Grunting softly, Spiers nods his head. Putting the word out was not his preferred way of doing things, but the last few days have put a strain on him. Time is short.
The leash he seems to be on is even shorter.
If T-Boy had just called and said he’d spotted what Spiers needed that morning, he wouldn’t have thought much of it.
When he’d called and asked if one of them was blind, Spiers knew he’d found what he was looking for.
“The Sundowner in West Covina?” Spiers repeats.
“Yeah, you know the place?” T-Boy asks, rustling the paper sack as he dives back in for more.
Spiers didn’t, but it wouldn’t be hard to find.
Chapter Ten
I told Mikey I’d be there at 0900, banking on the fact that early Sunday morning would keep the border crossing from being too backed up and the I-5 from being a stop-and-go mess. Had either been the case, it could have added anywhere from one to five hours to my trip, getting around in Southern California being one of the many reasons I make my home south of the border.
With my mind in a hundred other places, getting through security had been a fairly painless experience. By afternoon, it would take infinitely longer, the line of tourists popping down to Tijuana or Cabo for the weekend making the entire thing an exercise in misery.
Luckily for me, most of those same people were still sleeping off the night before, spread across every motel and hotel in the area.
Getting by San Diego had taken a couple more minutes than I would have liked. Ditto for Long Beach and Irvine, the urban sprawl basically one solid band that stretched the entire length of the coast.
Doing my best to ignore everyone, I’d instead kept the speedometer pinned at seventy miles an hour, swapping out the rusted truck I used daily for a much newer model of the same thing I kept stowed in the Quonset hut. Equipped with air-conditioning, I took advantage by using it for the first time in months, the cab conspicuously quiet without the sound of air rushing in around me.
Getting everything done I needed to and getting all the way to Huntington Beach in four hours had been a bit ambitious. Even under the near-optimal Sunday morning conditions, I arrive in four and a quarter, stopping three blocks short and lifting the new burner phone from the seat beside me.
Dialing from memory, it rings only once before Mikey answers.
“You’re late.”
I’m in no mood for more of his attempted banter, but right now I can’t risk pissing him off.
He has things I need.
“Traffic,” I reply.
“Figured,” Mikey says, a hint of a chuckle present. “Where are you?”
“Three blocks south. Wienerschnitzel parking lot. Want anything?”
This time the chuckle rises to a full laugh, a quick, sharp sound that is almost a bark in my ear. “There is so much loaded into that single statement, I don’t even know where to begin.”
Even more than just a minute ago, I really have no interest in any back-and-forth. About hotdogs or otherwise.
“We clear?”
“All good,” Mikey replies, his voice letting me know he sees what I did there.
“Black Tundra, Baja plates.”
“Roger that,” he replies, the line cutting out.
Tossing it down onto the seat beside me, I ease out of the parking lot and make my way the short distance.
The outer façade of the place Mikey calls his office is a working auto body shop, the sort of joint where nobody notices vehicles of every size and shape pulling in at all hours. Almost a city block in width, one end is a square structure made from concrete block painted blue and white. Stretched out beside it is a handful of stalls, all with roll-top doors and vinyl signage hawking various goods and services.
As I pull up, the first one in order rises, a man in blue coveralls standing beside it, operating a chain pulley. Taking the cue, I hook a right off the street and ease inside.
My rear bumper is no more than an inch through before the gate is pulled back down behind me, blotting the bright sun from view.
“Thanks,” I say, climbing out of the truck and extending a fist before me.
Finishing the door, the man in coveralls matches my gesture, touching his knuckles to mine. “Good to see you.”
“You too,” I reply.
The man is named Ramon, someone that was just a boy when Mikey had first gotten into this life and has since grown into a man. Tan skin abuts hair shorn down close to his scalp, no scars or tattoos visible.
“Heard you’d retired.”
“One last time,” I say, glancing to the black SUV parked beside me. Midsized, it has bland hubcaps and windows tinted to the legal limit. The sort of thing exactly like a million others on the road every day.
The perfect car for what I’m about to do.
“This me?” I ask, hooking a thumb toward the SUV.
“This is you,” a voice replies, the level raised to be heard from across the room, pulling both my and Ramon’s attention toward it.
A moment later, Mikey steps out from the side door of the office. His elbows are bent by his ribcage, his hands held up to either side.
He’s dressed in the same attire as the night before, not a trace of dust on his pants or boots.
“You said the full-service package,” he adds, walking around the back end of my truck, “right?”
“Right.”
“Well, here we aim to please,” he says, using one hand to clap Ramon on the shoulder. “Plates are clean, as is the VIN.”
Continuing on his path, he walks to the rear of the SUV and pops open the hatch. Following him over, I peer in to see a rear that was recently vacuumed, a black canvas duffel the sole thing that looks like it didn’t just immediately roll off the showroom floor.
“Everything is inside,” he says, pointing to the bag. “Light and midsize. Armor. A few extra toys to welcome you back.”
“I’m not back,” I reply, keeping my gaze on the bag. Just based on his thin description, I can imagine what is inside, the haul certainly more than enough for whatever awaits.
Even if I have no idea as yet what that might be.
“Sure, sure,” Mikey replies, gesturing with his chin toward the bed of my truck. On command, Ramon reaches for my bag, hoisting it out and adding it to the rear of the SUV.
Sitting side by side, they look small and unassuming, no reason for anybody to think twice at what might be stowed inside.
Which is exactly the point.
“Take it out of my cut?” I ask, staring down at them, mind already moving to the next thing in order.
Getting over the border with my own collection of goodies would have been impossible. Long ago, I’d closed out my last cache on American soil, sending it in various directions, a few pieces even ending up here with Mikey.
At the time, I never thought I’d be in need of them again.
Sure as hell never thought I’d be getting a call like this.
“Done and done,” Mikey replies, giving me one last look at the bags before closing the boot. Fishing a set of keys from his pocket, he holds them up, it is clear there is much more he’d like to say.
About the request and the file he’d left me with the night before. About what had drawn me out of hiding after so long, pulling me back into the life without a moment’s pause.
About what I was expecting to happen on the road ahead.
To his credit, he doesn’t voice of any of it.
“Happy trails,” he says, tossing me the keys as Ramon begins to raise the second bay door behind us.
Chapter Eleven
“Uncle Jaaaaaaaaay!”
The sound of the boy’s voice carries through the house and out the front door to the stoop where Jensen Spiers stands waiting. Twice as long and three times as loud as the doorbell that preceded it, the source shows up a moment later. Swinging around the end of the hallway running straight out from the glass door, the little guy is a tangle of knees and elbows,
a mass of shaggy blond hair serving as the centerpiece.
Heavy footsteps pound against the floorboards of the hall as he jerks open the door, his face barely wide enough to contain his smile.
“Uncle J!” Bryce Lucas calls out, pulling open the door. Raising his hand, he adds, “Up top!”
“My man,” Spiers replies, forcing a smile onto his face. Slapping the boy’s hand, he drops his own back by his waist and says, “Down low.”
Completing the two-part greeting the two have perfected over the years, Bryce steps back. Grin still affixed, he holds the door wide and screams back over a shoulder, “Dad! Uncle J is here!”
Turning back, the boy practically bounces in place, ten-year-old exuberance rolling off him. “First Chargers game of the year next weekend. You in?”
Talking to the boy is one of the very last things Spiers wants to be doing, but there isn’t a choice. At this point he needs to be exceedingly careful about who he contacts and in what manner, digital trails being something that never seem to die these days.
“The Chargers?” Spiers says, his face contorting in disgust. “They still have a team?”
“They do, and you will respect them when visiting this house,” a deep baritone replies before Bryce gets a chance. An instant later, the owner of the voice swings into view, grabbing the door above Bryce’s head. “Ain’t that right, buddy?”
“Right!” Bryce agrees, hopping once for added emphasis.
Wilton Lucas has been Spiers’s partner for more than eight years, first assigned when he graduated from beat cop to Detective I. At the time, he’d been in his early thirties, a bachelor with a penchant for cheeseburgers and hanging out in the precinct gym.
Now an even forty, he is married and a stepfather, everything about his life except his fondness for the gym having shifted. At six foot three, he is still square through the chest and shoulders, his blond hair shaped into a flattop.
Or, as Spiers likes to point out when he isn’t otherwise distracted, the living embodiment of the Boz, circa 1988.
Keeping the plastic smile in place, Spiers catches his partner’s eyes, flicking his own to the side. Saying nothing more, Lucas picks up on the motion, nodding slightly.
“Hey, buddy, I think your mom was just about to get brunch on the table. Why don’t you go see if she needs any help setting everything out?”
“Aw, man. Do I have to?”
Letting out a soft laugh, Lucas replies, “You do if you want any dessert afterwards.”
A loud huff accompanies the boy’s shoulders drooping. Looking to Spiers for help, he waits a moment before conceding defeat, turning and disappearing beneath his stepdad’s arm.
“Fiiine. See you, Uncle J!”
“Bye, buddy,” Spiers calls, waiting until he is almost to the end of the hall before stepping back away from the door.
Following behind him, Lucas pulls the door shut and folds his thick forearms over his chest. Dressed in shorts and a polo, he stands barefooted on the hot concrete. “What’s up?”
After leaving the McDonald’s, Spiers had stripped away the sport coat, though he can still feel heat radiating from him. A week into September, the afternoon highs are still well into the eighties, today promising the same, if not a little more.
Especially in the front yard of the home Lucas just completed a few months prior, nothing more than a few scraggly trees providing shade.
“I got a call from T-Boy this morning,” Spiers says, his voice lowered.
From where he’s standing, he can’t see anybody about, though houses sit close on either side. And across the street.
And Lucas’s wife and Bryce are just inside.
This certainly not being the sort of thing that needs to be overheard.
“T-Boy,” Lucas says, his brows coming together as he places the name. “The pissant from Montebello?”
“That’s him,” Spiers replies, the description pretty on par with how he’d best describe the kid as well. “One of his boys got a hit last night.”
A quick step forward cuts the gap between them, Lucas so close his elbow jabs into Spiers’s arm, promising a bruise by dinnertime. Leaning in, gone is any of the mirth he’d displayed in the doorway with Bryce.
In its place is obvious strain, the same sort of thing Spiers was staring at in the rearview mirror just an hour before.
The exact thing both have been concealing for the better part of a week now.
“Shit, where is he? Let’s go right now.”
Knowing this would be the response, Spiers gives a quick shake of the head. “I already met with him.”
The reason he’d opted against it was because he knew how flighty T-Boy could be. He alone had barely been able to keep the gravity of the situation from seeping out of him, trending toward desperation.
If he and Lucas had both been in the car — almost four hundred and fifty pounds of anxiety and adrenaline — there was a decent chance T-Boy would have clammed up, never saying a word.
Not to mention the obvious connotations with asking a known criminal to climb into the back seat of a police vehicle.
“Without me?” Lucas replies, the words shoved through gritted teeth. Casting a glance over his shoulder, he presses in a bit tighter, his torso flush against Spiers’s side.
For all the man’s positives, respecting personal space has never been one of them.
Leaning back to peer past his partner, Spiers slides a few inches to the side, pretending to be checking for lurkers while nabbing a couple of extra inches. “Look, I know this is your day with the family, so I didn’t want to send up the alarm unless things were legit.”
“I think we’re a little past that point by now, don’t you?” Lucas challenges, his brows rising up his forehead, the skin around them growing red. A combination of anger and sweat, his face is glistening, veins beginning to bulge in his forearms.
Wilton Lucas 101.
Given his preferences, Spiers would leave him on the sidelines. He would head to West Covina, find The Sundowner, and extract what he needed alone.
He would then go talk to Hector Lima and make sure this entire thing was behind them.
But they were past that point. Spiers knew it, Lucas had just said as much.
“Which is why I’m here,” Spiers fires back. “What he had sounded for real.”
The tension in Lucas remains as he thinks through things, weighing what was said against what they’d both been battling through the last several days. Bit by bit, it eases away, some of the color draining from his face as well.
“Thank God.”
“Exactly,” Spiers says, reaching out and slapping the man on the shoulder. “So go put some damn pants on, and let’s take a drive.”
Chapter Twelve
The building is the sort that has probably had a half-dozen different incarnations over the years. Based on the architecture — with arched windows and ornate doorways — Hector Lima would imagine that it had first been a church. Or a Spanish mission. Or something that was intended to spread the word of God.
Whichever one was most prevalent at the time, anyway.
From there, it had likely been repurposed into some sort of shelter. The kitchen in the basement was clearly a retrofitting, the appliances stainless steel, cut into the original woodwork.
When that too had failed to last, it might have been an office building. Or a children’s center. Or whatever else some civic-minded individual had tried to concoct for it.
If the date inscribed in the stone footer on the corner of the structure was to be believed, the building was the better part of a century old. Lima liked to imagine that each shift had been in tune with the neighborhood around it, matching whatever was most pressing to the community.
Much like now, the place serving as the official hub for him and his crew.
Parking in the first stall beside the building, Lima ignores the blue paint demarcating the space for the handicapped. Shutting down the engine and stepping out, he pa
uses, watching as a pair of boys in their late teens work in the front yard. One pushing a mower and the other trying his best with a pair of hedge trimmers, both pause just long enough to throw him a wave, their bodies already glistening with sweat.
In no way affiliated with the group, both kids are on the football team for the school down the street. Not private school yuppies that wear blazers and ties and drive far beyond the edge of town. Public schoolers, guys that can’t afford tuition or even a car to go anywhere else.
So they stay right where they are and they make the best of it.
Just like Lima.
Taking an extra moment to inspect their work, Lima leaves them to it. Entering through the side door, he passes through a small mudroom, the place lined with cabinets.
A moment later, he steps into the interior of the building. One large space, the ceiling is vaulted above, light streaming through the open windows. A pair of fans hang down, each spinning lazily, doing little more than pushing around the air inside.
Where lines of pews had once been, four couches have been arranged into a square, an enormous coffee table between them.
Around the edge of the room, desks and chairs are pressed up closely against the wall.
A trio of cots reside in the corner, all neatly made.
The group is not a gang, the building certainly not a headquarters. To have either would be in direct violation with what Lima believes in.
What the community most needs.
Instead, the space is more of a gathering place. A spot where anybody in the neighborhood can come and get something to eat. Have a place to sleep if need be.
And it is the focal point where all of Lima’s business is conducted.
“Hector,” Bocco greets him as he enters. Already seated on one end of a couch, he rests with one leg crossed over the other, an arm along the back of the sofa.
Bocco probably spends the most time in the building of anyone, and Lima wouldn’t be surprised to find out he’d simply slept over after their visit to On Tap the night before.
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