Strip (5 page)

Ospinsky was incensed. “Another ridiculous accusation. Mr. Kapak is a businessman with no record that would suggest anything of the sort. He had two vehicles stolen from his company and then, apparently, utterly destroyed.”

“Stolen? We don’t have a theft complaint.”

“You will immediately after we’re free to file one. Mr. Kapak works in an industry that requires him to be at work late at night. His first notification that the vehicles weren’t parked at one of his clubs came from you—a police officer—at seven this morning, two hours ago, and six hours before he would usually be awake. The fact that he hasn’t reported the theft yet doesn’t prove it’s not a theft.”

“And it doesn’t prove it was, either.” He studied Kapak. “I don’t know you at all, but I had assumed you were a semilegitimate businessman.”

Ospinsky was getting angry. “What exactly does that mean?”

Slosser kept his eyes on Kapak, as though he had spoken. “You’re in a business that’s perfectly legal most of the time, but not very nice. You’re selling people things that aren’t good for them. And you keep bouncers and backup men on the payroll, but not to protect your customers. It’s the way the business works. I haven’t seen anything in your files that makes you stand out or worries me. Until now”

Kapak held his hand up so Ospinsky wouldn’t go into an oration. “What do you see now?”

“I’ve got to be honest with you. Coming in here with your lawyer all paranoid and you sitting there stone-faced and sullen just to tell me why your two cars turned up on a deserted construction site this morning, well, it doesn’t make me feel good about you. It’s the way a small-time guy running a criminal enterprise acts. And I’m not just guessing. I’ve spent a lot of time with people like that. Maybe after I’ve got my pension vested next year, I’ll quit and go to law school and make some real money. I know exactly what I’ll tell my clients. ‘Don’t act like you’re guilty.’ Simple.”

“Are you advising my client to waive his right to legal counsel?”

“I’m just saying it might be a good strategy to behave differently. If you come in and act like you’re preparing a legal defense when all you’re doing is reporting that you’re a victim of a crime, a cop gets suspicious. He wonders what you’re hiding.”

Manco Kapak said, “You’re right.” He looked at Ospinsky for a moment. “Gerry, maybe you ought to be getting to your office. Thanks for coming.”

Ospinsky said, “Do you think this man is trying to help you?”

“I’ll be fine. I’ll call you later.”

Ospinsky shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He stood, stuffed his yellow notepad into his briefcase, and assumed an unnaturally straight posture to salvage his dignity, then left the room without looking back.

“I didn’t mean to offend him,” Slosser lied. “I was just making conversation. When you go into a police station, you generally have some specific business in mind. In this case maybe you want to report a car theft. You’ll be sent to talk to an auto theft officer. This may be the first time you’ve had a car stolen, but it isn’t his first. On average he’s seen maybe a thousand grand theft autos a year since the day he started. He knows exactly what you’re going to say and how you’re going to act. If you do or say something he doesn’t expect, he wonders why. He won’t stop until he knows the answer.”

Kapak said, “I hope you understand that for an ordinary man, it’s hard to know how to react to an early morning summons from the police.”

“You put on your shoes and come down and have a chat. Unless you’ve got something to worry about.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Like maybe there are drugs in the Hummers. Or blood. Or maybe you think I’m going to find out that there’s a child in Intensive Care at Cedars with Hummer tracks across his back.”

“None of that is true, I can tell you. I don’t get involved with anything that’s illegal. I run two gentlemen’s clubs, a dance club, a gym, and a couple of other businesses. Some years have been good, and some bad, but I never have time for things like drugs or whatever.”

“Is this a good year or a bad year?”

“A bad year. Did I tell you I got robbed?”

“Yes.”

“And besides that, my health isn’t too good.”

“What’s wrong with you?”

“I’m tired all the time. You can’t put your finger on when it happened, but you know you’re not the man you were. That’s old age. And it seems like I’m getting robbed all the time. First it’s a guy with a gun to my head, and now two expensive vehicles turned into junk.” Kapak could feel each of the hundreds of tiny scratches and punctures from the broken glass on his skin. Every time he shifted in his chair, he felt his shirt or his pants moving some tiny, unnoticed sliver of surgically sharp glass against the skin of his belly or genitals. He was being goaded toward madness like a bull in the ring, but he pretended to be a harmless, aging man. He used his torments to build an impression of candor.

“Maybe we can do something about the robberies, at least. Your lawyer wasn’t letting me ask you any questions. Is there anything that happened before last night that you haven’t thought to mention?”

“You’re my only source of information. I don’t think anybody who works for me knows the damned things are gone yet. They’re worth, like, fifty grand each. Were worth, I mean. You said they were impounded?”

“Yes. They were put on flatbeds with a crane and driven to impound.”

“Can my insurance company go look at them? I’d like to get a claim started. From the looks of those pictures, it could take a while.”

“Sure. Have them call me.” Slosser handed Kapak a business card from his coat pocket. “I’d guess there’s not much question they’re totaled. They looked like they were pushed from the fifth floor of the building.”

“Jesus. It sounds like a nasty prank or something. Do you think it was kids?”

“No. Adults.”

“What adult does this? If they took a car and drove it across the border to sell it, or to a garage to chop it for parts, I could agree, it’s adults. But if you wreck it completely, you can’t be making any money on that. Who does that but kids?”

“Both vehicles had their keys in them.”

“They did?”

“Yeah. That means your guys drove them there. So who was driving when it happened?”

“None of my people would do that. Somebody must have left the keys in them. Or maybe a burglar broke into the office and took the keys off the board on the wall.”

“Who could that be?”

“I couldn’t even give you a guess.”

“I suppose not,” Slosser said. He stood up. “Well, thanks for coming in.”

“No, thank you, Lieutenant” Kapak still had the mad bull’s determination. He stood up too, trying to make his painful movements seem only careful, the movements of an old man.

They parted in the hallway, and each went in a different direction. As Slosser walked back to his office, he smiled. He had managed to talk Kapak into getting rid of his lawyer for an interrogation, a feat for the record books, and one that would pay off later, because client and lawyer had lost confidence in each other. He still didn’t know exactly what was going on, but he could tell Kapak knew, and that it was something that would get him into serious trouble. That was plenty to accomplish before 10:00 in the morning.

Kapak walked toward the portico where he had entered the building, and he was satisfied. He had planted enough in Lieutenant Slosser’s mind to keep him busy for a while. Instead of hiding his surprise and being ashamed of it, he had used it to persuade Slosser that he was a victim of the theft and destruction of two expensive vehicles. He had planted some facts that might make Slosser draw the wrong conclusions. Since there was no hope of gain from wrecking a car, this could only be an attack on Kapak and his businesses. Slosser would try to find out who Kapak’s enemy was, and that would give Kapak a bit of room to work.

S
PENCE WAS OUTSIDE
the police station when Kapak emerged from the front entrance, walking with a strange stiffness, as though his knees had locked. Spence knew that it was the terrible discomfort of having glass fragments in his pants, so he took pity on Kapak, got out, opened the door of the Town Car, and stood at something like attention while Kapak eased himself onto the passenger seat. “Thanks,” said Kapak. “I feel like my dick is being sawed off”

“Better try sitting in a bath or something, until you get all the glass off.”

Spence got in and drove. He knew Kapak’s main concern for the moment was to get away from the toxic atmosphere of police headquarters and begin the important work of forgetting he had ever been there. Spence drove with some urgency, moving in and out of lanes to work his way among the slow stream of cars through the city.

He was up the freeway ramp and on his way out of the downtown section, where tall buildings shouldered up to the streets on both sides and made them seem narrow and dark. Kapak sat in the passenger seat, staring out the window at the glimpses of sunny hillsides far off beyond the buildings.

At last he seemed to catch his breath. “That was something. I’ve got a fucking police lieutenant showing me pictures of the two Hummers, which looked as though they’d been dropped from an airplane. There was no sign of any of the guys in them. Meanwhile, not one of our guys has seen fit to call me and tell me what’s up. Did Joe Carver kill them all and drag their bodies to a pit to be covered by cement? Did he scare them off? Buy them off?”

“Leave them alone and they’ll come home. If there were bodies, the cop would have said something.”

“What if he killed them quietly and took the bodies with him?”

“Can you imagine killing the Gaffney brothers without noise and blood?”

“No. You’re right. But the whole thing worries me. What is this Carver guy? He could be the wrong man. What if he’s just some pissed off little guy who got surprised by a case of mistaken identity? What if he’s not? He could be anything, even the advance man for some big players.”

“You met him and talked to him. What did he say he wanted?”

“‘Nothing,’ is what he said. He told me he just wanted me to leave him alone. He didn’t do the robbery, so he should be allowed to do whatever he wanted.”

“Then what were you shooting at him for?”

“You don’t think I was going to let him go just because he said that? Maybe he didn’t do the robbery. Whoever put the gun to my head got twenty-three thousand bucks. Joe Carver wrecked a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of cars, did God knows what to five of my employees, and brought me face to face with the kind of police lieutenant who isn’t going to leave me alone until one of us dies. He also broke into my house and sprayed my nuts with pulverized glass.”

“He did that? It looked like you shot the window out.”

“It’s like capital murder. If a thief forces the cops to shoot at him and one of them hits the other, he’s the one they charge with murder, not the cop. This is just like that.”

“I see,” said Spence.

“You should.”

Kapak’s cell phone rang. He put it to his ear. “Yeah?” He listened for a few seconds. “Is anybody dead?” He listened again. “Let me tell you something. I got dragged out of bed, practically at dawn, to go down to police headquarters to explain why two Hummers of mine were in a construction site, wrecked, with the keys in them. And did any one of you think to call me and say, ‘Hey, Joe Carver is alive, and he’s probably on his way to your house to kill you.’ Yeah, that happened. He didn’t kill me, but that’s no thanks to you. Where are you? We’ll be there in a minute.” Kapak hung up.

Spence drove the last few blocks, and then pulled into the driveway. “There’s somebody in the house. I saw the front curtain move.”

“Yeah, it’s the fucking geniuses.” As the car moved up the driveway toward the house, the Gaffney brothers, the big Russian, Corona, and Guzman all stepped out of the front door to stand on the front steps and wait. Their suits looked dusty, and one of the Gaffneys had a long rip at his knee so the paper-white skin showed. “Look at them,” Kapak said. “Jesus, I’m actually paying these people.”

“You need me for anything?”

Kapak leaned in to say, “No. I won’t need you until midnight. Go ahead.”

“Thanks.”

Kapak shut the car door and walked stiffly toward the front of the house. Spence backed out of the driveway, turned, and drove to the freeway entrance, merged with the traffic, and pulled into the left lane. The freeway was still clear and fast moving into the Valley. He switched to the Ventura Freeway, got off at Coldwater, and found the apartment building where he had left the girl two hours ago. He parked the Town Car, walked to the entrance, and looked at the names beside the buzzers at the door. When he saw “K. Noonan” he decided that it must be the right one. It was the only
K,
and she was the one who had volunteered her name, so maybe she hadn’t lied. He pressed the button, heard a click and a sudden sense of space like the other end of a telephone call, then her voice. “Who is it?”

“Spence, the guy who drove you home this morning.”

“Well, don’t advertise to the neighbors that I came home in the morning. When I buzz you in, come to the second floor landing. I’ll meet you.”

He heard the buzz and the click, and he tugged the door open and went up the stairs to find her barefooted and leaning against the wall wearing a T-shirt and sweatpants. Her arms were folded across her chest, and she had a puzzled smile. Her long hair was wet from a shower, hanging in loose strings that dampened her T-shirt.

“Hi, Kira.”

“Forget something?”

“I tried, but I couldn’t.”

“What?”

“You”

She put her hand over her mouth to stifle her laugh. “Oh my God. That is so cheesy. How can you say something like that?” She stopped, shook her head in disbelief, then laughed again. She turned and walked down the second-floor hall, and Spence followed her. He noticed how much shorter she was now that she was barefoot. She stopped in front of a door that was open six inches.

He pushed the door open for her and she looked up at him. “Did I say that was my apartment?” She walked on along the hall while Spence quickly reached for the door and pulled it back the way he’d found it. But as he turned to follow her, she doubled back, slipped inside the door, and closed it.