The Nightmare Thief (27 page)

He walked to the edge of the asphalt.

The headlights swung around the curve and lit the trees in a white arc. The engine sounded smooth and solid. And big. Gilbert stood at the edge of the road, waved the Maglite, and flagged them down.

A black Volvo SUV, glittering in the rain, pulled into the clearing behind his cruiser.

H
augen braked the Volvo SUV cleanly to a halt. In his headlights, the young sheriff’s deputy leaned into his patrol car, grabbed his radio, spoke briefly, then shielded his eyes and tramped toward him through the downpour.

Sabine had not tensed so much as coiled herself. “What does he want?”

“Information, I presume. That pickup truck possibly belongs to the hikers who entangled themselves in our operation today.”

From the backseat, Stringer said, “I bet you anything you’re right. Why else would it still be running?”

He shouldn’t have said that. And Haugen thought, not for the first time, that preventing Stringer from blurting information at the wrong moment was a tricky task. The man was brave and bold, but stupid.

He looked in the mirror at Stringer. “Keep your mouth shut. You’re Sabine’s brother. We’re on our way to a weekend at a cabin in the Sierras. I’ll do the talking.”

 

 

Amy Tang pulled her car—a girl-racer Honda Civic with low-profile tires and chrome rims, obviously her personal vehicle—to the curb in front of Ma Ratner’s house. For a moment, Tang looked like she didn’t want to leave the vehicle unguarded. She turned off the stereo. Beyoncé went silent.

She and Evan stared at the house—the chain-link fence with the ratty plastic windmills; the cracked sidewalk, and listing concrete steps up to the front door; the dingy porch light.

“You can stay here,” she said.

“To keep Mrs. Ratner’s dog from pissing on your shiny hubcaps? I think not,” Evan said.

They got out into a cutting wind. This was weather, and a neighborhood, that San Francisco hid when designing its tourist brochures.

The windmills sputtered at them. The gate cringed open. Through half-drawn drapes, Evan saw the reflected blue light of the television. Tang rang the doorbell and barking erupted inside.

“Pavlov’s rat,” Evan said.

Tang had her badge wallet in her hand. It was the first thing Mrs. Ratner saw when she opened the door.

Her eyes, behind the cat’s-eye glasses, were the color of cloudy marbles, and as cold. “And here I was hoping you was something less toxic, like sewer gas.”

The dog, Pepito, bounced and yipped behind her. It was wearing a teensy bandanna and a Western-style vest with a little sheriff’s hat and star. Mrs. Ratner’s gingham presence filled the doorway. She frowned at Evan.

“Where’s your badge, Starsky?”

“I’m a citizen. But Lt. Tang is cop enough for both of us.”

Tang put away her badge. “We’d like to speak to your son, Ruben.”

“He ain’t here.”

Pepito continued to bounce around Ma Ratner’s feet. Higher, and more agitated.

“Can you tell us where he is?” Tang said.

“Nope.”

“May we come in?”

“When horses piss champagne.”

From the living room came an eerie sound, otherworldly singing. Wavery, high-pitched. It was cowboy yodeling, an old Slim Whitman record. The sound made Evan’s skin contract. Pepito barked,
yip yip yip,
and pogoed on clicky little dog toes, straight up into the netherworld inside the parachute folds of Ma Ratner’s dress. The barking stopped and the dog dropped to the floor. Cringing, it trotted down the hall, tail between its legs. Ma Ratner continued to glare at Evan.

“You lied before, about wanting to hire Ruby Junior for a party. Go on. Get.”

“I came here earlier because I need to get in touch with Ruby Junior. We have a mutual acquaintance.” Or close enough. “But you chased me away with a forty-five. And now Lt. Tang has a few questions.”

Tang was half Ma Ratner’s size but showed not the slightest sign of feeling intimidated. “The flyer says he’s available not just to haul trash but to tend bar and organize parties. What kind of events—children’s birthday parties? Does his parole officer know this?”

“Get off my property.”

“And I take it you’re his business manager. Have you been forthcoming with prospective clients? Because I have to believe that Mr. and Mrs. Suburban might ask, every once and again, if the dude in the snap-button shirt is a violent felon.”

Ma Ratner muttered something, low and quick.

“What was that?” Tang said.

Evan said, “An Old West endearment. At least, I
think
‘skanky dykes’ is meant to be endearing.”

“Oh.” Tang tilted her head, just slightly, like the flick of a knife. “I can call Ruben’s parole officer. He’d be interested in all of this. Especially in the possibility that Ruben may have left San Francisco without informing him.”

“I never said that. Don’t twist my words.” Mrs. Ratner shifted in the doorway. It was almost tectonic. “He ain’t working a children’s party. And it’s perfectly legal. Don’t you dare make trouble for him with the parole people.”

“Where’s he working, Mrs. Ratner?”

“It’s a twenty-first-birthday party. And he’s on the payroll for a corporate outfit.”

“What outfit?” Tang said.

“Edge Adventures.”

Tang wrote it down. “What kind of outfit is that?”

“They take rich folks on scare-you-silly weekends. To make ’em feel alive.”

“Have a phone number for Edge Adventures?”

“No. But you’re a smart fortune cookie, you’ll figure it out.” Tang scribbled in the notebook and underlined something, hard. “Gotcha.”

Evan heard clicking on the broken cement walkway behind her. Like Pepito’s little claws, but heavier. And breathing. No, snorting. And the clink of a chain.

She and Tang turned in unison.

On the sidewalk behind them in the dark was a dog. Maybe a dog. It came up to Tang’s shoulder.

“This is Calamity,” Mrs. Ratner said. “You’ll be going, now.”

“Call it off.”

“I didn’t summon her. She’s got a mind of her own.”

“Quite the bitch, then,” Evan said.

“You’d know, I expect,” Mrs. Ratner said.

Its teeth showed under the porch light. It looked like a cross between a Rhodesian ridgeback and a razorback hog.

It growled. Evan didn’t think it was a dog.

She turned to Tang. “Shall we retire to your salon?”

“Where we’ll consider warrants, and perhaps call Animal Control. Depending on what happens in the next ten seconds.” She looked pointedly at Ma Ratner.

Mrs. Ratner scratched under her pendulous bosom. Then clapped. “Sit.”

Calamity parked its rear on the cement and sat panting and drooling. Evan and Tang inched down the steps and across the concrete lawn, giving it a generous berth.

Tang opened the creaking gate. Mrs. Ratner called, “You leave my boy alone. You come back here, you’ll need more than a warrant to get in.”

“Thanks,” Evan said. “It’s been a blast.”

The sound of the whining gate worked like a starter’s pistol. From the house, Pepito bolted out the door, straight at them.

“Damn.” Tang rushed to the car and hopped in.

Evan jumped in a second behind and slammed her door. She stared back at Calamity. “What
is
that thing? A
bear?
”

Outside her window Pepito appeared, in pogo mode, leaping up and barking at her.
Yip yip.
Down. Up.
Yip
.

Tang started the engine. “Edge Adventures.”

“Already on it.”

Evan got the number and dialed. Tang put the car in gear. Pepito ran into the street and popped up in front of the grille.
Yip.

Tang braked. Evan gritted her teeth. If they hit the dog, Ma Ratner would wail loud enough to summon folks from her prairie misanthropes reenactment society, wielding pitchforks and branding irons.

On the phone, the call was answered breathlessly by a voice that was young and female. “Terry?”

“Is this Edge Adventures?” Evan said.

“Kind of … who’s this?”

Kind of? “My name is Evan Delaney. I’m with Lt. Tang of the SFPD. I need to speak to someone in authority from Edge.”

Silence, abrupt and shocked. “Police?”

“Miss? Can you connect me to somebody from Edge?”

The brakes shuddered. Pepito landed on the hood of Tang’s car. From the doorway of her house, Ma Ratner gave an anguished cry.

“Pepito. You rammed Pepito.”

She charged down the steps, dress floating.

Tang gaped at the hood. “Get that thing off my car.”

“I’m not getting out,” Evan said.

Pepito yapped at the glass. Then, with its tiny snarling mouth, it sank its teeth into the windshield wiper.

“You have got to be kidding me,” Tang said.

“Go,” Evan said. “Ma Ratner’s coming.”

“Tell her to get the dog off my car.”

Evan leaned across to Tang’s side and hit the windshield wiper switch. The wipers started up. Pepito twisted and flew off the car with a high-pitched yelp.

Tang floored it.

Evan glanced out the back window. Pepito lay on the curb, feet pawing the air, sheriff’s hat cocked askew.

Friday night in the city. Who needed Disneyland?

She returned to the phone call. “Miss—I’m sorry. Are you still there?”

Nerves fizzed in the young woman’s voice. “Is it Terry? Is he okay?”

“I’m putting you on speaker.” Evan hit a key. “Who’s Terry, miss?”

“Terry Coates, my boyfriend. He owns Edge. Is he okay?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because he drove a speedboat out of the marina this morning, and disappeared.”

H
augen kept his hands in sight on the steering wheel. The young sheriff’s deputy walked toward the Volvo, a hand tented over his eyes. Haugen sensed Sabine’s tension, and said, “Happy citizens all are we.”

He put the window down. “Officer?”

The deputy hunched into his heavy winter jacket. His face was round and ruddy. He looked like any of a hundred thousand small-town boys who played on the high school football team and then, to maintain his position of authority, put on a badge. Eager and easily buffaloed.

Sabine was coiled in the passenger seat. Haugen felt her cool energy, husbanded, ready to lash out.

The deputy approached. “Evening, sir.”

“What’s going on?”

“Wondering if you’re on your way up the hill for the first time today, or whether you might have passed by this spot on your way down earlier.”

“We drove up from Los Angeles. Been on the road since this morning. Is there a problem?”

“Couple of people reported missing. That’s their truck.”

Haugen, Sabine, and Stringer dutifully looked at the blue Toyota pickup. Haugen adopted a look of surprised concern.

“What happened?” he said.

“Don’t know. I was hoping you might be able to offer some information.”

“Sorry, it’s a mystery to me.”

“Where are you headed?” the deputy said.

“Up the road a ways.”

“I ask because it’s possible these folks were hiking and got disoriented in the forest. They could have headed in the wrong direction. There’s a trail that meets the road about seven miles uphill. The trailhead’s clearly marked.”

“Understood. We’ll watch for them.”

“I appreciate it.”

The deputy was deliberately avoiding shining his big Maglite in the window—that being a provocative act, indicative of suspicion—but his country-boy eyes were running over Haugen’s face. This rube was sizing him up. He had to play the encounter at the correct pitch. Not disinterested, and definitely not antsy to leave.

Haugen nodded at the hard-driven Toyota pickup. “Who are they?”

“A doctor and an Air National Guardsman from San Francisco.”

Sabine turned at that. “What were they doing up here?”

The deputy paused. He eyed Sabine, which Haugen didn’t like.

“She’s a police consultant. She’s working on an investigation. They probably hiked up that trail there.”

He aimed the flashlight across the clearing. The beam swung toward the trees and illuminated the gleaming rainfall, bright and white. And something else.

The deputy stared. Raised a hand. “Hold on a minute, would you, sir?”

He walked across the clearing, past the blue pickup, focusing the flashlight on a spot on the ground. He stopped.

“I don’t like this,” Sabine said.

“Nor do I,” Haugen said. What was the deputy looking at?

“Go,” Sabine said.

“No.”

“Turn off the headlights and floor it. Get out of here before he gets more suspicious.”

“You idiot, he already has our plate number.”

“He didn’t write it down.”

“But he radioed the station. And look at his dashboard. He’s got us on video.”

Sabine saw the cruiser’s miniature camera, its lens aimed at the Volvo. “This is bad.”

The deputy crouched down and picked up something from the dirt. It was only a couple of inches long. It was brassy colored. He shined the flashlight on it.

It was the casing from a rifle cartridge.

 

 

Evan put the phone on speaker. “You can’t reach Mr. Coates?”

“He’s not answering, or replying to, my messages. Neither is his brother,” said the young woman. “I’m at his place. Calls to Edge’s office phone get forwarded here. That’s why I answered.”

Tang leaned toward the phone. Under the wash of streetlights, her face was grave. “This is Lt. Amy Tang of the SFPD.”

“Oh,” the young woman said. “I’m really worried about him.”

“Is it unusual for him to be out of contact while he’s—what did you say—running a scenario?”