The Deepest Cut (6 page)

She continued. “There’s a security guard posted at the construction site at night, but during questioning, he confessed that he was asleep in his car parked on the street behind the building. Didn’t hear anything until we rolled up. Homeless guy by the name of Kevin found the body and called it in. Patrol officers are canvassing the Old Town clubs and restaurants with mug shots of known Crooked Lane Crips.”

Kissick added, “The Lanes Crips were bound to respond to the Titus Clifford murder. Vario Pasadena Rifa might be good for it, too. They’ve been at war with NLK for years. But this isn’t anywhere near NLK territory. Why was Scrappy tagging here? Why was a thirty-something gangbanger tagging at all, making noise on the street? Guys Scrappy’s age usually aren’t even active anymore.”

Vining examined the board. “Cameron Lam from the Gangs Unit is on-scene.”

“I called him in,” Lieutenant Garner said. “Corporal Lam has the latest intel on what’s doing on the street. Scrappy just got out of prison after a drug-sale rap. Corporal Lam says the word is that he was trying to go straight.”

Vining looked toward the brightly lit shell of the building. It was circled by yellow barrier tape, marking the interior perimeter of the crime scene. “If Scrappy was out of the life, why was he shot while tagging a wall in Old Town? What did the tag say?”

“That’s another puzzle,” Kissick replied. “Says ‘China Dog, one-eight-seven.’”

The California Penal Code number for murder is 187.

“Death to China Dog,” Vining said. “Who’s China Dog?”

“No one knows,” the lieutenant said. “Corporal Lam asked his guys on the street and no one has a clue.”

“Is it a death threat against a Chinese gangbanger?” Vining looked at Kissick. “Chinese gangs have never gotten a foothold in Pasadena.”

He returned her grim gaze. “Looks like they might be moving in.”

SIX

A
COUNTY CORONER SEDAN AND VEHICLES FROM PPD’S FORENSIC
Services Unit were in the street in front of the gaping entrance to the partially demolished building. The façade, portico, and exterior walls of the original 1964 structure were intact while the guts were being scooped out. The cement portico was shaped like a large zigzag and was supported by austere square pillars. The walls were of polished cement with small, smooth pebbles pressed into them. The adult trees on the property were being preserved, encircled with wire mesh to protect them from the construction equipment.

Vining and Kissick walked through an open gate in the chain-link fence that surrounded the site. A sign on the fence announced:
60 LUXURY CONDOS AND STREET LEVEL RETAIL. DEVELOPED BY RED PEARL ENTERPRISES, LLC.
There was an artist’s rendering of the finished building. It showed angular towers of steel and glass that incorporated the building’s original design elements and expanded on them in the greenest way possible. Yuppies would be able to have Midcentury Modern chic but without the icky small rooms, low ceilings, and devil-may-care attitude about the environment.

Inside the shell, standing among half-destroyed offices that had been carved away around it, was a solitary wall that was fifteen feet high. It and the surrounding area were illuminated by floodlights that
made it bright as day, but that faded to shadows and darkness beyond the lights’ reach. A clutch of people were gathered at the base of the wall where the corpse lay. PPD Forensic Services specialists were searching the ruins of offices beyond the halo of light, the darkness nearly sucking up their flashlight beams, which flitted like shooting stars. The quarter moon cast scant light through the openings where large picture windows once were, from which the glass had been removed.

Floodlights lighting their path, Vining and Kissick walked past heavy machinery and huge piles of debris— broken sheets of dry wall, blocks of concrete, and splintered lumber. The flooring had been pulled out and the subfloor was marked with tire tracks from construction equipment.

From a dark room to their right, Vining and Kissick saw Detective Tony Ruiz approaching with a flashlight. Shuffling ahead of him was a thin, tall man whom Ruiz occasionally nudged to move along faster. The lanky man, who appeared to be barely in his twenties, made forty-seven-year-old Ruiz look even shorter and rounder. Kissick turned his flashlight beam on the man, revealing filthy clothes and long, matted hair. He was Caucasian and his skin was deeply tanned. He clutched a bundle wrapped inside a dirty blanket against his chest.

“Must be Kevin,” Kissick said. “The homeless guy who found the body.”

The man squinted as he stepped into the bright light, peering at Vining and Kissick with apprehension. He looked wide-eyed and skittish.

Vining had seen that feral look before and guessed that he suffered from a mental illness, as was the case with most of the full-time homeless. She had seen him around. He was among Pasadena’s steady homeless population, which hovered near one thousand in number. The city wasn’t a bad place to land on the skids, with mild climate and services offered by the many churches and shelters.

After giving the guy another shove, Ruiz dropped back, maintaining his distance. Vining guessed why, and as they drew close, her suspicions were confirmed. The stench emanating from the young man was overpowering.

“This is Kevin Conker,” Ruiz said. “He found the body. I’m gonna get one of the uniformed guys to take him to the station. He stinks too much to get in my car.”

Ruiz directed his comments to Kissick, not bothering to acknowledge Vining’s presence, as was his habit of late. He and Vining had a lengthy history. Their more recent interactions hadn’t improved matters. When Vining had returned from her extensive Injured on Duty leave, Sergeant Early bumped Ruiz from his long-sought-after desk in Homicide to return it to Vining. Some of Ruiz’s venom was no doubt due to a falling-out he’d had years ago with Vining’s longtime mentor.

Ruiz worked assaults, under Sergeant Early’s command, and had been brought onto the task force working the spate of gang-related incidents.

“Don’t take me to jail.” Kevin more tightly squeezed the blanket-wrapped bundle. “I can stay here. I won’t bother anything.”

Ruiz’s irritation showed. He looked ragged. His fringe of hair and his face were oily and he needed a shave. “I’m not arresting you, but I will if you keep giving me crap.”

Kevin’s knuckles were turning white from where he held the bundle. Breathing through his mouth, he shuffled backward a few steps. “I want to be outside.”

“We’re going to the station to get your statement. Got it?”

Ruiz was being a bully for no reason that Vining could fathom, other than the fact that he could. He had no legal grounds to force Kevin to go to the station. He was handling Kevin all wrong. A better strategy would have been to build a rapport with him.

“I already told him everything,” Kevin appealed to Vining. In such situations, people often did, believing a female officer would be more compassionate, which was not always the case.

Kevin said, “I went to look for aluminum cans. When I came back, I saw that clown. He was on the ground, dead. I went to the cigar store down the street and told them to call the police. That’s all I know. I don’t have anything else to say.” He hunched over as he spoke, as if to ward off a blow.

Clown?
Vining thought that was a harsh way to refer to a murder victim.

Ruiz reached behind his back, beneath his jacket, and brought out his handcuffs. He stepped toward Kevin, who stumbled on a broken block of cement. “Are you coming with me voluntarily, or do I have to arrest you for trespassing?”

Vining knew that was another lie. The property owner would have to be there to press charges.

“Tony …” Kissick put out his hand.

“I called the police.” Kevin’s protests became frantic. “I did the right thing. Don’t arrest me.”

“Ruiz, come on.” Vining knew all the detectives were running on fumes after working day and night sorting out the gang-war carnage, but Ruiz’s behavior was unnecessarily callous. She’d watched longtime cops grow bitter. Ruiz had never been a ray of sunshine to begin with. He should retire before someone got hurt.

Ruiz nearly shouted at Vining.
“Come on?
He’s our witness. I want a good statement. I don’t want to be sitting in court with the defense attorney poking holes in it.”

“Did you see it happen, Kevin?” Kissick asked. “Did you see anyone?”

Kevin stared at the ground and rapidly shook his head.

“I have my own methods,” Ruiz said. “They’ve worked for me for many years.”

“So much for values-based policing,” Vining shot back. The PPD emphasized not just getting the job done, but how the job is done.

Ruiz pointed at Kevin. “Don’t move.” He looked at Kissick. “Can I have a word?”

Kissick followed Ruiz, who walked a few feet away.

Ruiz spoke in a stage whisper that Vining clearly heard. She turned to the homeless man. “Look, Kevin, if I take you to McDonald’s for some food, will you tell me what you saw, and let me tape record it?”

“You need to teach her not to second-guess a fellow detective in front of the public,” Ruiz said.

“Tony, all due respect, but you’re handling that kid all wrong. We need to earn his trust so we can find him if there’s a trial, not scare him to the point that he’ll flee the city and disappear.”

Ruiz drew his eyebrows together. He was nearly bald, which made his eyebrows seem even more bushy and unruly

“Tony look,” Kissick said. “Nan and I will take it from here. We’ve all been burning the candle at both ends. Go home and get some sleep.”

The pink tip of his tongue stuck out from the corner of his mouth as Ruiz gave Kissick a sarcastic look. “Poison Ivy’s got
you
under her spell.”

Poison Ivy was one of the two monikers Vining had been anointed with at the station. The other was Quick Draw, which she’d earned after she’d shot the rock star to death. She hated both nicknames and Ruiz knew it. She didn’t respond, but instead continued talking with Kevin. “Where do you usually hang out?”

Kissick moved close to Ruiz. He kept his voice low, but there was no mistaking the tone. “Tony, I’m in charge of this investigation. You’re either on this team and enthusiastic about being on this team, or I’ll ask Sergeant Early to reassign you.”

“No problem, Jim. I’ll talk to Sarge myself first thing tomorrow. I just might tell her that I don’t think it’s smart to have two detectives who are fucking each other working on the same investigation. I apologize for being so blunt, but I feel compelled to speak my mind.”

“Do whatever your conscience dictates, Tony,” Kissick replied. “For now, take Kevin to the command post and have him wait there. Tell the lieutenant I’ll be out in a minute. You can go home.”

“Fine by me.”

Kissick walked back. “Kevin, Detective Ruiz is going to take you outside. I’ll come get you in a minute and we’ll go get some food, okay? Or maybe you want to go to Union Station.” He spoke of the local homeless shelter.

When Ruiz left with Kevin, Vining pulled on her latex gloves. “What happened?”

“I’m telling Sarge I want him off this case. I can’t work with him.”

Vining nodded. “I never could work with him.” She added, “I heard what he said about talking to Sarge about us.”

He met her eyes. “Nan, Early has certainly heard the rumors. If
she’s got a problem with it, she’ll bring it up. Would it make you sleep better at night if we go in and come clean with her?”

She thought about it. “Yes.” After a pause, “No … Well, maybe, but not right now.”

“Okay.”

They walked toward the wall that had been peeled away from the rest of the building. It had been bolstered by a wooden frame.

The wall looked majestic, standing like a giant tombstone, eerily shimmering beneath the spotlights. Drawing near, they saw the reason for the visual effect. The wall was covered with a vast mosaic composed of thousands of tiny squares of colored tile that had an iridescent glaze. The mosaic depicted the Colorado Street Bridge, a Pasadena icon and favorite subject of local artists. Instead of the typical 1920s romantic picture-postcard treatment, the style reflected the Space Age influence of the early 1960s. The bridge was rendered with sparse details and was surrounded with a border of boomerangs and atoms in a jarring contraposition. Blood splatter on the wall couldn’t have jibed with the artist’s vision.

“How about that?” Kissick said admiringly.

“Who knew that was in here all this time?” Vining said.

“Looks like they were making a path, hoping to get that mosaic out of here in one piece.”

The wall was partially shielded by plastic sheeting that appeared to have been carefully taped into place at one time. Part of it had been pulled off and lay crumpled on the ground. At the base, they could see the corpse’s tennis shoes and legs between the people gathered there. Maybe it was the effect of the artificial light, but Vining thought he looked as if he was wearing striped pajamas.

Vining spied some of the graffiti between two of the Pasadena Police’s own, Detective Alex Caspers and Corporal Cameron Lam, who appeared to be doing little besides watching a comely, young female coroner’s investigator crouched on the ground, working on the corpse.

Vining had worked with this coroner’s investigator before and knew her name was Bambi. Her parents had bestowed their sweet baby girl with a stripper’s name. It didn’t help matters when Bambi developed
a stripper’s figure. No one could have predicted that Bambi would pursue a career that called her out in the middle of the night to creep beneath freeway underpasses and around mean streets, analyzing corpses.

Caspers and Lam gave Kissick and Vining a perfunctory greeting. They were absorbed in observing not the corpse but Bambi as she supported the victim’s head and probed the single gunshot wound in the back of his skull. Both men were in their twenties, handsome, cocky, and attractive to women. Caspers especially was preoccupied with sex— having it, pursuing it, or thinking about it his every waking hour, and probably while he slept, too. Vining guessed he wasn’t different from other guys his age, or even much older, but most were more restrained in vocalizing their obsession, at least during working hours. She’d tried to curb him while on the job. While she hadn’t completely housebroken him, at least she’d trained him to go on the newspaper.