by Todd Borg
“Knows the rules,” I said. “You think my phone caller could be right?” I asked. “Can you see Watson for the murder of Grace Sun?”
Ramos shook his head. “From what we’ve learned watching him? Not his style. His guns have probably been used in killings. But personally murdering a woman? I doubt it.”
“Any idea why Watson bought a place here?” I asked.
“Probably wanted a Tahoe vacation getaway, same as everyone else. But he also uses it to wine and dine his vendors in an effort to get a lower bid. China may be a closed society compared to most countries, but they’re like any other place when it comes to business. You get the best deal from the people whose palms you grease and whose stomachs you feed. Last month, Watson rented a three-cabin cruiser from one of the marinas. He had a caterer come onboard to put on a gourmet spread for three Chinese businessmen. Dessert was three showgirls who moonlight for a high-priced escort business.”
“My caller said that Watson’s place is in something called the Blue Sky, Blue Water condos,” I said. “I’m not familiar with it.”
“It’s that new development on the West Shore where the old Masterson place used to be.”
“I don’t know Masterson, either.”
“Masterson was a movie producer who was a friend of the ballplayer Ty Cobb. Used to live on the East Shore next to Cobb in Glenbrook, then built a big estate on the West Shore. A couple of years ago, some big money from LA tore it down and put up a gated community. Four buildings, a dozen units each. Nice beach, pool, tennis courts, boat buoys for each unit, underground garages, all the trimmings. Watson moved in a couple of months ago.”
Ramos turned his head to get a glimpse of the water as he drove. He sighed. “This lake is a bucolic place. Happy tourists enjoying their vacations in the mountains. Kids playing at the beach. Most calls to the sheriffs’ departments are about bear problems. Now you get some unusual phone calls about an old murder, and a guy hijacks a charter boat, and it’s the same month that Thomas Watson moves into the basin. The hostage taker wants to talk to you. If it’s the same guy who’s been calling you, he must be real motivated to convince you that our Naval Academy cowboy is your San Francisco murderer. Makes you wonder why. But it could be nothing more than a wacko who knew of the woman’s murder in The City and wants to get his fifteen minutes by taking a hostage and making an outrageous claim.”
“We’ll know shortly,” I said.
TWO
Ramos turned onto Elks Point Road at Round Hill, and drove toward Nevada Beach. He went through a private gate, then turned down a driveway. Ramos pulled up to a three-car garage that projected out from a large house on the lake. He parked and we got out.
“Where are we?” I said.
“Mark and Mabel Cardman. They run an IT service business. Their clients are big Bay Area companies. We saved them from an identity theft problem a few years ago, and they’ve been trying to do us favors ever since.”
“The Cardmans have a boat,” I said.
“And we don’t,” Ramos said. “It’s come in handy a few times.”
We hustled around to the dock, Ramos carrying a small battery-powered megaphone. Ramos knew the combination for the electronic lock on the boathouse. We were in a Four Winns sport boat a few minutes later.
Ramos drove the small craft the way he did everything else, carefully and with precision. He eased out from the East Shore at no-wake speed. When we were a good distance from shore, he ran the speed up a bit but still kept it slow as we headed southwest, quartering the swell out of the south. The boat rocked up the front of each wave, then made a dramatic tip over the top and down the back side. Ramos picked it right, as the prop stayed in the water at each wave top.
It was obvious he’d had boating experience as he turned south toward the big hotels, drove into the calm waters in the lee of the south wind, and punched the throttle up.
“Tell me what the caller said,” Ramos shouted over the engine roar.
“He called at midnight. I answered the phone. A man’s voice said, ‘I know who killed Grace Sun.’ I asked who the caller was. The caller ignored me and said, ‘I read how you got some DNA evidence but no suspect to match. Check out Thomas Watson. He’s got a condo on the lake, Blue Sky, Blue Water on the West Shore.’ Then the caller hung up. The second and third nights he wanted to know if I’d arrested Thomas Watson. He was very frustrated when I told him that I was a private citizen and could only pass on his information to local law enforcement.”
“Did you pass it on?” Ramos asked.
“Yeah. I didn’t know where Blue Sky is, but if it is on the West Shore, it has to be Placer County or El Dorado county. So I called Santiago at Placer and Bains at El Dorado. I also mentioned it to Diamond and Mallory.”
“For good measure,” Ramos said.
“For good measure,” I said.
“But you didn’t call us,” he said.
Bukowski shot Ramos a look.
“Figured you guys got more important things to focus on than wacko callers,” I said. “I also called Joe Breeze at SFPD. He worked with me on the Sun murder.”
“Any of your cop pals heard of Thomas Watson?” Ramos asked.
“No.”
Near Edgewood Golf Course, Ramos turned the boat west across the southern part of the lake and pushed the throttle forward even more. When we came to Baldwin Beach, he put the boat into a sweeping turn to the starboard, and we headed north up the West Shore toward Emerald Bay and Rubicon Point beyond. It was a longer path, but Ramos had avoided a punishing and possibly dangerous ride across the windy open water of the big lake. Despite Ramos’s fast speed, his route around the giant lake still took 45 minutes to approach Rubicon Point.
Ramos had compact binoculars hanging on a cord around his neck. Every couple of minutes, he raised them to his eyes, then made a small course adjustment. Bukowski never said a word. He stared toward the Dreamscape with an intense frown creasing his forehead.
Ramos spoke on his phone as he drove. He eventually folded his phone and turned to me. “Sergeant Bains has gotten to the Dreamscape. He’s established incident command. I told him we were bringing you out. We’ve offered him our full support.”
“He’s a good guy. Worked with him on the avalanche case.”
When we were about a quarter mile away from the Dreamscape, Ramos throttled back, and the boat dropped off plane and settled down, stern low and bow high, trailing a large wake. I now understood his plan, as we were perfectly lined up with the Dreamscape’s stern.
“The Dreamscape is drifting,” Ramos said. “No anchor, because it’s about eleven hundred and fifty feet too deep. She’s currently pointing north. If the hostage taker remains at the bow, we can approach the stern without being seen.”
At 50 yards out, Ramos cut the throttle to idle, and we approached without wake or engine roar, either of which might alert the hostage taker.
“You got a plan to save the hostage if the hostage taker drops him overboard?” I said in a low voice.
“We talked about it,” Ramos said. “El Dorado Sheriff’s Department has a dive team. They’ve got a boat on the way. The thinking is that while you distract the hostage taker and buy time, they drop two divers in at the Dreamscape’s stern, out of sight from the hostage taker. If the divers stay directly under the boat, their bubbles will rise up along the hull, and won’t be visible to the hostage taker. If the hostage gets dropped, the hope is that they might be able to grab him before he plunges on past. After they grab the hostage, the divers will inflate their BCDs.”
I’d been diving years before in Maui, but it took me a moment to remember the term. “Bouyancy Compensation Devices,” I said.
“Yeah. Two BCDs make for a lot of buoyancy.”
Ramos eased the boat up to the boarding platform at the stern of the Dreamscape, throttling into neutral and then reverse to slow our approach. He turned to port at the last moment, bringing the starboard side of the speedboat alongside. The Dreamscape
looked close to 100 feet long and had maybe 20 or more feet of beam, so we were effectively hidden from the hijacker at the bow. One of the Dreamscape deckhands squatted down and grasped the gunwale of the sport boat.
Ramos turned to me. “Agent Bukowski will get out here. Bains wants you and me to re-approach the Dreamscape near the bow so that I can announce to the hostage taker that I’m bringing you as he requested.”
Bukowski jumped out onto the boarding platform of the Dreamscape.
Ramos jockeyed the boat as if it were a car in a tight parking place. I understood that instead of white lines, the constraints on his movement were the sightlines from the hostage taker. Ramos wanted to stay out of his sight.
Ramos got us turned around, and he throttled up, driving away from the Dreamscape’s stern, keeping in line with the big boat so that we stayed hidden from its bow. After a minute, he sped up. A half-mile out, he turned, and we traced a big curve until we were again approaching the Dreamscape, this time from its starboard side.
When we got close, Ramos slowed, then lifted his megaphone to his mouth.
“I have Owen McKenna onboard,” his amplified voice announced. As we drew closer, he slowed and repeated his announcement.
The hijacker turned to face us and took a single step away from his hostage.
Even from a distance, I could see that the hostage taker was a thick man whose head seemed swaddled in a spherical bush of hair that wrapped from the sides of his head down under his chin to a big beard. With his sunglasses, almost no part of his face was visible.
The man wore blue jeans with multiple pockets. The hijacker carried a large blue backpack that appeared to sag under a heavy load. His dark blue jacket was open at the front and revealed an unusual belt made up of multiple black rectangles. It reminded me of a picture I’d once seen of a suicide bomber wearing a similar belt. Just in case the backpack bomb wasn’t powerful enough, the C-4 plastic in the belt would add some extra punch.
The hostage was slim like a teenaged boy, wearing jeans and a baggy hooded sweatshirt with the hood up obscuring his face. The hostage was outside the bow rail, perched on the boat’s edge, facing the water.
Despite the ice-cold water of Tahoe, I didn’t dwell on the danger to the hostage until I saw the pile of heavy chain at the boy’s feet.
Ramos turned toward me and whispered, his voice barely audible over the speedboat’s engine. “Remember the principles…”
I nodded and whispered back. “Get him talking, keep it calm, try to buy time, show empathy and respect, expect a concession for each of any demands we can comfortably meet.”
Ramos gave me a look of surprise, as if competence in others was hard for him to comprehend. He pulled the throttle to neutral, and the speedboat once again eased next to the big boat. We touched the hull about twenty feet back from the bow curve and under a railing gate that was up above us at pier level.
A deckhand lowered a boarding ladder down to us. Ramos held onto it while I climbed up.
“Owen McKenna!” yelled the hostage taker as soon as I was on deck. He held a cord that stretched to the hostage. I nodded, made a small wave of acknowledgment, and walked toward him. As I got closer, the hostage’s position looked even more precarious, perched on the very edge of the bow, facing a certain death should the hostage taker drop him overboard.
The hostage taker was so tense that he seemed about to explode.
When I was in easy hearing range, I spoke. “I’m Owen,” I said.
At that came a gasping, whimpering cry from the hostage. “Owen! Help me!” A terrified voice that I recognized. A gut punch that knocked out my wind and made my vision go black.
The hostage was my girlfriend.
Street Casey.
THREE
“Street!” I shouted.
“Finally got your attention, McKenna?” The hijacker wagged the cord that drooped from him to the rail and then stretched tight to Street.
“Stay calm, sweetheart,” I said, my voice shaking. “We’ll get you to safety.” I couldn’t think. My heart hurt. A sudden headache seared. I tried to remember the negotiation principles, but I was in a black rage.
“I told you what I wanted on the phone,” the hijacker said. “But you ignored me.”
“No, I didn’t.” I struggled to say the words. My brain felt like it was being squeezed in a vice. “I told you the truth. I passed your information on to the county sheriff’s offices.”
“DON’T TELL ME WHAT YOU DID! I’M TALKING ABOUT WHAT YOU DIDN’T DO!” He reached down to a thigh pocket on his pants, his sleeve riding up and exposing a tattoo on his wrist. The blue marks were indistinct but looked like two infinity symbols. He pulled out a knife, a custom piece with an ornate design engraved on the handle. The man flipped the blade into the air, grabbed it in a flash of movement, then twirled it over and around the fingers of one hand like a magician with a coin. The spinning knife flashed in the sunlight. With a snap of his wrist, it disappeared into the sheath.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ll do whatever you want. Just please let me get Street back inside the boat railing.”
“She will be safe if you do EXACTLY AS I WANT!”
I was blowing it. The hijacker was in control. I was his puppet. I wasn’t buying time, I wasn’t calming him. Worst of all, Street was in greater danger since I set foot on the boat.
I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself.
“How can I help?” I said. “I want to help.”
“Sure, McKenna. That’s why you didn’t do a damn thing when I called! Three phone calls. I gave you every chance! Now you will do as I want!”
“Yes, of course. Whatever you want.” The words grated. But Street was hanging by a thread, her feet tied to an anchor chain. What else could I say? How could I calm him down? “You can call me Owen,” I said. “What’s your name?” It sounded ridiculous. It would never work.
“You don’t need my name, McKenna! I know the whole psychological routine you guys use with hostage takers. It won’t work on me. What you need to do is listen to me! You understand?” He paced two steps. His cord that controlled Street’s tether went tight. He turned, paced two steps back. One of his athletic shoes was untied, laces dragging. I worried that he would trip on the laces, jerk the cord. It would release the line that held Street.
“That’s what I’m here for,” I said, desperately trying to speak in a calm voice. “I’m listening. Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to shut up!” He kept his left hand in his pocket. A black wire came out of the pocket, ran up and inside the backpack.
I nodded understanding. I waited. My temper was on a tripwire. Blood pressure at stroke level.
The man paced, radiating pressure and anger as great as mine. “I gave you the murderer of Grace Sun! I told you where he lives. I’m serving you justice on a plate, but you cops just sit on your asses!”
“Thomas Watson,” I said, nodding. “I’ll go after him myself. Look, maybe we can sit and talk. If you untie Street, we can go inside the boat. Find a quiet place. I’ll guarantee your safety.”
“I told you to SHUT UP! You do anything but listen, I’ll drop her! You open your mouth one more time, I swear!” He pointed at the big chain by Street’s feet. “That anchor is heavy. She’ll be twelve hundred feet deep in a couple of minutes. You know what the pressure is down there? She won’t even be half way down before the air in her lungs is squeezed to nothing. You know what that means, McKenna? Before her ribs snap under the crushing pressure, her lungs will flood with ice cold water. She couldn’t stop it even if she wanted to. It’s not a pleasant death, McKenna!”
I held my hands out, palms forward, fingers up. I took a step back, a gesture of compliance.
The man marched his two-step pacing pattern, his big backpack swinging, the rip cord stretching taut at each turn, his loose laces nearly catching. He panted as if he were running up a mountain.
“Thomas Watson. You bring him in and check his DNA
. You understand? Don’t give me any shit about not being able to get a search warrant. You cops know how to make stuff up, plant some contraband. You promise me that you’ll bring him in. Promise me right now, or your girlfriend goes into the lake!” He pulled his cord tight. On the other side of the rail Street was wracked with violent shivers.
I made a solemn nod. He had told me not to say another word, then told me to promise. So I spoke as softly as I could and still be heard. “I promise.”
“Louder!” he said again.
Bukowski had said that I shouldn’t promise what I couldn’t provide. The hostage taker would know it was a false promise. It could backfire.
“I promise I’ll do my best to bring Thomas Watson in.”
“No!” he said. “Promise you’ll bring him in! I didn’t say promise to do your best. You’re condescending to me! You cops are all the same!” His pacing was frantic. A caged tiger. “I make it simple for you. But you play your little game, never doing what I want. You insult my intelligence! Too late, McKenna!”
He pulled his left hand out of his pocket, held it high so that his switch device at the end of the wire was easy to see.
I tensed, wondering at what point I should sprint forward to try to intercept him or catch Street. But if he pressed the switch, nothing I did would prevent us from being vaporized.
I gestured again with my hands. “I’m sorry. Please, let’s talk.”
He seemed not to hear me. His eyes were aflame. With his other hand, he unhitched the trip line from his belt, twisted his body, readying himself to jerk Street’s line. He took a step back, tripped on his loose shoelaces.
He tried to catch himself, tried to step back again, lifting on the stuck shoe.
The hostage taker fell back hard, dropping the line to Street.
I leaped toward Street.
The man’s butt hit the bow rail. The heavy backpack flipped him over the rail backward, and he fell out of my sight. Then came a splash as I grabbed Street from behind. The hostage taker’s voice was suddenly small, wafting up from over the edge of the bow. “Can’t swi...” he got out before his words were choked with water.