by Jeff Shelby
Deacon’s hand clenched tighter on the gun. My words weren’t backing him off. He was looking for payback for his sister’s murder and he wasn’t going to stop until he got it.
“And bottom line,” I said, “neither of us pulled the trigger.”
He blinked and I thought maybe I’d gotten through to him, maybe hit on the tiny part of reason that was left in his mind.
But then it was gone.
“I don’t give a shit about none of that,” he said. “All I know is my sister’s dead and she was fine until you two motherfuckers showed up in her life.”
He had a point.
“Wizard give you the okay on this?” I asked, looking to buy some time. “On taking us out? I mean, I know you can’t do anything without his approval.”
Moreno walked slowly toward me, the gun aimed at the center of my forehead. He pressed the barrel into my skull.
“Listen up, you cocksucker,” he said quietly. “I can do whatever the fuck I want. You understand that?”
“Didn’t seem that way to me when I talked to Wizard,” I said evenly.
“Wizard don’t control me,” he said, his voice now rising. “No one does. Wizard’s in charge ’cause he likes all the business and shit. Thinks he’s some sort of professional dude.” He shook his head. “He just like the rest of us, just more of a pussy. That motherfucker doesn’t even remember what it’s like to put a bullet in anybody no more. Lets us do all his fuckin’ work now.”
I’d hit a chord. Deacon Moreno was not happy being an underling. He didn’t appreciate having to answer to Matellion.
“So fuck Wizard and fuck you,” he said.
He pressed the gun harder into my forehead. I could feel the cold metal digging into my skin.
“How’s that feel, homeboy?” he asked, grinning like a madman.
“Great,” I said, thinking I’d made a huge mistake by ever talking to Peter Pluto on the beach.
“Then you’re gonna love this, motherfucker,” he said. “Good-night.”
I didn’t want to die looking at Deacon Moreno’s face.
But I didn’t think I had any choice.
Forty-two
The gunshot shattered the silence.
I flinched.
Deacon Moreno’s crazy smile melted from his face. He fell toward me.
I stepped back and let him hit the floor. A dark red spot was mushrooming in the center of his back.
Wesley’s TEC-9 was pointed where Deacon had been standing.
“People shouldn’t talk shit about Wizard,” he said, lowering the gun. “Easy to get dead that way.”
I looked at Linc. His arms were wrapped tight around his chest, his eyes wide with shock.
“Uh, thanks,” I said to Wesley, my heart thumping hard in my chest. “I think.”
“Don’t thank me,” Wesley said. “Just doing what I’m told.”
“Who told you to shoot your partner?”
Wesley turned around. Wizard Matellion stepped into the room, Big Ollie following close behind. Wizard nodded at Moreno’s body. Ollie walked over, lifted him up like he was a pen that had rolled off a table, placed him on his shoulder, and headed toward the back of the house.
“You alright?” Matellion asked.
“Fine,” I said.
“Was afraid old Deacon might try something like this,” he explained. “That’s why I had Wesley prepared. We kinda planned on this, so Wesley was instructed to call me—discreetly, of course—and let us know when and where. He made sure a door was unlocked for us.”
I looked at Wesley. He’d found a straw somewhere and was now chewing it furiously.
Linc continued to hug himself.
“Don’t get me wrong,” Matellion said, grinning. “I’m not in love with you or nothing. I just can’t deal with insubordination. Shootin’ folks has its place, but not when it’s not called for.”
The logic of criminals had saved me.
“You asked the other day about a couple of things,” Matellion continued. “I did not know about either the girl or the incident that involved you. You made me aware. But those things were done without my permission. They were personal for Deacon and that was unfortunate.”
“So he definitely was the person who shot the girl at the apartment?” I asked.
Matellion looked at Wesley.
“Deacon was pissed that his sister was dating a white dude.” Welsey explained. “Then, when he found out this dude wasn’t even square with his sister, he went cold crazy.” He paused. “He couldn’t find this dude, so he decided next best thing to do was to get the other girl.”
His use of the word “he” was interesting. I assumed Wesley had been along for the ride for what had occurred but was hanging it all on Deacon. Understandable, now that Deacon couldn’t defend himself.
“Then he seen you at the girl’s apartment when he rolled up,” Wesley said. “Had to wait for you to leave before he could get it done.”
“Did he know who I was?”
A wry smile formed on Wesley’s face. “Next morning, Deacon sent one of our boys back to the apartment.” The smile got a little bigger. “That fat white dude will tell anybody anything for a price.”
Rolovich. What a surprise.
“So, when he heard you was an investigator, he thought you might get to this dude before he did and Deacon wouldn’t have been able to take care of business. He wanted white boy here all to himself,” Wesley continued. “That’s why the thing happened with you down in Mission Beach. Was hoping to put you out of commission.”
“What do you mean, I wasn’t square with Malia?” Linc asked, coming back to life.
Wesley eyed him for a moment. “Man, you told us about the other chick. What Deacon supposed to think?”
“It was bullshit,” Linc said.
Wesley shrugged.
Linc dropped his head into his hands. “Nothing happened with Rachel after I met Malia. I wouldn’t have done that.”
I looked at Wesley. He shrugged again.
“I couldn’t care less about any of this,” Matellion said, rubbing his chin and looking at me. “I trust that as far as y’all are concerned, nothing happened here today?”
“You give me your word that you have no interest in him?” I said, nodding at Linc.
“I’m gonna forget his name as soon as we walk out of here,” Matellion said, grinning and flashing those bright white teeth.
“Then we’re gonna forget we were ever here,” I said, ready to get the hell out of there.
“One more thing,” he said, shoving his hands in the pockets of his sweatpants. “You know who killed Malia Moreno?”
“Why?”
“Deacon may have acted without my permission, but he was still a brother,” he said, his voice dropping. “And I look out for my brothers. Any motherfucker that messes with my brother’s family messes with me. Know what I’m saying?”
It would have been so easy to pass along Lonnie’s name to Wizard Matellion. He could’ve taken care of him and Mo in any number of ways that wouldn’t have involved me. Wiped them off the face of the earth and made the world a better place with no one the wiser.
“No,” I said. “I don’t know who did it.”
Matellion stared at me for a moment, his eyes hard like when he’d warned us about returning to his neighborhood. Finally, they changed and the killer’s edge was gone.
“You hear anything,” he said, “you let me know.”
He turned and left the room.
Wesley looked at me for a moment, the straw bouncing up and down in his mouth.
“You tell Carter I wouldn’t mind another shot at him one of these old days,” he said.
Wesley chuckled as he followed Matellion out of the room.
I hoped there wouldn’t be any more of these old days.
Forty-three
Linc and I drove away from the house in silence. There wasn’t much for either of us to say and he seemed to have lost the fight I’d seen in him
earlier.
I called Wellton, told him I was bringing Linc Pluto in and that I’d explain when we got there. He didn’t seem pleased, but I hung up before he could suggest anything else.
When we arrived at the station, Linc got out without protesting. Wellton met us as we came through the doors.
He looked Linc up and down, then turned to me. “This was the kid you couldn’t find?”
“Sneaky. Kids are sneaky.”
Linc stared at his shoes.
Wellton waved an officer over. He nodded at Linc and the officer moved Linc’s hands behind him and cuffed him.
“Can you just put him in holding for now?” I said.
Wellton lifted his chin at the cop and he escorted Linc down the hallway.
I followed Wellton up to his office.
“This is the kid with the guns, right?” Wellton asked, sliding into the chair behind his desk.
“The guns belonged to his father,” I said, sitting down in the metal chair opposite the desk, trying to buy Linc a little leeway. “Maybe he didn’t know they were there.”
“They were where his underwear should’ve been.”
“He’s had a rough time of it. He’d be a huge sympathy case if you charged him.”
Wellton shook his head. “Fine. Wanna tell me why I’m holding this kid, then?”
I explained about Dana finding the house in OB, my conversation with Linc, and our surprise visitors.
“You’re telling me Wizard Matellion saved your ass?” Wellton said when I’d finished.
“Not on the record, I’m not. Off the record, yeah, I guess he did.”
“We go on the record, I’d have something solid on Matellion,” Wellton said quietly. “Finally.”
“Matellion didn’t pull the trigger and I’ll never repeat what I just told you.”
The room went quiet. Wellton couldn’t make me talk, but he could make my life difficult. But I wasn’t sure he could make it more difficult than Wizard Matellion if I went back on my word.
“Just because he didn’t let Moreno kill you doesn’t make him a good guy,” Wellton said.
“I know that.”
Wellton stared hard at me for a while. It didn’t change my mind.
“What do you want me to do with this kid?” he finally asked.
“Can you hold him for a little bit?” I asked. “Let me see if I can fix the rest of this.”
“What does fix mean?”
I shrugged.
“You’ll have to be more specific,” Wellton said. “I don’t understand white-guy nonchalance.”
“There are still some loose ends,” I said. “He’s safer here for a little while.”
“What loose ends?”
“Just a few things, couple of people I need to talk to.”
We stared at each other, him trying to read me, me attempting to keep him from seeing anything.
“What about our skinhead friends?” Wellton asked.
“That’s why I want Linc here. They still want him.”
“You gonna go talk to them, too?” he asked, a tiny smile mocking me.
“Something like that.”
The smile disintegrated and he pointed a stubby finger at me. “As soon as we—and by we, I mean those of us that are cops—find them, we’ve got them on assault for you and two murders. That’s enough to make me forget about the weapons charge against Pluto. And that’s plenty enough reason for them to stay alive.”
“If you find them.”
“We will find them,” he growled.
I sat motionless. I thought back to my first conversation with Professor Famazio, when he indicated that sometimes the skinheads benefited from friends in higher places. Sometimes even the law wasn’t enough.
“Neither of them is worth it,” Wellton said quietly, his eyes staring intently at me over the desk. “Neither of them.”
“I know that.”
“I know that you know that, Braddock. What I want to make sure of is that you don’t do something in spite of it.”
The silence sat heavy in the room between us for a few minutes.
“What happened to you sucked,” he finally said. “No doubt about it. But if you take them out, if you do exactly what you say you’re trying to prevent from happening to the Pluto kid, then you haven’t helped anyone and you’ve completely fucked yourself up.”
I didn’t disagree with anything Wellton was saying. All of his words made sense. But there were other things that made sense to me, too, and I wasn’t sure which of them was more right.
“I’m talking to a brick wall,” Wellton said, disgusted at my refusal to engage in the conversation. He shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Shouldn’t even try.” He paused. “I’ll hold the kid for forty-eight hours.”
“That’s it?” I said.
“That’s it,” Wellton said. “Do whatever you’re gonna do. Make it right.” His eyes narrowed. “For Pluto. Not for you.”
I was pretty sure he knew his words were going to be in vain. I could see it in his eyes, hear it in his tone.
Or maybe he just knew I didn’t care what he said.
Forty-four
I drove back to Mission Beach and found Carter and Dana sitting in my living room, a plate of enchiladas on the coffee table as they watched the Padres game.
“We’re up five-zip,” he said, pointing at the television. “Bottom of the eighth.”
“Good.”
Dana twisted in my direction. “Where’s Linc?”
I nodded at Carter. “You tell him what happened?”
“Yeah, right up to the point where you kicked me out of the house,” she said, still annoyed. “I was so pissed, I just got in the car and left. He finally returned my message from this morning and told me to come over here.”
“Yeah, well, thanks for that. Because if you’d stuck around you might’ve been able to warn me that Deacon fuckin’ Moreno found Linc, too.”
Her eyes widened.
Carter picked up the plate of enchiladas and stuck a fork in one of them. “Tell us.”
I told them about all the fun in OB.
“Wesley said that?” Carter said when I was done, placing the now-empty plate on the table. “That he really wanted another shot at me?”
“Yep.”
Carter chuckled. “I’ll remember that. So now Pluto’s in jail?”
“Yeah.”
“Why did you take him to jail?” Dana asked. “Won’t they arrest him because of the guns?”
“It’ll be fine,” I said, trusting Wellton.
“As much as I hate anything to do with the law, jail for him is probably the safest place at the moment,” Carter said.
“Also keeps him out of the way.”
Carter raised an eyebrow. “You make it sound like we’re about to do some exciting things.”
Dana slid closer to him on the sofa. “Hey. You told me we were going to be the ones doing the exciting things later.”
“And I always keep my promises,” he said, flashing a grin at her.
“You better.”
“Christ,” I said. “Keep your clothes on. I’m still here.”
Carter looked at me. “Anyway, exciting things.”
“Depends on how you define ‘exciting.’”
“A Padres victory. Waves that are overhead. Thongs on blonds.”
“Then, no. You misinterpreted what I said.”
Dana cleared her throat.
“I meant thongs on you,” Carter said to her. “Really.”
“Thank you,” she said, turning back to the TV.
I pointed to the glass slider and Carter nodded.
“We’ll be right back,” he told her, standing up.
She watched us head for the door. “At some point, I’ll start to take this personally.”
Carter stood in front of me in the doorway. “I’ll make it up to you. In every way.”
She smiled. “Fantastic.”
I shoved him out the door and closed
it behind us.
The ocean air hit me hard and I took a deep breath, letting it fill my lungs.
Carter straddled one of the patio chairs, his arms crossed over the back of it. “Why’d you lie to Matellion when he asked if you knew who killed Malia?”
I wondered if he’d picked up on that. Should’ve known.
“Didn’t see the point of sending him after them,” I said.
“Why’d you just lie to me?”
I laughed, but didn’t say anything.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he said. “I’m happy. Means we get to go get them ourselves.”
“Figured if we go get them there’s a better chance they actually end up in jail,” I said.
“If a little worse for the wear.”
“You better believe it.”
“When do we go find them, then?” he asked.
“Tomorrow, I think.” I paused, watching the lines form in the water. “Look, I’m not sure what’s gonna happen when we find them. But it’s probably gonna get ugly. You cool with that?”
“Cool with that? Are you serious?”
“Just putting it out there.”
“Dude, I am down with whatever happens. As far as I’m concerned, with what they did to you, if we’re the last ones to ever see them,” he said, his eyes narrowing, “good for the rest of the world.”
I couldn’t have agreed more.
Forty-five
Carter and Dana left to go do their exciting things and I tried not to think about it.
I changed into a pair of board shorts and grabbed my board and trudged down to the sand in the hazy, early evening sunshine.
The tension and soreness that had riddled my body for most of the day emptied itself out into the ocean. The waves weren’t great—three-footers that were a little mushy—but they were enough to give me what I needed. Lots of little maneuvers that took concentration and forced me to think only about what I was doing in the water. The water was never deceiving. What you see is what you get and I would always appreciate that.
