Red Rock Island (Damian Green Book 1) (18 page)

Natalie sighed and said, “I do love your style, Damian.”

“I called you because I think they’re going to be back and I need some law enforcement help,” Damian reiterated. “Who can I call to get someone out here? I do have the men approaching by boat on video and you can clearly see their guns.”

“That’s a good question, Damian. My first instinct is to connect you to the San Francisco Police Department but they’re so far away across the water that they would take too long to come to your rescue. Let me do some research on the Contra Costa Sheriff and I’ll call you back with the name shortly.”

After the phone call ended, Damian looked at Ariana and Hermione to say, “You ladies better get going across the bay. Natalie will help me defend this island and while I think the bad guys will be back, I don’t think it will be tonight.”

Ariana stood there thinking for a moment and Damian could see the wheels turning in her head.

“You know, Damian, I do believe you can defend this island by yourself, and it would be good for Hermione if we don’t expose her to any further risks, so we’ll be going. If you need help day or night, call and I can be here in fifteen minutes at full speed. If your cops aren’t going to help you, you can always count on me.”

“And me,” Hermione said.

The support of these two women was causing huge fissures in the ice around Damian’s heart. Before he could understand his own behavior, he had enveloped them both in a hug. Moments later he let go and said, “Let’s go,” as he led the way downstairs and to the dock.

Moments later he could see both the sun setting in the west and the retreat of Ariana’s boat towards her home. He heard his cell phone trill and pulled it out of his pocket to answer Natalie’s call.

“Did you find someone?”

“Yeah. I spoke with a friend who is a Santa Clara deputy who has a friend working in the Contra Costa Sheriff’s department and fortunately he’s on duty and on his way along with a deputy from their Marine patrol. They’ll know the location of your island and will be there in about twenty minutes. I gave them your cell phone so they can make arrangements to get up to your house.”

“Thanks Natalie. I don’t think the Brotherhood will be back tonight, but it doesn’t hurt to have back-up ready when I need it.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

After ending his call with Natalie, Damian thought about how to greet the Marine patrol. Should he reveal the existence of his dock and watercraft garage or should he invite them up via the zip line. While the plans for his house had been approved by the three counties, the watercraft garage was on no blueprint; not that the deputies would know that. He decided not to mention the garage because if the island was under attack, he would not want to open the garage, and possibly let the intruder know of access to the lower level of his home. He wanted help to come from the beach.

He took his own zip line down to the beach and awaited a phone call from the sheriff. The beach was on the opposite side of the island from where their boat was coming from. Again his cell phone rang and he answered it to find a lot of wind noise and the sheriff on the line.

“This is Deputy Shawn Peterson, Natalie Severino gave us your information and we can see your island and are approaching from the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge. Do you have a dock?”

“Do you have the ability to park your boat on or close to the sand?” Damian replied not answering the question about a dock. That way he avoided lying to the deputy.

“We can anchor close to shore and use a ramp to walk on to your sand. Where’s the beach located?”

“It’s on the opposite side of the island from the direction you’re approaching. I’m standing on the sand ready to assist in your approach.”

Damian could hear the noise of the motor boat approaching and hoped it was the sheriff rather than another boat filled with Brotherhood members. He’d taken off his body armor and was vulnerable to attack on his sandy beach. He heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the word ‘Sheriff’ painted on the side of the boat.

The deputy maneuvered the boat close and anchored it. Damian assisted with putting a ramp on the sand and tying the boat to two hitches that he’d installed just for this purpose. Within minutes, the two deputies stepped from the ramp onto the beach and shook Damian’s hand as introductions were performed.

“I’ve always wanted to see this island, but it’s your private property and I haven’t had an official reason to visit.”

Damian explained in detail the attack earlier that evening, and offered to show the deputies his recording. He’d looked at it before they arrived to make sure he hadn’t seen anything in the video that he didn’t want the deputies to view. He offered them the choice of hiking up the hillside or riding his zip line. After answering their questions about the safety, function and design of the zip line, they chose that option.

Once on top, they surveyed the perimeter of the island with the one deputy actually filming it. Then they entered his house and walked down to the lab. Damian pulled the footage up and explained his pepper juice water guns. He decided not to mention the submarine punching a hole in the bottom of the boat as he might’ve violated some law with that tactic.

“This is an extraordinary set-up you have here. Most people don’t have this level of weaponry to protect themselves. What made you put this security in place?” asked Deputy Peterson.

“Two reasons. I am an inventor so it’s part experimentation.”

“And the other reason?”

“My wife and two little girls were murdered seven years ago in San Jose by a convict that was mistakenly released by Soledad Prison. It’s how I know Natalie; she killed my family’s killer during the manhunt for him.”

“I’m sorry, man. I get it,” replied the deputy. “Was he a member of the Aryan Brotherhood?”

“Yes,” better to let the officer think that was the reason for the gang’s anger against him.

“So you think they’ll be back?”

“Don’t you?”

The two deputies gave it some thought. Considering their training about gang behavior, they agreed they would keep coming back until the job was done.

“Yes.”

“So, suggestions on how to survive this group?” Damian asked.

“You appear to be doing a great job on your own. Certainly call us and we can have help here in about ten to fifteen minutes via helicopter. I’d like to take a copy of the video with me as it’s enough to issue an arrest warrant and we should check with urgent care and hospital emergency departments to see if they sought medical care for their eyes.”

Damian thought, ‘that is if the boat didn’t sink and drown them’ which was his hoped for outcome.

“I was lucky tonight. I was lighting my barbeque when I noticed the boat and used my binoculars to observe their brandishing of automatic weapons. They could have just as easily taken me by surprise which is to say they could have gotten on the beach intending to climb the hill, but I use water cannons to persuade unlawful visitors to head back to their boat. Those cannons aren’t loaded with pepper juice; it’s just water, so it probably wouldn’t impede them. My house is made with bullet proof materials but they could do a lot of damage here.”

“I don’t know what else to tell you. You got good defenses here and we’re going to try and find them and take them off the streets, but my experience with gang members is that they’re like picnic ants, you kill one and ten more are waiting to invade your food. I am going to brief the Sherriff about your set-up here and the actions of this gang. We’ll see if we can trace the boat they had, but there are many places to rent a boat up and down the Bay and Delta. We’ll have an all-points bulletin, but they could easily attack this island before we find them as a result of an APB. Is there anything else you can think of to suggest we do?” asked Deputy Peterson. This guy had done a lot to protect his island, but he was facing a criminal enterprise with unlimited guns and gang members ready to die for the cause.

“When I called you I frankly thought there wasn’t anything you could do to help as my distance and isolation makes your response times slow. But issuing an APB is helpful as well as just establishing contact so that if I call for help, someone will actually respond to this island rather than think it is a prank call.”

“We’ll add a blurb to the daily report to get the word out as you’re correct, some dispatchers and deputies might think this location is a prank call. We’ll also let you know if we catch your intruders.”

They headed outside and as it was now dark and the path treacherous all three headed down on Damian’s zip line. Damian untied the lines that were holding the boat to his island and waved off the two men.

Upon returning to the house, he relayed his conversation with the deputies to Ariana.

“How’s Hermione doing? I would hate to cause the kid more nightmares than she is already having.”

“I think she’s a strong kid and will be okay. I, on the other hand will be having nightmares for a while. Goodness, being attacked by gang members with automatic weapons. I must say I love your weapons; they completely stopped the attack without killing or seriously harming them. It was very disabling.”

“I could install it on your beachfront.” Damian offered.

“No thanks. If I need that kind of protection, I’ll just need to move to a new city.”

“I’ve had peace and quiet for seven years, but thugs are thugs and they don’t quit until they’re dead.”

“On that piece of pessimism, I’ll say goodnight and good luck. Keep us posted.”

“Will do.”

Chapter Thirty

Damian had a peaceful night with no intruders attacking his island. He decided to hack again into their email system to see if there was any communication about the event at his island, although when he thought back to other emails it seemed likely that they communicated some other way about activities on the outside of the prison. He certainly hadn’t found how or when Natalie’s name was placed in the hat so on second thought, why waste his time.

He began running on his treadmill to think about the people and problems in his life. They were rather like his inventions; he never knew the outcome of any tweak he applied to a design until he tried it. Sometimes he was spot on and other times he missed by a mile. He had to be grateful that all three women in his life, Natalie, Ariana, and Hermione were not drama queens.

  Then a new thought hit him, the police report of last night. His personal privacy was so important to him and now there was a public record that he owned this island because of the police report. This morning, he would devote his time to figuring out how to erase his existence from the Sheriff’s database. He would give them twenty-four hours to get the word out about his island and the problems there, but then he’d make sure he erased his name from their database or at least substituted the corporate name that the property was listed under.

His cell phone rang and he saw that it was Natalie.

“Was Deputy Peterson helpful?”

“More than I expected since he put a bulletin out to arrest the guys in the video and he notified his dispatch that if I ever call it’s not a prank. The thought of being a one-man army with no re-enforcements is daunting in light of the vast number of thugs that belong to the Brotherhood.”

“What did he think of your pepper spray water cannons?”

“I think he rather liked the idea of disabling the enemy without causing permanent serious harm or death.”

“You have a unique need because of your island status, but I admit if I could cheaply add it to the sides of my house to keep criminals out, I would. Of course that just moves the problem elsewhere, but at least my home would be safe. Guess it is rather like Medieval Times, when they threw boiling oil over the castle walls, except I surmise a fair number of them died from their burns.”

“Thanks, Natalie, for that vision. Though, I’ll admit that the men probably looked much the same after being doused in my pepper spray as they would if hot oil had reached their eyes.”

“Back at you, Damian, thanks for that horrible vision. What should we do about the Brotherhood? Should I try meeting with the guy again or should you release a few more emails today?”

“Natalie, I hate to be horribly pessimistic, but I’m no longer sure under what condition the Brotherhood will take your name out of the hat. I almost think we need to incite a riot where all the leaders are killed. How’s that for lowering myself to their level of scumbag?”

“It’s called fighting fire with fire. I feel like I need to talk to someone who understands this gang’s behavior. If this is indeed hopeless, what are my options?”

“I wonder what the Black Guerillas would say about the Aryan Brotherhood? Maybe we need to partner with them to get them to back down.”

“I’m going to talk to the department and see if they have any ideas. I’m sorry I dragged you into this mess.”

“From the day they murdered my family, I’ve been at your side fighting these domestic terrorists. You didn’t drag me into this fight; this is where I want to be. Why don’t you talk to your gang experts and get back to me as to whether we should release any more emails?”

“Will do.”

After they ended the call, Damian did a search on successes against violent gangs. The only tactic that seemed to work was changing their sentences from life imprisonment to being condemned on death row. Even if he went back and looked at the violent gangs from the 1920s, they were stopped by putting the gang members in jail for tax evasion. Today’s prisoners had so much more contact with the outside world that they could run criminal enterprises from behind prison bars.

He thought about the situation some more and decided he had nothing to lose by stirring the pot so to speak. So he released another five emails to the Black Guerillas. He wanted to send them anonymously to the Justice Department so they would go after the gang members for racketeering. He dropped Natalie a text asking her what she thought of that strategy while she waited for an answer from her gang experts.

Natalie didn’t respond right away and so he changed tactics completely doing some more research on Hermione’s parents. He couldn’t identify them with fingerprints and he could think of ways to avoid having your fingerprints on file. So how about facial recognition? He went back and slowed down the video from their house to see if there were frames that he could use for facial recognition. He didn’t have such a technology yet, but first he wanted to find out if he had a decent facial photo. Then Damian smacked himself up the side of his head, ‘what was he thinking?’ Hermione’s recovered phone had pictures he could use.

He pulled up the file with her images and started going through the pictures, then he had to smile. Her parents were masters at making sure their faces were never caught on camera as a full frontal. Without fail, each picture had their faces turned to one side or the other. The few full frontal shots were in costume, presumably Halloween. Next he went online to see if any of their monthly utility bills had been paid and he was excited to see that they had. Then he noticed they were on an auto pay scheme so that would continue as long as there was money in their bank account. Maybe he could track the bank account to see if money was being deposited in to it.

Banks were some of the hardest to hack into after a Russian group of mobsters stole an estimated $100M after hacking into over one-hundred banks worldwide. Then Damian saw another path he might take. He banked at the same institution as the Sherwoods, so maybe he could enter through his account. He was thinking about that when his alarm system sounded.

Crap! He was hoping to have more time before the idiots came back. He moved over and checked his monitors to see where they were. They were trolling close to the island and were planning on landing on his beach. He tried Shawn Peterson first and then thought he’d move on to dispatch if he didn’t answer his phone.

“Peterson.”

“Hi, it’s Damian Green and the Brotherhood are back. They’re surveying my beach to land there.”

“Let me order our copter then I’ll call you back.”

Damian sat at his computer screen firing his water cannons at the approaching boat and men. He also sent his drone around to drop some of the excess purple smoke bombs he had from setting up Natalie’s house as well as the green ink bombs. He moved the ink from the device he used for Natalie’s house into a water balloon. After he’d been attacked the previous night, and once the cops left, he rigged up his drone to assist with dropping the bombs. It might make a mess out his beach sand, so he hoped he could drop it on them before they reached the shore.

Peterson called back and said the helicopter would be arriving in about ten minutes. He was traveling by land and would be much slower. Damian gave him directions to the Richmond Marina while Peterson’s partner called the Harbor Master to ensure a boat ride upon their arrival. Damian had set the phone down to chat by speakerphone while he operated the drone by headset and the water cannons by a joystick.

“I’m firing water cannons at the boat, but I don’t have them loaded with pepper juice and they’ll realize that sooner or later. I’m about to drop green ink water balloons on the men and I’m putting purple smoke bombs on the sand which will block their view. Your helicopter can land on top on my island or just follow the boat if they give up and head back to shore.”

Peterson’s partner relayed that information to the approaching helicopter.

Damian debated getting the submarine out, but his hands and eyes were occupied operating the cannons and the drone.

Over the noise the men didn’t hear the drone as he had it sweep in from the back. They were wearing what looked to be ski googles to protect their eyes. Three on the boat were hit by the green dye balloons and they were soon covered in green ink. Two other men wearing raincoats had stepped onto his beach.

He moved the first drone quickly away from the boat and back around his island as he didn’t want them shooting it. A second drone dropped purple smoke bombs on both the boat and the sand. Sadly, it became a casualty of automatic gun fire. He had secondary water cannons that would soon go off from the cliff adding to the barrage on the sand, but this landing party was in a different boat with more men and based on the raincoats and googles, they came prepared for pepper juice.

Peterson said “Copter has your island in view and sees smoke. They want you to confirm that nothing is on fire.”

“It’s just smoke bombs on the sand. Warn your Copter that the men have automatic weapons as before. They’ve successfully shot down one of my drones and are working on the water cannons, but that’s just wasted ammo.”

“They plan to hover over the boat and give them a message from the air.”

Damian checked his boundary cameras and could see the copter’s approach. He relaxed a little knowing that re-enforcements had arrived. He landed the working drone as he didn’t want it near the copter. Within a minute the copter was in place over the bay and was using a PA system to address the boaters. Damian didn’t have speakers outside and decided that was the next security enhancement he would install. In a small portion of his brain, he wondered how long this little war would go on and were the men back because of yesterday’s action or this morning’s second release of emails. The boat pulled away leaving the two men on Damian’s island while the copter pursued the boat. Great, thought Damian, there went my back-up.

“Damian, the copter’s going after the boat. We have a boat approaching your island from the Delta; it’s about fifteen minutes away. My partner and I made good time and we’re pulling into the Richmond marina. We’ve arranged with the harbormaster to borrow a boat so I hope we’ll be out there in about five minutes.”

“There’s a few more smoke bombs I can drop on them and the water cannons should make it hard to climb the hillside to my house.”

“Is there a second beach we can dock the boat at on your island?”

Damian debated revealing the location of the dock but decided he needed a few secrets still. He didn’t know why that was important but it was.

“There’s a second beach, that’s harder to navigate, but doable. It’ll give you cover; just come in slow and be careful as there are rocks in that area. I’ll text you a quick diagram of what to avoid. It’s around the corner from the beach you landed on yesterday.” Damian drew two quick images of his island and texted them to the Deputy.

He could hear the wind noise in the background and then Peterson said, “Got it. Are they making any progress scaling your hill?”

“Not so far. It’s tricky under the best of circumstances and with the water pelting them; they’re stuck on the sand. The water is coming from the bay so I can keep the cannons on for a long time. You’ll be able to land, peer over the hillside and then I can turn them off when you’re ready to move. They’ve fired a lot of bullets at my hillside so hopefully they’ll be out of ammo soon.”

“If you can, aim the cannon at the gun as water in time will cause the gun to fail.”

“I didn’t think of that! Thanks, will do.”

Damian studied the two men’s movement and moved his water guns accordingly. Soon enough one of their guns failed to operate. Awesome! Now he was down to just one serious thug.

He could see through his security cameras, Deputy Peterson approaching his second smaller beach looking over the front bow of the boat watching for the rocks that Damian had drawn on his map. They drove the boat right up onto the beach and hopped off, taking cover. Damian sent Peterson a picture of the thugs on his other beach. They nodded and moved forward with the hillside providing cover.

Peterson texted Damian to shut off the water as they were in position.

The water noise ceased and then Peterson called out, “This is the police, put down your guns and put your hands in the air.”