No Human Involved - Barbara Seranella Page 20

  "Crazy Mike had something on him."

  "How do you know that?" Mace asked.

  She shrugged her shoulders and blew at the cup of coffee cupped in her hands. "Just the way they talked to each other. Mr. Potato Head didn't seem like the kind of guy to just hang out with bikers, so I figured it was some sort of business thing. I overheard them talking and Crazy Mike said something like, ‘You've been getting sloppy They found the last one, made it hot for everybody.' Potato Head said that that wouldn't happen again. Sounded like there had been others."

  "Sounds like Crazy Mike caught Ernie cleaning up after one of his parties. No wonder Crazy Mike had no record," Mace said. Divine nodded. A secretary walked into the room with a sketch pad. Cassiletti took it from her and thanked her. Mace watched him. Cassiletti seemed to have aged twenty years in the last two hours; his boyish innocence had evaporated. It wasn't his fault. Ernie had had them all fooled.

  "So what happened after you realized that the Pride was going to hand you over to Potts?" Captain Divine prompted.

  "They thought I was passed out, so they left me alone in the loft. I could see and hear them talking through the slats in the ceiling. Your guy Potts was asking Mike for a girl no one would miss. Crazy Mike said he had just the one, but it would cost a gram of heroin to keep my old man quiet. That Potts guy went out to his car and came back with a glassine bag full of China White. God, I was pissed. You think Flower George was gonna save any of that for me? Not on your life."

  The men didn't know what to say to that. Cassiletti handed Mace the pad of paper. It was the composite sketch of the hooker basher plaguing Venice, aka Homicide Detective Ernest Potts. Mace handed the sketch to the captain and Munch resumed her narration.

  "Then it hit me. This guy was going to snuff me." She sipped her coffee. Mace noted that her hands still shook. "They came up to get me and thought I was still passed out. I just made myself go totally limp. Even when they kicked me, I didn't react. They picked me up and dumped me in the trunk of Potts's car. It was lucky he wasn't driving the van."

  "Why is that?" Mace asked.

  "He wouldn't have been so careless if I was in the van with him. Knowing I was locked in the trunk gave him a false sense of security Trunks are meant to be safe from the outside," Munch told the men assembled around her in the squad room.

  "They're pretty easy to open from the inside."

  "And the gun?" Mace asked.

  "The idiot left it in his jacket in the trunk."

  Munch gave an embarrassed shrug. "Before I escaped, I went through his pockets. Habit." She grinned and the men laughed.

  "So then you went back to the house on Brooks?" Mace prompted.

  "First I stopped at a friends house and got down. That was the last time I ever used. I didn't even feel it. I don't think I was feeling anything. I wanted to tell George what those guys were going to do to me. I wanted him, for once, to say he was sorry. He never did. When I got there, he was OD'ed on the bed, but he saved me a taste. It was still in the syringe left in

  his arm. I pulled it out . . . "

  "The syringe?" Mace asked.

  "Yeah."

  "Did it bleed, his arm?"

  "I don't think so."

  "Think, it's important." He leaned forward and grasped her hand. "Did blood pump out when you pulled the needle out of his vein?"

  "No. No, it didn't. I pulled it out and I went in the bathroom and tied off. Just before I fixed, I looked at myself in the mirror. And I knew. It was him or me. It was like all the rage caught up to me, all of it. Everything that had just happened, everything that had happened before, everything that was yet to happen. I threw down the syringe and I grabbed the gun. He was still lying there, naked and stinking, like everything evil and disgusting in this world."

  "And already dead," Mace said quietly She stopped, stunned, and stared at him.

  "You shot him, honey, I know that. But you shot a dead man."

  "So what happens now?" she asked.

  Mace stood up and walked across the room. He picked up the eraser and offered it to his captain. Divine nodded his head and took the eraser from Mace. Then he turned to the board and made the name Mancini, written in red, disappear.

  "I guess you better get back to the Valley" Mace said to Munch. °'You're gonna need your sleep if you're going to be worth a damn at work tomorrow."

  Cassiletti grabbed the car keys off the desk. "I'll give her a ride." He turned back to Mace. "I'll put in for a transfer in the morning. I really let you down. I'm sorry"

  "Hey he had us all fooled. You can't quit now. Shit, I almost died raising you. You can't let all that effort go to waste."

  Cassiletti smile tentatively Mace laid a hand on the big man's shoulder. "I think we're going to call you Tiger," Mace said. "Tony the Tiger."

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to thank the following persons who helped in the creation of this novel;

  Ex-homicide detective Mike Walker, who shared many stories with me and a few pictures.

  Los Angeles Sheriff 's Department Homicide Detectives Gil Carrillo and Frank Gonzales, and Senior Criminalist Elizabeth Devine who invited me into their world and took the time to show me around.

  My thanks also to Deputy Mando Guzman who let me ride with him for a day in the front seat; the Palm Leaf Corporation and all the boy/men who love trains; and the fighters and trainers at Westminister Gym.

  The writing of this book would not have been possible without the excellent, gentle guidance of Susan Segal, my writing mentor. Praise is also in order for my agent, Sheree Bykofsky; and my editor, Ruth Gavin, for seeing the book through to production.

  Last, but not least, I want to thank my husband, Ron, whose loving support gave me the biggest gift a writer can hope for: Time. I had the motive but he supplied the opportunity