corner. Call it in as a suspicious disappearance.”
She moved toward the door.
The Iranian lifted the hinged counter and came
around to our side.
“What do you want? Why you make trouble?”
“Listen,” I told him, “I don’t care what kind of
82 jonathan l(eIlerman
nasty little games-you’ve got going on in the other
rooms. We need to talk to the family in fifteen.”
He pulled a ring of keys out of his pocket, “Come,
I show you, they not here. Then you leave me
alone, okay ?”
“It’s a deal.”
His-pants were baggy .and they flapped as he
strode across the asphalt, muttering and jingling
the keys.
A quick turn of the wrist and the lock released.
The door groaned as it opened. We stepped inside.
The desk clerk blanched, Beverly whispered Ohmi-god,
and I fought down a rising feeling of dread.
The room was small and dark and it had been
savaged.
The earthly belongings of the family Swope had
been removed from three cardboard suitcases, which
.lay crushed on one of the twin beds..Clothing and
personal articles were strewn about’: lotion, shampoo,
and detergent lealed from broken bottles in
viscous trails across the threadbare carpeting. Female
undergarments hung limply over the chain of
the plastic swag lamp. Paperback books and newspapers
had been shredded and scattered like confetti.
Open cans and boxes of food were everywhere,
the contents oozing out in congealing mounds.
The room reeked of rot and dead air.
Next to the bed was a patch of carpet that was
clear of litter, but far from empty. It was filled
with a .dark brown amoebalike stain half a foot
across.
“Oh no,” said Beverly. She staggered,’ lost her
balance, and I caught her.
You don’t have to spend much time in a hospital
to know the sight of dried blood.
BLOOD TEST 8
The Iranian’s face was waxen. His jaws worked
soundlessly.
“Come on,” I took hold of his bony shoulders and
guided him out, “we have to call the police now.”
It’s nice to know someone on the force. Especially
when that someone is your best friend and
won’t assume you’re a suspect when you call in a
crime. I bypassed 911 and called Milo’s extension
directly. He was in a meeting but I pushed a bit
and they called him out.
“Detective Sturgis.”
“Milo, it’s Alex.”
“Hello, pal. You Pulled me out of a fascinating
lecture. It seems the west side has become the
latest hot spot for PCP labs–they rent glitzy houses
and park Mercedes in the driveway. Why I need to
know all about it is beyond me but tell that to the
brass. Anyway, what’s up?”
I told hiTM and he turned businesslike immediately.
“All right. Stay there. Don’t let anyone touch
anything. I’ll get everything moving. There’s gonna
be a lot of people converging so don’t let the girl get
spooked. I’ll crap out of this meeting and be there
as soon as I can but I may not be the first, so if
someone gives you a hard time, drop’ my name and
hope they don’t give you a harder time because you
did. Bye.”
I hung up and went to Beverly. She-had the
drained, lost look of a stranded traveler. I put my
arm around her and sat her down next to the clerk,
who’d progressed to muttering to himself in Farsi,
no doubt reminiscing about the good old days with
the Ayatollah.
There was a coffee machine on the other side of
84
Jonathan Kellerman
the counter and I went through and poured three
cups. The Iranian took his gratefully, held it with ·
both hands, and gulped noisily. Beverly put hers
down on the table, and I sipped as we waited.
Five minutes later we saw the first flashing lights.
THE TWO uniformed policemen were muscular giants,
one white and blond, the other coal-black, his part-her’s
photographic negative. They questioned us
briefly, spending most of their time with. the Iranian
desk clerk. They didn’t like him instinctively, and
showed it in the way L.A.P.D. cops do–by bein
overly polite.
Most of-their interrogation had to do with when
he’d last seen the Swopes, what cars had come in