Baked

by Mark Haskell Smith

  Marianna looked at him.

  “What do you think?”

  “It’s an operation. But I really can’t be sure.”

  “So now what?”

  Miro considered it.

  “I should really take you back to the motel. It’s too dangerous.”

  They drove in silence for a moment and then Marianna turned to him.

  “You don’t have to have anything to do with the baby if you don’t want.”

  Miro looked at her, surprised.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “I don’t want you to feel like you are obligated. I want you to want to be involved as much as you feel like being involved.”

  Miro nodded.

  “That’s good because I want to be involved as much as you want me to be involved.”

  Marianna smiled and hooked a wayward strand of hair behind her ear.

  “Bom.”

  Miro reached out and held her hand.

  “Does that mean we’re involved?”

  She nodded.

  “Yes. I think we’re involved together.”

  She saw Miro shift in his seat, as if an idea had made him suddenly uncomfortable.

  “I still think it’s too dangerous.”

  Marianna held her hands up.

  “If it’s too dangerous for me, it’s too dangerous for you. We are involved now, you know.”

  That made Miro smile.

  …

  Miro drove back down the hill and found a small espresso bar on York.

  “I need a coffee. Want a tea or something?”

  She smiled, but it was a tired smile, the jet lag was catching up with her.

  “Go ahead. I’ll wait here.”

  When he came back with his coffee, Miro saw that she’d fallen asleep, her head leaning against the window. Sugar Minott’s “Good Thing Going” was playing softly on the iPod. Miro slid quietly into the car and watched Marianna. Her hair was sticking up and a couple of tendrils stuck out the window like some kind of exotic red octopus; her face was soft, relaxed and lovely, and her skin seemed to glow.

  Miro felt his body flood with a strange feeling. He felt a warmth toward her and it gave him a feeling of well-being, almost euphoria. This, he realized, was what being an animal —a warm-blooded mammal—was all about. He realized he loved her and wanted to stay with her, be her mate and companion and try to build some kind of life together.

  Of course coming to that conclusion, for a cannasseur, a grower of controlled substances, was problematic. Would a stoner make a good parent? Would they let a cannabis farmer coach the youth soccer team?

  He sipped his coffee and wondered what his next move should be. He’d found a grow house, but was it the grow house of the guys who stole the Elephant Crush? He didn’t want to rat on some innocent indoor farmer, that wouldn’t be cool.

  Miro realized he’d have to go back to the house and go up to the door. If the door was open and they were growing Elephant Crush he’d be able to smell it in a second.

  41

  TRAFFIC IN EUROPE is different than traffic in Los Angeles; despite the cobbled streets and lack of open space for parking, it’s much easier to navigate around Amsterdam or Paris. You might find yourself on ancient, medieval roads, or driving down a narrow mews, but wherever you were, whether in Brussels or Hamburg or Nice, your fellow drivers were, for the most part, kind and intelligent, courteous and observant even if they were tearing down the road like madmen. They were the kind of drivers who took a philosophical view of the experience. Because weren’t we all trapped in a machine made of steel and glass and rubber and plastic? The European drivers recognized that it was inhumane at best, that the automobile was an isolating presence in the world, an invention that had kept people apart, that denied people time to sit on a tram and read a book or strike up a conversation. Apparently, this philosophical understanding, this detachment from being dominated by machines, hadn’t made it to Los Angeles.

  Guus had the hashish traders drop him at a car-rental place and now found himself behind the wheel of a Chrysler Sebring convertible, driving slack-jawed through the clogged, infernal mayhem of gigantic smoking SUVs—their rearview mirrors shaking with every thump and wallop of their expensive stereos—rattle-trap trucks and cargo vans while a circus of tiny hybrids and Mini Coopers skittered in-between. They would careen toward a red light as if it were the finish line of the Indy 500, only to lock up their brakes, skid to a stop, and idle there, spewing fumes, and then start the race again when the light turned green.

  As he drove he felt his forehead broil slowly from white to pink to a sun-kissed crimson. Perhaps renting a convertible had been a mistake, but he was in California and top-down cruising underneath the palms seemed to him to be the thing to do.

  He’d decided to avoid the freeways. They seemed too fast: bone-break crazy and out-of-control like a ride at Disneyland that he wasn’t quite tall enough to go on. But he couldn’t have foreseen the demolition derby that ensued on the city streets, the slow hot slog through Hollywood toward Santa Monica and the Compassion Center’s corporate office, with the inflectionless drone of the GPS digital-voice guidance system showing him the way.

  …

  Vincent shook a Klonopin out of the prescription bottle and popped it in his mouth. He washed it down with some Fiji water. His assistant had argued with him that it was ridiculous to buy fresh water from the South Pacific, plastic containers that had been shipped halfway around the world by supertankers, trains, and trucks just so people like him could find it at their local grocery store and drive it home in their cars. His assistant had told him that between manufacturing the plastic and the transportation costs, each bottle of imported water had the same carbon footprint as a 747 jumbo jet flying across the country. Vincent found that a little farfetched. Besides, the water was tasty and he would recycle the plastic. Really. What was the big deal? Compared to the shit he was dealing with, remaining carbon neutral was small potatoes. It’s easy being green and keeping your carbon footprint small when everything in your life is going fine.

  But things weren’t going fine. He’d decided to go ahead with the party. He had to or he’d be the laughingstock of Santa Monica. But the fact that Miro was running around was really annoying. Why couldn’t that motherfucker stay dead? Vincent propped his head on his fist, stared off into space, and tried to think of what he was going to do.

  Nothing came to him. If Miro made a fuss, he was fucked. The Klonopin wasn’t working; maybe he needed Ritalin, that might improve his concentration. He opened a drawer, shook a pill out of a bottle, crushed it with a paperweight, and snorted it off the desktop. The pharmaceutical powder burned his nose but he started to feel more focused.

  If the shit hit the fan he could always say he had bought it from a reliable source, that he didn’t know it had been stolen. There was a certain built-in deniability. Worse case, he could blame Shamus and let him deal with the consequences. Who would people believe? Him? Or that psycho?

  Vincent pushed back from his desk, went to the center of his office, and assumed a Downward Dog pose. He thought it might help calm him but it didn’t; he couldn’t get into it, he was too agitated. Then he remembered it was calming to do an inversion so he tried a handstand against the wall. That ended up making him think that the Klonopin wasn’t getting digested, it felt like it was sliding back down his throat, so he stood up in the middle of his office, waiting for the powerful antianxiety drug to kick in. He considered that he probably should’ve just smoked some weed, but then he’d be stoned and he didn’t want to be stoned. Not with this shit going on.

  He tried a Pigeon pose, easing into the hip stretch in the middle of the floor. That’s when Guus entered the office.

  “We need to talk.”

  Vincent’s assistant was right behind him.

  “I tried to stop him.”

  Vincent looked up.

  “It’s cool. Get us a couple of Fiji waters.”

  …
>
  Cho watched as Quijano snapped the magazine into his Glock semiautomatic and ka-chunked the slide, sending a round into the chamber, before turning toward him with a frown.

  “What’s your problem?”

  “You’re not gonna need your gun.”

  “How do you know?”

  Cho pointed to the SWAT Team dressed in helmets, flak jackets, and ballistic assault gear jumping out of a couple of black SUVs and moving quickly toward the suburban tract home.

  “Let the guys in the turtle suits secure the site. Then we go in.”

  “I thought we’d take the lead on this.”

  Cho shook his head.

  “You watch too much TV.”

  It really wasn’t like the way they showed it on TV. The SWAT team didn’t go up to the front door and knock. They didn’t identify themselves or give the occupants thirty seconds to open the door. What they did was jump out of their SUVs before they even stopped, sprint up to the front door with a battering ram, knock the door down, and swarm inside with overwhelming force. It was shock and awe in the suburbs and it worked. Shots were rarely fired. Nobody got killed.

  Cho and Quijano sat in the car until they saw the SWAT captain stand on the front porch and flash a thumbs-up. Then they got out of the car and walked into the house. Cho could tell Quijano was disappointed that he didn’t get to kick in the door and wave his gun around. He gave him a friendly pat on the back.

  “Maybe you should apply to join the turtle suits.”

  “Fuck that.”

  Cho looked around and, for a moment, felt his heart sink. It looked like he’d fucked up royally. The house was completely normal and there was nothing about the couple of middle-aged Latinos—a man and a woman sitting on the couch in handcuffs—to make Cho think that they were anything other than hardworking, tax paying, innocent victims of a police pooch-screw. But then he noticed the steel-framed front door, obviously reinforced to prevent someone like Quijano from trying to kick it in, but not reinforced enough to give a SWAT battering ram much trouble. The SWAT captain came up to him, a big grin on his face.

  “What’ve you got?” Cho asked.

  “You tell me. You want to look at the farm in the basement or the hostages in the bedroom?”

  …

  Vincent looked at the Dutch dude sitting in the chair across from him. What is it with these Europeans? They come to LA dressed for a hipster’s funeral: black T-shirt, a gray sweater, a black leather jacket, black jeans, black boots, and a bright red face. If a lobster decided to dress like Lou Reed, he’d look just like this Dutch tourist. Vincent wondered why the Europeans didn’t check the weather. It was ninety degrees Fahrenheit in LA; maybe they thought that was cold in metric. Who the fuck knew?

  Or maybe he was red because he was obviously angry. He kept demanding to know things. Vincent didn’t know what he was supposed to say to the guy. He wasn’t going to confess to anything. As far as he was concerned, it had all spun out of control and was FUBAR. He thought about something his shrink had said. If it’s out of your control, it’s out of your control. So Vincent decided to tell the truth.

  “Look, I understand you’re upset. But you had the exclusive in Europe. This isn’t Europe.”

  Vincent was pleased to see the Dutchman squirm.

  “Might I ask how you came to be in possession of this plant?”

  Vincent smiled.

  “I can’t give you the name of my source. But someone came to me with it.”

  “It was stolen.”

  Vincent nodded in a show of empathy.

  “If I’d known ... but then someone else would’ve bought it. So you see it’s really worked out for the best.”

  “How has it worked out for the best?”

  “The universe takes care of you.”

  He watched the Dutch guy take his glasses off and clean them. Vincent’s assistant stuck her head in the door.

  “Vincent? The caterer’s here.”

  Vincent smiled.

  “Send her in.”

  The caterer entered with a box in her hands.

  “Fresh, handmade, mango-infused truffles.”

  Vincent took one and tasted it. The chocolate dissolved in his mouth spreading a rich, bittersweet flavor tinged with an edge of mango. It tasted decadent.

  Vincent pointed to the Dutch guy.

  “Try one. Delicious.”

  “You’re not going to get away with it.”

  There was something about the way the Dutch guy said this, his cold matter-of-factness, that was as startling as if he had stood up and screamed. The caterer stared at Vincent. Vincent felt his hand trembling. He took a breath. Inhaling, exhaling. Calmifying. Letting the Klonopin do its job.

  “He’s from Europe. These are great by the way. Perfect.”

  The caterer nodded.

  “Excellent. We’re all set for tonight.”

  Vincent nodded and the caterer left. Vincent turned his full attention to the Dutch pain in the ass sitting across from him.

  “Listen. I have the Elephant Crush. I’m going to grow it and sell it. You can either play along and take a piece of the pie or you can go fuck yourself.”

  The Dutch guy sat there for what seemed like ten minutes before he finally said something.

  “I believe I understand your position.”

  And then he got up and left.

  Vincent wondered, briefly, if he would have to have the Dutch asshole killed. He took out a Post-it and wrote: Dutch guy? He stuck the Post-it to his telephone to remind him the next time he talked to Shamus, although it occurred to him that Shamus wasn’t turning out to be the best hitman in the world. He might need to look for a new one. Maybe put an ad on Craigslist. He took out another Post-it and wrote: Craigslist.

  Then he popped another mango-infused truffle in his mouth. This party was going to rock.

  …

  Miro and Marianna had sat in the car around the corner and discussed the pros and cons of going up to the house and seeing if they were really growing Elephant Crush. Marianna didn’t think it was the best idea—she was afraid whoever opened the door would just start shooting—but Miro didn’t know what else to do. He didn’t feel comfortable dropping the dime on the grow op unless he was sure they were his plants they were growing. They finally decided that if they went to the door as a couple, pretending that they were looking for a friend, they might not get shot. If they were going to be a couple—and Marianna knew they had lots of things to discuss before that became a reality—they would do this together.

  “Think of it as a date.”

  As it turned out they didn’t have to go to the door of the suspected grow house. When they turned onto the street they saw swarms of police cars, unmarked cars, police vans, and all kinds of activity around the grow house. A uniformed officer yawned as he waved them past.

  42

  CALIFORNIA LAW—legislative statute SB 420—allows medical marijuana patients to grow six mature and twelve immature plants for personal use and for sale to a licensed cannabis dispensary, coop, or collective. The four to five hundred plants in various stages of maturity in the basement of the Glassell Park grow house were well beyond the legal limit. SWAT had called Narco and now five drug detectives were snooping around the place, taking photos and doing a rough inventory. Somebody was going down for this operation, that was for sure, but Cho didn’t really care. He thought the prohibition on cannabis was overcooked: it was no longer a scientific or rational debate but a political one, a hangover from the cold war era, the Old World morality that said anything that wasn’t white and male was bad. It was bullshit. Was a puff of marijuana any worse than a cigar and a scotch on the rocks?

  Cho knew some young and hungry assistant district attorney was on his or her way right now, ready to blow this thing open and make a name for him- or herself. The chief and the commissioner would follow, in hot pursuit of a photo op. They loved to get their names in the paper, puff up their chests, and preen in front of a pile of weed
. Cho didn’t give a flying fuck about any of that. He was getting close to Shamus Noriega. He could feel it.

  Cho wished he’d learned Spanish. He spoke a little Korean but his Spanish was limited to recognizing when someone called him a bad name. He sat at the kitchen table as Quijano hablaed with the two suspects. Cho leaned forward and slid the photo of Shamus taken by the herbal cooperative’s surveillance camera toward the couple and gave them an encouraging glare.

  Quijano asked them if they recognized the man. The two Mexicans shook their heads but Cho knew they were lying. He could see it in their hesitation, their blinks and gulps. It’d just be a matter of time now before one of them cracked and told him what he needed to know. He turned to Quijano and affected his bad-cop voice.

  “Make sure they understand that they’re completely, totally, irrevocably fucked.”

  He smacked the table with a meaty fist just to see them jump.

  Quijano nodded and translated a version of what Cho had said to them. Cho didn’t hear the word “chinga” so he figured Quijano was soft selling, taking the role of good cop. That was fine with Cho; he figured that the suspects, Bernardo and Blanca Guardado, could probably speak English well enough to get the gist of what he was saying.

  “Tell them we’re going to deport them. Send their asses back to El Salvador.”

  “They’re Mexican.”

  “I don’t care. They’re not going to some plush California prison on the taxpayer dime. Fuck that. I’m gonna personally feed these motherfuckers to the tiburones. Tell them that.”

  Cho got up.

  “I’m going to talk to the EMT.”

  He walked off, leaving Quijano to translate what he’d said, not that Quijano needed to. Cho could tell by the expressions on the couple’s faces that they’d understood him loud and clear.

  Cho stopped and looked into one of the bedrooms and found two SWAT officers pulling guns out of the closet and laying them on the bed. There was a brand-new Benelli M4 Super 90 combat shotgun—the kind the U.S. military uses in Afghanistan and Iraq—a couple of old-school gangbanger favorites like a MAC-10 and an AK-47, plus a full gun-show sized assortment of .38 caliber revolvers and .9 millimeter semi-automatic handguns.