Rhodes stepped behind the bar and found a plate to use as an ashtray. “I guess Hight held it together for as long as he could,” he said. “I’ve never met him, but during the trial he looked okay. Wearing down maybe, but okay.”
Lena nodded again without answering. No one in the division had met Tim Hight because his daughter’s murder investigation had been handled by local detectives on the Westside. The case didn’t ignite until prosecutors released those family snapshots to the press. By the time the public met Lily Hight, Jacob Gant had already been arrested and moved from his parents’ home in Venice to an isolated cell at Men’s Central Jail.
Rhodes leaned on the bar directly across from her. “After tonight people will think that Tim Hight’s a hero. They’re gonna say that he did what we couldn’t. That he did what he had to do. That he finally got justice for his daughter.”
“He’s not a hero,” she whispered.
“It doesn’t make any difference, Lena. They’ll call him one.”
The words settled in for a while.
“He’s not a hero,” she repeated. “He didn’t shoot Gant, lay down the gun, and wait to face the music. He walked into the room and shot Johnny Bosco first. And he shot him in the back, Stan. Then he tried to make it look like a robbery and ran away. He hit the wall and blew.”
“I agree, but it won’t play that way. It’s still poison for us. Sugarcoated poison. Leave it to the LAPD to set the bad guys free and send the good guys to jail.”
Lena remained quiet because she knew that what Rhodes had just said was true. Barrera and Deputy Chief Ramsey knew how it would play as well.
She started to reach for that pack of cigarettes after all, but stopped when she heard movement in the foyer behind her. It was a group of about ten people walking toward the front entrance as if on autopilot. She recognized the mayor’s chief of staff, a city councilwoman from Hollywood, and the LAPD chief’s new adjutant, Abraham Hernandez. It seemed like a good guess that this was the group who had been whispering in the darkness from the balcony outside Bosco’s office. When she saw Steven Bennett and Debi Watson, she reached out for Rhodes and gave him a nudge.
Bennett and Watson were the deputy district attorneys who had brought the case against Jacob Gant to trial. Until Buddy Paladino humiliated them in front of a courtroom wired for TV and the electronic universe beyond, they were considered to be two of the best and brightest deputy DAs in Los Angeles. Particularly Steven Bennett, whom the district attorney had taken to and was grooming to replace him if he won reelection for his third term in office. Tonight, it looked like Bennett and Watson were anything but the best and brightest. Tonight, they were shuffling their feet and keeping their heads down. Tonight, they were passing the investigator from the coroner’s office at the door-mere shadows of their former selves-and leaving another crime scene in shame.
5
She found Dante Escabar in the courtyard at a table by the pool. Although it seemed clear that he wanted to be alone, she pulled a chair out and sat down. Several moments passed before he even acknowledged her presence. He was deep within himself, sipping bourbon and brooding on automatic, with sheets of sharp blue light from the water ricocheting off his dark eyes.
“I’ve already told you people everything I know,” he said finally.
He hadn’t looked up, but was still staring at his drink. The ice was melting away.
“Sometimes in the heat of the moment details get left behind,” she said.
“Heat of the moment? Is that what the LAPD calls it?”
She could hear the fury in his voice. The venom. Escabar was younger than his partner by at least ten years. He was a handsome man with clear brown skin, a strong frame, and black hair as fine as silk cut just above the shoulders. Lena knew very little about him because Bosco had been the front man for Club 3 AM. She thought that she could remember reading somewhere that Escabar had spent his childhood on the street. That it had been a long climb that began at a taco stand on San Fernando Boulevard. That he met Bosco, who gave him a job and eventually took him under his wing. A few months back The Times photographed Escabar’s home on Mulholland Drive and the actress he was living with. The climb was part of his history, but Lena wondered about his temperament. She watched him take a long pull on the glass, his eyes settling somewhere over by the pool.
“How much will you benefit from Johnny Bosco’s death?” she said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“How much will you make?”
Escabar finally turned to her. “You’re right, Officer. After tonight I’ll be rich. I’ve been sitting here, counting it in my head. All that fucking money. While you assholes have spent the last three hours trying to cover for the fact that every one of you fucked up, I’ve been out here celebrating the murder of my best friend.”
A long moment passed. A long stretch of jagged silence.
“I know it’s not easy,” she said. “The timing’s worse than bad. But I need to clear a few things up and I need to do it quickly.”
Escabar took another swig of bourbon. “Sounds like you need to clear up more than that. You’re way off base.”
“I hope so,” Lena said. “But I still need an answer.”
“This isn’t about my partner. This is about that asshole kid.”
“How much are you gonna make from your partner’s death?”
Escabar glanced back at her, shaking his head at the inevitable. “Nada,” he said. “Nothing. Not a single cent. I’m lucky to be one of seven partners. More than lucky.”
“Who are the other five? Studio execs?”
“Three of them are. The other two are actors. If you want their names you’ll have to call our lawyer. But no one profits from Johnny’s death. The club grew out of his business with the studios. This was his place. His idea. Nothing changes, not even the split. He’s got family on the East Coast. South Jersey. A mother and father. If you really want to waste time, talk to them. Maybe they killed their own son tonight. It’s either that or you’ve gotta face the fact that Johnny Bosco’s dead because the LAPD couldn’t cut it. Someone else had to put Jacob Gant down, and he fucked it up. He killed Johnny. He’s even more lame than you are.”
Escabar turned away. As she thought it over, she studied his posture. His face and hands. Although she didn’t trust him, she believed that his reaction to her questions was genuine. That her gut instincts about the case were more right than wrong. Gant was the target. Bosco got in the way.
“Why did you tell the deputy chief that you thought this was a robbery?” she said.
Escabar didn’t move, didn’t blink-his eyes fixed on the memory.
“I heard the shots,” he said in a quieter voice. “I ran upstairs and found them. I saw Johnny lying on the floor, but the kid’s face was all fucked up. I didn’t recognize him. When I found out who he was, I knew I’d been wrong. It wasn’t a robbery.”
“Who told you his name?”
“I don’t know. I overheard some cops talking about it in the bar after you showed up.”
“What time did you hear the shots?”
“About twelve-thirty,” he said.
“What was Gant doing here? Why was he upstairs with Bosco?”
Escabar tossed his drink on the ground and set the glass down. “I’ve been asking myself the same thing. I have no fucking idea.”
“You ever see him here before, Dante?”
He shook his head again. “No.”