The Night Detectives

7

Among the benefits of being the former sheriff of one of America’s most populous counties was cooperation from other law-enforcement agencies even after you were out of office. An added perk was that Al Kimbrough was a San Diego Police commander. I first met him when Peralta had hired me back at MCSO and Kimbrough had been a detective. He could have stayed and become chief of detectives, but San Diego made him a better offer, one that didn’t include 108-degree May days. Peralta scheduled a meeting with him downtown and complained about the overcast.

“It’s the onshore flow,” I instructed. “The June Gloom.”

“It’s not June.”

I rolled down the window and looked over the bay at one of the aircraft carriers moored at North Island. “It’s cool. I’m happy.”

He handed me a copy he had made of Grace Hunter’s photo. “Why don’t you take the truck and go talk to the boyfriend? Here’s the address.”

I didn’t breathe for about five seconds and handed the address back to him.

“What, you’re showing off your photographic memory to an old man?”

“No,” I said. “I used to live there.” I sat for a few minutes in silence as a big jet going into Lindbergh Field rattled the cab. Sometimes coincidences were serendipity. Not this one. This was creepy. But there was a job to do. “Drop me off at Old Town. I’ll take the bus.”

“That’s nuts.”

“I couldn’t find a parking place, especially for your beast.”

“You can always find a parking place if you’re patient.”

“Not in O.B.”

As I gave directions to Old Town, he shook his head and shrugged. “You’re one weird guy, Mapstone.”

Fifteen minutes later, I was on a half-full 35 bus, rolling down Rosecrans Street, turning onto Midway Drive for the ride across the hump of Loma Portal and into Ocean Beach. Behind us was the bay, ahead was the ocean. I counted twenty Arizona license tags and quit counting. This time of year, San Diego was Phoenix West. Native San Diegans hated the invasion. When I lived here and rode this bus almost every day, I learned not to let on where I was from. The bus started downhill, with the sun beginning to burn off the clouds behind me, toward downtown. But ahead, it was still gray, the vast expanse of the Pacific a sheet of lead blending into the overcast. The Pacific played a trick of the eye, seeming to rise into the horizon, even though we were merely descending a long slope to the ocean.

If you stay on Interstate 8, you’d run right into O.B. But most tourists didn’t. They went north of the San Diego River to Sea World, Mission Bay and the more popular neighborhoods of Mission Beach or Pacific Beach, or they went south on I-5 to downtown. San Diego had changed substantially since I had lived here, but Ocean Beach looked much the same: the narrow streets, quaint and pricey cottages, one-story businesses lining Newport Avenue and the long municipal pier jutting into the ocean. I had lived two lives in San Diego: pre-Patty in Ocean Beach and with Patty in La Jolla.

It reminded me of the old days, getting off at Cable and Newport, and then walking past the business district down to Santa Cruz Avenue. A couple of guys carrying surfboards walked past me, going west. Seagulls passed overhead making their distinctive calls. The old apartment building was still two stories, painted white, and shaped like a U surrounding an interior swimming pool. My unit had been on the second floor. The boyfriend’s apartment was directly beside it. I felt an involuntary urge to check my mail, smiled at it, and walked up to No. 205. The windows were open, as was common here, and the drapes were drawn and partly hanging out.

The loud, angry voice coming from the apartment wasn’t surprising, either. O.B. was an eclectic place, where CPAs lived alongside bikers. Once I had been kept up all night when one of the latter had engaged in an all-night screaming fight with his old lady. Now I would put a stop to it, but I was different then.

The voice was deep and menacing, the dispute involving a woman, money, and perhaps more. The dialogue was generally, “I want Scarlett, motherfucker, and your white ass is out of excuses. Where is she? I need her ass back out making money,” on and on. “You think you can hide from me? Nobody gets away from me. I own her sweet little booty. Now where the fuck is she? Tell me now or I stomp your white ass to death and find her my own self.”

My mind momentarily thought of search warrants and probable cause, but, as Peralta said, we weren’t the law anymore. When I heard a fist connect with flesh, cartilage snap, and a man squeal, I opened the door.

“What the fuck?”

The voice belonged to a very large man with caramel-colored skin, mustard-yellow driving cap, delicately manicured beard, eyes way too small for his face. A Bluetooth device was attached to the left side of his head. He was my height and about a third wider. He wore a black T-shirt proclaiming RUN-D.M.C. Below his shorts were heavy stomp-your-white-ass boots.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“Life insurance.” I smiled.

He raised his shirt so I could see the butt of a semiautomatic pistol in his waistband. Then he advanced toward me, one step, two…

I thrust my hand forward suddenly, open and straight-fingered into the middle of his windpipe. The small eyes burst wide, the cap and Bluetooth flew off, and he was gasping. Both his hands clutched his throat in what we had been taught in first-aid classes was the “universal choking symbol.” Done properly, this was a useful move for incapacitating someone. Done wrong, it would kill him, which was why it had been discontinued by police agencies.

My next move, one second later, was to remove the Python from its shoulder holster and level it at his face.

“See, you never know when you might need life insurance.”

He staggered back. From his open mouth came the sound of an ailing carburetor. His eyes showed the most primal emotions: surprise, pain, and the sense that he was suffocating. It was a testimony to his size and strength that he was still standing. That made me uneasy.

“Move back, asshole.”

He did. When I was all the way inside, I kicked the door closed but made sure I was still facing him.

“Who are you?” This from a skinny, pale kid with bushy red hair, sitting on a sofa. He was probably the only person in O.B. without a tan. He was in pain, clutching his face. Seeing his hands occupied, I ignored him.

“Can you talk now?” I said this to the black man.

“Iiiihhhhhhhhhh.”

I asked him whether he was right- or left-handed. He opened his mouth and showed a gold incisor. He finally managed, “Left.”

“So use your left hand and pull out that gun very slowly and hand it to me.” I knew he was lying about which hand he favored, or at least I took that chance. After I had possession of the Glock, I shoved him back onto the sofa next to the white kid. Gravity did most of the work. Large human objects are easier to push around when they can barely breathe.

“Should’a known you was a motherfucking cop.” His voice was a shadow of its former booming self.

“I’m not a cop.” I kept the.357 magnum leveled at his chest. The barrel was only four inches of thick ribbed steel, but the business end might as well have been the size of eternity.

“Now wait a motherfucking minute.” He held out two big hands, palms facing me and tried to make himself smaller on the sofa, no easy task. His expression changed. He wasn’t worrying about his throat any longer. “Motherfuck! I’ve heard about you. Big guy with a big motherfucking gun…”

I held up my hand. He stopped talking.

“Did you ever consider that repeating the same profanity over and over deprives it of any ability to shock? You might consider trying out a word such as ‘mountebank’ or ‘scoundrel.’”

He lowered his hands and took a deep breath. “Look, man, I got no problem with Edward, man. I’m completely good with him. Why you think I’m here right now? This is between me and this skinny pale-ass mother…” He stopped. “Scoundrel.”

I said, “Who is Tim Lewis?”

“He is.” The black guy quickly pointed to the red-haired kid next to him.

“Then it’s time for you to leave.”

“What about my Glock?”

“Get another one.”

He stood without protest, picked up his cap, and hurried out the door, quietly closing it. I locked it, expecting him to at least be muttering indignation and threats as he departed, but nothing. I heard heavy steps thudding along the concrete, down the stairs, and then they faded. The gate to the street clanged shut.

I waited a few seconds and holstered the Python. “Who is he?”

“I think my nose is broken!” His voice sounded like a teary fourteen-year-old.

“So who broke it?”

“You don’t know? He knows you.” His eyes were curious. “He calls himself AFP.”

My mind did a sort: FDR, JFK, LBJ. I asked again.

Through his hands came a nasal response. “America’s Finest Pimp.”

Get it: San Diego called itself America’s Finest City. I didn’t smile. I leaned against the outer wall and stealthily looked out the drawn curtain. The courtyard was deserted. Nobody was at the pool that dominated the space. Beyond the fence, nobody was on the sidewalk.

From my pocket I produced the photo and held it out. “Do you know her?”

“That’s Scarlett.”

I worked hard to conceal my surprise. “Who?”

“Scarlett. My girlfriend.”

“What’s her last name?”

“Mason. Scarlett Mason. Do you know where she is?”

I nodded, put the picture away, and asked him what problem he had with America’s Finest Pimp.

“I’m really hurting, dude!”

I checked him out in more detail. He might have had the kind of face teenage girls consider cute, at least before his nose had been broken, but to me it looked like a comic-book face, a cross between Archie and Jimmy Olsen. His face was so thin, a vein running up his forehead was prominent.

His body looked rangy and underweight beneath a gray T-shirt, droopy Lakers shorts, and teal flip-flops. A flaming tattoo wrapped itself up his left calf. His fingers, long and slender, were oozing bright red blood from where America’s Finest Pimp had hit him, and now it was dripping onto his shirt. I walked to the kitchen, grabbed a dishtowel, and tossed it to him.

“Where is Scarlett? Please…” His tone was plaintive enough to be believable. I was about to tell him to get some ice on his nose so we could talk.

The next thing I heard sounded like a cat, until it didn’t. My right hand was on the way back to my holster. “Who else is here?”

“The baby.”