“But you did see something. Right?”
She grabbed another Kleenex and spread it out on her lap.
I was angry now. “ Right?” I shouted.
She nodded. “I did see a lot of the same stuff the pipehead saw.”
I gave her a skeptical look.
“For real. But I saw something else, too.
“Let’s hear it.”
“A lot of what I told you at the station last week was true. I was standing around, about to walk over to the dealer selling on the corner when I saw those two people coming down the hill. I didn’t get a decent look at the guy who got into the driver’s side of the car, but I did see the other one walk around the car and open the door. A street lamp was only a few feet away. I saw the passenger pull a gun out of a pocket, stuff it under the car seat, and then climb in.”
“What was he wearing?”
“Jeans and a stocking cap. A dark one.”
“What was his nationality?”
“What I said before was true-Mexican.”
“Besides the gun, you still haven’t told me anything I didn’t already know.”
“I know. There’s something else I didn’t tell you. Something kind of weird.”
“What is it?”
“Like I said, the passenger wore a stocking cap real low, just above the eyes, so at first I wasn’t sure. I just thought it was a guy with kind of delicate features. But after the passenger got into the car and whipped off the stocking cap, I saw the hair come tumbling out. I realized that the passenger was a woman.”
“You sure?”
“Pretty sure. I know I should have told you all this before. But I was afraid. I was just trying to protect myself. But like you said, they might keep coming after me until you catch them. So now I’m trying to help you.”
“Could you ID her if you saw her again?”
“I doubt it.”
“You bullshitting me again?”
“No.”
“Anything else you remember about her?”
“Yeah. After she took off her jacket, I could see she was wearing something around her neck. It stood out because it was white. It was a good sized crucifix.”
“Moonstone?”
“Could be.”
She leaned across the sofa, grabbed my hand, and squeezed it. “Do you know who this woman is?”
“I think I do.”
I asked her a few more quick questions and then jogged toward my car and sped to the freeway.
CHAPTER 42
As I was heading north on the 5, I called downtown for an address. I checked my GPS and made my way to the Santa Monica Freeway. Cutting north on the Hollywood Freeway, I exited near Griffith Park and drove up a winding foothill road in Los Feliz. I parked on a quiet side street, walked about fifty yards, and stopped in front of a redwood bungalow carved onto a hillside.
I could use some backup, but, at this point, I didn’t trust anyone in the LAPD. Wegland and Patowski were dirty. Duffy was a liar. I had no idea who else in the department was compromised. I felt safest handling this alone.
I flicked on my Maglite, edged my way down the driveway, circled the house, and stopped at the back door. Pulling a set of lock picks out of my back pocket, I inserted the tension wrench into the keyhole and turned it slightly. As I continued to apply pressure with the tension wrench, I slipped the pick into the keyhole. I lifted the pins, one by one, unit I heard a click — the upper pin falling into place. Rotating the plug and opening the door, I slipped through the darkened house. Every few steps I stopped and listened. All I could hear was the ticking of a clock and the humming of the refrigerator. When I reached a large bedroom, I peered inside. There she was, curled up on her side, one arm clutching a pillow. I needed a confession. If I didn’t get one, I would have to haul her back to the station. And I knew she’d keep her mouth shut until her lawyer arrived. But if I took her by surprise, knocked her off her mooring, I just might be able to extract something useful from her.
When I stopped by Internal Affairs a few weeks ago, all those old-timers were flashing me hostile looks. Virginia Saucedo seemed like the only supportive detective in the room. She was a damn good actress.
Reaching for the Beretta, I slowly removed it from my holster, the leather creaking. I walked across the room and stood over the bed. “Detective Saucedo. You’re under arrest.”
She twitched, opened her eyes, and reached for the drawer in her end table, where I assumed she kept a pistol. I grabbed her wrist and said, “Let’s go.”
She was wearing a sheer blue V-necked nightgown, and the moonstone cross around her neck glowed in the faint light. She looked younger than the last time I had seen her. Shivering on the edge of the bed, blinking hard, hugging herself, she looked like a scared little girl.
“Where we going?”
“To the living room.”
Grabbing a robe from the foot of the bed, she slipped it on, and as she stood up I noticed she was almost my height. She stumbled off to the living room as I followed her. I motioned toward the couch with the barrel of the Beretta. She sat down, and I pulled a chair across from her.
I glanced around the room. This house was beautiful, too nice for a single cop on a detective’s salary. An enormous hand-carved chest in front of the sofa served as a coffee table, Mexican folk art lined the walls, and a large picture window revealed a spectacular view of the city, a carpet of lights from downtown to the ocean.
I figured the best way to go would be to bluff her.
“Conrad Patowski layed you out.”
She glared at me.
“Patowski is singing to save his ass. He’s angling for a deal. He served you up on a silver platter.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Conrad tried to get the best deal for himself. So he started talking. Said you went along with Wally to Relovich’s. You know the felony murder rule. You’re going down.”
She clasped her hands on her lap. “That’s all bullshit.”
“Tell me what happened. I’ll go to the DA with your statement and see if he can give you a break. Since Patowski’s talking, you better not bullshit me. I’ll compare statements and see who’s lying.”
“I think you’re lying.”
I leaned forward and said softly, “Save yourself.”
“Save myself from what?”
“You know they execute women in California.”
“If you want to arrest me, arrest me.”
Ignoring her, I pulled a digital voice recorder from my vest pocket, set it on the wooden chest, flicked it on, and read Saucedo her rights. “How’d it begin with Wegland?”
She fixed me with a cold stare and said, “Go fuck yourself.”
Before I could react, I was staring into the long blue steel barrel of a. 38 revolver that a slender, jittery Hispanic man with a thin mustache was waving at me. “Set it down on the floor,” he said in a quavering voice.
I dropped the gun.
“Am I glad to see you, baby,” Saucedo said. “Even if you are late.”
“I saw through the window this pendejo pointing a piece at you, so I snuck in the back door. Who the hell is
