Bones

Milo said, “We really can return with a warrant.”

“Then you’d really better do that.”

Milo leaned on the bell. When he stopped, Anita Adams laughed. The sound was rocks in a tumbler.

“You see humor in the situation, ma’am?”

“You’re playing the bell, like some sort of brainwashing tactic. Why don’t you go get some of that rap music and blast it all over the street. See how popular that makes you with the neighbors. ’Specially when it turns out you had no good cause to…”

Milo and I returned to the unmarked. Her taunts reached nearly to the curb.

“Sweet lady,” he said. “Gosh, I wish she was my mom.”

We sat in the car and watched the little frame house. I drank cold coffee and he swigged Red Bull. Five minutes in, he phoned Moe Reed. Liz Wilkinson and three grad students interning at the bone lab were on their way to the western edge of the marsh. Insufficient daylight prevented a comprehensive search but they’d do a spot examination. Wilkinson suggested a helicopter sweep, and sure, the dogs were fine.

Nothing back on the shoe print.

Milo clicked off just as a car pulled up behind us.

Steel-colored Maybach. Debora Wallenburg got out and looked up and down the street before approaching the unmarked. Aqua Chanel suit, silver hair pulled back severely, lots of diamond glint.

“Tired of the Chevy, Counselor?”

Wallenburg flinched but recovered quickly. “You’re following me. Charming.”

“Have a chat with your elusive client recently?”

Wallenburg laughed. “Here goes the tape loop.”

“What’s funny, Counselor, is your viewing the situation as a yukfest.”

“I view it as theater of the absurd.”

“The way you claim to feel about Huck, I’d expect you to be taking it seriously.”

“Your alleged case.”

“Your client’s demise.”

Wallenburg’s cheek muscles twitched. Courtroom training delayed her response. “What are you talking about?”

“When’s the last time you actually spoke to ol’ Travis?”

Wallenburg cocked a hip in a display of mellow. Tension around the eyes blew the performance.

“Just like I thought,” said Milo.

“Is this the moment where your artful goading causes me to blurt out some crucial piece of information, Lieutenant?”

“It’s the moment that I tell you I know Huck didn’t call, you got a text message and assumed. No offense, Counselor, but maybe it’s an age thing. Digital naivete.”

“You’re mad,” said Wallenburg.

“More like peeved.”

“I meant in the mental illness sense.”

“Insult registered, digested, soon to be excreted.”

“My clients that concern you at this time are Mr. and Mrs. Adams,” she said. “They request that you cease harassing them.”

“Thought you were corporate,” said Milo. “How does that get you to front for a couple of working-class alkies who just happen to know Travis from dry-out camp?”

“Oka-ay,” said Wallenburg. “Now we switch to class warfare and denigration of people with the courage to recover.”

“My dad’s shirt was blue and I’ve known a few tipplers but the issue ain’t politics, it’s murder.”

Wallenburg didn’t answer.

“Hell,” said Milo, “what’s a few strangled women with their hands hacked off to a courthouse vet like you?”

“That’s repellent.”

“Thing is,” said Milo, “you’re not even doing good lawyering here. I’m not after your client as the prime bad guy. I’m figuring he was used and tossed. It’s in both our interests to get to the real evil.”

Debora Wallenburg shook her head. Diamond earrings swung. “You’re talking nonsense.”

“Then prove it. If Huck’s still respirating, bring him in. He cooperates, everyone stays friendly.”

Wallenburg clicked her tongue. “Hopeless. Stop harassing the Adamses, they’re good people and you’ve got no reason to be bothering them. Last I heard the department’s legal costs had climbed precipitously.”

“A girl named Sue,” said Milo. “What grounds?”

“I’ll think of something.” Wallenburg turned to leave.

“Huck’s a foot soldier, Counselor. I want the officers.”

“You people,” said Wallenburg. “Everything’s war.”

“Or at least armed conflict. Prove Huck’s alive by bringing him in.”

“He’s innocent.”

“You know that because…”

Wallenburg began walking away.

“The key is timing, Deb. Once we get a warrant for this house, there’s no telling.”

“You’re in Fantasyland. Mile. Talk about no grounds.”

“Tell that to Judge Stern.”

“Lisa was a classmate of mine.”

“Then you know how she feels about victims’ rights. And how she views attempts by officers of the court to meddle in extracurricular matters.”

Wallenburg ran a manicured finger across her lips. “What a nice man you are.”

She got in the Maybach and sped off.

I said, “When did you call Judge Stern?”

“Must be two years ago,” he said. “Gang shooting, slam dunk, easy paper.”

“The science of war.”

“More like marching in the dark.”

At four forty-seven p.m. an L.A. Unified school bus pulled up to the house. A blond girl in a red T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers got out and headed for the door. Ten or so, slight and stick-limbed, she labored under the weight of a mammoth backpack.

I said, “Baby Brandeen,” more to hear the sound of it than to inform him.

“Makes me misty, lad. They grow up so quickly.”

Before the girl reached the door it opened. A short, heavy, white-haired woman reached out and drew her inside. Instead of closing, she took the time to glare at us. A man materialized behind her, tall, black, bearded. Weary eyes, even at this distance.

Wilfred Adams said something to his wife.

She snapped back, flipped us off, slammed the door.

Milo said, “Maybe Huck is alive. She’s sure protecting something.”

His phone rang again. Moe Reed checking in a second time, from the marsh’s western edge. No obvious signs of disturbance, but the same cadaver dog had arrived and was looking “interested.”

“Pretty place,” said Reed. “Got that Garden of Eden thing going on.”

Milo said, “Find me the snake.”

He lit up a cigar, had puffed twice when Debora Wallenburg’s Maybach roared toward us from the north. The car pulled alongside the unmarked. A tinted window lowered silently.

Wallenburg’s hair was loose. She’d refreshed her makeup, but couldn’t hide fatigue.

“You missed me,” said Milo.

“Oh, I pine. Maybe we can play nice, but first some ground rules: I know the law allows you to lie like a conniving, sociopathic bastard to a suspect. But I wouldn’t recommend trying it with an attorney of record.”