The First Rule

8

PIKE RETURNED HOME AFTER leaving Frank’s house and found a message waiting from Elvis Cole, who was Pike’s friend and partner in a detective agency. Pike listened while he drank a bottle of water.

Cole said, “Hey. A cop named Terrio came by the office today, asking about you and someone named Frank Meyer. Felt like he was fishing, but he also said this guy Meyer was murdered. Call me.”

Pike deleted the message, then looked up Rahmi’s address on his computer. He was hungry, he wanted to exercise and return Cole’s call, but he needed to keep moving. Movement meant progress, and progress meant finding the men who killed Frank.

The Google Maps feature was like having a spy satellite. Pike typed in Rahmi’s address, and there it was-all of Compton spread out thousands of feet below. Pike zoomed in for a closer look, then went to the street view, which allowed him to see Rahmi’s building as if he were standing in the street. Faded paint. Dying grass. Big Wheel on its side. The Google pictures had been taken on a bright, sunny day, and might have been taken months ago, but they were a good place to start.

Rahmi Johnson lived in a green two-story apartment building 1.67 miles north of the Artesia Freeway in Compton. His building was shaped like a shoe box, with three units on bottom, three on top, and a flat, featureless roof. Rahmi had the center ground-floor apartment. Single-family homes and similar buildings lined Rahmi’s side of the street, set on lots so narrow that some of the homes were turned sideways. Rahmi’s building was sideways. Almost every yard was protected by short chain-link fences, and almost every house had security bars on its windows. The opposite side of the street was lined by single-story commercial buildings.

Because of the sideways orientation, the side of Rahmi’s building faced the street and the front of the building faced the next-door neighbor’s property. Residents entered through a chain-link gate, passed the Big Wheel, then went along the length of their building to reach their apartments. This sideways orientation made it difficult for Pike to see Rahmi’s door from the street. He considered this, and knew the police would have the same problem.

Pike was studying the buildings surrounding Rahmi’s apartment house when his cell phone rang. He saw it was John Chen, and took the call.

“Yes.”

“We confirmed a fourth gun to go with the fourth set of shoe prints. Three of the four guns were used in the earlier murders, but the fourth gun was not. That fourth gun showed casings in the nanny’s room and the family room.”

“How many?”

“Three. The fourth gunman shot Frank Meyer once, and put both bullets in the girl-Ana Markovic. We’re still matching the other bullets and casings, but that’s the prelim. I thought you’d want to know.”

“Thanks.”

Pike put down the phone, and thought about the fourth shooter. The new guy. Someone who had not taken part in the earlier invasions, but had gone to Frank’s house. Pike wondered why a fourth man had joined the crew. Had the original three members known about Frank’s background, and expected more resistance?

Pike finally put it out of his head, and returned to his computer. He studied Rahmi’s building, then the surrounding structures and the commercial properties across the street. He noticed that both sides of the street were lined with parked cars, then went back to the overhead view and realized why. Neither Rahmi’s building nor the other small apartment buildings had driveways or spaces for off-street parking; residents parked on the street. This meant Rahmi’s new Malibu would probably be parked in front of his building.

No building in the area was more than two stories, and most were only a single story. With no overlooking vantage point, the spotter would have to be close. The high density of residents, the on-street parking, and the long-term nature of the surveillance meant the spotter was housed in a nearby building. You couldn’t park a Crown Vic out front for three weeks and expect the neighbors not to notice. Ditto repair vans, delivery trucks, and phony cable trucks. After forty-five minutes of studying the area, Pike believed the surveillance options for SIS were limited. He had a pretty good idea where they would place their spotters, and also how he could reach Rahmi without being seen. He would have to see the area at night and during the day to be sure, but he knew what he had to do.

Pike changed into his workout gear, stretched to warm himself, then eased into the meditative state he always found through yoga. He moved slowly, and with great regard, working deeply through asanas from hatha yoga. He breathed, and felt himself settle. His heart rate slowed. Forty-two beats per minute. His blood pressure, one hundred over sixty. Peace came with certainty, and Pike was certain.

When Pike finished, he eased awake like a bubble rising to the surface of a great flat pond. Dinner was rice and red beans mixed with grilled corn and eggplant; the rice and beans he had made, the corn and eggplant were from a restaurant. After dinner, he showered, cleaned himself, then dressed in briefs and a T-shirt. He returned Cole’s call, but Cole didn’t pick up, so he left a message.

Pike poured a finger of scotch in a short glass, then shut the lights. He sat on his couch, alone in the dark, listening to water burble in the black granite meditation fountain. Listening to the water, it was easy to imagine he was in a natural world where wild things lived. He sipped the scotch, and listened.

After a while, Pike went upstairs to bed. The mattress was hard, but he liked it that way. He was asleep almost at once. Pike fell asleep easily. Staying asleep was difficult.

His eyes opened two hours later, and Joe Pike was awake. He blinked at the darkness, and knew sleep was done. He remembered no dreams, but his T-shirt was damp with sweat.

Pike rolled out of bed, dressed, got together his things, then drove south to Compton across a landscape brilliant with unwavering lights.

9

PIKE KNEW RAHMI was home the first and only time he drove past in his Jeep because the shiny black Malibu was wedged to the curb. Three in the morning on a weeknight, traffic was nonexistent and the streets were dead. Pike pulled his jacket collar high, his cap low, and slumped behind the wheel. Everyone else in the world might be sleeping, but SIS would be watching. One pass, they would ignore him. Two passes, they would wonder. A third pass, they would likely call in a radio car to see what was going on.

Pike drove to a well-lit, twenty-four-hour Mobil station by the freeway, parked, then called a cab service. While he waited for the cab, he went inside. The attendant was a middle-aged Latin guy with a weak chin who looked scared even though he was behind an inch and a half of bulletproof glass. As soon as Pike walked in, the attendant’s right hand went under the counter.

“Engine trouble. I’m going to leave my Jeep here for a while. Okay?”

Pike held up a twenty-dollar bill, then slipped it under the glass. The attendant didn’t touch it.

“Ain’t nothin’ bad in there, is it?”

“Bad?”

“Like… bad?”

Dope or a body.

Pike said, “Engine trouble. I’ll be back.”

The attendant took the twenty with his left hand. He never revealed his right. Pike wondered how many times he had been held up.

Pike went outside and stood in the vapor light breathing cold mist until a lime green cab showed up. It appeared lavender in the silky light.

The cab driver was a young African-American with suspicious eyes, who did a double take when he saw his fare was a white man.

He said, “Car trouble?”

“I have a friend nearby. You can take me to her place.”

“Ah.”

Her. A woman made everything better.

Pike gave the nearest major intersection, but not Rahmi’s address. Pike didn’t want the cabbie to know it if he was later questioned. When they reached Rahmi’s street, Pike told him to cruise the block.

Pike said, “Go slow. I’ll know it when I see it.”

“I thought you knew this girl.”

“It’s been a while.”

The SIS spotters would be watching the cab. This time of morning, they didn’t have anything else to watch. Pike slumped in the shadows of the backseat as they passed Rahmi’s building. The SIS spotters would be on alert now, but Pike wanted to see how Rahmi’s apartment was lit. The lighting was crucial in helping Pike determine where the spotters were hiding, and in planning how to defeat them.

Pike said, “Slower.”

The cab slowed even more. The watch officer was likely keying his radio or kicking his partner, saying they might have something here.

The entry side of Rahmi’s building was lit by six yellow bulbs, one outside each of the three doors on the ground level, but only one outside a door on the second floor. The others appeared to be out. Pike was more interested in the back of the building than the front. The Google images showed the back of Rahmi’s building was very close to the neighboring home, and now Pike saw the area caught only a small amount of reflected glow from the neighbor’s porch. This was good for Pike. The heavy shadows, along with the distance from the street and the narrow separation between the two buildings, meant the area behind Rahmi’s apartment was a tunnel of darkness. Pike would be able to disappear into the tunnel.

The cabbie said, “Which one?”

“Don’t see it. Let’s try the next block.”

Pike had the cabbie slow in front of two more buildings to throw off the spotters, then headed back to his Jeep. During his days as a combat Marine, the helicopter pilots used the same technique when inserting troops into enemy territory. They didn’t just fly in, drop off Marines, and leave. Instead, the pilots made three or four false inserts along with the real drop to mask the true drop point. If it worked in hostile jungles, it would work in South Central Los Angeles.

Pike took another cab past the apartment just before dawn to check the lighting again from the opposite direction, and made six more cab rides before noon, different cabs each time, twice having the cabs stop nearby so he could study the street. One of the cabbies asked if he was looking for a woman, another stared at him in the rearview with marble eyes, finally saying, “You down here to kill a man?”

They were parked outside a different apartment house on the next block. Pike now believed the primary SIS spotter was located in one of two commercial buildings directly across from Rahmi’s building. The only other building with a view of Rahmi’s door was the house it faced, but Pike had seen a tall, thin woman herd three children out of the house for school. The two commercial buildings were the only remaining possibilities. SIS wanted to see Rahmi’s door. They would want to see who entered, and who left, and with the bad angles this meant they had to be directly across the street in one of two places. Pike hadn’t found their exact location, but he now believed it wasn’t necessary.

The cabbie said, “I don’t want no shootin’ in this cab. Don’t you be gettin’ me involved in some crime.”

“I’m cool.”

“You don’t look cool. You look so hot a man could fry just bein’ next to you.”

Pike said, “Sh.”

“Just sayin’, is all.”

Pike pushed a twenty-dollar bill onto the man’s shoulder. The cabbie grunted like he was the world’s biggest fool, but the bill disappeared.

Rahmi’s Malibu was parked outside his building almost directly in front of the chain-link gate. Tuxedo black with double-chrome dubs covering the wheels that probably retailed at two thousand dollars each. Every time Rahmi drove away, SIS would follow. They would have placed a GPS locator on the car, and they would use at least three vehicles to maintain contact. Their cars would be nearby and ready to roll.

The Malibu was Pike’s key. SIS had to watch Rahmi’s apartment, but Pike only needed to watch the Malibu, and a place to hide without being seen.

The driver made a loud sigh.

“Ain’t you seen enough?”

Pike said, “Let’s go.”

Pike picked up his Jeep, then drove north into East L.A. A friend of his had a parking lot there, where he kept vehicles he rented to film companies. Vintage cars, mostly, but also specialty vehicles like dune buggies, decommissioned police cruisers, and customized hot rods. Pike rented a taco truck with faded paint, a heavy skin of dust, and a cracked window. A flowing blue legend was emblazoned along the side: ANTONIO’S MOTORIZED RESTAURANT-HOME OF THE BBQ TACO! The legend was faded, too.

Pike put it on his credit card, left his Jeep, then drove the taco truck back to Compton. He parked three blocks from Rahmi’s on the opposite side of the street in front of what appeared to be a tow yard and a row of abandoned storefronts.

Pike shut the engine, cracked open the windows for air, then moved back into the kitchen bay where he would be hidden from people on the street. Three blocks away, the SIS spotters would ignore him. They were too busy watching Rahmi’s apartment.

Pike couldn’t see the apartment, but he had a good view of the Malibu, and the Malibu was all he needed.

Pike settled in. He breathed. He waited for something to happen.

10

AT EIGHT-FIFTY THAT NIGHT, the Malibu pulled away, came toward Pike until the first cross street, then stopped before making the turn. The light was poor, but the black-on-black Malibu gleamed beautifully and the polished chrome dubs glittered.

Pike watched.

A dark blue Neon approached on the cross street as the Malibu signaled to turn. The Neon was dirty, and missing the left front hubcap. When the Malibu turned, the Neon continued across the intersection behind it. Pike figured the Neon was SIS, and at least two other vehicles were maneuvering into surrounding positions.

Pike waited another five minutes before he slipped out of the taco truck. No lights came on when he opened and closed the door.

When Rahmi left his apartment, the spotters would have radioed the officers in their nearby cars, and the drivers would have scrambled to get into position. After that it was their show. For the first time in hours, the spotters would relax. They would kick back, check email, call their significant others, get some exercise. They wouldn’t be staring at Rahmi Johnson’s door because Rahmi was gone.

Pike trotted up to the same intersection, then rounded the corner to the next street and vaulted a fence into the yard butting the back side of Rahmi’s building. A dog barked, mincing and scraping at the door of the neighbor’s house, but Pike slid past the door and lifted himself over another chain-link fence directly behind Rahmi’s apartment.

Pike stood in the shadows, waiting to see if someone would turn on a light. The little dog continued barking, but a woman in the house shouted, and after a few seconds the barking stopped. Pike got to work.

Each of the apartments had only a single window on the back of the building, one of those high, small windows you find in bathrooms, but the windows were caged by iron bars. Rahmi’s window and the window in the street-side apartment were lit, but the rear apartment was dark. Pike wondered if it was filled with SIS operators.

The bathroom door was open. The bathroom light was off, but lights and the television were on in the outer room. The television being on, Pike figured Rahmi would return soon, but couldn’t be sure.

Pike examined the security bars. The bars were not individual bars, but a single cage formed of vertical rods welded to a frame like a catcher’s mask. More expensive security systems were hinged on one side, but these bars had been installed on the cheap and were likely against the building code. Pike ran his fingers along the bottom frame plate and found four screws. The owner had probably sunk wood screws through the stucco into the studs. They would be difficult to break, but not impossible.

Pike had come prepared with a pry bar. He jimmied the pry bar under the frame, used his SOG knife to pop the heads off the screws, then levered the cage from the window. Pike placed it on the ground, pushed open the window, then lifted himself through.

Rahmi had a studio apartment, with the bath in one corner sharing a wall with his kitchen. The furnishings were ratty and cheap, with a thread-bare couch fronting a discolored coffee table, a couple of beanbag chairs pimpled with stains, and a gray comforter suggesting the couch did double duty as a bed. The sixty-inch flat-screen hung opposite the couch like a glittering jewel, as out of place as a human head. Cables bled down the wall to a stack of components, then vined along the floor to a series of speakers. Rahmi had Surround Sound.

Pike wanted to turn off the lights and mute the television, but if the police were watching and listening, they would wonder what happened. The police had almost certainly been inside the apartment, and probably left a listening device. Pike didn’t want them listening when Rahmi came home.

Pike put away the pry bar and knife, and took out a small RF scanner about the size and shape of an iPod. Pike used it often in his security work. If the scanner picked up an RF signal, which pretty much all eavesdropping bugs emitted, a red light would glow.

Pike swept the main room, the kitchen, and finally the bath, then checked the big-screen components and furniture without finding anything. Pike considered the air conditioner wedged in the window. If the device was in the AC and someone turned it on, you wouldn’t be able to hear anything, but he checked it anyway. Nothing. Then he studied the shades covering the windows. The rollers were dingy and fuzzy with dust and spiderwebs. Pike scanned them, and found the bug on the second roller. It was the size of an earbud and stuck to the roller’s bracket with a piece of earthquake putty. Pike gently removed it and placed it on the floor behind the door. This would be his position when Rahmi came home.

Pike put away the scanner, but continued his search. He found a nine-millimeter Smith and Wesson wedged between the cushions on the couch, a blue glass bong the length of a nightstick on the floor, and a baggie containing two joints and a small quantity of loose marijuana. A smaller glass rock pipe was in a wicker basket, along with a plastic bag containing three balls of rock cocaine and assorted pills. Pike unloaded the nine-millimeter, pocketed the bullets, then tucked the gun under his belt. He found nothing else of interest, so he returned to his position behind the door. Rahmi might be back in five minutes or five days, but Pike would wait. Pike was good at waiting.

Twenty-five minutes later, Pike heard the chain-link gate, and drew Rahmi’s pistol.

Three locks were built into the door. Someone unlocked them one by one, and then the door swung in. Pike stepped on the bug as the door opened. Rahmi Johnson entered carrying a white paper bag, closed the door, and saw Pike just as Pike hit him with the pistol. The police would have resumed their watchful positions and would be wondering why the sound went dead, but would assume the closing door had somehow knocked it loose.

Rahmi raised his hands for protection, but didn’t get them up fast enough. Pike hit him a second time, and Rahmi staggered sideways. Tacos spilled out of the bag, smelling of grease and chili sauce.

Pike twisted Rahmi’s arm behind his back, clipped his knees, and rode him down.

Rahmi said, “Bro, hey, the fuck?”

Pike held the gun out.

“See?”

Rahmi probably thought Pike was a cop, the white facedown here in Compton.

“What you want, man? I ain’t done nuthin’.” Pike tapped him again.

“Sh.”

Pike muted the television, then went through Rahmi’s pockets. He found a cell phone, a fold of cash, a pack of Parliaments, and a yellow Bic lighter. No wallet. He pulled Rahmi to his feet and pushed him to the couch.

“Sit.”

Rahmi sat, glaring at Pike like a sullen teenager. Rahmi was trying to read him, trying to figure out who Pike was and what was in store. Pike understood he looked like a cop, but he didn’t want Rahmi to think he was a cop.

Pike stuffed Rahmi’s cash into his pocket, and Rahmi jerked forward.

“Yo! That’s my money, muthuhfucka!”

“Not anymore. Jamal owes me cash.”

“You a cop?”

“Where’s Jamal?”

“I don’t know where Jamal is. Shit.”

“Jamal has my money. I’ll get it from him, or from you.”

“I don’t know you, man. I don’t know nuthin’ ’bout no money.”

Rahmi wet his lips, thinking if Pike wasn’t a cop, maybe it wasn’t as bad as he thought, but Pike wanted him to think it was worse.

Pike threw the cell phone at him, so hard Rahmi caught it to protect himself.

“Call him.”

“Man, I ain’t seen Jamal since visiting day. He in prison.”

Pike swung the Smith backhand, hitting the sixty-inch plasma dead in the center of the screen. The safety glass split, and multicolored blocks danced and shimmered where the image had been. Rahmi lunged up from the couch, eyes trembling like runny eggs.

Pike aimed the Smith at Rahmi’s forehead and thumbed back the hammer.

“Call.”

“I’ll call. I’ll call all you want, but we ain’t gonna get no answer. I been leavin’ messages. His message box full.”

Rahmi fumbled with the phone, then held it out for Pike to see.

“Here. Listen here. You’ll see. I called him right now.”

Pike held out his free hand, and Rahmi tossed the phone over. Pike caught it to hear a computer voice say the recipient’s message box was full.

Pike ended the connection, then brought up the call log. The last call out showed as Jamal. Pike closed the phone, then put it into his pocket. He would go through the other numbers later.

“Where is he?”

“I don’t know where he is. Layin’ up with some ho, I imagine. Maybe in Vegas.”

“He told me he was crashing here. How else would I have your address?”

Now Rahmi appeared confused, as if he thought all this might be possible, but wasn’t sure how.

“Man, that was weeks ago. I don’t know where he cribs now. He don’t tell me, and I don’t wanna know.”

“Why not?”

“Aw, man, you know. The police came around looking, so he’s gotta stay low. He didn’t say where he went and I didn’t ask. If I don’t know, I can’t say.”

Pike decided Rahmi was telling the truth, but Jamal was only one of the people he wanted to find.

“When’s the last time you spoke?”

“Few days, I guess. Maybe a week.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Just talkin’ shit. This cop show I’m watching on DVD, The Shield. That shit is righteous, here on the sixty-inch. We talkin’ about The Shield. Jamal say up there in Soledad, they all into The Shield.”

“I think you’re lying. I think he left my money with you, and you spent it.”

Pike aimed the Smith at Rahmi’s left eye. Rahmi held up a hand as if he could ward off the bullet.

“That’s crazy. I don’t know nuthin’ ’bout no money.”

“He tell you I was coming?”

“He ain’t said nuthin’ ’bout no money, you, or anything else. How much he owe you?”

“Thirty-two thousand dollars. I’m getting it from him, or you.”

“I ain’t got no thirty-two kay.”

“You were driving it. Now I’m driving it.”

Rahmi blinked at what was left of his big-screen television, then slumped in defeat.

“Nigga, please, whatever passed between you and Jamal, I got no part in that. Jamal, he gave me these things ’cause he doin’ so well. We family, dog.”

“How’d he get to be doing so well?”

“He got in with a good crew.”

“Who? Maybe I can find him through them.”

“Jamal never told me no names.”

“He never told you I’d come for my money, either. I think he stole it from me. I think this stuff is mine.”

Pike raised the gun again, and this time Rahmi pleaded.

“It’s true, bro. They hooked up with this Serbian cat, lays off one fat score after another. They makin’ the bank!”

Pike lowered the gun.

“Serbian.”

“They in with this dude set’m up with the scores. Tell’m who to hit, they split the cash. He say it the easiest money he ever made.”

“He said Serbian? Not Russian or Armenian?”

“What difference it make? How’s a brother know the difference?”

“What was the name?”

“Just some Serbian muthuhfucka, that’s all.”

Ana Markovic was from Serbia. Dying in the hospital with her sister standing guard.

Pike studied Rahmi, but wasn’t really looking at Rahmi. He thought for a moment, then went to the bag of tacos. He stepped on it. Crunch.

Rahmi looked pained.

“Muthuhfuckin’ dinner, muthuhfucka. Why you do a mean-hearted thing like that?”

Pike picked up Rahmi’s keys, then tossed them to him.

“Get some more tacos.”

“What?”

Pike held up the fold of bills.

“Take your car. Go get more tacos.”

Rahmi wet his lips as if he was expecting a trick, then snatched the bills and went to the door.

“How you know Jamal?”

“He murdered me.”

Rahmi froze with his hand on the knob.

Pike said, “You see Jamal before I find him, tell him Frank Meyer is coming.”

Rahmi let himself out.

Pike stood by the door, listening. He heard the gate. He heard the Malibu rumble, and the tires screech. Just as before, the SIS detail would scramble to follow.

Pike slipped out the bathroom window, and returned to the night.

11

PIKE RETURNED TO UCLA the next morning. When he stepped off the elevator onto the ICU floor, he saw Rina outside her sister’s door with a doctor and two nurses. Pike stepped back onto the elevator and rode down to the lobby. He wanted to speak with her alone.

Pike repositioned his Jeep so he could watch the lobby entrance, then turned on the phone he had taken from Rahmi Johnson. He had bought a power cord for the phone on the way to the hospital. Pike wanted to keep the phone charged in case Jamal called his cousin.

Pike scrolled through the list until he reached Jamal’s number, then pressed the button to dial. Pike had called the number twice last night, and now again, but the response was the same. A female computer voice came on, informing Pike that Jamal’s message box was full.

Pike put away the phone, then stared at the lobby. He was prepared to wait as long as necessary, but Rina emerged a few minutes later. Same jeans and jacket as yesterday. Same shoulder bag clutched to her chest.

Pike moved through a row of cars as she crossed into the parking lot. She walked fast, with hard, clipped steps, as if she wanted to cover as much ground as possible.

She didn’t see Pike until he stepped from between the cars, then she gasped.

Pike said, “Do you know who did this?”

“Of course not. How could I know?”

“Is that why you’re afraid? You know who did this?”

She edged away, keeping the purse close.

“I don’t know what you are saying. Of course I don’t know. The police are looking.”

Pike stepped in front of her.

“The people who shot her were sent by a Serbian.”

“And this means what? Please-”

She tried to get around him, but Pike caught her arm.

“The crew who shot your sister bought the score from a Serbian gangster. They bought information about a house where your sister worked. And now here you are, afraid, with the gun.”

She glared at his hand, then drew herself up.

“Leave go of me.”

Pike let go because he saw her look past him. Pike drifted to the side, and saw a large, burly man approaching. He was jumbo large, with sloping shoulders, a big gut, and a dark, unshaven face. His beard was thick enough to grind marble.

He stopped when Pike turned, still two rows away, and said something Pike did not understand. Rina answered in the same language.

“My friend, Yanni. He see you grab me. I tell him we’re fine.”

Yanni was probably six five and weighed three hundred pounds. He was scowling at Pike like a Balkan grizzly, but Pike wasn’t impressed. Size meant little.

Pike turned back to the woman.

“If you know who did this, tell me. I can protect you better than him.” Rina stepped back.

“I don’t know what you mean, Serbian gangster.”

“How did Frank and Cindy meet your sister? How did she get the job with them?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did someone you know recommend her to them?”

She moved farther away.

“If you think you know something, you should tell the police.”

“Who are you afraid of?”

She studied him a long time, then shook her head.

“Ana is dead now. I have much to do.”

She turned and walked past Yanni, the two of them exchanging words Pike could not understand. She walked quickly, as if she still had all the ground to cover but was falling behind. Yanni continued scowling, but now his scowl seemed sad.

Pike returned to his Jeep. He watched them cross the parking lot to a small white Toyota. The woman got in behind the wheel.

Pike let them gain ground before he followed them, creeping along several cars back through the ugly Westwood Village traffic, then onto the freeway. He kept the Toyota in sight, rolling north into the San Fernando Valley, then east to Studio City. Pike worked closer when they left the freeway, following them into a residential area between the L.A. River channel and Ventura Boulevard, and then into the parking lot of a large apartment complex. It was one of those complexes with gated entries and visitor parking, and lots of used brick and trees.

Pike parked at the curb and followed her on foot, staying along the edge of the building. He stopped when her brake lights flared. Yanni got out, spoke with her for a moment through the open window, then climbed into a metallic tan F-150 pickup truck. The Toyota continued into the residents’ parking lot.

Pike noted the F-150’s license plate, but stayed back until Yanni drove away, then jumped the gate into the parking structure. He continued along the line of parked vehicles until he found Rina’s Toyota parked in a space marked 2205. Pike thought it likely that 2205 would also be Rina’s apartment number.

Pike returned to his Jeep, wrote down the various license plates and numbers before he forgot them, then phoned a friend.

Pike was good at some things, but not so good at others. He wanted information about Ana and Rina Markovic, and on the phone numbers in Rahmi Johnson’s phone. Pike was a warrior. He could hunt, stalk, and defeat an enemy in almost any environment, but detective work required relationships Pike did not possess.

A man answered on the second ring.

“Elvis Cole Detective Agency. We find more for less. Check our prices.”

Pike said, “I need your help.”

12

Elvis Cole

ELVIS COLE PUT DOWN the phone, feeling even more concerned than he was before Pike called. Cole couldn’t count the times Pike had saved his life, or the endless moments of silence they had shared when just being with someone who has seen the same horrible things you have seen was the last best way to survive. But he could count on one hand the times Joe Pike had asked for help.

Cole hadn’t felt right since Detective-Sergeant Jack Terrio hit him with questions he couldn’t answer about a multiple homicide he knew nothing about, and now Cole was irritated he had to wait to find out what was going on. As usual, Pike hadn’t explained anything over the phone. Just said he was on his way, and hung up. Ever the mannered conversationalist.

The Elvis Cole Detective Agency maintained a two-office suite four flights above Santa Monica Boulevard. The selling point had been the balcony. Cole could step outside on a clear day and see all the way down Santa Monica to the sea. Sometimes, the seagulls flew inland, floating in the air like white porcelain kites, blinking at him with beady eyes. Sometimes, the woman in the next suite stepped onto her balcony to sun herself. Her selection of bikinis was impressive.

Cole’s name was on the door, but Joe Pike was his partner, as well as his friend. They bought the agency the same year Pike left the LAPD and Cole was licensed by the state of California as a private investigator.

That morning, the sky was milky, but bright, cool, but not chilly, and the French doors were open so Cole could enjoy the air. Cole was wearing a killer Jams World aloha shirt (colors for the day: sunburst and lime), khaki cargo pants, and an Italian suede shoulder holster of impeccable design, said holster currently gunless. Cole was wearing the holster in hopes the woman next door would emerge in her latest bikini, see it, and swoon, but so far, Cole was zero for two: no woman, no swooning.

Twenty minutes later, Cole was balancing his checkbook when Pike arrived. Cole didn’t hear the door open or close. This was just how Pike moved. As if he was so used to moving quietly he no longer touched the earth.

Cole pushed the checkbook aside, letting Pike see his irritation.

“So I’m sitting here, the door opens, and these cops walk in, badge, badge, badge. Three of them, so I know it’s important. They say, what do I know about Frank Meyer? I say, who? They say, Meyer was a merc with your boy Pike. I say, okay, and? They say, Meyer and his family were shot to death. I don’t know what to say to that, but that’s when the alpha cop, a guy named Terrio, asked what I knew about your personal relationship with Meyer, and whether you had a business relationship. I said, brother, I have never heard that name before.”

Cole watched as Pike settled into a spot against the wall. Pike rarely sat when he was at their office. He leaned against the wall.

Pike said, “No reason you would. Frank was one of my guys. From before.”

“Terrio told me they had reason to believe this crew hit Meyer because he had cash or drugs at his home.”

“Terrio’s wrong. He believes the other six victims were crooked, so he’s gunning for Frank.”

Cole frowned, feeling even less in the know.

“Other six?”

“Frank’s home was the seventh hit in a string. Same crew, working the Westside and Encino. They’ve been ripping off criminals.”

“Terrio left out that part. So did the paper.”

After Terrio left, Cole had searched the L.A. Times website and local news stations for their coverage of the murders. The Times had provided the most information, describing Frank Meyer as a successful, self-made businessman. No mention was made of his past as a professional military contractor, but maybe that hadn’t been known at the time the article was written. A detective named Stan Watts was quoted, saying he believed a professional home invasion crew numbering between three and four men entered the home between eight and ten P.M., with robbery as the likely motive. Watts provided no details about what might have been stolen.

Cole had printed out the article, and now pushed it toward Pike, but Pike didn’t look at it.

Cole said, “If Terrio’s wrong, then what did these people go there to steal?”

Pike took a sheet of notepaper and a cell phone from his pocket, and placed them on Cole’s desk.

“I found a connection Terrio doesn’t know about.”

Cole listened as Pike told him about a recently released criminal named Jamal Johnson and his cousin, Rahmi. Pike told him about a new Malibu, and that Jamal told Rahmi his crew bought scores from someone in the Serbian mob. Pike was in the middle of telling it when Cole raised a hand, stopping him.

“Waitaminute. SIS is watching this guy, and you broke into his place?”

“Yes.”

“That’s insane.”

Pike tossed the phone to Cole.

“Rahmi’s phone. Jamal’s number is in the memory. Maybe you could ID the service provider, and back-trace Jamal’s call list. We might be able to find him through his friends.”

Cole put the phone aside, and picked up the note.

“I’ll see what I can do. How are these people connected?”

“Ana Markovic was the Meyers’ nanny. She died this morning. Rina was her sister. She has a friend called Yanni. I’m not sure how he spells it. Rina was at the hospital before her sister died. She was standing guard because she believed the people who shot her sister might come around to finish the job.”

“You think she knows something?”

“They’re Serbian. Rahmi says his cousin hooked up with a Serbian gangster. What are the odds?”

Cole thought about it. Los Angeles has always had a small Serbian population, but, just as the Russian and Armenian populations increased after the Soviet Union collapsed, the Serbian and expatriate Yugoslavian populations shot up after the conflicts in the nineties. Criminals and organized gangsters arrived along with everyone else, and L.A. now had significant numbers of criminal gang sets from all over Eastern Europe. But even with the increasing populations, the numbers of East Europeans remained statistically small. A Latin, African-American, or Anglo connection would have meant nothing. A Balkan connection in Westwood was worth checking out.

Cole placed the note with the phone.

“Your pal Rina, you think she’d talk to me?”

“No.”

Cole stared at the information Pike had cribbed onto the sheet. It wasn’t much.

“Where did Ana live?”

“With Frank.”

“Maybe she had another place for the weekends.”

“I don’t know.”

“I guess you and I aren’t up to speed on the nanny lifestyle.”

“No.”

The classic Pike conversation.

“What I’m getting at here is that talking to people who knew this girl might be a good place to start. I’ll need the names of her friends, maybe some phone numbers, things like that. If the sister won’t talk to us, can we get into the crime scene?”

“I’ll take care of it. Also, John Chen is on the SID team. He’s running the physical evidence.”

Cole nodded. Chen was good, and Chen had worked with them before. Cole would call him after Pike left.

Two seagulls appeared in the empty blue nothing outside the glass. Cole watched them float on their invisible sea, tiny heads turning. One of them suddenly dropped out of sight. His partner watched the other fall, then folded his wings and followed.

Cole said, “And Terrio doesn’t know about Jamal and the Serbian connection?”

“No.”

“You going to tell him?”

“No. I want to find them before the police.”

Pike was staring at him, but his face was as empty of expression as always, the dark glasses like two black holes cut into space. The stillness in Pike was amazing.

Cole looked for the gulls again, but they were still gone. The winter sky was a milky blue, just edging into gray from the haze. Cole got up, went around his desk to the little fridge under the Pinocchio clock, and took out a bottle of water. He offered it to Pike. Pike shook his head once. Cole brought it back to his desk.

Cole glanced at the news story again, the one Pike had not touched. The second paragraph, where the names of the murdered victims were given. Frank, Cindy, Frank, Jr., Joe. The youngest was Joey. Executed. The word chosen by the journalist to describe what had happened. Executed. Cole had not stopped thinking about that word since he read the story. He knew better, but the writer was good. She had burned a few words onto a blank page, forcing Cole and her other readers to imagine the scene, and there it was. A black steel muzzle to the head. Clenched eyes, tears squeezing through stitched lids, maybe the sobbing and screaming, and the short, sharp BAM that ends all of it. The sobbing stops, the face grows serene as its lines relax in death, and all that remains is the mother’s screams. Cindy would have been last. Cole folded the article and pushed it aside, wondering the thing he had been wondering since reading the article yesterday-whether or not the youngest boy, Joey, had been named after Pike.

Who was Frank Meyer?

One of my guys.

Cole had learned enough over the years to know what was meant. Pike had been able to hand-pick his guys, which meant he chose people he respected. Then, because they were Pike’s guys, he would have arranged for their gear, and meals, and equipment, made sure they were paid on time, that their contracts were honored, and that they were properly equipped for the job at hand. He would have taken care of them, and they would have taken care of him, and he would not have let them sell their lives cheaply.

Who was Frank Meyer?

One of my guys.

Cole said, “I don’t need to hide from what you’re going to do. You haven’t done it yet. Maybe things will change. Maybe the police will find them first.”

Pike said, “Mm.”

Cole studied Pike, and thought that Pike was studying him back, but maybe Pike was just looking. Cole never knew what Pike was thinking. Maybe Pike was just waiting for Cole to say something. Pike was very patient.

Cole said, “I want you to hear this, and think about it. I don’t think Terrio is necessarily wrong. If I were him, I would be looking at Meyer, too. What if it turns out Frank isn’t the man you knew. What if Terrio’s right?”

The flat black lenses seemed to bore into Cole as if they were portholes into another dimension.

“He’s still one of my guys.”

The seagulls reappeared, drawing Cole’s eye. They hung in the air, tiny heads flicking left and right as they glanced at each other. Then, as one, the two birds looked at Cole. They stared with their merciless eyes, then banked away. Gone.

Cole said, “You see that?”

But when Cole looked over, Pike was gone, too.

13

TWO MEN AND A WOMAN in dark blue business suits were walking up Frank’s drive when Pike cruised past. A senior uniformed officer with the stars on her collar that marked her as a deputy chief was gesturing as the three civilians followed. Downtown brass giving a few big-shots the tour.

A single black-and-white command car was parked at the curb, indicating the officer had driven the civilians herself. No other official vehicles were present. Three days after the murders, the lab rats had found everything there was to find. Pike knew the house would remain sealed until the science people were certain they wouldn’t need additional samples. When they gave the okay, the detectives would release the house to Frank and Cindy’s estate, and someone would notify Ana Markovic’s family that they could claim her possessions. Pike wondered if Ana’s parents lived in Serbia, and if they had been notified. He wondered if they were flying in to claim their daughter’s body, and whether they could afford it.

Pike circled a nearby park, slowly winding his way back to Frank’s. He approached from the opposite direction this time, and parked two blocks up the street with an easy, eyes-forward view of the command car.

The senior officer and her guests stayed inside for forty-two minutes. This was much longer than Pike would have expected, but then they came back down the drive, climbed into the command car, and drove away.

Pike waited five minutes, then pulled forward to park across from Frank’s. An older woman with white hair was walking a little white dog. The dog was short, and old, with a heavy body and eyes that had been playful before they were tired. Pike let them pass, then walked up Frank’s drive, and entered through the side gate as he had two nights before.

Someone had taped a piece of cardboard over the broken pane in the French door. Pike pushed the cardboard aside and let himself in. After four days, the blood pooled on the floors had soured and mildewed. Pike ignored the smell, and went to Ana Markovic’s room.

The handmade Valentine poster made by Frank’s boys, the posters of European soccer players, the tiny desk with its clutter of magazines and laptop computer all remained as Pike remembered. The screen saver was still playing-a young Hawaiian surf stud riding a wave that swallowed him, only to be resurrected and swallowed again in an endless loop. Pike closed the screen, unplugged the power cord, and placed the computer by the door. He searched through the drawers and clutter, hoping for some kind of address book or cell phone, but found neither. Instead, he found a high school yearbook and some birthday and holiday cards. He put the cards in the yearbook, and the yearbook with the computer.

Pike was bothered by the absence of a phone. He looked under and around the desk, then pulled a mound of sheets and a comforter from the bed. He found rumpled clothes, two open boxes of cookies, an open box of Pampers, some magazines, three partially consumed bottles of water, a paperback novel about vampires, an unopened bag of Peanut M &M’s, and a single unused tampon still in its wrapper. He found the messy clutter of a young woman who liked to shove everything in the corner, but no phone. Pike lifted the mattress. Nothing.

Pike realized he had not found a purse or wallet, either. It occurred to him that her phone had probably been in her purse, and the paramedics might have taken her purse along when they rushed her to the hospital. Pike made a mental note to tell Cole. Cole could check to see if this was what happened, and whether or not the hospital still had the purse in their possession.

The tiny room held a closet smaller than a phone booth. The bathroom was across the hall. Pike went through the closet first, then the bath. The closet floor was deep with clothes, shoes, and an empty backpack. A corkboard had been tacked to the inside of the door and was covered with snapshots, cards, pictures cut from magazines, ticket stubs, and drawings. Ana was in most of the pictures, but not all, posing with people her own age, everyone smiling or mugging for the camera. Most of them had probably been taken in the past couple of years, and a few had writing. Luv, Krissy. You da bomb! BFF! Like that.

Pike didn’t take them all. He selected pictures that appeared the most recent, and those with handwritten notes and names, and tucked them into the yearbook. He had just crossed the hall into the bathroom when he heard a car door. He picked up the computer and yearbook, hurried to the front of the house, and saw two unmarked Crown Vics. Terrio and Deets were already out of their car, and two more detectives were climbing out of the second car. Terrio and Deets went to Pike’s Jeep, then scowled toward the house.

Pike left the way he had entered, went around to the side of the house, then slipped through the hedges to the wall. He didn’t go over. He stripped a.25 caliber Beretta from his ankle and a Colt.357 Python from his waist, then chinned himself up to see what was on the other side. He dropped the computer, yearbook, and guns into a soft cushion of calla lilies, then let himself out the side gate onto the drive.

Terrio and the others were halfway up the drive when Pike stepped out, letting them see him.

Terrio said, “You forget what that yellow tape means?”

“I wanted to see what happened.”

“You have no business seeing what happened. Did you enter the premises?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“To see.”

Deets grinned at the other detectives.

“I like it. We have breaking and entering, illegal entry, interfering with a lawful investigation. How about adding burglary, Pike? Did you take anything?”

Pike spread his arms, offering to let them search.

“See for yourself.”

Deets moved behind Pike.

“Good idea. I’ve heard about this guy, Jack. Never know what he might be packing.”

The younger detective ran his hands over Pike’s legs, pockets, and belt line, but his grin collapsed when he found nothing.

Terrio didn’t look so happy about it, either, but he tipped his head toward the house, speaking to the other detectives.

“I’ll catch up with you. I’m going to walk Mr. Pike to his car.”

Terrio didn’t say anything more until they reached the street. He leaned against Pike’s Jeep. This bothered Pike, but he didn’t object.

Terrio studied Frank’s house for a moment.

“Why’d you come here?”

“To see. Like I told you.”

“That why you went to the hospital?”

Pike wondered how Terrio knew.

“That’s right.”

“The girl died this morning. That makes twelve homicides. If you think I’m spending all my resources digging up dirt on your friend, you’re wrong.”

Pike didn’t respond. He figured Terrio would make his point soon enough.

“I’ve got the mayor, the police commissioner, and the brass on my arm. I’ve got a rising body count, and no certain suspects. If you know something that could help, you should tell me.”

“Can’t help you.”

Terrio stared at Pike for a moment, then laughed.

“Sure. Sure you can’t. You’re here because you want to see.”

Pike’s cell phone buzzed. It buzzed so loudly that Terrio stepped away from the Jeep.

“Why don’t you get it, Pike? Might be important.”

Pike didn’t move. The buzzing stopped when the call went to voice mail.

Terrio said, “Get out of here.”

Pike watched him head toward the house. Pike knew Terrio would glance back when he reached Frank’s door, so he got into his Jeep and pulled away. He drove far enough so he couldn’t be seen from Frank’s house, then jogged back through the neighbor’s yard to the calla lily bed, recovered his guns and the things he had taken, and walked away.

14

PIKE DROVE TO THE far side of the park before he pulled over to check his phone. Cole had left a message, asking him to call.

When Cole answered, Pike said, “Me.”

“You wanted to know how a gangster could be connected to the nanny?”

Cole was being dramatic, and continued without waiting for an answer.

“Here’s a hint. Your girl Rina works for the Serbian mob.”

“Ana’s sister.”

“That’s right. Her sister is the connection.”

Pike watched the children in the park. He watched the toddlers run with short, awkward steps, and little ones try to stack blocks, and fail, because their tiny hands were too small to hold the blocks well.

“You’ve been on this less than two hours.”

“Am I not the World’s Greatest Detective?”

Pike glanced at his watch.

“Ninety-two minutes.”

“Karina Markovic, also known as Karen Mark, age twenty-six, arrested twice for prostitution, once for assault, and once for robbery-a john claimed she stole his wallet. Total jail time served is nine days. She was busted in a Serbian sex crib up in the Valley. She’s been in this country for at least eight years, and she’s probably here illegally.”

The San Fernando Valley was the porn capital of the world, and the Russian gangs discovered it as soon as they arrived. The sex trade was an easy moneymaker, but American women were difficult to control, so the Russians brought Russian girls over, and each new wave of East European gang sets followed the pattern-from the Ukrainians to the Armenians to the Serbs.

Pike said, “Does she have warrants?”

“None at this time, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be. Her license plate came back as inactive, which means the plate is not in active registration through the DMV.”

“Her car is stolen.”

“Stolen, or built from stripped parts. The Eastern Bloc gangs are into that-they build them from stolen parts, and ship them home. She might not know it was stolen. She might not even know the plate is no good. But the apartment address you gave me? Definitely not hers. The registered tenant is one Janic-with-a-J Pevich.”

Cole pronounced Janic with a y. Yanni.

“He have a record?”

“Nothing that I found, but the day is young.”

Pike lowered the phone, but did not move. He watched the children playing, and thought that now he understood why Rina Markovic was armed and afraid. The Serbian mob owned her, and someone in the Serbian mob had killed her sister. Pike wondered if this was the fourth man.

Either way, Rina knew who pulled the trigger.

Pike made his way toward Yanni’s apartment, wondering if Rina was there or if she had already moved on. Pike wasn’t worried about it. Even if she had gone, he could make Yanni tell him where to find her.

Pike cruised through the small visitors’ parking lot where Yanni’s truck had been parked before, but now it was gone. He took a space at the end of the lot, and tucked the Python under his belt. He didn’t bother to hide the pry bar.

Pike waited until two joggers passed, then hopped the gate into the residents’ parking lot. Rina Markovic’s car was still in the parking spot for apartment 2205.

Pike left the parking garage like any other resident and made his way along a sidewalk between the buildings. The grounds were large, with eight separate three-story buildings laid out like four “equals” signs end to end in a line. The buildings followed a curve of land between the river channel and a residential street, and were pleasantly shaded with tall gray eucalyptus trees and thick oleanders. Pike searched almost ten minutes before he realized the apartment number wasn’t 2205, but was apartment 205 in building number 2. He found the apartment in the second-to-last building.

It was quiet at the rear buildings, with all the daytime activity around the pool and up front by the mailboxes and parking garages.

Pike climbed a flight of stairs, found 205, and listened at the door. The apartment was silent, so he covered the peephole and knocked. When no one answered, he knocked again, harder, but still heard nothing.

Pike checked the area to make sure no one was watching, then wedged the end of the pry bar into the jamb where the dead bolt was seated. The door had more play than he expected, so Pike pressed harder, and realized the dead bolt wasn’t locked. He gave the pry bar a hard shove, and the jamb gave at the knob lock. Pike stepped inside, then closed the door, having to force it past the splintered jamb.

Pike found himself in a small, simply furnished apartment that was dim because of the pulled curtains. He was in the living room, facing an open kitchen to his right and a bedroom to his left. The kitchen and bedroom were separated by a door that was probably a bathroom. The bedroom door was open, but the bathroom door was closed. The shower was running.

Pike drew the Python as he crossed to the bedroom. He made sure the bedroom was empty, then moved to the kitchen as the shower stopped. Quick glance into the kitchen, then he turned toward the bathroom, waiting, the gun hanging along his leg.

The door opened an inch, then suddenly opened wider with a billow of steamy air. Rina came out with her eyes down, vigorously toweling her hair. She was naked, with very white skin and a fleshy body. In the instant before she realized she was not alone, Pike studied her, seeing that corded pink scars crisscrossed her belly as if she had been clawed. The scars were so deep they puckered, and Pike knew by their faded color they were old.

Then she saw him. She shrieked and lurched sideways, bunching the towel to cover herself.

Pike raised the gun enough to make sure she saw it, but did not point it at her.

“Who killed them?”

She was as still as an ice sculpture. Her white face paled to translucence, her gaunt cheeks and hollow eyes highlighted by points of blue. She stood with the towel, water leaking across her shoulders and down her legs.

Pike said, “Who?”

“Get out of here. I will call the police.”

“Who?”

“You are insane. I will scream.”

She glanced at the door just as Pike heard the knob, and Yanni stepped through carrying what looked like a large gym bag. He was so big he filled the door, and had to tip sideways to enter.

A scowl flickered on the big man’s face even as he dropped the bag and charged. Rina shouted something in the other language, but Pike simply waited as he watched Yanni come.

Yanni came hard and large the way big men do, trusting his size to do everything for him, so Pike knew Yanni had never been properly trained. He came in with his arms up and out, planning to drive Pike into the wall. Pike was so far ahead of the play he saw the steps of what was about to happen as if they were preordained.

He let Yanni reach him, then pushed Yanni’s hand down to hook his arm. Pike dropped under and brought the arm with him, rolling the big man over his hip, and put Yanni flat on his back. Pike hit him on the forehead with the Python. Pike hit him again, harder, and this time the skin split deep and Yanni’s eyes turned glassy.

It took less than two seconds, but when Pike glanced up Rina was already in the bedroom.

He reached her as she turned from the bed with the pistol, caught it, and twisted it away. She didn’t quit easily. She punched at him and tried to claw his eyes as Pike dragged her backward to the living room so she could see Yanni. Her elbows cut into him, and she stomped at his feet and made grunting noises while trying to rake his eyes.

Pike said, “Stop.”

Yanni was still down, blinking in confusion at the blood filling his eyes.

“I know you know. The mob owns you. You know who did this.”

She fought even harder, whipping her head from side to side. She was strong. Muscles like rope under the pale skin.

Pike squeezed so tight that something in her cracked. He hammered back the Python.

“I won’t ask you again.”

“Yes.”

“Yes what?”

“I know. I know who killed them. I know who did this.”

“Who?”

“My husband.”

Pike held her trapped in his arm, the water from her hair soaking into his skin, her chest heaving.

15

PIKE TOLD HER TO wrap herself in the towel, then put her on the couch. She glanced at Yanni, still flat on his back.

“What about him?”

“He’s bleeding.”

“We should do something.”

“After you tell me.”

She didn’t like that, and said something to Yanni in Serbian.

Pike said, “English.”

Yanni rubbed stupidly at his face, smearing the blood on his arm. Pike slipped her pistol into his pocket, then positioned himself so he could see both of them at the same time. If Yanni tried to get up, Pike wanted to know.

Pike said, “Who’s your husband?”

“Michael Darko. You know this name?”

“No. He’s a thief?”

She smirked, as if Pike was an idiot. She was cool and aloof, even naked on the couch with Yanni bleeding on the floor.

“Please. He is a boss of thieves.”

“Okay, the boss. Was he your boss when you were arrested for prostitution?”

A tint of pink colored her cheeks.

“Yes. He bring me here to America. I work for him then.”

“Okay, the boss of thieves is a pimp. This boss sent a crew to Frank’s house?”

“Yes.”

“Did he go with them?”

“Maybe he go, maybe not. I was not there.”

“What did he go there to steal?”

“My baby.”

Her answer hung in the air like a frozen moment, as surprising as if they had gone to steal a nuclear bomb. Pike stared at her, thinking about what she had said, her gaunt face as smooth as porcelain, her eyes as hard as marble.

“Frank and Cindy had your baby?”

“My sister. I give him to my sister when I find out Michael is going to take him. I hide him with her until we can leave.”

Pike tried to get his head around it. Then he remembered seeing the box of Pampers in Ana’s room. He had seen it, but thought nothing of it because it was just another box. There had been no crib, or bassinet, or baby food-just the one box of Pampers.

“A baby.”

“Yes.”

“How old?”

“Ten months.”

She sat up straighter, pulling her shoulders back and chest out.

“I look good, yes? I do much hard work.”

“Michael and his crew, they’ve invaded six other homes. They’ve killed other people. He have kids in those places, too?”

Her eyes flashed, angry.

“I don’t know nothing about other things. All I know is this. Michael want his child. He take him back to Serbia.”

Terrio hadn’t mentioned a kidnapping. Neither had Chen or anyone else, and then Pike realized why.

“You didn’t tell the police, did you?”

“Of course not. They cannot help me.”

Of course not.

Yanni was waking up. He touched his face, then looked at the blood on his palm as if he wasn’t quite sure what it was. Pike moved the gun toward him.

“This one your boyfriend?”

“No. He want to be, but, no. I hide with him when I hear Michael wants the baby, but then I get scared and I have much to do, so I give the baby to Ana.”

Yanni stirred. A knee came up, then he rolled onto his side, trying to rise.

Pike said, “Tell him to stay down.”

“In English?”

“In whatever he understands. Tell him if he gets up, I’ll shoot him.”

“Would you?”

“Yes.”

She spoke the language, and Yanni turned toward Pike. Pike showed him the gun. Yanni sighed, then rested his head on the floor. His face was a mess.

Pike said, “I want to be clear. Your husband, this guy Michael Darko, he went to Frank’s house to steal his kid from your sister?”

“Yes.”

There it was. Michael Darko was the fourth man.

“What happened that night, it had nothing to do with Frank. It was all about taking your kid.”

“Michael is going back to Serbia. He wants to raise his son there. Me, he wants to kill.”

“Why?”

“I am nothing. Do you see? A whore he made pregnant. He does not want his son to be the child of a whore.”

“So he murdered your sister and an entire family?”

“My sister was nothing to him. Your friends, nothing. I am nothing, too. He will kill me if he can. He will kill you, too.”

Pike said, “We’ll see.”

He closed his eyes and saw the bodies: Frank, Cindy, Little Frank, Joe. He saw the oily, irregular pools of blood. The Day-Glo green yarn that traced the bullets’ paths.

Collateral damage.

Bystanders in a domestic dispute.

Pike took a slow breath, and felt as if his world had gently shifted. He ran a hand over his head, the short hair stiff and hard. Everything realigned itself into a more comfortable and familiar arrangement, but Frank and his family were still dead. Someone had violated their home. Someone had hurt them. Someone would pay.

Pike considered the woman on the couch, and realized Frank had not been expecting what happened.

“You didn’t warn them. Frank didn’t know this lunatic was after your kid.”

She glanced away for the first time, not quite so cold or aloof.

“No. We lie to them.”

She said it that simply. No, we lie to them. Then she went on.

“We tell them I have emergency. Is just for a few days, and the lady there, she is nice. I was making arrangements for to get to Seattle. A few days, that’s all, then we will go to Seattle. No one know Ana work for these people. How could he find out?”

Collateral damage.

Frank, Cindy, the boys. At least in the desert, Frank had seen the tanks coming.

“Stay on the couch.”

Pike went into the kitchen. He found ice in the freezer, and plastic trash bags under the sink. He cracked a tray of cubes into a trash bag, then dropped it on Yanni.

“Put this on your face. Tell him to put it on his face.”

Yanni said, “I know what you say.”

Pike stepped around him and returned to the woman. He thought about putting his pistol away, but decided to keep it out.

“Is Darko still in Los Angeles?”

“I think yes. It is hard to know.”

Pike wasn’t thrilled by her uncertainty, but at least she seemed willing to cooperate.

“Let’s say he is. If he’s here, where can I find him?”

“I don’t know. If I knew where he was I would have the boy, yes? I would shoot him, and take back the boy.”

“Where does he live?”

“I don’t know. He move a lot.”

“How can you not know where your husband lives?”

She closed her eyes. Her hard face softened, but the corners of her mouth seemed bitter.

“He has not been my husband for many months.”

Pike thought about it, then waved the gun at her belly.

“He do that?”

She looked down and opened the towel, not giving a thought that she was naked. Or maybe she had. Her pale body looked softer now; her belly creased awkwardly at the scars because she was seated. Her breasts were small, but firm. She was a good-looking woman. A little too hard and cold, but maybe that came from the belly. These weren’t surgical scars. Someone had wanted to hurt her, and had likely been trying to kill her. Pike wondered who, and why, and how long ago it had happened. She had been cut deep, and the cuts had hurt. Pike liked it that she wasn’t self-conscious about the scars.

She considered herself before closing the towel.

“No, not Michael. He make me pregnant after the scars. They turned him on.”

“You have a picture of him?”

“No. He does not have his picture taken. He has no pictures.”

“How about a phone?”

“No.”

Pike frowned. Everything was no.

“What if the kid got sick? What if you needed something?”

“These things are paid for. There are other people I tell.”

She shrugged like Pike was an idiot for not knowing the ways of the world.

Pike thought hard, trying to come at it from a different direction. Either she was lying, or she knew almost nothing about him.

“Where would he take the kid?”

“ Serbia.”

“Not Serbia. Now. Before he goes to Serbia. He has to keep a ten-month-old baby somewhere. ”

“A woman, I think, but there are many such women. Michael is not going to change the diaper. He is not going to wake all night to feed.”

“Another whore?”

Her eyes flashed, and Pike felt bad for saying it so harshly. He asked again.

“Does he have a girlfriend? Is he living with another woman?”

“I don’t know. I am going to find out.”

Pike studied her. She was going to find out. She was going to take back her child. She.

“It was a mistake not to tell the police. You still can. You should.”

Yanni mumbled something in Serbian, but Rina snapped back, cutting him off.

Pike said, “English.”

“What will they do, deport me? I have been arrested many times. I am not here with the papers.”

“They won’t ask if you’re a citizen. And they won’t care about your record. Your child was kidnapped. The kidnappers murdered five people. Michael’s crew has murdered twelve people, altogether. That’s what the police care about.”

“You don’t know anything.”

“I know the police. I used to be a policeman.”

The remains of her smile grew nasty.

“Well, let me ask you this, Mr. Policeman-used-to-be. When I find this man, you think the police will let me shoot him in the head? That is what I am going to do.”

Pike thought, this woman means it.

Rina seemed to read his thoughts, and the sharp smile grew edges.

“This is how we do it, old-school, where I am from. Do you see?”

“Are all Serbian women like you?”

“Yes.”

Pike glanced at Yanni, still with the bag of ice on his face. Yanni nodded.

Pike looked back at the woman.

“Maybe you should come with me. I can put you someplace safe.”

“I don’t know nothing about you, and I got a lot of work to do. I will stay with my friend.”

Pike holstered the Python. He took her Ruger from his pocket. It wasn’t a fancy gun, but it was serviceable and deadly. He took out the magazine, then worked the slide to unload the chamber just as he had at the hospital. He thumbed the loose cartridge into the magazine, then tossed the gun and magazine onto the couch. They bounced against her thigh.

She said, “You aren’t going to call the police?”

“No. I’m going to help you.”

When he took out his cell phone, Rina jumped up.

“You say no police!”

“I’m not calling the police.”

Pike called Elvis Cole.

16

MICHAEL DARKO. Pike now had a name, but he knew nothing about Michael Darko, and needed to know more. It was important to understand the enemy before you engaged him, and impossible to find him without knowing his patterns and needs.

When Cole arrived, Yanni was seated on a dinette chair, holding a bloody towel to his head. Rina was dressed, but the Ruger was still by her on the couch. Pike introduced them by pointing at each and saying their names.

Cole eyed Yanni, then the gun, then Rina. Rina eyed him back, cool and suspicious.

“What is this one, another used-to-be policeman?”

“He’s a private investigator. He’s good at finding people.”

“Then let him get started. We have wasted much time.”

Cole took a seat near the couch as Pike sketched out everything Rina had told him about Darko, how the baby came to be with Ana, the kidnapping, and Rina’s intention to take back her child. When Pike was recounting that part of it, Cole looked over at Rina. When Cole looked, she tapped the pistol nestled against her leg.

Cole said, “What’s your son’s name?”

“Petar. Peter.”

“You have a picture?”

Pike thought her face darkened, but she stared at Cole glumly until Yanni mumbled something in Serbian.

Pike said, “English. I’m not going to tell you again.”

Rina pushed up from the couch.

“Yes, I have picture.”

She went into the bedroom, dug through her bag, then returned with a snapshot. It showed a smiling baby with wispy red hair. The baby was on a green carpet, reaching toward the camera. Pike didn’t know much about babies, but this one didn’t look ten months old.

She said, “When I leave apartment, I leave fast. This is only picture I have. You cannot have it.”

Pike said, “He doesn’t look almost a year old.”

She scowled like he was an idiot.

“You are stupid? He is ten months and three days now. In picture, he is six months, one week, and one day. Is only picture I have.”

Cole arched his eyebrows at Pike.

“What’s wrong with you? Can’t you tell how old a baby is?”

Pike wasn’t sure if Cole was joking or not. Cole turned back to the woman.

“I can scan a copy on my computer, and give this one back. Would that be okay?”

She seemed to think about it, then nodded.

“That would be okay.”

Cole put the picture aside, and turned back to ask more questions.

“Why did you have to leave so fast?”

“Michael was coming.”

“For Peter.”

“Michael say he want the boy, I say no, he say ha. I know what Michael thinks. He kill me, he take the boy, he pretend the whore-mother never exist.”

“So you stashed Peter with your sister while you went to find a place to live in Seattle.”

“Yes.”

“How did Michael find them?”

“I don’t know.”

“Would Ana have called him, maybe trying to work things out for you?”

Rina laughed, but it was bitter and wise.

“She would never do that. She is scared of these people. I keep her away from all that.”

Cole glanced at Pike, not understanding.

“These people?”

Yanni spoke again, and another brief, incomprehensible conversation ensued. Pike stood, and Yanni immediately raised both hands.

“She means the thieves. Ana is little girl when they come. Rina keep Ana away from these men.”

Rina was nodding, her eyes narrowed and hard, and then she picked up where Yanni left off.

“She is not to be a whore. She is not to work for Michael. I make her go to school, and have normal friends in her life, and to be a good girl.”

Pike said, “You protected her.”

Rina glanced out the window.

“Not so well.”

Cole cleared his throat, pulling them back.

“Who knew Ana had the baby?”

“No one.”

“Yanni knew.”

Yanni raised his hands again and shook his head.

“I not tell anyone. I am with Rina every minute.”

Rina made an impatient wave.

“Yanni is good. I don’t know how Michael find her there. I cannot understand.”

Cole said, “Let’s get back to Michael. This guy is your husband, but you don’t know where he lives?”

“Nobody knows. That is how he makes his life.”

“No address, no picture, not even a phone?”

“He get new phone every week. The numbers change. What do you want me to say?”

Rina scowled at Pike.

“When is he going to start all this finding he is so good at?”

Pike said, “Michael hides. We get that. But you know more about him than anyone else here. We need information so we have something to work with.”

She spread her hands.

“I am anxious to get started.”

Cole said, “Who are his friends?”

“He has no friends.”

“Where does his family live?”

“Serbia.”

“I meant his relatives here.”

“He leave them all in Serbia.”

“Okay. What about your friends? Maybe one of them can help us find Michael.”

“I have no friends. They are all afraid of Michael.”

Cole looked over at Pike again.

“I can’t write fast enough to keep up.”

Rina squinted at him.

“Is the great finder of people making fun of me?”

Pike cleared his throat.

“We need some names. Who does Michael work with? Who works for him? Even if you don’t know them, you must’ve heard the names mentioned, time to time.”

Rina frowned at Yanni as if looking for guidance. Yanni glanced at Pike, afraid to say anything. Pike nodded, giving permission. They had a brief conversation that sounded more like an argument, and then they both started spitting out names. The names were difficult to understand, and even more difficult to spell, but Cole scratched them into his notebook.

When Cole finished with the names, he looked up, and seemed hopeful.

“Has Darko ever been arrested? Here in L.A.?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so, but I don’t know. He has been here much longer than me.”

Cole glanced over at Pike, arching his eyebrows again.

“Keep your fingers crossed on that one. I’ll check out Darko and these other guys, see if they’re in the system. If Darko’s been arrested, we might get lucky here. The one person you can’t lie to about where you live or what you own is the bail bondsman.”

Pike knew this to be true from his time as an officer. Criminals lie to everyone about everything. They would give phony names, ages, and addresses to the police, the courts, each other, and even their own lawyers, but they could not lie to a bail bondsman. A bondsman would not post a bond without collateral, and if a bondsman could not confirm that the applicant legally owned what he claimed to own, that applicant stayed in jail.

Cole continued the questioning, but she didn’t know very much more. Darko paid for everything in cash, used no credit cards that were not stolen, and made Rina pay all the bills for herself and the baby from her own checking account, which he then reimbursed in cash. Phones changed, addresses changed, locations changed, and cars changed. He was a man who left no trails and lived a hidden life.

Pike said, “How were you planning to find him?”

She shrugged as if there were only one way, and they should have gotten around to it sooner.

“I would watch for the money.”

Cole and Pike traded a glance, then Cole turned back to her.

“How does he make his money?”

“Sex. He has the girls. He has the people who steal the big trucks-”

“Hijackers? Trucks filled with TVs, clothes, things like that?”

“Yes. He has the people who steal the credit card information. He sells the bad gasoline. He has the strip clubs and bars.”

Pike said, “You know where these places are?”

“Some. I mostly know the girls.”

Cole glanced up from his notes.

“You know where he keeps the girls?”

“I don’t know to say the address. I can show you.”

Now Cole glanced over, and this time he stood. Pike followed him to the far side of the room, where Cole lowered his voice. Both Rina and Yanni were watching.

“Did you find anything of her sister’s?”

Pike told him what he found-the laptop, the yearbook, a few other things. All out in the Jeep.

Cole said, “Good. I want to check out her story. Just because she tells us this stuff doesn’t make it real.”

“I’ll put everything in your car when I leave.”

“Also, I want to see what I can find out about this guy, Darko. If she’s giving it to us straight about him, then I probably know someone on LAPD who can help.”

Pike knew someone, too, though not on LAPD, and now Pike wanted to see him.

From the couch, Rina said, “I don’t like all these whispers.”

Pike turned to face her.

“You’re going to take a ride with him. Show him whatever you know about Darko’s businesses, and answer his questions.”

“Where are you going? What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to answer his questions, too.”

Pike glanced at Cole.

“You good?”

“Living the dream.”

Pike let himself out.

17

PIKE PLACED THE LAPTOP and other things he had taken from Ana’s room in Cole’s car, then headed back to his Jeep. As he was crossing the visitors’ parking lot, a brown Nissan Sentra slowed by the entrance. Two Latin men in the front seats tumed to check out the parking lot, and seemed to be looking at Pike’s Jeep. Then the driver saw Pike. There was a slight hesitation, then the driver gestured angrily at his passenger, making as if they were in the middle of an argument and seeing Pike hadn’t meant anything. Then the Sentra sped up and was gone.

Maybe it was something, but maybe not.

Troops in the desert called it spider-sense, after the movies about the Marvel comic book character, Spider-Man, how he senses something bad before it happens.

Pike’s spider-sense tingled, but then the Sentra was gone. He tried to remember if he had seen a brown Sentra with two Latin guys earlier, but nothing came to mind.

Pike was in no hurry to leave. If the Sentra was waiting around the corner to follow him, they might get tired of waiting and come back to see what he was doing. Then Pike would have them.

Pike spent the next few minutes thinking about Michael Darko. Learning that Darko belonged to an EEOC gang set was a major break, mostly because it gave Pike direction. Los Angeles held the second largest collection of East European gangsters in the United States, most of whom were Russian. The fifteen republics of the former Soviet Union had all contributed gang sets to what most cops called Russian Organized Crime, whether they originally came from Russia or not. The Odessa Mafia was the largest set in L.A., followed by the Armenians, but smaller sets from Romania, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Chechnya, and the rest of Eastern Europe had been arriving for years. Most had been criminals back in their home states, but some had done other things.

Pike called Jon Stone.

“How’s your head?”

“Bugger off. My head’s fine, bro. That’s just another night for me.”

“Is Gregor still in L.A.?”

“It’s George. He’s George Smith now. You have to be careful with his name.”

“I remember. Is he here?”

“Got a new place over on La Brea. What do you want with George?”

“He might be able to help.”

“This thing with Frank?”

“An EOC gang is involved.”

“No shit?”

“Yes.”

Stone was silent for a moment, then gave Pike an address.

“Take your time getting there, okay? I’ll talk to him first. You walk in cold, he might get the wrong idea.”

“I understand.”

La Brea Avenue starts at the foot of the Hollywood Hills, and runs south through the city to the Hollywood Park racetrack. A ten-block stretch of its length between Melrose and Wilshire was known as decorators’ row because it was lined with everything from high-end custom furniture boutiques to Middle Eastern rug merchants to designer lighting and antique shops. The people who owned the stores came from all over the world, and sold to customers from all over the world, but not all of them were what they seemed.

Pike found a spot for his Jeep outside a flower shop a block south of Beverly Boulevard. Pike had watched for the Sentra on a meandering drive from the Valley, and now he checked for the Sentra again when he got out of his Jeep. The Sentra had probably been nothing more than two guys who thought they saw something they didn’t, but Pike still had the creeped out sensation of crosshairs on his back.

Pike didn’t go into the florist. He walked south one and a half blocks to an antique-lighting store. The store was narrow, with so many ceiling lights and wall sconces filling the window that the place looked like a secondhand junk store. A chime tinkled when Pike entered.

The interior of the shop was as cluttered as the window; the walls festooned with sconces, and chandeliers and pendant lamps dripping from the ceiling like moss. Lamps of different sizes sprouted from every available surface like tropical plants in a jungle.

A man’s voice said, “Hello, Joseph.”

Took Pike a moment to find him, hidden behind the lamps like a hunter hidden by undergrowth.

“Gregor.”

“It’s George now, please. Remember?”

“Sure. I’m sorry.”

George Smith materialized from between the lamps. Pike hadn’t seen him in years, but he looked the same-shorter than Pike, and not as muscular, but with the sleek, strong build of a surfer, a surfer’s tan, and pale blue eyes. George was one of the deadliest human beings Pike knew. A gifted sniper. An immaculate assassin.

George was Gregor Suvorov in those days, but had changed his name when he moved to Los Angeles. George Smith sounded as if he had grown up in Modesto, having what broadcasters called a “general American” accent, but Gregor Suvorov had grown up in Odessa, Ukraine, where he enlisted in the Army of the Russian Federation, and spent a dozen years in the Russian Special Purpose Regiment known as the Spetsnaz GRU-the Russian version of the U.S. Army’s Special Forces-which was run by the KGB. The KGB gave special schooling to their brightest troopers, and Gregor was exceptionally bright. Hence, his fluency with English.

After combat tours in Chechnya and Afghanistan, he cashed in to the private contractor market, enjoyed his newfound money and freedoms, and opted for even more. He moved to Los Angeles, where he enjoyed the sun, sold collectible lamps, and worked for the Odessa Mafia.

George offered his hand, and Pike took it. Warm iron. George smiling, welcoming Pike into his store.

“Man, it’s been forever. You good?”

“Good.”

“I was surprised when Jon called. But pleased. Watch your head. That’s a deco Tiffany, circa 1923. Eight thousand to the trade.”

Pike dipped sideways to avoid the light. Despite being filled with lamps, the shop was dingy and dim, with shadows lurking in the corners. George probably liked it that way.

Pike said, “Business good?”

“Excellent, thank you. I wish I had come to America sooner. I should have been born here, man. I’m telling you!”

“Not the lamp business. Your other business.”

“I knew what you meant. That business is good, too, both here and abroad.”

George still accepted special assignments outside of the Odessa work if the price was right, though his clients these days were almost always governments or political agencies. No one else could afford him.

Pike followed George to a desk at the rear of the shop where they could sit.

“Jon tell you why I’m here?”

“Yeah. Listen, I’m sorry about Frank. Really. I never met the dude, but I’ve heard good things.”

“You still involved with Odessa?”

George’s smile flashed again.

“You wouldn’t mind a quick scan, would you? Would that be all right?”

Pike spread his hands, saying scan all you want.

George took an RF scanner similar to the one Pike owned from his desk, and ran it over Pike from his sunglasses to his shoes. Pike didn’t object. He would have been surprised if George hadn’t checked him. When George was satisfied, he put the scanner away.

“Old habits.”

“No problem.”

“Would you like a cup of tea? I have the black tea. From Georgia. Not your Georgia-ours.”

Pike didn’t want his tea and didn’t want to chat.

“I’m good. You still in with the ROC, George?”

George pursed his lips. Annoyed. The deadliest man Pike knew was pissy.

“It’s Odessa, and I’m not in with them. I’m not a member. I consult on a freelance basis. I’m my own boss.”

This seemed important to George, so Pike nodded.

“I understand.”

“That being said, if you want to discuss Odessa business, I can’t.”

“I don’t care about Odessa. I want to know about the Serbs.”

“So Jon told me. A hard people. Very tough. I fought them in Chechnya.”

“Not there. Here. Can you talk about the gang sets here in Los Angeles?”

George nodded, but a vagueness came to his eyes as if he had suddenly noticed something a thousand yards away.

“Shouldn’t be a problem. They do their thing, Odessa is something else. Like with the Armenians. The same, but different.”

“You know of a Michael Darko?”

George rocked back in his chair, the body language telling Pike that George was uncomfortable talking about Darko.

“He killed your friend, Frank Meyer?”

“Looks that way.”

George grunted.

“I know who he is. A hard man.”

“What does hard mean?”

“You understand the word, pakhan?”

“No.”

“A boss. Middle management for now, but he’s on the way up. These people aren’t given their promotions, they take them. Like cannibals eating each other.”

Pike saw disdain in the pale eyes, and realized George felt superior to the gangsters who employed him. Maybe this was why he was adamant that Pike understand he was an independent contractor, and not part of Odessa. All of them might be killers, but George had come out of Spetsnaz-the rest were just animals.

“What kind of crime does he do?”

“A finger in many pies, like all these guys. Girls and sex, hijacking, extorting his own people. He’s aggressive, and trying to expand. Quick with the trigger.”

George made a pistol with his hand and pulled the trigger.

Pike said, “Know where I can find him?”

“I don’t.”

“A place of business? He must have some kind of front operation. He’d need that for taxes.”

“I’m sure he must, but this man is just a name to me. Like I said, different circles. I’m a lamp salesman.”

A lamp salesman who could put a bullet through your head from a thousand meters away. Then George continued.

“They have a nickname for him, the Shark. Did you know this?”

“No.”

“Could they be more dramatic? The Shark. He probably made this up for himself.”

George made quote marks in the air when he said “the Shark,” and rolled his eyes.

“He is the Shark because he never stops moving, and he moves so no one can find him. This is not a loved man, even among the Serb sets.”

Pike grunted, now understanding why Rina didn’t know where to find him. So far, her descriptions of Michael Darko matched with Gregor’s.

Pike said, “He’s been using a home invasion crew to take out his competition. He used the same crew on Frank. I want to find them, and I want to find him.”

George laughed, full-bodied and deep.

“You got part of that wrong, buddy. He isn’t taking out his competition. He’s ripping off his partners. Why do you think this asshole has to keep moving?”

“You know about this?”

“Enough to keep tabs. If he wants to rip off his own business partners, good riddance. If he sends a crew to Odessa, they’ll have to deal with me.”

Pike wondered if Darko was ripping off his partners because he was returning to Europe-get some quick cash, grab his kid, go.

“The tabs you keep include his crew?”

George shrugged, no big deal.

“Bangers from Compton.”

“Jamal Johnson?”

“Never heard of him.”

“A Compton offender who’s come into recent wealth.”

“Is he a Crip?”

“I don’t know.”

“A D-Block Crip called Moon Williams runs Darko’s crew. Another dramatic name. Darko feeds him the targets. Williams splits the take.”

Pike felt a burn of excitement, as if he had taken a step closer.

“Moon Williams. You sure?”

George cupped a hand behind his ear as if he was listening.

“The KGB is everywhere. Also, Mr. Moon has been making much money recently, too. He spends it in a club owned by Odessa. Cristal champagne, the finest rock, and beautiful Russian women. He loves the Russian women. He loves to tell them what a badazz life-takin’ nigga he is.”

George burst out laughing again, an obvious glee in his eyes. For George, people like Moon Williams were here so he would always have targets.

Pike said, “Uh-huh. Does the KGB know where I can find him?”

George considered Joe for a moment, then lifted his desk phone, and punched in a number. George spoke Russian to whoever answered, and had a back-and-forth conversation that lasted several minutes. George was silent for a while in the middle of the conversation as if he had been put on hold. During that silence, he gazed at Pike with his pale blue eyes empty, never once blinking. Then he came back to life, whispered a single word in Russian, and hung up. When he looked at Pike again, he was somber.

“Jon told me you and Frank were close.”

“Yes.”

“So you have business with Mr. Darko.”

“If he’s good for Frank’s death, yes. Is that a problem?”

“So long as you stay with the Serbian sets, go with God, my friend.”

“More than one gun was fired that night.”

“I understand. Odessa won’t like losing Mr. Williams. These girls go to work on him, he’s an outrageous source of information.”

“I’m not asking permission, George.”

George smiled at the phone.

“That’s probably the best way.”

George told him where to find Moon Williams, then stood to indicate their meeting was over.

They shook again, and Pike looked around the store. The lamps were old, and ornate, and each had been lovingly and delicately restored.

Pike said, “Why lamps?”

George smiled softly, and now it was filled with warmth and sadness, and, Pike thought, more than a little loss.

“Oh, Joseph. There is so much darkness in the world. Why not bring light?”

Pike nodded.

“Udachi, my friend. Good luck.”

When Pike reached the door, he glanced back, but George was hidden by the lamps, wrapped in so many shadows the light could not reach him.

18

EVEN WITH HIS SUNGLASSES, Pike squinted against the glare, scanning the cars parked along both sides of La Brea. He stood with his back to George’s door, searching until he was satisfied, then walked up the street to his Jeep. No Sentra.

Pike located Moon Williams’s address on his Thomas Guide map, then pulled into traffic.

According to George, Earvin “Moon” Williams was a D-Block Crip banger with a harsh reputation, two felony strikes, and five 187s tattooed in a neat column on his right forearm. Moon bragged to the Russian strippers that each 187 represented a body he knew for sure he put in the morgue, not the people he cut, stabbed, hit with a brick, beat down, or wounded-just the muthafuckas he saw die with his own eyes. Leaving some muthafucka hopping around in a pool of blood or screaming like a bitch didn’t count, he told the strippers. Shooting into a crowd of people on a porch didn’t count either. Moon had to see the bitch die with his own eyes or he didn’t claim the credit. Moon Williams, he told these girls, was a fearless, heartless, stone-cold killer.

Operatives of the Odessa Mafia, who followed him home on at least three occasions, twice without his knowledge and once to sell him drugs, determined that the stone-cold killer lived with his grandmother, a woman named Mildred Gertie Williams, who the killer called Maw-Maw.

Pike found the address in a weathered residential neighborhood in Willowbrook, just north of Compton, at the bottom of a freeway off-ramp. A small stucco house had probably sat on the property at one time, just like all the other houses lining the street, but at some point the original house had likely burned, and now a double-wide mobile home sat on blocks in its place, with four ancient Airstream trailers shoehorned behind it. Pike figured the no-doubt-illegal trailer park was how Mildred Williams paid her bills.

The trailers might have been nice at one time, but now they were faded and scabbed with freeway dust. The double-wide had a small porch set up with a sun awning and potted plants, but shriveled brown threads were all that remained of the plants, and the yard had gone over to sand, dirt, and litter blown down from the freeway. The litter hugged the inevitable chain-link fence as if trying to escape.

Pike turned around on the next block, then pulled to the curb. Three girls on bikes pedaled past, swung around hard in the middle of the street, and rode past again. Eyeing the white man. They probably thought he was a cop.

Pike watched the mobile homes for a few minutes, but saw no signs of activity. An ancient Buick Riviera was illegally parked alongside the fence, so wide it covered the sidewalk. Pike didn’t necessarily expect to find anyone home, but he wanted to confirm that Moon still lived here. If so, he would wait until Moon returned, then use him to reach Darko.

Pike took out his phone and called Jamal again. He got the computer once more. Jamal’s mailbox was still full.

The girls rode past again, slower, and this time Pike rolled down the window. The first girl wore a blue short-sleeved shirt, the second a baggy white T-shirt, and the third was wearing a red sweatshirt. Red, white, and blue. Pike wondered if they had planned it that way.

“Need some help, ladies. You live on this street, or you just passing through?”

The girl in blue turned in a slow, curious circle. The girl in white slowed, but the red kept going. She didn’t stop until she reached the corner.

The blue girl said, “Are you a policeman?”

“No. I’m a salesman.”

The girl laughed.

“You’re a plainclothes policeman. My Uncle Davis is a plainclothes officer, so I know. Also, you’re white. We don’t get many white people except for the police.”

Pike said, “Do you know Ms. Mildred Gertie Williams, up there in the trailers?”

The girl said, “You here for Moon?”

Just like that.

Pike said, “Yes.”

“I live right over there, that yellow house? Uncle Davis warned us about that Moon Williams. He said don’t never go over there and stay away from those boys. He said if that Moon ever makes a problem, we should call him right away.”

Pike tipped his head toward the other girls.

“Those your sisters?”

“No, sir. That’s Lureen and Jonelle. They’re my friends.”

“Which one of those trailers does Ms. Williams live in?”

“The one up front. That’s the big one.”

“Does Moon live with her?”

“He’s in the back trailer, the one with the dogs.”

Pike hadn’t seen dogs when he passed the yard.

“He has dogs?”

“Those pit bull dogs. Those dogs are mean. Uncle Davis told my mama if she ever saw those dogs running loose, she had to call him right away.”

“You know who lives in the other trailers?”

She screwed up her face, then shook her head.

“Was a lady in one and Jonelle’s cousin lived there for a while, but they moved out after Moon came home.”

Moon had brought a blight to the neighborhood.

“What’s your name, blue girl?”

“I’m not supposed to tell my name to strange adults.”

Uncle Davis again.

“You probably shouldn’t be talking to strangers, either.”

“I’m not stupid. You get out of that car, I’ll ride away as fast as I can. Lureen and Jonelle over there, they’ll call my Uncle Davis, then you’ll see.”

“One more thing. Have you seen Ms. Williams or Moon today?”

She circled a couple of times, thinking, then shook her head.

“No, I sure haven’t. I haven’t been down that way today. I was at school, and then I was at Jonelle’s, and Lureen just came over so we’re going to her house.”

Pike said, “Okay, then. You have a nice time at Lureen’s.”

“You watch out for those dogs.”

Pike decided he didn’t have much time as the three girls rode away. They would probably tell Lureen’s mother, and Lureen’s mother would probably call the blue girl’s mother, who would call Uncle Davis. Uncle Davis would probably send a patrol car by to take a look.

Pike waited until the girls disappeared, then idled forward and parked alongside the Riviera. The edge of Mildred’s yard butted against city property where the off-ramp looped down from the freeway, and the rear of the property backed against what appeared to be a large storage facility. Pike saw no dogs, though the last trailer was surrounded by its own taller fence. Pike slipped his.45 Kimber under his belt at the small of his back, clipped the Python to his belt under his sweatshirt, then hopped the first fence into Mildred Williams’s yard.

Pike went to the big double-wide, listened at the door, then went to the nearest window. The freeway was loud, which made listening difficult. He stretched on his toes to peek inside, and saw a basic living room with an old-fashioned console television. The room was neat, clean, and the television was off. Pike angled his head, trying to see through an interior door when a gray-and-white cat jumped against the window. The cat cried at him through the glass as if it was lonely and wanted to escape.

Pike returned to the door. He tapped three times, then decided Ms. Williams had probably gone out.

Pike drew the Python as he moved to the second trailer, and let it dangle down along his leg. The second and third trailers were both empty, the tenants long since gone to escape Moon and his crew.

The fourth trailer sat by itself against a wall of ragged oleanders, caged by a six-foot chain-link fence. A gate in the center of the fence was latched but not locked. There wasn’t much of a yard. Just a few feet of dirt on either side of the Airstream and a few feet behind. Two large metal bowls were under the trailer, one filled with water. A chain stretched from the tow hitch to disappear behind the trailer. It was the kind of chain used for a strong, aggressive dog, but Pike could not see what was attached to the other end.

Pike stood at the fence, listening. The trailer was still. Windows closed. No voices or music.

Pike made a tsk, tsk, tsk sound.

A dog inside the trailer barked. Not behind; inside.

Pike lowered himself into a push-up position, trying to see what was behind the trailer by looking under it, but accumulated junk and dead weeds blocked his view. He made the tsking sound again, and the dog inside barked. One dog inside.

The blue girl said Moon had dogs-more than one.

Pike let himself through the gate, ready to step back if an animal charged, but nothing moved. The dog inside was barking so loudly, Pike doubted Moon or anyone else was home. He latched the gate, then took a roundabout route to see behind the trailer, and that’s when he saw the dog. A ragged male pit bull lay on its side, two legs stiff in the air. The dog’s head was matted with dried blood and swarming with black bottle flies, but the dog wasn’t the only dead thing behind the trailer. An African-American man was sprawled a few feet beyond the dog, his face covered with so many ants they looked like a second skin. The smell followed an instant later, strong enough to make Pike’s eyes water.

Pike checked the body, but found no identification. He had been shot twice in the back. A black nine-millimeter Ruger pistol lay in the dirt by his hand.

Pike left the man and the gun, and went to the window. The barking inside grew louder as he approached, then abruptly stopped.

The old Airstream was much smaller than the double-wide. It contained only three small rooms-a kitchenette, a living room, and a single bedroom with a bath. Pike looked into the kitchen first, saw nothing, then looked into the living room.

The inside pit bull had stopped barking because it was eating. The dog tore a strip of flesh from a man’s neck, gulped the meat down, then lapped at the wound. The dog’s face and chest were matted with blood, and its feet were red boots. A second male body was half on a couch and half on the floor. The flesh on the second man’s left forearm had been partially eaten, but his right forearm was intact. The numbers tattooed there were easy to read.

187

187

187

187

187

One for each of the people he put in the ground.

Pike said, “Good night, Moon.”

19

PIKE STOOD AT THE WINDOW, deciding what he needed to do. He wouldn’t leave the dog trapped in the trailer, and he wouldn’t leave the bodies where the red, white, and blue girls could find them. Pike would call the police, but he wanted to search the premises first. While Pike was thinking, the dog stopped lapping the blood and looked at him. It cocked its head, squinting as if it couldn’t see so well, and wagged its tail. Then a fire grew in its eyes, and it lunged against the window.

Pike said, “Let’s hope I don’t have to kill you.”

Pike wasn’t afraid of the dog, but the trick would be controlling the animal without harming it.

Pike found a length of two-by-four by the double-wide. He unclipped the chain from the tow hitch, fashioned a noose, then looped it around the two-by-four. The dog tracked Pike’s location by sound, and followed him around the inside of the trailer, barking and snarling.

When Pike approached the trailer’s door, the dog slammed into the interior side like a linebacker.

Pike said, “Easy.”

The door was hinged to open out, which Pike figured would work to his advantage. He pressed his shoulder against the door, unshipped the latch, and the big dog immediately tried to push the door open.

Pike let it open enough to offer the end of the two-by-four. The dog crunched into the wood, shaking its head as if trying to break a smaller dog’s back. Pike let the noose slip off the board over the dog’s head, then pulled the noose tight, and dragged the dog out of the trailer. The dog spit out the two-by-four and lunged, so Pike lifted its front legs off the ground. The pit twisted and snapped, streamers of drool flying. The dog wasn’t trying to get away; it was trying to bite.

He worked the dog to the tow hitch, and wrapped the chain so the dog’s head was held close to the steel. The dog’s head and shoulders were blistered with scars, its nubby ears were shredded, and the left eye was milky. Mangy scabs covered its rump. A fight dog, tossed in the pit with similar dogs because Moon and his friends dug watching them rip each other apart. The dog licked the dried blood on its muzzle.

Pike said, “Guess you had the last laugh.”

Pike entered the trailer, picking a careful path around tendrils of blood that spread from the bodies. The chemical stink of decay gases, dog shit, and spoiled human meat was terrible. Pike pulled on a pair of latex gloves, then noticed that Williams’s right elbow appeared injured. The inside of the elbow above the 187s was badly discolored, showing a prominent lump under the skin as if Williams had two elbows instead of one. Pike felt the lump and realized it was bone. Moon’s elbow had been broken.

Pike thought Frank Meyer might have done the deed, and the corner of his mouth twitched, Pike’s version of a smile.

Pike searched Williams first, and found a nine-millimeter Glock in Williams’s back pocket. Pike checked the chamber, then the magazine, and counted thirteen cartridges in a magazine designed to hold seventeen. With one remaining in the chamber, this meant three shots could have been fired. Pike wondered if the bullets found in Frank’s house had come from this gun. SID would test-fire the weapon, and run a comparison, and then they would know. Pike put the clip back into the gun, and the gun in Moon’s pocket.

Moon’s remaining pockets produced a wallet, a ring of keys, a blue bandanna, a pack of Kools, two joints, a pink Bic lighter, and a PayDay candy bar. The wallet contained three hundred forty-two dollars, seven Visa cards in seven different names (none of them Earvin Williams), and no driver’s license. Pike examined the keys, and found one with worn teeth bearing the Buick emblem. He kept the keys.

The second body yielded another nine-millimeter Glock, this one missing two bullets. Elsewhere on the body, Pike found eighty-six dollars, a pack of Salem Lights, a stick of Juicy Fruit, and another set of keys, but no wallet or cell phone. Neither Moon nor the man outside had cell phones, either, which made it three for three.

Pike moved to the door for some fresh air, and looked back at the scene. Open beer bottles, two crack pipes on a wide ceramic ashtray, and a plastic baggie of rock-these guys were chilling when they were shot, and Moon had been trying to dull the pain of his damaged elbow. Moon had been shot twice in the face. The other man had been shot once in the chest and once in the head. Both were armed, but neither had drawn their weapons, suggesting they had been caught off guard by someone they knew. The third man probably bailed when the shooting started, but was chased down outside and shot.

Pike studied the floor, wondering if the murders had been committed by more than one person. The dog had been trapped for days, endlessly moving from door to windows, in and out of each room, and on the furniture. Blood, dog crap, and piss were smeared everywhere, obliterating any footprints.

Pike found three shell casings. He examined each one without touching it, noting that all three were nine-millimeter casings. He wondered if the bullets in Moon and his friends would match the bullets in Frank, and if Michael Darko had killed them.

Pike quickly searched the rest of the trailer, but found no evidence that a baby had been present. He decided to check the Buick, but when he stepped outside and saw the dog, he stopped. The pit bull made a low, huff ing bark, then pawed the earth. Its tongue lolled like a strip of purple liver.

Pike pulled the metal water pan from beneath the trailer, found a hose, then set the pan at the dog’s feet. The dog strained to drink, but the lead was too short, so Pike played out enough chain for the dog to reach the water. The dog slurped noisily, splashing most of the water out of the pan.

Pike laid a hand on the dog’s hard back, and the dog spun fast as a striking snake, exploding out of the water as it went for Pike’s throat. The dog was fast, but Pike was faster, one instant beside the dog, the next a pace away, just out of reach. The dog clamped its jaws in a frenzy.

Pike felt no fear or anger at the dog. He simply got the hose, and refilled the bowl from a safe distance. He figured the animal had been beaten regularly to make it mean. Wasn’t the dog’s fault. Even now, the dog tried so hard to reach him that its neck bulged over the chain and its eyes rolled with rage.

Pike said, “It’s okay, buddy. I understand.”

The dog strained even harder to bite him.

Pike went to the Riviera.

Moon’s key opened the Riviera perfectly, but Pike did not get in. He pulled on a fresh pair of latex gloves, then searched the glove box and under the front buckets, hoping for a cell phone or some hard link to Michael Darko.

He found it on the backseat, as alien to the car’s cracked, filthy interior as a perfect white rose-a baby’s bib. Made of a soft white cloth with a pattern of blue bunnies. Orange and green stains streaked the front. Pike felt the supple material, and knew the bib had been in the car only a few days. He held it to his nose, and knew the stains were recent. The orange smelled of apricots, the green of peas.

Pike folded the bib into a square and tucked it into his pocket, wondering what Moon Williams had done with the baby. Then Pike remembered Moon’s grandmother. The freeway noise was loud, but multiple gunshots had been fired. The woman should have heard. Her grandson and the other two bodies had been here for at least three days. She would have discovered them.

Pike locked the Riviera and went to the double-wide. This time he didn’t knock.

The gray-and-white cat raced out when he opened the door, and the same terrible smell seared his throat. The living room was neat and orderly the way he had seen it through the window, but as soon as he entered he saw the broken door at the end of the hall, and heard the cheery, upbeat melody of game-show music. Pike found Ms. Mildred Gertie Williams dead on her bedroom floor. A small television on her dresser was showing a rerun of Bob Barker’s The Price Is Right. Ms. Williams was wearing pajamas, a thin robe, and furry pink slippers, and had been shot twice in the body and once in the forehead. She had been shot in the left hand, too, but the bullet had entered the palm and exited the back of her hand, making a through-and-through defensive wound. She had been trying to ward off the shooter or begging for her life when the shooter fired, shooting through her hand.

Pike turned off the television. Her bed was rumpled and unmade, with a TV remote by the pillows. She was probably watching TV when she heard the shots, and got up to see what happened. Pike pictured her standing as she would have been before she was murdered. He placed himself where the shooter would have stood, made a gun of his hand, and aimed. The spent casings would have ejected to the right, so he looked right, and found them between the wall and an overstuffed chair. Two nine-millimeters, same brand as the casings in Moon’s trailer.

Pike stood over Mildred Williams, her face now misshapen and rimed with blood. Framed pictures of children lined the dresser, smiling gap-toothed boys and girls, one of whom was probably Moon.

Pike studied the pictures. He said nothing, but thought, this is how your love was repaid.

Pike left her as he found her, went outside, and sat in one of the lawn chairs under the awning. The air was good and cool, and not filled with death. Pike exhaled with his diaphragm, pushing out the bad stuff. If death was in him, he wanted to get rid of it.

Pike phoned John Chen, who answered from the lab at SID in a hushed, paranoid whisper.

“I can’t talk. They’re all around me.”

“Just listen. In a couple of hours, SID will roll to a murder site in Willowbrook. They’ll find three deceased males, a deceased female, three nine-millimeter pistols, and spent casings from a fourth gun.”

Chen’s voice grew even softer.

“Holy Christ, did you kill them?”

“Comp their guns with the casings and bullets you have from the Meyer house. They’re going to match.”

“Holy Christ again! You got the crew who killed the Meyers?”

“The spent casings in Willowbrook will probably match with the casings you found in Ana Markovic’s room. The man who killed Ana probably committed the Willowbrook murders.”

“The fourth man?”

“Yes.”

“Waitaminute. You’re saying one of their own guys killed them?”

“Yes.”

Pike broke the connection, then phoned Elvis Cole.

“It’s me. You alone?”

“Yeah. I’m at the office. Just dropped her off.”

“She have anything?”

“She showed me three condo complexes and gave me a lecture on how Darko runs his call-girl business, but whether it’s true or helps us, I don’t know. I’m having a title and document search run, but I won’t have the results until later. I’m about to get started on her sister.”

“You won’t need to trace Rahmi’s calls.”

“You found Jamal?”

Pike did not mention George Smith by name, but described how someone with inside information connected Michael Darko with a D-Block Crip named Moon Williams, who lived down in Willowbrook. Then Pike described what he found.

“You think they were killed the same night Meyer was murdered?”

“Within hours. We’ll know if these are the same guns when Chen runs the comps, but they’re going to match.”

Pike told him about the bib.

Cole said, “But why would Darko kill them after they delivered his kid?”

“Maybe they didn’t deliver the kid. Maybe they tried to hold him up for a bigger payoff, or maybe he just wanted to get rid of the witnesses.”

Cole said, “What are you going to do?”

“Call the police. I can’t leave these people like this. Little kids live around here. They might find the bodies.”

Even as Pike said it, the pit bull growled, and Pike saw two L.A. County sheriff’s cruisers coming toward him up the street. An unmarked car was behind them.

Pike said, “Looks like I won’t have to call. The sheriffs are rolling up now.”

“How did the cops get there?”

“Cars.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I don’t know. I’m wondering that myself.”

A third cruiser appeared from the opposite direction, the three of them blocking his Jeep. Uniformed deps and the plainclothes people climbed out of their vehicles, and no one seemed in much of a hurry. Almost as if they knew what they’d find. Pike found that curious.

Pike started to end the call, then remembered the bib in his pocket.

“Don’t tell her what I found here, okay? I want to tell her.”

“Whatever you want.”

“I have to go.”

Pike put away his phone, but stayed in the chair, and raised his hands. The deputies saw him, and an older dep with gray hair and a hard face approached the gate.

“You Joe Pike?”

“I am. I was just about to call you.”

“Sure, you were. That’s what they all say.”

The deputy drew his gun, and then the other deps fanned out along the fence, and they drew down on him, too.

The dep said, “You’re under arrest. You do anything with those hands other than keep them up, I’ll shoot you out of that chair.”

The pit bull went into a frenzy, trying to break free. Pike didn’t move. He studied the two plainclothes cops who got out of the unmarked car. Middle-aged Latin guys. They looked familiar, and then he realized where he had seen them before. The last time he saw them, they were driving a Sentra.

20

Elvis Cole

ANA MARKOVIC GRADUATED FROM the East Valley Arts and Sciences High School in Glendale two years earlier. Cole knew this from the yearbook Pike took from her room. First thing Cole did, he found her picture among the senior class-a thin girl with bright features, a large nose, and two monster zits on her chin. She had tried to cover them with makeup, but they were so inflamed they had burst through. Ana had probably been mortified.

Cole thought she kinda looked like Rina, but many people kinda looked like someone else.

The yearbook stated that Ana’s class consisted of 1,284 graduating seniors, most of whom, Cole thought, had written an inscription in Ana’s book. The yearbook’s inside covers were dense with notes and signatures, mostly from girls, telling Ana to remember what great times they had or teasing her about boys she had liked, everyone promising everyone else they would be best friends forever.

Pike had tucked three snapshots in the yearbook. One showed Ana with Frank Meyer’s two little boys, so Cole put it aside. The second showed Ana with two girlfriends, the three of them on a soccer field, arms around each other with huge, happy smiles. In this picture, one of the girls had short black hair with purple highlights, and the other was a tall girl with long, sandy brown hair, milky skin, and freckles. The third photo showed Ana and the brown-haired girl at what appeared to be a Halloween party. They wore identical flapper costumes, and had struck a funny pose with their splayed hands framing their faces like a couple of jazz-era dancers.

The background in the soccer field picture suggested a school campus, so Cole went back to the yearbook. He started at the beginning of the 1,284 senior class pictures and scanned the rows of portraits, hoping to get lucky. He did. The brown-haired girl was named Sarah Manning.

Cole phoned Information, and asked if they had a listing for that name in Glendale. He was hoping to get lucky again, but this time he wasn’t.

“I’m sorry, sir. We have no listing by that name.”

“What about Burbank and North Hollywood?”

Burbank and North Hollywood were next to Glendale.

“Sorry, sir. I already checked.”

Cole put the yearbook aside and examined Ana’s computer. It was an inexpensive PC that took forever to boot up, but the desktop finally appeared, revealing several neatly arranged rows of icons. Cole studied the icons for an address book, and found something called Speed Dial. He typed in Sarah Manning, clicked Search, and there she was.

Cole said, “The World’s Greatest Detective strikes again.”

The entry for Sarah Manning showed an address in Glendale, an 818 phone number, and a gmail Internet address. Cole almost never called in advance. People tended to hang up on him, and never returned his calls, but driving to Glendale to find out Sarah Manning had moved didn’t appeal to him. For all he knew, she was pulling a tour in Afghanistan.

He called the number, and was surprised when she answered.

“Hello?”

“Sarah Manning?”

“Yes, who is this, please?”

She sounded breathy, as if she was in a hurry. It occurred to him she might not know that Ana Markovic had been murdered, but she did, and didn’t seem particularly upset.

Cole said, “I’d like to sit down with you for a few minutes, Sarah. I have some questions about Ana.”

“I don’t know. I’m at school.”

“East Valley High?”

“Cal State Northridge. High school was two years ago.”

“Sorry. This won’t take long, but it’s important. I understand you were close with her.”

“Did they catch the people who did it?”

“Not yet. That’s why I need your help.”

She was slow to answer, as if she had to think about it.

“Well, okay, like what?”

“In person is better.”

“I’m really busy.”

Cole studied the picture of Ana and Sarah in the flapper outfits. Cole didn’t want to ask about prostitute sisters and Serbian mobsters over the phone, especially since these things might turn out to be lies.

“It’s important, Sarah. You’re on campus? I can be there in fifteen minutes.”

“Well, I guess so. I’ll have to cut class.”

Like it was the end of the world.

Sarah described a coffee shop on Reseda Boulevard not far from campus, and told him she would meet him in twenty minutes. Cole hung up before she could change her mind.

Twenty-two minutes later, he found her seated at an outside table. She was wearing pale blue shorts, a white T-shirt, and sandals. Her hair was shorter than in the high school picture, but otherwise she looked the same.

“Sarah?”

Cole gave her his best smile and offered his hand. She took it, but was clearly uncomfortable. He nodded toward the deli.

“Would you like something?”

“This is just weird, that’s all. I don’t know what I can tell you.”

“Well, let’s see where the answers take us. When was the last time you spoke with her?”

She thought for a moment, then shook her head.

“A year. Maybe more than a year. We kinda drifted apart.”

“But you were close in high school?”

“Since seventh grade. We all came from different elementaries. We were the three musketeers.”

Cole flashed on the picture of the three girls on the soccer field.

“Who was the third?”

“Lisa Topping. I thought about Lisa while I was waiting. You should talk to Lisa. They stayed in touch.”

“Black hair, purple highlights?”

Sarah cocked her head, and seemed engaged for the first time.

“Yeah. How’d you know?”

“Ana had a picture of the three of you in her room. She had a picture of you and her dressed like flappers, too. That’s how I found your name.”

Sarah stared at him for a moment, then looked away. She blinked several times, and her eyes grew pink.

Cole said, “You sure I can’t get you something? Water?”

She shook her head, glancing away as if eye contact was painful.

“No, I’m just-I don’t know-”

She suddenly reached into her purse and came out with her cell phone. She punched in a number, then held the phone to her ear. Voice mail.

“Hey, honey, it’s me. There’s this guy here, his name’s Elvis Cole and I guess he’s working with the police or something, he wants to know about Ana. Call him, okay-”

She covered her phone.

“What’s your number?”

Cole told her, and she repeated it. Then she put away her phone.

“She’ll call. It’s her you should talk to.”

“Purple hair.”

“Not anymore, but yeah. She goes to school in New York, but they stayed in touch.”

She seemed sad when she said it, and Cole wondered why.

“Great. I will. But you’re here, and you’ve known her since the seventh grade, too, so I’ll bet you can help. My understanding is she lived with her sister. Is that right?”

Sarah nodded, but stared at the street.

“That’s right. Her parents were dead. They died when she was little. Back in Serbia.”

“Uh-huh. And what was her sister’s name?”

Cole made as if he was poised to take notes. He had two objectives. He wanted to see if Rina’s story checked out, and, if so, he was hoping to learn something that might help find Darko.

Sarah said, “Rina. I think her full name was Karina, with a K, but we called her Rina.”

So far so good.

“You knew the sister?”

“Well, yeah. They lived together. Kinda.”

“What’s the ’kinda’ mean?”

Sarah suddenly shifted, and grew irritated.

“Dude, I’m not an idiot. I know you know. Rina was a prostitute. That’s how she paid the rent.”

Cole put down his pen.

“Did everyone know?”

“Ohmigod, no. Just me and Lisa, and we had to swear. Rina didn’t want anyone to know. She didn’t even want Ana to know, and Ana only told us because she had to tell someone. It was demented.”

“Her sister being a prostitute.”

“Yes! I mean, we were kids. We thought it was cool, like this glammy, sexy Hollywood thing. But it was creepy. After a while when you thought about it, it was just gross.”

She wet her lips and looked away again, and Cole sensed this was probably why they had grown apart.

“Did Rina see clients at home while Ana was there? Is that what you mean?”

“No, nothing like that. She would go away for a few days. I guess she worked at one of those places. She would go away for a few days, and then she would come back.”

Sarah made an exaggerated shiver.

“Yuck.”

Cole wondered how many people knew, and how far word had spread.

“Did you and Lisa tell anyone?”

Sarah glanced away again, and it took her a while to answer.

“We wouldn’t do that to her. She was our friend.”

“You ever hear them mention the name Michael Darko?”

“I don’t know. Who’s Michael Darko?”

“How about where she worked, or who she worked for? You remember anything like that?”

“Nothing to remember. Rina wouldn’t tell her anything about that part of her life. She absolutely refused to discuss it. Forget about us. She didn’t even know we knew. She wouldn’t tell Ana. It was like an open secret they had. Ana knew, but they didn’t talk about it.”

“How did Ana know if Rina wouldn’t talk about it?”

“Rina got arrested. Ana always thought Rina was a waitress or something until this time Rina called her from jail. Ana got really scared. That wasn’t until, like, ninth grade. I wanted to tell my mom and dad, but Ana totally freaked out. She made me swear. She said she’d never speak to me again if I told. So she came over and stayed with me for a couple of days like nothing was wrong-just like a regular sleepover. That’s how we explained it. Then she stayed with Lisa. She was really scared, ’cause she didn’t know what was going to happen, like, what if Rina went to prison? What would she do?”

Cole counted backward to ninth grade, and compared it with Rina’s arrest record. The year matched with the date of her first arrest.

Cole sighed. Ninth grade meant she would have been fourteen. A fourteen-year-old girl home alone, not knowing whether her only family and sole support was ever coming back. She would have been terrified.

“And nobody knew? Just you and Lisa.”

Sarah glanced away again, nodding.

“What about the other Serbian kids? Who were her Serbian friends?”

“She didn’t have any. Rina wouldn’t let her. Rina wouldn’t even tell her about the people they left behind.”

“So all she had was you.”

Sarah nodded again, looking lonely and lost.

Cole tried to read her, and thought he understood what she was feeling, both then and now.

He said, “Hey.”

She glanced over, then quickly away.

“Sounds like Rina was trying to protect her. I think you were trying to protect her, too.”

She didn’t look at him, but he could see her pink eyes fill.

“I should’ve told someone. We should have told.”

“You didn’t know, Sarah. None of us ever know. We just try to do our best.”

“She might be alive.”

Sarah Manning stood and walked away without looking back. Cole watched her go, hoping, for her sake, that she was wrong.

21

PIKE WATCHED THE TWO LATIN COPS. They stayed in the street, one making a short phone call while the other spoke with a dep. They did not approach Pike or acknowledge him, though the shorter of the two circled Pike’s Jeep before rejoining his friend. They left the scene while Pike was being searched.

The senior dep was named McKerrick. While his officers spread through the trailers, McKerrick placed Pike under arrest, cuffed him, and went through his pockets.

McKerrick said, “Christ, man, you’re an arsenal.”

He placed the things he found in a green evidence bag. These included Pike’s watch, wallet, weapons, and cell phone, but not the baby’s bib. McKerrick probably thought this was Pike’s handkerchief, and the stains were snot.

At no time did McKerrick Mirandize Pike, or question him. Nothing about the bodies, or why Pike was there, or anything else. Pike found this curious. He also wondered how the two Latin guys had followed him since he left Yanni’s apartment. Even if they had run a split-team tail, Pike was certain he hadn’t been followed. He found this curious, too.

When the search was complete, McKerrick walked Pike to a sheriff’s car, placed him in the backseat, then climbed in behind the wheel.

As they drove away, Pike looked back at the dog. The dog watched him go.

Willowbrook was not technically part of Los Angeles. It was an unincorporated area, and used the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department as its policing agent. Pike expected McKerrick to bring him to the nearest sheriff’s station, which was the Century Station just off the Century Freeway in Lynwood, but when they climbed onto the freeway, McKerrick headed away from the station. Pike found this curious, too.

Twenty minutes later, they pulled off the freeway into downtown L.A., and Pike knew where they were going.

McKerrick reached for his radio mike, and spoke two words.

“Three minutes.”

McKerrick brought him to Parker Center, the Los Angeles Police Department headquarters. They drove around the side of the building to the processing entrance, where three uniformed LAPD officers were waiting. Two men and a woman, all in their late twenties, with short hair and freshly polished shoes. The female officer opened the door, and gave him two more words.

“Get out.”

The lead officer was a rangy, athletic guy with spiky blond hair and buff shoulders. He steered Pike by the upper arm. They brought Pike inside without processing him, directed him onto an elevator, then up to the fourth floor. The fourth floor was special. Robbery Special. Rape Special. Homicide Special. The three divisions of the Robbery-Homicide Division. Terrio and his task force would live on the fourth floor.

“Gotta pee?”

“No.”

When the elevator opened, the officer carrying the evidence bag split off, and the other two steered Pike along an ugly beige hall to an interview room. Pike had been on the fourth floor before, and in their interview rooms. It was one of the smaller rooms, sporting the same bad paint, bad flooring, and cruddy walls as the rest of the building. A small table jutted from the wall, with a cheap plastic chair on either side.

The lead officer uncuffed Pike, then re-cuffed his right hand to a steel bar built into the table. When he had Pike locked down, he stepped back, but didn’t leave. The female officer waited in the door.

He said, “Joe Pike.”

Pike looked at him.

“I’ve been hearing stories about you since I came on the job. You don’t look like so much.”

A video camera was bolted to the wall in the corner up by the ceiling. The interview room didn’t have a two-way mirror; just the camera with its microphone.

Pike studied the officer for a moment, then tipped his head toward the camera. The two officers followed his gaze. When the male officer saw the camera, he turned red, realizing a senior officer might be watching him act like an ass. They stepped out, and closed the door.

Pike looked around. The interview room smelled of cigarettes. Even though smoking was not allowed in city buildings, the last suspect had probably been a smoker, or the last detective. The table and the wall beside the table were covered with a jigsaw of scribbles, drawings, gouges, stains, and jailhouse slogans, most of it cut so deep into the Formica it could not be erased. Biggie. ThugLife. LAPD187. OJWUZHERE.

Pike considered the camera, and wondered if Terrio was watching. They would probably let him wait for a while, but Pike didn’t mind. He took a slow, deep breath, paused, then emptied his lungs, taking exactly as long to exhale as to inhale. He focused on the camera. He emptied his mind of everything except the camera, and breathed. There was just Pike and the camera and whoever was on the other side of the camera. Then there was just Pike and the camera. And then only Pike. After a few breaths, he felt himself float, his chest expanding and contracting with the rhythm of the sea. His heart rate slowed. Time slowed. Then Pike simply was. Pike had spent days like this, waiting for the perfect shot in places that were not as comfortable as an LAPD interview room.

Pike pondered why they had pulled him in, and what they expected to learn. He knew they weren’t going to charge him with anything because they had not Mirandized him, and had bypassed the normal booking procedure. Hence, they wanted to talk, but the question was why? He also wondered why they bounced him at Williams’s home. If they were on him all day, they could have bounced him at any time, yet they waited until he found Williams.

Pike was still pondering these things two hours later when Terrio and Deets came in. Pike saw them as if he were hovering at the bottom of a deep, clear pond, and rose through the water to join them. Maybe now he would get answers.

Terrio unlocked the cuff from the metal bar, then from Pike’s wrist. He pocketed the handcuffs, then took the remaining chair. Deets leaned into the corner and crossed his arms. There was a carefulness to his expression that Pike thought was composed.

Terrio said, “Okay, listen. You are not under arrest. You don’t have to talk to us. I’m hoping you will, but you don’t have to. If you want a lawyer, here-”

Terrio took out a cell phone, slid it across the table-

“-you can use this. We’ll wait.”

Pike flicked it back.

“I’m good.”

Deets in his corner, chin down, looked up from under his brow.

“Did you kill those people?”

“No.”

“You know who did?”

“Not yet.”

Terrio pushed closer to the table.

“What were you doing down there?”

Down there. As if Willowbrook was another world.

“I was looking for a two-time felon named Earvin Williams. Williams might have participated in or had knowledge of Frank’s murder.”

“Why did you think Williams was involved?”

“Williams was a D-Block Crip. He put together a crew of his homies, some of whom have shown a sudden increase in personal wealth.”

Terrio arched his eyebrows.

“You know other D-Blocks who were involved?”

“Jamal Johnson.”

Terrio turned white, and Deets snapped a glance as fast as a nail gun.

“How do you know about Jamal Johnson?”

“His cousin, Rahmi.”

“No way. SIS is on Rahmi Johnson. They’re on him right now. You couldn’t have spoken with him.”

Pike shrugged, believe what you want.

“Williams and Johnson were both D-Block. I don’t know about the other guy. Was Johnson one of the vics?”

Deets said, “Screw that, Pike. We ask, you answer. This isn’t a conversation.”

Terrio held up a hand, cutting him off.

“Johnson was confirmed as one of the vics.”

“Who was the third male?”

“Samuel ‘Lil Tai’ Renfro. He goes back to the D-Block with Williams and Johnson. How was it you came to believe this is the crew who hit Meyer’s home?”

Terrio was staring at Pike so intently that he looked as if he might tip out of the chair. That’s when Pike realized that Jamal Johnson had still been only a suspect, and Williams hadn’t even been on their radar. They had not asked how Williams was involved, but why Pike thought he was involved. They hadn’t brought Pike in to find out what he knew-they wanted to know how he knew it.

Pike said, “I came to believe Williams was running the crew. We’ll know for sure after you run their guns.”

Deets shook his head.

“There is no we here. No we.”

The hand again.

Terrio said, “We have no physical evidence tying these people with what happened to Meyer or the earlier six robberies.”

“You do now. Run their guns.”

“How did you come to identify Williams as a person of interest?”

“Sources.”

Deets glared at the camera.

‘This is bullshit.”

Terrio slipped a spiral notepad from his pocket, and read an address.

“One of these sources live in Studio City?”

Pike didn’t respond. He was at Yanni’s apartment building in Studio City when he first saw the Sentra.

“How about on La Brea just south of Melrose? Maybe we’ll find one of your sources there, too.”

Terrio slipped the pad back into his pocket, then leaned forward again.

“Who killed these people?”

“ Don’t know.”

“Do you care?”

“No.”

Deets made a “ha,” then pushed from the corner.

“You would have popped them yourself, Pike. If you’d found those dudes alive, you would have fed them to the dogs just like the sonofabitch who left them there.”

Pike shifted his gaze to Deets.

“Not the lady.”

Terrio leaned back in his chair, studying Pike as he tapped the table.

“These three idiots-Williams, Johnson, and Renfro-they weren’t in this alone. Someone was pointing them in the right direction. You and I on the same page with that?”

“Yes.”

“Your sources tell you who they were working for?”

Pike studied Terrio for a moment, then glanced at the camera. Something about Terrio’s inflection suggested he already knew, and wanted to find out if Pike knew as well.

“Williams was working for a Serbian OC gangster named Michael Darko. Darko or someone working for Darko probably killed Williams and his crew.”

Terrio and Deets stared at him, and for a few seconds the interview room was quiet. Then a large, balding deputy chief opened the door. Darko was the magic word.

“Jack, let’s clear the room, please.”

Terrio and Deets left without a word. The chief followed them, and the woman Pike had seen in the backseat of Terrio’s car on the day they told him about Frank entered and closed the door. Blue blazer over a white shirt. Dark gray slacks. An angry slash for a mouth.

She studied Pike as if he were a lab specimen, then glanced up at the camera, hanging patiently from the ceiling. She went to the camera, unplugged it, then turned back to Pike.

She held up a federal badge.

“Kelly Walsh. I’m with the ATF. Do you remember me?”

Pike nodded.

“Good. Now that we’ve met, you’re going to do exactly what I say.”

As if she had no doubt it was so.