Act of Deceit

Chapter 20

M oments after Donnally passed him on the forest road, Deputy Pipkins flicked on his overheads and siren, and then spun a U-turn that took him off the blacktop and into the gravel. Even in the twilight, Donnally could see in his rearview mirror a cascade of rock and dirt enveloping Pipkins’s cruiser. The stunt reminded him of Will’s golden retriever who once knocked itself dizzy running into a tree stump while chasing a cat.

Looking over at Mauricio’s mutt, Ruby, sitting in the passenger seat, Donnally saw an expression as close to a smile as he’d ever seen on a dog and wondered whether Ruby had made the same connection.

Donnally had already parked his truck in a turnout and was leaning against it by the time Pipkins pulled up. Frozen air sliding up the canyon from the Trinity River where Donnally had spent the day fishing bit at his face and hands, but he wasn’t about to give Pipkins the satisfaction of watching him reach for the jacket behind the bench seat.

“You should’ve just called and asked me to stop by if you wanted to talk about something,” Donnally said as Pipkins approached, bundled in a department-issued green parka and wearing a cowboy hat.

Pipkins reddened. “How come you’re always telling me what to say and when to say it? You’re not my-”

“Father?”

“Fuck you.”

Pipkins rested his right hand on the butt of his gun and his left hand on his baton.

“I’m sick of you screwing with me, Harlan. You may’ve been a big-city detective once, but you’re just a short-order cook now.”

Donnally glanced back and forth between the two weapons, their outlines framed by Pipkins’s headlights. He then noticed that the silence of the forest hadn’t yet been broken by voices over the deputy’s radio, not even background static.

Pipkins had gone ten-seven. Out of service.

“You follow me across two counties to tell me that?” Donnally asked.

“Nope.” Pipkins smirked as he reached into the inside breast pocket of his parka. “To give you this.” He unfolded a subpoena and handed it over. “A DA down in Alameda County wanted this served ASAP.”

Donnally didn’t look at it. He just reached into his truck window and said, “Ruby, how about do me a favor and ruminate on this.”

Pipkins laughed like someone had just played into his hand at poker.

“He said you’d do something like that and that he’d be just as happy to have you testify in handcuffs.”

“And I guess you’ve already assigned yourself the task of hooking me up and hauling me down there.”

“I’ll be waiting for my phone to ring on Tuesday morning with the DA’s call. You’re either going to be on the stand at 10 A.M. in Oakland or in the back of my patrol car at 10:05.”

Donnally grinned. “Don’t let the anticipation keep you awake the night before.”

“It won’t, but something else will.” Pipkins leaned back against Donnally’s truck and crossed his arms over his chest. “I hear you’re good with numbers, Harlan. How about helping me with a little addition?”

The self-satisfied expression on Pipkins’s face told Donnally that they’d finally arrived at the real reason Pipkins was putting a dismal end to his good day on the river.

“I get this subpoena,” Pipkins continued, “then I call a guy I know in the Sheriff’s Department down there and he fills me in about the Charles Brown case. So I backtrack a little bit and find out that you headed on down there right after Mauricio kicked off. It gets me to wondering if there’s a connection.”

“Apples and oranges,” Donnally said. “That’s all.”

“I don’t think so. When the DA called to see if the subpoena arrived, I asked him about how you got into the case. He said you didn’t tell him and he doesn’t know. That alone tells me you got something to hide. And combine that with the name on the headstone

…” Pipkins arched his eyebrows. “It kinda gets me thinking that there’s a lot more to that little wetback than I thought.”

“Which means what?”

“That maybe we should have the city attorney-”

“You mean, your uncle Bud-”

“The city attorney… tie up Mauricio’s assets until we figure out if it’s all legit.”

With that comment, Donnally grasped the Pipkins family’s preoccupation with Mauricio. They wanted his land. For twenty-five years Pipkins Sr. had used rigged auctions, usually of property seized from pot growers, to build a real estate empire. Everybody in town knew it, but nobody wanted to risk a marijuana plant showing up on their property followed by a zero-tolerance seizure. Now Pipkins Jr. was playing a variation on his father’s theme, maybe trying to prove to his father that he’d someday be ready to sit at the head of the family table.

And what more satisfying way of doing it than by robbing a dead Mexican of his land and his legacy.

Pipkins grinned, then reached down and turned on the radio holstered on his belt. He then spoke into the mike attached to his shoulder strap.

“This is Pipkins. I’m ten-eight again.”