"Well," Henderson said, "here he is now."
The sheepish man stepped up to his boss. "Mr. Henderson."
"Billy," the owner said. "This's..."
"I'm Kathryn Dance, CBI." Her ID rose.
"Billy Culp," the young man said absently, staring at her ID. Eyes wide, perhaps seeing an opening door to a jail cell.
She ushered him away from the others. The owner sighed, hitched up his belt, gave it a moment more, then vanished inside. His blood kin joined him.
"Could you tell me about parking the truck here last night?"
The young man's eyes shifted to the club. "I came back this morning to help. I was thinking maybe I could help. But there was nothing to do." A faint smile, a hollow smile. "I wanted to, really bad."
"Mr. Culp?"
"Sure, sure. I had a run to Fresno, came in empty about seven. Parked there. Spot ten. You can't see clear. The paint's gone mostly. Wrote down the mileage and diesel level on my log and slipped it through the slot in the door, put the keys in the drop-box, there. Call me 'Billy.' 'Mr. Culp,' I start looking for my father."
Dance smiled. "You parked there and set the brake and put the truck in gear."
"I always do, ma'am. The brake, the gears." Then he swallowed. "But, fact is, I was tired. I admit. Real tired. Bakersfield, Fresno, here." His voice was unsteady. He'd been debating about coming clean. "I'm pretty sure I took care of things. But to swear a hundred percent? I don't know."
"Thanks for being honest, Billy."
He sighed. "I'll lose my job, whatever happens. Will I go to jail?"
"We're just investigating at this point." She noted a wedding band. She guessed children too. He was of that age. "You ever forgotten? Gears and brake?"
"Forgot to lock up once. Lost my CB. My radio, you know. But, no." A shake of his head. "Always set the brake. Never drive my personal car, I've had a single beer. Don't cruise through yellow lights. I'm not really smart and I'm not really talented at a lot of stuff. I'm a good driver, though, Officer Dance. No citations, no accidents were my fault." He shrugged. "But, truth is, yes, I was tired, ma'am. Officer."
"Jesus, look out!" Henderson shouted, calling through the open office door.
Billy and Dance glanced back and ducked as something zipped over their heads. The rock bounded over the asphalt and whacked the tire of another rig.
"You fucking son of a bitch!" the man who'd thrown the projectile shouted.
A group of a dozen people--mostly men--were walking fast up the incline from the direction of the club. Another flung a second rock. Dance and Billy dodged. The throw was wide but if it had hit the projectile would have cracked a skull. She was surprised to note that most of the crowd were well dressed. They seemed middle-class. Not bikers or thugs. But their expressions were chilling; they were out for blood.
"Get him!"
"Fucker!"
"You're the fucking driver, aren't you?"
"Look! Over there! It's the driver!"
"Police," Dance said, holding up her ID, not bothering with specific job titles.
Civ-Div...
"Stop right there."
Nobody paid the least attention to her. She looked for help from Holly or other fire department workers. Their vehicles were still parked outside the club but they weren't visible. Probably inside.
"You asshole! Killer."
"No," Billy said, his voice choking. "I didn't do anything."
Suddenly the group was joined by others striding fast from the impromptu memorial site near the roadhouse. Some started running. Pointing. They numbered about twenty now. Faces red with anger, shouting. Dance had her mobile out and was dialing 9-1-1. Getting through on the direct line to Dispatch would have taken too long.
She heard: "Police and Fire Emergen--"
Dance gasped as the tire iron spiraled straight for her face.
Chapter 9
Billy tackled Dance as the metal rod zipped past.
They both collapsed on the ground. Then he yanked her to her feet and together they hurried toward the office door of Henderson Jobbing. She completed her call, officer needs assistance, and twisted back, shouting to the approaching mob, "This is a police investigation! Disburse now. You will be arrested!"
And was greeted with another missile--a rock again. This one connected, though obliquely, with her left forearm, not far from her watch, which had shattered in the CBI parking lot. She cried out in pain.
"Arrest him!" called the burly blond woman she'd met earlier, the one whose fiance had been so badly injured.
"Arrest him? Fuck him up!"
Now the crowd caught up with them. Several of the men pushed Dance aside and shoved Billy backward, their palms slamming into his chest.
"You are committing a crime! There are police on the way." To a person, everyone ignored Dance's warning.
One man, with trim, businessman hair and wearing a dark-blue gym outfit, sprinted up and got right in their faces. Livid, he stuck a finger in Billy's chest and raged, "You parked there to take a crap or something! Or smoke weed, right? Then ran off." When Dance pulled him away he turned on her. "Oh, and fuck you, Officer! Why isn't he under arrest?"
"No, no, I didn't do anything. Please!" Billy was shaking his head and she saw tears in his eyes. He rubbed his chest from the finger poke a moment ago.
Others were swarming them now. Dance held her shield up and this resulted in a momentary stay of the madness.
Dance whispered, "This's going to blow up. We've got to get out of here now. Back to the office."
She and Billy pushed around those immediately in front of them and kept walking toward the door. The crowd followed behind them, a hostile escort. She told herself: Don't run. She knew if they did, the crowd would attack once again.
And though it was impossibly hard, she kept a slow, steady pace.
Somebody else growled, "Give me five minutes with him. I'll get a confession."
"Fuck him up, I keep saying!"
"You killed my daughter!"
They were now thirty feet from the office door. The crowd had grown and everyone was shouting insults. At least no more projectiles, other than spit.
Then one short, stocky man in jeans and a plaid shirt sped forward and slugged Billy in the side of the head. He cried out.
Dance displayed her shield once more. "You. Give me your name. Now!"
He laughed, grabbed the badge and flung it away. "Fuck you, bitch."
She doubted that even a weapon brandished would have slowed them down. In any event she had no Glock to draw.
"Fuck him up! Get him!"
"Kill him."
"Her too, bitch!"
These people were insane. Animals. Mad dogs.
"Listen to me," Dance shouted. "You're committing a felony! You will be arrested if you--"
It was then that the crowd's control broke. "Get him. Now!"
Some were picking up rocks, one had another tire iron.
Jesus.
She ducked as a large stone zipped past her ear. She didn't see who'd thrown it. She stumbled and ended up on her knees. The crowd surged forward.
Billy yanked her up to her feet and, hands over their heads, they sprinted to the office door. It was now closed. If Henderson had locked it, well, they could very well be dead in a few minutes.
Dance felt the full-on panic, an antelope hearing the rhythm of the lion's paws moving closer and closer.
The door...
Please...
Just as they arrived it swung open. Billy turned and this time a rock hit its target square. It slammed into the man's jaw and he gave a sharp cry. Blood poured and it was obvious he'd lost a tooth or two and possibly suffered a broken bone.
He staggered inside and collapsed on the floor, gripping his mouth. Dance stumbled inside too. The door slammed shut behind them and Henderson locked it.
"I called nine-one-one," the office manager said.
"I did too," Dance muttered, looking at Billy's gash. "They should
be here soon."
She looked out the window, her hands shaking, heart pounding audibly.
Panic...
The crowd had ganged at the door. Their faces were possessed. She thought of the time when a crazed Doberman, off its leash, charged her and her German shepherd, Dylan, on a walk. Only pepper spray had stopped it.
No reasoning, no escaping.
Dance grimaced, noting that Henderson was holding a revolver, a Smith & Wesson, short-barrel .38 Special. Ambivalent in his hand.
"Put that away."
"But--"
"Now," she snapped.
He set the weapon back in its drawer.
A rock smashed into the side of the office, a huge sound, thanks to the metal walls. Chunks of concrete, as well. Two windows broke, though no one tried to climb in. More shouts.
Dance regarded Billy, whose eyes were closed from the pain. He held a towel, filled with ice, against his swollen face. Henderson's relative had brought it.
Looking out through a broken window Dance could see flashing blue-and-white lights.
And just like in the Solitude Creek video of last night, the madness vanished. The mob that'd been ready to lynch Billy and break Dance's skull turned, separated and were walking away, making for their own cars, as if nothing had happened.
Fast, so fast. As quickly as they'd become enraged they'd calmed. The possession was over with. She noted several of them drop the rocks they held; it seemed some of them didn't even realize they were holding the weapons.
Squad cars from the MCSO eased to a stop in front of Henderson Jobbing. Two sheriff's deputies climbed out, surveyed the scene around them and walked inside.
"Kathryn," said the woman deputy, a tall, striking Latina. The other, a squat African American, nodded to her. She knew both of them well.
"Kit, John."
"The hell happened?" Kit asked.
Dance explained about the mob. She added, "You could probably get a few collars for assault and battery." A nod toward Billy and she showed her own rock-bruised arm. "I'll leave that up to you. I'm not processing criminal cases."
Kit Sanchez lifted an eyebrow.
"Long story. I'll witness, you need it."
John Lanners, the other deputy, looked over Billy Culp's shattered face and asked if he wanted to press charges against anyone in the mob. Billy's mumbled words: "I didn't see anyone."
He was lying, Dance could see. She understood, of course, that it was simply that he didn't want any more publicity as the man responsible for the Solitude Creek disaster. And his wife and children...they too would be targeted.
Dance shook her head. "You decide."
"Who's running this? CBI or us?" Lanners asked, nodding back to the roadhouse.
Sanchez said, "We don't care. Just, you know..."
"Bob Holly's here, for the county, so I guess you are." Dance added, "I came to check licenses." She shrugged. "But I decided to stay. Ask some questions."
Lanners wiped sweat--he was quite heavy--and said to Billy, "We'll call in some medical help."
The driver didn't seem to care, though he was in significant pain. He wiped tears.
Lanners pulled his radio off his belt and made a call for the EMS bus. The dispatcher reported they'd have one there in ten minutes. Dance asked Lanners, "Can you go with him?" She added in a whisper, "It's like there's a price on his head."
"Sure," he said. "And we'll give his family a call." The deputy too must have noted the wedding band.
Dance swiped at her own injury.
Kit asked, "You all right, Kathryn?"
"It's..."
Then Dance's eyes focused past the deputy, to another sign on the wall. She pointed. "Is that true?"
Henderson squinted and followed her gaze. "That? Yeah. Saved us a lot of money over the years."
"All the trucks?"
"Every single one."
Kathryn Dance smiled.
Chapter 10
The man Ray Henderson was going to sell out, the man the crowd ten minutes ago was ready to lynch, was innocent.
It took only five minutes to learn that Billy Culp was not responsible for the tragedy at Solitude Creek.
The sign Dance'd seen on the wall of Henderson Jobbing, not far from where the driver sat, miserable in his heart and hurting in his jaw, read:
WE know you Drive safely.
Remember: Our GPS does too!
Obey the posted Speed Limits.
All the Henderson Jobbing trucks, it seemed, were equipped with sat nav, not only to give the drivers directions but also to tell the boss exactly where the drivers were and how fast they'd been going. (Henderson explained that this was to protect them in the case of hijacking or theft; Dance suspected he was also tired of paying speeding tickets or shelling out more than he needed to for diesel fuel.)
Dance got permission from Bob Holly and the county deputies to extract the GPS device from Billy's truck and take it into the Henderson office. Once it was hooked up via a USB cord, Dance and the deputies looked over the data.
At 8:10 last night, an hour after Billy had parked and gone home, the GPS unit came to life when the diesel was turned on. It registered movement northward--toward the roadhouse--of about one hundred feet, then it stopped and shut off.
"So," Kit Sanchez said, "somebody drove it into position intentionally."
"Yep," Dance said. "Somebody broke into the drop-box. Got the key. Drove the truck to block the club doors, shut the engine off and returned the key."
"I was home then!" Billy said. "When it happened, eight o'clock, I was home. I've got witnesses!"
Henderson and his perhaps nephew diligently avoided looking at either Dance or Billy Culp, now knowing that the man they had wanted to throw under the...well, truck, was innocent.
"Security cameras?" Dance asked.
"In the warehouse. Nothing outside."
Too bad, that.
"And the key to the truck?" she asked.
"I've got it." Henderson reached for a drawer.
"No, don't touch it," Dance said.
Fingerprints. Forensics didn't much interest Kathryn Dance but you had to treat physical evidence with consummate reverence.
"Shit. I've already picked it up."
John Lanners, the MCSO deputy: "There'll be plenty of prints on it, I'd imagine, but we'll sort it out. Take yours for samples. Find the ones that don't match Billy's or the other drivers'."
In gloved hands, Kit Sanchez collected the key fob from the offending truck and put it in an evidence bag. Dance knew in her heart, however, there was no way Crime Scene would find any prints from the perp. He or she would be a person who took precautions.
Ironically, just after Dance had been shifted from criminal mode to civil, the administrative matter she'd come here about, taxation and insurance certificates, had just turned into a crime. A felony. Murder. Perhaps even a terrorist attack.
She said to Sanchez and Lanners, "Can you declare this a homicide? I can't." A wry smile. "That's the long story part. And secure the scene. The drop-box, the truck, the oil drum, the club. Better go for the parking lot too."
"Sure," Lanners said. "I'll call Crime Scene. Lock down everything."
With a warble of a siren, a county ambulance pulled up and parked in front of the office. Two techs, large white men, appeared in the doorway and nodded. They spotted Billy and walked to him, to assess damage and mobility.
"Is it broke, my jaw?" Billy asked.
One tech lifted off the icy and bloody towel. "Got to take X-rays first and then only a doctor can tell you after he looks over the film. But yeah, it's broke. Totally fucking broke. You can walk?"
"I'll walk. Is anybody out there?"
"How do you mean?"
Dance glanced out the window. "It's clear."
She and the others stepped outside and helped the scrawny driver into the ambulance. He reached out and took Dance's hand in both of his. His eyes were moist and not, Dance believed, from the pain. "You saved my li
fe, Officer Dance. More ways than just one. God bless you." Then he frowned. "But you watch yourself now. Those people, those animals, they wanted to kill you just as much as me. And you didn't do a lick wrong."
"Feel better, Billy."
Dance found her shield, dusted it off and slipped it into her pocket. She then returned to the roadhouse. She'd tell Bob Holly what she'd discovered but keep the news from Charles Overby until she'd done some more canvassing.
She needed as much ammunition as she could garner.
As she approached the gathered press and spectators outside the club she glanced toward a pretty woman TV reporter, in a precise suit, interviewing a Monterey County firefighter, a solid, sunburned man with a tight crew cut and massive arms. She'd seen him at several other fire and mass-disaster scenes over the past year or so.
The reporter said to the camera, "I'm talking here with Brad C. Dannon, a Monterey County fireman. Brad, you were the first on the scene last night at Solitude Creek?"
"Just happened I wasn't too far away when we got the call, that's right."
"So you saw a scene of panic? Could you describe it?"
"Panic, yeah. Everybody. Trying to get out, just throwing themselves against the door, like animals. I've been a firefighter for five years and I've never--"
Chapter 11
S een anything like this."
"Five years, really, Brad? Now tell me, it looks like the doors, the fire doors, were unlocked but they were all blocked by a truck that had parked there. A tractor trailer. We can see...there."
Antioch March lifted his eyes from his present gaze--the pillowcase of fine-weave cotton, six inches from his face--and glanced at the TV screen, across the bedroom here in the sumptuous Cedar Hills Inn in Pebble Beach. The camera from the crew outside the Solitude Creek roadhouse panned to Henderson Jobbing and Warehouse, which was all of ten miles from where March now lay.
A mouth beside his ear: "Yes, yes!" A moist whisper.
On TV, the anchor, blond as toffee, came back into high-definition view. "Brad, a number of victims and relatives of victims are accusing the driver of the truck of negligently blocking the doors, accusing him of parking there to go to the bathroom, or maybe even sneaking in to see the show last night. Do you think that's a possibility?"
Solitude Creek Page 5
