Dead Is Dead (The Jack Bertolino Series Book 3) (3 page)

Four wireless phones echoing in the empty loft announced that Cruz Feinberg was on the line. Cruz was a millennial computer genius who handled everything technical in Jack’s company. Jack tossed his keys into a wooden bowl next to the door and hoofed it over to the kitchen extension. He picked up a millisecond before the call was directed to voice mail.

“Turn on channel two,” Cruz said with enough urgency to spark Jack’s curiosity. He picked up the remote from the couch, hit Power, and his flat screen pinged to life.

The onscreen tableau showed a scene of mourning: lit candles, a small shrine of flowers, stuffed animals, and cards penned in childlike scrawl.

And a framed picture of a little girl.

A loose group of grieving family members stood behind a microphone that was set up in front of their house. A female reporter introduced Mrs. Sanchez, the victim’s mother, who was inconsolable, but spoke bravely in broken English through her tears.

“My Maria, she is only six. My angel. Gone. Who did this to my angel? Why you do this?”

The woman’s eyes rolled back in her head, her knees buckled, and she reeled. Her husband grabbed her before she hit the sidewalk. Still, she dissolved in a flurry of choking sobs and stark grief only a parent could fully understand.

Jack knew this was the shooting that had occurred while he was on the movie set.

“Do you know the family?” he asked Cruz.

“Yeah, the Sanchezes. They live a few houses down from my place.”

Cruz had moved into a garden guesthouse in Venice, near the Rose Café, as soon as he started working for Jack on a regular basis. The hours were ungodly when they were on a case, and living at home had led to hassles. His parents were sad to see him go, but glad not to be woken up in the middle of the night.

“Their son Juan is at the police station,” Cruz said. “It looks like he was involved in a drug deal with the male victim and lucky to be alive. The word on the street is the deal was just pot. The police think it was a gang-related drive-by.”

“Is Juan a banger?”

“No, just a kid, a worker bee. Still in high school.”

The female reporter, caught up in the emotion, reiterated Cruz’s story in hushed tones and drew Jack’s attention to the screen. He’d seen too many of these reports and attended too many of these scenarios when he was a detective working undercover in narcotics. They always left him feeling empty and angry. Frustrated at the waste of human life.

“They’re good people,” Cruz went on. “Father’s an illegal, afraid of the police, afraid of being deported, afraid for his family, and doesn’t know who to talk to. His son needs help. I thought . . . ?”

Cruz had proven himself in the heat of battle, but you couldn’t teach compassion and Jack was impressed.

“Why don’t you and I meet for breakfast at Three Squares, and then take a drive over? When the emotion settles down some.”

“That would be great, Jack. It’s a heartbreak.”

“I’ll see you at nine.”

Jack clicked off and listened to the reporter implore the television audience that if anyone had seen, heard, or knew anything about the shooter, they should call the Pacific Division of the LAPD. The phone number and address on Culver Boulevard flashed by on a crawl at the bottom of the screen, obscuring the dead girl’s photograph and the makeshift shrine.

Jack wasn’t optimistic. In his experience, if the shooting was gang-related, the community would be tight-lipped, afraid of retribution.

Their fear was reasonable, but Jack had ways of making people talk. If it was possible, someone would soon be held accountable for that little girl.

Four

Terrence Dirk was framed by the three-way-mirror in the Dirk Brothers shop, checking out the shoulder fit on a new black motorcycle jacket he’d ordered from Burberry. It was British, leather like butter, and had the retro look of a sixties Carnaby Street rocker. He wore black peg-legged pants, a classic English boot with a discreet silver buckle on the side, and one-inch heels that needlessly accentuated his height.

Six-foot-three, rail thin, with his rangy orange-red hair and gaunt face, he looked like the front man he was. Startling hazel eyes had the luminosity of a cat and showed no humor unless they were tempered by a fifth of highland scotch, and even then he looked mean.

Terrence stepped off the six-inch wooden platform where his father had died pinning the cuffs on a pair of Sansabelt slacks.

At twenty-eight, Terrence was now the reluctant family patriarch. He had dropped out of his freshman year at Duke, taken over the foundering family business, and found new ways to direct his own anger at the unfairness of life.

Retail was a mind-numbingly bore, but he learned all the tricks of the trade and discovered it provided a perfect outlet to launder money. Two sets of books. Doctored inventory. Inflated sales. Terrence vowed never to spend his time comparing the day’s receipts to the previous years, while tossing back Mylanta on every downtick, like his father had wasted his life doing.

Within a year, he had expanded the store and branched out into custom-made furnishings along with handmade suits. He discovered that with interior designer pieces, couches, mirrors, lighting, and art, he could gain entry to his clients’ homes to install the items. It was relatively easy to inflate the cost of materials and his own fees as a design consultant. A couch that was commissioned for two thousand could be sold for five, and on paper reported as ten. Five thousand dollars of dirty money could be cleansed on one transaction.

As long as he paid his estimated quarterly taxes on time and ran the numbers through a respected accounting firm, the family’s fat profit margin didn’t raise any red flags with the IRS. Everyone was happy as long as everyone got paid. The more money banked, the larger the commission.

Willful blindness.

This new line of work also put him in contact with a wide array of vendors, some who had a penchant for cutting corners, doing dirty deals, and fencing the occasional stolen object. Drugs—their specialty was stealing product and cash from other dealers—and high-end theft from the million-dollar properties that were interspersed among the older local denizens, guaranteed a consistent income stream.

The Dirk brothers, by selling to the yachting and country club set, knew when their marks were taking that dream cruise, the size of their art collection, and the number of carats in their wives’ engagement rings. They were making inroads into the Malibu colony and had photographs of a number of show business clients on the wall behind their bronze antique cash register.

People loved to brag when they were getting their inseams measured or their living rooms redecorated. Retail hadn’t worked out too well for Terrence senior, but he had left behind a loyal patronage and a perfect front for the Dirk brothers’ gang.

Terrence, suitably impressed by his new look, turned his attention to his younger brothers. Toby was slouched in a gray Barcelona chair, mildly distracted, drinking a long-neck Pacifico. Sean poured highland scotch into two glasses, neat, handed one to Terrence before giving him the floor.

Security bars were accordioned across the front door, the
CLOSED
sign hung in place, and the gray mesh shades had been pulled down, obscuring the two front windows. The shadows of late-night Main Street revelers walking past the shop played across the translucent window coverings like apparitions while the Kinks’ “Lola” drifted softly from hidden speakers.

Terrence took center stage. “The Diskins are leaving on the eighteenth for two months. They’ve got three Monet hand-signed color lithographs that we can switch out with copies and an original Basquiat from the eighties conservatively appraised at three hundred. Jerry has a client in Japan willing to go two hundred and a collector in Germany who’ll guarantee two seventy-five. He also has a client who’s Monet crazed and will toss in another fifty for the trio. He takes sixty percent and that nets us a little over—”

“They have a regular house sitter,” Sean said, cutting him off. “She’s a professional.”

“And she takes the dogs to the Airport Dog Park every day at three thirty for an hour and a half,” Terrence countered, clearly unhappy at being cut off.

“Why are we trading out the Monets?” Sean pressed. “They’re going to see that the Basquiat is missing. It’s a fool’s game and diminishes our bottom line.”

Terrence couldn’t argue that point. “So we take as much as we can carry, in and out in ten.”

“I don’t like it. We’re too close to Diskin. He generates enough income without stealing from the man. We’d be at the top of the list with the cops and the fine arts adjuster.”

“He makes a good point,” Toby said.

“And, we’re basically working for Jerry. It’s bullshit. We find the job, take the risk, and a sixty percent hit? The math’s all wrong,” Sean said, angrily tossing back some single malt.

“We still pocket a hundred-seventy-five K give or take,” Toby said, thinking purely about the bottom line.

“Right?” Terrence air-jabbed Sean. Met with dead eyes and deaf ears, he upped the volume a notch. “We spend twenty minutes inside the fucking house and walk away with a nice chunk of change.”

“Back the fuck off,” Sean said. “We’re just talking here. What about the grass? The deep-sea drop-off I pitched last month. We take the risk, but could walk away with as much as three-fifty. Cash dollars.”

“And we risk having the Sinaloa cartel up our ass.”

“How the fuck are they gonna know who scooped ’em? It’s a random act, a one-off. And I can unload it out of the area. Toby and I’ll drive the Mercedes to Sacramento as soon as we hit dry land. Ricky J’s got five medical marijuana pharmacies in operation and is always willing to take discounted product.”

“Toby?” Terrence asked, fishing for an ally.

“Day after Sean stumbled onto that tuna boat dropping bales off Catalina, everyone in my crew showed up with a bag full of dope and shit-eating grins. Same story two weeks ago.”

“They only had two guys on the ski boat running the product to shore,” Sean said, adding to his pitch. “There was a half hour lag time between drop-off and pickup. The bales were floating out in the middle of nowhere, shouting: take me, take me.”

Toby was sold. “And I like the pirate aspect. With two of us in kayaks, and you covering us in the Zodiac, we should be able to disable the GPS, hook up the bales, and make a run to the backside of Catalina before anyone’s the wiser. Even if the Mexicans overlap our play, three against two, we could probably get away clean without firing a shot.”

Terrence walked over to Sean, grabbed the bottle, and gave himself a generous pour. Stopped short of corking the bottle and tipped some into Sean’s glass. He looked around the shop, at the midcentury modern furniture, the Italian blown-glass lighting fixtures, and the fine local art and photography. Imported woolen suits hung in neat rows against a wood-paneled wall. He wasn’t happy.

“If they stay on schedule, we’re looking good for the end of the week,” Sean said, trying to close the deal.

The vote had to be unanimous.

Toby added, “My guys get a heads-up the day before the drop-off, gives them time to pool their money.”

“I heard Tomas Vegas ate a bullet,” Terrence said, taking a left turn, trying to catch Toby off guard, looking closely at his reaction.

Toby didn’t blink an eye. “One Lenox scumbag down, there’s always someone ready to take his place. Shouldn’t slow down commerce. I ain’t crying.”

“So we’re cool?” Terrence hammered the point, making the question a statement. “We don’t need the blowback.”

“Good to go. No worries,” Toby said with his studied cool.

Terrence wanted to believe his little brother. He understood that a successful criminal enterprise was only as strong as its weakest link.

“So we vote,” Terrence finally said. “All in favor of the art scam?” He was the only man to lift his arm. And then, “Pirates it is,” and he cracked a wicked grin. “But we’ve got to do this right or everything we’ve worked for comes tumbling down around our ankles.”

Toby growled, “Arghhh.” And that set Sean to cackling.

The three brothers lifted their drinks in a silent toast to a successful venture and the wealth that would follow. After all, those bales of marijuana would be just floating out there for the taking.

Five

Day Two

The summer rain canted toward the house and drummed against the picture window in the Sanchez family’s living room. Within the dark, damp room itself the overwhelming sense of heartache was palpable. A small side window was boarded up from the gunshot, leaking, the water dripping down the faded yellow wall like tears.

It wasn’t bad enough that their six-year-old daughter had taken a bullet to the head and their youngest boy was sitting in a jail cell for intent to sell marijuana, it’s gotta rain, Jack thought. The dampness inflamed his back, which was throbbing as he sat uncomfortably on the edge of the brightly upholstered couch, listening to the father’s lament, heavy with grief, while Cruz interpreted.

Mr. Sanchez hadn’t slept, shaved, or fully come to grips with the nightmare that had enveloped his family. His wife was in the bedroom, medicated, unable to cope. Extended family and neighbors milled through the house, preparing it for the friends who would be stopping by later in the day to pay their respects.

Jack’s gaze drifted to the blown-up photograph of Maria, bright-eyed with a toothy grin. He could tell she felt secure in the knowledge she was loved, and now she was dead.

“Tell Mr. Sanchez,” Jack said, “that I’ll find out who’s handling the case and do everything I can to help. I’ve already put in a call to my lawyer. His name is Tommy Aronsohn. He’s a good man who will try to get your son released on his own recognizance. If that doesn’t work, he’ll move for an immediate bail hearing on the drug charges. I’ll need to talk to your son myself as soon as possible.” Jack lowered his voice. “Plus, he’ll do everything in his power to gain the early release of your daughter’s body.”

In cases like this, Jack was certain there would be an autopsy. The bullet that killed the young girl could be an important piece of evidence, and it had been reported that the shot wasn’t a through-and-through.

Tommy Aronsohn had flown into L.A. that morning, checked himself into the Marina Ritz-Carlton, and hit the ground running. Being an ex-DA still carried enough weight to have a few favors granted. And Tommy wasn’t troubled by pro bono work or afraid to throw his weight around when needed. He had put in a call to DDA Leslie Sager, who immediately agreed to look into the matter. A thoughtful move not lost on Jack. He had been in a committed relationship with Leslie, but career choices and political aspirations created a wedge that was their undoing. They were on a trial separation that was pushing toward permanent.

Jack turned to Cruz, who had finished the translation. “Also, ask Mr. Sanchez if he’d be willing to use his house as collateral for his son’s bail, if needed.”

Mr. Sanchez nodded his head before Jack had finished speaking.

Platters and trays filled with cold cuts and foil-wrapped casseroles were being arranged on the dining room table. The doorbell rang and the sound of the rain became more pronounced as the door was pulled open by one of the family’s young cousins.

“Jesus Christ. Bertolino,” were the first irreverent words out of Lieutenant Gallina’s mouth as he stood in the doorway, dripping water onto the living room rug. Gallina, with a jowly face, soft build, and receding hairline, looked older than his thirty-five years. His partner, Detective Tompkins, cleared his throat and was finally allowed entry, generating his own puddle as he wiped the raindrops off his nose and wire-rimmed glasses. Six feet, lean, and African American, he stood a head taller than Gallina. As Jack had learned by now, he was the more reasonable half of their partnership.

“Jack,” he said.

Jack nodded his greeting to Tompkins, handed a business card to the father, and stood, ready to vacate the premises and let the good lieutenant go about his police business.

Mr. Sanchez pulled his wallet from his back pocket, but Jack put his hand over the grieving man’s hand. “It’s not necessary. You can call me, anytime, 24/7.”

Mr. Sanchez tried for a smile as he slid Jack’s card into the top pocket of his work shirt, but it never reached his tear-stained eyes.

As Jack moved toward the door, he was stopped by Gallina’s voice.

“What should I know?” he asked, not pleased Jack had gotten the first shot at interviewing the family.

Their relationship was better of late, but there was no love lost between the two men. At best they shared a begrudging professional respect. Of course, in Jack’s case, it was hard to warm up to the man who’d once arrested him for a murder he hadn’t committed.

“What’s the word?” Jack said, answering the question with a question.

“Drive-by. Drug deal. Internecine gang rivalry. The male victim was a Lenox Road banger. The gang squad’s rousting the usual suspects.”

“Who phoned it in?”

“A neighbor up the block in that white two-story modern job dialed 911 at the same time that Mrs. Sanchez called.”

“Did he see the shooter?”

“That’s a negative,” Tompkins piped in. “Heard the shots and saw a car drive by. Late-model Japanese sedan. Coulda been silver, coulda been white, dark windows, didn’t see the occupants or catch the license number. Wasn’t really sure what had happened until he saw the male hit the pavement face first and dialed it in.

“We had two uniforms canvassing the neighborhood, but this guy’s the only one who caught any of the action.”

Gallina and Tompkins were robbery-homicide and would be sharing intel, coordinating the investigation with the gang unit. Jack didn’t expect to be kept in the loop, but he could always put in a call to Detective Nick Aprea, his one good friend on the force, if he wanted the inside scoop.

“Need I ask why you are here?” Gallina asked as if the effort pained him. “But more important, whadda ya got?” he said, flicking the fingers on his right hand like he was playing standup bass.

“That there’s a big hole in the family’s heart and they’re afraid justice might not be served,” answered both of Gallina’s questions, Jack thought.

It didn’t satisfy the lieutenant, but he didn’t press. “The mayor, being elected on the promise to lower violent crime,” he said, “keep the streets safe and what-not, saw the little girl’s face on the tube last night, woke up the captain, who shared the joy and dragged us out.”

Gallina glanced over at Mr. Sanchez, who was huddled with Cruz. “The family will get all the justice politics can buy. You did not hear that from me.” And then, “Let the man know that his immigration status is not on the table. If he plays ball, we’ll do all we can to arrest the shit-heel who pulled the trigger.”

Jack walked back to the couch and spoke in hushed tones to Cruz, who relayed the information to Mr. Sanchez. The broken man looked warily at the lieutenant and then nodded in agreement. He let out a sigh that caught in his throat and caused Cruz to turn away, not wanting to intrude on the man’s grief. There was no relief to be had in the Sanchez house that day.

The storm cell rolled through Venice by midafternoon as it made its way north toward Ventura County, as predicted by Dallas Raines, the local weatherman on Channel 7.

Toby leaned back in his Tommy Bahama beach chair, placed in the wet sand directly beneath the takeoff path from LAX. He snapped a picture of a wide-body Lufthansa jet as it broke through the dense cloud cover, darkened the sky, and then roared out over the Pacific, the vibration thrumming in the pit of his stomach.

It was damp with a light breeze at Dockweiler beach; the blue sky radiated the kind of brilliance used on travel posters to entice out-of-towners to visit Southern California.

Toby checked his latest photo on his iPhone, posted it on Instagram, and then looked over at his girlfriend. Eva Perez sat in an identical chair, a lime-green scarf pulled up tight to her chin, framing her beautiful face, eyes closed.

A single tear appeared in the corner of her eye and streaked down the curve of her cheek. And then a second. Toby’s heart caught in his throat. He felt a burning rage that he tamped down. He started to speak, to ease her pain, but had to wait for the next jumbo jet to pass. He wished he were on that flight to anywhere.

The air was thick, clean, and salty; the dark waves were white capped and broke on the shoreline in rapid hypnotic succession. The wide beach was all but empty, two lone lovers on a vast stretch of white sand.

“Why’re you crying?” Toby asked as he wiped the tear from her cheek.

“Would you tell me—if you did it?” she asked, referring to the murder of Tomas Vegas, the gangbanger who had destroyed her life.

Toby gave her his most sincere gaze, which challenged anyone to doubt his word. He’d been perfecting it since he was old enough to speak. “I’d never lie to you, baby. And as far as the scumbag goes, bad things happen to bad people. Fuckin’ karma.”

Eva gave that some thought and her brow furrowed. “But . . . the little girl?”

Eva had lustrous blonde hair that was cut at a sharp angle just above her shoulders, and her wide brown eyes were ringed with gold. Her skin was what poets called honey and cream, Toby thought, or was that shampoo commercials? He didn’t really care. He could spend days lost in her gaze and the rest of his life between her thighs.

Toby had no answer for the death of little Maria. He was thankful another jet lumbered overhead and filled the painful silence with its prolonged roar. Finally, “You were at your aunt’s yesterday?”

Eva wiped her eyes with the back of her delicate hands, pulled out a Kleenex, and blew her nose. The trumpeting sound so belied her beauty that it made Toby laugh.

Eva fought the smile that was trying to form and shook her head yes.

“So you’re in the clear,” he said lightly.

“You know I was at Mona’s. You told me to go,” she said with attitude.

“And when did you start listening to me?” he snapped back.

Eva gave him a firm poke in the arm.

“So you’re good,” Toby said. “’Cause the cops might come around and ask questions. So, no sweat. Nothing to worry about.”

Eva’s eyes betrayed her fear of what might happen if she had another run-in with the law. She had told Toby that she’d lost a piece of herself, of her heart; she knew it was gone forever.

“I love you,” he said roughly. “We’re strong.”

“Forever?” she asked tentatively.

“Forever. Believe it. Our love is . . . damn, perfect.”

“Even now?”

“More than ever. I’ll never leave you. We are all the way good.”

But Toby knew there was one more target that needed to be run through with the karmic sword of retribution before he could move on and truly be free.

“Here, with me.” He pulled his chair tight against Eva’s, wrapped a comforting arm around her shoulder, and snapped a cheek-to-cheek selfie as a massive American Airliner sliced through the clouds and enveloped the lovers in shadow.

The Pacific Division Police Station on Culver was a modern, utilitarian rectangular box, with clean brick siding topped by a band of smooth beige concrete that ran the entire length of the building. A waterlogged American flag hung limply on a tapered brass pole in front of the building’s entrance. It was as nondescript as the beige detention room where Juan Sanchez was seated next to his court-appointed attorney.

Jack said, “I just want you to know that there are a lot of people working very hard on your behalf.”

Juan looked smaller, frail, and younger than his seventeen years. He hadn’t slept and the death of his sister was tearing him up. He was wired, on edge, and the only thing keeping him upright was the electrical charge surging through his veins.

“Now, DDA Sager is willing to let you go home to your family on your own recognizance, you understand?”

Juan nodded his head, his foot tapped nervously under the table.

“To help you all deal with this tragedy,” Jack went on. “But the story you’re telling, what you’re confessing to, doesn’t jive with what we understand to be the facts of the case. We need you to man-up, Juan, and tell the truth.”

“I was selling the weed to Vegas,” he said, tight but losing control, “not the other way around.” His resolve faltered and his voice cracked.

Jack gave him a moment to pull himself together. “And who did you buy it from, again?”

“A guy on the street, don’t know his name. He hung around sometimes.”

Jack squeezed the bridge of his nose and continued. “Tell me how it went down again, with Vegas. Maybe we can clear this up and get you on your way.”

Juan took a sip of warm Coke out of an aluminum can. “We talked some trash for a bit,” he said, “me and Vegas, and then I handed him the grass, and he handed me the money. And then a car drove by.”

“What kind of a car?”

“A Nissan, a Toyota, could’ve been a Sentra. White, silver, not new. Windows had a tint, I think.”

“Was one of the windows rolled down?”

“Must’ve been. I didn’t see, ’cause I was looking at Vegas. Then I heard a
pop
, and the window in my house exploded behind me. I turned to look and heard
pop, pop
, and saw that Tomas got shot and so I dove. I dove behind his car.”

Juan showed Jack the scrapes on his hands and elbows and the knees of his jeans to prove his point.

“And then Mama screamed. I didn’t know what happened. I didn’t know what. I’m so sorry.”

Juan broke, his face contorted, and the tears started streaming down his cheeks.

“I never would’ve done nothing like this if I knew what was gonna happen. Little Maria, oh my God. I’m so sorry, my sweet sister.”

“I believe that, son. I believe you.”

Jack pushed a box of Kleenex across the table and let Juan gather himself.

“Did Vegas have any enemies you were aware of?” Jack asked.

“He was Lenox Road. Any set not on Lenox.” Like duh.

“Not the SM18’s, or the Culver City 12’s?”

Juan sat mute. He knew the rules.

Jack had cheated death a few months earlier. A contract had been taken out on his life, and the young banger who was hell-bent on earning his first teardrop tattoo and full membership into the gang had missed his mark. Jack walked away from the scene happy to be alive. In between court appearances he had researched the gang activity that was simmering just below the surface in the Venice, Culver City, and Santa Monica areas.