The Night Crew

Chapter 8

Harper and Creek followed her outside, and Anna held her head over the picket fence and gagged. Nothing came up but a stream of saliva. After a moment, she turned back to the two men: 'Sorry.'

'So you didn't know the guy,' Harper said, a statement, not a question.

'Not except to nod to. I never met Jason's friends, except on the job.'

Harper was looking at her skeptically, and Anna said, 'Look, Jason was a part-timer. He worked maybe once or twice a month, when he came up with something.'

'Dope stuff?'

'No. Usually UCLA stuff. The night your son died, that was the last time we saw him. He had the inside track on a college animal rights group that raided the medical labs at UCLA.'

'I saw it on TV, the pig thing,' Harper said. 'How'd that connect with my kid?'

Creek said, 'It didn't. The raid was college kids, and your son was at a high-school party. The only connection was that they were a few blocks apart about the same time, and we happened to catch them both.'

Harper rubbed his chin, looking at Creek. 'You're sure?'

'Work it out yourself.'

Harper looked away, into the middle distance, then back, and nodded. 'All right. But my kid's dead, your friend's dead, they shared a dealer, and now a dealer's deadand Anna's name is carved on his chest. Something'sgoing on.'

'Did you see any of these dot things in therethe wizards?' Anna asked.

'How'd you know about the wizards?' Harper asked sharply.

'Wyatt told me. He told me about you so I wouldn't report that I was mugged.'

'Okay.' He looked at his shoes. 'Sorry about the thing at the apartment. I didn't know who it was, I was in there illegally, sort of. Not a good place to be caught messing with an apartment.'

'So how'd you track this guy down?' Anna asked, looking at the house.

'Got Wyatt to check Jason on the computer, found the arrest, got MacAllister's name, checked with the phone company and got an address. No problem.'

'You keep stepping into shit like this, it's gonna be a problem,' Creek said. 'Leave it to the cops.'

'I can't.' Harper shook his head: 'I've got a slightly different agenda than the cops.'

'What? Revenge?' Anna asked.

'Nah.' Harper said. He looked back at the house, as Anna had. 'But I'd like a little justice.'

'Leave it to the cops,' Creek said again.

'You don't get justice from cops,' Harper said. 'You get procedure. Sometimes you get arrests. Occasionally you get convictions. You never get justice.'

'So what do we do here?' Creek asked.

Anna took out her phone. 'Make a call.'

They called Wyatt at home, hoping for a charitable referral to the local Burbank cops.

'What?' Wyatt grumbled into the mouthpiece. His voice was thickened by sleep.

Anna identified herself and told him about the man on the bed.

'Stay out of the house, don't touch anything,' Wyatt said. He was awake now, and unhappy. 'I'm gonna call L.A.'

'I think we're in Burbank,' she said.

'All right, I'll call Burbank. You wait.'

'We're in the street right outside the house,' Anna said, glancing at Harper. 'It's a little complicated. I'd better let you talk to your friend Jake.'

'Jake? What's he doing there?' Wyatt asked, even more unhappy.

'I'll let him tell you,' Anna said, and she handed the phone to Harper.

Louis stuck his head out of the truck: 'We've got a fire in Hollywood Hills, the girlfriend of somebody big, the way the fire guys are talking.'

'Forget it,' Anna said, cutting him off. 'We've got problems.'

The first cop car arrived five minutes after Harper got off the phone: not Burbank, but North Hollywood. Burbank was two blocks away. The cops talked to Harper, briefly, a little chilly, and started the murder routine: cops around the house, neighbors on lawns, yellow crime scene tape, medical examiners, L.A. homicide detectives and, eventually, Wyatt. He nodded wordlessly as he passed them, flashed a badge at a cop outside the door and went in. Five minutes later, he was back out.

'What a mess,' he said.

'Yeah,' Anna said. 'And we had a prowler at my house this morning. He had a gun.'

'I hope you called someone,' Wyatt said.

'I live in Venice. The neighbors chased him off, the cops came over and had a Coke.'

'Might not be you,' Wyatt said. 'I mean, on the guy's chest.'

She got a quick mental flash of the body, and felt herself tighten up: whoever had done that was far gone. But she wouldn't fool herself, either: 'C'mon, how many Annas do you know?'

Wyatt said, 'All right. I don't want to scare you any more than you are, butremember the cuts on O'Brien's face? I thought they looked like gang marks?'

'Yes?'

'They were like this, remember?' He made a quick slashing triangle design on the palm of his hand with the opposite index finger.

'Triangles,' Anna said.

'Or A's,' Wyatt said quietly. 'Upside-down As.'

'Oh, no.' She put her hands to her cheeks. 'Can't be A's.'

'Could be,' Wyatt said. 'We gotta have a serious talk with the L.A. guys.'

'Are they upset?' She looked toward the house. 'About us going inside?'

Wyatt glanced toward Harper: 'Not as much as you might think.'

'Wasn't her fault anyway,' Harper said, stepping into the conversation. 'She didn't know what she was gonna see. I took her in. I thought she might say somethingmight know the guy.'

'Did she?'

Harper glanced at her, then suddenly grinned, the first time she'd seen him smile. Nice smile, she thought. 'No. She went outside and barfed.'

'Did not,' Anna said.

Creek, looking past them, said apprehensively, 'Uh-oh, here we go.'

An L.A. detective was headed their way, the languid, dangerous stroll affected by cops when they were being cool. He was carrying a rolled pamphlet. He glanced at Anna, nodded at Creek and said to Harper, 'How are you, Jake?'

A movie line: one that should have been followed by a cigarette flicked into the street. Harper shrugged: 'You heard about my kid.'

'Yeah. Brutal.' The detective looked back at the house, and then said, 'Listen, I know this is a really horseshit time to ask you this, but I got a problem. I gotta come see you. About Lucy.'

'Gonna do it this time?'

'I gotta. She's crazier than a shithouse mouse. If I don't get out of there. but I can't leave the kids.'

'Call me,' Harper said.

'I'm hurtin' for cash.' The cop was embarrassed.

'We'll put it on your Sears card,' Harper said. He poked the cop in the ribs, and the cop nodded and said, 'I'll call youthanks.' He nodded at Anna, glanced at Wyatt and strolled away.

'What was all that about?' Anna asked Wyatt.

'Jake's a lawyer,' Wyatt said. 'He has about half the cop business in the county.'

'I thought you said he wasa cop.'

'Was. Ten years ago.'

The lead detective's name was Carrol Trippen, a tall, impatient, prematurely white-haired Anglo. He split them up, talked to each of them for a moment, compared their stories and finally sent them downtown to make statements.

'Are we in trouble? Should I get a lawyer?' Anna asked, as Trippen started back toward the house.

'Harper pisses me off, calling you guys,' Trippen said sourly. 'But it wasn't your fault, and I know where he's coming from. I got bigger things to worry about than hassling people who looked at a dead guy.'

The cops kept Anna, Harper, Creek and Louis apart until the statements were done. Anna was interviewed by a sleepy cop with bad breath and a yellow shirt with a new coffee stain.

When they finished, he peered at her over his coffee cup and said, 'Tell you what: You know this guy. The killer.'

'If it's me.' She'd been having second thoughts.

'C'mon. Even youthink it's you.'

'So what do I do?'

'First thing is, with this prowler you had, I'd move out of your house. Stay at a motel for a few days, don't tell anybody where you are. When you've got to work, meet your friends somewhere. You got a cellular, anybody can get in touch if they need to.'

'I'll think about it,' Anna said, but she wouldn't leave her house.

'Do that. And I need you back this afternoon, if you can make itwe got a shrink and a serial killer profiler, they're gonna want to talk to you.'

'You're sure he did both Jason and Sean?'

'Trippen talked to Wyatt, and they think so. He says there's a level of violence there. You don't see it on the average murder. And this Sean was tied to the Jason guy, and Jason was tight with you.'

'All right.' And she knew himbut who was it?

Harper and Creek were waiting in the lobby when Anna got out. Louis was wandering around with the truck, waiting. When Creek saw Anna step out of the elevator, he dug out his cell phone, pushed a speed dial, got Louis: 'We're ready.'

'Are you headed home?' Harper asked, as the three of them walked down to the exit.

'I guess,' Anna said. She glanced at her watch. 'The night's shot.'

'Are you moving out of your house?' Harper asked.

'No.'

Then I'd like to come by and look around,' he said.

'Bad idea,' said Creek.

Harper turned to him: 'Look, I used to do this for a living. I want to see where she liveswhat the place is like. If the news is bad, I want you to help get her out of there. I'd just as soon she didn't get carved up until I find the guy who did my kid.'

'That's very sentimental,' Anna said.

Harper shrugged: 'I've got priorities.'

Creek was nodding: 'And you've got a point.' To Anna: 'Maybe I should stay over.'

'Good idea,' Harper said.

Anna shook her head, said to Creek: 'You'd drive me nuts.' And to Harper, 'When he lays around the house, he lays aroundthe house.' Nobody smiled at the old vauderville line.

'This ain't a comedy routine,' Creek grumbled. Then: 'Maybe we could get the cops to send somebody over, protection.'

'Fat chance,' Harper said. 'You know how many serial killers are running around L.A. right now? Probably a half-dozen.'

Anna grunted, 'Huh,' and glanced at Creek. 'Half-dozen?'

'No,' Creek said, following her thought, shaking his head. 'We ain'tdoing no story on that.'

Anna sent Creek and Louis home in the truck. Louis was shook, having talked with the cops twice in two days, having had statements taken. Louis thrived in anonymitysought it, treasured it. 'Everything's gonna be okay, right?' He was anxious, twisting a shredded copy of the L.A. Readerin his hands.

'Yeah, for us,' Anna told him. 'You guys take the truck, go home, get some sleep.'

'I just don't want anything to happen to us. to you,' Louis said, eyes large. 'I mean, if anything happened to you. what'd happen to me?'

'It'll be okay, Louis,' she said, giving him a quick smile and a pat on the back. 'I promise.'

When she told him she'd ride with Harper, Creek took her aside to whisper furiously: 'What the fuck is this? You don't even knowhim, he could be, you know, the guy.'

'Nah, we know what he's doinghis kid,' Anna said.

'Oh, horseshit,' Creek said in exasperation. He added: 'You started acting perky as soon as we met him outside the house, and now you're starting again.'

'Perky?' That made her mad. She put her hands on her hips and started, 'What are you.'

'Figure it out,' Creek said, and he stalked off to the truck. When he got there he turned and said, 'And what about Clark?'

Smack.

But he was in the truck and kicking it over before she could think of a proper reply.

Harper drove a black BMW 740IL. The cockpit showed as many ant-sized instrument lights as a jumbo jet. A half-dozen golf putters cluttered the passenger side. Harper popped the passenger door for Anna and tossed the putters in the back.

'Nice car,' she said, when he climbed in the driver's side. Cars were about four-hundredth on her priority list of Important Things in Life.

'Freeway cruiser,' he said, indifferently.

'And you play a little golf, huh?'

He looked at her, cool, and said, 'I do two things: I practice law, and I play golf.'

'I mean, like. seriously?'

'I'm serious about both,' he said; and she thought he was a little grim. Good-looking, but tight.

'Chasing a little white ball around a pasture.'

He looked at her, still not smiling: 'If golf was about chasing a little white ball around a pasture, I wouldn't do it,' he said.

She turned toward him, her face serious, touched his arm. 'Would you promise me something?'

'What?' The sudden, apparent intimacy took him by surprise.

'Don't ever, ever, evertry to explain to me what golf is really about.'

This time he grinned and she thought: Mmm. Harrison Ford.

At her house, he took a flashlight out of the trunk and walked once around the outside, checked the bushes, said, 'Ouch, what the hell is that?' and a couple minutes later, 'Good.'

Inside, he looked at the windows, including the boarded-up back window, and said, 'Leave the board for the time being,' and, 'You need to get some empty beer cans or pop cans. Before you go to sleep at night, stack them up inside the door. If anybody tries to come through, it'll sound like the end of the world.'

'Okay.'

'Your bushes scratched the heck out of me.'

'That's what they're for.'

'Okay. You got a gun?' he asked.

'Yeah.'

'Let's get it.'

He followed her upstairs to the bedroom, and she took the gun from its clip behind the bed's headboard.

'Smith amp; Wesson,' she said, handing him the chromed revolver.

'Good old six-forty,' he said. He checked the ammo: 'With three-fifty-seven wadcutters. You're in good shape. Do you know how to shoot it?'

'I went through a combat class when that was the fad,' she said. 'I go up behind Malibu every year or so and shoot up a gully, like they showed us. Ten feet.'

'So keep it handy,' he said. He handed the gun back, glanced at the quilt on the bed, said, 'Old-fashioned girl, huh?'

She opened her mouth to say something when the doorbell rang. They both looked at the head of the stairs: 'Uh-oh.'

'Probably not Aunt Pansy with a fruit pie,' Harper said, glancing at his watch.

'You think a killer is gonna ring the doorbell at'she glanced at her watch, too'five-oh-five in the morning?'

'Probably not,' he said. 'Let's go see. you go first.'

'Why me?'

''Cause you've got the gun.'

That seemed practical, if not particularly chivalrous. She led the way down, feeling slightly silly, gun in her hand, paused in the hallway, then whispered back, 'Now what?'

'Get away from the door and yell,' Harper suggested.

The doorbell rang again as they stepped into the kitchen and Anna shouted, 'Who is it?'

'Me. Creek.' Creek's voice, all right.

'Oh, boy,' Anna said. She went to the door, slipped the chain and pulled it open. Creek slouched on the porch, and his eyes stopped briefly on Anna and then flicked back to Harper.

'Just thought I'd check,' Creek said. To Harper, 'You all done?'

'Yeah, I'm done. I need to talk to Anna for a minute, alone. Then I'll be out of here.'

Creek nodded and stepped back on the porch, and pulled the door shut.

'Sorry about that,' Anna said. And she was thinking that Creek showed up at fairly inconvenient times.

'Yeah, no problem.' Harper took a slender leather wallet out of his jacket pocket, took out a thin gold pen, found a card and scribbled on it. 'My home phone. The office phone is on the front. Call me if anything comes up.'

'And you've got my card,' Anna said drily. He must've taken it from her purse.

'Yup.' Unembarrassed.

'I think we should let the police.'

She was talking over him, and only caught the last part: '. boyfriend stay over, it'd be another layer.'

She stopped: 'What?'

'Maybe you oughta have your boyfriend stay over,' he repeated. 'He'd be another layer between you and the killer. He's a big guy.'

'He's not my boyfriend. Creek's a friend.'

'Yeah? But you can trust him?'

'With my life.'

Harper bobbed his head, and said, Then you might think about it, even if he drives you nuts. I'll tell you what: This guy isn't gonna go away. This nut. He's thinking about you all the time. Sooner or laterhe'll turn up.'