Cicero's Dead (16 page)

“Dead and gone.”

The weight of what had just happened was beginning
to press in on me. “Jesus Christ.”

“What d’you wanna do, Nick?”

“Do?” I replied. My voice sounding strange, thin,
distant.

Bobby came over and took the nine millie out of my
hand. “Bro, get a grip.”

I looked at the blood and bits of tattooed flesh
slowly dripping off the mantelpiece, the spray pattern across the wall. I
desperately wanted to feel something, anything, but all I felt was numb.

He said quietly, “We call this in, the cops’ll be
all over us like flies on shit. We’ll beat it; I mean it’s clearly
self-defense, but who knows how long they’ll detain us. Clipper’ll be alerted.
So will Halladay. But the real problem is that Jade and Richie’ll be
vulnerable, and fuck knows what’ll happen to ‘em.”

He was right and we both knew it. The desire to
protect them was overwhelming, even though it could cost me my liberty. “I
guess we have to bury these bastards.”

He looked at them with utter contempt and shook
his head. “Fuck ‘em. They were gonna kill us.”

I shrugged. “So what do we do?”

“I have a compadre who runs a hog farm.”

“Oh, man, I dunno.”

“Why not? Hogs gotta eat too.”

I realized I’d been holding my breath and let it
out. “No, that’s just wrong.”

“Are you high?”

“No, but I could a use a few shots’a bourbon.”

“We’ll do that after we dump the guns and feed the
porkers.”

I hesitated and Bobby grew anxious. “Make your
mind up, bro. We don’t have time for any weak shit.”

Even though it felt wrong, I knew that he was
right. “I’ll get the body bags.” Years ago when we were first becoming pals,
Tony Bott gave me half-a-dozen body bags as a gag. Figuring you never know, I’d
always held onto them, hiding them up in the garage where Cassady wasn’t likely
to spot them.

When I came back in with two bags, Bobby was
pulling a pair of rubber utility gloves over his massive hands and stuffed what
remained of the bikers into the bags. I sliced open several black garbage bags
and taped them over the entrance where the French doors used to be. Next, we
wiped up all the blood, shoving the blood-stained rags into one of the bags. We
washed the wall and floor with a mixture of hot water, bleach and disinfectant.
It wouldn’t stand up to a UV blood scan, but on first blush it would pass. I
retrieved the Yukon from around the corner and backed it up to the garage. We
piled in the body bags and dismantled their guns, putting them in an old
shoebox. Before we took off, Bobby stashed his M14 up in the attic. Cops take a
real dim view of fully automatic guns, particularly when they’re fitted with a
silencer. They’re not fond of bodies full of bullet holes in body bags either,
but if our luck held, that would be only a passing concern.

As Bobby drove, I looked at myself in the side
mirror. My left eye was nearly closed and there was a bruise extending from it
clear to my chin. It was painful, but fortunately, nothing seemed to be broken,
and I could still see after a fashion.

Bobby wore a more relaxed version of his 1000 yard
stare, and was silent as we cruised at
 
a smooth 60, heading north on the 605 freeway. I was still trying to get
my head around how we were about to dispose of the bodies, and was grateful for
the silence, no matter how brooding. I got a chill as we passed the Santa Fe
Dam recreation area; the geography was like some strange lunar landscape. The
earth is gashed by a series of stone quarries and heavy equipment lines both
sides of the highway. Huge power poles stand guard over the terrain, with
random billboards advertising graveyards and cancer cures. In the distance, the
stone mountains shimmer.

We rolled east onto the old Route 66 and after
another few miles, turned north on a soothingly deserted Route 39. This is the
only access road leading to Morris Reservoir and a couple of miles further on,
our destination, the San Gabriel Reservoir. As we climbed into the foothills,
the smoke seemed to have dissipated, and the snow shimmered on the distant
mountains. It was nearly 5:00 and the quarry was completely deserted when we
pulled off the road. We parked in front of the locked chain link gate and got
out of the Yukon, stashed our guns, and clambered over the gate. The smell of
oil lingered in the air as we passed a bulldozer and stacks of sawhorses.

“My old man used to be into these machines,” said
Bobby, pointing at the bulldozer. “Big gravel industry outside of Mobile.”

“I never knew that.”

“I never told you.”

We worked our way around the perimeter, taking a
trail that overlooked the deepest part of the reservoir. When we reached the
top, half-shielded from the road by scrub oak, we stood gazing down into the
water, a good 200 feet below. I opened the shoebox and we each grabbed pieces
of the dismantled guns and threw them are far we could, watching as they hit
the surface before sinking to the bottom.

Back on the road, on the way to the pig farm, we
were both silent. The traffic was light to non-existent and we made good time,
finally pulling onto a hidden driveway that led to Bobby’s friend’s spread. We
stopped in front of the main house, a run-down affair made of quarry stone. The
stench from the pigs was overpowering, but not as bad as their constant
squealing.

Bobby was scanning the area. “Stay in the car ‘til
I’ve spoken to Porky.”

“Porky?”

Bobby looked at me. “What?”

“That’s his name?”

“Yeah.”

“And he runs a pig farm.”

“Is that a problem?”

“
Nada
.
Just kind’a weird, that’s all.”

Bobby shrugged. “Okay and, like I said, stay in
the car ‘til I give you the word. Porky gets real touchy about strangers.”

I nodded and he got out. As he headed for the main
house, a huge mountain man, complete with a shock of red hair and ZZ Top beard,
wearing bib-and-brace overalls and carrying a 12 gauge pump, exited the front
door. Bobby stopped and waited for Porky, who was now accompanied by three
pissed off looking dogs of indeterminate breed and lineage. They greeted each
other like long lost comrades and walked over to the Yukon.

“Nick, this is Porky.”

His huge shovel of a hand wrapped itself around
mine and felt like a steel press as he squeezed the blood out of it.

“Wha’sup, bro?” asked Porky, all smiles, not many
teeth, more or less Bobby’s age.

“I’ve been better.”

“Heard that.”

He released my hand and I rubbed it, waiting for the
feeling to return. As I climbed out of the truck and joined them, the dogs eyed
me suspiciously, but refrained from ripping my throat out.

“You want the bags in the pen?” asked Bobby.

“Yeah.”

I unlocked the back of the Yukon and we grabbed
the body bags and carried them over to the nearest pigpen. Inside, the smell
was even more rancid and the pigs, perhaps sensing that it might be feeding
time, squealed eagerly.

“Here’s good,” smiled Porky.

We dropped the bags, opened them and his smile
evaporated.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

He ignored me and turned to Bobby. “You didn’t
tell me they was Los Muertos.”

“So what if they are?”

“It’s a problem.”

“Why?”

“If they ever find out I disposed of some of their
crew, they’ll feed me to my own hogs.”

“But how would they know?” I asked.

“‘Cause I did some work for ‘em yesterday.”

Bobby shrugged. “So what?”

“So they could show up anytime with more business
for me.”

“Then you best get to it, bro.”

“I can’t, man, too risky.”

Bobby frowned, his growing irritation clear to anyone
who wasn’t blind. I wondered how well this hog farmer knew him.

“I’ll double your normal price.” Porky looked at
me, clearly swayed. “How much?”

“Twenty.”

“Done.”

Bobby was now glaring at him, his muscles coiled
and ready.

“You have it with you?”

“I’ve gotta go to the bank, so tomorrow.”

“Then bring the garbage when you come back.”

“But we can’t drive around with that in the
truck.”

“Not my problem.”

Bobby bit the inside of his cheek, and spat out
blood. “Nick, wait in the car.”

I knew that look and the tone in his voice all too
well. I headed for the door.

Suddenly Porky looked scared. “Relax, bro, I’ll do
it.”

“You sure?” growled Bobby quietly, looking like a
mountain lion, ready to pounce and rip him to shreds.

“Yeah. Did you remove the teeth?”

“For twenty large, you fuckin’ do it.”

“Okay, yeah, sure. No problem.”

Bobby stomped past me and got in the truck. I gave
Porky a small wave without really looking at him and got in next to him. We
drove off in silence.

Chapter V – Jailhouse
Rock

One block from Bobby’s
house, four black-and-whites closed in from all directions.

“What the hell?” I said as Bobby pulled over and
cut the engine.

Officer Jansen climbed out of the cruiser that was
across our bow, swaggered over to my side and smirked. “Out.”

All my favorite officers were there: Sanchez,
Tomito, Jansen, Detective Karsagian, and a host of others.

I grinned. “Nice to see you all again.”

“You’re an asshole,” said Jansen.

Bobby and I got out and they cuffed and searched
us. “I guess you’re not so smart after all,” said Karsagian.

I shrugged. “I have my moments and this ain’t
yours.”

The cop searching me found my .45 and looked at it
appreciatively. “Dirty Harry, huh?”

I ignored him and said to Karsagian, “To what do I
owe the pleasure?”

“You’re under arrest for the murder of Doctor
Tarkanian.”

Bobby and I looked at each other and grinned.

“What’s so funny, dick?” hissed Officer Sanchez.

“You gonna read us rights or not?”

“Put ‘em in a car and let’s go,” snarled
Karsagian.

This time there was no unnecessary roughness, as
they ushered us to the back seats of two separate cruisers.

Once again I had Officer Sanchez riding beside me.
“You look like shit, Crane.”

“Everybody’s a comedian.”

“Only you won’t be laughing very much longer.”

I ignored him and addressed Karsagian who was
riding shotgun. “When was he killed?”

“Late Friday night.”

“Wasn’t me.”

“Got an alibi, I suppose?”

“Ironclad.”

He frowned and I knew it was pointless to tell him
I was in San Francisco. He was intent on seeing this through and I had no choice
but to let him make his pitch. My time would come.

“How’d he die?”

“Don’t play games with me.”

“Indulge me, please.”

“You don’t remember burning his face off with a
blowtorch?”

I clammed up as we were transported to the Parker
Center at 1st and Los Angeles Street, just around the corner from the Roybal
Federal Courthouse. The Center is a nine story glass-and-concrete structure
built in the nondescript style of the 50’s. It appeared frequently on the late
‘60’s version of Dragnet, and is where they house the newly arrested until
they’re either released, or arraigned and transferred to L.A. Men’s Central.

In this case, however, they didn’t take us inside
immediately. Instead, I was escorted to the car holding Bobby. Officer Sanchez
shoved me inside and we were left alone. It was after six with just a hint of
lingering smoke in the dusty air.

This is an old police trick, leaving two suspects
together in a patrol car with a live microphone in the hope they’ll make
incriminating remarks. Bobby and I were hip to their game and sat there in
silence. I dozed off, falling into a half-lucid dream state. Bloody limbs,
eyeless decapitated heads, smoke and gunfire, cops and hogs side-by-side
munching on body parts. I woke up shuddering, drenched in sweat. Bobby was sound
asleep.

I tried to slow my breathing. My wife and daughter
materialized in my mind’s eye and then they were gone. I missed them terribly
and suddenly felt emotion sweeping over me. I pushed it to one side and
replayed the scene in Dr. Tarkanian’s office. He’d been shifty and thoroughly
corrupt. Still, his sins didn’t seem of a magnitude to justify murder. I had
the feeling that this time it was purely Tom and Ernie; Arnold had given the
order but had not even bothered to attend. This murder had obviously occurred
sometime before Gordo and Flaco jacked us at my house. When I’d been questioned
downtown on Thursday afternoon, I told Detective Karsagian what I knew about
Tom and Ernie. Jade had done the same when she and Bobby had met the cops at
the Croatian church in East L.A. At that time, I’d had no more sense of how to
find them than the police did. The key thing I’d held back was that Tarkanian
had been scheduled to meet with Tom or Ernie at the McDonald’s on 3rd Street,
to receive the last $5,000. Since the Egyptian taxi driver had showed up
instead, our anticipated straight path to Arnold had gone up in smoke.

Bobby finally woke up, looked at me and blinked
rapidly several times.

“Man, I could do with some chow.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Maybe these pigs’ll get us a bacon sandwich?”

“I wouldn’t hold my breath.”

He grinned and made obnoxious oinking sounds.

I knew exactly what he was referring to and shook
my head. I was about to respond when Officers Tomito and Sanchez opened the
back doors.

“Out,” said the latter.

We climbed out and they started to lead us toward
the entrance.

“Any chance of some In-N-Out?”

“Shut up, Crane,” hissed Sanchez.

“What about a Starbucks latte and a blueberry
muffin?”

Sanchez stopped, spun around and yanked down hard
on my cuffs, causing me intense pain. “Open your fucking mouth again, and I’ll
burn your goddamn eyes out,” he snarled, placing his hand on the can of mace on
his belt.

We locked eyes. “Take my cuffs off and give it a
shot.”

His lips curled back like an angry dog as he pulled
out the mace. Officer Tomito got in between us.

“Relax, Sanchez.”

“Get outta the way!”

Detective Karsagian came out of the lobby.
“Sanchez!” The cop let me go and turned to the detective. “Escort the prisoners
inside. Now!”

This time Sanchez led me by my arm, watched
closely by the senior officer.

I’ve been in Parker Center many times with
attorneys to meet with clients, and am actually rather fond of the place. A
great old African-American officer, Samuel Thomas, holds down the front desk,
Wednesday through Sunday evenings, from 2:00 to 10:00. He is knowledgeable on a
host of arcane topics such as spelunking, and lapidary, and always has time for
a cheery greeting. This time we weren’t brought in by the front desk but were
escorted through the rear entrance, where we were fingerprinted and booked.
Like many private investigators, I’ve been detained a few times over the years,
but it had been at least a decade since I’d been hauled in here. The desk
officers at Parker are as friendly as the guards at L.A. Men’s Central are
hostile.

There’s an old underworld saying that there’s no
worse place on earth to spend the night than in a South Georgia jail, but L.A.
Men’s Central can’t be far behind. A sprawling stone edifice, it was built back
in the 60’s when confinement allegedly wasn’t as cruel as it is today, and
guards and inmates apparently cooperated to a reasonable degree to keep the
ship afloat. Today, Men’s Central is run by gangbangers who decide which
inmates are housed together, and have carte blanche to “regulate” troublesome
convicts whenever the spirit moves them.

Parker Center, on the other hand, offers
reasonable overnight accommodations, that is, if you don’t mind the likelihood
of sleeping on a mattress on the floor. Of course, things go wrong at any jail
and it’s a good idea to keep your wits about you. Bobby and I were booked and
finger-printed by Officer Trujillo, an elderly Filipino officer with a ready
smile and a great head of thick, black hair. He’s been booking fresh arrivals
since the mid-80s, and maintains a pleasing calm that cannot fail to soothe the
inflamed mind of the newly arrested man.

“Nick, what’s going on?”

“Beats me.”

Trujillo scanned my bruised face and gave Sanchez
a disgusted look. “Looks like they already did.”

“Your friend,” said Officer Sanchez, who was
crowding me from behind, “brutally murdered an Armenian doctor.”

Officer Trujillo digested this bit of unexpected
information with a raised eyebrow. “You didn’t, did you?”

“Not that I recall.”

“I believe you have the wrong man,” said Trujillo.

I smiled and shrugged. Sanchez didn’t.

“I’ve pinched a lotta assholes, Crane, and I
really want some alone time with you.”

Trujillo glanced at Sanchez and placed my thumb
firmly down on his inkpad. “I’ll bet you a free trip to Santa Anita, Nick gets
sprung before you get any alone time.”

“We’ll see.”

Trujillo smiled at me. “Good luck, Nick.”

“Thanks and if you don’t mind, please ask Mrs.
Trujillo to burn a few candles for me.”

“Sure, my friend.”

It was Bobby’s turn and Officer Tomito shoved him
up to Trujillo’s desk.

Once we’d both been processed, we were turned over
to the guards, who escorted us up to a dormitory on the sixth floor. Parker
Center boasts a few wings of two and four man cells, but mostly houses its
detainees in dormitories. Depending on how business has been, these dorms are
either half-full, full or bursting at the seams. Right at the moment ours held
only six other guys, but the evening was young and Saturday night is usually
rocking. There are six sets of bunk beds occupying two walls, and a stack of
mattresses in one corner. Urinals, sinks and latrines painted institutional
green, occupy the opposite wall. The showers are down the hall. Generally
speaking, short-term residents have others things on their minds besides trying
to keep clean. There are no bars, simply a steel door with a meshed steel
window, through which an inmate could see out into the corridor and, of course,
Parker Center’s fabled, pneumatic tube delivery system for legal documents.
When a document arrives, a bell rings and an inmate walks over, slides open a
curved plastic door and extracts the paperwork.

Our fellow prisoners, predominantly Latino and
black, looked at us curiously as Bobby and I claimed 2 primo bunks while they
were still available. He took the lower and settled in as I clambered to the
upper. I stretched out and tried to relax, but there was such a cacophony, it
was all but impossible.

“What’s our next move?” said Bobby, his voice
weary.

I jumped down off my bunk and sat next to him on his.
“They’re trying to sweat us. That’s why we’re in here.”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“They know we didn’t kill the doc, but suspect we
know who did.”

“Why not just ask?”

“Because shit rolls downhill and right now, we’re
at the bottom.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Karsagian didn’t make detective ‘cause he’s
stupid. He knows there’s a lot more to this and, I guess, he figures I’m the
key. So he’ll bide his time, leaving us in here to ripen.”

“How long can they hold us?”

“Until arraignment court on Tuesday.”

“Shit, bro, who’s gonna look after my goats?”

I lowered my voice. “We have another problem.”

“What?”

“I was supposed to drop off the package for pig
boy tomorrow.”

“Why’s that a problem?”

“If he doesn’t hear from us, will he run his
mouth?”

Bobby grinned and shook his head. “No.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because he knows that I’ll feed him to his
fucking hogs if he does.”

I looked around to make sure no one was within
earshot. Inmates will trade the smallest scrap of info for reduced time, or if
it’s valuable enough, although this is quite rare, immunity for their own
crimes.

I nodded and whispered, “If they question you,
which they might not after talking to me, don’t say a word about Los Muertos,
and tell ‘em the only thing we were expecting at the McDonald’s was for someone
to slip the five large to the doctor.”

“What about me tailing him?”

“Negative, and leave Brad out of everything.”

He nodded and began chewing the inside of his
cheek.

“If you don’t like the way the questioning is
going, stonewall. Tell them you’re not saying another word until you consult
with your attorney.”

“I don’t have an attorney.”

“Sure you do. Bill Boxer. I’ll take care of it.”

“Man, the shit’s getting so thick it would drown
an alligator.”

“Just so it doesn’t drown us.”

Bobby glanced around the room. “I could use a
beer.”

“I’m covered for Friday night, so they can’t hang
Tarkanian on me. Where were you?”

He grinned. “After McDonald’s, on the way home I
stopped in at Leo’s a little after 7, and we went to a pescado restaurant at
Boyle and Olympic.”

“What time did you bail?”

“About 11:00. When I got home, Brad was already
there and I had to shout for him to even let me in the house ‘cause he was
still freaked out over the picture.”

“Okay, good.”

“These pigs are just fucking with us. Didn’t you
once tell me that about 40% of arrests end up going uncharged?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

Jail is usually the single most boring place in
the world. If nobody’s trying to kill or extort you, there’s very little to do,
and now that they don’t allow smoking, it’s a nightmare.

I stood up and surveyed the room that was filling
up fast. Groups of new arrivals, mostly head-shaved, tat-covered gangbangers,
and their “distant cousins”, non-gang affiliated pisas, were huddled together,
claiming their little piece of concrete as a continuation of their
neighborhoods. A couple of white guys that looked like cons were making their
way toward us, safety in numbers. Bobby is one of the only guys I know that
doesn’t play games with anyone of any race, color or creed. Like a junkyard
dog, his face turned harder and his muscles steeled. The cons got the message,
gave us a curt nod, and turned away.

“I’m gonna see if they’ll let me make a call.”

“Want me to watch your back?” asked Bobby.

“Stay here and guard the bunks.”

He nodded and I made my way toward the guard.
Several hard looking inmates eyeballed me, and I knew there was going to be a
problem. In lockup, you’re either a warrior or a victim, and mamma didn’t raise
no pussy.

“I’d like to make a call.”

A group of 5 gangbangers were watching me with
great interest. The guard, a white guy with a mashed face who could easily have
been one of them, glanced over at their leader, a nasty, head-shaved specimen:
5’8”, trunk like a gorilla and a brow ridge that out-Neanderthaled the
Neanderthal. And, of course, the black tats. Neanderthal nodded almost
imperceptibly and the guard pointed at the payphone.