The Devil's Necktie (23 page)

41

The peeling paint on the green door vibrated as the door slammed in a mindless way in the hot winter wind howling down off the San Bernardino Mountains.

Jack knew that a murder had been committed inside the low-rent apartment, but he'd found no visible blood and no body. He had alerted Nick, Gallina, and Tompkins, and wasn't looking forward to their scrutiny.

From the color of the splintered wood it appeared that the bedposts had recently been ripped off the frame. Two cut silk handkerchiefs skirted the bottom legs. The bed had been stripped and from the stains on the mattress it appeared that sex had occurred, but not necessarily a crime.

Not necessarily a murder, but the apartment smelled of fear and death. Jack wasn't confused about the energy in the room.

Nick was the first one to exit the apartment and step up to Jack. “It smells like a French whorehouse or my dorm room at college. Did you notice that as dirty as the place was—”

“The desk had been wiped clean,” Jack said, finishing Nick's sentence. “And the shower knobs, and that little fucking fridge. Who uses a fridge like that anymore?”

“College students living in dorms. For beer and huh, beer. I could get a tech unit in, but I don't see probable cause. And the sister's
feelings
won't play at the department.”

Jack pulled out a small envelope and handed it to Nick. “I found it in the carpet under the desk. I think there's blood on the tear.”

Curious, Nick opened the envelope and shook it out onto his notebook to avoid contamination.

A red-painted fingernail.

“So I'll call in the tech squad.”

Lieutenant Gallina walked out of the apartment, followed by Tompkins.

“Smells like sex in there,” Gallina said, scrunching up his face. “Funky. Why is this the first we're hearing about Johnny Rodriguez?”

Jack was cool about his oversight. “It was all preliminary until I got the call from his sister. Hector Lopez was just another potential on my list. I can't prove he's relevant yet. The two of them are supposed to be attached at the hip, though. And I think they're good for Mia.”

Gallina gave him a dark look. “I'm gonna call in a crew and have them do their thing. Too many bodies showing up,” he muttered.

Nick handed them the evidence envelope.

“Whose is this, and where the fuck did it come from?” Gallina asked, losing his patience.

Nick threw a glance at Jack.

“I found it under the desk,” Jack answered. “Don't know who it belongs to, but when I know, you'll know.”

“Christ, this is no way to run an investigation,” Gallina said. “Okay, keep me in the loop.”

“Lieutenant, can we keep his sister out of this for the time being? If she thinks I called in the calvary, I'll lose her as a contact. She may be valuable.”

Gallina looked like he was going to blow his top. “Okay, Bertolino,” he growled. “But if her brother turns up dead, she's ours.”

Jack nodded his thanks.

“But don't hold out on me. I want this put to bed as much as you two do. You two do,” he repeated, mocking himself. “Christ, I can't talk anymore.”

He stormed off toward his car as two black-and-whites rolled on to the scene. A fresh-faced uniform exited his vehicle with a roll of yellow crime scene tape, and went to work cordoning off the entrance to the apartment.

Tompkins stepped in close. “They found the Escalade at the Long Beach Airport, long-term parking. Front-end damage, no prints. Stolen. We looked at the security camera at the lot and—”

“All it showed was a guy in a wide-brimmed hat,” Jack said.

“You got it. I googled it. It's called a Panama.”

“Arturo Delgado. You find him, you're a hero,” Jack said evenly. “I find him, he's dead.”

That seemed reasonable to Tompkins.

—

Hector drove up into the mountains and hung a left off the paved road. He jumped out of the car to pull back a metal gate, then closed the gate behind him when he had driven through. His car disappeared around a bend in a rutted dirt fire road.

Mando had been furious when he heard about Johnny turning rat. It was a personal affront. He liked the kid, but he sanctioned the kill. They could have no weak links. No question. He offered to have someone else do the job, but Hector felt personally responsible and wanted it done right. He wanted his friend to disappear off the face of the earth.

Johnny was Hector's last tie to anything that could be construed as a personal relationship. Hector wasn't really sad. He didn't really feel anything. Strange. He was concerned about Angelina. She was a loose end, and that didn't sit well with Hector. She did have bigger balls than Johnny, and she was the one who had made the call. She would implicate herself if she went to the authorities. And she had Angel blood running through and through.

Hector would have a conversation with her brother and make sure he kept her in line. He nodded to himself as he bumped along. That was the right decision.

He soon pulled the car over to the side of the fire road and carefully backed up under a canopy of evergreen tree branches. His car would be hidden from police helicopters and prying eyes. Hector had work to do.

Johnny had been wrapped in his own sheets. Less potential DNA evidence left behind, Hector thought as he humped the dead body over one shoulder and carted it deep into the pine forest. Johnny's lifeless head banged roughly against a tree trunk as Hector made an abrupt turn while he scouted out the perfect burial site.

“You ain't so pretty now, huh, Johnny?”

Hector wasn't sure if he had said it out loud, or just thought it, but it made him laugh nonetheless. After scanning the area, he settled on a slight ridge, and threw the body down onto the pine straw.

Upon impact the sheet pulled off Johnny's naked upper body. One of his arms was pinned at an impossible angle behind his back. The other flopped over his head, revealing the handcuff still attached to his wrist. His hazel eyes were partly shut, dulled, covered in an opaque film. His neck was a solid mass of purple and blue bruises. Some of his tattoos were obscured by the blood that had settled in his chest while lying in the Impala's trunk. His tongue protruded from his mouth and was dark and distended.

Johnny Rodriguez had been strangled to death.

Change the pattern of the kill, slow down the search, leave no blood evidence behind, Hector mused, proud of his God-given talent.

He walked back to the Impala to retrieve his tools. His knives, a folding spade with a serrated blade, two rolls of three-millimeter plastic drop cloths, duct tape, a joint, matches, and a twelve-pack of Dos Equis. Might as well take some time and enjoy nature.

Hector locked up his beauty, started back up the trail, and sucked in full breaths of the fresh, chilled, pine-scented air.

—

No one looked up when Jack Bertolino entered the Black Stallion, but everyone knew that he wasn't a regular. Jack knew he'd worn out his welcome before he stepped over the threshold. He felt the frigid silence as he walked up to the bar and grabbed a stool.

He'd experienced a similar feeling as a young undercover detective when he found himself in a mob-owned private club on Mulberry Street. It was the wrong address, and the guys let him know before they'd wiped the espresso off their lips that he was on their turf, and if he wanted to enjoy the rest of his afternoon, he'd move on.

Jack could see the back of a woman, who he thought was Angelina, giving him the evil eye in the expanse of mirror that backed the bottles of booze, creating the illusion of a double row and a grander space. The mirror worked for them both.

Jack picked out Izel at the far end of the bar as she wiped glasses and held them up to the light to check for lipstick marks before placing them in an overhead rack for the evening rush. She pretended not to notice his existence. He hadn't come to hang her out to dry.

An older gentleman who had the feel of a gangster sat in the power booth, reading the newspaper and looking like he owned the place. The man never glanced up from his article.

Must be damn good reading, Jack thought.

Johnny's sister, Diane, had been extremely upset on the phone when Jack gave her the update. He promised to call again as soon as he heard anything related to Johnny's whereabouts, making sure to leave out the detail about the cops being involved. She in turn had provided him with Angelina's name, where she worked, and the extent of her relationship with Johnny as she understood it. Jack thought the time was ripe to rattle a cage or two.

Angelina grabbed a bar napkin and slapped it down in front of Jack. One of her fingernails was a different color and thickness from the rest. It was artificial, and the polish was a lighter shade of red.

“What can I get you?” she said, all business.

“I want a draft, and I want to talk to your boyfriend.”

“You and me both. This dating thing is crazy,” she deadpanned.

“Johnny Rodriguez,” he said so that the entire room could hear.

Jack felt the OG's eyes snap up before he caught him in the mirror.

Unruffled, Angelina pulled a draft and set it down in front of Jack.

“Old news. He broke up with me a month ago. Said I wasn't in the same socioeconomic class or some shit like that. Can you believe it? Who the fuck drives a Prius anyway?”

“When's the last time you saw him?”

“You a cop?”

“Is that a problem?”

Angelina looked at him like he was something she had stepped in and couldn't get off her shoe.

“I haven't seen him, like, socially. I mean, he comes around and I serve him like any other customer, you know?”

“That must hurt.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Your ear. Looks painful.”

Angelina's hand went reflexively to the bandage on the lobe of her torn ear, and her eyes flickered for a second and then went cold.

The older gentleman was out of his booth and moving toward the bar.

“I'm looking for Hector,” Jack said to Angelina.

“We get a lot of Hectors. Don't you know where you are, fool?” Angelina marched off to the far end of the bar, ducked under, and disappeared into a back room.

Felix was now standing at Jack's side, violating his personal space, staring into the mirror. No eye contact. Two young soldiers had taken flanking positions. Everyone was armed. Izel finished with a tray of limes and then followed Angelina's path under the bar.

“Drink's on me. Time to vamoose.”

Jack turned slowly, stared at Felix, and memorized his face.

“I'm looking for Johnny Rodriguez and Hector Lopez,” he said, quietly this time.

“Be careful what you wish for. Your time is up.”

Two more young thugs entered the bar and stood off to one side, poised for whatever was needed, ready to do gang business.

The numbers weren't adding up in Jack's favor, and he had already gotten what he came for. He threw a ten on the bar, turned, and walked out.

—

Jack rapidly crossed the street and headed down the sidewalk. He could see in the reflection of the retail stores that the two young thugs had followed him out as far as the parking lot and then turned back, confident that they had kept their machismo intact.

He made a left at the corner, jumped in the old Plymouth Fury, and waited a few more moments before turning the key. He was pleased with the sound the 426 hemi engine produced. After a few blocks he pulled to the curb on a side street that afforded him an unobstructed view of an alleyway and the delivery entrance to the Black Stallion.

Jack was about to dial his son's number at the hospital when the back door to the Stallion flew open, and Angelina pounded up the alley, away from Jack's position. She had her car keys dangling from one hand, and what appeared to be an overnight bag filled to the max in the other. He calmly put his phone away.

As soon as Angelina had reached the cross street, Nick Aprea in his Expedition, and Gallina and Tompkins in their government-issue, skidded to a stop and blocked her way.

Nick was the first out of his car and grabbed Angelina in a heartbeat. She went to slap him, and in a move he had perfected in hand-to-hand combat training in the marines, he spun her around and cuffed her before she had time to call him a
maricon
.

Tompkins took it from there. He grabbed Angelina by her cuffed wrists, shoved her into the rear of their undercover ride, jumped in beside her, and slammed the door. Gallina hit the gas and made a tire-spinning exit. Grabbing her overnight bag, Nick stepped up into his SUV and followed smoothly in their wake. In less than fifteen seconds, Angelina ceased to exist.

The plan was for Nick to lead the interview since he was up to speed on Jack's case and Johnny and Hector's history. Gallina and Tompkins agreed to take second position after much heated debate.

With Johnny's wallet and the keys to his new Prius left behind on top of his spotless desktop, no one was optimistic that he was still alive.

The wrong-number phone call—corroborated by Ortega in Miami—had been generated from Johnny's apartment and from Johnny's clean phone. And the woman's voice sounded a lot like Angelina's. If she knew he was talking to Bertolino and the cops, Johnny Rodriguez was as good as dead.

Jack was going to sit surveillance on the Lopez house. He was confident someone in the Angels would contact Hector and let him know he was in the crosshairs. If Hector had anything of value hidden at the family home, Jack felt certain he'd clear it out before he hit the road. It's what he would do before taking an extended trip, and he had the feeling that it was Hector who was going to vamoose for a long time.

—

“I told Jeremy that he had to take Mom back to the hotel or I'd start banging my head against the wall. She was driving me nuts,” Chris said.

“She's just worried about you,” Jack said from his parked location. He was two blocks from the Lopez residence, but no one could come or go without being made.