LA Requiem

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'You got a way to get at the files in storage?'

'I'm there almost every damned day with running the due diligence, but we can't just go in and sign the stuff out. You see?'

'So what do we do?'

'Steal it. You up for that?'

'Yes.'

'Glad you're up for something.'

The Los Angeles Police Department storage facility is an ancient, red brick building in an industrial area just south of the railroad yard. The bricks looked powdery, and I thought that there was probably no way the building could pass an earthquake inspection if it wasn't owned by the LAPD. It was

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the kind of place that, while you're in it, you're spending most of your time hoping we don't get a big temblor.

Dolan parked the Beemer well away from the other cars that were there, then led me through a plain gray door and along a short hall.

I said, 'Hot.'

'The frigging air must be out again. Listen, do us both a favor and don't say anything. I'll do all the talking.'

I didn't answer her.

'Well?'

'You said not to say anything.'

'Try not to act smart. You don't pull it off.'

An overweight civilian clerk named Sid Rogin was reading a magazine behind a low counter. He was in his sixties and balding, with thin, wispy hair, and a glass eye. He brightened when he saw Dolan and put down the magazine. He was also sweating, and had a little fan going. The fan was pathetic. He would've gotten more air from a chihuahua wagging its tail.

'Hey, Sammy, what it is? They still got you running down due diligence?'The middle-class white man does black.

Dolan gave him a sparkling grin. I would've guessed that if anyone called her Sammy she would gun them down on the spot. 'Yeah, same old same old. We've got to run down a deceased officer and a perp he was working named Leonard DeVille, also deceased.'

Rogin turned a sign-in log toward her. 'Names and badge numbers. What kind of time frame we talking here on the perp?'

She picked up his pen and glanced at me. 'I've got it. No sweat.' She told Rogin when DeVille had died.

'You taking out the files?'

'Not if we're lucky. Just gotta look up some dates.' She flashed the bright smile again. 'Figure my partner here could look up the officer while I get the perp, save everybody some time.'

'Okay. Step around behind.'

Dolan and I followed Rogin into a series of rooms lined with industrial shelving stacked with dusty cardboard boxes.

L.A. REQUIEM 255

'What's the officer's name?'

'Stuart Vincent.' She spelled Vincent.

'Good enough. Officers on this floor. You and I will have to go up to the second for the perps.'

'Noproblemo.'

We followed Rogin along the aisles, me thinking that all the crummy cardboard boxes looked like little crypts.

We turned a corner into a section of aisle marked T—Z. Rogin said, 'Here ya go, V as in Vincent.' Six boxes were marked with Fs. He pulled down the one that would hold Vi. 'All you wanna do is look through the file?'

Dolan glanced at me, and nodded.

I said, 'That's right.'

Rogin had the lid off, pulling out a thick file that had been tied with a string. He frowned. 'It's awful thick, Sammy. You gotta read through the whole thing?'

'You look busy, Sid. Sorry to put you out this way.'

'Well, it's not that. They just don't like people back here.'

Dolan raised her eyebrows back at him and stiffened. 'Well, Sidney, I guess if you'd rather I go back to Parker and have them call down.' She let it drop, watching him.

'Oh, no, hell, you don't have to do that. It's just I gotta get back up and watch the front.'

I said, 'I'll be done by the time you guys get back from the second floor. No sweat.'

'You sure?'

'Absolutely.'

Dolan clapped Sid on the shoulder and grinned at him some more. 'Let's do it, Sid. Get outta this goddamned heat.'

I pretended to be interested in Vincent's file until their steps were gone, then I searched down the aisle for the Ws. Twelve boxes were marked with a W, the eighth and ninth file boxes holding Wo.

We could have asked for Wozniak's file and signed for it, but we didn't want a written record connecting Dolan to what we were doing. She was in enough trouble, and if things went wrong I didn 't want her in more.

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I pulled Wozniak's file, then pushed the boxes back in their rows.

Wozniak's personnel file was too thick to shove down my pants, but most of it didn't concern me. I pulled the sheet listing his partners prior to Pike and their badge numbers, then flipped back to the beginning of his career and pulled the sheet noting his training officers. Wozniak was a top cop: He'd been awarded the Medal of Valor twice, twelve certificates of commendation, and a half dozen public service commendations for working with schools and troubled youth. The list of his arrests went on for pages, listing the arrestee, date of arrest, and charge. I jerked those pages, folded them, and put them in my jacket. The next section in the file was devoted to disciplinary actions. I wasn't even thinking to look at it except that Abel Wozniak had been called to appear before the Internal Affairs Group on two occasions six weeks prior to his death. The requesting Internal Affairs officer being one Detective Harvey Krantz.

I said, 'Damn.'

No other information was given except the notation that the inquiry was terminated, along with the date of termination.

Krantz.

I jerked that page, too, and put it with the others.

Dolan's voice came along the aisle, Dolan saying, 'Hey, buddy, I hope you're ready to go. We're outta here.'

I stuffed the remains of the file together and pushed it between the boxes, then hurried back to the Fs. I picked up Vincent's file just as Dolan and Rogin came around the corner.

She said, 'You find what you need?'

'Yeah. You?'

She shook her head. Slow.