Dominion (110 page)

“I didn’t know Leesa kept a diary,” Clarence said to Ollie as they walked out the door.

“She didn’t,” Ollie said.

“But you told Norcoast—”

“You weren’t listening. I never said she kept a diary.”

“And what about the DNA? Can you really prove whether Norcoast was the father? How come you never mentioned that? I didn’t know they ran a DNA test on the unborn child.”

“They didn’t. I never said they did. I said, Apparently you’re not aware’ they do. Well, the reason he’s probably not aware of them doing a DNA test on unborn babies is because, unless the death is suspect, they don’t. But none of that really matters. Because now we don’t
need
a DNA test, do we?”

Clarence went to bed that night, telling himself he finally had reason to sleep through the night. But being cleared of the charges, seeing the investigation progress, experiencing the encouragement of the church service and the community meeting—none of it was enough. None of it brought back Dani and Felicia. None of it brought back his tarnished reputation. None of it gave him confidence that justice would ever be meted out to the killers. Norcoast and Gray and Harper, and maybe the shooters too, would be protected by layers of lawyers having civil discussions and making backroom deals. He couldn’t stand the idea. His thirst for justice was becoming insatiable. He felt little hope justice would ever be satisfied by a corrupt and incompetent legal system.

Ollie flew into LAX four hours after getting the call that LAPD had found a Nine Deuce Hoover named Spider who currently drove a tricked-out blue Mercedes.

When he arrived at his old precinct, LAPD Lieutenant Tucker escorted Ollie into a dark, empty observation room with a view through a two-way mirror into a holding room. Ollie studied the young man seated alone in the room. He appeared to be in his early twenties. He wore a black Raiders jacket. Hanging out from under it was a knit shirt buttoned to the top, draping down a foot over his creased Levi’s. He wore Air Jordans with Crip-blue shoelaces, unlaced and dangling. His hair had a fresh fade cut, a highly styled flattop with geometric designs etched into the sides.

“That’s Spider,” Lieutenant Tucker said. “More a.k.a.s than you can shake a stick at, but the fingerprints tell us the real name’s Earl Banks. Here’s his rap sheet.”

Ollie looked over both pages and whistled. “What’s he doing walkin’ the streets? Sorry,” Ollie said, seeing the pained look in the lieutenant’s eyes. “I know I’m asking the wrong guy. I really appreciate your cooperation.”

“We’re on the same team, detective. I’d do this for you anyway, but the possibility you could link us to the cop killer who stole the weapon makes me feel even more hospitable.” He gestured at the window. “He’s all yours. Let me know if we can help. Think I’ll stay and watch you work awhile.”

“No problem.” Ollie smiled, welcoming the chance to perform for an audience. He walked out in the hallway and down to the holding room. He stepped in and made himself at home in the chair across the table from the contemptuous gaze of Spider.

“Hey, Spider, what’s happening?”

Spider wasn’t talking.

“How’s the Mercedes runnin’? Like it better than that dumpy old Lexus you traded in?”

No response.

“I’m down here from Oregon just to see you, Earl. Nice part of the country, Oregon, isn’t it?”

“Never been there.”

“Really? Never stolen a license plate from Woodburn? Never hung out at a Taco Bell on Martin Luther King? Never met with Gangster Cool of the Portland Rollin’ 60s? Never wear a red sweatshirt so you’d look like a Blood instead of a Crip? Never pulled over for speeding by a cop in Southern Oregon on your way down to Sacramento where you got your Mercedes?”

“Never.”

“What’s with the false IDs, Spider? Robert Rose and Jerome Rice? You and your buddy assumed the identities of dead guys. How come?”

Spider shrugged.

“We know where you were midnight September 2—920 Jackson Street. You thought it was Jack Street, didn’t you? Well the sign had been graffitied, and you got the wrong street. You shot the wrong people. You killed an innocent woman and a five-year-old girl. Nobody’s happy with you, Spider. I think they’re all turning on you. You shot up a Crip family. Took all that money from the guy that hired you, but you wasted the wrong people.”

Spider stared at him blankly.

“What if I told you we found the license plate you stole, the one you tossed over to the side of the road near Salem?”

Nothing.

“What if I told you your fingerprints are on that license plate?” Spider’s eyes darted.

“Or that your prints are on a disassembled part of the murder weapon we found?”

Ollie studied his eyes, looking for uncertainty. He thought he saw some.

“Tell you what, Spider. Let me get you a soda or something. Does a Pepsi sound good?”

Spider nodded, looking at Ollie with surprise, as if he wasn’t used to this kind of treatment. Ollie went to the door and called out to the hallway “Hey, bring Earl a Pepsi, would you? And maybe a donut or something.” In a few minutes a Pepsi and donut showed up at the door, and Ollie set them down on a small table in front of Spider.

“Here. Relax. I’ll be right back.”

Ollie returned a few minutes later carrying a boom box. “I know you’ve been cooped up in here for a while. Thought you could use some tunes. Go ahead, choose your favorite station.”

Spider flipped the knob, found some music incomprehensible to Ollie, and turned it up loud. Ollie reached for the volume and turned it down.

“You can rock out on it later. Right now let’s keep it at background level, okay?” Ollie smiled. He took a packet of colored markers out of his briefcase and chose a dark blue. He went to an erasable wallboard and started writing. First line: “Fingerprints on license and murder weapon.” Next line: “Positive ID on Lexus and Mercedes.” Next line: “Testimony of Medford police officer.”

“Now, I’ll throw in a few more. I haven’t got the results of the print they took of your shoes a couple hours ago, but I’m betting it’s a perfect match with the shoe print at the murder scene. Wear size eight and a half Air Jordans, don’t you?” He wrote, “Matching footprint.”

“And then we have a convenience store owner who saw you come to the door, saw your face close up and even saw the gun in your car because you had the door open. Remember the store you went to, the one that was closed, before you went to Taco Bell? He was looking out the shades.” Ollie wrote “Positive ID from: store owner, Taco Bell manager, eyewitness at the scene.”

“Whatchu mean, at the scene?”

“We’ve got you from every angle. A witness saw you screeching away from the murder scene. Even know the guy that paid you thirty-five thousand, give or take a few bucks, in Sacramento. Matthew Harper. Ring a bell? Now, Spider, lots of guys have had their lights put out for half the evidence we’ve got against you. What we’ve got so far could earn you, oh, about seven to ten years or the electric chair.”

Spider unconsciously wrung his hands and glanced side to side.

“Just one more thing, some friendly advice. I guess you know the weapon you used in Portland was the same one stolen from an L.A. cop in a street battle last spring. And of course, LAPD figures whoever had the rifle—that would be you—also killed the cop. If I were you, I’d talk to
me
since I’m an amiable Oregon cop and all the fresh air up there makes us generally nicer than L.A. cops. I’ll be headed home before your lawyer gets here. If you don’t talk to me, once I leave, you’re in the hands of LAPD. And I can’t vouch for them being nice—especially since they think you’re a cop killer.”

Ollie turned his back on Spider for a moment and looked toward the mirror, winking at the lieutenant he assumed was still on the other side. He turned back toward Spider.

“I’ll let you think about it, Earl. Anything I can get you? More Pepsi?”

Spider shook his head. Ollie started to go out the door, packet of markers still in his hand. He turned around. “I know it’s got to be boring in here. I’ll leave you these.” He tossed Spider the markers, noting he caught them in his left hand.

“Don’t draw on the walls, but feel free to use the boards up there.” Ollie pointed to the erasable wallboard he’d used, and a blank one next to it. “Make yourself comfortable. I’ll check back with you one more time. In case you want to talk with me before LAPD takes over.”

Lieutenant Tucker took Ollie across the street to a sandwich shop. “It’s official,” Tucker said. “Spider’s footprint’s a positive match with the copy of the cast you brought us. Just like you said it’d be. Still no lead on Robert Rose’s real ID. Thought it’d be easy to nail him—assumed he’d be Spider’s close friend, but looks like he’s not even in the same set. Maybe that was deliberate, so if one got caught the other wouldn’t go down with him. Sure wish we could get Spider to cough up his name.”

Tucker handed Ollie a family Christmas photo. “This is Rob Tallon, the SWAT officer who was killed—the one whose HK53 was stolen.” Ollie’s eyes went to Tallon’s wife and three children. They appeared an idyllic family, whose lives, Ollie knew without asking, had been shattered.

“We’ve passed out dozens of these photos. A lot of us keep them at our desks next to our own family pictures. Reminds us Rob’s killer is still out there. Here, you can keep this one.”

“Sure hope Spider leads us to him,” Ollie said, carefully putting the picture inside his suit pocket. “Speaking of which, we better get back. You can’t hold Spider much longer before attorneys storm the precinct. And I want to see if he’s done any artwork.”

They went back to the dimly lit observation room, where a man in plainclothes with a notepad in front of him peered into the holding room.

“Detective Chandler,” Lieutenant Tucker said, “this is Greg Suminski, our resident handwriting expert, the one I told you about.” Ollie shook his hand, then looked in on Spider. To his delight, he saw a number of scribblings on the board. Spider was just now finishing off the last line in a five-line composition. He was writing with his left hand.

Ollie pointed at the photo sitting in front of Suminski, an eight-by-ten of graffiti on the Taco Bell fence. “Okay,” Ollie said, “was this written by the same guy?”

Suminski looked down, then held the photo up in front of him, juxtaposed to the board. His eyes went back and forth methodically, checking every letter of every line.

“Absolutely,” he finally said. “No doubt.”

“You’re saying,” Ollie mouthed it slowly, “you’d testify in court that these were written by the same guy? So Spider would have
had
to be in Portland, less than a mile from the murder scene?”

“The guy in that room who just wrote on that board is the author of
this
tag,” Suminski said, pointing to the photograph. “Count on it. But you better get in there before he erases it. You’ll need a decent photo for a courtroom blow-up.”

Ollie went to Spider with a uniformed officer, bringing him another Pepsi and escorting him and the boom box to another interrogation room. Then Ollie returned to the original room with his camera to take some pictures of Spider’s handiwork. He asked the lieutenant if an LAPD photographer could take some as backups, which he did.

When he finished taking the pictures, Ollie decided to reward himself. He went in search of a jelly donut.

Ollie and Spider met back in the original interrogation room, where the temperature had been turned up to 78 degrees at Ollie’s request.

“I need to take off soon, Spider, but I’ve got something you should hear first. What if I told you your guy in Sacramento, Matthew Harper, is selling you out? What if he says he hired you just to make a delivery and you did the murder completely on your own?”

“He don’t say that.” Spider tried to sound certain.

“How do you think we found you if Harper didn’t give us Rafer Thomas?”

Spider looked around nervously, unable to answer.

“And Rafer Thomas will be the next to turn on you. He won’t be willing to go down as an accessory to murder. He’ll deal. How do you think we found out where you live if Rafer didn’t tell us?”

Spider wiped his forehead.

“Then there’s your driver for the Portland hit, a.k.a. Robert Rose. What if I told you we met with him an hour ago and he wants to cut a deal? Suppose he’s willing to testify you were the shooter, so you’ll fry and he won’t. Suppose he says it was all your doing, that you told him the two of you were just goin’ up there to do a couple of burglaries, that he never knew you intended to shoot anyone until you did it?”

“He say that, he be a liar.”

“I’m afraid there’s a lot you don’t know about this soldier—not your Road Dog, is he? Goes by all kinds of a.k.a.s. He sure fooled you, Spider. Bet you a hundred you didn’t even know his real name’s Jimmy Tennesen, did you? You probably know him as Michael Bock.”

Spider’s eyes got big. “Sailor’s name not be Michael or Jimmy. It be Allen.”

“Allen Jones?” Ollie smiled knowingly. “Yeah, that’s another one he uses.”

“Not Jones. Ivester.”

“Ivester, yeah, he goes by that one too.” Ollie turned and winked at the two-way mirror. Allen Ivester, a.k.a. Sailor. Pay dirt.

“Thing is, it looks really bad for you, Spider. You’re the one we can positively ID, the one the witnesses saw, the shooter. And since it was your gun, LAPD knows you killed that cop in April.”

“Didn’t even have that piece in April.” Spider’s voice trembled.

“Only one way to prove that,” Ollie said. “You’d have to tell me who
did
have it.”

Spider said nothing.

“Okay, Earl, if you’re done talking with me, I’ll head off now. You can take this up with LAPD.” Ollie walked to the door and opened it, then turned around and said, “I wish you luck.”

“Wait,” Spider blurted out. “Monk have the piece. Got it from Monk.”

“Who’s Monk?”

“He Nine Deuce. Traded him for it.” Ollie thought he heard a noise from the adjacent room, like a muffled cheer.

After a few more minutes, the well ran dry.

“I think they’ll be bringing charges against you, Earl,” Ollie said. “Better talk to your lawyer. Just knock on the door and ask one of the officers. They’ll take you out to make the phone call.”

Ollie walked out, heading to the observation room doorway twenty feet away. Lieutenant Tucker and a gang detective stepped out into the hall to greet him. Tucker smiled broadly and gave Ollie a high five.

“Monk! Nice work, Ollie! And Spider’s driver was…Allen Ivester. Brilliant! The dominoes are falling.”

“I can’t believe you got him to finger Monk,” the gang detective said. “I know him. He’s minister of defense for the Nine Deuces. We thought he was in that gun-fight, but we couldn’t prove it. This is just the break we needed.”

“As we speak,” Lieutenant Tucker said to Ollie, “one crew’s going to find Allen Ivester and another’s going to arrest Monk on suspicion of murdering Officer Tallon. We owe you big for this one, Ollie!”

The faint pneumatic sigh of the oil furnace expressed its bewilderment as to whether it was supposed to come on again after having been off so short a time.

Clarence lay shivering in the waterbed, reaching through the darkness blindly toward the dial to turn it up another notch. He pulled over his feet the Green Bay Packer stadium blanket he’d put on top of the covers. This was Geneva’s job, freezing on a winter night. But she lay there under her two extra comforters, sleeping soundly. How many nights without sleep would this make for him? He’d lost track. He felt punchy and disoriented, tossing and turning like a rotisserie minus the heat.

He couldn’t remember the boy on the bike coming to him so many nights in a row. He couldn’t remember ever feeling there was so little purpose in going to work in the mornings. He couldn’t remember it ever being so dark and cold.

“Wait a minute,” Clarence said to Ollie, after Chandler recounted to him and Manny his adventures in LA. “I didn’t know you got Spider’s prints off the license plate. And the gun? You never even told me part of the gun was found.”

“There
weren’t
any clear prints on the plate, unfortunately,” Ollie said. “It was out in the weather too long. I never told you I said there were prints, did I Manny?”

“No.” Manny smiled. “You just told us you said,
‘What if
I told you we found your prints on the plate?’”

“Same with the HK53,” Ollie said. “We never found the gun, and I never said we did. Since they didn’t object to the car search in Medford, I knew they’d ditched it. No time or place to deal it after the hit. I figured they disassembled it and disposed of it piece by piece—that’s what I would have done. I gambled Spider would buy we wouldn’t know that unless we’d really found a piece.”

Clarence looked at Ollie. “You’ve played some poker along the way, haven’t you?”

“Comes with the territory. Got a message from Lieutenant Tucker saying they arrested Allen Ivester last night. But I’m not optimistic about either of our Crips handing over Harper. They probably see him as someone who can help them behind the scenes, but only if they don’t betray him. We’ll try to get Harper from this side, through Gray and Norcoast. See if we can turn them against Harper and Harper against them, Harper against Spider, Spider against Harper, Ivester against Spider, Spider against Ivester. And throw in Rafer Thomas too, he’s a wild card. If they think the ship’s goin’ down, pretty soon they’re fighting for the life rafts. We’ll see. I tell you, Clarence, you would have been really impressed with LAPD.”

Clarence was expressionless.

“Very professional, very helpful,” Ollie said.

“Yeah,” Clarence said, rubbing his red eyes, “I suppose they’re cooperative when the victim’s one of their own.”