Running Cold (The Mick Callahan Novels)

by Harry Shannon

  "I don't know any lawyers."

  "I know this criminal law guy, name of Nathaniel Pearlman, back in LA. He owes me some favors. I sent him lots of girls in the life who wanted to get out clean, and most of them paid him top dollar. He negotiated with the pimps and a couple of mob guys a ways back. I'm sure he'd help you out."

  Wes frowned. "I don't get it. Help me how?"

  "By talking to Roth for one thing," she said, like someone explaining math to a kindergartner.

  "Guy opens his mouth, I could get killed."

  "Dummy," Rosa said, "once you're his client he can't say anything. He's sketchy, but Nate won't get you into trouble. He has to keep our confidence and shit. And hell, if there's anything in that suitcase worth money, he has a friend who's a pawn broker. Maybe he can unload it for you to cover his fee and even walk the cash to Roth. You just need someone with a cool head to work this thing out for you, that's all."

  "So now it's Nate, not Nathaniel?"

  Rosa got all tense and huffy. "So what if I fucked him once? I had to get out of a solicitation beef. He's an okay dude. What, you been acting like a virgin lately?"

  "Kidding. Kidding."

  Wes was really, really sleepy now, even though it was still early morning outside and the sun was thumping on the blinds like an angry thing. He wondered about Callahan and Roth and why things had gone south so quickly. Wondered if he was on borrowed time. If his Dad was in a better place. Wes McCann wanted to believe Rosa, that everything was going to be okay, especially if he just hired this Nathaniel Pearlman dude to make nice. So he did believe it. For a while, anyway.

  Just long enough to fall asleep.

  TWELVE

  Thursday am

  He dreamed about slaughter. The calf he raised for 4H one summer, grooming him and cleaning his ears and walking him around the dirt ring to faint applause. Callahan couldn't remember what he'd called the steer, a name of some kind. That wet pink nose with huge nostrils, those limpid brown eyes, even at ten Mick knew there was nothing all that smart going on inside of the beast, but then there wasn't anything mean or selfish either. Callahan didn't know what set his stepfather off that night. Danny had been drinking boilermakers all afternoon, which always tended to make him mean, so maybe it was as simple as that. Maybe he thought he'd educate Mick more as to the ways of the world. Perhaps it was the ghosts of a far-away war in the jungle, that place that had rotted him from the inside back in 1969. But something spun his crank.

  The men had been setting up all day, big metal and wood chutes with slots that dropped into place, portable fences to keep the herd moving forward in single file, one after another. And the sun was dead or dying when Danny yanked Mick out of his chair and marched him through the grass and down to the pens, where the butcher was hard at work. Callahan had blacked out on a lot of it, some kind of a gun that shot straight down into the skull, after which their knees just went all weak and wobbly and they dropped. In his dream it wasn't a lot of them, it was just that one calf he'd tended to all summer. Red-faced, sweaty men with sallow skin and wicked eyes were urging the young bull through the chute. They locked him into a small place where he squalled for Mick's help and rolled those confused dumb eyes and then the gun came down on the white blaze at the center of his skull and . . .

  Callahan woke up screaming, that achingly soft, harsh explosion of sound that comes when a vivid nightmare erupts with a rush of pain and compressed air. It was nearly dawn. He'd had night sweats again, the sheets were soaked. Mick Callahan pushed the nightmare away, rationalized Danny's decision. It hurt less when Callahan tried to see things his way. Danny had wanted the boy to understand the ways of the world, that animals were slaughtered in the end, that this is what it meant to eat a hamburger. He'd often preached that life eats itself and shits itself out again in one endless cycle. Danny hadn't meant to mark Mick for life, though he certainly had.

  Because of his brutality, Callahan's ferocity was finely tuned and unabated. It had resisted therapy, education, psychological training and morality and everything else his intellect had brought to bear. Fortunately, what had also survived was a blind devotion to the underdog, the downtrodden. The weak and confused one destined for the slaughter pen. A lot of people fit that description at least as well as a penned-up animal. Callahan didn't like predators. Or his own rage. So he tended to take it out on them.

  Time had taught Callahan that he couldn't rescue everyone in pain. They weren't all his to save. But God help anyone who tried to mess with one of his own. And once again, someone had. If Mick was perfectly honest with himself, he was almost glad. He'd been waiting for something ugly to happen. To be cut loose again.

  Donato had a man watching for Julius. No sign of him yet, that strange house was still boarded up and dark. Jerry was going to gather a report on Quinn. The clock was ticking, with little to go on.

  Callahan got up and decided to distract himself. It was a new day, a fresh start. The sun was up, the weather scorching hot, and business opportunities were coming out of the woodwork. Callahan did what any self-respecting, self-aware counselor would do when confronted by emotions that needed to be worked through. He numbed out. Jerry was set free to gather all the information he could and generally raise hell. Callahan had agreed to immediate photo shoots and spots for the new internet television show, although he'd generally rather have his dick stapled to a board than have his picture taken. They shot a couple of short commercials for the show, just his half of an imagined conversation, stuff like "It must have been difficult to discover your husband was having another affair," patently obvious crap like that. Stuff adored by the masses, for whatever reason.

  Callahan was feeling bitter and cynical and willing to both make and take a buck. What he didn't want to do was stop and feel.

  During the infrequent breaks that morning, travel time in the car, a workout at the gym, Jerry and Callahan exchanged information on the history, whereabouts and weaknesses of both Roth and his muscle man, Quinn. Hal was now hovering somewhere in the Pacific Northwest, but due in town in the next couple of days, though he hadn't been any more specific about when or even why he was finally returning for a visit after all these years. Callahan still hadn't been honest with him about Darlene, and his subsequent brush with relapse, though Mick's cowardice on this issue felt both like a betrayal and an embarrassment.

  Jerry texted Callahan, often emailed, and they used Skype sometimes. In that sense nothing changed. Quinn and Roth and Julius went unmentioned, as did Wes McCann. Mick knew Jerry was searching, and sooner or later they'd have something new to go on. They talked effortlessly, circling the thing both cared most about. A creative decision about the show Jerry wanted to produce would bounce right into the probable whereabouts of Wes McCann, assuming he was still alive. A plot for isolating Quinn so Callahan could have a quiet "talk" with the man morphed into a conversation about Hal's arrival, and where they'd all go for dinner. Donato and his team had completed a lot of research, and as was normal, Callahan relied on Jerry to keep him in the loop. Email files were exchanged. Still, nothing new broke through.

  One topic remained off limits, and to Jerry's credit, he didn't broach it. They did not discuss Darlene, her new relationship, or Mick's feelings about that relationship. Good thing, because Callahan would rather have had a root canal. Between all this frantic, avoidant behavior and the bad dream, a few hours managed to feel like a couple of long days. Callahan couldn't remember if he'd stopped for breakfast, it certainly didn't feel that way.

  Later that morning, Callahan checked in with Jerry again via cell phone. He was stuck on Woodman Avenue, and for no particular reason the traffic was slow and cranky. He was driving back from taping those promotional spots for the proposed web show. Callahan wasn't sure what was going on and didn't much care. Jerry said they were to raise money, that the team was looking for investors, although that part had Callahan a bit in the dark. What was the money for, the producer salaries? Why? A duo just drove over and shot them
right there at Callahan's office. Funny how times had changed. These days people could shoot high definition video on a two hundred dollar camera, fix the sound on a laptop and edit a decent looking commercial within a matter of hours.

  "How did it go?"

  "Fine, they just had me read some stuff from cards and do my half of a welcome conversation. I guess they're going to plug in an actress to be my fake client for the purposes of the demo or something. They spent more time on lighting than they did on anything to do with me."

  "Hi Def can be tricky that way."

  "Whatever you say."

  The guy in front of Callahan stopped on a dime. Callahan honked and the guy gave Callahan the finger. The guy behind Callahan honked and Callahan almost did the same thing but caught himself. Where the hell are we all going in such a hurry? The grave arrives soon enough.

  Callahan's earpiece cracked and hissed. Jerry said, "Okay, so I think I've found your guy, boss."

  Callahan sat up. "Quinn?"

  "The same."

  "Did he go back to Roth's office?"

  "No, he's been sailing, and I shit you not. The guy took two young hookers with him on a two-day cruise from San Diego to Mexico and back. Bargain basement stuff, nothing fancy, just all the food you can eat, all the booze you can drink. No extra charge for venereal disease and diarrhea."

  Callahan tried to count backwards while changing lanes. He was near his street. "Can we verify when he got on the boat, Jerry?"

  "Within hours of whatever went down at Cal's house, my man. As of now it looks like Quinn may have had just enough time to get there before you to do the deed, and that he left town just after it all went down."

  "We still like him for Cal, then."

  "Donato does. And I agree he makes the most sense."

  "But it would have been tight?"

  "Tight as a bastard, but he could have done it."

  "Then maybe you can help me out on something else, Jerry. Talk to Donato about this one. Let's see if we can predict the future. Try to pin down this guy's whereabouts later on today or early tomorrow. I want to arrange for a private meeting with Mr. Quinn. A little heart to heart."

  Jerry paused. "You sure about that, boss?"

  "Can you do it?"

  "Is the Pope a pedophile? Hell, yes. I've already got GPS and cell information, Donato has someone on his ass now. We have a jacket of where he goes regularly. So I can just pin down where he's going, triangulate an intercept point and bang."

  Callahan stopped at a light. "Maybe we lure him to some kind of a sit down. Not with me, obviously. With someone like Roth or one of his guys."

  "Or we make it look like pussy."

  "Well, it sounds like he's into recreation,"

  "Maybe he's tired now, though," Jerry said, "so maybe the trick is to arrange for Roth to send him something urgent and confidential. Set up a meeting of some kind, something Roth wouldn't feel he has to tend to personally, and then we'll have Quinn to ourselves."

  "No we, Jerry. Not this time."

  "You always cut me out of the fun stuff, like you don't trust me or something."

  "A tall drip, black."

  "What?"

  "Sorry," Callahan said. "I'm driving through a coffee joint." Callahan gave the girl some money and got his change. "Do we have any idea where Wes McCann has ended up? Even a hint?"

  "Not a sign of the guy. If he heard about his dad he's probably hiding out, though. Mick, the guy has a temper, so . . ."

  "Yeah, I know. He may want to get even."

  "Is that one of the reasons you want to get to Quinn first?"

  Callahan got his coffee. He drove off, sipping from the cup. "Exactly."

  "When does Hal arrive, bro? I can't wait to meet him in the flesh at long last." Jerry sneezed in Callahan's ear. "Fucking allergies."

  "I'm still waiting to hear. It's hard to believe he's going to actually show up this time, to be honest. He's been traveling for what, four years straight? I still remember the first time you hooked us up on a computer back in Dry Wells. Freaked me out. Now I'm so used to it I half expect him to show up with a monitor over his head."

  Callahan's phone beeped. Traffic started to move again, so Callahan didn't dare look at the number. Jerry said, "Is that you or me?"

  "Me, I think. I'd better take it. Talk to you soon." Callahan clicked over to the other line. "This is Mick."

  "It's me."

  Callahan almost lost the wheel.

  "Hi, how are you doing?" Oh, great opening line. "Look, Darlene, about the other night . . ."

  "Mick," she said, "we need to talk."

  "I know, I know. I acted like an asshole, I'm sorry."

  "No, I mean we need to sit down and talk. Can you make lunch?"

  Callahan swallowed. "Yeah, I guess so." Something about this didn't sound good, but then nothing much had sounded good lately.

  "Okay," she said. Callahan imagined her checking the time. "Noon where we first met for lunch. Don't come here first."

  She hung up before Callahan could respond.

  THIRTEEN

  Thursday noon

  The spot called Willie's was a run-down hamburger stand two blocks from the North Hollywood LAPD station. Cops loved the food. They'd dubbed it the Ptomaine Tavern. Callahan drove past it occasionally on his way to and from the counseling office. The joint hadn't changed in years, a small, dirty-white building covered with splintering boards. Big sign with red letters, one forlorn string of Christmas lights. Inside, wooden bar stools and card tables. Outside thick round tables now chained to the cement to keep them from being stolen during the night. The original owner had passed away some time ago but the name hadn't changed, nor had the menu. In keeping with tradition Juan, the overweight Hispanic man who fried the greasy food, still laughingly answered to the name "Willie."

  Callahan parked around the corner. He ordered himself to get it together, stop feeling so insecure. He rolled his window down. The sun was a white-hot plate in a blue china sky. It bore down with the kind of fierce intensity that caused bumpers and hubcaps to sizzle brightly. On the sidewalk, annoyed folks squinted and glared like angry cons on the yard. Callahan put on a pair of sunglasses, as much to protect his wilting pride as his tired eyes.

  There was an empty table outside Willie's. It sat in the sparse shade of a man-sized succulent, an orange and green spiked thing that appeared beamed down from some far less hospitable planet. Callahan staked out the table, left his shades and hit the counter. He asked the contemporary Willie to whip up a pair of cheeseburgers with chili fries and tall diet cokes. Only in America would a man order this much artery-clogging goo and then a sugar free drink. The food arrived quickly, efficiently. Callahan took it back to the table. Darlene was a few minutes late, which was out of character.

  The first time they'd come here they'd argued. Still, their attraction had sparked that first time, and steadily grown thereafter. Callahan had been busted by Darlene long before, while in a drunken stupor. Bad way to begin a friendship. So when they'd met that second time, with Callahan in sobriety, it had taken real effort to persuade Darlene to trust him. Within days, they'd fallen in love, worked together to locate a missing boy, and brought down a very bad man and his organization. Their relationship seemed both surprising and inevitable after that. An odd couple from the start, both of them bright and opinionated, stubborn and physical, workaholics, brash and yet easily hurt. They were always off balance due to their chemistry, the demands of her job in Homicide, his career issues . . . and the odd chaos that seemed to follow him everywhere like a gloomy cloud.

  Callahan's phone pinged. A text read 5 MINUTES SORRY.

  Callahan had one of the foul chili fries. He decided to skip the meat patty and just ingest some lettuce, tomato, and half of the wheat bun. That would tide him over. He could stop and score a protein shake at the Health Food store near Vineland. Five more minutes.

  Darlene Hernandez had saved Callahan's life, and more than once Callahan had been able t
o return the favor. Her absence from his heart and bed left an acute pain in its wake. Callahan was hoping to at least mend some broken fences. Bro, why don't you find out what she had on her mind before commencing to grovel?

  Callahan sipped some watery soft drink. He stared back at the police station, metal railings and huge windows gleaming in the sunlight. It was a strange mix of modern and tossed-together, and a rotund testament to city inefficiency and poor judgment. At that moment the tinted glass doors slid open. A clump of people emerged, some shuffling half sideways and others walking backwards as if unwilling to discontinue a conversation. As the clumsy group reached the steps up from the lobby and walked between the metal railings, they were forced to split into twos and threes. Darlene was in the second group. She was engaged in animated conversation with her new partner, the man Callahan had seen her with last night. Dennis something. He walked off toward the parking lot without looking back.

  Darlene spoke another few words to one of the guys who worked for the Crime Lab, a skinny blonde college grad with thinning hair. And then she finally started Callahan's way, heels clicking and hips swinging, that purse with the knife in it held tight, the small 9mm riding on her hip around the right side. Darlene was wearing dark slacks and a white blouse with a no-nonsense collar and a business vest. She had her long brown hair in a pony tail, something she rarely chose to do, though it seemed eminently practical to Callahan. She looked pretty hot. She saw him waiting at the table and picked up her pace. Some of the uniforms ate at Willies, but their schedule brought them back later in the afternoon for their junk fix. They'd have Willie's more or less to themselves.

  Darlene arrived and Callahan rose, almost knocking over the huge needled plant near their table. A long minute crawled by. Her eyes seemed guarded, her mind somewhere else. She was panting a bit, and her cheeks were flushed.