The prostitutes ball ss-10 Read online

  The prostitutes ball

  ( Shane Scully - 10 )

  Stephen Cannell

  Stephen Cannell

  The prostitutes ball

  Chapter 1

  This is a story about a story.

  Its also a story which, despite all my efforts to the contrary, seemed destined to become a major motion picture.

  It began a few days before Christmas, but it s not a Christmas story. Its about lost generations and emotional desertion, and about a Los Angeles family with way too much money. So I guess at its heart, it s a story about greed, corruption, and loss.

  With those themes, what better place to start than at an office Christmas party? But before we begin, just a few preliminary remarks.

  I'm a homicide detective, and as such, I'm carefully schooled in the three concepts mentioned above. I work at an elite LAPD detective division known as Homicide Special. Our unit was reconstituted after the O. J. Simpson case, another L. A. story of greed, corruption, and loss.

  After losing that high-profile media trial, it occurred to our command floor managers that maybe it wasn't such a good idea to have homicide detectives carrying blood evidence vials around a crime scene where they could later be accused of planting it.

  As a result, Homicide Special was completely reorganized and staffed with our most seasoned detectives. I'm lucky to be assigned there. It's a great gig.

  My name is Shane Scully, and for this story I will be your host narrator. It's going to be a fast ride through L. A. with a lot of reckless driving. Look out for abrupt lane changes, freeway shootings, and dangerous hairpin turns. As a police officer, I'm required to advise you to fasten your seat belts.

  All set? Then let's go… Cue the opening theme music. Fade slowly up from black, and we'll begin at: THE INCITING STORY EVENT

  Chapter 2

  The chiefs Christmas celebration was being held at the Magic Castle, an old baroque mansion in the foothills just above Hollywood Boulevard. It was a private club that normally catered to L. A.'s large population of magicians, but was also available to rent out for special occasions such as this one.

  Half a dozen professional sleight-of-hand performers were ripping up twenty-dollar bills or cutting apart ugly neckties then magically restoring them before a crowd of half-lit captains and deputy chiefs who'd seen their share of deception and were squinting through alcohol filters, trying to bust these tricksters.

  The party was for the chief's command staff and their spouses. More than a few of the braided hats were getting seriously hammered at the open bar, sometimes exposing their dark, competitive natures or revealing dangerous political aspirations. The music was about peace on earth, goodwill toward men, but most of the people in this room had seen too much street crime to believe it.

  Our chief, Tony Filosiani, mingled happily, wearing a blue double-breasted pinstripe over his lunchbox-shaped frame. On his shiny bald head was a Santa hat. He moved through the room, grinning and slapping backs, the ridiculous red hat bobbing along, identifying his position like a hazard warning.

  It was hard not to wonder what would happen once this half-lit badge-heavy crowd hit the street and ran into the poor stiffs in our Traffic Division.

  As usual, my beautiful wife, Alexa, was the center of attention, her looks both a blessing and a curse. Gleaming black hair, reefwater blue eyes, and high fashion-model cheekbones made Alexa attractive in a way that drew people to her but also made it impossible for a few of the old boy cops in this room to accept her as a division commander. Some of the wives stared enviously, while others wondered openly about her.

  I was only here as Alexa's husband and was haunting the corners of the room, trying for invisibility. I look like a middleweight club fighter with a nose broken too many times and short black hair that never quite lies down, so people stay out of my way.

  On that December night, Alexa was riding on a political wave of congratulatory remarks. The day before, it had been announced that she was being promoted to captain and would finally be able to drop the word "acting" from her title of Detective Division commander.

  For two years she'd been running the Detective Division that supervised three hundred plainclothes cops. In L. A. only captains can head police divisions, but she took over the job as a lieutenant and the "acting" adverb had been haunting her authority like an asterisk. With her appointment to captain came full-fledged membership in the department's double bar club.

  I watched as a few of the more aggressive career assassins mingled and schmoozed, wearing big, deceptive grins. They cruised the party like ocean predators, their dangerous personalities barely visible, only the hiss of their dorsals giving them away.

  "You ready yet?" I asked Alexa, trying for the third time to get us out of there. I'm a line officer, a Detective III. I don't mix well at these things. Because I was uncomfortable, I wasn't drinking alcohol, so I wouldn't inadvertently insult somebody who could later decide to wreck my career.

  "In a minute," Alexa said, turning toward a florid-faced commander named Medavoy, who ran the Special Operations Support Division. I knew he had actively opposed Alexa's appointment to captain, but you'd never know it as he congratulated her, gave her a big, expansive hug, and told her she was the absolute best. The putz.

  I wandered off to find a backwater as the music changed and the annoying strains of the Chipmunks singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" began to claw relentlessly at my brain.

  "Shane?"

  I turned to find Sally Quinn, my partner from Homicide Special.

  "Sally! What re you doing here?" I was surprised to see her because this was a command-floor-only party. Short, with a bob hairstyle and freckles, she looked as uncomfortable as I did.

  "Cal invited me as kind of a going-away thing," she said, referring to both Jeb Calloway, our captain at Homicide Special, and the bombshell she'd laid on me without warning that afternoon.

  "I was hoping to get some time with you before I left tomorrow," she said.

  Sally and I had been partners for three years, although much of that had been interrupted, first by her maternity leave and then by medical complications she'd had following the birth of her daughter. I got benched right after she got back because I'd been wounded and needed time off to recover. As a result, we'd only been working the job together for a little over eighteen months.

  Earlier this afternoon, she'd informed me she was taking another family leave. She and her husband had just received the difficult news that their little two-year-old daughter, Tara, had been diagnosed with autism. Sally had decided to stay home to work with her.

  "Now that it's sunk in, I hope you're not too upset," she said. "You seemed a little quiet after I told you."

  "Of course I'm not upset." I took her hand. "I'm gonna miss having you as my partner is all. I thought we were finally through the medical stuff and ready to kick ass."

  "I'm sorry we had such a choppy go. After the baby, I had more stuff going wrong than a Russian airline." She squeezed my hand. "I just wanted you to know I think you're a great partner and I'll be back once Thomas and I have a good support program set up."

  "I'll be waiting," I told her.

  "You know yet who Cal is going to assign to our desk?" she asked.

  "Nope."

  "I hope it's not Hitch. You deserve better than that."

  "I doubt he'll put Hitchens with me." But the truth was, I'd been worrying about that ever since Sally told me she was taking another home leave.

  Sumner Hitchens had been bouncing between partners, hitting the guardrail, getting slapped to the center, and ringing all the tilt buzzers, before ending back in the return tray like the kinetically overshot pinball he was. We were current
ly the only two unattached detectives at Homicide Special.

  A captain from Ad Vice jostled us as he made his way back to the bar. "These guys look sloshed," Sally commented. "Its dangerous to drink at these things."

  "Its a Christmas party," I said noncommittally. "Hopefully, Yellow Cabs gonna make the difference."

  Sally hugged me and we wished each other luck.

  Twenty minutes later I had Alexa by the arm and we were mercifully out of there. We walked to the valet stand out front, followed by the faint strains of "Frosty the Snowman."

  My black MDX pulled to the curb and we both got in. Alexa and I had ridden in together this morning because of the party. My wife never drinks at police events either, so thankfully, with what was just about to happen, we were both completely sober.

  I turned out of the parking lot and headed down the hill, then took a left on Franklin, making my way toward the Hollywood Freeway.

  According to the Communications Division, the radio call we answered a few minutes later hit dispatch at 10:13 P. M.

  It was December 22nd, three days before Christmas.

  Chapter 3

  LAPD protocol demands you always keep your police scanner on even while off duty. Alexa reached into the glove box as we hit the 101 freeway and flipped the switch. A steady stream of low-value mistakes bubbled out at us, all of it delivered in a flat, rambling female monotone.

  "One X-Ray Seven, meet L-Fifteen Code Six at the market, 3316 West Olympic," the RTO said. "Cross street is Western. Felony 211 suspect needs transport to MCJ for booking."

  It went on like that. Nothing too big seemed to be going down at the moment.

  Since it was relatively late, I was using the freeways, taking the long way home in miles, which at this hour should turn out to be the short way in minutes.

  I was tooling along, glad to be out of that party, when Alexa said, "I saw you talking to Sally. What a shame about her little girl."

  "Yeah, she thinks if they start working with specialists right now, they can minimize the effect of the autism. Tara's so young, it s hard to test her, so the doctors don't really know how severe it is yet."

  Because Alexa ran the Detective Bureau I couldn't help but wonder if she'd seen Captain Jeb Calloway's new Homicide Special partners list, so I casually floated the question.

  "I'd sure like to know who Jeb s gonna put with me. You heard anything?"

  We were about five miles from the transition to the San Diego Freeway, which would take us to Venice Beach, where our little canal house was located on one of the waterways there. When Alexa didn't answer I glanced over.

  I knew that expression. She was trying to make up her mind. It was always a problem for us when she knew something that affected me but that she wasn't supposed to confide.

  "I'm hoping it's not going to be Sumner Hitchens," I gently prodded.

  Then she said, "I think Detective Hitchens is going to be transfered to CAPS in the Valley. But please don't say anything because I don't think he's been told yet."

  CAPS was Crimes Against Persons, and if that was true, it was a big demotion for him to go from the elite Homicide Special squad where he was currently assigned to some Valley purse-snatch detail.

  Hitchens, or "Hitch" as he preferred to be called, had somehow gonzo'd his way into our unit, then had burned through three partners in less than a year. All of them eventually became so frustrated with him they demanded reassignment.

  "You sure he's going to the Valley?" I asked.

  "It's just something I think I heard," she responded vaguely.

  "Okay, that's good. Actually, that's great. But it leaves us with an odd number up there. Means they'll have to transfer in someone new to partner with me. Bobby Shepherd has been trying for the unit. I worked great with him when we were in patrol. You think you could put in a good word? I'd love to get Shep as my new partner."

  She poker-faced my dash.

  "I hope making captain isn't going to fuck up that nice, easy management style you're so widely appreciated for," I said, trying to kid her along.

  "Come on, Shane, you know who gets in Homicide Special is Jeb's call. I can't micromanage my commanders and then hold them responsible for their performance."

  At that moment the radio call that put this story in motion burbled out of the scanner.

  "All units and One Adam Twenty. A 415 with shots fired at 3151 Skyline Drive. Nearest cross street is Mulholland. One Adam Twenty, your call is Code Three."

  "Isn't that about a mile or two up there?" Alexa said, pointing off at the hills to my left where some very pricey real estate was located. We'd both been patrol officers for five years and as a result had a pretty thorough knowledge of the city.

  "Yeah," I said. "I think Skyline Drive is just off Mulholland near Laurel Canyon."

  Alexa snatched up the mike and keyed it.

  "This is Delta Fifteen. Scully and Scully. Off duty, but in the immediate vicinity. We will take the Skyline Drive 415 shots-fired call."

  "Roger that," the RTO replied. "All units, all frequencies, Delta Fifteen is in the vicinity of 3151 Skyline and is responding Code Three. All other units, your call is now Code Two."

  Code Three is red lights and siren. I hit the switch, and the strobes I'd had installed in the grille and back window of my Acura flashed on. Simultaneously Alexa reached out and flipped another toggle and as the siren began to bray I floored it.

  A 415 radio call is a disturbance where the 911 caller is so hysterical or incoherent that dispatch doesn't know the exact reason or nature of the event. In the Patrol Division, 415s were dreaded calls because you could be rolling on anything from an old lady locked out of her house to something as deadly as the North Hollywood bank shootout.

  One night, years ago, when I was still in an X-car, I got a "possible major 415 with knives and chains." It sounded like a riot. We squealed in with our adrenaline surging and our weapons out. It turned out to be two eighty-year-old men fighting over a garden hose. We were so keyed up, and the lighting in the backyard was so bad, we could have easily shot one of them by mistake.

  You had to be extremely careful but ready for anything on 415s. The shots-fired tag definitely upped the ante.

  We exited the freeway on Laurel Canyon and headed into the hills. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Alexa fishing in her purse for her 9 mm Spanish Astra. I caught her eye just as she tromboned the slide, kicking a fresh round into the chamber, then clicked on the safety.

  "Merry Christmas, sweetheart," she deadpanned.

  Chapter 4

  We powered up Laurel Canyon with the siren squealing and turned right onto Mulholland Drive, which runs for a way along the top of a mountain ridge that separates Hollywood from the Valley. The road was almost a thousand feet up and provided spectacular views of Studio City on the right and Hollywood to the left. The view was the reason so many multimillion-dollar estates dotted this hillside.

  About a mile down Mulholland, we saw Skyline Drive. It cut in on the left heading farther into the mountainside. As I made the turn I almost hit a blue Maserati that flashed past, speeding onto Mulholland. Alexa snapped her head around to look through our back window but the car had already disappeared.

  "Didn't get it," she said, referring to the license plate.

  The engine on the Acura roared loudly beneath my siren as we continued up the grade, passing more cantilevered mansions that hung off the mountain like glass-walled palaces. We were in the 2800 block, which meant we still had a ways to go.

  Then a red Ferrari Mondial sped past us. There were two people inside. The savvy driver flashed his high beams up into our eyes so we couldn't read his plate.

  "Didn't get that one, either," Alexa said. She was looking out the back window again but missed the rear plate because of the dark, underlit street.

  We passed two bumper-chasing Escalades. Both had their headlights off and were screaming down the hill. No front plates. Next, a half-million-dollar Mercedes McLaren whipped past, its
high beams blinding us, followed by a Bentley Azure, then another Maserati. This one was yellow with a maroon racing stripe.

  "Nope," Alexa said, turning again. It was way too dark to see much.

  "Cockroaches running for the baseboards," I muttered as I grabbed a curb number. 3140. The house we wanted was going to be near the top of the hill.

  The last car to pass us was a new black Mercedes 350. It was also running without lights, but this time as Alexa spun around she managed to catch the first four letters on the back plate.

  "4 L M C!" she exclaimed. "Didn't get any other numbers."

  We got to the address and I skidded the MDX to a stop, flipping off my emergency package as Alexa and I bailed.

  I clawed my party gun, the backup Taurus Ultra-Lite. 38, from my jacket-slimming ankle holster and we both surveyed the scene, our hearts pounding.

  3151 was at the very end of Skyline. The driveway looked like an extension of the street leading up a hill onto a large property dominated by a looming overgrown mansion on the left. We were the first unit on the scene.

  The huge house was a big, rundown Spanish structure that looked like it was built in the early 1900s, well before the rest of the sixties-style neighborhood had filled in around it. The front yard had gone to seed. An old wooden gate was hanging crooked but standing open across the driveway. I could hear Christmas music coming from the back Bing Crosby singing "Silver Bells/'

  "Let's clear it," Alexa said.

  I nodded and we passed through the open gate and started up the drive with our guns drawn, moving carefully, ready for anything.

  The mansion was dark. As far as I could see, not one light was on inside. We walked up the steep drive, hugging the mansion's south wall, heading toward the sound of the music.

  When we neared the top of the hill a huge eight-car garage came into view and we could see lights coming from a large backyard area. We crested the drive and saw that the house sat right on a promontory point. A magnificent half-acre pool area with a spectacular view overlooked the lights of the Valley on the left and parts of Hollywood on the right.