Violent Spring (10 page)

“Then this isn't a decision of your board.”

“There is a certain amount of discretionary funds I have control over. And of course I will send a memo around to them about this development.”

“I'll send over a contract,” Monk said, pocketing the envelope. “It'll spell out that if I discover anything that puts me in conflict with my primary client, our deal, and your money, will be returned.”

“Fair enough.”

They finished their meals and walked to the parking lot together. O'Day stopped at a shiny Lincoln Mark VII. The license plate read NEW DAY. The silver-haired wheeler-dealer stuck out his hand again, and Monk took it.

“I look forward to us keeping in touch. And please let me know if there's anything I can do for you in the course of this investigation,” O'Day said.

“There is.” Monk took out his notepad and wrote down the name of Jiang Holdings in Stanton, California. He handed the paper to O'Day. “This name has come up a couple of times. The only thing I've turned up on it so far is that it's a mail drop in Orange County. I'm sure your hot shot law clerks can do a more efficient and thorough legal search than I can.”

O'Day got into his car. “I'll see what I can find out.”

Monk said, “Thank you,” and got into his Galaxie. Both vehicles made their way down the expanse of the drive. At the bottom, the exit gate lifted, and the Lincoln pulled off. Quite suddenly the gate descended again. Monk slammed on the brakes, glaring at Crewcut in Cerberus' belly. Nonchalantly, the kid sucked loudly on a lollipop.

Monk put the car in neutral, opened his door, stood up, placing his arm on the hood of the 500. “Is there some problem?”

“Problem?”

Monk engaged the emergency brake and stepped around to the guard booth. “Yes, is there some problem?” He reached into the booth, aiming his hand for the switch to lift the gate. The kid's hand snaked forward and latched onto Monk's wrist. Monk lurched back, taking Crewcut off his stool, breaking the grip on his wrist.

“That's your ass, nigger.” The door to the booth came open and he stepped out. He was two inches taller than Monk and looked to be at least ten years younger.

“Your momma's a nigger,” Monk growled, moving his body forward. He caught the other one around the waist with his arms, his weight driving the both of them back against the booth.

Crewcut brought a fist down between Monk's shoulder blades. Stars exploded in the corner of his right eye. He grunted in pain but held on. He wrenched to the left, upsetting their balance. They tumbled to the asphalt.

“That's enough,” Ponytail said, running over to the two.

Monk's teeth came together sharply as Crewcut socked him hard in the side. He went over on his side and the younger man clambered on top of him.

“Cut it out, Stacy,” Ponytail yelled, grabbing at the other's arm.

“Get the fuck off,” Stacy hollered back, turning his head slightly. Just then, Monk jabbed upward, into the blonde farmboy's Adam's apple. Stacy's eyes bulged. Involuntarily, his hands clutched at his throat. Monk kneed him in the stomach and he went over.

Monk regained his footing, glaring at the crewcut Stacy. “Get up, so I can put you on the ground again.”

Ponytail came between them. “Look mister,” he said to Monk. “He's always bullshittin'. He didn't mean anything.”

Stacy was on one knee, gaping at the other two. Monk pointed a finger at Crewcut and addressed Ponytail. “I bet Maxfield O'Day would like to know how his guests get treated around here.”

“You ain't nothing to Maxfield O'Day except hired backdoor help,” Crewcut said, rising up.

Monk stepped closer to him. “What's it to you?”

Stacy looked at Monk, then Ponytail. “Sorry Bart,” he said to Ponytail. “I didn't mean nothin'.”

He started to walk off. Monk got in his way.

“Look man, it was just a joke that got out of hand.” He said the words, but Monk heard no sincerity behind them.

Bart put a hand on Monk's shoulder. “Hey, 'bro, can't we let this slide. You know how it is.” He turned his natural blonde head. An emerald Jaguar was stopped behind Monk's car. A heavy set man leaned his jowled face out the window, observing the scene.

Monk glared at Stacy, who glared back. “Yes. I know how it is.” He shoved him, waiting for the comeback. None was to be had. Monk got in his car and drove off. It was past the morning rush hour and Monk burned off excess adrenalin by speeding back to Continental Donuts.

The middle knuckles on his right hand were skinned and had started to throb. The second joint on his left index was split open and was swelling. He swabbed Mer curachrome on his abrasions and taped a Band-Aid over the joint. Monk called his office.

“What's shaking?” he said to Delilah after pleasantries.

“Tina Chalmers called.”

An electric charge pulsed along Monk's spine. “What did she say?”

“Wouldn't tell me. You're supposed to call her back at two. She'll be out till then.”

“Okay. Talk to you later.” Two was his appointed time with the task force, something he was desperate to avoid. He locked up his office and went out front. The only customers in the place were two of the regulars playing chess in one of the booths.

“What it is, Lenny?” He patted the man on the shoulder and nodded at the other one. “Hilton.”

Lenny Levine was a retired union organizer who, with a fellow black organizer, led the fight to integrate the docks of San Pedro and Long Beach in the fifties. Branded a communist—he was a “card-carrying,” bonafide, hair-shirt-wearing member of the Communist Party-USA in those days—he was driven out of the union under the Tenney Committee, a California version of the federal House Un-American Activities Committee.

“Fine, brother Monk.” Levine moved the rook, intently watching the board.

His chess partner sat back, contemplating his next move. Hilton was a mulatto in his late forties. The rumor was that early in life he'd passed for white and had risen to some prominence in a large petro-chemical company. That was the most anyone had ever gotten out of him about his past.

“Hawkshaw.” Hilton deployed one of his bishops.

Monk went behind the counter where Elrod sat, reading the latest issue of a rap magazine. The private eye poured himself a cup of coffee and went back around the counter, facing the big man. “How many Rolling Daltons do you know?”

Elrod said, “Been sometime since I hung with that kind'a crowd, chief. Them young bucks a little too fast for my blood.”

“Who?”

Big sigh. Moments into molasses. Eventually Elrod put the magazine down and leaned close to Monk. “Why you want'a go fuckin' with them hard-headed rascals?”

Monk told Elrod what he was working on.

“And you aim to find this James?”

“I want to find him before the FBI does. 'Cause when that happens, I'll never get to him.”

“Some of them are all right. I've never met the other one you mentioned, Crosshairs, but I heard he's straight enough. A real OG, you know, a serious gangsta' in his day. But I hear he's on with the peace thing now.”

“Can you put me in touch with him?”

Elrod puffed his cheeks and blew air out of them. “I suppose so. But you better come strapped. Some of them boys he hangs with ain't wrapped too tight Truce or no truce.”

“So Crosshairs is part of it?”

“Him and a few others are said to be the originators. He grew up in the Imperial Courts housing project, and all of his best boys come from around there.”

“Solid.” Monk put aside his still full cup. He got off the stool and made for the door. “But don't put yourself in a bind, Elrod. Nice and easy, you know?”

What might have been a smile creased the giant's face. “Always safety first.”

Monk waved goodby and got in his car. He drove east on Vernon until he reached Main then swung south along the boulevard. He arrived at 55th Place, then turned east on it and came to a clapboard house, the last known address for Ruben Ursua. The information O'Day had given him had jibed with what he'd learned from Karen Jacobs.

She'd told him that Ursua had done time in prison, hot car beef, and had worked at the Hi-Life while on parole. According to her, he was moody, distant. He didn't laugh and joke with the others the way employees do. Yesterday, Monk had called around and produced this address, the same one O'Day provided him this morning. He sat parked in front of the house.

It was a modest single-family job with peeling brown paint adorned with steel mesh on the windows and a metal screen on the door. Twin anemic columns sprouted from either side of the porch ending in a dilapidated canopy. A beat-to-hell lounge chair decorated the left side of the cracked porch. Angled across the lawn of dirt, dead grass and the walkway, was a grey-primed '77 Monte Carlo. It was up on floor jacks and the rear wheels and the brake drums were off.

Monk knocked on the door. Presently, he heard it swing inward. A soft rectangle of light shone through the screen. Whoever stood there didn't say a word.

“Is Ruben in?” Monk didn't offer his license.

“No,” a woman's tired voice said.

“You expect him later?”

“Shit, I don't know.” There was another gap, then, “Nice ride.”

“Thanks.”

“You a friend of his?” The voice got more animated.

“Friend of a friend.”

“Sure you are.”

“You betchum Red Rider.”

There was a short burst of either contempt or joy. “What you want me to tell him, man?”

“Tell him his friends from the Hi-Life say hi.” Monk began to walk away. The screen door opened to reveal a handsome Latina with hard eyes. She couldn't be more than twenty or twenty-one, Monk reasoned.

“You didn't work with him there.”

Monk stopped on the steps, looking back. “How do you know that?”

“The car, how you dress.” She thrust her head forward as if listening to an invisible voice. “You ain't the heat and you ain't no ex-con. That's the only kind of people Ruben knows.”

“I'll keep you guessing for now.” Monk got in his car, the woman still looking at him as he drove away along 55th Place. The Galaxie wound north then west, eventually gliding to a stop at the Oki Dog fast food stand on Pico and Sycamore.

Pico Boulevard was a sort of Maginot line of the Mid-City area, a buffer of the better-offs against the deprived hordes. South of it, along this stretch, there were the homes and apartments of mostly black working class folks. The populace included quite a few young people, and, as fall-out from the Federal cutbacks in social spending during the 80s, several were members of the Rolling Daltons. Not that Monk laid the entire blame for gangsterism at the feet of men like Reagan and Bush. Still, he had to admit that they had set a fine example as the biggest gangbangers of all with their violent escapades in Grenada, Libya, Panama and Iraq—all while the cities went to hell and the young folk emulated their elders.

North of Pico the homes and lawns got a little neater, a bit bigger. The demographics shifted from solely black to mixtures including whites and Asians. Some green lawns had signs staked into them announcing this or that armed-response security service. Judiciously placed in the corner of some windows were stickers declaring that the house participated in the Police Watch Program or was a member of a particular block club. Which didn't mean these neighborhoods didn't have forays from the residents south of Pico, it just meant they were easier to spot.

East of the Oki Dog stand, on the northwest corner of Pico and LaBrea, was the Mexican fast food joint, Lucy's. Every day—and he could see them out there now—brown, black and white men milled about on the curbs in front of the establishment. They whistled and gestured to the drivers of cars and trucks as they sped by on either thoroughfare. But these fellows were no sellers of crack, or aging chickenhawks. Their product was indeed their body, but the market they sought was work as day laborers, or handymen, or movers, or painters, or whatever physical task, whatever payment in cash they could scrounge.

Men younger and older than Monk who once upon a time in post-'50s America worked in auto plants, attaching bumpers to Chevys, or steel mills, pouring molten rivers of metal. Maybe they worked the swing shift in the old Goodyear plant on Central turning out mountain high piles of tires, or ran a drill press in a factory in South Gate. But the '90s and the deindustrialized core had little use for semi-skilled workers, displaced now because the factory relocated to a foreign country to take advantage of a home-grown, exploitable labor force. And even the service sector jobs at McDonald's or the frozen yogurt stand were out of their reach because they just couldn't take orders from guys too young to date their daughters.

Monk sat in the enclosed dining area of Oki Dog eating his pastrami sandwich, heavy on the onions and light on the mustard. The stand itself was neutral territory. Gang members, low riders, hip-hoppers and metal heads—there was a recording studio across the street—and beat cops all came to the Oki Dog for at least a weekly repast. Wilshire Division, where Monk was to be in about an hour, was less than two miles away on Venice.

The patrons came to indulge in such fare as the Oki Dog's wondrous heaping plate of fries, the spuds cut into long strips with the skins partially left on and served on a paper plate with a few green chili peppers on the side. Or a triple chili cheeseburger and a giant root beer. Maybe even a cholesterol-laden Oki Dog: two hot dogs swarmed in the secret chili, onions and cheese, and garnished with bacon wrapped in a flour burrito.

Monk ate, ruminating on the case. Two young men in their late teens entered the enclosed area. They were dressed in double breasted suits of some shiny material and each wore bowlers. Scalp Hunters. They were a minor set as far as gangs like the Daltons, the Swans and the Del Nines were concerned. But they weren't partners to the truce and therefore considered loose cannons by all concerned.