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“Couple of possibles. I fi gure we’ll put a list together and check ‘em all out after.” Martinez held up the stack. “You want half?”
David took the proffered papers. Slipping on his reading glasses, he read.
By lunch they had amassed less than a dozen promising names. David decided it would have to do for now. “Let’s grab something to eat, then we can start calling.”
David took them to Little Thailand, a small hole in the wall place a couple of blocks west of the station. It was nearly always fi lled with cops; David was hooked on their green curry chicken.
Martinez always tried to surpass himself with hot and mind-numbingly spicy. He challenged the cook at Little Thailand, an ex-cop who had retired on disability, to make something he couldn’t handle. So far the guy had failed. But neither one of them would say uncle.
The tall Latina waitress knew David and Martinez by sight.
She grinned, revealing a mouthful of braces. “Hey, Bill was just complaining the other day that you guys never came in anymore.
I think he was getting bored.”
Martinez rubbed his hands together and pretended to study the menu. “What’s he got for me today?”
“Got some fresh shrimp in just this morning. He got hold of some of those Naga Jolokia. He’s been hoping you’d come in.
No one else will try them.” She shuddered fi ercely. “
Olvídeselo
, I won’t even touch those things.
Que picosisimo!
”
Martinez’s eyes gleamed. “Bring it on.” He grinned at David.
“I live for the challenge.”
David watched in amazement as Martinez shoveled a plateful of shrimp and rice into his mouth, washed down with milk.
“I can’t imagine what that stuff is doing to your stomach.”
Martinez burped and waved fumes of chili across the table.
“Puts hair on my chest.”
180 P.A. Brown
David had seen Martinez shirtless in the station’s locker room.
He was nearly as hairless as Chris.
Bill Maruti, Little Thailand’s owner, stopped by their table.
The limp that had fi rst put him behind a desk then pushed him into early retirement was noticeable. He must have caught David’s look; he grimaced, his dark, scarred face twisting into a scowl.
“Weather’s changing. It’ll be raining by tomorrow night.” He turned gleaming eyes on Martinez, who was visibly sweating.
“Want some ice there, Juanita?”
“Ha, you aren’t there yet, gimpy.”
“You guys busy these days?” Though he had been off the force for ten years, Bill never tired of hearing about their ongoing cases. “Got a hot one?”
It was David’s turn to scowl. “Lukewarm and going nowhere,”
he said.
“Doesn’t feel good?” As a cop, he would know that feeling all too well. “Or is it just not coming together like you thought it would?”
“Sometimes I don’t think there’s anything there to come together,” David said. “We couldn’t make a case if we threw everything we had in front of a jury and the defense phoned it in.”
Bill winced.
“It gets worse,” David said. “We had him and we let him walk.
Now he’s gone ghost.”
“It happens. Things fall apart. But if he’s going to be the ghost, then maybe it’s time for you to be the ghost buster.”
“Yeah,” Martinez said. “He’s found a hole to hide his sorry ass in, and we’re gonna fi nd it and drag him out.”
L.A. BYTES
181
Friday, 12:10 pm, USC County General, State Street, Los Angeles
Chris forced himself to fi nish the bland chicken soup. At least the crackers gave it some body. He glanced at the lime green Jell-O with a jaundiced eye and was grateful when his phone rang.
Shoving the tray back, he scooped the receiver up.
It was Becky.
“Hey boss,” she said. “You developing a thing for hospitals that you gotta keep going back into them? Too many cute doctors?”
“Hey, no one told me there was a bomb there.”
“They usually don’t.”
“Funny. And I don’t even look at the doctors anymore.”
“Honey, everybody looks at the doctors.”
“Hmph.” Chris shoved his spoon into the Jell-O. It jiggled and he made a face. While it tasted bland, it easily slid down his sore throat. “You at work?”
“At Ste. Anne’s. Just fi nishing up those intrusion tests. You’ll be happy to know everything is holding up. Terry confi rms no more fi les have been hit and all the restores are golden.”
“Thanks, hon. You have no idea how much I appreciate it.”
He sighed in relief. “Hey, someday I’ll fi gure out a way to pay you back.”
“Good. Looking forward to collecting that.” Her voice dropped. “I also called Desclan and Third Planet Design just to see if they needed anything, since I knew they were your most active accounts outside of Pharmaden.”
A thread of apprehension in her tone put him on instant alert.
“What is it, Becky?”
“The CIO at Desclan got a pretty nasty email yesterday, he seems to think it came from you. Dodge over at Third Planet got something too, but he won’t say what. Just that it really upset him.
He was talking about calling his lawyers until I told him you were
182 P.A. Brown
in the hospital, and had been for several days. Now he doesn’t know what to do.”
Goose bumps covered Chris’s body. Hesitantly, then with greater strength as anger bubbled through him, he told her about Sandman and the kiddie porn.
“Jesus, do you think that what’s happened to Dodge? No wonder he was freaked out.”
“That or something worse,” Chris said, though he wasn’t sure what “worse” could entail. “Whatever it is, this guy is fucking up my life good.”
“But why?” Becky asked. “How does he even know about your contacts?”
“I don’t—” Chris tried to sit up and grunted at the pain in his ribs. “My Blackberry. It got lost in the rubble.”
“I’d say it’s not lost now. You better call your provider and freeze that account.”
“I will.”
“Well you might want to try to do that like yesterday. This guy’s on a real tear, from what I’ve heard.”
Chris looked down. Both arms were a mass of dark bruises, starting to turn yellow and green around the edges; his shoulders ached even when he lay still. Just breathing too deeply sent spasms of pain through his chest; moving was a nightmare. How the hell was he supposed to get out of here any time in the near future?
His doctor would never allow it; Chris could just imagine David’s reaction if he told him he wanted to go home. But pain or no, he was going to have to get out of here. If he didn’t, he wasn’t going to have a business left.
He’d worry about explaining it later.
“How did the guy get back in to fi nd my Blackberry, anyway?
I don’t imagine the cops just let anyone roam around after something like that.”
“Unless they thought he belonged,” Becky said.
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“Listen, Beck, thanks for calling, but I have to go.”
“Call me,” she said. “I don’t care when, day or night. If you need anything at all.”
“Thanks, I will.”
Chris hung up and immediately called the police station.
David wasn’t in. So he asked for whoever was in charge of the hospital bombing. Within minutes he was talking to some cop called Bentzen. He vaguely remembered talking to the guy after his surgery. He couldn’t for the life of him remember him, beyond that he was almost albino blond.
“Yes, Chris?” Bentzen’s voice was deep and soothing. A sexy voice; Chris wondered what he looked like. “How can I help you?”
“Actually, I may be able to help you,” Chris said. “I think my Blackberry was picked up by the bomber.”
“And what makes you think the bomber got it?”
“He not only took it, but it’s defi nitely the same guy who’s been harassing me.”
“This is the Sandman, right?” Bentzen asked. “David mentioned him. When did he take your Blackberry?”
“After the bomb,” Chris’s voice rose. “The guy went back in after the bomb had gone off. Somebody had to have seen him.
He probably talked to you guys—if he could get past the cops, then he must have been able to prove he belonged there.”
“It was pretty chaotic the fi rst hour. It was more important to get the patients out, they drafted just about everyone who was still ambulatory...” Chris heard the sound of papers rustling.
“Thank you, Chris. I promise we’ll look into it. Now if I need to speak with you again I can call the hospital, right?”
“What? Oh, sure. Call me here.” Not that Chris had any intention of staying put.
Friday, 10:35 pm, USC County General, State Street, Los Angeles
When Chris awoke again it was dark. His mind was foggy and sluggish. He grabbed his watch off the nightstand. Ten-thirty.
He fell back on the uncomfortable bed with a groan. He missed his own bed; more, he missed David’s comforting presence and strong arms. Exhaustion clung to him like a wet blanket. It was all he could do to keep his eyes open.
He knew the exhaustion was his body’s way of forcing him to rest. The doctor might be upbeat about his progress; the accident had still taken a serious toll.
Did he really want to risk his health going after the elusive Sandman? What was he going to do if he found him? He couldn’t even call David; he had no cell phone, no BlackBerry.
That made his next decision easy. He knew Des would be up; the man never went to sleep before midnight. With a brief hope that he wasn’t interrupting something, he dialed his friend’s Beverly Hills exchange. He tried not to think of the horrendous charges that were being tacked onto his hospital bill.
Des picked up on the second ring.
“Chris, baby. Oh my God, you’re okay!”
“Hey,” Chris said, suddenly realizing how long it had been since he had last talked to Des. So much had happened since then. “Yeah, I’m okay. Better all the time.”
“You’re at home?”
“Ah, no,” Chris said reluctantly, knowing exactly how Des was going to take that news. “Not yet—”
“Why are they keeping you there? What’s wrong?”
“I’m fi ne. You gotta believe me—”
186 P.A. Brown
“Right. You don’t think I haven’t talked to David? I know what’s going on. I don’t believe it. A bomb!” His voice broke.
“You could have died.”
“Come on, Des. I’m not dead. Not even close.”
“You can joke. But it’s not funny.” Des sniffed. “If you ever do that again, I’ll—I’ll kill you myself!”
“I’ll remember that. Honest, honey, I’m fi ne.” Chris took a deep breath, pushing his exhaustion further back. “I need to ask you a favor.”
“Favor? What?”
Chris told him.
“A cell phone? What for?”
Chris had his argument ready. “I can’t afford to lose my business. I need to be able to keep in touch—check my email, take messages. They don’t do that here. Besides, do you have any idea what they’re charging me for these calls?”
“So stay off the phone,” Des said, his fl amboyance gone, his voice deepening. Chris winced. When Des adopted that tone he wasn’t going to be argued with. He wouldn’t even listen to Chris’s best wheedling. “You need to rest, not be on the phone all day.”
“I am resting—”
“Besides,” Des’s voice grew even more suspicious. “You can’t use a cell phone in the hospital. They make you turn them off.”
“Des—”
“No, Chrissy. You can take care of your business when you get better. I’m not going to help you kill yourself because you don’t know how to let go.”
“Damn it, Des—”
“Don’t think I don’t know you, Christopher Ryan Bellamere.
I know you’re up to something, so don’t try and deny it. I’ll come by tomorrow to visit. If you need me to make some phone calls I’ll do it then.”
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Before Chris could marshal another argument Des hung up.
Chris swore.
A wave of utter exhaustion drove the last of his will away.
He was asleep before his head hit the stiff pillow that smelled vaguely of his own sweat.
Saturday, 8:45 am, N. Vermont Avenue, East Hollywood
“Adnan Baruq.” David read the address from their DMV
print out. It was the third Adam-like name with a green Honda they had come to check out.
This one lived in an apartment above a badly lit furniture store stocked with Frank Lloyd Wright and Bauhaus knock offs. The stairs smelled faintly of mildew and urine. They passed a single mailbox with no name on it.
The door at the top of the stairs was propped open with a brick. David nudged it open more with his foot. A second, inner door was shut. The smell of urine was fainter overlaid by pine cleaner. From inside they heard the soft, recorded tones of a woman singing. The words sounded Arabic.
David didn’t like the layout of the two doors. They had to stand directly between them when they knocked, and he and Martinez would be exposed to whoever stood behind it. He nodded at Martinez who moved across the hall and rapped sharply on the peeling paint.
Immediately the music cut off. There was movement beyond the door. David held his breath.
“Yes? Who is it?”
David tried to determine if he’d ever heard that voice before.
It was muffl ed by the intervening wood. “The police, Mr. Baruq,”
he said. “We need to ask you a couple of questions.”
“What about?”
188 P.A. Brown
“I can’t do this through the door,” David said. “Let us in and we can talk.”
There was silence on the other side. Finally a shuffl ing of feet.
“Okay, give me a minute to get dressed...”
There was the sharp sound of a bolt being thrown then more silence. David and Martinez traded glances.
David struck the door again, more sharply this time. “Adam, open up. We need to talk.”
There was a muffl ed clang. David pushed at the door. It rattled on its hinges but didn’t give way.
From further away, an engine roared to life.
Martinez swore. Together they raced down the stairs. David bolted ahead of his partner. His gaze darted left when he emerged onto the street. An alley ran between the furniture store and the Iranian restaurant next door. An older couple, the woman in the traditional black chador, the man in an equally dark suit, paused at the mouth of the alley when David appeared. They looked alarmed and David held up his gold badge. On the street, the air brakes on a diesel truck whooshed and an impatient driver laid on his horn.