Guilty Blood

by Rick Acker

  She glanced at the book but didn’t take it from him. “I’ve seen these. I want to look at the other ledger.”

  His bloodshot eyes widened for an instant. “I don’t have any other ledger.”

  “Yes, you do,” Sofia said. “The ledger you use to record cash transactions.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

  “Let me see if I can help you find it.” Sofia got up and took a step toward the open file cabinet.

  Fitzpatrick intercepted her and grabbed her by the arm. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Please let go of her,” Amy said. Her voice was calm, but her hand was inside her jacket, resting on the butt of her pistol.

  Fitzpatrick looked at Amy and froze for an instant, then let go of Sofia. “Okay, okay,” he said, holding his hands up.

  “Please sit down and place your hands on the desk,” Amy said. “Don’t move quickly.”

  Fitzpatrick did as instructed, a faint sheen of sweat on his forehead.

  Sofia walked over to the file cabinet and bent over. She pulled out another ledger book and leafed through it. “I thought you might have forgotten something.” She put the second ledger down on the desk and smiled brightly at Fitzpatrick. “And you know what my old abuelita used to say? ‘If you’ve forgotten one thing, you’ve probably forgotten two.’ So let’s see whether you forgot anything else.”

  She turned back to the file cabinets and started opening other drawers.

  “You can’t do that,” Fitzpatrick said, glancing nervously at Amy.

  “And you can’t withhold documents that are responsive to a lawful subpoena,” Sofia said. “But here we are.”

  Sofia came to a drawer that was locked. “Keys,” she said, extending her hand toward Fitzpatrick.

  He reached toward the left side of his desk.

  “No,” Amy said. “Jessica, please open the drawer and get the key. Mr. Fitzpatrick, please move back from the desk.”

  Fitzpatrick pushed back from the desk and rolled his chair into a corner of the office. His eyes darted back and forth between Amy and Jessica, and he looked a little like a trapped animal.

  Jessica walked around the desk, keeping as far from him as possible. She reached for the left-hand drawer.

  “Actually, I think the key is to the right,” Fitzpatrick said, his voice taut.

  On impulse, Jessica opened the left drawer anyway. A chill went through her when she looked inside. “There’s a gun in here,” she said.

  Amy’s eyes flashed. She strode over quickly, plucked the gun out of the drawer, and pointed it at Fitzpatrick’s head. “You would have been dead before you could aim,” she told him in an icy voice. Without taking her eyes off him, she said, “You can get the keys now, Jessica.”

  With shaking hands, Jessica opened the right desk drawer and found a wire ring holding two small keys. She handed it to Sofia, who unlocked the cabinet.

  “Huh,” Sofia said, holding up a wad of cash and a handful of baggies filled with a greenish-brown substance. “Looks like he’s running a little unlicensed cannabis club too. You’re just a bad-decision machine, aren’t you, Tim?”

  His face was slick with sweat and pale beneath its web of broken capillaries. “Why are you doing this?” he asked. “I thought you were from the Public Defender’s Office.”

  “That’s right,” Sofia said. “I’m just trying to defend my client, but that’s really hard when witnesses lie and play hide-the-ball. When that happens, I have to poke around and try to figure stuff out on my own. And sometimes I stumble across evidence of other crimes, like tax fraud.” She nodded toward the ledgers on the desk. “Or selling pot without a license.” She dropped the baggies and the cash back into the file-cabinet drawer. “Then I have a decision to make. I can either call the DA’s Office or I can let it go. You haven’t really been doing much to make me want to let this go, but maybe things will change.” She looked at him expectantly.

  He licked his lips. “Uh, what could I do?”

  “You could start by giving us what the subpoena called for. We’ve got the ledger. Give me anything else you’ve got from the days listed in the subpoena.”

  “Right now?”

  “Yes,” Sofia said. “Either that or I go through your files myself and copy anything interesting I find.”

  He flicked a quick, nervous glance at Amy. “I, uh, don’t have a copy of the subpoena handy.”

  Sofia reached into her bag, pulled out a copy of the subpoena, and flipped it across his desk. “Now you do.”

  He got up hesitantly, walked over to the file cabinets, pulled out a fat manila folder, and set it on his desk. He looked through it for a few minutes, consulting the subpoena and pulling out sheets of paper from time to time, creating a small stack. He put the stack on top of the ledger and looked up. “Okay, that’s all of it. I already gave you everything I had on the computer. I don’t have a copier here, but there’s a FedEx about three blocks from here where you can copy stuff.” He paused, then quickly added, “Or you can, you know, take it back to your office and copy it there. Whatever’s easiest for you.”

  “Thanks,” Sofia said, picking up the stack of papers and skimming them as she spoke.

  “So we’re done, then?” Fitzpatrick asked hopefully.

  Sofia shook her head. “I think you know more about Linc Thomas’s death than you told the police.”

  He stiffened. “Why do you think that?”

  “I have my reasons. For starters, the way you reacted just now.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I don’t know anything.”

  Sofia looked at him silently.

  He reddened. “I don’t know anything more! I swear it!”

  Sofia snapped her fingers. “You know what I forgot to ask for in that subpoena? Phone records. I need records of all incoming and outgoing calls for all the days listed in the subpoena. Will I need to go out to my car and write up a subpoena while Amy keeps an eye on you, or are you willing to be cooperative and give them to me?”

  His face was tight with fear. “Why do you need those?”

  “That’s not something I need to tell you, but it should be pretty obvious. I’m looking for people who might know more about Linc Thomas’s death than you seem to. I’ll go through the numbers on your bills, looking for any that seem interesting or unusual. Then I’ll start making some calls. And if they ask where I got their numbers, I’ll say they came from you.”

  The fear in his face began to turn to panic. “Don’t do that. Please.”

  She shrugged. “Like I said, when witnesses don’t cooperate, I have to poke around on my own. Sometimes I wind up poking a hornet nest—and I’m not necessarily the one who gets stung.”

  He wiped his forehead, and his hand trembled. “I . . . I can’t cooperate. They’ll kill me.”

  “Who will kill you?”

  He shook his head. “I can’t.”

  “Whoever it is, you don’t think they’ll kill you when I call them and say you gave me their number?”

  His breath came in pants, and Jessica almost felt sorry for him. “If I tell you, will you promise not to call?” he asked.

  “If I don’t have to call, I won’t,” Sofia said. “You need to convince me that I already know everything, so there’s no point in calling. Understand?”

  He nodded jerkily. “Okay.” He licked his lips. “One day a couple of years ago, Linc came in with this really hot Chinese hooker.” He glanced uncomfortably at Amy, who still held a gun pointed at his chest. “I mean, uh, she was very good looking and she dressed like prostitutes usually do. Anyway, she handed me a credit card and Linc said, ‘Don’t run it through the machine, just call the number on the back and do what they tell you.’ Then he ran up a tab, and when he was ready to leave, I called the number. A guy with a Chinese accent answered. He asked me who I was, and he told me to read the number on the front of the card. I did. Then he asked me how much the bill was. I told h
im, and he said I’d be paid by the end of the week. A couple of days later, a guy showed up with a sealed envelope with the exact amount in it. Then a few months later, the same thing happened with a different girl. And then it happened again a month or two after that. It became sort of a thing—five or six times a year, Linc would come in with a really good-looking Chinese girl, she would hand the same card to me or whoever was tending bar, we’d call the number, and the cash would show up a few days later. It was strange and shady, but I didn’t think much about it. A lot of strange and shady things go on in this part of town.”

  “So I’ve noticed,” Sofia commented with a nod toward his file cabinets.

  He cleared his throat. “Yeah, well, the last time Linc came in with a girl, the guy on the line told me to call the next time Linc came into the bar, whether he had a girl or not. He said they’d pay me a thousand dollars if I did that.”

  “And did you?” Sofia asked.

  He nodded. “I thought maybe he owed them money or they wanted to talk to him or, uh . . .” His voice trailed off. “I didn’t know they were going to kill him.”

  “Uh-huh,” Sofia said. “And did they pay you?”

  “Yeah. And there was a note in the envelope with the cash. It said, Silence and live. So I can’t testify. You understand that, right? I’ll cooperate as much as I can, but I can’t do that. Even if you call the DA and I go to jail.”

  Sofia looked him in the eye for a moment. “I still need the phone records.”

  His eyes bugged out. “But I told you everything!”

  “I didn’t say I’d call any of them,” she said. “But I do need the bills. You can either give them to me or I can fish around in your computer and file cabinets until I find them.”

  His hands twitched and he looked like he wanted to speak, but he apparently concluded that nothing he could say would help. After a few seconds, he turned to the computer and pulled up several phone bills, which he printed and handed to Sofia.

  “Which one of these is the number you called to get paid?” Sofia asked.

  He gave her a pleading look. “You’re not going to call it, are you?”

  “I don’t plan to,” she said. “But I do need to know which one it is.”

  He hesitated for a moment, then pointed to the top bill with a sausage-like finger. “That’s it.”

  “Thank you,” Sofia said. She thought for a moment. “I think that’s all I need.”

  Fitzpatrick sighed and sagged back into his chair.

  Sofia gathered the papers he had given her into a stack on the cash ledger, which she picked up and put in her bag.

  Amy lowered the gun and said, “This will be in the trash can outside. Don’t come for it until we are gone.” Then she turned and walked out the door.

  Jessica stood unsteadily. She looked at the notebook in her hands, the paper damp with sweat where she had clutched it. She realized that she had completely forgotten to take notes. She followed Amy out. Sofia came last.

  As she reached the office door, Sofia turned and gave Fitzpatrick a sunny smile. “Thank you for your cooperation.”

  CHAPTER 64

  Brandon could feel it. The tension thickened, and a sense of imminent violence hung over the jail like a thundercloud. The guards sensed it now too. They were warier and less likely to be alone. And for a change, they actually seemed to be trying to stop prisoner fights before they started.

  The animus wasn’t all directed at Brandon, but he was certainly a focus of it. On the few occasions where he came in contact with gen-pop prisoners, they shot him glares and occasional insults. On one occasion, a man muttered something about “your mama” as he passed Brandon in a hallway. Brandon shot an insult back in return. The other man—who was several steps past Brandon by that point—turned and started back toward him. Brandon brought his fists up, but a swarm of guards got between them.

  Brandon’s yard time was curtailed after that. So were his commissary visits. That was fine. It gave him more time to get ready for whatever was coming. He went back to practicing fighting moves in his cell, though without the savage ferocity that had earned him a psych evaluation.

  When he had first set foot in Tassajara, he’d had a grudge against the type of men who lived here. That grudge had only grown over the months he had spent behind bars. Everything he’d thought about them had turned out to be true. They were lying, explosively violent, utterly corrupt men. Not even men, really—animals.

  And he had become an animal to survive. After the incident in the hallway, he had caught a glimpse of himself in a security mirror. The face looking back at him had been wary, sullen, dangerous, and semi-feral. It was the face of a dog that was turning into a wolf.

  Brandon’s lips curled into a bitter smile as he practiced punches and blocks. God—if there was a God—had a dark sense of humor. He had dropped Brandon into the middle of a cesspool filled with precisely the type of men he detested most, and now He was turning Brandon into one of them. What a black joke.

  CHAPTER 65

  “I hate this,” Billy said.

  “Yeah, me too,” Cole said, hearing the weariness in his own voice.

  “Did you know that the CIA and NSA are involved now?” Billy asked.

  “No, but I can’t say I’m surprised,” Cole replied. “Francini said Nate Daniels’s source claimed he could name names and provide hacked emails from China. As far as I know, all the Lan Long operatives are foreign. That gives the CIA a hook to get involved. And if CODIS really was hacked, the NSA will be all over it.”

  Billy paced back and forth in Cole’s office, too agitated to sit down. “But the Blue Dragon is ours,” he protested.

  “Was ours, you mean,” Cole said bitterly.

  What was happening to them wasn’t fair. They had been working on the Lan Long investigation for years. They were the ones who figured out that a Chinese triad named Lan Long was trafficking women through the Port of Oakland. They were the ones who found Linc Thomas and developed him as a source. They were the ones who discovered that Lan Long had essentially no US operation and functioned through surrogates and middlemen, making the triad virtually invulnerable to American authorities. And they were the ones who found the Achilles’ heel in Lan Long’s scheme: they needed to bring a ship to Oakland for long enough to unload the women.

  If they could only catch that ship and crew, they would be able to deal a major blow to Lan Long, maybe even break them. Lan Long must have people on that ship to keep the women sedated and alive. They would need a trained medical professional, drugs and IV equipment, and so on. That person would go to jail, of course. And there was no way the crew didn’t know what was going on, so they’d all be arrested too. The women would all be in protective custody. The US would also be able to “arrest” the ship under maritime law, giving them leverage over the owner. People would talk, probably enough people to ID all the key players in Lan Long. Maybe that would be enough to put those guys behind bars, maybe not. But at the very least, they could be indicted in absentia and they’d never leave their rat holes in China again. And a lot of vulnerable young women would be a little safer.

  That had been the plan, anyway. And they had been close to pulling it off. Linc had promised to tell them when the next shipment was coming in. They had a team of specialists ready to raid the ship and an Assistant US Attorney on call and ready to go to court on five minutes’ notice to get whatever warrants or other legal papers they needed. But then Linc died, and everything went on hold.

  And now it was being taken away from them. No one had explicitly told Cole or Billy that their investigation was being handed to someone else, but Cole had been around long enough that he knew the signs.

  “This can’t just happen!” Billy exploded. “There has to be a way for us to get back in the driver’s seat.” He stopped and turned to Cole. “Lan Long is still bringing in shipments, so they must’ve replaced Linc, right?”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “We just have to find the
new guy and get him to talk.”

  “Easier said than done, Billy,” Cole said. “We’ve been looking, remember? We’ve got wiretaps, informants among the longshoremen, customs agents on the lookout. The whole nine yards.”

  “Maybe that’s the problem,” Billy said. “Maybe we’re not the only ones with sources on the docks. If Lan Long knows who we’ve got watching them, they can work around us.”

  “True. What are you suggesting?”

  “That I go out in the field—the docks during the day, Chinatown at night. Wherever the new Linc Thomas might be,” Billy said.

  Cole thought about it. If they could find whoever was helping Lan Long get their shipments through customs and turn that person into an informant, then they’d be right back where they were before Linc died. It wasn’t risk-free, but the payoff could be huge. “Okay, but be careful. And happy hunting.”

  CHAPTER 66

  Jessica sat in her usual place at their usual table at Pescadero on Lake Merritt. Since her original meeting here with Nate and Sofia, the restaurant had become their default location for meetings—which Jessica thoroughly appreciated now that summer had come to the lake and they could comfortably sit outside.

  For a moment, she let herself fantasize about taking Brandon here. He liked seafood, and he would enjoy the idea of going to a restaurant owned by Sofia’s family. It would be the perfect place for a celebratory dinner if he was acquitted. She pictured the four of them together, having a long, happy dinner—toasting each other, reliving war stories from the case, speculating about Brandon’s future once he graduated from Berkeley. Then, after dessert, maybe they would take a walk along the lakeshore as the sun set.

  She hadn’t allowed herself to think like this before. To hope. Everything had seemed so grim. There had been nothing tangible for her daydreams to latch onto and grow.

  She had been praying for Brandon to be set free, of course. She prayed for it every day, often every hour. But she realized that she hadn’t really believed that it could happen. She remembered what the epileptic boy’s father said to Jesus: “I believe, Lord. Help my unbelief.” She smiled—that was definitely her. She “believed” that God would answer her prayers for Brandon, but it hadn’t seemed like a real possibility until she, Sofia, and Amy walked out of the Captain’s Lounge yesterday.