Killer Swell

24

San Diego Police headquarters is located in the heart of downtown on Broadway, a couple blocks from the courts and jail and right near the Michael Graves-designed Horton Plaza. San Diegans liked to point out the strange shopping mall as a defining image of the city, but I could never get past the fact that the biggest obstacle in building the structure had been figuring out where to move the homeless folks so they wouldn’t be hovering around a major tourist attraction.

Square, bland, and unimaginative, headquarters could not look any more governmental. Liz’s office occupied a spot at the end of the hall on the third floor. Her head was down, staring at some paperwork on her desk.

“We’re looking for the Pirates of the Caribbean,” I said. “Can you point us in the right direction?”

She glanced up, pulling her dark hair away from her face and over her shoulder. “Shut the door behind you.”

Her office was small. A perfect square, with cheap cabinets in each of the four corners, her metal desk in the middle so that she could see anyone coming in. No pictures on the walls, only a city-issued calendar, with pictures of the zoo.

Carter and I sat in the two chairs facing her desk. Her chair looked considerably more comfortable.

“You need to back off,” she said, her eyes on me.

I scooted my chair back a couple of inches. “That good enough?”

Her mouth screwed into a tight circle, a clear sign that whatever patience she had allotted for me was now gone. Same old, same old.

She unscrewed her mouth. “Noah, Costilla is off-limits to you.”

“Officially?”

“Officially, unofficially, on the record, off the record,” she said. “Any way you want it. You go near him again, you’re done.”

She looked at Carter. “And before you open that sinkhole you call a mouth, that means you, too.”

Carter stared back at her with no expression.

“Why?” I asked.

“Because.”

“Gee, Mommy, I need something better than that,” I said.

She leaned forward on the desk, the silver bracelets on her wrists jingling softly. “Because I’ve got an ID on you both in San Ysidro and I’ll arrest you if you so much as wink at him.”

“Bullshit,” Carter said. “You got an ID, you’d arrest us now.”

“Contrary to the opinion of the rest of this city, I’m not looking to lock you up,” she said. “As far as I’m concerned, one of Costilla’s guys biting it isn’t such a bad thing. But I can sit you both in a cell if I need to. Those pain-in-the-ass twins you call friends, too, if I want.”

“So if I say no,” I said, “then you’re going to arrest us right now.”

She nodded.

I looked at Carter. He shrugged.

I looked back at Liz. “No.”

We all sat there. No one came rushing in with handcuffs and jumpsuits. I turned around to make sure. Nobody came in. They wouldn’t have fit in the room anyway.

Liz shifted uncomfortably in her comfortable chair and leaned back into it again. “He’s Federal, Noah.”

“So?”

“He’s Federal with our cooperation. Specifically, my cooperation.”

“So?”

She slapped her hand on the desk. “Goddammit, Noah. Don’t fuck around with me on this. He is off-limits. The Feds are on him, I am assisting, and they don’t want to see you near him. So keep your fucking ass far, far away from him.”

Carter looked at me. “Couldn’t she have left this on the machine?”

I ignored him, because I knew Liz was serious. The flames coming out her ears were my first clue.

“Okay,” I said to her. “Off-limits.”

She watched me, suspicion shooting out her eyes.

With good reason.

“But only if you answer me one thing,” I said.

Her mouth twitched. “What?”

“Were the Feds looking at Kate, too?”

She blinked once, shifted her neck like there was a kink in it. “You won’t get within a hundred miles of him?”

“Two hundred.”

She paused, staring at me like she was trying to decide if I was telling her the truth. “Kate was working for them.”

“The FBI?” I asked.

She let out a deep breath. “No. It’s DEA.”

If she had jumped over the desk and kissed Carter, it would’ve surprised me less. “No way.”

“She was inside.”

“Then how did she die?” Carter asked.

She set her elbow on the desk, made a fist, and leaned her chin on it, her face drawn. “They screwed up.”

Her words hung in the air like a neon sign. I knew by the way that she said it, that whoever had screwed up, whoever had let Kate die, wouldn’t admit to it. Collateral damage in a bigger operation.

I felt my chest tighten. “Back up. What the hell was she doing inside?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“The fuck you can’t,” I said, louder than I’d intended.

Her eyes widened, and she lifted her head off of her chin. “Beg your pardon?”

“You drop that cannonball on me and then tell me you can’t explain?” I said. “Like I’m just supposed to accept it, not be surprised by it? You give me more, or any promise I made to you is off the table.”

Liz shrugged. “Then I’ll arrest you both.” She looked at Carter. “Are you really dumb enough to think that someone wouldn’t notice that shitpiece you drive?” She turned back to me. “You don’t believe me? Try me.”

I wanted to reach across the desk and grab her by the throat. Maybe throw something at the wall behind her, something to let her know how badly she was pissing me off.

But none of that would get me closer to the reason for Kate’s death.

“So, you’ll tell me that she got killed because someone screwed up somewhere, but you won’t tell me anything about what she was doing?” I asked quietly. “Not even off the record?”

She shook her head slowly. “I can’t, Noah.”

“Then you know I won’t leave it alone.”

She thought about that, then nodded.

“And if you catch me near Costilla, you’ll toss on the cuffs,” I said.

She nodded again.

I stood up, and Carter did the same.

“Then catch me if you can,” I said and we left.