“No good. We don’t want any third party involved.”

This time, she gave him the full force of her eyes. “The DA told me that Renaldes is strictly off-limits because El Paso talked without an attorney present. If I talk to Renaldes, I could mess up a future indictment for Sarah Sanders’s rape case.”

Decker glared at her. “And you give a solitaryshitwhat this littleprickhas to say when there’s someone out there who’s trying to blow your head off?”

Cindy looked at her lap. “Phrased in that manner, I suppose not.”

“What area?” Decker repeated.

“Okay… okay… uh… I have this recollection of Exposition Park. If I could just dash in and check my locker, I could-”

“Cindy, you’ve been temporarily relieved. You don’t go near the station until they tell you to come in.” Decker spoke through gritted teeth. He hit Western and headed for the freeway on-ramp. “Okay. Exposition Park. Near USC or…?”

She closed her eyes. “Maybe Forty-second Street. Why does that sound familiar?”

“It’s a musical, Cynthia.”

“Yes!” Cindy lifted a finger in the air. “Yes! Brilliant!” She grinned. “Exactly! It wasn’t Forty-second, it was Thirty-second and Broadway, because I remember thinking that his address sounded like a musical!”

“Specific numbers?”

“Can you congratulate me first?”

“Congratulations.” He turned left onto 10 East and ripped pavement. The Porsche’s engine sang. “Numbers?”

She twirled a strand of hair with an index finger. When she spoke, she had to shout over the roar of the engine. “You know, Renaldes could be listed.”

Decker took out his cell phone.

“I’ll do it,” Cindy told him.

“No, I will.”

“Dad, you’re going ninety on the freeway!”

Decker ignored her and called up information.

“You’re crazy!” Cindy shouted. “I have a maniac for a father.”

“I can’t hear! Quiet!”

“Oh God!” She slumped in her seat. “I wish I were a Catholic. Then I could cross myself.”

Decker hung up the phone and put it back into his pocket. “He wasn’t listed. Let’s try again. Specific numbers?”

Cindy sighed. “I seem to remember a six or a seven in the beginning.”

“So that means three numbers if we’re talking around Broadway and Thirty-second.”

“Yeah, you’re right. It was a three-number address. I think it was an even number.”

“That narrows it down. I’m five minutes away. Let’s just poke around. See if something jogs your memory or maybe we’ll happen to come across a shot-out bronze Nova.”

“I will be happy to go along with whatever plans you’ve devised, including leaning on scumbags like Pepe Renaldes, should we find him. But not until you give me the phone and let me call Koby.”

“No.”

“Dad-”

“Not a chance!”

“Daddy, he’s worried about me. And frankly, I want to talk to him.”

“No.”

“If you don’t give me the phone, I’m going to leave at the next stoplight.”

“We’re on the freeway.”

“Daddy, give me the friggin’ phonenow!”

“Now that’s conviction!” Decker smiled at his daughter and handed her the phone. “Finally.”

36

Gray skies hovered overthe awakening city as the Loo parked the Porsche curbside. We were in an area of high crime, and the lone sports car sitting on the empty block just cried out,Jack me! Chop me!I asked him how comfortable he felt leaving his baby without backup, and he showed me his Beretta. At that point, I gave up. The man was on his own private mission, masquerading as my avenging angel.

It was an immigrant neighborhood, mostly Hispanic, and while the inhabitants weren’t steeped in dire poverty, most of them were surely poor. Because the area predated its current population and there had been wealth a time ago, there remained some magnificent old mansions built with the kind of detail that failed replication. But most of those estates had been bought up by the nearby university and were used for graduate-study centers. The rest of the architecture was a mixture of old and older, of fixer-uppers and buildings in serious disrepair. There were several turn-of-the-century Victorian houses replete with gingerbread, scallops, and curlicues, but the dwellings sagged under age, waiting for that expensive face-lift. There were also some Arts and Crafts bungalows with shingled sides and roofs, and spacious front porches. But the majority of the single-family houses were broken stucco boxes with little to offer except protection from the elements. Even those were preferable to the rows of dingbats-lifeless, square apartment buildings without charm that were shedding stucco chunks like a diseased leper molting facial features.

I thought about asking Decker what his game plan was. We couldn’t very well start by ringing doorbells. He suggested we take a walk and shake out our legs. While we ambled down the wrong side of the tracks, we poked around exterior mailboxes, read labels on newspaper deliveries, and scanned the directories of apartment buildings. Nothing came close to Renaldes. After an hour of fruitless effort, I told Dad that this was ridiculous.

“Patience.” He rubbed his hands together. “Let’s just hang for a while.”

“Dad, we don’t even know if we’re on the right block.”

“I think we’re close.”

“You’re in denial.” It was six-thirty and I was sleep deprived. Thinking had become hard work. “You know, construction crews start pretty early.”

My father looked at me.

I said, “In my area, we get loads of Hispanic guys waiting on street corners or by paint stores, hoping to be picked up by the boss man.”

“I thought you said this guy had a steady job.”

“I said Renaldes had listed Do-Rite Construction as his current employer. I don’t know how long ago he might have worked for the company. Or even if he worked for the company at all. I never got a chance to check it out, because my superiors in title told me to back off. But now I’m thinking that if Renaldes listed Do-Rite as his employer, he probably worked construction with other companies, too.”

Decker didn’t answer me.

“Why don’t we drive around-”

“I wanted to get this guy while he was sleeping.”

“Daddy, we don’t know where he lives!” My father could be incredibly thickheaded sometimes. “I think it would be a better use of our time if we found some crews and asked about Renaldes. You’d have no trouble convincing anyone that you’re a West Side contractor looking for hands. You’re fluent in Spanish and you’re driving a flashy car.”

“Contractors drive Porsches?”

“The ones who work in Brentwood certainly do.”

“I thought they drove trucks.”

“Both.”

“I’m in the wrong business.”

“Didn’t Mom try to tell you that a long time ago?”

Decker flashed me a sour look.

“Contractors and real estate agents: They drive Porsches, Mercedes, Beemers, Jags… It’s all part of the image. Can we talk about my idea now?”

“Coming in, I didn’t see any work crews.”

“We didn’t look for any crews. Besides, it’s later now. Let’s go hit the lumberyards or the paint stores and see if we can’t get something going.”

My father tapped his toe, unwilling to comment.

“It’s a good idea, Decker,” I told him. “Much better than anything you have. You know, Daddy, I’m the one who was shot at and was yanked off active duty. Plus, I haven’t slept in over twenty hours. If you don’t start pulling your weight, I’m going home.”

My father slipped his hands into his pockets. “Point well taken.”

“Thank you. So do we go or what?”

Decker took out his keys. “I guess we go.”

Using the ruse that Pepe Renaldes owed my father, the boss man, a considerable sum of money-something that the men we talked to found very easy to believe-we came away with a half-dozen addresses in the right neighborhood. All it took was two hours of our time and two hundred bucks in twenties. Neither one of us had that much play cash, so Dad withdrew money from his ATM. I asked him if he really thought it was worth the effort, and he retorted by asking me exactly how much didIthink my life was worth? He was overstating the case, but after his lecture on threat, I felt it best not to challenge.