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Mal kicked the dope around, thinking that it played true to his take on the brain trusters: they were duplicitous, they talked a lot, they took their own sweet time acting and let outside events call the tune. “Who have you met besides Kostenz and De Haven?”
“Loftis, Minear and Ziffkin, but just briefly.”
“How did they impress you?”
Da
Buzz chuckled and loosened his belt. “You were lucky old Reynolds didn’t jump your bones instead of De Haven. Nice-lookin’ young guy like you would probably get that old prowler stiffin’ up a hard yard.”
Da
Da
Mal said, “No”; he watched Da
“They’re Dudley’s men, not mine! They won’t even report to me, and Mike Breuning’s jerking my chain! For all I know he’s bunked out on the whole job!”
Mal slapped the table, bringing Da
Da
The operative spoke to his operator. “A man named Felix Gordean. He’s a homosexual procurer co
Mal said, “Well, I’ve never heard of him, and I’m top Bureau dog. Buzz, do you know this guy?”
“Sure do, boss. Large City juice, larger County. One lean and mean fruitfly, plays golf with Sheriff Eugene Biscailuz, puts a few shekels in Al Dietrich’s pockets come Christmastime, too.”
As he said the words, Mal knew it was one of the finest moments of his life. “Lean on him, Da
Da
It was just about the nicest thing anyone ever told him. Mal said, “Have another piece of pie, lad. I’m picking up the check.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
The hall window scraping, three soft footsteps on the bedroom floor.
Buzz stirred, rolled away from Audrey, reached under the pillow and palmed his .38, camouflaging the movement with a sleep sigh. Two more footsteps, Audrey snoring, light through a crack in the curtains eclipsed. A shape coming around his side of the bed; the sound of a hammer being cocked; “Mickey, you’re dead.”
Buzz stiff-armed Audrey to the floor, away from the voice; a silencer snicked and muzzle flash lit up a big man in a dark overcoat. Audrey screamed; Buzz felt the mattress rip an inch from his legs. In one swipe, he grabbed his billy club off the nightstand and swung it at the man’s knees; wood-encased steel cracked bone; the man stumbled toward the bed. Audrey shrieked, “Meeks!”; a shot ripped the far wall; another half second of muzzle light gave Buzz a sighting. He grabbed the man’s coat and pulled him to the bed, smothered his head with a pillow and shot him twice in the face point-blank.
The explosions were muffled; Audrey screeching was siren loud. Buzz moved around the bed and bear-hugged her, killing her tremors with his own shakes. He whispered, “Go into the bathroom, keep the light off and your head down. This was for Mickey, and if there’s a back-up man outside, he’s comin’. Stay fuckin’ down and stay fuckin’ calm.”
Audrey retreated on her knees; Buzz went into the living room, parted the front curtains and looked out. There was a sedan parked directly across the street that wasn’t there when he walked in; no other cars were stationed curbside. He did a runthrough on what probably happened:
He looked like Mickey from a distance; he drove a green ‘48 Eldo. Mickey’s house was bombed yesterday; Mickey, wife and pet bulldog survived. He parked his car the standard three blocks away; half-assed surveillance convinced the gunman he was Mickey, a short fat okie subbing for a short fat Jew.
Buzz kept eyeballing the sedan; it stayed still, no tell-tale cigarette glow. Five minutes went by; no cops or backup men appeared. Buzz took it as a single-o play, walked back to the bedroom and flicked on the overhead light.
The room reeked of cordite; the bed was soaked in blood; the pillow was solid saturated crimson. Buzz lifted it off and propped up the dead man’s head. It had no face, there were no exit wounds, all the red was leaking out his ears. He rifled his pockets—and the wicked bad willies came on.
An LAPD badge and ID buzzer: Detective Sergeant Eugene J. Niles, Hollywood Squad. An Automobile Club card, vehicle dope in the lower left corner—maroon ‘46 Ford Crown Victoria Sedan, Cal ‘49 JS 1497. A California driver’s license made out to Eugene Niles, residence 3987 Melbourne Avenue, Hollywood. Car keys and other keys and pieces of paper with Audrey’s address and an architectural floor plan for a house that looked like Mickey’s pad in Brentwood.
Old rumors, new facts, killer shakes.
The LAPD was behind the shootout at Sherry’s; Jack D. and Mickey had buried the hatchet; Niles worked Hollywood Division, the eye of the Brenda Allen storm. Buzz ran across the street on fear overdrive, saw that the sedan was ‘46 Vicky JS 1497, unlocked the trunk and ran back. He hauled out a big bed quilt, wrapped Niles and his gun up in it, shoulder-slung him up and over to the Vicky and locked him in the trunk, folding him double next to the spare tire. Panting, sweat-soaked and shaky, he walked back and braced Audrey.
She was sitting on the toilet, naked, smoking. A half dozen butts littered the floor; the bathroom was a tobacco cloud. She looked like the woman from Mars: tears had melted her makeup and her lipstick was still smudged from their lovemaking.
Buzz knelt in front of her. “Honey, I’ll take care of it. This was for Mickey, so I think we’re okay. But I should stay away from you for a while, just in case this guy had partners—we don’t want them figurin’ out it was you and me instead of you and Mickey.”
Audrey dropped her cigarette on the floor and snuffed it with her bare feet, no pain registering. She said, “All right,” a hoarse smoker’s croak.
Buzz said, “You strip the bed and burn it in the incinerator. There’s bullets in the mattress and the wall, you dig ‘em out and toss ‘em. And you don’t tell nobody.”