Sanctuary (9 page)

The smell of urine and feces hung in the air. No light reached past the cracks in the steel doors. Other than the padding of their feet down the hall, the only sound came from the whimpering in one of the cells. It made Danny wonder how many inmates were being held in segregation.

When they drew abreast the cell of the whimpering man, the facilitator banged his stick against the steel door. “That’s another week, Perkins. Shut your foul mouth!”

The whimpering shriveled to a whisper. No due warning, no filing, no due process or hearing. A clear violation of the California penal protocol.

They passed eight additional cells before the guard stopped him. “Hold up.”

The facilitator unlocked the cell door and swung the door wide. Inside was a concrete room four feet wide and maybe eight feet deep. A raised slab of cement, three feet wide, formed a bed of sorts next to a sealed steel panel on the floor. A metal sink and toilet combo hugged the corner. That was it. No bedding. Nothing else.

“Take off your shoes, your socks, your pants, and your underwear.”

Still cuffed, Danny did as ordered.

“Inside.”

He stepped into the concrete box, immediately aware of the temperature drop. Behind him, the cell door clanked shut. A bolt was thrown and the upper slat door squealed open.

“Back up to the slat.”

The facilitator uncuffed him through the opening and withdrew the restraint, leaving Danny free to move his arms.

“Take off your shirt and pass it out.”

He unbuttoned the shirt, shrugged out of it, and passed it out.

“You can consider due process served. The warden will make his recommendation. If you’re lucky you’ll be out in a few days.”

The slat cover slammed shut, leaving Danny naked in the dark. The accommodations were poor. It was cold. There wasn’t a single soft surface in the small room. He stepped to the sink and turned the faucet. No water. It was likely on a timer or controlled manually from the outside, as was the water for the toilet.

It was rumored that some of the cells in the death-row segregation ward at San Quentin were set up similarly, although the inmates were allowed to wear their shorts. Cups had been banned because any vessel could be used to collect urine and feces to throw at an officer who opened the slat. Clothing and sheets could be used to commit suicide by way of strangulation. Mattresses could be torn apart or used to block entry into the cell.

But this wasn’t San Quentin. Danny wondered if anyone outside these walls knew the true nature of administrative segregation in the bowels of Basal.

The door at the end of the hall slammed shut, leaving the entire floor in an eerie calm.

Danny found the edge of the raised slab and eased down onto the bed. He lay back on the cold concrete, stared up into the darkness for a full minute, then shut his eyes and sought God, who is love.

Slowly, he let his mind still, seeking out the light between his thoughts and emotions. There, in simply being still, he found solace.

WEDNESDAY

KEITH HAMMOND, THE
sheriff’s deputy who’d taken down Bruce Randell, wasn’t eager to be found. I might have just given up and gone to the authorities to find him if not for my own aversion to the law. Danny had done a good job steering me clear, and when my dedication finally paid off two days later, I was relieved to learn that Keith was no longer professionally tied to the law.

He lived in a condo on Acacia Avenue in Huntington Beach, a twenty-five-minute drive from my home in Long Beach without traffic. The neighborhood, only ten blocks from the ocean, was populated by free-spirited types who would rather head to the beach than to work. The condo was nice enough—white with green bushes along the base of the building and a bright green canopy leading up from the sidewalk. Several large palm trees in the back rose over the roof. But it wasn’t the neighborhood I cared about, it was the man who lived inside 1245 Acacia Street #3. I was now pinning my hopes on him. All of them.

I sat in my Corolla down and across the street, gently picking at my lower lip as I obsessed over how best to meet him. When to make my move. What to say. How to determine if I could trust him. Whether he would be willing to help. If he still had the mustache from his days in the Los Angeles County sheriff’s department, as pictured.

He didn’t have a Facebook profile, which was fine, because neither did I. He hadn’t made any news for a few years. Good enough—I hadn’t either, at least not for three years, and then only as an unidentified subject in a rather nasty slaying.

What he did have was a two-year history working as an attorney, and five years in the sheriff’s department before that. Best as I could fit the rather disconnected pieces together, Keith had joined the sheriff’s department right out of law school, served for five years, entered private practice, and then dropped off the scene altogether a year or two ago.

The
Los Angeles Times
had at least a dozen stories that included the name Keith Hammond in their archives, five of them about the bust and the high-profile trial of a meth cook and distributor, one Bruce Randell.

Bruce: the viper doing time in Basal who hated priests and was now going to kill Danny. Over my dead body. Likely both.

Keith spoke of his reason for leaving the sheriff’s department in an article about Martinez Boutros, the only client from his two years of law practice that I was able to identify. Boutros was a twenty-six-year-old Mexican immigrant who’d been charged with murder in a drug case. He was wrongfully accused, Hammond claimed, and then he was acquitted. And the
Times
came looking to find out why Keith had switched sides from drug buster to busting out druggies.

In a short statement Keith claimed he’d left the sheriff’s department to find true justice. When pressed about how the department lacked true justice, he sidestepped the question.

Conclusion: Keith left because of corruption in the system. Maybe not, but honestly, that’s what I hoped for. Then he took up practicing the law to defend the innocent. And then…well, then he’d quit on the system altogether.

That’s what I pieced together. That and the fact that he’d gone through a bitter divorce eight years earlier, about the time he quit the sheriff. He’d been twenty-seven years old at the time and was now thirty-five, same age as Danny.

I had my attorney, albeit one who no longer practiced law. I had my defender of the weak, righter of wrongs, and, most important, I had someone with a common enemy: Bruce Randell.

But that was only in my mind. In reality, I didn’t have him at all. He lived in the condo across the street, and for all I knew he’d moved there to get away from people like me.

The sun was long gone, and I was about to give up in frustration when a black Ford Ranger approached the condo, turned up the driveway, and pulled into the garage on the first floor. I could hardly mistake the face of the man through the windshield. The man who would help me save Danny had come home.

How he could help, I didn’t know. But that wasn’t all I didn’t know. Short of storming Basal with an Uzi—and believe me, I’d thought about it—I didn’t know how to get to Danny. I didn’t know who I could trust, who I could get to listen, who I could hire. I needed someone to help me think. To be with me, because alone I was lost.

The instant the garage door closed, I opened my car door, stepped out into the gray dusk, and headed across the street. I climbed the three steps to the condo’s landing, pushed the doorbell, and stepped back. Hoping to make a good impression, I’d washed my hair twice, blown it half-dry and combed it out so that it laid naturally. The Miss Me jeans I wore were boot cut, better than the skinny jeans I used to wear. My top was a brown BKE with dolman sleeves. I knew these things because I bought all of my clothes from either the Buckle at the Irvine Spectrum Center or from the online store, and I stick to what makes me comfortable without looking shabby. Jane had introduced me to the Buckle two years earlier, and I hadn’t found the need to switch.

I rarely wore a bra around the apartment, but out was a different matter. I’d chosen one of two padded bras that I owned. There’s no way to make B breasts look like double-D breasts, and even if there was, I wasn’t interested. Still, I was on a mission and I figured a little help wouldn’t hurt.

The door opened and Keith Hammond stood in the condo’s entry light. His short hair was blond and tossed but still somehow neat, his face was clean shaven but he still looked rough, his jeans were marked but not torn, his shirt was a blue button-front with short sleeves, but it wasn’t buttoned. How he’d gotten so casual so quickly was a bit of a mystery, but my first impression of him was hopeful.

He looked like the kind of man who wasn’t confined by the system.

“Sorry, honey, whatever you’re selling, I’m not buying,” he said.

“You’re Keith Hammond?” I replied.

“That would be me.”

“Can I come in?”

“Umm, why?”

See, that’s what I would have said. He wasn’t only outside the system, he was cautious. That was good.

“Because I have some information you might find interesting, that’s why. And I’m not selling it.”

“And who are you?”

“My name is Renee Gilmore.”

“Information, huh? And what makes you think I need any information, Renee Gilmore?”

“Because you and I have the same enemy.”

His brow arched. “Is that so? And who might that be?”

“Bruce Randell,” I said.

Up to that point Keith had worn the face of a man who is mildly amused. But when I gave him the name, the light went out of his eyes.

“I wouldn’t say that Mr. Randell is my enemy,” he said. “Our paths crossed once, but that was a long time ago.”

“Do you know where he is today?”

“Chino, last I heard.”

“He’s in Basal.”

“Basal?”

“Basal Institute of Corrections.”

“The experimental prison.”

“The inmates call it Basal.”

“And why should that concern me?”

“Because Danny’s there too.”

“And who’s Danny?”

“My husband,” I said. “Well, not technically. Sort of.”

“Sort of?”

“Can I come in?”

“You do realize I don’t practice law anymore.”

“I’m not looking for a lawyer.”

“How did you hear about me?”

“I tracked you down. Can I come in?”

He studied me for a moment, then stepped aside. “Be my guest. But I can assure you there’s nothing I can do for you. Unless you’re looking for a drink and dinner. That I think I could manage.”

I ignored the compliment and looked around his condo. Stairs to my right descended to what I assumed was the garage and maybe a room or two. The brown carpet was lint free. Beyond the living room, a tiled breakfast bar divided the rest of the living space from a spotless kitchen, although I couldn’t see the sink from where I stood—sinks always speak the truth. By all appearances Keith looked to be a clean man who was comfortable enough in his own shell to leave his shirt unbuttoned when answering the door.

But I wasn’t here to judge his cleanliness. I wanted his help.

He stepped past me, doing up one button in a respectable show of modesty. “Look, Renee…I know you think there’s a connection between us, but I’m afraid you’re mistaken.” He put a hand on the stair rail and crossed one leg over the other. “You’ve obviously done your research and know that I helped put Bruce Randell behind bars, but like I said, that was a long time ago. I really don’t care what he’s doing, as long as he stays where he was put.”

“He’s trying to kill Danny,” I said.

“Your not-really-husband husband.”

“That’s right. And I can’t get into Basal to warn him.”

“What makes you think I can? Assuming I wanted to. Prisons are run by wardens who all share at least one goal: preventing violence. You should be talking to the warden, not to a washed-up cop-turned-attorney who walked away from it all. I dabble in stocks for a living now, did you know that too?”

“That’s why I need your help.”

“Why? Because I trade stocks?”

“Because you’re washed up. Like me.”

He glanced at my name-brand jeans. “You don’t look washed up to me.”

“That’s because you don’t know me,” I said, and then I pushed the point, thinking I had to use what I could for Danny’s sake. “Would you like to?”

The light sparked in his eyes, or maybe it was only my imagination. “Boy, you’re full of surprises, aren’t you? Thank you, but no, I’m not really looking for a romantic relationship with a woman right now.”

“Did I say romantic? I just assumed by your history that you are a kind person interested in doing the right thing. Like helping a woman who has nowhere left to turn.”

“Then you don’t understand my history. I had my chance to help people and I turned my back on it. All of it. I wish I could help you, but I’m not the person you’re looking for.”

It wasn’t going well, but, considering my options, I wasn’t about to let him off the hook that easily. He was like me, you see. He just wanted to be left alone to live his life in peace.

I stepped past him, walked into his living room, and sat down on a stuffed tan chair, keeping my eyes on the window. I didn’t intend to appear distraught, I just wasn’t interested in his dismissal.

He hesitated, then followed me and eased into the couch opposite me without a word. We sat like that for a few moments, silent, an odd stalemate of sorts. And he didn’t seem inclined to break it.

So I did.

“I received a call on Monday from a stranger who told me he was going to kill Danny. He was just transferred to Basal and there’s no way for me to make contact. That same afternoon a woman named Constance came to my apartment and told me that an inmate named Bruce Randell was a threat to Danny.”

“None of this really matters to me—”

“I got a finger in a shoe box,” I said.

“A finger?”

“Or something that looked like a finger. It was a warning.”

“From who?”

“Who do you think? Randell.”

He eyed me. I’d finally gotten his attention.

“Either way, none of this is really my concern,” he said.

“How can you say that?” I snapped. “You haven’t even heard what I have to say. You may be all cozy, sitting here trading stocks and drinking beer with your poker pals, but there’re people out there in the system who’ll die if you don’t help them. Me included.”

“You’re assuming I can help. And for the record, there’s no way to fix the system. It’s broken. Trying to fix it will only break you.”

“I’m already broken!”

He peered at me, unmoved, either a broken man himself or someone who didn’t care about anyone but himself. I had to hope it was the first.

“Do you still have your law license?” I asked.

“I haven’t practiced in over a year.”

“But you have it, right?”

“Yes.”

“Will you at least hear me out? It’s not every day a helpless woman comes knocking on your door asking you for help. Don’t be so cold.”

Keith leaned back and looked out the window. “That’s fair.” Eyes back on me. “So tell me.”

His insincere attitude toward my distress was infuriating. I almost stood up right then and left. But I didn’t have anywhere to go or anyone else to turn to. So I told him what I thought he needed to know. Nothing Danny would have disapproved of, mind you. Nothing about my past, only about Danny’s conviction and the events that had led up to my receiving the shoe box.

He listened to all of it, asking only a few questions, like an attorney making inquiries of a client he was considering taking on.

“And so you came here and waited for me,” he said after I’d finished.

“Yes.”

Keith nodded thoughtfully. “And that’s all?”

“Pretty much. Yes.”

“I’m really not coldhearted, you know.”

“I didn’t say you were. I only asked you not to be.”

“Any other time in my life and I might be all over this. But for reasons I’m not at liberty to share right now, none of which have anything to do with your predicament, I just can’t represent or assist you. Still, maybe I can give you some advice.”

It was a letdown, but not enough to dash my hopes. For the first time he was showing real interest in my predicament, as he called it.

“What kind of advice?” I asked.

“Your coming here, for starters. I don’t mean to alarm you, but the woman was right. People like Bruce routinely reach beyond the walls of their cells and destroy people on the outside. I’d advise against walking up to complete strangers and telling them the kind of things you’ve told me.”

“You’re underestimating me,” I said. “The only reason I came to you was because I had nowhere else to turn.”

“Just because someone’s a warden or a cop doesn’t mean they’re not working with people like Randell. Trust me, I’ve seen it from the inside.”

“Which is precisely why I’m here. You’re
not
on the inside anymore.”

“Just be careful. Also, I wouldn’t assume that Randell was the person who called you.”

“The timing doesn’t line up, right?” I said. “I know, but it’s still technically possible. Who else would call me?”