by Mike Monson
“But, shit,” Adams said. “What do you want? Just like you said, we got motive, opportunity, and, now, if this tip is true, means.”
“Maybe someone is fucking with him. And us. I really don’t like him for this.”
“You think there’s someone out there killing normal citizens sophisticated enough to frame an innocent man? This ain’t TV.”
“I know, I know,” Fagan said. “Maybe they weren’t so normal, maybe we should look into the vics a little bit more, you know? And that guy, Rincon.”
“Let’s see what happens when you go out there, okay? In the meantime, I’ll do some checking on Pisko and his partner. If the weapon is under the guy’s bed, it’ll be enough for an arrest and we can go from there.”
Mavis pulled up with Miranda. Fagan and the patrolman got out of their cars.
“Sorry, to disturb you like this, Mrs. Love,” Fagan said. He didn’t hide his pleasure at looking Mavis up and down, lingering on her legs and her cleavage. “But you understand that we have to follow up on every tip?”
“Yes, I do understand, Detective.”
Mavis and Miranda walked up the steps to the porch and stood near the door. The two policemen followed and stopped on the front walkway.
“And who is this with you?” Fagan asked. He motioned toward Miranda, who glared at Plant and Monday.
“That’s Miranda Fish, Detective,” Officer Plant said. “I’ve arrested her a couple of times. Along with her boyfriend Logan Swift. They’re both pain in the ass scumbags.”
“How dare you,” Mavis said to Plant. She looked at Fagan.
“Now, Plant,” Fagan said. “Show some respect.”
“This is my granddaughter,” Mavis said. “And yes, her name is Miranda Fish.”
Mavis stared at Plant.
“Logan Swift is your boyfriend?” Fagan looked genuinely shocked.
Miranda looked at Mavis.
“Yes, that’s right,” Mavis said. “That boy is nothing like his monster brother. He’s a good boy, and Miranda, yes, she’s made some mistakes but she’s paying for them, isn’t that right dear?”
“That’s right,” Miranda said. “Besides, I’m just here to support my grandma.”
“Okay,” Fagan said, “whatever. Let’s get this done.”
Fagan started to walk up the steps.
“Would it be okay if I went in first?” Mavis said. “Just for a minute or two?”
She smiled at Fagan and walked up close to him. Fagan blushed.
“No,” he said. “I can’t do that.” He handed Mavis a single piece of paper. “Here’s the warrant. It gives us access strictly to the bedroom of Paul Dunn, along with his 1997 Honda Accord. Please open the door and let us in.”
Mavis walked up even closer, and lightly touched Fagan’s chest with the nails of her right finger. She stretched out of her high heels to get as close to his left ear as possible, and she whispered so that the other cop couldn’t hear:
“Does that mean that anything that might be on the coffee table in the living room is … uh … off limits? And not part of your search, Detective Fagan?”
Fagan took her right hand in his left and caressed her fingers. He looked down at her, and said, just as quietly, “Maybe some time I could conduct a thorough search of your bedroom?”
Mavis squeezed Fagan’s hand and looked him in his eyes for a moment.
“So,” she said, “do we have an understanding?”
Fagan let go of Mavis and walked to the door.
“Let’s see how thing go here, Ms. Love. Now, please open the door.”
NINETEEN
Bethany Fish was stressed out. She had a lot of business to take care of and every time she thought she was on top of it, someone messed up her plans.
She and Pete made a fortune during the real estate boom of the early and mid-2000s. Dozens of subdivisions had popped up all over Modesto to serve the insatiable hunger of Modestans and San Francisco Bay Area and Silicon Valley commuters. Long-time residents were getting huge offers for their older houses and cashing in and upgrading. For half the price of a one-room condo in a bad Oakland neighborhood, it was possible for a family to buy a sparkling 2600 square-foot home with islands in the kitchens, lovely master bedrooms with a sunken tub in the bathroom, and a big back yard for the kids. The only catch for the transplants: one or both of the home-buying couple had to be willing to commute back to their Bay Area or Silicon Valley jobs up to three hours each way every day to pay for such luxury. One could afford their wonderful new lifestyle, but never have time to enjoy it—accept, of course, for weekends, which were inevitably dominated by soccer games and little league and dance practice and recitals and band practice and girl scouts and cub scouts and backyard barbeques with other stressed-out-pissed-off parents with no spare time.
Pete and Bethany Fish had sold nearly 400 of those houses and bought one for themselves, along with two very expensive cars. They were rolling in cash and they spent it faster than they earned it on furniture and boats and clothes and vacations and dinners out every night and on and on. When the real estate bubble burst in 2008, they were broke, in debt, and scrambling for money to get back their opulent lifestyle.
Most of their clients had foreclosed, abandoned their homes, and moved back to Richmond or San Bruno or South San Francisco. Pete and Bethany were out of money and hadn’t made a house or a car payment in nearly six months. Their credit had maxed out. If they didn’t pay the bank nearly five thousand dollars in a week, they’d be forced out of their home as well. If it wasn’t for a quick, high-interest loan and some good trades buying and selling guns, they would’ve been homeless and starving months before. Plus, there was the Reverend Philip Michael Polk, the famous evangelist and far-right radio show host who had been helping them out with starting their church.
She sat in her house, in the living room that she’d decorated painstakingly. This room, along with the rest of the home, was a thing of true beauty to Bethany, a monument to the hard work and Christian values of her and her husband. She reached out and ran her fingers along the thick black leather of the couch.
She picked up her cell phone. Man, she loved that thing. A brand new iPhone 4S that Bethany stood in line for twelve hours to get. Luckily they’d managed to keep up their phone bill and the upgrade to the new phone was only 99 dollars they managed to scrap together—mostly because of a last-minute loan from Reverend Polk. It was covered in a pink faux metal case that had fake brass knuckles along the side. She loved the way it felt in her hand, and it was a rare moment when she wasn’t holding or using it. She wasn’t interested in social media and she didn’t use it to take photos—her cell was for calling, emailing, or texting someone to do with business, her family, or the church.
She dialed it now.
“Yes, Carla Daniels, please … it’s Bethany Fish … yes, I’ll hold … Yes, yes, I know I… yes, I am well aware of that … believe me … I promise you, we will have your money by Monday. Not only the five K, but much more as well. I know, I understand. Yes, it’s our last chance, I understand. No, no worries, if we don’t have it then we will walk out the door, the house is yours, okay? Yes? I know. I really appreciate your patience.”
As soon as she ended the call, her phone rang. She looked at the number and scowled.
“What! I cannot believe your nerve, Randa. What? When? No … no … no! That won’t work for us … that doesn’t work for us. Because … we have a … okay okay, we’ll be there. You better have it cause your Dad has a buyer who is getting very impatient. Okay. Fine… I said fine.”
She clicked off. Leaned back on the sofa. Sighed. Leaned forward again. Dialed.
“Brad, yeah, it’s Beth … yeah … great ….great. Please tell me you got a look at my mom’s papers. Great. And who’s the main beneficiary and trustee? No. No. No. Huh? What? Oh, come on, no. Really? That piece of … poo. Not Paul, there is no way he deserves that. Darn it. And what if he wasn’t around, you know? … You know, what if he
was dead? Then me? You sure? Thanks God for that at least. Can’t you scan it? Some of it? No? Email it? Really? Darn, darn … darn. I understand. God bless you … Oh … okay. Darn!”
Bethany clicked off the call. She put the phone on the coffee table. She bowed her head.
“Lord. I understand you know what is best. Please give me faith, please give me the faith and the trust to know that you will help us to further your plan for the world. Please show us the way. I am open to your messages. In Jesus Christ’s name A—”
Ring. Bethany looked at the number and answered right away.
“Sweatheart. I talked to Brad, you know the parishioner who’s a paralegal at Jackson & Stephens? He says that it’s set up for Paul to be named as the trustee of Mom’s estate. The money goes all over, though a lot of it will be Paul’s. He couldn’t read it all to me over the phone, too afraid of getting caught … no, he was looking at it on their network … Cause it’s confidential, sweetie, and he doesn’t work in that department so if they know he was snooping around, checked the records or something … It’s all in these complicated trusts for Miranda, and Paul and me and some stuff that Clyde Pike and Scott Love are involved in, some homosexual nonsense or something …. calm down … calm down … there … okay … of course. But there is no way to get any of it quickly … no, no, no, he couldn’t say… looks like millions though, way more than we’d even suspected… yeah, right? I know …. No, no, I asked and he just couldn’t … he was doing us a big favor just telling us this… anyway, the Trustee of course, has total power over all the money, and can get this big salary just for being in charge. I know, I know, it’s so dumb. I knew that since they aren’t Christians they’d … right, right, yes, of course God is on our side, I know that. Darn it. So … no, no, no. Right, if he’s… gone, it’s me. Oh, what? Oh, Randa is next in line after me, can you imagine? Okay, okay. Wait, there’s more. No, stop, listen. We have to meet Logan and Randa to get the stuff tonight. At eleven. I know, I know. It’s ridiculous. No, I don’t see any way out of it. Behind the church, in the lot by the stupid Hole In the Wall. I have no idea why there. No, not a clue. I can’t talk to her anymore, you know that. You sure Jorge will …. I know, but can we count on that? Okay, have faith bla bla bla right. Just talk to Reverend Polk, let him know it’ll be just a few more hours, okay? All right… all right. Love you too. Bye.”
TWENTY
Paul really wanted to get to his house and show Detective Fagan the gun. Let him bring it to the lab or wherever and see if it was the weapon that killed Tina and Mark. Wanted to call out Miranda in front of the police and hopefully shake loose whatever the truth was about her involvement in the murders and her possible framing of him. He wanted to file a complaint against Reverend Fish and his cronies because there was no way they should be able to get away with what they did to him. Paul wasn’t going to get them back on his own. He was surprised to find that he believed in the system. He was certain the Modesto Police Department would take his complaint seriously and make things difficult for those religious homophobe nut jobs and Reverend Fish. He thought he could maybe even get a lawsuit out of it, and get some settlement out of that, which coupled with the money he was going to get from Tina’s insurance and pension, set him up nicely. Get him out of his mother’s house. Make it so he could get more custody of his kids.
That’s what he wanted to do. Instead, he wound up driving Logan Swift’s Ford pickup in the totally opposite direction with Logan sitting next to him pointing the shotgun at the side of his head.
“Uncle Paul,” Logan said, after they had driven north on McHenry until they were just about out of town, now surrounded by almond orchards on both sides of the road. “You need to calm down.”
“I am calm,” Paul said. “I was never not calm. I just want to go home. I need to go to my house. Jesus Christ.”
“Hey, Randa told me you were off to meet the po-po there waving this shotgun or some such shit. That’s like suicide by cop, you know? We couldn’t let that happen to you. No way, man.”
Just after Paul turned left off of Sylvan, Logan appeared next to him and used his truck to force him into the parking lot of a Baptist church. Paul had to slam his brakes and make a hard turn into the lot to avoid being hit by Logan’s truck. He parked and Logan parked just inches in front of him. As Logan jumped out and approached his passenger door, Paul thought about pulling into reverse to get away, but he was just too slow from drugs and pain. And, as usual, he was fascinated by what Logan was going to do next.
Which, this time, was to open the door of the Honda, grab the shotgun off the seat, open it up, take two shells out of his pocket, load each barrel, close the gun with a gangster-like flick of the wrist, and point it at Paul.
“Okay, Uncle Paul,” he said. “Let’s go.”
He motioned with the gun toward his truck. Paul looked at Logan and the gun, then out onto the busy street and raised his eyebrows like, “are you kidding me?”
“Please, dude,” Logan said. “You know I don’t want to shoot this thing and hurt you or your car and attract a bunch of attention, right? But I will, you know me. I’m a crazy Bosnian rape orphan and I’m out of control!”
Logan bugged his eyes out and cocked both barrels.
“Jesus,” Paul said. He gingerly got out of his car. He looked again at Logan holding the gun, and at the street and toward the church buildings. “Am I supposed to hold my hands up?”
Paul could not believe what was happening. It seemed so stupid.
“Naw,” Logan said. “Just get in my fucking truck and start driving. Go like back to McHenry and turn left, and keep going.”
Paul sighed and shook his head. He knew it was possible that Logan would shoot him, fuck him up good, if he thought that would be somehow following Miranda’s instructions. He knew she’d called him. He had no doubt about that.
TWENTY-ONE
Back at the house, Mavis, Miranda, and Officer Plant stood in Paul’s room. Plant had just looked under the bed and all they found was a plastic Walgreens bag containing an empty bottle of Extra Strength Robitussin.
“Dude,” Miranda said to Fagan, “We told you that we just saw Paul with the gun. He took off out of town, going east on Sylvan.”
Fagan looked at Mavis. He smiled.
“I thought you said you didn’t know where your son was, Ms. Love,” he said. “That the last you saw him he was sitting out there, in the living room, watching TV. Right?”
“Well…” Mavis said. “I told you several times now to call me Mavis.”
“Why don’t you take me out there and show me where you last saw him … Mavis.”
“It was after you called,” Miranda said. “He must’ve figured out you were coming and grabbed the gun and took off. He knew where we were. He was scared. And desperate. As you can imagine.”
“I hope that’s true,” Fagan said. “I wouldn’t want your gorgeous grandmother here to have to serve time on an obstruction of justice charge.”
Fagan and his colleague looked in Paul’s closet. A suit hung still covered by the dry cleaning plastic. There were two dress shirts, one navy blue and one white. Five or six black polo shirts. Two pairs of khaki pants. One denim jacket. On the floor was a pair of worn out and dirty white Nike cross training shoes, and black slip-on dress shoes in need of a shine. There was nothing else, the shelf above the hangers was empty.
The policemen turned to the small, three-drawer dresser—the only other object in the room besides the bed and cardboard box bedside table.
“Officer Plant,” Fagan said as he looked in Paul’s drawers at the four pairs of boxer shorts, a half dozen t-shirts, some shorts, and two pairs of socks. “What kinds of things have you had to arrest Ms. Fish here for? And Mr. Swift? What is the basic kind of fuck-up those two are involved in?”
“A couple months ago we got her on a DUI,” Plant said.
“Jeez,” Fagan said after closing the third drawer. “Is this everything that guy owns?”
&n
bsp; “This is it, really,” Mavis said. “When he moved in here, he didn’t have much. Just came over in his car with a couple of boxes. He used to have tons of books, guitars, CDs, a house full of furniture.”
“What else?” Fagan said to Plant.
“Well, Logan Swift was hauled in for theft and burglary and possession of meth and heroin as a juvenile. He was constantly in and out of the Hall.”
“Is that right?” Fagan said.
“Since he turned eighteen he hasn’t been arrested, but we’ve had to respond to half a dozen or so calls to break up disturbances and fights he instigated or was involved in, along with Ms. Fish. These two are a pain in the ass. She’s always pissing someone off for something and then Logan ends up stomping a guy or a woman. He doesn’t care.”
“Most of those calls are just bull—”
“How did Mr. Dunn wind up in so much debt, single, living with his mother and with this decrepit collection of possessions?” Fagan asked Mavis.
“Well, I don’t know all the details. Tina left him to hook up with Mark Pisko after Paul quit his job at Turlock High School. She went a little nuts I think, was having some kind of breakdown. Her mother ended up filing some kind of motion to get full custody of their kids until they could go to court and sort it all out. As far as I know, Tina still hadn’t got them back. After about six months the house was foreclosed on and Paul just left everything behind and came here. That was six months ago. He was working briefly as a fry cook before he got injured.”
“When we picked up Miranda on the DUI,” Plant said, “Logan was the passenger. We found syringes under his seat, but no drugs in the car. I guess she pled guilty to the DUI and got off on the paraphernalia charge. We’re pretty sure Mr. Swift is still involved in meth and heroin.”
“Is that right, Ms. Fish?” Fagan said. He sat down on the bed facing Mavis and Miranda. “You and your boyfriend like to shoot up shit? You sure look like one of those skanks from down on south Ninth. I’d hate to be the lady cop that had to search your ass.” He looked at Plant. “God I hate fucking junkies.”