Private #1 Suspect (Private 2)

I didn’t see a crack of hope.

They had me, and if they could they would destroy me.

CHAPTER 55

TANDY AND ZIEGLER broke a path through the thick clots of gangbangers between the street and the chain-link fence surrounding the prison building. A guard opened the gate, Tandy spoke, and we were led through a number of checkpoints until we reached an interrogation room on the ground floor.

This small gray room was a gateway to the grand cesspool of the men’s jail, a hellhole built to hold a quarter of the eighteen thousand inmates warehoused here at any given time.

I expected to see Eric Caine waiting for me, but I should have known better. Twin Towers was a daunting, 1.5-million-square-foot maze, and defense attorneys were not welcomed here.

Ziegler closed the interview room door, blew his nose into a tissue, and lobbed the wad across the room into a wastebasket.

Tandy said, “You need anything, Jack?”

This was his good-buddy act, which was somehow more threatening than when Tandy was showing me the sadistic SOB he really was.

I said, “I’ve got nothing to say until I see my lawyer.”

“Sit down,” Ziegler said.

He shoved me in the direction of a metal chair, and as I stumbled toward it, Ziegler stuck out his foot and I went down, chin first, on the linoleum floor.

Tandy helped me to my feet, saying, “I’m sorry, Jack. Len didn’t mean to do that. It was an accident.”

Even cuffed, I could have gotten in a groin kick Ziegler would have remembered for a couple of months, but I knew what would happen to me after that.

“Sure, what else could it have been?”

Tandy said, “You’re not getting mouthy with us, are you, Jack? That wouldn’t be smart.”

Ziegler and Tandy hoisted me to my feet and angled me into the chair. I wondered who was behind the one-way glass and if Fescoe knew I was about to be worked over.

“I’ve got to admit it,” Tandy said. “We sent your lawyer on a little detour, kind of a runaround. It’ll take him a while to find you, but we did it for your benefit. We’ve got information you’re going to appreciate.”

“Ah. I get it, Mitch. You’re going to help me.”

Tandy walked behind me to a spot where I couldn’t see him. Ziegler sat two feet away from me. He cleaned his nails with his pearl-handled pocket knife. Len Ziegler was a vain man. He worked out. He dressed well. But there wasn’t much he could do about his weak chin and his little pig eyes.

“Listen, Jack,” Ziegler said. “This is as close to a slam dunk as the LAPD has ever seen.”

He listed the physical evidence they had against me, then said, “You made a phone call to your brother at around the time the victim bought it. We talked to Tommy. We leaned on him. Hard. He says all he got was a hang-up call. But here’s the thing, Jack. You established your presence at the scene.”

“Why’d you make that phone call?” Tandy asked. “That’s a mystery to me. Did you dial by mistake? Do you have a guilty subconscious?”

“I don’t understand that phone call either,” I said. “I didn’t call Tommy. As soon as I saw what happened, I called 911. Mitch, given your theory of the crime, why on earth would I have called Tommy?”

Tandy said, “Well, I asked Tommy about that. I spent a couple of hours with him. He has a good alibi and nothing good to say about you. Frankly, and I tell you this as a guy who’s been a cop for twenty years, you are so cooked, I don’t know when I’ve been happier. Len, have you ever seen me this happy?”

“I think when you hit the trifecta at Santa Anita you were over the moon, but it’s a close call.”

“One Fine Day. That was that filly’s name.” Tandy laughed at the memory, then said, “I’m just an intermediary at this point; you know that. It’s the chief who asked me to help you out.”

Ziegler folded his knife and put it in his back pocket. “Fescoe said to tell you, if you save the city the cost and trouble of a trial, if you make a statement detailing what you did, Mickey will take care of you. He said he would do that. And to remind you that he and the DA are the best of friends.”

“I didn’t kill Colleen.”

Tandy put his hands on my shoulders and tipped my chair over backward. I went down, and when my head was on the floor, Ziegler tapped it with the toe of his shoe. It was jus