Gerald Petievich - To Die in Beverly Hills

"We'll be able to hear everything that goes on," Carr said.

"I could get killed."

"And L.A. might have an earthquake today," Higgins said. He turned another page.

"I feel like a scotch and water," Chagra said. "Is it okay if I make myself a drink?"

"No," Carr said.

Chagra gave a sigh of disgust and lay back down on the sofa.

Suddenly the telephone rang. Chagra sat up as if he'd received an electrical shock. He reached for the phone sitting on the coffee table in front of him.

Carr made a "take-it-easy" motion with both hands. He hurried to the bedroom and placed his hand on the receiver of an extension. Stepping into the bedroom doorway, he nodded to Chagra. They lifted the receivers simultaneously.

"Was it there?" Bailey said.

"Even more than you said would be there." Chagra stared nervously at Carr.

"We'll get together tomorrow."

Carr shook his head violently. He mouthed the word today.

Chagra swallowed. "There's something we need to talk about."

"I'm listening."

"Somebody paid me a visit. They asked me about-"

"Not on the phone," Bailey interrupted.

"Can you come over?"

There was a silence. "I'll pick you up in front of the Blue Peach in an hour," Bailey said and hung up.

Carr set the phone down and stepped back into the living room.

Bones Chagra was wringing his hands. "He sounds more suspicious than usual."

Carr noticed that Chagra's face had lost color.

Higgins picked up a medium-sized black leather suitcase off the floor and set it on the sofa. He unsnapped the latches and flipped it open. It was filled with electronic equipment fitted into Styrofoam padding. He removed a miniature transmitter attached to a long wire and a small battery pack. "Take off your shirt, Bones," Higgins said as he examined the equipment.

Bones shook his head, backed away from the detective. "I don't think I can do it. I'm too nervous. He'll know something is wrong as soon as he looks at me. Besides, this whole thing turns my stomach. I've never ratted on anyone in my whole life."

Higgins and Carr exchanged worried glances.

"It's your choice," Carr said to Chagra. "If you want to do Bailey's time that's strictly up to you. But I'll tell you right now that if you back out on us, we'll interview Bailey right after we book you. And we'll tell him that you handed him up. We won't have enough evidence to arrest him, so he'll beat the rap. And you'll be in jail wearing a snitch jacket."

More wringing of hands. Chagra rubbed his temples as he stared blankly at the floor. In a show of disgust, Higgins shoved the transmitter and battery pack back into the suitcase. He slammed the lid shut and snapped the latches.

Chagra turned toward the window. "Okay," he said. "I'll go through with it."

As Higgins flipped open the briefcase again, Carr phoned the Field Office and asked for B. B. Martin. He gave surveillance instructions and told him to pick up Jack Kelly, then hung up.

Chagra took off his shirt. It took Higgins less than fifteen minutes to tape the four-inch battery pack to the small of Chagra's back. He looped the microphone wire around his left shoulder and taped it above his collarbone.

Chagra put his shirt back on. The microphone was invisible.

"I'm scared to death."

"We'll be close by," Carr said.

Higgins packed up the briefcase. "Just relax and pretend you're not wearing it."

"But I am, man. If he finds it he'll kill me. I know he'll kill me."

They barely made it to the meeting spot on time. Carr parked the government sedan around the corner from the Blue Peach and let Chagra out. He walked to the corner and turned right toward the nightclub.

"I have our boy in sight," Kelly said over the radio.

Carr clicked the transmit button twice to acknowledge receipt of the transmission.

"I can see him too," B. B. Martin said. The radio made a squelch sound.

Higgins sat in the passenger seat with the transmitter briefcase open on his lap. He adjusted the volume. There was the sound of footsteps and the rustling of clothes. "If Bailey doesn't admit to the murder on the tape, we're through. There's no way the district attorney will ever file a murder charge on him."

Carr didn't respond. He knew Higgins was right.

A few minutes later the radio buzzed. "We have an arrival," Kelly said.

Carr started the engine and put the car in gear.

"Bones is getting in the passenger side," Kelly said. "It's a white police sedan with no markings. He's taking off southbound … southbound and pulling up to a stoplight."

Carr stepped on the accelerator and raced to the corner. He proceeded slowly around the corner. As he made the right turn, Bailey's car was a block or so ahead.

Static buzzed from the transmitter. Higgins adjusted the dials frantically. More static. He plugged and unplugged the recording jack, flipped switches. More squelch sounds. "Come on, you son-of-a-bitch." He slapped the sides of the briefcase.

"…half gold and half silver," they heard Bones Chagra saying. "I haven't even looked at the coins real close yet." Higgins turned up the volume.

"Where are they?" Bailey said.

"I've got the coins in a rental locker. But that's not what's important right now. Carr just paid me a visit. He was with some guy from L.A.P.D. Homicide. They asked me about Amanda. I think they know something."

"Tell me exactly what they said." Bailey's voice was calm, almost soothing.

As the transmitter volume became weaker, Carr stepped on the gas. Ahead, he saw Bailey's police car pull into a lane leading to a freeway on-ramp. The car entered the northbound freeway. A traffic light turned red and vehicles in both lanes stopped in front of Carr. He backed up and swerved around the tie-up in a parking lane. Cross-traffic sped by, blocking him from going through the red light. The voices on the transmitter faded to nothing. The Treasury radio barked with Martin's and Kelly's voices. They had lost sight of the police car.

Brakes from the oncoming traffic squealed as Carr slammed the accelerator to the floor and zoomed through the red light and onto the freeway.

Travis Bailey flicked the turn indicator and exited the freeway. He turned right on Santa Monica Boulevard and drove east for a mile or so. He made a left turn onto a manicured residential street and continued north toward Sunset Boulevard. He noticed that Chagra kept wringing his hands.

"So they asked me what I was doing the night Amanda Kennedy was killed," Chagra said. "I told them, 'How the hell do I know what I did on such and such a day? I don't keep a daily diary.' DeMille, the bondsman, gave them my name. He told them that I put up the money to bad Amanda out of jail. The rotten bastard copped out on me. So Carr says he wants me to come down to his office to make a statement. I said no, but I'm worried, Travis, really worried."

Travis Bailey said nothing. He made a left turn on Sunset Boulevard. A block later, he turned right onto a side street and then left into a steep driveway leading to the porticoed entrance to the Beverly Hills Hotel. He proceeded up the driveway and turned into the outdoor elevated parking lot, which faced the front of the hotel. A black limousine with smoked-glass windows was parked at the front door.

"I don't want you making any statements," Bailey said as he gazed at the panorama of million-dollar homes below.

"I have to tell 'em something," Chagra said, "If I just clam up they can get me for being an accessory. I bailed her out of jail and she ends up dead. They can arrest me."

"So let them arrest you. They'll never get the case filed. They don't have enough evidence."

Chagra's hands were shaking. He clasped them together."That's easy enough for you to say. Nobody's knocking on your door."