“Sorry,” the driver said. “We got hit with a couple of extra stops we hadn’t planned for.”
“It’s okay,” Dewey said. “You’re here now.”
Dewey signed “Harold Phillips” to the trucker’s invoice, and the driver said, “One more signature.”
“Of course,” Dewey said, signing the second invoice.
Then both men walked back to the truck and opened the rear doors. No men with badges jumped out. Dewey looked both ways on the street but still didn’t see Creole and Jerzy. The delivery team was carrying a Sony forty-six-inch HDTV up the three steps, when Dewey said, “Just leave everything on the front porch.” Then for their benefit, Dewey spoke into his cell phone to an imaginary installer, and said, “Roger? Are you and Slim on the way now?” A pause and then, “See you in fifteen. Everything’s here.”
“The front porch?” the Latino said. “Don’t you want this stuff inside the house?”
“I’ve got my geeks coming. They’re gonna set up the plasma in the den, a Sony in the living room, and the other in my bedroom. Just haul everything to the porch and they’ll bring it in as needed. Easier for them, easier for you.”
The Latino shrugged and both men returned to the truck. It took four trips up the long walkway before everything was on the porch, including another Sony and a Pioneer sixty-inch plasma HDTV. Then the Latino hesitated, as though something wasn’t quite right here. He said, “Why don’t you let us -”
Dewey distracted him with a $20 bill, saying, “Thanks, guys. Stop and get yourselves a sandwich on me.”
Both deliverymen smiled and thanked Dewey, then hurried back to the truck and were gone. Within seconds Dewey saw his runners driving down from somewhere near the top of the hill. They parked and got out quickly.
“You had me worried,” Dewey said. “I couldn’t see your car.”
“You’re not supposed to see our car, boss,” Tristan said. “That’s the idea.”
“Let’s get to work,” Dewey said. “Our window of opportunity is closing.”
After having loaded the merchandise into the rented van, Tristan and Jerzy were following their employer’s car to the storage facility in Reseda, when Tristan said, “When we got to that house, did you notice somethin’ funny about Kessler?”
Jerzy, who’d been dozing in the passenger seat, said, “Naw, he looked like the same butt-tight Nazi he always looks like.”
“He was way nervous, man,” Tristan said.
“Why not?” Jerzy said. “The fucker jist raided somebody’s credit-card account for several grand and had some sweet fuckin’ electronics delivered to the sucker’s crib. Didn’t you feel your asshole wink every time a car drove up the street?”
Tristan said, “Yeah, but when he was nervous, he didn’t sound so much like Schwarzenegger. In fact, he sounded like a regular old citizen of the U.S. of A.”
“What’s your point, dude?” Jerzy said.
“That made me check him out a little closer, and I don’t think his hair looked the same. His forehead looked higher.”
“So, maybe the old fuck wears a rug,” Jerzy said.
“He didn’t look so old today neither,” Tristan said.
“So he got a good night’s sleep.”
“I think he wears a disguise when we’re with him.”
Jerzy said, “I don’t give a fuck if he decides to dress up like Wonder Woman and hustle tourists on Hollywood Boulevard. Jist so he pays us for the jobs.”
“It might be worth our while to find out who he is.”
“For what?”
“You never know. How about we follow him home and see where it’s at?”
“In this fuckin’ van?”
“Just leave it to me,” Tristan said.
A ten-foot-high chain-link fence enclosed the storage facility, with wire strung across the top of it. The runners watched their boss stop outside and punch in an access code to open the car gate. They followed him in and waited while he stopped and presented his ID to a woman in an office adjacent to the storage rooms. After he returned to his car, they followed him to the rear of the facility, where he waved them to a parking area.
While they were unloading the van, their boss unlocked a double-size storage room and began shoving aside other crates and boxes to make room for the new merchandise. It only took a few minutes to carry it inside, and while his two employees were surveying the other stacks of crates to see what they might contain, their employer began counting currency he’d removed from his wallet.
“Two hundred for each of you and one hundred for the van rental,” he said.
“We got somethin’ more for you, Mr. Kessler,” Tristan said, glancing at his partner, who looked perplexed.
“And what might that be, Creole?”
“Some very good mail. We worked the hills yesterday and did some Dumpster-diving outside a law firm on Wilshire Boulevard.”
“Since I didn’t order that service, how much are you expecting me to pay?”
“Real cheap. A hundred takes all of it.”
They waited while their boss pondered before he said, “All right, let’s have a look at it.”
“It’s not here. It’s in my car,” Tristan said. “Can we meet you back at the office late this afternoon?”
Dewey hadn’t planned on going there, and Eunice still hadn’t worked the last batch of mail they’d received, but the price was right, so he said, “All right, meet me there at six o’clock.”
“We’ll see you there at six,” Tristan said.
When they were driving out the gate of the storage facility, Jerzy said to Tristan, “Now, what’s this all about? We ain’t got no new mail for him.”
“We will have,” Tristan said. “We’re gonna make a quick run through the Hollywood Hills and grab what we can.”
“Fuck you!” Jerzy said. “What, for a lousy Franklin we’re gonna risk our ass again?”
“Trust me, wood,” Tristan said. “After we sell him the mail, we’re gonna tail him right to his crib. And that’s gonna pay off in robo-bucks. I may jist take me a trip back to New Orleans to meet my cousins. My momma and me left there when I was five years old and came to L.A.”
Jerzy mulled it for a moment. He hated to admit it, but this little nigger was smarter than he thought. Finally he said, “Whadda people in New Orleans do in their spare time besides drown?”
There was one crime that Sergeant Murillo read at roll call that got everyone’s attention. After he went over the information concerning yesterday’s attack on a woman who lived in the southeast corner of Hollywood Division, he said, “Of course, this has to be the same box cutter suspect. The victim in this one gave a description that matched, but she didn’t see the guy as an Arab. She thought he looked Hispanic, but she couldn’t say for sure. The box cutter nails it.”
Dana said, “Sergeant, is this victim middle-aged? And do you happen to know if she’s a blonde?”
Hollywood Nate jerked a thumb in the direction of the surfer team sitting on his right and said, “These days, who isn’t blond?”
Everyone had a chuckle except Flotsam and Jetsam. Then Sergeant Murillo said, “I don’t know if she’s blonde. You might check with the sex crimes detail at West Bureau. It might be meaningful or maybe not. He might go after a brunette next time. One thing for sure, though, with a guy like him there will be a next time. He clocked her bad but didn’t rape her.”
“He didn’t cut her?” Dana said.
“He dropped the box cutter during the struggle,” Sergeant Murillo said. “She was lucky. After he was through punching and kicking her, he picked up the weapon and fled. This attack was a lot more violent than his first try, and the victim’s in the hospital. I’m guessing we’ll see a gathering storm of violence with this guy. Both times he struck in the evening, the same time that you’re nice and fresh and ready to rock. It’d be terrific if one of you midwatch units were to stop a likely guy on a shake and come up with a box knife. If you do, I’ll buy you pizza for a week. Hell, make it two weeks.”