Free Fall

  "They impounded my car. You think they got the Jeep?"

  "I was on the next street over. They didn't know about it."

  "That makes it, what, ten or twelve blocks from here? Might as well be in Fresno."

  Pike said, "If we have limits, they are self-imposed." Always count on Pike for something like that.

  Two black-and-whites sped east on Florence under the freeway. After they passed, we trotted west into an Arco station that had one of those little Minimart places. A couple of cars sat at the pumps, and a Hostess delivery van sat at the Minimart. A young black guy in his early twenties got out of the van with a box of baked goods and went into the Minimart. Pike said, "Wheels."

  "Maybe he'll give us a ride."

  Pike frowned.

  The delivery guy came out of the Minimart, threw his box into the van, and climbed in after it. I went up to his window and said, "Excuse me. We need a lift about ten blocks west of here. Think you could help?"

  The delivery guy said, "Hey, sure. No problem."

  Only in L.A.

  Maybe ten minutes later he dropped us off at Joe Pike's Cherokee. Joe keeps a spare key duct-taped to the inside of the front fender. He found it, unlocked the cab, and we climbed inside. Joe dug under the dash and came out with a plastic bag containing five hundred dollars in cash, a driver's license that said his name was Fred C. Larson, a Visa card in the same name, and a Walther TPH .22-caliber pocket gun. Be prepared.

  I said, "Fred?"

  Pike headed toward the freeway. "They'll cover our houses and our businesses."

  "We don't go home. We try for Jennifer Sheridan. We've got to get her off the street before D'Muere finds her."

  "Where does she live?"

  I told him. Pike drove quickly, and neither of us spoke during the ride.

  We parked in front of her building maybe forty minutes later and pressed her call button, but no one answered. We pressed more buttons until someone finally buzzed open the glass door and we went up to the third floor.

  We were knocking on her door when a woman with two small children came out of the apartment across the hall. The woman was maybe in her forties and heavy across the hips. She made a tsking sound when she saw us and said, "I'd appreciate it if you ask her not to make so much noise tonight. All the hammering woke up Teddi."

  I looked at her. "What hammering?"

  She pulled the door shut and locked it. The two children ran down the hall. I guess one of them was Teddi. "Well, the knocking. It was so loud it woke Teddi and Teddi woke me and I had to look. It was after two." She squinted at Pike. "Was it you?"

  Pike shook his head.

  I said, "Someone was hammering at her door after two in the morning?"

  The woman nodded, but now she wasn't interested in talking. Her children had disappeared around a corner and she wanted to go after them. "Yes, and someone got quite loud, too. It was very inconsiderate."

  "More than one voice?" I was thinking D'Muere.

  "I don't believe so." She glanced at Pike again. "Well, I thought it was him but I guess not. Her boyfriend. That big guy. I think he's a police officer."

  "Mark Thurman?"

  "I don't know his name. We just see him in the hall."

  "He was here at two this morning?"

  She nodded. "Making a terrible racket. Then they left together." Now she frowned at me and looked at my hair.

  I said, "What?"

  She gave embarrassed, and then she hurried away down the hall. "I've got to find those damn kids."

  I looked at Pike. He said, "You've got something in your hair."

  I touched my hair and felt something crusty. My fingers came away speckled red. James Edward Washington's blood. "If she's with Thurman, she's running. If she's running, that means she's safe."

  "Until she gets found."

  "Yeah."

  Thirty minutes later we checked into a motel Pike knew two blocks from the beach in Santa Monica. It was called the Rising Star Motel. Fred C. Larson signed the register.

  The room was simple, but functional, with two double beds and a bath and cheap wall paneling that had been scarred by years of transient use. There was a little round table and two chairs by the window, and a TV bolted to a dresser. The bolts looked thick and heavy enough to pin down a Saturn Five.

  Pike left after a couple of minutes, and I went into the bathroom and inspected myself.

  I went out to the ice machine, brought back a bucket of ice, then peeled off my shirt, put it in the sink, covered it with the ice, and ran in cold water. I wanted to call Mrs. Washington and tell her about James Edward, but I didn't. James Edward Washington's blood was on my shirt and in my hair. How could I tell her about that? When the shirt was soaking, I took off the rest of my clothes, went into the shower, and let the water beat into me. The water was hot. I used the little motel soap and a washcloth, and I scrubbed hard at my face and my neck and my hands and my hair, and then at the rest of me. I washed my hair twice. The police had let me wash off; but that had been with Handi Wipes and paper towels and Borax soap. There's only so much you can do with a Handi Wipe. I scrubbed until my skin was pink and my scalp stung with the hot water, and then I got out to see about the shirt. I rubbed the fabric as hard as I had rubbed my skin, but it was too late. The bloodstains were set, and would always be there. How could I tell Ida Leigh Washington about that?

  Twenty minutes later there was a double rap at the door and Joe Pike let himself in. He was carrying an olive green Marine Corps duffel and a large grocery bag and he was wearing new sunglasses. The sunglasses would've been the first thing he bought. He put the grocery bag on the little round table and the duffel bag on the bed. He looked at me and nodded. "Better."

  "You went by the gun shop?"

  He took waist holsters and handguns from the duffel. "Called one of the guys and had him pick up some things. We met at the market."

  "Have the cops been by your shop?"

  Pike nodded. "They've got an undercover van parked down the block. It'll be the same at your place, too."

  Great.

  Pike unwrapped the holsters and inspected them, and then tossed one to me. Clip holsters. We could snap them to our waistbands and wear our shirts out over them for that Miami thug look. Pike handed me a Smith .38. He counted four hundred dollars out of a plain white envelope, handed half to me. "There's food in the bags."

  He'd bought soap and deodorant and toothbrushes and paste and razors and the things you need to keep yourself up. He'd also bought a six-pack of cold Thai beer. I put the toiletries in the bathroom, and then we ate. While we ate I called my office to check for messages, but there were none. I called my home next and there were two messages from Jennifer Sheridan. In the first message she identified herself and asked if I was there and, when I didn't answer, she hung up. In the second, she again asked if I was there, but this time when I didn't answer she said that she would call back later tonight. She said that it was very important that she speak with me. She was speaking softly and she didn't sound happy.

  Pike watched me listen. "Jennifer?"

  "She's going to call later tonight."

  Pike stared at me.

  "I've got to be there, Joe."

  Pike's mouth twitched, and he stood up, ready to go. "If it were easy, it wouldn't be fun."

  CHAPTER 22

  We cruised the Mulholland Snake from Cahuenga Pass to Laurel Canyon, and then back again. It was after ten, and the traffic was light and getting lighter, mostly affluent stragglers who'd put in extra hours at the office or in the bar and were only now cresting the mountain in their effort toward home.

  When we saw that there were no police stationed at either end of Woodrow Wilson Drive

  , Pike shut the lights and pulled over. "You want me to take you in closer?" The turnoff to my house was maybe a mile in along Woodrow Wilson.

  "Nope. Too easy to get boxed if we meet a black-and-white coming the other way."

  Pike nodded. "I know. Just tho
ught I'd offer."

  "There's a turnout about a mile and a half east that the kids use as a parking place, on the valley side overlooking Universal Studios. Wait there. If the police come I'll work my way downslope, then come back around onto Mulholland and meet you there."

  "If you don't get caught."

  Some support, huh?

  I slipped out of the Jeep, then trotted off Mulholland and onto Woodrow Wilson Drive

  , taking it easy and slipping into bushes or shadows or behind parked cars whenever headlights showed around a curve. Woodrow Wilson Drive

  is narrow and winding and affects sort of a rural quality, even in the midst of high-density housing and fourteen million people. There are trees and coyotes and sometimes even deer, and, though there are many homes in the area, the houses are built for privacy and are often hidden from view. Frank Zappa lives there. So does Ringo Starr. Smaller streets branch off of Woodrow Wilson, and, like mine, lead to areas often more private, and even more rustic. If the police were waiting for me, or came while I was there, it would be easy to work my way downslope, then loop around and work back to Mulholland. Of course, it's always easy if you don't get caught.

  I passed three joggers and, twice, couples walking dogs, once a man and woman with an Akita, and once two men with a black Lab. I nodded at them and they nodded back. Elvis Cole, the Friendly Felon, out for an evening's stroll.

  I left Woodrow Wilson and turned up my road and moved into the trees. The mountain shoulders up there, and the road follows the shoulder into a little canyon. I crept through the scrub oak until the road curved around to my house, and then I saw the plain unmarked sedan sitting in the shadows beneath a willow tree, maybe sixty yards past my front door. I kept the trunk of an oak between myself and the car and I waited. Maybe eight minutes later someone on the passenger's side moved, then the driver moved, and then they were still again. Shadows within shadows. If there were cops outside the house, there might be cops inside the house. The smart thing to do would be to leave and forget about being in my living room when Jennifer Sheridan called. Of course, if I wasn't there when she called, maybe she'd never call again. For all I knew, Akeem D'Muere was closing in on her at this very moment and her last call would be a call for help and I wouldn't be there to answer it because I'd be off doing the smart thing. Whatever that was.

  Across the canyon, headlights moved on mountain roads and someone somewhere laughed and it carried on the night breeze. A woman. I thought about it some more and then I moved down the slope toward my house. Sometimes there is no smart move.

  I worked through the trees and the brush until I was beneath my house, and then I climbed up to the deck. There were no police posted along the back and, as best I could tell, none within the house. Of course, I wouldn't know that for sure until I went in, would I?

  I checked to see if the two cops were still in their sedan, and then I went back downslope and found the spare key I keep beneath the deck. I moved back across the slope to the far side of the house, climbed up onto the deck, and let myself in through the glass doors.

  The house was still and dark and undisturbed. No cops were lying in wait, and the SWAT team didn't rappel down from my loft. If the police had been here, they had come and gone without breaking the door and without abusing my possessions.

  The message light on my machine was blinking. I played it back, worried that it was Jennifer and that I had missed her call, but it was Lou Poitras. He called me an asshole, and then he hung up. You've got to love Lou.

  I went into the kitchen, opened a Falstaff, and drank some. The moon was waxing three-quarters, and blue light spilled through the glass steeples at the back of my A-frame to flood the living room. I didn't need the light. Behind me the cat door clacked and the cat walked into the kitchen. He went to his food bowl.

  I said, "It's been a pretty crummy day. The least you could do is say hello."

  He stared at his bowl.

  I took out his dry food and fed him. I watched as he ate, and then I took down a larger bowl and put it on the floor and emptied the box into it. I didn't know when I would get back, so I figured that this would have to do. I turned on the kitchen tap just enough to drip. He could hop up and drink.

  I went to each door to make sure it was locked, then found a nylon overnight bag and packed it with toiletry items and three changes of clothes. The police had my wallet and all the things in it, but I had spare American Express cards and Visa cards in my dresser, along with gas cards and three hundred dollars in cash. I packed that, too.

  When I was done I called Charlie Bauman, a lawyer I know who has an office in Santa Monica. I called him at home. Charlie answered on the fourth ring and said, "Hey, Elvis, how's it going, buddy?" There was music somewhere behind him and he sounded glad to hear from me.

  I said, "I'm sitting on the floor in my living room, in the dark, and I'm wanted on three murder counts and a dope charge."

  Charlie said, "Shit, are you out of your nut?" He didn't sound so happy to hear from me anymore.

  I told him about it. When I got to the arrest and the questioning, he stopped me.

  "You should've called me. Never give up your right to an attorney. That was bush."

  "I'm calling you now, Charlie."

  "Yeah, yeah. After you fuck up."

  I gave him the rest of it. When I finished, he didn't say anything for a while.

  "Charlie?"

  "You assaulted a police officer, and you escaped?"

  "Pike and I. Yeah."

  "Shit."

  I didn't say anything.

  Charlie said, "Okay. You've got to come in. Come to my place, and we'll go in together. I'm sure we can pull bail, even after this."

  "No."

  "What do you mean, no?"

  "I can't come in yet, Charlie. There's something I've got to do."

  Charlie went ballistic. "Are you fucked?"

  I hung up.

  The house was quiet with a stillness that went beyond the auditory or the visual. Outside, a police helicopter tracked across the horizon, overflying Hollywood. Closer, cars wound their way along mountain roads. The phone rang, but I did not answer it. The machine caught it, and Charlie said, "Okay, so you're not going to go in. Shit, pick up, willya?"

  I picked up.

  He made a sigh. "All right. I'll talk to the DA. I'll start trying to work things out."

  "Sure."

  "Shit, don't get killed." He hung up. What a way to say good-bye.

  I went back to the aloneness of my house and wondered if in fact Jennifer Sheridan was going to call. Maybe I was just wasting my time, and risking my freedom.

  The cat came out of the kitchen and watched me for a while, the way cats will, but then he tired of it and left. I thought that, were I a cat, it might be nice to go with him. Creep through a little grass, stalk a few field mice, maybe hang with a couple of nice lady cats. I guess cats grow weary of human pursuits. So do humans.

  Thirty-six minutes later gravel crunched outside my front door and a light played through the entry windows. The cops from the sedan, come to take a look-see.

  Footsteps moved to the carport and a second light tracked along the opposite side of the house. I scrambled behind the couch, and tried to wedge myself under it. The footsteps came out onto the deck, and now both lights raked over the couch and the living room and the stairs that lead up to my loft. There was maybe eight feet and a couple of dust bunnies between me and the two cops. I held my breath. The lights worked over the couch again and then the footsteps went away. My, my. Nothing like an adrenaline jolt to help you wile away the hours.

  Seventy-two minutes after the cops had come to call, the phone rang again, and this time it was Jennifer Sheridan. When I picked up, she said, "Thank God you're there."

  "Where are you?" Her voice was low, as if maybe she were calling without Mark knowing. Or maybe because she was just tired.

  "I'm with Mark."

  "Where with Mark?"

  "I made
a mistake getting you involved in this. You have to stop, now. You have to leave us alone."

  "It's too late to leave you alone, Jennifer." I told her about the Eight-Deuce Gangster Boys. I told her about Eric Dees working through the Eight-Deuce to set me up and I told her about James Edward Washington getting his brains blown out. I said, "They're killing people. That means Mark is involved. They set us up with the Eight-Deuce and Akeem D'Muere killed James Edward Washington and that's the same as if they had ordered him killed. They're accessories before the fact, and if you're a part of it now, then you're an accessory after the fact. Do you understand that?"

  She was breathing hard, but she didn't sound frantic. She sounded resolved. "We can't come back, yet. We have to stay away."

  "Because of Mark?"

  "It's not like what you think. Eric is going to work everything out. We only have to be up here a little while." Up here.

  I said, "Eric isn't going to work it out, Jennifer. D'Muere is out of control. You need to come in. Tell me where you are."

  "I can't do that. I'm calling to ask you to stop. I want you to leave us alone."

  "I can't do that. It's larger than you now, Jennifer. There's James Edward."

  Jennifer Sheridan hung up.

  I stood in the dark with the phone in my hand, and then I replaced the receiver and reset the answering machine. I made sure all of the windows were locked and the alarm was armed and the faucet still dripped for the cat, and then I picked up the overnight bag, let myself out, and moved back down the slope to the trees.

  It took just under an hour to work my way back to Mulholland and to the turnout where Joe Pike was waiting. It was a broad, flat area looking out on the valley. Pike's Jeep was there. So were a Toyota Celica and a Chevy van. Music came from the van.

  I slipped into the passenger side of the Jeep and Pike looked at me. The smell of coffee was strong. "She call?"

  "Yes. She wouldn't tell me where she is."