Compulsion

CHAPTER 32

This time Tasha ran.

“Oh, great,” said Milo, as she ducked off Santa Monica onto Orange and veered into an alley.

He jumped out of the car and I circled the block to Mansfield. When I got to the mouth of the alley, Tasha was racing toward me, skinny-legged sprint easily outstripping Milo ’s openmouthed lumber.

Shoes in hand, panty hose shredding.

Milo ’s arms churned air. His face was crimson.

Tasha looked back at him, picked up speed. Saw me. Looked back again. Stumbled.

She went down hard on her back, purse landing just out of reach from a splayed arm.

As she got to her feet, Milo caught up, sucking air. He flipped her over, did a quick frisk and cuff, snarled a command not to move. Snagging the purse, he dumped the contents. Tissues, condoms, cosmetics, and a packet of Oreos landed on the asphalt. Then a clatter as a pearl-handled straight razor slid out.

Still panting, Milo stomped the weapon hard, ground pearl into dust. Hauled Tasha up hard.

“Idiot,” he said.

She grew limp in his grasp. Her face crumpled. Bits of gravel clung to her pancake veneer.

She began working up a smile.

Milo ’s snarl killed that. He put her in the back of the car, used the seat belt for further confinement.

This time he got in front.

Tasha jangled the cuffs. “You can take these off. I won’t run, sir. I promise, sir.”

“Open your mouth again” – pant pant – “and I’ll hogtie you.” To me: “ Hollywood station.”

“Sir, that’s not necessary!”

Milo strained so hard for oxygen that his bulk rose off the seat.

I drove.

Tasha said, “Least it’s a nice ride. Love these old Caddy-lackers. What was it, confiscated from some-”

“Shut the hell up.”

“Sorry. Sir.”

“Are you deaf?”

Five blocks from Wilcox Avenue: “Sir, don’t get mad but you’re still breathing hard. You sure you’re okay?”

“Why the hell did you rabbit?”

“I got scared.”

“Did we hurt you the first time?”

“No, but…”

“But what?”

Silence.

Milo said, “God forbid you should miss a trick. Idiot.”

“A girl’s got to make a living.”

“You’re not gonna be living if you don’t stop acting like a moron. Guess who got cut right after he left you?”

“Someone got cut?”

“You really are deaf.”

Long silence. “You’re not saying Tony?”

“You’re ready for Jeopardy!, genius.”

“Tony got cut? Omigod is he all right?”

Milo said, “Quite the opposite.”

“You mean-”

“We’re talking one trick that won’t be giving you any repeat business.”

“Omigod, ohsweetlord-”

“It happened right after he saw you,” said Milo. “We’re figuring someone was watching besides us.”

“Who who who?”

“What’s that, your owl imitation?”

“Who, sir? Please!”

“Think ugly suit and seamed stockings.”

“Him? Omigod no way!”

“You know something about him we don’t?”

“No, sir, no…”

“But?”

“I just never knew someone who… did that.”

“All those years on the street?” said Milo. “Spare me the innocence.”

“I seen fights, sir. Seen a man beat another man to death over a wrong look. Seen people all doped up, losing their lives ’cause a… seen plenty of badmen, sir, but no, not that, never something like that…”

“Not what?”

“Something… all controlled.”

“How do you know it was controlled?”

“Wannaboos,” said Tasha. “It’s all about the game. Tony didn’t do nothing to nobody, right?”

“Why not?”

“Tony was weak, there was no anger in him, just sadness.”

“You’re right about one thing,” said Milo. “This was real controlled.”

“I don’t wanna know, sir, please don’t tell me details.”

“Fine, but we like details. Let’s hear everything you know about Tweed.”

“Nothing else, I swear, nothing.”

Milo turned to me: “This is not going well, pard.”

Tasha said, “Just what I told you, sir, that’s everything I know!”

“How many parties have you been to with Tweed?”

“Just that one.”

“Why not more?”

Silence.

“What was the problem?” said Milo.

“It’s not a place I gone to again.”

“That’s no answer.”

Tasha said, “It’s – to be honest, no one invited me.”

When we got to the rear door at Hollywood station, she said, “You don’t need to lock me up, I promise.”

Milo whistled “ Dixie.”

“Sir, there’s a problem, a real problem, usually they only got one girl cell free ’cause all the troublemakers are boys and if the girl room’s all full, they put you in a boy room and it’s dangerous.”

“You have equipment for the girl room?”

Silence.

“Do you?”

Barely audible: “Not yet, I’m saving up.”

“Nothing I can do, then. You know the rules.”

“I am human, sir, not plumbing.”

“What can I say.” Tough tone but his cheek muscles twitched.

“Please, sir. Other policemen are nice to me, I don’t make trouble, they put me in the girl room. The girls like me there, ask anyone, I don’t cause no problems, check your files.”

“When’s the last time you were here?”

“A year, sir. Maybe more. I swear. You put me in the right place and I’ll do anything you-”

“Tell you what,” said Milo. “You cooperate, I won’t book you for the blade even though you were already warned. Or for resisting, even though you made me exercise.”

“Yes, sure, of course… what does cooperate mean?”

“You’re a material witness. I might even get you a snack.”

“That is so kind, sir… you did lose my Oreos.”

Hollywood Division obliged with an empty interview room where Milo stashed Tasha. He brought her a donut and a Coke, phoned Raul Biro at the murder scene on Rodney.

Biro was still waiting for access to the apartment, had some forensic guesses to pass along.

Tony Mancusi’s head had been sawed off right beneath the chin, leaving most of the neck’s internal structure intact. Care had been taken to sever vertebrae without breaking them.

Clean work; the coroner’s investigator’s guess was a large, extremely sharp, nonserrated blade, consistent with the weapon that had dispatched Ella Mancusi. The same weapon had probably been used on Tony’s fingers. Exploratory cuts on the other hand suggested intent for a bilateral amputation.

“Maybe he got bored,” said Biro. “Or ran out of time.”

Final disposition was the coroner’s purview but the C.I., a registered nurse with twenty years’ experience, admitted off the record that the hyoid cartilage appeared ruptured. Pinpoint hemorrhages in the eyes could’ve been due to a number of causes but, combined with the neck injury, strangulation was a “decent possibility, let’s see if the doc agrees.”

Milo looked for the Altair Terrace address in a Thomas Guide, found a single block of curving, dead-end tributary off the northeastern edge of Beachwood Drive.

Not far from a rent-a-horse ranch where I used to ride when I worked at Western Pediatric. Walking distance from Franklin Avenue, but heavily wooded and freakishly quiet. I remembered how bends in the trail opened abruptly to dry, flat mesas. The vulgar message of the Hollywood sign.

Milo said, “I’m starved,” and called out for four barbecued beef sandwiches from a place on Western. I had one, he ate two, he passed the last one to Tasha, who said, “Normally I stay away from red meat, but that smells yum.”

By six forty the sky was felt-gray deepening to black and we put her back in the Seville.

She said, “I’m still tasting that lovely sauce.”

Milo said, “Behave yourself and you can have dessert.”

“So kind, sir. I do like this car.”

I drove up Beachwood, parked two blocks south of Altair Terrace.

Milo unbelted. “Time for a little hike.”

“Sir, it’s uphill, you sure you’re okay?”

“Your concern is touching. Let’s go.”

“Is this guaranteed safe?”

“What are you worried about?”

“He could see me.”

“What makes you think he’s here?”

“You’re taking me here.”

“This is to jog your memory.”

“I already told you, this is definitely the place.”

“We’re not on the street yet.”

“This is it, I feel it.”

“ESP?”

“I get feelings,” she said. “In my hair, the roots get all tingly, means I’m getting a message.”

“Out of the car.”

One block later: “Can we at least go slow, sir? My poor little feet are so sore.”

“I offered to get you some sneakers.”

“With this dress? As if. Can we just go slow?”

Milo exhaled and shortened his steps.

Tasha winked at me.

Ebony night; no sidewalks or streetlights, wide spacing between the properties filled with unruly greenery and old-growth trees.

A world in silhouette.

Tasha said, “That’s the party house, I’m sure. Let’s go.”

“Whisper.”

“Sorry. That’s the party-”

“I heard you. Which one?”

“Um, we’re not there yet.”

“Forward march.”

Ninety seconds later: “That’s the one! All the way on top!”

“Whisper, dammit!”

“Sorry, sorry. That’s it. For sure.”

A long-nailed hand pointed to a low, pale box perched on the uppermost rim of the cul-de-sac.

Milo motioned us to stay in place, hiked past three houses, then four more. Stopped just short of the target. Waited. Hazarded a quick flashlight wash of the façade.

Blank but for a single shuttered window. Garage to the left, with a corrugated aluminum door.

The flashlight beam dipped to a cement walkway. Pines and eucalyptus towered behind the flat roof. Sparse vegetation in front: a spindly yucca plant and a stunted palm.

Milo padded back. “You’re sure?”

Tasha said, “Absolutely, sir. That stupid spiky thing, got a run in my stocking. And over there’s where if you step out in back you can see the sign and over there is where Tony – rest-his-soul – and me walked.”

Tracing the curve of the cul-de-sac. “It’s all coming back to me – out there is where all the coyote screaming came from, I got so scared, sir, it was dark just like it is now. I hate the darkness, can we go?”

“Stay put with my partner.” He retraced his climb, got closer to the pale house.

Tasha said, “All that climbing can’t be good for him.”

I didn’t answer.

“He should work out… You don’t say much, sir… It’s too weird out here, real scary-quiet, know what I mean, like something’s gonna jump out? Like something’s gonna – quiet’s basically an evil thing. The devil likes quiet. The devil likes you to think everything’s nice and quiet then he jumps up and grabs you. This is a bad quiet. Even Fontana had a better quiet than this quiet. When the chickens were all sleeping you could hear the train. I liked to lie in bed listening to the train and wondering where it was going – okay, here he is again, maybe he seen enough and we can get outta here.”

Milo said, “Can’t be sure but looks like no one home.”

Tasha said, “My hair says that’s a message from God, let’s get outta here, find us some noise.”