Rollins moved in the moment of darkness. He opened the kitchen door, peeled off his gloves, and stepped out. A cop and a German shepherd were in the backyard. The dog was a deep-chested brute with angry eyes and fangs like daggers. The cop shouted as the dog charged.
2
Elvis Cole
MERYL LAWRENCE GAVE ME three things on that rainy night when she hired me to find Amy Breslyn. She gave me an address in Echo Park, two thousand dollars in cash, and a corporate personnel file with so much information about her missing friend it could have been compiled by the NSA. It probably was. She gave me these three things, but nothing else. Everything else was secret.
The Echo Park address was four or five years old and probably no longer useful, but it was on my way home. Twenty minutes before ten that same night—fifty-two minutes after I agreed to find Amy Breslyn—I parked beneath a streetlight during a soft, feathery rain, one block from the Echo Park house. I would have parked closer, but no other spots were available. A fire hydrant saved me.
A teenage girl chased a young boy past the window of a house across from me. Next door, a middle-aged woman in purple tights pedaled an exercise bike. Behind me, a balding man laughed at a television as large as a wall. Nine forty was early. Every house on the block was alive with life except the house I came to find. It was dark and lonely and promised to be a waste of time.
I was watching the purple woman when my phone rang.
“Elvis Cole Detective Agency. We do it in the rain.”
Humor. I am my own best audience.
Meryl Lawrence’s voice was quiet within the darkness.
“I found her house key. I guess it fell off the console. It was under my front seat.”
I had met with Meryl Lawrence in her car behind Vroman’s Bookstore in Pasadena. She hired me in a parking lot because Ms. Lawrence did not want to be seen with me. She paid me in cash because she wanted no record of our association. Like so much about Amy Breslyn, my relationship with Meryl Lawrence was Top Secret.
I said, “Good work. Now I won’t have to climb down her chimney.”
“Are you coming back? I’ll give you the key and her alarm code.”
“Not tonight. I’m at Lerner’s house.”
Her voice perked up.
“Has he seen her?”
“Haven’t spoken to him yet. I’m waiting for the rain to stop.”
“Oh.”
She sounded deflated. The address belonged to an aspiring writer named Thomas Lerner. Lerner and Amy’s son, Jacob, grew up together. After college, Lerner wanted to be a writer, so he rented the Echo Park house for cheap and set about typing. Jacob Breslyn went to work as a journalist and happily traveled the world until he and thirteen other people were killed by a terrorist blast in Nigeria. Amy changed after Jacob died, Meryl told me. Amy withdrew and was never the same. Now, sixteen months after Jacob’s death, Amy had simply walked away, vanished, disappeared, over and out, gone. Meryl did not know if Amy had kept in touch with Lerner or if he still lived at the Echo Park address, but if anyone knew Amy’s secrets, Meryl felt it would be Amy’s last and only link to her son.
“It doesn’t look like anyone’s home. If he’s here, I’ll see what he knows. If he moved, maybe I can find out how to reach him.”
“Ask if she mentioned a boyfriend.”
She had gone on about the boyfriend in Vroman’s parking lot. Meryl Lawrence had never met the man, didn’t know his name, and couldn’t describe him, but she was one hundred percent convinced a man was behind Amy’s disappearance. Sometimes you just have to let them vent.
“I’ll ask.”
“I only met Thomas the one time, but he should remember. Tell him I haven’t been able to reach her, so I’m worried, but don’t tell him I hired you, and please for God’s sake don’t mention anything else I’ve told you.”
“I know how to handle it.”
“I know you know, but I want to make sure you understand. Everything I told you is strictly off-limits.”
“If I understood any better, it would be tattooed on my head.”
Meryl Lawrence swore me to secrecy because she was afraid. She was a senior executive for a company called Woodson Energy Solutions, where Amy Breslyn had been a chemical production engineer for fourteen years. They manufactured fuels for the Department of Defense, which meant their work was classified. The first thing she asked when we met was if the word ‘confidential’ on my business card truly meant confidential.
I told her, “Yes, ma’am, it does.”
“Swear to me. Swear you won’t breathe a word.”
“I promise.”
Four days earlier, Amy Breslyn had taken a leave of absence without explanation and with no advance warning. She did so by email. Meryl and her bosses tried to reach Amy, but their calls and texts were not returned. A day later, Meryl went to Amy’s home. Amy was gone, but nothing seemed amiss. The following day, Meryl discovered four hundred sixty thousand dollars missing from Amy’s department. Meryl kept this discovery secret. She believed her friend had been coerced, and hoped to handle the situation without involving the authorities. She hired me off the books and without her company’s knowledge. She also refused to give me access to Amy’s office, corporate email, and any information related to Amy Breslyn’s work. Security.
“I’ll get the key from you in the morning. Want to meet in the same place?”
“Oh my God, no. It’s too chancy. I have to be in West Hollywood tomorrow. Pick a place, and plan on meeting me at seven.”
I suggested a parking lot at the corner of Fairfax and Sunset. Meryl Lawrence liked parking lots.
“All right, tomorrow at seven unless I hear otherwise. Maybe you can settle this tonight and save us the trouble.”
From the look of the dead little house, I doubted it.
“Is it still raining?”
“Yes.”
“If you do it in the rain, get out of your car and find her.”
One hour into the job and I was already getting attitude.
I fingered through Amy Breslyn’s file by the hazy glow of the streetlight. Her corporate portrait showed a round woman with light brown hair, a soft face, and the sad eyes of someone who lost her only child for reasons no sane person could understand. If she wore makeup, I could not see it. She was as anonymous as a blur in a crowd except for the fact this particular blur possessed a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from UCLA. I tucked her picture into my pocket.
When the rain stopped a few minutes later, I walked up the street and went to Lerner’s door. A porch lamp hung beside the door, but the bulb was as dark as the rest of the house. I knocked, waited a few seconds, and knocked again. I pressed the buzzer, but the bell didn’t work any better than the lamp. Lovely.
I knocked some more, then went back to my car.
Twelve minutes later I was deciding whether to wait or return in the morning when an LAPD helicopter thundered overhead so low it rattled my car. Its searchlight crawled across the nearby houses, making their newly wet roofs shimmer. I craned my head to watch. A flashing radio car suddenly filled the street three blocks ahead and more lights flashed in my mirror. A second black-and-white crowded the intersection one block behind me. The helicopter boomed over again, raking the ground with its light. I twisted and turned. Whatever was happening was happening fast. More radio cars joined the first two, strobing the houses with red and blue flashes as a small army of uniformed officers dismounted to block the street.
The people who lived in the houses appeared in their windows or came outside to watch. I got out of my car and watched along with them. The Los Angeles Police Department was surrounding their neighborhood like a gathering thunderstorm.
A short man in a faded sweatshirt came to the door of the house behind me and called out with a Spanish accent.
“What they doin’?”
/> “Setting up a perimeter. I think they’re looking for someone.”
He joined me on the sidewalk. A woman holding a baby took his place in the door.
The helicopter flew in a lazy circle three or four blocks wide, burning the earth with its searchlight. We stood below in a brilliant white pool so bright we squinted, but then the pool was gone.
The man hooked his thumbs in his pockets.
“We got too much crime ’round here. I got babies in my house.”
I pointed at Lerner’s.
“The dark house on the next block. Does Thomas Lerner live there?”
He stared at the house.
“Who?”
“Young guy. Anglo. He’d be twenty-eight or twenty-nine, something like that. Thomas Lerner.”
He shook his head before I finished.
“We been here three years and there ain’t no Lermer guy there.”
“Lerner.”
“Was some black chicks when we moved in, but they gone. A Filipino dude stayed there for a few weeks and we had a man from El Salvador, but that was a couple years ago. Nobody livin’ there now.”
The news wasn’t all bad. If the property was a rental before, during, and after Lerner lived there, the landlord might have a forwarding address or Lerner’s rental application. The rental app would give me the names and addresses of employers, references, and maybe even Lerner’s parents. Finding him would be easy.
Several officers were working their way toward us, going from door to door. An officer with dark hair came up the sidewalk. Sergeant stripes were pinned to his collar and his name tag read ALVIN.
I said, “What’s going on?”
“Suspect pursuit. Latin male, twenty-five to thirty. He’s wearing a black T-shirt with a skull on the front. You guys see anyone like that run through here?”
We told him we hadn’t.
The homeowner said, “What he do?”
“Homicide warrant. We spotted him over on Vermont, and chased him this way. We’re pretty sure he went to ground here in the neighborhood.”
The homeowner glanced at his wife and lowered his voice.
“We got babies, sir. I don’t want no shootin’ out here.”
“Lock your doors and windows, okay? We’ll find him. We’ve got the eye in the sky, the manpower, and a dog coming out. Stay inside and you’ll be fine.”
The man hurried back to his house.
I said, “People coming home from work or getting back from dinner or whatever, are you guys going to let them in?”
“Yeah, no problem, but not after they turn loose the dog. If a dog is running around, we won’t let anyone in.”
I glanced toward the black-and-whites blocking the intersection.
“How about leaving? Can I get out?”
“You can, but we have to finish the door-knocks. We’ll free up someone to move the cars as soon as we can.”
“Okay, Officer. Thanks.”
It was going to be a long night.
A few minutes after I settled into my car, the helicopter broadcast a recorded announcement. The recording warned residents a police K-9 dog was going to be released and told the suspect this was his last chance to give up. I heard barking, but it sounded far away.
The cops finally finished their door-knocks and drifted back to the intersection. I spotted Alvin, decided it was a good time to leave, and was putting my key in the ignition when a man came out of Thomas Lerner’s house. I could not see his face and I did not see a black T-shirt, but everything about the way he moved told me he was wrong. He did not stroll casually from his house the way a person would or pause to look at the helicopter or amble out to the street. He stayed close to the house, masked by broken shadows and clearly trying to hide. I got out of my car for a better look, but lost him in the darkness. Then lights flashed in the trees behind his house and the dog barked fierce and close. The shadows moved, and the man ran away from me into the neighboring yard.
I shouted and waved at the cops behind me.
“Alvin! Runner! OVER HERE!”
Alvin shouted back, but I was already chasing the man and running hard.
The man veered hard across the street and passed through a pool of faint light. I saw a dark sport coat and dark pants and maybe dark hair, but then he was gone between the houses. Alvin was shouting. I was gaining ground when I reached Lerner’s house, but an officer in tactical gear charged into the front yard. He shouted, too, and he aimed a pistol.
I stopped cold and threw my hands in the air.
“A man came out. There! He ran across the street.”
The tactical cop shouted past his pistol.
“STOP! Do not MOVE!”
I didn’t move. Somewhere behind me, Alvin shouted I was a civilian and the tactical cop ran back behind the house. Alvin and two other cops reached me. The other cops kept running, but Alvin grabbed my arm.
“Dude, what the hell? You want to get shot?”
“Man came out of this house. He ran across the street.”
“Was it our guy? Long hair? Latin in a black T-shirt?”
“I thought so, but I don’t know. Short hair. He was wearing a sport coat.”
Alvin radioed that officers were in foot pursuit of a man seen leaving the address and gave them the general direction. The helicopter pulled into a tight orbit overhead, then banked away to hunt. Its whup-whup-whup was deafening.
Alvin shouted over the roar.
“So you decided to play hero?”
“I didn’t decide anything, Alvin. I saw him and I thought he was your guy. He ran and you were a block behind me. It seemed like the thing to do.”
Alvin suddenly lifted his radio and glanced at the house.
“We got him.”
“The guy I was chasing?”
He tipped his radio toward Lerner’s house.
“No, numbnuts. The guy you thought you were chasing. Our one-eighty-seven suspect. He was in there, too, and his running days are over.”
I stared at Thomas Lerner’s house and felt a greasy prickle across my chest. I pictured myself knocking with a body on the other side of the door. I pictured myself with a murderer inches away.
“Your fugitive was in this house?”
“Still is. Looks like the asshole you saw killed him.”
Alvin started away, but I didn’t move.
“Alvin, I’m looking for a guy who used to live here. I knocked on the door twenty minutes ago.”
Alvin studied me like he didn’t understand.
“I didn’t go in. I knocked a couple of times, no one answered, so I went back to my car. I was about to leave when you guys rolled up.”
Alvin asked to see my identification. I handed him my driver’s license and investigator’s license. The investigator’s ticket made him frown.
“Okay, Mr. Cole, stand by. They’ll want to talk to you.”
Alvin radioed again and had trouble getting an answer. The helicopter orbited back and speared Lerner’s house with its light. Alvin’s radio exploded with overlapping transmissions. He darkened at something he heard, abruptly took my arm, and steered me toward the perimeter.
“Let’s move. They’re sending someone.”
Alvin changed in that single moment. The officers grouped at their cars changed. The houses and yards and night clouds above us all changed as the air crackled with frantic tension.
Alvin towed me down the center of the street as if we couldn’t walk fast enough. The officers who had been on the perimeter only minutes ago hurried from their posts to spread through the neighborhood, once more knocking on doors, their faces brittle and anxious.
“What’s going on, Alvin? What’s happening?”
Alvin broke into a jog, so I jogged along with him.
People were directed from
their homes as we passed. Some hesitated. Others lurched to the street. The cops moved faster and their voices grew louder. Their eyes seemed wider and brighter.
“Why are these people leaving their homes, damnit?”
Alvin picked up the pace.
When we reached the intersection, a middle-aged male detective in a tired gray suit and a female detective in a navy pants suit were waiting by a dark blue unmarked sedan. A uniform command officer stood nearby, but paid no attention.
Alvin said, “This is him.”
The male detective lifted his jacket to show me his badge.
“Bob Redmon, Mr. Cole. Rampart Detectives. This is Detective Furth. We’d like you to come with us.”
Furth barely glanced at me. She was watching the men and women, teenagers and children flow across the perimeter, some angry and sullen, others nervous and scared. They formed a growing crowd that spread along the sidewalk.
I said, “Tell me what’s going on, Redmon. Why are you pulling these people out of their houses?”
Redmon ignored my question.
“While it’s fresh, you know? Shouldn’t take long.”
“Are you arresting me?”
He opened the sedan’s rear door and motioned me in.
“We’ll give you a lift back.”
“My car’s a block away.”
Furth spoke for the first time, showing her strain.
“Get in the car or we’ll lock your ass up. C’mon, Bobby, I want to get out of here.”
I asked them again.
“Why are you evacuating these people?”
Redmon simply held the door until I got in. Furth and Redmon got in after me and Furth started the engine.
A loud siren whooped on the far side of the intersection. A large black Suburban topped with blue flashers arrived and nosed through the intersection. It was an ominous vehicle with words on its side that answered my question.
Furth eased forward, going slow because of the crowd. I stared at the Suburban. Somewhere above, the helicopter’s whup-whup-whup matched the beat of my heart. When I was in the Army, it was a comforting sound. The heavy pulse of rotors meant someone was coming to save your life.