by Jeff Shelby
The Cadillac turned into the parking lot of the outlets and drove to the western end of the strip mall.
“Guys, if we could hit the Mikasa store, that would be great,” I said. “I need some new goblets.”
“Just a word of warning,” Ramon said, not bothering to turn around. “Mr. Costilla does not find many things funny.”
I closed my big trap.
The car came to a stop at the end of the lot, idling next to the curb.
Ramon turned around. “I’m going to assume that you know that just because you don’t see any guns doesn’t mean there aren’t any guns.” He smiled. “Follow me, please.”
Carter and I slid out of the backseat. The driver stayed in the car and U-turned the Cadillac into a handicapped space.
We walked with Ramon past the Nike store, moving with the crowd of shoppers, a mix of local Mexicans and tourists looking for bargains. At the end of the row of shops, Ramon stopped in front of an empty suite. He produced a key and unlocked the door, holding it open for us. “After you.”
The front of the store was vacant, apparently in the process of being renovated. Paint cans and their lids were strewn across the concrete floor, with several ladders pushed up against the walls.
Ramon shut the door behind us. “The back room,” he said, pointing toward the door at the rear of the space.
I looked at Carter, who shrugged and nodded in that direction. We walked to the back and stopped in front of a partially closed door. If the shop were open for business, it would’ve been to the back office or the storeroom. For us, I wasn’t quite sure where it would lead.
Ramon yelled out something in Spanish.
“Come in,” a voice said from behind the door.
We went in. The storage room was double the size of the storefront, all gray concrete and cinder blocks. Empty metal shelves lined the walls from floor to ceiling.
One man stood near the back door on the far side of the room, an Uzi resting in his large hands and pointed in our direction.
Alejandro Costilla paced back and forth between us in the middle of the room, an angry cat in a human body.
He was taller than I expected, probably six foot two, his athletic frame moving effortlessly in gray slacks, a white silk shirt, and black leather sandals. His head was shaved clean, a tan, gleaming scalp in place of hair. A thick black goatee made its way around his mouth. His eyes were narrow slits, outlined by thin black brows.
He froze when he saw us, as if we’d interrupted his concentration. His eyes narrowed a little more. He pointed at me. “You’re Braddock?”
His voice was high pitched for a man and it stopped me for a moment. He sounded like Charlie Brown.
“Yeah,” I said, regaining my composure.
He glared at Carter. “And you’re the one that set this up with Ramon?”
Carter nodded slightly. I realized his eyes were focused on the guy with the gun.
“He said you can be trusted,” Costilla said.
“That’s half right,” Carter told him.
Costilla raised an eyebrow. “What’s the other half?”
“Feared, too,” Carter replied, expressionless.
Costilla stared at him for a moment before letting his mouth slide into a thin smile.
“Perhaps Ramon said that, too.”
Carter shrugged.
Costilla started pacing again, but kept an eye on me. “You are investigating the murder?”
“I am,” I said, trying to relax. “You knew her?”
“We’d met,” he said, rubbing his hands together.
“In San Francisco?”
He waved a hand in the air, the silver rings on his fingers flashing like lightning. “I don’t remember and it doesn’t matter.” He stopped moving for a moment and turned his full gaze on me. “What do you know so far?”
I thought about that for a moment. I knew several things, but I wasn’t sure how wise it would be to share those things with Costilla. I needed to know what he wanted.
“I know she’s dead,” I said.
He stared at me for a moment, his eyes like black holes. He put his hands in his pockets.
“What do you know?” he asked quietly.
“Why?”
He shook his head slightly and looked at the floor, as if I were a child that kept making the same mistake. “Because I want to know.”
It was a statement made by a man who was not used to being questioned. And it chilled the room.
“I know I found her in the trunk of the car,” I said, deciding to play it semi-straight. “I know I think she was strangled. I know the medical examiner is still working on it. And I know her parents asked me to look into her death.”
Costilla looked up and clapped his hands together softly, mockingly. “That’s better.”
I glanced at Carter out of the corner of my eye. He was still locked in a staredown with Costilla’s bodyguard.
“That last part,” Costilla said to me. “You are done looking into her death.”
“I am?”
Costilla nodded, quick and hard. “You are.”
“Normally the people that hire me tell me when I’m done,” I said. “You didn’t hire me.”
Costilla placed his hands in his pockets. “No, I didn’t. But I am telling you that you are done.”
“And if I say I’m not?” I asked, watching him. My spine felt like an aluminum bat, the tension locking me up completely.
He started pacing again, this time not looking at me. “You will be well compensated for your time, Mr. Braddock.”
I watched him walk, confident and assured.
“Why do you want me off?” I asked.
He stopped and turned to me, an amused look on his face. “You ask a lot of questions, man. Stay with me for a second, but you do know who I am, right?”
I nodded.
He smiled, exposing bright, white teeth. “Of course you do. I ask that question to demonstrate something. Do you understand?”
“Not sure.”
“My point is you shouldn’t be asking questions of me,” he said, his smile growing wider. “Instead, you should be thinking about how to make sure I don’t fucking kill you today.”
I knew that, but I also knew that if I bowed down to this guy, I was done forever.
“I don’t always do the right thing,” I told him.
He nodded, evidently agreeing. “I heard that. But doing the wrong thing and doing something completely loco are two different things.” He nailed me with his eyes. “And right now you are on the loco side.”
I watched the lines around his eyes intensify.
“Don’t know what to tell you,” I said.
“There are two responses for you to choose from,” he said, holding up two fingers. “Yes, I’m going to back off. Or no, I’m staying on it.” He waggled the two fingers. “Simple choice. I will let you make the decision. But you only get one chance.”
I paused, considering where my answer might take me. I knew what the right thing to say was, the safe thing. I knew which answer would get us out of the empty room and away from Costilla. But I couldn’t get it out of my mouth.
“No,” I said. “I’m staying on it.”
I heard Carter clear his throat.
Costilla folded his arms across his chest. “An unfortunate decision,” he said, his eyes burning holes into me. “Ricardo will see you out. The back door.”
“I don’t think so,” Carter said.
Costilla glared at him. “Too bad.” He snapped his fingers. “Ricardo.”
Ricardo waved the gun, motioning for us to move.
Carter finally moved his eyes from Ricardo to Costilla. “An unfortunate decision.”
Costilla returned the stare but said nothing.
I felt a knot form in my stomach and followed Carter toward the door. I knew Carter wouldn’t be moving unless he had a plan. Now I just needed to get inside his head and figure out what it was before we both took bullets to the back of
the head.
Ricardo got to the door and opened it with his right hand, holding the gun in his left.
Then Ricardo’s head exploded.
Bullets poured into the room, ricocheting off the walls like marbles in an ice cooler. I dove to the floor, Carter landing next to me. I heard some yelling in Spanish from the storefront. I rolled next to the wall and looked at Carter.
He grinned back at me.
I heard some more yelling in Spanish, the voices retreating from the room. The bullets finally settled down, the silence nearly louder than the violence. The stench of hot metal and smoke filled my nose and stung my eyes.
“Carter?” a voice asked above us.
“It’s clear,” another voice said.
We both sat up.
Timmy and Jimmy Tate stood in the doorway, each holding something that looked like an AK-47.
Jimmy nodded at me. “What’s up, Noah?”
The Tates were identical twins. They were buddies of Carter’s. Working buddies. Psychotic buddies. Painfully thin, with pale, white skin, they both stood about five foot eight. Sad eyes and monobrows made them look like forlorn raccoons. Each sported a tight Marine crew cut of jet-black hair. Timmy wore a white bandana around his forehead. Jimmy sported a green one. Camouflage pants and a couple of black T-shirts completed their renegade ensemble.
The only way to tell them apart was that Jimmy’s right eye was fake, the result of taking a pool cue in the face during a fight with his brother. He’d somehow obtained a glass eye that had a red stone in the middle of it, giving him the look of having stepped out of a photograph where the flash didn’t work correctly.
That’s how I knew it was Jimmy that was talking to me.
I looked around, scanning the room. “Where’s Costilla?”
“Beat it out the door,” Timmy said. “Think I got somebody in the shoulder, though.”
I turned back around to them. “What are you doing here?”
They nodded at Carter.
Carter stared at me like I was a moron. “You think we were gonna come in here naked?”
“Gotta go,” Jimmy said, backing out the door.
“Yep,” Timmy said, following him.
“Call you guys,” Carter said. “Thanks.”
They disappeared out the door.
“The twins have the right idea. Let’s get the hell out of here,” Carter said.
I stood and stepped over Ricardo’s bullet-ridden body, the blood pooling in splotches around what was left of his head.
I looked back at the door that Alejandro Costilla had escaped through, possibly wounded by someone he would associate with me.
I knew he wouldn’t wait long to track me down.
17
Carter’s car, if that’s what you’d call it, waited for us at the far end of the parking lot. He’d arranged for the Tate brothers to deliver the beast.
Carter owned a 1985 Dodge Ram Charger, a monstrosity of an automobile that sat high off the ground on tires the size of carousels. He had cut the top off because he decided it was easier to throw his surfboards in that way. The seats were torn in different spots, the yellow foam oozing out from beneath the duct tape he’d used to try to cover up the tears.
The 4x4 had originally been painted bright red, but Carter is anything but bright red. So he’d painted it all black, then added white stripes on the sides and back. Sort of a zebra hybrid look. Save for the giant skull and crossbones he’d stenciled on the hood.
Carter’s car.
We drove without talking, the wind slapping around us loudly and urgently as we made our way up the freeway, before exiting and taking the bridges over the southern edge of Mission Bay, past the Bahia Resort Hotel and onto the small isthmus of land between the bay and the ocean that was Mission Beach.
I wasn’t as worried as I should have been about Costilla. I wanted to be anxious, to be nervous, but I couldn’t stop thinking about Kate and where her life had taken her. I figured the panic would set in later. Like when I found Costilla waiting for me in my house or something.
Carter pulled to a halt in front of my place, but the motor under the skull kept humming.
“You could’ve told him you’d drop it,” he said.
I nodded. “Could’ve.”
“Didn’t figure you would, though.”
I opened the door and dropped to the ground, my chin barely over the seat cushion. “You are a think tank.”
He ran a hand through his bleached hair. “Want my thoughts?”
“No.”
He gave them to me anyway. “She was dealing or she was a mule. Why else would she have had contact with Costilla? You don’t buy just a weekend’s worth from him.”
I smoothed a piece of duct tape on the seat. The same thought had crossed my mind, but I couldn’t get it to work for me. I couldn’t picture any thirty-year-old woman from a filthy rich background operating in the heroin trade, and I couldn’t even begin to think that Kate could’ve been involved in something that dark.
Carter gripped the steering wheel. A giant in his giant car. “So she either had her own business going or she delivered for him.”
“Neither makes sense,” I told him.
“We’re not trying to make sense. We’re trying to make a connection.” He stepped on the accelerator, the engine revving like a jet plane. “Gotta go. Got some things to do.”
With Carter, it’s hard to tell. He could’ve meant grocery shopping or he could’ve meant hunting down Costilla.
I didn’t ask.
“Okay,” I said, stepping back and shutting the door. “The service for Kate is tomorrow.”
He nodded. “I never miss a party.”
“Not much of a party.”
He nodded again, stepped on the gas, and peeled out in the alley, smoke trailing behind him as he disappeared.
I went inside my house, more cautious than usual. After I checked in the closets, under the bed, and in the freezer, I settled out on the patio with a beer under the late afternoon sun, watching a few stragglers on the water try to make something of waves that were amounting to nothing.
In college, I had developed an affection for late afternoons on the water. Between my classes during the day and waiting tables at night, it was the one part of the day that I had free to surf. The waves were usually awful, but it never bothered me much. The professors and the restaurant customers couldn’t touch me out there, and I used that time to enjoy myself and keep my head clear.
I sipped at the beer, thinking about how Kate could’ve been connected to Costilla. It became a pointless exercise because I realized I probably didn’t really know Kate anymore. The girl I remembered was gone the second I left Catalina Island, and she had vanished somewhere along the way in the years since I had last seen her.
“Some things never change,” a voice said from behind me.
“I don’t think I ever gave you a key, Liz,” I said, without turning around.
Detective Liz Santangelo came around and sat on the patio wall, her back to the sun and sea. “You didn’t. Door was open.”
“I’m so careless.”
“Might want to change that,” she said, folding her arms across her black blouse and crossing her legs, the white cotton of the capri pants wrinkling at the knees.
I looked past her down to the shoreline. The waves were small and slow, and I knew I wasn’t missing anything out there, as the stragglers gave up and looked back at the water, shaking their heads, wishing for better things from the ocean.
“Yesterday,” I said finally. “I shouldn’t have said what I said.”
“No, you shouldn’t have,” she replied.
I knew that Liz took enough grief from her colleagues about being a woman in a man’s job. I didn’t need to make it tougher for her. I’d been pissed off and out of line.
“So I’m sorry,” I said. “Really.”
She nodded. “Thanks.”
The ocean hitting the shore filled the silence between us
. I thought maybe she was surprised at my apology, but I wasn’t sure.
“Were you down at the border earlier today?” she asked.
I drank some more of the beer and squinted at her. “Not that I recall.”
She tilted her head to the left, her eyes narrowing a bit. “Little shoot-out down there this afternoon. Alejandro Costilla and a few of his friends were seen fleeing. One guy dead. Two other guys were seen leaving the outlets.”
“I’ve never cared for outlet shopping. Seems like cheating. Dangerous, too, apparently.”
“Witness says they left in a convertible. A big, God-awful-looking convertible.”
I shook my head. “Convertibles are tough on my hair, Liz. And you know how vain I can be.”
She watched me for a moment. I stared back. I was actually staring over her shoulder, watching two seagulls battle for a hot dog bun in midair, but I didn’t tell her that.
“What the fuck are you doing messing around with Alejandro Costilla?” she finally asked.
“I would have to be an idiot to be messing around with Alejandro Costilla,” I said. “Detective.”
She nodded in agreement. “Yeah. You would have to be an idiot. And most of the time you are.”
I finished the beer and pointed the empty bottle at her. “That was rude. After I apologized and everything. I think you should leave now.”
She stood and sighed deeply, her annoyance with me evident. It was a sigh I’d gotten used to hearing when we’d been together.
“This is bigger than you, Noah,” she said, her voice softening. “Trust me.”
“Trust you?” I said. “What’s bigger than me? Tell me what I don’t know.”
“I can’t,” she said, shaking her head.
“Then if you can’t trust me, why would I trust you?”
“Because I’m telling you to.”
The fact that she wouldn’t tell me what she knew bothered me more than her attitude. Our relationship had always been rocky, personally and professionally, but we’d always been straight with one another. Our paths had crossed professionally over the last couple of years, and while we weren’t best friends, she’d never asked me to get out of the way.