There weren’t any cameras mounted outside, to make the place seem like easy pickings, but there were plenty of them hidden inside, strategically aimed at the windows to show them, and the deputy on duty at Lost Hills, all sides of the house. One camera in the guest bedroom upstairs showed them a view of the back hillside, all the way down to the golf course and Parkway Calabasas, while another in the master bathroom gave them a view of the front yard. Other cameras in the house were placed to record video and audio that would be used as evidence if they were ever robbed.
“You’re being eased back into active duty after being seriously injured on the job,” Duncan said, talking with his mouth full. “But don’t fool yourself. This is a big case. The department is spending a fortune on it. If it doesn’t pay off in another day or two, we’ll be back in our cubicles at Lost Hills and you’ll miss this.”
“You mean that you will. You’re getting paid to ride around in a Rolls-Royce, eat free food, and sit in a plush home theater all day watching westerns.”
Duncan washed down a mouthful of corned beef and sourdough with some Diet Coke. “Would you feel better if we were undercover as homeless people, eating rancid scraps from garbage cans and living in cardboard boxes on urine-soaked dirt beside a freeway off-ramp?”
“Yes,” she said.
“You’re just feeling guilty because soon you could be living like this.”
She unwrapped her sandwich. “Never.”
“You just optioned your life story as a TV series.”
The first episode would probably begin with her off-duty arrest of a violent movie star, hero of the globally successful Deathfist movies, and the viral video of the takedown that was shot by onlookers. It would tell how she’d leveraged her popularity with the public, during a time when the LASD was embroiled in scandal and bad press, to get the sheriff to promote her from a lowly deputy to the robbery-homicide division just to keep her at the front of the news cycle. And it would cover her first murder case, the capture of a killer who’d slaughtered a family.
“That doesn’t mean the series will happen,” Eve said. “And even if it does, I’m not giving up this job.”
The idea of her life becoming a TV series made her nauseous. She pushed her sandwich aside. She’d only accepted the deal because a series would be made with or without her involvement and so she’d have the money to hire a decent lawyer. Eve knew it was only a matter of time before she was sued by the widow of the deputy who’d killed himself as a result of her last investigation, the one that left her with a broken sternum.
“The job may give you up first,” Duncan said.
“The department is certainly trying.”
“Yeah, this is brutal,” he said, shaking his head. “Seriously, you need to learn how to relax or you’re gonna burn yourself out before you hit thirty.”
He took another bite of his sandwich. They were quiet for a long moment, then she said, “Urine-soaked dirt?”
“What?”
“Why would we put our cardboard boxes on urine-soaked dirt?”
“Because you enjoy suffering.”
Movement on one of the iPad feeds caught Eve’s eye. She picked up the iPad and saw three men in sunglasses wearing orange-and-yellow SoCalGas company vests over their khaki shirts and blue SoCalGas baseball caps, the brims pulled low over their faces, approaching the front door. The man in the lead held a clipboard. She turned the iPad so Duncan could see the feeds, too.
“We have some visitors,” she said. “I don’t see a gas company truck on the street, do you?”
“Maybe it’s parked around the corner.” He didn’t say it with much conviction.
Her heartbeat jacked up. “Do you think this is it?”
He nodded and slid off his barstool. “Let’s not call the cavalry until we’re sure. You answer the door when they knock. I’ll be in the living room.”
Duncan went to the hallway and got his walker. Eve watched the iPad as the men came to the door. She knew the deputy at Lost Hills was seeing the video feeds, too, and she hoped that he’d already told the dispatcher to alert the nearest patrol cars.
The doorbell rang.
Here we go.
CHAPTER TWO
Eve hid the iPad in the silverware drawer and walked to the front door. The three men were standing outside. Anytime she saw three men she didn’t know, she dubbed them Manny, Moe, and Jack, the Pep Boys, until she had their names. Manny was facing the door, but Moe and Jack were behind him, with their heads bowed down, the brims of their hats obscuring their faces. But she could still tell the Pep Boys were white.