by Jeff Shelby
“Finding a guy who owed my guy some money,” he said, waving the bottle in the air. “You don’t wanna know. I go down to Ensenada to find this guy and the guy that hired me says another dude’s meeting me there, in case I need some help.” He smirked. “I was polite and didn’t tell him that wouldn’t be necessary.”
“Big of you.”
“Very. Guess who my help was.”
“Wesley?”
“Yep. Met him at the house where the dude was hiding.” He shrugged. “We exchange hellos and then we go into the house, grab the dude, and lucky us, we find a big-ass duffel bag of money, too.”
“Lucky.”
“So we do our thing with the guy and I grab the bag of cash to take back to my employer.” He shook his head, his eyes somewhere on the horizon. “Then old Wesley grabs it from me, says that my boss actually owes his boss and that’s why he took the job.”
“Wizard?” I asked.
“I guess,” Carter said. “I didn’t know it at the time, but that makes sense now. So he wants the money, says he’s taking it with him.” His mouth slithered into a grin. “And I said no.”
Carter raised the bottle to his lips and drained it, then set the bottle down on the table.
“I drilled him in the ribs and put him on his ass and he dropped the bag,” he said, still smiling. “I know I broke a couple of them because I felt those fuckers crack. Then I bend over to pick up the bag and he catches me flush in the jaw with his foot.”
“Oops.”
He rubbed his jaw. “I had to get two teeth put back in. Anyway, we heard sirens, figured the federales were on their way, and got the hell out of there.” He paused. “And I, of course, left with the money.”
“Of course.”
“Hadn’t seen or heard from the guy until today.”
I shook my head. Carter lived in a comic-book world that the rest of us thought couldn’t possibly be real. He enjoyed proving otherwise.
“Great story, but none of it helps me,” I said.
“You asked, and I didn’t say it would.”
The more I worked over what we’d learned, the more I thought Moreno had made a simple mistake. He knew a guy who could supply him with guns. But he hadn’t checked him out. If he had known that Linc was tied to National Nation, he probably would’ve flat-out tried to kill him.
Carter sat up in the chair. “Dollar drafts down at the Pennant tonight. Wanna go over?”
“Dollar drafts?” I said, a tiny bell going off in my brain. “That would mean today’s Saturday.”
“Uh, yeah. All day, I think.”
The pounding in my head turned into an ugly jackhammer.
I stood up. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
I watched the sun fight with the horizon, trying to squeeze out a few more minutes of daylight before it disappeared for another night. I stared at it for a moment, watching the water swallow the last few rays, silently pleading with the water to take me as well.
“Because,” I finally said, wishing hard that it were already Sunday, “I’m having dinner with Carolina Braddock.”
Thirty
Carter left without saying much, knowing that my anxiety level was skyrocketing by the second.
I changed into a pair of shorts and a collared Quiksilver pullover and headed out. I walked up Mission to the small Italian restaurant I’d told Carolina about on my message. I’d been standing out front for about fifteen minutes, wondering if she’d gotten my message, when she came strolling up the sidewalk.
She wore a yellow-and-white-striped cotton sundress, her hair falling on her bare shoulders. A simple gold watch on one wrist and a matching bracelet on the other. White leather sandals glowed against her tan feet.
“You found it,” I said.
“I did.” She hesitated for a moment. “I was surprised at your message. I thought we were going to have dinner at your home.”
“Nah,” I said, putting a hand on her arm and guiding her toward the door of the restaurant. “This’ll be better.”
I avoided her look. I knew she was thinking I was keeping her out of my life. But I didn’t feel like explaining that we might be in danger at my place.
“Whatever you say,” she said.
The hostess took us to a table on the restaurant’s patio that faced the boardwalk.
As Carolina walked by me to her chair, I reflexively sniffed the air for alcohol, but came up empty.
“You live so close to the water,” she said. “What a wonderful view you must have.”
“Yeah, it’s not bad.”
“You always did love the beach.”
“Yep.”
The waitress arrived at our table. “Can I get you all something to drink?”
“Water’s fine,” Carolina said without looking at me.
“Me, too.”
The waitress disappeared.
“You’ve lived down here a long time, haven’t you?”
“Since college.”
She nodded, as if she knew that already. She turned to me. “I should’ve come down to see you.”
I shrugged, not wanting to get angry.
“I should be familiar with my son’s home,” she said.
The waitress came back with our water and we ordered our food.
After she’d been gone for a few minutes, Carolina said, “I’m sorry.”
I sipped the water. “Don’t be.”
A faint smile appeared on her lips. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Thank you for inviting me here, Noah,” she clarified, her thin eyebrows rising just slightly. “For inviting me to your home. Or at least, to where you live.”
I looked across the table at her. As far as I could tell, she arrived sober and she was making an effort. I was straddling the line somewhere between indifferent and asshole, and that probably wasn’t fair.
“You’re welcome,” I said.
When our food came, we ate quietly, the clinks of the silverware on the plates interspersed with the soft falling of the waves out beyond the boardwalk. The silence brought back memories of quiet evening meals when I was growing up, as Carolina more often than not was suffering through a hangover after an alcohol-drenched day. I managed to quell the anger and bitterness that threatened to spill out of my mouth, trying to simply enjoy the moment for what it was.
After we finished, she ordered coffee and we sat there in the still evening air.
“How is your job?” she asked, her voice sounding foreign after the long period of silence.
“It’s good,” I answered. “I like my boss.”
“Who’s that?”
“Me.”
She smiled. “Of course.” Her smile faded to concern. “You wouldn’t tell me about the bruises on your face the other day.”
“It’s no big deal.”
“Do you get hurt often?”
“I try not to,” I said. “But sometimes it happens.”
Her hazel eyes focused intently on me, as if she were trying to figure out where a puzzle piece was meant to fit. “You were always tough. Even as a boy.”
I didn’t say anything, not knowing whether her statement was a compliment or criticism.
“But I guess you didn’t really have a choice,” she said. “I made that choice for you.”
I stared at the black edge of the water, trying to find the waves. “Yeah, probably.”
She shifted in the chair and I felt her eyes leave me.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I know,” I said.
“And I’m sorry that I’m always saying I’m sorry,” she said, her voice catching just slightly. “I wanted it to be different. I always did, but I could never get it right.” She paused. “I’d look at you and know that I was screwing up, but I just couldn’t fix it. I wanted to, you may not have known that, but I did.” She turned back to me. “And then you were eighteen and gone. My tough little boy out of my house and out of my life.”
&n
bsp; I looked at her, not necessarily surprised by the words, but maybe by the sincerity. I remembered leaving the house the summer after I graduated from high school. I managed to talk my way into the dorms early at San Diego State, negotiating a move-in right after the Fourth of July. I’d taken two surfboards and a duffel bag full of clothes. I left the rest behind, not needing or wanting anything else out of that house or that life. I’d seen her twice since that day, both times inadvertent and uncomfortable.
“I am sorry, Noah,” she said, her voice catching again. “I really am.”
“I know.”
“I’m not asking to come back into your life,” she said. Then she laughed, the lines around her eyes tightening. “That’s a lie. That’s exactly what I’m asking for. But not all at once. I don’t want to come in and try to make up for lost time, for the years that I failed you. I can’t and I know that.” She stopped for a moment, then reached across the table and put her hand on my arm. “I just want to know my son again.”
I looked at her hand on my arm, surprised that I hadn’t pulled away. Her nails were neatly manicured and it was one of those obscure things that takes you back to childhood. I had loved the smell of nail polish as a kid and I remembered sitting next to her as a seven- or eight-year-old while she painted her nails.
“I can’t do the drinking thing,” I said, still looking at her hand. “I just can’t.”
“I haven’t had a drink since you brought me home the other day,” she said.
It wasn’t defensive and it wasn’t angry. She was just letting me know. And I’m not sure whether it was the clarity in her eyes or the sincerity of what I was hearing or the memory of the nail polish.
But I believed her.
I moved my eyes from her hand to her face. When she had come up the alley, I thought she looked as young as she always had. But up close, I could see the fine wrinkles on her face, the faint gray in her hair, and the exhaustion of someone much older in too many ways.
She wouldn’t be there forever.
“Alright,” I said.
She tilted her head, tiny tears in the corners of her eyes. “Alright?”
If she could try to give up the alcohol, I could try to give up the bitterness.
“The bruises,” I said. “I got them from a guy named Mo. And he’s the reason we’re at this restaurant rather than my place.”
I saw the tension that she’d been carrying in her shoulders since she arrived slowly inch away. She blinked twice, like she was making sure that whatever invisible barrier had been between us was gone. “Mo.”
I nodded and spent the rest of the night letting my mother get to know her son again.
Thirty-one
We walked back down Mission to where Carolina had parked her car and she left a little before eleven, before either of us had time to say or do something stupid and ruin the evening. I told her I’d call her in a day or two. No hugs, no kisses, no stiff gestures or insincere affection between us. Just small smiles, quick nods, and the hope that maybe we could figure out how to be something close to mother and son again.
I slept well for what seemed like the first time in months-my need for sleep finally overruling any concerns I had about skinheads, gang members, or Plutos-and woke up early with a clear head. I hadn’t checked in on Rachel in a while and called the hospital. She answered on the third ring. I was relieved to hear that she was doing fine-her shoulder was still sore, but she was healing. She told me that she was leaving later in the day-her parents were coming to pick her up and she was going to stay with them for a little while. I gave her my cell-phone number and told her to call me if she needed anything and then said goodbye.
I sat on my sofa for a few minutes, wondering if I could’ve done anything else for Rachel. I still didn’t understand how she was connected to everything, what she’d done to make someone shoot her. The more I thought about it, the more confused I got. Frustrated by the lack of any concrete answers, I finally gave up, pulled on my trunks, grabbed the Ron Jon, and headed out for the water.
The water was smooth and the waves were solid, rolling in at regular intervals, letting me work up a rhythm of riding and paddling back out, my muscles loosening with each movement. I was sharp, gliding down the faces, snapping through the lips, floating on the tops. It was effortless and it felt good. I lasted for about an hour beneath a clear sky and a bright early morning sun and I couldn’t help but smile as I walked back up the sand to my place.
I showered, dressed, and called Carter.
He answered with a grunt.
“You up?” I asked.
“Am now.”
“You missed good water this morning.”
“Seriously?”
“Yep.”
“Dammit.”
“Definitely sucks for you. Can you be over here in about an hour?”
I heard him stifle a yawn. “For the right price.”
“Breakfast will do?”
“Affirmative.”
“I need you to bring a couple things,” I said.
I told him what they were.
The line buzzed for a moment, then he said, “I’m assuming you’ll explain when I get there?”
“I will.”
“Breakfast better be hot.”
Forty-five minutes later I was wrapping the chorizo and scrambled eggs into tortillas when Carter strode in the door.
“I’ll assume there are at least three of those for me,” he said, his electric-white hair still wet, a wrinkled yellow T-shirt and long cargo shorts covering his frame. “I could eat a fat man.”
“Fortunately, the fat men will be safe today,” I said, placing two of the burritos on a plate and sliding it across the counter. “Two more for you when you’re ready.”
He sat down at the kitchen table, wolfed one down in three bites, and was halfway through the second when he asked, “How was last night?”
I sat down across from him. “Good.”
“Just good?”
I thought about it. “Yeah.”
The second burrito was gone and he walked into the kitchen to grab a third. “Yelling, screaming, any of that?”
“None.”
He came back and sat down again. “Wow. Sounds like you acted like an adult.”
“Shut up.”
He shrugged and started in on the burrito. I knew he was right, but I didn’t want to discuss my mother. If I started talking and thinking more about her and our dinner, I knew I’d start second-guessing myself and doubting Carolina. I needed to just let it sit and see what happened.
Carter wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Thanks. That was good.”
I stared at his empty plate. “Did you even taste them?”
“A little bit,” he said, pushing back from the table and stretching out his legs. “So. Wanna tell me what we’re doing today?”
“You bring everything?”
He nodded. “A couple of rifles, scopes, and a bunch of ammo. We going on some sort of man picnic?”
“You wish,” I said, standing up from the table and grabbing both of our plates.
“You aren’t gonna break out a ring and propose to me, are you?” he asked, his eyebrows bouncing up and down.
I walked into the kitchen and dumped the plates in the sink. “I might propose you go screw yourself.”
“I’ve heard that before.”
“No doubt,” I said. “We’re going out to Alpine.”
He made a face like I’d said we were going to go eat sewage instead of going to one of the outermost areas of San Diego County.
“Alpine?” he said, practically spitting the word out. “Why not just go to Kansas? Almost as far east.”
“I’m trying to expand your cultural horizons.”
“Gonna have to take me a lot fucking further than Alpine to do that.”
“Well, then, that’s not a trip I ever wish to make.”
He shook his head, then twisted around in his chair to look at me as I walked b
y him out to the kitchen. “Why are we wasting a perfectly good day going to Alpine, Noah?”
I stared past him out the glass door at the water. He was right. It was a perfectly good day. The light blue sky over the dark blue water made for a pretty picture.
I didn’t know if it was because of my renewed optimism over my relationship with Carolina, but I was feeling more of a sense of urgency to solve the whole Pluto thing. Linc was the one who could thread all of it together. I’d agreed to his aunt’s request to continue looking for him, but in truth, I was doing it more for me than for her. Mo and Lonnie had already made one visit to my home. I didn’t want another where someone other than me might have to face their wrath. And I refused to be glancing behind me, watching for them.
I reached for my gun on the counter. I checked the chamber and racked the slide, the noise echoing off the living room walls.
“We are going to Alpine,” I said, staring hard at the door, the brand-new glass door that had replaced the old one. “Because it’s time to go visit Lonnie and Mo.”
Thirty-two
Brochures handed out by the Chamber of Commerce would have you believe that all of San Diego looks out upon sparkling blue ocean or a harbor dotted with sailboats. A carefree place to visit where everyone has a view of the ocean.
While that is true for the fortunate few who live on the coastline, most of San Diego County is made up of communities set in canyons, hills, and brush that can’t get a sniff of the ocean even on the best day. Thirty miles to the east, Alpine is one of those places.
Interstate 8 snaked us through Mission Valley, north of San Diego State and then out to La Mesa and El Cajon. The highway then elevated up into the small mountain communities near Descanso and Julian, areas that were regularly singed with brush fires every summer, but managed to make comebacks as soon as the flames were extinguished.
The map that Professor Famazio had given me led us to an area just east of Alpine, on the western edge of Cleveland National Forest, before the interstate dropped again and made its way out to El Centro and the scorched desert of Arizona.
“We should let Arizona annex this part of San Diego,” Carter observed, shaking his head. “Tell ’em to send over a few fine-looking ladies from the U of A with a case of beer and it’s theirs.”