Silent Joe (16 page)

His expression said that he wanted to believe me, but couldn't. "I think you know more about that night than you're saying. A lot more."

I felt my face grow warm, felt the scar tissue tingle. Yes, there were a few details I'd kept to myself. The last of Will's secrets, maybe, at least the last ones he entrusted to me.

"Joe, your father doesn't need your protection anymore. He's past that. He needs you to tell the truth. And let me tell you something else—a dog can keep a secret forever. But a man has to learn when he's doing more harm than good. Is this clear to you?"

"Yes, sir."

"It damned well should be if you want a career in law enforcement."

"Yes, I know."

He waited a long moment, then shook his head like I'd given the wrong answer.

From the privacy of my car and my cell phone, I called the home number for Ellen Erskine. No answer, no message recorder. I tried her work phone. A pleasant female voice said "Hillview Home for Children," and I asked for Ms. Erskine.

"She's in a meeting, may I take a message?"

"No message," I said, and hung up.

Hillview Home for Children, I thought: Why? A donation, a fundraiser, a change in budget? Lost in speculation that got me nothing, I went to Mod J to get what Sammy Nguyen had promised me.

Gary Sargola, the so-called Ice-Box Killer, demanded a doctor because phlebitis-swollen leg was killing him. That wasn't my decision so I told Sergeant Delano.

"Let him suffer a while," he said. "That poor girl he put in the freezer did. By the way, nice hat."

Dave Hauser, the former assistant district attorney who went into drug trade with a guy he prosecuted, showed me a picture of his new daughter. Dave had been in jail four months, and his daughter was about two days old. Her name was Kristen. Dave said when he got
out
was moving the whole family to Tahiti, had some land there, not far from Brando.

Dr. Chapin Fortnell lay on his cot sobbing. When I asked him what was wrong, he rolled over and looked at me with swollen red eyes. It’s all coming apart, Joe." Later, I learned that one of the six boys the good doctor was accused of molesting had hanged himself.

Serial rapist Frankie Dilsey was in the day room watching a soap opera. He turned to me when I passed by, pointing at the actress on the screen and smiling.
"Dat's what it's all about, Shitface. Dat's the ticket, right there, dat stuff."

And so on.

My work.

I watched them take a new prisoner in that afternoon, to be given the cell next to Sammy. He was a meth biker named Giant Mike Staich who’d apparently taken a machete to a stoolie, severed his head and carried around for a few weeks in a pillowcase tied to his hog. A motorcycle cop had driven behind him for a few miles, pulled up behind him at a red light, smelled the head and pulled him over. They'd shaved Staich at Intake. "Too many lice to kill with just soap, man." He had tattoos around neck, all the way up to his chin. The middle finger of his left hand missing. He stood six feet six, huge belly, short bowed legs like they designed to straddle a gas tank ten hours a day. He asked what they all do. "What the fuck happened to that face of yours?"

"Acid."

"Roadkill looks better than that. Why don't you get an operation?"

"I've had eight."

He considered, nodding. "Cover it up with a tat, man. Get a big-ass skull with a sword through it, or a lion with its mouth open, and nobody'll even know what's under. I gotta guy in Stanton's real good."

"Thanks for your advice."

In the next cell, Sammy Nguyen lay on his cot, as always, staring up at the picture of Bernadette. When I stopped to talk to him, he was sullen and hostile, complaining that we'd confiscated his dog nail clippers and wouldn't give them back.

"There's no dog in here," I said.

"Any idiot can see that, Joe. I use them for
my
nails. It's the only way to get the right angle, make them look right. You ask any beautician or cosmetologist. Maybe you can get them back for me."

"You still owe me for the rat trap."

He looked surprised. "Owe you what?"

"Alex Blazak."

Sammy suddenly looked lighter. He blew a kiss at Bernadette's picture, then came over to the bars. "I totally forgot."

"You're busy," I said.

He laughed at this and I smiled along with him.

"This is the deal," he said. He looked with conspiracy to his right, then his left. Then he leaned up close to the steel bars of his cage. "Do you know what a couturier is?"

I nodded.

"His girlfriend's one. She's got a shop on Laguna Canyon Road, by the big antique store. Christy or Christine or something like that. And her last name is Sands. Like sand at the beach."

"Good," I said.

"Then get me my clippers back."

"I'll be honest with you, Sammy—there's no way the captain is going to allow dog clippers."

He shrugged, made a face. "Screw the captain, Joe. I give you Christy Sands, you get my dog clippers back."

"I can't do that."

Back to the sullen pout then, a convincingly tragic expression. "Then get me a better trap to kill that rat with. I've seen him in here every night for two weeks. Look."

He pointed to the floor. I saw the plastic rat trap with the adhesive the bottom. Apparently it was unmolested.

"I'll see about a better trap."

He gave me an injured look, then climbed back onto his cot. "Make sure it's a good one. One of the big ones, not the kind for mice. For
rats.’’

Giant Mike Staich, lodged right next to Sammy, had to get in on this.

"Just step on the damned thing," he growled. A wall separates inmates. They could both see me, but not each other.

Sammy sighed, imploring me with an expression that said,
why
you put a moron next to me?

"Hey rat-man," said Giant. "I'm Mike. I'm in for doing some jerk-off and putting his head in a bag. Like I'm dumb enough to do that."

"Why'd you put it in a bag?" Sammy asked.

"It wasn't me."

Sammy looked disgusted. "I'm Sammy Nguyen," he said curtly. ‘’I’m in for killing a cop I never saw in my life. When I'm released because of false imprisonment, I'm going to sue this place into another bankruptcy. Everybody except Joe, because he's a decent guy."

"Who's Joe?"

"He's standing right in front of you."

"Oh, you mean Shitface."

"It's scar tissue," said Sammy.

"Looks like cow shit that ain't dried yet. Get yourself the tattoo, Fuck the hat."

"I'll consider it."

"A tattoo won't cover it," said Sammy. "He needs another surgery."

"He's had eight of them."

Even the cons talk about me like I'm not there.

My work.

But that was the good part of my job—meeting interesting people, making new and exotic friends.

The bad part was the boredom and the constant hustles, the constant lies. The constant bad jokes about my scars. I hadn't heard a good one in weeks.

I wanted out of there. Even though it reminded me on some primitive level of my early childhood, I still knew I had to get out.

The average jail time for a deputy in Orange County is five years. So I guess I didn't have it so bad. Almost four years down. But it still felt like a life sentence, eight hours at a time.

They don't reduce your time for good behavior. Only the inmates get that.

I
don't know what I was expecting from a girlfriend of Crazy Alex Blazak, but Chrissa Sands was not it. Sammy Nguyen had her name wrong, but he'd gotten the location perfectly. She was older than Alex by a few years—mid-twenties, I guessed, and pretty, with high cheekbones and bangs and the rest of her thick blond hair cut straight at the shoulders. I could feel the energy humming off her. She took some time to study me. She considered the face, didn't turn away.

"Nice hat."

"Thank you."

"Try this."

She shot across the little shop and came back with a rustred felt fedora with a cream-colored band. In the two seconds it took her, I eyed the place. Four racks of dresses, some shelves along the walls with what appeared to be sweaters. In the back was a large table with three different sewing machines on it and three fitting mannequins wearing half-finished clothing, There were sketches and magazines and scissors everywhere.

We traded hats and I put it on. She reached up and tilted back the brim a little. She wiggled a pin between her teeth, then stood back and considered.

"Excellent in every way," she said. "Here."

She pulled me by my arm to a full-length mirror. I heard her humming to herself. I thought the hat looked fine. She was nodding at it.

"I need to talk about Alex and Savannah," I said.

"I know who you are and I know you're a cop."

"I'm a jailer, actually."

"You don't look like a jailer."

"Well, thank you, I guess. The thing is, Ms. Sands—"

"Chrissa."

"Chrissa, I'm not here as a cop. I'm just trying to find Savannah Blazak."

"Yeah," she said quietly. "You and everybody else."

"Maybe we could sit down and talk a minute."

"We'll need longer than that. Let's go get lunch. I need a break from this place."

We exchanged hats and she put on the red one. I thought it looked fine with her jeans and white T-shirt and yellow blazer. She zoomed behind the sewing table and came back with a purse over her shoulder and a fat ring of keys in her hand. Her sunglasses had silver frames and tiny lenses.

"You drive," she said.

We went outside and she waved to two guys standing at a bus stop not far from the parking lot driveway. I'd always heard what a friendly town Laguna Beach was, but the guys didn't bother to wave back.

"Assholes," she said, clicking her seatbelt into place.

"Who are they?"

"Never mind."

We sat at a plastic table on a big patio overlooking the beach. The waves were small and crisp and loud when they shattered on the sand. There was a light haze in the air that made the water shimmer like mercury in slow motion. There weren't a lot of people in the water, but the sand was crowded with sunbathers.

Chrissa Sands polished off a Bloody Mary and ordered another. She told me that Alex and Jack Blazak had "despised" each other for almost five years. Jack had expected perfection from his son; Alex had "felt the whip" and answered with rebellion. She said that Alex
was
a little crazy--- nothing serious, in her opinion—just a willingness to take more risks than the average spoiled, rich young man. Sure, Alex liked to act tough. Liked his guns and knives and weapons, but once you got to know him, he was really cool guy. Would never hurt anybody, not even an animal. Vegetarian, never ate anything with a face. The weapons were just something he liked to look at, the same way some people liked looking at art. They were a way to make money. Alex had a sword that was made for Napoleon ; later given by Hitler to Himmler or maybe the other way around, worth something like five hundred grand. But Alex was "definitely non-violent and non-aggro."

"He's a sweet young guy," she said, with a tear welling up in her eye. "He walked into my store one day, looking for something for his mother, he says. He's got a gold-plated pistol in his briefcase—he tells me all about it, how it was owned by some admiral in Japan—but he's trying to buy mommy a birthday present. I wanted to hug him. So . . . cute. Acts like toughest guy in the world, but he's not. He needs encouragement to do right things. He needs protection from the wrong people. I've tried to do that for him. And when you've got his attention, it's the most wonderful feeling, because he's so intense, so completely
alive.
I mean, I'm like that too . . . we're both a little random, maybe, but in a good way. At least I hope it's good."

I handed her a monogrammed handkerchief. She dabbed and smiled

"God, I love a man with decent manners. Handkerchiefs are so excellently cool. I really ought to do something with them. I'll clean this
and
return it to you."

"That's not necessary."

She smiled, waved the kerchief at me, then set it on the plastic tab top by my hand.

"Joe, you're such a complete square. But I like that. That's okay. Now watch you say thank you."