The 8th Confession (26 page)

I gave him my badge number and location, said we needed crowd control.
Forthwith.

A man wearing a good suit pushed toward us, calling out to me, "Sergeant, Sergeant, I'm Franklin Morris, a member of the Fifth Street Association. I can't let you arrest these men because
I
shot Rodney Booker—and I can prove it. Neil tried to stop me from doing it, but I had to do what was right.
Tell her, Neil.
"

It was the beginning of a chain reaction, the likes of which I'd never seen before—and could have never imagined.

"I'm Luvie Jump," said a black woman wearing purple frames and a dashiki over her tights, turning her thin body sideways, edging toward me as she talked. "Don't listen to Mr. Morris, Sergeant. He's Neil Pincus's best friend. Listen to
me.

"We called the police
repeatedly,
and they did nothing. Rodney Booker was a one-man plague. He sold drugs. He turned nice girls into druggies and whores. I shot him because he was the devil. Ask anyone. I did it with Neil Pincus's dirty little gun and I'm ready to come in."

I was getting dizzy and a little sick.

The car was only twenty yards away, but the crowd was so deep, I couldn't see it. I listened for sirens, but I heard nothing save the uproar around me.

And yet another man confessed, grabbing at my sleeve, saying his name was Harry Bainbridge. He was black, with Rasta hair and gold teeth, looked homeless, said he beat Booker with a two-by-four after he blew the man's brains out with Pincus's Saturday night special.

"Those newspaper stories saying what a good man Bagman Jesus was? He was dog shit. Where was you people when we called you? Why I have to be the one to get blood on
my
hands? But I did it, lady cop. I stole Mr. Pincus's gun, and I shot that mother. He was begging for his life, and I didn't care because of what he did to my girl, Flora."

A woman stepped forward, or maybe it was a man dressed as a woman, I couldn't be sure. Said her name was Mercy.

"That bastard turned my little sister into a whore. He pumped her full of meth and she died on the street. Right over there. I had to kill that fucker, you see? I'm already certified as crazy—so I wasn't worried about no jury."

"Mercy! Shut up. Don't admit to nothing. I did it," said a man who looked like a young prizefighter.

His nose was smashed to one side, and he had the look of a person whose brain had been rattled against his skull too many times.

"I shot Bagman six times with the lawyer's gun.
Bam-bam, bam-bam, bam-bam,
and when Bagman dropped, I kicked him. I hit him with these," he said, shaking his fists. "I terminated that piece of crap for what he did to our neighborhood."

A familiar blond-haired girl, gaunt-faced, pretty as a cheerleader on meth, came forward.

"My father, my uncle Al, they're not guilty of anything but trying to save me," said Sammy. "I said I loved Bagman, but that was a lie. After I killed him, we
all
lied so the police wouldn't suspect any of us. But he was a tyrant. He enslaved me. That's why I took my father's gun—"

It was clear to me now, clear as glass. This chaos had been
organized.
Had the Pincus brothers planned this since the day they—or someone—killed Bagman Jesus?

Cruisers and police vans, all with sirens whooping, flew up Fifth Street and braked on the sidewalk, scattering the crowd. Cops jumped out, swinging their bats, shoving the crowd back.

"Take these two in," I said to the cops standing closest to me. I handed the Pincus brothers over, and as they were escorted to the van, the crowd surged forward again.

Neil Pincus turned his head as the officer was folding him into the back of the van. He said, "One second, Officer. Sergeant Boxer?" he shouted. "Don't you see? Either
all
of us did it or none of us did.

"And even if you get anyone to trial, you'll never get a conviction. Rodney Booker's killer is a frickin'
hero.
"

W
ITH THE HELP of the mob squad, Conklin and I flattened six people against the wall and frisked them. We made sure we had their names, then we had them loaded into cars and vans so they could come to the Hall for questioning.

I wanted to hear all eight of them tell us the story of killing Bagman, how they did it, and why.

I was behind the wheel, still sweating as Conklin and I drove back to the Hall of Justice. That mob scene had shot my heart rate into the stratosphere, and it was still well above my normal sixty-eight beats per minute. But I was happy. Make that
exhilarated.

I glanced into the rearview mirror and saw Franklin Morris and "Mercy" behind the grille at my back, chatting as if we were driving them to lunch.

Why should they worry?

The Pincus brothers might be disbarred for confessing to homicide, but someone else would step in to defend this group of conspirators, one or all of whom were guilty of Rodney Booker's murder. But I thought Neil Pincus's prediction was right.

If these people stuck to their stories, no jury would convict. Eight confessions were eight times worse than one, each contradicting the other, so reasonable doubt would rule. I wondered if there'd even be a trial.

I said to Conklin, "Cindy's going to get a movie deal out of this one. 'From folk hero to mass killer, a drug dealer is brought down by a conspiracy of street vigilantes.' You should call her."

"No, you do it. I don't want to mess with the chain of command."

I smiled, said, "Okay. After we take care of business, I'll give her the exclusive."

I was quiet after that.

As I turned the car onto Bryant Street, I thought about Bagman Jesus, a charming and handsome lowlife who'd sold crack to kids, turned girls into meth addicts, a man who had commissioned a mobile meth lab that had blown up, killing ten people, most of them ordinary citizens on their way to work.

I don't condone street justice.

If we could nail Booker's killer, we would. But maybe this time, law enforcement would bow to a different kind of law. Bagman Jesus, the street saint who wasn't, had been taken out faster and smarter than we could have done it—and without giving him the possibility of parole.

It was indisputable that our city was better off now that he was gone.

"Whatcha thinking, Lindsay?" Conklin asked me.

I turned to look at him, saw that he, too, was feeling fine. I said, "I was thinking that in a funny way, this is a good day to be a cop."

A
S JOE PILOTED his nice black Mercedes S-Class, I relaxed in the seat beside him. It was great to look to my left and see his gorgeous face, his strong hands on the wheel. Every time he caught me looking at him, he turned to look at
me.

We grinned at each other like high-school kids with a first crush. "Keep your eyes on the road, buster," I said to him.

"I want to take that dress off you," he said.

"I just put it on!"

"I remember," he said, leering. "Now what was it you were telling me?"

"Yuki."

"Right. Yuki's going away for a few weeks."

"She
was
going away for a few weeks, then Parisi called her into his office and said, 'I've got a case for you, Ms. Castellano. I think there could be a promotion in it. And a raise.' "

Joe turned the wheel, and we swept into the drive leading to the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Pacific Heights, an insanely beautiful and kind of creepy old mansion where Joe's friend the mayor was holding a big fund-raiser for inner-city children.

It was an A-list event, and Joe was high on that list because he was a government contractor, the former deputy director of Homeland Security, and a specialist in Middle Eastern affairs.

Valet parkers in Flying Dutchman outfits stepped out of the shadows, and spotlights out front transformed the school into an elegant nightspot. Guests wearing Prada-everything emerged from their expensive cars, and Joe got out of ours.

He handed the keys to a valet, then came around and opened the door for me. I took his arm.

"I want to hear the rest of the story," he said.

We headed toward the arched stone entrance. I was conscious of being dressed up for a change: wearing high-heeled shoes, putting my hair up, zipping into a long, tight red dress, and it felt good knowing that if ever a gown was made for a five-foot-ten-inch blonde, I was wearing it. And if ever there was a good-looking man in a tuxedo, I was on his arm.

"Oh. So Parisi says to Yuki, 'I'm giving you the Rodney Booker case. Congratulations.' He handed her a
bomb,
Joe. Eight defendants, no witnesses, an unmatchable possible murder weapon, and an unsympathetic victim. She's going to work on this for a year, and then she's going to get killed in court."

"Poor frickin' Yuki."

"One day she's going to catch a break. Maybe. I hope."

We stepped over the threshold into a cocktail party in high gear. Beautiful people were engaged in avid conversation, laughing, their voices echoing in the magnificent Reception Room with its high, coffered ceilings designed to look like the Vatican—sixteenth-century Italian High Renaissance.

A waiter came by with a tray of champagne flutes, and Joe and I each took one.

After a sip, Joe set his glass down on a nearby table, reached inside his pocket, and took out a black velvet box I'd seen many times before. He had presented it to me twice, and although I'd never fully accepted it, I'd kept it safe through fire and through moving to Joe's, and every once in a while I'd opened the box, just to see where I stood in my own mind.

And now Joe was opening that black clamshell case again and holding it so that the five diamonds in the platinum setting twinkled like a crystal chandelier.

I looked up at him, thinking he didn't need the trappings. I would love him in a spangled spandex bodysuit. I smiled.

"I have this sense of déjà vu," he said.

My butterflies did cartwheels, but I stood still, holding the gaze of my blue-eyed hunka man.

"Do I have to go back to Queens and live with my mother? Or will you marry me, Lindsay? Will you be my wife?"

As people swirled around us, a band started to play a kind of corny but very sentimental big-band tune from the '40s. It was utterly perfect.

I put down my glass and held out my hand.

"Is that a yes?" Joe said. "Or are you asking me to dance?"

"Both. It's a definite double yes."

Joe's face buckled with emotion. He said, "I love you, Blondie." He wiggled the ring onto my finger and kissed me. I felt the power of our kiss, the way it sealed this perfect moment and blessed our future together.

I put my arms around Joe's neck, and he held me tight. As we swayed to Glenn Miller's "Moonlight Serenade," Joe's voice was soft in my ear: "You're not changing your mind. We're getting married."

"Yes, Joe, we will. I love you completely. I truly do."

N
ORMA JOHNSON WAS resting in her maximum-security cell in the Central California Women's Facility. The cell was eight by eight feet of beige-painted metal containing two narrow pallets, one bunk over the other, a sink, a stainless-steel toilet, and unless you counted the cell mate snoring overhead, that was all.

Her cell mate was Bernadette Radke, old enough to be her mother, a murderer like she was but nowhere near as smart or as cool. Bernie had killed her husband by running him down with a pickup truck, and then, as she was "bookin' outta there," she ran a red light and killed three more people. One of them was an eight-year-old kid.

Despite her body count, Bernadette was a lightweight.

She had done no planning, had no finesse. She was just a borderline mentally challenged rage freak, but that was fine with Pet Girl because Bernie was her virtual slave.

Everyone was.

Norma Johnson wasn't Pet Girl anymore.

She had no duties, no responsibilities, and every guard in the place, every trustee, had to take care of
her.
Her food was prepared. Her blue uniform was washed. Her sheets were folded. Her mail was delivered, and guess what? There was a lot of mail. From fans. From magazines. From Hollywood.

She was a celebrity now.

Everyone wanted to know her, to talk to her. They were both afraid of and in awe of her.

And she felt like the homecoming queen in this place. For the first time in her life, she thought she was where she belonged.

Norma lay on her pallet, looked up at the underside of the bunk above her, projected her whole life onto that blank screen. She turned over the many moments that had made her who she was, examined the greatest ones, and told her own story to herself.

She especially reviewed the one story she'd never told anyone: about the time her daddy had brought her to his house on Nob Hill when no one was there. He'd shown her the snakes he kept in his private room, shown her how he handled them, and told her how they could be used to kill.

She remembered how much she loved him then. How she worshipped him. But there was something else, too.
The question.
Why couldn't he fully acknowledge her?

Her mom was usually right downstairs, running the vacuum in the living room. Why couldn't Daddy kick out his wife? Why couldn't he make Norma and her mom his real family, since he loved them both so much?

And then something happened.

His wife came in and saw Norma and her father together, and she'd gotten enraged.

"No, Chris. Not
here.
I told you.
Never
bring that girl into my house."

And her daddy had said, "Yes, dear. Sorry, dear."

And Norma had been holding the snake in her hand, its jaws held open at the hinge by her thumb and forefinger, just like Daddy had taught her.

But at that moment, there was panic in his face. He said, "I've got to get you out of here." Like she was trash. Not flesh and blood. Not his daughter. Not the descendant of a senator's daughter and the first citizen of California.