Private L.A. (Private 6)

I SAT UP all night on a couch outside the surgical facility. Mo-bot joined me around one, Sci an hour later.

Del Rio had gone under the knife at eleven p.m., two hours before I got to the hospital after a short visit to Sanders’s Beverly Hills offices, where a simple e-mail message from a blind source declared, “The children will be released tomorrow. Time to be determined. We contact. Justice has been served. They are innocents.”

As hour upon hour ticked by on the clock with no word from the doctors trying to treat Del Rio’s burns and back, I felt unable to think or talk about the Harlows, or No Prisoners, or Tommy, or Carmine Noccia, for that matter. For the first time in a long time, probably since my mother’s death, I prayed, confessing my belief that I had caused Bud Rankin’s death as surely as No Prisoners had. I was also the reason my best friend was five hours into surgery, and now six. I begged God for mercy, for Rankin’s soul, for Del Rio’s spine.

I didn’t know whom to contact about Rankin. The man had no family and was a real loner. I vowed, however, to honor his passing in some way.

Overriding those thoughts was the fact that I’d always considered Del Rio virtually indestructible—a force fused to me in battle, a fellow marine, a blood brother who would never desert me, a man whom I would never desert. As dawn broke over Los Angeles, the idea of that man in a wheelchair for the rest of his life nearly broke my heart.

I sipped a coffee Sci had gotten me and gazed up, numb, at the television blaring coverage of the bombing and the deaths on the Huntington Beach Pier. The media had much of the story now and was blaring every aspect except, it seemed, Private’s involvement. The mayor was even shown admitting that the explosion had taken place during a phony drop of—

“Jack?” Justine said, shaking me from the screen.

Cruz was there too, but I could only look at her. She looked exhausted. Her right forearm was wrapped in bandages. Her lower face was slightly swollen. And yet she was beautiful as always. But I could see that something had been taken from her in Mexico, or cracked in her in Mexico, and that only served to bewilder me more.

A tiny woman in surgical scrubs exited the operating room. She introduced herself as Dr. Phyllis Oates, chief neurosurgeon at the medical center.

“Who is

Mr. Del Rio’s next of kin?” she asked.

I swallowed hard, instantly feared the worst, and said, “I’m closest.”

For a moment, Dr. Oates just looked at me, and I felt like I was being pushed over a cliff. Then the surgeon managed a tired smile and put her hand on my arm. “I wanted you to know what a lucky, lucky man Mr. Del Rio is. By all rights, he should have been paralyzed from the waist down, but the lineman’s belt and the wet suit held the broken vertebrae in place, prevented them from severing his spinal cord. There’s considerable swelling, and it might take several months, but I believe he’ll walk again. And run.”

I looked at Justine, and Sci, and Mo-Bot and Cruz, and we all began to cry and hug. I don’t remember being happier or more grateful in my entire life.

Chapter 50

“WE’VE GOT THEIR attention now, Mr. Cobb,” Watson said, looking away from several computer screens streaming early-morning coverage of the Huntington Beach Pier explosion, as well as clips from the killings at Malibu and at the CVS.

“We do indeed, Mr. Watson,” Cobb said. “Two more cycles and we’ll have a clear shot at the prize.”

They were inside the garage in the City of Commerce. Cobb was stuffing the Lakers hoodie, the blond wig, the sunglasses, and the cap into a trash bag. There would be no further need for the disguise. It had served its purpose and more. For the time being, law enforcement would be focused on a man answering No Prisoners’ description, which was how Cobb wanted it.

“Today?” Kelleher asked.

“Today we rest and regroup, Mr. Kelleher,” Cobb said. “In the meantime we let the media do its job, get the drumbeat of threat going, build the panic exponentially, get the government worms all squirming like they’ve been plugged into a socket. We let them assure the people that they are safe, and then we wait until we start hearing them speculate that we might be finished, that we’ve left Los Angeles alone. That could be twelve hours after the assurance of safety. Could be thirty-six, or forty-eight.”

“And then we go again?” Johnson said. The wiry black man was sitting on the foot of his cot, cleaning a pistol.

“Yes, Mr. Johnson,” Cobb said. “When that happens we go again. Meantime, anybody up for breakfast at Robby Eden’s? I could go for three eggs over easy, two sides of bacon, and an order of sourdough toast.”

Chapter 51

BY NOON I was running on fumes, riding shotgun with Cruz driving the company Suburban. Justine was in the backseat. So were Sci and Mo-bot. Behind them were stacked boxes of forensics gear.

“I don’t believe the Mexicans,” Justine said for the fourth or fifth time. “The Harlows are down there, Jack. Or were.”

“I’m not saying they aren’t, or weren’t,” I replied. “But the kids can tell us more. And then we’ll decide if we need to go back to Mexico.”

Cruz barreled us into the Beverly Center parking lot ten minutes after Sanders called to say that we would find the children on level six of the luxury shopping mall, near the top of the Macy’s escalator and the Apple Store.

I caught up with Dave Sanders, Camilla Bronson, and Cynthia Maines on the escalator between levels four and five two minutes later. The Harlows’ lawyer was talking on his cell phone, head down, intent. The personal assistant looked like she’d been crying. The publicist wore dark sunglasses and scanned everywhere around her.

“Ms. Maines,” I said. “Surprised to see you here.”

“Camilla called last night,” Maines replied. “She thought I should be here.”