Tropical Depression (Billy Knight Thrillers 1)

gers. There’s one shot, bam, and Hector goes down.” There was a small catch in her voice as she said it.

“Did you see where the shot came from?”

She shook her head. “I was inside the store with my father. I couldn’t even hear what they were saying. But I could hear the shot.”

“Okay, you couldn’t see the shot. But you saw Hector. How did he fall?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, when the shot hit him, how did he fall? Did he go straight back? Did he twist left or fall forward? What? How did he fall?”

She nodded. “I get it. He like twisted down. Sort of—” She showed me there on the sidewalk, in slow motion, a strange watusi of a fall. It was like she was screwing herself into the pavement. I nodded at her.

“Okay. So the shot came from above.”

“Hey,” she said, and looked very thoughtful. I looked up at the building, and then at the bank next door.

“Can I see the roof?”

She nodded again, suddenly very brisk. “Sure. This way.”

Lin led me around to the back of the building, where a fire escape climbed up the side to the roof. She pulled on a rope tied to a length of rusty chain and the lower stair slid down. I held it for her and then followed her up.

Halfway up a woman’s voice yelled something and Lin yelled back. She turned and gave me a small grimace of a smile. “My mother,” she said apologetically.

She led me up to where the steps turned into one last iron ladder bolted to the wall of the building, and climbed it to the roof. I followed, being very conscious that to look upward at the legs of a seventeen-year-old girl, no matter how gorgeous, was indecent beyond measure. Keeping that thought firmly in mind, I climbed out onto the roof a moment later, and I only looked once.

As I climbed onto the gravel roof I could see Lin ahead, about thirty feet away. There was a desperately ratty lawn chair and a few milk crates sitting in a clump. I came up behind Lin and she spoke without looking at me. “We used to come up here all the time. Just—you know, to talk.” She flashed me a furiously embarrassed look. “Not what you think. Just talking. It was like our hangout, the whole posse and everybody.”

I nodded and looked at the chair.

“Hector was an amazing guy,” she said. “But my father—all he could see was this black boy, and it freaked him out. Told me I couldn’t see Hector at all. So I had to like sneak away to talk to him. And Hector wasn’t just—he wanted—”

She stopped altogether for a moment. She frowned and stepped to the chair. A worn Dodgers baseball cap was underneath. She picked it up, brushed it off with the back of her hand, and set it on the seat of the chair. “Anyway, I guess he had something he wanted to prove to my father, which is like maybe why he did some of that, you know. Nonviolent confrontation. So my father would see, here’s a man. Who was tough and stubborn, just like my father. I don’t know,” she said, and sat on the milk crate.

So she was feeling guilty about Hector’s death, too. It wasn’t enough that she had to feel his loss and her father’s disapproval. Poor lovely child, carrying a weight so much heavier than herself. Carrying it quite well, too. Tough and stubborn—a chip off the old block. If he could only understand his daughter he would be quite proud of her.

I felt that I should say something, but I couldn’t think what. So I watched her for a minute. She just sat, looking down at the roof between her feet.

I turned away to give her some privacy. At the western edge of the building the bank loomed up. It was some twenty feet higher than the roof I stood on, and there was a gap of about twenty-five feet between the two buildings. I walked over to the edge and stood looking at the bank building. There wasn’t much to see, but I saw it anyway.

Screwed into the side of the building was a large and healthy-looking stainless steel eyebolt. I pulled at it. It seemed very solid, strong enough to hold my weight and a lot more. I tried to think what might go there that would need a bolt that big. Window-washing equipment? Not on a building like this. Bungee cord?

I gradually became aware of a strong smell of cheap cologne. I stood up and turned back towards Lin.

The two comedians and four of their friends stood facing me in a half-circle, about eight feet away. The friends were stamped from the same mold; young, baggy clothes, Raiders paraphernalia. One of them was Chicano, one of them Korean. The others were black. They didn’t look very friendly.

“What’s happening, ghost?” said Porkpie Hat.

I nodded. “Something on your mind?”

He took a step forward. “No, man, something on my roof.” The others laughed and inched forward. They smelled blood and they liked it. I smelled it, too, mixed with the cheap cologne, but I wasn’t happy about it.

“Did you know Hector McAuley?” I asked them.

They got very serious very fast. “What’s it to you, ghost?”

“His father was a friend of mine. He asked me to look into Hector’s murder.”