The White Angel Murder

19

It was nearly eleven o’clock when Stanton dropped Jessica off at her apartment and made his way to Rancho Santa Fe to meet Hunter at his place.

Rancho Santa Fe was easily the most affluent area of the city and in the top three most affluent places in America. The median household income was right under $200,000 and for a small cottage with no yard someone could expect to pay over a million dollars. It was predominantly white and in every driveway was a Mercedes or BMW or Cadillac or Lincoln. The usual marks of life indicating that people lived in a neighborhood were not present here; there were no toys left out on lawns, no neighbors barbequing together. Whenever Stanton came through this area it gave him a heavy gray feeling in his gut. Becoming successful enough to live in Rancho Santa Fe was the goal of most people in the city, but the top was as hollow as the bottom. Meaning came from somewhere else.

He pulled into a quiet street in a cul-de-sac and parked on the curb. The home was square with a well manicured lawn and trimmed hedges. A neon sign hung above the door:

ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE

Stanton walked up the driveway past a 7-Series BMW and knocked on the door. No one came. He knocked again and rang the doorbell. He tried the door; it was open.

The house was immaculately clean and a small note with a mint was on a table by the door, indicating that a maid had come through recently. Art hung on all the walls. It was neither good art nor bad, but the eclectic mix gave it a certain randomness that made it appear tacky.

The living room was a large space with three flat-screens up on a single wall, all turned to the same channel. It was a vampire show and on the leather sofas that took up most of the room were two partially nude women; one black, one white. They were wearing bathing suit bottoms but no tops and the stale air of marijuana smoke was thick.

“I’m looking for Hunter.”

“He’s in the pool,” one of the girls said without taking her eyes off the televisions.

Stanton saw the sliding glass doors and went outside. The pool was large and lit with underwater lights on each end. Hunter was splashing around with a woman, both of them nude. A male was passed out in a lounge chair on the side of the pool, a small line of cocaine laid out on a mirror he had placed on his chest.

“Johnny boy!” Hunter yelled out. He stuck his tongue in the girl’s mouth and said something that made her giggle before climbing out of the pool and wrapping a white robe around himself. The initials “MHR” were stitched in gold lettering over the heart. “Hungry, thirsty, horny?”

“I’m fine, thanks. I brought the cash.”

“Straight to business, huh? Well at least come inside and watch while I get drunk.”

They walked inside and to the kitchen. Hunter opened the fridge and scanned up and down, unfamiliar with what was in there, and noticed a bottle of cognac.

“Who the fuck put my cognac in the fridge?” he yelled to no one. He poured it into a wine glass and drank half before motioning to the living room. He plopped in between the two girls and put his arms around them. “Interesting little cookie this Francisco.”

“Can we talk in private?”

“Oh don’t worry,” he said, pushing the heads of the girls together lightly, “they’re empty as rocks. Ain’t you girls?”

“Asshole,” one of them said.

Hunter took a drink and grinned. “They got him set up on Cleveland Ave in a little shitty apartment. The name of the apartments is the, Boca Del Ray. His name’s Hector Garcia and he’s a footsoldier with the Sureños. They sent him in for the prostitution the gang’s been running. Prostitutes are a much safer business than drugs. Most pimps are low level guys out there by themselves. Sureños think with their rep they can muscle everybody out and have it to themselves. They’re probably right too.”

Stanton wrote everything down in his pad and then took out two thousand in cash in an envelope.

“No no,” Hunter said, “on me. For the gun thing.”

“Thanks. Consider us even.”

“Even Steven.” He began pushing the girls’ heads into his lap. “You sure you don’t want to stay?”

“Positive.”

*****

Stanton sat in his car outside awhile, staring at the information in his notepad. He had to move forward cautiously; if the crew Francisco was running with even suspected that he was working with the cops, much less was a cop, it would be instant death. No words exchanged, no explanations given. Just a bullet in the back of his head when he wasn’t expecting it.

He pulled away and got onto the Interstate, taking his time to get to the Cleveland/Lincoln Avenue exits. The area was primarily apartment high-rises and low-income tenements. It was segregated into three different districts: white, Mexican, and Russian. He remembered a case he had out here. A wife had shot her husband after she found a receipt from an escort agency in his pants.

The Boca Del Ray was a square, cream colored building with a large front porch and a keypad entry. Two young Mexicans were on the porch smoking. They saw him and Stanton could tell from the looks on their faces they made him for police before his car even came to a stop in front of the building.

He got out and looked around. In heavily populated gang turf there were scouts everywhere. Their job was to alert the street’s enforcer; the person in charge of protection from rival gangs and the police. They had grown sophisticated over the past two decades, choosing to take to sniping from rooftops rather than face-to-face combat. A lot of officers were shot because they weren’t aware of what they were up against. Newbies would act tough, thinking they would win by dog psychology, and set off flags from the scouts that this officer wasn’t going away.

“Smells like bacon, holmes.”

Stanton stepped up onto the porch. It was too late for subtlety so he flashed his badge and crossed his arms; he couldn’t afford to let them see he wasn’t packing a firearm. “Someone called 911.”

“Ain’t no one called 911 from here.”

“Look guys, someone called 911. Female. Said her boyfriend or someone was beating on her. Just let me talk to her and make sure she’s okay and I’ll get outta here.”

The men looked to each other. They mumbled something in Spanish and Stanton made out the words, dumb bitch.

One of the men entered a code on the door. “They in 2-C.”

Stanton walked through without looking at them. It had the feel of a compound and he’d just gotten past the sentinels. Not five miles from here was a police station and a courthouse but there was no law here. He suddenly felt foolish for not carrying his gun with him.

The front lobby was orange carpet and walls with a staircase leading to the second floor. The mailboxes were covered in graffiti and most of them had been pried open. He wondered how the people here got their mail or if they were so disconnected from the rest of society that mail didn’t matter.

He walked up the stairs to apartment 2-C and knocked. A young woman answered.

“Are you okay?” he said.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“I’m the police. Someone called 911 and said there was a domestic disturbance here.”

“Ain’t no domestic disturbance.”

“So you’re saying you don’t need any help?”

“Do I look like I need any fucking help?”

“No, you certainly don’t. Sorry to take your time.”

She slammed the door in his face and he left and went back to the first floor. It was enough. The men out front would think she’d called and when she denied it they would think she was lying. The boyfriend would deny hitting her, but everyone denied that. They wouldn’t think a cop made the whole thing up.

Francisco’s apartment was at the end of the hallway. He made sure the two men on the porch weren’t paying attention before crossing over into that hallway and hurrying across the soiled carpet. Stanton could smell cooking food; pork or beef. A Spanish television station was turned up somewhere and he could hear it through the walls.

Stanton knocked and then stepped to the side of the door. It opened and he saw the tip of a.38 caliber Remington sticking out.

He twisted and grabbed the gun, spinning to his left and tearing it out of the person’s hands. The man was short and bald with a thick goat-t. Stanton stepped back and held the gun firmly pointed at his face.

“Inside,” he said.

Francisco stepped back into the apartment, not raising his arms. They walked down the hall to the living room and stood quietly as Stanton glanced around.

“Is there anyone else here?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

Stanton lowered the gun and held it out for him. “I’m Jon Stanton. I’m with SDPD.” He took out his badge again. He could see fury in Francisco’s eyes.

“Do you know what you’ve-”

“I don’t care about your hooker operation. I need your help.”

“Fuck you.”

He was animated now, his arms beginning to move, his brow furrowed in anger. He grabbed the gun from him and held it pointed to the ground. Stanton had met him once a long time ago and remembered that he spoke perfect English. Now, his speech pattern was of someone whose primary language was Spanish. He’s been under too long, he thought.

“Do you remember the Tami Jacobs case? She was killed in her apartment in La Jolla? I have it now. I have some questions about the investigation.”

Francisco stepped within an inch of his face. “Fuck … you.” He shoved him at the shoulders.

“I just need five minutes and then you’ll never see me again.”

Francisco’s right hand was clinched into a fist and there was only the bare minimum memory that he was a police officer holding him back from smashing it into Jon’s face. Stanton could see there wouldn’t be any conversation tonight.

“I’ll leave.”

When he was outside again he heard the two men on the porch laughing at him as he got into his older model Honda. As he drove away he looked up to the sky and saw a crescent moon hanging over the city; and on the rooftop of a building, a young boy with a rifle slung over his shoulder.