Tried & True (Mayfield Cozy Mystery Book 5) (12 page)

CHAPTER 16

I’d trusted Josh with my life more than once. I wished I hadn’t questioned his judgment this time either. Good thing I hadn’t been able to object out loud while we were trailing the Mongrels because now I got to share in his satisfaction.

“I knew it.” Josh thumped the gas tank with his fist, his whisper fierce but excited. “I knew they’d have to unload.”

We were parked beside a sturdy mail box unit at the edge of an unlit road—the kind of mail box with a dozen individually lockable compartments that is installed by the post office to consolidate the delivery location for a bunch of addresses in order to make life easier for rural mail carriers. The box was posted at the base of a private road that wound deep in the chaparral. We were in one of the hollers that still occasionally exist in the midst of the Bay Area’s urban sprawl, a valley probably originally settled by ranching families who had held their ground all these years.

It was easy to tell which house and barn belonged to the bullied acquaintance of a patched Mongrel—just follow the line of single red taillights.

“I knew it,” Josh murmured again. “With such short notice, Ebersole had to use the local chapter to run this mission. And while they all have a few screws loose, they do have the sense not to carry their full armory around when they’re finished. They also have the sense not to keep their weapons—aside from maybe a knife and a single handgun—in their own homes. Probably because most of them are felons. You know, felon in possession…it adds time to any new prison sentence.”

He twisted on the seat to look at me through the gap created by his open visor. “They had to stash their stuff somewhere. So they’re dropping off their weapons, then they’ll report to Ebersole or maybe Butch, and then they’ll party. I wonder if the ATF knows about this place. How would you feel about getting one more three-letter federal agency in on the fun? Because ATF is maniacal about gun crimes. I’m sure they’d find something in that barn to get all riled up about.” It was too dark to really see his expression, but his gleeful tone told me everything I needed to know.

I chuckled softly. “Your call—all yours. But I can definitely see the possibilities. Oh—wait! Wait.” So much for advance planning. There was no way I would have ever heard my phone ring or felt it vibrate. And this was the first placid moment we’d had since the Mongrels had introduced themselves to Freddy Blandings. I frantically patted my pocket, found the zipper pull, and check my phone.

No messages, no missed calls. I wondered if Judge Trane was waging mental battle over my case or enjoying a delicious, candlelit dinner with her husband.

“Nothing.” I shook my head at Josh.

“Good. ‘Cause we’re about to have company. Hang on.” Josh fired up the bike.

I cast a quick glance up the winding road and saw a line of white headlights aiming our direction. I decided on the spot that stealth is a feature I’d gladly pay premium for in a motorcycle. Pity no manufacturer has thought to offer it yet. Hopefully, the Mongrels wouldn’t notice us due to the roar of their own exhaust pipes in their ears.

But, boy, that Kawasaki could fly.

oOo

My night wasn’t over yet. I have a pretty good navigational sense of the Bay Area, but I had no idea where we were. Of course, things look very different in the dark. Plus, we’d been technically off-road for the past couple miles, traversing a rutted, hard-packed dirt track.

Josh cut the engine, motioned for me to hop off, and rocked the bike up on its kickstand. There were a few city lights on the horizon, the edge of one of the suburbs. Then a gap of darkness which was likely terrain too rough to build houses on or, possibly, privately owned. But the capstone of the view was a brilliantly lit fortress on a hillock.

Even from our distance, I could see that it was surrounded by several layers of barriers—an inner decorative stone wall, a thicket of shrubbery then a razor-topped fence, then a graded dirt road with the occasional headlights of a patrolling vehicle, then another, lower fence of posts strung with barbed wire which looked similar to what you’d see surrounding ranch land—all particularly well-illuminated. It looked like a prison in a third-world country. The kind you’re allowed to leave only in a body bag.

I had to remind myself I was still in the United States, not on a trip to visit an orphanage in some remote Central American region that enjoyed a fragile stability due only to the benevolence of the local drug lord. I’d seen several such orphanages in my tenure as the director of Skip’s charitable foundation, and I’d always had to fight the futile urge to smuggle all the children out and flee in the night.

Because we most certainly would have been caught, and I would have made the plight of those children even worse. I had to hope the criminals who were trying to burnish their images in their home territory with do-goodism would continue holding to that particular course if they got a little support from us. I was a stickler for making sure any money from Skip’s foundation did actually reach the children in the form of nutritious food, clean water, new bedrolls, educational materials, etc. But I never enjoyed the negotiation process.

It’s amazing how convoluted the unseen connections underlying nonprofits and charities can be, even (maybe especially) in democratic countries—how political and ultimately motivated by selfish gain those ties are, at their roots. Duplicity and hypocrisy hidden under a thick veneer of faux altruism.

That same swirl of uneasiness passed through me as I viewed the isolated mansion and all its trappings of paranoia.

Josh tapped on my helmet, and I pulled it off. “This is Felix Ochoa’s compound,” he whispered near my ear. “We’re on a Forest Service road, and believe me, tomorrow morning his security chief will be researching all Kawasaki Ninjas registered within a hundred-mile radius based on the tire tracks we’ve left up here.”

“That’s a lot of effort for a little privacy,” I muttered.

“No one really knows the last time Ochoa left his compound. There are rumors that he hires body doubles, sometimes sending out two at the same time, in opposite directions, to test the responses from his enemies and possibly from law enforcement.” Josh shrugged, bumping my arm. “But none of those doubles has ever been identified, let alone questioned, nor has anyone volunteered information about the practice as a confidential informant. It’s all speculation of the kind that escalates and expands further from the realm of truth with every retelling.”

I just nodded, knowing, yet again, that we couldn’t afford to linger. I took one long, final look—trying to memorize my Numero Uno’s outer shell, letting this repulsive reality settle into my gut—and climbed back on the bike.

oOo

Saturday was a long day. Good but interminable at the same time. Because it was consumed with waiting.

The good part was that I got to spend much of that waiting time with my dad. Not that he ever really registered my presence. I chose to hover on the periphery instead of dogging him as I had done the day before. He still made the rounds, but he seemed less agitated. It was like watching a wild creature pacing in a zoo enclosure—circling, prowling for any breaks in the boundary so he could make a run for it. Dad provided a stark contrast with Felix Ochoa who voluntarily chose to confine himself under similar conditions. Frankly, they were both delusional.

Which made me wonder if my tactics were going to work on Ochoa. Could I reasonably expect to motivate him, either by preying upon his own fears or through greed? Would a combination of the two be potent enough to elicit action? But worrying about it didn’t make it so—either way.

I shared a cup of coffee and a long chat with Arleta, who was back on duty. She did a lot to set my mind at ease about Dad. She’d seen the full spectrum of Alzheimer’s progression in her many patients over the years, and she knew where he was headed. It wasn’t a pretty prospect, but I’ll take the hard truth over euphemism any day.

“Send him pictures,” Arleta urged. “Tangible images he can hold in his hands and tack up in his room. He won’t remember your name, or even your face, but the residents here often still have the sense that they know something, even if they can’t locate the word associated with that knowledge anymore. That sense of familiarity is reassuring to them. He’ll enjoy being able to look at the pictures on his own schedule, when he’s ready.”

Special Agent Antonio Hackett had also drawn weekend duty, and he popped his shaved head into the nurses’ station. His dark eyes lit up at the sight of Arleta, but then he saw me and that dampened any enthusiasm that might have been brewing on his part. He gave me a stiff nod and backed out of the room.

Arleta flashed her brilliant smile and shook her head. There was a general pinkening of her dusky cheeks, but she continued as though the minor interruption hadn’t occurred. “I know it sounds juvenile, but you could also try sending your dad a few stuffed animals. They’re great companions and listeners, and sometimes the residents just need something soft and fuzzy to cuddle with.”

I could definitely relate to that form of comfort. And isn’t that what Walt—and I, with my recent addition of miniature donkeys—had done for the boys? Give them something to take care of—creatures absolutely dependent on the boys’ responsible actions and kindness for their wellbeing? We all need to be needed.

But Arleta wasn’t masking her distraction very well. I grinned and leaned forward on my elbows. “So are you going to marry him?” I’m really good at asking the impertinent questions.

“We’ve only known each other a few weeks, Nora!” She tried to sound offended, but the flush was back in earnest.

I pulled one of Clarice’s tricks out of my arsenal and pitched my eyebrows at her, a knowing half-glare in my gaze. I felt the expression work its magic on her, and I hadn’t even practiced it in the mirror.

Arleta chewed her lip, trilled her fingernails on the desktop for two seconds, and admitted, “Well, if he asks me.” A look of panicked terror streaked across her face, followed by a wide smile, and she blinked as though surprised. “I guess.” Maybe the knowledge was as much a revelation to her as it was to me.

I grinned into my coffee cup. “He will.”

May all my prophecies come true.

oOo

Sunday was much the same as Saturday, and I thought I would go crazy. Waiting is not my forte. And I was homesick in the worst fashion.

The hours crept by. Just how long did it take for a judge to make a decision? Any why didn’t she have any more questions for me? I would rather have been grilled all over again than stare at the walls of my hotel room for another second. And let’s just say that daytime television is inane twaddle beyond all description.

I punched the off button on the remote and jumped up from the rumpled bed to pace between the large window overlooking the hotel next door and the closet. I wore a groove in the carpet.

When phone rang late in the afternoon, I pounced on it, not bothering to check who was calling. “Yes?”

If someone replied, I didn’t hear it, because there was so much mechanical wailing and rattling in the background.

“Hello?” I hollered.

“Nora?” Loretta’s voice was a faint whisper. “We’re on our way to the hospital.”

“What? Who?” Panic swelled in my throat.

“Des and me. We have Tarq loaded in Des’s Jeep. He couldn’t breathe, Nora. I didn’t know what else to do.” Loretta broke into rough sobs. “He was struggling to breathe, thrashing.”

I gripped the bathroom doorjamb to keep from sagging to the floor. “Okay, okay. Shhhh,” I murmured into the phone. “Okay.” The nonsense words were for my benefit as much as for Loretta’s, to give me time to form thoughts. “Des is with you?” Of course, I knew the answer—the wailing siren in the background confirmed it—but I wanted the solid foundation of reliable information before I tried to process the dreadful facts.

“There wasn’t time to wait for an ambulance. Are you coming home?” Loretta whimpered. “He wants to see you before—before—”

“Yes,” I said firmly. “Yes. Now. Is he awake for—for this?” How horrible. I held my breath, waiting for Loretta’s answer.

There was murmuring and rustling, then her voice returned. “Des helped me get him comfortable, lying in the back of the Jeep. I’m holding his hand. He knows I’m talking to you. Come home, Nora.”

“Call me back after you get to the hospital. I’ll let you know which flight I’m on.” I hung up and stood staring blankly at the white walls and generic furniture which distorted into wavy lines through my tears.

Move. Move. Move. I’d collapse in a permanent puddle of grief if I didn’t get moving.

CHAPTER 17

I did what any lost soul would do in that situation—I called my executive assistant. Through my blubbering Clarice figured out exactly what was needed and issued a string of commands that jolted me out of my teary stupor and into the productive task of packing.

Which took two minutes.

And then I was stuck pacing again, waiting for another phone call. Any phone call. Either to tell me that Tarq was safely admitted to the hospital and breathing successfully with the assistance of all their fancy equipment or that I had a flight reservation to whisk me home as quickly as possible. Or both. I desperately wanted that phone to ring twice.

Still, when it did ring, I just about jumped out of my skin. “How is he?” I pivoted, narrowly missing dead-ending in the open closet.

“I don’t know about him, but I’m fine, Ms. Ingram-Sheldon. Thanks for asking,” Judge Trane said evenly.

“Oh,” I gulped. “I have to go.”

“I don’t know in what sense you mean the word
go
, Ms. Ingram-Sheldon, but as I explicitly and rather forcefully requested earlier, you will need to meet with me before you leave the city. Can you be in my chambers by six o’clock? Theo will have the documents ready by then.”

I said what I had to, to get her off the line. “Yes.”

“Excellent.” She hung up abruptly.

Which had been my goal. But documents? What documents? The judge’s decision had dropped so low on my priority list that I hadn’t thought to ask about the fate of Turbo-Tidy’s bankruptcy case.

I’d reached the other side of the room and pressed my forehead against the window. On the street below, traffic flowed between the two tall rival hotels in fits and spurts of red taillights, as though it was lifeblood pulsing from a wound.

The phone in my hand rang again. This time I remembered to check the caller ID. “I have bad news,” I said by way of greeting.

“Worse than Tarq being hospitalized?” Clarice snapped.

“No. Yes—maybe. I have to meet with the judge before I can leave. I won’t be able to slip out of town unnoticed now.”

“What time?” I could hear Clarice’s fingers clicking rapidly over a laptop’s keyboard. She was as steady as granite.

I tried to absorb some of her calmness. “Six.”

“No problem. I wasn’t able to get you on a flight until 7:56 p.m. anyway. But the airport’s almost an hour away from the judge’s chambers, so it’ll be up to you to make that meeting short. Got it?”

I swallowed and nodded, then remembered she couldn’t see me. “Yeah.” I’d wanted to board a plane immediately, but the days of chartered flights were long gone. I was constrained to the schedule of commercial airlines.

“I’m getting you town car service for the next few hours. Better than a taxi since they’re paid for their time instead of their mileage. It’ll be at the door to your hotel in about twenty minutes. Tell the driver you’ll tip him handsomely if he exceeds the speed limit.”

“Thank you,” I murmured.

“Call me every step of the way, girl. I’m sitting right here in front of this computer until you set foot in May County. I’ll get you whatever you need.”

“I know.” I quietly hung up and wondered why I’d ever left Mayfield. Was chasing down a mobster worth this separation from all I held dear? Well, almost all. Dad was my only tie to San Francisco now, but he too was fading away from me.

My focus shortened, and I became aware of my own reflection in the glass. It was a ghostly image, and I barely recognized myself, even though my scar formed a startlingly white streak above my lip. What would it take to make time stand still?

But I couldn’t afford to stand still. I turned off all the lights, slung my carry-on bag over my shoulder, and swiped the room key card off the table. I was halfway down the hall toward Josh’s room when my phone rang.

My stomach clenched into tight knots as I slumped against the wall to answer it.

“We’re here,” Loretta murmured. “At the hospital. They have Tarq hooked up to all kinds of machines. Beeping and clicking. Tubes.”

I wanted more than anything to be able to wrap my arms around her.

“They gave him some kind of sedative. He’s breathing okay now,” she continued. “But they won’t let me sit with him—” Her voice trailed off into soft sobs.

And then I understood why she was so distressed. The separation was worse for her than Tarq’s medical emergency. Because she was determined to be there for him, no matter what.

“Can I talk to Des?” I asked. I needed particulars and an objective analysis, and I just couldn’t bring myself to put Loretta through that kind of interrogation. Earlier, I hadn’t suggested that she contact Des if she needed help because he was so often working, away on patrol or holed up in his office. But I should have known he’d make himself available for Tarq.

There was a brief moment of swooshing white noise, then Des came on the line. I didn’t have to utter a word. He launched into a concise description of Tarq’s status without preamble, calmly and slowly, with reassuring words like “stable” and “resting comfortably.”

But then there was a pause and Des’s voice lowered. “He won’t be going home, Nora. The doctor says this is the beginning of the very end. He won’t live long enough now to set him up with hospice care. Loretta doesn’t know that yet. Do you want me to tell her?”

I groaned. “Did the doctor say how much time?”

“A few days, at the outside, since Tarq has refused a feeding tube. But his lungs are fairly clear right now. There should be time for you to get here, but these things are never really predictable.”

“I understand,” I whispered. My hands were shaking. I asked to speak to Loretta again, just so I could tell her I loved her. It was no longer possible to say those words too often, to anyone.

I pounded on Josh’s door. He opened the door with a phone pressed to his ear, took one look at my face, and told the person on the other end of the line that he’d call back.

He had returned the motorcycle to his friend who was going to quarantine it in his garage for a few weeks. Which meant Josh was also without transportation at the moment. But he insisted on accompanying me to Judge Trane’s office and the airport in the town car Clarice had ordered.

We were silent in the backseat of the sleek black Lincoln, my carry-on bag wedged between us. I felt as though I was inside a thick bubble that shaded my whole view gray—I was watching the city zip by the window without really seeing it. Sounds were both sharper and duller at the same time, and everything was happening to somebody else who happened to be residing in my body.

Josh nudged my shoulder, dropping me like sack of cement back into the present tense. “Would you like some good news?”

I turned to him, struggled to bring his serious brown eyes into focus, and nodded dumbly.

He leaned over my bag and spoke in a low voice, so the driver wouldn’t overhear. “I spent most of the day on the phone, gleaning information from my friends at law enforcement agencies in the area. The party at Blandings’ house was for his wife’s birthday. No one was hurt, although he does have a wicked Mongrels bulldog logo carved into his front door. Three people inside the house dialed 911. Four neighbors also called 911. One of those calls was a hang up.” Josh smirked. “That would have been the FBI surveillance team just making sure help was on the way. They didn’t want to reveal their presence by stepping into the fray themselves.”

I bit my lip and interlaced my fingers in my lap. As much as I disliked the guy, I hoped Blandings—and his wife—weren’t terribly traumatized. My main concern was how he would interpret the Mongrels’ message—and if he would act upon it.

Josh patted my knee. “All in all, last night went down the way it should have. The whole thing. It was a good idea. But there’s something else.”

I glanced up at the eagerness in his voice.

“The ATF is very interested in the barn we found near Emeryville. The property is owned by a dispatcher for the California Highway Patrol.”

My jaw dropped. “Uh, conflict of interest?” I blurted. “But that would explain how Ebersole’s been able to operate with so few repercussions for so long—if he has advance warning of raids, or even of investigations. He might have similar connections in other agencies too.”

“Exactly. So my friend at ATF is going to keep this knowledge strictly in house. They don’t want to raid the place immediately. And when they do, they do it on the sly, with only their own team to execute the search warrant.”

“Baiting the trap after it’s already been sprung. You know what I think about that,” I muttered. “Patience doesn’t always pay off—at least not the way you hope it will.”

“The more charges against him, the longer he’ll go away for.”

Josh had a point. Ebersole wasn’t a young man anymore. Maybe the threat of a hefty sentence that would leave him behind bars for the rest of his life would encourage him to turn the tables on his organization. Maybe self-interest would usurp loyalty. It wouldn’t be the first time. Ebersole demanded loyalty from others, but I wasn’t sure he gave that much in return.

“I’m going to stay here for a while, keep tabs on things.” Josh peered at me, his face lit intermittently by the headlights of passing cars.

“Thanks for everything.” I reached over and squeezed his hand. “Everything.”

“Wouldn’t have it any other way, Nora,” he replied. “You’ve given me a chance to clear my name, helped me clarify my own goals. It’s been a good ride.”

I chuckled at that, and felt some of the muscles in my abdomen relax. A good ride, both literally and figuratively.

“Let’s get you out of here.” Josh opened his door and stepped out of the car.

I hadn’t even noticed that we’d stopped, but the solemn glass and concrete monolith that held Judge Trane’s chambers loomed over us.

An elderly security guard with a handgun holster and a walkie-talkie clipped to his belt let us in at the main entrance—a much cleaner and more welcoming portal than the delivery dock we’d used earlier, with manicured plants in decorative containers and a few weirdly modern sculptures that I thought might have been expected to double as seats in the lobby. He quickly relocked the door behind us. He’d obviously been given instructions about our arrival, and he ushered us past the empty reception desk to a bank of elevators where one set of doors yawned open.

That waiting cavity made me think of Jonah’s whale, like a vessel sent to retrieve us and then propel us onward toward the mission, intact but repentant. I shook my head. Clearly, the pressing surge of worry and apprehension and hope and grief and—I couldn’t even name all the emotions that seemed to be eddying about my knees—was also befuddling my gray cells.

The security guard was either mute or didn’t feel the need to be sociable. He was a small, thin-boned man, and he watched us with a tense bouncing on the balls of his trim feet as though he expected us to take flight at any moment. Once we had obediently entered the elevator, he reached inside and pressed the button for the seventeenth floor. The closing doors narrowed my view of him until he was gone.

“Bet that was a first for him,” Josh murmured.

“What do you mean?”

“Letting people into the building late on a Sunday without signing them in or asking to see their ID. It’s so far against regulations, he’s probably wondering if he’s going to get fired. If anyone finds out, that is.”

I frowned at Josh. “We didn’t sign in before either.”

“Exactly. We’ve never been here.” A slight grin angled across his face. “I’d say that bodes well for Judge Trane ruling in your favor. For this to work, it has to look like it was all her decision and you had nothing to do with it. So your name will not appear on anything in this building—not on visitor logs or noted in any records of official proceedings. How does it feel to be invisible?” He playfully poked me in the side. “Because this is as close as you’ll ever get.”