“Of what?”
“The rest of the property.”
“There’s a section that’s not developed?”
“ ’Zactly. Phase Two.”
“When’s it going to be developed?”
Borchard shrugged.
Milo said, “How do you get to the service road without driving through here?”
“You probably took Lewis off the freeway, right? Next time, get off one exit before, then you travel a few streets and go on some farm roads. But trust me, no one’s gonna get in that way. And even if they did-and they didn’t-there’d be nowhere to hide. Plus the residents have panic buttons in their condos and they can pay extra for portable ones to carry around. We got no problems here. Never.”
Milo said, “So the delivery road cuts through the back and ends up at a loading dock.”
“Not one dock, a bunch, and there’s always people around. Trust me, your lowlife wouldn’t last a minute. What even makes you think he’s anywhere near here?”
“Because he used to live here?”
“In Camarillo? It’s a big place.”
“Not the city, Rudy. Here.”
“Huh? Oh. He was one of those.”
“One of who?”
“A nutter. From when this was a nuthouse.”
I said, “Do the residents know about that?”
Borchard smiled. “It’s not on the brochure but sure, some of them would have to. But no one gives two rats. Because that was a long time ago and now everything’s normal and safe. Why would a nutter come back to where he was locked up, anyway? That’s not logical. Psychologically speaking.”
Milo suppressed a smile. “Maybe so, Rudy. How many guys on your security staff?”
“Five. Including me. It’s enough, trust me. Nothing happens here. The whole nut thing’s a joke to us. Like when something gets dug up.”
“Dug up?”
“When they’re doing landscaping,” said Borchard. “Someone’s turning the dirt for plants, whatever, something pops up.”
“Like what?”
“Oh, no, don’t go thinking criminal. I’m talking spoons, forks, cups. With the hospital brand on it, this big VS. One time some buckles and a strap got dug up, probably from one of those straitjackets.”
“What do you do with all that when you find it?”
“I don’t find it, the landscaping crew does. They give it to me and I throw it out, what do you think? It’s junk.” Borchard checked his watch. “Your maniac ain’t here but if he shows up I’ll take care of it.”
Unbuttoning the oversized jacket, he gave us a view of a holstered Glock.
“Nice piece,” said Milo.
“And I know how to use it.”
“You were in the military?”
Borchard flushed. “I go to the range. Have a nice day, guys.”
Milo said, “How about showing us that service road?”
“You’re kidding.”
“Just so we can tell the boss we’ve been careful.”
“Bosses,” said Borchard. “Yeah, I hear that. Fine, I’ll show you, but it’s clear on the other end, you don’t wanna walk.”
“So we’ll drive.”
Borchard eyed the unmarked. “I’m not getting in the back of that, looks bad to the residents, you know?”
“I promise not to cuff you, Rudy.”
“I like your jokes. Not.” He touched the spot beneath his jacket where the gun was positioned. “You really need to be doing this?”
“We drove all the way from L.A.”
“So go get a fish taco in town and say you looked.”
Milo smiled.
“Okay, okay, hold on.” A man with a cane was approaching and Borchard hurried to intercept him. Borchard smiled and talked. The man walked away, midsentence, muttering. Borchard shot us an I-told-you-so look, disappeared around a leafy turn, and emerged several minutes later driving a canvas-topped golf cart.
“Hop in for the E Ride.”
Milo sat next to him, I took the rear bench. The plastic seat was aqua blue patterned with green herons.
“Guys, I’m only doing this cop-to-cop, trust me your nutter didn’t stow away in some eighteen-wheeler. Everything comes from recognized vendors, we log every ingress and egress. Now, if the tunnels were still open, I might consider you have a point, but they’re not so you don’t.”
“What tunnels?”
“Ha, knew I’d get you with that,” said Borchard, chuckling. “I’m messing with you, trust me, it’s nothing.”
“No tunnels.”
“Not anymore and they’re all filled with concrete.”
“None, but they’re filled.”
“You know what I mean, you can’t go in ’em.”
Milo looked back at me. I shook my head.
Borchard said, “What it was, back in the day there were these underground passages between some of the hospital buildings. For moving supplies, I guess.” He laughed harder. “Or maybe they ran the nutters down there for exercise, punishment, whatever. Anyway, when the developers bought the property the county made them fill them all with concrete because of earthquakes. You want to see?”
“Why not?” said Milo, casually.
“Giving you the full tour, gonna be a surcharge.” Laughing and flooring the cart’s accelerator, Borchard swung a quick U-turn and headed up the road at five mph. Moments later, he stopped at a side street that led to a clump of condos. Sea Wave Road. Motioning us out, he squatted, parted some bushes. Inlaid in the dirt was a metal disk around six feet in diameter. Painted brown, unmarked, like an oversized manhole cover with two metal eyelets.
“Watch, this is cool.” Looping a finger around one of the eyelets, Borchard tried to lift. The lid didn’t budge. He strained. “Must be stuck or something.”
“Want some help?” said Milo.
“No, no, no.” Borchard used two hands, turned scarlet. The lid lifted an inch and Borchard let go and some sort of pneumatic mechanism kicked in. The lid rose until it was perpendicular with the ground.
Underneath was a circle of concrete. Borchard stood on top of it, jumped like a kid on a trampoline. “Solid, all the way through. Rebar and concrete, extra-strong to handle the big one.”
“How many openings like this are there, Rudy?”
“Who knows? Most of them are buried over, they run under the condos. It’s only when they’re in landscaped areas that we find them. I’ve seen four of those and trust me, they’re all solid, like this one.” He jumped twice more. “Nutter skulking through a tunnel would be a good movie. Unfortunately, this is reality, guys. You really don’t want to bother seeing the back fence, do you?”
Milo shrugged. “What can I tell you, Rudy?”
“Knew you’d say that.”
We put-putted along Sea Bird Lane, switched to Sea Star Drive, reached the rear of the development. The service road was a single lane of asphalt that passed through a high chain-link gate. A closed-circuit camera was bolted to the right-hand post. Through the links a slice of blue sky and brown field and mauve mountains was visible but the broad view afforded only sky above twenty-plus feet of ficus hedge. The trees had been densely planted on
