TWENTY-FIVE

The congressman was alone and in a big hurry, half-walking, half-running toward the parking lot behind his building.

“Representative Walton?”

Walton blanched when he saw me and quickened his pace in something approaching panic. I caught up to him as he reached his Prius.

“I’ve got nothing to say to you,” he said, opening the driver’s door.

“Wrong.” I slammed it shut. “You’ve got plenty to say to me.”

He backed up, fear written all over his face. “Assaulting a member of Congress. That’s a felony.”

“So is drugging and kidnapping somebody, which I’m sure the local news media would have a field day with if that somebody were to leak the story. Now where would you like to start?”

“You’re delusional. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I was told you were on your way to Washington.”

“My flight leaves in forty-five minutes.” He tried once more to open the door.

Again I slammed it.

“Either you take your hand off my car,” Walton said, “or I’m calling the police.”

Nobody needed to tell me I was walking a fine line. Walton belonged to the power elite. I was essentially a nobody with a sketchy past. If push came to shove, it would be his word against mine, but in that moment, in my rage, I honestly didn’t care.

I grabbed a handful of his perfectly knotted tie and shoved him back against the car.

“Either you’re going to tell me the truth,” I said, “or missing your flight is going to be the least of your troubles.”

“The truth about what?”

“Let’s start with hookers in Roy Hollister’s jet. We can move on to Emil Sokol and illegal campaign contributions after that. And, oh yeah, why you drugged me.”

Walton was terrified. “Nobody was going to harm you, I swear. I wanted those photographs only to protect my wife, my family, from the embarrassment of my actions, my behavior. I have a sickness, Mr. Logan. It’s called sexual addiction. I’ve agreed to begin treatment for it. Please, can’t you understand?”

“What about the Hollisters?”

“Roy was a friend, a good friend. Toni too. I had absolutely nothing to do with their deaths. You have to believe me. I don’t know anything. If I did, I would tell you.” He began to sob. “I swear on the lives of my children. Please.”

Crying didn’t make him any less of a misogynistic dirtbag in my view, but it did make him slightly more credible. I let him go. He wrote down his private number on a business card and encouraged me to call him anytime, 24/7, if I had any other questions. And while he didn’t come right out and say it, he offered an apology of sorts for doping my coffee and leaving me in the hands of the two Samoan guys.

“My fears got the best of me,” Walton said. “I’m not proud of that. I shouldn’t have done what I did.” Then the blood drained from his face as a thought hit him. “By the way, you’re not wearing a wire, are you?”

“You better hope like hell I’m not.”

He wanted to know if I’d be willing to give him the photos.

“As soon as you resign.”

“I’ll have to think about it,” Walton said.

“Unless you want to see those pictures on the news,” I said, “don’t think too long.”

WITHOUT A door key, I had to break in to my own apartment, removing a screen and prying up the bedroom window. Kiddiot found it all wonderfully exciting, tail twitching, his front paws curled under him, watching me as if I were a real burglar before diving under the bed while I climbed inside.

He hadn’t touched his food. How he managed to remain unpleasantly plump, even with Mrs. Schmulowitz absent and unable to cook elaborate chicken recipes for him, was an enigma. I wasn’t nearly as picky when it came to eating. I got two tortillas and a slice of jack cheese out of my purple-colored refrigerator (which Mrs. Schmulowitz had picked up for cheap at some aging rock star’s home-remodeling sale), rolled the cheese between the tortillas—instant quesadilla— and ate it cold over my purple sink. Why dirty a dish or use the microwave when you don’t have to? The environment could thank me later.

When I was finished with dinner, I drew a hot bath in my purple tub, squirted in a healthy shot of Mr. Bubble because I like the way it smells, then eased into the steamy, foaming water. It had been a frustrating day. I hoped that a long soak would help clear my mind of anything to do with Congressman Pierce Walton or anyone else who may or may not have been complicit in the slayings of Roy and Toni Hollister. Only soaking seemed to have the opposite effect. My brain wouldn’t turn off.

Had Roy Hollister, hurting for money and with his safari business in decline, tried to blackmail Walton with incriminating pictures of a carnal nature? Had Walton retaliated by paying someone to permanently silence Hollister and Hollister’s wife? Roy Hollister had obviously been aware of Walton’s sexual addiction—they’d been together with prostitutes in Hollister’s plane—but, then, many people had to have been aware of Walton’s proclivities, including the call girls he used and abused. Walton would’ve had to kill a whole bunch of people, not only Roy Hollister, to keep his extracurricular activities under wraps.

And what of my former father-in-law’s nephew, two-bit animal rights activist Dino Birch? There was little doubt that Birch had sent Hollister threatening anonymous letters and, yes, he’d received military sniper training with the same type of rifle used to gun down the Hollisters. But there was no way as far as I was concerned that Birch would have left his business card in the hills above the Hollister mansion where anybody with a fundamental understanding of ballistics and bullet trajectories would have eventually discovered it. That there was no record of him ever having purchased such a rifle in civilian life, and the fact that the Rancho Bonita police had yet to find the murder weapon, left me convinced that somebody had planted that business card up there in the hillside in what can only be described as an amateurish attempt to frame him—the same person who, in all probability, had shot up my apartment, trying to get me to back off.

I wondered where Toni Hollister fit in amid all of it. She’d been eulogized as a gracious and giving philanthropist, the yin to her pompous, big game-hunting husband’s yang. Even if Toni in reality hadn’t quite been the saint her obituary made her out to be, had her affair with pilot Pete McManus somehow played a role in her demise and led to the death of her husband? My gut told me no. My head told me you never know. What I wanted was my wallet back. And my keys. And my gun. Moby Dick, otherwise known as Eugene Toleafoa, and his brother, Tiny, had them. Come morning, I intended to pay them a visit and ask for my things back. If they declined, I would tenderize them both like cheap cuts of meat.

The laceration under my eye throbbed. It probably needed a couple of stitches, but at least it was no longer bleeding. There was something to be said for that, I guess. I scrubbed it until it stopped hurting, soaped up, washed off, and got out of the tub.

My bed smelled of cat. I didn’t care. Sleep came that night like a welcomed friend. When I opened my eyes again, diffuse sunlight was canting in through the blinds. Outside, a crow was cawing. The red digits on my bedside clock showed 0610 hours.

I dressed quickly, washed out the Classic Paté Chicken and Tuna Dinner festering untouched in Kiddiot’s bowl, replaced it with Classic Paté Sea Captain’s Choice fresh from the can, and tapped into my loose change jar before trotting out to my truck.

MOBY DICK rubbed the sand from his eyes, still half-asleep. I appeared to be the last person he expected to find ringing his doorbell at 0625.

“You got some balls, you know that, coming over here, man,” he said, yawning and filling the doorframe. “Whaddya want?”

“We can discuss it inside, over breakfast.”

“Breakfast? Man, it’s way too early for breakfast.”

“Chocolate or coconut?”

“Say what?” He was staring at the small white paper bag I was holding in my right hand.

“Stopped off at a donut shop on my way over,” I said. “I could only afford two because you stole my wallet. So, chocolate or coconut?”

“I’ll take chocolate.”

“Oh, too bad. I’m going with the chocolate. Looks like you’re stuck with coconut.”

“You’re freakin’ off-the-hook, man.” Moby Dick scratched his belly, which was hanging over the stretched-out waistband of his faded pajama bottoms.

“I brought you a freshly baked confection. In some cultures, that’s equivalent to a marriage proposal. Now are you going to invite me inside, or are we going to have to stand out here and eat these bad boys, making the rest of the world jealous?”

He thought for a second, then moved aside. I walked in.

His brother, Tiny, who I’d hammered with the oxygen canister, was sacked out on the sofa. A nubby blanket with satin edging, baby blue, covered his massive heaving chest. A blood-soaked bandage partially covered the jaw I’d broken. He didn’t wake up. A good thing, considering I only brought two donuts.

“You want some coffee?” Moby Dick asked as I followed him into the kitchen.

“I’ll pass,” I said, remembering the spiked coffee my local congressman had served me.

We sat down at the table. I split both donuts and gave him half. Neither of us said anything for a while, savoring each delectable bite. He was still waking up.

“Let me ask you this,” I said. “How much did Congressman Walton pay you to work me over?”

“Man, I ain’t telling you diddly,” Moby Dick said, licking chocolate from his sausage fingers, “on the grounds I might incinerate myself.”

I smiled politely at his cheesy little play on words. He smiled, too, but refused to discuss anything to do with Walton or events from the previous day.

“You’re lucky you weren’t arrested yesterday,” I said.

“Tell me about it,” he said.

We finished our donuts. He declared them “badass” and said he wished for more.

“Give me back my stuff and we’ll go get some more.”

“What stuff?”

“You know what stuff.”

“Afraid I don’t.”

He was looking at me hard, his palms flat on the table, waiting for me to make a move. The man was scary, even in faded pajama bottoms. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little unnerved.

In a purposely calm, self-assured voice, with a no-nonsense smile, I said, “Let me explain how this thing is going to go down, Eugene. You’re going to go get my revolver, my wallet, and my keys, and give them back to me, or you’re about five seconds away from the most humiliating ass-kicking of your life.”

“Verbal judo” is what the experts call it—using the threat of violence to de-escalate a potentially violent confrontation or avoid one altogether. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. I sure hoped it did in this situation. You never want to fight a man twice your size.

Our eyes were locked. I balled my fists and silently prepared my battle strategy. He’d likely lunge across the table, or hurl the table aside and then lunge. I’d let him, letting his immense girth and momentum work against him as I backed clear of his hands, then counterattacked. His throat or his eyes. Soft targets. I’d go for those first.

He held up his own fist as if to show me its overpowering size, then covered his mouth, closed his eyes, and sneezed. It sounded like a missile launching.

“Stupid hay fever,” Moby Dick said, wiping his nose on the back of his right forearm.

He pushed back in his chair and sneezed again as walked to the cabinets above a double stainless-steel sink overflowing with filthy dishes. He opened the cabinet door and reached inside. When he turned back to face me, he was holding my .357.

“You’re not going to shoot me, are you? Because I’d hate for you to have nothing to read on death row.”

“That’s all they do on death row,” Moby Dick said.

“True, but it’s the quality of the reading material that would concern me. Good luck finding any Melville. All they have is Better Homes and Gardens with half the pages torn out so you don’t get any crazy-go-nuts ideas about turning macramé plant hangers into escape ladders.”

“No Melville?” He walked toward me with the gun at his side, the muzzle pointed toward the floor. “Now, that would be criminal.” Then, with a smile, he handed over the revolver, butt first. “Thanks for the donuts. No hard feelings, I hope.”

“Some,” I said, stroking the cut below my eye, “but I’ll get over them.”

MY KEYS were returned to me, as was my wallet. My one credit card was still tucked safely inside and so was my cash— all $23 of it. Moby Dick had proven himself definitely more trustworthy than the average muscle for hire. He was certainly better read.

I decided to check in on Larry, to see what progress he’d made in replacing the Ruptured Duck’s vulturized windscreen. Until that got fixed, I wouldn’t be doing any flying and no flying meant no income. I’m not saying that the Buddha, who frowned on the pursuit of money, was wrong, but I doubt he ever had to pay for parking tickets—or, as fate would have it, buy a long-overdue set of new truck tires.

Three miles from the airport, driving in the slow lane of the southbound 101 Freeway, the left rear retread on my Tacoma began shedding rubber like a stripper. With sparks flying and the tireless wheel rim scraping pavement, I put on my emergency blinkers and wrestled my crippled truck to the shoulder of the road. Cars and big rigs whizzed past. Nobody stopped to help. I called the Auto Club for a tow and dialed Buzz while I waited for the truck to arrive.

“Why didn’t you check in?” he demanded. “Where the hell have you been?”

“You don’t want to know, Buzz.”

“You’re right,” Buzz said. “I don’t want to know. I’ve got the White House riding my ass like a jockey at Wimbledon, Logan.”

“Wimbledon’s a tennis tournament, Buzz, not a horse race.”

“I don’t give a damn if it’s a chili cook-off! I’m assuming you didn’t meet your objective and get Walton to quit because if he had, it would be all over Fox and CNN, would it not?”

“He’s thinking about it.”

“Thinking about it? For Chrissake, how long does it take to think about doing the right thing?”

I would’ve brought him up to speed on other developments in the Hollister murder investigation, but I knew he didn’t much care. I was wondering if I did either.

That was before I went to Costco and everything changed.