Terminal (A Lomax & Biggs Mystery Book 5) (19 page)

“Stay out of it,” I said. “Thanks for the beer.”

I got up, walked out, and left him sitting in the truck barn, fuming.

CHAPTER 49

“SO HOW DID
Sophie like Familyland?” Terry asked when I got to the squad room on the next morning.

“Funny thing about that,” I said. “You want the long version or the short version?”

“At this hour? The shorter the better.”

“She ran away from the aunt and uncle, hopped on a bus, Brian called in a dozen units to help me track her down, I did, I promised her she could stay here with us forever, and then I told Diana that I might have leukemia.”

“Okay, you’ve piqued my interest,” Terry said. “I think I’ll go for the longer version.”

I gave it to him.

“Why the hell didn’t you call me as soon as you found out the kid ran away?”

“You sound like my father,” I said. “The truth is, I thought about calling you, but I didn’t know what to ask you to do.”

“That’s the problem with you, Lomax. You have no leadership skills.”

“But he’ll still make sergeant before you, dickwad,” a voice said.

We looked up. Kilcullen had come through the door and was headed straight at us, looking even crankier than usual.

“Brendan,” Terry said, “what an unexpected pleasure to gaze
upon your smiling Irish countenance on this glorious Sunday morning. What can we do for you?”

“You can kiss my Irish ass, Biggs.”

“Ass kissing is not my strong suit, sir.”

“Shut up! You know why I’m here. I’ve been duly notified that you plan to be asking the CEO of Chilton-Winslow a bunch of stupid-ass questions.”

“Are you serious, lieutenant?” I said. “Did Mel Berger actually send you to hold our hands in the middle of a homicide investigation?”

“Do you think it was
my
idea to spend my day off telling you how to do your job? Berger asked you guys not to harass Egan Granville. All you had to do was say yes, then go off and do whatever you want, but Biggs basically responded with a one-finger salute. Berger turned around and put it on me.”

“So are you here to tell us not to interview Granville?” I said

“Hell, no. I figure you’ve got a good reason, but rather than try to explain that shit to a politician, I told him I’d go with you and keep you from embarrassing the department and the mayor. Now, why don’t you bring me up to speed.”

We took Kilcullen through everything we’d learned about Ovamax, including the fact that Amanda Dunbar told us that Granville was responsible for keeping the drug on the market for two years after he knew it was killing patients.

“She’s got to be lying,” Kilcullen said. “The President of the United States nominated Granville for a cabinet post. He was vetted by Congress.”

“And now he’s going to be vetted by LAPD,” I said. “Even if he’s not guilty of anything, he’s probably high on our killer’s hit list.”

Terry opened up the annual report we’d found in Charlie Brock’s apartment. “Dead, dead, and dead,” he said, pointing to Carolyn Butler, Kristian Kraus, and Wade Yancy. “Dunbar is an obvious target, but we paid her a visit, and from the looks of it,
she’s hunkered down and ready for Armageddon.”

“If what she said is even remotely true, then Granville’s ass is also in the crosshairs,” Kilcullen said. “Are you planning to tell him that his life is in danger?”

“We’d rather arrest him for criminally negligent manslaughter,” Terry said, “but that’s not in the cards. We’re ready to move out. Are you sure you want to ride with us?”

“It’s the last thing I want to be doing, but the deputy mayor wants someone with political savvy to finesse the meeting with Granville,” Kilcullen said.

“In that case, you definitely should tag along,” Terry said. “Like I said, ass kissing isn’t my strong suit.”

CHAPTER 50

WE ARRIVED AT
Chilton-Winslow in Culver City at 9:30. Marion McGirr, Granville’s executive guard dog, kept us waiting at the security desk for twenty minutes and was less than thrilled when she saw that we’d added yet another cop to the mix.

“Really?” she grumbled as soon as Kilcullen introduced himself. “Now there are
three
of you? This is getting to be like the Spanish Inquisition.”

“Sorry if we blindsided you, Ms. McGirr,” Kilcullen said, his Irish charm on point, “but the mayor’s office felt that a man of Mr. Granville’s stature warranted a personal visit from the unit commander.”

“That explains why
you’re
here, lieutenant,” McGirr said. “Why you still need these other two escapes me, but we don’t have time to debate. Mr. Granville should be arriving in ten minutes. Let’s go up to the helipad.”

We took the elevator to the roof, where three men in red coveralls were waiting for the helicopter to land.

“According to everything I read,” Kilcullen said, making small talk, “the Senate is likely to confirm Mr. Granville’s appointment tomorrow.”

“It’s more than
likely
,” McGirr said. “The vote takes place at 10 a.m. Washington time, and we’ve already scheduled a board meeting for noon our time, so Mr. Granville can step down
from Chilton-Winslow. And then, as he will say in his farewell remarks, he’ll be moving ‘from the medicine cabinet to the President’s cabinet.’”

“They’re coming in,” one of the red coveralls called out.

“Who else is travelling with Mr. Granville?” Kilcullen said.

McGirr looked at him sharply. “Why would you ask?”

Kilcullen is a smart cop. He’d studied the pictures in the annual report, and he knew that Granville might not be the only target on board. But that was none of Marion McGirr’s damn business.

He smiled. “Senior executives have a broader perspective than everyone else, Ms. McGirr. I’m sure you’d agree that it would be an injustice for us to be surrounded by people of that caliber and not ask them a few questions that might lead to our understanding of why Dr. Kraus was killed.”

That pacified her, and she glanced at the manifest. “In addition to Mr. Granville, we have Nolan Sutter, our Chief Financial Officer, Ernst Zweig, Executive VP Manufacturing, and Arvin Boynton-Forbes, our Global Ethics and Compliance Officer.”

Terry put his hand over his mouth to cover the smirk that blossomed when she said Global Ethics.

I looked at Kilcullen. He nodded. He’d recognized the names. We had just seen their faces in the annual report.

The chopper was about half a mile out, and we watched it approach. About two hundred feet shy of the building, it slowed and hovered.

The landing team looked up, then at each other. The crew chief picked up his radio. “CW Air, this is CW Ground. Is there a problem?”

No answer.

He keyed the mic again. “CW Air, this is CW Ground. You’re clear to land. Do you read me?”

Still no answer.

McGirr snatched the radio out of his hand. “Captain Elliott, this is Marion McGirr. What the hell is going on up there?”

“Ms. McGirr,” a voice responded. “I’ve heard so much about you from Captain Elliott.”

“Who is this,” she demanded, “and where is my pilot?”

“The captain is back at the terminal, no doubt silently cursing out the makers of Duck Tape for producing such a strong, durable product,” the voice came back. “My name is Charlie. Your pilot this morning is Dahlia. We won’t be landing today. We will, however, be dropping off several of your board members. The first to disembark will be your Corrupt Financial Officer.”

A few seconds passed, and two men appeared in the open doorway of the aircraft. I recognized Charlie Brock immediately. I didn’t know the man standing in front of him, but I was sure McGirr would.

“Oh, my God,” she said. “It’s Nolan Sutter.”

Sutter clawed at the door frame, desperately trying to fight his way back into the chopper. But the corporate number cruncher was no match for the veteran combat Marine.

For one brief moment Sutter was the focal point of a tableau, frozen in the sky fifteen hundred feet over the West Coast Campus of Chilton-Winslow. The next moment his body was hurtling toward the ground, legs kicking, arms flailing, the screams that came from his open mouth never to be heard, drowned out by the rhythmic drone of the rotors.

But nothing could mask the sickening sound of shattering bone and ripping flesh as the CFO of one of the most powerful pharmaceutical companies on the planet exploded onto the concrete.

Marion McGirr covered her eyes just before the moment of impact, and while there was nothing in our police training that said we couldn’t have done the same, Terry, Kilcullen, and I all watched in collective horror until the deadly free fall came to its inevitable violent conclusion.

Marion screamed, and Kilcullen, shock still etched on his face, instinctively sprang to her side to shield her from the mangled mass of blood and viscera on the ground below.

Charlie’s voice came back over the radio. “I would like to extend a special welcome to our guests from LAPD, Detectives Lomax and Biggs. Gentlemen, I can’t tell you what a wonderful surprise it is to see that you’re here just in time to watch our little show. That was Act One. Now why don’t you hop on La Cienega and meet us at 5801 Wilshire Boulevard for Act Two.”

CHAPTER 51

I’VE WITNESSED VIOLENT
deaths before, a few even more mind-searing than the cold-blooded murder of Nolan Sutter. I’m trained to dissociate from the horror, control my gut-level human reaction, and respond to the emergency.

Marion McGirr had no such training. She broke loose from Kilcullen, raised a fist to the sky, and began screaming into the radio.

The noise of the blades whirring overhead made most of it unintelligible, but I managed to pick out “wife and three children.”

Kilcullen grabbed the radio and tried to calm her down, but the woman was in shock, and she began pounding on his chest and wailing at him to do something.

Terry and I helped get her under control, and we ordered the landing crew chief to stay with her till the paramedics arrived. Then the three of us raced for the elevator.

As soon as we started to descend Kilcullen began barking into the ground-to-air radio. “This is Lieutenant Brendan Kilcullen, LAPD. There is nowhere you can go in a helicopter that you won’t be caught. Land now and give yourselves up.”

Land now?
Charlie Brock was a trained assassin who had commandeered a helicopter, kidnapped the soon-to-be Secretary of Health and Human Services, and publicly murdered a high-ranking executive of a major corporation.
He wasn’t about
to land
. Kilcullen’s request was as fruitless as McGirr’s tirade. I’m sure he knew it, but he was following police protocol.

“I repeat,” he said, “land now. You will be caught, and you will only make the consequences worse for yourselves if you kill any more innocent people.”

“News flash, lieutenant,” Charlie’s voice came back. “There are no innocent people on this aircraft. Myself included.”

The elevator reached the lobby, and we ran toward the parking lot. The chopper was still hovering overhead. As soon as we were in the car, the pilot banked to the left, climbed, and headed for their next drop-off point.

Kilcullen was already on his cell phone to Dispatch. “I’m at Chilton-Winslow Pharmaceuticals on Bristol Parkway, Culver City, where a helicopter dropped a man from fifteen hundred feet.”

I couldn’t hear the other side of the conversation, but his face turned red, and he exploded into the phone. “Of course, there’s a fucking fatality! Send the coroner and tell him to bring a fucking spatula and a sponge. I also need a bus on the scene to treat people for trauma.”

He took a beat to gain his composure. “Detectives Lomax and Biggs and I are on the ground in pursuit of a royal blue Bell helicopter, which is reportedly heading for five-eight-zero-one Wilshire. I want a bird in the air tracking them, and I need all available cars to report to that location, Code 3. Round up as many CHP units as you can to clear traffic along La Cienega, Slauson, and whatever else is between Bristol and 5801 Wilshire. Have them cordon off the area for six blocks in every direction and move all civilians off the streets. And the goddamn press is going to be all over this, so for God’s sake, keep them at a distance. Odds are these crazy bastards are going to splatter another body on the pavement.”

“I don’t think you have to worry about that, Lieutenant,” I said.

“What the hell are you talking about?” he boomed. “You heard what that psycho said.
Act Two
. Are you telling me you don’t think he’s going to toss another body?”

“Oh, he’s going to toss one,” I said. “But not to the pavement.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I just checked the location on the GPS. There’s not a lot of pavement at 5801 Wilshire.”

“Then what the hell is there?”

“Tar. Acres and acres of tar.”

CHAPTER 52

“IT’S KIND OF
inspired don’t you think?” Terry said as we sped along Hauser Boulevard, keeping pace with the chopper.

“What’s inspired?” Kilcullen said.

“The La Brea Tar Pits,” Terry said. “I mean, if you’re going to drop these evil drug lords out of a chopper, then the tar pits is the perfect place to do it.”

“Do I have to remind you that your job is to prevent that from happening?” Kilcullen said.

“And do I have to remind you that on Day One my partner told you that Kraus had been his wife’s fertility doctor, and you said, ‘no connection, no conflict’? So now that it turns out Kraus was knowingly, willfully injecting her with a drug that killed her, it’s hard for me hang onto that ‘no conflict’ shit.”

“You wear the shield, you do the job,” Kilcullen said.

“Hey, I’m not saying I won’t protect and serve. I’m just saying it would be righteously poetic if they drop one of those fuckers in a lake of bubbling oil. And for the record, if I fail to stop them, I guarantee you I won’t lose any sleep over it.”

Kilcullen had the good sense not to pursue the discussion.

As soon as we turned onto Wilshire it was clear that Kilcullen’s order to cordon off the area was wishful thinking at best. It was a beautiful Sunday in October, and the Pits, one of the city’s biggest attractions, was bubbling over with tourists as well as tar.