A Good Bunch of Men Page 5
We stood table side and watched as the doctor and a technician recorded details of the subject: her ethnicity, the color of her skin, hair, and eyes, the presence of any marks, bruises, or scars, and her sex, which caused considerable pause. And soon the table was surrounded by other examiners, technicians, and detectives who came to opine or observe an uncommon specimen.
Muffled conversation persisted through respirators and paper masks and then the internal examination began. Her organs were extracted, and the condition and weight were noted and recorded. Dr. Thurman then removed two plastic liquid-filled casings from beneath the skin of her breasts, held each up for a closer examination, and asked the tech to record the numbers that he prepared to read aloud.
Floyd said, “What the hell?”
“Serial numbers,” the doctor replied, “required by law.”
“I’ll be damned.”
Everywhere we went Floyd seemed to liberate something that didn’t belong to him, certain he couldn’t live without it. Hotels? Floyd would fill his suitcase every day with hotel shampoo, conditioner, body soap, face soap, shower caps, tissues, coffee—caffeinated and decaf—hand towels . . . Hey Dickie, you have any room in your bag? The guy has a cabinet full of stolen hotel supplies at home that he’ll never use, but he’s all stocked up, just in case. The original prepper.
Following the postmortem examination of Susie, Floyd and I stood in the coroner’s office supply room where we discarded the paper gowns, booties, headgear and gloves. Floyd began stuffing a supply of new booties and rubber gloves in every pocket of his gray pinstriped Joseph Abboud.
“What the hell are you doing, retard?”
“Stocking up,” he said, holding his suit open, looking for another pocket. “I used my last pair of gloves yesterday on your drag queen. Here, stuff a couple of these in your pockets, would you?”
“Booties?”
“Keeps the blood off the bottom of my shoes, Dickie.”
“You’ve never worn booties at a crime scene,” I said. “You mentioned one time, after the O.J. trial I think, that maybe we should start, but you’ve never—”
“There’s always a first, Dickie.”
“I hope a news crew catches it, first time you decide to put that shit on. See what that does to your image.”
“I might just step out of a crime scene stark-raving naked, Dickie, stand there in front of the cameras in my blue booties. You’d be in the background doing that detective shit you do, I’d be all, How do you like me now?”
I tucked the booties in my trouser pockets. “Get me a couple pairs of gloves, would ya?”
When we cleared the loading dock on the way out, or more appropriately, the unloading dock, Floyd pulled four pairs of latex gloves from his jacket and handed them to me. “If that cheap captain of yours would supply us with the good stuff, I wouldn’t be forced to commandeer this shit. The guy’s making a common thief out of me.”
“These are good gloves,” I said, admiring the weight and feel of them, thinking I’d rather wear these the next time I touched bloody whatever.
“The thick ones,” Floyd said, walking around to the passenger’s door of my Crown Vic, “don’t tear as easy. So, what do you think now, Dickie, about your girl?”
“Susie Q? I don’t know, man. It’s crazy.”
I lowered myself into the driver’s seat, started the car, and flipped the air-conditioner up full blast.
I looked over. “Operation must’ve cost several thousand, or better.”
“I’d guess ten grand,” Floyd said. “At least ten, now that I think about it. The implants were probably five, then you add the retro-fit for the plumbing down there. Jesus, the whole package. That’s a man serious about being a woman.”
I pulled out of the lot onto Mission Boulevard, scooting between dilapidated cars and buses emitting black smoke into the smoggy sky, taking in the street and surrounding structures that were old and in need of repair, one of the many rundown neighborhoods of Los Angeles County. I moved into the turn lane for the southbound Golden State Freeway, ignoring an irate driver’s horn.
“Where’s a street whore get cash like that?”
“That’s my point,” Floyd said, “maybe she’s not a street whore. Maybe she’s got something else going on, something bigger than what we’re seeing.”
I accelerated up the on-ramp, watching the side view mirror as I merged into traffic. When I settled in, making it to the fast lane and bringing it up to cruising speed—about thirty miles per hour this time of morning—I glanced over to see Floyd staring out his window.
“Did you know about those serial numbers on implants?”
“Nope, that was news to me, Dickie.”
“Me too. Pretty cool though, if you think about it.”
“Cool?”
“I mean, yeah, they can find out who made them, who installed them, and when. Think about it, if we get an unidentified victim who happens to have implants, we’d be able to ID her by tracking those numbers, theoretically. You don’t think that’s cool?”
“Or him,” he replied, as he gazed out the window, looking off to the east. Maybe admiring the skyscrapers, maybe just contemplating the morning sun subdued by a gray haze, a new day dawning, the darkness and depravity now behind us for the time being.
At times she could be deceptive, this City of Angels that sparkled and shined in magazines and movies. But on the sweltering summer nights—especially—some of us saw her for what she had become, saw the hordes of undesirables who made her vile, decrepit, murderous, the Madonna now past her prime, the lady fallen from grace. The angels had been replaced by evil spirits. The city of devils. Los Diablos.
“You know what, partner?”
“What’s that?” Floyd asked, finally coming back to me. His face showed no emotion, a blank stare, a mystery to the one who knew him better than most.
“This place has become nothing more than a freak show. Men becoming women, women going butch, kids on dope and the so-called adults sit on their porches drunk or loaded as they watch it all happen, nobody in charge. Nobody getting their asses kicked for bad behavior.”
“You should fix it all up, Dickie.”
“You’d have to nuke the place, start fresh. Maybe make an announcement for the few remaining functional citizens to pull out, have them bring the flag.”
5
IT MAKES NO difference how a person lives, there is always someone who loves them. Telling that person their loved one has been killed is among the most difficult tasks with which a cop is burdened, especially when that person is a parent of the deceased.
Floyd and I stepped into the modest home of Lucille Wright, the robust woman holding open a wrought-iron security door. I thanked her and brushed past, stepping into a tidy living room furnished in floral patterns and dark wood. She waved me to an armchair as she sank into the adjacent sofa. Floyd balanced on the edge of the same sofa, but at the opposite end of Ms. Wright, as if he hadn’t planned to stay long. He opened his notebook and gave me the nod.
“Ma’am,” I said and paused, “you were out there the other night, so you know about your boy being killed. We’re very sorry for your loss.”
She sat solemnly, nodded and said, “Thank you.”
“Detective Tyler and I are responsible for investigating your son’s case, finding out what happened and why, try to figure out who’s responsible.”
She dabbed the corners of her eyes with a handkerchief. “What happened to him?”
“We’re not sure yet,” I told her, “it’ll be a while before the coroner makes his report. In the meantime, we’re talking to those who knew him, family and friends, hoping to learn more about his life. The more we know about how he lived, the better our chances to find out who killed him and why.”
“You don’t know anything?”
“He may have been strangled—”
“Oh, Lord!”
“—but we’re not sure yet. They’ll have to do more tests.”
“He didn’t suffer much, ma’am, you should know that.”
Her body jerked as she restrained her emotions, her eyes drifting to a mantle with photos of a young boy, maybe eight, wearing a green and white baseball uniform, holding a bat over his shoulder with a wide grin, a short afro sticking out from his cap. Another of a handsome teenaged boy, smooth brown skin and a flawless smile wearing a purple graduation cap and gown. Pictures of her boy before he became a girl.
“Is that Shane?” I asked, and brought my eyes back to Mrs. Wright.
A hint of a smile crept onto her face then disappeared a moment later. “That was my boy. Graduated right here, Lynwood High,” she said, nodding as though we could see the school from where we sat. “Lots of boys around here never do finish up high schoo’, no, theys more’n likely to drop out and join a gang or get to smokin’ that dope. I was very proud of my boy.”
“That’s right, ma’am,” I said, “he did good, graduating from high school.”
“It seems like such a long time ago, now, Shane changing so much over the years, and then after . . .” She faded off and looked down, staring at the carpet now.
“After what, ma’am?”
“His daddy,” she said and paused to dab her eyes again, “he never did show him much affection, you know? Always saying Shane acted like a little girl, called him a little sissy boy. Not the boy he had hoped for I guess, the type to play ball, get out and mix it up with them other boys.
“Shane was always a little bit different. His only real friend was a little girl down the street, Donna Edwards. He’d play dolls and dress-up with that little girl, let her put makeup on him, paint his eyes all silver and blue with sparkles . . .”
She shook her head, looking down at the green and blue shag carpeting beneath her calloused, bare feet. “Shane’s daddy caught him one time getting dolled up, had just put on his makeup and I guess he was putting on some red lipstick—”
Tears rolled down her cheeks steady now, and she lifted her head toward the heavens and stared off for a moment.
“—he gave that boy a beating that day, beat him with his fists.”
I shook my head and felt my lips draw tight, my jaw clench, my brows beginning to crowd my eyes, the Irish temper about to be lost. Most times I could control it, but there had been a few occasions when a vulnerable victim had suffered at the hands of a bully, and the temper had gotten the best of me. Hearing of a full-grown man beating a boy—a soft boy at that—as if he were another man, made my blood boil. I made a mental note we’d be talking to this man, this bully, this little boy’s daddy. I glanced at Floyd and saw we were on the same page.
“He’s lucky I didn’t have no gun up here in this house, is all I can say,” she said. “Probably for the better, I guess, or else I’d be spending my life in prison.
“I had the po-lice lock him up that time, ‘cept they didn’t keep him long. Let him go on bail, I think his mama posted it.”
She wiped her cheeks, drew a long breath, and let it out slowly. “That was the end of him being here, Shane’s daddy. I told him he ever lifted a hand to that boy again, I’d kill him in his sleep, and I meant every damn word of it too, forgive my language.
“He was never the same after that. Pretty soon he started not being around here, staying out all night, doing what he wanted. I couldn’t do anything about it. I tried talking to the boy, but he wouldn’t talk to me much for quite a little while.”
“How old was he then?” I asked.
“Let me see,” she said and glanced to the mantle again, “I’d say about thirteen, maybe fourteen? Yeah, probably thirteen or fourteen. He matured slowly, never did have to shave his face. Maybe he was older, now that I think about it. Fifteen?
“After a while—and with his daddy out the house now—Shane and I had mended our relationship and got real close again. Maybe ‘cause I took up for him with his daddy, maybe just ‘cause I understood him. But truthfully I think it’s ‘cause I accepted who he was and allowed him to be just that. Pretty soon he got to where he’d talk to me about how he felt, and then one day he said he just didn’t feel like he was meant to be a boy. Lordy it broke my heart at first, but I still loved the boy, couldn’t imagine not loving him no matter what he turned out to be. Then he told me he wished he’d just been born a girl,” she said, and looked up with a smile to finish, “and by God I wished it too, knowing he’d be happier and his little life wouldn’t have been so hard.”
I reached over and covered her hand with mine. She drew a deep breath and paused to gather herself.
I retreated and asked, “He stay in touch at all, Shane’s daddy?”
“I never heard from that son-of-a-bitch—’scuse my language—after I threw his ass outta here for whoopin’ up on Shane.” She paused and then came right back, some excitement now in her voice. “Wait, one other time he got hisself locked up for something else and had the nerve to call me. Called me collect of all things, asking would I come see him, put some money on his books down at the county jail. I told him he could rot in hell and hung up on that fool.”
“What’s his full name, the father?”
“Charlie Wright. Charlie Lincoln Wright. His mama stay right over here in Inglewood,” she said, and pointed across the living room, “Leilana Wright, nasty ol’ thing she is. He’s probably living off her, when he ain’t in jail.”
“That should be helpful,” I said, “we need anything else we’ll—”
“Did you know about the sex change?” Floyd blurted out.
It really didn’t surprise me, though I had hoped this one time, Floyd might avoid working sex into the conversation.
“Shane started dressing like a girl every day ‘bout two years ago, right after high schoo’. He’d leave here all dolled up, had them fake boobies I’d seen on his bed one time, you know?” she said, looking at Floyd now, “thems ones molded from plastic, like a girdle with boobies, you know what I mean?”
Floyd nodded, “Yes ma’am.”
I frowned.
“Came a point,” she said, “I gave up thinking he’d change, grow out of it, so I decided to support him, tell him he looked nice. It seemed to make him happy and that’s all I ever wanted for him, was to be happy. Then one day he tells me about having real boobies now. I said, ‘Oh Lordy Jesus.’ He showed ‘em to me, says, ‘I’m gonna have the rest done too, mama. Be a complete woman.’ I didn’t ask what he meant, didn’t wanna hear no more of all that.”
“Do you know how he paid for all of this, Mrs. Wright?” Floyd asked.
“I don’t,” she said. She thought for a moment and then showed a puzzled expression, as if she had never thought about it before. “Do you?”
I quickly spoke up, “No, ma’am.”
Lucille Wright, now gathered and composed after stepping off of that roller coaster—for the time being—looked at Floyd and then me, and said, “That boy loved his mama, and he loved the Lord.”
“I’m sure he loved you very much, ma’am,” I told her as I stood, digging in my pocket for a business card. I handed it to her and said, “Best way to reach me is on the pager. Just punch your number in at the beep, or leave me a voicemail, either way.”
Floyd told her, “We’re sorry for your loss, Mrs. Wright.”
Floyd looked at me over the top of his Ford Taurus, each of us hanging a suit jacket in the back seat where they’d likely stay the rest of the day. He said, “Do we hate Charlie Lincoln Wright?”
“It’s what I’m thinking.”
We ducked into the front seats and closed our doors simultaneously. Floyd glanced over as he started the car. “
Shall we pay him a visit?”
I opened my cell phone and said, “We shall.”
An instrumental jazz version of some pop song from the seventies played through my earpiece as I waited on hold for Sylvia, the perpetually busy receptionist at our office. I had asked her to check the computer for an address on a Leilana Wright, probably living in Inglewood.
The music stopped and Sylvia’s voice was back. “You still there?”
“I’m here.”
“10119 South Inglewood Avenue, Apartment 201. You need me to check for a phone number?”
“No thank you, dear, me and Floyd are going to pay her a visit. I appreciate the info.”
“Be careful, guys.”
When I disconnected, Floyd said, “Well?”
“Inglewood Avenue, take the freeway.”
“You’re not the boss of me, Dickie.”
“Jesus.”
Fifteen minutes had passed without conversation, the radio tuned to a rock station for Floyd’s listening pleasure.
“This is it,” I said as we passed the lime green apartment complex with gangsters loitering out front. “Nice place.”
Floyd whipped the car to the curb and looked through his window at the gangsters who were now looking at us. No doubt they knew who we were; they were probably only wondering for whom we were there.
“They’re going to love us,” he said.
I studied the gangsters, black men—or boys—in baggy jeans and wife-beaters, the small sleeveless undershirts fit tightly to their bodies. Most of them either wore a cap or had a bandana on their head, though one sported a sixties-style afro with a comb sticking out on one side. There were two who could have been concealing weapons, based on their dress. Those were the two I’d watch the closest. I didn’t have to say anything to Floyd, knowing he’d be with me or ahead of me on that.