Broken Saint, The (14 page)

Chapter 22

We drove out toward the west. When I moved here sixteen
years ago, most of the western suburbs were pasture and ranchland. Since then,
the downtown has oozed out. Part of the area is now two- and three-acre spreads
with barns big enough for four or six horses. Part of it is zoned commercial,
with places like RV dealers, small-boat and snowmobile shops, auto-body repair
places, mom-and-pop used-car lots, a big barn that rents out card tables to
people trying to sell their
Life
magazines from the sixties, a group of
women who sell metal sculptures they make, and other low-prestige businesses. One
thing they had in common: pea-gravel parking lots out front.

“Martinez said it was around the side of the
building with Paragon Plumbing Supplies,” Ryan said.

“Here it is.” I parked alongside one of the
Paragon vans and put down my police visor. Ryan and I walked around to the
north side of the building and knocked on the scratched-up, unmarked gray steel
door. It had a dull brass plate with a lock set in it, but no doorknob. I heard
footsteps, then nothing. Someone would be looking at us through the peephole. I
held up my shield.

The door opened a quarter. It was a Hispanic guy,
early twenties, scraggly mustache, baby fat on his face. He was wearing a navy
blue t-shirt, with some cheap-shit chains and a crucifix on the outside. I
could see the butt of his .38 between his plaid underwear and his low-rider
jeans, with the front pockets down almost to his knees. I wanted to yank his
pants right off, but my son, Tommy, didn’t find it all that funny when I did it
to him, and I doubted this loser would, either.

“Detective Seagate, my partner Detective Miner. We
want to talk to The One.”

He closed the door. I could hear his footsteps as
he waddled away.

“Gee,” I said, “I hope the young man hasn’t just
insulted us.”

“I think he’ll be back,” Ryan said. “He needs to
get instructions on what to do now.”

A minute later the door opened again. The boy
spoke with a heavy Hispanic accent. “He says, what you want to talk about?”

“Tell him it’s a surprise,” I said. “We can talk
here, or we can talk at police headquarters.”

The door closed again.

“This is getting stupid,” I said to Ryan.

“It’s about face. He wants to make us stand here. You
already messed up by not contacting him ahead of time.”

“Me?”

Ryan smiled. “Yeah, you, Karen.”

The door opened again. The kid held out his hand
and said, “Give me your guns.”

I shook my head. “Listen, I’m letting you keep
your gun, which I bet isn’t even legal. We’re keeping ours. Lead us back to The
One right now or we leave and come back with the whole crew.”

The chubby kid let us in. Just off to the right
was a Formica-covered parts counter that looked like it used to be part of the
plumbing-supply business. Rows of built-in steel shelving, heavy-duty, extended
up to a ten-foot ceiling. There was nothing on the shelves, no posters or
pictures or writing of any kind on any of the walls. You wouldn’t know who the
current residents were.

The kid led us through a doorway and down a short
hall lit by two bare bulbs on the ceiling. He opened the door to an unmarked
room on the right and stepped out of the way for me and Ryan to enter.

A couple of tough-looking guys, each with a piece
in his hand, sat on two ratty couches against the paneled walls. Their eyes
followed us. They didn’t stand. I guessed it was about face.

Behind the beat-up steel desk at the far side of
the room sat The One. He was a good-looking guy, maybe forty, jet black hair
receding a little in the front. A well-trimmed mustache and wire-rimmed
glasses. He wore a crimson long-sleeve shirt, silk or something like it, so I
couldn’t see any ink on his arms. The top of the LVL on the left side of his
neck poked out over the collar of his shirt. There were three teardrops inked
on his face, beneath his right eye. Each teardrop was for a family member who
died when he was inside.

I held up my shield. “I’m Seagate, this is Miner.
We want to talk to you about Maricel Salizar.”

He nodded, just a little, to show that he wasn’t
going to put himself out.

I said, “She was wearing your colors when we
recovered her body.”

He took a pack of Camels off his desk, pulled one
out, and lit it with a big gold lighter, shaped like a genie’s lamp, like the
one that used to sit on the coffee table in my house when I was a kid. He
exhaled the blue-gray smoke toward the ceiling, squinting a little when he did
it, and looked at me.

I waited for him to say something. He didn’t. “Cat
got your tongue?”

“I don’t know what you want me to say.” He glanced
down at his right hand, focusing on the cuticle on his thumb.

“Okay, let me put it in the form of a question. Do
you know why Maricel Salizar was showing your colors?”

He made a show of thinking about this tough
question. “Navy blue is a very popular color.”

One of his apes on the couch let out a chuckle,
like The One’s insight was really clever.

“Was she sexed-in with the Latins?” I didn’t know
if this group used a gang-bang initiation of females. I know it’s pretty common
in LA, where they use guys with HIV to up the drama. All part of the live-hard,
die-young philosophy.

“I’m sorry,” The One said. “I’m not familiar with
that term.” Both apes laughed.

“We know Maricel was Hector Cruz’s girlfriend, and
he wears your ink on his chest. I’m just asking if she was in the Latins.”

The One frowned as he inspected the cuticle on his
right thumb. Good grooming trumps good manners. Then he looked up at me and
said, “What’s your name?”

“Seagate.”

“Detective Seagate. It’s a pleasure to make your
acquaintance.” He paused. “I’m a little surprised to see you here. When you get
back to headquarters, please pass along my regards to Detective Martinez.”

“Yeah, I’ll do that.”

“Did he not tell you that I prefer to receive
notification when you wish to talk to me?”

“Come on, stop wasting my time,” I said. “Yeah, he
told me you like cops to kiss your ass, but we got other things we need to do.”
The two goons on the couches shifted around, like they were waiting for a
signal from The One to jump us, but he held up a few fingers to tell them to
sit still.

“I’m just asking you a few questions,” I said. “You
give me answers, my partner and I are out of here in a couple minutes and you
go back to whatever illegal shit you were doing. You don’t have to make this a
big thing.”

He smiled, just a little. “What was the question?”

“Maricel Salizar. Was she in the Latins?”

He tapped the ash off his cigarette in the heavy
glass ashtray on his desk and then took a long pull. He exhaled slowly. “I
don’t discuss membership in any gang.”

“You understand, if you don’t talk to me, I gotta
report that to my chief, and he’s gotta do something about it. We have to bring
you in, take a statement, you gotta call your guy, Samosa. This doesn’t have to
be a whole thing.”

“I’d like you to show me some respect,” he said,
his face set.

“All right. You call yourself The One, right?
Okay, The One. Let me explain to you how I am showing you respect,” I said. “I’m
asking you a question. I’m hoping you’ll give me a truthful answer. And I’m
willing to take your answer at face value. Why is that? Because I understand
you’re a professional, just like me. You’re the general in the Latins. You got
a business. You got people. You got a payroll. We’re in different fields. Okay,
I get that. But I need you to help me with this investigation. If the Salizar
killing was a Latins hit, I gotta report that, and we bring in the Anti-Gang
Unit, the feds if we can convince them it was a RICO violation. It’s gonna be a
real shitstorm.

“But if Salizar wasn’t a Latins hit, we just walk
away. I’m not here to humiliate you. I’m not here to be a pain in the ass. Why
don’t you make this easy on both of us? Give me a reason to tell my boss I
don’t think it was a gang hit.”

“I don’t read the newspaper. Never heard of
Salizar.”

“Okay,” I said. “Thank you. I appreciate that.
Next question: is Hector Cruz an active or a wanna-be?”

“I have no way to control who puts ink on their
chest.”

“All right. I understand that answer, too. Thank
you. So, just to make sure I got this right, you’re saying that there was no
initiation Sunday night? Nobody putting in work?

The One held my gaze and shook his head.

“One more question. Any one of your boys do a
drive-by on my house early this morning?”

He raised an eyebrow. “I hope nobody was hurt.”

“Nobody was hurt.”

“Did it scare you?” he said.

“It woke me up. I gotta repair a couple of holes
in my house.”

“I know it can be very disturbing.”

“Did one of your guys do it?”

“Any reason one of my guys would do it?”

Apparently he was done answering my questions. “Ah,
shit, are we back to this nonsense? We were communicating so well there for a
second. Just answer my question. I know you’ve got your guy Samosa stirring
things up. Did he ask you to throw a few shots my way to scare me?”

“Are you scared?”

I just stood there. I heard a chuckle from one of
the goons on the couch, who was nodding his head in admiration of the boss’
ability to work his mouth.

“You should be scared,” The One said. “Fear is a
good thing. It helps you live longer.”

“You’re not gonna give me a straight answer?”

He smiled, then turned to one of his bodyguards.
“The detectives are leaving now.”

I shook my head. “We’ll talk some more.” Ryan and
I turned and left.

The pudgy kid was standing outside the door. He
escorted us to the parts counter, then out the steel door to the parking lot.

Back in the car, I said, “What do you make of
that?”

Ryan said, “I think part of it was the truth.”

“Which part?”

“I believed him that Maricel wasn’t in the Latins.
Or Hector, either.”

“And about him doing the drive-by?”

“That one I’m not sure,” Ryan said. “What about
you?”

“Yeah, I couldn’t tell. I assume he’s in touch
with Samosa, so he knows he’s supposed to pretend to be pissed at me. And I
imagine The One doesn’t roll around town doing the shooting himself. But he
might have had one of his junior assholes do it.”

“Or maybe Hector Cruz.”

“Sure. Or one of the wanna-be’s did it to impress
the boss.”

Ryan said, “Even if the Latins had nothing to do
with it, The One isn’t going to admit that.”

“Certainly not in front of his thugs.”

“So where does that leave us?”

“Well, it doesn’t get us any closer to figuring
out who killed Maricel,” I said.

“One other thing you should consider, Karen. Even
if he wasn’t behind the drive-by this morning, you might have given him a good
idea about how to get to you.”

“For not showing him the appropriate respect?” I
said.

Ryan spread his palms. “I’m just saying.”

Chapter 23

The light was flashing on my desk phone. The screen said
Gerson, Albert left a message a half-hour ago. I hit Play and put it on Speaker.
“Um, Detective Seagate, this is Andrea Gerson.” There was a pause. “Dr.
Gerson’s wife, from the university? I’m sorry to bother you, I’m sure you’re
very busy. I just wanted to say thank you for your assistance with Mark the
other day. Mark, our son. He’s home now, and it’s just such a relief to us. My
husband and I both want you to know how much we appreciate … what you did.” The
message ended.

Ryan said, “You know, we never did get a chance to
interview her. And with her husband at the university, she won’t be able to run
into another room.”

I picked up the phone and called her. Yes, she
would be happy to talk with us.

We drove over, parked in front of her house,
walked up, and rang the bell.

The door opened. She was dressed in a blouse and
slacks, and she held her chin high. She looked like she was trying real hard to
keep it together this time.

“Detective Seagate,” she said to me, forcing a
smile. “Detective Miner. So good of you both to come.” She took our coats, hung
them in the closet, and led us to the living room. “Won’t you please take a
seat?” The sun had broken through the clouds and was hitting the black wood of
the piano and the red and blue designs on the Persian carpet beneath it. “I
have tea and coffee—both regular and decaf,” she said, nodding to Ryan.

“Coffee would be great, if you don’t mind,” I
said.

“Decaf,” Ryan said, smiling.

“I’ll be right back,” she said and walked back
toward the kitchen.

“Decaf’s okay with your church?”

“That’s a point of contention.” He smiled. “Some
LDS think it’s impossible to remove all the caffeine. But I’m okay with it.”

“You live on the edge, right?”

“I’m gangsta Mormon.”

She came back in, carrying a tray with three china
cups on saucers plus sugar and cream. “There we are,” she said. “Won’t you
please help yourself to cream and sugar?”

Ryan and I got up and fixed our coffees, then
returned to our seats.

“Again,” Andrea Gerson said, “we want to express
our appreciation for how you treated Mark.”

“No problem,” I said. “He’s home now?”

“Well,” she said, her gaze pulled down to her
hands, “not home this minute, but he is sleeping at home, which, unfortunately,
is the best we can hope for.”

Ryan said, “I know it’s difficult for people with
schizophrenia to stay on their meds. One of my sisters has it.”

Andrea Gerson’s face clouded. “Oh, I’m so sorry,
Detective. Believe me, I know what a heartache it can be.” She paused a long
moment. “I feel I owe you an explanation.”

I shook my head, indicating she didn’t have to
tell us. But I was hoping she would.

“Mark and Mitch … looked like identical twins, but
they had always been a little different in their personalities. Mark was more
introspective, a little bit withdrawn. And he could be moody. But he seemed
reasonably successful.” She stopped, her hand nervously touching the corner of
her eye. “His twin, Mitch, died in a snowboarding accident.” She looked down at
the coffee service and touched the handle of the sugar jar for no apparent
reason.

“Yes,” I said, “your husband mentioned that.”

“I see,” she said, like she was apologizing for
wasting our time. “That was when the symptoms of schizophrenia began. Right
then. That day. I had been hoping that my children would be spared this
terrible disease.”

“It’s in your family?” Ryan said.

Andrea Gerson nodded. “We were so lucky with Judy.
She is … she is so well-adjusted.” Andrea smiled slightly. “Our daughter.” Then
the smile slipped from her face, and I could see a tear in her eye. “She chose
a college in Connecticut. We understood why she would want to put some miles
between us. She had done her time here, with me and Mark. Al and I tried to
show her we understood her feelings, that it was for the best.”

She took a deep breath. “I don’t believe Mark has
told his father this. Mark believes that he is responsible for his brother’s
death.” She closed her eyes and kept them closed for a few beats. I could see
her face was shaking, like she had a tremor or was having some kind of psychological
reaction to what she was saying.

Ryan and I sat there, not knowing whether to say
anything.

“They had been playing,” she said as she opened
her eyes. “You know how kids are. Apparently, Mark was teasing his brother,
daring him to go off the trail. Mitch did. He fell, hit his head on a rock.”

She began to cry openly, her hands coming up to
cover her eyes. “I’m so sorry,” she said in a soft voice. “I was hoping—this
time—not to make a scene.”

“It’s quite all right, Ms. Gerson,” Ryan said,
standing and walking over to her. He knelt beside her, putting his hand on her
shoulder tenderly. She reached up and covered his hand, moving toward him. She
reached her other arm around his shoulder, and they hugged. After a few
seconds, they ended the hug, but Ryan stayed next to her, on one knee, his hand
on her shoulder.

“That must be a terrible burden for Mark to
carry,” I said.

“I cannot tell you how many times, how many ways I’ve
tried to convince him that it wasn’t his fault. He’s not a bad boy, and the
loss of his brother hurt him more than it hurt anyone else. When a twin loses
his sibling, I think it’s like losing a part of himself.”

“It’s a heavy weight for everyone in the family,”
Ryan said. He raised himself off his knee and sat next to her on the couch.
“Can you tell us how your husband dealt with it?”

She sighed and turned to him. “The Church.
Definitely, the Church has been a big part of it.”

I said, “You mean, he grew closer to people in the
church who experienced loss?”

She turned to me. “Well, yes, there was one couple
who were very kind to us.” She wiped a tear with her finger. “But I meant that
he stepped up his contributions to the Church. He’s the bishop of our ward,
which, as I’m sure you know, is extremely time-consuming. I think … I don’t
want this to sound negative, but I think he has responded in a way that males
do, more than women. I don’t know, I really have no idea what I’m saying …”

“Not at all, Ms. Gerson,” Ryan said. “I think I
understand exactly what you’re saying. When men face a tremendous personal
loss, they tend to throw themselves into activities that help distract them
from their loss. They work harder at the office, they do more at their Church.”

“Whereas women tend to sink deeper into their
memories,” Andrea Gerson said. She started to cry again, covering her face in
her hands.

“I can’t imagine how difficult it must have
been—must be—for you,” Ryan said.

“Ms. Gerson,” I said, “you mentioned that Mark
confided in you about Mitch’s death—told you something you didn’t think he even
told his father.”

“Yes,” she said, her finger coming up to wipe at
her eye. “Al is a wonderful father. Mark is extremely fortunate in that way.
He’s sensitive, patient—just excellent in every way …”

I waited for the “but,” but she seemed to be
unable to say it.

“Is there some kind of tension between them?”

“Al thinks it is very important—and I agree with
him completely—that Mark take as much responsibility as he can in managing the
schizophrenia. As I’m sure you know, Detective Miner, with your sister, many
people with schizophrenia find it difficult to stay on their medications
because of the way it makes them feel.”

“Yes, I do know that, Ms. Gerson,” Ryan said.

“And so that’s become a source of conflict between
Mark and his father,” I said.

“Mark … I think Mark has grown a little closer to
me as a result. You know how men can be.” She tried to smile as she looked at
me. “They have this reason.” She clenched her fists in front of her. “And they
keep repeating it, as if everyone will start to act appropriately if they just keep
saying it often enough.”

“Ms. Gerson,” I said, “we’re having a real hard
time understanding why anyone would want to hurt Maricel. Has Mark told you
anything that might help us with what was going on in her life recently?”

She looked up, almost startled. My guess is that
she had been running on fumes psychologically for some years now. Not that she
was indifferent to the death of Maricel. It was more that the murder was one
more thing added to the mix, a mix that was already killing her. “I’m afraid I
can’t give you any details,” she said. “Mark was particularly agitated the last
few weeks. I’m sure that contributed to his decision to go off his meds—and
then the psychotic episode. I shouldn’t use the word
decision
.” She
turned to Ryan. “I’m not sure how much control a person with schizophrenia has
over their actions.”

Ryan nodded his agreement.

I wanted to get back to Maricel. “Did Mark mention
Maricel in anything he said to you?”

“Well, yes, of course, he mentioned her all the
time. He still does. She must have had some kind of fight with Hector—I don’t
know what it was about. But the last month, she wasn’t seeing Hector
as much as she did around Christmas and New Year. I
do remember that Mark mentioned that Maricel said something to him about how you
should be careful about choosing your friends. She said she learned an
important lesson. I don’t know what Hector did—or what she thought he did.”

“Ms. Gerson, you’ve been very generous with your
time.” I stood. “We appreciate it very much.” I walked over to her and handed
her my card. “If you can think of anything else that might be useful to us,
please get in touch with me.”

“Of course, Detective Seagate. I’m sorry I haven’t
been able to be of more assistance.” She walked us out to the entryway and got
our coats from the closet.

Ryan and I got back in the cruiser, which,
thankfully, was relatively warm in the sun.

I said, “So Dad spends more time at the
university, more time with the church.”

“Plausible but not particularly helpful. The guy’s
in his early forties, the provost at a university. He’s putting in the hours
anyway.”

“And doing more with the church?”

“You could do a hundred hours a week at the Church,”
Ryan said, “and we’d appreciate it. Being a bishop is a big deal, like another full-time
job.”

“And what do you make of what she said about
Maricel cooling off toward Hector?”

Ryan just shook his head. “The time frame fits
with Maricel’s abortion, which Hector didn’t want. Not helpful.”

“What did Maricel say: you should be careful about
choosing your friends?”

“Yep, according to Mom.”

“There’s something here we’re missing,” I said. “Girls
don’t refer to their boyfriends as ‘friends.’”

“Amber?” Ryan said.

“Yeah. And her idiot boyfriend with the big
earring.”