Survival of the Fittest (9 page)

“I’ll be happy to try.”

“Thank you.” She handed me the number.

“One question that I have, Helena, is why Nolan transferred from West L.A. to Hollywood. Did Sergeant Baker say anything about that?”

“No. I didn’t ask him. Why? Is that strange?”

“Most officers consider West L.A. a plum. And Nolan went from the day shift to the night shift. But if he liked excitement, he could have wanted an assignment with more action.”

“Could be. He did like action. Roller coasters, surfing, motorcycling.   .   .   . Why why why, all these whys. It’s stupid to keep asking questions that can’t be answered, isn’t it?”

“No, it’s normal,” I said, thinking of Zev Carmeli.

She laughed, a jarring sound. “I saw this cartoon in the paper, once. That Viking, Hagar the Horrible? He’s standing on a mountaintop, with rain and lightning all around, holding his hands up to the heavens, shouting, “Why me?’ And down from the heavens comes the answer: “Why not?’ Maybe that’s the ultimate truth, Dr. Delaware. What right do I have to expect a smooth ride?”

“You have a right to ask questions.”

“Well, maybe I should do more than ask. There’s still Nolan’s stuff to go through. I’ve been putting it off, but I should start.”

“When you’re ready.”

“I’m ready now. After all, it’s all mine, now. He left everything to me.”

She made an appointment for next week and left. I called Dr. Roone Lehmann’s number and gave my name to his service, asking for the office address.

“Seventh Street,” said the operator, reciting a number that put it near Flower, in the heart of the downtown financial district. Unusual location for a therapist but if he got lots of referrals from LAPD and other government agencies, I guess it made sense.

Just as I hung up, Milo called, his voice charged with some kind of energy.

“Got another case. Retarded girl, strangled.”

“Pretty quick—”

“Not from the files, Alex. I’m talking brand-new, here and now. Caught the radio call a few minutes ago and I’m headed over to Southwest Division—Western near Twenty-eighth. If you come by now you might get a look at the body before they take it away. It’s a school. Booker T. Washington Elementary.”

Chapter

11

Southwest Division was twenty miles and a universe away from the park where Irit Carmeli had lost her life. I took Sunset to La Cienega, headed south down San Vicente, and picked up the Santa Monica Freeway east at La Brea. Exiting at Western, I covered the next few blocks of inner city with relative speed. Few cars were on the street as I passed shuttered buildings and burned-out lots that hadn’t been rebuilt since the riots and maybe never would be. The sky was very pale gray, almost white, looked as if it had given up on blue.

Washington Elementary was old, dun-colored, and cruelly graffitied. Set on acres of potholed playground, the entire property was surrounded by twelve-foot chain-link fencing that hadn’t prevented vandals from pretending they were artists.

I parked on Twenty-eighth, near the main gate. Wide open but guarded by a uniform. Squad cars, technical vans, and the coroner’s station wagon had converged at the south end of the playground, between the monkey bars and the swings. Yellow tape divided the lot in two. On the northern half children ran and played under the eyes of teachers and aides. Most of the adults watched the activity across the field. Few of the kids did and the yard was filled with laughter and protest, the scrappy doggerel of childhood.

No media cars, yet. Or maybe a murder down here just wasn’t good enough copy.

It took a while to get past the uniform but finally I was allowed to make my way to Milo.

He was talking to a gray-haired man in an olive suit and writing in his notepad. A stethoscope hung around the other man’s neck and he talked steadily, without visible emotion. Two black men with badges on their sportcoats stood twenty feet away, looking at a figure on the ground. A photographer snapped pictures and techs worked under the swing set with a portable vacuum, brushes, and tweezers. Other uniforms crowded the scene but they didn’t seem to have much to do. Among them was a short, bearded Hispanic man around fifty, wearing gray work clothes.

As I came closer, the black detectives stopped chatting and watched me. One was fortyish, five nine and soft-heavy, with a head shaved clean, bulldog jowls, and a dyspeptic expression. His jacket was beige over black trousers and his tie was black printed with crimson orchids. His companion was ten years younger, tall and slim with a bushy mustache and a full head of hair. He wore a navy blazer, cream slacks, blue tie. Both had analytic eyes.

Milo saw me and held up a finger.

The black detectives resumed their conversation.

I took a look at the dead girl on the field.

Not much bigger than Irit. Lying the same way Irit had been positioned, hands to the sides, palms up, feet straight out. But this face was different: swollen and purplish, tongue extending from the lower left corner of the mouth, the neck circled by a red, puckered ring of bruise.

Her age was hard to make out but she looked in her teens. Black, wavy hair, broad features, dark eyes, some acne on the cheeks. Light-skinned black, or Latino. She wore navy sweatpants and white tennis shoes, a short denim jacket over a black top.

Dirty fingernails.

The eyes open, staring sightlessly at the milk-colored sky.

The tongue lavender-gray, huge.

Behind her, a foot of rope hung from the top bar of the swing set, the end cut cleanly. No breeze, no movement.

The coroner left and Milo approached the black detectives while waving me over. He introduced the heavy one as Willis Hooks, his partner as Roy McLaren.

“Pleased to meet you,” said Hooks. His hand was baked leather.

McLaren nodded. He had clear, nearly coal-black skin, and clean features. Turning back to look at the dead girl, he set his jaw and chewed air.

“Was she left that way or cut down?” I said.

“Cut down,” said Milo. “Why?”

“My first thought was she looks like Irit. The position.”

He turned to the body and his eyebrows rose a millimeter.

“Irit’s yours?” said Hooks.

Milo nodded. “She was arranged just like that.”

“Well, unless the janitor’s our killer I don’t see any big deal about that.”

“The janitor cut her down?” I said.

“Uh-huh.” Hooks pulled out his pad. “School custodian, excuse me. Guillermo Montez, that older Mexican guy in the gray uniform. Showed up for work at seven this morning, mopped the main building first then came out here to pick up trash from the yard and found her. Ran back to get a knife and cut her down, but she was dead, had been for several hours. Said the rope was thick, it took work.”

“Dr. Cohen said she’d been dead at least three or four hours by then, maybe more,” said Milo.

“Cohen’s usually pretty close,” said McLaren.

“So she was killed sometime during the night,” I said, “but the sun’s been out since six. No one driving or walking by saw her?”

“Apparently not,” said Hooks. “Or maybe someone did.” He turned to Milo. “Tell me more about yours.”

Milo did.

Hooks listened with his finger to his mouth. “Apart from the retardation, I don’t see any big parallels.” He looked at his partner.

McLaren said, “No, I wouldn’t call this gentle strangulation.”

“Ours wasn’t raped,” said Milo. “Cohen told me there were no obvious signs of rape with yours, either.”

“So far,” said McLaren. “But who knows. Janitor says her pants were up but maybe the bad guy pulled them up. Coroner’ll get in there and let us know for sure.”

“The strangulation,” said Milo. “From the size of the ligature burn, the rope could have actually killed her, as opposed to his doing it some other way first and then stringing her up.”

Hooks said, “Could be. It would be tough stringing up someone who struggled, even a small girl, but if she was flying, maybe. We know she used crack.”

“Who was she?” I said.

“Local girl named Latvinia Shaver,” said Hooks. “Patrol officer ID’d her before we got here, but I know her myself from working Vice a couple of years ago.”

“A pro?” said Milo.

“She’s been busted for it, but I wouldn’t call her a pro. Just a street girl, nothing cooking up here.” He tapped his bald head. “Nothing to do all day, so she gets into trouble, maybe does some guy for a vial or some spare change.”

“Big crack habit?”

“Patrol officer said nothing big that she was aware of but hold on, let’s ask her.”

He went over to the uniforms and pulled a short, slim woman away from the group.

“Officer Rinaldo,” he said, “meet Detective Sturgis and Dr. Delaware, who’s a psychological consultant. Officer Rinaldo knew Latvinia.”

“Just a bit,” said Rinaldo, in a subdued voice. “From the neighborhood.” She looked to be twenty-five, with hennaed hair pulled into a ponytail and thin, pained features that seemed to be aging quickly.

“What do you know besides her tricking for dope?” said Hooks.

“Not a bad kid,” said Rinaldo. “Basically. But she was retarded.”

“How retarded?” said Milo.

“I think she was eighteen or nineteen, but she acted more like twelve. Or even younger. The family’s pretty messed up. She lives with a grandmother or maybe it’s an older aunt, over on Thirty-ninth, people constantly going in and out.”

“Crack house?”

“I don’t know for sure but it wouldn’t surprise me. She has a brother up in San Quentin, used to be big in the Tray-One Crips.”

“Name?”

“Don’t know that either, sorry. I just remember that ’cause the grandmother told me about him, said she was glad he was gone so Latvinia wouldn’t be influenced.”

She frowned. “The lady seemed to be trying.”

Hooks wrote something down.

“Any gangster boyfriends or known acquaintances?” said McLaren.

Rinaldo shrugged. “As far as I could see she didn’t hang with anyone in particular. No gang, I mean. More like whoever was around .   .   . basically she was pretty promiscuous. She drank, too, ’cause I caught her woozy a few times, with bottles of malt and gin.”

“Bust her for it?”

Rinaldo blushed. “No, I just took it away and tossed it. You know how it is out here.”

“Sure do,” said Hooks. “Anything else in her fun-pack?”

“Probably, but I never saw anything worse—I mean, she didn’t shoot heroin, far as I know.”

“She have any kids?”

“Not that I heard about. But maybe, she was pretty easygoing, you know? Easy to con. Like a kid with a grown-up body. So who knows.”

“Be interesting if she was pregnant,” said Hooks. “Can’t wait to see the autopsy on this one.” He glanced back at the body. “Not that she’s showing. Small lady.”

“Small,” McLaren agreed. “Cohen estimated five one, ninety.”

“Yeah, she was small,” said Rinaldo. “Anyone could have hurt her.”

“Any ideas about who did?”

“Not a one.”

“So no known enemies?”

“Not that I heard. Overall, she was a pretty nice kid, but anyone could have conned her. Like I said, she was retarded.”

“I’m still trying to get a feel for how retarded,” said Hooks.

“I don’t know exactly, sir. I mean, she could talk and make sense and at first glance she didn’t look weird, but once you talked to her you realized she was immature.”

“Like a twelve-year-old.”

“Maybe even younger. Ten, eleven. Despite all her fooling around she was kinda .   .   . innocent.” Another blush. “Not a hard kid, you know?”

“Was she in any program?” said McLaren. “Special school, that kind of thing?”

“I don’t think she was in school, period. I just used to see her on the streets, walking around, hanging. Sometimes I had to tell her to get moving, go home.”

She winced. “The thing is, sometimes she didn’t put on enough clothes. No underwear or bra and sometimes she’d wear real filmy see-through clothes. Or leave her shirt unbuttoned. When I’d say what on earth are you doing, girl, she’d giggle and button up.”

“Advertising for business?” said McLaren.

“I always thought she was just acting stupid,” said Rinaldo.

“Whether or not she was advertising,” said Hooks, “going around like that, she probably got business.”

“I’m sure,” said Rinaldo.

“No boyfriend,” said McLaren.

“Not to my knowledge.”

“No gangsters in her social life at all?”

“The brother’s all I know. You’d have to ask her grandmother.”

“We’ll do that,” said Hooks. “What’s the home address?”

“Don’t know the exact number but it’s on Thirty-ninth a couple of blocks east of here. Green house, old, one of those big wooden ones converted to rooms, chain-link fence in front and cement instead of grass. I know because I took her home one time when she had a short dress and no panties. The wind was blowing the dress up and I just wanted to get her inside.” She blinked. “Grandmother’s on the second floor.”

“When Latvinia was busted,” said Hooks, “were you the arresting officer?”

“Me and my partner, Kretzer. We pulled her twice for soliciting. Both times she was out late, over on Hoover near the freeway on-ramp, getting in the way of traffic.”

“East ramp or west?”

“West.”

“Trying to snag a Beverly Hills guy, maybe,” said McLaren.

Rinaldo shrugged.

“When was this?” said Hooks.

“Last year. December, I think. It was cold and she had on a quilted jacket but no top underneath.”

Hooks wrote. “So I can get her personal info from the files.”

“Probably not, it was a juvey bust, sealed. She was just short of eighteen and I told her she was a lucky girl. If it’s just the home address you need, I can take you there.”

“The address is a good place to start,” said Hooks. He looked at McLaren. “You want?”

The younger man said, “Sure.”

He and Rinaldo walked away, got into a black-and-white, and drove toward the south gate.

“See any dramatic parallels, yet?” Hooks asked Milo.

“Not really.”

“Yours was a diplomat’s kid?”