Crash and Burn (18 page)

Krista tipped her head to the side. “And the cops say what?”

“Jailhouse beating, rival gang. Just what you’d expect.”

And there it was. The gang connection.

A connection that could be the reason behind Lily’s sudden disappearance. Except for one thing.

Lily was a witness for the
defense
, not the prosecution. Would some rival gang—one that had a grudge against Saurez or his family—want to screw up the trial and make sure Saurez got sent away?

Sixty years to life was a serious grudge.

Krista sipped her beer. “So, Walker thinks he can get him off?”

DeSilva smiled. “Wouldn’t take the case otherwise. Not good for his acquittal rate.”

“But Saurez was arrested driving the victim’s car and using his credit card. And an eye witness puts a guy matching Saurez’s description behind the wheel of a black Mercedes, speeding away from the alley where the victim was found, right after gunshots were heard.”

“Yeah, well, we’ve got another eye witness who casts doubt on all that.”

“Lily Daniels.”

“She was across the street from the alley and says she saw a guy who looked nothing at all like Saurez
or
the victim parking a black Mercedes at the end of the alley. She watched the guy walk away from the car and catch a ride with a black Range Rover at the end of the block. This was a full hour before the supposed gunshots.”

Krista thought about that. Where was the doctor while this was happening? Was he already dead? If so, it certainly complicated the prosecutor’s murder-by-a-gansta-car-thief scenario.

“Who’s the prosecution’s witness?”

“Vinh Nguyen. Vietnamese business owner, runs the motel across from the crime scene. Been here thirty years, speaks good English. He’s a law-abiding citizen with a son on his way to Stanford—first kid in their family to go to college. Jury’s gonna love this guy.”

“Meanwhile, you’ve got a twenty-two-year-old unemployed actress with a drug possession charge under her belt.”

He frowned. “Where’d you hear that?”

“Around.”

“Sounds like you got a handle on it. What do you need me for?” He tipped back his beer.

“I want the file. The real one. Lilian Daniels is crucial to your case, so don’t tell me you didn’t turn her inside out. I know how you guys work.”

DeSilva plunked his glass down. “Walker’s protective about his case files.”

Walker was paranoid, like every other defense attorney she knew. Lawyers on both sides worried about leaks and spies, especially if the case had been in the news, and especially right before trial. It was a cutthroat business. If the defense team’s case strategy slipped out, they’d lose the element of surprise, and possibly the case, too.

Krista got all that, but she had her own end to worry about. And she didn’t like working with incomplete information.

“It’s not like I want the whole case file,” she said, “just Lily’s piece.”

DeSilva glanced over her shoulder, clearly getting impatient. “He’s touchy about this one.”

“Come on, Andy.”

He met her gaze. She could see she was wearing him down.

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She smiled and slid off her barstool, pulling some money from her purse. “Thanks. I mean it.”

“Yeah, no promises.”

“Can you get it to me tonight?”

“Get serious.”

“I’m on a clock here. I’ve got sixteen hours left.” She punched his arm playfully. “Come on. The night is young. You’ve got interns burning the midnight oil over there. Give someone a call.”

He sighed, and she knew she had him. Persistence worked.

Plus, he was on a mission to hook-up tonight, and she was botching his chances. He glanced past her again, and she tucked her money under her beer glass. Time to go.

“No promises,” he said, “but I’ll see what I can do.”

~ ~ ~

Krista made her way by Lily’s Newport Beach rental and pulled into the driveway of a vacant house that looked like a rundown version of Lily’s home.

She got out quietly and glanced around. Moths flitted around the streetlamps, which cast spheres of light on the pavement between every third home. The street was quiet. No joggers, no people milling on porches. Not even any cars, just the distant whir of traffic on the San Diego Freeway.

 Krista eased down the driveway and passed under one of the streetlights. The air smelled like fresh-cut grass. Mrs. Meyer’s house looked sleepy, but the blue flicker in back told Krista she had a TV on in the bedroom.

Krista was more concerned with Lily’s other neighbor, who had about six home security signs sprouting up from the flower beds and a Beware of Dog warning tacked to the fence. Sure enough, a dog started yapping as soon as Krista walked by. It was about the size of a hamster, judging from the bark, but still it was unnerving to listen to as she unlatched the gate and slipped into Lily’s back yard.

The back of the house was darker than the front. Overgrown bushes lined the fence. A trio of plastic patio chairs sat near the back door, clustered around a ceramic bowl overflowing with cigarette butts. Stray beer bottles littered the lawn.

Krista zeroed in on the northwest window, which would be the back bedroom. She wiped the dusty pane with the sleeve of her jacket and aimed her flashlight through the glass. Unmade bed. Clothes strewn about. The closet door stood open, but from her angle, she couldn’t see anything inside. The bedroom was a pigsty for sure, but it didn’t show the callous disarray of a place that had been ransacked. Looked more like the hovel of a sloppy teenager.

Krista moved to a higher-up window and peered into the bathroom. Beyond a row of shampoo bottles, she saw a crumpled towel on the floor and cosmetics scattered across the vanity.

More yapping. A door opened. Krista switched off her flashlight and stopped to listen as someone ordered the dog inside.

She crept around to the garage, such as it was. It didn’t have a door. The structure listed severely, and didn’t look like a smart place to house a car in an earthquake zone. Lily’s Kia wasn’t there, and Krista hadn’t expected it to be. She skirted around the back and set her sights on tonight’s main objective.

People’s faces often brightened when Krista mentioned she was a P.I.—especially the men. They probably pictured Tom Selleck in his red Ferrari, surrounded by bikini-clad women. The reality was a bit less glamorous, involving tedious phone calls, fruitless stakeouts, and nausea-inducing trash dives.

Krista sucked in a breath and approached the big plastic cans nestled against the fence. Something scampered along the wall, and she swept her flashlight around just in time to see a wiry gray tail disappear beneath the slats. Shuddering, she turned her attention to the cans.

She opened the first one and knew she’d hit pay dirt by the rank smell. She pulled out the top bag and set it on the ground. She lifted bag after bag out and piled them around her in a circle. She reached the last one, plunked it at her feet, and crouched down. She took a gulp of air and whipped out her Leatherman. A quick slash of the knife.

The stench hit her like a sucker punch.

She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head to clear it. Then she scanned the flashlight beam over yogurt cups, coffee grounds, blackened salad remnants. She combed through empty soup cans and gelatinous food chunks in search of anything paper.

Nothing.

The second bag nearly knocked her over. With efficiency born of oxygen deprivation, she rooted through crumpled napkins, soy sauce packets, and slimy take-out cartons from Bangkok Palace. Globs of chicken pad thai dripped onto her shoes as she dug for a receipt, an order slip, anything with a date stamp. Trash pickup was four days ago, but this stuff had to be two weeks old, at least.

Bag three contained more yogurt, along with beer bottles and takeout containers, everything putrid and sticky. Krista’s throat began to burn. Her eyes watered. Something skittered up her arm and she yelped and fell back on her hands. A soft
pop
of plastic, and cool, wet ooze seeped between her fingers. She jumped to her feet, yelping and flailing and beaming the flashlight around as roaches darted for cover.

A noise had her whirling around. A large shadow stood behind her in the narrow passageway. She reached for the gun under her jacket.

“You know you’re trespassing.”

Her heart lurched. She recognized the voice—low and smug and infuriating. He stepped closer until he was looming over her.

She beamed the light at him. Dark hair dipped low over his forehead. He glanced down at the knife in her hand and raised an eyebrow.

“Find what you’re looking for?”

Her heart lodged in her throat. Slime dripped off her fingers as she stared up at him and all her morning’s worries suddenly materialized in the form of a tall, arrogant, blue-eyed, blue-jeans-wearing reality.

“How was Hawaii?”

The corner of his mouth curved up. “Stimulating.”

Images flooded her brain. Stimulating as in cliff diving? Catching some waves? Getting laid?

Probably all of the above.

His gazed dropped to the noodles clinging to her sleeve. “Nice outfit.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Same thing you are.” He glanced around, a ridiculously broad-shouldered shadow in the darkness. “Trash pickup was four days ago.”

“I know.” She heaved bags into the can, one by one. Fury formed a ball in her chest. She should have known this job was too good to be true. She
had
known it, and yet she’d spent the entire day racing around, visions of new tires dancing through her head. All those uneasy feelings of being tailed by someone suddenly made sense.

He made no move to help her. She scooped up the last bag of trash and dumped it into the can, then slammed the lid shut.

“When’d you get back?” she asked.

“This afternoon.”

She looked at him. So, even if he
had
been tailing her, hoping to horn in on her case, there was still a chance he didn’t know about Braxton Creative. She wanted to keep it that way. So far, Berle Braxton was her best hope for finding Lily.

“So, any good leads here?” he asked.

“Plenty.”

He smiled down at her, a flash of white teeth in the dimness. “Want to share?”

“No.”

“Why not? We could team up on this.”

“You mean like I bust ass finding the witness, and you swoop in to collect my fee? Fuck you, R.J.”

He grinned. “Whenever you’re ready, sweetheart.”

She stuffed the flashlight in her pocket and squeezed past the trashcans. There was a gate facing the driveway, and she tried to open it, but it wouldn’t budge.

He reached around her and gave it a jerk.

“After you.”

She ducked under his arm. He followed her onto the driveway, and she whirled around and jabbed a finger at his chest.

“Stay away from me while I’m working.”

“What about while you’re not working?” He reached out and peeled a noodle from the front of her T-shirt. A breeze kicked up, and he cringed at the smell. “You know, you should probably clean up before you do any more investigating tonight. This perfume’s no good for your stealth approach.”

“I mean it. Keep out of my way.”

She turned around and stalked down the drive.

~ ~ ~

Krista took a window seat at In-N-Out Burger. She scanned the restaurant and slurped the super-size Coke that was going to fuel her activities for the next twelve hours.

A fortyish man walked in, and she knew he was her guy. She pegged him for a reporter by his cheap sport coat and shaggy hair. His gaze settled on her as he approached, and Krista felt a spurt of self-consciousness. She’d cleaned herself up a minute ago, but public restroom foam soap and paper towels could only do so much.

“Krista Hart?”

She nodded.

He slid into the booth. “John Wayland.”

They shook hands, and she didn’t waste time getting to the point.

“I’m working for Drake Walker, trying to locate a witness.”

He leaned back in the booth. “So you said in your message. This has to do with the Sheffield murder trial?”

“That’s right. You covering it?”

“We’ve got a stringer on it.” He shrugged. “It might get a few inches in local.” He sounded nonchalant, but underneath he seemed pissy, and she didn’t know whether he’d wanted to cover the trial himself or simply thought it wasn’t getting enough media play.

Of course, that could change once Walker got rolling. He had a reputation for attracting the press to his trials by planting rumors, and then when he had all eyes on him, dropping bombshells in the courtroom.

“What’s the wit’s name?” Wayland asked.

“Lilian Daniels.”

He frowned. “Never heard of her. Think someone got to her?”

“Why would you say that?”

He didn’t answer, but his expression looked grim.

“She’s supposed to take the stand soon,” Krista said, “but from what I gather, she left town.”

“Don’t remember hearing the name,” he said. “Was she a staying at the motel across from the crime scene?”

“She lives locally, so I’m assuming she was there to meet someone. She was in the parking lot at midnight, and there’s nothing else open that time of night.”

“Except maybe the corner drugstore.”

She’d thought about it. According to Krista’s police contacts, Lily had a possession charge on her record. But Krista couldn’t envision her venturing into that neighborhood at midnight to buy drugs unless she was desperate.

“It’s possible,” she admitted. “I don’t really know why she was there, and at this point, I’m much more concerned with finding out where she is now.”

“Wish I could help you, but I never talked to her. Interviewed the motel manager, though.”

The way he said “manager” seemed to have some hidden meaning.

“You been out to the scene yet?” he asked her.

“No.”

“You should probably check it out. You know, Walker looked me up a while back and I told him the same thing. Very next day, he announced he was taking the case.”

“Thanks for the tip,” she said, even though she didn’t really know what she was thanking him for. Maybe for taking the trouble to meet with her, although from the sound of it he was no longer assigned to the story. Still, he wanted something from her or he wouldn’t have come.