the Prostitutes' Ball (2010) (19 page)

An arrogant remark, but somehow Sumner Hitchens had the charm to get away with it. He dialed a number, then turned away and had a quiet conversation on his phone with someone, which included some whispered nuances before he finally disconnected.

"Frieda has a judge who will write it blind if she promises not to release the warrant without signed authorization from the primary property owner, which would be our man, Brooks. She said she'd be here in an hour."

"That works."

After three quarters of an hour had passed I said, "Lets see if Brooks feels any better about cooperating with our investigation now."

We went back over to the PAB and checked in with the booking sergeant, who told us he'd put Brooks into 2-15, an Erne gang car on the second floor.

I wanted him in a group cell but I wasn't sure he should be put into a cell with a bunch of Mexican Mafia. We followed the sergeant quickly into the elevator and rode up. As soon as I stepped out into the cell block, I could hear Brooks whining or whimpering. When we rounded the corner on our way to 2-15, we heard a slap followed by a squeal.

"Leave me alone. Please!" Brooks pleaded. "I can pay you money. My dad's a billionaire." Something you probably don't want to confide to a cell full of extortionists.

We stepped in front of the barred door and saw Brooks against the wall, surrounded by three Hispanic bangers, each with a large "18" tattooed on the back of his neck, indicating they were from the Mexican Mafia's hardened 18th Street gang.

"Hey ese, ease up. Don't go committing no assault on my arrestee," Hitch said sharply.

The gangbangers turned away from Brooks as the sergeant from the booking cage pulled out his keys and let the terrified Heir Abhorrent out.

Once he was in the corridor I saw he had a puffed lip from getting smacked around. Tears were wet on his cheeks.

Hitch and I led him into one of the I-rooms off the jail corridor and closed the door behind us. I took out my cuffs, and for effect, locked him to the ring on the table.

"What are you doing? What re you doing?" he squealed hysterically, pulling back. But once chained up, he wasn't going anywhere.

"How come you didn't come to my office?" I began. "You need to give me a good reason."

"Be . . . be . . . because," he stammered.

Hitch leaned forward. "Because is not a reason. We're looking for an action word here, Brooks. 'Because' is a conjunction."

"I had things to do."

"So, for no stated reason, you hampered and delayed our triple homicide investigation, keeping us from doing our job?" I said. "Don't you want us to solve this? You aren't somehow involved, are you?"

"No! Of course not. How could I be involved? I have an alibi. I was at my Christmas party. You already know that. And of course I want you to do your job." Brooks sniffled. "I'm very pro-police."

"Doesn't seem that way," Hitch said.

"I am, I really am!" he pleaded.

"How are you getting along with Stender Sheedy Senior?" I asked, abruptly changing the subject.

Now real anger flared. "I hate that fucker. He works for my father. Asshole made me fly all the way back from Amsterdam once 'cause he needed my signature on some stupid document that needed to be notarized."

"How 'bout Junior?"

"Sten is okay. He's a tight-ass, but he gets me stuff."

"Those two haven't exactly been helping me and my partner either," I said.

"Nope," Hitch agreed. "Makes us want to take it out on somebody.

Since you're handy I'm thinking we should park you in this jail 'til like, say, Easter. How's that sound?"

"No! No, please! Please don't!" he wailed. "Whatever the problem is, I can fix it, but you've got to let me outta here tonight. Those guys in that cell scare the shit outta me."

"Maybe you should stop wearing T-shirts that insult people," Hitch suggested.

"I'm not so sure we can just fix this," I said. "This isn't the Bel Air Country Club. You're not in here for throwing up in the pool. This is a triple homicide. Took place on your property. Until you convince us otherwise, we gotta assume you're part of it."

"I'm not! I promise you. What do you need? I'll do anything. Please!"

He was leaning forward. Tears again began to well in his eyes.

"I don't know." I looked over at Hitch. "What do you want to do?"

"I don't know," he said in deep theatrical thought. "I'm torn."

"Me too."

"Please! Just tell me what you want. I'll do anything. Just tell me. Whatever it is, I'll make sure it's done," Brooks whimpered.

"Okay," I said, rubbing my chin. "So here's the problem. In order for us to clear you, we need to make sure none of your DNA is on that crime scene."

"I wasn't there," he said. "How could my DNA be there if I wasn t?

"You say you weren't there but you haven't been too honest with us up 'til now," I reminded him. "Like we know you met with Yolanda Dublin up on Skyline Drive to get her money, but you said you never go there. That was a lie. We lose trust when people lie. When trust is lost it's almost impossible to earn it back again."

"I just said that to you so my dad wouldn't find out I was renting that backyard to people. And I didn't exactly go up there. Sten showed her the property. I met her on Skyline Drive a day later and she paid me. We were out front standing in the street. I never even went up the drive."

Hitch thought about it, then pretended to have an idea. "Hey, if that's true, what if we go back there with a spit kit and check the house and the backyard for Brooks's DNA. If all he did was stand in the street and get her money, then his DNA won't be on the crime scene and we can cut him loose."

"'Cept we don't have a search warrant," I replied, furrowing my brow. Of course, all of this was patently ridiculous, but it was working because Brooks had a panicked look on his face.

"We'd need the owner's permission to go in there looking for the DNA," I continued. "Sheedy won't give it, so that's just gonna end up being a huge unproductive hassle."

"I have complete ownership of that property, not Sheedy," Brooks said, lunging at the idea. "I sign papers all the time on that place. Por taxes and all kinds of shit. I can give the permission."

"I don't know," Hitch said, looking at me. "It's pretty late in the case now for that. Maybe we should just keep him here and sort it out later."

"No! Please. No! I'll sign it. I will." He was almost shrieking at us.

"We gotta think about it," I said. "Don't go anywhere."

We walked out of the room, leaving him chained to the table. Hitch notified the jail guard that our wit was to be detained in the I-room, and not put back in 2-15. We wanted to scare him, but we didn't want him killed.

Then we went to the lobby of the jail to wait for Frieda Wilson from the ADA's office.

She arrived twenty minutes later with our warrant and turned out to be another fox with great legs, wearing a very short skirt. The warrant she brought us was extensive. This one included both the house and the yard. There was a place for Brooks Dunbar to sign, granting us permission to search the premises.

"You're the best," Hitch told Frieda, who smiled longingly at him before she left.

The two of us went back upstairs to the jail. Brooks was crying softly when we walked back into the I-room.

Hopefully, this had been an eye-opening, life-changing experience for him.

"You left me. I was so scared you weren't coming back," he cried.

Hitch and I sat down facing him. "Here's the deal," I said. "You sign this and maybe . . . maybe we let you go home tonight."

"I'll sign. I'll sign."

"Since this is a sensitive case with a lot of media overtones, you better damn well keep this to yourself," I added. "You tell anyone and we slam you back in here."

"I promise," he said. "I won't tell anyone. Where do I sign?"

"Right here." I handed him my ballpoint. "Two copies. You keep the bottom one."

He signed without even reading.

Chapter
31.

By the time we stepped outside the Men's Central Jail with Brooks it was after one A
. M
. The temperature was hovering in the low seventies and the Santa Ana wind condition had fully developed. Santa Anas clear the L
. A
. basin of pollutants, but they also drive up the pollen count and Claritin sales throughout the city.

As it turned out, Brooks had allergies, so as soon as we got outside he started sneezing. "You just gonna leave me here?" he whined, wiping his nose with his forearm after a big wet one. "Aren't you even gonna take me home?"

"We don't run a taxi service," Hitch said.

"Then how'm I s'posed to get there?" Another sneeze.

Hitch pointed at Brooks's four-hundred-dollar Gucci sneakers
,
which, miraculously, he'd not lost to his murderous cellmates. "The left one goes in front of the right one," Sumner said patiently. "If you keep repeating the process, you'll be doing something we call walking. Should get you home."

"Here's your copy of our permission to search Skyline Drive," I said, handing him the paper. "Do not talk about this to anyone."

He nodded, then sneezed again.

"You're just gonna leave me here?"

"That's the plan," I answered.

We got into the slick-back and left him standing there, wobbly and confused as a day-old changeling.

Hitch and I headed back to the crime scene. On the way, we stopped at the CSI equipment warehouse at the new forsensic lab at Cal State L
. A
. where we checked out a fire extinguisher-sized canister of Luminol spray with a nozzle.

As I signed for the stuff, I couldn't help but think about the paper trail I was leaving for Dahlia Wilkes. I pushed that troubling thought aside and in minutes we were again in the slick-back, heading to the Hollywood Hills.

When we arrived at the mansion, it was almost two A
. M
. We parked our black-and-white in the bushes off the road, then grabbed our equipment and briefcases and snuck up the driveway, through the main gate, and around to the far side of the house, where we wouldn't be visible from the Prentiss's second-floor windows.

The twenty-foot cypress trees in the yard swayed in the brisk Santa Anas over our heads, shaking their leaves like giant pom-poms. We paused at the back door and looked down at the big, commercial
-
sized Yale padlock.

"Shoulda brought some bolt cutters," Hitch said, studying the padlock. "We'll have to break a window."

"I'm not breaking a window," I answered. "If we don't find anything, I want to back out of here without leaving a trail. I'm still hoping this doesn't draw too much negative official interest."

"Including your wife's," Hitch said.

I hate keeping stuff from Alexa. Even when I was skating the edges of the rule book, I always eventually told her what 1 was doing because she's the smartest cop I know and one of my best crime-solving resources. But there was no way Hitch could appreciate that, and since we were taking some career chances, I decided for the time being to continue to honor my promise.

"Okay, okay. I won't tell her without at least talking it over with you first."

"Some vow of silence," he muttered. "How you planning to get inside if we don't break a window?"

I reached into my pocket and removed my little leather lock pick case. It's no bigger than a small manicure kit. I'd learned to pick locks from one of my training partners almost twenty years ago. It's actually not too difficult once you get the hang of it.

I unwrapped the leather case and pulled out the main pick. It was longer and thicker than the other ones and had a small right angle at the very end. Then I removed half a dozen shorter, thinner picks, each with a variety of different shaped bends at the end.

The idea was to slip the main pick into the guide slot, then jiggle it until it found the main tumbler. The smaller ones then slid in under it, fitting into the secondary tumblers, until you had enough traction to turn the lock. There are easier, more high-tech ways to open locks, such as master tap keys or electric magnets. This was admittedly a little old school, but I liked the fact it took some skill and that I had mastered it.

"Shine your Mini Mag on this," I said, and Hitch aimed the small LED at the lock while I worked.

It took me about two and a half minutes before I had the padlock open.

"When we do the movie, I think the Hitchens character should work the lock pick and the Scully character should hold the light," he said. "Those picks are way cool. Its exactly the kind of thing Jamie digs in a film."

I was still fighting the idea there was going to be a film, so I just let that go and pushed the door open. We stepped inside and closed it quietly behind us.

The house was dark and creepy. We stood in the back pantry and listened to the mansion creak and groan in the growing wind.

I saw a documentary once about a bunch of little birds in the Amazon who have this unique relationship with the river crocodiles who live and hunt along the banks of that mammoth river. Part of the film told how sometimes, when a croc had meat stuck in the back of his mouth, he would open it for one of the little birds to hop inside. The bird would then stand on the huge reptile s tongue and feed himself by cleaning the croc s sharp, deadly teeth. The narrator called it an extraordinary act of synergy and trust. I remember thinking there had to be a better way for those little birds to feed themselves. To me, it just seemed stupid.