Violent Spring Read online

  “Because it makes sense politically. As you may know, my organization, the Korean Urban Council, has taken public stands against some of the more reactionary positions of the KAMG.”

  “You think you can change the Merchants Group’s perspective?”

  “Provide an alternative viewpoint at times. As Rodney King said in the wake of 4/29, ‘We’re all stuck here for a while.’ So we either try to build it up as one, or L.A. might make Sarajevo look like a rehearsal.”

  Their food and coffee came. “Why wasn’t Suh a member of the Merchants Group?” Monk asked.

  “The way I understand it,” Kenny Yu said over a mouthful of eggs, “is that early on he was, but gradually he came to fewer meetings, until finally they expelled him.”

  “Any reasons given for why Suh didn’t come around.”

  “Like I said, it was before my time. Contrary to popular belief, Koreans can have sharp differences of opinions like anyone else. And there’s plenty of chances of that in the Merchants Group.”

  “Yet you’re a member.”

  “It’s only when I and some of my comrades from college and law school started the KUC that the elders took attention of us.”

  “Particularly since you began to get better press than them.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Who are the big players in the Merchants Group?”

  Kenny Yu swallowed a dollop of coffee and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Li you know.”

  “Aside from being the president of the Merchants Group, what does he do?”

  “Business ventures, import, export, has a little money in property and a couple of car dealerships.”

  “Where’d the money come from?”

  “You’d have to ask brother Li about that,” he said wryly. “Though I have heard his family had it back in the old country. Heavy industry or something like that.”

  “Okay. Who else?”

  “Park Hangyoung owns property big-time. The office building where the Merchants Group is, for instance. He was one of the developers of the Western Gardens Plaza, and has some land out in Orange County.”

  “In the name of Jiang Holdings.”

  Yu looked at the ceiling then at Monk. “It sounds familiar, but honestly, I’m not sure.”

  “Are either of these two on the board of Ginwah Bank?”

  “Born of them are as well as John Hong.”

  “And he’s in the Merchants Group?”

  “Yes, he’d taught math on the university level in South Korea and does some consulting work here and some teaching in junior colleges.”

  “I see.”

  “Possibly you don’t. It’s not some grand conspiracy for three middle-aged, connected men, men who know how to work the American system, to be on boards where those abilities can come in handy.”

  “Capitalists are capitalists after all.”

  Yu lifted his coffee cup and tipped it in Monk’s direction.

  The meal ended, Monk paid the tab, thanked Kenny Yu for his time, and went to his office.

  “Hey, you look tired.” Delilah stood at the coffee machine pouring herself a cup. She wore acid-washed denims so tight Monk swore they were tattooed on.

  “You ain’t never lied. Dexter didn’t call, did he?” Involuntarily, Monk found himself twitching his head, as if the FBI’s listening device would suddenly appear at the sound of the secret word.

  “Somebody called the machine around three-thirty this morning. There was some beep, beeps, you know like punching the star button repeatedly, then—”

  “Give it to me,” Monk shouted, cutting her off.

  “Sure.” Delilah removed the standard cassette from the answering machine and Monk ran down to his car. For the better part of Sunday, he and Jill had inspected the Galaxie searching for a bug. They found nothing, which didn’t totally relieve Monk’s anxiety, but it was as safe a haven as he could manage under the circumstances.

  Monk turned on the car’s ignition and placed the tape into the radio’s cassette player. He heard the phone coming online and then a series of long and short beeps. It wasn’t Morse Code, which he’d learned in the Merchant Marines, but they were deliberate bursts. Therefore, he knew it was from Grant. His message about the Cork had put Grant on guard. That, and probably what he’d learned about the past of Bong Kim Suh.

  Monk replayed the beeps. Again, and again. Whatever it meant, it wasn’t coming to him. He was thinking too hard about it, wanting to solve it right then and there. He played the tape once again. But this time to put it in his brain, let it gestate there and hopefully the answer would sprout in the relaxed soil of his mind.

  He turned off the power and got out of the car and returned to his office, the tape in his jacket pocket.

  He called O’Day’s office but was told he was out of town. He then dialed Luis Santillion, but he was out and not expected back until the afternoon. He got Elrod on the phone.

  “Any luck on what we talked about?”

  “A little something. Matter of fact—”

  Monk stopped him. “Right on. I’ll be over there around two. We’ll talk about it then.”

  “Sure, boss.” The big man severed the line.

  Monk went out into the rotunda. He got another tape from a desk drawer and inserted it into the answering machine. He could feel Delilah’s curiosity burning into him. “I’m sorry about yelling at you, D.”

  She cocked her head. “It goes with the job.”

  “I’ve got some stuff to do away from the office, and I’ll probably be in after three if anyone calls.”

  “All right,” she said, still waiting for an answer.

  Monk only gave her an enigmatic look and turned at the sound of the door to the reception area opening. Marasco Seguin and another cop, a large brother he didn’t know, entered.

  Seguin said hi to Delilah, then to Monk. “They want to see you over at the station, right away, home.”

  Monk looked at his friend. “I’m kind’a busy right now, Marasco. You’re the ones that stood up our last date.”

  The other cop slid his hooded eyes over Monk, lingered on Delilah, then swept the room. Effortlessly, he dipped a large hand into an inside pocket and produced a summons. He put it on the desk, stood back, and winked at Monk. He clasped his hands in front of his body. A copper Golem in a business suit.

  Seguin looked at Monk. “This isn’t just about what the Bureau wants, Ivan. The captain wants you brought in to answer some questions about the death of Stacy Grimes.”

  “Who?” Monk said sincerely.

  “Crew cut blonde gentleman who worked as a security guard at the Odin Club. A young fella you had an altercation with last week,” the other cop said quietly.

  Monk felt the air rush into his open mouth.

  He sat at the table in the room he’d waited vainly in last Friday. Seguin and the black cop, Roberts, sat opposite him. FBI agents Keys, who Monk recognized as the one who’d blacked out the camera at the televised bust, and Diaz leaned against the wall on either side of the door. Each had their hands buried in their pockets and impassively assessed Monk. White-shirted bookends looking to put the squeeze on him, he reasoned pragmatically.

  “What was the fight about?” Roberts asked casually. Those sleepy eyes of his and easy-going manner didn’t sandbag Monk. He knew it was all an act, that underneath it lay a taut intelligence waiting to crush you in its coils.

  “As I’ve already told you several times, Detective Roberts, after my meeting with Maxfield O’Day, I went to raise the gate which Mr. Grimes deliberately brought down in front of me, and subsequently, he and I got into a fight.”

  “But you’re the one that tackled him,” Diaz contributed.

  Who the fuck was in charge here? Monk wanted to know. “He called me the big ‘N,’ Agent Diaz. And from his hostile body language, it was apparent Grimes intended bodily harm against me.”

  “You don’t know that for a fact,” Keys declared.

  “I know that from experien
ce, Agent Keys.”

  “Bart Samuels says the gate was up and you stopped your car, rushed out of it, then pulled Grimes out of his boom, attacking him for no reason,” Roberts said.

  “Samuels is lying. You know what size Grimes was. Does it look like I could just pull him out of the booth? And if it did happen like that, why didn’t Grimes press charges?”

  “Maybe he was scared you’d kill him,” Roberts offered.

  “Why? What’s my motivation for killing a perfect stranger?”

  “In addition to his duties at the Odin Club, Grimes did free-lance strong arm stuff. Could be you two crossed paths and you had an old score to settle,” Keys emphasized.

  “Could be my sister’s got wheels, you know what I’m saying.”

  They all gave him the universal I’ve-heard-it-all-before bored-cop-look.

  “For whom did Grimes do some of his work?” Monk asked.

  “You’re here to answer our questions, Mr. Monk,” Keys retorted, straightening up from the wall and folding his arms across his lean body.

  “Can you establish your whereabouts for last night?” Roberts said, shifting his powerful frame uncomfortably on the plastic chair.

  “For what hours, and where was he killed?”

  A perturbed look made a fleeting impression on Roberts’ face. Legally, he had to tell Monk. “Around eleven-thirty last night. Grimes was killed in his apartment in Hermosa Beach.”

  “Yes.”

  “Judge Kodama,” Keys said.

  “That’s right,” Monk replied. It galled him that his life was a file on this bastard’s desk, but what were the lives of others he too had compiled information on? Fuck it. Monk wished he had a file on Keys.

  “She’ll swear to that?” Diaz said skeptically.

  “What do you think?”

  “You tell me, champ,” Diaz replied, coming off the wall and walking half the distance to the table.

  Monk sat and said nothing.

  The phone rang in the corner. Roberts ambled over to it and picked up the receiver. He listened for a moment, said something, then hung up. “That was Monk’s lawyer, Judge Kodama. There’s an electronic writ on the way releasing Monk.” Roberts came back to his seat. “Solid chick to have around, bro’.” He winked at Monk again.

  Monk realized that everyone in the room knew that sitting judges could not, ethically speaking, represent clients. He also figured they wouldn’t push it, not at this stage, anyway.

  “The writ only applies to the subject of the murder investigation,” Keys began. “The task force still has questions concerning what you know or don’t know about the whereabouts of Crosshairs Sawyer.”

  “I have another game we can play, Agent Keys.” Monk sat up straight in his chair. “Why don’t you tell me why it was the task force that arrested me on what would appear to be an unrelated murder charge? No, wait, I’ll tell you. I’m betting because the expired Mr. Grimes is another piece in the puzzle.”

  “You’re in no position to be flip,” Keys said irritably.

  “I’ll tell you what I’m in a position to do, agent Keys. I’m in a position to tell you that Grimes was probably found with at least one, if not more, .32-caliber screw-turn brass bullets pumped into the back of his skull.”

  Keys tugged on a cuff link. His eyes, clear and narrow behind the thin lenses of his glasses, transfixed themselves on Monk. Roberts nodded slightly and Seguin smiled. Diaz looked beside himself.

  Diaz leaned on the table, pushing his face toward Monk. “And just how would you have knowledge of that?”

  “It’s called deduction, Agent Diaz. That’s how Bong Kim Suh was murdered. ’Course maybe you over-slept the day when they had that lesson at the Academy.”

  Roberts snorted. Diaz fumed. Monk sat back in the chair and crossed his legs. Keys again leaned against the wall. Diaz returned to his position midway between the table and the wall. He took out a stick of gum and eased it into his mouth. A puff adder devouring its prey.

  “What do you know about the whereabouts of Sawyer?” Keys said.

  Unwaveringly, Monk said, “Nothing.”

  “It’s a federal offense to lie to a member of the Bureau,” Diaz offered, meticulously chewing his gum. “Not to mention the possibility of an obstruction of justice charge.” He turned sideways, chewing, and staring at the wall.

  “If you can prove different, oh excuse me, if you can prove legally that you know different,” Monk emphasized, “do it.” He stood up and started for the door. Keys opened it for him.

  “This isn’t our last visit, slick,” the bespectacled agent said. He tilted his head in mock deference to Monk.

  “I’m counting the hours until our next encounter.” Monk stepped out into the hall. The door closed at his back. And the chill that fluttered along his neck wasn’t from its wind.

  MONK GOT OVER to his donut shop after three. Entering the place, he saw Abe Carson perched at the counter. The tall carpenter methodically stirred a cup of coffee, lost in his thoughts. He turned at the approach of Monk.

  “What’s going on?” he said.

  “The usual, Abe. Elrod around?”

  “He wasn’t here when I got here.” Carson pointed a lengthy digit toward the back. “That kid, Lonny, is here though.”

  Lonny was a member of a rap group called The Exiles, and they played rave scenes and underground clubs around town waiting to be discovered. To make ends meet, he worked at the donut shop part-time. “Okay.” Monk disappeared into his office and called Elrod’s home, an apartment over on Denker. There was no answer. Monk returned to the front.

  Lonny was waiting on a customer and Abe now sipped the coffee in his slow, precise way.

  “What up, chief?” Lonny drawled, handing two jelly donuts to the customer. He was dressed in baggy print shorts, a Cross Colours over-sized T, and a Raiders cap backwards on his shaved scalp. A club-worn pair of Doc Marten boots rounded out his attire.

  They shook the soul handshake and Monk said, “Do you know where Elrod went?”

  “He told me it had something to do with what you’d asked him to check on. He said he’d call you tonight.”

  The last thing Monk wanted was Elrod calling to tell him where to find Crosshairs with Keys listening in. Monk hurried toward the rear. “If he comes back, tell him I’ll call him.”

  “Solid, Ted, see you later, Fred.”

  Monk went by Elrod’s place and left a note explaining that if he called him later, make it seem as if he’d rung up about something else. Realizing it was past four, Monk drove to the address he’d been given for James Robinson, another ex-employee of the Hi-Life liquor store. The information O’Day had supplied stated that Robinson got off work at 3:15 in the afternoon and got home around four. Unlike Karen Jacobs and Conrad James who were in their twenties, or even Ursua who was in his thirties, Robinson was listed as fifty-two. And he lived with his mother.

  The house was a neat and trim Spanish-Mediterranean located close to Manchester and 10th Avenue. The lawn had been cut within the last week, and the hedges that surrounded the home were shaped into organic green rectangles. Monk walked up to a road-weary ’73 Olds Cutlass with mismatched tires in the driveway. He felt the hood; it was still warm. He walked to the door and knocked. There was no answer, and he knocked again.

  A surly “Yeah” leapt from the other side.

  “Mr. Robinson?”

  The same “Yeah” repeated.

  Monk said who he was and what he wanted.

  “What the fuck do I care about that dead Korean?” came the reply through the door.

  “Look man,” Monk said to the door. “I’m not going to take much of your time, I just want to ask a few questions.”

  “Ain’t nothin’ I can tell you ’bout that Korean mess.”

  “You talk to me or you talk to the cops,” Monk bluffed.

  “Shit.” A beat, then the door swung inward. The man on the other side of it was over six feet tall, about Monk’s color, and carried a pot
belly topped with a sunken chest. He wore faded Levi’s and an athletic shirt with a purplish stain over his right breast. His feet were encased in dirty white socks, and his left hand, the right was still on the knob, held a red plastic tumbler that clinked with ice.

  “Goddamn,” Robinson said, “they make black private motherfuckin’ dicks like Shaft an’ shit?”

  Monk showed him the proof and entered uninvited. The door led directly into the living room. The rug was of the industrial variety and needed a shampooing. The furniture did not match Robinson’s personality. Bright flower-print fabric exploded on all the pieces, and everything was preserved in plastic. Robinson took a seat in a low-slung upholstered chair, his leg draped over one of the arms. The front door stood open.

  Monk stood in front of the other man. “I’ve talked with Karen Jacobs about the time she used to work at the Hi-Life.”

  “That uptight bitch.” Robinson took a swig of his drink, which Monk could tell was booze from its odor.

  “You ask her out, is that it, Mr. Robinson?”

  A baleful eye peered at Monk over the rim of the cup. “You here to ask about Suh, or my love life?” he said, lowering the tumbler.

  Monk swallowed a witty come-back. “I’m sorry, that’s none of my business.”

  “Fuckin’ right it ain’t.”

  Monk sat on the couch. Plastic crinkled like dry cereal giving in to the weight of his body. “Is there anything you can tell me about Suh that might be of interest?”

  Robinson farted and didn’t try to hide it. “Now what the fuck do you think, home stump? I worked there, I went home. Me and Suh didn’t get all buddy-buddy like James and him. Shit, he’s the one you should be askin’.”

  “Do you know where he might be?”

  “Fuck no.” He took another pull on his drink.

  “Son?”

  Monk and Robinson turned at the new sound. An elderly woman, wrapped in a thick shawl, rolled into the dining room. An archway separated it from the front room. She was in a wheelchair, and her hands, younger looking than the rest of her, gripped the rubber rimmed wheels. “Son,” she repeated, “are you going to get that gate fixed tonight? Those dogs are getting into my carnations, you know.” She jabbed a finger at Monk. “I don’t have time for your no account friends dropping by when you got work to do.”