Red Tide

by G. M. Ford

Holmes stepped back a pace and looked them over. Satisfied would be far too strong a word to describe his feelings. No…this crew was far too motley for a word as strong as that. Hopeful was the best he could manage. Hopeful they could keep themselves together for long enough to get the job done. Hopeful their former lives burned in their chests like embers. Embers they could fan into enough of a fire to take their places among the pantheon of heroes. Or, failing that, into the ground with their brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers and all who had come before.

  “Your identification cards are legitimate,” he said. “Your names appear on company rolls. You have actually been hired by the companies involved in the service.” He waited a moment for his words to sink in. “There will be no problem with your bona fides. The only trick will be to substitute your canisters for the ones you will be given.”

  He pointed. “Wesley and Nathan will take the van.” They both nodded solemnly. “Nathan will drive. Your crew assembles at eight-thirty sharp. I have left directions from the hotel to the lot where you are expected to park. They’re on the same street.”

  He now turned his attention to Samuel and Paul. He walked to the window. “Come here,” he said. They walked quickly to his side. He pulled back the curtains and pointed out into the street. “You see the red Subaru?” He didn’t wait for a reply. “That is for you. Samuel is to drive.” Since the plan had first been outlined, the cousins had good-naturedly argued about who was going to be what Paul liked to call “the wheelman.” The matter was now settled. Paul cast a disgusted look his partner’s way. “The registration and insurance cards are in the compartment. Your crew assembles at ten o’clock.”

  “What about Martin?” Wesley asked. “Bobby can’t drive. How’s he going to get—”

  “I will be Bobby’s new partner,” Holmes said quickly. “The company has been notified that Martin will not be showing up for work. They are expecting me instead.”

  He crooked a finger at the group. “Remember…there is no reason to hurry. The crews are working into the early afternoon. Be circumspect. Try to do your work on common areas rather than individual spaces. Wear your breathing devices at all times. Take your time. What you will be spraying will not become active and contagious for thirty hours. So long as you don’t breathe any of it, you will have plenty of time to do your work, decontaminate one another and be on your way.”

  He looked at each of them…one after the other. “If they put you together…that’s good. If they assign you a more experienced partner…if the partner is in the way…you do whatever it takes.” A rustle of understanding passed among them. “We have practiced over and over. You have been well trained. All you need to do is what you have been trained to do…”—he aimed his palms at the ceiling—“…and you will…”—he stopped himself. “You will finally have your moment.”

  “And you yours,” Wesley pointed out.

  Holmes straightened his spine and squared his shoulders. “I have lived a dozen years of my life, only for this moment. I have searched my soul. I can safely say I am willing to die for this to happen.” He said it with enough conviction to surprise himself. “Not anxious, but willing,” he added with a small smile. A ripple of nervous laughter rolled through the line of young men.

  Holmes waved himself off. “Listen to me,” he scoffed. “Lecturing to you. You who have fallen through the cracks of the cracks and survived.” He nodded approvingly to each young man in turn. “They have enemies all over the world. They are looking over their shoulders for everyone but us. They have no idea we are coming. They—”

  The doorbell rang.

  29

  Along the western horizon, a dark line of clouds rolled north like dirty boxcars. Below, a stiff southerly wind had churned the surface of Elliott Bay into an uneven washboard of whitecaps, swirling the black water in all directions at once, slamming the waves against one another in a disorganized maelstrom of foam and windblown water. Far out over the surface, halfway to Bainbridge Island, a solitary set of sails…reefed hard…straining…showed white against the dark surface of the Sound.

  Corso gestured at the sails as he and Detective Gutierrez waited to cross East Republican Street. “Guy’s got a lotta balls,” he said. “It’s blowing like hell out there today. You gotta know what you’re doing to sail in this.”

  Gutierrez shook his head. “Never understood that sailing thing people got,” he said. “Gotta be a better way to get from one place to another without freezing your ass off on the back of a boat.” A huge green and white Bekins truck had run out of momentum at the apex of Republican Street and now sat with its cab nearly up on the flat and its load dangling precariously over the steepest part of the hill. Inside the cab, the driver and his partner were engaged in an animated discussion of what to do next.

  Corso chuckled. “Sailing’s hard to describe. There’s a zen to it. Something about the feel of the wake behind the boat, the hum of the sails and the rigging.” From the corner of his eye, Corso could see that Gutierrez wasn’t buying any of it, so he shut up.

  The moving van roared as the driver suddenly raced the engine, then shifted down to granny gear, slowly pulling the big truck upward out of the intersection, bringing Dougherty and Charly Hart into view, half a block down, standing on the sidewalk in front of her house, making conversation.

  “Forensics went over this last night,” Gutierrez said as they walked along scanning the sidewalk and the adjacent strip of grass. “Just want to be sure.”

  As the pair approached, Dougherty and Hart strolled across Thirteenth Street. Meg was talking and gesturing with her arms as she walked. Corso could make out the words above the rush of wind in the trees. “We were parked right here,” she was saying. “Stevie and me.” She looked over at Charly Hart, who stood at her side, notebook and pencil poised.

  “This is Steveland Gerkey you’re referring to?”

  She nodded. “You know…it might help me remember if we had…”

  The detective read her mind. “His landlady says he went to Las Vegas to see his kids. We’ve got a want in with the Vegas police for him.”

  Detective Gutierrez placed his pocket handkerchief on the sidewalk and rested one knee on the neatly folded square of black silk. He meticulously combed the semicircle of grass on the sidewalk side of a massive oak tree, using his fingers to pick through the rough tangle of autumn grass. After a few moments, he rose to his feet empty-handed.

  He raised his voice, talking to Meg Dougherty across the street. “In your original statement, you told us you thought there might have been someone else on the street last night when you first spotted Mr. Bohannon.”

  Dougherty looked confused. Annoyed even. “Did I?” she wondered.

  Charly Hart flipped through his notebook. He began to read. “‘It was like there was somebody over on the sidewalk. It was like this shadow went behind this big tree and never came out…and then like I recognized Brian…and you know forgot all about…’ What did you do then?” Charly Hart asked. “After you recognized Mr. Bohannon?”

  She thought about it. “I told Stevie. I said, ‘That’s the guy—you know, the guy who did this to me.’ I had to explain it to him. You know…about Brian and the tattoos and all that stuff.”

  Detective Gutierrez stood on the grass, with his back to the tree.

  “And you and Mr. Gerkey were exactly where when all this was happening?” Charly Hart pressed. “You were both still sitting in the cab while you were explaining the situation to Mr. Gerkey?”

  “Yes…” She caught her breath. Raised a long finger. “No. No we weren’t. We were standing in the street. I’d gotten out of the car and so had he. I was about to pay him when I saw Brian start up the street.” She pointed north.

  “So then…” Corso began, “presuming you were right and there was somebody else in the street last night, it’s safe to assume that whoever it was heard everything you said to Mr. Gerkey.”

  “Well…I don’t know…I guess it’s possible.”


  Detective Gutierrez stepped out from behind the oak tree. “I had no problem hearing everything you just said to Detective Hart,” he said. “And at that time of the night there was probably less ambient noise than there is right now.”

  “So…” she began.

  “That would explain a major portion of the mystery. The part about how a stranger would know where you lived and how they would know enough about the situation between you and Mr. Bohannon to consider leaving his body dead on your kitchen floor.”

  “But how would this person know I wasn’t home? How would a stranger know I don’t have a housekeeper and six kids?”

  Gutierrez crossed the street now. “You told us you followed Mr. Bohannon.”

  “Yes…we did. Stevie and I.”

  “What if the stranger followed you?” Corso asked.

  Her brow furrowed. “You mean while we were following Brian?”

  “Yup.”

  Before she could respond, Charly Hart spoke. “So Mr. Bohannon leaves your house. What next?”

  Again she pointed north. “He had a gray van parked up there.”

  “Let’s go see,” said Detective Gutierrez.

  They walked the half a block. “Right here,” she said, pointing to the first parking space on the east side of Thirteenth Street, a place currently occupied by a rusting Dodge Dart. Last car on the street anybody was going to steal had The Club locked across its steering wheel. “Guy leads a rich fantasy life,” Charly Hart commented.

  While the others milled around the sidewalk, Detective Gutierrez got down on one knee and examined the area adjacent to the parking space. Again he came up empty, dusting his hands against one another and shaking his head.

  “So you follow him where from here?” he asked.

  “To the U District,” she said. “And then all the way back to this neighborhood again.”

  “Let’s do the Broadway stop next,” said Detective Gutierrez, “while we’re in the neighborhood. Then we’ll head for the U District.”

  On the way back to the car, the wind was full in their faces, tousling their hair and flapping their outer garments about them like spastic wings.

  The steep face of Mercer Street had everybody hanging on. Seemed like it was almost straight down, as if the designers, in a fit of whimsy, had decided to add a little adrenaline to the otherwise unspectacular five-block jaunt to Broadway.

  They parked the Ford Taurus illegally close to the corner of Broadway and Harrison. Just about the time Detective Gutierrez slipped the police department sign onto the dashboard and locked the doors, about the time everybody got their clothes straightened out, the ongoing chatter suddenly fell silent. Everyone looked around, scanning Broadway as if they’d dropped their wallets, looking for something unnamed but unquestionably missing. A “What’s wrong with this picture?” kind of thing.

  Dougherty broke the silence. “Dead,” she said.

  “Never seen it this quiet,” Charley Hart agreed.

  They were right. Broadway was usually the most insistently alive part of the city. Not so today. The usual river of pierced, painted, black-clad humanity that flowed down the sidewalks twenty hours a day had been reduced to a mere trickle. Not even a trickle really. More like languid pools of fools. Without options. The homeless. The runaways. Those too sick, too stupid or too far gone to be anyplace else but the streets. Maybe ten percent of the usual Saturday afternoon traffic lolled about.

  The Four Horsemen Tattoo Parlor was located on the upper floor of an off-street shopping mall. Wedged between a sandwich shop and a design consulting firm, the sign featured a passable rendition of Dürer’s famous pale riders and an offer to pierce any and all parts of your body.

  Meg Dougherty stood on the sidewalk, hands thrust deep into her pockets, looking up, seemingly transfixed by the sight of the ghostly mounted riders.

  Charly Hart broke the spell. “Anybody in there gonna recognize you?” he asked.

  “Maybe,” she said. “I used to know a lot of people in this neighborhood.”

  “Probably better you stay down here then.”

  She nodded and turned away from him, milling around the immediate area, taking in the bank of free publications lining the curb: help you find a car…help you find an apartment…help find you a lover…help find you that soul mate to play nude Yahtzee with.

  Corso watched as the detectives disappeared inside. When he turned back to the street, Dougherty had wandered farther up the block toward the espresso stand and the outdoor café, rain or shine usually one of the major venues for the “see and be seen” crowd, nearly empty today. USA Today proclaimed, “DOOMSDAY IN SEATTLE.”

  He watched as she worked her way to the front of the line and ordered. She paid for the coffee and started back his way. Corso opened his mouth to speak.

  She held up a palm. “Don’t,” she said. “I’m not in the mood for any of the usual juvenile banter.”

  “Juvenile?”

  She took a deep breath and a sip of coffee. “I’ve had a tough night, Frank,” she said. “I’ve watched my career go up in smoke. I found somebody I used to love dead on my kitchen floor. I’ve had some nut in a car try to run me down. I’ve witnessed a fistfight…seen somebody die of a heart attack. I’ve been arrested by the police, hijacked by the FBI, then rehijacked by the police…who are…who are making me relive the whole damn thing over again…”—she waved a disgusted hand—“so if you don’t mind, just leave me alone. I did my duty. I kept them from putting you back in jail. From here on in, you’re on your own.” She turned her back and wandered farther up the street.

  Corso leaned against a parked car. Watched her slowly window-shopping her way back in his direction, when Hart and Gutierrez reappeared on the sidewalk.

  Gutierrez was the first to speak. “He stopped in to see a guy he used to work with…”

  Charly Hart checked his notes. “Back in ninety-seven, ninety-eight. Yushi Takei is his name. Another tattoo artist. He says Bohannon stopped in out of the blue last night. Says he hasn’t seen him in years. Says Bohannon just wanted to shoot the breeze about old times and such, but Takei was working on a customer and couldn’t do a whole lot of talking, so Bohannon stayed about five minutes and then hit the bricks.” He looked over at Dougherty. “That square with how long you remember Mr. Bohannon being inside?”

  She nodded, said, “Yeah,” and went back to sipping her coffee.

  “Interesting though…” Detective Gutierrez began. “Mr. Takei says he’s gotten a couple of postcards from Mr. Bohannon in the past couple of years. Says they weren’t from France either. Says they were from somewhere in India. Says Bohannon’s family imports a bunch of stuff from India for their business. Says Bohannon’s been hanging out there for the past couple of years. Waiting for things to die down so’s he could maybe come back to the States.”

  “Says he knows you,” Charly Hart said.

  Again Dougherty nodded. “Yushi’s real good,” she said. “Been around a long time. Booked up months in advance. Does a lot of traditional Japanese work.”

  Gutierrez looked around the half-deserted street. “I think I like it better when the slimeballs are out in force,” he said. Charly Hart agreed and then turned to Dougherty.

  “Where to?”

  She dropped the remains of her coffee into a trash can. Wiped her hands on the paper napkin and then threw it in too. “U District,” she said.

  30

  Governor James Doss unfurrowed his brow just long enough to allow the chubby woman in the blue smock to dab makeup onto his forehead with a small triangular sponge. The sight of Seattle Police Chief Harry Dobson and King County Sheriff Dan Reinhart approaching the makeshift dais in tandem brought the furrows back…harder…deeper than before. “Nice touch,” he thought to himself. “Showing up together…shoulder to shoulder. Nice show of solidarity.”

  When she reached out with the sponge again, he pulled his head back. “That’s enough, Ruth,” he said. “Time for me to go
to work.”

  Without a word, she pocketed the sponge and waddled down the stairs, past the pair of bodyguards, out onto the floor, until she was lost among the rush of technicians and security personnel swirling about in the final preparations for the news conference.

  Doss appreciated Gary Dean’s choice of venue. In this room it was nearly impossible to get a shot that didn’t include a chandelier. Nice credibility enhancer. Spoke well of the wealth and power of the state. Gave people confidence.

  He’d learned about setting from his predecessor Ramsey Haynes. “Remember,” Haynes had told him on the day he’d been sworn in, “half an hour later, all they remember are the pictures.”

  When the chief and the sheriff veered left, toward the rear of the stage, where the assortment of dignitaries necessary to present a united front were in the process of assembling, Doss spoke to the nearest bodyguard. “Tommy,” he said, “ask those two gentlemen if they would be so kind as to step up here and have a word with me.”

  Directly in front of the governor, three technicians gave a bank of microphones the finishing touches, while another pair scanned the stage area with light meters.

  He watched, from the corner of his eye, as Tommy Shannon lumbered over to the pair, watched as they stopped walking and cast quick glances up his way. He had neither illusions nor complaints regarding either Dobson or Reinhart. As governor, he had his own State Police force and thus had no direct power over either of them. Dobson was appointed by the Seattle City Council and the mayor, and, although Reinhart was an elected official, the sheriff was sufficiently popular with both the public and the deputies union that he did not require the patronage of a lame duck governor.

  He wondered if Gary Dean was smart enough to know how lucky Gary Dean had gotten. Dobson and Reinhart were both highly able administrators. Lifetime cops who’d risen through the ranks and were nearly universally respected by those whom they led. The kind of guys from whom you could expect a straight answer to a straight question.