Genesys X

by B. J. Graf

  “One each.” She cast me an appreciative glance. “The psychic website should hire you.”

  “I’m not psychic,” I said. “Just a cop.”

  Lee’d been talking to a divorce lawyer but hadn’t filed for divorce. “When did he get the vasectomy?”

  “Five years ago, Denver said. Why?”

  Five years ago, but Britney Devonshire hadn’t known Lee then. So, if she’d tried to pin paternity on him with that blood spot, Lee would have known it was a scam without a DNA test. Contradictions kept mounting.

  “Everybody lies,” I said. “And hides stuff.”

  “Like you doing searches on the Q.T.?” Denver’s mood tee shirt now read “WHY NOT?” in green.

  I winked. “I’m on vacation. And I’m one of the good guys.”

  “Not that good.” With a knowing grin, she downloaded the information. These days most people store whatever data isn’t on the cloud in their DNA. Thumb drives have become literal since that’s where the USB port is. But I don’t like using even my junk DNA for storage, so I go old school. Denver handed me the flash-dot, the miniature memory stick the size of a pinky fingernail. For just a second the lagoon green of Denver’s tee-shirt bounced off the reflective surface of the Starbuck’s window. The question flickered on her glasses. Then it vanished like a rainbow in full sun.

  Lee’s favorite new hang-out was an Indian casino just outside Clara Vista, one of those little beach towns on the coast north of Santa Barbara.

  “This is me saying good-by Piedmont.” Waving her hand in dismissal, Denver flipped back to her horoscope.

  I wagged my finger at her good-naturedly. “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.” The line from high school Shakespeare was still in the mental hard drive.

  “Who’s Brutus?” Denver said.

  “Backup singer in an old death-metal band.” I watched as she touched the edge of the I-Brow wearable again and retreated back into her Solo-Shell.

  I was in a good mood. Clara Vista - the search had given me my next move.

  As I walked out, Denver whirled back around, her head and heart already focused on her stars caught in the web.

  ------------

  October afternoon sun beat down on the city. Beads of sweat trickled down my spine by the time I reached my Porsche. In the car’s cool interior I voice-activated the number on my glove phone I still knew by heart.

  Frank Waldron, my former partner from NOHO homicide answered on the ninth ring - pretty good, considering. Frank appeared floating in the Nokia Handy’s L-shape between my thumb and forefinger. He had a face like a dried apple, but the eyes were still bright and lively.

  “Hey Frank, it’s me,” I said. “You look like shit.”

  He’d turned fifty-five last year. Frank had bad knees and a cheap animatronic arm that gave him chronic pain. He’d lost his left arm when the Sphinx collar turned ugly. While the Sphinx arrest got me promoted to Homicide Special, it had permanently retired Frank on disability. And disability didn’t pay enough for one of the deluxe animatronic arms. I’d offered to make up the difference, but Frank was allergic to anything even close to a handout.

  “And you still dress like you’re going to a photo shoot, not a homicide scene.” He was grinning now though, not wincing. “I knew you couldn’t drive a desk for long.”

  “You saw the news.”

  He laughed. “Lots of lightning. Thunder hit yet?”

  Lightning to thunder was our code for the time delay between the shit that goes down on the street and the emotions that flood in, sometimes days after.

  “Still standing,” I said. “You busy?”

  “You know.” He wasn’t.

  Now a licensed private investigator, Frank got by on disability payments, pension and whatever his buddies threw him in the way of work. He and his wife Ruth had moved inland, up north of Oxnard where property values were cheaper.

  “Listen, if you’re free,” I said, “I need you to put some eyes on a Lexus SUV out your way.”

  After all there was nothing in the regulations that prevented Eddie Piedmont, private citizen on vacation, from hiring a licensed private investigator to find Lee.

  “Roger that, house mouse,” Frank said.

  He was never gonna let me live down desk duty. But I was glad to hear him breaking my balls. It meant he hadn’t given up.

  “Ta ma-de, Frank,” I said with real affection for the old guy.

  “I see your vocab hasn’t improved,” Frank said. “Just gone global.”

  I walked him through what I already knew about Lee before ending the call.

  With Frank on the job I looked forward to my first night of real sleep since the shooting. I hoped it’d be dreamless.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  At seven-thirty the next morning dog walkers and squawking tourists had barely started their morning perambulations round the canals of Venice when Frank called. I left the deck, where I’d been staring out over the water, and headed back inside. The smart home shut out the noise with the click of the sliding glass door.

  “You find Lee already?”

  Still shirtless in sweat pants, I leaned back against the kitchen counter, feeling the cool touch of granite on the small of my back as I stared at Frank’s floating face in my Nokia Handy. I could hear gulls in the background. Frank’s glove phone had that shaky-cam effect. He was walking back to his blue Toyota Corolla, parked on a tony Clara Vista side street, somewhere near the beach.

  “Spotted his Lexus at the Whole Foods you tagged,” Frank wheezed as he stopped to scrape beach tar off the soles of his shoes. “Chipped it while he was inside. Take a look.”

  The lean Asian man in the first pic Frank sent had on Dockers, a worn blue Oxford shirt and New Balance sneakers along with his unkempt beard and mustache. His once black hair was longer and scruffier than Lee’s had been on his driver’s license. Now dyed a mousy brown, he’d combed it over his ears – like a man on the run keen on hiding a major security bio-identifier. The bones under his hangdog face were more prominent too, and the skin round the jaw had softened. It looked like Lee’s skull was pressing up through thinning skin even as gravity tugged the flesh down towards his chest. The combination of time and stress had not been kind to the scientist. But it was Lee alright, leaving the grocery store and getting in the Lexus. The next couple snaps showed the same man exiting the Lexus and entering a small beach bungalow.

  The bungalow was one of those places built for the Hollywood overflow the first decade of the twenty-first century, when even wealthy people looking for ocean front property found themselves out-priced by the tech billionaires in the Malibu market.

  “What’s the word on the beach house?” I said.

  “Rental leased to a trust. But it looks like Lee’s not moving back anytime soon. The wife may be his next discard.”

  “He’s been talking to divorce lawyers,” I said, nodding, “but hasn’t filed.”

  “Maybe the ax is just about to fall.” Frank sent me a little streaming video over the phone. “This happened yesterday around four.”

  In the video a woman wearing a beige sweater set and black pearls I instantly pegged as Mrs. Lee got out of her white Mercedes. She stormed Lee in the driveway of the Clara Vista bungalow. I paused the video and checked the time code: 5:14 p.m. yesterday.

  “That’s the wife, isn’t it?” Frank said.

  “Yeah.” I did a rough calculation. “She must have headed up north right after I left her door.”

  “She’s hopping mad,” Frank said. “You tell her the husband was bonking a stripper?”

  “I may have given her that idea.”

  I let the video play through this time. Lee and his wife held themselves stiffly at first, but as their conversation escalated into a heated argument, the gesticulations got wilder. Then, Mrs. Lee slapped her husband hard and started pummeling him like a windmill on overdrive. Dr. Lee covered his face, warding off the blows. Finally, Mrs. Lee whirled a
round, and ran back to her car.

  “I couldn’t make out a single word,” Frank said. “Korean?”

  I nodded and replayed the argument with the audio up this time.

  I flicked on my phone’s translation app. Divorce popped out. Police and shame repeated several times, but the rest of the translation was more gibberish than English.

  “The dialect’s too thick,” I said. “I’ll get Shin to translate.”

  Shin’s wife Ahn was Korean, and his time in K-town before his transfer to Homicide Special had made Shin’s already good Korean fluent.

  I watched the argument replay once more. Divorce, police, shame. Their conversation seemed more linked to my questions about Britney Devonshire than any beef with protestors, but two things were clear. Dr. Lee was in meltdown mode. And he was hiding alright, but it wasn’t from his wife. She’d known exactly where he was. She’d lied to me.

  “Stay on Lee,” I said to Frank. “I’m coming up north.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  I left word for Jo not to expect me back early. Four hours later I met Frank outside the Clamshell Casino in Clara Vista.

  The casino lay in an outgrowth of urban sprawl just a little further north of Clara Vista proper. It was one of those smaller operations that catered to the senior crowd, a place and time the developers momentarily forgot. Centered in a large patchwork of parking lots, the casino was flanked by the green cross of a marijuana outlet at one end and a drive-through Chinese-Mexican joint at the other. Two big north and south facing entrances and exits gaped like giant maws gobbling up and spitting out gamblers into the traffic of the surrounding streets.

  Dr. Gabriel Lee’s Lexus was parked two aisles down from the Casino’s main entrance. Frank was already stationed near the north exit. Upon arrival, I’d driven through the Take a Bao and Burrito and picked up food for us both, pepper chicken for me and spring rolls with black beans for Frank.

  When I rapped on his window, Frank startled. His face was squashed pink from the door. It was obvious he hadn’t been to bed since I’d first called him yesterday, and he looked even worse than he had over the phone.

  But Lee’s Lexus hadn’t budged from its parking space since the scientist pulled in three hours ago, and we had the tracker on him, so I let the nap ride. After dropping off Frank’s food, I returned to my car, parked near the south exit so Lee couldn’t slip past us unseen, and waited. I called Frank up on my Porsches’ vid-phone.

  “What does your fortune say, Frank?”

  “I should have bought gold in 2007.”

  Grinning, I set my fortune cookie aside and dug into the pepper chicken.

  As we watched and ate, Frank launched into one of his golden oldies.

  “Remember that moke who got out of prison and the same day he’s back into B&E? Only he forgot he already ripped off that house? The old guy inside, however, has not forgotten. So when the moke goes in this time, he has a close encounter with a double barrel shotgun.” Frank chuckled. “Fate caught up with him.”

  When we’d been partners in NOHO, Frank hadn’t been one to dwell on the past. He was reveling in it now though, laughing and gesticulating with gusto. I let him relive the old days.

  Frank chattered on. I finished my chicken and tossed the remains back in the bag. “What’d you say we expedite and wrap this up?” I said after he’d finished another story and started to repeat his recitation of the first golden oldie. “Lee should have lost all his money by now.”

  “Sure. Let me make the approach.” Frank clipped the little body camera onto his lapel. “That’s what you hired me for.”

  It killed me to take the back seat, but Frank was right. Besides, the camera would give me a front-line view of Lee. “Okay, I’ll stay back in case he slips out.”

  Frank headed in, and I watched from my Porsche.

  The casino had a big open floor with ten rows of clanging slot machines closest to the door. Beyond the slots were the roulette and blackjack tables. Three additional rooms branched off the back, a small area for poker and a larger space for sports betting and bingo. Bright lighting and unobtrusive cameras stood sentinel overhead. No clocks anywhere distracted customers with unwelcome reminders of time slipping away along with their money.

  Frank didn’t even have to circle the floor once. Dr. Lee sat, shoulders hunched and elbows planted at the blackjack table, a squat glass of whisky and a small stack of chips to his right. He looked even thinner than he had in the video, shrunken. The shadows pooling under his eyes were darker and his complexion had taken on a dull greyish cast. But his lips were curled in a hopeful smile. Lee must have won a hand.

  There were several open seats around the blackjack table. I watched Frank take the one on Lee’s right.

  “Excuse, me, Dr. Lee?” Frank signaled to the server to bring Lee another round. “Could I talk to you for a second?” Frank kept his tone light and polite. He held out his private investigator’s license and introduced himself.

  Lee’s head tipped to the side like an inquisitive dog. The smile disappeared, but his face remained calm as he accepted the drink. “What about?”

  “I’d like to ask you a couple questions about Britney Devonshire.”

  The eyes widened the second Lee heard the name. “Sure. Would you excuse me for just a second though? Too much whiskey.” He slowly rose to his feet and turned as if to go to the can.

  Watching from my Porsche, I felt it before it happened. I punched the ignition as Lee whirled round and knocked over his chair onto the seated Frank. As Frank untangled his animatronic arm from the chair, Lee bolted for the front door, leaving his pile of chips on the table.

  Redfaced, Frank recovered and followed, but Lee had a head start.

  I had Lee’s Lexus up on the screen before the scientist made it out the door.

  I called Frank as Lee scurried to his car.

  “Don’t sweat it, Frank,” I said. “We’ve got the tracker on him. Besides, his reaction told me half of what I wanted to know.” The deceased’s name alone was enough to make Lee run. He was scared, and he looked guilty as hell. Shin would have to reopen the case and pull Dr. Lee in for questioning.

  As I followed Lee from a distance, I hit the satellite map and traffic system, scanning options.

  Frank was back in his Toyota. I could hear his labored breathing and mumbled self-recriminations.

  “Lee’s heading to PCH,” I said. “Take the shortcut on Vista Drive to get ahead of him. You’re front. I’m follow. But give him room. Let’s just see where he lands.”

  “Roger that.” Frank raced ahead, managing to pull out onto PCH three cars in front of Lee.

  There we were driving along the strip of coast line – Frank in the blue clunker up front, staying well ahead of the speeding silver Lexus SUV, and me bringing up the rear in my black Porsche – hugging the curves as we headed north, a sheer drop to the left. I kept to the speed limit.

  We drove for about forty-five minutes. During that time, Lee calmed down enough to slow the Lexus to seventy mph. Where was he heading? Did he know, or was he just running?

  As Lee calmed down, Frank ramped up. His mumbling stopped, and I could hear the adrenaline surge in his voice. “Just like the old days, huh, Eddie?”

  That’s when I noticed fluid leaking from Lee’s car. There’d been no sign of a leak back in the parking lot, but now liquid trickled out and left a clear trail.

  “Frank,” I said. “Let him go.” I told Frank about the leak and pulled way back.

  “Your show,” Frank said. “But I think we should play it out.”

  “It’s not a chase, Frank. The last thing I need is another black mark on my jacket.”

  “Just let me push him a little. I can nail this.” Frank slowed down just as Lee sped up, boxing the Lexus in.

  That’s when Lee must have suddenly realized the old guy in the poky Corolla was the same guy from the casino. Lee’s answer was to try to pass Frank in a no-passing zone. Just as the two lanes going no
rth narrowed into one. A construction zone. Frank sped up.

  A widening plume of fluid from Lee’s car painted the road now.

  “Frank,” I said, speeding up too. “Get out of there now.”

  With Lee sandwiched between Frank out ahead and me coming up from behind in my Porsche, we cornered another turn, tires screeching now. The road grade grew steeper. That’s when Lee started to panic. He punched the gas and jerked the wheel, veering onto the shoulder of the road.

  I heard a small bang and saw a plume of greasy smoke rise from under Lee’s car. Suddenly the leak gushed like a severed artery. I drove over a mare’s tail of spilled fluid.

  Lee opened his windows. Careening wildly over three lanes of highway, Lee reached over and grabbed something from the glove department. I saw the black shape as Lee sat back up and drew parallel with Frank’s car.

  “Taser, Frank! Punch it!” I yelled and braked hard, but Lee fired into my partner’s open passenger-side window.

  The taser’s harpoon whizzed through the open window and stuck in Frank’s animatronic arm. His seat belt kept Frank pinned to the car seat. The sharp jerk of the fifteenfoot line wrenched the taser out of Lee’s hand, sending it whirling out the window. It spun around Frank’s Toyota like a steel tether ball till it smashed into the rear window screen.

  A golden halo encircled Frank’s dark blue Toyota. Frank slumped over the wheel, his animatronic arm ripped off his shoulder and wedged in the frame of the car door.

  Lee punched the gas and wrenched his steering wheel to the right. But his tires slid on the leaking plume of greasy fluid, skidding into the dead Corolla at 70 mph. Lee sent Frank’s Toyota hurtling off the cliff. I heard the explosion as Frank’s car hit the rocks below.

  I swerved, riding two feet up the lip of the mountain on the passenger side, and steered hard to avoid the collision. It was a miracle I didn’t flip or hit anything but rocks.

  The texting driver in the southbound BMW wasn’t so lucky. Other drivers stopped or swerved in time. But the distracted BMW guy looked up from his phone just in time to see the Lexus sitting there in the middle of the road, facing him.