California Fire and Life

by Don Winslow

  “I wouldn’t fuck with you, Tom.”

  This is definitely true, because not only are Jack Wade and Tom Casey good friends, but Tom Casey is the Meanest Man in California.

  This isn’t just Jack’s opinion; it’s an official title Casey won by unanimous vote at a California Defense Bar Association meeting after he gave a now infamous lecture on the fine art of cross-examination.

  Casey’s lecture was a joke.

  Literally. And it went something like this:

  “This accountant goes to prison for embezzlement,” Casey tells the audience, “and the second he gets to his cell, his cell mate, an enormous, mean-looking guy, says, ‘Now, here in this prison we like to play House. Which would you rather be, the husband or the wife?’

  “The accountant—who is terrified—doesn’t want to be either, of course, but when he considers the various options, he decides he’d rather be the husband. So he manages to croak, ‘The husband. I’ll be the husband.’

  “ ‘Okay, Husband,’ the cell mate says, ‘now get over here and suck your wife’s dick.’ ”

  After the subsequent horrified gasp and burst of laughter, Casey tells the crowd, “And that joke tells you everything you need to know about cross-examination, to wit—when you get to the ultimate question, it shouldn’t matter whether the witness says yes or no.”

  After which, Casey is officially named the Meanest Man in California.

  “Goddamn it, Jack,” Goddamn Billy Hayes says. He’s irritable because Casey has insisted that they meet in the air-conditioned office and there’s no smoking in there.

  “Whatever the fuck kind of dog,” Casey says.

  Jack gazes on Casey’s sartorial splendor. Today he’s wearing a pearl gray Halbert & Halbert DB with a two-toned white shirt and red silk tie. Casey’s famous for his clothes, especially his ties. The joke around the office is that you can actually take a tour of his walk-in closet at home, and that the bus stops for lunch at the shirt section before setting out for the shrine that is the tie rack.

  He lifts his hands in his trademark shrug and asks Jack the same question he often asks (rhetorically) of juries, “I mean, am I missing something here?”

  “You’re missing a lot,” Jack says.

  “Enlighten me,” Casey says, then he sits down and crosses his legs. His eyes widen in mock innocence. “Please, teach me.”

  Like, make your case.

  Convince me and maybe you can convince a jury.

  Don’t convince me and I’ll advise Goddamn Billy to pay the claim.

  Jack knows the drill. He takes out the chart he made and lays it on Billy’s desk.

  “Bentley’s whole overdose theory relies on Pamela Vale smoking in bed and drinking,” Jack says. “I have eight witnesses who will swear that she was sober at least as of 10 p.m.”

  “That gives her half the night—”

  “She didn’t keep booze in the house.”

  “She bought—”

  “Not anywhere in Dana Point.”

  “Go ahead,” Casey says.

  “The same witnesses will testify that Pam was terrified that night,” Jack says. “That she told them Nicky was going to kill her.”

  “Hearsay.”

  “You can get it in.”

  Casey smiles. “Maybe.”

  “You’ll get it in.”

  “Even if I do,” Casey says, “so what? Pamela Vale was afraid and alone. Sadly, she fell off the wagon and went back to the one solace she had—the bottle. She drank herself into unconsciousness, the cigarette slipped from her hand, she died of CO asphyxiation or overdose before the flames hit her. A tragic accident.”

  “But before she passed out,” Jack says, “she poured kerosene from the closet, across the floor, over the bed and under the bed?”

  He hands Casey Dinesh’s report.

  “The formal report will be here in a day or so,” Jack says. “Dinesh faxed me the charts.”

  “You sandbagged me, Jack,” Casey says.

  “Kerosene,” Jack says.

  “Volume?”

  “Two to five gallons.”

  Casey says, “Bentley’s fucked. Motive?”

  Jack lays it out for him.

  “It’s enough for me,” Billy says.

  “Not so fast, Cisco,” Casey says. “You have incendiary origin. You have motive. But opportunity? You have nothing to put your insured on the scene.”

  “There’s nothing that indicates anyone else had access to the scene,” Jack says.

  “A boyfriend?” Casey asks. “A lover? Vale says they were going to reconcile. She tells the boyfriend, ‘Sorry, Charlie, it was beautiful but now it’s over.’ The boyfriend is—forgive me—inflamed with rage. Decides, ‘I’ll show you over, bitch.’ Strangles her and lights her up. Perfect revenge on her and the husband.”

  “So this phantom lover kills her, sets up the fire, gets a key and locks the doors on his way out?” Jack asks. “Why? Besides which, there’s no indication anywhere of any phantom boyfriend. And then there’s Leo.”

  “The poodle.”

  “The Yorkie,” Jack says. “Nicky waits until the kids are asleep, until everything is dead on the streets, then he leaves Mother Russia’s and drives to the Bluffside Drive house. He lets himself in. The dog doesn’t bark because it’s Daddy. Of course, Daddy has a can of kerosene with him, but what does a dog know?”

  “What time is it now?” Casey asks.

  Jack shrugs. “Three. Three-thirty.”

  “Okay. Go on.”

  “Nicky goes into the bedroom,” Jack says. “Maybe he has a gun, maybe he has a knife—but he forces her to drink. Maybe he rapes her, I don’t know. But he smothers her on the bed. Then he takes the kerosene and pours a big pool in the closet, trails it across the room and pours a bigger pool under the bed and over her body.”

  “Why?” Casey asks. “If she’s already dead?”

  “Rage,” Jack says. “He pours it from her waist down.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “But he just can’t barbecue the pooch. Just won’t torch little Leo. So he puts Leo outside and shuts the door. We’re talking about 4:30 now. He goes back inside and lights the match.”

  “Timing device?” Billy asks.

  “I’m guessing he uses a cigarette tucked into a book of matches. That gives him five to ten minutes before the flame touches off the kerosene. It’s a nine-minute drive back to Monarch Bay. The guard sees him come back in around 4:45.”

  “One minute after Meissner sees the fire,” Casey says.

  “And the same time Mother sees him checking on his kids,” Jack says. “Convenient.”

  “Will the guard testify?” Casey asks.

  “When you subpoena him,” Jack says.

  “Proving that he could do it,” Casey says, “isn’t the same as proving that he did do it.”

  “He lied on tape,” Jack says. “Short of Pamela Vale coming back to testify—”

  “—this is the strongest case we could have,” Casey says. “I agree. The issue is: Is it strong enough?”

  The three of them stand there and look at Jack’s chart. After a few minutes Goddamn Billy says, “Jack?”

  “Deny the claim.”

  “Tom?”

  “I think you’re taking a big risk.”

  He cites Bentley’s report and the coroner’s conclusion.

  “If Vale sues,” Casey says, “you’ll have to bring two public officials to the stand and make them eat their own reports. Juries don’t like that.”

  Jack says, “If we give Ng the rest of this evidence, he’ll be happy to modify his report. As for Bentley …”

  “Fuck him?” Casey says.

  Jack shrugs.

  “I still don’t know,” Casey says.

  “What about you, Billy?” Jack asks. “Where are you on this?”

  Billy is suddenly Fuck it on the No Smoking rule. He draws a Camel from the pack, jams it between his lips, lights it, takes a long draw, then exhales.<
br />
  Saying, “It’s your call, Jack.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yup.”

  “Then we deny the life claim and the fire claim,” Jack says, “void the policies and sue to get the advance back.”

  “Write the denial letter,” Goddamn Billy says. “Inform the insured of our decision.”

  Oh, yeah, Jack thinks.

  I’ll inform him.

  76

  Sandra Hansen knocks on the door of Room 813 at the Ritz-Carlton. Waits while the FBI agent inside checks her out. The door slides open, she steps in, and the door closes quickly behind her.

  The agent’s name is Young and she’s known him for three years. They’ve been on the same anti-fraud-ring task force with the two others sitting in the room: Danny Banner, an investigator with the California Attorney General’s office Anti-ROC (Russian organized crime) Task Force, and Sergeant Richard Jimenez, from LAPD. Banner and Jimenez are sitting on a sofa by the coffee table, setting up a tape recorder and going over notes.

  “Guys,” Hansen says.

  “Sandy.”

  “Dr. Howard,” Hansen says.

  Howard looks up from his easy chair. He’s very unhappy.

  “I’m Sandra Hansen,” she says. “From California Fire and Life. You’ve taken us for a lot of money, Howard.”

  “On the phone you said no police,” Howard says.

  “Gee, I guess I committed fraud on you, huh, Doctor?”

  “I should just get up and leave.”

  “Go.”

  Howard’s not going anywhere. Hansen knows Howard’s not going anywhere. She sits down in a chair across from him and lays a file on the table. Opens it and says, “Dr. Howard, yesterday you treated a woman named Lourdes Hidalgo for muscle trauma. Here’s the treatment report. That’s your signature, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “But, Doctor,” Hansen says, “the problem with this is that Lourdes Hidalgo died in a car crash the day before you treated her.”

  “As I said on the phone,” Howard says, “I must have mixed her up with someone else. A mistake in paperwork.”

  “Well, when did you treat Mrs. Hidalgo?” Hansen asks. “And who did you confuse her with?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know because you screwed up,” Hansen says. “You never saw Lourdes Hidalgo, you were just signing paperwork. You were signing phony bills for treatment you never performed. Isn’t that right, Doctor? Or did you administer ultrasound therapy to a jar of ashes? Even you’d notice that, wouldn’t you, Doctor Howard? That your patient is a loose collection of charred bones?”

  “There is no need for—”

  “I think there’s need,” Hansen says. “They identified Lourdes through her dental work. Now I’m going to press charges against you for insurance fraud against California Fire and Life. Sergeant Jimenez here is about to read you your rights and arrest you.”

  “A misdemeanor,” Howard says.

  “Where did you get your medical degree?” Banner asks. “Because you’re very stupid, Doctor. This treatment report connects you to eight murders. Eight people were incinerated in that van.”

  “I had nothing to do—”

  “You had everything to do with it,” Hansen says. “Your billing factory is the whole motive for drive-downs like that one that went wrong. That connects you. That makes you a conspirator.”

  “My lawyers will—”

  “Execute your will,” Jimenez says. “Because you’ll be dead. I know the names of three corrections officers in the downtown jail who are on the Russian payroll. They’ll put you in a cell and you’ll never make it out. You’ll never make it to the arraignment.”

  Banner says, “We can get you capital punishment just by charging you. We don’t have to win a trial.”

  “If I press these charges,” Hansen says, “your partners will kill you. They’ll be afraid that you’ll talk. Maybe if it were a misdemeanor they’d hang in with you, but a seven-count homicide charge?”

  Howard is not a tough guy. He starts crying. Asks, “What do you want from me?”

  “Only everything,” Hansen says. “You’re going to start meeting with us. You’re going to go over all your records and tell us which ones are phonies. You’re going to give us names of who you’re working with.”

  “Starting now,” Banner says. “Who brings you the forms to sign?”

  “It’s changed,” Howard says. “Two new guys.”

  “Names,” Banner says.

  Howard shrugs.

  “You don’t know?” Banner asks.

  “Sorry.”

  Banner looks at Jimenez and says, “What are we doing here? Read him his rights.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Come on,” Hansen says. “When they’d call you, they’d say, ‘This is …’ ”

  “Ivan,” Howard says.

  “You’re shitting me,” Banner says.

  “Ivan and Boris,” Howard says. “It was like, you know, a joke.”

  “No kidding,” Hansen says.

  Young says, “Describe them.”

  Howard describes them. When he’s done, Banner takes some pictures out of a file and tosses them on the table.

  “Those two,” Howard says.

  “Who’d they work for?”

  “I dunno. I thought they worked for themselves.”

  “Don’t be jerking us, Howard,” Banner says. “You’re not a moron. You know you’re hooked up with the Russian Mafia, not Two Guys from Kiev.”

  “But they don’t tell you,” Howard says. “These two, they just came in and said ‘Now you report to us.’ ”

  “Did you ever hear anyone mention the name Tratchev?” Hansen asks.

  “No.”

  “Rubinsky?”

  “No.”

  “Schaller?”

  “No.”

  Jimenez turns to Hansen. “You want to press charges?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “No,” Howard whines.

  Hansen leans forward so her face is real close to his. Says, “Here’s the deal, you drunken quack. Listen to me very carefully—I don’t care if they kill you. I think that you’re bottom-feeding scum and you deserve everything you have coming to you. Now I will keep my finger in the shit dike for just as long as you’re useful to me. The second you stop, the second you balk, the second you don’t do exactly what we tell you, I’ll pull my finger out. I’ll have you arrested, and just to make sure, I’ll call up Mr. Tratchev and tell him that you met with us and gave up two of his boys. I’ll send him an edited version of the videotape. By the way, smile for the camera, Dr. Howard.”

  “You are a terrible person.”

  “You bet,” Hansen says.

  “I want to go into protective custody,” Howard says to Banner.

  “You don’t know enough,” Banner says. “There’s a price tag for protective custody and you don’t even have the ante. You have to go up at least another level to get protection.”

  “I’ll relocate,” Howard says.

  Young says, “Doctor, what do you think I’m doing here? Federal agent? Federal Bureau blah-blah-blah? What are you thinking about? That you can set up in Arizona and your former playmates are going to come to a screeching halt at the border? They’re nationwide, stupid. They’re set up in Arizona, Texas, West Virginia, Ohio, New York … Look at me when I’m talking to you. These Russian SOBs take $5 million a week out of my country and you help them do it. You can’t run far enough to get away from them or me.”

  “What’s he going to do?” Jimenez asks.

  “Next time you meet with them,” Banner says, “you’re going to wear a wire.”

  Howard shakes his head. “They’ll kill me.”

  “I don’t care,” Banner says. “You’re going to sit with them and demand a meeting with their boss.”

  “I’m not doing this.”

  Jimenez says, “You have the right to remain silent. Anything that you say can and
will—”

  “Okay, okay.”

  Howard puts his face in his hands and sobs. This goes on for about two minutes until Hansen says, “I can’t take this anymore. Get out.”

  Jimenez says, “We’ll let you know when and where our next rendezvous is. You bring records, we’ll bring recording equipment.”

  “It’ll be fun,” Hansen says.

  She takes Howard’s arm and helps him out of the chair. Walks him to the door and says, “Thank you for coming.”

  She sits back down and Young says, “He’ll do.”

  “That doctor’s a corpse,” Banner says.

  “Tough shit,” Sandra Hansen says.

  In an operation of this magnitude, you have to expect some casualties.

  77

  Ding-dong.

  Nicky comes to the door; he’s holding a glass of champagne.

  “Grieving?” Jack asks him.

  “To each his own.”

  “I know you’re anxious about the resolution of your claim,” Jack says. “So as part of California Fire and Life’s continuing commitment to excellent service, I thought I’d come personally to inform you.”

  “Of what, precisely?”

  Jack can see Mother Russia standing a few feet behind Nicky.

  “You’ll be getting a certified letter tomorrow,” Jack says. “Informing you that we’re denying both the life insurance and the fire claim on the grounds that you’ve violated the terms of the policies by intentional acts. To wit, we believe there’s sufficient evidence to indicate that you were involved in the death of your wife and in the fire at your home.”

  Jack watches Nicky’s eyes go narrow and hard.

  “You’re making a very serious mistake,” Nicky says.

  “Yeah, well, I’ve made them before.”

  “And you didn’t learn?”

  “I guess not.”

  Cool Nicky shrugs and sips his champagne.

  Jack looks over his shoulder and asks, “Aren’t you going to ask me in for tea?”

  The door shuts in his face.

  “I guess that’s a nyet,” Jack says.

  He feels better than he’s felt in twelve years.

  Like a long night’s finally ending.

  78

  The sun comes up like it’s been waiting all night to burn somebody.