Swift Vengeance

by T. Jefferson Parker

  Quickly followed by a fresh Tweet from newly minted @Caliphornia Dreamer, his avatar now changed to a janbiya raised in a black-gloved hand. All people of the Book rise up against America, this whore of Satan. The martyr Hector is smiling on us from Paradise! Forty-eight hours!

  Then a YouTube video from Caliph2ReVenge of Kenny Bryce’s head on his bed, and narration in Caliphornia’s strangely inflected, surfer-Arabic English: Two down and one left to go. Pleasant dreams to you tonight, Lindsey, and all the unclean infidels you mate with!

  YouTube took it down after five minutes, but it was already in the ether, the damage ongoing.

  Which of course unleashed speculation on the identity of “Lindsey.” A specific woman or even man? A generic nickname for . . . a Western woman? A nonbeliever? An old lover? A prostitute? Why her, specifically?

  Minutes before midnight, Frank Salvano, the tall and now haggard Western Region JTTF director, took to the lectern again while the cameras flashed and whirred. This time he had a large monitor beside him and a remote in his hand.

  “We have identified two suspects in the murder of FBI agent Darrel Blevins in San Diego this evening,” he said.

  The monitor blipped to life with a blowup of smiling Ben Azmeh and Kalima Amin, the image downloaded to Taucher’s phone by well-meaning Marah Azmeh. Their names were superimposed beneath them. Salvano spoke their names anyway, and said their last-known address was an apartment in Santa Ana. Next came an outdated DMV mug of one Ben Adams sporting dreadlocks and a humorless glare—clearly Ben Azmeh. Then a State Department head-and-shoulders photograph of solemn Kalima Amin, staring out from behind her hijab with just a hint of contempt.

  “This picture of Kalima Amin was taken from her application for a fiancée visa, issued by our State Department in 2016,” said Salvano, the TV lights flashing on his glasses. He described the suspects physically and said they were last seen at approximately 6:30 p.m. leaving the parking area on Tuna Lane in an older white Ford Taurus, near the Unconditional Surrender statue on San Diego’s waterfront.

  “Ben Azmeh is an American citizen,” he said. “Kalima Amin is a Syrian national in this country legally. They are armed and violent and should not be approached. Azmeh has pledged bayat—an oath of allegiance—to Islamic State. If you have any information on these suspects, call the number at the bottom of your screen immediately. If you’re having trouble seeing it, the number is . . .”

  I watched and drifted. Watched and drifted.

  Tired as I’d ever been.

  Willing to hit back but no target.

  Taucher’s desperate request for action gnawing inside.

  I knew I wouldn’t sleep, not with Blevins’s blood under my nails and on my clothes and in my nostrils, my flesh held together by Burt’s neat stitch, and the kaleidoscope of gore turning relentlessly in my mind’s eye, with the threat of more upon the land.

  This land.

  Made for you and me.

  42

  JUST AFTER ONE in the morning I went to the barn and attacked the heavy bag with an anger I hadn’t felt in years. Not since the day that Justine went down into the ocean in her pretty pink airplane. I was too tired to be sharp. Wondered what it would be like to step into the ring at thirty-nine. Foreman a champ at forty-five. When I couldn’t throw any more good punches I jumped some rope and raised my heavy arms again to the speed bag.

  Then shaved and showered and grabbed a handful of Oxley flyers.

  I drove the dark curving streets of greater Fallbrook, stopping here and there to post a new one or replace a rain-faded original. It felt right to be doing something helpful. Something optimistic. Something. When I had covered miles and miles—trees and power poles and fences and the walls of buildings downtown—I drove to Los Jilgueros Nature Preserve, where Lindsey had twice met her son.

  The preserve’s gate was closed and locked, so I parked my truck out of the way and jumped it. The moon was up and the sky was clear and I walked the dirt trails under the sycamores and the young oaks, past the spindly flowerless stands of matilija poppies and the dying-back sage and the wild buckwheat gone brown and brittle with fall. I stopped and listened and looked. Tammy Bellamy had been quiet these last few days, and I sensed surrender. How good was my chance of finding Oxley here? About as good as luring Caliphornia into the open again, I thought.

  Since when was hope foolish? Even just the hope of finding a cat?

  It angered me that hope was foolish.

  I wanted to knock out Caliphornia with an uppercut. Feel his jaw cave in and see his lights go out. Hate on an empty stomach. I wouldn’t finish him off, though. I’d call Taucher. Or maybe just 911. Nation of laws. Roland Ford: model citizen.

  I continued down the wide dirt road to the first pond, black and twinkling under the moon. Stopped and listened to a great horned owl hooting from the woods. Then heard the mate answer back—notes on the hunt, spoken in their own language. Something splashed near the close shore. Too cold for the frogs and birds. I wondered.

  Sat on a bench donated in memory of a Fallbrook boy who’d died young. I knew nothing about him. I sat with my back to the water so I could oversee the central meadow.

  What was this, looking for a lost cat while a terrorist stalks your city? The end of hope?

  Then, the beginning of an idea.

  Maybe just the idea of an idea.

  You will know me again before forty-eight hours have passed . . .

  Lindsey, and all the unclean infidels you mate with . . .

  Lindsey. Forty-eight. My shy idea approached, brushed against me, then vanished.

  What I really wanted to do was get Hall Pass 2 into the sky at first light and fly her up to Mammoth, go fishing for a few days. Nothing like a rainbow trout dripping silver water in the sun of a Sierra day.

  Maybe ski, too. On the slopes I’m graceless but fast. Size is your friend going downhill if velocity is what you’re after. After that, dinner and wine in a good restaurant. Maybe get a farm-raised version of the trout I let go. Talk to a pretty waitress.

  Or I could just go dancing in San Diego, right here close to home. I know the dance clubs and I have a calendar of the amateur ballroom competitions. I’ve done fairly well in some of them. Always content on a dance floor, so nice to be moved by music and to move with someone.

  But instead, I sat on a boy’s memorial bench and looked out at the pale meadow. Let my eyes relax and tried to dismiss the brutality of the day, to let something like light come to my mind, something good or promising or optimistic, something like Oxley luxuriating in the moonlight, studying me with his hypnotic green eyes. Anything. Anything but what I’d seen.

  * * *

  —

  I thought of you, too, as you know I often do. I always start at the beginning. It’s like getting to meet you all over again. The way you smiled at me when we met, at that awkward holiday party at the Grand Hyatt downtown. The big storm coming and you there with a friend and I alone. Of course, I liked the way you looked in the red party dress and your sleek red hair and your green eyes and the smile that gave up little and withheld much. And I said something male and witless, which you pointed out but seemed to forgive. Justine Timmerman. I landed in the public defender’s office about the time you ditched the sheriff’s . . . Right then, from the very beginning, we were Timmerman brains and Ford brawn and we were happy with that arrangement, weren’t we?

  And, as you know, after that first night together, life changed. Went in a fifth direction. How can something so surprising be so right? Love just mowed down the opposition, trampled everything in its way, left me panting but eager to keep up. Those two years we had—from the time we first laid eyes on each other until God and Hall Pass took you down, Justine—those were us. Young and passionate and fearless. Our own soap. Not everyone gets that.

  I clearly remember what you said to me about death once: that you w
eren’t afraid of dying, only of being forgotten. Rest assured—smart, funny, courageous, skeptical, sweet, lovely woman—you are not forgotten. I’ll carry you as long as I live.

  Want out? Sure you do. Here you come. There you are. I’ve missed you.

  * * *

  —

  Later that morning, as I looked out my window to the first chill light of five o’clock, it came to me. Knocked right on my front door and introduced itself.

  A way to Caliphornia. Not through Raqqa 9. Not through the Warrior of Allah. Rather, through someone who had recently done some work for Caliphornia. A licensed professional. A man who once told me he wanted to wake up and feel blameless for a day.

  I found the contact and dialed.

  “Ford,” said Bayless. “Can you believe that shit?”

  “This is important, Jason,” I said. “I want you to Telegram Hector Padilla.”

  He chuckled sleepily. “I doubt he’ll answer.”

  “I’m hoping his boss will,” I said.

  “Explain.”

  “Were your Telegrams with Hector group-messaged?”

  Bayless was quiet for a few seconds. “Yeah. Someone calling himself Andrews was in the chain but he never participated. Why?”

  “Hector wanted very specific information about Lindsey for his boss, right? Not just her address, but the layout of my place, which rooms were hers. Who the other tenants were. When she might come and go. Hector said she might not need a place to live for very much longer.”

  “That’s when I pulled the plug,” said Bayless.

  “Plug back in,” I said. “Because you have that information now. It took you some time and it will be expensive, but you’ve got it and it’s for sale.”

  “To his boss. Andrews.”

  “Andrews wants it for something evil that we can prevent,” I said. “Interested?”

  “Is he part of the attack last night?” he asked.

  My turn for a moment of consideration. Sometimes the most persuasive thing you can offer is trust. “You bet he is.”

  “Then I’m more than interested.”

  “Can you be in my Main Street office in two hours?”

  Next I called the number that Frank Salvano, special director of the Western Region JTTF, had given out. Got put on hold for half an hour. Told Agent Camille Rodriguez that I had specific information about the San Diego terrorist Caliphornia that I would give only to Frank Salvano.

  Salvano was on the line within half a minute.

  * * *

  —

  Three hours later, Taucher, Salvano, Jason, and I were anxiously loitering in my Main Street office, each of us lost to the private thoughts and uneasy tedium that cops and PIs come to know so well.

  It had taken us only minutes to compose and send Jason’s Telegram solicitation to the deceased Hector Padilla. The Telegram had been received. Now we could do nothing but hope that Caliphornia, emboldened by a night of bloodshed and terror, would answer Bayless soon.

  Another hour crept by. The manager of the Dublin Pub sent us up some breakfast, two plastic bags’ worth, coffee and flatware, too. I always pay cash and tip heavily.

  I was halfway through the egg-and-corned-beef scramble when Jason dropped his fork to his plate, stood up, phone in hand. “Ladies and gentlemen, we have a Telegram from Andrews.”

  Taucher pumped a fist.

  Salvano raised an eyebrow.

  I felt a wave of relief wash over me, followed by a wave of dread.

  “‘I am Hector’s employer,’” said Jason, reading off of the screen. “‘Need photos of property and house where Lindsey is staying. Not macro Google Earth but detailed close-up photos, TWO OF WHICH must contain Lindsey. Need view from road, entrance, gate, fences. Need gate code. How many residents/tenants? Landlord is still PI Roland Ford? Does he live there? What security company? Alarms? Neighbors near? Dogs? How much money for this? Need all by five thirty p.m. today or no deal.’”

  Jason lowered the phone. “Son of a bitch,” he said, as if baffled. “It worked. And he’s in a hurry.”

  All eyes on me. Salvano and Taucher already on their phones.

  “Tell him no problem,” I said. “And charge him a lot.”

  * * *

  —

  Over the next hour we helped Jason photograph Rancho de los Robles on his phone. I kept the Irregulars out of the shots, causing them concern and curiosity. Told them I’d explain all of this later. Jason photographed Lindsey coming out of her casita and playing Ping-Pong against an unpictured opponent. She seemed anxious and uncertain. We left Zeno out of the frame. Jason shot the road and the gate and the keypad. I helped him write up a brief paragraph about the tenants and landlord, keeping us as vague and inconsequential as possible. No, landlord Roland Ford no longer lives on the property. No, the other four tenants have no firm schedules and are often gone. None are apparently employed. Lindsey Rakes almost never leaves the compound. No alarm system, no dog, neighbors not a factor. Charge: fifteen hundred dollars. Photos and gate code to come, will accept cash, credit card, or PayPal. Andrews said he would have cash delivered after receiving the images. Bayless accepted, based on Hector’s record of prompt payments in the past.

  Such a strange thing to be luring terror into your home, as if it was something you couldn’t say no to.

  It was just after three o’clock when Jason hit send.

  43

  I CALLED A MEETING of the Irregulars. Taucher, Salvano, Jason, and I waited at the picnic table under the palapa, overlooking the pond.

  Burt sat right down and asked us what the plan was and how he could help.

  “We won’t be needing any help,” said Salvano. “But you’ll all need to be out of here in the next couple of hours.”

  Burt shook his head. “I’d reconsider that if I were you.”

  Salvano looked ready to say something, but Grandpa Dick and Grandma Liz arrived, each holding the other’s hand and a large cordial glass filled to the salted brim with red liquid, sprouting a celery stick and a lemon wedge. Liz introduced herself and husband to my guests and offered to make them one of her “military-grade Bloody Marys.”

  No takers. So she and Dick sat down with us, Dick noting that he could spot federal employees “from miles downwind.” No one had said anything about federal employees, so I had to take him at his word.

  “What a gift that must be,” noted Taucher.

  Dick gave her a wry smile.

  Next came Clevenger, recently awakened for the day. His hair was a mess and his face looked weighted. He plopped down across from Burt. “Another long night chasing coyotes,” he explained. “Never even heard one.”

  “Any sign of Oxley?” asked Liz.

  “No Oxley today,” said Clevenger, rubbing his forehead. “The Oxster is a goner, Liz. We all know that.”

  “I choose hope over defeat,” she said.

  The agents and Jason looked at one another like this must be code for something, plainly puzzled by the Irregulars.

  Lindsey came down last, Zeno plodding along big-footed beside her, ears up for all the new faces. She wore one of her cowgirl uniforms: Ariats and pressed jeans, a blue yoked satin blouse with white piping and mother-of-pearl snaps, a belt like a boxing champ would hold over his head.

  Taucher stood and offered her hand. “I’m Joan Taucher. Nice to finally meet you.”

  Lindsey smiled apologetically. “Thanks for everything you’ve done for me.”

  “Thank you for trusting us,” said Joan.

  “I’ve been trying to hold up my end,” said Lindsey. I knew she was talking about her son, and the unopened bottles of Stolichnaya still sitting in plain sight on her kitchen counter. This according to Burt.

  “Nice dog,” said Taucher. “We had Cane Corsos when I was a kid.”

  Lindsey sat at one end of th
e long table, Zeno beside her, facing the rest of us.

  “Is this everybody?” Salvano asked me.

  “Everybody who counts,” said Dick.

  Salvano stood. He looked taller than he did on TV, his face leaner and stronger. Exhaustion and anger still showing through.

  “You need to move out for a few days,” he said. “There’s no safe way we can make this arrest with all of you fine citizens at risk and in the way. I assume this isn’t a problem.”

  “Reconsider,” said Burt. “Knowing that there are five total tenants here, what will our boy make of such emptiness? When you trap an animal, you scent the trap so it smells right. In this case, so it looks right.”

  Salvano looked sharply my way, displeased that Burt knew what was going on. “Nonsense,” he said.

  “I found Burt’s logic convincing,” said Dick. “Though I have no idea what you’re all planning.”

  “We can’t plan anything with you people in our way,” said Salvano, sitting down. He seemed to sense he was in for a long fight. “But I can tell you that we’ll be arresting a very dangerous individual. Perhaps two. They will certainly be armed and dangerous.”

  “The couple from the bombing last night?” asked Clevenger. “Here?”

  “I did not say that,” said Salvano.

  “You wouldn’t be here for anything less,” said Dick. “Not after last night.”

  “The terrorists?” asked Liz. “I’ve got a sharp carving knife. I’ll stay right here and help!” She raised her glass and drank.

  “You’re exactly what we’re afraid of,” said Salvano.

  Lindsey looked at me questioningly. “Roland? Explain to them.”

  “There’s no damned explanation necessary,” said Salvano, “because I’m in—”

  “Let me do this,” I interrupted. I told them everything. From that day in April of 2015 when the Headhunters killed nine innocents to last night’s terrorist attack in San Diego. From Caliphornia’s threat against Lindsey to our plot to lure him here, literally straight into their backyard.