I parked on my driveway and got out. Rosa hovered by the gate line, waiting to be invited onto my property like some vampire, but I wasn’t going to make that mistake, and walked over to her.
“Nice evening?” she asked.
I didn’t reply.
“You been anywhere interesting?”
What did she know? Was she in on this somehow? She’d turned up to spring me when I’d got arrested on my way back from San Diego, but had she really seen my arrest flagged? Was it possible she was linked to my patron? Was she my patron?
“Why are you here, Detective?”
“I’d like to ask you a few more questions. Can we go inside?” She gestured toward the house and took a step forward.
I shook my head. “I don’t think so. And you can stay off my property.” Magic words. Cop vampires can’t trespass without cause. She took a step back.
“Okay. I can talk from here. It’s a warm night is all, and I wanted you to be comfortable.”
“I appreciate your concern, but I don’t have to talk to you. I’m tired and I want to get some shut-eye.”
I started toward the house.
“You say you don’t know anything about Walter Glaze,” she said. “But have you ever heard of Farah Younis?”
It took a ton of self-control to maintain my mask, but inside a storm was raging. How had they linked the deaths so quickly? Had I left incriminating DNA at the scenes? Or been picked up on camera?
The reckoning, Walter’s ghost whispered unhelpfully.
If they had hard evidence, a battalion of cops would already be hauling me in for booking. I stopped and turned slowly, casually.
“Never heard of her. What’s she got to do with Walter Glaze?”
“Farah Younis is a lawyer who was shot in San Diego,” Rosa replied. “The day before I secured your release from San Clemente. Were you in San Diego?”
“Yeah,” I responded.
Gun in the glove box.
Cash in a strongbox in the house.
Fibers.
DNA.
Who knows what other evidence all over me, my car, and my place?
I started sweating.
“I’ve got a thing for good food,” I said. “I drove down to Hodad’s for a burger.”
“A burger?” Rosa asked in a tone that made me think we were actors in a bad soap, each going through the motions of their role, neither convinced by the performance of the other.
This wasn’t a simple fishing expedition. They had something that tied Farah to Walter, but did they have anything on me?
“Hodad’s is a top five all-American burger joint. I’d just bought this car and wanted to stretch her out on a road trip.”
“I see,” she said. “And were you ever in the downtown area?”
“I might have driven through. I went into the city because it seemed a shame not to tour when I’d gone so far.”
“But you don’t know Farah Younis?”
I shook my head. “I don’t. Sorry. Can’t help you. How did you get my new address?”
“Your ex-wife,” Rosa replied.
Toni. I told her she shouldn’t give anyone my details.
“Why?” Rosa asked. “Are you hiding? You should know you can’t hide from the LAPD. Not for long anyway.”
I scoffed, but I didn’t feel jovial. “I’m not hiding. Just interested in knowing since I haven’t sent out my change-of-address notices yet.”
She smiled. “It’s a nice place. Step up from the old. You come into money?”
“Savings,” I replied. If she did some digging, that tale wouldn’t hold.
“Savings,” she repeated. “I wish I could learn how to put some money aside, but a cop’s paycheck doesn’t go far these days. Certainly doesn’t reach the hills.”
She eyed me coldly for a moment, but I didn’t give her a response. Not even so much as a twitch. Instead, I looked her up and down, all disappointment and pity. If I didn’t have the right to judge Walter Glaze, Farah Younis, or Richard Gibson, what right did this collection of cells, this body of flesh given purpose by a flawed soul, have to judge me? What was she anyway? A cop? A meaningless title given to her by those in power to legitimize their view of the world and protect their interests over mine. If Anna Cacciola did get me assessed by a psychiatrist, they wouldn’t have a problem identifying a heavy-duty problem with authority.
I see you, cop, I thought as I stared at her. I see you, flawed like the rest of us.
“Well, thank you for your time, Mr. Collard,” she said at last.
“No problem.”
I watched her get into her car. I walked to the gate and closed it as she started her engine and drove down the hill toward the city.
What right did she have to come here asking me questions? Making me feel like a wrongdoer? In a hundred years no one would care about what I’d done, and in a thousand no one would even know. Morality was a question of perspective. Justice a matter of who had power. I had the power to rid the world of evil, and that made me just.
As the gate clicked shut, I noticed the mailbox wasn’t fully closed. Skye must not have shut it properly. I walked over and checked inside the small metal locker to see another package from my mysterious patron.
It was the largest yet.