Robert Crais - Chasing Darkness

Cass was making a big loopy grin.

“Charles was so totally into that chick.”

Charles flushed.

“Stop it, dude. Discretion.”

“Who’s Ivy?”

Cass touched the midpoint of her left forearm.

“She had a broken heart here on her arm. The wreckage of Charles’s love.”

“Dude!”

Cass was pleased with Charles’s mortification and crossed her arms smugly.

“She lived up there in the big redwood house. A total hippie throwback to the commune age.”

Charles shot a sulky glance at Cass.

“It’s not a commune. Dude rents out his rooms, is all. Ivy crashed there for a few weeks.”

Cass mouthed her words with exaggerated volume.

“Not long enough to drop her shorts.”

Phil laughed and went back to his tuna.

The big redwood house was next door to Tina Isbecki. I had been there less than an hour ago and spoken with a bald man named Lloyd and a woman named Jan who identified herself as a screenwriter. Neither had known anything about Lionel Byrd, and no one named Ivy was present.

“I was just up there talking to Lloyd. Ivy doesn’t live with them anymore?”

“Uh-uh. She went home.”

Great. The only person I’d found who had any contact with Byrd had ridden the tornado back to Oz.

“Because of what happened?”

“She left before the fires. She only had the room while her real place was being repaired. They found mold in her bathroom.”

Charles suddenly looked alarmed.

“Hey, he didn’t kill her, did he? Is she dead?”

“No, it’s nothing like that, but I’d like to speak with her. You know how to reach her?”

Cass made swoony eyes.

“Ooohhh, yeeaaahhh.”

Then she mouthed, “Stalker.”

Charles couldn’t give me Ivy Casik’s phone or address, but he knew how to find her apartment. Ivy’s car had died in the parking lot, and Charles had given her a lift to pick up cash for the repair. He had brought her to an apartment in Hollywood.

I copied the directions, thanked them for the help, then went out to my car.

When I reached the parking lot, a stocky kid in a Foo Fighters T-shirt and black wraparounds was peering at the interior. You drive a ’66 Corvette, you get that. He saw me coming, and stepped away.

“Nice ride. Want to sell it?”

“No, thanks.”

“Too bad. I could rock a car like this.”

He lit a cigarette, then drifted away to a blue Mustang. He stared at my car as he smoked. Vehicle envy.

I headed back to Sunset, then followed Charles’s directions east into Hollywood. Things were looking up. I had a real, live lead who might even be able to provide something useful. Of course, the odds she knew anything useful were probably along the lines of getting brained by a meteor, but you take your hope where you find it.

I was feeling so good, I almost didn’t see the black Toyota pickup pull into traffic behind me. It was the same Toyota with the Tattooed Beach Sluts sticker. A few seconds later, the Foo Fighters’ blue Mustang appeared a few cars behind.

Ivy Casik’s address would have led me into the low foothills near the Hollywood Bowl, but I drove south through West Hollywood in a loose circle around the Farmers Market, watching my rearview mirror.

The Mustang tightened up on the truck, then the truck turned off. A few blocks later, the truck was waiting at a cross street ahead of me. As I drove past, the truck turned in behind, and the Mustang disappeared. We went on like that, leapfrogging through the city, with one or the other of them always behind me but never for very long. They were using radios or cell phones to coordinate their moves.

When I was certain they were following me, I took my pistol from under the seat, put it beside my leg, then called Pike. He was still watching my house.

Pike said, “You get a tag?”

“Mud on their plates. Nice trick, seeing as how we haven’t had rain in five months.”

“You think they’re police?”

The Foo Fighter seemed pretty young for an officer, but a lot of guys in their early twenties looked younger.

“Could be. Bastilla was pissed off when I told her I was looking for Tomaso. Maybe they’re the same guys who searched my office.”

Pike grunted.

“An officer wouldn’t piss on your chair.”

“Crimmens phonied a confession in a capital crime. He would piss on a chair if he thought he could cover the search by making it look like vandalism.”

“Okay.”

“I’m on my way to see a woman named Ivy Casik up by the Bowl. When you’re on them, I’ll lose them, then you can follow them home.”

“I’m all over it.”

“Thought you might be.”

I turned north toward the hills and maintained an easy, meandering pace, watching them drift in and out of the mirror. Sometimes I didn’t see them for blocks at a time, then one or the other would reappear.

I slipped into a shoulder harness, then covered it with a light cotton jacket. The day was too hot for the jacket, but the jacket covered the gun.

Sixteen minutes later, Pike called.

“I’m on the Mustang.”

“Good hunting.”

I closed the phone and picked up speed.

I TURNED up Hillcrest into an older residential area with winding streets, high curbs, and plenty of sturdy palms. When I climbed into the curves, the truck and the Mustang were easy to lose. They would probably circle for a while, blaming each other for losing me, but then they would head for home, unaware Pike was with them. After I finished with Ivy Casik, I would join him, but they wouldn’t know that, either. Then we would talk.

I parked beneath a jacaranda tree across from Ivy’s building, then headed for her apartment. Ivy lived in Apartment 4, which was the bottom unit at the back of the courtyard. I rang the bell twice and knocked, but she wasn’t home. Perfect.

Ivy wasn’t much of a lead, but she was the only lead I had, so I returned to my car. Twenty-two minutes later, a dusty Ford Neon appeared and parked on the opposite curb. A tall young woman with serious eyes and straight hair climbed out. She had the broad shoulders and defined legs of an athlete and was wearing running shorts, a thin T, and blue Saucony running shoes, as if she had been for a run. The little heart on her forearm stood out like a strawberry.

I followed her into the courtyard, hurrying to catch up.

“Ivy Casik!”

She jumped sideways as if I had shouted “Boo,” and seemed about to run.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

She glanced at the other apartments as if she might start calling for help.

“You scared the hell out of me.”

“Sorry.”

I held out a card.

“Elvis Cole. I’d like to ask you about Lionel Byrd, the man you knew as Lonnie Jones.”

She backed away, still searching the apartments for help.

“Who are you?”

“I’m a private investigator. Just look at my card.”

“Anyone can get a card.”

I spread my arms.

“I could show you my gun.”

She hesitated, but seemed to grow calmer. I put away the card and held out my license.

“Licensed by the State of California, see? I’m sorry I scared you.”

“You’re a policeman?”

“Private, but the police will want to talk to you. I would have called before I came, but I didn’t have your number.”

She studied the license as if it was difficult to read.

“You are Ivy Casik, aren’t you?”

She glanced up, but seemed to be getting used to me.

“Why are you here?”

“About Lionel Byrd, the man you knew as Lonnie Jones.”

“Yes?”

I couldn’t tell from her answer if she recognized his name or not. “The people at Laurel Market told me you knew him. A clerk named Charles. Did you read the newspaper this morning?”