Adjourned (2 page)

Shaw took a seat facing Stocker, who was flanked on one side by the state flag and on the other by the national flag. "What can I do for you, sir? Your message was rather vague."

Stocker scooted his chair forward and opened a file that was on the desk. "It's about your investigation into the murders of those young girls." He shuffled through the papers for a moment before finding the one he wanted. "Oh yes, here it is."

Leaning back in his chair, propping the file open in his lap, Stocker shot a scornful glance at Shaw. "Well, Sergeant, thanks to you, the city is being sued for three million dollars."

"Look, Mayor—," Shaw began.

Stocker continued, raising his voice over Shaw's. "A trio of sharp Century City lawyers representing Wesley Saputo is charging you with harassment. They say he hasn't been able to move an inch without bumping into a badge."

"C'mon, sir, I'm only doing my job," Shaw insisted. "In the two weeks since we found Cassie Reed beside the canal, two more girls have been kidnapped, raped, and strangled. The murders fit Saputo's MO. I've only been doing what any conscientious cop would do. I've brought him in for questioning, obtained a search warrant and gone through his house, and maintained constant surveillance."

Stocker shook his head. "I appreciate enthusiasm. As former police chief, and now as mayor, I expect my officers to take the extra step. But, Sergeant, you've gone too far."

Shaw felt his face flushing with anger. "What do you want me to do, let him go on raping and killing young girls?"

Shaw had seen it happen before. Men like Saputo are labeled mentally disordered sex offenders, sent to a cushy state hospital for a few years, and then put back on the street. Shaw didn't know who was sicker, Saputo or the shrinks who set him free.

"Don't smart-mouth me, Shaw," Stocker thundered. "You have to face reality. His lawyers say you don't have any evidence against him, not a single fingerprint and no semen matchup."

"I know it's Saputo," Shaw shot back. "True, we have no prints. But all of Saputo's victims were girls between the ages of ten and twelve. Same thing now. All of Saputo's victims were raped, sodomized, and strangled. Again, so are the new victims. We couldn't get a blood type off of Saputo's semen five years ago because he is a nonsecretor. The person who raped these girls is also a nonsecretor."

"So, to summarize, you don't have shit," Stocker stated, tossing the file onto his desk.

Shaw tapped the arm of his chair with his fingers, trying to keep cool. "I'll get the evidence, you can count on that. I'll make sure they put him behind bars forever."

"How are you going to do that?" Stocker asked. "Saputo's lawyers are going to seek a restraining order from Superior Court Judge Lewis Nile this afternoon, and I think they'll get it. Any further attempts to bring Saputo in for questioning and the lawyers will haul us to court."

Stocker scowled. "Face it, you botched this one, Shaw. You came on too strong and now we can't get near him."

Shaw glared at Stocker. "Are you telling me to let this guy go?"

"No, I'm telling you to call Brett Macklin."

The words, like a sharp punch to the solar plexus, stole Shaw's breath. He stared at the mayor for a moment in disbelieving silence.

"I want these murders to stop, but I don't want Saputo and his lawyers getting a chance to give the press a show," Stocker explained. "I don't want Saputo turned into some kind of fucking martyr. The city doesn't need a slew of negative headlines screaming about police harassment."

"The city doesn't need a vigilante, either. Fighting crime with crime isn't the answer," Shaw cautioned. "Let's not make the situation any worse."

"How could it get any worse, Sergeant? You just got done telling me that Saputo is killing children. I'm telling you the LAPD can't get near him." Stocker held up his hands despairingly. "Do you have a better idea?"

"There has to be another way, a legal way," Shaw insisted.

"There is no other way," Stocker shouted. "I want Macklin on this.
Now.
"

# # # # # #

He ran madly down the street, the World War I fighter plane riddling the asphalt on either side of him with bullets. The plane streaked across the cloudless sky above the office buildings, banked, and barreled down on him again, the gun turrets spitting slugs.

He ped onto a parked car, rolled across the hood, and fell onto the sidewalk behind it. Bullets chewed up the street toward the car. He flung himself forward as the bullets raked the car and punctured the gas tank.

The car exploded, ripping the air and hurling a pulsating ball of flame into the sky. The plane roared away, preparing to bank again.

He stood up, flames licking out for him, and pulled the Magnum out of his waistband.

"Fuck this," he mumbled, strolling into the street, shrouded by a veil of smoke. He stopped in the center of the street and straddled the broken white piding line, daring the plane. "Come and get it."

The plane dropped down low and came for him.

The flames from the car sounded like a windstorm, the staccato beat of the bullets chipping away at the street a savage hail.

He raised his gun. The plane filled his vision. The engine's roar filled his ears. The bullets clamored for him.

He fired twice.

The plane vomited deep black smoke and curled sharply in a skyward arc, sputtered, and ped. Rocking uncontrollably, the plane glided unevenly toward the entrance of a parking structure behind him, as if it suddenly thought it was just a fancy Ford station wagon.

The plane's wings were ripped away as it skidded through the entranceway into the darkness on a carpet of sparks and smoke. A split second later, an explosion tore through the structure, the building splitting open like a popcorn kernel.

He lowered his gun and, as people started to peek out of the doorways and windows they had been hiding behind, walked leisurely down the street.

"That was fantastic!" Mort Suderson yelled, slapping the floor in front of the television. The film's end credits rolled across the screen as Nick Crecko, the Bloodmaster, disappeared into the sunset against the Los Angeles skyline. "Wasn't it great, Brett?"

"C'mon, Mort, it was crap," Macklin groaned, reaching toward the VCR atop the TV set.

"Wait! Don't turn it off yet. Don't you want to see our credit?" Mort looked at Macklin as if he were crazy. Macklin, raising his hands in a show of acquiescence, stepped back and watched the screen.

Aerial transportation provided by: Blue Yonder Airways

"That's us!" Mort pointed at the set, wagging his finger excitedly. "That's us, boss! We're stars!"

Macklin clicked off the VCR and hit the "eject" button, tossing the videotape onto Mort's lap. "All we did was fly the film crew around. No one is going to nominate us for an Oscar."

Mort reached up, braced himself on a couch cushion, rose to his feet and stretched. "Christ, Brett, I love hard-core police drama."

Macklin went into his kitchen, which adjoined the living room. "That was shit, Mort. C'mon, a fighter plane chasing a guy through downtown Los Angeles? Who are they kidding?"

Mort, glancing back to make sure he wasn't being watched, brushed potato chip crumbs off his faded blue jeans onto the shag carpet and then followed Macklin into the kitchen. "It's exciting. It isn't supposed to be Shakespeare."

Macklin opened the refrigerator. "What would you like, Mort?"

Mort eyed the six-pack of Schlitz longingly but knew better. Booze had already fucked up his life enough. "Gimme one of those Diet Cokes."

Macklin grabbed a beer for himself and handed Mort the diet drink. "I have a hard time separating what I know about the filmmakers from the film itself. Brock Dale, the guy who played macho Nick Crecko, is a whimpering homosexual, an egotistical little hemorrhoid in the ass of humanity."

"You've got to forget that." Mort snapped open the Diet Coke and took a big gulp. "On screen, he's the invincible Bloodmaster. Has been for years." Mort ambled into the living room and dropped himself onto Macklin's couch.

"Has-been is right." Macklin, sipping his beer, leaned against the kitchen doorway. He could hear raindrops tapping the roof. "But I have to admit, it was a nice way to kill a lazy, rainy afternoon."

"Yeah, I tell you, I'm going to fucking sue the Beach Boys," Mort said, pausing to swallow a mouthful of Diet Coke. "Did they ever mention weeklong rainstorms in their songs, huh? No. The sun was always shining and everybody was getting laid. Do you see the sunshine? Do you see me getting laid?"

Mort shifted his gaze to the Duraflame log burning in the fireplace beside the TV. "But that's going to change."

"The weather or your sex life?" Macklin quipped.

"Who gives a shit about the weather? I can't do anything about that. I can fix my sex life. I'm going to make a few changes."

"Like what?"

"I'm thinking of changing my name," Mort offered cautiously. "I've thought it out and I think I'd make a good Mortimer
Neville
. It's sexy, it's now, and it's a happening name. It's me."

Macklin stared silently at Mort.

"It's a great name, huh?" Mort continued, nervously filling the silence. "A real
fuckable
name. A guy with a name like that could get so much action he'd have to get his schlong insured against injury."

Mort stood up and started pacing in front of the fire. "Of course if I'm going to be that active with the ladies, I'm going to need an operation."

"Operation?" Macklin asked uneasily.

Mort stuck his tongue out, shoved his index finger under it, and approached Macklin. "I'm gonna have this little connection here snipped off," he slobbered. "It'll make my tongue longer. I think it's too short and I'm not adequately satisfying women with it, you know? I also plan to drop a few hundred bucks into some new clothes."

The sound of the front door slamming shut drew their attention to the entry hall. The two men turned and saw a frowning Cheshire Davis, still in her white nurse's uniform, carrying two bags of groceries into the house. "That's disgusting, Mort, nauseating."

"How long have you been standing there?" Mort said, his face reddening.

She walked past Mort into the kitchen, her eyes scolding him. "Long enough, Mort."

Macklin started to laugh.

"Ah, fuck you, Brett," Mort shot back, reaching for his pseudo-sheepskin-lined Levi's jacket lying in a heap on the floor. "It isn't funny. I was born handicapped, with a deformed tongue."

Macklin, rocking with laughter, spilled his beer on the floor. Cheshire, unpacking the groceries, began to laugh as well.

"It isn't funny!" Mort shouted. "I'm correcting a birth defect."

Realizing that he was making no headway with either of them, Mort gave up, stomping to the front door in a huff and yanking it open.

Macklin's laughter stopped abruptly. He saw Shaw standing in the doorway, his gray trench coat soaked with rain.

Mort looked over his shoulder at Brett for some kind of cue.

"See you later, Mort." Macklin caught his breath, his smile ebbing. Mort hesitated for a moment, uncertain whether to leave or not, then brushed past Shaw into the rain.

"Can I come in?" Shaw asked sheepishly.

Macklin looked over his shoulder at Cheshire, who was busy stuffing food into the refrigerator and apparently hadn't heard Shaw's voice. Macklin sighed, approaching Shaw quietly. He made no motion to invite him in.

"What is it?" Macklin demanded, careful to keep his voice low. He knew what Shaw wanted. Every morning Macklin awoke and wondered, is this the day they come for me again? The fear that his wondering might actually be longing kept him up nights.

"Mayor Stocker wants to see you," Shaw said.

Stocker wants you to pick up your gun again,
a voice teased Macklin.
He
wants you to dig it out from under the floorboards, slip the six bullets into the chamber, and squeeze the trigger. You'd like that, wouldn't you, Macky boy? You'd like that a lot.

"No," Macklin said.

Shaw swallowed. "Look, Mack, you don't have any choice."

Macklin looked over his shoulder toward the kitchen. Cheshire was out of sight, probably putting food into the refrigerator. He faced Shaw again. "My life is becoming whole again. Do you want to shatter that?" He was asking the voice inside him. Not Shaw.

"No, I don't," Shaw replied, anger seeping defensively into his voice. "You know how I feel about it. But it's not in my hands." Shaw immediately regretted the tone of his voice. None of the sympathy he actually felt came across.

To Shaw, Macklin's ocean blue eyes suddenly dimmed, his face tightening into the savage look of determination that made Shaw doubt this was the same Brett Macklin he had grown up with. The look that symbolized the man Macklin had become since his father, a beat cop, was set aflame by a street gang. The look of a killer who made sure each of those gang members ended up in a burial plot.

It was that look, and the lawlessness it represented to Shaw, that made it impossible for Shaw to ever enjoy the deep friendship they'd once had.

"When does he want to see me?" Macklin's words seemed to have a serrated edge.

"Tomorrow morning. Nine o'clock."

"All right, I'll be there." Their eyes met for a second that felt like days to Shaw. He thought he saw a spark of vulnerability in Macklin's eyes and was about to say something, to reflexively grasp for their old closeness, when Macklin slowly closed the door in his face.

The punker with the tangerine orange Mohawk held a sawed-off shotgun, Macklin was sure of that. Macklin had seen him out of the corner of his eye as he drove past the Quick Stop market on his way to Stocker's office.

Macklin pressed the gas pedal to the floor. The black Cadillac shot forward. At the next intersection, Macklin twisted the wheel, whipping the car into a screeching U-turn and gliding it to a stop at the street corner a quarter block up from the market. He wasn't even thinking now. His anger was doing the thinking for him.

He didn't have his gun, but he wasn't going to let that stop him. The wooden skeleton of a building under construction adjoined the garage-size Quick Stop market. Macklin assumed he could find a weapon at the construction site.