Vigilante (28 page)

We reached the cul-de-sac at the end of the road and Lester smoked the Navigator to a stop. I looked past the new designer houses and caught a glimpse of what looked like a man running in the moonlight through the brush up into the hills beyond.

Lester got out, then turned to Marcia. “Can you drive?”

“I think so,” she said. Her hair was in tangles. She had vomit stains on the front of her once-stylish gray designer pantsuit.

“Take this car back down the hill. On the way, call nine-one-one and give them this location. There’s a police station a mile away on San Fernando. Get help up here.”

Then, as Marcia pulled out, Lester led the way up toward the hillside. I stumbled along behind him clutching his .38 in my still-numb hand.

CHAPTER

49

Lester was limping without his cane but making damn good time. I was struggling to keep pace.

We made our way between two houses and exited a back gate to a wilderness area behind the designer development. I saw Lee Bob loping across a large field of dry, brown grass cover. He was almost a quarter mile away, heading toward a three-hundred-foot rock cliff. If he got over the top, he could disappear into the mountains. He was barely lit by moonlight as he got to the rocks and began climbing the craggy surface, using his ropy build to pull himself effortlessly up.

Lester Madrid knelt in the dirt at the edge of the brown grassy meadow and watched Lee Bob scale the cliff.

“Fucking little spider monkey, ain’t he?” Lester said.

“I don’t think I can make that climb,” I said, as I dropped in beside him. “I don’t know what drug that nut-job gave me, but my coordination is shot.”

“With this leg I sure as shit ain’t gonna climb no rock wall,” Lester said. “Come on.”

We moved out into the field, breaking through tinder-dry brush, and hurried to close the distance to the cliff face.

Lee Bob was now almost halfway up, moving faster all the time as the degree of ascent lessened near the top. He must have heard us crashing through the brush below, because he paused and then turned to look down. He studied us for a minute, hanging from the rock face, then resumed his climb.

“If he gets over that ridge, he’ll be gone,” I said hotly. “We gotta do something.”

“Fuckin’ calm down. He ain’t getting over no ridge,” Lester replied. Then he licked his fingertips and moistened his gun sight.

“You can’t just shoot him in the back,” I said.

“Suggestion box is open, Dudley Do Right, but you better make it fast.” I couldn’t come up with anything. The Cajun was almost at the top of the cliff as Lester carefully sighted down the barrel and slowly began to squeeze the trigger. It was a tough shot. Problem was I needed Lee Bob alive to make my case against Nash. I certainly didn’t want this retired SIS gunfighter dropping him.

Without thinking, I lunged at Lester’s gun hand, trying to throw off his aim. My speed and coordination were still way off. Lester saw my move coming and swung the Glock at me, slamming the barrel into my head. I fell sideways.

As I struggled to get up Lester barked, “Stay down,” then retrained the 9mm on Lee Bob.

Batiste had just arrived at the top of the cliff face. He turned for a minute to look back at us. I could see him pointing a gun. A plume of dust kicked up a foot to the right of where we were. The sound was a bit slower and a second later we heard his distant gunshot.

“Adios, motherfucker,” Lester said, and triggered off one shot.

Lee Bob was almost five hundred yards away and a hundred feet above us. Under optimum conditions it would have been a tricky shot. Out here, under moonlight, it was pretty much impossible.

As soon as the retort on the Glock sounded, Batiste straightened up from the impact. The bullet must have gone through him without hitting bone, because instead of blowing him backward, the recoil from the through-and-through shot tumbled him forward.

He took one hesitant step toward the ledge, as if to look down and check the height. Then he continued awkwardly forward, finally taking a swan dive off the top, waving his arms and yelling as he fell. His high-pitched scream cut the still night like a predator’s cry. It was cut off abruptly as he thudded into the dirt.

“Not bad for a lousy three-inch barrel,” Lester said.

When he looked over at me I saw the moonlight glint in gray eyes. No emotion, no feeling. Like Lee Bob’s they displayed a remorseless soul. Shark eyes prowling in shallow water.

“Let’s go spit on the carcass,” Lester said.

He moved off, heading toward the place where Lee Bob fell. I got to my feet and followed.

Batiste’s body was sprawled at an unnatural angle. His neck was broken, skull crushed. His orange hair was beginning to darken, turning red with matted blood.

He lay there in the dark, waiting for the loup-garou.

CHAPTER

50

“The friends of this charity deserve a huge standing ovation, so give it up for yourselves. Let’s hear it!”

Nix Nash was onstage at a podium with signage that read FRIENDS OF THE CHILDREN’S CANCER FUND in the grand ballroom of the Beverly Hills Hotel. His eyes were shining happily as he stood in the spotlight gazing out at an audience of well-turned-out people and Hollywood celebrities who were now on their feet, applauding their own charity.

“You know, there’s an important difference between love and friendship,” Nash continued. “While the former delights in extreme opposites, the latter demands a high degree of quality. The Friends of the CCF display that quality daily as they give care and devotion to the children who desperately need this help.”

I was standing in the wings at the edge of the stage in the large ballroom with two uniformed cops beside me. We had units from the Hollywood Division and the Beverly Hills PD deployed. I watched Nash from the side of the stage as he continued his pitch to raise money for children with cancer. Something must have alerted him to my presence. Some vibe—some predatory sense of danger. Maybe it was just the powerful hatred I was focusing at him.

He turned suddenly and saw me, then stopped mid-sentence and stared. I gave him an innocent little hand wave and then beckoned him toward me with one index finger.

He froze for a moment, the silk lapels of his beautifully tailored tux shining in a bright follow spot. Then he began to back away from the podium, still holding the hand mike. The audience sensed something was wrong and the room full of people at this five-hundred-dollar-a-plate dinner began to murmur. Nix turned quickly and bolted toward the curtain behind him, frantically pawing the fabric, looking for an opening.

There was nothing back there but a wall. I knew because I’d just checked it three minutes earlier.

Two uniformed officers moved out onto the stage from the other wing as two more teams came up the aisles toward the stage.

“Excuse me,” Nash said, and threw down his microphone. Because six cops were closing in from the left, he turned and rushed offstage in my direction.

I grabbed him as he tried to push past.

“Hang on a minute, Nix. We’ve got a broken window to repair here.”

“Let go!” he shrieked.

“I got this,” I said to the two uniformed cops behind me who were moving in to assist. Then I spun Nix around and pushed him against a wall. I pulled out my cuffs and hooked his right wrist, but I was a little sloppy doing it, and before I could secure his left Nash pulled his hand free and threw a punch at me. It was a right cross and it was slow and ugly. He threw it from chest high and I easily knocked it aside; then I turned him away from the two startled cops.

“You don’t want to do that, Nix,” I said. “Just calm the fuck down.”

But he was in a full panic and swung on me again.

I’d like to say that I didn’t want to hit him and that this awkward hookup was simply the result of Lee Bob’s drug overload, but that would have been a lie. I actually gave Nash the opening. I wanted the arrogant dirtbag to take his shot.

His second swing was a roundhouse left. Not much of a problem and I ducked under it easily as well.

My uppercut, on the other hand, was devastating. I heard his teeth chip as his jaws slammed together. His head went back. Blood spurted. I put everything I had into that shot. Every ounce of strength. I was hitting him for a lot of people, so it had to count. My punch was for every department that had lost credibility because of his dumb TV program. It was for Russ and Gloria Trumbull and their daughter, Hannah. I hit him for Hitch, who had a new hole in his leg courtesy of all this bullshit, and for Detectives Caleb Cole and Ronald Baron, who lost their jobs in Atlanta, as well as for Joffa Hill, aka Fuzzy, who was doing life in a Georgia prison on multiple murders he didn’t commit. I hit Nash for Frank Palgrave, J. J. Blunt, and Marcia Breen, once good servants of the people who got confused and had sold out for Nash’s version of success. But I especially hit him for Lita Mendez. She hated cops, but I was her final advocate. My job was to speak for the dead. It sickened me that she gave up her life for six or eight points on the Nielsen ratings.

It was a helluva shot. Nash went out with a mouthful of ivory chips.

I didn’t even feel it when the middle knuckle on my right hand broke. I was lost in the moment. That full of revenge.

CHAPTER

51

At the end of a case, you like things to be clean. Everything neat, every box on the arrest form checked. Unfortunately, on this one it didn’t seem like that was going to happen.

Lee Bob was dead and couldn’t turn State’s evidence. Marcia didn’t have anything but supposition on what Nix was doing, and I already knew most of what she had but couldn’t prove it. Nix Nash was locked up in Metro Detention Center jail awaiting an indictment on the charges of kidnapping and conspiracy to commit murder. Marcia and I had been his victims, were eyewitnesses, and could swear to everything in court. Because we couldn’t put him behind a direct murder charge, if Nix got the right lawyer he would probably end up getting twenty-five to life. With good time, he could be out in seventeen years. Not enough.

And I still didn’t know who the hell had killed nurse Hannah Trumbull.

The next day, Hitch and I were back in our cubicle at Homicide Special, working that case into the evening. Hitch had a huge dressing on his thigh, and for the first time since I’ve known him he didn’t look like a runway model. He was in baggy, oversized sweatpants and a sweater. I had a cast on my right hand to secure my broken knuckle. The plastic went all the way up my forearm. As far as Hannah Trumbull was concerned, we didn’t have too much to go on, but Hitch and I had told her parents we would get some justice for their daughter and we were both determined to keep that promise. Problem was, the case was going nowhere.

At eight o’clock, as we were getting ready to leave, our phone rang.

“If that’s my pizza order, tell the guy it’s too late,” Hitch said irritably as I nodded and picked up the joint line.

“Scully and Hitchens,” I said.

“You guys are putting in long hours,” a familiar voice said. It was Nix Nash, but he sounded different, like he was talking through a wired jaw, which he was. Nix was calling from the phone in the MDC.

“Whatta you want?”

“I want to make a deal.”

“If you want to plead your case, take it up with the District Attorney.”

“I don’t want to plead it; I want to trade it.”

“Just a minute.” I put him on hold and looked over at Hitch. “This dirtbag is trying to give us somebody.”

“Fuck him,” Hitch said.

“’Kay.” I punched the phone up again. “Sorry, Nix. Take it up with the DA.”

“I don’t like the DA. Besides, you and I have simpatico and it’s the Trumbull case I want to trade for. I understand you’re working that now.”

I sat there trying to deal with this.

“I know who killed Hannah Trumbull,” he went on. “I had that case solved before I even picked it. It was going to be part of the show’s finale. Got an eyewitness to the crime. It’s direct testimony and will bring the killer to justice. I give that to you and in return you broker my deal with the DA for me.”

“On my way,” I said, and hung up.

“You’re not actually thinking about dealing with that shit stick?” Hitch said, appalled.

“He says he can give us Hannah’s murderer.”

Hitch stood and followed me to the elevator.

After sitting vacant for over two years due to a city budget crisis, the gleeming new MDC where Nix Nash now resided had finally opened. This state-of-the-art facility was a much needed replacement to the decaying, over-crowded jail at Parker Center. Hitch and I left our weapons in the gun locker and were buzzed back. We passed through automatic security doors and walked down a corridor wired with video cameras to an I-room where Nash was waiting. I told the jailor to activate the video equipment; then Hitch and I walked inside.

Gone were Nash’s troublesome choices over wardrobe. He now only had one shade on his color wheel—jailhouse orange. His mouth was wired shut and he was chained to the wall, sitting at a low table on an attached metal stool.

Despite this huge change in his life circumstances, he seemed strangely happy and at ease. As if none of this really affected him. A total lack of emotion. Like Scott Peterson, he didn’t seem to care. It was classic psychopathic behavior. I guess if you don’t experience human emotion, everything is just in the moment.

“Make this good, Nix, ’cause if it starts coming off like bullshit, we’re outta here.”

“I know who killed Hannah Trumbull,” he said again. “I have a witness. He never talked because he knew the killer and the man scared him. He didn’t want to get involved.”

“Keep going.”

“If I give you this, what I’m going to need is a big reduction in charges.”

“I can’t make any deals.”

“No, but you can take it to the DA and argue to support it.”