Last shot

Chapter 20

Multiple-voice yelling rose above the blaring TV inside. Tim gave the doorbell a double ring and flattened himself to the wall beside the knob. Bear waited back from the porch, thumb break unsnapped on his holster.

Half-moon indentations pressed into the soft wood of the upper doorjamb, baton or flashlight impressions from domestic-disturbance calls, a warning for future responders. Repeat customer. Tim banged the door with a fist, not eager for a door-kick entry after he'd broadcast his presence. The Aryan Brotherhood was a "blood-in, blood-out" gang, and whatever they might learn here wasn't worth being somebody's initiation kill.

More shouting. Tim looked at Bear and shrugged. Probable cause? Probably not.

He tried the knob, and it gave up a full turn. A sign from the Locksmith in the Sky.

Past the raised step of the entryway, in the living room, a hefty woman in a stretched off-white undershirt sat angrily against the arm of a couch. A white male wearing muscle pants paced before her, the tattooed bulges of his muscular torso glimmering with sweat. An inked shamrock, complete with three sixes, stood out on the pale dip between his shoulder blades. A small stalactite of blood stained the woman's shirt, hanging from the collar. Matted hair clung to her face, pasted around the nasty gash beside her eye. Pinned down by various remote controls, a newspaper lay sectioned on a cable-spool table. On a TV split with undulating gray stripes, Rachel and Chandler bemoaned some intricacy of Monica's anal retentiveness. In the corner a Doberman lay curled up, inexplicably asleep.

"Howdy, folks!" Bear yelled against the din of the TV.

Yves Dagrain turned, perfectly calm, the rectangles of his six-pack shifting like the scales of a snake.

The woman continued chattering. "Course I didn't fucking call, baby. What do you think I am? I'd never call." And then, to Tim: "Get out of here." She heaved her purse in their vicinity. A ganglion of key chains hit the carpet at their feet, along with a sprinkling of change and a travel bottle of Dermablend, the preferred makeup of battered women. Given the amount of purse debris littering the carpet, a direct hit would've knocked Tim's head off.

Bear said wearily, "You had to go and do that."

Yves chuckled as Bear frisked her and tightened flex-cuffs around her chubby wrists. Then Bear fought with the remotes, clicking past a vacuum-seal storage bag infomercial and a parrot on ice skates before finding a mute button. The abrupt silence was blissful.

"Okay," Tim said. "Let's start this over. We're deputy U.S. marshals. We have a few questions for you."

Bear deposited the woman on a La-Z-Boy. Yves remained standing.

Tim walked over to the adjacent kitchen and dug through the freezer. He tossed a bag of frozen corn at the woman, which she pressed to her eye.

"Thanks," Yves said. "Now, what the fuck do you want?"

"I want to ask you about Walker Jameson."

"Can't say I've had the pleasure."

Tim reached over, pulled the L.A. Times front section from the cable-spool table, and held the photo of Terminal Island's watchtower in front of Yves's face. "Really?"

"I don't know nothin' 'bout that," Yves announced proudly. "I don't read."

Tim's eyes flicked to the silenced TV. Melissa Yueh, KCOM's tireless anchor, was gabbing from location at the San Pedro landfill, a photo of Walker Jameson occupying the upper right quadrant of the screen. "Blind, too?"

"My eyes work good enough to see an illegal search of my private property."

"Okay. You want to play this game? Battery on your woman here. You're the AB's top dog for Southern California, you've got responsibilities now. Do you really want another stint in the pen?"

"That shit only works on smart people."

"Reason?"

"Intimidation."

"Pretend you're smart, then."

Yves took a deep breath and held it. His exhale smelled of marijuana. He aimed a finger at Walker's picture on the TV. "I ain't makin' no specific threats, and I ain't sayin' I'll do nuthin', but that boy's a dead man. Period."

"Thank you," Bear said.

"For what?"

"For punctuating your sentences. I have a hard time keeping up otherwise."

Tim rose and pulled the woman to her feet.

"Don't you fuckin' talk to Jenna. You can't take her away. That's an infraction of my constitutional rights."

"Actually," Tim said, "Gonzales overturned the right to keep your battered girlfriend within arm's length at all times."

"I ain't battered," Jenna said.

"Don't you fucking take her out of my sight." Yves emphasized his words with a stabbing finger that Tim had learned generally presaged violence. Not wanting a carpet dance, he pretended to let his own temper flare to back Yves down.

"Relax, assfuck. Let me treat her eye so it doesn't get infected, and you won't have to waste your precious fucking time driving her to the hospital."

As Tim reached the door with Jenna, he heard a chuckle behind him. "Assfuck," Yves repeated to himself, amused.

Tim sat Jenna on the curb, still in flex-cuffs. He returned from Bear's rig with a first-aid kit, but she jerked her head away from him.

"Just lemme do it myself later. Y'all always screw it up anyhow."

"Okay." Tim knelt, bringing himself to eye level. "We think your boyfriend's going to be involved with a hit on Walker Jameson. I want some information from you, right now, or I'm gonna go in there and arrest him and say it was on your word."

Fear widened her eyes. Tim was surprised by his easy cruelty, but also, oddly, reassured.

"You can't do that."

Tim just stared at her.

"He don't do wet work. Not no more. Wet work comes outta Vegas."

"No shit. Can you give me a name?"

"If I wanna end up on the wrong side of the dirt."

Tim walked her back inside and handed her off to Bear, who cut off her flex-cuffs and sat her on the couch. Tim's Nextel vibrated, and he signaled Bear to give him a second and stepped outside again.

Guerrera's voice came quick and excited. "I found one of Walker's platoon-mates, right here in the VA in Westwood. Medical discharge. They shipped him home from Germany, but he had to go back into the hospital due to complications."

Tim jotted down the name. "Great. And how's it coming with the family?"

"I found a birth certificate so I could track down the parents. His mom's doing a slow fade in some home up in Sylmar-"

"Dying mom's good," Tim mused.

"— and I'm still looking for the father."

"Get a local unmarked, preferably females, to sit on the Sylmar nursing home in case Walker pays Mom a visit before Bear and I can get there." Tim signed off and dialed Ian Summer, a friend who'd recently transferred to the Vegas office. He caught Ian on a stakeout and therefore eager to talk.

"Yeah, we got good intel on the AB chapter out here," Ian said, "especially through the task force."

Tim and Bear had worked closely with the Service-sponsored Vegas Task Force in the past, having Ian track down collateral leads for them in Nevada. He and Bear had returned enough favors to consider Ian a long-distance partner. "I heard these guys use hit men from the Vegas chapter. Do you know who the enforcers there are?"

"No, but a couple of the Metro PD guys have been keeping up files. I'll dig into the intel this afternoon, keep an eye out, and throw you a heads-up if we catch wind of any movement. If it's for the over-the-fence you're dealing with, I'm sure the chief'll be happy to toss some man-hours your way."

Tim thanked him and headed back inside. Her legs tucked under her, Jenna sat beside Yves on the couch, leaning on him and teasing his hair with her fingernails. Yves looked vaguely worried, focused on Bear, who was bent over the Doberman in the corner. The dog still hadn't roused. Tim put two and two together when Bear shook his head, tensing his mouth. "What happened to the dog?"

Yves's eyes were gleaming. "Died of old age."

Bear's gaze lingered on the dog's caved ribs, and then his jaw set, dangerously. "You think this is funny, motherfucker? You lose your temper, hit your woman, kick your dog." He started sharply for Yves, causing him to recoil, but veered instead and headed out the door.

Tim started after him, then stopped. "Look, I have to ask. Do you want to press charges?"

Jenna went on rubbing Yves's bare chest. "For what?"

He'd seen enough domestic violence to know that these two would probably continue to fight it out until one gave the other a street divorce, served by the business end of a. 45.

Offering her a resigned nod, he left them to their marital bliss.