Private #1 Suspect (Private 2)

I looked beyond him into the room and saw a murder scene horrifying enough to shake up a kid with a degree in hotel management. It shook me up too, and I’d been through a war.

A man lay dead, half on the bed, half on the floor. A homemade wire garrote with two wooden handles had been pulled so hard around his neck an artery had been severed. The victim’s blood had splashed onto the unmade bed before he died.

“That’s Mr. Albert Singh,” said Knowles. “He checked in at one a.m. Had the ‘Do Not Disturb’ light on all day. He didn’t put any charges on his bill.”

Mr. Singh looked to be in his twenties, was wearing briefs and a white T-shirt. He had a wedding band on the ring finger of his outstretched hand.

“Ms. Poole, I said I’d wait for you,” Knowles was saying to Jinx, “and now you’re here. I’ve had enough, Ms. Poole. Here are my keys and my pass. I’ll send back my uniform, but I have to go home—”

I touched his arm, interrupting his exit speech.

“Mr. Knowles. I’m Jack Morgan, Private Investigations. I work for Ms. Poole. Talk to me for a minute. Tell me what happened.”

His voice was a screech. “Like I know? Housekeeping knocked on the door. There was no answer. The housekeeper came in and saw this.”

Old hotels, even those renovated in high style, weren’t designed with modern security in mind. If the killer was running true to form, he’d ducked the cameras. It might actually be impossible to secure this hotel and still keep it open for business.

If Mr. Singh was like the five other men killed in this manner, my theory was that he had hired a hooker. Sometime after she’d left, he’d let the killer into his room. Maybe a limo driver pretending that he was a hotel engineer investigating a leak, or hotel security. Most guests would let the guy in.

The LAPD was working the case, and we hadn’t gotten in their way. But we hadn’t helped them either. We had an unproven theory.

That was pretty much all we had.

Like Knowles, I felt like calling it quits. I was sorry I had taken the job. Sorry I had let Jinx down.

“Jinx, we have to call the police,” I said.

She had her fist to her mouth. I wasn’t sure she even heard me. I took out my cell phone and called it in.

Then I called Del Rio.

“I was just calling you,” he said. “We’ve got breaking news on the hotel john killer. Come quick. We need you to talk to someone, Jack. Someone who needs convincing.”

CHAPTER 109

I HAD A clear view of the hotel’s entrance through the windows of the late Albert Singh’s room. Cops streamed into the Sun’s driveway, and sirens wailed as more sped up South Santa Monica Boulevard.

I put my hands on Jinx’s shoulders and made eye contact with her. I said, “I’ll call you as soon as I can. You’re going to be all right.”

I didn’t want to leave her, but Del Rio said he needed me urgently. I had to go.

I left the hotel by the rear exit, got my car out of the lot, and drove to Fifth Street. I found Del Rio and Cruz in a garbage-strewn alley called Werdin Place. A half block from King Eddy’s, Werdin ran between buildings and served as a parking place for owners of the businesses on the block. The shops were closed for the night, and Werdin was deserted.

Cruz greeted me at the top of the alley. Behind him, Del Rio held his gun on a forty-ish black man who was sitting on the ground, his fingers interlaced behind his neck. He was in what we called “Private custody.”

Del Rio said, “Jack, I’d like you to meet Mr. Tyson Keyes.”

Keyes didn’t look at me, kept his eyes on the heap of trash bags ten feet away.

Del Rio had filed a report after he’d talked to the bouncer from Havana. The bouncer had told Del Rio that Keyes was a felon of the violent kind and that he knew the name of the hotel john killer.

Del Rio said, “Mr. Morgan, Mr. Keyes doesn’t want to talk to us. I told him if he didn’t tell us who killed those johns, I would blow his head off, but that corporate policy dictates I get your permission first.”

I stooped down to Keyes’s level. “Mr. Keyes,” I said, “no one will call in shots coming from this location. You know that. And here’s something you don’t know. Mr. Del Rio has nothing to lose. He has cancer. He’ll be dead before he ever sees jail again.”

I looked past Cruz’s startled expression, said, “It’s metastasized, isn’t that right, Rick?”

“Right you are, Jack. I’ve made peace with my maker. I’m ready to go at any time.”