Last shot

Chapter 9

Fifth and Wall. The nucleus of a few blocks that stoically held out for squalor, resisting tooth and nail the gentrification of downtown Los Angeles. Two homeless guys were fighting by an overturned shopping cart, bears spinning in rags. They were well padded and badly coordinated, their blows decelerated to a slow-motion tempo by alcohol or exhaustion. They stumbled off as Tim and Bear drew near, their fleeing shadows stretching several stories up. One storefront remained lit, leading Tim to ponder the age-old question: Who buys a mini-motorcycle at eleven-thirty at night?

Shouts from various open windows called for someone to shut up, demands so self-defeatingly persistent that Tim couldn't discern their target. When the yelling quieted, the source confrontation became audible-a stern domestic lecture emanating from a parked Cadillac.

Happily for Tim and Bear, Guerrera had sublimated his pent-up frustration from being deskbound into working the databanks. He'd not only produced an address for them from the phone number LaRue had dialed, but he'd also ferreted out the apartment records. A gas bill had been paid three months ago by a check on First Union Bank, account of Freddy Campbell, the same Freddy Campbell who'd celled with Tommy LaRue in Victorville for a few years before LaRue's transfer to TI. The apartment leaseholder was thrice-divorced Bernadette Monroe, whom Guerrera pegged for Freddy's girlfriend, given that they'd traveled together last March to Rio. Freddy had no driver's license, no registered vehicle, and no major credit cards in his name.

Tim and Bear made their way up sticky stairs to number 214, rang the bell, and stood to the side of the door, hands on their guns.

"Better be your sorry-ass ass," they heard, and then the door pulled open to reveal an imposing woman, bathrobe barely containing a mass of flesh and frilly nightshirt. "The hell are you?"

Bear and Tim peered past her into the one-room apartment.

Bear said, "U.S. Marshals, ma'am. Mind if we come in?"

"Hell, you can drag the National Guard through here, all I care. Maybe they can find the fool calls hisself the man of this crib."

Bear brushed past her, moving to safe the apartment. She exaggerated, stumbling back from the intrusion, her eyes flaring. "Oh, no you didn't just! Oh, no you di'int!"

"I'm terribly sorry," Bear said over a shoulder, "but I did."

He disappeared into the bathroom, and Tim heard him rake back the shower curtain. Tim checked the closet-empty-and peered under the bed. Boxes littered the water-warped floor, cardboard lids torn back to reveal every order of merchandise-pedicure kits, baby lotion, bootleg purses, dolls, bags of balloons with Chinese ideograms, coffee mugs with corporate logos. Cosmetics overflowed a vanity beneath the window. Papers, mail, and half-burned candles covered an embattled wooden table.

Bear emerged, running a forearm across his brow. "We're looking for Freddy Campbell. Do you know if-"

"Don't you be talkin' to me after you shoved me outta the door."

Bear tried to voice an apology but found himself talking to the hand.

"Ma'am," Tim interrupted, "does Freddy Campbell live here?"

Bernadette whirled, suddenly calm and regal, head withdrawn. A delivery worthy of a screen diva: "Not anymore."

"Are you expec-"

"Hayell no. And that fool better not think he can limp his nappy ass home with an empty wallet again. Stankin' of cheap liquor and knockoff perfume. Uh-uh. I said he beh'a not."

Tim held up Walker's booking photo. "Do you know this man? Walker Jameson?"

From her face it was clear she didn't. "He your brother or something?"

Tim shook his head, sliding the photo into his back pocket. "Did Freddy ever mention a guy named Boss Hahn?"

"Quit playin'. Ain't no fool named Boss nowhere 'cept on the TV."

"Do you know where we might find Freddy?"

But already she was hustling them toward the door, literally leaning into Bear with the heels of both hands. "You come all storm-troopin' through here, and me in my drawers."

The phone rang, and she gave up momentarily, holding up one finger while she hunted for the cordless. "I ain't done with y'all."

As Bernadette rooted through the bedding for the source of the trill, Tim surreptitiously flipped over the top pieces of mail on the table, scanning a few bills and junk-mailers.

Bernadette slammed a fist to her cocked hip and shouted into the phone, "Do I sound like I wanna refinance?"

As the phone sailed back toward the bed and Bernadette began a dramatic pivot to face them, Tim tossed the mail to the table and dropped his hands to his sides. The paperwork mound slid over a few inches, revealing a torn paycheck stub bearing the golden arches.

July 27. $375. Freddy Campbell.

Bernadette came at them, leading with a long maroon nail. "Get to steppin'. Or come back with some paper."

Tim's eyes found the address beneath Ronald McDonald's grinning face an instant before Bernadette propelled him out through the door.