12 Days (4 page)

Day One: 2:59 p.m.

The West Covina police station was essentially a large room with six desks and a holding cell. There was an office for the lieutenant and a conference room in the back, but a tour of the facility normally took little more than a sweep of the eyes. Jim did not give Lisa a tour. He led her to his desk and sat her down on a very uncomfortable chair.

“Would you like some coffee?”

“Yes, thanks. Cream, if you have it.”

She was already keyed up from her earlier caffeine jolt and from the discovery on the tree, but what the hell, she liked the feeling. It made the excitement more intense. Jim returned moments later with two paper cups of something that looked like coffee. With the added cream, Lisa tasted something reminiscent of a glass of dishwater and milk, but she sipped it like a trooper, hiding her grimace as Jim sat down in his chair. Jim was not so polite. Upon his first taste, he gagged and shouted to no one in particular.

“Prints came back from the California Bar Association. Our dead Santa is Paul Anthony Artridge, 9776 Wilshire Blvd. #1403, Los Angeles, California. Apparently, he was some hot shot litigation attorney, a partner in a big firm in Century City.”

Roy continued.

“The jumpsuits found ligature marks around the guy’s wrists and traces of chloroform on toxicology screen. Mr. Artridge did not kill himself. He definitely had help.”

“I’ve been living in West Covina for three years, Officer Jovian. Besides the occasional gang banger, I don’t remember there being that many murders in the area. This has to be a big deal for you guys.”

Jim put the papers aside.

“Why do you assume that this was a murder, Ms. Klein?”

“Come on, Officer Jovian, of course he was murdered. I mean, he could have done it himself but there was no ladder and that branch might not have supported his weight while he tied the rope.”

“Maybe. It’s impossible to know at this point. I mean it could have been made by anyone. Maybe two young lovers to commemorate their first kiss.”

“If it’s not, based upon the weight of our Santa and the height of the tree branch, she would have to be one gigantic buffed-up woman.”

“You’re a pretty sharp cookie, Ms. Klein.”

“Jim.”

“I know Deputy Horndog over there told you he got a match on the prints. Give me a name and I’ll show you the edited piece before it airs.”

“I have an idea. Why don’t you take your pal over there into the back and keep him distracted for a minute. I’ll walk over to his desk, find the name and be on my way. I’ll call you at seven tonight and confirm that his family knows. I air my story, you clear your conscience, and nobody is the wiser.”

Jim stared at Lisa, knowing better than to say ‘yes’ but feeling he could not say ‘no’ to this woman. There was something about her. Her hair, her voice, her confidence. She could be the ingredient missing from his life. He knew this as surely as he knew there would be more murders.

As Jim and Roy moved out of view, Lisa grabbed a pen from Jim’s desk and skulked over to Roy’s workspace. The file was easy to find - the only one on Roy’s desk. She opened it with the pen and read the name.

Lisa gasped.

“Paul Artridge, holy shit.”

She closed the file and hurried out of the office. Jim and Roy returned from their sojourn just as the door closed behind her. When Jim saw that she was gone, he felt a strange emptiness. He was not concerned that he may have compromised his future as a police officer in West Covina. He realized he was more concerned that Lisa would not call at seven as promised.

Day One: 4:35 p.m.

The Los Angeles Zoo was in Griffith Park, about fourteen miles north of downtown L.A. Not as famous as the renowned animal sanctuary 150 miles south in San Diego, the L.A. Zoo was closed to the public on holidays.
Stupid
, he thought, for when else would people want to see animals, other than on days off? Regardless of the calendar, rain or shine, the denizens of the zoo needed to eat. He knew that feeding time on Thanksgiving was completed by 5:00 p.m. and then everyone, except a single watchman, would be gone for the night. The same was true Christmas Day. He sat in the parking lot and waited for the employees to leave so that he could enter the zoo and continue his work. He heard her kicking against the canopy that covered the truck’s rear bed. Jesus Christ, she was persistent. He wanted to scream, threaten to kill her now, but he thought better of it. For this whole symphony to crescendo correctly, he needed to be precise. Patience was his master. He closed his eyes, visualizing the grand work in his mind, visualizing as he had learned from
The Secret
and all those other self-help books. He was tapping into his source, the power that connects us all. Somewhere deep inside the zoo, an elephant blared a trumpeting cry.

Day One: 5:47 p.m.

The ringing phone jolted Jim from his slumber. At first, he thought the noise was part of his dream, an annoying distraction as he hunted deep in the woods for a prey that had no form. The fourth ring was the wake up blow. He bolted upright and looked at the clock radio, its LED numbers proudly displayed 5:47. Too early, he thought, for Lisa’s call.

“There were a lot of prints on the car; apparently the old lady didn’t wash it too often. But on the driver’s side front window were two palm prints, very close to one another, and a partial thumb. We ran it against Artridge and got a positive match. Nice call, man.”

It felt a hundred pound rock was sinking into his gut.
The Captain wants to see me. Shit.

Jim hung up the phone and sat up in bed.
The motherfucker set off the car alarm. I could have been there. I could have stopped it. Now the Captain wants to see me. Fuck. No one checks out car alarms. Especially when Alice Edwards is on the phone. The batshit old hag calls the precinct all the fucking time; kids on her lawn, music from the neighbors too loud, never ending. God damn it. What am I going to do?

Jim sized up the situation. He’d play it as it rolled, just like he always did. He rose from his bed and headed for the shower. He turned on the hot water and let it run, hoping it would have a cleansing effect on his mind, body and soul. But it was just warm water, not a baptism. That sick feeling in the pit of his stomach was growing with every breath, like a cancer. He couldn’t help but feel that everything was about to be lost. Every damned thing.

Day One: 6:30 p.m.

Lisa sat quietly in the editing bay at KVTM News, reviewing Milt’s footage. She read the copy she wrote and smiled when she saw that it hummed. The story was unsettling, but the story would sell, and that’s all that mattered. She tried to focus on her work, but it was difficult; she could not get her mind off the carving on the tree. Lisa wouldn’t show it on the air, as she promised, but at some point, the public had a right to know. She was not going to lie to Officer Jovian, at least not yet. Besides, Jim might be very useful if the “one” led to a “two, three, four.”

And it was more than that. She sensed something in his eyes, something about the way he looked at her. Lisa had seen that look before, many times in her early twenties; not so often lately. Long ago, she had given up thinking that the perfect guy was out there. And although most unmarried career women of her age spend their time believing that thirty was the new twenty, Lisa was not that delusional. She saw the early signs of age after every smile, the random silver streak peaking anxiously through her auburn hair, the sagging. All of it was a little unnerving. Under the right circumstances, any imperfect man could fill the void that ambition had carved into her life. She was looking forward to their conversation at seven. A brief thought of kissing him crossed her mind; where did that come from? Getting her mind back on her work, she hoped beyond hope that the Artridge family had been notified. She was going to use his name in the story regardless and she did not want to lose Jim as an ally. Not yet, anyway.