She was getting married next month to an old college sweetheart. He wished her well.
Activity at the inn. A car—plain, gray, probably a rental—pulled in. A woman in jeans and a dark-colored jacket, her head
covered with a scarf, got out and went into the office. She returned quickly, retrieved a bag from the car, and entered Room
19, next to Craig’s.
Mick took out his binoculars, noted the license plate of the car. Jotted down her time of arrival.
Half an hour later another inconspicuous sedan arrived. White this time. A man in jeans and a parka, its hood pulled up and
resting low on his brow, got out and went to register. When he came out, he moved the car and entered Room 21, to the other
side of Craig. Mick noted down the plate number and time.
For an hour after that, nothing happened. It was getting cold on the clifftop: icy gusts of wind ruffled his hair and permeated
his leather jacket. Finally he started the Harley and drove into the inn’s parking lot. The pleasant woman at the desk agreed
to give him Room 22.
“That’s the second request I’ve had today for a certain room number,” she said. “Man came in this morning and took Room Twenty,
said he was meeting two associates; he described them and asked they be put on either side of him. Said not to mention he
was here—it was a surprise. You a member of his party, too?”
“Yes, ma’am, I am.” He wanted to ask her the names all three had registered under, but didn’t want to arouse her suspicions.
“Any good takeout places that deliver around here?”
“There’s a pizza joint, but I wouldn’t recommended it.” There was an ominous tone to her voice.
Mick was glad he always carried a couple of nutrition bars. It could be a long night.
T
he second of the Bill Delaneys turned out to be Callie O’Leary’s attorney. He had his office in the front room of his shabby
Victorian on Shotwell Street in Bernal Heights, two blocks from All Souls’ former headquarters. When Rae came to his door
and said she was an investigator hired to locate Callie so she could claim an inheritance left her by her grandmother, Delaney
let her in, but the small eyes that peered out of poochy folds of flesh were shrewd and wary.
He probably didn’t believe her but hoped there might be something in it for him.
Delaney urged her to take one of his clients’ chairs and sat behind his old oak desk. The room’s sagging shelves were lined
with law books, but the bindings looked brittle and were faded by the sun coming through the unshaded bay window. The air
smelled of dust and stale cigar smoke; the collar and cuffs of Delaney’s blue oxford cloth shirt were frayed. Rae felt much
better dressed in her jeans and sweater.
“So Ms. O’Leary is an heiress,” Delaney said, folding his stubby-fingered hands on a file in front of him.
“I wouldn’t put it that way, but the sum is substantial for a… woman of her means.”
“And how would you know about Ms. O’Leary’s ‘means’?” “I’ve been to her last address. And from what people tell me, she was
a hooker.”
Delaney frowned reprovingly. “A sex worker, Ms. Kelleher. There’s a difference.”
She ignored his correction. “Can you provide me with Ms. O’Leary’s present address?”
“She doesn’t wish it to be made known. She calls me periodically, however. Perhaps you could leave the check for the inheritance
with me, and I’ll hold it for her.”
Right. Did she look like she had an IQ of twenty?
“Sorry, no. First she’ll have to sign some documents in the presence of a notary.”
“Then I can’t help you, Ms. Kelleher.”
“Will you at least pass on a message asking her to call me?” Rae extended one of her cards.
“Certainly.” He took it, tossed it carelessly on the desk, and stood up. “More than anything else, I’d like to see my client
financially secure and out of her present dubious occupation.”
Sure he would. But only if she’d go halves with him.
When she got back to her car—a lovely black BMW Z4 that Ricky had given her on her birthday two years ago—Rae checked her
cell phone for messages. One from Ted, asking why the hell she’d missed the staff meeting, and another from Maggie Lambert
of Victims’ Advocates. She wanted a report.
The Advocates had their offices only a few blocks away on Valencia Street. Rae decided she might as well go there and talk
with Lambert in person.
The offices were up a dimly lighted, mildewy-smelling staircase above a taqueria. While many blocks of Valencia Street were
now lined with good restaurants and chichi shops, the economic upturn hadn’t reached this pocket of poverty. At the top Rae
pushed through the door and entered a room full of cast-off furnishings. Maggie Lambert—short, gray-haired, and clad in faded
jeans and a red flannel shirt with one button missing—sat at her desk leafing through a thick file. When she looked up and
saw Rae, her face became stern.
“Rae, thank you for coming. Is there any progress in the Angie Atkins case?”
Trust Maggie to get right to the point. Rae said, “I’ve got a lead to that friend of hers I told you about—Callie O’Leary.”
“And that’s it?”
“Her attorney will put us in touch when he hears from her.”
“This is very unsatisfactory.”
Rae bit back a tart retort about asking a lot of someone who was working pro bono. Said, “I’m not happy with it myself. If
I could talk with Callie, she might be able to tell me more about Angie. From the police report, I gather that’s not her true
identity, but there’s no guarantee she told Callie anything other than her street name.”
“What about dental records? DNA? Did you ask the police about them?”
Maggie must’ve been watching too many episodes of
CSI
. “In order to compare dental charts, you need to have some idea of who the victim was. DNA samples were taken and stored,
but they didn’t match any in the current databases.”
“So exactly what is it you intend to do?”
“Wait for Callie O’Leary’s attorney to call. Talk with the investigating officers at the SFPD again. Comb through my files
for overlooked leads. Especially anything that may connect this case with my employer’s shooting.”
Maggie’s face softened. “How’s she doing?”
“As well as can be expected. In fact, I’m going to visit her now: even though she can’t speak, I suspect she’ll be a great
source of inspiration.”
I
closed my eyes after Rae left my room. Even with brief naps I was exhausted. Besides Hy and her, I’d had three other visitors:
Julia, my sister Charlene, and my brother John. Enough already.
I was beginning to understand the routine of this place. The sun was slanting low on the eucalyptus grove, which meant the
nurse would soon come in, check my vital signs, catheter, and feeding tube, and turn me onto my other side. I’d doze, and
when I woke Hy would be there. He’d leave late, and then there’d be another visit from the nurse. If I was lucky, I’d sleep
deeply for a few hours. If not, I’d face my demons alone in the dark.
My demons were large and numerous: looming figures from the past, including the dark one who had shot me. Vague shadows of
the future—fleeting, unreal, frightening. And my present…
Good God, is
this
going to be my life?
No. No way I could face that.
So what’s your alternative? Suicide?
I’d always considered suicides to be cowards, heedless of the damage they did to those who loved them. Leaving messes behind
for others to clean up, as my brother Joey had done when he’d overdosed on booze and drugs in a lumber-town shack outside
of Eureka. On one level I hated Joey for the pain he’d inflicted on my family members and me—particularly for causing the
shadows that, even on a happy day, never left my mother’s eyes. But Joey had been facing demons he apparently couldn’t control;
now, facing my own, I began to wonder if he hadn’t done us, as well as himself, a favor.
And if I were to remain in this state indefinitely? No way I could endure that. I’d rather just check out.
But California didn’t have an assisted-suicide law. And asking assistance from someone I loved—namely Hy—would put a terrible
burden on him.
Besides, I wanted to live. I’d reached a point in my life where I could say I was happy and looking forward to a good future.
At least I had been, until someone fired a bullet into my skull.
I felt the rage bubble and boil over again. I wished I could scream invectives, hit something, smash the vase of roses placed
prominently within my range of vision.
Slowly I regained control. Calm and purpose returned. I would not die a suicide, even if it was possible, because that would
be giving in to the scumbag who shot me.
I began going over everything I’d been told so far, hunting for a lead that might ID him.
Slow, soft footsteps creeping toward me. Then a noisy rush.
Flash of light. Pain, pain, pain.
Chains pulling at me.
I wasn’t dreaming; it was another hideous, very real flashback.
H
e waited under the shelter of the Cessna’s high wing, in his tie-down space at Oakland Airport’s North Field. The afternoon
was clear but windy—windy enough to make the wings of the neighboring aircraft, a homebuilt, creak and groan. After a while
a man cut through the rows of planes and approached him: near six feet five, heavily muscled, wearing a brown leather flight
jacket as battered as Hy’s own and a plain blue baseball cap pulled low on his forehead.
Len Weathers, an acquaintance from the old days in Bangkok. Weathers kept a Cessna Citation here at the field, and Hy and
he had exchanged nods over the years, but they’d never spoken. Neither wanted to acknowledge those old days, and Hy didn’t
want to acknowledge Weathers because of what it was rumored he’d become.
The word was that Weathers freelanced as an enforcer for various unsavory elements in California and Nevada. Among his alleged
services were kidnapping and murder for hire. The same forces that had operated in Southeast Asia during the post-Vietnam
era—greed, ruthlessness, and preying upon the weak and helpless—had affected both him and Hy in vastly different ways. Hy
had returned with a load of guilt and nightmares enough to last his lifetime and—in time—a desire to make the world a better
place. Weathers had continued in an ugly, downward spiral.
Hy had been certain he’d never again exchange a word with Len Weathers. But now he needed one of the man’s services.
Weathers ducked under the wing. Shook Hy’s hand. Said, “I understand you’ve got a problem.”
Hy had relayed his desire to talk with Weathers through one of the line men at the fuel pumps.
“Yeah,” he replied. “My wife—”
“I know what happened to your wife.”
“Her agency and I are working on finding whoever did it.”
“How does that concern me?”
“It doesn’t until we find the person.”
Their eyes met and held, each man taking the other’s measure. Hy flashed back to Bangkok: Weathers had been a hotdog pilot
for K-Air, the flight service Hy was employed by, and a tough man. But there’d been a good-natured, humorous side to him.
Now there was no trace of that; he was cold and hard and exuded the scent of danger.
Weathers also had not aged well; although he was only in his forties, his face was deeply lined. A scar from a knife fight
in Bangkok cut crazily across his forehead, and Hy had noticed a limp as he approached. A few more years and he’d look like
an old man.
What happened to you, Weathers? What happened to
me
that I’d be standing here about to ask you to do this thing?
Well, he knew what had happened to him. McCone had been shot and might die.
“Okay,” Weathers said after a moment. “You want me to take him or her out?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because this person is mine. But I want to know if I can call on you if there’s a problem.”
“Call on me any time you want. I’ve got to warn you—I don’t come cheap.”
“I don’t care about price; it’s dependability I’m after.”
“Deal.” Weathers held out his hand.
Hy took it, thinking, My God, I feel as if I’m shaking hands with the Devil.
H
e’d spent the afternoon replaying the videos he’d taken from Harvey Davis’s condo. Young women and major players in state
and city politics, engaging in all sorts of explicit sex acts. No clue as to who the women were—save one—but surprise and
outright shock about the male participants. By the time the doors opened and closed in the rooms to either side of him, he
felt both grim and outraged. Dirty all over again.
He picked up the earpieces to the listening devices he’d earlier installed.
Supervisor Amanda Teller sighed, unzipped her travel bag, and ran a bath.
Representative Paul Janssen went out for ice, opened a bottle and poured into what sounded like one of the plastic glasses
provided in the bathroom. A chair groaned.
Teller bathed. Janssen drank. Craig fiddled with the volume on the earpieces and their connections to his recorders.
The phone rang in Janssen’s room. “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll be right there.”
Noises from Janssen’s room; his door closed and his footsteps went toward Teller’s unit. He tapped on the door, and seconds
later was admitted.
“Good trip down?” she asked.
“As if you care.”
“No need to be hostile in these beautiful surroundings.”
“Why not? Did you hear about Harvey Davis being killed?”
“Yes. Poor man.”
“That’s all you can say? Don’t you understand what his murder means to you and me?”
“Suppose you spell it out.”
“Harvey knew, or maybe only suspected, what was going on. But he was an insatiable information gatherer; the reason he was
shot is that they knew he had those videos. If they know you’ve figured it out—”
“Don’t be nonsensical, Paul. I didn’t tell Harvey anything he didn’t need to know.” Teller paused, and there was a rustling
of papers. “I have the document right here. I’ll go over it with you.”