Street Dreams

36

Gray skies hovered overthe awakening city as the Loo parked the Porsche curbside. We were in an area of high crime, and the lone sports car sitting on the empty block just cried out,Jack me! Chop me!I asked him how comfortable he felt leaving his baby without backup, and he showed me his Beretta. At that point, I gave up. The man was on his own private mission, masquerading as my avenging angel.

It was an immigrant neighborhood, mostly Hispanic, and while the inhabitants weren’t steeped in dire poverty, most of them were surely poor. Because the area predated its current population and there had been wealth a time ago, there remained some magnificent old mansions built with the kind of detail that failed replication. But most of those estates had been bought up by the nearby university and were used for graduate-study centers. The rest of the architecture was a mixture of old and older, of fixer-uppers and buildings in serious disrepair. There were several turn-of-the-century Victorian houses replete with gingerbread, scallops, and curlicues, but the dwellings sagged under age, waiting for that expensive face-lift. There were also some Arts and Crafts bungalows with shingled sides and roofs, and spacious front porches. But the majority of the single-family houses were broken stucco boxes with little to offer except protection from the elements. Even those were preferable to the rows of dingbats-lifeless, square apartment buildings without charm that were shedding stucco chunks like a diseased leper molting facial features.

I thought about asking Decker what his game plan was. We couldn’t very well start by ringing doorbells. He suggested we take a walk and shake out our legs. While we ambled down the wrong side of the tracks, we poked around exterior mailboxes, read labels on newspaper deliveries, and scanned the directories of apartment buildings. Nothing came close to Renaldes. After an hour of fruitless effort, I told Dad that this was ridiculous.

“Patience.” He rubbed his hands together. “Let’s just hang for a while.”

“Dad, we don’t even know if we’re on the right block.”

“I think we’re close.”

“You’re in denial.” It was six-thirty and I was sleep deprived. Thinking had become hard work. “You know, construction crews start pretty early.”

My father looked at me.

I said, “In my area, we get loads of Hispanic guys waiting on street corners or by paint stores, hoping to be picked up by the boss man.”

“I thought you said this guy had a steady job.”

“I said Renaldes had listed Do-Rite Construction as his current employer. I don’t know how long ago he might have worked for the company. Or even if he worked for the company at all. I never got a chance to check it out, because my superiors in title told me to back off. But now I’m thinking that if Renaldes listed Do-Rite as his employer, he probably worked construction with other companies, too.”

Decker didn’t answer me.

“Why don’t we drive around-”

“I wanted to get this guy while he was sleeping.”

“Daddy, we don’t know where he lives!” My father could be incredibly thickheaded sometimes. “I think it would be a better use of our time if we found some crews and asked about Renaldes. You’d have no trouble convincing anyone that you’re a West Side contractor looking for hands. You’re fluent in Spanish and you’re driving a flashy car.”

“Contractors drive Porsches?”

“The ones who work in Brentwood certainly do.”

“I thought they drove trucks.”

“Both.”

“I’m in the wrong business.”

“Didn’t Mom try to tell you that a long time ago?”

Decker flashed me a sour look.

“Contractors and real estate agents: They drive Porsches, Mercedes, Beemers, Jags… It’s all part of the image. Can we talk about my idea now?”

“Coming in, I didn’t see any work crews.”

“We didn’t look for any crews. Besides, it’s later now. Let’s go hit the lumberyards or the paint stores and see if we can’t get something going.”

My father tapped his toe, unwilling to comment.

“It’s a good idea, Decker,” I told him. “Much better than anything you have. You know, Daddy, I’m the one who was shot at and was yanked off active duty. Plus, I haven’t slept in over twenty hours. If you don’t start pulling your weight, I’m going home.”

My father slipped his hands into his pockets. “Point well taken.”

“Thank you. So do we go or what?”

Decker took out his keys. “I guess we go.”

Using the ruse that Pepe Renaldes owed my father, the boss man, a considerable sum of money-something that the men we talked to found very easy to believe-we came away with a half-dozen addresses in the right neighborhood. All it took was two hours of our time and two hundred bucks in twenties. Neither one of us had that much play cash, so Dad withdrew money from his ATM. I asked him if he really thought it was worth the effort, and he retorted by asking me exactly how much didIthink my life was worth? He was overstating the case, but after his lecture on threat, I felt it best not to challenge.

The first address didn’t exist and the second one was a Kinko’s. The third was one of those squashed stucco houses. That looked promising, although the occupants’ last name was Martez. Inside were a mother and her two sullen teenage daughters, who were polishing their toenails, mixing the smell of acetone with the odor of bacon grease. She insisted that there was no Pepe Renaldes in residence, but since she was less than convincing, Decker searched the house. She let him do it because Decker was big, and Decker was authoritative, and Decker must have said something to her in Spanish that scared the bejesus out of her.

By the time we hit the fourth address-a dingbat apartment building-it was almost ten and the hopes of finding Pepe Renaldes in bed were fading fast. It was a two-story building of brown stucco, fronted by a patch of straggly lawn that had a couple of full-size palm trees dropping premature palm nuts. The little black balls littered the sidewalk and poked into the soles of my shoes. The place had no lobby, but it did have a directory-twelve units with number four looking very promising because the occupants were listed asRand nothing else. This little bit of Heaven was toward the back and secured by iron grilles on the front door and windows. As we approached the unit, I could hear ferocious barking in the midrange level coming from inside. I had reservations about dropping in, but Dad had other ideas.

“Okay,” he whispered. “You stay out of sight.”

“It’s got bars and a dog, Dad. How do you propose we get in?”

“You leave that to me.”

“You can’t push in the door. And even if you did, there’s a dog-”

“Just stay back and let me handle this.”

“Do you have another gun?”

My father smiled at me. “Aw… you care.” His face turned grave. “Stand over there, all right?”

“Do you know what you’re doing?”

“Very much so.” He knocked on the door.

The dog went wild. I could picture my father charging in and the dog responding by going for his throat. I was naked without my gun and didn’t like that feeling at all.

We waited… thirty seconds… a minute.

Decker knocked again. He shouted something in Spanish.

The dog had worked itself up into a frenzy. There was yelling from above. Dad yelled back at him.

“You’re going to cause a riot,” I told my father.

“Nah, he’s just screaming for someone to shut the dog up.”

“Obviously, no one’s home.”

“Or sleeping. If he was out last night, Cin, he might be sleeping late.” Dad knocked again.

The dog kept up its vocal pyrotechnics.

Dad pounded this time.

“Let it ride-”

“You want to take control of your destiny or leave it to assholes?”

I exhaled. Dad gave the door another thrashing. “Last time,” he announced.

The dog was barking itself hoarse.

Ten seconds… twenty.

The dog quieted-a bark or two but without real feeling behind it. To my utter shock, I heard movement behind the door. My father pushed me out of the way. “Yo, Pepe,” he said. “Soy Miguel.”

I couldn’t understand the rest of his speech. I caught words but nothing else. I thought about Dad with his Spanish and Koby speaking three languages. I could barely cope with my native one.

Muffled Spanish came from behind the door.

Dad responded, “Un hombre blanco-alto con pelo rojo. El la busca, hombre. El dice que usted le debe dinero. Yo no le dije nada pero el dice que tiene una pistola, amigo. Si me da cincuenta dolares y una cerveza, pienso que yo puedo hacerlo esperar.”

Silence.

I whispered, “What did you say?”

He shut me up with a movement of his hand and put his finger to his lips. A couple of perfunctory yelps from the pooch, then I could hear the clunk of the dead bolt being opened. Dad pushed me against the wall.

The image of a charging pit bull leaping at my father’s face became quite vivid.

“Give me your gun,” I told him.

“What?”

“Don’t argue!” I spat fiercely. “You told me to have convictions-I have them now. Give me your gun now or I’m going to yell police!”

He gave me his gun.

Slowly, the door started to open. Just a crack at first, then it opened a little wider. Immediately, Decker shoved full force with his body and the door flew open.

As expected, the dog sprang upward, but Dad had come prepared. He gave the canine a swift, hard kick in the cranium, sending the midsize pooch across the room and crashing into a table. Pepe was going in one direction, while the dog, a pit bull mix, was shaking itself off, readying itself for round two.

I jumped on Pepe’s back, squeezing my legs around his waist and encircling his throat with my left arm. I jammed the bore of the gun into the nape of his neck. “CALL THE DOG OFF!” I shoved the gun deep against his cervical vertebrae. “CALL IT OFF! CALL IT OFF!”

The pit bull started charging. Dad picked up an end table. I screamed and shot at the intractable beast, grazing its head but not deterring it an iota. Dad threw the end table, knocking it again on the head as Renaldes did a rain dance, trying to shake me off his back.

“CALL IT OFF!” I shot a bullet past his temple. “CALL IT OFF!” Another bullet past the other ear.

“Don’ shoot!”

“OFF NOW OR THIS TIME IT’S YOUR FUCKING HEAD!”

He finally started making overtures to the beast, calling him by his name, Fuego, cooing at him like a parakeet. Although Fuego was still pissed, he was disoriented from being slammed by flying furniture.

I was still holding on to Renaldes. “Put him in a closet!” I demanded.

“Get off-”

I zinged another shot past his ear.“EL PERROIN THE CLOSET! NOW!”

At last my demand sank in. Pepe bent down, almost falling on his face under the burden of my weight, but somehow he managed to grab Fuego’s collar and lead him into a closet. As soon as the pit bull was secured behind the door, I jumped off, and at the same time, my father grabbed Renaldes by the throat. He pushed him down onto a tattered couch and tightened his grip. Renaldes’s face started turning a very unhealthy red. With his right hand, Decker motioned for his weapon. I gave it to him and he shoved it into Renaldes’s mouth. I do believe Pepe pissed in his pants.

I realized that my own mouth was open and closed it shut. I had never seen this side of my father. I must have looked as shocked as Koby did when I took down El Paso. Behind the closet, Fuego started barking again-loud and angry, ordering a rematch with my father.

Renaldes was struggling under Dad’s bulk, but he was clearly outmatched. Pepe had some muscle definition but was on the short side-smaller than I was. He had a shaved head and dark eyes, which were popping out of their sockets. He had been wearing a terry-cloth robe when we barged in. Now it had opened up, revealing a chest inked with tattoos-a devil, a snake, a spider, et cetera, et cetera, yawn, yawn. It was hard to say anything about his complexion because he was bright pink from pressure and fear.

Decker pulled the gun out of Pepe’s mouth and placed it on his forehead. He whispered, “You went after the wrong person,amigo.”

He choked out, “No se-”

“Shut up and listen!”

“Por favor-”

Decker tightened his grip. Renaldes was literally about to explode. “I said, shut up andlisten!”

He was on the verge of passing out. I brought my hand over my father’s fingers and pried them open, just enough to loosen his grip and give Pepe some air. Decker didn’t even realize I was doing it.

Decker spoke low and slow. “Someone shot at a cop last night. Someone in a bronze Nova with stolen plates. Now if you’re straight with me, guess what, Pepe? You’ll live. If you give me bullshit, you’ll die.Muy fácil. La verdad o la muerte. Comprendes, amigo?”

The man’s head bobbed up and down. The dog was now thumping against the closet door. I looked around the room, then pushed the coffee table in front of Fuego’s escape route. I pounded on the door to shut the beast up. It worked for a moment, but then Fuego continued yelping.

“Who did it, Renaldes?Quien?”

“No conozco.I don’t know-”

Again the gun was shoved down Pepe’s throat. Decker counted to ten. “Let’s try it again.Quien tiene un carro-a bronze Nova?”

Renaldes’s eyes rolled back. My heart was beating a mile a minute, adrenaline pumping through my system. Fuego was damn near hysterical. “He’s losing consciousness!” I called out over the barking. “Ease up!”

My father regarded my face, his eyes as feral as any zoo animal I’ve ever seen. I think he forgot about me.

“Ease up!” I repeated louder.

Decker lessened his grip and took the gun out of Pepe’s mouth.

“Sit him up,” I told my father. “I’ll get a glass of water.” I patted Pepe’s red and sweaty face. “I can’t control him for too much longer. Don’t piss him off.”

I went into the kitchenette, banging on the closet door as I walked past it. My chest hurt and I could barely catch my breath. The sink was filthy, filled with crusted dishes from the Jurassic age. Little black ants were crawling on the countertop. I opened a cupboard and searched for a clean glass. I found a couple of blue plastic mugs and filled one with cloudy tap water. I debated taking a drink myself but nixed the opportunity to hydrate myself, fearing unseen microbes. I brought it back to Pepe, again banging on the closet door as I passed it.

I think Fuego started to get the hint. His resumption of barking was slow on the uptake.

Pepe was sitting on the couch next to my father, his bald head down, hands clasped and shaking. My father was standing over him, the gun still in his right hand. I gave the small man the water. He drank greedily and actually thanked me.

“You okay?” I asked Pepe.

Renaldes eyed Decker. “Heescrazy!”

“Excitable,” I corrected.

Decker growled at me. “You want to ask him about the Nova, hotshot?”

“Take it easy,” I responded testily.

“My finger’s getting itchy.”

I rolled my eyes at Pepe. His eyes said thank you. Somehow Decker and I had fallen into “Good cop/bad cop,” except it wasn’t completely playacting. I sat next to Pepe.

“Sunset and Marchant… a little after twelve o’clock last night. Bronze Nova, tinted windows, primer on the driver’s door, dented hood, stolen plates.” I gave him the numbers. “They shot out a ’92 black Toyota Corolla. There was a cop inside the car. Big trouble, Pepe. You don’t want anything to do with it.”

“I don’t know nothin’.”

Decker shoved him against the back of the couch, water splashing all over his bare chest. Renaldes’s face went white with fear.

“Will you stop?” I scolded. I got up to get a towel, banging the closet door as I went. I found several napkins purloined from Tasty Taco and gave them to Pepe to wipe off the droplets.

Again I sat next to him. I said, “Renaldes, we have a credibility problem.”

He gave me a blank look.

I said, “I don’t believe you.No creoyou.”

Decker smiled.

I said, “Look you are in very serious trouble.Mucho problemos, usted tiene. Comprendes?” I glanced at my father. “Could you translate this?”

“No need. He understands perfectly.”

“You’re a big help.” I turned to Pepe and pointed to Decker. “He’s crazy.” I pointed to myself. “I’m not. Work with me, Pepe.”

“I was no drivin’ last night. I here.”

“Who can alibi you other than Fuego?”

A blank stare.

My eyes went to my father’s face. “Please?”

Dad asked the question in Spanish.

Renaldes shrugged, shook his head. “I here,” he repeated.

“Alone?” I asked. “Solo?”

“Sí, solo.”

“Bullshit!” my father spat out. He placed his gun on the top of Renaldes’s head.

Gently, I pushed it away and touched my forehead with an index finger. I studied Pepe’s face. His complexion had gone from fire to ice; it was now holding a sickly blue pallor. I said, “Renaldes, I believe you. But he doesn’t and that’s a problem.”

Pepe’s eyes darted back and forth. “I no there. I don’ know!”

Again my father showed him the gun. I chided him with a wag of the finger. To Pepe, I said, “Look, I got an idea. Tell me who owns the car and maybe I can get this guy”-a thumb in Dad’s direction-“maybe I can get him off your back.”

His eyes went from my face to Decker’s. I’m not sure he understood everything, but he sure understood the tone. Dad translated what I had told him. Renaldes turned his attention to me.

“Wha’ car?”

“A Chevrolet Nova. Bronze. Primer on the driver’s side. Tinted windows. Dented. Old.”

Renaldes said, “I don’ know decarro.I don’ know who drive… I no there.Pero si el carro es caliente… if eet’s hot, I know de peoples dat… de peoples dat chop.”

My father and I exchanged glances.

Pepe sensed a reprieve. “I give you denumeros… de address.”

Dad said, “No, you’re going toshowus the address.”

Renaldes looked at me. I regarded my father. “We’re driving a two-seater.”

“So give him a thrill. Sit on his lap.”