[Chauncey Means 01.0] A Hard Place

by Sean Lynch

  “Should I be wearing a tinfoil hat?” I asked him.

  “Not unless you’re allergic to having your mind read and your innermost thoughts divulged in an internet chat room,” he answered.

  Lothar inserted the SIM card into the body of one of several cellular phone shells on his workshop table. These were linked to the computer layout. Then he sat down and began typing on a keyboard.

  “So you gunned down a couple of Oakland residents,” he commented as he worked. “What’s the matter with you, Chance? Don’t you realize we’re all fellow cosmonauts inhabiting spaceship earth? Where’s your humanity? Don’t you like people?”

  “I don’t mind people,” I said. “It’s the ones who try to kill me I have a problem with. How did you know about that?”

  He gestured elaborately at the electronics bonanza surrounding us. “Lothar the Merciless sees all, and knows all, my son,” he said.

  “Seriously; how’d you find out?”

  “Actually, I heard it go down on the OPD police frequency chatter. One of the cops read your name over his transceiver while checking your identity and running you for warrants. I have all the Bay Area police frequencies digitally unscrambled and decoded in my computer.”

  “Aren’t the police frequencies supposed to be locked so they can’t be un-scrambled?”

  “Yes,” Lothar said smugly.

  “Why did I ask?”

  One of Lothar’s computer monitors lit up and began displaying data arranged horizontally by date and time. “We’re in,” he said. “Anything special you’re looking for?”

  “What have you got?”

  “It looks like this SIM card is from a prepaid phone,” Lothar said. “None of the calls or texts appear to be older than a few days.”

  “Stands to reason,” I said. “I took it from a pimp’s soldier. They probably switch out phones every couple of days for security purposes.”

  “Prepaid phones can’t be traced to their owner,” Lothar said. “It’s the primary reason people use them.”

  “I know,” I said. “I bought one yesterday with that objective.”

  “There’re a lot of text messages, and a lot of calls on this SIM card for such a short period of time,” Lothar went on. “The guy who used it must have been like a telephone switchboard operator. Most of the texts appear to be in some kind of code.”

  I looked over his shoulder at the computer screen. I recognized the numerous text messages as mostly coded descriptions of sex acts, fees, and abbreviated descriptions of the Johns who were soliciting the B-girls. This was so the pimp collecting the cash could track the transactions. I’d seen a lot of drug dealer and pimp pay/owe sheets which were similarly organized.

  For example, one of the dozens of text messages dated on the Friday night I was on the Track read, ‘hh 75 wb br hond J.’ I surmised this message may have meant, ‘half and half for $75 with a white boy in a brown Honda.’ All of the messages ended with a single letter, so ‘J’ must have denoted the B-girl; her call-sign, so to speak. There were at least thirty-five or forty different letter combinations ending the messages on just the first page displayed on Lothar’s computer.

  Each message was stamped with the date and time it was sent. This meant the pimp could monitor how much time each girl spent on each trick, and signal her via a text message if she was taking too long. It was all about production. I suspect, based on what Holly told me, that failure to adhere to the rules governing time-allocation would have gone very badly for a girl on the Track. It was a ruthlessly efficient system, as Holly could no longer attest to. Cellular phone technology merely added another dimension of iron-fisted control to the world’s second-oldest profession.

  “Anything special you’re looking for?”

  “Take a look for anything coming in after about nine o’clock on Friday night. That’s about the time I left Holly.”

  “Who’s Holly?” Lothar asked.

  “B-girl I met on the Track. I was posing as a John.”

  “Sure you were,” Lothar chuckled. “Did you ‘pose’ Holly over the back seat of your car during your undercover investigation?”

  “That question wounds my soul.”

  “You don’t have a soul, Chance. I’ll bet if I asked Holly I’d get a different answer.”

  “Not likely. She’s dead.”

  “That sucks,” Lothar said. “How did she get it?”

  “Not long after talking to me somebody thumped and dumped her up on Skyline Boulevard.”

  “Now I know why you want to me scan this SIM card. How’d you obtain it?”

  “Belonged to one of the shooters,” I said. “He wasn’t going to need it anymore.”

  “I guess not. The Oakland cops know you have it?”

  “I’m insulted you would presume I’m capable of pilfering something of evidentiary value from a crime scene,” I said.

  “That answers my question,” Lothar said.

  Lothar scrolled down. Sure enough, at 9:06 PM, a message was sent which read, ‘bj 40 wb gr toy H.’

  “That’s me,” I pointed out. “Scroll down some more. I want to see all the phone calls which came in after that.”

  “They’re very few phone calls,” Lothar said. “It’s almost all text messages. The texts look like coded messages from different hookers; like the one your friend Holly sent. There sure are a lot of them. How many girls was this guy running?”

  “Actually, I think the phone’s owner wasn’t running them; only supervising them for somebody else. He was sort of like a shift manager. And to answer your question, he and his partner were probably supervising anywhere between three and four dozen B-girls in about a three block radius.”

  “That’s serious cash-flow,” Lothar said. “Say thirty-six girls running at least four-to-five tricks an hour, at between fifty and one-hundred dollars per trick…that’s conservatively in the neighborhood of between ten and fifteen thousand tax free dollars per hour. All night long.”

  “Sounds about right,” I said.

  “That’s the kind of money people protect,” Lothar said. “It might explain why they hit you, if you were snooping around down there.”

  “Maybe,” I said. “To find out for sure I need to know who gave the order.”

  “I get it,” Lothar said. “If the guys who hit you were employees, that order would have come in from the boss and received on this cell phone. And something as heavy-duty as a kill-order most likely wouldn’t have been a text message; it would be an actual phone call.”

  “You move to the head of the class.”

  “You realize of course,” Lothar said, “That the boss is probably using a prepaid cell phone also. Which means there’s no way for you to trace it. You’re probably going to have to find another way to locate the dude who put the smack-down on you.”

  “Or find that dude’s phone and match the call to this one.”

  “That’s one way to do it,” Lothar conceded.

  Lothar looked at the computer screen. “There’re only two phone calls which came in after 9:06 PM. One at 9:27 PM, from this number,” he pointed to the screen, “and one from this one,” he pointed again. “After that, the phone is blank. Nothing in, nothing out.”

  I wrote down the two phone numbers. “Can you hold onto the SIM card for safekeeping for me?”

  “Sure,” said Lothar. “But I’m not testifying to anything and I’m going to wipe this from my computer. I’m retired, remember?”

  “I would expect nothing less. You hungry?”

  “I believe you mentioned the First Street Alehouse,” Lothar said.

  “I did indeed.”

  Ten minutes later, Lothar and I were seated at an outdoor table at the First Street Alehouse. The sun was still showing, and the place was starting to fill up with after-church diners. I sympathized; I wasn’t a churchgoer, but if I was, the first place I’d go after a sermon was a pub.

  The First Street Alehouse is one of the best pubs in the Bay Area; a real gem. Locate
d smack-dab in the heart of Livermore’s historic downtown, the First Street Alehouse had, in addition to their stellar beer selection and laid-back atmosphere, one of the best menus going.

  Most pubs, even those with great atmosphere and good beers, have only so-so food. Patrons mostly go to pubs for the beer and tolerate the chow. But the First Street Alehouse’s eats were top-notch, and their extensive menu boasted items which would rival any much fancier restaurant in taste and quality.

  The interior of the First Street Alehouse is gorgeous, too; all brick and wood. The waitresses are friendly, and easy on the eyes.

  Lothar ordered an Alaskan Amber Ale and I got a Deschutes Mirror Pond Ale; one of my staples. He ordered a Cajun burger and I settled on the tri-tip sandwich. We split a large plate of nachos waiting for our orders to arrive.

  “So when are you making the move to Colorado?” I asked. “You’ve been retired almost a year now. Something keeping you?”

  “Naw,” he said around a wedge of tortilla chip slathered in jalapenos and sour cream. “House is going up for sale next week. Already bought a place in Fort Collins. If you’re going to be around in a few weeks, you can help me move.”

  “I’ll have to check my social calendar,” I told him. “I’ll try to work you in between the cotillions and coronations.”

  “Why not get out of California yourself, Chance?” Lothar asked. “You’re a Midwest kid like me. You’ve got no family here; your brother’s back in Iowa. Why don’t you leave? This fucking state has become nothing but a socialist paradise for unemployed layabouts and dope-addled lunatics.”

  “And leave all the crime, high taxes, over-regulation, and liberal social policies behind? Are you crazy?”

  “I’m not kidding,” he said. “What the hell does California have to offer? In California, the grasshoppers outnumber the ants. In a democracy, that means the grasshoppers get to decide how to spend what the ants produce.”

  “So you’re saying I’m an insect?”

  “You know what I mean. California is the official haven for America’s shitheads and assholes. A typical Californian of working age sits on his ass collecting a government check, which is used to buy drugs, because he eats free courtesy of the food stamps and soup kitchens, and spends his time soliciting slip-and-fall attorneys to sue hardworking bastards like you and me out of everything we’re worth. It’s Orwellian.”

  “The joke’s on him,” I said. “I’m not worth anything.”

  Lothar continued. “That’s not the point. You’ve got nothing holding you down, Chance. You’re self-employed, you have no debts, you don’t own property, and you don’t have a wife and kids to support. You can go anywhere in the country, or the world, for that matter, you want. Why stay another minute in this god-forsaken place?”

  “You said California is full of shitheads and assholes?” I asked.

  “I did indeed,” Lothar reiterated.

  “That’s why I stay in California,” I told him. “In my line of work, you go where the customers are.”

  Chapter 22

  When I got home it was late afternoon and my telephone answering machine message light was blinking. It was a voicemail from Al Quintana, asking me to call him. It had come in around noon, while I was dining with Lothar in Livermore. I recognized the number as belonging to his cellular phone. I called it back.

  “Quintana,” he answered after a couple of rings.

  “Al, this is Chance Means. Just got home and got your message.”

  “You should get a cellular phone,” Quintana said. “It makes you a lot easier to get a hold of.”

  “That’s why I don’t have a cellular phone,” I told him truthfully. “What’s up?”

  Before he could answer, my telephone’s call-waiting tone kicked in. It was Karen Pearson’s number.

  “Al,” I said, “Can I call you back in a few minutes? Got another call coming in I have to take.”

  “Sure. Call when you can.”

  “Thanks.”

  I switched over to the incoming call. “Hello,” I said, never at a loss for glib banter.

  “Chance? This is Karen Pearson.”

  “Hi Karen.”

  There was a long pause. “This is usually the part of the conversation when the caller tells the person they called the reason for the call,” I said.

  “It is, isn’t it?” she said. “I want to apologize for last night.”

  “Apologize for what?” I said. “Don’t you have to do something wrong before you apologize?”

  “Maybe I wasn’t wrong,” she said, “but I wasn’t right, either. I also wasn’t very understanding or considerate. I came across as self-righteous and disapproving. I’m sorry for that.”

  “No need to be sorry. You were expressing how you truly felt, weren’t you?”

  “I was.”

  “Then don’t apologize,” I said. “I value honesty.”

  “I kind of killed the evening, didn’t I?”

  “I’ve experienced worse evenings,” I laughed.

  There was another long pause. “Will you give me another chance?”

  “That’s my name, isn’t it? Of course I will.”

  “Now I really feel bad,” she said. “I was expecting a lecture on how judgmental I was, and how you weren’t going to put up with that kind of crap from a broad like me.”

  “What makes you think I’d say that?”

  “Because I deserve it.”

  “Forget it,” I said. “I would love to see you. I’m not sure if I made it clear last night, but I like you, Karen. I like you a lot.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. I was afraid I’d squandered an opportunity.”

  “You didn’t. I’ve been thinking about you all day.”

  “Me too,” she said.

  “I thought about what you asked me last night,” I said. ‘What kind of a man am I?’ A question like that, coming from a woman like you, can mess with a guy’s head.”

  “That wasn’t my intent,” she said softly. “To mess with your head.”

  “Intent doesn’t matter; a stray bullet will kill you as dead as a deliberately aimed one.”

  “I know.”

  “And then I went for a run, and cleared the cobwebs out of my noggin, and got my compass pointing north again. That’s when I realized I have neither the need, nor the desire, to justify myself to you or anyone else. I’m comfortable in my own skin. If you can’t accept me, I’m okay with that. It doesn’t mean I’m right and you’re wrong, or the other way around. It only means we don’t agree. And I learned a long time ago rejection isn’t fatal.”

  “I’m not rejecting you. I had to process this, that’s all.”

  “Did you?”

  “Yes. After lying awake all night and thinking about you, and what transpired between us, and the way I reacted to your honesty, I came to the realization I’d been narrow-minded and insensitive. You were being candid with me and I was being petulant with you.”

  “Karen,” I went on. “I won’t lie to you, play games, or pull any punches. Like I told you, I don’t apologize for who I am or what I do. But I don’t want to impose myself, if there’s something about me you aren’t comfortable with.”

  “I’m fine, now,” she said. “I was hoping you’d let me tell you that in person.”

  “I’d like nothing more,” I said.

  “You available tonight?” she asked. “Or is it too much of me too soon?”

  “Are you kidding? I’d love to see you. But I have to work tonight. At least for a while.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “I have to meet with a cop I know. He’s got a line on the guy who might have been Marisol’s pimp.”

  “Can I come along?”

  “Really? You want to accompany me?”

  “Why not?”

  “Are you sure you’re up to it?” I asked. “Sometimes when I’m working I have to do things you might find distasteful.”

  “Why don’t you let me be the judge
of that?”

  “Very well; but remember I gave you fair warning.”

  “I’m tougher than you think,” she said.

  “I know that already,” I said.

  “That makes me feel better,” she said. “And thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “For being cool about the way I acted last night. I’ll make it up to you; I promise.”

  The last time Karen Pearson said that phrase to me she made good on it by meeting me at her doorstep in her birthday suit. I could endure that again.

  I signed off with Karen and re-dialed Al Quintana.

  “Quintana,” he blurted.

  “It’s Chance, Al. Sorry for the interruption.”

  “No sweat,” he said. “Thought I’d let you know I got a line on DeShawn Bullock.”

  “What have you got?”

  “I’d rather tell you in person,” he said. “You around tonight?”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “I’m a two-time member of the divorced cop’s club,” he said. “I got child support and alimony to pay. I moonlight as a bartender at my uncle’s place. You know the Yucatan?”

  “Which one,” I asked. “Oakland, San Leandro, or Alameda?”

  “My dad owns the Oakland and Alameda restaurants; I worked for him enough already while growing up. I prefer to sling drinks for my uncle in San Leandro. He pays me in cash under the table. Dad doesn’t pay me at all. He calls it, ‘an advance on my inheritance.’ I call it free labor. So I work at the San Leandro Yucatan.”

  “Never been there,” I said, “but I can find it.”