In Cold Hit, detective Shane Scully searches for a serial killer, but is suddenly taken off the case by the Department of Homeland Security for reasons unknown.
"Come on, Shane. Don't be a hard-ass. I thought we were friends." She was trying to keep me occupied while her cameraman pivoted, subtly manuevering to get a shot of the body in the culvert forty feet below. I moved up and blocked his lens. "You shoot that body, Gary, and I'll bust you for interfering with a homicide investigation."
"Everybody calls me Gar now," he said. "Unless you turn that thing off, I'm gonna call you the arrestee. Now get behind the tape. Move back or you're headed downtown." Reluctantly they did what I instructed. From where I was, I could just make out the vic, lying half in and half out of the flowing Los Angeles River.
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Zack watched Carmen and Gar head sullenly back across the street to the news vans parked in front of the sloping hills of Forest Lawn. The cemetery stretched along the lip of the river running for almost three miles, fronted by Forest Lawn Drive. "Least they won't have to carry the stiff far to bury him," Zack noted dryly. "Quality observation," I growled as I looked down into the culvert at three cops and paramedics standing a few yards from the body.
Zack and I started along the lip of the hill, looking for the crime scene egress that I hoped the uniforms had been smart enough to lay out and mark for us. As soon as we started walking, the pack of video predators across the street got active. They switched on their lights and moved parallel to us, gunning off shots as we headed toward Barham looking for a pre-marked path. "We're gonna have to start wearing makeup," Zack grumbled, sipping at the last of his coffee.
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After dinner that evening, Alexa and I got into a rare, but somewhat heated, argument. It ended up being about Zack. We were sitting in our backyard looking out at the shimmering canals of Venice, California. The development was a Disney-esque version of Venice, Italy, designed by a romantic dreamer named Abbot Kinney, back in the thirties.
The five-block area was spanned by narrow bridges that arched over three-foot-deep canals. Several of our neighbors had added rowboat-sized gondolas that bobbed like plastic ornaments on the shiny, moonlit water. Alexa and I had just popped open two Heinekens, and agreed that Pete Carroll and USC would be a good fit for Chooch, when I decided to get something off my chest.
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"Are you with the family?" the county psychiatric evaluator asked, looking down at a clipboard with all of Zack's pertinent information. We were standing in the lobby just outside the secure psychiatric wing of the Queen of Angels Hospital. The doctor was tall and bald, peering at me through rose-colored lenses, which seemed to me like a bad visual metaphor in the sensitive field of mental health.
His name tag identified him as Leonard M. Pepper, M.D., but he was pure vanilla. "I'm Don Farrell. Zack's brother," I lied. He found Zack's brother's name on the clipboard. "Okay." He had that kind of spacey, nonconfrontational manner usually found in westside head shops. "I'm just wondering how he's doing."
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The offices of California Homeland Security were located on the top three floors of the old Tishman Building on Wilshire Boulevard. The Tishman was a monument to the concept of temporary architecture- a cheaply constructed twenty-story high-rise that was built in the '60s. The L.A. Times had recently reported it was already under discussion as a possible teardown.
The three gray sedans swept into the underground garage to the bottom parking level, and pulled up next to a single secure elevator with a red sign on a metal stand that read: U.S. GOVERNMENT USE ONLY. The car doors swung open as Rowdy and Snitch were pulled roughly out of separate sedans. I was yanked out of a third and rushed toward the elevator.
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We pulled into VIP parking at the Staples Center and ten minutes later I was sitting in the best seat I'd ever had at that arena. Nine rows up, center court. The tip-off was at eight o'clock sharp. While I watched the game, Broadway and Perry took turns getting up and going to the bathroom, or out to buy beers. Something was definitely up, but when I asked them what, they waved it off. I decided to just wait them out. Whatever we were doing here, it had nothing to do with the Lakers.
At the half the home team was only up by three points. Fans were stretching and going out to the concession stands. Broadway said he wanted another hotdog and headed toward the exit. Ten minutes later, Perry grabbed my arm. "We're leaving," he announced.
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The three of us were sitting at a concrete picnic table on the long wooden pier that stretched out from the beach into the ocean at Santa Monica. The structure included an amusement park and restaurants, which were almost empty at this hour of the morning. A ten-foot hurricane break from a storm in Mexico was rolling in, pounding the sand, slamming against the concrete pilings.
Not that we were overly paranoid, but we chose this location because even with a powerful directional mike, it would be next to impossible for the feds, or anyone else, to record our conversation over the crashing surf. "I'm open to suggestions," Roger said. He had bought a hotdog from a vendor and was peeling back the paper.
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I executed the maneuver twice and then drove on surface streets to Shutters, which sits right on Santa Monica Beach and, in my opinion, is one of the most delightful little hotels in Southern California. I handed over my car to the valet and went upstairs to our ocean-view suite on the second floor. Delfina and Chooch were both inside doing their homework. "Hi. Where's Mom?" I asked, as I came through the door.
"Gonna be late," Chooch said. "She called and said she wants us to get dinner without her." Franco was out on the balcony leering at seagulls swooping in over his head, turning back and forth, watching them with hungry eyes. I got a beer from the minibar and joined him. The beautiful white sand beach stretched out beyond the bike path where the surf thundered in, making turquoise and white foam. Off to the right was the Santa Monica Pier where we had our disasterous noontime meeting.
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The house was designed to look like a Swiss chalet with wood carved eves and Disney-esque pastel colors. The Petrovitches' summer place on New Melones Lake. I was going to disappear up here just like Calvin Lerner. I glanced at Sammy. He had a blank expression on his ruptured face and was again rocking side to side.
Two brigadiers were standing behind, watching him sway, frozen by his murderous intensity. "Sammy...," I said. He didn't answer. "Listen, man, you don't want to kill me. This is a very bad plan. I'm a cop. You kill a cop, it doesn't go away."
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Ten minutes later we were speeding down the 405 toward the Van Nuys Airport. Alexa was driving. I was slouched in the passenger seat watching the lights from the freeway streaking across her face. At 1:35am, we pulled into the parking lot of Peterson Executive Jet Terminal in Van Nuys. Tony Filosiani, Lieutenant Cubio, and Judd Underwood were already there, along with dozen cops and FBI agents.
A heated procedural argument was in progress. "It doesn't matter to me if it belongs to John Travolta or John the Baptist," Tony was saying. "It ain't takin' off. We gotta make a move." Then he turned to face us. "An hour ago, Travolta's Gulfstream filed a flight plan for Berlin."
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Shane Scully's Tour of Duty - Cold Hit
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