The Poisonous Ten (12 page)

“It could get worse for you, you know,” Hardwick said.

“It can always get worse. That’s life. Only cure for that is to stop living. And I don’t see that as an option.”

Hardwick stared out into the relatively empty bar and shook the blankness off. Four college-aged kids had entered and sat at
the other end of the bar, laughing and being loud as they began to drink away the night. Two men in business suits sat at a booth near the front of the bar, each one staring up at an opposing sporting event.  

“I don’t blame you, you know? For what happened. You’re his partner? Hell, I’m his boss. I should have known. I’m going over all of his past cases myself. Forget the inquisition board. I want to know. How did this happen? I’m not saying it doesn’t. There are corrupt cops just like there are corrupt people in any other profession. But Levinson was getting away with shit like that for half of his career. When did it start? Why? These are things I want to know. But I don’t blame you. Not now. Not ever. Not for him. I want you to know that. Forget everyone else. The department will survive. The rest of the squad will survive. And they’ll come around. You’re too good a cop for any of them to doubt you for too long.”

“I appreciate that,” Parks said, downing another shot. “But I think what’s pissing me off, even more than Levi
nson’s betrayal, is the fact that Kozlov might go free. A child killer. And that, because I wasn’t aware of my partner’s actions, will be on me.”

Hardwick didn’t respond to his comment. “How’s Tippin doing?”

Parks tilted his head at the change of conversation and took a swallow of another shot as he digested the question.

“You know, it used to be you needed experience to be a good detective. Years working cases, being on the street, familiarizing yourself with the human condition. But now
adays it’s all so different. Now, people like me—with all the experience in the world—are becoming extinct, and people like Tippin, with no experience on the street whatsoever, are becoming the direction of the force. We didn’t use to have computers, and trace evidence, and all this technology. We just had good old-fashioned police work. Digging into a victim’s life and putting it all together like pieces of a puzzle. Now we scan for fingerprints and fibers and DNA. You just need to press a button and, voila, out pops a killer. The bad guys out there have gotten more sophisticated and so must we. It’s just the way the world works now. Times change.”

“Being able to work a computer will never make up for years of experience.”

“No. But it sure helps level the playing field.” Parks finished off his drink. “Don’t get me wrong. Tippin is a good kid. A hard worker. And I don’t mean anything against him personally. He’s doing well. You were right.” Hardwick raised an eyebrow in triumph and took another shoot. “His instincts aren’t all there yet, but he’s new to it all. Over time he’ll become a great asset to the team. He’s smart as hell and ready to learn and prove himself. It’s all just . . . interesting to me.”

Hardwick downed one more shot.

“Son of a bitch.” Parks bit his tongue and finished off his drink.

Hardwick noticed him peering up at the television over the bar. The seven o’clock news was on, with captioning below the faces to let them know what was being reported. Charles Wyler was going on about the inefficiency of the
department and how nothing was being done about the two slain victims that had been discovered.

“Ignore him,” Hardwick ordered. “Nothing you can do about what they say. I’ll have Public Relations contact the station and deal with them. Nothing for you to worry about. Your only job is the case. You understand me?”

“It’s just that sometimes—”

“I know. I know. Free speech and all that rubbish. It still doesn’t change anything. Forget about Charles Wyler. He has nothing to do with this case. What you need to do is f
ocus on who your possible victim number four could be . . . and then get to him before our killer does.” 

15

“Anything at all. Anything out of place. Something that wasn’t here before. Something that’s been moved. Anything at all.” Parks stood off in one of the corners of the Bollinger’s living room while Moore guided Mrs. Bollinger throughout her apartment, hoping she might see something that would lead them in the direction of the killer’s identity. Parks was losing patience with the “grieving” widow and was about to wring her neck and throw her out a window himself.

“We don’t have much,” Mrs. Bollinger snapped. “As you can see.”

The longer Moore guided Mrs. Bollinger around the apartment, the more he noticed how sparse and empty it was. As the two women walked around he heard the hollow-sounding echo their shoes made, as if they were inside of a museum. There were no pieces of art on the walls, only a few sporadic pictures of the couple. A simple couch resided in front of a twenty-two-inch TV that Parks thought was older than him. There were no DVDs or walls of CDs, let alone a stereo to play music on. The kitchen was equally vacant, with only a kitchen table and a single chair left, as the other one that Jason Bollinger had been found dead in had been removed and tagged as evidence. The small kitchen had a microwave, refrigerator, and oven/stove. He couldn’t remember the last time he had seen such a dreary-looking apartment.

“Why is that?” Moore asked breaking the silence.

“What?”

“Why don’t you have much? I mean, it almost looks like you two didn’t actually live here. I thought you were a fi
tness instructor and your husband was . . . ?”

“Unemployed,” Mrs. Bollinger admitted, her posture b
ecoming more erect. “We’ve only been here a year. Jason used to be an investment consultant.” She paused. “He got paid to play with other people’s money.”

“And—?”

“Twelve months ago we got served,” Mrs. Bollinger continued, biting her lip. “Jason was being investigated by the IRS and FBI for money laundering or extortion or something. Some Ponzi-type scheme. He never actually showed me the papers. I only know what little I was able to get from phone calls through walls or papers that were delivered when he wasn’t here. He was accused of stealing money from several companies and hiding it in offshore accounts. He denied it of course. And I believed him. I stood by his side. Even as everything we owned was taken away and we were reduced to this. I stood by his side.”

Mrs. Bollinger wiped several tears from her face as she finished looking around the kitchen and fell into the single chair at the kitchen table. Parks wondered if maybe Mrs.
Bollinger wasn’t hiding something from them. Or perhaps her husband had been hiding something from her. The apartment, sparse in its decorations, was by no means a cheap place to live, due to its size and the building it was in. Something wasn’t adding up. It was like the Bollingers had tried to put on the face of being poor without being so. 

“Why did you go home to visit your family this past week?” Parks finally interjected.

“I . . . I just missed them. That’s all. It was a holiday this weekend. Had a longer weekend from work. So I chose to go visit them.”

Parks didn’t buy it. He had seen his share of liars over the years, and Mrs. Bollinger showed plenty of signs. She wouldn’t make eye contact with either one of them. She couldn’t stop fidgeting either, and it was starting to get to him.

“But the three-day weekend was Saturday through Monday. Most people get back to work on Tuesday.”

“Yeah? And? So what?”

“So you didn’t leave to see your family Friday after work or even Saturday morning. You didn’t leave to see them until Monday morning, the last day of your vacation. And you were still gone Tuesday and Wednesday. So again, why did you go home to see your family?”

Mrs. Bollinger wiped away several tears, her mascara running, not that it mattered to anyone in the room. The woman wasn’t a screaming Hollywood beauty, but she
would have made most men turn their heads. Despite her only reaching five foot four in height, her body was fit, as was in accordance with her job.

Parks wondered if she had been aware of the fact that her neighbor, Ian Harris, had been spying on her. Taking photos of her. Desiring her. That’s when it hit him.

“You were leaving him,” Parks said. He had seen the look before and knew it well. “Weren’t you?”

Mrs. Bollinger nodded her head and cried some more.

“Why?”

“I . . .” Mrs. Bollinger sighed and inhaled deeply. “He lied to me. All these months. He lied to me. His wife. He did do it. What they accused him of. Stealing. He did it. But worse than that, he lied to me about it. I mean, I was his wife. I would have stood by him. Supported him. But ever
ything . . . it was too much. All he did was shut me out of everything. Out of his job. His legal troubles. His life. It was supposed to be our life. Ours. But he chose himself instead of us. So yes. I was leaving him. I went home to talk about it with my parents. To get their help and support. I didn’t know what to do. Then you called.” Mrs. Bollinger paused, then reached for her purse on the table and dug through it for something. “There’s nothing here that isn’t the way it was before.” Mrs. Bollinger retrieved the compact mirror and began fixing her makeup. “Nothing new. At least that I’m aware of. Nothing moved. Nothing changed. Nothing missing. It’s all here. And it can all burn as far as I’m concerned.”

“Okay,” Parks said, motioning to Moore. “We thank you for your time.”

“Thanks,” Mrs. Bollinger huffed, staring out the window.

“Oh, one other thing,” Parks said, turning back around
. He motioned for Moore to hand him something from the briefcase in her hands. She retrieved a photo of the lionfish and handed it to the grieving widow. “Does this have any meaning to you?”

Mrs. Bollinger took in the photo, staring through it as if it wasn’t in front of her at all. Finally, she shook her head.

“We’ve never had any fish. It means nothing to me,” she said, sighing.

“No problem. Thanks for all of your help.”

Parks wasn’t sure what else to say and backed out of the apartment, leaving the woman alone to grieve in her own way.

*
                            *                            *

“All right, ladies and gentlemen,” Parks said, getting his team’s attention. It was noon and he knew they would want a break soon, and he hoped after their midmorning recap that he would be able to let them go for an hour. “There’s a co
nnection here. We’re just not seeing it. This lionfish—whatever it means—it means something. What have we found on it?”

Tippin was looking down at his laptop opposite of Moore and Fairmont, both of whom were frustrated and out of a
nswers. Everyone on the team was burned out thanks to long days and late nights with no results. 

“Sorry I’m late,” Jackie said, rushing into the room like a breath of fresh air, waking everyone up. “Morning from hell. But I have paperwork.”

And that she did. Jackie set the pile that she had been carrying with two hands onto the conference table, and for a second Parks thought the table might collapse underneath the weight.

“What’s all that?” Parks asked.

“Information dealing with poisons,” Jackie said, pulling a strand of hair out of her face and tucking it behind her ear. “Particularly dealing with Los Angeles. I called into my office and had them print everything I asked for. Not sure what will be helpful, so I grabbed it all.”

“And?”

“And what? I just got here,” Jackie shot back, smirking. “But never fear. I know there’s something in here. Somehow. Somewhere. Who supplies whom with what and how much and why. Everything. And wherever it is, I’ll find it.”

Jackie plopped into her chair with a smile plastered on her face. She brought with her an air of optimism that most in the room were not used to. Then again, this wasn’t her job, and once this case was over she would be able to escape the reality they lived through day after day.
It was almost as if the near-death experience the day before had changed her somehow. Given her a different perspective.

“Uh, boss,” Tippin said quietly, raising his hand like a student waiting to be picked on.

“What is it, Milo?” Parks asked.

“I think you need to see this, sir,” Tippin said swiveling his laptop around so everyone else could see it.

“What are you watching?” Parks asked, somewhat upset by being sidetracked.

“It’s live,” Tippin said as Parks stared at the screen in front of him. “It’s a special report. Charles Wyler.”

“What’s that guy talking about now?” Fairmont asked.

“It’s not important,” Parks snapped. “I want us to focus on our case. Not what this jerk thinks he has that we don’t.”

“Did you know they’re calling him the Palisades Poisoner?” Fairmont laughed at this bit of information.

“Palisades Poisoner?” Parks said with a roll of his eyes. “What the hell is that? He hasn’t killed anyone in the Pal
isades.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Fairmont agreed. “But you know they need the moniker to sound catchy, and a repeated letter helps. Remember when you took down the Silver Lake Strangler two years ago? Or like, let’s see . . . the Pasadena Pedophile? Or was it pervert? Or puncher?”

“Jake,” Moore snapped.

“Anyway, there’s also the Compton Killers or Bel Air Burglars. Get it? Or us, Hollywood Homicide.”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” Parks said, shaking his head.

“Hey, it’s not us,” Fairmont said defensively. “It’s the damn news people. They need something catchy to get people’s attention. Palisades Poisoner sounds catchy. It sells.”

“It’s misinformation and will get the wrong people thinking the wrong things,” Parks replied, now even more upset by Charles Wyler and what he was doing to their investigation. “It doesn’t matter. Forget him and focus back on what we’re doing here. Milo, put that away.” 

“But, sir,” Tippin said. “Look where he’s at.”

“Where?” Parks asked. “Looks like downtown. Union Station.”

“Yeah. At the end of the metro line. But don’t you see it?”

“What?” Parks asked as he leaned in closer to the laptop screen along with the rest of his team. “What am I looking at? So he’s doing a report from downtown. So what?”

“Behind him,” Tippin huffed, getting fed up with no one seeing what he had caught so quickly.

“So he’s in front of a fish tank. It’s always been there. It’s at the entran—” Parks stopped talking as he saw what it was that Tippin had been trying to point out since he first turned his laptop around. Swimming in the giant aquarium at the Union Station were several lionfish. “Are we sure there’s a connection?”

“He’s doing a press conference about the Palisades Po
isoner,” Tippin confirmed. “What do you think?”

“I think we need to get down there,” Parks said. “Can you keep watching?”

“I got a live stream,” Tippin said.               

“—who has been terrorizing the streets of Los Angeles since Labor Day weekend,” Charles Wyler said over the screen. “The Palisades Poisoner has already claimed the lives of two innocents. That we know of. This leaves the top questions on the public’s mind: Will he strike again? And where? And who?”

“Son of a bitch,” Parks cursed. “Let’s go. Everyone grab your stuff. Come on.”

“Something’s wrong,” Tippin said stopping everyone from moving. Parks maneuvered himself over to Tippin’s side and stared down at the screen. Airing live, the camera man was focused on Wyler, who appeared to be stalling when someone off screen yelled his name. Both Wyler and the cameraman turned at the sound.

A homeless person threw a Styrofoam cup filled with a reddish liquid into Wyler’s face. Wyler held up his hands to block the liquid but missed most of it as it flew into his face, getting into his eyes, mouth, and every other crevice it could seep into. 

“Oh my God,” Moore exclaimed, throwing a hand to her mouth.

“Let’s move people,” Parks ordered. “Now!”

Wyler immediately began screaming.

The cameraman was still filming everything, broadcasting live across every television in the Los Angeles area.

“Cut that shit,” a professional-looking woman ordered the cameraman, almost pushing him over as she rushed to W
yler’s side to see if there was anything she could do for him.

“Help me,” Wyler cried, the tears pouring from his bugged-out eyes mixing with the red substance all over his face, making him look as if he was reenacting the prom scene from Carrie. “Help me!”