by Jeff Shelby
I sat up a little straighter. “Really?”
“Yeah. About an hour before you rolled in.”
Images of Lonnie and Mo fired through my head. I turned around and did a quick scan of the room. No one with a shaved head.
I turned back to Marsha. “Get a name?”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
I could feel the hair on my neck come to attention. “What did he look like?”
“Black guy,” she said. “Maybe twenty or so. About your size. Lots of gold on him, wearing a Raiders jersey and a Dodgers cap.”
I relaxed a little at her description, realizing it hadn’t been Lonnie or Mo. “Say what he wanted?”
“No,” she said, pushing herself off the bar. “Came in, asked Marco if he knew you, Marco pointed him in my direction, I told him I hadn’t seen you today.”
Her description reminded me of Deacon Moreno, the kid that Rolovich had complained about at the apartment complex. If it had been him, I wasn’t sure why he’d be looking for me, but I was immediately uncomfortable with the idea that he knew to find me at the SandDune.
I stood up from the stool. “Thanks, Marsha.” I fished some money out of my pocket and slid it across the bar. “He comes back, give me a buzz, alright?”
She scooped up the money. “No problem.”
I walked out of the SandDune into the cool evening air. Mission Boulevard was heavy with traffic, cars crawling at a snail’s pace, but no one seeming to mind. The late summer tourists walked slowly down the street, pointing and smiling at nothing in particular.
A Toyota Camry with a thumping bass coming from the interior broke out of the line of traffic and pulled to the curb in front of me.
I stepped back and reached around my waist, touching the butt of my gun for reassurance.
The passenger window dropped and the volume of the music went down with it. A kid, about eighteen, with skin the color of black licorice leaned out. He didn’t match the photo Rolovich had shown me.
“Yo,” he said, exposing a gold tooth in the middle of his mouth. “How we get to Garnet?”
I tried to glance around him, but couldn’t see the other face behind the wheel. “About two miles up to the north. Same direction you’re going.”
He leaned on the window, a thick chain around his neck jangling against the inside of the door. “This way? You sure, dude?”
“Yeah.”
His tongue snaked out the corner of his mouth and he nodded slowly. “Cool.” He lifted his chin as a way of saying thanks, then leaned back in the car. He turned to the driver, said something, and then turned back to me. “Good thing we found you standing out here. Makes things easy, know what I’m saying?” He winked and the window and the volume of the music both went up.
The wink didn’t fit as I watched the Camry pull away from the curb, back into the northbound traffic, my heart beating faster than I would’ve liked. I took a step forward, trying to get an eye on the receding license plate, when I saw the red Escalade coming on the southbound side of Mission.
The back window on the driver’s side slid down and two gun barrels poked their heads out like a pair of twin cobras.
The kid in the Camry had done his job and served me up on a platter.
I dropped to the sidewalk, my already aching body taking another jolt, and hit the concrete, the first wave of bullets whistling above my head. Tires squealed, people screamed, and glass shattered as the guns fired into the front window of the SandDune. I ignored the throbbing in my ribs and rolled to the curb, trying to avoid the falling glass and taking cover next to the parked cars on the street.
The gunshots stopped as quickly as they’d started. An engine roared and as I moved to my knees and drew my gun, the Escalade tore down the middle of Mission and jerked left onto Mission Bay at the roller coaster, disappearing around the corner.
It was quiet for a moment and then a cacophony of confusion and fearful voices filled the air.
I looked in through the entrance of the SandDune. People were starting to stand back up inside, eyes wide with terror and shock. I couldn’t tell for sure, but it didn’t look like anyone was hurt. Marsha was on the phone, probably calling the police.
I stood up awkwardly, my muscles screaming in pain and my gun hanging impotently in my right hand. I stepped back onto the sidewalk, pieces of the painted glass that had spelled out the bar’s name crunching beneath my shoes. Sirens wailed in the distance.
I took a deep breath.
I didn’t know where Linc Pluto was.
I didn’t know who shot Rachel outside her apartment.
I didn’t know why Lonnie and Mo had killed Peter Pluto.
And I didn’t know who had just tracked me down in my own neighborhood and tried to ventilate my body with bullets.
But as I stood there amid the gunsmoke, burnt rubber, and chaos, with my stomach in knots and my thoughts speeding through my brain on a conveyor belt, I did know one thing.
It was time to go on the offensive.
Twelve
I spent an hour answering questions for a group of SDPD officers as they tried to clean up the chaos on Mission. I said I didn’t know if the shots were aimed at me. That was the truth. I assumed they were meant for me, but I didn’t know that for certain and I didn’t plan on spending the whole night explaining myself.
Being shot at made me think about Rachel and I hadn’t been to the hospital yet to visit her. While I wasn’t enamored with visiting a hospital again so soon after being released, I wanted to get out of Mission Beach and I needed to talk to her.
I made the drive to Sharp, my muscles stiffening up and throbbing after another long drive, reminding me that I wasn’t recovered yet. I needed one more good night’s sleep, but I wasn’t sure if I’d get it.
I called the hospital on my way over, asked for Rachel’s room. She sounded tired when she answered, but told me she wouldn’t mind if I stopped by and gave me her room number.
A lady at the information desk in the lobby directed me to the fifth floor and I found Rachel in her room, propped up in her bed, watching TV.
She looked at me when I stuck my head in the doorway. “Hi.”
I held up a hand and waved. The color was gone from her face. Her red hair was pulled back into a sloppy ponytail. She looked small and weak.
“How are you?” I asked.
“I’m okay, I guess.”
I pointed at the chair next to the bed. “You mind?”
“No. Go ahead.” She watched me sit down. “What happened to you?”
“Got in a fight with the wrong guys,” I said, trying to find a comfortable position where my back didn’t feel like it was on fire.
“Have you found Linc?”
“No. Not yet.”
She turned back to the TV. It was tuned to one of those home decorating shows that I tried to never watch.
“So,” I said. “You’re going to be okay?”
She hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah.”
“Where did the bullet hit you?”
She winced when I said bullet. “Just below my collarbone, I guess. They said it went out my back.”
“That’s good.”
“Unfortunately, it hit my collarbone,” she said. “It’s fractured.”
That was going to make her uncomfortable for a while. “How long will you be here?”
“A couple more days,” she said. “They wanna make sure there’s no infection and that it starts to heal okay.”
“I’m sure it will.”
She glanced at me. “Yeah.”
We listened to the host of the show ramble on about colors.
“What happened at your apartment, Rachel?” I asked.
“I already told the police.”
“I know, and I’m sorry to bring it up again. But can you tell me, too?”
She sighed, kept her eyes on the show. “Someone knocked on the door. We thought maybe it was you again. I opened the door, but no one was there. I walked ou
tside to see if anyone was around. I didn’t see anyone, so I guessed someone was just messing with us.” She went silent for a moment. “That’s when it happened.”
“Did you see the gun?”
She shook her head.
“Any cars you recognized?”
She shook her head again. “There were a bunch of cars on the street. I heard this big bang. Then I felt something hit me-hard. After that I don’t remember a whole lot other than being in pain.” She looked away-I could tell it wasn’t easy for her to talk about what had happened. She was still scared and still confused. And she had a right to be.
“I told you I got in a fight,” I said. “It was with some other guys looking for Linc-skinheads, Rachel. Do you know anything about them? Or have you seen them around the apartments?”
She wiped the tears off of her face and took a deep breath. “Skinheads? No. That doesn’t sound like Linc.” She sighed and turned back to the TV. “Does Linc have something to do with what happened to me?”
“Honestly, I don’t know.” I started to feel guilty for coming. Her eyes were heavy with fatigue and I wasn’t helping. “Can I get you anything, Rachel?”
She sighed again and her eyes fluttered. “Um…some more water, maybe?” She turned to the side. “There’s a pitcher, but it’s empty.”
I grabbed the pitcher off the table and stood. “Be right back.”
I walked down to the nurses’ station and had them refill the pitcher with water and ice. When I walked back into the room, Rachel was asleep.
I set the pitcher back on the table, found the remote and switched off the television, and moved quietly out of the room, letting Rachel get the rest she needed.
Thirteen
After getting back from the hospital and a night of thinking more than sleeping, I woke to find Carter drying himself off out on the patio in the sunshine, his board on the concrete next to him.
He shook his head and water sprayed from his hair like from a Labrador’s coat. His wet trunks dripped the ocean all over the ground.
He plopped down into one of the chairs. “I’m getting old.”
“Why’s that?”
“Little fourteen-year-old kid just put on a demo out there,” he said, motioning to the water. “Snapped the board like it was glued to his feet. Just ripped the ocean a new one. I looked like a robot out there compared to the little shit.”
I leaned against the doorjamb. “Maybe I can help you recapture your youth.”
He ran his hand over his face. “How’s that?”
“Do some things that might get us in trouble.”
His mood brightened. “Gimme five minutes.”
Ten minutes later we were headed east on I-8 to the college area and Linc Pluto’s apartment complex.
I told him about the shooting on Mission, but didn’t mention anything about seeing Mike and Liz. I had other things to worry about.
“For sure they were aiming for you?” he asked, twisting in the passenger seat of my Jeep and adjusting the seat belt around his large frame.
“Seemed like it. I was the only one standing there.”
“The Camry is pretty standard stuff.”
“What do you mean?”
He straightened up in the seat. “The young bangers do the setup while the older guys make the hit. Kid probably moved up a rung by getting you to stand still for the hitter.”
I nodded, thinking he was right. Even if I had pegged the Camry immediately, about the only thing I could’ve done was scamper back into the bar, making me an even easier target if they’d chosen to come in.
I took the southbound exchange to 805. “Really bothers me that they knew where to find me.”
Carter shrugged his big shoulders. “Yeah, but come on. People know you down there. They know you’re a PI. Hell, you use that bar as much for an office as you do anything else.”
“Still. Bunch of gang members stick out in South Mission. Anybody that knows me would’ve known they weren’t looking to hire me.”
Carter nodded. “Probably. Bigger question, though, Noah, is why.”
“Why what?”
“Why does some gang have you on their radar?”
I’d been bouncing the same question around in my head and hadn’t arrived at an answer. The only connecting line I could draw to that was Linc’s possible relationship with Deacon Moreno. I wasn’t sure how I fit into that equation and the connection seemed shaky at best.
As we pulled into Linc’s apartment complex, I hoped that something there might be able to offer some answers.
The crime tape was gone from the front of Rachel and Dana’s apartment and the complex looked as quiet as when I’d arrived the first time.
Carter leaned forward in his seat. “Jesus. What a dump.”
“Pretty much.”
“Kid lives here, there wasn’t much in his trust fund.”
“Or it was a convenient place to hide.”
Carter turned to me. “From what?”
I opened the door to get out. “Let’s see if we can find out.”
I glanced around the parking lot and street, looking for anything out of place. I kept expecting to see Lonnie and Mo show up somewhere and I didn’t want to be surprised.
Carter came up next to me. “What are you looking for?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Come on.”
We walked to Linc Pluto’s door.
“You got a key?” Carter asked.
“No,” I said. “That’s why I brought you.”
I knocked on the door and got no response.
I looked at Carter. “All yours.”
He grinned and motioned for me to step aside. I did, and he took a couple of steps back from the door. Then he stepped forward, lifted his right leg, and jammed his foot into the door near the lock. The door snapped open and slammed against the wall inside.
Carter swept his arm toward the door. “Right this way.”
I looked at him. “I meant that I wanted you to pick the lock.”
“Oh.” He shrugged. “Shoulda been more specific.”
I shook my head and went into the apartment. Carter followed. I inspected the door and saw that the lock was still in place. Carter’s big foot had just splintered the wood in the frame. I shut the door behind us and it closed like nothing had happened.
The apartment was as neat and clean as Rachel and Dana’s was messy and dirty. An expensive-looking leather sofa rested against the longest wall, a square glass table in front of it with several magazines stacked in the middle. A flat-screen TV hung on the wall across from the sofa and several audio and video components were lined up beneath it. Large photographs of the ocean hung in dark wood frames. A computer hutch with an office chair stood in the corner near the kitchen.
Noticeably absent was the presence of any photos of people. It all looked nice, but it felt empty and lonely to me.
“Place is nicer than yours,” Carter observed.
“I don’t have a trust fund.”
“Guy doesn’t live in a shitty complex like this when he’s clearly got the means to move somewhere else unless he’s got a reason.”
“Yep,” I said, thinking the same thing. “Check the bedroom. I’m gonna look at the computer.”
“What am I looking for?” Carter said, walking toward the hall.
“Big black things that shoot bullets. They’re called guns.”
“My specialty.”
I sat down at the chair in front of the hutch, saw the lights on the monitor and CPU that indicated the computer was dormant, and jiggled the mouse.
“Christ,” Carter hollered from the bedroom.
“What?”
“Kid’s got, like, twelve-hundred-count sheets. Softer than a monkey’s ass.”
“Familiar with the texture of a monkey’s ass, are you?”
“No. But these are awesome.”
Carter was easily distracted.
“Keep looking,” I said.
The computer’s main
screen came up. I looked through the files on the desktop but didn’t find anything other than what looked like school homework.
I found the directory and checked the Internet history. Nothing out of the ordinary-a few porn addresses, some sports websites, the SDSU address, and a couple of news sites.
Until I got to the last one.
The line read www.whiteisright.com.
The phrase immediately brought goose bumps to the backs of my arms. It was like I was looking right at Mo’s big forehead again.
I found an AOL icon on his desktop and clicked on it. The main menu came up and I logged on as a guest. After entering my password, the computer connected and I typed www.whiteisright.com into the search bar.
“Jackpot,” Carter yelled from the other room.
I watched the screen continue to load. “What’d you get?”
“Come see for yourself.”
“Hang on a sec.”
A very real image of a burning cross flashed onto the screen. The image dissolved into a smiling black man’s face. A gun emerged near the man’s ear and two cartoon bullets moved toward the side of his head. The bullets hit the face and the smile disappeared from the man’s face. The image faded away.
WHITE IS RIGHT!!! flashed on the screen.
My stomach tightened from both the image and my decidedly unpleasant memory of the phrase.
A menu bar loaded on the screen, offering tabs for history, donations, and to find out more.
“Shit, Noah,” Carter yelled again from the bedroom. “You gotta see all this.”
It wouldn’t be hard to remember the address. I closed down the Internet connection, shut off the computer, and walked into the bedroom.
Carter was sitting at the foot of a queen-sized bed in the middle of the room.
He pointed at the oak dresser next to the closet. “Take a look in there.”
The top drawer was pulled halfway out.
It was filled with AK-47s and handguns, probably a dozen total.
“All the drawers, dude,” Carter said. “Same shit.”
I opened the next one down and found sawed-off shotguns. The three remaining drawers were filled with semiautomatics and boxes of ammunition.