Hot Shot (24 page)

“Sí.”

I touched the hem of his sleeve. “Felina
knew
that someone wanted to murder her?”

He stared at me, uncomprehending.

“I'm confused, sir. Felina died just a few weeks ago. When did you talk to her last?”

A long moment. He wiped his face with the flat of his hand, looking just as puzzled as I.

“I haven't spoken to Felina in five years.”

*   *   *

The interior of the Buick was like a broiler oven. Nevertheless, I sat there in the U-Park, windows up, for nearly twenty minutes, trying to process the information that I had prized out of Eduardo Lopez.

A good reporter bird-dogs the parts of the story that don't make sense. Pieces stick out, just like one of Lopez's half-formed cigars. And it's those sticking-out pieces that demand your attention. They've either got to be nudged into place or chopped off.

The story of Felina Lopez and Dick Mann had pieces sticking out all over it, and I'd been in such a damn hurry to get the book done, to write the story that Jack Danziger wanted me to write, that I hadn't paid attention.

And the answer had been there all along, from the day I first met Felina Lopez in Tijuana; if I'd just taken the time, not to look at it, but really to
see
it, the same way I'd finally seen Jeff and Karen at the opening of Canem … the same way I'd finally seen Claudia and me.

The car was hot. I was breaking a sweat.

Felina had been murdered. It wasn't just a robbery gone wrong, though that might have been part of it. I knew who'd done it. And I knew who had wanted to get hold of my manuscript, and why.

What I didn't know was what I was going to do next.

I sat there sweating for ten more minutes, and then I started the car and drove over to Second and Spring.

*   *   *

The fourth floor was unusually quiet for a weekday. A few people were at their desks, but the usual white noise of a thousand fingers tapping a thousand keys was strangely muted. I weaved my way through the bullpens, saying hi to a few folks, noticing more pods vacant and empty. Reporters used to call the paper “The Velvet Coffin”—because so many talented writers landed there and ended up in cushy, benefit-laden oblivion. Now it just felt like a funeral home.

Fortunately, Sally was at the desk that she'd occupied for almost three decades, and her pod was a reassuring mess of printouts, reference books, old dummies, and a battered Coyote terminal with Post-Its stuck to its edges. She had an open container of Yoplait and a bottled water sitting on a stack of newspapers. Editor's lunch.

“Hey.”

“Kieran!” She stopped typing and swiveled around. “Oh, God, I forgot to call you back. I'd take you to lunch, but I'm whomped again.”

“Where is everybody? The garage was nearly empty, and this dump looks like a ghost town.”

“At least ghost towns get a few tourists. This is pretty much it right now.”

“Why is Barbara Kuhn's pod empty?”

“Barbara took the buyout. I thought you knew. Friday was her last day.”

“Barbara had been here almost as long as you, Sal.”

“Well, she's in Puerto Rico now for a month. She's thinking of trying to get a job on a small-town paper in Idaho or Utah. Now I'm doing her job as well as mine.” Her voice dropped. “I might end up there myself. They wanted me to take the buyout, too, but I dug in my feet. Now I'm wondering if it was a mistake. They really want me out. But screw 'em. I'm tired of thinking about it. I'm sure you didn't come down to listen to me bitch.” She smiled, but her eyes were tired. “So what was so important on the phone yesterday?”

“Nothing, really. I just came down to do a little research.”

She waved her arm at the nearly empty bullpen. “Use Barbara's desk. Or pick a pod, any pod. It doesn't really matter much anymore.”

“Okay. Thanks. Hey, is Roy Cruz still down on cityside?”

“Roy's still here. Some of us dinosaurs are hard to kill.”

“Thanks, Sal.”

*   *   *

Barbara's pod still had a working phone. I scared up some paper and pens and got down to it. First was a call to the library. I had them pull some clips from about five years ago. Library staff had been cut, too. The guy at the other end of the phone was busy, but promised to pull them right away.

I went up to the library. By the time the elevator had taken me down to cityside, I'd found what I suspected. But I still wanted to talk to Roy Cruz.

Roy had been at the paper even longer than Sally. His beat was LAPD headquarters. I was in luck: He was sitting at his desk in shirtsleeves and tie, reading his own stack of printouts.

“Roy? You have a minute?”

He squinted up at me. “Oh, Kieran. Sure. I just got back from Parker Center. What's up?”

*   *   *

Back in Barbara's pod, I took some deep breaths. Roy Cruz had confirmed what I suspected, and I knew what I had to do next.

I called 411 and got a number for an office in Century City.

“You have reached the offices of Levin Investigations. Please listen to the following options and, using your Touch-Tone pad, select the one—”

Screw it. I pressed 0.

“Levin Investigations,” said a real live voice.

“Put Brooks on, would you?”

A huffy pause. “Who's calling for Mr. Levin, please?”

“Kieran O'Connor.”

“Mr. Levin's not available, but if—”

“Look. He's been sending me messages for a while. If he's not there, call him. Or page him. Send up the Batsignal. I don't give a shit what you do. Just get hold of him and tell him I'll be at this number for exactly fifteen minutes.”

Silence. After a moment, she asked, “What was that name again?”

I gave her Barbara's extension and sat back to wait.

Seven minutes later, the phone rang.

18

W
HEN
I
WALKED BACK
out to Spring Street, it was ninety-nine degrees and so smoggy I couldn't see the hills. The 10 was a sludgy river of metal heading west. By the time I passed Fairfax, though, traffic began to thin, and when I got off in downtown Santa Monica, it was seventy-five degrees, with a cool Pacific breeze. On the right day, you can sometimes remember why you bother to live in Southern California.

I found a quasi-legal spot on Broadway and jogged across the street to Palisades Park, a tiny strip of green that ran along the bluffs overlooking the Pacific Coast Highway.

Down below, joggers, Rollerbladers, and bicyclists shared the concrete path that curved through the sand. The Ferris wheel on the pier stood tall and still, a spare tire propped against the horizon. A lone box kite nipped at the sky. The sun hanging over the water was orange and sports-car red. From here, I could see all of Santa Monica Bay, from Rancho Palos Verdes up to the point at Malibu. A necklace of cars stretched up the Pacific Coast Highway, taillights heading home.

I put my hands on the railing and took a deep breath. My watch said 5:54.

I had six minutes, just enough time to make my appointment.

*   *   *

It was 5:59 by the time I reached the gazebo at Ocean and Idaho. But the person I'd come to meet was nowhere around. All I saw was a homeless guy asleep in the grass, a teenage couple tangled up under a picnic blanket, and a woman with a scarf who stared out to sea behind dark glasses. Down the walk, a Dumpster-diver was rummaging through a trash bin, stacking bright-green cans of Mountain Dew in his shopping cart.

New temporary fencing had been erected along the bluffs' edge here. The hillside was crumbling, slowly decaying from the annual rainstorms and the million little temblors that ran under our feet each day, invisible and unfelt. One day, miles under the earth, the wrong plate would shift a few inches, and the whole hillside would tumble across the highway and return to the sea.

“Hello, Kieran.”

Materialized
was the only word for it. One second he wasn't there, and the next he was standing in front of me, blocking out the fading sun.

Though I'd never even seen a picture of Brooks Levin, I knew him immediately. He was a good six-three, with beefy shoulders and large hands. He wore a nondescript blue blazer and a white shirt. Despite his cornerback build, there was something lithe and quick about him. Wire-rimmed glasses made his eyes look mild, even reproving. I had no idea where he'd come from. I could see why the guy had a nearly supernatural reputation.

“Where's your client?”

“Couldn't make it after all. So I'm standing in.” The voice was the one I'd heard on the phone at the Wind & Sea, and it matched the body: understated but strong, and self-assured in the absolute.

I tried to control the rising panic I felt. “Is that supposed to scare me?”

“We need to talk.”

“I came to talk to your client.”

“You can tell me whatever you have to say.”

“All right.” I took two steps back from the edge of the bluff, away from Levin. “You said we need to talk? So talk.”

“Why do you want to ruin his life?”

“Here's a better question, Levin. Why did you break into my room at the Beverly Hillshire?”

“I didn't break into your room, Kieran.”

“So you paid someone else to do it. Sloan Baker probably let you in. I don't care how it happened. The end result was the same. You stole my manuscript.”

He shrugged and didn't say anything.

“I'm outta here,” I told him. “I didn't come to talk to you.”

“Please hear me out.” His voice was calm, eminently reasonable. “Think about what you're doing. How is making this public going to help anything? Felina is dead. It was just a matter of time. You're talking about ruining someone's life.”

“That's not my problem. My job is to make sure the truth gets told.”

A smile twitched the corners of his lips. “Spoken like a real reporter.”

“I guess so. And that's
your
problem. See ya, Levin.”

When I was several paces away, he called, “Hey.”

I turned around.

Levin had his hand in his jacket. The hand came out with an envelope.

He held it out to me. The wind shifted and got colder.

When I didn't move, he walked toward me, hand extended. The sun went behind a cloud, and salt spray hit my nose like ammonia.

“Take it,” he said, amused. “Open it.”

Inside was a bank draft, much like the one Shelly Nguyen had given me. Only this one had my name spelled correctly, and this one was for a lot more money. More money, in fact, than I'd gotten for the book. And, as the anti-conscience in the back of my head whispered, fifteen percent of this one didn't have to go to Jocelyn.

“It's a gift. For publishing your book. Just as written. It's fine the way it is. You'll sell a lot of copies, and no more lives have to be ruined.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “Be reasonable. Let it go.”

“Levin, let me repeat: I didn't come here to talk to you.”

He sighed and looked out to sea, not removing his hand from my shoulder.

“All right,” he said after a moment.

Disappointed, shaking his head, Levin walked back down the path and stopped at the gazebo. He leaned down and spoke to the woman in the dark glasses. She got up, brushing her hands against her slacks, and walked over to me. Levin disappeared behind the gazebo. When she got close, I could see that the hair under the scarf was a wig.

“Hello, Betty,” I said.

*   *   *

“You're going to ruin my son's life?” she said.

“This isn't tabloid gossip. I have to tell what I know.”

“Richie already lost his father. You want him to lose his mother, too? Jesus Christ Almighty. You people are sick. Beyond sick.” Betty took off her glasses. Her eyes were puffy and red.

“It's not my fault. It's yours. You made him lose both of his mothers.”

She opened her mouth, but all that came out was a sharp, knifelike gasp of air.

“People knew Richie was adopted, Betty. Sloan Baker told me the first time I met her. And the adoption wasn't quiet. The two of you even did a spread in
Celeb,
welcoming home the new baby. You might have been able to keep his picture out of the press for a while, but he's in school now. It can't go on forever. The older he gets, the more he'll look like his father. What were you planning to do then?”

She covered her mouth, trying to stop her hyperventilation. Betty Bradford Mann wasn't acting now. She simply wasn't that good an actor.

“And the damnedest part is: Felina didn't tell me she was Richie's mother. You must have read that manuscript by now. If anything, she
protected
you and your family.”

“You don't
understand.
”

“Then explain it.”

“She wanted him back. She wanted him
back.
” Betty took a deep breath, pressing her hand against her chest.

“Custody?”

Betty nodded.

“How did you get custody in the first place?”

“This all started about six years ago. Dick and I were having problems. He was seeing Felina. It didn't last long. We patched it up. Then she called him and said she was two months pregnant. I didn't know what to do. Dick was upset, but he couldn't stand the thought of…”

“So you agreed to buy the baby.”

“Not buy. Adopt. We got her out of L.A. After Richie was born, we gave her enough money to get out of our lives forever. She used it to buy that house. I thought we'd never hear from her again. That was part of the deal. Then Dick died. And she called me.

“I thought she wanted more money, but she didn't. She said that now that Dick was gone, she wanted Richie back. She said he needed to be with his real mother.” Betty glared at me. “I
am
that child's real mother.”