Troubleshooter

Chapter 8

The air-conditioned elevator filled with the Muzak stylings of "Arthur's Theme." Bear hummed along at the chorus, then rustled under Tim's and Guerrera's looks.

"What? I was clearing my throat."

The elevator stopped, and they stepped out into a marble foyer that led to glass doors with deco etching. Bear, who'd made short and noisy work of an eye-opener Super Big Gulp on the way over, ducked into a bathroom.

The foyer window looked down four stories onto South Rodeo Drive. Tim and Guerrera stood shoulder to shoulder and watched Jags and Hummers flash back the morning light.

Guerrera brought his knuckle to his jawbone, a nervous tap. "Listen, I'm sorry I lost my cool at the clubhouse yesterday."

"You let Pete get to you a little, that's all."

"Never seen you get rattled like that."

Tim laughed. "You don't read the papers."

"You know what I mean. You're level, even when you're not."

"They say racist shit to get a rise out of you. Don't give it to them. Detach."

Bear stepped out from the bathroom, readjusting the star on his belt, and by tacit understanding, Tim and Guerrera let the exchange end. The three headed to reception and flashed creds. After a fifteen-minute wait, during which they were forced to endure the receptionist's too-loud phone recollections of a recent shopping expedition, they were escorted past a secretary and a dressed-for-success paralegal to the Inner Office.

Dana Lake stood with her back to them, silhouetted against a sun-bleached pane of glass. A cordless headset slightly crimped her hair. "If you won't offer us anything better than that, I'll wait until five minutes before trial to plead him out. I'll make you spend six months building a case you won't even try. Yeah? Then don't waste our time with bullshit offers."

She pulled off the headset, shook out her hair, and pivoted to face them. "Don't fuck with my client. You want to talk to him, you bring a warrant or you phone me."

"Uncle Pete and I reached our own arrangement," Tim said.

She tossed the headset onto her meticulously ordered desk. "Credentials."

They handed them to her, and she wrote down their names and badge numbers on a yellow legal pad. A framed lithograph of the Laughing Sinner logo commanded the wall behind her desk. "To DL-a friend to bikers, my kind of tough broad." Danny the Wand's flourish of a signature was Sharpied beneath the dedication.

Dana stared at Tim's creds for an extra beat. "I hope you don't think you can get away with your celebrated stunts with my clients, Deputy Rackley. I'll have your ass in a sling."

"Ms. Lake, my ass lives in a sling."

"So. You've sicced the heat on the entire Laughing Sinners organization. Incisive investigative strategy. Was the Marshals Service the brain trust behind color-coding Arab travelers after