“No names!” Davenport yelled. “Jesus Christ, Ballard, I told you. No. Names.”
“Okay, okay, what do you want me to call you?” Ballard asked. “I want this to be a conversation and I’d like to have a name for the person I’m talking to.”
“How about Jane Doe?” Davenport yelled.
He pronounced the J like an H.
“Okay, never mind,” Ballard said. “Let’s start with what your association was with Las Palmas Thirteen.”
“My fiancé — at least the man I thought was my fiancé — was a leader at the time I was with him,” the woman said. “A shot caller.”
“And you were an informant at that time?”
“Yes, I was.”
“Why?”
The woman spoke without hesitation or trace of an accent. She spoke matter-of-factly about the potentially deadly double life she had led.
“He started fucking around on me. Stepping out with other girls. Gang whores. And nobody does that to me.”
“So you didn’t leave him. You became an informant.”
“That’s right. And I was paid too. My information was good.”
She glanced back at Davenport as if to get confirmation. Davenport said nothing. Ballard had to guess that the fiancé she was talking about was Humberto Viera, who Davenport said went away to Pelican Bay and was never coming back. Ballard was talking to the living embodiment of the scorned-woman warning. Hell hath no fury.
“Fifteen minutes,” Davenport helpfully called out.
“You told your LAPD handler about fourteen years ago that Javier Raffa bought his way out of Las Palmas,” Ballard said. “He paid twenty-five thousand dollars to Humberto Viera. Do you remember that?”
“I do,” the woman said.
“How did you come up with that piece of intel at the time?”
“I saw the money. I saw him deliver it.”
Her seeing the transaction seemed to further confirm that Viera was her fiancé and that his sentence to Pelican Bay was in part due to her vengeance.
“How did that deal come about?” Ballard asked. “Did Raffa just make the offer?”
“It was negotiated,” the informant said. “Raffa wanted out and knew there was only one way — in a box. But my man was greedy. He always thought about himself before the gang. And before me. He told Raffa he could pay his way out. He set the price and helped Raffa get it.”
“Chopping cars?”
“No, Raffa was already doing that. That was his job. He was even called El Chopo by them. Like a joke.”
“So then, where did he get the money?”
“He had to get a loan.”
“Where do you get a loan to get out of a gang?”
“There was a man. People knew him. A banquero callejero. He went to him.”
“A street banker.”
“Yes, he got the money from him. The banquero knew people to get it from. People who wanted to make a loan.”
“Do you remember his name or who he was?”
“I heard he was a cop.”
Davenport flung his door open and came around the front end of the car to Ballard’s window.
“What are you doing?” Ballard said.
His arm came at her and she ducked back. He reached in and pulled her key out of her car’s ignition.
“That’s it,” he said. “No more.”
“What are you talking about, Davenport?” she said. “This is an investigation.”
“And I didn’t sign up to drag no cop into this. Not on my fucking watch.”
“Give me my key.”
Davenport was already moving around his car again, back to his open door.
“I’ll bring it back after I get her where you can’t fucking find her.”
“Davenport, give me the key. I will fucking one-twenty-eight you on this if you — ”
“Fuck you, Ballard. I’ll one-twenty-eight you right back. We’ll see who they believe. You are one beef from the fucking door.”
He jumped back in the car and slammed the door. Ballard focused on the woman.
“Who was the cop?” Ballard asked.
“Don’t you fucking answer,” Davenport yelled.
He looked down at his left, and the passenger window started going up.
“Who was it?” Ballard asked again.
Davenport started the car. The informant just stared at Ballard as her window closed. The car took off, racing across the parking lot to the exit.
“Goddammit!” Ballard yelled. “Shit!”