by Matt Coyle
None of it was fair to Kim. Now she’d finally realized it. Just as I finally realized that I loved her.
She dropped her eyes back to my chest. “I love the man he is, and he loves me without qualification.”
“Is that enough for you, Kimmie?” I put my fingers on her chin and gently raised it so she’d look at me. “To be with a man you admire who loves you?”
“Yes.” Tears pooled in her eyes. “Better than to be with a man I love who admires me.”
“I do love you.” The words tumbled from my throat.
“Why? Why now?” Angry tears ran down her cheeks. “It’s too late, Rick. It’s too late.”
“It’s not, Kimmie.” I held her shoulders, wanting to pull her toward me and start anew. “It’s not too late.”
“You have to do the right thing, Rick. Please. That’s how you live your life, trying to do the right thing.” She forced the words out between sobs. “Keep the car as long as you want. Save the world. But when you’re done, do the right thing, Rick. Walk away. Please just walk away.”
“Okay.” The word, a croak. Painful as it left my mouth. I blinked through liquid and looked down at Kim. “I’ll just drop the keys through the mail slot when I bring the car back. We won’t have to see each other.”
She stepped into me and wrapped me in a hug. Her face against my chest, jerked by sobs. I hugged back. Hard. She smelled clean and fresh scrubbed like she always did. I breathed her smell in and held it, trying to hold onto a piece of her for as long as I could. I kissed her on the forehead and let her go.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The thirty-foot walk back to the street seemed like a mile. The adrenaline that had pulsed through my body all night sucked out of me and left me deflated. Inside out. I got into Kim’s RAV4 and my left shoulder throbbed where Wayne Delk had hit me with the gun. I put on the seat belt and his kick from a week ago echoed along my ribs.
Kim had waited for me to come back to her in full and realize that I loved her. Now that I had, it was too late. I’d taken Kim’s love for granted for so long that I’d forgotten that I didn’t deserve it. It had always been there, even when we weren’t together. Like air I needed to survive, never realizing how precious it was. But she wasn’t Colleen, and I never forgave her or myself for that. Now she only had to worry about living up to herself. That was more than most men and, certainly, more than I deserved.
There were plenty of bars between me and the La Jolla Marriott up in the Golden Triangle. I could call Sierra and tell her that she’d be safe and had nothing to worry about. Or that I’d be back at the hotel in an hour. I thought about calling Buckley. Not to tell him about the dead body and everything else, but to ask him if he had any room left in that bottle he crawled into every night. I didn’t know the source of his pain, but I knew the ache. The bars and Buckley’s bottle would have to wait. There was one last woman I’d made a promise to whom I wouldn’t disappoint. At least, not yet.
I got back to the hotel room around one-fifteen a.m. Sierra greeted me at the door barefoot, wearing a bathing suit bottom and a Charger sweat top. She’d obviously packed for all contingencies. Even the summer. My guess was she usually slept naked and got as close as she could without looking too enticing.
Failed.
She had beach-volleyball legs to go with her beach-blond hair. If I wanted to go “This Ol’ Cowboy” by the Marshall Tucker Band and “kiss the lips of another woman and forget all about” Kim, tonight would have been a nice place to start.
But that was the wolf in me that was in every man, and I kept him on a short leash. Off leash, regret usually followed. For me and for the woman. Besides, I needed answers from Sierra tonight. Nothing else.
Sierra slipped into bed, and I sat down in the upholstered chair diagonally across from her.
“I have to be at work at the Morning Cup at seven-thirty tomorrow.” She looked at the clock radio on the bedside table. “Or I guess I should say this morning. Can you give me a ride there?”
“Sure.”
“And maybe make sure no one, ah, tries to hurt me?”
“I’ll make sure you’re safe. I promise.” Without a gun.
“Thanks for everything you did tonight. I don’t think I could have made it through alone.” She rolled over onto her side. “Good night, Rick.”
I walked over to the bed and sat down on the open side that Sierra now faced. She smiled at me.
“Sierra, I need to get some things straight so I can protect Trey.”
“Okay.” She sat up and wrapped her arms around her blanket-covered knees.
“Trey has only one picture in his house and it’s of you and the man he called Brad Larson. There are plenty of pictures of you alone that he could’ve hung on his wall, but he chose one of you with the man who is in a lot of your Facebook photos. The same man whose picture is on the wall at Dianne Wilkens’ house where Trey hid out. This guy is obviously important to you, but he’s important to Trey too. Who is he? And don’t pretend that you don’t know who I’m talking about.”
“His name is Brad Bauer.” Her eyes fell to the bed.
“Why doesn’t he have the same last name as his mother, Dianne Wilkens?”
“He’d been a foster child when Dianne and her late husband adopted him. He kept his family name.”
“Where is Dianne now?”
“She’s in Hawaii. She gave me her keys so I could water her plants while she was gone.”
“Why did you lie to me about knowing Brad Bauer this morning?”
“I didn’t lie.” Her head came up, lips curled. “You did. You asked about some guy I’d never heard of.”
“True.” I squinted at her. “But you knew who I was talking about.”
“Say I did, why should I tell anything to some guy I’ve never met who is lying to me?”
“Good point. That was stupid of me. I should have just told you who I was and asked you straight out. I apologize.” I loosened the squint. “But I need to know everything now. Who is Brad Bauer, and why did Trey lie to me about his name?”
“He’s my boyfriend.”
“I already figured that one out, Sierra.” I shook my head. “Where is he now, and why would Trey lie to me about him?”
“Do you think Brad has something to do with all of this?” Her eyebrows lifted and she squeezed her knees tighter.
“Maybe.” Probably.
“Why?”
“Call it a cop’s gut instinct.” That’s really all I had.
“You’re not a cop.”
“I used to be.” I inched slightly closer to her and raised my chin. “Sierra, where is Brad now?”
She rested her right cheek on her knees and sighed. A sad, lonely sound. “He’s in prison.”
Now I knew why Trey had lied to me about Bauer’s name. He didn’t want me to know that Bauer was in prison. He’d blurted out the real first name, realized he’d made a mistake, and then made up a last name. But why didn’t he want me to know the truth about Bauer? He was a drug dealer, I was a PI who’d been a cop. Surely Trey knew I wouldn’t be shocked to hear that he had a friend in prison. It was something else.
“What was he busted for?”
“Selling drugs.”
“Weed. Must have been a lot?”
“Cocaine. He got caught in a sting.” Sierra let out a long, sad sigh. “He’d been selling pounds of weed to this guy for months and everything was cool. Then the guy asked Brad if he could get him some cocaine. He said Brad could make $20,000 on a onetime deal. The guy was an undercover cop. The cop set him up, but the judge didn’t care.”
“Was Trey involved?”
“No.” She looked down at the bed. A lie.
“Did Brad take the fall for Trey, Sierra? You’ve gotta tell me everything. Now.”
“No.” A tear pooled in the corner of her left eye, then broke free and slipped down her face along her nose and onto the blanket. “Kind of. Brad wouldn’t tell the police about Trey and the other…”
“Other what?”
The tears streamed now. Sierra put her face in her hands and rested them on her knees.
“Other people? Brad wouldn’t tell the police about who supplied him with the coke? Is that it, Sierra?”
Her head bobbed up and down on her knees.
Brad wouldn’t rat out his partner or his supplier to get a lesser sentence. A stand-up guy. As crooks go. And if he was Trey’s partner, then his suppliers were the Raptors. A smart decision not to rat them out.
The itch I’d first felt when I’d seen Trey look at the picture of Brad Bauer and his sister on the wall of his apartment ran all the way down my spine. He’d been nervous and glanced at the picture when I’d asked him if he’d testify against Steven Lunsdorf in court. The glance had been a tell. I’d sensed it at the time, but didn’t know what it meant. I still didn’t, but I was more convinced than ever that it meant something.
Bauer in prison. Wouldn’t rat out Trey or the Raptors. The Raptor Kingpin, Raymond Oscar Karsten, in prison. Defended by Alan Rankin, the lawyer who’d visited Trey with murdered Raptor, Eric Schmidt. The Raptors asking me if “he” had sent me before they roughed me up at The Chalked Cue the first time. Wayne Delk telling me that “Rock” had sent another dumb motherfucker to sneak up on him when he stuck a gun in my neck tonight.
He.
Raymond Oscar Karsten.
R. O. K.
Rock.
The Raptors thought I was working for their old boss. Now their enemy. That made me more than a nuisance who poked around in their bar looking for answers. That made me a target. I wished I had the gun that Sierra lost back at her apartment building. Or my own Ruger that I’d hidden at the Candlelight murder scene. I couldn’t take the chance of getting stopped by LJPD with a murder weapon on me. Now I’d forced myself to take a chance on my life unarmed.
Hopefully I could remedy that tomorrow. Tonight I still had a puzzle to put together.
Brad Bauer was a piece to Trey Fellows’ other puzzle. The one I always felt he was working on. Separate, yet connected to the Eddington case. Somehow. And the rest of the puzzle pieces were the Raptors. Bad blood between the old boss and the new boss. Eric Schmidt picked the wrong side and ended up dead. Bauer was the link to the Raptors. To Rock Karsten. But what did it mean?
Why had Trey met with the lawyer, Alan Rankin? Was Rankin paying Trey to testify against Steven Lunsdorf? To lie? Why? Randall Eddington was innocent of murdering his family. I knew it. I now had proof. The police had planted the blood evidence. Maybe Rankin was paying Trey to tell the truth. Rankin knew that Trey was afraid to testify against the Raptors and he paid him to make sure that he would.
But where did Brad Bauer figure in? Was he doing time with Rock Karsten? A liaison between Karsten and Trey?
I whipped out my iPhone and googled the story about Alan Rankin and Raymond Oscar Karsten to find out where Karsten was incarcerated. Found it. Corcoran State Prison.
“Sierra, where is Brad serving his time?”
“San Quentin.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
San Quentin? “Are you sure?”
Sierra lifted her head off her knees and pointed bloodshot eyes at me. “Yes. I know what prison my boyfriend is in. He’s been there for three years.”
I looked up the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation website on my phone and logged on. I found the inmate locator page and typed in Raymond Oscar Karsten. Just like the article I’d read. Corcoran.
I looked at Sierra. “And he wasn’t transferred to Corcoran in the last few weeks?”
“No.” Arched eyebrows. “Why? What’s going on?”
“I don’t know.”
I didn’t know. I’d let my imagination run wild and it nosedived off a cliff. Maybe there was no other puzzle. Maybe Trey Fellows was just trying to do the right thing.
“One last question.” I pinned my eyes on Sierra’s. “Why do you think Trey came forward with the information about the Eddingtons?”
“I’ve asked him the same question a million times.” She shook her head and looked down at her knees. “He says he wants to do the right thing.”
“And you believe him?”
Her eyes went up to the right like she was looking for an answer. Then she looked at me like she’d found it. “Yes.”
“I know Trey’s your brother and I think he’s a decent guy, but risking his life to do the right thing seems a bit out of character.” Like Arnold Schwarzenegger playing Hamlet.
“You don’t know Trey.” She shook her head. “Sometimes, I wonder if I do. Right when I’m convinced he’s just a stoned-out loser, he’ll surprise me and do something wonderful.”
She was right. I didn’t know Trey. Not very well. Just the stoned-out loser part of him. I wasn’t yet convinced he had any other parts.
“Good night, Rick.” Sierra reached over to the nightstand and turned off the light.
I stretched out on the bed on top of the comforter and closed my eyes on a night that I hoped to wake up the next morning and find had all been a nightmare. But I knew it couldn’t happen. My nightmares were real.
The ceiling closed down on me and I bolted upright. I was alive. The man in my nightmare was dead. Until he’d be alive again in my dreams tomorrow night.
“Are you okay?” Sierra, a frightened voice out of the night.
“Yeah. Bad dream. Sorry.”
I’d slept with a few women over the last couple years but never long enough to fall asleep. I’d always gone home to sleep alone. And wake up in the middle of a nightmare the same way. It wasn’t fair to make someone else have to deal with it. Certainly not Sierra, who’d already been through enough.
“Get under the covers. You don’t have to sleep like that.”
“I’m okay. Thanks.”
“No, really. You’re making me feel bad. You went out of your way to help me tonight and then I made you stay with me. You should at least be able to sleep under the covers in the bed you’re paying for.”
Actually, Buckley was paying for the bed and, ultimately, the Eddingtons were. I was too tired to explain or argue.
I slipped off my jeans and shirt in the dark and got under the covers. I turned away from Sierra and hoped she’d fall back asleep. I hoped I would too.
“This is going to seem weird.” Sierra wasn’t ready to go back to sleep yet. “But could you just hold me for a couple minutes? Nights are still hard without Brad. This whole thing is scary. I just need someone to hold me tonight.”
I flipped over and put my arms around Sierra. Her body was warm and felt good against mine. I hadn’t held a woman in bed that I hadn’t just had sex with in years. I’d usually be in my car within fifteen minutes. I wasn’t going anywhere tonight.
Sierra’s breathing grew deep and steady.
I fell asleep and slept through the night.
I circled the block around the Morning Cup a couple times before I dropped Sierra off for work at seven-thirty a.m. She’d pleaded with me to come in with her, but I told her she’d be safe inside and that I’d check by every couple hours.
I doubted the Raptors would make a brazen move for Sierra in public. I doubted they’d make any move at all. They’d put their other plan in action. The dead body in Trey’s hideout. The murder weapon now would never be found, but the body would. Maybe it already had. I’d transferred the police scanner from my car to Kim’s last night and had it on during the drive. No mention yet of suspicious circumstances, possible DB or a 187, possible homicide.
Either way, I needed to talk to Buckley right now. I called him as I drove out of downtown La Jolla and headed onto La Jolla Boulevard toward Pacific Beach. Of course, he didn’t answer. Morning before eight a.m., he’d still be sleeping off last night. I left a message and warned him that I was on the way. The morning air was damp and thick and collected on the windshield of the car. An occasional swipe of the wiper cleared the view. Huge Monterey cypress trees canopied the street as La J
olla turned into Bird Rock. A shady respite from the sun on most days. This morning with the fog, a dark claustrophobic ceiling.
Buckley lived in Pacific Beach, just a stone’s throw down from Bird Rock. PB often got a bad rap for being a dusty, twenty-somethings’ playground. Especially from me. But that was just the strip of streets downtown. The rest was family friendly, with lots of homes having either a view of Mission Bay or the Pacific Ocean. Buckley’s rested on a hill that offered a little piece of both. The house was modern, with sloping peaks and big bay windows. I’d expected a ranch house. Or a log cabin.
I grabbed the grocery bag with the cigarette butts from The Chalked Cue parking lot and walked up to the house. I knocked on the door and waited. Knocked and waited some more. Then rang the bell and pounded on the door. I knew it wouldn’t be easy to pull Buckley out of the bottle he’d poured himself into last night, but I didn’t have time to be mannerly.
Finally, a gray head peeked through a latticed window next to the front door. The door opened and Buckley stood slumped over in a white terrycloth robe. Gray hair loose from his ponytail stretched out in all directions like a broken halo. He looked like Jesus, had Jesus grown old and not been the son of God. And drank too much.
“Rick, what in the hell is this all about? Do you know what time it is?”
“Yes, I do.” I stepped inside his house, though he hadn’t offered. “It’s about the time people who work are already up and starting their day.”
“Well, come the hell in, then.” He shut the door, realizing I was already in. “Let me get some coffee before you give me what can only be bad news at this time of the morning.”
He was right about that. He wasn’t going to be happy about how right. I followed him into the kitchen as he shuffled bare feet along dark hardwood floors. The kitchen had top-notch appliances, Wolf oven, Sub-Zero refrigerator. Buckley liked to cook, but he was messy about it. The sink was full of dirty dishes and an unwashed, cast-iron skillet sat on the stove.