The Waiting

Two years ago, following a law enforcement trend that had budget-challenged police departments across the country using retired detectives to investigate cold cases, Ballard had been placed in charge of the LAPD’s previously mothballed unit. If she gave Beltran a case that was solved someday, her request for a print run would become part of discovery during a prosecution and could hand a defense attorney all that was needed to question the integrity of the case. Ballard nodded, knowing that the two-handed carry would hinder an effort to draw a weapon. And she was the one in Vegas who finally got Van Ness to open up and talk.