Heaven, INC: Chapter 20: THE KARAOKE KRIME KING

You are about to have your first experience with
a Greek lunch. I will kill you if you pretend to like it.
—JACQUELINE KENNEDY ONASSIS

1561 PACIFIC AVENUE,
CORONADO
10:16 A.M. PDT

DARK, SUSPICIOUS EYES studied Jimmy through a flap in the door. “Who?”

“Jimmy Francisco. Just tell Beev I’m here.”

The eyes flicked to Jimmy’s shirt. “Carpet cleaner? We don’t need no carpets cleaned.”

“Hey, bud, just tell Bivo that Jimmy Francisco needs to talk.”

From inside the house, Jimmy heard the guy mangle his name and someone respond in Greek. The dark suspicious eyes returned. “You wait.” The flap snapped shut.

A minute passed. Then the sound of tumbling locks and a different Greek dude’s face appeared through the cracked door; big guy with sharp blue eyes and a gold horn swinging from his neck as he shot glances at the street and their feet. A look of distaste crossed his face as he ordered them to remove their shoes before admonishing, “Touch nothing.”

Jimmy’d been here a couple times, so it didn’t phase him, except for the overwhelming smell of dark tobacco and Aqua Velva. Two toughies sat at a coffee table playing dominoes, one guy in a black pork-pie hat; when Owen said, “Cool hat, dude,” he got only stony silence in return.

The big Greek led them to the pool, one of those Olympic deals surrounded by bushes carved into topiary that always made Jimmy think of Disneyland— if, instead of Dumbo and Mickey bushes, Walt had preferred women with leafy, oversized breasts.

Bivo sat at an umbrella table reading a newspaper, in sandals, a robe and tinted designer glasses. Without taking his eyes from the paper, he added a lump of sugar to a little espresso cup. Only when the big Greek cleared his throat did Bivo look up.

“Ah, Jimmy, my old friend, is been far too long. Please sit. Spiro? Bring Jimmy and his friend some coffee. The Greek, yes?”

When Spiro set a dish of green leafy things before them and poured coffee from a silver pot into little cups like Bivo’s, Bivo cheerfully explained, “One Greek is equal to five American.” He smiled. “Cups of coffee, of course.” Bivo sipped his coffee and nodded approvingly. “Jimmy, is most fortuitous that you are visiting. Most fortuitous indeed.”

“Yeah? And why’s that, Beev?”

“Because now you can help me choose song for tonight’s American PopStar western sub-regional finals— Heartbreak Hotel? Or Living La Vida Loca?” Before Jimmy could answer, Bivo turned to Owen. “Did you know Ricky Martin was in Menudo when he was a boy? And then such a long and distinguished career.” He grew serious. “Someday, Bivo Papacostas will be even bigger.” Smiling again, he said, “Jimmy here is good singer. Little nasal—” holding his fingers a quarter-inch apart “— but still quite nice. Right, Jimmy?”

Jimmy watched Spiro watch them from over by a leafy-titted woman and said nothing.

Bivo said to Owen— Owen’s expression was the flat one he wore when humoring someone trying to explain the musical merits of New Kids on the Block— Bivo said , “Once Jimmy and I did a duet of Unchained Melody? A standing ovation. Remember Jimmy?”

“It was six drunks and two sarcastic cops.”

“So? You think they do not know talent when they hear it?” Bivo sipped his coffee. “Jimmy, my friend, you have not even touched your coffee.”

Jimmy obliged and immediately decided the coffee tasted like the Daytona 500 in August. Adding sugar cubes, he said, “Z’ere cyanide in here?”

“No, Jimmy. Strychnine. We just run out of cyanide.” Bivo smiled at Owen. “Jimmy always my favorite detective— the others so unpolished, they track mud onto my beautiful carpets, refuse my food. And DEA? No manners at all.” Bivo refilled his cup from the silver pot. “So you here to clean my rugs, Jimmy?”

“I’m here,” Jimmy said, “about Mij Poopikov— owns Red Circus, over in OB?”

“I know the place. Karaoke Metal Shop on Mondays. Excellent sound. Decent book. I do the Motley Crüe and Scorpions— but I don’t think I know this Mij Poopikov person.”

“Cut the shit, Beev. You know the owner of every karaoke bar in the city. Maybe Mij was into you for some juice on the side.” Over Bivo’s shoulder, Jimmy watched Spiro drag a net along the far edge of the pool. That, and overtly listen, as Bivo said, “I am sorry, but I do not understand. I thought you work for—” he squinted at Jimmy’s shirt “—ChemSteemy Superior Carpet Cleaning? Carpet cleaners ask about doing the drapes and upholstery but you ask policeman questions.” On the table, a cheap looking cell-phone buzzed. Bivo silenced it and, smiling, said, “Jimmy, you have not touched the dolmas.”

Jimmy looked at the leafy things on the plate. “Dolmas?”

“Grape leaves stuffed with rice. I assure you they are very good.”

When Jimmy shook his head, Owen said, “Yo, I’ll eat ‘em,” and slid the plate over; Owen had the metabolism of a hummingbird on methamphetamine and free food was to him the sweetest nectar.

Bivo smiled approvingly. “So tell me, Jimmy, why you playing detective again?”

“Someone beat Mij up last night, then shot him and dumped his body.”

Bivo’s eyes grew wide behind tinted lenses. At the pool, Spiro stood motionless with the net until he saw Jimmy watching him. Immediately, he began netting more invisible objects from the sparkling pool.

Bivo leaned forward. “Mij shot? Shot by who? Who shot Mij?”

“I’m sure the cops’ll be asking you the same thing: they have a description matches your man Spiro’s of somebody showing up yesterday at Red Circus yesterday and shaking down Mij. I expect PD’ll be calling you anytime.”

Bivo scowled. “Is because I am Greek they always suspect me.”

“No, it’s because beneath your jolly demeanor you’re a hostile sociopath.”

Bivo brightened. “Yes, but with a good singing voice, no?”

“Not bad. You know, Beev, it was never proven you shoved that karaoke singer down the stairs, but you did make some enemies in the process. Neil Finnerty for one.”

Bivo scowled more. “King of the mud-trackers. He ruin my carpet with his stupid cowboy boots. Him and his gorilla friend.”

“Neil was his brother-in-law’s manager and claims he lost a lot of money when Gilfinkle missed the finals.”

Bivo’s pace grew pinched. “Lester Gilfinkle was faker! He sang Garth Brooks in fakers wheelchair and people feel sorry for him so he take Bivo Papacostas’ place on American Popstar. Is an outrage, Jimmy. An outrage! But I swear,” Bivo added slyly, “I know nothing about his unfortunate accident. Is why Popstar needs the alternates.”

Bivo sat looking alternately indignant and puzzled. Owen just looked ill; whether it was from Bivo’s display of karaoke passion or the grape leaves, Jimmy wasn’t sure, but he grabbed Owen’s last dolmas and took a bite of grape leaves and rice tangy with vinegar. Jimmy chewed and waited.

Finally, Bivo couldn’t resist. “Is good, yes?” When Jimmy agreed, he offered less petulantly,
“Jimmy, I do not know who killed Mij. I swear on my mother’s grave was not me or my people.”

“Your mother’s alive and cooking in the kitchen.”

Bivo crossed himself. “When she dies, is what I mean.”

Jimmy had the distinct impression Bivo was actually telling the truth. There was more to it, but the essential fact was that Bivo was surprised to learn of Mij’s demise. And without a badge, Jimmy had to take that at face value. His gaze went to the pool and to Spiro’s pool-net on the decking, but no Spiro.

“Can I use your bathroom?” Before Bivo could reply, Jimmy was out of his seat and heading for the house.

JIMMY MOVED ROOM TO ROOM without finding what he was looking for, even when passing two bathrooms without entering.

After discovering the Greeks were no longer playing dominoes, Jimmy heard a Greek voice coming from behind a closed door. You didn’t need to speak Greek to know the speaker was pissed off. Jimmy stoop to peer through the old-school key-hole.

There was Spiro, now jabbing a finger in Porkpie Hat’s chest, then pointed at something outside the house before jabbing his finger at Porkpie hat again. The whole time, Porkpie Hat was shaking his head vigorously while the other domino player had a cell-phone to his ear. Cell-Phone hung up and said something to Spiro who shook his head.

BIVO LOOKED UP as Jimmy stepped out the back door. “Your friend,” Bivo said, “is big fan of the King. He convince me tonight is the night for the King and not for Ricky Martin. So what you think, Jimmy, I sing the Love Me Tender? Or the Blue Hawaii?” Bivo frowned. “Jimmy, my friend, you look anxious. Did you not find the bathroom? You need to make a number two?”

JIMMY WHEELED THE VAN down the street and around the corner before whipping into a driveway beside a long hedge of oleanders and leaving the engine running.

So Owen said, “In normal jobs, this sort of goldbricking gets you fired. Course, this being ChemSteem, I suppose so long as we don’t break, burn or steal anything, we should be fine. In that case, Officer Coolie sends you back to prison and breaks up the band. Again.”

A car went by, a silver Mercedes with two French in front, the driver wearing a porkpie hat. Jimmy waited a moment and was rolling out of the driveway and after the Mercedes when Owen’s cell phone rang.

Owen glanced at the number. “It’s Roscoe. Probably calling about that big flood job, hunh?”

“You probably don’t want to answer that.”

“No? Why, because we’re not gonna make that La Jolla five-area by 11? Or because we’re not gonna make it at all?”

Jimmy turned onto Orange Avenue and let the Mercedes get a little out in front while the cell continued to chime the Grateful Dead’s Truckin’.

“Tell me,” Owen said, “why we’re following these guys. You think Bivo killed Evie?”
Jimmy thought about it again. “I don’t. But something’s up. Look, I want to see where they’re going in such a hurry. And trust me, it won’t be that hard— toughest thing’s not getting seen tailing them when we cross the bridge, but who pays attention to a carpet-cleaning van?”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 19: I SAW THE MAN YOU ARE LOOKING FOR

NORCESTOR AND IMPERIAL,
BUILDING 3,
9:50 AM PDT

POPE LET HIS GAZE drift to Building #3 again, giving the appearance of someone suffering the mild pesterings of a child. “Did you talk to the doctor?”

She shook her head. “No, I just saw him. He bumped into Chucho.”

“What did Chucho do then?”

“He chased after the fat man. The man who stole the car.”

Wait, the man who stole Ducroix’s car . . .

Pope was keenly aware of being watched, and what might happen to the little girl if she talked to law enforcement about the happenings and going ons at the Norcestor Arms. 30 years of this shit had taught Pope that, for some people, no child was too young to die. On the other hand, he needed information.

Pope pulled out his phone and stuck it to his ear, but saying to the little girl, “What happened to the man who bumped Chucho?”

“Oh, he ran away. He was scared— Uh-oh, I think Chucho’s watching. And here comes mama . . . Don’t say I told.”

Pope turned in time to see a woman bee-lining at them like a human torpedo.

“Gabrielle, venga aquí!” The woman glared at Pope. “You cannot talk to my daughter without asking. Is the law.” She glared at Gabrielle. “I told you never ever talk to police. No police!”

“I’m sorry, Mama. I only said—”

“Ma’am,” Pope boldly stated for anyone to hear, “I asked your daughter why she’s not in school today. It’s a Friday at 9:30 and she’s not in class. Why?”

The woman looked to be late 20's, in a short skirt, bed head and floppy slippers. She backpedaled a bit: “She got the fever. Bad fever.”

Pope studied Gabrielle, her small face thin behind oversized glasses. “Do I need to remind you of the new Truancy laws? Either get this little girl in bed with something nourishing and preferably hot to eat or I’ll arrest you for aiding and abetting a truant.”

The woman stared at Pope a moment before saying, “Come, Gabrielle. You can have the menudo Hector brought me. Mama let you watch TV in her bed.”

Pope watched the woman as Al, running behind, watched her pass by with an arch look on his face— though his color had improved considerably since the tapioca-maggot incident— and came up saying, “I’m away from you for two minutes, you’re busy nattering to some welfare queen about aiding and abetting a truant? Yet, you won’t let me break a world speed record for arresting illegals. Well, there’s that peerless liberal logic for you.”

Across the burned out lawn and watching intently from the shadows was a man with a smooth shaven head, thick arms and wife-beater Pope wondered might possibly be Chucho, covered in fresh prison tattoos and bad attitude.

Waving a hand, Pope flashed the international quacking sign of pointless talking. “Yada yada yada, like I’ve got all freaking day to talk to kids. Jesus,” he said, shaking his head.
Al frowned. “Hey, Gideon, little kids like to talk. Baby illegal or not, you don’t need to get all asshole-ish about it. Jeez. Even I got limits.”

Well, at least Al was buying it. Hopefully, so was Chucho or whoever else it was had watched the interchange. Now Pope just had to find Chucho and round him up without alerting him to the kid.

Heaven, INC: Chapter 18: THE CURIOUS CASE OF THE FLYING PRIVATE DETECTIVE

Who’s on the seventh floor, brewing alternatives?
What’s in the bottom drawer, waiting for things to give?
—The Cutter,
ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN

OFFICE OF GEORGE McCRACKEN,
PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR
9:49 AM PDT

GEORGE LOOKED UP from his open briefcase. “Hey, Mick, I was just gonna call you.”

Mick smiled. “What a coincidence: I was in the area and thought I’d stop in.” He whistled. “Wow, George, great view.”

Out the window lay Petco Park, buzzing as the Padres prepared for a game against the Dodgers. Beyond Petco was San Diego Harbor and the Coronado Bridge and, beyond that, Coronado Island. The window was open enough to hear the sound of traffic and a jack-hammer seven floors below, but not enough to clear the office of air stale with cigar smoke.

“Jesus, George, y’ever think about turning on the AC? Maybe open this window all the way, get some fresh air?”

“AC’s busted and the window’s stuck.” George was a tall and wiry man with ruddy skin and a nose ridged with the scar of a broken beer bottle. His eyes went to the phone on his desk and back to Mick. “Got a coupla tickets behind home plate to today’s game if you want em. Take Tonya and score some points.”

Mick studied George’s eyes before turning back to the window and giving it an experimental tug. “You could make a hundred bucks scalping two against the Dodgers, why you wanna give em to me? Besides, you know Tonya’s tit’s’re too big for standard stadium seating. We’d need at least a skybox.” Mick studied the window. “Problem’s someone painted over the window jamb. Hand me that letter opener there, would’ja? I’ll get it open.”

George’s gaze went to the letter opener— fashioned to resemble a ceremonial dagger— and back to Mick. “Don’t worry about that, Mick. I’ll call the property management company. Rent I pay on this dump, least they can do’s fix my goddamn window.”

“Forget it. Hand me that letter opener and I’ll fix it right now.”

George hesitated before handing over the letter-dagger.

At window, dagger in hand, Mick said, “So you said you were gonna call.”

“Right. About Mij Poopikov being dead.”

Mick turned to study George. “What?”

George studied Mick in return. “I just got a call. Somebody shot Mij about two a.m.”

Mick turned back to the window, again running the letter opener along the jamb and wondered if Bivo’d lost his temper again. Out the corner of his eye, he also noticed two travel bags packed and ready to go. “Cops know who did it?”

“Hard to say. Mij had a lotta enemies.”

Mick dug the blade between the window and jamb. “You hear anything about Mij being connected to the Russians?”

“Russians?” George seemed to consider the question. “Come to think of it, I think I heard somewhere Mij was into Viktor Ledbedev for a bit of money.”

Mick studied George studying him. Then turned back to the window and giving it an experimental tug. “Hey, look at that: fresh air.”

Seven stories below, a construction crew working on the new condominium high-rise next door had broken for lunch and was heading for the roach coach.

“They finish that condo and you can kiss your view goodbye, George.” Mick turned back to George. “You know Victor?”

George shook his head. “For my health, I find it best to steer clear of the Russians.”

“Yeah, that’s good thinking,” Mick agreed, glancing out the window. Far below, the lunching construction workers had moved to the shade of the building’s far side. “Well, it’s been nice talking with you, George, but I gotta go. I do appreciate the offer of those tickets, though— maybe another time, if you get a skybox for Tonya’s tits.” He started for the door and stopped.

“Oops. Almost walked out with your letter opener.”

“No problem,” George said, and held out a hand into which Mick plunged the letter-opener, stifling George’s scream by clapping a hand over his mouth. Then, using the blade as leverage, he yanked George from his chair and over to the open window, hissing, “Stop insulting my intelligence, George, or so help me, I’m gonna shove you out this window. Now you know why I’m here— Mij told Spiro what you two were up to. Fucking over Bivo Papacostas? Have you lost your mind?”

Mick removed his hand and George said, “Victor said he’d wipe me a clean slate.”

“You consider fucking over Bivo Papacostas a clean slate?” Mick twisted the blade to elicit another groan. “Where’s the master tape?”

“The master tape?”

Mick gave the blade another twist. “Don’t fuck with me, George: the tape of Bivo at the sub-regionals. You know what I’m talking about. The lip-sync tape.”

George looked pained by more than just the blade. “I tell you, you ain’t gonna kill me like Mij, are you?”

“For god sake, George, we were dorm-mates our freshmen year, how could I kill you? And I don’t know who killed Mij, but it wasn’t me. I just want the tape.”

George seemed to consider his options. “In the safe. Behind the picture.”

On the wall was a black-and-white photograph of downtown San Diego, circa 1920: Model-Ts, dirt streets and short buildings.

“Don’t move,” Mick said, and with the letter-opener still piercing George’s hand, he drove the blade into the window-sill.

Behind the picture was a wall-safe that looked old enough to have come with the building.

“What’s the combination?”

“You swear you aren’t gonna kill me?”

“George, quit being so goddamn paranoid and give me the combo.” Getting it, Mick opened the safe to find a manila envelope and a bundle of bills looked to be about 10 grand.

Removing the envelope, Mick said, “By the way, I meant to ask, how’s Ray Anne?”
George blinked. Across his brow, sweat stood out in heavy beads. “Ray Anne? She’s good. She’s a sophomore now, lives in the same dorm we did.”

Mick opened the envelope to a VHS tape. “Ray Anne still planning on studying Criminal Justice?”

“What? Oh. Yeah, she still wants to be an FBI agent, if you can believe it.”

“Better than being a crook or a crooked PI, right, George?” Mick studied the tape. “Hey, this is a copy. Where’s the master?”

George seemed to consider a lie and think better of it. “I gave one to Mij.”

Mick frowned. “Mij said you didn’t give him shit. And we tossed his car, house, even his shitty bar, but there was no tape. You lying to me, George? Because I don’t wanna hurt you anymore.”

“Uh, maybe you ougghta check his girlfriend’s house. The Russian chick? I got her address in my Rolodex. Maybe he stashed the tape at her place.”

Mick studied George, putting the lie detector on him. When nothing registered, he got the Russian chick’s address from the Rolodex.

“Look, George, I’m sorry about your hand, but it’s just business. Okay,” Mick said, gripping the letter-opener, “this is gonna hurt.”

George groaned as Mick yanked the letter-opener free. “Son-of-a-bitch that hurts.” Cradling his bleeding hand, he leaned against the window-sill studying it. “I’m gonna need a tetanus.”

Mick said, “George, I’ve always liked you, ever since we were pledges and we got caught raiding Pat Bridge’s ice-chest— you’re just a good guy who fucked up.”

George tried grabbing Mick’s arm, tried snatching at the place it had been, but it was too late— Mick’s hard shove was fast and forceful and out the window George tumbled. George was still on his way down and screaming when Mick pulled the handkerchief from his pocket and began wiping down the window. He wiped the safe, the desk drawer, the Rolodex, the doorknob and the picture of San Diego, too, but the letter opener and the ten grand he took, exiting the back of the building as a siren began to wail in the distance.

Heaven, INC: Chapter 17: OF FLIES, TAPIOCA PUDDING AND DOGS

NORCESTOR & IMPERIAL,
MARKET PARK
9:32 AM PDT

POPE COMPARED the Norcestor Arms’ dusty blueprints to a police report and tried to block out Al’s negativity and cynicism. Focusing on the mission at hand and what was known.

According to the Red Garter’s bouncer, a white male aged mid-to-late 20s, was seen fleeing in the direction of Building 3 at three in the morning. The bouncer’s description matched the description of a Mrs. Doris De La Clemente. Notably, a man dressed in a outfit Mrs. De La Clemente called ‘Interview with a Vampire-y’. In the picture taken at the masquerade ball, Christian Ducroix wore a mask, and the woman beside him, identified as the Russian agent, Mona Romanokova, wore an elaborate, feather and sequin-adorned mask. Pope thought they both looked to be dressed as French aristocrat, but then Pope was never a big fashion. Either way, a person matching Christian Ducroix’s description and . That man, upon being denied use of Mrs. De La Clemente’s phone— and cursing her in an unknown language— had promptly fled her door, to disappear into the depths of the Norcestor Arms, Building #3, at just before three in morning.

At that moment, Al offered another opinion, the fifth or sixth box car in a train of opinions . . .

What were you thinking? What? You could have just jumped in the truck and bugged!

. . . that had Pope wondering if he really gave a damn about another government goat-fuck described as the end of the world scenario, especially so soon after the First Lady’s missing belt.

Sorry to say, and never let Al know it, but the thing just felt hinky.

“— and I’m telling you, Gideon, this shit’s got hink written all over it. You seeing what I’m seeing?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, no? Well you mark my words, Gideon, you mark my words. This kid was here scoring drugs. Coke, Ecstasy, heroin, I don’t know, but it was illegal narcotics. And it’s because of illegal narcotics the kid was down here to get car jacked. Not kidnaped, what weak ass story, kidnaped. That kid was car jacked trying to score illegal narcotics. And because he was breaking the law, me and you gotta postpone our fishing trip so we can make.” Al glanced over at Rose—

Still furiously texting.

— and back at Pope. “I am telling you, Gideon, this is one great big government goatfuck to cover up the fact that cocksucker Dominic Ducroix’s got a junkie for a son.”

Pope glanced down at the picture. It was hard to tell, but by stature and the little bit of skin showing, the kid looked good for a junkie. And definitely good for a person infected with Ebola.

“I must say, your faith in the US government is astonishing.”

“Hey,” Al said, “I just call em how I see em. We keep checking the trash chutes, he’ll turn up.”
He winked. “I’m East Coast. I got a sense for this kind of thing.”

“You’ve also got tapioca on your jacket.”

“What the . . . Ah, for chrissake.”

While Al searched out a napkin, Pope consulted a street map of a six-block radius.

A car headed west out of Market Park down Imperial could be on the 805 south in Tijuana within 15 minutes. If it was a kidnaping, why had the RussiansWhoever jacked the kid’s Mustang had headed east on Imperial through Encanto, Lomita Park, Skyline and on to Lemon Grove, closely pursued by an unidentified silver Mercedes Benz . . .

“Shizmato to Base.”

Pope keyed his handset. “Base— Go ahead, Shiz.”

“Chief, we’ve got a body down here, least we think it’s a torso. It’s covered in maggots and until we get it fished out and outside for a better look, we can’t be sure. The flies down here are Biblical plague-level.”

Pope grimaced a little at the thought. “What’s your 20?’

“North-east trash receptacle. Right at the bottom of the chute.”

“Meet you there in three.”

Al looked up from his tapioca-spattered jacket, smiling. “Am I good? Or am I good?”

THEY ARRIVED AND GOT INTO BIO-SUITS in time to watch the body hauled from the maggot infested trash-pit located in the basement that had been fed for decades from a dilapidated system of chutes in turn fed by a dozen stories of government-subsidized housing; the trash had piled unchecked for nearly a month because, the maintenance manager explained,

“There’s been some kinda foul-up at the waste company.” Equally alarming was a stench so powerful it actually penetrated Pope’s BioSuit, causing him to wonder about the suit’s performance in a full-scale gas attack.

Swatting at the flies ferociously buzzing his mask, he watched a torso-shaped thing wrapped in a sheet emerge from the trash pit, the sheet covered in a mass of squirming hungry maggots that Pope thought looked a lot like tapioca pudding dripping back into the pit. That’s when Al threw up in his mask.

FORTUNATELY— OR UNFORTUNATELY—once the sheet was removed and the maggots cleared away, the torso was discovered not to be Christian Ducroix’s or any human’s, but rather a dead basset hound, half consumed by maggots. Also discovered was a goodbye note in a child’s hand addressed to ‘Pookie’ and concerned with dogs and Heaven.

Head-Maintenance stepped in then to say dogs were forbidden. “Not from Heaven,” he explained. “From the Norcestor Arms. And not just dogs. All pets.”

In the corner, cleaning out his mask and looking bilious, Al burped, “I’ll be fine, no worries. Just the tapioca backing up.”

POPE EXITED THE NORCESTOR ARMS to find a place where the sun could burn away the stink of the trash pit, standing there a moment amid the hard stares of the residents, the glares of people themselves feeling invaded for the sake of an invading stranger—

Pope felt a tug at his sleeve.

It was little Mexican girl, no more than 6 or 7, with braided hair and glasses too big for her face.

“Is FBI police? Because Mama says I can’t talk to the police. Or La Migra. Specially La Migra. But she never said anything about the FBI. Are you police?”

Pope smiled, just a kid, but he had to get back to Basecamp Cardtable and reporting to Deputy Inspector Rose’s. “Yes, I am a kind of police.”

“Well, you don’t act like police. I was wondering if I can talk to you.”

Pope scanned the area and spotted Rose, off to the side and texting furiously. “Talk about what?”

“About the man you looking for. I saw him. He ran away.”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 16: ATTACK OF THE KILLER FLEA MONSTER

DEL MONTE APARTMENTS, #2,
IMPERIAL BEACH
9:31 AM PDT

“Twenty dollars?” Owen grimaced, pushing dogs away. “Man, this is nasty.”

Jimmy frowned. The world was one of barking, jumping, squirming, frantic-tail-wagging wiener dogs and as he struggled to see in the gloom of an apartment, he noted the stinks of spilt bong-water, dirty dishes and wiener. “I thought you’d been here?”

“I’ve been out front to pick up a bag of weed, but I’ve never been inside. Jimmy, they won’t stop humping me.” Two horny wiener dogs attached to Owen’s bare legs were really having at it. “Get down. C’mon, get . . . get down . . . Get— Jimmy, I can’t do this. Let’s get out of here, man. I’ll even give Tory his money back.”

Jimmy winced as a flea bit him, before shaking his head. “I can’t. Tory got me off the hook back there and I owe him.”

It took a couple minutes, but they managed to herd the wiener dogs into the bedroom before going back out to retrieve the cleaning unit and some DeepKleen solution from the van. On the way back in, Owen’s cell-phone started playing a Grateful Dead tune that turned out to be Tory calling about leaving the key in the planter out front when they were done. Owen was complaining about the wiener dogs when he said, “Alright, hold on, here he is,” and handed Jimmy the phone.

Tory’s voice saying then, “Yo, Jimmy, I remembered something that maybe might help identify that Albanian guy— maybe somebody’s name? I heard him say a couple times Malakai? Or maccaca? Something like that.”

Jimmy’s eyes narrowed. “malakas? Was that the word? Malakas?”

“Malakas. Yeah, that’s it. How’d you know?”

“I just know. Did you tell this to Sergeant Finnerty?”

“I haven’t told that asshole shit. He’s with Kelly Jaye, showing her the book and trying to get in her pants. What a total dick.”

“Be smart: cooperate— you don’t want to get on Sergeant Finnerty’s bad side.”

“Or his partner, that sweaty gorilla, Detective Buttkowski. That guy really hates you.”

“Thanks, I know,” Jimmy said. “Look, I gotta get to the carpet.”

Jimmy reentered the apartment to find Owen flipping on lights and scratching and saying, “You see that mist along the floor? Kinda like dry-ice fog but black and oily?”

Jimmy did notice the fog now, but even with the lights, couldn’t make it out. Scratching at his leg, he opened the drapes.

“Holy shit!” Owen said, “it isn’t mist . . . it’s fleas! Dude, it’s thousands of fleas!”

Actually, judging by the mist’s density, it could be millions. And their appetite was stimulated by the sunlight. Suddenly, Jimmy felt his legs stung by scores of bites as the flea-mist rose thigh-high and threatened Jimmy’s crotch with a locust-like hum . . .


BACK OUT IN THE BREEZE WAY and slapping his flea-covered legs, Owen was saying, “No way are we doing this job, dude. No way. It’s ridic in there, ridic, like some kind of flea monster from The X-Files.”

Slapping at his own leg, Jimmy said, “How does Tory live there?”

“I don’t know. Maybe the combined levels of nicotine and THC are to high to support fleas.”

Shaking out his shirt, Owen added, “So we’re skipping it, right?” When Jimmy shook his head, Owen said, “Are you crazy? You’re gonna go back in there for Tory? The guy conned you. Right down to getting it done for twenty bucks.”

Slapping fleas, Jimmy said, “Yeah, I know, but I feel sorry for the dogs. Besides, I got an idea.”

Owen’s gaze followed Jimmy’s to the silver canister cannister. “DeepKleen? Sure, it’ll kill the fleas, but how’re you gonna get in there to spray? They’ll eat you alive.”

Jimmy started rolling up the cuffs of his shorts. “Spray me.”

Owen eyes widened. “With DK? Are you nuts? You can’t spray DK on human skin— who knows what it’ll do.”

Jimmy considered Owen’s point. “You mixed the batch. It’ll be a light solution.”

“Light DK solution is like saying small nuclear bomb. It won’t end well.”


IT HAD PROBABLY NEVER been tried before and God knew the long-term consequences, but it worked; by spraying his legs with DeepKleen— and enduring the stinging burn and spreading rash— Jimmy was able to fight his way across the apartment like a Marine cleaning out Iwo Jima with a flamethrower. Thinking, as he DK’ed fleas into oblivion, about the word Malakas and a hunch he’d check out with a quick stop in Coronado. First, though, he needed calamine lotion to treat the nasty rash developing on his legs, and he was in fact in the drug-store lotions aisle when Elmond Winkle called saying, “You know Dominic Ducroix had a son? Kid went missing last night at Norcestor & Imperial. Ain’t that some kind of freaky coincidence?”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 15: FUN AND GAMES WITH BIG ED WALKER

TACO SHACK PARKING LOT,
NORCESTOR AND IMPERIAL
9:28 AM P.D.T.

BIG ED WALKER STARED through the dirty windshield at a crowd of wetbacks gathering outside the police ribbon and a lot of cops and FBI fucks inside and saw the tall one, the pedophile fuck, talking with some little girl, probably wanting to diddle her or something, the perverted pedofile fuck, until the arrogant fat fuck, Big Mouth, came up and they started big-mouthing like he had something important to talk about, the self-important fuck.

“Look atcha, thinking you’re so bad. Like everyone’s gotta kiss your government ass cause you got a badge and you’re so much fucking better’n everybody else. Well, I got news for ya— you ain’t better n’ Big Ed Walker. No sirree, not by a long mile.”
Sipping whisky, Ed settled in to watch.

IT WAS ONLY FRIDAY of last week that Big Ed Walker strode out San Quentin’s front gate and into the first day of freedom in nine years to a high blue sky and a sweet breeze that blew in off the Pacific and in Big Ed’s opinion was God’s way of saying ‘Welcome back, son, and have a good time.” Not that God needed to remind Ed of that— ain’t nobody liked a good time more than Big Ed Walker.

From San Quentin, Big Ed walked far enough to catch a bus into San Rafael where, for three straight days, he chased cooter— strangely without success— before deciding he’d best get about his business. This, of course, following the fight with that pretty girl’s asshole bartender boyfriend, the ex-football fuck who thought he was so much better than Big Ed. Fact, truth of the matter is, the only reason Ed hadn’t gone back in there to finish the pussy off was on account of the girl’s smile, the one told Ed that while she’d miss him, and that it would never be easy, she’d somehow manage to shuffle along without him. So you see, it was really out of pity that Big Ed let it go. Well, that, and on account of the usual: cops out to harass a man just trying to have a good time.

Fucking cops.

Well after that, Big Ed had hot-footed it out of town by catching the last seat on a Greyhound bus next to some old migrant-worker on his way to meet a new daughter-in-law in San Diego or something, the old beaner had a terrible accent from San Rafael to Salinas, the senile old fuck talked non-stop about Caesar Shahfez, some Roman-Arab fuck who picked lettuce, blah blah fucking blah, and then for the next 50 miles, the guy talked about how excited he was to see his son’s new wife.

Ed got so pestered that by the time they pulled into San Luis Obispo, he thought his meth-swollen brain might finally explode. Like a medical emergency, so that it certainly wasn’t Ed’s fault— or the speed’s — that he was forced to beat the yapper senseless in the Men’s and steal his 432 bucks. The stealing, that Ed knew was immoral and wrong. Killing the yapper? Pure medical necessity.

After that and in a big ol hurry, Big Ed beat tracks to the AMTRAK and caught a train from San Luis Obispo to San Diego, drinking Budweisers in the bar-car while snorting meth in the Men’s. In fact, it was just three days ago that Ed showed up at ChemSteem looking for work, a place a buddy in the Brotherhood had told him would hire anybody with a pulse. No shit. After taking one look at the sorry bunch of losers in the ChemSteem shop, Ed knew it was only a matter of time till he was top-dog. And then yesterday, day two, the boss guy, Roscoe, he tells Ed how things are all screwed up and how Ed’s already getting promoted to his own van for the day, Van #3. Roscoe warning Ed about stealing from customers’ houses and breaking company equipment and shit, which made good sense, but then he totally leaves out any word about killing people and Ed figured he’d found a loophole. Not that he planned to use the loophole, you understand, just that the loophole was indeed there. And certainly, when Ed rolled out of the shop yesterday morning optimistic and fully intending to get his shit back together, he planned on working hard and keeping the meth to a minimum. Get a car, the cool pad and a girl. Then get married and have some kids. Ed figured it take about 90 days and maybe another month to take that asshole Roscoe’s job as Chem Steam’s General Manager. By Ed’s estimation, it’d take about 90 days. Well, except for the kid. That’d take at least nine months, ten if you included finding a girl part.


BIG ED MADE IT CLEAR through the first job and into the second before he fell off the wagon and nearly got through the third job before the real nonsense kicked in. By time Ed showed up at the homo hairdresser’s, Big Ed found himself dangerously close to the loophole and all over an ugly lamp the ass-fucker wouldn’t shut his mouth up about. And when Ed gave him an, ‘Aye-aye, Captain Turdburglar’, all bets were off. Now, that selfish goddamn fuck, along with the rich banker fuck and the squirrelly lawyer fuck, the fuckhead politician with the big mouth and the welfare queen thought she had it all over the world, all of em were in back and stinking up the van and where was Ed but back deep in the pudding with a bunch of dead fucks on his hands and what was he to do now but kill a bunch more people before he got himself killed? Shit. Wasn’t like it was Ed’s fault or nothing, just his shitty luck of the draw and how shit always turned bad for Ed, and he’d swear the mess was all bad luck and had absolutely nothing to do with the awesome amount of crystal methamphetamine he’d ingested over the course of the last week and the accompanying total lack of sleep.

Course, it would not have surprised Big Ed Walker one tiny bit to learn in less than twenty-four hours he’ have civilization on the very brink, see, because Mama always said how Ed was born with a mission in life. Ed’s mission just happened to be the destruction of the world as we know it.

But we’ll get to that part later.

Heaven, INC: Chapter 14: THE WAY AL SEES IT

NORCESTOR & IMPERIAL,
MARKET PARK
8:39 AM PDT

WHILE POPE TRIED CONCENTRATING on the street map and the Deputy Chief Inspector continued his texting, Al analyzed the gathering crowd, filtered through his own particular way of looking at the world..

“Jesus, wouldja look at em all? Look at em! Coming outta the woodwork like it’s some kinda biiig show. Bet none of em’s got a job, either, less you call crime a vocation and none of em spics speaks a speck of English either, content to jibber jabber in Spanish . . .”

“Al—”

“ . . . same people you see on the TV marching for unemployment insurance and social security and citizenship. Like it’s a hand-out . . .”

“Al—”

“ . . . all, I might add, while flying their goddamned Mexican flags. In fact— I bet I start checking IDs, I find three-quarters of these assholes’re illegal.”

Pope looked up from the map. “Al, we are not here to arrest illegal aliens. We are here to find Christian Ducroix and possibly avert a catastrophe. Now quick dicking around and start helping.”

“Oh, so my philosophy is dicking around, now?” Al glared at the growing crowd of brown people, and Pope had to admit Norcestor and Imperial did have an ‘international’ feel, with the radios blaring and the odd low-rider’s horn tooting La Cucaraca.

“Look,” Pope said calmly, “if you stopped complaining for a minute, we might find this kid and his bag a little quicker a get onto our trip. Have you thought about that?”

Al’s expression turned treacly. “You’re not . . . heh . . . you’re not telling me you actually believe in this Apocalypse horseshit, do you? You do. My god, you do. Puhleeze, Gideon, it’s clearly all a lie, beginning to end, propped up by the Powers That Be. For all we know, ol Tom Collins got another girl pregnant.”

“I’d keep my mouth shut,” Pope said. “You aren’t retired yet. Keep talking like that, you could lose your pension.”

Though that was highly unlikely at the moment, given the Deputy Inspector was locked into a particularly intense bout of texting, so much a lock of perfect hair had fallen across his face and tie a smidge askew. This served as panic for the masters of the universe.

Pope returned his attention to the map. Beyond the Norcestor Arms lay 96th Avenue and beyond 96th, more neighboring streets comprised of low-income housing and empty warehouses . . .

“Look at this place,” Al growled. “The butthole of America. Terrorists’d be doing us a favor to car-bomb it— oh, don’t give me that wounded Liberal look. These people breed crime and that’s a fact.”

Pope shook and focused on the map, tracing Imperial Avenue all while up to here with Al’s unending negativity and cynicism. Also, the simple fact Al was more pissed off by the virus than scared by it was pissing Gideon off.

If Margie hadn’t answered the phone . . .

On Imperial Avenue, where it bleeds down into Lemon Grove, were reports of automatic gunfire around three in the morning. Two witness reported seeing a Mustang matching Christian Ducroix’s at Broadway reportedly being pursued through the red light by a silver Mercedes Benz. All three witnesses claimed the Benz did not have license plates; DNS had detailed Charlie Chu and a team of a dozen agents out of L.A. to run down every silver, late-model Benz in town and four counties, and God knew how many that might be, but then DNS was running the operation against their budget and, apparently, money was no object in DNS.

Deputy Inspector Rose’s voice heightened in urgency.

“Fine, alright, I’ve got it, I can have a check to your office by close of business today . . . I promise . . . Now get me 30,000 more in Moo and 40K in the October pork-bellies and December corn . . . No, all of it . . . Buy it all . . . ”

Al glanced from the map to the Deputy Inspector and back. “I read every one of them DNS whiz kids comes from one of the investment banks or the hedge funds. FBI recruits cops, lawyers, accountants, these guys go for Wall Street wise-guys.”

It did make you wonder just who a guy like Rose owed his allegiance: his country? Or his checking account.

“Gideon, as far as all this, let me explain something to you: whether or not this is actually a legitimate crisis or just another mysterious government ass-grabbing mission, it has now been—” consulting his wrist-watch “—eight hours and 14 minutes since the kid was seen in the area. Now, coupled with the fact the crime-scene’s been run over by about a thousand illegal aliens that you won’t let me arrest and none of whom claims to have seen one lousy thing, well I don’t see what Deputy Inspector Text Message or anybody else expects us to find in the way of additional physical evidence to a garden-variety car jacking . . . Remember the prince’s missing cat?”

“I don’t need reminding about the cat.”

“Good, because if you remember, housekeeping found the goddamn cat in the drawer. We gotta scramble tactical teams all over the Gaslamp looking for a missing Siamese because some Muzz prince can’t bother searching his own dresser-drawers.”

“Drop the cat.”

“Fine. I just brought up the cat because, if I recall, you were taking your grand kids to Disney Land until the cat went miss—”

Pope’s gaze was unrelenting.

“Fine. Consider the cat dropped. Jeez.”

Pope frowned, casting a glance over at Rose—

“What do you mean, I’m out of margin? I just spoke to you and said I’d have a check . . . What do you mean, I don’t have the funds? Of course I have the funds. I’m rich.”

— before saying, “How about this, Al, so we can stop arguing and start working: whatever is really going on, whether it be a missing scientist infected with a doomsday virus or just another missing belt, let’s try to wrap it up so we can get on with our vacation? Just pretend it’s worth doing so we can get it done.”

Al was sullen; sometimes, when he got like this, it reminded Pope of James, when he was five and Pope took away his choo choo and gave the boo hoo face. It was times like this Pope wondered exactly how Al passed the psychology exam to get in, police or FBI.

“Well, I just state up front, that if you want my opinion—”

Which Pope did not.

“—our fishing trip’s been postponed for a glorified government goat-fucking expedition and the entire thing was invented by the Department of Lies— I’m serious. In fact, I bet Ducroix Senior ain’t even been kidnaped. God knows what he’s actually done that requires this kind of bullshit cover-up, but that’s where I’m at. Fact of the matter is, I think our time’d be better served busting and bar-coding illegal aliens than searching for some punkass preppy who got jacked while out trolling for dope.”

“Back up. Bar-coding illegals?”

Al adopted his matter-of-fact look. “Yeah. You scan a little bar-code in ultraviolet ink right behind the ear, part of a modified catch-and-release program. First time we catch ‘em trespassing, we bar-code ‘em and send ‘em home.”

“I’m afraid to ask about the second time.”

“Hey,” Al said with a shrug, “they got a bar-code, second time they get a firing squad. Oh come on now, don’t give me that wounded Liberal look— if I warn I’m gonna shoot trespassers, how’s it my bad you get caught trespassing and I shoot you? That’s like sticking your finger in a light-socket and blaming the electric company for the shock. It isn’t like in the middle of the night we suddenly moved America to a place that used to be Mexico so some innocent Mexican steps on it like it’s a hidden landmine.”

Pope shook his head in appalled amazement. “You get this stuff from that radio program? Norm Campbell?”

“100,000 watts of truth and vision. Yesterday, he said—”

At that moment, his cell rang, mercifully saving Pope from out what Norm Campbell thought.
Jim Cabral saying, “Chief, a woman on the second floor reports a mid-20s white male knocked on her door about three in the morning asking could use her phone.”

“She ID the pic?”

“Through the peep-hole because, according to Mrs. De La Clemente, only a crazy person would open their door after dark. When whoever it was asked to use her phone and then which building he was in, both times she declined to respond. Mrs. De la Clemente had the impression Ducroix was a crazy homeless kid.”

Pope thought about the black&white of Christian Ducroix, the rich preppy kid in his Brooks Brother blazer. “What made her think that?”

Cabral said, “Just said he looked really unhealthy and disheveled, even wild-eyed.”
Pope peered up at the dilapidated ruins of the Norcestor Arms’ third building marked near the top with a faded numeral three. “She say which way he ran?”

“Says he ran deeper into the building. Said he seemed lost.”

Hanging up the phone, Pope was suddenly aware of Rose’s attention.

“Someone had contact with Ducroix?”

“Through a closed peep hole. No viral exposure.”
Rose’s eyes narrowed in concentration, before he turned to walk away, off and furiously texting again.

Pope had the distinct impression Rose was somehow disappointed.

Heaven, INC: Chapter 1: JIMMY FINDS OUT

Out in the street, it’s 6 a.m., another sleepless night.
Three cups of coffee, but I can’t clear my head
from what went down last night.
—Blue Morning, Blue Day,
FOREIGNER

SLEEPYTIME TRAILER PARK,
LAKESIDE, CALIFORNIA
6:02 A.M. PDT

[PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS CHAPTER ONE AND OUT OF SEQUENCE TO CHAPTERS 13 AND 14]

THE NUMBER DISPLAYED on Jimmy’s cell was unfamiliar but not so the voice.

Elmond Winkle saying, “Been a long time, James. How you doing?”

Jimmy fumbled with an instant coffee packet in the early-dawn gloom of cousin Frankie’s travel-trailer, one that stank of fish and saltwater but was free and all Jimmy’s whenever Frankie was out on the tuna-boat. Running warm tap-water into the cup, Jimmy said, “You get my number from Coolidge?”

“Yeah. Can’t believe they made a guy like that your P.O. He treating you okay?”

“I’ll live.” Jimmy sipped the coffee, nasty with undissolved instant coffee-crystals. Crossing the two feet of space that comprised the trailer’s kitchen and dining room, he unlocked the door and cracked it an inch ajar and cautiously scan the dried-up junipers for a bouffant hairdo and cat-eye glasses peeping round a tree limb—

“Yo, Jimmy, you still there?”

“Hold on a moment.” Jimmy quietly descended two short steps to wheel and peer beneath the trailer . . .

Nothing. Nothing but spider webs and two-by-fours. Of course, ever since Doris learned to hide in the frame beneath Frankie’s trailer and render herself invisible to casual observation— unless you crawled beneath to investigate, which was never gonna happen— it had become a clever game of cat-and-mouse.

“Yo, you gonna talk or what?”

“Dude, you wanna just chill a sec?” Jimmy retreated from the trailer enough to give himself room to react should Doris suddenly appear. “Alright, so what gives? You call at six in the morning, we haven’t talked since I went away, you got a reason.” Jimmy lit a cigarette. “So what’s the reason, El?”

“Listen, for the record, I expected to get your voice-mail— heard you was doing the musician deal again, I figured you’d be sleeping til noon and I’d leave a message.”

Jimmy said nothing, feeling no need to explain that, per his parole conditions, he needed a job and playing in a band counts with neither parole officers, creditors nor ex-wives and that the only day-job his felonious ass could get was as a carpet-cleaner for a dirtbag carpet cleaning company like ChemSteem. Elmond wanted to know that, he could call the Coolie.

“Yo, all bullshit aside,” Elmond said, “I called cause I think you know a stiff we got in last night. Mij Poopikov?”

Jimmy knew him. Mij Poopikov was the owner of DreamCircus, one of San Diego’s main venues for up-and-coming bands. Panorama Love had played it just last week, a showcase gig for a Pacific Records A&R guy named Lance. Of course, even following a showcase, Mij tried shorting them on the door.

“Tortured,” Elmond said, “then two in the head.”

“Well, Mij always did have a knack for pissing people off.” Jimmy flicked his cigarette into the narrow, trailer-park lane, clearly courting danger; if the citizens’ council of the Sleepy Time Trailer Park Estates found out, it’d be another fine for cousin Frankie. So Jimmy found himself in the lane and policing up the butt— head swiveling, alert for Doris— saying, “El, you really called me after six years to tell me something I can read in the paper?”

“Five years, yo. And what I know you won’t read in the paper.”

Jimmy took a seat at the picnic table, the filthy red-and-white-checked plastic tablecloth strewn with a variety of large, rusted fish hooks. He fingered a hook, saying, “Alright, El, enough chit-chat. What’s up?”

There was a pause. “Rudy Juarez found a carpet fiber that’s got certain unique characteristics that match another case. There’s blood on the fiber that’s not Poopikov’s.”

A crow fluttered down on Frankie’s mailbox, a box built like a seahorse, yellow-and-blue paint now cracked and peeling with a mane carved of wood to resemble seaweed. The crow perched atop the mane, its feathers black and glossy and its beady eyes on Jimmy.

“Who’s blood’s on the fiber, El?”

“Rudy says the DNA’s not entirely conclusive so we have to wait til—”

“Who’s blood?”

A pause at the other end of the line. “It’s Evie’s.”

When Jimmy was little and got terrible news— like the day Aunt Gloria got run over by the acid-head in the Buick— he’d climb into the back of his closet and try thinking good thoughts like the day at Disneyland when he was five and they rode the Matterhorn 11 times. In the days following the discovery of Evie’s body and that bloodied bit of carpet fiber, Jimmy had slipped into a darkened closet called whiskey. When he finally climbed out, nothing remained but primal thoughts of revenge . . .

But that was six years ago. Now, the crow was bobbing and cawing again so raucously, so brazenly, that it occurred to Jimmy a rock would be handy, something throwing-sized, and though the citizen’s council of the Sleepy Time Trailer Park Manor Estates would surely fine him— or Frankie, it being Frankie’s trailer— the fine would be worth silencing that mocking crow. “Where’d they find Mij’s body?”

“Avocado grove out by Beeler Canyon,” Elmond said. “Guy’s out walking the grove about one in the morning when he sees flashlights. Says at first he thought it somebody stealing his avocados, so he fired a round in the air and called out that the cops were on their way and whoever was back there’d best get the hell off his property.”

“He get a look?”

“Just one of the cars, a black Hummer. Couldn’t get the plate, but he did find empty jugs of muriatic acid, kind you put in a pool. Neil Finnerty says it was somebody closing out a contract on Poopikov and trying to hide his identity.”

Jimmy frowned. “Then why not drive two hours east and plant him in the desert?”

“Crossed my mind, too. Maybe they didn’t have time.”

Jimmy glanced at his watch. If he didn’t get going, they’d get in late, which at ChemSteem earned Evil Roscoe’s wrath and the day’s shittiest jobs— El Cajon, Logan Heights, Escondido and the other dreg-burbs of San Diego. “I gotta get ready for work.”

“Okay, but before you go, you hear? Bobby Falcône got caught busting butt with a some male prostitute. All over the news, yo. Underage kid, too.”

Wow. As a kid, Jimmy’d stayed up late listening to Bobby Falcône records with his dad
long after Mom thought she’d put him to bed. Now Bobby was a pedophile? The world was a truly fucked up place. “Wow. Media’s gonna go nuts.”

“Bro, you have got no idea.”

BEFORE GOING OUT THE DOOR, Jimmy took from behind the travel-trailer’s stove an unregistered Czechoslovakian .40 caliber. After checking the magazine, he climbed into his GTO and slipped the pistol beneath the seat, then backed out of the driveway and turned up the lane. The last thing he saw was Doris staring out the window of her double-wide like a sad old basset hound, her elderly lips done in brightest red as she held open a bathrobe to reveal ancient sagging breasts. Over those breasts, Doris’ expression was a mix equal parts melancholy and lust.

Heaven, INC: Chapter 13: EVERYBODY HATES MIJ

Do you remember the bills you have to pay?
Or even yesterday?
Have you been an un-American?
—Young American,
DAVID BOWIE

RED CIRCUS NIGHTCLUB,
OCEAN BEACH
8:59 AM PDT

JIMMY PARKED around the corner and walked to the Red Circus with Owen tagging along on account of 75 bucks Tory owed him. Out front of the bar were parked a half-dozen police-cruisers along with a big Chrysler bearing the license-plate TOP CAT Jimmy recognized as Neil Finnerty’s.

“Hey, let’s go round back, see if Tory’s smoking.”


TORY WAS INDEED out back and perched on a milk crate, smoking a cigarette as Owen came through the back gate.

Tory saying with perfect aplomb, “What’s up, dude? I was gonna call you to say I’ll give you your money after tonight’s show. If there is a show tonight.”

For Owen, it was a growl. “What about the money from last night’s show?”

“You know, dude, bills, lotta bills.” Seeing Jimmy, Tory’s eyes widened. “Oh, hey, Jimmy, how you doing, bro?” He turned to Owen. “Know what? Think I got thirty bucks in my pocket.” Fishing around, he pulled out a pair of rumpled twenties. “Whoa, look at that. I woulda had all of it if Mij hadn’t gotten killed— you heard about that, right?” Dragging on his cigarette, Tory concluded, “Mij wasn’t around to pay so the band got pissed and poured beer on the sound-board and now everything’s shorted out. Which is why I’m here at the crack of dawn seeing what the fuck I gotta buy to get it working. And I may be out a job with Mij dead. Talk about bullshit with your morning coffee.”

Jimmy said, “You see Mij yesterday?”

Tory nodded reflectively. “He came in and sat at the end of the bar reading his paper and drinking his scotch like he always does, bitching to Kelly Jaye she was screwing up the ice in his drink.” He shrugged. “I told her I’d be like, what the fuck, Mij, it’s scotch, not a mai tai. Lotta ice, a little, either way it tastes like ass. The guy who came in to see Mij drank Jamesons and didn’t complain one bit. The other guy had a Heineken and tried flirting with Kelly Jaye. He was European, but he wouldn’t tell her what country unless she went on a date. She told him she has a fiancé, so he never told her where.”

Owen asked, “Kelly Jaye has a fiancé?”

“Nah, she’s still single, she’s just not gonna let some douchebag in a pork-pie hat know.”

“What about the other guy, Jamesons?”

Tory shrugged, taking a last drag on his cigarette before flicking it over the fence. “Some big dude in a suit. Sat in the booth talking to Mij in a low voice, but you could tell he was tearing Mij a new one.” Tory pulled out his cigarettes. “Dark hair, no tie and one of those gold horns hanging from around his neck like the guidos wear. And he had these heavy eyebrows, like a caveman.”

“How old?”

“45, 50. Sergeant Finnerty wants Kelly Jaye and me to go downtown and see if we can pick em out of a book.”

“Good.” Jimmy considered this a moment. “So, what’d Mij do after these guys left?”

“He seemed nervous, actually. Or it coulda been the coke. He had a couple more drinks and bailed, saying he’d come back to pay the band.” Tory lighted his cigarette, suddenly noticing their shirts and the ChemSteem logo embroidered on the breast. “Hey, I’ve got an idea—why don’t you guys go over and clean my carpet?”

“No way. We are not going to IB.”

“Owen, your money’s stashed back at my pad. All you gotta do—”

The Red Circus’ back door suddenly banged open and out strode none other than Detective Sergeant Neil Finnerty, an Alaskan idiot resplendent in brown leisure-suit and cowboy boots. And giant belt buckle in the shape of a Dallas Cowboys helmet.

Neil adopted a surprised expression. “Holeee shit. Jimmy Francisco, fresh outta stir.” Neil’s gaze sharpened. “See you found your true calling . . . carpet boy at ChemSteem Superior Carpet Cleaning and Upholstery Specialists. ” Neil laughed, like it was all a big ol’ hoot. “Hey, carpet boy: how about you do my car interior, I give you ten bucks?” The country fuck grinning around his toothpick and hardy har-harring like it was funniest thing in the world. “Fact, you get all the oil Buttkowski’s tracked in my car, I might even tip. How’s that, convict?”

“How about I clean your wig instead? You’re getting a little greasy around the temples.”
Neil Finnerty’s smile flattened. “We’ll see how funny you are back in stir after I nail your ass for witness tampering.”

Jimmy shrugged. “I’m talking to a friend.”

“Francisco, all your friends are all in jail.” Neil’s breath reeked of cheap cigarettes and 7-Eleven coffee. “Didn’t prison teach you about poking your nose into places it doesn’t belong?” Neil cocked his head. “You know what? I think you don’t know this guy from Adam, you’re just back here poking around again, asking questions don’t pertain to you in a murder investigation you got no business getting involved in. And that’d be a problem, since a paroled felon accused of witness tampering could find himself back inside.”

It was at that moment Tory made his move.

“Mister detective, dude, sir, we were talking about my carpet.”

“Your carpet.”

“Yes, sir. About Jimmy cleaning it for 20 bucks. Right Jimmy?”

Jimmy nodded. Realizing Tory was pulling another of his vintage cheapy operations.

“The whole apartment, right, Jimmy? A deuce.”

Jimmy nodded. Tory might succeed in getting Neil off his back, but it would cost.

Neil eyeballed Jimmy’s ChemSteem attire, the too-big ChemSteem shirt, the shorts and tennies.

“And here I thought doing my car for 10 bucks was an insult when you’re already an insult to yourself. How old are you, Francisco?”

“41.”

“Jesus. A 41-year old man cleaning carpet and living in some deadbeat trailer-park, I hear? For what, so you can play in some bullshit band?” Neil stood there, shaking his head. “What are you, 15 fucking years old? Grow up, Francisco, you were a cop once, remember?”

Jimmy glanced down at his battered tennies, the starting-to-fray shorts and the too big ChemSteem shirt and couldn’t entirely disagree, but what was the point anyway?

It’s Neil you’re talking to.

The only upside to this rotten enchilada was Neil’s contentment with humiliation over interrogation. “You know, Francisco, the fact of seeing a man once carried a shield reduced to a ratty, low-budget carpet-cleaner sickens me, it really does.” Neil took a long, dramatic moment to suck at nicotine-stained teeth before concluding, “Tell ya what I’m gonna do . . . On account of pity at seeing a cop reduced to a pathetic, bottom-feeding low-life—”

Neil was flat out loving this part, dishing the shit out and Jimmy offering nothing in return, but what the fuck, Neil had a badge and he’d have his say. Besides, it was Neil.

“— I’m gonna overlook this situation so you can get back to your carpet cleaning while we do the investigating. Like when one of those lords let a peasant off for hunting his land.”

Before Jimmy could respond and probably end pursuit of the evidence chain via whoever had visited Mij, Tory was holding out his keys. Closing the deal.”

“Silver house-key, dude, 20 bucks is under the fish tank. And don’t let the dogs out.”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 12: DOMINIC DUCROIX

NORCESTOR & IMPERIAL,
MARKET PARK
8:29 AM PDT

UNDER THE QUASI-WATCHFUL EYE of Deputy Inspector Rose— when the kid wasn’t text messaging, so less than half the time—Pope traced a finger along the street map spread across the hood of Margie’s car.

“Alright, let’s box out Skyline to Federal, and 86th to 105th Street. Coe and Cabral, your teams will take the immediate vicinity, starting with the towers— I don’t care what it takes, but find someone who saw something and get them talking. McKimbelroy, Rank, Foxwell and Hewitt, your teams will work the rest of the box.” Pope drew his finger out from the intersection of Norcestor and Imperial. “Harper and Schreiber, your people will work the transportation net— trolley, cab, bus, scooter, skateboard, if the kid voluntarily left the area and hasn’t reported in, I want to know how he left and where he went. We can figure the why later.” Pope looked from the map to the people he’d worked with for years. “If Ducroix’s inside the box, let’s bring him home. If he’s out of the box, let’s find out where he went. Alright, let’s get moving, people— daylight’s a-burning.”


POPE STUDIED the case-file’s black-and-white of Christian Ducroix, a good-looking kid in a
classically-cut suit and confident smile with dark hair parted on the side.

The file described a successful young man who’d graduated at the top of his class as the rarest of San Diego State grads, the captain of a championship sports team. If you know San Diego State’s dismal sports legacy, you know that captaining a championship at State, even one in badminton, is an almost singular achievement.

"Loser U,” Al called the school, “in the middle of Loser Town.”

After graduating from Loser U with a BS in Microbiology and minors in History and Photojournalism, the boy headed east, where he attended A.M.P., earning a masters in something called Germ-Line Engineering. Two years ago, he’d landed a posting at PharmaCon’s Vienna lab before being transferred back to the San Diego campus, working under his father. The file listed a Solana Beach address.

Brushing at a buzzing fly, Pope shifted his gaze shifted to the brooding towers of the Norcestor Arms and the newly risen sun now casting long shadows across the working class row-houses that lined St. Angela and La Raza streets; to Pope, the shadows of the grim monoliths portended a world running down, a no-man’s land of decay and despair 30 miles and a world away from Solana Beach.

Pope flipped the file to a U.S. Customs’ report detailing Christian Ducroix’s recent travel plans, including a trip to Paris and back this last July. It also showed Christian had three weeks ago left the states on a Buenos Aires flight from LAX before returning on a flight out of Caracas flight and into Lindbergh Field yesterday.

Kid’s really looking to rack up the frequent fliers . . .

Pope set aside Christian Ducroix’s file and opened that of his father’s, to a photograph of Dr. Ducroix— middle-aged, gun-metal grey hair, bushy eyebrows and sharp blue eyes. More than anything, Pope was struck by how much alike were father and son, the strong chins and piercing eyes.

Ambitious eyes.

The background report stated that Dominic Ducroix was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the only child of a Swiss diplomat. As a boy, Dominic attended a Jesuit’s school before heading to university in Vienna and, following graduation, landing a post at the French pharmaceutical giant Alcametre. In 1979, Ducroix left Alcametre to resurface in South Guyana, purportedly as a physician to the country’s dictator, Gen. Anton Salazar.

Dominic remained in North Guyana until 1988, leaving shortly before the regime fell to Left-wing revolutionaries. Dominic took his wife and young Christian to the States, where he landed a job at Long Island’s Oakmont Bay Laboratory. Curiously, less than a year later, Ducroix and his family were again moving, this time to Golden State and a posting at PharmaCon’s Torrey Pines campus. Eight years later, serving as Director of Genetic Studies, Dominic received the American Prize for Science. Now, Dr. Ducroix was something of a science rock star, or at least the Stephen Hawking of Genetics and without the wheelchair and voice box.

Ducroix also belonged to a lot of organizations. The file listed big names like the National Cancer Society, American Endowment for Medicine and the International Red Cross as well as smaller organizations like the Elder League, The Ares Project and something called the Strategic Population Research Council.


POPE CLOSED THE FILE as Linda Garcia appeared, one of his favorite agents looking as sharp as anyone can in an FBI windbreaker and knee-brace. “Agent Garcia, I wasn’t expecting you in the field so soon. How’s the knee?”

“Fine.” Linda shrugged. “Better than my head, anyway— Chief, I’m going nutty being cooped up in that office. I need to get out in the field and walk around.” She flexed her knee. “See? No pain at all.”

Pope smiled. “Glad to hear it, but you’re a terrible bluffer. Besides, I need your brilliant research abilities more than balky knee.” Sliding a glace Rose’s way— the Deputy Inspector was engrossed in a furious conversation with an unknown caller— Pope said, “Get me everything that’s not in these that should be.”

“Dump it . . . All of it. . . Then use that money to buy 10,000 January 8's . . .”

To which Al, looking on, interjected, “Jeez, end of the world and the guy’s calling his stock-broker. Goddamned government.”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 11: MEET THE PRESIDENT

The world is governed by very different personages
from what is imagined by those
who are not behind the scenes.
—BENJAMIN DISRAELI

OVAL OFFICE,
WASHINGTON, D.C.
11:29 A.M. EDT

“ . . . because, Mister President, sir, as the virus evolves in humans, its impact on plant and animal species will grow exponentially until nothing organic remains untouched.”

“You mean untouched as in the mass extinction thing.”

“Yes sir. But even before that, mankind would experience a societal shift of a scope and magnitude unparalleled in human history. Humans fighting other humans over ever dwindling resources, facing starvation, chronic warfare—”

“Plague, death and the end of civilization, yeah, I got all that. Jesus Christ . . . I am gonna get hammered in the polls.”

“Not necessarily, Mr. President. We can always institute a total quarantine.”

“Of Tijuana? Or San Diego?”

“Of the Media, sir. Deny everything. We go total information/disinformation look-down.”

“Ahem, Mr. President? Sir, with all due respect to Press Secretary Pukes on here’s idea of a total look-down, I recommend we employ something a little more, uh, real world.”

“And what would that be, General?”

“Firebombing.”

“Firebombing?”

“Yessir, firebombing. It's the only way we can be absolutely sure. Besides we know it's nothing but a goddamn cesspool of drugs addicts and criminals down there.”

“Are you talking about San Diego? Or Tijuana?”

“Tijuana of course. Though it’s a well-known fact San Diego’s a druggy town, too.”

“General, you're not bombing San Diego or Tijuana on my watch. You send bombers across De La Fuente’s borders, there’s no telling what that nut’ll do. But you can start with another ten million illegals banging at the border out of spite alone.”

“Yes, Mr. President, sir, but given what the Science Director here just said, I’d argue we can’t be worrying about maps when the Devil’s riding shotgun.”

“Mr. President? If I might interject around General Maxwell’s colorful opinions, I suggest that quarantining, let alone firebombing, a major American city a month before the election would be sub-optimal regardless what we do with Tijuana. In fact, internal polling indicates a quarantine of any sort would be suicide in the Electoral College.”

“You’ve even got polling data on quarantines?”

“Every political contingency must be planned for.”

“Unh-hunh. Well I thought the polls said I got no chance anyway. Hell, why not just let General Maxwell here have a rip at it and see what happens?”

“Yes, indeed . . . Mr. President, if we might confer a moment alone? Gentlemen, if you’ll get yourselves a drink— Thank you . . . . . . All right, Tom . . . Let’s talk turkey.”

“I don’t think I like the sound of your voice.”

“That’s because Vienna’s not real happy right now, Tom.”

“Vienna ain’t happy? I don’t give two farts about Vienna’s happiness right now. I’m the leader of this country ain’t I? Well, I’m awake and ready to take charge.”

“Tom, let’s be serious. We both know the terms agreed upon when you asked Vienna to back you. And unfortunately, with the election coming up and your extraordinarily weak position in the polls coupled with the impeachment rumors and the dress—”

“OK, you’ve made your point. I just think being president oughtta count for something.”

“Hmmm. Alright . . . There’s been some ah, blowback. But it’s being handled.” “Blowback? Sounds like another fuck-up. Who was it this time, CIA? NSA? DNS?”

“No one. Everyone— look, let’s just say it’s a complicated, system-wide failure initiated by operational contamination that has left us with three, maybe four dead civilians and one missing operative. But we have it all under control.”

“Except for some SOB running around foot loose and fancy free and infected with a virus that’s gonna fuck up the world, yeah, sure sounds like it’s under control. Hells bells, why can’t you find the silly bastard using one of them satellites y’always bragging on?”

“Normally, we could. But solar activity’s temporarily blinding the birds, forcing us to do things the old-fashioned way, with boots on the ground.”

“Wait a minute, boots on the ground sounds suspiciously like F. B.— it is, isn’t it? Oh, for the love a Pete, those nitwits couldn’t find a whore in Bangkok. Remember the belt?”

“Tom, I assure you, stories of Bureau incompetence are grossly exaggerated. Regardless, FBI’s been subordinated to DNS for the grunt work.”

“Isn’t that something I shoulda been at least consulted on? The FBI working for DNS?”

“Technically, as president, I suppose. But you were barricaded in the Situation Room with three coeds from Gamma Omicron. You were also intoxicated and, frankly, belligerent; the coeds didn’t help matters after you told them it was a partisan sexual witch-hunt. I must say, they were most vocal in your defense.”

“Vocal? How vocal? Vocal enough for Mrs. Collins to hear?”

“Doubtful. The First Lady was entertaining the Crown Prince and his three wives in the East Wing. But she does have her spies.”

“No shit, she’s worse than the goddamn Brits. Hmmm . . . reminds me— have DNS rustle up those coeds’s numbers, get em over for another game of naked Risk, see if that little red-headed number thinks she’ll take North America this time.”

“Tom . . . Do you want to focus on board-games with the girls from Gamma Omicron or the operation to save the world, not to mention your legacy?”

“Alright, already, I’m focusing, I’m focusing . . . I assume you got one of your patented cover-scandals brewing.”

“The mother of all scandals, actually . . . Bobby Falcône caught in flagrante and on camera with a 17-year old.”

“Bobby Falcône? No shit. Why that dirty old dog. Who is she?”

“He is a 17-year-old male prostitute.”

“Hold on just one minute. You’re telling me Bobby Falcône’s a turd burglar?”

“We’ve been holding these photos secret for years in case of an emergency just like this. Instant classics of personal destruction.”

“Bobby Falcône is a butt pirate.”

“Look, Tom, this requires something explosive if it’s gonna really consume the media’s attention. This is explosive enough, we can drop a half-dozen bodies and nobody outside San Diego and the internet will hear a word.”

“You know . . . Mrs. Collins is president of Bobby’s fan club. Every Thanksgiving, Bobby eats three helpings of mash-potatoes telling her how good they are. Hell, she’s already playing Hoboken Christmas and it’s only September— she finds out I had anything to do with outting Bobby and we got real problems. And you know what I’m talking about.”

“Indeed. I’ve already notified Secret Service’s tasters.”

“Christ, that just pissed her off the last time. Besides, they nearly missed the pot roast— I was already pouring gravy when that poor son-of-a-bitch keeled over in his peas. Can’t you distract ‘em another way? Maybe the Crop-Duster of Death bit again? People like planes.”

“It’s probably best we don’t go to the same well too often.”

“S’pose you’re right. Alright, bring me up to speed on what happened in San Francisco.”

“San Diego.”

“Right. San Diego. And maybe start from the top again so I can get it all straight in my head. Can’t tell you how hard it is to concentrate through this god-awful hangover.”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 10: BIG ED WALKER

Mental wounds not healing,
Life’s a bitter shame.
I’m going off the rails on a crazy train.
—Crazy Train,
OZZY OSBOURNE

TACO SHACK PARKING LOT,
NORCESTOR AND IMPERIAL
8:28 AM PDT

BIG ED WALKER sat in ChemSteem van #3 sipping whisky while watching arrogant fucks in FBI windbreaker stand around with FBI attitudes and FBI walkie-talkies acting like they owned the place and could do whatever the fuck they wanted . . .

The fucks.

. . . and even a hundred yards away— on account of Big Ed’s very powerful, ninja vision— even at that distance Ed could clearly see they thought they were better than other people, the insufferable arrogant fucks and, in Big Ed Walker’s opinion a lot like the niggers in Cell-Block 12 of the California Correctional Facility at San Quentin who had so enthusiastically terrorized Ed’s fragile rectum— and even more fragile sanity— so that he spent eight years with a tampon stuffed up his ass and the guards' nickname of 'Tampon-Ass'.

The arrogant fucking fucks.

Now, while thoughts of FBI agents, niggers and prison guards swirled in Big Ed’s Jack Daniels-and-meth sauteed fore-brain, in Ed’s hind-brain, that part inherited from our reptilian ancestors, little sparks started kicking off like a train going off the tracks, thoughts ricocheting around those sex-starved motherfuckers’ and their big fists and the laundry room, the darkness and the pain of a laundry room all wrapped in the scent of industrial laundry detergent, as Ed was raped over and over and over again—

“Fuck you!”

Big Ed downed a swig of Jack Daniels as rage rose within him like vomit rising in a drunk.
See, with a normal person— which Big Ed most certainly was not— it would be astonishing how quickly his emotional state could metastasize from idling in its normal mode of mild jealousy and paranoia to a RAGING FURY OF PURE HATRED in but a fraction of a second— but then that was just Ed being Ed; like electrons jumping their shells, there was no middle ground to shifts in emotional state; one minute he’d be swigging whiskey straight from the bottle or doing a fat ragged line of tweak while his mind idled in first-gear paranoia when—

zzzzzZZZZAPPP!

— some invariably minor thing would send him into what a psychiatrist might call a Disassociative Rage, something not at all pretty, as any of the seven people in the back of Ed’s van could heartily attest. If they weren’t dead of course.

The fucking dead fucks.

Through a slit in the curtain, Ed peered into the back of the van and, sure enough, the smart-alecky homo who’d bitched about Ed knocking over his faggotty-ass table lamp with the carpet-cleaning unit, that fuck was eyeballing him, the fish-eyed fuck.

Ed adjusted the curtain so the homo couldn’t look at him. Not because Ed was creeped out or anything, you understand, he just didn’t appreciate people staring at him, not even dead people.

Th dead fucking fucks.

Ed returned his gaze to the FBI pussies and it was at that precise moment when thousands of synapses in a crystal-meth-ravaged neo-cortex misfired and Ed’s woefully stunted SuperEgo submitted to a meth-fueled Id—.

zzzzzZZZZAPPP!

— at the moment two FBI fucks, one tall, the other fat, appeared, catching Ed’s gaze like something sparkly catches a cat’s. Unconsciously, Ed began rubbing the gun in his pants, a 9mm he found cleaning an El Cajon 4-Area—a good carpet cleaner always made it a point to case a house while working. He rubbed the gun like it was as an extension of his cock, like chromed Death in his pants, growing more aroused as he watched the tall fuck pointing and giving orders like he was so much better than everyone else, the arrogant goddamn fuck.

Heaven, INC: Chapter 9: NORCESTOR & IMPERIAL

NORCESTOR & IMPERIAL,
MARKET PARK
8:02 AM PDT

BASE CAMP CARD TABLE, as Al dubbed it, was a fancy, over-the-topper provided by DNS budget and planted at Norcestor and Imperial, a trash-strewn intersection in a suburb of San Diego called Market Park that compares to La Jolla as Hell does to Heaven. At the intersection’s north-east corner sits the Red Garter Lounge across the street from which are a Taco Shack on one corner and an abandoned strip-mall with boarded-up windows on the other. Behind Valu-Land mall is a junkyard called Chuey’s Tip & Tow, while across the street from the mall squats a three hulking apartment towers in the brooding urban-gothic style, that of burnt-out lawns, broken windows, government subsidies and the angry, despondent and defeated. Every big city in America has this place. In San Diego, it’s Norcestor and Imperial.


POPE AND AL CROSSED a police ribbon to find a homicide lieutenant at the card table talking with Deputy Inspector Rose.

Seeing Pope, Lt. Marcus gave a nod of recognition before pointing a cigarette at the Red Garter Lounge and saying, “So. . . as I was saying . . . This bouncer says he was arguing with one of his dancers, trying to get her to come into work, when he hears the sound of breaking glass and someone yelling out in the street. Goes outside, sees an old Mustang heading east on Imperial along with a late-twenties white male hightailing it in the direction of the Norcestor Arms, and subsequently returns to the club to call 911— Dispatch clocked the call at three minutes to three in the morning.” Marcus drew on his cigarette, exhaling smoke and saying, “In the ensuing call, you hear two gunshots, one of which we think goes along with a slug found in a homeless shot dead around the corner from the club. 9mm, maybe a.380.”

Pope took in the towers of the Norcestor Arms, the nearest a dozen brooding stories high and marked near the top with a great faded ‘3’, built on something of a plateau, with a broad dirt hillside leading down to the street and intersected by wide concrete stairs; on the stairs, a group of local hoods had gathered to watch the festivities.

After introducing himself— after flashing DNS credentials and enduring Marcus asking his age— Deputy Inspector Rose presented a black-and-white photo. “This is who we’re looking for. We believe the Mustang is this man, Christian Ducroix. We believe he was the victim of a botched car-jacking.”

“Zat so?” The lieutenant studied the picture. “This kid by any chance related to that other Dr. Ducroix?”

“Yes, Dr. Ducroix is Christian’s father.”

The lieutenant looked to Pope and back at Rose. “Why don’t we get to it?” He waved his cigarette, taking in the brooding apartment towers and Chuey’s Tip & Tow. “This place is on the way to anywhere, so I’d bet he’s just another rich kid looking to score a baggy in the ‘Hood and finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Since that would be bad for his old man’s image, you come out this cock and bull. Zat about right?” Before Rose could answer, Marcus smiled. “Boys down at the Station’ll like that, hearing the esteemed Dr. Ducroix’s kid’s out trolling the Park for party favors or maybe dirty puss.”

Rose looked annoyed. “Look, Detective—“

“Lieutenant.”

“Lieutenant, that’s ridiculous. Dr. Ducroix has no history of drug use.”

“Which one?”

“Which . . . Both. Neither. Look, the fact of the matter is we know Christian and his date left Lord Bletchly’s party in an intoxicated state and it’s probable he wandered into the wrong neighborhood. You can get there from here.”

“Where was the party?”

“Rancho del Sol Estates.”

Marcus smirked. “Yeah right.” His dubious gaze slid to Pope and back to Rose, reminding Pope that it was the opinion of more than a few cops it was the FBI that got Detective Francisco sent away instead of Christian Ducroix’s father. “Only other thing I gotta say is, how improbable it is the driveway camera apparently malfunctioned and erased the surveillance data. I mean, given all the other weirdly improbable shit surrounding that family.” Clearly wanting to say more, Marcus simply said, “Look, I’m sure it’d be a damn shame if anything terrible happened to the good doctor’s kid, but if you mind, I gotta get back to investigating my dead homeless nobody gives a rat’s ass about.” And with that, he shoved off into the crowd of onlookers in the direction of the Red Garter.

Simultaneously, before Pope could ask a question, the deputy inspector’s phone chirped. Snapping it out to reading a text, he then stated abruptly, “Alright . . . Look, I need to make a very important call. Agent Pope, if you’d take over a moment, directing your people to, well, whatever you people do, I’ll get this real quick,” and without waiting for a response, Rose was walking away, not calling anyone but instead frantically texting.

Al captured Pope’s sentiment best. “What the fuck?”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 8: JIMMY AND EVIE

Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone,
only darkness every day.
—Ain’t No Sunshine,
BILL WITHERS

622 NAUTILUS AVENUE
LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA
8:01 AM PDT

IT WASN’T UNTIL JIMMY finished the guest room that Pearl Necklace abandoned him to work with Owen downstairs, but even a floor above, Jimmy could hear her shrewish voice warning Owen against bleeding on her Italian marble floor and that if he did bleed on the marble or anywhere else, for that matter, he’d be sued by the best attorney in the state to the effect “you’ll never clean carpets in this town again.”

It wasn’t long until the woman’s absence and the hum of the cleaning unit relaxed Jimmy’s mind enough to get his thoughts circling, like they so often did, back to Evie.


JIMMY’S REACTION TO EVIE’S MURDER might seem ironic, given he was homicide and all the bodies he’d encountered, but there’s really no preparing a man to see his love dumped on a hillside with nothing but the flies to keep her company, dumped as Evie had been, with the mattresses, old tires and the dried-up houseplants the world no longer wanted.
Jimmy, he went nuts for awhile.

Now, the record label guys, so enamored with Panorama Love and their rock-pop duo, they said how sorry they were, what a tragedy it was and how remarkable had been Evie’s voice, the clear power with which she sang— but then added, “Listen, Jimmy, you’re the songwriter. We find someone to fill Evie’s role, someone special, bang, you could go straight to the top . . . And I know just the girl to replace her . . . Just the girl, Jimmy. Young, hot, ambitious. I’m telling you, we fill Evie’s spot, I can take Panorama Love straight to the top. With, of course, the proper marketing.”

The guy saying this, sniffling with a scotch in hand, Jimmy at least waited until he set his drink down before slamming a fist into the guy’s face. And after that, you could say things soured a bit. In fact, could say things got downright awful. But what would you do, finding your love with a broken neck and left out on a garbage-strewn hillside like trash no more valuable than a broken lamp? It’s a terrible pain beats in your chest, a living thing, suffocating and all-powerful that most everyone just sucks up because there’s nothing else they can do but wait passively by the phone.

But Jimmy was police, Jimmy was Homicide, and Jimmy was the emotional type and in the position and of certain a disposition that rendered him unwilling and unable to simply forget about Evie and take up with her replacement— how does one replace a soul?— to play those dreamed-of shows at the Troubadour and the Whiskey, dreamed of on a hundred nights and a thousand dreary days.

No, Evie was the only thing that went unforgotten.

And it never mattered to Jimmy he was banned from the investigation on grounds of personal prejudice because he worked his own investigation, worked it morning, noon and night like a junkie works a needle, working it long after losing his job, his band and his mind, lost somewhere well past the exit points of exhaustion, hope and sanity down in the ragged crevasses of despair where the only thing that still animates a man is the need to revenge . . .

All of it, beginning, middle and end, hung in Jimmy’s mind like an angry red E-note. And Jimmy never gave up. Oh, it may have taken 16 months of his life and wrecked nearly every last relationship, but Jimmy finally found his man because no other outcome was acceptable. So after tracking down Evie’s killer and arresting the stone cold killer, as was his strong desire, what was the outcome, but watching the motherfucker walk free, exonerated of all charges by strands of genetic code drawn from his cold veins that supposedly didn’t match and that set him free despite the overwhelming circumstantial evidence. And none of it, not one goddamn word, was ever released to the public by a gag order out of the D.A.s office, and the D.A. a known political slime-bag on the block for anybody with enough money to bid his services—

“Hello? HELLO? Can’t you see that dark patch there? I mean, wake up and pay attention please. My god, where’s your head?”

Pearl-Necklace pointed to a patch of bright white carpet along the edge of the king-sized bed, carpet so bright it was nearly blinding. “None of you people pay attention to detail or craftsmanship anymore.” Her hands went to her hips. “I want it white, you understand? White white white.”

Jimmy glanced around at the antiseptically white master bedroom, the white carpet, white furniture and the polished chrome, all devoid of any touch of human warmth and so like the woman, rich, white and soulless.

“Ma’am, I’ve gone over that area twice and it’s bad for the carpet, blasting more hot water into the glue backing, but on top of that, it’s a shadow, ma’am—”

“I’ll be the judge of that. This is my carpet, my house and you’re working for me. Now clean that edge!”

With a shrug, Jimmy started along the bed’s edge. The ChemSteem-patented unit featured steam nozzles and vacuum intakes mounted on a rotating head that swept in circles—

“White!”

— and as Jimmy ran the rotating head under the edge of the bed-spread, the woman watched over his shoulder.

“Yes. Yes, just like that, all the way around, I want my carpet to glow, do you understand, glow. If you need to get down on your hands and knees and scrub it then that’s what I expect—”

Chh-Clunk!

The unit shuddered as the rotating head brushed something beneath the bed. Whatever it was suddenly flung from under the bed and with dread, Jimmy powered down the unit.

Amazingly and for the first time since arriving, the woman was quiet. Instead, she stood with her shoulders hunched and hands over her mouth in a Monkey Speak No Evil kind of way as she stared at the object loitering on her bright white carpet.

It was a rubber dildo, arm-length and black, and it featured life-like veins and tissue paper stuck to its life-like testicles.

The woman looked to Jimmy—

He didn’t even bother trying to suppress his smile.

— and back to the dildo. Hesitating, one hand again fingering the pearls as she looked back at
Jimmy—

Jimmy grinned broadly.

— before she crossed the room and grabbed the dildo by the head. Slinging it over her shoulder, she silently exited the room.


THE WOMAN made no eye contact signing the job manifest and tipped them all of five bucks total for nearly two hours work.

Curiously, the next job on the list was the Ocean Beach 3-area they’d pass Mij Poopikov’s DreamCircus getting to, and as Jimmy started the van, he looked over at Owen. “Gonna make a pit stop on the way,” adding, “Before we get there, though, there’s something I gotta tell you.”
Owen smiled as the van got rolling. “Cool. How about starting with the part about the gun sticking out from under your seat.”

Heaven, INC: Chapter 7: GIDEON POPE

Civilization is the lamb’s skin
in which barbarism masquerades.
— THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH

NORCESTOR AVENUE,
MARKET PARK
7:35 AM PDT

THE POPE’S FIRST APARTMENT had been no more than a couple miles from Millard Fillmore junior high, one Margie chose in particular because an upstairs unit was worth ten dollars more while Pope was away on a WestPac. It was safer with just her and little Jake, and there was the added bonus that the apartment’s large windows faced east. Margie most of all believed babies should wake to the light of a new day, and Jake was indeed born to an eastern sun at Mercy Hospital, one month to the day before Pope’s return. It was striking just how drastically the neighborhood had declined in those 40 years, gone from a little enclave of multi-colored middle-class to today and the visible rot wrought by drugs, poverty and decay. It occurred to Pope how lucky had been Sarah’s birth that forced them to buy a house they could barely afford but would eventually grow into and thereby saved his kids from ever having to attend Millard Fillmore Junior High.


It was with vision of the past and concerns over the future, and what Mills had told them, that they walked the few blocks to their new posting, allowing Al plenty of time to vent a few thoughts out of earshot of Deputy Inspector Rose . . .


“Norcestor and Imperial? Norcestor and Imperial. How in the fuck could our fishing trip be postponed . . . maybe even canceled . . . so we can babysit Norcestor and goddamned Imperial? And, to top it off, you’re not even in charge, no, because some fresh out of college DNS punk is calling the shots. Goddamnit, Gideon, it just isn’t right.”


During the short walk, Pope tried tuning Al and his opinions out to consider what they had been told by Mills regarding the Russians . . .


“We coulda got the airport, for chrissake, the harbor, hell, I’d even take TJ if I had my Pepto, but Norcestor and Imperial? The devil wouldn’t be caught dead in a hell-hole like Norcestor and Imperial.”


. . . and the covert DNS operation to roll up the Russian kidnaping team without creating a lot of publicity a week before the big summit. And without notifying Pope or anyone else in the FBI’s San Diego office.


Mills had described one member as Sergei Zukov, a former Lieutenant Colonel in Soviet Special Forces, and some sort of bad-ass pilot of any fixed-wing aircraft or helicopter. One slide even showed Zukov outfitted in race-wear, taken three years ago at Le Mans.



Zukov’s partner was Ramona Alexovna Romanokova, ex-Russian army and, judging by the slides of her vacationing on the Black Sea a couple years ago, the most beautiful Colonel that Pope had ever seen. As for her vacation buddy, Vassily Chelnikov, he controlled an oil company, Russia’s biggest bank, two car manufacturers, more munitions factories than the army and a majority of the country’s media. According to Chief Deputy Inspector Mills, Chelnikov had bankrolled the kidnappers, as well as the executioners who took out the research team in the Brazilian Highlands, and Mills claimed it was unclear how much the Mexican government was involved. Pope’s mission at Norcestor and Imperial, in addition to any clues to the whereabouts of Christian Ducroix or his body, would be to locate and quarantine anyone exposed to the virus under the guise of a witness round-up. It was essentially a lie, but lately, most everything the FBI did seemed to revolve around a lie.


POPE WAS SECOND GENERATION FBI, not through his father but through his uncle, Henry, who was one of Hoover’s favorites and an untouchable until dying of pancreatic cancer in ‘42. Gideon’s father was a farmer, growing soybeans and wheat, mostly, on a thousand acres of good land in west Kansas near the Oklahoma border. Though college educated, Nelson Pope was a man of the land, a man who’s heart was filled with the good dark soil of America. Things were never easy as a farmer— there were times they lived on nothing but potatoes and beans for months on end, until the milk check came in— but the Popes had a good life. Gideon was the youngest boy, his brother, Oliver, was oldest, and he had three sisters in between, Ellen, Faith and Iris. Gideon’s mother named him such because he was born in a motel room in Abilene, Gideon breaking his water while she was reading Psalms. Born prematurely, the doctor said it was a miracle he’d lived, but Angela had just smiled, convinced it was never in doubt because the Lord knew all well in advance. They were good Methodists, going to church on Sundays and church dances sometimes on Fridays. It was a modest life of family, farm and church, and Gideon was a happy child. In the fall of 1956, on the night of Ike’s re-election, with the grass of the west Kansas prairie turned brown and brittle, things changed for Gideon.


Oliver, tall and strong-willed, was a star linebacker for the Kansas Jayhawks and Gideon’s idol. Sometimes, after games, he’d take Gideon to after-parties at the fraternity houses— for which, if Angela had ever found out, Oliver would have had hell to pay— introducing Gideon as his kid brother, the kid who was gonna grow up to be the “best damn receiver the Jayhawks ever had and help us win another national championship.” On that Tuesday night, a few days before the big game against Nebraska, a lightning storm brewed up somewhere out of Texas, an uncommonly powerful storm full of anger and malevolence. Oliver, returning to campus from the farm, stopped to help a woman change a tire. He was stooped over in the rain, turning a lug when a tractor-trailer, loaded down with old tires, took a direct lightning strike, the tractor-trailer going over and spilling tires in the road. A single threadbare Goodyear white-wall broke free and with unholy, unerring accuracy clipped Oliver in the back of his buzz-cut head, just over the up-turned collar of his lettermen’s jacket. At the hospital, Oliver Pope was pronounced dead on arrival.



The tight-knit Pope family was devastated, but none more than Gideon, consumed by grief, seemingly unable to overcome the loss of his brother, his hero and his best friend. For months inconsolable, he wandered through the fields in a daze, or would lay in bed at night, staring at the bed across the room from which Oliver had launched balled-up socks around the room for Gideon to catch. When spring came, when the time came to plant the fields, he remained distant and cold to the family, Gradually, youth and the rhythm and cadence of the land’s ritual, the planting and harvesting, healed Gideon, until a couple years had passed and it came time for he himself to attend Ulysses High. He joined the football team, switching to linebacker, and was given Oliver’s old number 28. On the JV team, he set a school record for tackles in a season and was poised to start on varsity the following year and the memory of Oliver’s loss, though still strong, instead of an errant thread hanging free, was tucked into the quilt of Gideon’s life.
Times were always tough on the farm, and 1958 was the worst in a long line of drought, the fields of wheat rendered sickly and small. As ususal, they got by on Angela’s potato and bean-diet, until that summer, when Gideon went with his father to get the milk check and deposit it, to pay down the farm’s debt and have a little left over; this was a big day around the Pope household, signifying the end, for a time, of potatoes and beans because, after cashing the check, Nelson Pope would pick up a big roast, a monster, which Angela would cook up with carrots and onions and cloves, inviting family and friends to share the bounty. Afterwards, there’d be a sing-along followed by fresh ice-cream made right there in the kitchen; Gideon loved helping make ice-cream, his part being to sit on the ice-cream maker as his father ground the ice and salt and cream.


On the day Gideon and his father went to the bank to deposit the milk check, a man was hell-bent on stealing the bank’s money. They were walking in and the bank-robber was backing out— menacing the tellers and customers with a blue-steel automatic— and Nelson, catching the man unaware, wrestled him to the ground. But the man broke free and in the tussle, the gun discharged and Nelson, the milk check still in the hip pocket of his overalls, fell dead to the ground. The bank-robber had turned to Gideon— not yet 15 and down the two most important men in his life— and all that was visible over the bandana were the robber’s eyes.


“Sorry, kid,” the bank-robber said, before racing to his car. The man, named Horace ‘Dirty Socks’ Hicks, was caught three days later, shot dead after washing his socks in the sink.
Once more, grief descended upon the Pope farm in west Kansas, just north of the Oklahoma border. Angela retired behind the bible, claiming it was somehow part of God’s plan. Ellen returned home from nursing school in Kansas City, to help with the hurt and to help with the farm, but neither could be helped. Angela, deciding it was pointless to struggle to keep the debt-ridden farm until the bank got everything, got what she could; the sale of the thousand acres and tractor, all that Gideon’s father had earned in a life-time of hard work, earned them enough for gas to go cross-country, to Los Angeles, and three months rent in an apartment in Whittier. Angela, Faith and Iris got jobs at the Coca-Cola plant, working long days. On Friday nights, Angela she and Gideon’s sisters went to the Methodist dances, and sometimes, when he wasn’t drinking beers with the Gonzalez brothers, Gideon went with them. Adjusting to LA wasn’t easy— even in the late-Fifties, it was a big city, and much bigger than anything in west Kansas— but Gideon managed to do well in school and even to play football for Whittier High. He wore number 28 and made flying tackles that earned him write-ups in the Herald-Examiner and the Times and gained him all-city honors while attracting notice from college recruiters. Scholarship offers came from Oregon, Ohio State and Nebraska and others, but none from his beloved Kansas Jayhawks, who were extraordinarily deep at linebacker that year, nor from UCLA or USC, who simply were not interested. With nothing close to his mom and sisters, with nothing at KU, and with no intention of ever having anything to do with the ‘Huskers, Pope turned his focus to the east. The Naval Academy had noticed his crisp tackles and high grades. At his mother’s urging, Gideon accepted the offer to play at Annapolis.


He was never what you’d call the star there— that designation belonged to a man by the name of Staubach— but he did well; his key tackle against Army helped seal the grudge match of ‘67. After tours aboard the carriers Independence and Ticonderoga, Pope left the Navy in ‘74 to a bittersweet homecoming: Mom had died of breast cancer in ‘69, Faith of the same in ‘70 and Iris in an automobile crash on Christmas day 1973, less than a mile from Pope and Margie’s tiny San Pedro apartment.


Following the Navy, Pope applied to the FBI and was quickly accepted, and after Quantico, was assigned to the San Francisco field office, finding himself shortly thereafter present at the arrest of Patty Hearst and her SLA captors.


Over the years, he and Margie were moved all over the country, as the Bureau is wont to do, spending time in Tacoma, Jacksonville, Boston and Santa Fe, before being posted to the San Diego Field office as SAC, through a kind of luck unheard of in the FBI, he’d been here ever since.