“Gina! Are you here for the meeting tonight? Black currant scones—your favorite.”
“Mom’ll give me a scone just for poking my nose into the kitchen. What can you offer to sweeten the deal?”
“What d’you need?”
I sat down in a red plaid wingback chair beside the fireplace. “Advice. I’ve got a new case, Dad.”
He stopped puttering about and came to sit opposite me, giving me his entire attention. I love that about Dad. He listens, he watches, he gets things. Except for the fact that he’s only five-foot-seven and Japanese, he’s a ringer for the “real” Sherlock Holmes.
“Good for you!” my Sherlock said now. “Tell me about it.”
“A stalker . . . or two.”
“Stalker? You a detective or a bodyguard?”
“A little of both, actually,” I admitted. “It’s Rose, Dad. She was being followed. The guy turned out to be an archaeologist and reporter for a Mexican anthropology rag, but now that we’ve got him mostly sorted out, someone else has come out of the woodwork.”
“Another stalker?”
I nodded.
“Tag team?”
I blinked. Why hadn’t I thought of that?
“You think?”
“Seems an awful big coincidence.”
“Yeah, but this Cruz Veras guy—the journalist . . . archaeologist—turned out to be legit.”
“Well, which is he—journalist or archaeologist?”
“Both, as it happens. The guy’s got a PhD—Dr. Veras, if you please. He works for the Mexican National Historical Institute and contributes academic articles to Arqueología magazine.”
“Dr. Veras, is it? Is he single?” Mom stood in the doorway with a tea tray in her hands.
“I have no clue,” I said quashingly.
“Well, you should get one,” she told me, with barely a hint of her Russian accent, and deposited the tray full of scones and tea cakes on the table next to my chair. “I will bring you tea. Alvin is here. He has a PhD also.”
Mom has long had it in her fertile imagination that Alvie Spielman and I are perfect for each other. I have come to the conclusion that I am not “perfect” for anyone. Which is not to say that Alvie doesn’t have his appeal. He’s a very good friend—a nice starting point for romance, I’ve been told—he has a quirky and somewhat morbid sense of humor and he’s good-looking in a nerdy sort of way. Imagine Harry Potter on growth hormones, but Jewish.
“Gina has come to me for advice,” my father said, and gave my mother a “look.”
Mom’s sleek eyebrows disappeared beneath her thick auburn bangs. “I’ll invite Alvie to the kitchen,” she said, and left us in peace.
I knew the rest of the SASH Squad would be here shortly, so I dove right in. “Here’s the thing: I’m thinking of laying a trap for this new stalker. Nothing really perilous, just draw him out so we can get a look at him.”
I laid out all of the pieces to the plan that Rose and I had concocted so far, from timing and location to the super subtle communication cues we came up with.
“My question is: How can I bulletproof it? I’d like it to be fairly solid before I present it to Rose’s boss.”
Dad smiled. “Ah. I notice you’re not asking me if this is a good idea.”
“It is, isn’t it? I mean, I thought it would be better to be in control of as many variables in the situation as we can. If we just play wait and see, we’re at this guy’s mercy. Right?”
He was nodding. Not in a Eureka, you’ve found it! way, but in an inscrutable Zen Master Yoda way. “This seems logical.”
I half expected him to add, “Grasshopper.” But he didn’t, so it was my turn.
“But . . . ?” I prompted.
“But what? I said it seems logical. It is always best to be the master of a situation rather than its slave. How many operatives will you use?”
“I don’t know. That’s up to Rose’s boss, Ellen Robb.”
“How many would you suggest?”
I imagined the stretch of hilly beach I reckoned would be the best damned sand trap in the Bay Area. “Enough to cover escape. One on each end of the beach trail. One in the parking area. One above the trail, one below.”
He was nodding, his eyes unfocused, as if he were seeing the images in my head. “Make sure some of your assets are visible but self-involved,” he said. “Otherwise—”
“The mark might be suspicious if it’s too quiet,” I finished.
“Nothing’s ever completely bulletproof, Gina,” he reminded me. “You know this as well as I do.”
I shivered, understanding this as a veiled reference to the case that had cost Dad his career as a detective. “I know.”
He got up to cross the room to a small black lacquer hutch that I have always thought of as the Shrine. Dad calls it a curio cabinet, but it’s where he keeps his ancestors, which seems a shrine-like usage to me. When he came back to the fire, he was holding something small, which he proceeded to place in the palm of my hand.
It was a mingei—a Japanese lucky charm—in the form of a tanuki. In other (Russian) words, an obereg.
Now, anyone who’s ever become addicted to Mario Bros. video games knows that a tanuki is a cute little potbellied critter that looks a lot like a raccoon. In fact, tanuki essentially means “raccoon dog.” This is not to be confused, mind you, with Mario in a raccoon suit. The tanuki is an ancient and legendary bit of Japanese culture. Mario in a raccoon suit, not so much. The tanuki is a shape-shifter, so I suspected Dad thought this was an appropriate mingei for a private detective.
I smiled and got up to kiss his cheek. “Thanks, Dad.” I pocketed the tanuki and shuffled my feet.
“You’re leaving? You’re not staying for the SASH meeting?”
“I really should go home and feed my cat.” I edged toward the parlor door.
“Your cat eats just fine without you. I’ve seen her—birds, fish, small seals.”
“Hi, Gina.”
Alvie was in the doorway, blocking my retreat. Mom and two other SASH members—appropriately dressed for the occasion—stood behind him in the hall.
“Hi, Alvie. I was just going.” I angled toward the door, making “make-a-hole” motions with my shoulder.
“Can’t you stay?” Dad asked. “We’re doing ‘The Speckled Band.’”
I snapped my fingers. “Oh, you know, I’ve read that one—saw the BBC episode too. The snake did it.”
My father was giving me the inscrutable Zen eyeball. I couldn’t bear to look at my mother to see what she was giving me.
“Didn’t I offer good advice?” Dad asked ingenuously.
I stayed.
For the entire meeting.
It was more fun than I’m willing to admit. I ended up playing Watson to Alvie’s Holmes in a role-playing vignette, after which Holmes asked me out for lunch.
“It’s not a date, I promise,” he told me when I hesitated. “Just two friends having lunch. Friends do that, I hear.”
I could feel Mom’s eyes on me all the way from her study at the back of the houseboat. Could hear her thinking, Gina, don’t be a doorak.
I wriggled inside, wanting to say “yes” and “no” simultaneously.
Relief came in the form of an ice-cold epiphany: I really was a doorak, I realized, and kicked myself for allowing even a hint of discomfort to creep into my relationship with Alvie. He didn’t deserve that. Hell, I didn’t deserve that. If I gave in to the urge to hide out even from Alvin Spielman, it would be another point scored for Jeremy Augustine.
I gave Alvie my biggest, most sincere smile. “Sure,” I said. “Call me tomorrow. We’ll set a definite date.”
“Date?” he repeated, looking rattled. His thick, brown hair was standing on end from the many times he’d swept his fingers through it, and now he pushed his glasses up his very Holmesian nose and blinked at me.
I reached up (way up) and patted his cheek. “Call me tomorrow.”
God bless him, he blushe
d. Alvie’s such an open book. Uncomplicated. Sincere. If I were smart, I’d have fallen for him long ago. But I seemed to have a natural attraction to gold-plated scoundrels.
When I finally collected my jacket from the coatrack in the hall, I found that Mom had parked yet another lucky doodad in my pocket. It was the smallest of a set of nesting babushka dolls that I knew for a fact had once reposed under the altar at Our Lady of Kazan. I put Dad’s tanuki in there with it (who knew, maybe they’d reproduce) and returned to my houseboat feeling doubly blessed.
Wednesday morning at 8:50 A.M., I parked Boris the Harley behind a restroom along the headland walk, slipped into the fragrant building, and peeled off my leather jacket to reveal an oversize Spider-Man sweatshirt. Then I rolled my jeans up to mid-calf, un-hiding sneakers and tube socks. Lastly, I pulled a Penney’s bag containing a short light brown wig and a Frisbee out from beneath my sweatshirt. I stuffed my collar-length hair up under the wig, the Frisbee under my arm, and my jacket into the bag. Net effect: I went into the restroom a diminutive Hells Angel and came out a suntanned person of indeterminate gender and age.
I surreptitiously returned the Penney’s bag to the motorcycle’s lockbox, then skipped off down the walk, tossing my Frisbee in the air. On the way, I passed by Greg Sheffield who, in cargo shorts and a white fisherman’s sweater, was ostensibly painting a seascape. Yes, you can construe from this that Ellen Robb liked my sand-trap idea, fine-tuned it, and dedicated three of her agents to it.
As prearranged, Greg didn’t give me the time of day. Beneath the cable-knit, I knew, was holstered a shiny, well-used Ruger GP100. Like me, Greg favored a revolver, although I’ll take my little seven-shooter over his big old six-shooter any day of the week.
Just down from the trailhead, I bypassed Agent Rodney Hammermill, to all appearances having a leisurely cup of coffee atop a saltgrass ottoman between the trail and the beach. Less than one-quarter of a mile later, I was in position myself, lying on my back atop a little dune, apparently dozing in the lee of a tuft of sedge and verbena. There was a third agent—Pearl Rodriguez—at the other end of the trail where it rose to converge with a bike path.
Barely six feet below me was the jogging trail. About thirty feet below that, down a steep sand bank peppered with stunted trees, brush, and rocks, was the beach. Above and to my left the hill rose steeply to a rocky crown. I was morbidly conscious of the item my sweatshirt concealed: my Taurus, tucked into a hip holster and digging into my upper thigh.
I’d been lying there sunning my shins for about fifteen minutes when I heard the sound of footfalls and humming—a jogger coming up the trail. A moment later, I caught that the runner was singing the theme song from Big Trouble in Little China (which I admit, unapologetically, is my favorite film of all time).
The signal was given—Rose thought she was being followed. If she was convinced she had no tail, she was supposed to use her best Tina Turner impersonation on “We Don’t Need Another Hero.”
I tensed as she jogged by below me, then turned my head to peer through the waving grasses down her back trail.
There he was.
He was older than Cruz Veras, and much bigger. Beefy’s a good word. He had short brown hair, wore mirror shades, a knit cap, and a jogging suit capable of hiding any number of weapons. His jacket was loosely zipped and seemed bulkier on the left than on the right. His jogging was unconvincing as well. He ran as if his feet were made of lead, dragging the toes of his Nikes so that little puffs of sand rose up to disperse on the breeze.
I put my head down as he lumbered past, then rolled onto my left side so I could watch him. He’d gotten about three yards beyond me, his right arm bent at the elbow as he reached toward his left shoulder. Either he was having a heart attack or he was going for something in his jacket.
I got to my knees and slipped a hand under my sweatshirt, wrapping my fingers around the butt of the Taurus.
He was slowing, stopping, reaching.
Damn! Where were Greg and Rodney? Should I shout, or shoot, or—?
A second later, it all became academic; a large clod of grassy turf flew out of nowhere and connected with Rose’s head. She stumbled and fell to her knees, momentum carrying her right off the trail and down the steep, sandy embankment to the beach. In seconds, she’d disappeared below the lip of the trail.
Her stalker ran to where she’d fallen and stopped, scanning the rugged hillside below. He was in profile to me, so I could see that he held a gun with both hands and was apparently looking for a target.
I eased the Taurus out of its holster.
Another dirt clod landed, this time at the stalker’s feet, exploding messily onto the back of his pants. He spun, eyes scouring the steep hill behind him.
I flattened myself to the ground and tried to follow his gaze. From my vantage point, I could see nothing, but he must have seen something he didn’t like, because he jammed the gun into his shoulder holster and took off back the way he’d come as fast as his leaden feet would carry him. The backup team would have to take care of him; my focus was on Rose.
I let him get out of sight behind a turn in the trail before I popped up and scanned the hill myself. I saw nothing but a thin banner of breeze-borne silt fanning out from a sand-fall just below the rocks.
Damning any possible torpedoes, I slid from my perch and raced to the place where Rose had gone over the side. I could see no trace of her, so I went over myself, reasoning that if I were being observed from the hilltop (read: making a target of myself), I’d be a whole lot less visible down among the coyote brush and toyon trees.
“Rose?” I dared to call out. “Rosie? It’s Gina! You all right?”
She appeared far below me, backing out of the shadow of the embankment onto the tide-wet sand of the beach. She beckoned me to where she stood and I scrambled down, using rocks and tufts of sedge as foot holds, then dropped the last four or five feet to land beside her with a soggy scrunch.
“I’m fine,” she said, before I could ask again, and rubbed the red spot at her temple where the divot had scored. “I took the dirt clod as a sign that I should get quickly out of sight and dove for cover. Thanks, I guess.”
“It wasn’t me,” I told her as I looked at her for any signs of a concussion. “How does your head feel? Any dizziness or nausea?”
“Tink, imagine this is your cat talking. I meant to do that. I didn’t fall . . . much. I dove chaotically.”
I gave her a look as close to one of Mom’s skeptical squints as I could, and she took a few steps away from me and back to demonstrate her fitness for duty. Temporarily satisfied, I inspected her person. Her braid was covered in sand and tufted with toyon needles and seagull feathers, and her joggers were filthy and torn in one knee. She was wet, too, and the side she’d landed on was caked with soggy sand. She made a half-hearted swipe at her right hip then nodded toward the trail.
“Let’s get going. I can’t wait to meet this guy face-to-face. I think it’ll be faster if we keep to the beach until we’re just below the parking lot.”
I started to turn up the beach, but Rose put a hand on my arm. I looked back and met her dark gaze. There was a question in it.
“That man . . . he was armed, wasn’t he?”
I nodded. “Smith and Wesson nine mil.”
She exhaled sharply, then started jogging back up the beach. I sprinted after her. As I reached her, she pulled a pint-sized walkie-talkie out of her jacket pocket. I could tell at a glance she wasn’t going to raise anybody on that thing; the antenna was broken. She swore and ran faster.
We scrambled up the hill to the parking lot, where we were met with a jarringly unexpected sight: Greg Sheffield was still seated at his easel, dabbing paint on a canvas. The stalker was nowhere in sight. Stunned, Rose and I stopped in unison at the edge of the tarmac just as Greg glanced up and saw us. He looked just as surprised as I’m sure we did. Frowning, he put down his paintbrush and strode toward us across the parking area.
Rose bro
ke her silence to murmur, “This is really serious now, isn’t it, Tink? That guy was going to shoot me.”
“It sure looked that way, although I suppose he might’ve just been trying to scare you. I don’t understand the motivation. It’s hard to imagine the Anasazi pothunters resorting to murder to keep from going to jail for a couple of years. Hell, they might get off with heavy fines and some community service. Pulling a gun is a whole other level from aggressive driving.”
Greg had reached us now, concern and confusion blooming on his face. “Rose, are you okay? What happened?” His voice went up a notch or two in panic as he took in the dirt, ripped clothes, and our shaken expressions.
“A lot,” I told him. “Big out-of-shape guy in brand new jogging duds made some threatening moves with a Smith & Wesson. Where were you?”
“I was waiting for . . .” He grimaced. “I was waiting for a big out-of-shape guy in brand new jogging duds.”
“You didn’t see him?” Rose asked.
Greg shook his head. “No. He must have found a way to bypass the parking lot. Rodney and Pearl too, apparently, although I’m not sure how.”
“He didn’t come back this way?”
“Nope. Dammit.” He pulled out a walkie-talkie and told the other two agents to come in. Then he jammed the thing back into his pocket with a gesture of pure frustration. “Damn it!” he repeated, then stabbed a finger at me. “Get Rose back to the office now. I think it’s time this escalates to the police.”
Couldn’t argue with that.
I saw Rose to her car and retrieved Boris from behind the restroom. I know both of us were scanning for a green LeBaron or a big beefy man in or out of a tracksuit. I’d just donned my leathers and helmet and mounted up to follow Rose back to her office for the debriefing when I saw something that made my blood boil and run cold simultaneously. Sitting back under some low trees at one end of the parking area was a burgundy Honda. Even as I was squinting to make out the license number, it backed up and disappeared into the shadows.
I revved up the Harley and gave chase, but by the time I reached the trees, the car was gone. I sat motionless on my bike, thoughts rattling around the inside of my head like aimless pinballs.
The Antiquities Hunter Page 7
