Defiled: The Sequel to Nailed Featuring John Tall Wolf (A Ron Ketchum Mystery Book 2) (25 page)

“You’re still thinking about your current deputy chief?”

“Yeah, if he hasn’t gone and found another job. That and if think you can work with him.” Ron killed the motor. The boat drifted forward.

“Some reason we’re stopping out here in the middle of the lake? You going to throw me overboard if I don’t agree to your plan?”

“It was your idea, if I remember right and, no, that’s not why I stopped here. This is the spot where the bomb was when I got to it. Pretty much the deepest point of the lake.”

Keely nodded. Sometimes people needed to revisit the site of a near-death experience just to remind themselves they really had survived. And that they weren’t all that easy to kill.

“You checked the location by GPS?” Keely asked.

Ron nodded.

“We find this bomber,” Keely said. “I’ll shoot him for you, if you want. I would not have been happy to learn you’d gotten blown up.”

The chief smiled, “You sweet talker, you.”

Keely embraced Ron. Looking over her shoulder, he could see a dark smudge on the distant shoreline. The site of the Jade Emperor, darkened by the fire-bombing, was already being rebuilt. The project’s completion date wouldn’t be delayed by more than a month.

Ron turned Keely around and pointed out what he was looking at.

“I’ve come to think of that fire as a course correction. More like what a real eco-terrorist would do. Strike out at a gaudy example of greedy, despoiling capitalism.”

“Whereas poisoning a natural wonder like this lake isn’t their cup of tea.”

“I tossed that detonator over the side right about here. I think Tall Wolf is right; it’s time we got it back. Find out, if we can, whether the timer really malfunctioned or stopped the countdown right where it was supposed to.”

“How deep is the water here?” Keely asked.

“A little over twelve hundred feet.”

“And how would you get way down there?”

Ron was about to tell her when a call came through from Sergeant Stanley.

He wanted the chief to get back to headquarters right away.

Bevin Trent, M.D. was sitting eight feet away from Walt Ketchum at
Patisserie Leroux
when the elderly man toppled from his chair. Trent was a heart surgeon who once a month lived dangerously by consuming a plain croissant at the patisserie. Seeing no point in being entirely reckless, he always brought his medical bag with him.

Trent, an exemplar of good health at forty-two years old, grabbed his bag and leapt to Walt’s aid. He was comforted by the fact that California’s Good Samaritan Law would shield him from civil damages that might otherwise result from his rendering emergency care. He found no sign that the figure on the ground before him was breathing.

In a voice whose calm tone surprised him, he called out, “I’m a doctor. This man is in respiratory arrest. Call 911. We need an ambulance immediately.”

He didn’t notice but it appeared that every diner within the sound of his voice called for an emergency response on their cell phones. He could have told them the diagnosis was heart attack, but he was sure that would be everyone’s first guess.

It was cardiac arrest to be precise. Not only was the man in front of him not breathing, he had no perceptible heartbeat.

Trent began compressing Walt’s chest, performing the CPR in perfect form, doing his best to get the old guy’s heart to start beating again. After thirty seconds of fruitless effort, he popped open his medical bag. By now the people in the café were divided between watching him work and looking for the ambulance. Trent withdrew a syringe from his bag. It was filled with heparin. Its purpose was to break up blood clots. He carried the medicine as his little personal joke. If he ever needed it, he’d just shoot himself up.

The doctor injected his patient. The medical literature said a heart attack victim had a better chance of survival if thrombolytic medication was administered within ninety minutes of the start of the episode. By that measure, Walt’s chances of surviving should have been improved, but he still didn’t resume breathing.

Trent went back to compressing the victim’s chest. He felt he’d been at it for hours by the time the paramedics arrived. In reality, it had been three minutes. He grabbed the paddles of the automatic external defibrillator from the first responder and shocked the old man. He was nonrespondent.

In cases of cardiac arrest without ventricular fibrillation, the heart didn’t respond to electric currents. It required medication. Which Trent had already administered without result. He got into the back of the ambulance and rode with the victim to the hospital, as attempts at resuscitation continued en route.

The ambulance arrived at Community Hospital and the ER team relieved Trent of the victim. They would do all they could for him, of course, might even call on him to assist with the surgery. Except Bevin Trent now felt sure the old man, whoever he was, could have been pronounced dead the moment he fell to the ground.

The old man’s identity remained a puzzle for the better part of an hour. He carried no identification. A call to
Patisserie Leroux
revealed that he’d been a regular customer the past few months but was known only by his first name, Walt.

He’d been friendly and a good tipper, if that was any help.

Walt had seen no need to carry ID. He didn’t drive anymore. He didn’t use credit cards or checks to make purchases. Paid cash for everything. Didn’t like to owe money. Didn’t want government snoops to know every last thing he’d bought.

His fingerprints were scanned and that would have turned up both Walt’s career with LAPD and his service in the army. Before that could happen, a cop working a traffic accident that had sent two teenagers to the hospital had spotted Walt as he was being wheeled from the ER to the morgue. The old man’s face was covered but his left hand was exposed. The cop thought the wedding ring he saw looked familiar.

“Hold on,” he told the orderly. When the man complied, the cop took a look at the dead man’s face. “Jesus Christ,” he said, “this is Chief Ketchum’s father.”

Art Beltran had been the cop who’d taken Walt Ketchum to the mayor’s house when the old man had forgotten which way was up. The orderly directed Beltran to the doctors who’d tried to resuscitate the victim. Learning the cause of death and that he’d been the first one to identify Walt Ketchum, Beltran found a quiet room and called the news in to Sergeant Stanley.

For just a moment, Beltran’s news produced only silence.

“You there, Sarge?” he asked.

Sergeant Stanley’s voice came back, as on top of things as ever.

“I am, Officer Beltran. Thank you for letting me know. I’ll make the notification.”

The first call Sergeant Stanley made was to Mayor Steadman.

Ron saw Clay Steadman waiting for him on the police dock as he cut the engine and let momentum carry the patrol boat forward. Even by the standards of a man who had earned his fame and made his fortune by looking grimmer than any reaper, the mayor’s countenance was one of desolation. Abandon all hope, his eyes said.

The boat bumped the dock and as waiting cops tied off the lines, Ron’s heart all but stopped.“My father?” the chief asked. “He’s really …”

Clay nodded. He extended a hand to Ron. Helped him jump onto the dock. Put an arm around his shoulders and walked him into the Muni Complex, whispering the details of what had happened.

Keely watched them go, tears running down her cheeks.

Sergeant Stanley did for her what the mayor had done for the chief.

Provided comfort, support and information.

She noted the flag flying over the Muni Complex was already at half staff.

John Tall Wolf and Abra Benjamin pulled into the parking lot at Goldstrike’s government center bumper to bumper. In keeping with the manners his mother had taught him, Tall Wolf let Benjamin take the closer available space, opting for the more distant one. Showing consideration not common among rival federal agents, Benjamin waited for Tall Wolf before starting for the Muni Complex’s main entrance.

She told him, “I took the precautions you suggested, in case we need more hands on deck before we’re through here. I gave more than a few people back in Washington the willies by making my requests. My boss even suggested we move the assets in close, in case we need them. A plane should be landing in Reno within the next several hours.”

“A 747?” Tall Wolf asked.

“Wouldn’t be surprised. You think about it —”

They both saw the flag flying at half staff at the same time.

Looked at each other and said in unison, “Who died?”

As if in answer, Clay Steadman and Ron Ketchum emerged from the building.

It was easy to see who the bereaved was. The mayor raised a hand and a gleaming black SUV pulled up in front of him and Ron. They got in and drove off.

Benjamin said, “Who do you—”

Tall Wolf remembered helping the elder Ketchum.

“My guess is it’s the chief’s father.”

“Damn.”

The feds saw Keely and Sergeant Stanley step outside. Keely was still crying and the sergeant looked like the mayor’s understudy in bleakness. The sergeant and the retired LAPD detective stood face to face, talking in tones Tall Wolf and Benjamin couldn’t hear.

Tall Wolf said, “You believe in the power of work to heal all wounds?”

“That’s about all I believe in,” Benjamin replied.

The BIA and the FBI approached the locals to remind them they all had jobs to do.

Under the direction of Sergeant Stanley, the Goldstrike PD stepped up the effort to find Helios “Sonny” Sideris. He hadn’t checked out of the Renaissance Hotel but a review of the security videos showed no sign of him on the premises since Tuesday morning. So he hadn’t returned to his room in over forty-eight hours.

He’d left a valid credit card number — Marjorie Fitzroy had checked that — on file with the hotel. So it wasn’t like he was trying to run out on his room charges; he was continuing to pile them up. Sideris had no criminal record so there was no reason for him not to check out like any normal guest would do.

Abra Benjamin and four of Goldstrike’s finest paid a visit to Sideris’ room.

Maybe he’d just kept to his room and was a real heavy sleeper.

Turned out, there was a Please Do Not Disturb card hanging from the doorknob of his room. A quick check with hotel housekeeping showed that the request had been honored. Had the card been left in place one more day, it would have been reported to management.

The assistant manager on duty offered to let Special Agent Benjamin into the room. She chose to call a federal judge in the district court and get a search warrant over the phone. The real possibility that Sideris might have delivered radioactive waste to a domestic terrorist persuaded the jurist that urgency was required.

Making the most of the moment, the FBI agent also asked for and received permission to search the safe deposit box Sideris had recently rented at Sierra National Bank.

Having obtained judicial permission to snoop, Benjamin and the cops entered Sonny Sideris’ hotel room. It was in serious need of tidying. Every drawer in the room’s dresser and desk sat on the floor. The bed’s box springs and mattress leaned against a wall. Light fixtures sat on the desktop. The room’s digital combination safe had been hit with a blunt object hard enough to pop its door open.

The bathtub, where Benjamin thought she might find a body, was empty.

The rest of the room was also free of human remains.

But somebody had been looking for something that Mr. Sideris had possessed.

The extent of the search suggested it might have been unsuccessful.

The jumble spoke of both determination and frustration.

Tall Wolf, being the sharing soul that he was, had told Benjamin whom he suspected had been working with Sideris. Almost made the FBI agent felt guilty about being so personally ambitious. Almost but not quite. A girl had to do what she had to do.

Especially after she’d let herself get knocked up.

She had the room sealed and left a cop to guard it.

Another review of the security videos would be needed. Someone had entered Sideris’ room to conduct the search. If the hotel’s door locks had been upgraded to protect against hacking, that would lead Benjamin to think the searcher had used Sideris’ key-card to gain access to his room.

If that was the case, it was a good bet Sonny-boy was dead.

Next up was the safe-deposit box at the bank.

Sergeant Stanley was orchestrating the larger search for their wanted man from police headquarters. Feeling a momentary impulse of collegiality, she called the sergeant and asked if he’d like to be on hand when she opened the box. He said he’d be at the bank in a flash.

Benjamin felt an immediate pang of regret.

Shared credit was diminished credit.

Damn that Tall Wolf, she thought.

Him and his subversive goody-two-shoes influence.

As long as she’d been suckered, though, Benjamin gave Sergeant Stanley the first look at what was in the safe-deposit box. His eyes widened and a look of avarice washed over them. He reached a latex-gloved hand into the box and brought out a shining object too big for him to close his fingers around. That didn’t stop him from trying, though.