Hollywood Crows (31 page)

“Son of a bitch!” he yelled, and he leaped upright, dropping his little flashlight and holding the Beretta in both hands. “Down! Get down on your belly!”

Gert, holding her light in one hand and her Glock in the other, sprang forward, crouching below Dan’s extended arms, and yelled, “Down, goddamn you!”

Bix Ramstead edged into the crowded space and looked in the room.

The Somalian was on his knees then, wearing only the black trousers he wore when last Bix saw him. He was also wearing half-glasses, his eyes looking like tarnished dimes, and he clutched a Koran in his right hand when he slid down into the prone position.

Bix Ramstead mumbled, “In the name of god!”

Lying prone, Omar Hasan Benawi said, “Yes, in the name of the one true god. She did the shameful thing with a white man. Now I give her to the white man.”

There was dried white paint spatter on one wall, and puddles of paint on the threadbare carpet had dried and were hardening. Dried paint smeared the other walls and had dried in streaks on the window blinds. The Somalian’s hands were white with dried paint and there were smears on his bare torso and on the tops of his bare feet, and the front of his trousers was caked with white paint. A cheap table lamp lay broken on the floor, and an empty five-gallon can of paint was lying on the floor beside the bed alongside an eight-inch paintbrush. There was dried white paint all over the coppery bedspread.

And on the bedspread was Safia, the wife of Omar Hasan Benawi. She had been strangled with the cord he’d jerked from the table lamp, and the ligature lay coiled like a serpent on the pillow beside her head. Naked, she looked tinier, more frail and fragile and vulnerable, than Bix Ramstead had remembered her. And more childlike. She was lying supine on the bed with her head on a pillow, and her arms were crossed over her small breasts, as her husband had posed them. And she was white.

He had painted every inch of her white. From the bottoms of her delicate feet to the crown of her small round head, she had been painted dead white. Even her opened lifeless eyes had not been spared. Dried paint clogged the cavernous orbs that Bix Ramstead remembered so well.

When Dan was handcuffing the Somalian’s hands behind his back, the prisoner said, “Now she is yours to bury with other white dogs in your infidel places of the dead.”

“Shut the fuck up!” Gert Von Braun said. “And listen while I advise you of your rights.”

There were dozens of employees of the Los Angeles Police Department at that crime scene before the sun rose. One of the first was the night-watch detective Compassionate Charlie Gilford, who was about to go end-of-watch when he got the call from Bix Ramstead. He just had to see this one, so he jumped into a detective unit and drove to Southeast Hollywood as fast as he could.

After he took in the grotesque scene in the little bedroom, he walked out on the front step and directed his nuggets of wisdom at a pair of night-watch coppers who’d been called to assist with scene preservation.

“Fucking Hollywood,” the disappointed detective said. “You can blame this kinda shit on the movies. I’ll bet this fifty-one-fifty was sitting there watching TV and got the idea from
Goldfinger
, where they did the same thing to James Bond’s snitch. Different color paint is all. This don’t show any imagination. This Somali wing nut’s nothing more than a second-rate copycat.”

Ronnie Sinclair received a call from Bix Ramstead just before she went to bed. He told her what they’d found in the cottage and that he’d be at Hollywood Station until the early-morning hours, doing reports and being interviewed by Homicide detectives. Bix told Ronnie that there was no telling what time he’d get home and would need to take tomorrow off. He said he’d left a long message on their sergeant’s voice mail explaining what had happened.

Before the conversation ended, Ronnie Sinclair said to Bix Ramstead, “It was not our fault. It is not our tragedy.”

He didn’t respond to that.

T
HIS WAS
the thousand-dollar day! Leonard Stilwell awoke before dawn and did something he almost never did. He went for a stroll along the Walk of Fame before the tourists arrived, breathing deeply, even shadowboxing for a few minutes, jabbing and hooking until the midget at the newsstand on Hollywood Boulevard said, “I wouldn’t take that pussy jab into a ring, buddy. Even Paris Hilton would kick your ass.”

“How would you like me to try it on you, you fucking termite,” Leonard said.

But when the belligerent midget scuttled forward, saying, “Bring it, you turd licker!” Leonard got away fast, before the little maggot started gnawing on his leg.

Leonard wanted to go to the Starbucks on Sunset but didn’t have enough money. Instead he drove to Pablo’s Tacos, where all the tweakers hung out, and he bought a cup of Pablo’s crappy coffee and a sweet, greasy Mexican pastry. Then he went home to rest and wait. But first he stopped and stole an
L.A
.
Times
from the driveway of a house two blocks from his apartment.

The only reason Ali Aziz slept so soundly was that he’d swallowed two of the magenta-and-turquoise sleep aids with a double shot of Jack Daniel’s. He did have a slight headache when he awoke, and he recalled that Margot would never take one after she’d been drinking alcoholic beverages. He had a hot shower and then a cold one. Then he sat in his robe with a cup of tea and looked out from the balcony of his condo, where the view encompassed some of the commercial real estate of Beverly Hills.

It couldn’t compare with the view from Mt. Olympus, from the house that he loved and that had been stolen from him by his bitch wife. Someday, god willing, when he had his son all to himself, they would live in a place where the boy could have land under his feet, perhaps a dog to run with, or even a horse to ride. There were places like that in some parts of the San Fernando Valley and in Ventura County, but they were disappearing fast with the influx of people clogging the freeways. Still, he would live in a place like that for his son’s sake, and he’d make the long daily drive to his Hollywood businesses without complaint. He would do that for his son. He would do anything for his son.

At 2
P.M
., Leonard Stilwell arrived at the Leopard Lounge. He found Ali Aziz in his office and he sat in the client chair in front of Ali’s desk. Without comment, Ali removed a garage door opener from his desk drawer and slid it across to him.

“How much do I get if this don’t work and we have to shitcan the whole plan?”

“It shall work,” Ali said solemnly.

“How can you be sure?”

“One day last week when I know my wife was not home, I drove by and pressed on the button. The door opens and closes.”

“Okay, gimme the alarm code,” Leonard said, and Ali pushed a piece of paper across the desk.

Ali said, “Alarm pad is right inside on the wall. I want these things back to me when we meet later. And my big envelope, for sure.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Leonard said. “You get all the incriminating evidence and I get my thousand bucks, all at the same time.”

“You shall have it,” Ali said.

“I better have it,” Leonard said. “Or else.”

“What is your meaning?” Ali said. “‘Or else’?”

“Nothing,” Leonard said. “We got to trust each other, is all. Don’t we, Ali? And we gotta keep real quiet afterwards.”

Ali did not like the words that had just come from the mouth of the thief, but he thought he should say nothing about it. Not now.

“Ten minute after four o’clock, you do it,” Ali said. “You park fifty meters past the house, up on top of the hill. No houses there yet. Nobody shall pay attention.”

“And I meet you by the Mount Olympus sign down below after I do it.”

“That is exactly correct,” Ali said.

“I’ll see you then,” Leonard said.

After Leonard had gone, Ali sat motionless and thought about those words:
Or else
. He wondered if he had underestimated the thief. What if Leonard threatened to tell Margot that he had been paid to enter her house and steal an envelope? It would mean nothing to Margot. There was no document of any value whatsoever in that house, and Margot knew it, only legitimate file folders with bills and check stubs that they were told to keep for several years in case of a tax audit.

But that would get Margot thinking about why Ali would pay a thief to enter her house. And she would call her lawyer. Ali didn’t want Margot to think too much. He hated her, but he admired her mind. Margot was a very clever woman. Look how she had stolen half his fortune. If Leonard ever talked to Margot, it would put Ali in great jeopardy.

He opened his middle desk drawer and withdrew the envelope with the backup green capsule in it. He placed a clean sheet of paper on the desk. He removed the coke spoon and razor blade from the drawer, along with the vial of magenta-and-turquoise sleep aids, and emptied a sleep aid into his trash basket. Then he made another little funnel.

When he had completed his work, there were now two special magenta-and-turquoise capsules in the little envelope. Two deadly sisters side by side. He would carry one of them with him this afternoon and he would leave the other behind. In case there ever was an
or else
coming from the thief Leonard Stilwell.

At 3:30
P.M
., moments after Ronnie Sinclair had tried unsuccessfully for the third time that scorching summer afternoon to reach Bix Ramstead on his cell, Leonard Stilwell had just left a drugstore where he’d bought latex gloves. He was driving up to Mt. Olympus a bit ahead of schedule. As his Honda was chugging up the hill, he saw a Latino teenager and an older woman passenger driving down in a smoke-belching Plymouth. He wondered if that was the maid with her grandson. He drove past the house and continued up to a turn in the street where there were no houses because of the steep terrain.

Leonard parked the Honda, got out, and locked it. He remembered Whitey Dawson telling about a time when he and some crackhead pulled a burglary at a supermarket and succeeded in attacking an ATM without setting off any alarms whatsoever. But the crackhead screwed up during their exit and set off the silent alarm, and when they got outside they discovered that their car had been stolen. They both got caught flat-footed when cops responded to the alarm. He’d learned a lot from Whitey Dawson, but not how to pick a lock.

Just after 4
P.M
., Leonard chose a purposefully brisk stride to walk down the steep street to the Aziz home. Whitey Dawson had never believed in slinking around and arousing suspicion. Upon approaching the house, Leonard hit the button on the remote control in his pocket and held it down. When he was in front of the driveway the door opened. He ducked under the rising door and used the remote to stop and close it before it had finished the sequence. When he was safely inside the garage, he donned his latex gloves, took the tools from his pocket, and approached the door.

“Fucking Ay-rab!” he said when he saw that it was not an old knob setup. It was a bronze-handled, single-sided dead bolt, no doubt with a thumb-turn on the inside.

He told himself to stay calm. That shouldn’t matter at all. Old knob, new handle, what the fuck was the difference? He found the light switch and turned on the garage light. It was fluorescent and provided more than enough illumination. He knelt in front of the handle and inserted the tension bar, then the pick, and he repeated Junior’s words.

“Tension bar turns cylinder. Rake lifts pin.”

For a few seconds he thought it felt like the setup on Junior’s door. But then he lost it. He removed the tools, took out a penlight, and squinted at the key slot. It looked pretty much like the one at Junior’s crib. So why did it feel different?

He tried it again. This time he used all the terminology, mumbling it like a mantra: “Insert TR-four tension bar to turn the cylinder. Then insert double-diamond pick to lift the pin.” He moved his bony fingers delicately, gracefully, just as Junior had moved his brown sausage fingers. Nothing happened.

He choked back a sob of frustration. Ten Ben Franklins just to turn a fucking cylinder and lift a fucking pin! A Fijian gorilla with the brain of a cockatoo could do it with his eyes shut. And that gave him an idea.

Leonard shut his eyes and inserted the tension bar and the pick. Blind people develop a special touch, he told himself. He felt for the cylinder and the pin, but he only felt metal scraping metal.

He opened his eyes, and this time a wet balloon of a sob escaped his lips. “Jesus!” he said. “Why can’t I get just one fucking break?”

Then he had a head-slapping moment. The gloves! The fucking latex gloves had diminished the feel. The touch.

He peeled off the gloves. He wiggled his fingers. Even though it was a blister outside and ovenlike in the garage, he blew on his fingers and flexed them like safecrackers do in the movies. He held the tension bar and the pick as lightly as he could. Like two delicate bugs he didn’t want to harm.

He inserted the tension bar. He inserted the rake. He felt for the cylinder and he felt for the pin. He also felt the sweat pouring down his face. He was tasting it. It was flowing under the neck of his T-shirt. Flop sweat, a Hollywood malady.

He couldn’t feel shit! He threw the tension bar and pick onto the concrete floor. If they were bugs, the little fuckers would be dead.

Leonard Stilwell groaned when he stood up. It was over. He was going to blame it on the new door hardware. Maybe that fucking sand nigger would give him something for his attempt. Maybe a President Grant. If not, maybe an Andrew Jackson. But in his heart Leonard knew better. That towel head would want Leonard to return the two-bill advance that he’d already smoked up.

He bent over to pick up the tension bar and pick. His back had stiffened, and feeling unsteady, he grabbed at the door handle for support. And the handle dropped. And the door opened. The maid Lola had failed to set the thumb-turn on the inside handle!