in Westwood. He was standing when I got there. Maybe he’d been standing there the whole time since he’d made the call.
“Follow me,” he said. “We’re going to make this quick.”
“Whatever works.”
After giving a uniformed guard the nod he led me through a security door using a card key and then he used it again to access the elevator I was already familiar with.
“You guys got your own elevator and everything,” I said. “Pretty cool.”
Peoples wasn’t impressed. He turned so he was looking right at me.
“I’m doing this because I have no choice. I’ve decided to agree to this extortion because I believe in the greater good of what I’m trying to accomplish here.”
“Is that why you sent Milton into my lawyer’s office last night? Was that all part of the greater good you’re talking about?”
He didn’t answer.
“Look, you can hate me and that’s fine. That’s your option. But let’s not bullshit each other. Don’t hide behind that stuff, because we both know what’s going on here. Your guy crossed the line and got caught. Now it’s just time to pay the price. That’s what this is about. It’s that simple.”
“And meantime an investigation is compromised and lives may be at stake.”
“We’ll see about that, won’t we?”
The elevator opened on the ninth floor. He led me out without answering. The ever handy card key got us through another door and into a squad room where several agents were working at desks. As we passed through, most of them stopped what they were doing to look at me. I assumed that they had either been briefed on who I was and what I was doing or just the occurrence of a non-agent in the inner sanctum was worth noting.
When I was halfway across the room I spotted Milton sitting at a desk near the back. He was leaning back in his chair giving me his best show of being relaxed. But I could sense the anger pulsing beneath the façade. I winked at him and turned my attention away.
Peoples led me into a small room with a desk and two chairs. On the desk was a cardboard box. I looked into it and recognized my own notebook and the file I had kept on Angella Benton. There was also the file from Lawton Cross’s garage and a black binder full of documents two inches thick. I assumed it was the copy of the LAPD’s murder book. I got excited just looking at it. It was the full deck of cards I had been looking for.
“Where’s the rest?” I asked.
Peoples walked around behind the desk and opened the middle drawer. He removed a file and dropped it on the top of the desk.
“In there you will find subject location reports covering the two dates you requested. I don’t think they will help you but it’s what you wanted. You can look at them here but you cannot take them with you. They will not leave this office. Do you understand that?”
I nodded, deciding not to push it.
“What about Aziz?”
“When you are ready I will put you in a room with him. But he won’t talk to you. You’ll be wasting your time.”
“Well, it’s mine to waste.”
“Then, before you leave here, you will call your attorney and instruct her to turn over to me the original and all copies of the surveillance recordings you have from last night and the night before.”
I shook my head.
“Sorry, that’s not the deal.”
“It certainly is.”
“No, I never said I would turn over the recordings. What I said was that I would not go public with them. There’s a difference. I’m not going to turn over the only leverage I’ve got. I’m not stupid, John.”
“We had a deal,” he said, his cheeks beginning to quiver with anger.
“And I’m keeping the deal. Exactly as offered.”
I reached into my pocket and pulled out a cassette tape. I held it out to him.
“If you don’t believe me you can listen for yourself. I was wearing a wire last night in the booth.”
I watched his eyes register that I now even had him directly tied in.
“Take it, John. Call it a goodwill gesture. It’s the original. No copies were made.”
He slowly reached up and took the tape. I moved around behind the desk.
“Why don’t I take a look at what you’ve got in the file while you go do whatever you have to do to get Aziz ready?”
Peoples pocketed the tape and nodded.
“I’ll be back in ten minutes,” he said. “If anyone