Gregg Hurwitz - The Crime Writer

We all started talking at the same time; Preston, of course, prevailed. "So, fine, you were framed, Mort was framed. You're missing the point."

"That's what I been trying to tell him," Chic said. "If Mort ain't your guy "

"Then why'd he act so bizarrely hostile toward you?"

Annoyed by their ebony-and-ivory routine, I took a moment to respond.

But Chic didn't give me a moment. "Because homeboy thought you was framing him."

"He's on the wrong side of the story, just like you are," Preston said. "You're still not asking the key question. And that is "

Preston and Chic, now side by side on the piano keyboard: "Who framed Mort?"

Chic stared at me expectantly. Static from Preston. Clearly they were better at posing questions than coming up with answers. We sat in frustration for a few moments before Preston signed off. The silence that followed felt like defeat.

My Highlander was parked on the dirt shoulder off Mulholland where it had been left.

Chic gave me a wink as I climbed out. "Call when you find what you find."

I'd left the moonroof shoved back, and the seats gave off a deep warmth. Closing my eyes, I worked every link in the case like a rosary. How was I gonna know who would have a motive to frame Mort? I didn't know anything about him. I stared at the view, the world's most expansive dead end. It dawned on me by degrees Preston and Chic's motive approach was wrongheaded. It came down to opportunity.

Not why would somebody have framed Mort? But who could have?

I pictured that telltale dent on the right front wheel well of Frankel's Volvo. My mind kept realigning the data, and I didn't like what it was coming up with.

I called the hospital and asked to be put through to Big Brontell's unit.

An unreasonably pleasant clerk answered. "I'm sorry, he stepped out for a bite. He'll be back shortly."

I left my cell-phone number, which she kindly jotted down, and then I drove the remaining two miles home. Xena had pulled my high-tops from the coat closet and chewed the toes to a pulp, but last night she'd likely saved my life, which I figured worth a pair of Nikes. I reheated some taco meat and put it in her salad-bowl dish to reward her for her bad behavior. Then I went to my office and got the murder book and all the notes I'd gathered on the investigation.

I was halfway down the stairs when I stopped, went back up, and grabbed my manuscript.

For the drive across town, I twisted and turned the evidence, trying to make a pretty picture. I got a few variations on the picture, none of them pretty.

Though the four o'clock sun was strong, the lights shone at the window of Frankel's apartment, a reminder of the detectives' late-night visit. I drifted up the street past the hot-dog stand, past the fabric store with the creepy mannequins tilting in the window, and parked by the car-rental lot. Frankel's mechanic was across the way, locking up the garage. I caught him as he fastened the security screen.

"Hi, I'm Drew. I was referred to you by one of my neighbors. Mort?" I offered a hand, and he held his up in apology, grease etching the lines in the rough skin.

He had wonderfully elaborate tattoos, dragons and busty nymphs, sheathing either arm. The ink stopped in neat cuffs at his wrists. "Oh, yeah. Mortie. Sure."

"He said you do great work."

"Dings to wrecks."

"You must be good. Mortie doesn't exactly lavish praise, does he?"

"No, he don't."

"You banged out that dent for him."

"That's right."

"I got one myself. Came out to my car in the morning and there it was. Wheel well." I shook my head, galled by the imaginary scofflaw. "Just like Mort's. No note, no nothing."

"He figured some asshole smacked it with a bike."

"We park side by side. I think the guy hit mine at the same time. A week ago Wednesday."

The mechanic shook his head. "Not Mort's. His got hit just a couple nights ago. You know Mort he brought it to me the next morning."

"You sure?"

"Course I'm sure. He dropped the car first thing Tuesday, I had it back to him by the time he got off work."

The very night I'd gotten the vehicle ID from Junior, a ding had appeared in Mort's wheel well. And there was only one person other than Junior who could've known to put it there.

Acutely aware of the breeze across my suddenly hot face, I said, "You work fast."

"He's funny about that car. You'd do better to punch him in the nose than ding it. Though I wouldn't want to punch him in the nose."

"No," I said, "neither would I."

I sat in my car, elbows on the steering wheel, face tilted into my hands. My eyes ached, especially when I rubbed them.

I needed to proceed carefully and consider every possibility. Two reasonable options remained to explain Mort's wheel-well dent. Since the first was so incredible, I focused on the other. If Junior had embellished his story about the Volvo, that would have sent me scrambling off down the wrong clue trail, narrowing the field to felons and crooks and picking one of my liking. The ding in the right front wheel well a considerable coincidence in this scenario made this unlikely. But I had to be certain.

I called Hope House and explained to Caroline how I'd spent the time since I'd seen her last.

She said, "When the time is right, you'll have a nice lawsuit to press against LAPD."

"Right now I need you to make sure Junior is absolutely certain about everything he told me about the brown Volvo. Put him on the rack or whatever you shrinks use."

"Thumbscrews."

I thanked her, then stopped for a Coke and a refill at the gas station where I'd solidified Junior's love of smoking. The sky was starting to take on orange at the fringe, outlining the buildings and trees. My phone rang.

Caroline said, "Junior's positive about the Volvo. He said he's offended you're questioning his memory."

"Of course he is. Tell him I'll make it up to him at the Big Brother soiree next month." I climbed back into the Highlander, turned over the motor, and peeled out.

Fifteen minutes later I was across from the killer's house in North Hollywood.

I parked in the shadows about a half block down, beneath the waterfall foliage of a pepper tree. Shadows scalloped the windshield, and dry leaves scraped the roof. From my vantage only the garage and edge of the house were visible.

The scene demanded a noirish cast dramatic lighting, gloomy sky, pessimistic clouds. But Los Angeles can be an uncooperative place. The evening had darkened a few degrees, sure, but there was a pleasing uniformity to the remaining sunshine, a suburban flatness. Leftover warmth lingered, trapped in the stifling stillness of the Valley air. It smelled of mulch and frying meat. Overhead a jet droned lazily toward Burbank.

The garage door was raised, the rear of the van laid open apparently he was midtask, though from my limited perspective I could spot no movement around the house. The van was now the vehicle of choice; he wouldn't risk taking the other car out, not again.

I didn't want to believe it I almost couldn't believe it but who else made sense? Who could've broken in to my house, taken my blood, and put it on Broach's corpse? Who could taint the crime scene with a hair that wouldn't raise suspicion? Who had been helpful as long as I was running down the wrong trail? Who had samples from which to simulate my handwriting in the matchbook? Who'd shown me Richard Collins's fingerprint match only once he'd confirmed that the lifted print wasn't his own? Who had handpicked Mort from the pool of brown-Volvo owners I'd closed in on, selected him as the felon most plausible for a murder upgrade? Who had carte blanche access to equipment and databases and throwaway pistols? Who would know precisely how to angle the blade into an unconscious body to make the killer appear left-handed? Who'd been in convenient proximity to the site where Broach's body had been dumped, in fact, because he'd done the dumping?