Макс Коллинз: No One Will Hear You

Kneeling and grabbing the kid by his T-shirt, Harrow advised, “Stay down, son — you’re caught.”

Blinking furiously, sweat pouring off him, the meth cooker looked up at his captor, with a goofy smile. “Hey — you’re that guy on TV! J.C. Harrow!”

“Please — no autographs.”

Harrow no longer heard gunfire from around the house. Choi ambled up, gunman in tow, hands behind his head, the firearms expert holding the AK nonchalantly in the bad guy’s general direction.

“On your knees, dickweed,” Choi said.

The gunman spat two angry words at Choi.

Who said, “Isn’t one ass-kicking enough tonight?”

Though still glaring, the gunman relented and knelt next to Harrow’s captive.

Choi looked around. “Where’s the other meth cooker?”

“In the wind.”

“You let him go?”

A gentle dig.

“Bird in the hand.” Harrow grinned at his young colleague. “My guy recognized me. Did yours?”

Choi’s hurt frown was answer enough.

In Harrow’s ear, Jenny was saying, “Boss, what’s happening? Please report!”

“Easy, Jen,” Harrow said fondly. “We’re okay.”

Sheriff Watson and his deputies came through the backdoor of the house and approached the Crime Seen pair and their prisoners.

“You two okay?” Watson asked.

Choi’s cocky grin was back. “Better than these buttwipes.”

“Better than the two out front, too,” Watson said, his voice a little shaky.

“Your men all right?” Harrow asked.

Watson pushed his hat back. “Sure as hell not what they’re used to... but they did fine. One bad guy dead, other wounded. We’ll get forensics support out here and I hope to send my men home to their families before too damn long.”

“I hear that,” Harrow said.

“Judging from what we found inside,” Watson said, “your tipster hit it on the button. All the ingredients for meth, boxes of vintage comic books — Superman, Batman, Captain America — and a big old pile of cash money.”

“Great.”

“Look, uh, Mr. Harrow — we appreciate the backup. If I didn’t make you feel welcome, I surely do apologize.”

“I’m a former sheriff myself. I know what it’s like to have your turf invaded.”

The two men traded respectful nods.

As it turned out, Maury Hathaway had snagged great footage of both Choi and Harrow’s take-downs, plus the sheriff’s firefight with the would-be thieves.

Once the crime scene unit cleared it, Harrow did an on-camera wraparound from inside the house, showing off the comics, the drug paraphernalia, and, of course, the impressive stacks of money.

As they loaded out, Harrow could just hear network president Dennis Byrnes laughing like a gleeful kid. Taking down a meth lab, stopping four felons, pleasing UBC’s president — all that should have given Harrow a nice Colorado high.

Instead, with the second season of his hit show winding down, Harrow felt tired beyond his years.

Not long ago, he and his team had tracked down the maniac who had slaughtered his family — which had been the sole motivation behind accepting the Crime Seen job, and allowing himself to become a public figure. A TV star, for Christ’s sake.

But now he’d accomplished everything he set out to, and more. Standing here in the cool spring mountain air, watching bad guys get carted away, he felt no real satisfaction.

When one of the sheriff’s vehicles had trouble gaining traction on the dirt road, he grinned without humor into the night.

Me, too, he thought. Spinning my wheels ...

Barely over the LAPD minimum height requirement of five feet, Lieutenant Anna Amari had to let her work as a lead investigator at the LAPD Sex Crimes Division walk tall for her.

She keep her makeup to a minimum and her dress low-key professional, like the dark gray blazer, light gray silk blouse, and darker gray slacks she wore on this cool May morning.

Still, she was a strikingly attractive woman of forty-two, with a naturally busty, narrow-waisted figure, deep olive complexion, and brown razor-cut hair brushing her shoulders. Brown almond-shaped eyes missed little, and — despite the bleak nature of her work — her smile came easily and often.

She and her latest partner — LeRon Polk, a somewhat inexperienced African-American detective — had been called to a murder scene at the Star Struck Hotel in West Hollywood.

Himself only a few inches taller than Amari, Polk seemed skinnier all over, from his black tie on white shirt under black suit, to the slash of mustache with his wispy goatee. He had a vintage detective look, close-cropped hair under a black-banded gray fedora.

As they left their Crown Vic to walk toward the uniformed officer at the hotel entrance, Amari said to Polk, “You do know nobody wears hats like that anymore.”

“That’s an inaccurate statement.”

“Is it?”

“It is,” Polk said, firm if good-natured. “Because I wear hats like this. Anyway, all the great ol’ detectives wore this kinda hat.”

“Shaft didn’t.”

Polk considered this as they moved into a high-ceilinged lobby whose carpet had such a busy pattern, it was hard to discern wear marks.

At the front desk, a uniformed sergeant was talking to a tall character in a well-cut charcoal suit, a clerk or more likely the manager. Couches and a few chairs were spread somewhat casually around the lobby. A few Grecian-style statues of nude men posed here and there.

Amari approached the uniformed sergeant, a lanky, white-haired white cop named Thompson.

“Bring me up to speed, Sarge,” Amari said.

“Homicide upstairs,” Thompson said. He might have been ordering coffee. “Room 425.”

“ID the victim?”

“White male,” Thompson said. “Room is registered to a Jeff Bailey.”

Polk asked, “That our dead body?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. This is Mr. Farquar, the manager.”

Amari gave the manager a quick nod. Farquar’s salt-and-pepper hair was slicked back; this, with his pointy face, gave him the look of a sleek gray otter.

“Did you see anything, Mr. Farquar?”

“No. I had no idea anything had happened until the guests started burning up the phones.”

Thompson explained, “Maid found the body this morning, freaked out, started screaming.”

“Angelina is one of our best employees,” Farquar said, pointlessly.

Amari asked Thompson, “Did you talk to the maid?”

The sergeant nodded. “Nice lady. Scared out of her gourd. Probably never seen anything like that before.”

Amari noted a slight inflection in Thompson’s voice. Nothing rattled a twenty-year vet like the sarge, but this murder seemed to have gotten to him.

“Mr. Farquar,” Amari said, “the crime scene team will need to take any surveillance video you have.”

The manager blanched a little. “Um... that is... I mean to say, our clientele? It’s somewhat specialized. They come to the Star Struck expecting a certain amount of... discretion.”

The Star Struck wasn’t a flophouse by any means, but this hotel, like West Hollywood in general, had a reputation for being a haven for the gay community, whether in or out of the closet. She understood and respected their need for privacy.

But now, such considerations were as dead as the victim upstairs. They needed that security video.

Amari gave the manager a hard look.

Wilting, Farquar said, “It will be ready when your people ask for it.”

“Thank you. We appreciate your cooperation.” To Thompson, she said, “We’re going upstairs.”

Soon, on the fourth floor, elevator doors whispered open and Amari and Polk stepped out. The corridor was empty save for a uniformed officer outside what Amari assumed was room 425.