Hidden Palms

by Harry Bryant

  "What is it?" I asked.

  She shook her head. "I'm sorry, Bliss. I'm so sorry."

  She stuffed her phone in her purse as she pushed her chair back from the table.

  I started to get up too, but she shook her head, telling me to stay put. She stood next to the table for a second, wiping at the corner of her eye. "This was really nice," she said in a quiet voice, and when I reached out for her arm, she fled.

  I was utterly confused about what had just happened.

  Someone made a noise, and I realized Julio was standing awkwardly nearby. "It was the underwear thing, wasn't it?" he asked. "That's what wrecked it, wasn't it?"

  "It was not the underwear thing," I said. "She just had an important meeting she forgot about."

  "Uh-huh," he said.

  "Do you want a tip or not?" My voice was harder than I meant it to be.

  He shrugged. "She told us to put the whole meal on her credit card when she made the reservation," he said.

  "You can do that?"

  "She did."

  "She's clever," I said softly.

  Julio pressed his lips together and raised his eyebrows.

  "Well, bring me the bill anyway," I said, waving a hand in his direction. I was suddenly very tired. "Maybe I'll pay it again, just because you've been a good sport."

  "Very good, sir," he said.

  "Did she leave a phone number when she made her reservation?" I asked, not willing to give up quite yet.

  He hesitated for half a second. "I'll check," he said.

  "Now I'm definitely leaving a tip," I said.

  I stared at the door of the restaurant, willing it to open and let her back in. Wishing the last few minutes hadn't happened. Was there something I could have done that would have prevented that call from coming in?

  She had called him David and had said "Mom." Her brother had done something stupid. He only got one phone call, and he had used it to call his big sister.

  I don't remember who I had called when I had been arrested. Maybe I hadn't called anyone. If I had, it hadn't made any difference. I hadn't had a big sister like Dolly. I had been on my own.

  Which meant I didn't blame her in the slightest for leaving me in the restaurant.

  And then it sank in that I was still alone, after all these years.

  CHAPTER 14

  I didn't have much else to do, what with the abrupt end to dinner, and so I drove back to Los Alamos and the hotel. I went up to my room, noted the curtains were as I had left them, and cautiously went in. No one was waiting for me, and so I used the phone in the room to call the number I had gotten from Julio. It rang a few times, before a recording of Dolly's voice told me to leave a message after the tone.

  "Hi," I said, when I was prompted to speak. "It's me. I'm sorry about whatever it is that's going on. Not that I had anything to do with it, really. I don't know why I said that, I guess, I . . . I guess I'm just sorry that whatever happened has happened. Anyway, I just wanted to call and say that dinner was great, and the company was better, and I hope we can do it again some time. And—"

  Whatever machine was on the other end beeped suddenly, cutting me off.

  I stood there for a second, phone in my hand, feeling like an idiot as I replayed what I had said. I almost called her back and tried again.

  I sat on the end of the bed for a few minutes, staring at the phone, and it didn't ring.

  I stretched out and stared at the ceiling for awhile.

  The phone still didn't ring.

  I got up, and went and used the bathroom. Washed my hands. And came back and sat down on the bed again.

  The phone still didn't ring.

  I left the hotel room.

  Waiting on the inside was a Zen exercise. Waiting on the outside was excruciating. When you're in a cell, you have nowhere else to go. No other appointments you need to keep. It's easy to learn how to wait in prison. An hour is nothing when you have months and years before you get out. A week is barely enough time to get worked up about anything.

  There was a sliver of moon in the sky, hanging low and brushing the tops of the mountains. The air was cool and gentle on my face. I decided to walk over to Rye. Just in case the sheriff's deputy was looking for an excuse to get inside my car. And as I walked, I put aside the notion of waiting for the phone to ring, and thought about my other problem.

  By the time I reached Rye, I was thinking about delivery trucks. Maybe that was the key to getting into Hidden Palms. Not by hanging off the back bumper, but by being inside the truck. I just had to convince the deliverymen to let me go for a ride.

  There were a handful of cars in the lot, and I circled around to the back of the restaurant. The beer garden was empty, and the French doors were shut. There wasn't much else at the back other than an old chair next to an ashtray and a couple of locked dumpsters. I sat on the chair and listened to the distant thump of noise from the restaurant. The lights from the parking lot left a lot of shadows, and if I leaned back in the chair, I was almost lost in the night.

  Finally, the kitchen door opened and a figure came out. He didn't see me at first, too busy fishing underneath his apron for a lighter. When he found it and flicked it on, I caught sight of a heavily lined and bearded face, and a fat, hand-rolled spliff shoved between his lips. He saw me too, and almost dropped his marijuana cigarette. The tiny flame went out as he juggled his weed and the lighter. Wisely, he opted to hang on to his fattie, and the lighter clattered on the concrete.

  "Jesus Christ," he swore. "What the fuck?"

  I spotted the lighter and picked it up. It was an old metal Zippo, and I flicked it with my thumb to bring the flame. He took the lighter back, lit his spliff, and then snapped the metal case closed. He held in his marijuana smoke for a moment, and then exhaled noisily, blowing the smoke in my direction.

  "What the fuck?" he asked again.

  "Sorry," I said. "It seemed like a quiet spot."

  "Do I know you?" His voice sounded like tires crunching on an old gravel road, and the light from his hand-rolled made his face even craggier.

  "I doubt it," I said. "I was here the other night. Had a few drinks. You watched me have a chat with local law enforcement."

  "That's right," he said.

  "That was Deputy Dawg, right?"

  He laughed, a noise like stones turning over in a washing machine. "Hackman," he said. "Deputy Franklin Hackman. One of Santa Barbara's County's finest."

  "You don't seem like a fan," I said.

  He took a long drag on his spliff, and the pungent odor of his weed swirled around us as it crackled and burned. "Not sure what it matters to you," he said.

  "It probably doesn't," I said, crossing my arms and leaning back in the chair again. "Just curious."

  "I was curious once," he said.

  "What happened."

  "Tet."

  "What?"

  "The Tet Offensive," he said. "‘Nam. ‘68."

  "Before my time," I said.

  He inhaled again, and when he exhaled, he directed the plume of smoke away from me. "I'm not going to share," he said.

  "I'm good with the secondhand buzz," I said.

  "Why was Hack busting your balls?" he asked.

  "I suspect he does it with a lot of people," I said.

  He shrugged. "Especially those who've got that look."

  "Which look is that?"

  "The one you get from squinting through bars."

  "Ah, that one."

  I checked his arms, and while it was too dim to see any details, I spotted a couple of blobs on his right arm. Military tats. Not the stuff you got in prison. "After you got back?" I asked.

  "Yeah," he said. "Did a nickel in Lewisburg."

  "For stupid shit?"

  "Isn't it always?"

  "I did a pair of nick
els at Tehachapi," I said.

  He laughed. "A pair?"

  "Went in with one; ended up with two," I explained.

  "Went back for a second helping of stupid, did you?"

  "That's a pretty good way to put it," I said.

  His spliff was more than halfway gone, and he hesitated for a second as he raised it to his lips again.

  I waved him off. We might be best pals now, but I didn't need him to feel like he had to share.

  "What's on your mind, friend?" he asked after exhaling another lungful of marijuana smoke. "You ain't sitting out here for the atmosphere."

  "I was hoping to have a chat with you," I said.

  "Chat away. I've got a few minutes left on my state-mandated break."

  "There's a delivery truck that was here yesterday. A white one—"

  His mood changed abruptly. "Ah, man," he said as he pinched the end of his spliff, putting out the smoldering weed.

  "What?" I asked.

  "Go fuck yourself," he said.

  While I was wondering what had set him off, he went back into the restaurant and closed the door firmly behind him.

  A few minutes later, before the sweet secondhand smoke buzz was gone, an SUV turned into the lot. It swung around, its high beams blinding me. The car came to a sudden stop, and I blinked heavily, trying to see through the spots dancing on my retinas. I heard the car door slam, and as my vision finally cooperated, I looked up at a familiar flat-brimmed hat.

  "Well, shit," I said.

  "Get up," said Deputy Franklin Hackman. "Turn around, and put your face against the wall with your hands behind your back."

  "What for?" I asked.

  His hand dropped to the butt of his service weapon, and my hands went up. "I'm complying," I said. I stood up and turned around. He shoved me against the wall, and pulled one arm and then the other down behind my back. I felt the cold metal of his handcuffs close around my wrists.

  He walked back to his SUV, hauling me with him. I stumbled backward, trying not to fall down. He opened the back passenger side door, spun me around, and shoved me. I narrowly escaped banging my head on the door frame, as I sprawled into the car. He shoved my feet in, slammed the door, and then got into the driver's seat. I struggled to sit up as he started the car, put it in reverse, and backed up.

  He sped out of the parking lot, bouncing hard across the curb, and I rolled around like a gerbil in a habitrail during an earthquake. I made some noises as I struggled to sit upright without having to sit on my hands.

  His eyes flicked up toward the rearview mirror, checking on me.

  "We need to talk," he said.

  Those certainly weren't the words I had been expecting to come out of his mouth. "Sure," I replied. "Let's talk."

  What else was I going to say?

  CHAPTER 15

  Hack drove for a few more blocks and finally turned into an empty lot near a long warehouse. He pulled around to the side of the building and stopped the car. He took off his hat and looked back at me through the grating. "I'm going to get out, and then I'm going to get you out. Okay?"

  "Works for me," I said.

  That was pretty much how it went. Once I was out of the SUV, he pushed me up against the side as he pulled at the handcuffs. I felt him remove the cuff on one hand, and when I tensed, he jerked my other arm up. "Hold still," he hissed. He didn't bother unlocking the other cuff though, and with a shove, he backed away from me.

  I remained still, chest pressed against the car, and after a few seconds, I slowly turned my head, trying to find him in the gloom. There were no lights in the warehouse or in the lot. The only illumination was coming from the thin moon, which hung nervously in the sky to my right.

  "I'm going to assume you're not going to shoot me while I'm leaning against your car," I said.

  "I'm not," Hack said. "You can turn around."

  I did, keeping my back to the car. I let my fingers explore the handcuff still attached to my left wrist. I knew how to get out of them—one of the useful skills you pick up while incarcerated—but I had one hand free, and the remaining cuff wasn't too tight.

  He was about fifteen feet away from me, not much more than a man-shaped blob in the dark. I could hear his breathing, loud and nervous.

  "I'm listening," I said.

  "You were supposed to make contact with me," he said. "Not doing whatever the fuck it is you're doing."

  I looked over at the moon again as if it could offer some insight into what Deputy Hackman was talking about. "I was getting the lay of the land," I said, playing for time.

  "Goddamn it. It's my ass on the line here," he snapped. "I've been calling you for months now, and—look, I handed you this whole thing. All you needed to—"

  "What's happened?" I asked. I didn't want to interrupt him, but at the same time, the longer he ran at the mouth, the more thinking out loud he'd be doing, and I had a feeling now was not the time for a lot of introspection. Keep moving. Don't stand still.

  "The kid—David Boreal—got picked up."

  The name didn't ring any bells, but then I remembered Dolly's conversation at the restaurant, and then pieces started to fall into place. David Boreal. Dolly's perpetually pot-addled brother.

  "Where?" I asked.

  "Oceano. Outside the SVRA, thank God."

  "What was he doing?"

  "Selling weed, the dumb fuck. He had bags of it in his van."

  I hesitated, not quite sure of what to say. From an ex-con's perspective, getting caught selling was bad news, but from SBCSO's side of the law, busting a dealer with a van full of baggies was a score. So why was Deputy Hackman all stressed out?

  Unless, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Office was involved in some way and . . .

  "You don't have him," I said.

  "No shit, I don't. He's at the Santa Maria Branch jail. They're going to process him in the morning. Probably transfer him to County after that. Unless we can get him out."

  "We?"

  "Yeah, you and I. And . . ." He didn't move much, but I could feel a change in his demeanor. The wheels in his head were churning. He was starting to think too much. "How do I know—"

  "Seriously?" I interjected. "You think I'm carrying ID on me?" I didn't know who I was supposed to be, but I had an idea. Not much of one, mind you, but enough to push back. Bluff my way out. "I'm undercover, you idiot. Why do you think I was driving around like a fucking tourist? And that bullshit you pulled on me last night in the parking lot? That wasn't smart."

  "What bullshit? What?"

  "Following me from the restaurant. Accosting me in the parking lot. In front of witnesses, even."

  "Last night?"

  It was almost as if he didn't remember. Seriously?

  "Look, it's not important now," I said. "We have bigger problems, don't we?" He didn't respond right away—those wheels were making a lot of noise in his head—and so I pressed him. "Don't we?"

  He undid the strap over his service weapon. "Tell me something about citrus farming," he said. "Something I don't know."

  "It's fucking California," I said. "We're number two after Florida. What is this? Agriculture Hour? You want some hot tips about whatever it is they do to oranges to make them grow?"

  "Grafting," he said. "They graft a bud onto rootstock, so that they can control what type of orange they grow."

  "Probably the same sort of shit they do with weed," I said. "Who knows? Do I look like I have a degree in biology?"

  We shared a tense moment in the moonlight, and then he exhaled loudly.

  I did too, but I kept it quiet.

  "Look," I said, raising my hands so he could see I wasn't doing anything funny with them. The clicking noise of the open handcuff against the chain caught his attention. "Do we have a problem or not? Do you want to fix it or not?"

 
"God damnit," he said. "Okay, okay." He exhaled loudly again, and I wondered if he was going to hyperventilate on me. "Look, when I first called your offices and said I wanted to cut a deal, your people said they'd look into it. I called back a month later, and told them that if they wanted this whole region delivered to them, that I was their man. Not just the weed. I could deliver the whole cocaine supply chain, up and down the 101. And some jackass middle manager said they'd look into it. Again.

  "And when I called last week, I told them to send someone out, someone I could talk to. I gave you—fuck! I gave you evidence that could get me in some serious trouble. And who did they send? Some asshole who wants to wander around and get acclimated to the environment or some shit. Well, tourist time is over, Bliss. Boreal is in lockup. When they transfer him to County, the crazy mother-fuckers are going to have him killed. That's what's going to happen. And it's going to spook the guys in the woods. This is all going to come apart, badly."

  "The crazy mother-fuckers . . . ?"

  "The CMFMC. Jesus, didn't those jackasses at the DEA tell you anything?"

  I figured out what the first three letters of the acronym were, and then I realized what the last two stood for. Motorcycle Club. Where had I seen those letters? Right. On a motorcycle jacket. With a knife stuck through them.

  "No, no," I said. "Sorry. I thought it stood for something else."

  "Something else? What else could it stand for?"

  "‘Callous,'" I said. "Maybe ‘carefree.'"

  He was quiet for a long time—long enough that I was starting to wonder if I had pushed him too far—and then he let go with another one of those monster exhalations. This guy telegraphed everything.

  "You really are a fucking piece of work," he said.

  "I get that on occasion," I said.

  "When I first heard about you, I couldn't believe it. It was just too ridiculous. Rising porn star gets popped for cocaine trafficking. Goes to CCI where he shanks a guy in the shower who was trying to rape him. Jesus, that's some back story. Lady I talked to said it was the most insane deep cover story she'd ever seen."

  I bit back a laugh that would have blown it for me. "Yeah, well, the best ones are the weird ones," I said. I didn't even know if that was true, but what the hell. So the missing decade of my life was now some deranged narrative for secret work as an undercover DEA agent? Like I was going to contradict the deputy.