Lantana made the call on a wall phone with a long cord that stretched to the nook. Eventually the phone was handed to Ballard and she stepped into the hallway with Jenkins, pulling the cord to its full extension. She was talking to a fraud alert specialist with an English-Indian accent. Ballard identified herself as a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department and asked for the shipping address that had been entered for the credit-card purchase before it was rejected as possibly fraudulent. The fraud alert specialist said he could not provide that information without court approval.
“What do you mean?” Ballard asked. “You are the fraud alert specialist, right? This was fraud, and if you give me the address, I might be able to do something about it.”
“I am sorry,” the specialist said. “I cannot do this. Our legal office must tell me to do so and they have not.”
“Let me talk to the legal office.”
“They are closed now. It is lunchtime and they close.”
“Then let me talk to your supervisor.”
Ballard looked at Jenkins and shook her head in frustration.
“Look, it’s all going to the burglary table in the morning,” Jenkins said. “Why don’t you let them deal with it?”
“Because they won’t deal with it,” Ballard said. “It will get lost in the stack. They won’t follow up and that’s not fair to her.”
She nodded toward the kitchen, where the crime victim was sitting and looking forlorn.
“Nobody said anything about anything being fair,” Jenkins said. “It is what it is.”
After five minutes the supervisor came on the line. Ballard explained that they had a fluid situation and needed to move quickly to catch the person who stole Mrs. Lantana’s credit card. The supervisor explained that the attempted use of the credit card did not go through, so the fraud alert system had worked.
“There is no need for this ‘fluid situation,’ as you say,” he said.
“The system only works if we catch the guy,” Ballard said. “Don’t you see? Stopping the card from being used is only part of it. That protects your corporate client. It doesn’t protect Mrs. Lantana, who had someone inside her house.”
“I am sorry,” the supervisor said. “I cannot help you without documentation from the courts. It is our protocol.”
“What is your name?”
“My name is Irfan.”
“Where are you, Irfan?”
“How do you mean?”
“Are you in Mumbai? Delhi? Where?”
“I am in Mumbai, yes.”
“And that’s why you don’t give a shit. Because this guy’s never going to come into your house and steal your wallet in Mumbai. Thanks very much.”
She stepped back into the kitchen and hung up the phone before the useless supervisor could respond. She turned back to her partner.
“Okay, we go back to the barn, write it up, give it to the burglary table,” she said. “Let’s go.”
2
Ballard and Jenkins didn’t make it back to the station to begin writing the report on the Lantana burglary. They were diverted to Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center by the watch commander to check out an assault. Ballard parked in an ambulance slot by the ER entrance, left the grille lights on, and then she and Jenkins entered through the automatic doors. Ballard noted the time for the report she would write later. It was 12:41 a.m. according to the clock over the reception window in the ER waiting room.
There was a P-1 standing there, his skin as white as a vampire’s. Ballard gave him the nod and he came over to brief them. He was a slick sleeve and maybe even a boot and too new in the division for her to know his name.
“We found her in a lot on Santa Monica by Highland,” the officer stated. “Looked like she had been dumped there. Whoever did it probably thought she was dead. But she was alive and she sort of woke up and was semiconscious for a couple minutes. Somebody had worked her over really good. One of the paramedics said she might have a skull fracture. They have her in the back. My TO’s back there too.”
The assault may have now been elevated to an abduction, and that increased Ballard’s level of interest. She checked the patrolman’s plate and saw his name was Taylor.
“Taylor, I’m Ballard,” she said, “and this is Detective Jenkins, fellow denizen of the dark. When did you get to Super Six?”
“First deployment actually,” Taylor said.
“Right from the academy? Well, welcome. You’ll have more fun in the Six than you’ll have anywhere else. Who’s your training officer?”
“Officer Smith, ma’am.”
“I’m not your mother. Don’t call me ma’am.”
“Sorry, ma’am. I mean—”
“You’re in good hands with Smitty. He’s cool. You guys get an ID on the vic?”
“No, there was no purse or anything but we were trying to talk to her while we were waiting on the paramedics. She was in and out, not making a lot of sense. Sounded like she said her name was Ramona.”
“She say anything else?”
“Yeah, she said ‘the upside-down house.’”
“‘The upside-down house’?”
“That’s what she said. Officer Smith asked if she knew her attacker and she said no. He asked where she was attacked and she said ‘the upside-down house.’ Like I said, she wasn’t making a lot of sense.”
Ballard nodded and thought about what that could mean.
“Okay,” she said. “We’ll go back and check things out.”
Ballard nodded to Jenkins and headed toward the door that led to the ER’s treatment bays. She was wearing a charcoal-gray Van Heusen suit with a chalk pinstripe. She always thought the formality of the suit went well with her light brown skin and sun-streaked hair. And it had an authority that helped overcome her slight stature. She pulled her jacket back enough for the receptionist behind the glass window to see the badge on her belt and open the automatic door.
The intake center consisted of six patient assessment and treatment bays behind closed curtains. Doctors, nurses, and technicians were moving about a command station in the center of the room. There was organized chaos, everybody with a job to do and some unseen hand choreographing it all. It was a busy night, but every night was at Hollywood Pres.
Another patrol officer was standing in front of the curtain for treatment bay 4 and Ballard and Jenkins proceeded directly toward him. He had three hash marks on his sleeves—fifteen years on the department—and Ballard knew him well.
“Smitty, the doc in there?” Ballard asked.
Officer Melvin Smith looked up from his phone, where he had been composing a text.
“Ballard, Jenkins, how’s it hanging?” Smith said. Then: “Nah, she’s alone. They’re about to take her up to the OR. Fractured skull, brain swelling. They said they need to open her head up to relieve the pressure.”
“I know the feeling,” Jenkins said.
“So she’s not talking?” Ballard asked.
“Not anymore,” Smith said. “They sedated her and I overheard them talking about inducing a coma till the swelling goes down. Hey, how’s Lola, Ballard? Haven’t seen her in a while.”
“Lola’s good,” Ballard said. “Did you guys find her, or was it a call?”
“It was a hot shot,” Smith said. “Somebody must’ve called it in but they were GOA when we got there. The vic was just lying there alone in the parking lot. We thought she was dead when we first rolled up.”
“Did you call anybody out to hold the crime scene?” Ballard asked.
“Nah, there’s nothing there but blood on the asphalt, Ballard,” Smith said. “This was a body dump.”