“That can’t be the entire Battalion.”
“No. It’s not. It’s only a few who go out if somebody doesn’t pay.
Trusted senior guys. In other words, professional muscle. On the payroll, and paid for by your tax dollars, by the way.”
“And you think Turner’s got access to these guys?”
“Not exactly. No.”
“Well, then…”
“Wyatt, I know it. Fifteen years you’re a public defender here, you learn a few things. These kids aren’t angels to begin with, you know. Como gives them the jobs, strictly legit, tutoring and cleaning up at Ortega, passing out political pamphlets and like that. Eventually the promising ones are in the Battalion, moving up, getting paid decent money. AmeriCorps money, by the way. Life’s good. Turner picks a few every year and just tells them if they want to stay on, they’ll just do this or that. Break the window on this store, vandalize that flower shop, strong-arm some liquor store clerk. Otherwise, they go back to jail.”
“And Como didn’t know about this?”
Gina shrugged. “Maybe he did. I don’t know. But he wouldn’t have had to. Or maybe it was his cost of doing business and he thought it was a fair trade. Or maybe he just found out last week and he called Turner on it.”
“You’re saying Turner could have one of these Battalion kids kill for him?”
“I’m saying if I were Juhle or Russo, at least I’d try to rule it out. Oh, and if it turns out this is any part of it, I told Jeff Elliot I’d split the reward with him.”
“I’ll put that in my report if the time comes. With a strong recommendation.”
“I’ve got a strong recommendation for you.” Roake drained the last of her Scotch, and placed it down on the lamp table with finality. She reached over, took his hand, and stood up. “If you want to get the lights.”
26
It was by no means the obvious choice.
In fact, it was risky and desperate, but Mickey couldn’t think of another solution.
Alicia had abandoned her own digs. If Juhle and Russo were planning to put her under arrest, the next place they would look would probably be Ian’s, who was listed at Morton’s as her primary contact in case of an emergency. As she’d told Mickey, none of her girlfriends lived alone, so they were out. And once they realized that Mickey had disappeared from the hospital, they would undoubtedly come to his place. They could go to a motel, of course, but that was both expensive and impractical-they would have to register and he, with a black eye and his arm in a cast, would be easy to identify.
Eventually he formed his plan, and under his direction, she took the 280 Freeway to the Sixth Street exit and turned right onto Brannan, then made a U-turn and pulled into the depressed curb space outside an industrial roll-up garage door to a good-sized and completely darkened warehouse. Mickey got out into the now frankly bitter night and pushed the button on the box next to the metal door adjacent to the garage’s entrance.
When no one answered, he got back into the car and directed Alicia to turn right at the next corner, then to take another quick right into the alley behind Brannan. She pulled over and stopped by a low stoop under a darkened door that he knew to be painted bright orange by day. The light over the door, and all the windows in a row high along the wall, were dark. But Mickey knew where he was going as he got out of the car again and found the key right where it was supposed to be, tucked into a magnet case that was stuck against the upper inside edge of a floor vent on the side of the stoop.
He told Alicia to wait where she was. Then, opening the back door, he let himself into Hunt’s warehouse on the residential side. He deactivated the alarm, and then, turning on lights as he walked through the kitchen, den, hallway by the bedroom, he let himself into the massive basketball court side, then crossed to the door next to the garage and unlocked it. Retracing his steps, in spite of his gimpy walk, he was in seconds back in Alicia’s car, directing her down to the end of the alley, then through another couple of right turns back onto Brannan, and then waiting by the curb while he let himself in again, and pushed the button to raise the garage door. As soon as she was all the way inside, with Mickey getting her parked so she’d be out of the way of Wyatt’s Cooper, another push of the button let the garage door down.
Alicia let herself out of the car and stood dumbstruck, turning all the way around as she attempted to take it all in-the half basketball court, the guitars and audio stuff, the computers against the opposite wall. “Where are we?” she finally asked.
“My boss lives here. Pretty cool, huh?”
“Unbelievable.”
It may have been unbelievable, but it was also very cold on this side of the warehouse, and in another minute they were inside the living area, where the temperature was close to seventy degrees. Alicia found herself a seat in a leather- and-chrome reading chair in the den and Mickey went to help himself to a couple of beers from Hunt’s refrigerator. He brought back the Pilsner Urquells and a corkscrew that doubled as a bottle opener. “I could open these,” he said, “but I bet you could do it easier.”
“I bet I could too.” She opened both bottles, passed one to Mickey, who gingerly sat on Hunt’s tan leather couch. “So did I miss something?” she asked. “Does your boss know we were coming here?”
Mickey tipped up his bottle. “I don’t see how he could have, since I didn’t know it myself until about a half hour ago.”
“But-”
“Yeah, I know. It could be a problem, but I don’t think so. Wyatt’s a good guy and he’s on the right side. Besides that, and more important, Juhle wouldn’t ever believe that he’d be keeping you here. Not without telling him. And at least until there’s a warrant out for you, there’s no legal issue. You can stay anywhere you want.”
“So we’re staying here?”
“That’s my plan.” Mickey sipped more beer. “For a few days anyway. It’s the safest place I can think of. Plus your car’s off the street. Presto, you’re disappeared.”
“That’s scary.”
“Maybe. But a lot safer for you. And not just because of Juhle.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean whoever killed Dominic and Neshek. If they know you’re a suspect and you, say, show up dead, looking like a suicide, well, now, wouldn’t that be convenient?”
“Now you are scaring me.”
“Well, that’s one of the reasons I thought of coming here. You’re safe here. From everybody.”
Alicia digested that for a long moment. “So when is Mr. Hunt getting home?”
“I don’t know. Sometime.”
“You don’t want to call him and leave a message we’re here?”
“I don’t think so,” Mickey said. He didn’t want to give Hunt the option of ordering them out-not an impossibility-before he’d had a chance to argue for his position. “It might be better as a surprise.”
“Nobody ever cooks for me,” Mickey said, “except in restaurants.”
“Well, I do now.”
At ten-fourteen on this Wednesday night, Alicia was standing over a bowl of half a dozen broken eggs in Hunt’s kitchen by his four-burner Viking stove. Mickey had stolen one of Hunt’s short-sleeved sweatshirts and he and Alicia had maneuvered it down over his cast and now he sat-nearly reclined, actually-at the kitchen table. She’d already set out a couple of plates and utensils and had bread going in the toaster. He held his just-opened third beer in his right hand.
Pouring the eggs into the skillet, she pinched some salt and pepper over them, then opened the spice cabinet over the kitchen counter and took down a small bottle of yellowish liquid. “Truffle oil? Normal people have truffle oil?”
“Don’t leave home without it,” Mickey said. “Sure.”
“Should I put some in?”
“Every chance you get.”
In a small stream, she added some of the magical stuff, gathered the eggs with a spatula, then turned off the heat as the toast popped up. After buttering it, she put a sli
ce on each plate, ladled the eggs onto each, covering both pieces of toast completely, then topping the mass with another pat of butter.
Mickey picked up his fork and took a bite. “These are perfect,” he said.
After they’d finished their eggs and Alicia had washed up, they were back in the den. Mickey had perked up when they’d first arrived, and that burst of energy had carried him through their meal. But now he sat slumped down in the reading chair, feet up on an ottoman, head on a pillow, covered with a blanket that Alicia had found next to the pillow on the top shelf of Hunt’s bedroom closet. “The couch opens up.” His voice sounded thick and groggy. “You can sleep there.”
“What about you?”
“I’m good here. I’m almost asleep already.”
“Sorry, Mick. You’re mangled and battered. You get the bed. Period.”
“Are we going to have a fight about this?”
She was already pulling the cushions off the couch. “No. You’re going to get in the bed as soon as I get it made.”
“And what about you?”
“I’ve got my trusty sleeping bag and pad in the back of my car out there.” She pulled out the couch mattress, which was already made up for guests with a sheet and a blanket. Then, pulling down a corner of the blanket, she turned to face him. “Do you need help getting up?”
“No.” But even as he said it, he winced at the attempt.
“Stop.” She stepped over and took off his shoes, then held his feet up while she moved the ottoman out from under them. Next she removed the blanket and draped it over the bed.
With his feet flat on the floor, he took her hand with his good arm and lifted himself into a sitting position while she went to one knee in front of him.
“Okay,” she said. “Good arm around my neck. Easy, easy.”
Suppressing the urge to moan, he was up, still leaning on her.
She guided him over a few steps, then helped him down so that he was sitting on the bed. Finally, she put his pillow down where his head would be, lifted his feet, and turned him so that he could recline fully. She pulled the oversheet and both blankets over him and tucked them in. Then she lowered herself and sat on the edge of the bed. “How’s that?”
Clearly, the movement had cost him. Any boost he’d felt when they’d first gotten here had dissipated with the adrenaline and the beer. Now a light sweat had broken on his forehead and he was breathing through the pain in his ribs, slowly and deeply through parsed lips. “Good.”
“Would you tell me if it was bad?”
“Maybe.” He broke a tired smile. “Probably not.”
“You macho guys.” She gently wiped his forehead with a corner of the oversheet, then tucked it back around him. After a minute her shoulders settled and she let out a long sigh. “I’m so sorry, Mickey.”
“For what?”
“Getting you into this.”
“You didn’t get me into this. I got me into this.”
She brooded on that for a long beat. “Not really. If I…” She exhaled heavily again. “Anyway, I don’t know how I can thank you. I don’t know what I’d be doing right now if it wasn’t for you.”
“You’d be fine.”
“No. I’d be running, I think. Though I see now how dumb that would be.”
He shook his head ever so slightly. “There’s no need to run. Not yet. Maybe not ever.”
“But I wouldn’t have known that if not for you. I’d have just screwed up more.”
Mickey put his hand softly on her thigh. “You haven’t screwed up. You didn’t do anything wrong. Look at me. Alicia, look at me. You haven’t done anything wrong.”
She turned to face him, but couldn’t hold his gaze. Rather, her mouth trembled and she closed her eyes. She put her hand over his as though grasping it for support. For a long moment, neither of them moved. Mickey studied her face, on the verge of tears. And then heavy drops formed and fell at the same time from both of her eyes.
“Hey.” Mickey squeezed her leg. “Hey, now, it’s going to be all right.”
But she was shaking her head from side to side. “No. I have screwed up. I did do something wrong.”
“No, you didn’t. You just-”
“I did, Mickey, I did. I… I lied to those inspectors. I’ve even been lying to you.” Now she looked straight down at him. “That last morning when I came in to work? Dominic’s last day?”
“What about it?”
“He did fire me. He said I couldn’t work at Sunset anymore. He couldn’t see me anymore either. He said we could never see each other again.” Her shoulders began to shake, and a deep wrenching sob broke from her throat.
Tamara got ready for bed and then turned on the television to watch the late news.
Generally preferring to read or, in the old days when she had a social life, to hang out with friends, she almost never watched TV. But tonight it was the only thing she could think of to keep herself from imploding with frustration, concern, and anger.
Mostly anger.
Jim Parr still hadn’t made it home. Where the hell had he gone, and why wouldn’t he have called if he’d known he was going to be so late? But of course, he didn’t have a cell phone, had never bothered to learn how to use one. As if this took some sort of special dexterity or brains. She had already decided that she and Mickey were going to buy him one immediately if not sooner. Of course, then he probably wouldn’t pick it up when the damn thing rang on his belt. He had nothing but scorn for her and Mickey “being the slaves to technology” anyway.
Beyond that, she would be good and goddamned if she would try getting through the Gestapo switchboard at San Francisco General again to try to talk to Mickey. She did consider testing her Volkswagen and driving down there, but in the end decided that, since it was past visiting hours, she’d have less chance actually seeing him than she would talking to him on the telephone. And wasn’t it just the perfect karma for today that Mick’s cell phone had died in the accident so she couldn’t call him directly?
That was really special, and further proof that God hated her.
And when Wyatt Hunt had dropped her off at her home earlier, he told her that he had a date with Gina Roake, and it was far too late to interrupt them, even if she thought Wyatt might have been able to help in some way. Which she didn’t.
Finally, she knew she could call the police and report her grandfather as missing, except that it was decidedly premature for that. She knew from work that authorities would do nothing about a missing person report until that person had been missing for at least three days. Beyond that, Jim had been home most nights for the past six months since Tamara had lived here, but at least three times he’d wound up staying out somewhere mysterious and didn’t seem to feel the need to explain where or to check in with his grandchildren. She’d thought it was just drinking and probably passing out at the apartment of one of his bocce-ball companions, but then she’d discovered the plastic container of Viagra (certainly not Mickey’s) when she’d been cleaning up one day, and a little later had overheard him bragging to Mick that he’d “gotten lucky.”
But, the whole tenor of the evening nagging at her, she thought she’d better at least check the late- night news to see if there was anything about a body of an old man being found in a ditch or somewhere. But though there was no shortage of murder and mayhem in and around the greater Bay Area, there was no mention of anyone who could have been her grandfather.
At the end of the program, the smiling weatherman informed her that the northern storm whose lower edge had arrived in the city this morning would really slam them tomorrow. It would be cold and wet, great news for a drought-starved state. And more good news-it was expected to drop up to four feet of snow in the Sierra.
Somehow underwhelmed by all the terrific weather and other news, Tamara hit the remote, pulled the covers over her head on the Murphy bed, turned onto her side, and went to sleep.
27
Hunt liked to run most mornings, but he wasn�
�t a fanatic. When the weather turned this ugly, he thought he could let a day go by and not miss it too much. He’d pump some iron at home and maybe get in a sprint workout on the court and could still be showered and shaved, dressed, and ready to head for work by eight.
With his windshield wipers slapping away, at a few minutes after six o’clock Hunt depressed the garage door button on his car’s visor and started to turn in, only to abruptly slam on his brakes. Just there to his right, parked along the wall, was a dark blue Honda Element. A frown creased his brow, and he considered jamming his car into reverse, backing out of there, and calling the police, telling them he had an intruder.
Instead, though, he scanned the open space in front of him. The Cooper’s lights were still on, and he could see at a glance that no one was lying in wait for him, although someone could conceivably be using the Honda for cover.
His heart pumping in his ears, he pushed the visor button and heard the garage door beginning to close behind him.
Moving the Cooper forward, he next pushed the dashboard button to shut off his engine, pulled out his keys, and opened his car door. His car’s beams now were out, and crouching low, he scampered over to the light switch next to the metal door and brought up the room lights.
Nothing. And nothing looked to have been touched. On this side of the warehouse, anyway.
Hunt owned a couple of guns. He generally did not carry them with him, and didn’t have them now. They were locked into a hidden safe under a pull-up board in the floor in his bedroom.
Note to self, he was thinking. When you’re working on any aspect of a murder case, carry your piece. You just never know.
But if that was today’s lesson, it was too late to benefit from it now. Again he considered letting himself out into the downpour, using his cell phone, getting a police presence or some reinforcements. But again, something stopped him.
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