Demolition Angel Read online

  Chosen by the San Francisco

  Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times

  as

  One of the Best Books of the Year

  “Packs an explosive punch … Though the pace of the book moves like a quick-burning fuse, Crais still takes the time in Demolition Angel to sketch out some memorable characters: Starkey, haunted and hollow-eyed, covering up her pain with a Bogart-tough demeanor; and John Michael Fowles (aka Mr. Red), a sociopath who gets all sorts of information from the Internet without breaking a sweat. … Crais keeps things wound so tight that readers will be getting paper cuts in their rush to finish this one.”

  —The Denver Post

  “The final pages can hardly be turned fast enough, and the climactic violence is tempered masterfully with a sweet irony.”

  —The San Diego Union-Tribune

  “A suspenseful ride … A crisp and engrossing novel set in the literally volatile world of bomb disposal.”

  —The Seattle Times

  “Compelling … The characters of Carol Starkey and Jack Pell, quintessential star-crossed lovers, are his richest, most involving creations. … Crais’ command of material and willingness to explore complicated characters without settling for easy resolutions give Demolition Angel an explosive power beyond the reach of normal whodunit fiction.”

  —The Ft. Worth Star-Telegram

  “AN INTENSE, IN-YOUR-FACE

  PAGE TURNER …

  In a stunning departure from his ever-popular Elvis Cole mysteries, Robert Crais gives us a standalone chiller and thriller.”

  —Tulsa World

  “Crais deftly straddles the demarcation line between police procedural and thriller in this novel set in Los Angeles, weaving together how police defuse bombs with a story about a police officer whose life has been shattered by one.”

  —The Baltimore Sun

  “Crais has given us a new and exciting thriller that more than matches what we’ve come to expect.”

  —The Rocky Mountain News

  “A master storyteller … Crais is one of the best mystery authors working today, and Demolition Angel shows why. It’s an exciting, page-turning read, made all the more interesting by the intense focus on Starkey, an utterly original character. … Crais does an excellent job of getting inside Starkey’s head. She’s a ‘tough girl’ lost in the memories of her own near-death experience, seemingly doomed to relive that moment forever.”

  —APBnews.com

  “FILLED WITH FORCE, SURPRISES, AND SHOCKERS.”

  —The Midwest Book Review

  “[A] white-hot crossover thriller … So many surprises and such a masterly command of pace that you’ll find yourself checking the clock every ten pages.”

  —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

  “Highly recommended … Fast-paced, authentic, well-written, and combining suspense and police procedural, this tale features a tough heroine who should win a whole new audience for Crais.”

  —Library Journal (starred review)

  “One of the most complex heroines to grace a thriller since Clarice Starling locked eyes with Hannibal Lecter. … This novel gets high marks for originality and even higher ones for suspense and, above all, for multidimensional, wounded characters who give all the excitement a rare depth.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  Also by Robert Crais

  THE MONKEY’S RAINCOAT

  STALKING THE ANGEL

  LULLABY TOWN

  FREE FALL

  VOODOO RIVER

  SUNSET EXPRESS

  INDIGO SLAM

  L.A. REQUIEM

  DEMOLITION ANGEL

  HOSTAGE

  THE LAST DETECTIVE

  THE FORGOTTEN MAN

  Books published by The Random House Publishing Group are available at quantity discounts on bulk purchases for premium, educational, fund-raising, and special sales use. For details, please call 1-800-733-3000.

  For Jeffrey and Celia

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The author wishes to thank the following people for their help: Det. John Petievich, LAPD (retired); Det. Paul Bishop, LAPD; Det. Bob Nelson, Criminal Conspiracy Section, LAPD (retired); Lt. Mike DeCoudres, commanding officer, LAPD Bomb Squad; Sgt. Joe Pau, supervisor, LAPD Bomb Squad; Lt. Anthony Alba, LAPD Public Affairs; Special Agent Charles Hustmyer, ATF; Stephen B. Scheid, Explosives Specialist, ATF; Marc Scott Taylor, Technical Associates, Inc.; Steven B. Richlin, OD; Jane Bryson, Ph.D.; Angela Donahue, Ph.D., Behavioral Science Unit, LAPD; Patricia Crais; Celia Gleason; Clay Fourrier; Leslie Day; Tami Hoag; Gerald Petievich; Shawn Coyne; Steve Rubin; Gina Centrello; Aaron Priest; Norman Kurland; Emile Gladstone; Tricia Davey; Jonathan King; and Laurence Mark.

  The explosives experts and bomb technicians with whom I spoke were justifiably concerned that this book neither be instructional, nor reveal the exact capabilities by which bomb techs ply their trade. To that end, I have changed certain facts and procedures and fictionalized others. Professionals knowledgeable in the field should note that the technical and procedural inaccuracies contained in this work are the author’s responsibility, and his alone.

  PROLOGUE

  To be disrupted: when the human body is blown apart; as by the pressure force of a bomb.

  —Gradwohl’s Legal Medicine

  • • •

  Code Three Roll Out

  Bomb Squad

  Silver Lake, California

  Charlie Riggio stared at the cardboard box sitting beside the Dumpster. It was a Jolly Green Giant box, with what appeared to be a crumpled brown paper bag sticking up through the top. The box was stamped GREEN BEANS. Neither Riggio nor the two uniformed officers with him approached closer than the corner of the strip mall there on Sunset Boulevard; they could see the box fine from where they were.

  “How long has it been there?”

  One of the Adam car officers, a Filipino named Ruiz, checked his watch.

  “We got our dispatch about two hours ago. We been here since.”

  “Find anyone who saw how it got there?”

  “Oh, no, dude. Nobody.”

  The other officer, a black guy named Mason, nodded.

  “Ruiz is the one saw it. He went over and looked in the bag, the crazy Flip.”

  “So tell me what you saw.”

  “I told your sergeant.”

  “Tell me. I’m the sonofabitch who’s gonna approach the damned thing.”

  Ruiz described seeing the capped ends of two galvanized pipes taped together with silver duct tape. The pipes were loosely wrapped in newspaper, Ruiz said, so he had only seen the ends.

  Riggio considered that. They were standing in a strip mall on Sunset Boulevard in Silver Lake, an area that had seen increasing gang activity in recent months. Gangbangers would steal galvanized pipe from construction sites or dig up plastic PVC from some poor bastard’s garden, then stuff them with bottle rocket powder or match heads. Riggio didn’t know if the Green Giant box held an actual bomb or not, but he had to approach it as if it did. That’s the way it was with bomb calls. Better than ninety-five percent turned out to be hairspray cans, some teenager’s book bag, or, like his most recent call-out, two pounds of marijuana wrapped in Pampers. Only one out of a hundred was what the bomb techs called an “improvised munition.”

  A homemade bomb.

  “You hear ticking or anything like that?”

  “No.”

  “Smell anything burning?”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “Did you open the bag to get a better look?”

  “Hell, no.”

  “Did you move the box or anything?”

  Ruiz smiled like Riggio was nuts.

  “Dude, I saw those pipes and shit my pants. The only thing I moved was my fee
t!”

  Mason laughed.

  Riggio walked back to his vehicle. The Bomb Squad drove dark blue Suburbans, rigged with a light bar, and crammed with all the tools of the bomb technician’s trade, except for the robots. You wanted the robots, you had to call them out special, and he wasn’t going to do that. The goddamned robot would just get bogged down in all the potholes around the box.

  Riggio found his supervisor, Buck Daggett, instructing a uniformed sergeant to evacuate the area for a hundred yards in all directions. The fire department had already been called, and paramedics were on the way. Sunset Boulevard had been closed, and traffic rerouted. All for something that might turn out to be some do-it-yourself plumber’s castoff drain trap.

  “Hey, Buck, I’m ready to take a look at that thing.”

  “I want you in the suit.”

  “It’s too hot. I’ll use the chest protector for the first pass, then the suit if I have to bring out the de-armer.”

  All Riggio would be doing on the first pass was lugging out a portable X-ray to see inside the bag. If the contents appeared to be a bomb, he and Daggett would formulate a game plan and either de-arm the device, or explode it in place.

  “I want you in the suit, Charles. I got a feeling about this one.”

  “You’ve always got a feeling.”

  “I’ve also got the sergeant stripes. You’re in the suit.”

  The armored suit weighed almost ninety pounds. Made of Kevlar plates and heavy Nomex batting, it covered every part of Riggio’s body except his hands, which remained bare. A bomb tech needed the dexterity of unencumbered fingers.

  When the suit was in place, Riggio took the Real Time RTR3 X-ray unit and lumbered toward the package. Walking in the suit was like walking with his body wrapped in wet quilts, only hotter. Three minutes in the armor, and sweat was already running into his eyes. To make it worse, a safety cable and hardwire dragged behind him, the hardwire connecting him to Daggett via a telex communicator. A separate wire linked the Real Time to a computer in the Suburban’s cargo bay. He felt like he was pulling a plow.

  Daggett’s voice came into Riggio’s ear. “How you doing out there?”

  “Sweating my ass off, thanks to you.”

  Riggio hated this part the most, approaching an object before he knew what it was. Every time was the same: Riggio thought of that unknown object as a living beast with a life and a mind. Like a sleeping pit bull. If he approached it carefully and made the right moves, everything would be fine. If he startled the dog, the damn thing would rip him apart.

  Eighty-two slow-motion paces brought him to the box.

  It was unremarkable except for a wet stain on one corner that looked like dog piss. The brown paper bag, crumpled and uneven, was open. Riggio peered into the bag without touching it. Leaning over was hard, and when he did, sweat dripped onto the Lexan faceplate like rain.

  He saw the two pipes that Ruiz had described. The pipe caps appeared to be about two-and-a-half inches in diameter and taped together, but nothing else about them was visible. They were loosely wrapped with newspaper, leaving only the ends exposed. Daggett said, “How’s it look?”

  “Like a couple of pipes. Stand by. I’ll get us a picture.”

  Riggio placed the Real Time RTR3 on the ground at the base of the box, aimed for a side view, then turned on the unit. It provided the same type of translucent shadow image that security personnel see on airline baggage units, reproducing the image on two screens: one for Riggio on top of the RTR3 and another on the computer back at the Suburban.

  Charlie Riggio smiled.

  “Sonofabitch. We got one, Buck. We got us a bomb.”

  “I’m seeing it.”

  The two pipes were impenetrable shadows with what appeared to be a spool of wire or fuse triangled between them. There didn’t appear to be a timer or an initiator of a more sophisticated nature, leading Riggio to believe that the bomb was a garage project made by an enterprising local gangbanger. Low-tech, dirty, and not particularly difficult to de-arm.

  “This one’s going to be a piece of cake, Buck. I make a basic fuse of the light-it-and-run-like-hell variety.”

  “You be careful. Might be some kind of motion switch tucked away in there.”

  “I’m not gonna touch it, Buck. Jesus. Gimme some credit.”

  “Don’t get cocky. Take the snaps and let’s figure out what’s what.”

  The procedure was to take a series of digital computer snaps of the device via the Real Time at forty-five-degree angles. When they had the device mapped, Riggio would fall back to the Suburban where he and Daggett would decide how best to destroy or de-arm it.

  Riggio shuffled around the box, aiming the Real Time over the different angles. He felt no fear as he did this because he knew what he was dealing with now and trusted he could beat it. Riggio had approached over forty-eight suspicious packages in his six years with the Bomb Squad; only nine had been actual explosive devices. None of those had ever detonated in a manner that he did not control.

  “You’re not talking to me, Charlie. You okay?”

  “Just got to work around the potholes, Sarge. Almost done. Hey, you know what I’m having? I’m having a brainstorm.”

  “Stop. You’ll hurt yourself.”

  “No, listen to this. You know those people on the infomercials who make all that money with the stupid shit they sell? We could sell these damned suits to fat people, see? You just wear it and you lose weight.”

  “Keep your damned head with that bomb, Riggio. How’s your body temp?”

  “I’m okay.”

  In truth, he was so hot that he felt dizzy, but he wanted to make sure he had good clean shots. He circled the box like a man in a space suit, getting front, side, and off angles, then pointed the Real Time straight down for a top view. That’s when he saw a shadow that hadn’t been visible in the side views.

  “Buck, you see that? I think I got something.”

  “What?”

  “Here in the overhead view. Take a snap.”

  A thin, hairlike shadow emerged from the side of one pipe and extended up through the spool. This wire wasn’t attached to the others, which confused Riggio until a sudden, unexpected thought occurred to him: Maybe the spool was there only to hide this other wire.

  In that moment, fear crackled through him and his bowels clenched. He called out to Buck Daggett, but the words did not form.

  Riggio thought, Oh, God.

  The bomb detonated at a rate of twenty-seven thousand feet per second, twenty-two times faster than a nine-millimeter bullet leaves the muzzle of a pistol. Heat flashed outward in a burst of white light hot enough to melt iron. The air pressure spiked from a normal fifteen pounds per square inch to twenty-two hundred pounds, shattering the iron pipes into jagged shrapnel that punched through the Kevlar suit like hyperfast bullets. The shock wave slammed into his body with an overpressure of three hundred thousand pounds, crushing his chest, rupturing his liver, spleen, and lungs, and separating his unprotected hands. Charlie Riggio was lifted fourteen feet into the air and thrown a distance of thirty-eight feet.

  Even this close to the point of detonation, Riggio might have survived if this had been, as he first suspected, a garage bomb cooked up by a gangbanger with makeshift materials.

  It wasn’t.

  Bits of tarmac and steel fell around him like bloody rain, long after Charlie Riggio was dead.

  PART ONE

  • • •

  1

  • • •

  “Tell me about the thumb. I know what you told me on the phone, but tell me everything now.”

  Starkey inhaled half an inch of cigarette, then flicked ash on the floor, not bothering with the ashtray. She did that every time she was annoyed with being here, which was always.

  “Please use the ashtray, Carol.”

  “I missed.”

  “You didn’t miss.”

  Detective-2 Carol Starkey took another deep pull on the cigarette, then crushed i
t out. When she first started seeing this therapist, Dana Williams wouldn’t let her smoke during session. That was three years and four therapists ago. In the time Starkey was working her way through the second and third therapists, Dana had gone back to the smokes herself, and now didn’t mind. Sometimes they both smoked and the goddamned room clouded up like the Imperial Valley capped by an inversion layer.

  Starkey shrugged.

  “No, I guess I didn’t miss. I’m just pissed off, is all. It’s been three years, and here I am back where I started.”

  “With me.”

  “Yeah. Like in three years I shouldn’t be over this shit.”

  “So tell me what happened, Carol. Tell me about the little girl’s thumb.”

  Starkey fired up another cigarette, then settled back to recall the little girl’s thumb. Starkey was down to three packs a day. The progress should have made her feel better, but didn’t.

  “It was Fourth of July. This idiot down in Venice decides to make his own fireworks and give them away to the neighbors. A little girl ends up losing the thumb and index finger on her right hand, so we get the call from the emergency room.”

  “Who is ‘we’?”

  “Me and my partner that day, Beth Marzik.”

  “Another woman?”

  “Yeah. There’s two of us in CCS.”

  “Okay.”

  “By the time we get down there, the family’s gone home, so we go to the house. The father’s crying, saying how they found the finger, but not the thumb, and then he shows us these homemade firecrackers that are so damned big she’s lucky she didn’t lose the hand.”

  “He made them?”

  “No, a guy in the neighborhood made them, but the father won’t tell us. He says the man didn’t mean any harm. I say, your daughter has been maimed, sir, other children are at risk, sir, but the guy won’t cop. I ask the mother, but the guy says something in Spanish, and now she won’t talk, either.”