12

12

BALLARD STEALTHILY APPROACHED the door to apartment 211, then leaned her right ear toward the jamb. She heard music playing inside but again couldn't identify it.

She took a step back and checked for a peephole or a Ring camera. There was none. She used the side of her fist to pound loudly on the door.

"Parole, open up!"

She leaned forward again but heard no movement inside—no toilet flushing, no footsteps of someone rushing around trying to hide contraband. She pounded on the door again, this time harder.

"Department of Parole. Open the door or we'll kick it in."

Now she heard the music cut off and footsteps approaching. She unholstered her weapon and held it down at her side.

The door opened and the man from the balcony stood there.

"He's not here," he said.

"Step back," Ballard said.

Dean Delsey saw the gun at her side and raised his hands as he stepped back.

"Whoa, no need for that," he said. "Bobby's not here."

"Are you Dean Delsey?" Ballard asked.

"That's me but—"

"Against the wall. Now."

"Okay, okay."

Delsey turned, spread his hands at shoulder height, and put them on the wall, a move he had clearly made in the past. Ballard used a foot to kick his legs farther apart. She holstered her gun, then placed one hand on his back to keep him in position while using the other to pat him down for weapons.

"Where's your father?"

"I don't know. He went out, didn't tell me where."

"When's he coming back?"

"He didn't say."

"Give me your right hand behind your back."

"Look, you don't need—"

"Right hand behind your back. Now."

He complied. She took the handcuffs out of the waistband at the back of her pants and snapped one around his wrist.

"Now the left."

Delsey complied again, but not without complaint. "I'm just saying, if you're here for him, you don't have to hook me up," he said.

"Who said I'm here for him?" Ballard said. "Move."

She pulled him away from the wall and walked him to the center of the apartment's living room. There was a threadbare couch, a beat-up La-Z-Boy chair with its faux leather cracked and split on the armrests, and a flat-screen TV tuned to a muted music channel.

"On your knees," Ballard said.

"Aw, come on," Delsey said.

"Knees."

"Fuck it."

Delsey dropped to his knees on the uncarpeted terrazzo floor. Ballard grabbed the chain between the cuffs with one hand and the back collar of his Hawaiian shirt with the other.

"Okay, I'm going to lower you onto your belly now. This is for my safety and yours."

"Yeah, bullshit."

Ballard pushed him forward and he went down easily.

"Okay, what is this?" Delsey protested. "Are you here for me or him?"

"For you, Dino," Ballard said. "And I could violate you right now and put you in the pen. I watched you drinking and toking on the balcony ten minutes ago."

"I got news for you: I'm over twenty-one, and recreational use of marijuana is legal."

"And I got news for you: Read the terms of your probation. No alcohol and no drugs, even legal ones, without permission of the court. You want to show me your court permission to get high?"

She waited. Delsey was silent.

"I didn't think so. You are fucked, my friend. I own you."

"Fuck this. I want to see some ID right the fuck now."

"That's funny. I want to see some ID too. My ID. But you took it."

Delsey strained to look up at Ballard standing over him. She saw that he recognized her from the LAPD ID card stolen from her car.

"Yeah, it didn't take me long," Ballard said. "I found your ass."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Delsey said.

"Sure you do. But you know what? This is your lucky day, Dino. If you make it right, you can stay out of jail. Otherwise, we wait here for dear old Dad to come home and see if he wants to make a deal instead. He still has five years on his parole tail. You have eighteen months on your suspended sentence. I'm guessing he'll throw you under the bus to avoid going back to Soledad for the full nickel."

Delsey was silent. Ballard waited.

"What do you want?" he finally said.

Ballard moved over, sat on the couch, and leaned down toward him. His face was on the terrazzo, turned to the side.

"I want my shit back," she said. "All of it."

"Impossible," Delsey said.

"Why is that?"

"Because we don't keep it, okay? I mean, I've still got the wallet and ID card but everything else is long gone, so you're out of luck, Officer."

"If that's the case, then you're the one who's out of luck. You've got one shot here, Dino. Tell me where it went and I cut you loose. Nobody needs to know, not even your father."

Delsey thought about it. After a moment Ballard prodded him.

"The clock is ticking," she said. "All bets are off the minute Daddy comes through that door. What's it going to be, Dino?"

"I hate that," Delsey said. "Would you stop fucking calling me that?"

"Fine. What's it going to be, Dean ? I take off the cuffs or I take you to jail? I'm running out of goodwill here."

"Fuck."

"Yeah, I get it. Life's a bitch. But it is what it is, Dean. So decide."

"All right. We take everything to a guy down the beach. He gives us cash. That's it."

"What guy?"

"His name's Lionel but he calls himself the Lion. I don't know his last name. He's connected to some serious people. My dad knew his dad up at Soledad."

"Where is he exactly?"

"The Eldorado. He lives in one room and does business in another across the hall."

Ballard knew of the Eldorado. It was a dump hotel about ten blocks up Speedway. "How do you reach out to him?" she asked.

"My dad texts him when we have stuff," Delsey said. "That's it."

"You brought him stuff yesterday after ripping me off at Stair-cases?"

"Bobby did, yeah."

"What kind of security does the Lion have?"

"I think there's a guy there. But I don't know for sure. My dad always goes."

"What's his number?"

"I don't know. I've never texted him."

"Then I guess we're going to have to wait here for Bobby to show up. But then he'll know that you snitched. Is that going to be a problem?"

"Look, I don't know the number because it changes all the time. But I know where yesterday's number is."

"Where?"

"In Bo—uh, my father's room. There's a night table next to the bed. He's got a pad in the drawer there and he scratches off the old number and writes the new one down every time."

"And you said you still had my wallet with my ID card. Where is it?"

"My room. There's a table in the same spot."

Most criminals were not smart. Ballard knew that it was usually a criminal's stupidity rather than a detective's great work that led to solving cases. Delsey and son were not shining examples of the criminal mind.

Ballard looked around and saw a bottle of Corona on a pass-through counter to the kitchen. She grabbed it and took it back to the living room. She carefully placed it on Delsey's back between his shoulder blades.

"You move, I'll know it," she said. "You won't want that."

She walked into a short hall that led to two bedrooms with a bathroom between them. In the first bedroom, she found her wallet with her ID card in the top drawer of the bedside table. She was surprised by how relieved she felt at recovering it. The badge was the main thing and that was still out there somewhere, but the ID card got her through security at all city facilities. She could go back to using the front entrance at the Ahmanson Center. All the credit cards that had been in the wallet were gone, but her driver's license was still behind the plastic window. She got another mood lift from that.

Ballard checked the living room to make sure Delsey had not moved, then went into the other bedroom, opened the bedside table drawer, and found the scratch pad. Bobby Delsey had written down seven phone numbers; six of them were crossed out. As Ballard typed the seventh number into her phone, she wondered how long the Delsey duo had been ripping off surfers and fencing the goods through the Lion. She tore the page off the pad and stuffed it in her pocket, hoping it would cut off communication between the Lion and the Delsey duo.

When she put the pad back in the drawer, she noticed a watch with a metal band; it had been hidden behind the scratch pad. She lifted it out and studied the face. There was a brand mark: Breitling. She realized it was probably the watch stolen from Seth Dawson. The watch his father had given him. She turned it over and checked the back. There was an inscription: To Seth from Dad 12-25-21 .

She pushed it over her hand and onto her wrist.

When she returned to the living room, she saw the beer bottle still in place between Delsey's shoulder blades.

"You and your father were using the Surf's Up app to pick your locations," she said.

"Is that a question?" Delsey asked.

"Not really. I'm just telling you I'm onto your game. Is there any code used when texting the Lion?"

"I don't know. My dad always did it."

"Don't move." She put one foot on either side of his body and used a key to remove the handcuffs.

"You should have reached farther under the seat," she said. "You would have gotten my cuffs."

"It wasn't me," Delsey said. "It was my dad. I was just lookout."

"What a team. My guess is you actually knew some of the surfers you ripped off."

Delsey said nothing. Perhaps he felt guilty, but Ballard doubted it.

"Don't tell your dad or anyone else about me. You warn the Lion and I'll fucking come back and find you. You won't want that."

"I'm not going to say anything."

"And I'll tell the Lion it was you who snitched him off. You and Bobby won't want that either."

"I told you, I'm not going to say anything."

"And you're not going to rip off any more surfers. I'll be reading the crime reports every day. One more rip-off at a surf beach and I'll put together a case on you myself."

"How do I tell my dad we have to stop without telling him about you?"

"Just say your probation officer came by and asked questions about the thefts. Convince your dad it's time to move on."

"Easy for you to say."

"I'm a little short on sympathy for you, Dino. In fact, I want to put you and your fucking father in jail and throw away the key. But you got lucky this time. It won't happen with me again."

Ballard went out the door. She was halfway down the stairs when she heard the glass beer bottle rattle and then roll across the apartment's terrazzo floor.

When she got back to Speedway and headed toward her car, she saw a tow truck parked in front of it; the hook was being lowered. A man with white hair pulled into a ponytail stood between the car and the garage door it was blocking. He wore sunglasses and had his arms folded across his chest as he watched the tow truck operator lower the hook. Ballard trotted over before her Defender got attached.

"Hey, hold on!" she yelled over the sound of the truck. "I'm moving it."

"You're too late!" the man with the folded arms yelled back. "It's clearly marked ‘No Parking.' Why do people ignore the signs?"

Ballard walked into the channel between the garage and the car. The man unfolded his arms and held his hands up as if to stop her forward progress.

"I'm sorry," he said. "You ignored the warnings and you'll have to pay Venice Tow if you want it back."

Ballard held up her newly returned ID card. "I was on police business," she said. "Talk about signs—you didn't see the sign on the visor?"

"Uh, what sign?" the man asked.

"Go look."

"I will."

He went all the way around the Defender to get to the front and had to crane his neck to see the OFFICIAL LAPD BUSINESS sign attached to the visor. Ballard followed him and used the key fob to unlock the car.

"That's too small," the man said. "Nobody would notice that."

She opened the driver's-side door, and the man put his hand on her arm to stop her from getting in. Ballard reacted quickly, mostly out of instinct and partly out of the anger she felt at having to let the Delsey duo off the hook. She grabbed the man's wrist with her left hand, seized his elbow with her right, and spun him hard into the passenger door of the Defender.

"Do you want to go to jail for assaulting a police officer?"

"Assault? That was no assault. You assaulted me. "

"You touched me. It was unwanted. That's assault."

"Look, you—"

"No, you look. Go back inside and set your parking trap for somebody else."

The man's mouth dropped open.

"That's right," Ballard said. "I know. You get a nice kickback from the tow yard."

She let him loose. The man turned and silently walked over to the tow truck operator, shaking his head.

Ballard got in the Defender and started it up.