The Innocents

by Richard Barre

  “Probably nothing,” Wil said, tossing his paper plate in the trash.

  “You figure this guy for tonight?”

  Wil nodded.

  “Yeah,” Mo said, looking out. “Me, too.”

  Too much caffeine and too little action, three to five had been especially tense. But now light was showing in the east and their piranha snappishness was easing. Zavala would have hit by now if he were coming—chased, they figured, by too much heat and too little time.

  Wil stood a last watch while Mo readied himself for L.A., then Epstein stayed on duty while Hardesty slept. At eleven Mo woke him with, “Great weekend. Especially the food.” He jammed the last of his things into his duffel bag. “Keep in touch, chum, and I’ll do the same. What Freiman doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

  From the window, Wil watched Mo’s car turn southward, lost it past the Shoals, then cast an eye north. Not bad conditions. He checked the scope, thought he saw Gringo out there. After three nightmare days and the sun out and Zavala in flight, he was ready.

  Deliberating whether or not to pack heat, he rolled up the .45 and four clips in a spare towel, put them in his beat-up ice chest, and locked the door behind him. The fresh air tasted clean and big and salty and it mussed his hair. Taking it in, he felt like a convict loose after hard time.

  NINETEEN

  Bolo Zavala watched the white car cross the tracks and swing north. First the other man and now Hardesty, no telling how long he’d be gone. Follow or break in and wait? Two days already shot thanks to the other cabrón—a cop probably—not that he hadn’t had his chance. He’d fucked up leaving the photo in there. By now Donna’d probably given him up. Should have done her when he had the chance.

  A snort of cocaine snapped his head back.

  It was getting crazy: Donna, the baby, Lenny. Where else did Lenny think he’d take his kid, the thought reminding him he had to get back. Fucking time! He hit the other nostril and it all came into focus. Lenny didn’t know it, but his time was up; soon as he came back for the baby, he’d settle up with Lenny. Fuck Lenny’s file and his threats and his contacts, there were places he knew.

  Vida nueva. Almost there.

  His eyes followed the white car and its driver. The knife would have been so much more satisfying. But he had the Llama with the silencer and an AK-47 he was pretty good with.

  Passing the banana plantation: now or never.

  With a shower of mud and gravel, Zavala shot the IROC out of hiding and onto the freeway. Distance melted; he saw the white car pull off and cautiously followed it into the parking lot marked Rincon. At the opposite end, Hardesty nosed into a space next to a rusty pickup; Zavala watched him unload a longboard and a cooler and make for the trail.

  It hit him like a jolt of the flake: The cabrón was a surfer—better still, a bird in a shooting gallery—thinking he was safe, that Bolo Zavala had gone slinking away like a dog. Guess again. He stuck the pistol under his jacket and started for the trail, minutes later spotting groups of spectators watching the action, but no Hardesty.

  He was in the water. It would be the rifle.

  Too public where he was, however; around the point a creek offered cover, but it was too far from the action, though it did lead back to the parking lot. A clump of bushes faced the surfline; behind them, green lawn and a house. He cased the property. No one there—maybe his luck was back.

  He approached a group of young men in bright wetsuits waxing their boards. “Which is Hardesty?” he asked. “I was told he is one to watch.”

  They ignored him, so he asked again, sharpening his tone this time. One, expressionless in iridescent wraparounds, pointed out to a group of surfers waiting for a wave. “Longboard, red stripe crossed by blue. Dude’s wearing a black wetsuit. You can’t miss him.”

  Got that right, chico. He felt like turning the pistol on them. Never worked a day in their worthless fucking lives—at their age he was bleeding in smoky arenas for pesos. He started to go, stopped. Curious in spite of himself.

  The figure caught the wave, swept down it, let it curl over him, then burst free. Casual moves, a flip, and the board was pointed back toward the line of incoming breakers.

  Bolo Zavala spat, turned toward the IROC and what was in the trunk. Picking his way over the streambed, he noticed the jet trails pointing north. They were like white tracers, sharp contrast against the sky’s depthless blue.

  They’d finished a run when Gringo brought it up.

  “Crankin’ out there,” he said. “Think you could handle this baby?” Grinning at Wil, “Nah, I guess not.”

  Wil swung wet hair out of his eyes. “That popgun? Come on, get serious.”

  They were sitting on their surfboards, feet dangling in the water. Catching their breath as the surge rolled past beneath them. “One way to find out,” Gringo said. “Deal is, whoever has the most dumps on the other’s board buys the brew—winner’s choice.”

  Wil looked at him. “Your brew against my cheeseburger?”

  “Oh, right. You ever get a yen for the old days?”

  Closing too many bars with Gringo came back like the mornings after. “Fall down and throw up, you mean? Listen, I’m sorry about Pam’s leaving.”

  “Yeah. So what’s life without barf? We on here or what?”

  “You must like taking gas,” Wil said.

  Gringo’s expression twisted to a smirk. “Fall off something that big? Give it up, Kahuna.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Wil handed him his leash, took Gringo’s, and they headed out. First runs were dicey, the waves radical overheads that started early and finished late. Wil found the thruster much quicker than he anticipated and oversteered, then watched Gringo having control problems with the longboard. They wiped out here, bailed there, before getting the hang of it. At length Wil kicked out of a wave near Gringo and paddled over.

  “This thing’s wild, but I’m gonna feel it tomorrow,” he said. “One more, then swap back.”

  “If I can borrow the barge again sometime.”

  “You passed. C’mon, rock and roll.” Muscles complaining, Wil paddled toward the point.

  Bolo Zavala wrapped the assault rifle in his jacket and made his way back down the creekbed, cutting in this time at a secluded path between houses. So far he’d been lucky. Spectators crowded the beach, nobody leaving or arriving; to his right and through a gate he saw the patch of green, the bushes beyond. He entered, prepared now to kill anyone who got in his way.

  The foliage was good cover—luxuriant growth six feet high. The only drawback was he could be seen from the house, something he’d deal with if it happened. He unwrapped the rifle, settled in, turned his attention to the pointbreak, for a moment panicking, realizing then his target had taken a previous swell. He used the time to line up another rider, watching the black suit raise up, gather momentum, angle right to left. Damn, he’d have to be quick. It was in his field of fire only briefly then was gone, too distant for a sure kill. Crucial to anticipate.

  Off to his left he saw the big board slicing back out.

  Gringo beat him but waited, letting a couple of half-baked ones go by. Wil caught up and they sat facing the incoming sets, wanting picture-perfect, dream-session water. Three passed, then four, and there it was: forming out beyond the others, keeping its shape, promising the moon. They bellied down and then it was on them.

  Gringo, up the line, took it first, glancing back to hoot-salute.

  Two seconds behind, Wil saw the bright bloom, saw Gringo jerk upright and pitch forward off the longboard. Hearing the pops, seeing the flashes and the waterspouts, he dove for the safety of the water as the big wave heaved away to spend itself.

  He gave it thirty seconds, then surfaced. The shooting had stopped; on the beach were frantic scatterings, thin screams. He twisted back, scanning, scanning, seeing Gringo then, face down in a trough, arms out as though conducting some underwater orchestra. A few yards away, the Southern Cross tugged at Gring
o’s leg. Urging him on.

  Sonofabitch-sonofabitch-sonofabitch—

  Wil made up the yards between them in seconds: The exit wound had blown away half of Gringo’s forehead; he lay sprawled on the surface, his long hair a red jellyfish in the rising-falling water. Wil shouted to the beach, to the others, anyone who’d hear. “The fuck was that?” said the first surfer to reach him. Until he saw Gringo.

  With difficulty they got him up on the longboard and headed in, coffin-carried the board ashore. A crowd formed around the body. Gringo had the vacant look of someone wondering where everything had gone.

  Wil stood a minute, fighting nausea, doubled over from the exertion, then found his towel, placed it over the shattered head. Some time later—he wasn’t sure how long—four sheriff’s deputies picked their way over the rocks. He put a hand over his eyes, feeling enraged and responsible and despondent in no particular order.

  “You know this fella?”

  He looked up at a hawk-nosed man with a dark crew cut and noncommittal eyes, the tag reading Sgt. Jim Dietrich. Unlike the uniforms, he was dressed in corduroys and a windbreaker.

  Wil nodded.

  “He got a name?”

  “Adams…Jared,” Wil said, struggling to remember it. “Goes by Gringo. He’s an occasional carpenter, odd jobs. Lives in La Conchita—he has a trailer there.”

  Dietrich began penciling in a small notebook. “And who might you be?”

  Wil told him, waited for Dietrich to quit writing, said, “My ID’s in the cooler there cabled to that log.” He fumbled for the key.

  Dietrich handed it to a deputy, who undid the lock and brought it over. They went through it, then Dietrich looked up. “Not everybody surfs so well armed. You expect this?”

  “No, Sergeant, but I am on a case.” He rubbed his temples, weary of knots in his gut.

  “Don’t overwhelm me with details,” Dietrich said. “For instance what this guy did that made somebody take him out like that. And why you really came to the beach with a .45, extra bullets and all. We can do this easy or hard—your choice.”

  Wil looked past him. By now the deputies had pushed the crowd back from the body and were examining the ambush site. A siren growled down, a gurney bumped toward them; nearby a flash unit went off. At the eye of it, Gringo looked oddly neglected.

  It was getting all too familiar. “Easy,” Wil said.

  They sat in Dietrich’s sedan as the deputies reported. No one got a look at the killer, the gallery freaking at the sound of gunfire, although a couple in the parking lot did spot a guy running for a dark blue Camaro/Firebird/One-of-Those. No reason to remember the license, just that he’d wasted no time leaving. A deputy went to radio the CHP.

  Sunlight danced on restless leaves.

  Wil ran through the whole thing, after which Dietrich contacted Vella and Epstein for verification. A sticking point was Hardesty’s judgment. “Wonder nobody else was hit,” Dietrich griped at him. “You got a killer on your tail, and you not only play it alone, you bring your grief here. Jesus Christ.”

  Wil said nothing, no arguing the point. Freiman doubtless would come to the same conclusion. And Lisa. “You need me here?” he said.

  “Don’t go far,” Dietrich said coldly. “And don’t forget your artillery.”

  Halfway to Santa Paula, Bolo heard the scanner’s first calls. The net was forming; no surprise there, he knew he’d been spotted. Already he’d ragged down and tossed the AK-47 into a drainage ditch; if found, it was untraceable and no great loss, plenty more around. A more serious problem was the car. The IROC was out of time.

  Nosing off 126, he began to scout for wheels. Downtown Santa Paula was busy with holiday shoppers, so he cased side streets until he found it parked by a restored bungalow. The old Dart was perfect, the For Sale sign meaning it probably ran. With luck it wouldn’t be missed until the owner got home; couple of hours to L.A., then he’d switch again.

  He circled, parked in the alley behind the Dart house. Grabbing his jacket and the nine millimeter, he was ready to do it when the car phone buzzed.

  “Where are you?” The tone was impatient.

  “Safe enough,” he said. “There were problems, but it’s done now.” In the earpiece he heard an expulsion of breath.

  “Bolo, Bolo—it was on the radio. You got the wrong man, a friend or something. Come in. Now.”

  “Que—?” His head felt light; heat started in his gut like a boiler firing.

  “I said you missed, goddamnit. Open your fucking ears.”

  He barely heard. The cabrón was dead. He’d seen it—the board, the figure in the sights, the hit. He twisted the key, thumbed in AM, flipped around until he hit a newscast.

  “—occurred about forty-five minutes ago. Dead at the scene was a twenty-five-year-old part-time carpenter, identified by another La Conchita resident, Sean Wilson Hardesty. Authorities are searching for a late-model dark blue Camaro seen leaving the Rincon. No motive has been established yet for the slaying—”

  How? The lightness became a roaring that blocked the newscast, Lenny’s voice, the car, the need to flee. The heat went acid, stabbing his diaphragm. How was it possible?

  “Going back,” he managed to say.

  “Bad enough you let the woman live. Don’t make it worse.”

  “Bolo will not be made a fool of.”

  “Too late for that, my friend.”

  He found the inhaler, two hard pulls. “La Conchita,” he said. They’d never look for him there, so close. “I will finish this thing and be back tonight.”

  Guerra softened his tone. “Listen to me. They’re watching the roads, they know the car. Now is not safe. Not smart.”

  Motherfuck: Lenny was a dead man. “You listen,” he said. “I will kill this bastard and then I will come for my niña. Comprende, patrón?” He heard Lenny say something else, but it made no difference, there would be no more listening. He wiped down the IROC, left it with the keys in. Somebody stole it, so much the better.

  Two minutes to swipe the Dart, roughly the time it took to backtrack west, orange trees blurring as he gained speed. Fucking luck—losing his touch if he didn’t know better. Hardesty he’d fix—sever the link, erase the threat. But a flood, for Christ’s sake. And the medal. If only he could remember: Benito-Benito-Benito-Benito—as usual, nothing. Slowing for the turn north; sure enough, black-and-whites tearing east. Restaurant on the left, Hungry something. Hungry alright—enough to scarf the menu with room left over.

  Smoke poured from the Dart’s tires, and it slewed sickeningly before he controlled the skid. Stopped there on the fringe, heart pumping, he hit the inhaler as he’d hit the brakes. The goddamn menu. It had been there all along at the fat one’s house, the name on the note: Reyes, the family who owned the restaurants. Ignacio Reyes. He tried to picture the man, came up with tall and gaunt-looking, nothing much else. No matter—Reyes was as dead now as el cabrón.

  What to do? No phone in the clunker and no time to find one. In a short while, however, all the time in the world.

  Finally he would finish it with Leonardo Guerra.

  Wil leaned against the Bonnie, tilted the bottle, and knocked back another slug of Jack Daniels. Fuck it! Below where he’d parked, waves boomed, their constancy reminding him only of broken promises.

  Fuck ’em!

  He took another belt, conscious of the fire in his upper gut and a spreading shame fed by guilt and his failures. The bourbon made his mind loop: Paul, whose ashes they’d bury tomorrow; Gringo, who had nobody much to care what happened to him; himself, casualty of a battle he hadn’t yet figured out. Some detective. Just don’t stand too close.

  He thought about calling Lisa, decided to tell her at home. Around five he slowly backed the car down the bluff, turned it around, and pointed it south. Still in the wetsuit, he ached for a hot shower, ached to scrub it all off, settled for more whiskey.

  He passed the Rincon, feeling Gringo. Beyond the presence he’d miss, there was what Gr
ingo represented—freer times, if there were such things. Wil looked at the waves curling around the point. Just before sunset the light was gold, the water translucent as it foamed up the beach and rolled back. As he made the left turn, the setting sun blazed from La Conchita’s windows.

  Pretty some other time.

  In the carport he capped the bottle, raised the trunk, lifted out the Southern Cross. Among the scratches and dents from rocks was a shallow groove from a stray round and traces of red. He hosed it off, replaced the board in its stirrup. Grabbing the bottle of Jack, he put the ice chest under his arm and started for the stairs.

  The first fusillade hit the Bonneville broadside, making a punk, punk, punk sound he knew at once. He scrambled for cover around the front of the car to the back, tore open the chest, and racked a round into the .45. The flashes were coming from the drainage ditch near the entrance to the tunnel. The faint coughing noise told him silencer; little doubt who was pulling the trigger.

  He flattened as more rounds hit, spanging and clanking in the wheels, blowing out both rear tires. Wil squeezed off five himself; he needed better cover, but where? Everyplace he looked would put a neighbor in jeopardy. Some already were appearing on balconies and lawns.

  He yelled at the closest one, saw her duck back inside. Then he dove behind the corner of the carport—still not good enough. He had to direct Zavala’s attention away from the houses. Rolling to his right, he expended his remaining shots, shoved in a new clip, angled a frantic sprint toward the ditch.

  Rounds sang past his head, then he was in the weeds, the line of fire now parallel with the highway. He could see the man’s position, pumped his entire clip toward it. Dirt flew. Zavala slid down the ditch and ran under the railroad tracks toward the tunnel; seeing him for the first time, Wil felt a wild surge of adrenaline. Crazy, he thought—the man cutting himself off like that. Unless he had a car on the other side.