Dead Game (14 page)

Marquez found Lisa
down on her dock replacing a couple of rotted deck boards. He helped her cut and screw into place a new pressure-treated piece of two-by-six. The last gold reflection off the river caused her to squint as she stood and faced him, and she wiped chips of the arsenic-laced wood off her cheeks. He rolled up her power cord as they talked.

“Richie’s friends are already here,” she said. “Or they were half an hour ago. They were asking about you again. I was going to call you as soon as I finished this. They said they’re meeting you here for dinner. Their last names are Torp and Perry. They make me uncomfortable.”

“They should. Did they rent a room?”

“One room for the two of them. I put them as far away from you as I could.”

“What about Crey?”

She shook her head, and that said it all. Marquez had told Crey he was staying here, and Crey had told “the boys.” No doubt they figured to get the chain of command straight tonight with Crey standing off to the side and innocent. Marquez walked up from the dock with Lisa. He prepaid his room, then moved his truck up there. He’d switched out of the Scout. He talked to Shauf again from the room.

“I just heard Bell quit,” she said. “He handed Baird his badge and a letter of resignation this morning, then walked out. I’m surprised he didn’t stick around to watch us twist in the wind.”

Had to be about his divorce, Marquez thought, and listened quietly, thinking about people who’d left. Who you thought would stick didn’t and vice versa. He knew he’d be gone too when the SOU shut down.

At dusk he left the room and walked down to the marina. Crey, Perry, and Torp were already at the bar. Torp spotted him first and nudged Perry as Marquez walked in. Might as well warm it up right away, Marquez thought.

“I didn’t know it was a party,” he said to Crey. “Or weren’t you able to get a babysitter?” He looked at Torp and Perry. “Just kidding, guys, and I’ll buy you a drink if you take it outside.”

Maybe they were here to vet him for Crey. Crey was moody and quiet, so it was possible it had rained on the big rock candy mountain this afternoon.

“Man, you are some kind of asshole,” Perry said.

“You two bring it out in me.”

Crey settled it down, and they moved from the bar to a table and ordered drinks. Lisa turned on the Christmas lights, and the different colors lined the windows and cast a glow on the deck.
Two couples came in for dinner as it got darker, and right around the second round of drinks or maybe their third, Perry got interested in the young woman who worked nights as a waitress. He waved her over.

“How’d you like to dance on my lap?”

Marquez leaned over to talk to Crey, though he made sure Perry and Torp could hear. “Can’t you feed him outside and then put him in the car until we’re done? There are people in here trying to eat, and I can’t think with him around.”

That lit up Perry. Anger was bright in his eyes. He pointed a finger at Marquez.

“This is going to get squared up.”

“Sounds good to me.”

Perry lifted the empty bread basket and waved it. “Chiquita. Bread.”

“Get him out of here,” Marquez said.

“You boys go to the bar,” Crey said to them. “The man and I are going to talk.”

They didn’t move, so Marquez stood and said he was going to use the restroom, figuring that would give Crey time to sort it out. In the hallway on the way, there was a poster of Anna Burdovsky. “Missing.” “Feared Abducted.” When he got back Crey nodded toward Perry and Torp standing at the bar.

“These guys don’t get why you’re all over them. Why not give it a rest?”

“Why are they staying here tonight?”

“Is that what this is about?”

“You tell me. Are they here because I’m here?”

“You’ve got to make your peace with them, my man. However you do it, it’s got to happen. They’re part of my crew.”

“You don’t need them.”

“They’re all I’ve got to put between me and anyone watching. I’m not a big operation. I’m not like the Russians.”

“Right, and I keep hearing about these Russians. Maybe I should be doing business with them.”

“You don’t want to deal with them.”

The waitress returned and took their dinner orders. Marquez saw Lisa handing Torp and Perry menus. They’d taken seats at the bar.

“What do you think of the chick that runs this place?” Crey asked, following his eyes.

“I like her.”

“Yeah, she’s cute.” Crey sighed. “You’ve got to back off a little, man. You’re not a bad guy but you’re making problems I don’t need.”

“I keep saying the same thing over and over; I’d rather deal straight with you.”

“Lou is pretty quick with a knife, and you’ve got him angry. I want you to apologize tonight. Why do you have such a hard-on for them?”

“Why’d you ask me about Lisa?”

“Because she’s alone here and she’s got to be lonely.” Crey gave him a sly smile. “She needs somebody to keep her warm at night.”

In his room before walking down to the marina deck, Marquez had read through what Ehrmann left for him at DFG. Torp was a registered sex offender who had to report his whereabouts. The home address for him was Sherri La Belle’s address in Stockton. She was the owner of the gold Le Mans Perry and Torp had traded for the van.

“Here’s what bothers me,” Marquez said. “They stick out. Like that car of theirs.”

“The Le Mans is gone. They traded it for a van.”

“But you know what I mean.”

Torp also had two strikes, and Marquez wasn’t much of a fan of California’s three-strike system. There wasn’t enough flexibility in the way the law got applied. In some cases the application of the law was immoral. In the case of a man named Santos Reyes, for example. Reyes had perjured himself on a driver’s license application and taken the test for a cousin who couldn’t read so that his cousin could work as a roofer. Reyes had two priors, one for robbery a decade before, and a burglary as a juvenile in ‘81. He got his third strike for the driver’s license fiasco, and in consequence twenty-six to life.

“It’s more complicated than you know about. Liam is a good mechanic. He works on my charter boat, and I need him.”

“But look at them right now, both trying to hit on her. They stand out. Cops will pick up on them.” Marquez added, “I’ve done business for a long time by not sticking out.”

“They’re who I’ve got right now. Later, we’ll figure it out differently.”

“I’m on record about them, okay?”

“Man, you are too loud and clear on record. Chill.”

The waitress brought more drinks, and Crey bought another round for the guys at the bar. Lisa put a burger in front of Torp and spaghetti in front of Perry. She brought more bread. She gave them what they asked for and otherwise ignored them, pretending to be too busy, and Marquez kept an eye on the bar. He took the conversation at the table back to the Russians.

“So if these guys exist, have you done business with them?”

“I’ve done some. I heard about it when I was inside. I heard they were into sturgeon so I made contact when I got out. But you don’t need them, you’ve got me. I can take whatever you’ve got to sell.”

“And what do you do with it? Do you sell to them?”

“Don’t worry about who I sell to. My money is good. That’s all you need to know.”

Marquez kept drinking beer. Crey switched from hard liquor to wine, ordering another glass as Marquez looked around at what Lisa had here.

Twelve tables with wood tops, big A-frame windows looked out on the deck and the river. He’d seen Lisa on a ladder with a caulking gun a couple of times, trying to find leaks. The floor was old wood plank and worn. There were water stains and grooves worn in the flooring around the bar. Bathrooms were clean but needed to be redone, and Lisa had told him she just got by. Made just enough to justify keeping the doors open. The space was warm when sunlight came through the windows. It was a comfortable place in the good parts of the year, and the rest of the time she had to hustle more. He watched Torp and Perry follow her movements down the bar and didn’t have to guess to know what they were thinking. Crey swirled wine in his glass, trying to be something he wasn’t. Then he surprised Marquez, pulling out a two-ounce glass jar of caviar with August’s import label from his coat.

“Take a look at this. It’s some good beluga. The largest one of those ever caught ran fifty-three hundred pounds. Man, you wouldn’t know how to move something like that.”

“You’ve got that right.”

“You’d have to cut the ovaries out right there on the riverbank and kick the thing back in the water.”

“Hack off a little meat too.”

“Make you rich, wouldn’t it? How many pounds of eggs are in fifty-three hundred pounds?”

“Enough.”

“You know it.”

Crey twisted the top, broke the vacuum seal. He handed it to Marquez to taste.

“If you eat caviar the alcohol doesn’t absorb as fast,” Crey said. “That’s the God’s truth. I heard it from a Russian.”

“Okay, so where are these Russians from?”

“They put the word out about a year ago. They’ve got some guys working the middle for them, so when you sell to them you drop stuff off. You never deal direct, kind of like what I’m doing with the boys.” He used his wineglass to gesture toward the caviar. “That’s some good shit, isn’t it? It’s what the jar says that matters. The label, man. Things keep heating up with the Iranians, and Congress will be cutting off the caviar they ship here, but those fat-ass bankers in New York are still going to want caviar, and that’s where you and me make the money.”

They ate dinner and talked sturgeon haunts, different baits, the best holes for finding the big sturgies. Ghost shrimp. Grass shrimp. Eel/shrimp combos. Pile worms and eels. Crey favored grass shrimp. He liked to fish the Big Cut and would eat bass or halibut or crappie over sturgeon because he found sturgeon too oily.

“I learned to fish with my old man and Tom Beaudry. But I never liked Beaudry. He was an asshole to work for and a lying fucker. He’d look those Fish and Game people right in the eye and
lie his ass off. Let me tell you, we were big time over-limit so many times I can’t remember how many. But he taught me, man, that’s the one good thing he did. Well, actually, two good things because he sold me his shop way too cheap.”

“Why’d he do that?”

“He wanted out.”

“Hey, I knew him. That’s bullshit.”

“Okay, let me put it this way. He owed money, and I was connected with the people he owed it to. They got the deal done for me, and I’m paying them a little on the side.”

“Are we talking Russians again?”

“That’s it for tonight, man.”

Crey stood and, with a long bow-legged stride, cowboy boots clicking on the flooring, left after talking to the boys. Marquez watched the backs of Torp and Perry and finished his drink, thinking over what Crey had told him. He’d said that Beaudry taught him the two big rivers and the bays, where to take the sport boat, and he still fished Cache Slough, Steamboat, and Chain and Decker Islands. The Mothball Fleet was always reliable for sturgies. Meeks Hole. Mare Island. Montezuma Slough. The PG&E plant, the power lines, Ryer and Sherman Islands, though not in the wind. Lots of times he’d check out sturgeonfishing.com. The whole online thing was good for fishing.

It was a short walk from here back to the room, and Marquez thought he’d call Katherine before going to sleep. The waitress cleared his table. Lisa turned a couple of the lights off when there was nobody left in the room but himself, Torp, and Perry. She came over to his table and sat down after Perry and Torp moved out onto the deck to smoke.

“One of those two came into the kitchen tonight and scared me.”

“Which one?”

“The thin one with the dark hair. I think his name is Liam.”

“What did he want in the kitchen?”

“He said he used to work as a cook and he’s looking for a job again, but when I asked him about it, it didn’t sound like he knows how to cook. He was a short-order cook or something like that in Florida for a few weeks once, and I don’t even believe that. He says he was in Sarasota but can’t remember the name of the restaurant he worked at.”

“He got Sarasota from your waterskiing photos on the wall.”

“I don’t like the way he looks at me. It makes me feel like I need to take a shower.”

Perry and Torp watched through the windows as he talked with Lisa. Then they came back inside and up to the bar. When Lisa got up to go serve them Marquez also stood.

“Last call, gentlemen,” she said.

“We’d like to buy a bottle of Jack Daniels,” Perry said, and pointed at Marquez. “Put it on his room.”

Lisa turned to Marquez. “That okay with you?”

“No.”

“Thought you were going to buy us a drink,” Perry said.

“Sure, give them a last drink on me.”

“And one for him too,” Perry said.

“I’m done.”

“Stick around because we’ve got something to say to you.”

“Say it now.”

“It’s got to wait for outside.”

Lisa poured two Jack Daniels and turned the bar lights off.

“Take them out on the deck,” she said. “I’m going upstairs.”

Marquez led the way out to the deck. It was late but cold and clear. The deck chairs had dew on them. Cigarette smell lingered from when Torp and Perry had been out here earlier.

“Richie is a real good friend of mine so I didn’t get into it with you earlier, but you treat me like that ever again I’ll kill you,” Perry said.

Marquez waited. Nothing more came.

“That’s all you have to say?”

“You wouldn’t be the first either.”

“I’ll remember that. Enjoy your drink. It’s the last one I’ll ever buy you.”

Marquez woke to footsteps
on the gravel, soft steps stopping near his truck before moving on. After whoever was there moved away he eased out of bed and very slowly clicked the deadbolt back and opened the door. Cold flooded in. A white moon was out over the water. He read the roofline of the marina building and saw part of the deck, but no one on the road. Another night he might have gone back to bed. He looked toward Perry and Torp’s room, then dressed and slipped on his shoulder harness, felt the cold gun against his chest.

Torp and Perry’s white van was still in front of the room they’d rented. The two rooms between theirs and his were empty. No lights were on. He didn’t hear any sounds, and this was probably needless worry. He softly shut his door, threw the deadbolt, and then, rather than walk past Torp and Perry’s room and down the road to the marina building, he went the opposite way up to the levee road.

Now he looked down on the roofs of the rooms Lisa rented and the big marina building, the boats docked below, the light on the river. He stayed in the shadow out of the moonlight and knew there was a footpath somewhere up here that led back down. It took a few minutes to find it. Then he climbed over the guard rail and dropped steeply on the path through mud and brush until he was down to where Lisa’s car sat in a narrow carport.

He worked his way to the dark corner of the marina building. He knew he hadn’t imagined the footsteps but wondered now if it had been Torp or Perry going outside for a smoke. He kept one hand sliding along the wood siding of the marina building as he worked his way around it, moving toward the river and the moonlit deck.

When he rounded the corner and was under the deck he heard movement on the deck. Soft footsteps. They stopped, then started again. He edged his way around to the river face of the deck, staying low, listening to a scratching noise, and then moved onto one of the deck steps and saw someone at the bar door, his back turned to him. He climbed the steps slowly and moved toward the figure, knew if the man turned he’d see him on the deck in the moonlight. It’s Torp, he thought, looking at the back of him. Heard the faint rattle of the door lock, Torp trying to get the door open, and not turning around until Marquez was within ten feet of him.

“I’m getting a drink,” Torp said, jumping back, startled and surprised.

“There’s a whole river you can drink. Where’s your friend?”

He saw a blur of movement or maybe he heard a chair scrape, or Torp was too quiet, too slow to answer. When Perry charged across the deck Marquez was already in motion. Perry’s blade sliced through his coat, and Marquez swung a deck chair with his
left hand, missed Perry but caught Torp in the face and broke a leg of the chair. He saw Torp go down moaning and faced Perry, was close to drawing his gun but swung the chair instead, kept Perry circling. Torp started to rise, and Marquez swung at Perry again, then kicked Torp in the head, watched him stagger, lie flat, and surprisingly start to get up yet again.

“Do him,” Perry said and advanced on Marquez, the knife blade flashing in the moonlight. “Liam, shoot him.”

Marquez swung the chair at the advancing Perry, and Torp was on his feet again. He reached into his coat, and Marquez jumped toward him with the chair and with a slashing swing forced him to block with his arms and jump back before he was hit. In the same motion he continued around with the chair and caught part of Perry. Then he was on Torp clubbing him to the deck, his big fist hammering down on the back of Torp’s neck. Marquez pulled the gun from Torp’s belt and aimed at Perry.

“Drop the knife.”

“Are you going to shoot me, Fish Boy?”

“Right now.”

He clicked the safety off, aimed at Perry’s midsection, and heard the knife clatter onto the decking. He backed Perry up, picked up the knife, then walked them both up the road to the rooms and had Perry lie face down on the gravel near their van as a bleeding Torp staggered around getting their stuff out of their room. Then he had Perry get in and start the van. After they drove off he sat out in the cold for an hour and talked to Cairo, who was down the street from Crey’s house where the lights were on still. He was still shaking from adrenaline.

“These guys are operating outside of Crey,” Marquez said.

“You need to bag it and pull out tonight, Lieutenant. We can get a police cruiser to sit out there and watch the marina.”

Marquez looked at the knife and gun, knew that they wouldn’t be back tonight and that things were in motion now with Torp and Perry in a way that wouldn’t stop until satisfied. He left it with Cairo that he’d find him around dawn, then went back into the room, lay down with his gun near him, his heart still pounding.