The Pressure of Darkness (24 page)

"Yeah."

"And finally Doc does a little digging for you, and among other things says the baby powder from the adjoining suite doesn't match yours. So now we have to figure somebody else
did
go in there to slice-and-dice Stryker."

Burke sat up carefully. "You left something out."

"Dinky Martin?"

"No, I doubt that's related to any of this. I think Dinky just wanted to even the score for the whipping I gave him Sunday night."

"So what are you talking about?"

"I meant the fact that Doc has gotten some serious heat for helping me out. And add to that Scotty Bowden suddenly acting so weird. Jesus, you'd think he was on the other side, or something."

"Other side of
what
, Burke?"

"That's the question, isn't it? Beats the hell out me."

Burke leaned forward, elbows on the desk. He'd been pounded on before, but not at this advanced age. He remembered a line from an old Indiana Jones movie, something about it not being the speed but the mileage that finally got you.

"Okay, Suite 1124."

"Say what?"

"That old couple who rented the suite next to Stryker at the Sheraton," Gina said, impatiently. She looked down at her notes, unconsciously pursed her lips. She looked like a small child. "Here it is, Dorothy. Clinton and Dorothy Farnsworth. I looked them up on the Internet, Burke. They pop up on the society pages a lot. Fund raising for hospital wings, doubles tennis for the prune juice set, that sort of thing."

Burke grunted. "Likely to be squeaky clean, in other words."

"Well, I got to wondering. What would a rich Bel Air couple owns their own mansion be doing renting a not-that-swanky suite at the Sheraton for a night? Construction on their mansion, what?"

He felt a chill jogging on thin, hairy legs. "You know something, that is a damned good question, isn't it? So you checked on their whereabouts the night of Stryker's death, just to be sure."

"Oh, they were in town all right, but they were supposedly attending a private birthday party at Shutters in Santa Monica, and stayed quite late. Whoever checked into that suite, Burke, it wasn't them."

"Did you get a description from the staff? I don't remember there being anything in the police report we could use."

Gina produced a folded piece of paper. "I schmoozed, I wheedled, I begged. Scotty almost shit himself, but then he faxed it over."

Burke grabbed it from her hand. It was a copy of the hotel's registration documents for Mr. and Mrs. Clinton Farnsworth. "The handwriting?"

"It's a reasonably good forgery," Gina said, "but it's fake. I checked." She yawned. "But witness the colossal arrogance, my man. The business address is correct for the real Farnsworth, over on Avenue of the Stars in Century City. But take a look at the home address they gave."

"Did the cops ever follow up on this?"

"Not so far. And trust me, Scotty sounded scared."

"Tell him I'll be dropping by his second office later tonight, okay?"

"Oh, fuck. You're going there, aren't you." It was not a question. They both knew Burke had no choice. The address given as the Farnsworth residence was not in upscale Bel Air. It was in Panorama City. That meant the barrio. Gang country.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Twenty minutes later, Burke was on his way.

Sepulveda showed signs of strain around Burbank Boulevard, near the overpass entrance to the 405 freeway. That's where the crack whores started to appear, at first half in shadow, like emaciated citizens of a third world country, but eventually strutting openly along on the sidewalk. They wore butt-floss shorts, halter tops, and black high heels, and sported a carpet of goose bumps from the cold night air. Some were still adrift in puberty, some nearing menopause, but their faces looked the same due to makeup thick as dry-wall mud. A few were bold enough to stick their thumbs out as though asking for a ride, not looking for a john, but most merely paced in circles, waiting for work.

Burke continued north, past the rows of neon strip malls packed with middle-class cars and shopping carts. At around Victory, the first signs of gang graffiti appeared, one florid NHBZ, the spray-painted signature of the North Hollywood Boys. Crowds of rootless young men and women dominated the cracked sidewalk by the time Burke neared Saticoy, still heading upstream. The males had their heads shaved close to the scalp and sported sagging blue jeans, wife-beater tee shirts, and padded fluorescent jackets baggy enough to hide automatic weapons. The police working this neighborhood did so with considerable anal tension.

Burke drove on, the address repeating itself in his brain like a mantra. Lawrence Street finally appeared just north of Roscoe. He turned right into the gloom, down a row of pastel-painted 1940s wood frame homes fronted by stacks of tires and used cars that were works-in-progress. His shoulders tensed a bit. Two of the four weary streetlamps had been broken, or perhaps shot out.

The house was at the end of the street in a cul-de-sac. It looked deserted, nearly uninhabitable. The slatted wood was splintered, peeling, and in places regurgitating large nails already orange with rust. Burke pulled to the curb and parked just two doors away and on the opposite side of the street. He checked the rearview mirror. A group of five adolescent boys had followed his slow progress down the street. Their body language was already agitated and stiff, sporting various hand signs. They were working themselves up, discussing this arrogant
gringo
invading their turf. He hadn't much time before the young sociopaths—and perhaps several of their erstwhile friends—decided to challenge his presence.

Burke armed his 9mm Glock, grabbed his flashlight. He stepped out of the car into the humid night air. The nearest street lamp was still working, making him clearly visible to the gang. After a moment Burke allowed his gun to hang loose at his side, in plain view. He hoped to read like a private citizen out to settle a score, maybe with some drug dealer. Perhaps that impression would slow the boys down. Of course, another possibility was that the kids came down the block ready for all-out war. If that was the case, things could get ugly in a hurry.

The lawn was thick with weeds and piled high with trash; the ground parched. There were footprints everywhere, going across and in and out of the area, so Burke's own would be impossible to identify. He walked across the cluttered lawn, stepped on cans or crushed fast-food containers wherever possible, and got to the foot of the wooden steps. Nothing moved within the darkened house. Burke glanced back over his shoulder.

Like a trick shot from a horror movie, the clump of angry boys had gotten one hell of a lot closer; they were still doing exactly what they were doing before, but were now less than half a block away. Their hostile muttering became audible.

Burke used the flashlight to nudge the door open and roll back the darkness. He discovered a room filthy and reeking of decay. There were needles, condoms, empty bottles, and all manner of cushions, pillows, and lawn chairs. This was a former crack house, from the look of it, although the dust everywhere suggested it has not been used for some time. He stepped wide over the threshold and into the living room, listening intently. A vague humming sound caught his attention. It was the faint sound of static from a radio that had lost signal, or perhaps from a broken television set.

Another glance over his shoulder. The gang members were now spread out on the sidewalk, arms hanging loose at their sides. Three of them carried baseball bats, one seemed empty-handed, but the last was holding a shiny silver automatic. They moved no closer, almost as if they were afraid.

Of what? Something that lives in this house?

Burke swallowed dryly and moved deeper into the gloom. He swept the dark with his flashlight. More trash, traditional waste products from drug use and prostitution. He moved toward that annoying, low humming sound, eased down the hallway and closer to the back rooms. Soon it was not a humming sound. It was a buzzing.

A stench assailed his nostrils. Burke knew what he'd find. He kicked open the bedroom door, recoiled in disgust.
An ugly little man seated on a pile of reeking corpses, rocking back and forth and laughing and laughing . . .
Burke blinked away history. He saw an elderly man and woman hanging upside down from a wooden beam. Their bodies were covered with an excited, rolling carpet of gorging, black and green bottle flies. They had been gutted, and their darkening entrails were festooned along what seemed to be a piece of thick, plastic drop cloth spread beneath them. Burke had seen death many times, but the disrespectful abuse of these old people made him tremble. He moved the beam of the flashlight. Pieces of their flesh had been carved away. They had been butchered, but the coroner would have to determine what had happened before and after death.

Burke heard a sound behind him. He raised the 9mm and turned.

"Madre de Dios!"

A stocky gang-banger wearing a checkered scarf as a headband was two yards back in the living room. His mouth was hanging open, eyes bullfrog wide. The handgun was hanging useless at his side. His friends were behind him. Burke twirled the light and pinned them in the glare. They were all visibly upset, a bunch of bewildered, shaken kids.

"What the fuck happen here,
ese
?"

Burke lowered the light. "I don't know exactly. Somebody brought these people here, killed them, and left them as a message."

"On
our
streets, man? Holy shit." The three boys holding up the rear looked lost and terrified. But their leader was already summoning machismo. He puffed his chest. "Then we gonna find them and do them back, right?"

Burke backed away from the crime scene. "I don't think the message was meant for you and your homies."

"Then who did it, man?"

"I don't know for certain, but I'm thinking this might have been left for me."

The kid, who has seen far too many rap videos, jerked the .38 in the air, pointed down and at an angle. The gesture was intended to be at once casual and threatening. Burke had the Glock aimed at the kid's forehead before the idea reached his conscious mind. No one blinked. Burke lowered his weapon and the kid followed suit.

"You might want to put that away before someone gets hurt."

The kid's lower lip trembled, but he held his water. "Who the fuck are you,
ese
? What did you bring down on my street?"

"Don't worry, I'll never come back here again," Burke replied, coolly. "But I doubt whoever did this chose your turf for any particular reason."

"You better hope so, man."

"Here's what I think you guys should do. First, forget you ever saw me. Get someone to call this in. Let the cops handle it. You'll do your block a solid."

"Shit," one of the kids in the back moaned. "They'll blame it on us,
vato
!"

But the first kid smiled. "I get you, man. Maybe they want to nail us, but we didn't have nothing to do with it, so they can't. But the word gets out that we're bad, either way."

Burke nodded. "People will leave you alone. And I can get back to trying to track down who did this without being interrupted."

Gato examined the offer carefully and finally smiled. "I can get behind that, man. Did you know these people?"

"No, but I think I know who they are." He gave the kid his props. "Hey, do I have your permission to leave?"

A stately consideration, followed by: "Yeah. Get the fuck out of here."

TWENTY-NINE

The drive from the barrio down to the cop bar on Magnolia Boulevard in Studio City was a blur. The after-effects of the crime scene were severe. Burke broke out in a cold sweat. He put The Wave on the radio and tried to slow too-rapid breathing. The sight of old people gutted like deer had distilled the truth of the situation. He was crossing swords with people ruthless as enraged Columbian drug dealers. They already knew about Jack Burke—but he still had no idea who they were, or why they were committing these horrific crimes.

The converted storefront called the "Love Inn" started out as a gay hangout. Frequent visits from vice and undercover LAPD officers gradually transformed it into a cop bar by the early 90s. Now it was one of Scott Bowden's favorite watering holes. The parking lot was unpaved, the outside lighting poor. Burke eased in through the back way, walked past the stench of urine coming from the men's room, entered the dark bar and stood near the antique jukebox. He saw Scotty Bowden, unshaven as always, in a nearby booth. His handsome head was weaving slightly as he stared into a candle flame with reddened eyes. Burke sat down.

"Brothers!" Scotty was pretty sloshed. "Have a drink with me, man."

"I went to the address the hotel register had listed for the Farnsworth's," Burke said. "Do you know what I found up there, Scotty?"

Bowden couldn't meet Burke's eyes. He remained silent. Someone disengaged from a cluster of drunks at the bar and moved their way. Burke thought the woman looked vaguely familiar, so he shrank back into the gloom until she'd passed by.

Bowden responded to the movement. "Thanks for that, man. It will go better for me if I'm not seen talking to you."

Burke's mind was still riveted to the crawling flies and two dead bodies. He put his elbows on the table, kept his face down. "Some gang bangers will call it in any time now. I don't think they had anything to do with it."

"With what?"

Burke leaned a lot closer. "With potential Stryker witnesses Mr. and Mrs. Farnsworth hanging from the rafters, sliced open with some pieces missing. I figure they've been dead at least a day or so."

Bowden looked up, eyes wide. "Witnesses to what, Red? I don't think they were even there at the Sheraton that night."

"I don't think they were, either. But they must have known something about what was going to happen to Stryker, and someone couldn't take the chance they'd talk."

Bowden looked back down, sipped his drink. "I am
so
fucked."