The Dark Hours (21 page)

The autopsy was routine, except that seeing Javier Raffa’s naked body on the exam table showed Ballard the lengths to which he had gone to escape the gang life and set an example for his son, Gabriel. In addition to what she had already seen on the neck, there were laser scars all over the chest, stomach, and arms, a painful map of tattoo removal. She guessed it had taken years to get rid of all the ink. It reminded Ballard of the monks who practiced self-flagellation with whips and other instruments to repent for their sins. Whatever Javier Raffa’s sins were, he had paid a painful price.

There was only one tattoo left on the body. It was a rising sun over water on the left shoulder blade. It showed no symbols or words of gang affiliation.

“Well, he got to keep one,” said Dr. Zvader, the deputy medical examiner handling the autopsy. “A setting sun.”

Ballard realized there was no telling whether it was a rising or setting sun, even though they might have significant differences in meaning.

“Funny,” she said. “I was thinking it was a rising sun.”

“It’s California,” Zvader said. “Has to be going down.”

Ballard nodded. He was probably right but it made her feel bad. A setting sun meant the end of day. A rising sun was a
start. It was promise. She wondered if Raffa knew that his time was short.

Ballard stayed in the autopsy suite until Zvader found the bullet that had killed Raffa embedded in the cartilage of the nose. It had traversed the brain after entering near the top of the skull, killing Raffa instantly and lodging behind the nose.

“I think he was looking up at the fireworks when he died,” Zvader said.

“That’s so sad,” Ballard said.

“Well, it’s better than knowing it’s coming and being afraid,” Zvader replied.

Ballard nodded. Maybe.

The slug was heavily damaged, first by the impact on the skull and then by the cartilage. Zvader bagged the projectile and put his name and coroner’s case number on the package before handing it to Ballard.

Ballard headed to the Ballistics Unit to drop off the slug for comparison analysis in the NIBIN database. It was an even longer shot than the shell casing comparison because of the damage to the slug. The database was essentially for casing comparison. So much so that projectile comparison was backburnered, and Ballard knew she would not be waiting around for a tech to conduct the analysis. She would be lucky to hear anything within a week.

Along the way, she took a call from Carl Schaeffer, the BSL yard supervisor.

“We got one. A new one.”

“A streetlight out?”

“Yeah, call just came in. On Outpost.”

“First of all, Mr. Schaeffer, thank you for remembering to call.”

“Not a problem. I got your card right here on the desk.”

“Do you have any details yet?”

“No, she just said that the light outside her house is burned out. I was going to send a truck but thought I’d check with you first.”

“Thank you. Don’t send a truck. Let me make a call and see if I can get the print car out there first. I or one of my colleagues will call you when it’s clear to repair.”

“You got it, Detective.”

“And Carl, I don’t want you to forget to call me when these come in, but I’m not sure I want my card on your desk. Remember, I want this low profile, and I noticed you have the time clock in your office. Everybody punches out there, right?”

“Right, I got you. It goes in the drawer now.”

“Thank you, Carl. Can you give me the exact address or location of the streetlight we’re talking about and the name of the person who called it in?”

Schaeffer gave her the information. The streetlight in question was on lower Outpost Drive, a winding hillside road that went north from Franklin Avenue all the way up to Mulholland Drive. Ballard considered dismissing the call from Schaeffer because it was still eleven days from the next holiday weekend and in the previous cases the streetlight had been tampered with just a day or so before the Midnight Men attacked. But Outpost was just across the Cahuenga Pass from the Dell. The first two assaults had occurred in generally the same area — the same patrol zone, at least. The Dell case could be the start of a second cluster.

She also had to consider that a fourth attack had already occurred over the past holiday weekend and had not yet been reported. The bottom line was that she couldn’t dismiss the tip from Schaeffer.

After dropping off the bullet that killed Javier Raffa at the Ballistics Unit, Ballard drove to Outpost and located the streetlight in question. She stopped the car at the curb to get out and
take a closer look. It was an acorn-style light like those in the Dell. She saw no obvious signs of tampering on the access plate at the bottom of the post. The light was located directly across the street from the house from which the complaint had come. The woman who lived there and had called in the complaint was named Abigail Cena. The house was what Ballard always called a Spanish rambler. It was one level and spread wide, with a red barrel-tile roof and a white stucco facade. There were bushes and other vegetation lining the front, going beneath every window. There was also an attached garage that reminded Ballard of Cindy Carpenter’s house and the suspected access route of the men who assaulted her.

Ballard first called the Forensics Unit to request that the print car come out and process the streetlight’s access plate. She then called Matt Neumayer and told him about the call from Carl Schaeffer at the BSL yard.

“What do you think?” Neumayer asked. “Are they changing things up? This MO doesn’t fit.”

“I can’t tell,” Ballard said. “But we also have to consider that if this is them, it may have already happened over this past weekend. That they hit two women, and the streetlight’s just been reported now.”

“Oh, shit, you’re right. It could be a nonreported case.”

“I can come out and sit on the neighborhood tonight — not being obvious about it — but I have to get some downtime now. I’m running on fumes. I was thinking your crew could run down who lives in the neighborhood, maybe determine if this Abigail Cena lives alone or if any other women do in this immediate quad of homes.”

“Yeah, we’ll do it. You go get some sleep. And don’t worry about tonight. I know you’re off. If we want to stake the place, we’ll set it up. Maybe I should get Lisa used to working nights.”

That told Ballard that Robinson-Reynolds had not told Neumayer that he was rescinding Moore’s reassignment to the late show. She felt bad about holding it as a secret from a good guy like Neumayer, but she was bound by the order from the lieutenant. And she wanted no part in the command games he was playing.

“Roger that,” Ballard said. “Shoot me an email if you set it up. I’d just like to know what’s happening.”

“You got it, Renée. Pleasant dreams.”

“Yeah, we’ll see about — Oh, wait, did Lisa and Ronin pick up the other Lambkin surveys?”

“They’re out now getting them. They went together rather than split up.”

“Got it. Well, let me know about that too. It would be nice if we found a triple cross with all three of them.”

“Would make our job easier.”

“Roger that.”

Ballard disconnected and decided she had to stop using “Roger that” as a sign-off. It was getting old. As she was leaning forward to turn the key in the ignition, she saw movement to her left and turned to see the garage door at Abigail Cena’s house going up.

There was a silver Mercedes G-wagon in the bay and soon she saw its brake lights flare, followed by its reverse lights. The Mercedes backed out of the garage and then the big door rolled back down. Ballard could only see a silhouette of the driver because of the tinting of the windows, but she thought the hair profile indicated a woman. The Mercedes backed into the street and then headed down to the traffic signal at Franklin two blocks away.

Ballard was dead tired but her investigator’s curiosity — both a blessing and a curse — got the better of her. She made a
U-turn and followed the G-wagon. She wanted to get a look at Abigail Cena — if it was her — and see if she fit the victim profile established with the first three victims of the Midnight Men.

She trailed the Mercedes east on Franklin toward Los Feliz. Ballard thought that at least she would be near home when this little exercise ended.

A call came in on her cell from an unknown number. She answered with a simple hello since she was technically off duty.

“Detective Ballard, Ross Bettany, West Bureau Homicide. We need to get together so I can pick up that gangbanger case and see what you’ve got.”

Ballard paused to compose an answer.

“I just left the autopsy and it’s not a gangbanger case.”

“I was told the guy was Las Palmas.”

“Was. He got out of the gang a long time ago. This wasn’t a gang thing.”

“Well, my last two were, so this will be a welcome change. When can we get together? My partner, Denise Kirkwood, is out today — added a vacay day to the weekend — but back tomorrow. Maybe we could come see you then?”

Ballard was relieved. She needed to get some sleep. She saw the Mercedes she was following turn off Franklin into the parking lot of the Gelson’s supermarket at Canyon Drive. A little charge of adrenaline sparked in her exhaustion because she knew from Cindy Carpenter’s Lambkin survey that she shopped at this Gelson’s as did one of the other victims.

“Tomorrow would be good,” Ballard said. “I’m heading home to sleep for the first time in about twenty-four hours. What time? Where?”

“We’ll come see you at Hollywood,” Bettany said. “Then we can go scope things out, pick up where you left off. How is nine at Hollywood Division? Will you have gotten enough sleep?”

He asked the last question good-naturedly but Ballard was stuck on “where you left off.” Those words bothered her, and once again she hesitated in handing the case off. Her good work. Bosch’s good work. She wanted to be there when they hooked up the four dentists and Christopher Bonner.
If
Bettany and Kirkwood managed to hook them up.

“You still there, Ballard?” Bettany prompted.

“Yeah, nine at the station is fine,” Ballard said. “If you want to do something today, you could write up a search warrant for the victim’s business records. I haven’t had the time to go through his office at the shop.”

“Gotcha. I’ll probably wait till tomorrow. Denise does the writing.”

Ballard knew that routine. The male detective assumes the alpha role, makes the female do the housekeeping and paperwork.

“So, Hollywood Division — where?” Bettany asked.

“We can meet in the task force room,” Ballard said. “It’s not being used.”

“What’s a task force, right?” Bettany said.

The question was rhetorical. He was referring to the drought of proactive police work going on these days. Ballard decided not to engage with that.

“I’ll see you then,” she said.

She put her cell away and watched as the Mercedes G-wagon she was tailing parked in a blue-painted disabled parking slot in front of the store. Ballard just stopped in the parking lot aisle to watch. She checked her mirror and saw another car pull into the lane behind her, but he had room to go around. After a few seconds, the door opened on the G-wagon and a woman used the side step on the vehicle to get down to the ground.

She looked like she was in her sixties, with white hair pulled
into a ponytail. She wore a black mask with big red lips printed on the front. It was garish but Ballard figured the woman probably thought it was funny. She carried her reusable shopping bags toward the automatic door to the store. She did not appear to have a physical handicap.

The woman was far outside the age range of the three known victims. Ballard guessed that if the streetlight across from her house was put out by the Midnight Men, then their intended victim was someone else on Outpost. She decided she would check with Neumayer on their follow-up on Outpost after she had slept.

From Gelson’s it was only ten minutes to her building. After entering her apartment, she went directly to the bedroom, put her gun, badge, and cuffs on the bed table, dropped her clothes right there on the floor, and changed into the sweats she had left on the bed from the last time she’d slept. She set a six-hour alarm on her phone, then crawled under the covers of her unmade bed, too tired even to brush her teeth.

She put in foam earplugs from the bed table to help blunt the normal daytime sounds of the city and pulled on a sleep mask to keep out the light.

And she was gone from the world in ten minutes, plunging face-first into a deep sleep, where the water that swirled around her was black and there were garish red lips floating in the emptiness.

Ballard felt the weight on her ribs and arms before anything else. She opened her eyes to darkness and realized she had been blindfolded. No, it was the sleep mask. A hand covered her mouth and gripped her jaw. Her first thought was the Midnight Men —
How did they find me? Did they see me on Outpost?
Her memory flashed on the car she had seen in her rearview mirror pulling into the lane behind her at Gelson’s.

She tried to struggle but the weight on her was too much. She violently turned her head to the side to loosen the grip of the hand on her jaw so that she could scream, but just as quickly the grip tightened, she was pulled back faceup, and pressure was applied to her chin, pulling her mouth open.

She heard the distinctive metal click of a gun cocking and that threw thoughts of the Midnight Men askew. None of the victims had mentioned a gun. It was two against one — they didn’t need a gun.

Ballard realized all the weight was on the top half of her body. Her attacker was straddling her ribs, his legs pinning her arms to the bed. She couldn’t move her upper body but her hips and legs were unrestrained. That was the flaw in the attack.

With all of the panicked, adrenaline-charged effort she could
muster, she brought her knees up, planted her feet in the mattress and thrust her hips up, tipping her attacker forward into the headboard.

The move was unexpected and the attacker hit the hard wooden headboard with a clunk. The barrel of the gun scraped down Ballard’s chin but the weapon didn’t fire. Ballard’s right arm broke free and she used it to shove the attacker to her left and off the bed. She heard him hit the floor. She yanked off the sleep mask and saw a man she immediately recognized on the floor.

It was Bonner.

He was struggling to get up. His left arm was swinging up and toward her with the gun — her gun — in his grasp. Ballard drew her right elbow back and then pistoned a strike forward into his throat.

Bonner fell back to the floor, dropped the gun, and brought both hands up to his neck. His face flushed red and his eyes widened as he realized he could not take in air. Ballard realized she had crushed his throat with the fist strike. She untangled herself from the blanket and sheet and rolled onto the floor. She now straddled him, swept her gun across the floor behind her, and reached up to her phone to call 911.

“This is Detective Ballard, LAPD, I need an ambulance to four-three-four-three Finley right away. Have a man here who can’t breathe.”

Bonner started making gagging sounds and his face was now more purple than red.

“Hold while I put it out,” the emergency dispatcher said.

Ballard was put on hold. She reached down and tried to put her hand under Bonner’s chin to see if she could feel where the blockage was. He pushed her hand away instinctively.

“Stop fighting,” she said. “I’m trying to help.”

As if responding to her but more likely due to the lack of oxygen going to his brain, Bonner’s hands fell away from his neck and dropped to the floor. There was a dry scraping sound coming from his open mouth. His eyes were open, staring up at her, and he was dying.

The dispatcher came back on the phone.

“Okay, we are en route.”

“What’s the ETA?”

“Four minutes.”

“He’s not going to make that. He’s coding right now.”

“Can you open his passageway?”

“It’s crushed.”

Ballard blurted out her apartment number and the code to the main entrance gate, then disconnected. She quickly pulled up her contact list and called Garrett Single. He answered immediately.

“Renée, how’s the noggin?”

“Garrett, listen to me. I need you to talk me through a field trach.”

“Wait, what are you — ”

“Listen, there’s no time. I have a man here, he can’t breathe. His upper throat is blocked. I have EMTs coming but he won’t make it that long. Talk me through a field tracheotomy. Now.”

“This is a gag, right?”

“Goddammit, no! I need you to tell me what to do. Now!”

“Okay, okay, uh, where exactly is the block?”

“Upper throat. He’s over a minute without air. He’s circling.”

“Above or below the Adam’s apple?”

“Above.”

“Okay, good. Put something under his neck so it’s clear and arched, jaw pointing up.”

Ballard put the phone on speaker, then placed it on the floor.
She reached under the bed and blindly grabbed a shoe — a running shoe. She reached down with one hand to raise Bonner’s neck, then shoved the shoe in like a wedge.

“Okay, got it. What’s next?”

“Okay, this is important — you have to find the spot.”

“What spot?”

“Use your finger and trace along the front of the neck. You are looking for a spot between the rings. The Adam’s apple is the big ring. Go below it and find the next ring.”

Ballard did as instructed and found the second ring.

“Got it, got it.”

“Okay, you want the soft spot between the rings — do you have a knife? You need a scalpel or a knife to make a small incision.”

Ballard reached up to the bed table and pulled the drawer out completely. It dropped to the floor over Bonner’s head. She scrambled her hand through the junk she had thrown in there after moving in — all stuff she’d planned to find a spot for later. She found the small Blackie Collins folding knife she had carried when she was in uniform. She depressed the lock and opened the blade.

“Okay, got it. Where do I cut?”

“Okay, the soft spot you found between the rings. The soft tissue. You need to make an incision there. But first, you’re sure he’s not breathing? You don’t want to do this if — ”

“He’s purple, Garrett. Just tell me what to do.”

“Okay, a small incision — like a quarter of an inch wide in the soft tissue between the cartilage. Horizontal and not too deep. You don’t want to go through the windpipe. No more than half an inch.”

Ballard carefully positioned the point of the blade and pushed it into the skin. Immediately blood came out and ran down
both sides of Bonner’s neck to the wood floor. But it wasn’t much and Ballard took that as a sign that Bonner’s heart was shutting down.

“Okay, I’m there.”

“Okay, you need to put in the tube so that air — ”

“Shit, what tube? I didn’t think — ”

Ballard reached over and swiped her free hand through the junk drawer while carefully holding the knife in place in Bonner’s neck. She saw nothing that would work.

“Do you have a plastic straw or a pen or anything that you could — ”

“No! I don’t have shit! God — ”

She remembered something and yanked open the bottom drawer of the bed table. After she had separated her shoulder surfing a few years before, she had bought a recirculating pump that pushed cold water into a rubber wrap that she could lay over her shoulder to ease the pain and swelling. A clear plastic tube connected the pump to the wrap. She yanked it out of the drawer and put it down on the floor.

“Okay, I found something. Can I take the knife out of his neck to cut the tube?”

“Do it.”

“How long do you want the tube?”

“No more than six inches needed.”

Ballard pulled the knife back and quickly cut a six-inch length of the tube with the razor-sharp blade.

“Okay, got it. What next?”

“Put one end of the tube through the incision and into the airway. Don’t go more than an inch in. Just push it through.”

Ballard did as instructed and felt the tube break through and into the windpipe.

“Okay, I’m in. Does he just start breathing, or what?”

“No, you have to get him started. Breathe into the tube. Check his chest, make sure it’s rising. Not too hard. Be gentle.”

Ballard jumped off Bonner and moved to his side. She gently blew into the tube and saw his chest rise.

“Okay,” she said.

“All right, watch his chest,” Single said. “You want to see if he breathes on his own.”

“It went down, that’s it.”

“Try it again, try it again.”

Ballard repeated the procedure, with no result.

“Nothing. Trying again.”

“You may have to breathe for him until the rescue gets there.”

Ballard tried again and then crouched low so she could watch the profile of Bonner’s chest. She saw it go down as air escaped through the tube. But then it rose again on its own.

“I think … he’s breathing. Yes, he’s breathing.”

“Well done, Detective. How’s his color?”

Ballard looked at Bonner’s face. The purple was leaching out of it. Fresh blood was circulating.

“It’s good. It’s getting there.”

“Okay, what I want you to do is call me back on FaceTime so I can look at him. Can you do that?”

Ballard disconnected the call without replying and then called back on FaceTime. While she waited for the call to go through, she reached up to the top of the bed table to grab her handcuffs. She snapped one cuff around Bonner’s right wrist and clamped the other around the metal bed frame half a foot away.

She looked down at Bonner. His eyes were slits and he showed no sign of being conscious, but there was no doubt that he was breathing. There was a low whistling sound coming from the tube she had inserted into his neck.

Single answered the call and Ballard saw his face. It looked
like he was outside, and she could see the yellow brick of the fire station behind him.

“You’re hurt,” he said. “Are you okay?”

For the first time, Ballard remembered the barrel of the gun being dragged down her chin. She brought her hand up to touch the wound and felt blood.

“I’m okay,” she said. “Take a look at him.”

She flipped the camera so Single could see Bonner on the floor. She could now hear sirens but was unsure whether they were on her end of the call or Single’s.

“You see him?”

“Yes. Uh, it looks good. Actually, it looks perfect. He’s breathing and his color is good. You got rescue on the way?”

“Yeah, I think I hear them now.”

“Yeah, that’s them. They’re coming. Who is this guy? You handcuffed him?”

“I just did that in case he woke up. I was sleeping and he broke in. He was going to kill me with my own gun — I think to make it look like suicide.”

“Jesus, why?”

“He’s a murder suspect. Somehow he found out I was onto him and where I live.”

“Holy shit!”

“Yeah.”

Ballard tried to think of how Bonner could have known about her and the investigation. The easy answer was Dennis Hoyle. She had spooked Hoyle, and he in turn sent Bonner after her. That reminded her — Bosch had been there as well.

“Listen, Garrett, I need to make another call,” she said. “Thank you so much for helping me.”

“I don’t know if I should have, if this guy was trying to kill you,” he said.

Ballard smiled.

“That might be the sweetest thing anybody’s ever said to me. I’ll call you later.”

“I’m here. And Renée, I’m glad you’re okay.”

After hanging up, Ballard immediately called Bosch. He picked up, and there was no indication of stress in his voice.

“Harry, you’re okay?”

“Why shouldn’t I be?”

“Because Bonner just tried to take me out. He’s on the floor of my apartment.”

“Give me the address. I’m on my way.”

“No, it’s handled. But you’re okay? I thought maybe he went to you first.”

“All good. You sure you’re safe?”

“Yeah. I almost killed him. But I’ve got people coming. You stay back but be ready. After I clear this, I want to pay a visit to Dr. Hoyle.”

“I want to be there for that.”

Ballard disconnected. She heard the sirens cut off in front of the building. She knew she had to work quickly. She crouched down and started going through the pockets of Bonner’s pants. She found a phone that looked like a cheap convenience-store burner in one pocket and a small leather wallet holding a set of lockpicks — Bonner’s way into the apartment — in another. There was no vehicle key or anything else.

She put the pick set back in the pocket where she found it but buried the phone under the junk in the bed table drawer. The rattle of jewelry and other belongings made Bonner stir. There was a louder sound of rushing air from the breathing tube and he opened his eyes as Ballard pulled back from the drawer. He made a move to raise his upper body but then quickly stopped as he sensed something was wrong. He tried to move his right hand
but it was cuffed to the bed frame. He brought his left hand up to his throat and found the protruding tube.

“You pull that out, you die,” Ballard said.

He looked at her.

“I crushed your windpipe,” she said. “That tube is what you’re breathing through.”

His eyes moved about as he took in the room and the circumstances. Without moving his head, he cast his eyes down and saw the handcuff. He then looked at Ballard and she saw something register in his eyes. It was like he understood where he was and what was going to happen to him.

In one swift move he reached up and yanked the breathing tube out. He threw it over the bed and across the room. He stared at Ballard as his face began to get red. It was then that she heard the rescue team coming through the door to her apartment.