The Late Show (Renée Ballard #1)(85)

Castor led Ballard south for four blocks, until he got to the corner of 5th Street, then took a right and disappeared through an open door. Ballard wondered if it was a move designed to lose a tail, but as she caught up, she saw a neon sign that announced the business as the last bookstore.

Ballard entered cautiously and found a giant bookstore in a space that appeared to have formerly been the grand lobby of a bank. There were rows of freestanding bookshelves angled between Corinthian columns rising two stories to an ornate coffered ceiling. On one wall hung a sculpture of books forming a wave. Balconies fronting small art-and used-record shops offered a view down onto the main floor, which was crowded with customers. Ballard had no idea of the place’s existence and the excitement of the find almost made her forget her quarry.

Using a set of shelves dedicated to the classics as a partial blind, Ballard scanned the lower level of the bookstore, looking for Castor. The reporter was nowhere to be seen, and it was impossible to cover every corner of the space because of the shelves, columns, and other obstacles to her vision.

Ballard saw a man with a name tag pinned to his shirt walking toward the checkout counter near the door.

“Excuse me,” she said. “How do I get upstairs?”

“I’ll show you real quick,” the man said.

He walked Ballard over to an alcove that had been hidden from her sight and pointed to a set of stairs. She thanked him and quickly started up.

The upper-level balconies afforded Ballard a fuller view of the bookstore below. There were several reading alcoves created by shelf stands positioned at right angles and complete with old leather chairs or couches in the privacy spots. It was the perfect place for a clandestine meeting.

Ballard scanned the whole place twice before finally spotting Castor in an alcove almost directly below her. He was sitting on the edge of a couch, leaning forward and in animated but quiet conversation with another man. It took a moment for the other man to turn his face so that Ballard could clearly see it.

It was Lieutenant Feltzer.

Ballard didn’t know whether to be more outraged by Feltzer’s treachery or jubilant that she now knew who the leak was and could do something about it.

She pulled her phone and surreptitiously took several photos of the meeting below. At one point she switched to video, when Castor stood up like he was in a hurry and looked down at Feltzer. He waved his hands in a dismissive way and then walked out of the alcove and crossed the main floor of the store. Ballard kept the camera going, tracking the reporter until he left the store through the door he had used to enter.

When Ballard brought the camera back across the floor to the alcove where Feltzer had been sitting, he was gone. She lowered the phone and scanned the store as best as she could. There was no sign of Feltzer.

Ballard suddenly became concerned that Feltzer had seen her and that he was on his way up to the second level. She turned to the steps but she saw nobody coming up. She was safe. Feltzer must have left the store, taking a different route through the maze of shelves and then out the door.

Ballard went down to the main floor, watching for Feltzer but catching no glimpse of him. She exited the store onto 5th and looked about. No sign of Feltzer.

Ballard guessed that Feltzer, like Castor, had walked to the meeting but that he had passed the same four blocks via Main Street instead of Spring. Main was more convenient from the PAB’s exit and it put space between the reporter and his source. She saw the light at the intersection change and crossed, then followed 5th to Main Street. At the intersection, she casually looked around the corner and north on Main. There, about two blocks away in the direction of the PAB, she saw a man walking with a fast pace that she recognized as Feltzer’s hard-charging gait.

Concerned that Feltzer would be more alert than Castor to the possibility of a tail, Ballard waited another ten minutes before heading up Main herself. When she got to First, she turned right and walked down into Little Tokyo.

At the Miyako Hotel she checked into a room after being assured by the desk clerk that there were several sushi choices on the room-service menu.

She got to the room and ordered dinner first thing. Then she opened her shoulder bag and laid out the clothes she planned to wear in the morning. The meeting with Feltzer was going to be pivotal.

While she waited for her food, she pulled out her phone and Googled the business number for defense attorney Dean Towson. She expected Towson wouldn’t be in his office this late but he would most likely get her message. Defense attorneys were used to getting late-night calls from clients. And judging by how fearful Towson had grown by the end of Ballard’s interview with him Sunday morning, he would return the call promptly.

The call went through to an answering service, and Ballard spoke to a live individual instead of a computer.

“My name is Detective Renée Ballard with the LAPD. I spoke to Mr. Towson Sunday morning about a murder investigation. Please get a message to Mr. Towson tonight. I need him to call me back as soon as possible, no matter how late. This is urgent.”

She disconnected and began the wait.

To pass the time, she put on the room’s television and was soon distracted by the political infighting and name-calling presented every night on cable TV.

Towson’s callback came faster than the sushi.





31

At 8:25 a.m. Wednesday morning, Ballard walked into the FID offices at PAB with Dean Towson. It had been Towson’s idea to arrive late and to ignore Lieutenant Feltzer’s two calls and messages to Ballard, asking where she was. It put Feltzer on edge before they even got there.