Shell Games

by Kirk Russell

  “They’ll kill my girlfriend if I started telling you a bunch of shit I don’t know about anyway,” Heinemann said. He took a drink of Pepsi and the brown soda dribbled down his chin before he could wipe it with his elbow.

  He’s not lying about being afraid of whoever he was diving for, Marquez thought, then asked, “Are you in college?”

  “What?”

  “Are you enrolled at UC Santa Cruz?”

  “No, well, I mean, I plan to.”

  “Your girlfriend thinks you’re going to school there. You lie to her, why wouldn’t you lie to us?”

  “She knows, man. Meghan knows what’s up.”

  “She lied to us?”

  “I’m not saying she lied.”

  “Someone lied.”

  “What’s the big deal about a fucking college?”

  “The big deal is you keep coming up in the middle of these lies. You want us to believe you, but you don’t come across very believable. Tonight, you’re caught with a stolen boat buying illegal abalone and what you did in Sausalito could bring felony charges. You’re in a bad way, Mark. This story about working on a slave diving ship—why did you owe them for Sausalito if you held up your end? You picked up the abalone and transferred most of it to the Emily Jane. You got Bailey to use his boat.”

  “Bullshit, I got Jimmy to do anything.”

  “We’re getting this from Bailey. He’s going to testify against you. He’s pissed off you burned him.”

  “Fuck him, he’s not pinning any shit on me. I’ve done one thing here, man. I dove for money. I needed the bucks to repair my boat and I’ll tell a judge that.”

  “That’s not the way Bailey tells it. You want to read the tran-script?” There wasn’t any transcript, nothing to show him, but Heinemann’s hesitation said he may not have been in contact with Bailey. “We might have a copy with us.” Marquez looked at Shauf, said, “Mine’s gone to the DA, what about yours?” She shook her head. “Okay, I guess we don’t tonight, but I’ll get you a copy. I don’t have a problem with you reading it; I’ll drop it by your cell, if you want.”

  “It was Bailey that got me into this. He offered me five bills for the Point Reyes dive and helping move it in Sausalito. But that was all and you already know what happened. You ask Meghan if she’s seen me since. I’ve been like a captive on a slave ship, man, and then they brought me out for this bullshit tonight.”

  “Another problem I have,” Marquez said, “is that you and Jimmy go back a ways. What I’m hearing is you two were work-ing together in San Diego a lot of years ago, so it makes it hard to believe he sucked you into this.”

  “I was never in San Diego.”

  Marquez reached out and shut off the recorder. “I’m going to let you take that back,” he said. “But you’ve only got about three seconds to decide.”

  “I got out of all that. I put that behind me and Meghan will tell you I’ve been thinking about going back to school. I don’t deal drugs anymore. That was a bad phase of life.”

  “You berth three down from Jimmy at Pillar Point and you want to tell us that’s coincidence.”

  “I thought we were talking about ab diving. I’m getting fuck-ing confused.”

  “We’re talking about all of it.”

  “I don’t deal drugs anymore. If you think I’m in with Jimmy on that, you’re wrong.”

  “Convince me about you. I want to believe we’re not wasting our time talking to you but so far it seems like we are. It’s getting late and you keep repeating the same story but you don’t explain away the inconsistencies, so it’s looking like you’re blowing smoke at us.”

  “I’m just telling the truth, man.”

  “About a diving slave ship? Come on, Mark, give us a break.”

  “I’m not shitting you.”

  “We found your girlfriend’s pickup at Marina Bay here in Richmond, but you say you were dropped off by boat. Do you want to say Jimmy drove it up here? Maybe Meghan gave him the keys and we should arrest her? That what you’re saying?” He stared at Heinemann. “No answer? Okay, maybe we ought to bag it and get some sleep, let you get in there and meet your cellmates.” Marquez glanced down at a sheet. “Twenty years in prison. That’s what I get when I add up what you’re charged with. You’re way past abalone but you don’t seem to get that we can make it swing one way or the other.”

  “Man, you keep changing subjects. I can’t fucking keep up.”

  “Okay, tell us about the Emily Jane, and this is your last chance.”

  “I just ran for the boat. Your warden had her fucking knee on my back when they pulled guns on you.”

  “Tell us about the men on the Emily Jane.”

  “I don’t know about them. They never let me in the cabin and they dumped me on a dock in Eureka and then I got on the other boat.”

  Earlier, Heinemann said he’d run to the Emily Jane because that’s what Bailey had said to do if anything went wrong. Marquez looked over at Shauf. “I’m going to find a bathroom,” he said. “When I get back we’ll wrap this up.” He paused before going out the door, looked at Heinemann. “Tomorrow isn’t the same for us, I want you to understand that. Tomorrow, every day after that you can talk to your lawyer instead of us.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Whatever?”

  “Hey, man, Fish and Game is a fucking joke. You think I’m risking something happening to Meghan or me?”

  Marquez threw cold water on his face in the bathroom and ignored the sidelong look of a Richmond cop. He walked back in as Heinemann was telling Shauf how easy it was to poach and not get caught. He was in his head swimming underwater somewhere with a light stick when Marquez cut him off.

  “Why’d Bailey run?” Marquez interrupted.

  “You tell me.”

  “Is Meghan Burris in on this too?”

  Heinemann avoided the question. “Everything that happened to me I got forced to do.”

  “How many times are you going to tell us that?”

  “As long as you keep asking the same questions.”

  “Who’s buying the abalone?”

  “Ask Jimmy since you said he’s talking to you.”

  “He’s talking to them, also. He’s convincing them it was you that fucked up. Maybe when you were on that boat with the Mexi-cans you were wondering, what’s going on, why am I not hearing from my friend, Jimmy? Should be hearing from Jimmy, right? Isn’t he the guy to get you off that boat? You’re not hearing from him because he put it all on you. Who’d they get Meghan’s name from if it wasn’t Jimmy?” Heinemann rubbed the back of his neck like a mosquito had bit him and Marquez knew they had an open-ing. Heinemann really was worried about his girlfriend. He studied Heinemann’s face, thinking about how he could bring the image home. “The divers who got killed up north were selling to the same people you and Jimmy have gotten involved with and you’re right to be scared of them. I was up there at Guyanno Creek; I saw those two. Do you know how they died?”

  When Heinemann didn’t answer, Marquez asked the question again.

  “Stabbed,” Heinemann said.

  “Stand up. I want to show you what happened to them.”

  “I don’t need the bullshit.”

  “It’ll stay with you better if I show you.”

  “You hit me, I’ll sue your ass.”

  “Nothing like that is going to happen.”

  Heinemann was visibly uncomfortable and squared his thick shoulders, showed a stance that said I can take care of myself and Marquez pressed two fingers low against Heinemann’s abdomen, just under his belt, enough to make him nervous, enough to make him feel sexual vulnerability and Heinemann’s eyes went to Shauf.

  “Fuck man, what are you doing?”

  “With the divers up north, these guys that got chained to a tree and killed, the knife cut was just above the pubic bone. He’ll push the knife in and not too deep, at first. I’ve heard that arouses him, but I don’t know if that’s true, or not. Only you and he will know that,
because he’ll be pressed up against you. Good chance he’ll be talking to you, maybe asking you questions, telling you it can be okay still, that everything can work out if you’ve got the right answers. But then, after you’ve told him what he wants to know, he’ll push the blade in further. Not enough to kill you yet. We used to hear terrible stories about him making promises not to kill as long as you don’t scream. If you can take the pain and not cry out, he’s going to stop. Just don’t say anything. Just listen to him. Your blood will run down into your crotch and your scrotum will shrink back as your gut burns. You’ll watch his eyes change as he breathes into your face and you’ll know he’s not going to let you go.”

  Marquez brought his fingers up Heinemann’s abdomen. He pushed Heinemann back against the wall with his fingers up under his breast bone. “The blade will rip up through your gut. Those divers up at Guyanno are no different than you. They messed up and he made an example out of them and when he’s done here, if we don’t get him first, he’ll wipe all his tracks and move on. That’s how he’s managed to survive and stay ahead of the FBI. And they’re not trying to bring him in, either. They’re way past that. They want to corner him and bring enough firepower to make sure it’s over.” Marquez dropped his arms to his side and stepped back. “Your best chance is to help us. I’m not kidding you, I know this man.”

  “Then what do you need me for, if you know him?” Hein-emann smiled like it was nothing. “Hey, I haven’t seen any freaks and I’m not really involved in all this shit.”

  “He’s tall, fairly thin, but not in a way that would make you think he’s weak.”

  “Never seen him.”

  “The day the man came down to Bailey’s boat there was another man up in a car Bailey said you went up and talked to.”

  “He went up.”

  “He said the man wanted to get a look at you and that makes sense to me.” Marquez let a minute pass with only the hiss of the recorder, then dropped it on him. “Bailey works for us as a paid informant. We gave him two grand for this ride.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “He was,” Shauf said, and slid over a report with Bailey men-tioned as a paid informant. It was dated over a month ago, Bailey’s name highlighted, Keeler’s signature, DFG stationery. They waited as he read, studied, and stared. Then, he changed, and Marquez saw it happen, saw his face pale, saw the difference.

  “We’re going to leave you alone for five minutes and you think it over,” Marquez said. “Do you want more proof Bailey works for us?”

  Heinemann shook his head, and they only made it as far as the door. “Yeah, I want to make a deal,” he said. “And, yeah, I met him and you’re right about the guy. He’s fucking weird.”

  “I’m going to show you a photo,” Marquez said. “I’ve got a file.” He heard his own voice as strangely calm. “But I’ve got to get it out of my truck.”

  He walked out to get it and his footsteps echoed in the corridor. The cool air of the night brushed his face and he crossed through the pooled light on the asphalt and heard the voices of the dead as he reached for the file, the promises he’d made.

  18

  Marquez opened the file, and the photos of Federales and cartel operatives had an almost quaint aspect, faces yellowed and cracked, haircuts dated. Half of those pictured were dead. Heinemann shook his head and Marquez flipped a page, smelling stone dust from under his house on the paper. He was still trying to get a better read on Heinemann, trying to get a sense of what made him roll over—or whether he really had—or was this another game. It was his experience that the vain often had a hard time seeing things for what they were.

  He flipped another page and the face of Kline was there, fea-tures blurred, but the long head and heavy bones clear enough for Heinemann. Taken in Mexico City eleven years ago. He’d paid three hundred dollars for it and had tried to get the FBI to validate the photo, tell him it was Kline, but they’d turned him away. The photographer had been an expatriate American who’d refused to take pesos and Marquez remembered his argument with him regarding the grainy, fuzzy quality of the photo. Heinemann said nothing, and Marquez only paused long enough for him to get a quick view of each image. It didn’t take long to go through the file. He thought Heinemann had hesitated, yet he hadn’t said anything, had let him keep turning pages.

  He prompted him now. “Did you get anything?”

  “I don’t know, maybe.”

  “Nothing jumped out at you?”

  “Jumped?” As if the word was odd, frustration at being trapped, probably. “No, nothing jumped.”

  “Okay.”

  Marquez shut the file and without asking, Heinemann reached for it and he let him take it. Heinemann flipped the first page, ask-ing, “What about computer enhancement?”

  “What about it?”

  “Couldn’t these faces be aged up to today?”

  “You’d know him, you’d remember him.”

  Heinemann flipped through again, Marquez watching, his senses keyed in. The file was a jacket with photos, all the paper-work removed, and now Heinemann’s eyes lingered on the Mexico City photo. Flipped to the next page, then flipped back and touched the photo with his index finger.

  “If anyone, maybe this guy,” and Marquez felt his throat tighten and a floating lightness in his head. “It was dark. We were in the backseat of a car.”

  “Where?”

  “In the harbor last month like you heard.”

  “Pillar Point?”

  “Yeah.”

  They were ready and Shauf slid a Day-Timer across. “When?” Marquez asked.

  “You mean the exact date?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I don’t know if I can remember the exact date.”

  “Your girlfriend says you’re good at math. She says you could be a professor if you wanted.” If you weren’t moving dope and raping the ocean, if the day was a little longer or you taught night classes. “We need dates,” Marquez said quietly, and could tell Heinemann was wheeling through the possibilities, was in a room with two game wardens and trying to figure out how to get out of here without getting charged, trying to figure out where to stop talking and start dealing. He was trying to calculate what exact dates were worth and what he gave up by pinning it down, what the risk was. He was most worried about Roberts, about getting charged with assaulting a peace officer, because he’d made an earlier comment that the longest prison sentence ever given for poaching abalone was three years. He wasn’t worried about abalone poaching. He wasn’t intimidated by anything they’d threatened regarding abalone.

  Marquez watched him study the Mexico City photo and felt his pulse pounding in his ears, saw a red haze around the light in the room and was back with Ramon and a good friend, another DEA agent named Brian Hidalgo. Brian stood in the room now next to Shauf, pointing a finger at Heinemann and rubbing his own scalp making fun of Heinemann’s haircut, then turning back to smile at him and asking, “Remember that plane going down?” They’d watched a drug smuggler’s plane shot down and a ball of orange light rising from the desert plateau become a column of black smoke and spread in the cold wind until it was gone. Marquez shook it off, Hidalgo vanishing. Heinemann played with the calendar pages, stalling for time and Marquez caught Shauf’s eye. Heinemann knew the answer and she gave the faintest nod of agreement.

  “It was around the end of August,” Heinemann said. “Yeah, pretty sure it was like Saturday the thirty-first, but it’s not like any-thing happened that night.”

  “Saturday the thirty-first, what time?”

  “Almost dark, sort of twilight. This guy in the photo might be a guy I met up in a car up in the parking lot.” Heinemann leaned back and folded his arms. “So you really want this dude?”

  “You would have noticed something else.”

  “About him?”

  “A physical characteristic.”

  “It’s not like I was paying that kind of attention.”

  “We’re nowhere without it.”
/>   “I just picked him out of those shitty photos.”

  “That’s not good enough.” Marquez caught Shauf’s confused look. He needed more proof, needed to be absolutely sure. Heine-mann could be feeding them this date and the car story by pre-arrangement. He could have worked it out with Bailey and Meghan Burris. “You went up to this car and what got said.”

  “He told me what would happen if I messed up, like if I talked to anyone like right now. But it was weird, because it was Jimmy’s deal.”

  “No, it was yours, that’s why he wanted to see you. Bailey was just the hired ride.”

  Heinemann shook his head. His voice got quieter. “It was all Jimmy’s.”

  “We’ve been paying Bailey and you keep saying he’s the guy behind it all. If that’s true we want you on our side of the table, but you’d have to have proof.”

  “I could get him to talk.”

  “That might work.” Marquez gauged him. “You’d have to testify, too.”

  “I know.”

  “If what we’re doing here, right now, proves out, then we’ll want to talk about the next step, but listen, we’re going to step outside again.”

  Marquez walked out behind Shauf. He faced her in the hall-way and realized his hands were shaking.

  “He’s picked out Kline,” he said.

  “I get that, so why mess with him?”

  “We need it to come from him, not just pointing at my photos. I want him to dig a little deeper because he’ll be more committed to us if he does.”

  When they walked back in Marquez started slowly. “Think of it like this, we’re telling you to wade into the ocean and just keep swimming out to sea. I want to see you swim out far enough to where I know you need us. You want a deal that keeps you out of prison and I want a confession in return. Dates. Times. Methods of transferring abalone. I want you to identify this man in a way that makes me certain. It’s like a password for me.”