Cut to the Quick (28 page)

“Mark, I don’t know if you believe in fate, but that day at small-claims court was a cosmic coincidence. Manna from Heaven.” Jenkins raised his drink toward Scoville.

Scoville writhed against the wooden bench. “I was venting to a stranger. How did I know I was talking to a, a …”

“To a what, Mark?”

Scoville shot a sideways glance at Jenkins. After the initial shock of seeing him in the bar, he hadn’t been able to look him directly in the face. Every time he tried, the sheen of purple eye shadow or the carefully painted lips repelled him. “Who takes an angry comment made by someone who’s had a couple of drinks … Okay,
made by a
drunk
and runs with it? What kind of a lunatic are you?”

“There’s no need to be harsh. Especially when you opened the door to the whole thing.”

Scoville moaned,
“There is no thing.”

“Answer me this. Is your life easier now that Oliver Mercer is out of the way?”

Scoville dug the heels of his hands into his eyes and raked his fingers slick with chicken grease through his hair.

Jenkins repeated his question. “Is your life easier now that Oliver Mercer is out of the way?”

The waitress brought the fresh drinks.

“Thanks, honey.” Jenkins took a sip before continuing. “I’ll answer for you. Yes, it is. Even if you won’t stand up like a man and agree that there was a bargain, even you, Mark Scoville, has to admit that you owe me a huge debt for returning your life to you.”

Scoville stared into the vodka. If only he could float away on that cold ice.

“Now, Mark, it’s time for you to step up to the plate. I’ve brought you peace. Now I want peace. I will have no peace until Bowie Crowley is dead.”

Jenkins’s eyebrows danced on his forehead as he warmed to his subject. “The justice system determined that Bowie paid his debt to society and cut him loose. Now he’s going around like the risen Christ, if Christ had been made over by a team of celebrity stylists. Everyone’s listening to Bowie Crowley. Everyone wants to be seen with Bowie Crowley. Everyone wants to fuck Bowie Crowley. Hell, he’s an
artiste
. They love it because he’s a scary man. A criminal. An ex-con. A card-carrying killer. He’s out there preaching, ‘Parents, don’t let your children grow up to be me.’ Whoooooo …”
Jack waggled his fingers in Scoville’s face, as if he should be scared.

“A killer …” Jenkins hawked up the word. “Fucking two-bit throwaway stint for voluntary manslaughter. Give me a break. Killer my ass. I’ll show him killer. We’ll see who the tough guy is.”

Scoville imploringly raised his hands. “That’s my point. I’m not a killer. I don’t have it in me.”

“Course you do, Mark. Everyone does. They just don’t know it. Haven’t gotten in touch with that part of themselves.”

“Jack, you’ve murdered at least two people. You said you’ve done hits. Why don’t you kill Bowie Crowley?”

“Because I want you to.”

“
Why?
”

“Because.”

“That’s crazy.”

“Mark, stop using those words, please. Crazy. Insane. Lunatic. I mean, I’m the one who’s sitting here calm and cool and you’re the one who’s nearly busting a gasket.”

Jenkins picked up a hot wing, picked off the meat with his fingers, and put it in his mouth. “Look, Mark. Bowie and I have a history, just like you and Mercer had a history. It’s cleaner this way.”

“What did Crowley do to you?” Scoville asked.

“That’s between him and me. Make sure you tell him before you off him. ‘This is for Jack.’ Make sure you say that.”

“I’m not doing it.”

“You’re boring me, Mark.”

“Look, I’ll come clean with you about something. This will surprise you. I would like to see Bowie Crowley blown off the face of the earth too, and I’ll tell you why.” Scoville took a breath and prepared to utter those terrible words. Telling someone would legitimize it. Make it
real. He had no choice. He looked straight at Jenkins, having avoided it until now. He saw a heavily made-up ugly man. The fact that he’d gotten used to it was proof to him that he was on the road to hell.

Jenkins hijacked the moment. He began guffawing, sending those eyebrows higher on his forehead, setting his face between quotation marks. “Fucking-A. You caught ’em together, didn’t cha? Didn’t cha? I can tell you did by the look on your face. Crowley always was a swordsman. Hasn’t lost his touch with the ladies.”

After his laughter subsided, Jenkins asked, “What’s your point?”

“What’s my point?” Scoville was incredulous. “That
is
the point.” He leaned toward Jenkins and lowered his voice. “Your plan, the way you described it to me later—because, my hand to God, we never discussed it that day in front of the courthouse—was to commit each other’s murder and we’d never get caught because neither of us had a connection to the guy we killed or an obvious motive. Now I have a connection to Crowley and a motive. I’m the wronged husband. The cops would be on me like nobody’s business.”

“Not my problem. You owe me. You ain’t got no way out. Kill Bowie Crowley or I will frame you for Mercer’s and that girl’s murder.”

“Frame me?”

“Frame you.” Jenkins held the back of his hand up to Scoville. “I’ve not only got Oliver’s ring, I’ve got the hand it was on.”

Scoville paled.

“Mark, can you say, ‘death penalty’?” Jenkins tittered at Scoville’s defeated expression. “Mark, Mark, Mark …”

He picked up his purse and alarmed Scoville by getting up and sliding onto the bench beside him. He opened his handbag and took something out that was
wrapped in a silk scarf printed with colorful drawings of hot-air balloons. He pulled Scoville’s hand beneath the table and shoved the bundle into it.

“That’s an untraceable nine millimeter semiautomatic with a silencer. Got eight bullets in the clip and one in the chamber. You’ll only need one clip because if you don’t stop Bowie with that, he’ll tear your head off and spit down your neck before you can reload. You sit there all self-righteous, thinking you’re better than me. It’s not clothing that makes a man a man. It’s action. Stop whining and get it done, Mark.”

Scoville made a wheezing noise when Jenkins grabbed his crotch.

“See, I knew you had cojones. Now use ’em.”

On his way out, Jenkins muttered to himself, “I love messing with that wuss.”

TWENTY-FIVE

V
ining badged
her way through the emergency room at the Big G, slowing only slightly as she passed the armed security guards with metal-detecting wands who screened all hospital visitors. Security had been beefed up after an incident in 1993 when a patient, disgruntled over having to wait too long for pain medication, opened fire in the emergency room, wounding three doctors and taking staff members hostage.

County-USC Medical Center on North State Street in East Los Angeles, with more square feet than the Pentagon,
is one of the largest academic medical centers in the country and has one of the busiest emergency rooms. It is most famous for its art deco towers, which appear in the opening scenes of the soap opera
General Hospital
.

On the aged linoleum floor, seven lines, each a different color, lead to various sections of the mammoth facility. Vining didn’t need to follow the orange line, as she knew the way. “Psychiatric Emergency Services” was painted on the wall of an alcove. Inside, closed double doors were painted a homely shade of aqua that someone twenty years ago had probably deemed a calming hue.

She hadn’t called ahead and wasn’t accompanied by a detainee for the facility, but the no-nonsense female security guard at a wooden podium didn’t press her about her business. With her shield in her hand, Vining smiled and jived with the guard, behavior that didn’t come naturally but that she thought she faked pretty well. She channeled Kaitlyn for inspiration.

Vining illegibly scribbled her name on the sign-in sheet on the clipboard. From a drawer, the guard produced a small key with a numbered fob for a gun locker. While police officers could keep their weapons in the hospital proper, guns were not allowed in the psych ward. The guard smacked a button and the two doors swung open. Inside was a waiting room. A psych tech sat in a small office behind a shatterproof, polycarbonate-reinforced glass window. A door with a similar window was at one end of the small room. Bolted to the wall was a set of numbered gun lockers that looked like large post office boxes.

Sitting on plastic and steel chairs were two uniformed officers, both young males, who sat a small distance from their handcuffed charge, likely because of her odor. She was a middle-aged African American woman
whose filthy clothing, matted hair, and stench indicated that she lived on the streets. She incessantly muttered, “I know people in Trenton. Trenton. Don’t mess with me, cuz I know people in Trenton.”

It was after 11:00 p.m., known as “quiet time” in the psych ward. The doctors had gone home and a skeleton crew of psych techs and nurses was on duty. The staff made sure the patients were sufficiently medicated to sleep through the night.

Vining knew that Nitro was still incarcerated at the Big G. Despite patient confidentiality laws, she had been able to glean that much information through a phone call. She also knew about quiet time and protocol at the Big G psych ward. She was counting on being able to take advantage of an overburdened and overwhelmed system. Men’s Central Jail was overburdened too, but she knew her odds were better at the Big G to accomplish what she had in mind. So far, so good.

A psych tech came to the window. He was a burly, dark-haired young man with a carefully sculpted short beard. A nametag on his uniform said: L. Chapel.

“You have a patient here called Nitro,” Vining told him. “Young guy, white, tall, slight build. Won’t speak.” When the tech indicated he knew who she was talking about, she went on. “This guy has a necklace among his personal possessions. I want to have a look at it. We had a report of a piece of stolen jewelry that matches its description.”

Without questioning her, Chapel left to fetch the necklace. Vining opened the gun locker that matched the key. In it she deposited her sidearm, the Glock .40. She did not remove her backup weapon, the Walther PPK in her ankle holster.

She remained standing. The two officers talked and laughed in low voices, leaning forward in their chairs,
regaling each other with stories of conquests, Vining suspected, either on the street or in the bedroom. Meanwhile, the delusional woman blathered about Trenton.

Shortly, the psych tech returned. “Is this what you want?” He held up a plastic bag containing Nitro’s necklace.

Vining took it from him and examined it, turning the bag over. She nodded. “Looks like our stolen necklace. I’m seizing it as evidence. I’ll give you a receipt.”

“Can you do that?”

“I already am.” She put the bag with the necklace in her pocket and took out a memo pad. She pulled off the pen that was clipped to it and scribbled a receipt. As she tore it from the pad, she asked the tech, “Is Nitro talking?”

“Not yet.”

“Can I see him for a few minutes?”

“I can’t let anyone back there.”

Vining shrugged. “It’s quiet time.”

“What do you want to see him for?”

“I’ve only seen a picture of him. I want to see him in person, see if he matches the description of a cat burglar working our area.”

“I’m not supposed to let anyone back there without authorization.”

Vining put away her notepad. When she pulled her hand out, she had a hundred-dollar bill hidden in her palm. “That’s cool. I understand.” She raised her hand to shake the tech’s. “If you can work something out.…”

Taking the cash, the tech turned his palm to look at it. He glanced at the two cops, who were still deep in their own world. Their charge was immersed in
her
own world. “I can work something out. Did you lock up your weapon?”

Vining turned to show that the holster attached to her belt was empty.

He said quietly into her ear, “You’ve got five minutes and you’d better just be looking. Don’t mess me up.” He went behind the counter.

At the sound of the buzzer, Vining pushed through the door. She entered a large ward with hospital beds lining both sides of the walls. At the far end were chairs facing a TV suspended from the ceiling. A pay phone was on the wall. Most of the beds were occupied. A few patients were handcuffed to their bed. Some were strapped down. Patients wore their own clothing, which ran the gamut from clean pajamas, robes, and slippers to the grime-caked vestments of those who called the streets home.

It was quiet and the light was dim.

Vining walked down the aisle between the beds, peering at the faces. Her heart raced. With her left hand inside her pocket, she opened the plastic bag and touched the necklace, running her fingers up and down it as if it was a rosary.

A big Latino who was strapped to his bed hissed as she passed, “Chica … Come here, chica. I’ve got something for you. Chica, come see.”

She saw a shock of white hair. Nitro. Beside his bed, she looked down at him, watching him sleeping. He looked even younger, and his unlined, trouble-free face filled her with rage.

Nitro opened his eyes with a start.

“Shhh …” Vining pressed her finger against her lips. “It’s only me. Nan Vining. You remember me.”

He wasn’t glad to see her.

“Sure you do. You remember me.”

She leaned as close as she dared, wanting to stand as close to him as T. B. Mann had stood to her during those
final moments while he waited to watch her die. She felt a vibration from Nitro that was familiar, so much like T. B. Mann. It terrified and mesmerized her.

“Who put you up to this?” She knew he felt her breath on his face. That was what she wanted, just like she had felt T. B. Mann’s breath on hers. Let her breath get under his skin and filter into his nightmares, just like T. B. Mann’s had for her.

She was close, unwisely close. The hands can kill you, she’d learned in her Academy training. Keep your eyes on the hands. Distance is your biggest ally. She was disregarding those rules. He could grab her, bite her, jab his thumbs into her eyes, blind her.