“What do I know? I only work here. How about you? You still on the job?”
I nodded.
Wendy Vann said, “Good.”
She turned to go.
I said, “Wendy.”
She stopped.
“Chow Wan Li.”
The corner of her mouth curled with a tiny smile.
“I hear you.”
I watched her cross the lawn, then started my car and idled away. I meandered around Toluca Lake, thinking about Josh and his parents and the guards and a phrase Jon Stone used. These cats lived under so many layers of black they ceased to exist. Yet here they were in Toluca Lake. Maintaining an outwardly normal life must have been stressful when their true lives were hidden by lies. Spies and criminals thrived on lies, but Adele and Corbin had been college professors. Not to say professors couldn’t be liars, but once the Schumachers entered the black, they’d been forced to lie to their parents, their siblings, their oldest and dearest friends, and their child. I wondered if all the lying had driven them apart. I wondered if Adele’s paranoia was the result and the strain had caused Corbin to focus his frustration on Josh. I couldn’t know these things and never would. None of it mattered. Maybe I was just giving myself a reason to continue.
I was heading west on Ventura toward Laurel when Eddie Ditko called. I cringed when I saw his name on the caller ID. I didn’t want to answer. I was tired. I wanted to go home, wash off the day, and sleep. I pulled over and answered.
First thing he said was “Can you hear me? Hello? Goddamnit.”
“Eddie, I’m here.”
“They let you out already?”
“I’m out.”
“Sue’m. A cop farts sideways these days, whiny scumbags bank a fortune.”
“I’m good. What did you find out?”
“Okay, listen. The Sandman helped the Crystal Emperor get built. They had problems out the ass with the planning commission, but once the Sandman stepped in, the problems disappeared.”
“Business as usual. So what?”
“So LWL and Crystal Future have five more projects up for approval and all five are sailing through committee faster than a goose shits buttered bullets. Wanna guess who’s paving the way?”
“Richter.”
“I heard this from two different sources.”
“Meaning what, he’s on the take? They’re all on the take.”
“Damn. You must be having a bad day.”
“Nothing eight or nine beers won’t fix.”
“Maybe this will help. You have these other firms on your list, Dieder-Scotti, Mendez-Warren, Block Sixteen, these other developers.”
I had listed them, but only a few of the articles focused on them and their projects.
“Are they paying the Sandman, too?”
Eddie made the heh-heh laugh.
“Nah, but maybe they should. They all had projects killed in committee by the Sandman or his friends. What I’m hearing is, if a developer won’t play ball, his project doesn’t get approved.”
“Hang on. Are you saying Richter shakes down developers?”
“Do the math. Which brings us back to Crystal Future’s partner, LWL. A guy named Horton Tarly owns LWL. Ever heard of him before now?”
Tarly was mentioned in several of the articles, but otherwise I’d never heard of him.
“No.”
“Me neither, and I hear everything.”
“Is this important?”
Eddie made the snide heh.
“Tarly started out building car washes over in San Gabriel and worked his way up to low-rent strip malls. So ask yourself, here’s this international hotel chain from China, got all the money in the world, they wanna build hundred-million-dollar projects here in L.A., why in hell would they partner with a car wash guy from San Gabriel?”
“Should I break out the Ouija board or guess?”
“Horton Tarly is married to Grady Locke’s sister.”
And just like that, I saw it. Rachel and Grady Locke, Grady Locke and Richter, Richter and Chow Wan Li. Rachel and Josh.
I said, “Chow Wan Li used Tarly to get in bed with Locke and Richter. They’re partners by marriage.”
Eddie cackled.
“See? You’re not stupid.”
“Neither are they.”
“It’s a smart play. Tarly’s local, which looks good to members who don’t like all this foreign money buying up the city. Tarly and his little car wash business plays the front. Chow’s the wizard behind the curtain, paying off Richter. Richter green-lights their projects and—I promise you—he does not work cheap. We just gotta find it.”