The Replacements

by David Putnam

  He pulled out completely, with a huge smile. “Call for backup. I want every one of those swinging dicks in there booked on RICO, conspiracy to commit murder, robbery, and kidnap.” He pointed to the two SWAT guys. “You two. Take this ram, and I want you to take down this wall right here, but don’t go any farther than right here.” He indicated another place on the wall.

  Before the SWAT guys moved, I stepped in close and held out my cuffed hands. Dan smiled and handed me his flashlight. I stuck my arms in the hole and then my head. I couldn’t get in nearly as far with my hands cuffed, but far enough.

  Clay had needed a place to run his organization. He knew there would be search warrant after search warrant served on the clubhouse, and he had to have a way to keep evidence out of the hands of law enforcement. He built another wall in his office to partition off a four-foot-wide room. There had to be a secret lever that accessed a hidden door. We didn’t need the lever or the door; we had the ram.

  An odor of gun oil and sweat came at me hard. The flashlight lit up the narrow space.

  Inside, on one wall hung all the tools of the trade, sawed-off shotguns, machine guns, pistols—including the two H&K P9s with silencers—one of which Clay had used to shoot Drago in the foot. That’s what he’d done when he left us in the living room with Roy Boy, Slim Jim, Sandman, and the other cronies. He’d gone into his office, activated the lever, entered the room, and gotten to the H&Ks. I thought that I had heard the desk being moved when it had been the secret door.

  I marveled at all the guns and weapons as the light panned down the length of the wall. At the end, on the floor sat a smaller safe, shorter, the one that would contain the books, the records tracking all the ill-gotten gain for the SS International. I moved the flashlight above the safe. My breath caught. I whispered to no one, “What a damn fool.” On the narrow four-foot-wide wall at the end and above the safe, Clay had thwarted so many search warrants in the past that he’d grown arrogant and invincible, enough to pin up old Polaroid photos and trophies from his past. Dead enemies of the SS. Witnesses, bikers from opposing gangs, and all those who failed to fall into line under their tyranny.

  I started to pull back and remembered Drago. I pointed the flashlight straight down. On the floor just on the other side of the new wall, Clay had done a poor job with instant concrete mix. He’d tried to cover the hole where the safe used to sit. The shadow outline of the golden doughnut, still painted lead-gray, rose a quarter inch from the concrete, hardly visible at all unless you knew what to look for, a true Bluebeard’s treasure. The doughnut would not draw any attention from the FBI forensic people coming to document and seize the evidence.

  I pulled back out, stunned. Barbara stood close. I handed her the flashlight. She went up on tiptoes to look in the hole.

  Dan moved in close and immediately put the key into my handcuffs. “What do you need? You name it. You can have all the manpower you want. I’ll even pull in all the officers from the Joint Terrorist Task Force.”

  “I don’t have any time left for that. I find my wife and the kids in the next hour or it’s not going to matter.” I walked out, down the hall, and out to the front yard. The sun colored everything orange and yellow as it went down ending the day. I leaned against the closest Harley and closed my eyes. Now that I had freedom, the pressure of not going to prison, clearing Mack and Drago, I could think straight.

  I was barely aware that Barbara stood close by. In my mind, I deliberately went over everything that had happened since Barbara Wicks came back into my life, step-by-step, scene-by-scene, from the time she walked up from the beach. I replayed the dialogue from each conversation.

  The common denominator was the city of Montclair. Montclair continued to come up in all the information. Jonas rented a car and used the Montclair address. He used an underground doctor at a Montclair address. He used a Montclair address as a dead drop, a vacant house—

  I opened my eyes.

  “What?” asked Barbara.

  I looked at her. “We have to go. We have to go right now.”

  Her expression turned professional. One of the many FBI agents came out of the house, escorting a biker. She said, “I need your car keys, give them to me.”

  He shook his head. “Not a chance in hell.”

  Dan came out right behind him. Dan took hold of the biker the agent was escorting and said, “Go with them, do exactly what that man, Bruno Johnson, tells you to do. Do you understand?”

  The agent nodded.

  We ran for his car.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  I had to slow down to let the agent guide us to the right car. He beelined to one of the many navy-blue Chevy Suburbans parked on the street just outside the wrought-iron gate. I went to the front with him and said, “Give me the keys, I’m driving.”

  “You’re not an agent. You can’t drive.”

  Barbara, with her hand already on the back door handle, said, “Didn’t you hear what your ASAC just told you?”

  The agent looked at me, his eyes falling to the BMF tattoo on my arm as he weighed the options. I couldn’t wait. I grabbed the keys from his hand and hit the fob to open the doors. I said to the agent, “You get in back. Barbara up front with me.”

  This time he did as instructed. Barbara ran around and got in. I started up, put it in drive, and hit the gas. “Gimme me directions to Kadota off of Mission.”

  She didn’t answer.

  I had to concentrate on negotiating the huge vehicle in and out of traffic at high speed, and couldn’t look at her to see her expression as to why she’d didn’t answer.

  “Bruno, that’s in Montclair,” she said.

  “That’s right.” Then I caught on. If I was correct, the location would be in her city. “Snap out of it. We’re talking about Marie and the kids here. We can worry about public relations later.”

  “Of course, you’re right. Go down to the San Bernardino Freeway and take it west, get off at Central and go south.”

  “Right, now I remember.”

  “Why do you think it’s back in Montclair?”

  “Everything links back to Montclair, specifically, Mission and Kadota.”

  I checked the rearview and caught the FBI agent dialing his phone. He was going to alert his fellow agents to this hot new lead.

  “Barbara, take his phone.” She didn’t hesitate, whipped around, leaned in between the seats, and snatched his phone.

  I checked my driving path and then looked back in the mirror. “What’s your name?”

  “Price.”

  “Your first name?”

  “Zack.”

  “Give him his phone back,” I said to Barbara. “Zack, I’m sorry, there’s a lot at stake right now, and I need you on my side. We can’t have a lot of cops swarming the area until I know for sure which house we’re going to. There are lives at stake. You understand?”

  “Yes. If you want, I can call and have them stage out of the area.”

  “Not yet.”

  He nodded. Barbara handed back his phone.

  “I had a detective and forensics check out the place on Kadota,” Barbara said. “It was vacant.”

  “Forensics?”

  “Yes. There were signs someone had been there, but the place had been wiped clean. I told you that house is a dead end.”

  “What about the house the car came back registered to?”

  “What car?”

  “The Rent-a-Wreck with Micah’s body?”

  “That house was neg—”

  “What street was the car registered to?”

  “Roswell.”

  I looked at her as she deciphered the new information. “How close together are Roswell and Kadota?” I asked.

  “Kadota’s the next block over. Oh my God, why didn’t I see that?”

  “There isn’t any reason why you should have. It could just be a coincidence, but the coincidence is all we have right now.”

  I hit the freeway and opened up the Suburban to 120. The su
n was completely down and dusk settled in.

  “So what are you thinking?” she asked.

  “He’s used this same area twice. There has to be a reason why.”

  “Maybe it’s because he’s familiar with it?” Zack said.

  “Good. Can you have your people do a record check on Jonas? See if he has any friends who live in the area? Maybe Jonas listed someone on his booking form the times he was arrested, the ‘in case of emergency’ contacts.” I checked the mirror. Zack had already dialed, and the phone was up to his ear.

  I came up on Central Avenue too fast and had to push the brakes so hard the seatbelt bit into my shoulder. I hit the off ramp, checked the intersection, and ran the red signal to southbound Central.

  Zack closed his phone. “No luck.”

  I said, “Call back and have them check…” I looked at Barbara and said, “Have them check what?” I was running out of ideas. If we didn’t come up with something, we were going have to go door to door, three blocks’ worth of houses. It was seven fifteen.

  “It’s a long shot he’s even in the area,” she said.

  I hit Mission and took a long sweeping right. “Point out Kadota.”

  “Right there.”

  I took a hard left, pulled over, and parked. “Let’s go on foot from here.”

  We got out and met on the sidewalk. “Bruno, we checked this out. I’m telling you, there’s nothing here.”

  “Jonas has been bold,” I said. “He let the FBI tail him. He hid in plain sight because he knew we couldn’t do anything to him. He knew our only way to get the kids was to follow him. He has to be right around here, and I’m betting it’s going to be right here in plain sight.”

  “He didn’t know we were tailing him,” Zack said.

  “Yes, he did. He wanted me to find him, to personally rub my face in it. He’s been three steps ahead of us the whole time.”

  We came to the house with the Mercury Marquis parked in the front yard behind a chain-link fence. I went through the gate without hesitating. We were running into a dead end. What next? What else could we do?

  I took several quick breaths to force down the panic and continued up the walkway in the dimming light.

  “What’s that?” asked Barbara.

  “Residue, blood from Jonas’ gunshot foot. When I dropped him off.” The foot I’d shot and later regretted. I didn’t regret shooting him now.

  The door was open. Inside, the house was unearthly quiet and smelled of musty carpet and dust, with a faint hint of antiseptic. The blood trail did not transect the threshold. So we didn’t have solid evidence he entered this house.

  I checked the entire house, two bedrooms and one bath. Nothing. None of the small stuffy rooms had furniture or anything sitting on the threadbare carpeted floor. Wallpaper with an old floral design peeled away in long tongues, exposing the lath and plaster. Dust-laden weeping curtains let in the fading sunlight.

  “You’re right,” I said, “If they did actually use this place, they did a good job of taking everything with them.”

  Zack got down on his hands and knees and put his face close, parallel to the carpet, looking for micro evidence or unique disturbances. I respected the man for trying.

  In the kitchen, I tugged on the back door. It wouldn’t budge an inch. I examined it closely. The door had been nailed to the frame, the window in the door covered over with plywood. “Hey?”

  Barbara and Zack came in. “What?”

  “Did your detective say anything about checking the backyard?”

  She shook her head. “No, they didn’t find anything inside so…son of a bitch.” She turned and went out the front at a fast walk. I took one side of the house, and Zack followed Barbara around on the other. Darkness took the opportunity to hinder us further. I dodged overturned trash cans, pieces of wood, a stained sink, and a pile of used red brick. A detached garage sat back away from the house in the long lot. All the furniture from in the house had been tossed into a tall pile in the dirt and weed backyard.

  Barbara pulled up on the one-car garage door. It came up a few inches.

  “Hold it,” said Zack. He pulled his service weapon, backed up the drive, and got down on one knee, aiming his gun and his little flashlight under the door. “Go ahead.”

  I didn’t think anything would be in the garage, but it did make me realize I didn’t have a gun. I took one side and helped Barbara lift the door open. Discarded trash bags went almost to the rafters. The sour reek backed us off. Nothing. I pulled the garage door back down.

  “I guess we have to go check the Roswell street address.” The back gate caught my eye, and I looked down at the concrete walk leading to it. Nothing remarkable. “Come on, let’s check the alley.”

  They didn’t argue or complain and followed along. Through the unlocked gate the alley contained degraded asphalt with weeds pushing up in untended cracks. Both sides of the alley had abandoned cars and trash cans but still left room, if need be, for one car to drive through. In the eerie darkness the cars looked like dead animals.

  “You guys go that way,” I said. “I’ll check this way.”

  Zack headed off.

  Barbara stayed with me. Good thing, since I didn’t have a flashlight. “This is a dead end,” she said. “I know you don’t want to believe it, but it is. Let’s move on to something else.”

  I stopped. “What? What else is there?”

  She shrugged. “We could check—”

  “Over here,” called Zack.

  We turned and ran to him.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  Zack pointed to a small bloody splotch, almost indiscernible on the broken asphalt with scattered tiny rocks.

  “What do you make of it?” I didn’t want to hope too much.

  Zack said, “If your assumption is correct and he did receive medical attention in that house back there, then he might have walked away with a freshly bandaged foot.”

  Barbara finished it for him as she walked farther down the alley. “And if he walked away, it took until right there where that splotch is for him to bleed through the bandage.”

  We walked faster down the alley. The dried blood spore grew in size and frequency as Jonas had walked faster. I looked up periodically, watching our forward progress, not wanting to walk fat, dumb, and happy, right into Jonas. He had been three steps ahead of us at every turn. Did he know we would eventually get this far and wait in ambush for us?

  We came to the cross street, the first east-west street south of Mission, Howard Avenue. The blood trail stopped at the edge of the road. This time I didn’t have to ask Zack what he thought.

  “Looks like he had a car waiting,” he said.

  I sat down on the curb, put my head in my hands, and closed my eyes. I’d been so sure this would do it, but I couldn’t give up. Screw it. Zack and Barbara stood close by. Eyes still closed, I said, “There has to be a reason why he chose this area. Why Montclair of all places? What could possibly have drawn him to—”

  I stood. Next to me, Barbara was nothing more than a dim shadow. “What do you have?” she asked.

  “Do you have access to the county assessor’s office?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “Get them on the phone.”

  She pulled out her phone. “And ask them what?”

  “Ask them if Bella Mabry or Micah had a house in Montclair.”

  Barbara shook her head as she dialed and muttered, “Son of a bitch.”

  “No, wait.” I pointed to Zack. “Call your people and have them check marriage records and get Bella’s maiden name. Then you,” I pointed to Barbara, but she was with me now and waved her hand.

  Zack dialed. When the other end picked up, he said, “Priority flag, ASAC Chulack cleared. I need an immediate record check for a marriage license in the name of Micah Mabry.” He paused. “I don’t know, check Los Angeles County and San Bernardino.” He looked at me for confirmation. I nodded.

  Barbara said into her phone, “This is Mo
ntclair Chief of Police. Stand by, I’m going to need an immediate record check on a residence in my city.”

  “Dobbs, Bella Dobbs,” Zack said.

  “Bella Dobbs,” Barbara said. “I need you to check the tax records for a Bella Dobbs.”

  “Keep him on the line,” I said to Zack.

  Zack nodded. “Hold on one.”

  We waited, standing on the sidewalk, looking at each other. Barbara shook her head “no.”

  I said to Zack, “On the marriage license, get the first name of Bella’s father.”

  “Now the first name of Bella’s father,” he repeated into the phone.

  “Jack,” Zack repeated to me.

  Barbara paused a moment, confusion in her expression, and said, “Check Jack Dobbs.”

  A long moment passed. She closed her phone and took off running. We caught up. She said, “One street over on Pipeline. I’m calling in for backup.”

  “No, wait. There are three of us. Let’s scout it first. We don’t want—”

  She hit speed dial. “This is Chief Wicks. I want three patrol units to stage at Mission and Central. I want them there now but without lights and siren. Call out the SWAT team and have them stage in the same place. No one moves without my go-ahead.” The last came out gasping as she ran and talked at the same time.

  We turned left and ran up Pipeline. “It should be about halfway up,” she said. “It’s an even number, so it’s going to be on the left.”

  The houses on Pipeline were different than the tract homes on Kadota. These were unique, custom built, but years ago, decades ago, with wide, deep lots. I looked halfway up the long block. Right in the middle stood a house wider, taller than the rest. Barbara saw the house at the same time. She stopped running. Her breath came hard. “Let’s go easy. Move in slow.”

  I didn’t want to stop, I wanted to get there. My Marie was in that house, I knew it.

  Barbara stopped two houses down, pulled her gun, and stood behind a tree with a wide trunk. “I know this house. Every cop in Montclair knows this house. When I heard the name, I wasn’t sure. Now I am.”