Simple Justice (6 page)

Luis Albundo was in my rearview mirror as I drove away, standing in the street and yelling after me.

“¡Mata todos los pinches putos!”

I knew enough street Spanish to make the translation.

Kill all the fucking faggots!

I drove down out of the hills to Sunset Boulevard and a land of
bodegas
and
tiendas
and
taquerías
, where spirited Latin music drifted from bars and workers poured out of city buses stacked up at intersections three or four deep.

Late afternoon traffic clogged the street, pushing radiators and tempers toward the boiling point. When it came to a standstill, I passed the time eyeing handsome young men as they sauntered by in the crosswalk, their brown faces stained with the sweat of a hard day’s work performed for dog’s pay, yet somehow radiant with optimism and laughter. All around me on the sidewalks were mothers with children, old people with children, children with younger brothers and sisters, and yet I neither heard nor saw a child crying. It made no sense or perfect sense, depending on how you looked at it.

On the car radio next to me, I heard a Selena tune end and something by Luis Miguel start up. The light changed and traffic moved haltingly again, snaking past potholes deep enough to plant trees in and patches of asphalt made soft like cheese from the heat.

I edged along until Echo Park was behind me and I was into the Silver Lake district. When I saw the side street I was looking for, I forced a left turn through the stream of vehicles and found The Out Crowd a few blocks later.

As I parked across the street, I glanced at the Mustang’s odometer and clock: The trip had covered 2.2 miles and taken seventeen minutes and change. I figured that late on a weeknight, when the streets were nearly empty, Gonzalo Albundo could have reached the bar from home in less than half that time and driven back just as quickly. It also occurred to me that his brother Luis could have made the same trip, carrying with him all his homophobic rage, and maybe the .38 revolver that had been used to kill Billy Lusk, but never found.

The Out Crowd was an inconspicuous, single-story place, painted flat black, situated near the end of a long block of warehouses and body shops. Directly behind it, a hard dirt cliff covered with clinging cactus stretched a hundred feet to its rim, where older homes perched precariously, looking out on Hollywood and the more affluent communities beyond. On a rare day like this, when westerly winds blew the basin clean of smog, the clifftop residents could see all the way across the Promised Land to the sea, where the exiled pollution hung like dirty linen on the far horizon.

I sat for a moment in the Mustang and surveyed the crime scene. Strips of yellow tape cordoned off the main parking lot, which was located on the bar’s north side. A narrower section wrapped around behind, up against the hard slope. It was on that narrow stretch of asphalt forty hours earlier that Gonzalo Albundo had been spotted bending over the victim’s body, before fleeing into the darkness. Or so the witness had told the police.

I wasn’t the only one interested in The Out Crowd that afternoon.

As I crossed the street, Senator Paul Masterman stood on the sidewalk just outside the yellow tape, preparing to read lines off cue cards while a handheld minicam recorded his latest anti-crime message.

Masterman had removed his jacket, loosened his necktie, and rolled up the sleeves of his dress shirt to reveal thick forearms burnished with graying hair and a Rolex watch that must have set him back a thousand dollars or two. Under the watchful eye of the director, a female assistant carefully arranged the folds of Masterman’s jacket, which he’d hooked on one finger and slung casually over his shoulder. With his luxuriant waves of silvery hair, broad shoulders, and sharply cut jawline, Senator Paul Masterman was a man worth looking at, and he knew it.

My eyes moved from the senator to an intent young man nearby, who looked away from the activity only long enough to jot notes on a clipboard. Although he was on the wiry side, rather than broad-shouldered and barrel-chested, the resemblance to Masterman was unmistakable. The younger man had the senator’s strong facial lines and flinty green eyes, and the same erect bearing that suggested an ease of confidence and authority.

Like Senator Masterman, he’d rolled up his sleeves, loosened his tie, and opened the top button of his shirt. A few strands of golden-brown chest hair curled teasingly at his neck, promising more but not too much. I had considerable trouble keeping my eyes off him.

“Quiet, please,” the director shouted. “Everybody settle!”

The assistant stepped forward and held a hinged clapboard in front of the camera, marked with the number “9.”

“Masterman gay bar spot, take nine.”

With a loud clack, she slapped the two sections of the board together and stepped quickly back.

“Here we go!” the director yelled. “And…record!”

Senator Masterman peered into the lens, catching the rotating cue cards with the edges of his eyes, reading the copy with expert inflection and flawlessly placed beats.

“This time, violent crime took the life of a young man outside a gay bar. But his tragic death has meaning for us all. Because each of us, no matter what our lifestyle, deserves to live safely, free of fear, free of violence.”

On cue, Masterman toughened his tone and posture, and the cameraman did a slow zoom to the senator’s rugged face.

“It takes a special person, someone with real guts, to put the punks and thugs in prison where they belong, and return the streets to the decent citizens of our communities. I’m that man. But I can’t do it alone. If we’re to win the battle, I must have your support.

“Remember, in our fight to take back the streets, every vote counts.”

He finished by looking steadfastly into the lens, never blinking.

The director yelled, “Cut!” And then: “We’ll keep that one. Nice job, Paul.”

The assistant handed the senator a cold drink and scurried off. The young man approached beaming, and Masterman put an arm around his shoulders, talking earnestly as they referred to his clipboard notes.

When he looked up again, Masterman noticed me standing a few yards away, my eyes focused not on him but on the younger man beside him.

The senator lifted his cleft chin to peer down at me with un-disguised displeasure, and I was reminded of two things: He loathed homosexuals, and he knew I was one.

He took a few steps in my direction until we were face to face for the first time since he’d walked out angrily on our interview nearly seven years before.

“Benjamin Justice, I believe.”

He didn’t offer his hand, and I didn’t offer mine.

“Senator Masterman.”

We stepped aside as a grip hauled a light reflector past us to a waiting truck. Around him, a half-dozen other crew members scurried to pack up equipment. “I don’t suppose you’re here taping a spot in support of gun control,” I said.

“You know my stand on that, Justice.”

His voice was faintly amused, but just faintly.

“Guns don’t kill people,” I said. “People kill people.”

“As the vicious murder that took place here so well illustrates.”

“As I recall, Senator, you sometimes carry a handgun yourself.”

“For self-protection. And with a special permit from the sheriff.”

The younger man had been standing a step or two behind the senator, but now moved forward so they were shoulder to shoulder, and the resemblance became even more striking. “A man in Dad’s position gets a lot of threats,” he said, confirming their relationship. “He can never be too careful.”

“Especially when an irresponsible press goes out of its way to portray me in an unfavorable light,” the senator added.

“You seem to have survived.”

What little humor had been in his voice was suddenly gone.

“I’ll always survive, Justice. Whether the attacks come from the anti-gun crowd or the militant feminists or the proselytizing homosexuals.” He smiled like a shark. “Or their media sympathizers.”

“Dad?”

The senator reacted like a man being called back from a distant room. He and his son communicated briefly with their eyes before the senator turned back to me.

“Forgive my rudeness. This is my son, Paul, Jr.” Pride suddenly softened his face. “Just got his law degree from USC, like his old man. Paul, Benjamin Justice.”

Paul, Jr., shook my hand.

“The name rings a bell.” His voice sounded cautious, but not unfriendly.

“It carries a certain notoriety,” I said.

“Justice used to be a reporter with the
L.A. Times
,” Senator Masterman said. “Until he had a little problem with the Pulitzer committee.”

His son studied me closely for a moment, recognition dawning on his face.

“I think I remember. A story about AIDS, wasn’t it?”

“I keep running into people with good memories,” I said.

“It was a big story on a serious subject. Not something one easily forgets.”

“And not every reporter wins a Pulitzer and then has to give it back,” the senator added. “Who could ever forget that?”

His son smiled awkwardly and dropped his eyes, a gesture of decency that surprised me. It made me like him a little, despite his bloodlines.

“So what brings you out this way, Justice?” the senator asked. “Don’t tell me you’re working parking lot security at gay bars now.”

“I’m doing some legwork for the
Sun
.”

“Like hell.”

“Strictly freelance, Senator. Nothing major.”

“You’re not serious.”

He sounded incredulous. I nodded. His next words came from a clenched jaw.

“Nothing to do with me, I assume. Or I’ll damn well stop it right now.”

I was reminded that Masterman had social connections with the
Sun
’s publisher.

“You’re safe, Senator. I’m working the Billy Lusk story.”

“Who the hell’s Billy Lusk?”

“Dad.” His son gave him a look just short of reproach. “William Lusk is the murder victim. His name was highlighted in the news clippings I gave you this morning.”

“Of course.” The senator smiled with the ease of a man who long ago stopped counting the lies he got away with. “I guess it slipped my mind.”

Then, without the smile: “I find it hard to believe you’re working in journalism again, Justice. Even for the
Sun
.”

Behind him, a crew member removed the yellow tape that surrounded the crime scene. I realized then that it wasn’t official police tape at all, but a prop for the TV spot. The police had apparently removed their own tape earlier, considering the investigation complete.

“Just gathering some background,” I said. “For Harry Brofsky.”

“After what you did to him? He must be a bigger fool than I figured him for.”

The senator and I stood eye to eye, two monumental male egos in a showdown that only the senator could win, given my well-publicized debasement.

Then something happened that neither of us expected: For reasons I didn’t understand, the senator’s son decided to balance the scales a bit, which made me like him a little more.

“Everyone deserves a second chance,” he said, fixing his father with clear, unblinking eyes. “Don’t they, Dad?”

The senator shifted uncomfortably in his wingtips and cleared his tight throat. I’d never before had the pleasure of witnessing him so unnerved, not even the time I’d grilled him about his messy divorce with a tape recorder running.

“A second chance,” he said quietly. I wondered if his history of infidelity and spousal abuse was on both their minds. “Yes, I suppose we all deserve that.”

The pride I’d seen a minute earlier transformed his face again.

“You see this kid’s talent for diplomacy? When it comes to politics, he won’t just follow in my footsteps. He’ll leave me in the dust.”

He caught his son’s neck in the crook of his elbow, pulled him close, and kissed him roughly on one of his well-shaved cheeks.

As I stood there awkwardly, I felt a pang of envy that had nothing to do with the fact that I found Paul Masterman, Jr., so attractive, even likable. It had everything to do with the sudden warmth shown by his father. Maybe I didn’t care much for Senator Masterman’s politics, and I had no doubt he’d been a bastard as a husband. But any man who showed such open and unabashed affection for his son got at least a token of my admiration.

It troubled me to think what I would have traded, how much of myself I would have given up, for a single moment like that with my own father. I wanted to know how a son reached that place with his father, what the secret was. Most of all, I wanted to know what it felt like. I wanted the senator’s son to tell me.

“Senator!”

From a big black Buick nearby, the assistant waved a cellular phone. Masterman excused himself, and I was suddenly alone with Paul, Jr.

Tension more oppressive than the heat filled the space between us. I didn’t know what the source was for him—lack of trust, perhaps, since I had once written some damning articles about his father. From my side, it felt charged with sexual desire, along with something deeper and more complicated that I didn’t yet comprehend.

“You’re probably busy,” I said. “I don’t want to keep you.”

It was the kind of thing we say when we mean just the opposite, and Masterman was perceptive enough to know that.