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  She was willing to admit that the LAPD probably had more than their fair share of bad cops. That was obvious enough. And it was possible that one of them was shaking down the Estrellas. She’d reluctantly entertained the possibility, and the more she examined it, the more plausible it seemed. She still didn’t like that a cop might be involved, but the more she played with the idea, the more sense it made.

  “Good guess, but no. Think about the tags,” she prodded. “Who’s Tonio been Xing out?”

  Bobby still hadn’t driven out of Tarn’s little lot.

  “We sitting here all day?”

  He shoved the car into drive, hunching over the wheel. Finally he turned to his boss.

  “You can’t mean a cop?”

  “Why not?”

  “No way. No sir,” he insisted adamantly.

  “Just calm down for a minute. Don’t get squeamish on me. Tell me how long that family’s been dealing.”

  Bobby heaved one of his gargantuan shoulders, “Forever. So?”

  “So when was the last time any one of them got busted?”

  “It’s been a long time,” he admitted. “So you’re talking about a shakedown.”

  “It’s possible. It fits. Like Claudia claiming you brought donuts. It wasn’t you or Nook. But Alicia said some cop brought donuts. Why? Who? Why would she say that? Why all the LAPD strikes all of a sudden? I mean there’s always been some, but why this sudden proliferation at Tonio’s hand? And it would absolutely explain why they’re not talking, not retaliating, why they’re afraid.”

  “I don’t like it,” Bobby maintained.

  “I’m not asking you to like it; I’m asking you to consider it. Shit, I don’t like it either, but this isn’t lifting a bottle of Scotch or a leather jacket. It’s not even lifting eight pounds of coke from a locker, man, it’s murder. Wholesale murder.”

  “Maybe,” Bobby corrected, as Frank always did when her men mistook supposition for fact.

  “Maybe,” she agreed. “That’s all I’m saying. It’s a possibility. And we shouldn’t look the other way because we don’t like what we see.”

  “Isn’t that being kind of hypocritical?”

  “What do you mean?” Frank asked carefully.

  “We looked the other way on Willie Larkin.”

  Frank took in an iron works shop and the metal recycling center next door. They passed a body shop, then a sunroof and alarm store before she answered, “That was different and you know it.”

  A small-time hustler, Larkin’d been working the block since he could walk. His felony charges used more ink than the editorial section of the Sunday Times and at nineteen he’d already danced on two murder raps. One was an old bag lady, Crazy Sadie. She only weighed 90 pounds with all her clothes on, but Larkin had strangled her because she wouldn’t give up her Walkman. The second charge he’d waltzed on was the shooting of Travis Jones. Larkin and his homes were hanging out at JayZ’s poolhall while eight year-old Travis pedaled slowly down the street. One of the homes bet Larkin couldn’t shoot the bike out from under him and Larkin bet a bottle of Olde English that he could. He took aim with his .44 and the boy went down, shot through his femoral artery. Larkin looked around for high-fives while the kid bled to death in the street. The homes who’d bet the 40-ouncer reneged and Larkin beat the shit out of him.

  Eighteen months later the owner of JayZ’s called in a 240, assault in progress. Sergeant Eric Venedez was first on the scene. By the time he got there Larkin and his wrestling companion had put away their knives, but both were still in flight after pounding 40s all day, and thought Venedez looked like some fun standing there all alone.

  Witnesses claimed Venedez approached the men first. Venedez said they came to him. After a short, confusing scuffle, the outcome was a DOG, Larkin’s foe turned ally “dead on ground”. Witnesses said Venedez shot without provocation. Venedez said Larkins’s buddy pulled a gun. No one in the bar had seen him with a gun, only a knife, but backup units and Nine-three detectives found a stainless steel .38 next to him. Everyone in Figueroa knew Venedez carried a stainless steel .38 drop gun and even the boots knew why. Venedez’ frequent and vociferous rationale was, “I’m not about to let twelve people who aren’t even smart enough to get out of jury duty second-guess what I should or shouldn’t do out there. My ass is on the line, not theirs.”

  Venedez carried his luck with him that day, but Larkin left his at home with his brains. When he was patted down for his ride to the station, they found a 9mm on him, a 9mm he should have ditched the minute he saw Venedez pull his. Yet there it was, Venedez’ defense riding in Larkin’s waistband. Not one cop, Frank included, asked Venedez where his backup piece was. After inconclusive ballistics tests and autopsy findings came in, and not withstanding that no one in the bar had seen the dead man with a .38, Larkin went to the bing for a mandatory twenty-five.

  In Larkin’s case, the law was absent while justice stepped forward. Larkin killed in cold-blood; Venedez had killed in self-defense. Larkin belonged in jail; Venedez didn’t. The logic was simple and Frank had succumbed to it, but not happily. Despite it’s frequent and egregious errors, Frank believed in the system as a whole. Because homicide was the ultimate offense, she wasn’t against bending the rules now and then to close a case. But no matter how justified Larkin’s setup was, it dismayed her that she could so easily leap to the other side of the law.

  “Looks like a double-standard to me,” Bobby argued softly.

  “Then you’re looking at it wrong. Venedez is one of the best uniforms we have. He does good work out there. What happened that day was an accident, but he’d have been left twisting in the wind for it. Whoever’s bumping off the Estrellas isn’t doing it by accident. This is cold, it’s calculated, and it’s deliberate. And where’s it going to stop?”

  “I still think you’re barking up the wrong tree,” Bobby muttered.

  Sipping around his braking and accelerating, Frank countered, “Maybe, Picasso. But in case you haven’t noticed, we’re running out of trees to bark at.”

  They were working south on Hoover, toward Compton.

  They were obviously in Blood territory, because the project wall on Frank’s right dripped, “Bompton Krip Killas” in bright red paint. Frank considered the rash of anti-LAPD graffiti in Tonio’s hood.

  “Just play with it for a sec. Assume for the sake of argument that we’re looking for a cop. Where do we start?”

  “Damn,” Bobby swore his strongest oath.

  “Where do you start?” Frank repeated patiently.

  “I don’t know. Surveillance?” her detective said reluctantly.

  Frank hoisted an eyebrow.

  “On your spare time, Nook’s, or mine?”

  “All right. We bug the house. Put in a camera.”

  “Possible, but improbable. Unless we did it illegally.”

  Bobby took a sideways glance at his lieutenant.

  “It wouldn’t be admissible anyway, so who’d know if we did it off the record.”

  “Off the record,” Frank smirked. “You’re starting to sound like a reporter. If you were shaking them down would you be going to their house all the time?”

  “Risky,” he conceded, his teeth sinking into the query. Frank knew once he bit down on it Bobby wouldn’t let go until he’d thrashed out every possible answer. He was like a pit bull.

  “Get Narco in on it,” he suggested.

  “What if it is Narco? We don’t know that. We still haven’t looked too closely at Barracas. I gotta get his file. Maybe he’s got some sticky fingers here. And that courier service. What the hell kind of front is that? Did you subpoena his IRS records yet?”

  Bobby shook his head.

  “We don’t get Narco on this. Too risky. Next plan?”

  Bobby negotiated a maze of blocks that had once been a proud neighborhood. Now the houses were crumbling and disintegrating. Trash spilled from them, blowing from yard to yard. Cracked, uprooted sidewalks glinted with broken glass.r />
  A weedy lot with burned furniture and bullet-pocked appliances had become the local dump.

  “How about we bust a move on Claudia and her kids? Hit them with what you know. Or what you think you know.”

  “Now you sound like a cop,” Frank praised. “But let’s not do anything yet. In fact don’t even mention it to Nook. Just think about it. Kick it around some while I run with it a little, okay?”

  “You’re the boss.”

  It was after three by the time they returned to the station. Bobby processed their suspect while Frank went upstairs to generate the avalanche of reports and forms on him. This wasn’t her job as a Lieutenant, but they were so short-handed that she pitched in whenever she could. Besides, what would take her a couple hours would take the finical Detective Taylor a couple of days. Ike and Noah were still there, typing and talking on the phone. Noah grinned and flapped a big hand at her. Ike just glanced at her. She hung her linen jacket behind the door, glad there were no more meetings today.

  The phone rang and she picked it up. It was Fubar whining about her write-up for the monthly newsletter. Assuring him it would be on his desk tomorrow morning, she absently poked through one of Placa’s cartons. Nook had sent the clothing off to the lab. There was white powder in most of her pockets and they wanted an analysis, even though it was probably just antacid residue. Placa had stubs of Turns rolls everywhere — her pockets, drawers, backpack. That was a lot of bellyaches and Frank had been meaning to ask Claudia if Placa had an ulcer.

  Foubarelle ranted about sundry things, and Frank answered in monosyllables as she went through the backpack. Two notebooks, school papers, a math and history text. A Dallas Cowboys cap. She fished out Tampax, half a pack of generic cigarettes, crumpled napkins and match books, a handful of bus schedules and tokens, six open Turns rolls.

  Frank had to offer the captain more assurances before he’d let her go, then she pawed through the litter in the bottom of the pack. Discarded wrappers, crumbled tablets and loose tobacco concealed an assortment of hollow-point bullets and an envelope of razor blades. A zippered flap held an ugly switchblade.

  Frank shook the pack onto a section of newspaper without finding anything else. She wet her finger and tasted the powdery residue coating everything. Sweet. Turns. Flipping through one of Placa’s notebooks, she placed a call.

  “Hey sport. You get the stuff I sent you about Custard Pie?”

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  They chatted for a minute, Frank fending off the anticipatory jabs, like Kennedy accusing Frank of calling because she missed her.

  “Horribly,” Frank answered, “but as long as I’m here, I was wondering if you could do me a favor.”

  Kennedy said something obscene and as steeled as she was, Frank was glad Kennedy wasn’t there to see her face flush. Sex with Kennedy had been exhilarating and Frank wished for a moment she could accept the young woman’s indecent proposal.

  ” ‘Fraid nothing that exciting,” she said levelly. “But while you’re still on the desk, check out this family for me.”

  Frank gave Kennedy all the Estrella’s names, asking her to dig up whatever she could on them. When Ike strolled into her office it gave Frank an excuse to hang up before Kennedy could launch into her customary harangue.

  “Wus up, Pink?”

  Running a bejeweled hand down his silk tie, he bared perfect white teeth.

  “Hittin’ them Estrella’s hard, huh?”

  “Tryin’ to.”

  “You getting anywhere?”

  Frank rocked a flat hand back and forth.

  “What can I do for you?”

  The dapper detective seemed to chase his thoughts around, then said, “Anthony Richards. Queenie’s offering to drop him from 2nd-degree to vehicular manslaughter if he pleads guilty. And drop the kidnapping because he never intended to take the kid.”

  Frank thought over laced fingers. Richards had jacked a car parked in front of an AM/PM. The owner of the car had run in to buy a soda and a pack of cigarettes, leaving the car running with his 4-year old son in the car seat. Richards had shoved the boy out, but the car seat got tangled in the seat belt and never detached from the vehicle. He drove up the One-Ten at over 80 miles an hour before being stopped just south of the Coliseum. The kid was still strapped into the remains of the car seat. The DA didn’t want him getting off on technicalities so she was lightening the charges to get him at all.

  “I’ll call her,” Frank said.

  “His arraignment’s tomorrow,” Ike warned. He was resplendent in a tailored three-piece navy pinstripe, diamonds winking, and mustache perfectly groomed to department standards. Even though he bristled each time, it was impossible for the guys to resist calling him “Gangsta”.

  Frank reached for the phone and it rang just as she touched it.

  “Homicide. Franco.”

  “Hi. It’s Gail.”

  “Hey.” Frank was pleased, but didn’t show it. “Hold on.”

  She lowered the mouthpiece.

  “Anything else?”

  “No. Don’t forget, though.”

  “I won’t,” she promised, waiting until he left before asking into the phone, “What’s up?”

  “Bad time to call?”

  “Not at all.”

  “I just wanted to let you know I got Placa’s tox results.”

  “Anything stand out?”

  “Not really. At least not to me. Alcohol, lots of antacid residue, cannibinol. The usual stuff. Anyway, I’ve got to go. I just wanted to let you know it’s here. I’ll leave it with Rhondie.”

  “Good. I’ll stop and get it on my way home.”

  Placa’s toxicology report was incentive enough for Frank to leave the office at a reasonable time and at the Coroner’s office she took the stairs two at a time.

  “Hey, Rhondie,” she greeted Gail’s secretary. “The boss around?”

  The older woman nodded toward the doc’s office, saying, “I think she’s busy.”

  “I won’t bug her then. Just tell her I said thanks.”

  “I’ll buzz her if you like, and let her know you’re here.”

  “I don’t want to interrupt.”

  “Hold on.”

  Rhondie called the doc who said on her speaker phone to send Frank in. She was bent over a computer on a wheeled stand, surrounded by a flurry of sketches and diagrams.

  “Hi,” Gail grinned, “Check this out.”

  She demonstrated a vividly animated reconstruction of a stabbing, showing exact placement of the wounds and points of entry.

  “Pretty cool, huh?”

  “That come with an R rating?”

  “It should. Did you get your report?”

  “Yeah. Thanks. Hey look, I really appreciate you getting these to me so quickly.”

  “Pays to know the Chief Coroner, doesn’t it?”

  “In spades. And I was wondering if the Chief Coroner would let me buy her dinner. The lowly homicide cop’s humble way of saying thank you.”

  Gail glanced at the thin watch on her wrist and Frank admonished, “When are you going to get some vinyl gloves?”

  “I’m hopeless,” Gail shrugged. “But I’d love dinner.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Across the street from the USC complex, the Marengo Grill was a modern clash of dark wood and mirrors, soulless, but functional. The waiter tried to seat them at a table in the center of the room, but Frank was uneasy with her back to the entrance. She told the waiter she wanted the empty bench seat in the corner and he obliged, efficiently taking their drink orders.

  “I took your suggestion to heart,” Frank said, settling a napkin onto her lap.

  “Which suggestion is that?” Gail asked, doing the same thing.

  “Considering that a cop might be involved in the Estrella business.”

  “Really?” Gail asked, surprised.

  “I don’t have any better leads right now,” Frank allowed, “and some of the things you said made sense. I don
’t have a suspect but it’s an interesting idea to toy with. It would explain a couple lose ends that have been bugging me.”

  “Like what?”

  “Odds and ends.”

  She explained what she’d already told Bobby, adding, “There wasn’t one spent shotgun shell at the Estrella’s. Whoever did them picked up after himself. Or herself. I should be impartial ‘til I have a fact. Anyway, you saw Luis Estrella’s room. It was a pigsty.”

  As a junkie’s habit worsened, so did his personal hygiene, and from the looks and smell of the garage room, Luis had been pretty heavily into his addiction. Frank went on to explain the incongruity of an oil-burner like Luis meticulously shooting six people and carefully picking up each ejected shell.

  “Yeah,” Gail agreed. “Especially after just having killed his family.”

  “And the dog,” Frank added, the line having become the black joke tagged on to any mention of the Estrella body count.

  “And we know Placa took five rounds, but only one casing was recovered from the scene.”

  “Maybe she was being shot at from inside the car.”

  “Not likely. It doesn’t make physical sense to fire a handgun inside a car. If the shooter was in the vehicle, in all probability he had his hand out the window. So where are the other four jackets? Item: only one out of eleven cartridges was found. Item: all the Estrella’s were killed with one, well-placed shot. The shooter wasn’t firing in a panic or a frenzy. He was coolly, deliberately aiming for maximum effect. He was doing a premeditated job.”

  “The same for Placa,” Gail added and Frank nodded.

  “Let’s say it was the same shooter. He got three of the five shots in the ten spot. That’s damn good placement for a moving target. Whoever shot her’s either extremely lucky or has had some serious practice with a handgun. Plus another item: the shot to the back of her head? One hundred percent fatal — you’re random shooter doesn’t know that. These idiots spray bullets everywhere and half of them glance off the skull bone. This guy, or gal, but I don’t think so, went out of his way to place that shot. It was worth it to him to risk the extra time it took to make that shot. Why would somebody be that afraid of her? Was it somebody with a lot to lose? A reputation, a career, a family?”