Kelly snagged a pair of stools at the front corner of the bar that tucked them back from the crowd but allowed a view of the room and the front door.
“Back when your hat was in fashion,” she said, “this place would have been full of cigar-chomping newspapermen. Now that it’s fashionable to listen to Frank Sinatra and drink cocktails again, it’s overrun with young professionals looking for sex partners.”
“The world’s gone to hell on a sled,” Parker observed.
He ordered a tonic and lime for himself. Kelly asked for the best scotch in the place, then raised an eyebrow at Parker. “You’re still paying, right? I’m counting this as part of the date.”
“We’re not on a date.”
“You want something from me, and you bought me dinner in hopes of getting it,” she said. “How is that different from a date?”
“There’s not going to be sex involved.”
“Well, Jesus, reject me to my face, why don’t you?” she said, pretending outrage. “You’re brutal. At least most of the guys I date are too cowardly to be blunt. There’s something to be said for that.”
Parker chuckled. “You’ve still got it, Andi. You know, I’d kind of forgotten that. During that whole mess with the preppie murder, you were the only person who made me laugh.”
“I’m not quite sure how to take that.”
“As a compliment.” He turned toward her on his stool, going serious. “You were decent to me on that. I don’t know that I ever said thank you.”
She blushed a little, looked away, took a sip of her scotch, caught an errant drop from her upper lip with the tip of her tongue.
“Telling the truth is my job,” she said. “I shouldn’t have to be patted on the back for doing what’s right.”
“Well, still . . . You stood up when it wasn’t the popular thing to do. I appreciated that.”
Kelly tried to shrug it off, even though Parker knew she had taken flak for it at the time.
“I don’t see Caldrovics,” she said. “But that little pack in the fourth booth down is the one he might run with. The obnoxiously young and hungry,” she said with disgust. “I have jeans as old as they are.”
“You’re not old,” Parker scoffed. “If you’re old, I’m old. I don’t accept that.”
“Easy for you to say. A sexy guy is a sexy guy until he becomes incontinent and has to use an ear trumpet to hear. Look at Sean Connery. The guy has more hair coming out his ears than on his head, and women still fantasize about him. A girl hits forty-something in this town, and she’s culled from the herd.”
“Are you fishing for compliments, Kelly?”
She scowled. “No. I’m casting a fucking net. What are you? Stupid? Has training recruits had the same effect on you as a frontal lobotomy?”
“You look great,” Parker said. “You haven’t aged a day. Your skin is luminous, and your ass looks fantastic in those pants. How’s that?”
She pretended to pout. “You hit the key points, but you could score better on sincerity.”
“I’m out of practice.”
“That’s hard to believe.”
“I’m telling you, I’m a quiet homebody now,” he said. “So tell me about Goran.”
“There’s nothing much to tell.”
“You married the guy.”
“Seemed like a good idea at the time,” she said, looking down into her drink, waiting for Parker to drop it, but he was waiting her out, and she blinked first.
“I thought he was the love of my life. Turned out I wasn’t the only one who thought that.” She shrugged and made a funny face that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “C’est la vie. Who needs it, right? I don’t see a ring on your finger.”
“Nope. I’m still working on the joy of being me.”
“There he is,” Kelly said, nodding across the room. “Caldrovics. He’s coming from the back. Must have been in the men’s room. Greasy hair, scruffy goatee, looks like a homeless person.”
“Got him,” Parker said, sliding off the bar stool.
“And for God’s sake,” Kelly said, “whatever you do, don’t mention my name.”
He put some bills on the bar to cover the tab, then made his way across the room, through the yuppies in heat, past a couple of old bulldogs arguing about the president’s Middle East policies. None of Caldrovics’ pals noticed him approaching their booth. They were too caught up in themselves and in some tale Caldrovics was telling as he stood at the end of the booth with his back to Parker.
Parker put a hand on the kid’s shoulder. “Mr. Caldrovics?”
The expression was unpleasant surprise with a base of suspicion. He was maybe twenty-four, twenty-five. He still had acne. He was probably still having flashbacks of being sent to the principal’s office.
“I’d like to have a word with you, please,” Parker said. He cupped his shield in his hand and flashed it discreetly to Caldrovics.
Before the rest of the table could become interested, Parker moved away from it, his hand still resting firmly at the base of the kid’s neck.
“What’s this about?” Caldrovics asked, dragging his feet.
“Doing your civic duty,” Parker said. “You want to do your civic duty, don’t you?”
“Well—”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know your first name.”
“Danny—”
“Can I call you Danny?” Parker asked, walking him toward the back hall. “I’m Detective Parker, Kev Parker. LAPD Central Division, Homicide.”
“Homicide?”
“Yeah. When one person kills another person, that’s called homicide.”
“I know what it means.”
They went out the back exit to an alley where a couple of bar staffers were having cigarettes and looking bored.
“Let’s take a walk, Danny,” Parker suggested.
“This isn’t a very safe area.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m carrying a loaded weapon,” Parker said, tightening the tenor of his voice a little more with each word. “Two, actually. Do you have a gun, Danny?”
“Shit, no!”
“Well, that’s all right. I’m sure you’ll never need one.”
Caldrovics tried to put the brakes on. “Where are we going?”
“Just over here,” Parker said, giving him a little shove as they passed a Dumpster, where they couldn’t be seen by the employees behind the bar. “I thought a little privacy would be a good thing. I don’t like people eavesdropping on conversations. You know, like reporters. They never get the facts right, do they, Danny?”
He pulled his service weapon from his belt holster and kicked the side of the trash container. The sound reverberated like a gong. “Everybody out!”
Caldrovics jumped back, wide-eyed. “Shit, man! What are you doing?”
“Damn pipeheads,” Parker complained. “They’re always back in these alleys like rats in the garbage. They’ll slit your throat for a dime.”
The security light behind the building had the astonishing white brightness of a full moon. Parker could see the kid’s every expression but the kid couldn’t see his. The brim of his hat cast a shadow over his face.
“I need to ask you a couple of questions, Danny,” he began. “About that little bit you had in the paper this morning regarding the murder of Leonard Lowell, Esquire.”
Caldrovics took a step back toward the Dumpster.
“I’m the primary investigator on that case,” Parker said. “That means everything comes through me. Everyone who has anything to do with or to say about that case has to come to me.”
“I don’t have—”
“It’s protocol, Danny. I’m a stickler for protocol.”
“That’s not what I’ve heard,” Caldrovics muttered.
“Excuse me?” Parker said, taking an aggressive step forward. “What did you just say?”
“Nothing.”