Dangerous Games (19 page)

She hoped so.

15

Tess took the San Diego Freeway south to the Culver Boulevard exit and parked outside the LAPD’s Pacific Area station. She found Goddard in the detectives’ squad room, seated at one of many gray metal desks butted together to form common work areas.

The squad room did not compare favorably to the one at the field office. At the Bureau, the atmosphere was corporate, white-collar, while the Pacific station had a decidedly blue-collar feel. Cheap swivel chairs with squeaky casters rolled on the well-worn beige carpet. Potted plants that looked half-dead sat atop dented file cabinets. A copy machine idled in a corner, under a wall-mounted TV, volume off, tuned to CNN.

She took a seat at Goddard’s desk, where a spread of documents lay on a green blotter in no apparent order. “You McCallum?” he asked. “You caught me on a good day. My partner’s testifying in court, and I’m catching up on some paperwork. Now what did you want to see me about?”

“A case you handled last year, involving a police officer named William Kolb.”

“I remember.” Suddenly Goddard seemed uncomfortable. The ballpoint pen in his hand tapped the blotter in a nervous rhythm.

“You don’t sound happy about it.”

“It’s never fun when you’re dealing with a bad cop.”

Tess thought there was more to his attitude than he was letting on, but she allowed it to pass. “Why don’t you tell me about the case?”

“I assume you know the basics—the kitchen fire in Kolb’s apartment, the stuff the fire department found. The engine company brought in a squad car, and the patrol guys called for an investigator. My partner and I were catching calls that day.”

“Kolb lived in Mar Vista, as I understand. Good neighborhood?”

“Best he could afford. His apartment was no showplace, but I don’t think he cared. He wasn’t exactly known for hosting dinner parties.”

“Antisocial?”

“Unsocial is more like it. You know how the neighbors always say the guy was quiet, kept to himself? In this case it was true.”

“Did he have friends on the force?”

“A few. No enemies, far as I could tell.”

“Did you know him?”

“He was patrol; he worked a different division—we might’ve crossed paths now and then, that’s all.”

“Did you know he was a cop when you went to his apartment?”

“All I knew was that the fire department had found some suspicious items in plain view.”

“And when you found out he was a cop…?”

“Yeah?”

“It must have come as a surprise.”

Goddard squinted at her. “I know what you’re saying. You want to know if it affected the way we handled the case. The answer is, you bet it did. If he’d been a civilian, we would’ve taken twice as long to make the arrest. Everything was expedited once we found out he was LAPD.”

“Why?”

“First, because we were afraid it would be taken away from us. High-profile cases get snatched up by Robbery-Homicide downtown. And second, there’d been criticism of the department for letting criminal complaints against police officers languish until the statute of limitations expired. We’d been getting some bad press, including an exposé in the
Times
. I saw Kolb as an opportunity to repair the damage.”

“When you say the investigation was expedited…”

“My partner and I walked into the apartment at nine hundred hours, and we’d cleared the case to the DA’s office by fifteen hundred hours the same day.”

“Record time.”

“I can’t take too much credit. The case was open-and-shut. We didn’t need a warrant for the evidence in plain sight, only for a search of Kolb’s computer, and we found a judge who signed off telephonically. We brought in a tech from the computer crime squad, who found digital pictures of the woman Kolb was stalking.”

“Madeleine Grant.”

A nod. “And he found copies of e-mail messages Kolb sent her. There was no reason for Kolb to keep the stuff, except I guess he got off on it. A lot of these guys do.”

“So you had him cold.”

“Absolutely. We did all this while he was still on duty. At the end of his watch, we made the arrest.”

“How did you handle it?”

“We waited for him outside the West LA station house. He went quietly.”

“Did he make bail?”

“No, the judge set it high. All indications were that this would be a high-profile case. There was pretty strong media coverage in the first few days.”

“I take it things didn’t work out the way you expected.”

Goddard didn’t answer. The pen started tapping again. Tess began to think that this was more than a nervous habit. It seemed almost like a signal—as if he were sending her a message:
Read between the lines
.

She didn’t pursue the question immediately. “Did Kolb show any remorse?”

“He didn’t show a goddamn thing. He was giving us the thousand-yard stare. You’d get more information out of a prisoner of war.”

“How about his record? Any problems in that area?”

“A few civilian complaints, nothing too serious. You work the streets, you’re going to rub some people the wrong way. Professional Standards—what we used to call Internal Affairs—looked at him once or twice, gave him a couple of wrist slaps.”

“I’ve heard he had an interest in Mobius.”

“I was wondering if you would ask about that. He had a book of clippings about that case. It was all in there, everything the
Times
and the newsmagazines had to say. Including some stuff about you.”

“Nice to know I have a fan. Did you ask him about Mobius?”

“We asked. He didn’t tell us anything. Name, rank, and badge number—that’s all we got out of him.”

“What’s the penalty for stalking in California?”

“Maximum is three years in state prison.”

“Kolb got one year.”

“That’s right. With good behavior he served out his sentence in ten months.”

“Pretty light sentence.”

“I doubt he thought so.”

“They didn’t exactly throw the book at him, did they?”

No answer.

“I thought California was ahead of the curve as far as antistalking statutes are concerned,” Tess said.

Goddard shrugged. “We are. But the whole area is dicey. Problem is, you’re dealing essentially with a thought crime. You need to establish that the stalker’s intent was to place his victim in a state of fear. So you’re dealing with two states of mind, his intent and her fear. Both are subjective. What looks like stalking to one person might look like a prank to someone else.”

“Kolb was planning more than a prank. He had the paraphernalia he needed to kidnap Madeleine Grant. That ought to show plenty of intent. The DA could have gone for the maximum. He didn’t, though.”

Tess let the statement hang in the air, an implied question. Goddard said nothing. He tapped a staccato code with his ballpoint.

She took a shot. “Was it political pressure? Going easy on a police officer to avoid giving the department another black eye?”

She thought he might give her a wink and a nod, but he surprised her.

“That’s bullshit.” Goddard took a breath, then added in a softer voice, “We police our own around here. This is still one of the cleanest departments in the country, I don’t give a damn what anybody says. There were problems, but we cleaned house. We take all kinds of crap for the problems and get no credit for the cleanup.”

Apparently she’d been misreading his signals. “I didn’t mean to be confrontational. But if it wasn’t to protect the department, why wouldn’t they have gone harder on him?”

“You’d have to ask the DA’s office about that.”

“Why? Is it a secret?”

“It’s out of my area. Once the case is handed to the DA, they’re in charge.”

“It’s still your case.”

“I’m not running the show. They are. Any decisions have to come from their office.”

“Why do I get the sense that there’s something funny going on here?”

Goddard looked at her. No, not
at
her. Through her. His voice was flat and firm. “The case was handled by Deputy District Attorney Richard Snelling. He’s on the eighth floor of the Criminal Justice Center downtown.”

“And if I see him, I’ll get some answers?”

There was no expression on his face. “I can’t say what you’ll get.”

“Then I’ll have to find out for myself. One more thing, Detective. Madeleine Grant tells me that she called the LAPD with some suspicions regarding Kolb’s recent activities.”

“She called me.”

“She seems to feel the call wasn’t taken seriously.”

He still wasn’t meeting her gaze. “I take every call seriously.”

“So you’re pursuing the lead?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You’re not saying much of anything all of a sudden. Why wouldn’t you follow up on a tip like that?”

His voice was toneless. “You think Kolb has something to do with the kidnappings?”

“Not necessarily. I’m just curious why you’d be so cavalier about her call. She was right last year, wasn’t she?”

“Sure she was.”

“You don’t sound entirely certain.”

“I can’t be responsible for what you read into my answers.”

“No, you can’t. Thanks for your help, Detective.”

Tess left the squad room, thinking that Kolb wasn’t the only one who knew about the thousand-yard stare.

16

Abby spent an hour in her condo, cutting notches in the key blank with a pair of Curtis clippers, then filing down the rough edges. She added the duplicate key to her already crowded key chain. Somehow she intended to find the padlock it fit. She had a feeling that when she did, she would learn a lot more of Kolb’s secrets.

In the meantime she wanted to know why he’d returned home so early. She drove her Miata across town to the supermarket where he was normally stationed. She parked two blocks away and approached cautiously, ready to beat a hasty retreat if Kolb had shown up.

He wasn’t there. A different guard was on duty. She put on her best ditzy persona and sashayed up to him. “Hey, where’s the guy who’s usually here?”

The guard looked her over. “Who wants to know?” he asked with what he apparently believed was a rakish smile.

“I’m Ginger,” she said. It was the first name she could think of. Homage to
Gilligan’s Island
. “I shop here a lot.”

“How come I ain’t seen you around? I think I’d remember you.” The guy was doing his best to ooze charm, though as far as Abby could tell, the only thing oozing out of him was sweat.

“I just come here during the day. The other guy’s always here. This is the first time I’ve seen
you
.” She put a provocative emphasis on the last word.

“Now you know what you been missing.”

Smooth talker. Must be a devil with the ladies. “So what happened to him?” she asked. “He get moved to a different location?”

“What I heard, he got canned.”

Abby set her face in a pout. “That’s too bad. I liked him.”

“Bet you could get to like me, if you give it a shot.”

“You never know.” She twirled her hair like an idiot, sending a signal of empty-headedness that was sure to mark her as easy sexual prey. “How come they let him go?”

“Probably the usual reason.” Smiling conspiratorially, the guard stepped closer. “Some of these guys, they got prison records. They hide it for a few weeks, but sooner or later they get caught. Then they’re out.”

Abby feigned stupefaction. “You mean, he might’ve been in
jail
?”

“Kolb? Yeah, that’s what I’d bet. He never said much, but he had that look about him. When you been in this business awhile, you get to know the signs.”

“Well, I guess it’s good he’s gone, then. I wasn’t interested in…I mean, if he’s a convict, ex-convict, whatever…”

He bought her flustered-ingenue act. “Don’t let it shake you up,” he said in a fatherly tone, though clearly his intentions were fatherly only in the John Huston-
Chinatown
sense. “I can spot his type a mile away. But a little lady like you, well, there’s no way you could know what you were in for.”

“I guess not.”

“Maybe I’ll be seeing you, now that I’m working the day shift.”

“Maybe you will.” She showed him a parting smile, just enough to keep his hopes up—well, his hopes and anything else that might’ve been raised by the encounter.

She went into the supermarket and prowled the aisles, biding her time until a large Latino family was leaving. She blended in with them and exited, unnoticed by the guard, then doubled back to her Mazda.

So Kolb was out of work. If he was the Rain Man, he didn’t need the job anyway. But he’d kept it, which meant that for some reason he wanted it. She wondered how his premature termination would affect his emotional stability.

Her cell phone rang as she was slipping back into the convertible. The breathless voice on the other end of the line belonged to Madeleine Grant. “I think he’s here. I think he’s watching me.”

Abby didn’t have to ask who. “Where is he?”

“In the woods by my house.”

“Inside or outside the perimeter fence?”

“Outside.”

“Is your alarm system on?”

“Of course it is. I’m not a fool, for Christ’s sake.”

Abby pulled away from the curb. “Calm down; take it easy. Can you still see him?”

“No, I can’t. The foliage is dense. I only got a glimpse. I’m not sure it was him. But who else could it be?”

“Which side of the house?”

“The north side. It’s a jungle. A neighbor lost her dog in there once, and we all went looking. There are trees—he could climb a tree to get over the fence.”

“You had all the trees trimmed back, remember?”

“You’re right. I’m becoming hysterical, aren’t I?”

“Not at all,” Abby lied. “You’re being observant and alert. Did you call the police?”

“Should I?”

Abby didn’t want Madeleine taking any unnecessary risks, but with Kolb—or whoever it was—still outside the fence, and with the alarm system activated, there was probably no immediate danger.

“Why don’t you hold off on calling nine-one-one? I’ll be there ASAP. I’ll park one street over and cut through the woods on foot, see if I can get the jump on him.”