by J. R. Rain
The smallish shape turned out to be a woman. Her eyes were red and her nose was a little puffy. She had been crying. I am, after all, an ace detective. Then again, lots of my clients come here crying, or leave here crying. Or both. I haven’t cried since I was ten. I was going on twenty-one crying-free years. A streak I was proud of.
She looked me over. “You’re all sweaty,” she said.
I couldn’t tell if she disapproved or not. And since I didn’t care if she approved or not, I said, “I’m sweaty. I’m also six foot four with shoulders nearly as wide as this doorway. I’m a lot of obvious things.”
She blinked. “Are you Jim Knighthorse?”
“And that,” I said, “is what I’m most proud of.”
“You’re also kind of cocky.”
“Cocky is good in my business.”
She looked me up and down some more, craning her head to do so. “I suppose it is. So, can I come in, or are you just going to keep blocking the doorway with those wide shoulders of yours?”
I grinned and stepped aside. She moved past me and paused just inside my office, taking it in. Doesn’t take long to take in. A bookshelf filled with Clive Cussler and James Rollins novels there, a sink with a Mr. Coffee next to it, a couch for Cindy and I to roll around on, a filing cabinet with my physical case files, four client chairs and my hand-tooled, leather-topped desk. The desk was obnoxiously big and more than one pissed-off client had mentioned something about “penis compensation,” but I dismissed it since the desk had come with the office. Besides, I had big feet.
“What’s with all those pictures?” she asked. She motioned to the wall of photographs behind my desk.
I shut the door behind me, headed over to my desk and slipped into my new leather chair. The leather made rude noises that we both thought best to ignore.
“Wait,” she said, stepping forward. “These are pictures of you. All of them.”
“I’m very photogenic. At least, that’s what Cindy tells me.”
“Who’s Cindy?”
“The most beautiful girl in the world.”
“Are you always like this?” she asked.
“Like what?”
“So...confident?”
“Only when I’m not.”
“And when are you not?”
“Almost never.”
She turned away from one of the pictures and looked at me. “Are you for real?”
“Ask that inside linebacker in the Oregon game.”
“The inside what?”
“That picture you’re looking at. The guy with his feet kicked up in the air. He might concur that I’m real enough.”
She did look, shook her head, then came over and sat in one of the four client chairs. I couldn’t think of a time when all four were filled at once, but I’m ever optimistic.
“Okay, I get it,” she said. She crossed her legs and kicked her foot. A sort of nervous tic. “You were a jock who liked to bash heads and hurt people. But are you a good detective?”
For an answer, I opened one of the desk drawers and extracted a sheet of paper from one of the file folders. I handed it to her.
“What’s this?”
“A list of referrals.”
“And they’ll vouch for you?”
“Some more enthusiastically than others.”
She folded the paper and put it in her purse. “Thanks. Detective Chad something-or-other recommended I see you. He said you don’t scare easy.”
“Detective Hansen,” I said. “And not yet.”
“He also said you could be a handful.”
“You have no idea.”
“Is that a sexual reference?”
“Would a sexual reference offend you?”
“Of course.”
“Then, no.”
She sat back in her chair. She was about twenty-five. She was smallish, but tough-looking. Her hair was short and her nails were unpainted. Upon closer inspection, I saw that her nails were worn down by a lot of work. Work doing what, I didn’t know. She sported a bodacious tan, but also tan lines along her thighs and her upper arms. She was tan, but she wasn’t sunbathing. She was working in the sun. And hard.
“I need help, Mr. Knighthorse. I need someone who doesn’t scare easy and someone who knows what they’re doing. Whether you’re a sexist pig or you think too highly of yourself, I don’t really care. I just need help.”
“What kind of help?”
“My boyfriend’s missing.”
“Missing how long?”
“One week.”
“What does Hansen say?”
“He’s becoming less and less optimistic. Which is why he suggested that I speak with you.”
I nodded and waited.
She looked around my office some more but I don’t think she was really seeing it, mostly because tears had begun filling the corners of her eyes. And now they were running down her cheeks. I handed her a tissue. Ever the chivalrous gentleman.
“Any chance your boyfriend split and decided not to tell you about it?” I asked, when she had wiped her eyes.
She shook her head. “We were in love.”
“Of course.”
Her eyes were red again and her nose was as puffy as ever. She looked at me long and hard. I think she was still trying to figure me out, but figuring me out was low on her list of priorities. I hate being low on anyone’s list of priorities.
“Mitch was a good man. He loved me like no one ever had, and he had a big heart. He also had a lot of compassion, and that extended to all animals.”
I waited, wondering where this was going.
She fished into her purse and pulled out a business card. “We run a nonprofit organization that fights shark finning.”
The card had two names on it. Heidi Mann and Mitch Golden. It also had a faint black-and-white image of hundreds of shark fins lining a deck. My stomach turned.
“I think he was killed, Mr. Knighthorse.”
She had showed me the card for a reason. I said nothing.
“Look at the picture again, Mr. Knighthood. What do you see in the upper corner of the picture?”
I squinted, looking hard. I saw something.
“Cages,” I said.
She nodded. “They’re not empty, Mr. Knighthorse. There are dogs inside those cages.”
I was confused at first, which isn’t hard to do. I am, after all, a jock first. But then I thought about it, and something broke inside me.
She went on, “They use dogs as live bait, Mr. Knighthorse. They hook the little fellows through the muzzle and throw them overboard, and while they paddle desperately back to the boat, drowning from the heaving line, bleeding through their mouths and noses, they attract sharks. The sharks tear the helpless dogs apart; that is, of course, if they haven’t already drowned.”
“Jesus.”
“A few of us fight to stop them. We fight for the sharks and we fight for the dogs. Sometimes we win, but mostly we lose.”
I looked at her. “And you think your boyfriend lost?”
She looked away, swallowed hard. “They’re ruthless. Think about it. Who on God’s earth could hook a sweet little dog through the nose? And then throw that little guy into the ocean to fight for its life. Fucking animals.”
“Have you talked to Detective Hansen about this?”
She nodded. “I have.”
“What did he say?”
“He said to talk to you.”
Hansen wouldn’t have suggested me if he didn’t think there was something to this. I said, “Why do you think they killed your boyfriend?”
“Because they threatened us.”
“And what did Hansen have to say about that?”
“He said it wasn’t enough to go on.”
“Police are particular that way,” I said.
“And are you?” she asked.
I looked at the card and wasn’t very surprised to see that I had inadvertently bent it. “Me, not so much.”
“So,
will you help me, Mr. Knighthorse?”
I didn’t have to think about my answer for long. “Yeah,” I said, setting the bent card with the shark fins and dog cages on the desk. “Yeah, I’ll help you.”
She removed a manila folder from her purse and set it before me. “Here’s what we have on them.”
“The shark hunters?”
“Yes.”
“We’ve got names of workers, the owner, some of their contacts, berthing docks, office addresses. Most are in Mexico. But there’s one guy here in San Diego.”
“You’re very thorough.”
She gave me a tight smile that showed some bottom teeth. “We are good at what we do.”
“And what is it that you do?”
“We put the bad guys out of business, Mr. Knighthorse.”
Chapter Two
Detective Hansen and I were sitting in his squad car, parked in the handicapped section near the Huntington Beach Pier. It was early morning so the babes weren’t out in full swing yet. A few of the joggers showed promise, but it was hard to tell with the baggy windbreakers and workout pants.
“Next time we meet at the beach,” said Hansen, “let’s do it when the sun’s out.”
“Because you like the sunshine?”
“Because I like the babes.”
I nodded. Good point. There had been a box of assorted donuts sitting on the console between us. Now there was just a few cinnamon cakes and a maple bar that had seen better days. We were both sipping coffee.
“You want the maple bar?” asked Hansen.
“It’s all yours.”
A slender woman with a great white sheepdog jogged past us on PCH, then angled down toward the boardwalk, where the bulk of the joggers were. The sun was higher up on the horizon than when we had first started on the donuts. Hansen was a tan guy. He was wearing tan slacks, loafers and no socks. His ankles were also tan and I suspected there was a tanning bed somewhere with his ass prints all over it.
“I take it Heidi Mann swung by your office,” said Hansen. “If you want to call it that.”
“It’s a nice office.”
“It’s a Jim Knighthorse football shrine.”
“Like I said, it’s a nice office.”
“Sprinkled with bullet holes,” he said.
“The bullet holes give it character.”
He shook his head and licked his fingers. When it comes to donuts and frosting, every man reverts to his inner ten-year-old. After some minor debate, I went ahead and fished out one of the cinnamon cakes. I took a healthy bite. It tasted better than it looked.
I said, “You have anything on her boyfriend?”
He shook his head. There was some chocolate frosting in his thick cop mustache. With the frosting, Hansen didn’t look nearly as cool as he thought he looked.
He said, “No. And it’s not as clean and clear-cut as she probably made it out to be.”
I nodded. Few things were. I waited.
“Her boyfriend might have been a small-time drug dealer. We’re thinking he might have run into some trouble down that road.”
“It’s a hell of a road,” I said. I had eaten six donuts. Dammit, I wanted another. What the hell was wrong with me? “You look into the shark hunters?”
“No reason to.”
“They threatened them, according to Heidi.”
“They’re just fishermen, Knighthorse. And these...activists get threatened all the time. Heidi and Mitch and others like them, get under people’s skin for a living. They shut down honest businesses for a living. To most people, they’re a pain in the ass. Come to think of it, they kind of sound like you.”
“My kind of people,” I said. “What do you know of the shark hunters?”
“They hunt sharks. Some of them, apparently, just for the fins.”
“What do you think of that?”
“I think it has nothing to do with my job, so I could give a shit.”
“That’s what I thought. And the story about the dogs?”
“Using dogs for bait?”
I nodded. “Yeah, that.”
“Sounds shitty.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“That’s all I can say. I can’t save the world, Knighthorse. That’s your job.”
We were both silent, and as the sun rose a little higher, we spotted our first bikini walking across the sand. Hansen smiled. I might have smiled, too, if I felt like it.
I didn’t.
Chapter Three
Cindy and I were at Buca di Beppo in Huntington Beach, and I couldn’t have been happier.
“You love it here,” said Cindy.
“They serve large portions,” I said.
“They serve family-sized portions,” she corrected.
“That’s just a fancy way of saying large.”
“It’s not that fancy.”
“What can I say, I’m a simple man.”
“With a huge appetite,” she said. “And for the love of God don’t say, ‘It ain’t easy being me.’”
I winked. “I didn’t have to.”
The waiter came over and took our order. The family-sized portions were meant to feed four. In our case, one, although Cindy would nibble on it here and there, but not enough to do any real damage. Mostly she would fill up on salad and bread and tiramisu.
I was drinking a pint of Pyramid Hefeweizen, a new favorite. Cindy was working her way steadily through a house chardonnay. I don’t like chardonnay, or wine for that matter. It tastes funny. The problem with wine is that it doesn’t taste like beer. If wine tasted like beer, well, we would be in business.
I only see Cindy about three times a week, which works out to be about perfect. Just enough days off to miss her, and just enough on to feel deeply connected.
She asked me what I was working on and I told her. About the time I finished telling her, I finished my beer. Synchronicity at its best. Our waiter came by, saw the pathetic condition of my empty beer mug, and promptly did something about it. Good man. A few minutes later and I was once again drinking from a full pint, as happy as a mole with eagle eyes.
“So is that why you ordered vegetarian tonight?” asked Cindy. “Because of the mistreatment of these animals?”
“It got me thinking,” I said.
“Thinking how?”
“About the mistreatment of animals in general. Humans are bastards to our creatures.”
“Humans are also hungry,” said Cindy.
“Well, this human might change his ways.”
“Change how?” asked Cindy. “I thought real men eat meat.”
“Real men stand up for what they believe.”
“And what do you believe?” she asked.
“I’m working on that,” I said.
“And in the meantime, no more meat?”
“For now,” I said.
“And what if I want meat? And for the love of God don’t turn that sexual.”
“I haven’t a clue what you mean,” I said innocently, wiping away what I was certain was a foam mustache. “And eat what you want. I’m not trying to change the way you eat.”
“Thank God. I love bacon.” She swirled her wine in her glass. Professor Cynthia Darwin was blond and blue-eyed and looked nothing like the distinguished anthropology professor I knew her to be. A distinguished professor with the pedigree name. Yes, she’s related to that Darwin. Survival of the fittest and all that.
She said, “So, in the meantime, you’re not going to eat meat?”
“Nope.”
“Do you think you’ll ever eat it again?”
“Dunno.”
She looked at me from behind her glass. Her pupils were growing increasingly dilated, seemingly with each sip.
“So, you’re doing it for the animals?” she asked.
“Something like that.”
“Somehow,” she said, setting down her glass and reaching across the table and taking my hand, “I find that kind of sexy.”
“Protect
ing animals is sexy?”
Except I knew that after one glass of wine, Cindy found just about anything I did sexy. She didn’t have to think about it long. “Yeah, I find that very sexy.”
Chapter Four
I was sitting in my van and studying the outside of a bar in Belmont Shores. The bar where Mitch Golden had last been seen.
It was called Panama Joe’s. Belmont Shores is a trendy little subdivision of Long Beach, and parking is at a premium here, which is why I was currently mostly blocking a driveway into a Bank of America. I also mostly didn’t care.
Although it’s highly illegal to do so, Detective Hansen had “accidentally” emailed me some of the pertinent information from his missing person file.
Any police investigator worth his salt appreciated help on a case, even from a private eye, just as long as that private eye didn’t get in the way. Hansen appreciated the help, although he would never admit it.
So now I was sitting in my newish Ford Cargo Van, which I had recently purchased for the sole purpose of surveillance work. I loved the Mustang, and I still owned it, but the classic car was proving not to be very practical during stakeouts. People tended to remember classic Mustangs; not so much nondescript Ford Cargo Vans, which are a dime a dozen.
My Cargo Van had been heavily customized. The windows were tinted. A divider separated the front seats from the rear of the van, accessed via a small door, which I could climb through and shut behind me. The cargo area featured a small desk, two swivel recliners, a TV, electrical jacks, a mini-refrigerator, a sink and a small bathroom that I really hate to use, but will if I have to. Stacked near the desk was a pile of various magnetized company names. Bogus companies, of course. A van that said “Al’s Plumbing” drew less attention than a plain-unmarked van.
I flipped through Hansen’s notes. Seven days ago, Mitch Golden went missing. His girlfriend, Heidi Mann, filed a missing person’s report the next day. Detective Hansen had been assigned the case later that day, which was when he made his initial phone call to Heidi Mann. She had come down to his office where he’d asked her all the usual questions.
I read his question and her answers now. Nothing stood out, other than the vague threat made by owners of a fishing vessel near San Diego. The vessel apparently hailed from Mexico and allegedly hunted hammerheads off the coast of California and Mexico. Hansen never followed up on it, although he did forward her concerns to a game warden friend of his at the Department of Fish and Game, who oversees commercial fishing.