It only became a felony when Ron—in his role as sheriff deputy—knowingly filed a false death-investigation report. Matt committed fraud when he started the process to obtain new identification documents. Birdie committed fraud when she collected Matt’s estate and life insurance as his beneficiary. There were others equally guilty of punishable offenses. All subject to prison time. The consequences of a lone decision made by Matt were far reaching and damaging.

  This was the crux of the issue. Birdie wanted to know why he was so selfish and put to risk those he professed to love the most. Matt was a man who organized every decision with exacting detail. So why did he leave her hanging with the multitude of unanswered questions? Did he know why Gerard got involved with Soto and his gang of blue brothers? She’d like the answer to that one. Since Soto excelled at extortion and blackmail, she wondered what he had on her father. Matt likely knew that answer, too. Mostly, she wanted to know why he left her breadcrumbs. He knew she’d do what she did. He knew that she knew he was alive and at-large in the world.

  Birdie agreed with Ron in regards to the off-limit topic of Matt. He wanted to protect his ass. And Birdie’s ass. And the other’s, too. He thought that Birdie’s search put them all in jeopardy of being found out. And he was right. Birdie knew this. So after discovering the truth about Matt back in February she should’ve just shut her mouth and never uttered Matt’s name again. She should’ve gone about the business of finding him in secrecy. But she didn’t. And now it hung over their heads. Always there. And what really tanned her hide is that she was certain Matt had been in contact with Frank and Ron.

  “I feel left out,” Birdie whispered to herself. “Why do you continually exclude me, Matt? Why am I not worthy of your surreptitious phone calls? I’m the one who needs the explanations, the closure.”

  To free himself from the threat of Matt, Ron had admitted that some secrets were destructive forces. That’s why he confessed his role in Matt’s death. Birdie reflected on this concept. Put her feet up on the headboard. Their relationship was young and unstable. What if Birdie had discovered the truth years from now when the relationship was entrenched? Built upon a lie? Ron took a risk by giving Birdie that information preemptively. His vanguard was the kind of maneuver military men were used to making. Ron put a lot on the line for her. In this instance the telling paid off.

  She popped off the bed. She was doing the same thing. The whole purpose of trying to find Matt was to confront him. She wouldn’t be able to conceal that visit from Ron. Nor should she. What might happen between Birdie and Matt affected Ron. She owed him the courtesy of truthfulness. And not just because she loved him. It’d be the right thing to do. Which was easier said than done in these days of compromised concerns.

  Birdie flopped back on the bed in frustration.

  Why had she been so careless and stupid?

  That damned tablet.

  George found it shortly after moving into Matt’s Koreatown house. Matt had willed George first rights of sale knowing how much care he would take in maintaining the property. George snapped at the deal. Many of the furnishings included? Oh, yeah. The tablet had seemingly slid between the mattress and wood frame of a daybed. And though somewhat protected, covered in a thin layer of dust.

  Long forgot? Or a plant?

  It was an older model, off-brand tablet. Dead. Birdie bought a power cable and charged it up only to find the device password protected. She tried a number of passwords Matt might’ve used. After several failed attempts she cracked it open. Removed the back plate, the battery, and some components to get to the micro SD—a tiny memory card about the size of a thumbnail.

  She attached it to an adapter and plugged it into her computer. Up popped the folders: application data, photos, movies, books, notes. She found the settings folder and edited some lines of code to make the device think it no longer had a password. Then she had access to the browsing history … a long list of seemingly random animal videos. So not Matt.

  And this was where Birdie made her mistake. She left the tablet in plain sight. When Ron asked her about it she told the truth and a battle began.

  It didn’t help matters when Birdie told Ron that she didn’t think Matt had been the tablet’s owner. The photos were of people she never met. The movies weren’t his favorites. The books she never heard of. The only thing “Matt like” in the device were maps. Lots of maps. State maps, county maps, city maps, weather maps, and even ocean maps of the Atlantic and Caribbean.

  Well, nothing she could do about it now. The damage had been done. The words said, feelings hurt, not easily forgotten.

  Birdie crawled into bed and pulled up the covers. As she drifted to sleep she was left with one last thought: she could see Ron’s point of view in regard to the Matt issue. Why couldn’t he see hers?

  sixteen

  Thom waved his keycard at the street entrance reader. The gates protecting the underground parking garage of the Police Administration Building were blast-proof roll-ups that went up and down lightning fast. Thom drove his vintage ’75 Ford Mustang coupe—a gift from Anne—through the gate and parked it on the P1 level. The privilege to park here cost a monthly fee—worth the payroll deduction to keep his car safe and close. Somewhere below him he heard maintenance workers keeping the building alive and operational. The PAB never slept.

  Thom stopped suddenly on his way to the elevator on the lobby level. He thought of Anne and what Birdie had said, “For Christsake, she’s having an affair.” Eleven years ago Anne was through with Thom. Fell out of love, she said. Going to seek a divorce. Funny that. She insisted they display the happy façade to the world. Dinners out. Public events. Live in the fancy house. Send the boys to private school. Drive the newest cars.

  Then one night of drunken intimacy resulted in pregnancy. The girls. Oops babies. Anne agreed to stay with Thom for appearances and gave him permission to discretely seek sex elsewhere—so long as she or the kids never knew and as long as it didn’t affect their household. That was an age ago. Thom had had more than his fair share of women since. But he’d never had an affair by the classic definition. Never fell in love with another. And still, he desired his wife more than any woman.

  Thom managed to skip through the last ten years, ignoring the fact that their life was a fraud. Inside his soul, where wishes dwelled, he hoped that one day Anne would forget their outlandish agreement and go back to happily-ever-after.

  Instead, Thom got a beat down with one word. Affair.

  What did that mean? Sex? Love? Either option devastated Thom’s hope.

  Birdie was right when she insisted he needed to know for certain and he already set that wheel a’rolling. If it be true? Then what? Murder her lover and rewind to what had been a thr
eadbare relationship?

  He knew, for certain, that she’d loved him once. They’d had an intense love affair. Marriage, children, and responsibility was the bucket of water that extinguished the flames. Perhaps it’s that guy he needed to find. The one she fell in love with. The cocky young stud that fought for and won her attention.

  Thom hitched his pants. Felt the strain on his waistband. Mindlessly, he headed for the stairwell. He’d never been up the stairs before.

  _____

  Thom arrived on the fifth floor winded from vertical exertion. He stopped to take a breather. Good thing he didn’t have to give chase anymore—all the runners would escape. Once his heart rate returned to normal, he rounded the corner and saw George in the glass-walled kitchenette making them coffee on the pod machine. Thom swiped his keycard and entered.

  Once inside the building, the keycard was required for every door except the bathroom. The LAPD big brother/security geeks would know every move Thom made once he swiped the card with its special chip at the parking garage, or when he came through the front door and used it to get through the lobby turnstiles. They tracked all the employees, sworn or civil, and probably created performance reports with pie charts and graphs. Nothing was private. Except a piss. And, hell, they could probably guestimate when he’d taken one by how long it took before he swiped again.

  George lifted his chin in greeting. “You okay? You look peaked.”

  “What does peaked mean exactly?” said Thom.

  “Sick. You look sick.”

  “Just say you look sick. Why use a fancy word?”

  “Because fancy guys use fancy words”—in Valley speak—“like, fer-sure, fer-sure, like totally.”

  Thom turned his back. “God, I hate morning people.”

  “The proper response would be, barf me out, or gag me with a spoon.”

  “Sometimes I really hate you.”

  George followed him out with a cup of coffee in each hand, briefcase strap slung across his torso. They walked the long corridor with the pumpkin-colored interior wall on their right. Out the left wall of glass, well-placed lights illuminated the bone structure of City Hall. She looked like a movie star awaiting her close-up.

  The corridor ended at Robbery/Homicide’s door.

  Thom swiped his keycard and they entered the expansive squad bay. Long rows of high-tech lights hung from the acoustic ceiling on white cords. They snapped to life with the movement. Row after row after row of business gray cubicles sat empty.

  The room was invisibly divided into three sections: homicide on the east, robbery on the west, special in the middle—they’re the rowdy ones that wore street clothes.

  “Freaky,” muttered George. “I’ve never been the first one in before.”

  “Be here long enough and the novelty wears off.”

  “It’s hot in here.”

  “Temperature’s master controlled. The air won’t kick on until daylight.”

  Thom dropped his briefcase on his desk chair and closed the vertical blinds. Their cubicles were located on the far east side of the squad. Their backs to the “100 building”—Caltrans District 7 HQ—with its four-story high numbers. Thom didn’t like his back to the glass. Sniper-proof or not.

  _____

  Thom and George assembled the Lawrence murder book containing what they had so far: various sign-in logs, law enforcement entry map, sketches of the home’s layout, preliminary victim(s) background, Thom’s entry notes, Field Interview cards, surveillance disc, signed consents, notes on SID’s forensic evidence, the CI’s body notes, checked evidence reports.

  Reynolds had come in with the morning crowd to deliver the crime scene photos and CD. Thom was nearly done labeling the printed matter. He carefully slid them into acid-free sleeves and snapped them into the three-ring binder. George hunched over his computer, buds stuffed in his ears, fingers flying across the keyboard, finishing the transcription of the taped interview of Jelena Shkatova, person reporting, and now, person of interest. They had clerical for that, but that involved paperwork. George was faster.

  Thom wrote a thank-you note to Reynolds for the speedy delivery of the photos. A hand delivery deserved card stock and it always made an impression. He’d be remembered—good future-favor status—just as Reynolds would with the fast processing. They both knew the game.

  Thom rolled his chair over to George’s cubicle and plucked a bud from his ear, tucked it into his own and listened. Jelena’s voice—a raw mixture of nicotine and alcohol—gave him much pleasure Saturday night, but made him bristle on this Monday morning.

  —Were you drunk?

  —No.

  —Did this man … Thomas, take advantage of you?

  —No. I ask him for sex. He say ok. We go to my car and have good sex.

  —Not your apartment?

  —I ask, but Thomas say no.

  —Then what?

  —Thomas leave at two-thirty. I go to apartment for sleep.

  —Were your roommates home?

  —Not Claudia. Her door is open when I go home, but it is closed when I leave in morning. I share room with Dona. She is sleeping when I go home and sleeping when I leave.

  —Can anyone verify your whereabouts from two-thirty until seven this morning?

  —I not think so unless Dona wake up during night.

  —I’ll need to verify with Thomas. How can I reach him?

  —I did not get his number. But bartender knows him so I can see him again.

  —You had sex with a man you don’t know?

  —Is it necessary? I talk with him. I like him. He call me ‘little Jelena.’ I like having sex with him so I will see him again.

  Thom removed the bud and flicked it away. He felt sick and disgusted. He nearly sprinted to the bathroom and ran cold water over his wrists. Relax, he told himself, don’t hyperventilate. It’s not that bad. How could you know she was connected to Lawrence? Who could’ve predicted that they’d be murdered hours later? The randomness was enormous.

  Thing is, when it came to cold-blooded murder Thom didn’t believe in random.

  He shoved that thought deep down. The water was nice, but he needed a pick-me-up and didn’t want to take the time to go outside for a cigarette.

  When he returned George said, “Lena has been in the states since she was eight. That’s fourteen years. Don’t you think a child would’ve lost their native accent in that amount of time?”

  “Eight, huh?” Thom searched through a messy drawer full of pens, Post-it notes, paper clips, and desk junk in search of nicotine gum. “I don’t think it’s that simple,” he said. “She wasn’t a native speaker when she moved here. She had to learn to speak English. Grammar, too. But I suppose it depends on the motivation. When Da and Uncle Gerard immigrated they worked hard at learning American English because they wanted to fit in. Maybe Jelena thought her speech pattern made her special. Or maybe she’s a slow learner.”

  Thom finally found the gum and pushed a piece through the foil bubble.

  “Something about it bothers me,” said George.

  “Roll with the gut.”

  seventeen

  By now the squad had a quiet, library-like buzz as detectives worked their phones and computers. The air was on, too.

  Lieutenant Lance Craig breezed in, stopped in front of Thom and George and frowned. After a few beats he said, “War room in ten,” then went to his large desk in the corner and picked up the phone.

  George whispered, “What the hell did we do?”

  Thom shrugged.

  Craig was two heads shorter than Thom—the type of short guy that would’ve worn a leather belt with a big-ass buckle in high school. The kind he could easily whip off and swing when he got jumped. Thom held no doubts that Craig’s scrappy upbringing made him the prick he was rumored to be. Personally, Thom had no problems wit
h Craig and seemingly he had no issues with Thom. They got along fine because Thom treated his supervisor with respect. That was the way in his father’s house. Show disrespect and get punished. But Thom’s relatively easy rapport with Craig was an anomaly in the squad. Craig had a chip on his shoulder that said don’t-underestimate-my-shortness-because-I-can-kick-your-ass.

  At the eight-minute mark, Craig nodded to Thom and George as he passed their cubbies. They gathered all the Lawrence materials and followed Craig to a war room. It was being used, so they ducked into an interview room for privacy. A glassless room about twelve-by-eight with a table bolted to the floor and three chairs. Small, cramped, and not designed for comfort.

  George opened the murder book.

  Craig flipped through the front pages and pointed at the disc in a plastic holder. “What’s on this?”

  “A neighbor’s security surveillance with a partial street view,” said George. “The resident lives three houses up on the other side of the street from the Lawrence’s.”

  “Relevant?”

  “Yes. At oh-four-fifty-seven an arc of light appeared on the right side of the frame. As if a car came up the hill and made a U-turn. The view is limited—doesn’t get the vehicle, just the light—but it’s a distinctive tell because the CI estimates TOD between oh-four-thirty and oh-six-hundred. It’s possible our murder suspect drove up the hill, turned around, and parked on the opposite side of the street, pointing downhill.”

  “The potential parking area has been examined,” added Thom. “That portion of the street is flanked by a hill of ivy. A perfect hiding place for a murder gun. It was exhaustively searched with metal detectors but yielded nothing of interest. No other vehicles came up or down the street until nearly oh-seven-hundred when the camera recorded another set of lights that didn’t arc.”

  “Indicating that whoever drove the vehicle didn’t make a U-turn,” said Craig.