Adjourned (4 page)

"It never did, Mack." Shaw shook his head. "You're kidding yourself if you think anything will justify it now."

"Injustice, Ronny, that's our justification," Macklin replied. "The law isn't working. Too many criminals are going free and too many innocent people are getting hurt."

"Oh, spare me the ethical bullshit and let's get to the point, okay?" Stocker shuffled to his desk and fell into his seat. "We're talking about a fourth man. Someone else who knows, Macklin, that you're Mr. Jury."

"And knows you're encouraging me."

"What kind of man are we talking about?" Stocker ran his hands through his hair. Macklin had him by the balls. He had to show Macklin just how crazy the idea was. "A neoconservative ex-judge like Sinclair Thompson, a lunatic liberal lawyer like Frank Swift, or a mercurial Harlan Fitz clone? Face it, Macklin, the three of us are in it alone. We are inextricably bound to each other."

"Harlan Fitz . . . ," Macklin mused.

"A big-mouthed, headline-mongering ex-judge turned talk-show personality who has his head securely up his ass," Stocker snapped.
Jesus, why can't Macklin understand?
"The guy can't figure whether he's on our side or the ACLU's. He's a jackass. We both hate him. Case closed. We're back to square one."

"I've never heard of Harlan Fitz," Macklin mused, "but he sounds like our man. If both sides can't stand him, he must be doing something right."

Macklin walked toward the door. "Ronny, you approach him while I scope out Mr. Saputo."

Before either Stocker or Shaw could object, Macklin was gone.

There's no business like show business, it's like no business I know . . .

The needle was stuck on Brett Macklin's mental turntable. Ethel Merman belted out that lyric again and again in Macklin's head as he glided toward the red light at Overland and Culver Boulevard. He could understand why the song droned on. It was the toll charge the neighborhood exacted for driving through.

The MGM Studios water tower, with the logo of the company's latest film emblazoned on it, loomed a few blocks up under a blanket of bruised clouds. To his right he saw the Veterans Memorial Building fountain, frothy water gurgling through the sprockets of three intertwined steel strips fashioned like movie film.

This is movieland,
he heard the neighborhood try to convince him,
and there is glitter here. You may not see it, but it's here.

The neighborhood merchants apparently saw it, somewhere behind the age-beaten Premiere Motel or beside Celebrity Hair Styling or around the corner from Al's Star Burgers.

Macklin didn't see any. Maybe Wesley Saputo, riding in a tan four-door Seville two cars in front of him, did. The light switched to green and the traffic crawled eastward on the rain-slicked street toward downtown Culver City.

Macklin studied the buildings as he passed them. They looked like the facades pretending to be buildings on a Hollywood backlot. Cement and gray, art deco, fantasyland, urbanity. If one could buy a business district at Ralph's, Macklin thought, this would be in the plain-wrap section.

He sighed. He'd driven past here a thousand times and never cared about appearances before. Now he cared.
Shit,
he thought,
am I bored.
To drown out Ethel, he clicked on KROQ-FM and turned up the volume. A rebel yell from Billy Idol shook the car. Ethel sang on, undaunted.

Macklin had been following Saputo around for two days and had canceled several charter flights to find the time. He was beginning to get mad about all the money he had pissed away to play cops and robbers. Time Macklin could have spent in the air, flying charters and thereby paying the bills that cluttered his office, was killed in his car outside Saputo's apartment building listening to Dire Straits and Bruce Springsteen tapes.

At least Mort is flying,
Macklin thought.
It's a good thing, too, or I wouldn't have the money to pay him.

Macklin wouldn't have been upset if Saputo had at least done something incriminating. But Saputo rarely left his weed-landscaped mustard yellow Mar Vista apartment building except to run down to Safeway for groceries. Macklin was beginning to wonder if Stocker and Shaw knew what they were talking about.

Saputo turned right where Culver met Venice Boulevard and then veered left onto Robertson. Macklin followed, yawning, noticing with irritation that the afternoon was giving way to evening. The city was now enjoying the chilly afterglow of a day of cold, hazy blue sunshine.

The Seville wound through a mazelike path of side streets lined with bland, boxy, one- and two-story industrial buildings before pulling over beside a windowless warehouse. Macklin drove past the warehouse, made a U-turn two blocks away, and came back. He stopped behind a cement mixing truck parked kitty-corner from the warehouse and turned off his ignition.

He watched Saputo rise from the passenger side of the Seville. Three hairless grizzly bears stuffed into camel-colored slacks and Sanka brown corduroy jackets emerged from the car after him. Macklin had no doubt the three apes packed some heavy artillery under those carved-granite shoulders.

Macklin studied Saputo, who strutted toward the warehouse door in his Jordache jeans, tan polyester jacket, and red silky dress shirt unbuttoned down to the bulge of his stomach. A gold chain tapped against his bony chest with each footfall.

It was Macklin's first opportunity to look at the man. In the next brief second or two, Macklin knew Stocker and Shaw were right. He saw it in Saputo's self-impressed gait, in the narrow I'm-fucking-your-wife-and-your-daughter-too grin, in the eyes that conveyed a school-yard bully's childish defiance and disrespect.

Macklin saw Saputo slip a key into the steel door, which was the bottom right corner of a much larger door that could slide up to let in trucks. Saputo stepped inside, two guards galloping after him like pet dogs. The third man stayed outside grimacing, apparently unhappy at having to perform sentry duty.

Macklin settled back in his seat, pushed a Doors tape in the Sanyo, and prepared for a long wait. The guard lit a cigarette, reached down with one hand to adjust his balls, and began to pace in front of the warehouse, blowing smoke out of his mouth in tiny circles.

# # # # # #

A van wound around the corner in front of Macklin, the headlight beams cutting a swath in the darkness toward his head. Macklin ducked as the light passed through the car and glanced at his watch. It was 8:04 p.m. Roughly three hours had passed since he had parked outside the warehouse.

Macklin sat up and saw the van pull up to the warehouse door. The driver honked twice. The sentry, facing Macklin's direction as he appeared around the edge of the warehouse, tossed away a glowing cigarette butt and walked around the back of the van to the driver's side.

The driver and the sentry knew each other, Macklin assumed, because the sentry stayed there chatting as the steel warehouse door rose noisily. Bright light spilled from inside the warehouse and bathed the van in whiteness. The van surged forward, and Macklin could see the end of a laugh on the sentry's face. The warehouse door dropped quickly, swallowing the van and the light. But not before Macklin caught a glimpse of the van's license plate.

Macklin scribbled the plate number down on a notepad beside him, adding to the list of plate numbers he had copied from cars parked around the warehouse.

The sentry walked toward Macklin without noticing him and then turned around the edge of the warehouse, disappearing from Macklin's view.

Macklin scratched his cheek. Hmmm.

His buttocks ached, and he was sick of listening to his tapes. And nothing was happening outside the warehouse. All the action was inside. Macklin figured those were good reasons to get up, stretch, and give the warehouse a careful look-over.

He opened the door, stepped outside, and bent over, touching his toes. His back cracked audibly. Macklin frowned.
I'm turning into a fat old man.
Lately, Macklin had come to accept that he wasn't the muscular youth who had dashed through UCLA on a track scholarship anymore.

Macklin closed the door, careful to muffle the sound, and sprinted stealthily across the street to the shadows of the office building beside the warehouse.
By now the sentry is directly behind Saputo's warehouse,
Macklin thought.
If I'm alert, I can circle the building undetected, staying behind the sentry.

Abandoning his cover in the shadows against the building, he dashed lightly on the balls of his feet across the alley to the side of Saputo's warehouse. As he moved along the wall, he noticed the cement expanse had no doors or windows.

Macklin slid his body around the back of the warehouse and saw the back of the sentry disappearing around the opposite side. This wall, too, had no openings. He sprinted across the length of the warehouse and paused before rounding the next corner. Peering around the wall's edge, he saw the sentry standing next to a garbage bin. The sentry struck a match on the edge of the bin, his fleshy face momentarily illuminated as he lit the cigarette that dangled between his puffy lips.

The sentry flicked his smoking match away and shuffled along the asphalt to the front of the warehouse. As soon as the sentry rounded the corner, Macklin crept quietly over to the trash bin. He noticed that a rust-coated padlock clamped the bin closed.

What kind of trash is so important that you lock it up?
Macklin wondered, tugging on the padlock. He stared at the bin, letting his imagination assume the worst. In his mind, he could see his nine-year-old daughter, Corinne, amidst the trash, neck sliced open, maggots squirming over her bloated, decaying face.

He shivered, his stomach churning.

You've got a sick mind, Mack, a real sick mind.

Macklin dashed back, the way he had come, to the rear of the warehouse and crossed the alley to the rear of the adjacent office building. He went around the side of the building and paused, glancing to his left to see where the sentry was. The sentry was out of sight, probably beginning his circle around the warehouse again. Macklin trotted to his car and got inside.

He took a deep breath and studied the warehouse.
What are you doing in there, Wesley?
Macklin reached out to the glove box with his right hand. Sitting beside the .357 Magnum was a baggie full of cut carrots. He pulled out the bag, closed the glove box, and clicked on the stereo. Munching on his carrots, he scrunched down in his seat and waited, letting his mind wander to thoughts of Cheshire.

He was glad Cheshire had the night shift this week and wouldn't be stumbling into the house until after midnight. She'd be less aware of his absence and would be less likely to question his excuses.

Cheshire was spending four to five nights a week at Macklin's Venice home. Macklin remembered how uncomfortable it had felt at first, how scared and pressured her presence had made him feel. But those uncomfortable feelings had ebbed with surprising speed and were replaced by an urgency, a need to spend time with her.

Macklin found it all so ironic. Becoming involved with her had never been part of his plans. They had met nearly a year ago, during the horrible weeks after his father's murder.

She had gone to nursing school with Mort's sister and had patched up the stab wound Macklin received in a deadly struggle with one of the gang members who had killed his father.

He used her then, making love to her and spending the night with her as an alibi. While she slept, Macklin snuck away to kill one of the murderers.

But after his father had been avenged, Macklin continued to see her. In fact, she was the only person he saw. He couldn't bring himself to see his daughter, Cory, or Brooke, his ex-wife. Not after what he had done. Not after what he had become.

Cheshire was part of his new life. Cory and Brooke were part of his old life, a life sacrificed to the driving compulsion inside him that the public called Mr. Jury. For now, despite his love for Cory, Cheshire was all he had.

He felt that being with Cheshire was rebuilding him. He was beginning to feel that he might be able to recapture some of what he had lost.

The small warehouse door opened, interrupting Macklin's introspection. Wesley Saputo, accompanied by his two guards, emerged from inside and sauntered to the Seville. Saputo was hyped up, talking excitedly, his hands moving quickly to illustrate some point. They waited for the sentry to join them, and then the four men got into the Seville. The headlights flashed on and the engine roared to life.

Macklin ducked down as the Seville sped past him. When the car had turned the corner, Macklin started up his car and drove to the edge of the warehouse, stopping next to the trash bin. Leaving the engine running, he got out and opened the trunk.

He pulled out a pair of bolt cutters and a Glad trash bag and closed the trunk. His face etched with determination, Macklin pinched the padlock between the cutting blades and snapped the clasp. Dropping the bolt cutters, he lifted open the trash bin.

The sour stench of decay smacked him, curling his face into a wince.
God, what a smell.
Breathing through his mouth to avoid the smell, Macklin leaned into the bin, searching through the rotten food, empty bottles, and cans. He grabbed handfuls of damp, slippery paper and three typewriter ribbon cartridges and shoved them into the bag.

Closing the bin, he picked up the bag and his bolt cutters and returned to the car. Macklin turned on his interior light and examined the contents of the bag.

A wave of nausea rocked Macklin as he gazed at three soiled, torn, and yellowed photos of naked girls, no older than ten or eleven, being fondled by men with hungry grins.

The bastards . . .

He shoved the photos back into the bag.
I'm going to stop this shit,
Macklin thought.
What Saputo is doing is inhuman.
Macklin flipped off the interior light, started the engine, and drove away.

Had Macklin looked in his rearview mirror, he would have seen the dark form standing at the edge of the warehouse behind him, watching.