Mort squinted his eyes quizzically and tilted his head toward Macklin. "What?"
"Cheshire is dead," Macklin said carefully.
Mort swatted Macklin's arm away. "It's you, isn't it?"
"What?" Macklin snapped.
"Mr. Jury. The killing. It isn't over, is it?" Mort glared at Macklin. "
Is it!?
" he yelled.
Macklin frowned and exhaled slowly. "No, it isn't, Mort. I'm not sure it ever will be."
Without warning, Mort smashed his fist into Macklin's stomach and, before Macklin could recover, followed through with an uppercut that sent Macklin sprawling onto the floor.
"Fuck you, Brett, just fuck you."
Turning his back to Macklin, Mort walked toward the hangar door.
"Mort," Macklin rasped, propping himself up on his elbows. "Wait, I need your help!"
Mort kept walking.
"Damn it, Mort, I loved her, too!"
Mort stopped, his shoulders sagging.
Macklin stood up shakily. "We can make them pay, Mort. Together."
Mort looked over his shoulder. "Who are they?"
"A bunch of psychos who kidnap kids, force them to have sex in porno movies, and then kill them." Macklin held out his hand to him. "Will you help me?"
Mort turned around slowly and sighed. Macklin waited, his hand out.
"Please?" Macklin prodded.
Mort nodded, reached out, and shook Macklin's hand. "I'm sorry I hit you. I was pissed. I know it isn't your fault."
"It's all right, I don't blame you. I thought it was over, too."
Macklin told Mort about his meeting with Stocker and Shaw, the surveillance of Saputo, his meeting earlier that day with Harlan Fitz, and the phone call he had just made to Orlock.
"What do you want me to do?" Mort asked.
"I want you on the roof of the building across from the warehouse, taking pictures and covering me," Macklin said. "If I get into trouble, call Shaw."
"All right."
"You have a gun, don't you?"
Mort hedged with silence. He hadn't used a gun since his alcoholic days on the LAPD chopper patrol.
"Yes or no, Mort? Do you have a gun?" Macklin knew Mort had been a crack shot once and thought he probably wasn't too bad now.
"Yes," Mort said. "But, Mack, I haven't fired a gun sinceâ"
"No arguments," Macklin interrupted. "It will protect both of us."
Macklin yanked a pen out of his breast pocket. "Gimme a piece of paper, Mort."
Mort pulled a wrinkled Blue Yonder Airways business card out of his back pocket and handed it to him. Macklin glanced at the card, gave Mort a disapproving look, and turned it over.
"Here's where I'm meeting Orlock." He scribbled down directions and gave the card back to Mort.
"It's a date," Mort said, studying the card.
"Good, then I'll see you tonight." Macklin headed toward the door.
"Wait a minute, Brett."
Macklin turned around.
"If they put a bomb in your car, they must know who you are," Mort said. "They must know you're not a representative of some eastern syndicate."
"I don't think they ever saw my face," Macklin replied. "My hunch is they saw me tailing Saputo, got my license number, and didn't bother to do any other checking before they decided to play it safe and kill me."
"And what if you're wrong?" Mort argued. "What if they know you're just a cocky pilot?"
"I'll have to stay alive long enough for you to rescue me."
Shaw sat on the edge of his couch and leaned close to the portable black-and-white TV, which was sitting on a blue plastic milk crate in the center of the living room.
Tuxedo-clad superspy Pete Cypher stood in the underground garage of his apartment building watching three sword-swinging ninja warriors kick his blazing red Corvette convertible into a pile of fiberglass dust.
"As you can see, Mr. Cypher, we mean business."
The portly Frenchman in the wheelchair grinned, stroking the chameleon in his lap.
"Where is the electrofremeon nodule?"
Cypher arched his eyebrows in mock surprise.
"I thought you knew."
He shot a glance at the rubble that had once been his car.
"It was in the glove compartment."
"Oh, Pete Cypher is smooth," Shaw whispered, glancing over his shoulder at his white girlfriend. "C'mon, Sunshine, you gotta see this. Cypher is gonna flatten these guys any second now with his laser ring or his flame-throwing shoe."
"Uh-huh," she mumbled without looking up from her paperback copy of
Loose Change
. Curled up in a red vinyl bean bag, Sunshine was braless in her gauze blouse, her long brown hair falling across her chest and clear down to her Indian wraparound skirt.
Shaw shrugged, decided it was her loss, and stared intently at the screen again.
"Very amusing, Mr. Cypher,"
the Frenchman quipped,
"but that isn't reason enough to keep you alive. I want it now."
Cypher grinned.
"Then I'll just have to give it to you."
Shaw laughed. "Here it comes, Sunny. Cypher is gonna do his thing."
"Uh-huh," Sunshine replied.
Someone knocked at Shaw's door.
"Shit. Sunshine, could you get that?" Shaw didn't shift his attention from Pete Cypher.
Sunshine peered at him over the top of her book. "You've got two legs and two hands."
"I can't," Shaw whined. "I've invested forty-five minutes in this. You've read that book three times. Okay? Please?"
Sunshine sighed, pulled herself up, and trudged to the door.
"Hello, my name is Jessica Mordente. I'm a reporter with the
Los Angeles Times
," Shaw heard a woman say. "Is Sergeant Shaw in?"
Shaw groaned. Cypher squinted at the three ninjas and pointed his digital wristwatch at them.
"Come in, Ms. Mordente," Sunshine said.
"Thank you," Mordente replied.
Shaw reluctantly rose from the couch, his eyes on the set, and back-stepped toward the door.
What has Cypher got in his watch?
"Ronny!" Sunshine shouted.
Shaw whirled around, startled, and flashed an apologetic smile at Sunshine and Mordente.
"Sergeant Shaw?" Mordente ventured, offering her hand to him.
"Yes," Shaw replied, a questioning look on his face, and shook Mordente's hand. "What can I do for you, Ms. Mordente?"
"Please, call me Jessie. Everyone does."
"Right," Shaw said, leading Mordente to the couch. He stopped to watch a pin-size missile blast out of Cypher's watch and zoom toward the terrified ninjas.
"Ronny, why don't you turn off the TV so we can talk?" Sunshine urged. Shaw reluctantly switched off the set and sat on the arm of the couch beside Mordente.
"So, what's your story?" Shaw asked glumly.
"Mr. Jury." Mordente replied.
Shaw felt the anxiety flare in his chest and shrugged, as if her remark meant nothing to him. "Well, I could have saved you a trip," he casually remarked. "It's an ongoing investigation, and I can't release any information."
Sunshine shot a curious look at Shaw as she picked a discarded pair of her wooden platform shoes off the living room floor.
"I think Mr. Jury is the man who foiled that bank robbery this afternoon," Mordente said.
So do I,
Shaw thought. "You may be right. Then again, you may not. It's speculation at this point, and I'm in no position right now to discuss the case." Shaw narrowed his eyes and wondered what she was after. "Really, why don't you contact our press relations office in the morning? It's been a long day andâ"
"Do you have any evidence in the Mr. Jury case?" she interrupted. "Any fingerprints, witnesses, suspects?"
"Look, I already told you. I can't discuss the case." A stroke of anger colored his voice. "We have leads we are actively pursuing."
"That's the same speech Stocker used to give me back when he was chief of police," she commented dryly. "C'mon, Sergeant, hasn't anything changed since then?"
Shaw didn't like the way this conversation was going. He felt as though his words were footsteps in a mine field. "That's all I can tell you. I don't want to risk jeopardizing the investigation. You already know what I'm authorized to tell you. The only description we have is from a cashier in a Quick Stop market. He says Mr. Jury is a short Asian with a weight problem."
"Sergeant, you once arrested Brett Macklin because you thought he was Mr. Jury," she said evenly. "Isn't that true?"
Sunshine came beside Shaw and wrapped her arm around his waist.
"Not exactly," Shaw said, wishing he had Cypher's watch right now. "But we did bring him in for questioning." Shaw's heart pounded. She couldn't know the truth, could she? "Just what are you gettiâ"
"Why did you arrest him?" she interjected pointedly, her words coming in a rush. "What evidence did you have linking him to the murders? Was it simply his revenge motive or something more that led you to arrest him? Is he still a suspect?"
Shaw stood up, strode silently to the front door, and held it open. "Ms. Mordente, that's enough for tonight. You want to interview me, you call the press information office in the morning and we'll go from there."
Mordente scratched her cheek and smiled. "What are you afraid of, Sergeant?"
"I'm afraid you're not going to leave and the whole evening will be shot to hell."
She stood up and shifted her gaze between Sunshine and Shaw. "You have been friends with Brett Macklin for a long time. I think if he was Mr. Jury, you might be tempted to cover up for him."
"Stop playing games with us," Sunshine shot back. "You're saying Mack is Mr. Jury and you're accusing Ronny of covering for him."
"Mack and I are close friends, Ms. Mordente," Shaw said. "I'd be lying if I said it wasn't painful having to question him about the Mr. Jury killings. But you're right. He had motive." Shaw leaned against the wall. "The fact is, Brett Macklin is a man who has had to endure a lot of personal tragedy lately. Someone out there got mad about that and decided to do something about it."
"How do you know that someone isn't your friend? It's the logical assumption, Sergeant."
"Ms. Mordente, I'd like to watch a little TV, make some popcorn, spend a quiet evening at home, okay?" Shaw tilted his head toward the door. "Let's call it a night."
Mordente acquiesced. "All right." She pulled a card out of her skirt pocket and gave it to Shaw. "Here's my card if you want to reach me." Mordente glanced at Sunshine. "Thank you both for your time."
Shaw closed the door behind Mordente and tore up the card into scraps.
It's finally
happening,
he thought,
what I knew would happen all along.
He felt a chill ride over him, raising goose bumps on his flesh and making him shiver.
He walked into the living room and stood beside the fire, the heat warming his back. The heat against his back only made the iciness over the rest of his body more acute.
Someone is picking apart our flimsy cover-up,
he warned himself.
It's only a matter of time now before the whole thing comes crumbling down and crushes us all.
He recognized his chills for what they wereâthe same chills he felt as a child whenever the doctor wanted to give him a blood test or throat culture. The chills of unadulterated fear.
Sunshine crossed her legs and sat down in front of him. "I hate to admit it, Ronny, but she has a point."
Shaw tossed the bits of paper into the fire and sat down on the couch behind her. He willed the fear out of his voice. "Sure she does. That doesn't make it the truth."
"But it is the truth, isn't it?" she asked softly, staring into the fire.
"No," he told her quietly, one last lie in the whole string of lies that he felt, with aching certainty, would soon become his noose.
# # # # # #
Luck didn't seem to be on Mort Suderson's side Friday night. His windbreaker wouldn't zip up, and there was no dry place to squat on the roof of the building across from Orlock's warehouse.
Sitting on the roof was like wading in a stagnant pond. A vast puddle of rainwater stretched across the roof, reaching into all the corners that afforded the best view of the street below. There was no way around it. Mort had to get wet. His socks were soaked sponges inside his wet tennis shoes and made his feet feel like solid blocks of ice.
Mort sniffled and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. He cursed himself for not bringing his heavy Levi's jacket. He squatted in the far left-hand corner of the warehouse roofline, two stories above the street, Orlock's warehouse in front of him, an alley to his left. The last, dimming rays of the sun gave the greenish haze above the city a sickly glow. It reminded Mort that the poison air didn't disappear at nightâit simply hid in the darkness.
He glanced at his watch. It was 6:30 p.m. Perfect, he thought. He wanted to settle in early.
The gun felt snug against him in his LAPD-issue shoulder holster, and the Canon AE-1 hung around his neck. With nothing else to do, he decided to play with the camera. He sighted Orlock's warehouse through the viewfinder, adjusting the zoom lens. If he wanted to, he knew he could snap clear pictures of the bolts on the steel warehouse door.
This is going to be easy,
Mort thought.
He aimed the camera at the moon, playfully thinking he'd take a few pictures of craters.
Mort heard something splash in the water behind him. He lowered the camera and jerked his head around. His eyes caught the flash of steel an instant too late. The wrench slammed into the side of his head, and a blinding burst of intense pain consumed him. In the fraction of a second before darkness swallowed his thoughts, Mort realized he should have guessed there would be others who wanted to settle in early.
Tice wiped the blood off the wrench with a white handkerchief and slipped them both into the pocket of his overcoat. He examined his black-gloved hands to see if any blood had splattered them. They were clean. His thin lips stretched into a self-satisfied grin as he casually glanced down at Mort, who lay at his feet wide-eyed but unseeing, tiny rivulets of blood crawling down his cheek.
Tice lifted Mort by the armpits and dragged him through the water to the building's edge. Then, with the heel of his black shoe, he pushed Mort over the edge with a sharp kick.