Bob said, “You didn’t tell Rocha about the phone number.”
“I want to take a look at this bar, see who we can find,” Lucas said. “Rocha would take down Deese if she had the chance, but she really wants Beauchamps and Nast. That’s her priority, not ours. If she grabs Beauchamps, we might lose our connection to Deese.”
“I’ll buy that,” Rae said. “If we get Deese, we’ll probably get Beauchamps anyway. Might not work the other way around. When are we leaving?”
“I’ll call Russ Forte’s assistant,” Lucas said. “We’ve got reading to do... I’m thinking tomorrow morning—early.”
—
GETTING FROMNew Orleans to Los Angeles wasn’t as simple as it should have been, and they didn’t get out early. Check-in always took time, with the bag full of guns and armor that Bob and Rae traveled with, and they finally made it into LAX on a Delta flight at one o’clock in the afternoon.
Because feds were so identified with SUVs, and local cops with beaters, they rented two Chevy Malibus from Avis. Lucas had been in Los Angeles any number of times and usually stayed in Santa Monica, at Shutters on the Beach. He didn’t think it waslikely that the Marshals Service would go for rooms at Shutters, so they checked into the Marina del Rey Marriott. They didn’t get suites, which disappointed Bob and Rae, but they did get views of the marina and, Bob noticed, a Cheesecake Factory. They were a ten-minute walk from Flower Child’s Bar and Grill on Washington Boulevard.
They were out of the hotel by four o’clock; the day was clear and warm, the temperature in the upper 70s, with only a fitful breeze coming off the ocean and into their faces as they walked down to the bar: all reasons to live in LA, including the smell of the ocean.
Flower Child’s was in a low, two-story stucco building a few blocks from the Pacific, with a pink-striped awning over the sidewalk. The awning was also decorated with painted flowers, marijuana leaves, and ukuleles.
Inside, a central bar divided a front room from a room in back. The bar was wrapped with thin lighted tubes in pastel pink, green, and yellow that made it look like a vintage jukebox. The front room had open tables of various sizes and was brightly lit, with customers reading newspapers as they ate. The back room was darker and lined with booths, about a third of them occupied.
They took a booth in the very back, Bob on one side of the table, Lucas and Rae on the other. A waitress came over and said, “The burgers are great... What do you want to drink?” She was wearing turquoise eye shadow, a tube top, and short shorts, and had a collection of rings piercing the lip of her navel. A tattoo of a boa constrictor started at the nape of her neck, ran down her back beneath the tube top, reappeared below it, and followed her spine down into her shorts. She was chewing gum.
“Nice ink,” Bob said.
“Thanks. An old boyfriend did it for me. It goes all the way down between my cheeks.”
“That’s a lotta fine information,” Rae said.
“Well, you know...” she said, rolling her eyes. “Whatever...”
They all got burgers and fries, and Lucas got a Diet Coke and Bob and Rae ordered Dos Equis. A song that sounded vaguely familiar to Lucas was playing through the sound system but he couldn’t quite place it. Bob identified it as “Plastic Fantastic Lover” by Jefferson Airplane, “which is about right for this place.”
When the waitress came back with the Coke and beers, she told them that a flower child tribute band played in the back room in the evenings: “Mamas and Papas, Lovin’ Spoonful—that kinda shit. I get outta here before it comes on, to tell the truth. I’m afraid it’ll suck the brain right outta my ear.”
“Is the owner a flower child?” Lucas asked.
She snorted. “No. He’s whatever he thinks the bar should be. It used to be called Hang Eleven, because he thought he might get the wannabe surfers. Before that, it was called Duder’s, because of that movie. And, before that, it was called Shredder’s. The name changes, nothing else does. We even use the same ‘Under New Management’ sign. Tourists and locals during the day, middle-aged meat rack at night. Guys with gold chains.”
“Guys still do that?” Rae asked.
“They do here.” She checked out Lucas, then Bob. “If you two’re looking for love, you’d do okay.” And to Rae: “You’re more upscale.”
Made them laugh, and when she went to get the burgers Bob said, “She’s workin’ us for tips.”
“Probably gonna get ’em, too,” Rae said.
—
THE BURGERSwere great, like the waitress said, the fries hot, salty, greasy, like they should be. They were halfway through the meal when a couple of uniformed LA cops came in, pulled off their sunglasses, and looked around. They picked a booth in the back, and both of them looked long and hard at the three marshals as they went by. The waitress knew the two, called them by their first names.
After they ordered, they were still looking at Lucas and Rae—they couldn’t see Bob from where they were sitting—and Rae muttered, “The cops made us.”
“Yeah, I think.” He fished his ID out of his pocket and said, “Be right back.”
With the waitress nowhere in sight, he slid out of the booth, walked over to the cops, and laid the ID on the table. “Appreciate it if you could keep quiet about this,” Lucas said.
“Something happening here?” one of the cops asked.
“We’re looking for a guy who might come in here sometimes,” Lucas said. “You know the owner?”
