Robert Crais - L.A. Requiem

When Pike walked her out to the truck, he could not see them, but as he settled into a groove on the Hollywood Freeway, they were with him again. He wondered if they knew where he was going and thought they must. If they didn't, they were in for a surprise. Karen said, “Do I look okay?”

“Better than okay.” He'd been watching the rearview.

Now she gave him the little look out the corner of her eye. “How much better?”

He held up his thumb and forefinger, maybe a quarter inch apart.

She slapped his leg.

He spread his fingers as wide as they would go.

“Better.”

She slid across the Ford Ranger's bench seat and snuggled into him, oblivious to the car or the men in the car or what might happen because of that car. She was wearing a bright yellow sundress and sandals, the yellow going well with her golden skin and white smile. Her black hair glistened in the late morning sun and smelled of lavender. She was a lovely young woman, bright and funny, and Pike enjoyed her company.

When he took the Stadium Way exit off the Golden State Freeway, the tail car left him. That meant they knew where he was going, and either were content to break off the surveillance or had someone assigned to pick him up inside.

He followed Stadium Way through the manicured green lawns of Elysian Park to Academy Road, saw that cars were already parking along the road just up from the gate to Dodger Stadium, and pulled the Ranger to the curb. Karen said, “Look at all these cars. How many people will be here?”

“Five or six hundred, I guess.” Wozniak would be here. Along with his wife and daughter. Pike wondered again if the IAG spooks would have a man out.

Pike walked around the front of the truck and helped her out. Wilt Deedle, a Rampart bunco detective who weighed almost three hundred pounds, pulled in behind the Ranger and nodded. Joe nodded back. They didn't really know each other, but they were familiar enough to nod. Deedle's wife and four kids were wedged into his car. Deedle, his wife, and three of the kids were wearing matching Hawaiian shirts. The fourth kid, a teenaged girl, was wearing a black tee shirt and looked sullen.

Families and couples were leaving their cars and walking up a little road into the canyon. Pike took Karen's hand, and the two of them followed. Karen said, “It doesn't look anything like I expected. It almost looks like a resort.”

Pike let his mouth twitch, as much for the little girl's wonder in her eyes as the notion of the Los Angeles Police Academy as a resort. “Not much of a resort when it's a hundred degrees and you're running the obstacle course. You never been here before?”

“I knew it was here, but the closest I've been is Dodger Stadium. It's pretty.”

The Academy was snuggled between two ridges in the foothills of Elysian Park, a point-blank pistol shot north of Dodger Stadium. The buildings were Spanish and laid out beneath mature red pines and eucalyptus trees. You could stand in the Academy parking lot and see across acres of stadium parking past the bleachers and into the first-base seats. That close. The Ramparts Division Events Officer had wisely made sure that the Dodgers were out of town before booking the Academy on this particular Sunday for the Family Day Picnic. They wouldn't have to worry about game traffic, but the police were making plenty of their own. A burglary detective named Warren Steiner and one of the senior Rampart uniforms, Captain Dennis O'Halloran, were trying to pick the lock to the Dodgers' gate so the arriving families could use the ball club's parking lot. They weren't having much luck with it.

Pike led Karen uphill past the guard shack and the armory, along a little tarmac road that ran between the pines to the target range and the Recruit Training Center. A couple of hundred people were already spread around the track field, some already having staked out positions with spread blankets, others tossing Frisbees or Nerf balls, most just standing around because they hadn't yet had enough beer to loosen up. Three long barbecue grills were set up at the far end of the field by the picnic tables, clouding the trees with smoke and the smell of burning chicken. Rampart Homicide had drawn chef duty this year, and wore matching tee shirts that said Don't ask where we got the meat.

Cop humor.

Karen said, “Do you see anyone you know?”

“Know most of them.”

“Who are your friends?”

Joe didn't know what to say to that. He was looking for Wozniak and for faces he had seen downtown at Parker Center. He thought it possible that IAG might've worked through Rampart command for an officer to continue the surveillance, but he didn't think so. Wozniak had a lot of years on the job, and IAG wouldn't be certain where the Rampart commander's loyalties would lie.

Karen tugged at his arm and grinned at him. “We can't just stand here. Come on!”

The Division had set up a soft-drink table in front of a cement wall painted with the Academy symbol and the LAPD's motto , To Protect and to Serve . When Pike was a recruit, his class had been doing physical training on the track field one hot winter afternoon as their PT instructor shouted that unless they got the lead out of their asses they wouldn't be fit to protect dog shit or serve hot beer. A black kid named Elihu Gimble cracked that he'd be happy to serve, but only after coffee and donuts, and the entire class had had to run an extra five miles. Five months later, when Gimble was a probationary officer on patrol in East L.A., he'd been shot in the back by an unknown assailant while responding to a see-the-woman call. The shooter was never identified.

Pike led Karen to the table, and together they stood in line for their drinks. Karen kept her arm looped in his, and before long she was chatting with everyone around them. Pike admired her. Whereas he rarely spoke, she spoke constantly. Whereas he felt obvious, and apart from others, she fit easily with an openness that was quickly returned. By the time they had their sodas, she had found another couple with whom to sit, a pale woman with twin boys whose husband was a uniformed officer named Casey. Casey worked the evening shift, and Pike had never met him.

They were spreading their blankets when Paulette Wozniak appeared behind them. “Hello, Joe. Is this the young lady we've heard so much about?”

Karen flashed the wide, friendly smile and put out her hand. “Karen Garcia. And I can't imagine Joe saying very much about anything, but if he's been talking about me, I'm glad. That's a good sign.”

The two women shook, Paulette returning her own smile, which was slow and real and pure in a way that made Pike think of a clean, deep pool. “Paulette Wozniak. I'm married to Joe's partner, Abel. Everyone calls him Woz.” She pointed across the field to the trees beyond where Homicide was burning the mystery meat. Abel Wozniak and a little girl were just coming through the trees. Pike guessed that Woz had been showing his daughter the obstacle course. “That's him with the bow legs and the girl.”

Paulette was eight years older than Joe, with short light brown hair and soft brown eyes and even teeth. Her fair skin was beginning to line around the eyes and the corners of her mouth. She didn't seem bothered by the lines, and Pike liked that. She rarely wore makeup, and Pike liked that, too. The lines made her face interesting and knowing.

Paulette touched Joe's arm. “Could I borrow you for a minute, Joe?” She put the smile on Karen. “I won't keep him long.”