Unpaid Dues (11 page)

"I'm not forgetting this," she said. She
returned to her jobs in progress with a laugh in her throat.

Asia's school bus let her off at the gas station at
four-fifteen. Asia spent the hour before they went home doing her
homework in Lou's office. That evening, Munch heard the front door
open, followed by the sounds of Nathan's and Asia's voices. She
couldn't make out the conversation but was pleased that the two of
them were establishing a relationship of their own.

Nathan came in the kitchen. His jeans were dirty and
he looked exhausted.

"
So how'd it go?"

He opened the refrigerator and stood there staring at
the shelves. Asia hovered beside him.

"You said you were going to call some guy Some
construction gig?"

"Yeah, yeah. I got it." He pulled out the
carton of milk and unfolded the spout.

Munch grabbed a glass out of the cabinet over the
sink and handed it to him. He poured himself a glass of milk. Asia
took the carton from him and put it back into the refrigerator.

"That's great. Good for you. " She looked
at the plaster dust clinging to his face and hair. "Why don't
you clean up? Dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes."

"Good, I'm hungry"

"Asia, have you done your homework?"

"Yes," she said, staring after Nathan.

"Anything exciting happen at school today?"

"Not really "

"Who did you eat lunch with?"

"Uh, Brittany and Alyssa."

"What did you talk about?"

"Brittany's sister is having a baby so Brittany
is going to be an aunt."

"How old is the sister?"

"Eighteen."

Munch wondered if the girl was married and if the
birth father was sticking around.

"Hey" Asia said, brightening at the memory
"I almost forgot. We learned a new song today."

"You did?" Munch tried to sound
enthusiastic.

Asia burst into a robust rendition of "John
Henry."

Munch had no idea there were so many refrains as her
daughter belted out verse after off-key verse, complete with
pantomime about the hardworking steel-driving man. Nathan came back
in the room and joined in. Asia was flabbergasted.

"How do you know the words?" she asked. "I
just learned that song."

"It's been around awhile," Munch said,
hiding a smile. "But I know how you feel." When she first
got sober, learning to live in the straight world had felt like a
continual game of catch-up. She was three years sober before she
first heard about health insurance. She still remembered her pleased
surprise that such a good idea already existed.

She handed Nathan forks, napkins, and three place
mats. He stared at them as if they were pieces of a Rubik's cube.

"You're supposed to set the table," Asia
said.

"
I'm not sure how," Nathan said.

"Oh, I'll show you," Asia said with a sigh
that sounded forty years old.

Nathan winked at Munch before following Asia to the
table and watching her fold the napkins, then set the forks on top of
them.

Munch stirred the spaghetti sauce and checked the
pasta by pressing a noodle against the side of the pot with a wooden
spoon. It cut easily so she turned off the burner and sent Asia to
wash her hands, leaving her and Nathan alone in the kitchen.

"
She looks like him," he said.

The observation surprised her. "You remember
Sleaze?" She drained the pasta and added it to the sauce.

"Yeah, he was an asshole."

"Sleaze was a lot of things, and watch the
language."

She took down three plates and filled them with
spaghetti. "Wasn't he always nice to you?"

Nathan didn't answer and Munch knew why His mother
had probably told him that Sleaze was a snitch and that's why he was
killed. There was a whole lot more to that story.

"
You know, not everything is black and white,"
she said. "In fact, hardly anything is. A person can do stuff,
stuff that's wrong, stuff that maybe hurts someone, and not be a
completely bad person. Sometimes people get caught up in things and
get in over their heads. You get one side of the story but not the
whole story"

He just stared at her. She couldn't read him. He
wasn't exactly hostile, but he didn't look like he was accepting her
wisdom either.

"I'm only saying 'judge not lest ye be judged! "
A rote saying. She tried again. "Do you think you would ever see
yourself in a situation where you might need to call the cops? Maybe
to protect yourself or someone you love?"

"I could have called the cops on you a few
times."

"And that would have been all right. Getting
busted saved me. It drove me to a place where I needed to get
straight or go to jail. If dope were legal, like in England, I'd
still be strung out. I wouldn't have my work, or Asia, or this home.
So maybe if you had called the cops way back when, I would have
gotten sober that much sooner." Maybe your mom would have too,
she thought.

"I don't know," he said. "I was raised
that you don't rat. Ever."

"
I was too. 'Snitches end up in ditches.'
Right?"

He looked at her with surprise, the way Asia did when
she learned something new in school and then found out her mother
already knew. Kids. They all thought they'd invented the wheel.

"It's all bullsh—Uh, baloney, Nathan. Stupid
rhymes that cons run by each other to perpetuate their loser
lifestyles."

"Would you drop a dime?"

She didn't tell him that she already had. "Depends
on the situation and who was getting hurt. You get to be my age and
you learn never to say never."

He smiled, and she felt a ray of hope.

"And another thing, my boy. You're welcome to
stay here, but I'm not your maid. I expect you to help with the other
chores around here. You can start by doing the dinner dishes."

Nathan began to protest, but then stopped himself.
Perhaps he sensed the thin ice.

"And don't even think of doing a crappy job so I
don't ask you again. I'm hip to that trick."

He grinned as he picked up two of the steaming plates
of pasta and took them to the table. "I don't mind helping. I
can even baby-sit sometime if you want."

"I just might take you up on that, but don't
call it that in front of Asia."

"No, I hear you. She's a cool little kid."

"
Thanks. I think so too." She watched him
move awkwardly around the small table. He'd shed his work boots, but
he was still tall and gangly. His face was unguarded for a moment as
he aligned the dinner plates. She had a quick vision of him as a
four-year-old in stocking feet. "How are you going to get to
work?"

"Bus, I guess, until I get some wheels."

"Do you have a driver's license?"

"Yeah. I even got a passport. My mom's going to
send me a ticket when she gets settled."

Munch hid her reaction to the boy's slim hope.

"
I've got this little Honda Civic at work. I've
been fixing it up. It runs okay paint's not bad considering. Can you
drive a stick?"

"
Yeah, my mom's truck was a stick. Three on the
tree."

"Well, are you interested?"

"
What are you asking?"

"
I'll sell you the Honda for what I have in it,
but you have to get insurance and put it in your name."

The name that was on his driver's license anyway.

"For real?" he asked, that big smile of his
threatening to break out.

"This is L.A. You need a ride."

"I get paid Friday"

"All right, come to my work and we'll go to the
DMV together." She went to her desk and found the business card
of her insurance company. His having fraudulent identification was
not something she cared about. It wasn't his fault that he was on his
own and forced to take care of himself so young. She'd had her own
set of ID when she was fourteen and was driving. The important thing
was taking responsibility and having insurance was part of that
package. "These people have the lowest rates around. I use them
for my limo business and my personal cars."

"Yeah, I saw the limo in the back. What' s the
deal with that?"

"Bare1y worth the effort, I'm sorry to say I
have the one car and an ad in the Yellow Pages. I do weddings, some
airport runs. Most of the time it just sits around costing me money
but come spring, especially May I make some good bucks."

"
What happens in May?"

"
High school proms. See what all you're
missing?"

"
When did you want me to baby-sit?" he
asked.

"
How about Friday night?"

"
Sure."

"
You're all right, kid. Now go find madam and
tell her dinner is served."

After dinner, Munch pulled down a box from the upper
shelf in her bedroom closet. She kept precious few artifacts of her
old life. Most had been lost to fire and moves and unplanned
incarcerations. Deb had always been the one who was into pictures and
keepsakes. She had compiled three albums devoted to Nathan's
milestone events by the time he was four.

Over the years, she also had collected and saved
photographs of most of the old gang. When Munch adopted Asia, Deb had
sent pictures of Sleaze John. Asia kept them in her own little
keepsake box in her room.

Munch's mementos fit in a shoe box: a courtesy card
from the Satan's Pride, a tooled leather belt made by a former
boyfriend, and a few old pictures. She unrolled the belt and studied
its imperfect craftsmanship. The tooling was a craft he'd probably
learned in some youth rehabilitation facility; '76 was stamped above
the rivets holding the belt buckle and next to that were two
lightning bolts signifying Aryan Brotherhood. Then came the words WE
EAT SLEEP RIDE BREATHE DREAM LIVE AND LOVE MOTORCYCLES, H.D. (for
Harley-Davidson), more lightning bolts. A large Venice in between two
Harley wings. Beneath Venice smaller letters that read IS NOT MARINA
DEL REY. And finally a nicely rendered marijuana leaf.

Thank God, she thought for not the first time, that
she had never gone in for tattoos.

She put the belt back in the box and then opened an
envelope of pictures. There they were: the pictures of Thor and
Jane's wedding. He looked drunk, sneering at the camera. Whoever had
taken the picture—Boogie, probably—had held the camera crookedly
so that Thor and Jane stood at an angle. Jane, in her white dress,
smiled brightly happily oblivious to what was coming.
 

Chapter 11

Cassiletti sipped his morning coffee and stared at
the braided rope before him. The whole cinder-block thing was on hold
for the moment. The killer had either been experienced at concealing
his crimes or dumb lucky to dump the body in water. Moving water at
that, one of the biggest enemies in an investigation that depended on
trace evidence such as fibers and fluids.

St. John was working the victim angle, but Cassiletti
believed the answers lay in the killer's methodology He dreamed of
coming up with the significant something that would give them the
killer. St. John would grin, shake his head, and say something like,
"That Cassiletti, he's something. Son of a bitch."

He'd use a tone of gruff admiration. "Fucking
Cassiletti, huh? Tony the goddam 'tiger.' "

Cassiletti would shrug modestly; play down St. John's
praises of him in the bullpen—no, better yet—a bar, a cop bar
full of men angling to buy him a drink and pat his back. This would
be the day of the trial, when the defense attorney attempts to break
him and fails. Cassiletti looks the jury in the eyes as he explains
himself and his thought process. The jury deliberates less than an
hour before returning a verdict of guilty

When the newspapers take his picture, he doesn't
smile. He has an intelligent expression on his face, maybe does
something with his hands to show how he's pieced together the clues
to re-create the crime. He takes off his coat so that his weapon and
badge show. It looks impressive, his big black thirty-eight in the
tan holster and next to that, his gold shield. He wears his gray
slacks that day and a black belt, the Italian one.

A dispatcher from downstairs walked by Cassiletti
shook himself back to reality

Both he and St. John believed they were looking for a
strong man as their offender. A man perhaps comfortable around
horses, good with his hands.

The rope the killer used was white, or had been when
it was new and clean. It appeared to be made of nylon. The ends had
been sealed by some heat source that left them blackened. When it
extended, the rope would have been six feet long. Cassiletti could
only estimate this, as the knot that had been fastened by whoever
tied the cement block to the body was still intact.

The core of the rope was braided. He went over to the
crime lab and checked other samples of rope. Many were braided on the
outside, fewer had a center core, and he could find no samples of
rope that were a braid encased in a braid.