Halfway House (30 page)

Each of them, in their own turn, cast their eyes toward Lucy. Would he bring them through this?
Could
he bring them through this?

Lucy wore a black suit, white shirt, and tie. He knew how to show respect. His men were poor and couldn’t afford such clothes so he never begrudged them their T-shirts and pants. He dressed as he did to set the example. He wanted them to know what was right, and respect him for that. Standing at the grave of an old friend was an easy thing. To face the dead all one had to do was pray. To face the living meant so much more.

Bobby stood next to him, still dressed in his Elvis sequin jacket. This was the best he could do, but honestly, he never once thought about what to wear. He’d never been very good at the more complex emotions. Death and love were foreign languages that he’d yet to learn to speak. He knew that a part of him had loved Laurie, but he also knew that that part was in hiding, a defensive mechanism he’d developed long ago in the halls of the orphanage.

As he stared at the casket containing the girl he’d called his own and the daughter of Kanga, who even now believed he was speaking with her in front of the halfway house, Bobby promised that one day he’d mourn her properly.

When he had time.

When he knew how.

Until then, she was just another disappointing loss in a lifetime of disappointments, and he’d treat her memory like he’d treated everyone who’d come before.

He’d deal with it later.

*  * *

After Laurie was laid to rest, most of the gangbangers dispersed. Manolo, Trujillo and Blockbuster hung out, smoking or staring at their feet, while Lucy escorted his mother and his
abuela
to a waiting car. Once it drove away, the large gangbanger lumbered back up the slope to where Bobby still stood watching the grave, now freshly covered with dirt. Lucy waited with him for a while, then finally spoke.

“We’ve had a bad time of it, Bobby.”

“Me, too.”

“We lost Split.” Seeing Bobby’s surprised look, Lucy explained. “MS 13. There was an all-out attack last night. Split was pulling lookout on the welcome bridge and they got him.”

“Fucking pussy-assed
chupavergas!
” Manolo spat.

“Not around the grave!” snapped Lucy.

Trujillo smacked Manolo hard on the back of the head.

“How did it happen?” Bobby asked.

“Dunno. They seemed to be concentrating in one area, though. My guess is that MS 13 wants to expand and needs to find a way to get us out of the picture.”

Bobby looked at the row of police cars that had already begun to diminish since the funeral had ended. “Is that why they’re here?”

“Yes and no. Believe it or not, the cops are on our side. As they see it, we aren’t bad as gangs go, which is what I’ve been trying to get us to be. Last thing they need is for the Salvadorans to be in town. Blood would be knee-high in the streets.”

“Sorry about Split and the others,” Bobby said. “And thanks for doing this funeral. I know Kanga would have appreciated it.”

Lucy waved his hand. “I don’t know Kanga for shit, but Laurie’s been a friend since I was five. I’d do it for anyone in town, but for Laurie...well, that was special.”

“Yeah. Real special.”

Lucy turned as if to examine Bobby, then shook his head. “I don’t know if you’re a cold fish, or if growing up the way you did fucked you up.”

“I don’t know either, Lucy. Trying to get a handle on it, though.”

Lucy seemed about to say something when his cell phone rang. He stepped a few feet away and took the call. Anger raked his features as he listened to what was being said. His skin turned red and a jet-fueled glare scorched the line of cop cars. He hung up and shoved the phone into his pants.

“Fucking cops. They attend a funeral instead of doing their jobs.”

“What happened?” Bobby asked.

“My pops. They tried to get him in the hospital.”

“Holy Christ! What happened?”

“Three MS 13 bangers came in wearing UPS uniforms. The cop at the door had been pulled or something. All I know is that he wasn’t where he was supposed to be, and they sauntered right into my father’s room where he was hooked up to IVs and shit.”

The Angels erupted with curses and questions.

“What?”

“Is he okay?”

“Where the fuck were the police? Fucking
pendejos!
”

The sound of police radios intruded upon the background noise as static-laced commands poured in. Bobby watched out of the corner of his eye as several cops ran to their radios and pulled away. A tall blonde woman standing by the curb walked toward them. Her fingers were hooked in her belt. A look of disgust was etched on her pretty European features.

“Rafa was coming out of the bathroom when the bangers were pulling shotguns from the boxes they were carrying,” continued Lucy. “One look at the
chupaverga
and Rafa capped them with his nine.”

“And your pop?”

“He’s fine. Complained about the noise and shit, but other than that, he’s on cloud nine with morphine. Old Julio is bringing the dominoes by later. My pops is okay for now.”

“Look here.” Manolo pointed with his chin toward the police captain.

When Lucy turned, so did the others. “What you got Rafa locked up for? He was doing your job.”

“So you heard,” the woman said as she came to a stop in front of the half circle of men. She showed no fear. Her thumbs were casually hooked through her utility belt. She eyed each of them, her gaze resting a little longer on Bobby.

“Where were the cops? You told me you’d have a cop on the door.”

“We’re going to find out what happened, Louis. In the meantime, you need to call off your boys and let us handle this.”

“In the meantime, you need to let Rafa go. All he was doing was what your cop should have done in the first place.”

“You know we can’t do that.”

“I don’t know anything. Rafa saved my pops’ life. If your cop was there like he was supposed to, then Rafa wouldn’t have needed to be there.”

“Why was he there in the first place?”

“In case your cops screwed it up,” Lucy sneered.

She looked at the ground a moment, then into Lucy’s eyes. “I’m not going to kid you. Rafa’s in a lot of trouble.” She held up her hand as the gangbangers began to argue. “But things have a way of changing. We’re going to hold him for a few weeks. Once this dies down, I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets released.”

Lucy eyed her speculatively.

“You need to trust me on this, Louis.”

“I trusted you to keep my pops alive.”

“Yeah. Well, we get a second chance with that one. And I promise I won’t mess this up. In the meantime, I need you to promise not to do anything stupid.”

Lucy sucked on the inside of his cheek as he thought about it. He gazed out toward the horizon before answering. “We’ll do what we need to protect our own, but we won’t go out of our way to do it.”

She shook her head. “Is that the best you can do?”

“That’s the best I can do.”

She nodded, then turned on her heel and headed back to her cruiser. Lucy waited until she’d gone before he spoke.

“Trujillo, you know what this means?”

“They’re going to be coming again.”

“Definitely. Remember showdown at the OK Corral?”

Trujillo shook his head.

“Never mind. You get everyone set up. I want rabbits and hounds. I want lookouts. I want everything ready. We should know they’re coming before they get into Pedro, so call in some markers. I want to know when they hit PCH and the Harbor Freeway. There’s no reason for us not to get the word on this. Understand?”

“Understand, boss.”

Something Lucy had said earlier had been bothering Bobby. It wasn’t until now that he realized what it was, and if he was right, it could possibly solve their entire problem.

“Verdina,” Bobby whispered.

Lucy, who was the closest, couldn’t help but hear. “What did you say?”

“It all leads back to Verdina.”

“The pedophile from Van Nuys?” Blockbuster asked.

“Exactly. Remember when he gave us the address for the movie director in Rancho Palos Verdes? Well, I met him last night and we ended up having a long conversation before he threw me out. One thing he kept going on about was how he wanted to build a golf course and how Donald Trump had stolen his idea away from him.”

“What does Donald Trump have to do with this?”

“Nothing—everything. Listen.” Bobby felt the truth of the idea as it worked through his mind. “Shrewsbury talked about this plan he had to buy up property in San Pedro over near some park for a golf course. When it fell through, he made it seem as if he wasn’t done, that he had something else in mind.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. But maybe MS 13 is connected. You said they were firebombing houses. Why do that unless you want people to move out?”

“
Gringo
might have a point here.”

“Still a little far-fetched.” Lucy chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Which park did he say?”

Bobby struck the side of his head with his knuckles. “Damn. I don’t remember. All I can think of is that Canadian skategirl rocker who looks like she’s twelve and a crack addict.”

“Avril Lavigne?” Blockbuster asked.

“Yeah! That’s what he said. Avril Park.”

“You mean
Averill
Park.” Manolo grinned and grabbed Lucy by the shoulder. “Holy shit, that’s where MS 13 was getting busy last night. Remember the guy we caught...” His voice fell away as his gaze shot to where the cops stood. He continued in a rough whisper. “That guy was from over on Weymouth trying to burn down one-armed Polo’s house. That’s right by Averill Park.”

Lucy’s gaze was drawn to the harbor, toward which he stared for a moment while the information sunk in. Then be nodded slowly. He put one hand on Manolo’s shoulder and one on Bobby’s.

“Maybe this porn director has made a deal with the devil,” Trujillo said.

“Then maybe we should visit him with Angels.” Lucy grinned. “Just like in the Bible: when Angels come to visit, it’s never a good sign.” He chuckled deep and mean, like rocks rumbling in a can. “And if I find out that
pringao
porn director has anything to do with this business of mine, I’m going to rain down such a host of Angels to make his home look like Sodom and Gomorrah,
The Day After
.”

Three o’clock in the afternoon, and the Pacific Coast Highway was just beginning to build up to a four o’clock crawl. Blockbuster and Bobby were on the crest of the last free wave of cars, scrambling from traffic light to traffic light as they moved north through Torrance, Hermosa Beach, Manhattan Beach, El Segundo, then Venice Beach. There was a three-car pileup in Santa Monica, but Blockbuster avoided it by zipping up Ocean Avenue.

They rumbled past Vista View park filled with upscale homeless. Bobby had stayed there a day when he’d first arrived in Los Angeles. There was a particular homeless mafia at work in the park, but they’d left him alone. Still, this was an upscale neighborhood and the million dollar condos across the street shared the same million dollar view as the homeless.

He especially remembered how the Ferris wheel looked lit up at night on the pier, the lights reflected in the Pacific Ocean like a French impressionist painting. One could almost forget they were destitute with such a backdrop to their misery.

When Bobby and Blockbuster reached the end of the park, they slid back down to PCH. From there on, it was smooth sailing to Malibu.

After Bobby had dropped the bomb about Shrewsbury, he’d barely managed to tell Lucy about his lead on his heirloom. At first Lucy seemed not to remember what he was talking about, but that was understandable. In the face of Split’s murder and all of the other deaths, an award for a fifty-year-old album won by the dead King of Rock and Roll didn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things. But it eventually clicked and Lucy showed sincere enthusiasm about Bobby’s progress, if only because it took him away from the reality of his current problems. And because of their past association, he assigned Blockbuster to drive Bobby.

Still, Blockbuster had been silent the entire way, something he’d never been before. Every other time he’d driven Bobby anywhere, the lean Hispanic had kept up a constant chatter of movie trivia. Bobby figured the silence had more to do with the death of Split than anything else.

Bobby glanced sidelong at the lean Hispanic as he sat behind the wheel of the old Chevy.

“Sorry about Split, man.”

The Hispanic mumbled something unintelligible and kept his gaze on the road.

Bobby felt like he should say something else. “He was a great guy. I really appreciated the way you guys took care of me.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” The words came out like a whisper.

“All right, I can respect that.” Bobby stared through the windshield.

A Lexus pulled out in front of Blockbuster. He slammed on his brakes and jerked the wheel to the right. He didn’t even spout off a curse.

“I just wanted to say that I miss him, too,” Bobby added, looking out the window at the hills.

They’d gone perhaps another mile and were waiting for the light to change at the San Vincente intersection when a question that Bobby had had for days resurfaced. When he’d first asked it, the gold-toothed young man had warned Blockbuster not to say, but now that Split was dead, Bobby hoped that the commandment to keep it a secret could be waived.

“Why did they call him Split, anyway?”

Blockbuster turned and glared at Bobby a moment, then his face softened as he cracked a wistful smile. “He made me promise not to tell you. He was afraid you’d laugh at him.”