Solitude Creek (48 page)

‘Yeah?’ a man’s voice called. ‘I was in the john. Come on in.’

They walked inside. And froze.

On the bathroom floor they could see two legs stretched out. Streak of blood on them. Puddling on the floor too.

Foster drew his gun and started to turn but the young man behind the curtain next to the sliding door quickly touched the agent’s skull with his own gun.

He pulled Foster’s Glock from his hand and shoved him forward, then closed the door.

They both turned to the lean Latino gazing at them with fierce eyes.

‘Serrano,’ Dance whispered.

They were back.

At last. Thank you, Lord.

The two boys from the other night. Except there were three of them at the moment.

Well, now that David Goldschmidt thought about it, there might’ve been three the other night. Only two bikes but, yes, there could have been another one then.

The other night.

The night of shame, he thought of it. His heart pounding even now, several days afterward. Palms sweating. Like
Kristallnacht
, the ‘Night of Broken Glass’, in 1938, when the Germans had rioted and destroyed a thousand Jewish homes and businesses throughout the country.

Goldschmidt was watching them on the video screen, which wasn’t, as he’d told Officer Dance the other night, in the bedroom but in the den. They were moving closer now, all three. Looking around, furtive. Guilt on wheels.

True, he hadn’t exactly gotten a look at them the other day, not their faces – that was why he’d asked Dance for more details: he didn’t want to make a mistake. But this was surely them. He’d seen their posture, their clothes, as they’d fled, after obscenely defacing his house. Besides, who else would it be?

They’d returned for their precious bikes.

Coming after the bait.

Which was why he’d kept them.

Bait …

Now he was ready. He’d called his wife in Seattle and had her stay a few days longer with her sister. Made up some story that he himself wanted to come up for the weekend. Why didn’t she stay and he’d join her? She’d bought it.

As the boys stole closer still, glancing around them, pausing from time to time, Goldschmidt looked up and watched them through the den window, the lace curtain.

One, the most intense, seemed to be the ringleader. He was wearing a combat jacket. Floppy hair. A second, a handsome teenager, was holding his phone, probably to record the theft. The third, big, dangerously big.

My God, they looked young. Younger than high school, Goldschmidt reckoned. But that didn’t mean they weren’t evil. They were probably the sons of neo-Nazis or some Aryan group. Such a shame they hadn’t formed their own opinions before their racist fathers, mothers too probably, had got a hold of their malleable brains and turned them into monsters.

Evil …

And deadly. Deadly as all bigots were.

Which was why Goldschmidt was now holding his Beretta double-barrel shotgun, loaded with 00 buckshot, each pellet the diameter of a .33-caliber slug.

He closed the weapon with a soft click.

The law on self-defense in California is very clear …

It certainly was, Officer Dance. Once somebody was in your home and you had a reasonable fear for your safety, you could shoot them.

And for all Goldschmidt knew, they too were armed.

Because this country was America. Where guns were plentiful and reluctance to use them rare.

The boys paused on the corner. Surveilling the area. Noting that his car was gone – he’d parked it blocks away. That the lights were out. He wasn’t home. Safe to come get your Schwinns.

The door’s open, kids. Come on in.

Goldschmidt rose, thumbed off the safety and walked into the kitchen, where he opened the door to the garage. That location, he’d checked, was considered part of your home too. And all he had to do was convince the prosecutor he’d legitimately feared for his life.

He’d memorized the sentence, ‘I used the minimum amount of force necessary under the circumstances to protect myself.’

He peered through the crack.

Come on, boys. Come on.

‘And you, Officer Dance. Your weapon too. Let’s go.’

Without taking his eyes off them, the Latino tugged the curtain shut, a gauzy shield against passers-by.

‘I’m not armed. Look, Serrano. Joaquin. Let’s talk about—’

‘Not armed.’ A smile.

‘Really. I’m not.’

‘You say this, I say that.’

‘Listen—’ Foster began.

‘Sssh, you. Now, Agent Dance. How about you just tug up that fancy jacket of yours, turn around like my niece does, pirouette? I think that’s what it’s called. She in ballet class. She’s pretty good.’

Dance lifted her jacket and turned. Her eyes returned defiantly to his.

‘Well, they don’t trust you with guns, your bosses? My woman, she can shoot. She’s good. You afraid of shooting. Too loud?’

Foster nodded toward the bathroom, where a man’s legs were just visible. Crimson spatters covered the tiles. ‘That’s Escalanza?’

‘The fuck’re you to ask me questions?’ the man sneered. ‘Shut up.’ He stepped to the windows and looked outside. Dance could see through the slit in the flyblown drapes. She saw no one other than Stemple, gazing out over the highway.

‘Who’s that big boy out there?’

Dance said, ‘He’s with us, the Bureau of Investigation.’

He returned. ‘Hey, there, Officer … Or, no, it’s
Agent
. Have to remember that.
Sí
, Agent Dance. I enjoyed our conversation in the room, that interrogation room there. Always like talking to a beautiful woman. Too bad no
cervezas
. You get more confessions you open a bar there. Patron, Herradura, a little rum. No, I know! Hire a
puta
. Give somebody head, they confess fast.’

Dance said evenly, ‘You’re in a bad situation here.’

He smiled.

Foster said impatiently, ‘Look, Serrano, whatever you have in mind, nothing good’s going to come from killing law.’

‘That’s your opinion, whoever you are. Were you one of those watching me in the goldfish bowl the other day?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fooled you pretty good, didn’t I?’ he gloated.

Dance said, ‘Yes, you did. But my colleague’s right. It’s not going to work out how you want.’

The young man said evenly, ‘You said nothing good comes from killing law. Well, you know what? I’m thinking a lot of good’ll come of it. You been on my ass since Wednesday. I been hiding here, hiding there. That’s a pain I don’t need. So I think a lot of good is going to come from having you both fucking dead. Okay. Enough.’

Dance said, ‘You shoot us and you think the agent out there won’t hear? If he doesn’t nail your ass, he’ll keep you pinned down until a TAC team …’

Fishing in his back pocket, Serrano pulled a silencer out and screwed it onto the muzzle of his weapon. ‘I like the way you say “ass”.’

Dance glanced at Foster, whose expression remained placid.

‘So. Here. I’m a religious man. You take a few seconds to make your peace. Pray. You have something you want to say? Somebody up there you want to say it to?’

Her voice ominous, Dance said defiantly, ‘You’re not thinking, Joaquin. Our boss knows we’re here, a dozen others. I could get a call any minute. I don’t pick up and there’ll be a dozen TAC officers here in ten minutes, combing the area. Lockdown on the roads. You’ll never get away.’

‘Yeah, I think I take my chances.’

‘Work with me and I can keep you alive. You walk out that door and you’re a dead man.’

‘Work with you?’ He laughed. ‘You got nothing. What they say in football, I mean soccer? Nil. You’ve got nil to offer.’

The gun was already racked. He lifted it toward Foster, who said, ‘Lamont.’

The young man frowned. ‘What?’

‘Lamont Howard.’

A confused look. ‘What’re you saying?’

‘Don’t act stupid.’ Foster shook his head.

‘Fuck you saying to me, asshole?’

Foster seemed merely inconvenienced, not the least intimidated. Or scared. ‘I’m saying to you,
asshole
, the name Lamont Howard.’ When there was no response he continued, ‘You know Lamont, right?’

The Latino’s eyes scanned their faces uncertainly. Then: ‘Lamont, the gang-banger run the Four Seven Bloods in Oakland. What about him?’

Dance said, ‘Steve?’

Foster: ‘You been to his house in Village Bottoms?’

A blink.

‘West Oakland.’

‘I know where the Bottoms is.’

Dance snapped, ‘What’s this all about, Steve?’

Foster waved her silent. Back to the young man. ‘Okay, Serrano, here’s the deal. You kill me, Lamont will kill you. Simple as that. And he’ll kill everybody in your family. And then he’ll go back to his steak dinner, because he likes his steak. I know that because I
have
been to his crib and had a steak dinner with him. A dozen of them, in fact.’

Dance turned to Foster. She whispered, ‘
What?
’

‘Fuck you saying, man?’

‘Are you catching on? I’m Lamont’s inside man.’

Dance stared at him.

‘No fucking way.’

‘Yeah, well, Serrano, I can say yes and you can say no way until you have to take a crap. But wouldn’t it make sense just to ask him? ’Cause if you don’t and you take me out, Lamont and his crew lose their one connection to CBI and points beyond. DEA, Customs and Border, Homeland. And I wonder which dry well you and your mother and sister will be sleeping out eternity in.’

‘Fuck. Wait. I hear something. A month ago. Some Oakland crew was getting solids from Sacramento.’

‘That’s me.’ Foster seemed proud.

Dance looked out of the window. Stemple, still gazing away into the waving grass. She growled to Foster, ‘You son of a bitch.’

He ignored her. ‘So, call him.’

The Latino looked him over, not getting too close. Foster was much larger. ‘I no got his number. You think him and me, we asshole buddies?’

Foster sighed. ‘Look, I’m taking my phone out of my pocket. That’s all. My phone.’ He did. ‘Ah, Kathryn, careful there.’

Her hand had dropped toward a table on which a heavy metal lamp sat.

‘Serrano? Could you …’

The young man noted that Dance had been going for the lamp. He stepped forward and roughly pushed her against the wall, away from any potential weapons.

Foster made a call.

‘Lamont, it’s Steve.’ He hit the speaker.

‘Foster?’

‘Yeah.’

‘What you calling for?’ The voice was wary.

‘Got a situation here. Sorry, man. There’s a hothead, from one of the Salinas crews, with a piece on me. He’s out of the …’ Foster lifted an eyebrow.

‘Barrio Majados.’

‘You hear that?’

Howard’s voice: ‘Yo, I know ’em, I work with ’em. What’s this about? Who is he?’

‘Serrano.’

‘Joaquin? I know Serrano. He disappeared. There was heat on him.’

‘He’s surfaced. He doesn’t know who I am. Just tell him we work together. Or he’s going to park a slug in my head.’

‘Fuck you doing, Serrano? Leave my boy Foster alone. You got that?’

‘He with you?’

‘The fuck I say?’

The gun didn’t lower. ‘Okay, only … any chance he undercover?’

‘Well, he is, then he’s the only undercover took out a Oakland cop.’

‘No shit.’

Howard said, ‘Asshole show up at my place unexpected. Foster, pop pop, took him down.’

‘Steve, no!’ Dance whispered, dismay in her voice.

Howard called, ‘The fuck’s that?’

‘Another cop, works with Foster.’

‘That’s just fucking great.’ The banger in Oakland sighed. ‘You two take care of her. I got shit to do here.’

The call ended.

‘Serrano,’ Dance began, ‘what I was saying before. You need to be smart. You—’

The Latino snapped, ‘Shut up, Kathryn.’

With a cold smile, she said to Foster, ‘The story you told me before. You don’t have a son, do you? That was a lie.’

He turned to her, offering a nonchalant shrug. ‘I didn’t know what was going down. Needed you on my side.’

Dance sneered, ‘You can’t be running a network on your own. You’re not that smart.’

Foster was indignant. ‘Fuck you. I don’t need anybody else.’

‘How many people’ve died because of what you’ve done?’

‘Oh, come on,’ the man said gruffly. Then: ‘Serrano, let’s get this done. Do her, I’ll get the asshole outside in here. We take him out. I’ll tell the response team I got out the back and hid in the hills. I’ll say it was somebody else here, not you. One of the crews from Tijuana.’

‘Okay with me,’ was the matter-of-fact response.

Then Foster was squinting. ‘Wait.’

‘What?’

‘You … you said, “Kathryn”. You called her “Kathryn”.’

A shrug. ‘I don’t know. So?’

‘I never used her first name here. And I was at the interview last week between you and her. She never said it either.’

I’m Agent Dance …

A grimace. The Latino accent was gone as the young man said, ‘Yep, I screwed up on that. Sorry.’ He was speaking to Kathryn Dance.

‘No worries, José,’ she said, smiling. ‘We got everything we needed. You did great.’

Foster stared from one to the other. ‘Oh, Jesus Christ.’

‘Serrano’ who was actually a Bakersfield detective named José Felipe-Santoval, aimed his weapon center-mass on Foster’s chest, while Dance, relieved of her weapon but not her cuffs, ratcheted the bracelets on.

Adding to Foster’s shock, the agent who’d been pretending to be the deceased Pedro Escalanza hopped to and dusted off his jeans, drawing his own weapon. He’d been lying face down, head hidden from the trio in the hotel room.

‘Hey, TJ.’

‘Boss. Good takedown. How’s the blood?’ He glanced at his legs, spattered red. ‘I tried a new formula. Hershey’s syrup and food coloring.’

‘Big improvement,’ she said, nodding at the tiles.

Foster gasped, ‘A sting. The whole thing.’

Dance pulled out her cell phone. Hit speed-dial five as she glanced down and noticed her Aldo pumps had a scuff. Have to fix that. They were her favorite shoes for field work.