Marquez’s phone rang as he drove away from the marina. He’d been on the phone to Keeler, trying to reach an agreement about how to handle the Mauro situation and expected it to be Keeler calling back before he saw the screen read “Private Number.” When he answered he heard multiple voices and his immediate reaction was that someone had inadvertently hit his phone number, perhaps an informant. The voices were male and the sound muffled as though from a cell phone in a coat pocket. He heard yelling now, someone saying, “Back up, back up!” Then another order in Spanish and several seconds of quiet followed by muffled voices, and one voice much clearer that he was sure belonged to whoever carried the phone, saying, “Okay, okay.”
He thought he heard someone pleading, but it was distant like something you might imagine you hear in the wind, then three distinct pops that Marquez knew was the sound of gunfire, and the phone clicked off abruptly. The next call came in minutes and he stared at the screen unable to recognize the number and still wondering what he’d just heard.
“Lieutenant Marquez?”
It was another detective investigating Meghan Burris’s murder and wanting to meet him in Pillar Point. For several days Marquez had tried to get back on board the Open Sea, Heinemann’s boat. He knew it had been searched already—the detective told him they’d like to go through the boat cabin again today with Marquez present, the implication being that Fish and Game now could have a look.
Marquez got there in just over an hour and there was very little to look at. The detective, a freckled middle-aged woman, showed him loose papers with nothing coherent on them, an address book that Marquez thumbed, and a log she’d found in the boat cabin.
“I’m looking for anything with the name Mauro on it,” Marquez said. “He’s an Oakland fish broker and it’s unlikely he knew Burris, but Heinemann may have dealt with him.”
Mauro had insisted that wasn’t the case, that he didn’t know anyone named Heinemann and Bailey was always alone. The poaching angle he’d already talked over with this detective several times in phone interviews, but she went back through it pedantically now as Marquez searched the cabin. He left the Open Sea an hour later having learned nothing and walked past Bailey’s empty berth. He met briefly with Cairo, then headed north, talking to Keeler at dusk as Keeler was leaving headquarters. Douglas had called complaining that the telelocator readings were static. Either the equipment was malfunctioning or most of the team was in one location all day.
“They aren’t carrying them,” Keeler said. “You tell them they’re making us all look bad after we gave our word.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Or I will.”
Keeler hung up and Marquez called Hansen. He wanted Hansen’s perspective on the FBI as an overseer, to hear what the FBI had him doing and what Hansen thought about the homeland security patrols he’d made for months. Hansen was onboard the Marlin, coming up from the south bay.
“Reminds me of my riverboat days in Nam,” Hansen said. “It’s just the times we’re living in. The Feds have new information about every two weeks. They don’t have any choice but to check it out and until they’re comfortable again, they’re going to run all of us. Tell you where our boat is at right now, we’re passing the old naval yard south of Hunter’s Point, and I’m looking at the abandoned crane that loaded the Hiroshima bomb. That says something about all of it, doesn’t it? Hey, I saw one of those Fountains streaking across the bay this afternoon. Looked like someone familiar standing tall at the wheel.”
“Where were you?”
“Berkeley pier.”
“You’ve got some good eyes on you still, Nick.”
“They’re the only thing that’s held up. I’ll talk to you later.”
Marquez got Katherine on her cell phone on her way home from Maria’s doctor. She asked him to come over to talk about what the doctor had said. He headed to Katherine’s house, making a call to Petersen as he drove.
Petersen had gone out to the campground at Salt Point chasing down a poaching tip and interviewed a woman staying in a camper there. Her husband was a retired Park Service ranger who’d become suspicious of a couple of divers staying in the campground. Last night he’d seen headlights after midnight and got out of bed when he heard voices. He’d copied down the license plate of a white panel van after he’d seen the divers loading coolers into it. When he’d turned his flashlight on them and demanded to know what they were doing, someone had struck him from behind. From the damage to his skull and the pattern of the bruising the hospital speculation was that he’d been hit with a hammer. He was still in the hospital and Petersen had gone there after talking with the woman.
“He’s going to be okay,” she said. “He was able to talk just fine, though they didn’t allow me more than a few minutes with him. He’d written the license number on his palm with a pen, but he also fell on that hand and they cleaned it up at the hospital while he was still woozy. He didn’t realize they’d rubbed the ink off. Both he and his wife say they can identify the men who’ve been camping at Salt Point.”
“But they’re gone now.”
“Yeah, they’d dragged him into some bushes and his wife didn’t realize what had happened until she woke and started worrying around three in the morning. She called the sheriff, and deputies found him. They’ve already got a composite worked up and tomorrow I’ll take that around to the harbors and bars and see if I can find anyone that recognizes these guys.”
“Be careful.”
“Are you going to coach me in my last month?”
“I guess not. Let me know what you find out.”
He ate dinner with Katherine and Maria and though the conversation was friendly the evening felt charged with tension. After dinner, Katherine walked him to his truck, and got in on the passenger side to talk. Maria had met alone with the doctor, who’d in turn talked with Katherine afterwards, telling her that Maria was definitely anorexic. She’d set targets with Maria and would see her again in two weeks. She’d also advised that Katherine avoid any more confrontations, because Maria had told the doctor that her mom was making it harder to get things in control.
Maria had eaten an adequately portioned meal tonight, then withdrawn to her room and homework and the music she downloaded off her computer, and the friends she kept in constant e-mail contact with. Katherine was quiet in a way he’d seen only a few times before. Something else had been said to her that he suspected had both hurt and surprised her.
“I suppose I’m a failure as a parent,” she said. “Her father left when she was two and a half and maybe she never really got over that. So often things go all the way back.”
“I wouldn’t make excuses for Maria and you’ve been doing the right thing calling her on how she’s eating. Her doctor has got it wrong.”
“The doctor says it’s healthier to work from goal to goal.”
“You’ve been doing the right thing.”
“You don’t make a very good cheerleader, John, so knock it off.” She paused a moment. “Maria told the doctor that you and I are divorcing. Have you said anything like that to her?”
“Never.”
“I feel pretty disillusioned and I know I’ve said some things to her, but I’ve never said that.”
“Maybe she needs us to reach resolution one way or the other.”
“I know, and I’ve been going to a therapist, and when she asks me what do I really want I can’t tell her. I don’t really know. I’m sorry if that’s hurtful.”
“It’s what it is,” he said, though it stung him. “Better that you say what you feel.”
“I guess I’m still really angry, but I can’t talk about that tonight. I’m too worried about Maria.”
Marquez walked back in to say goodnight to Maria, and told her what he’d told her when he and Katherine had separated. No matter what, he was there for her. He told her he wanted to help her get through this. He talked with Katherine a while after, and left the house wondering why they couldn’t get their marriage together, why he was driving away. “What are the issues?” his sister had asked, when he’d tried to talk to her about the problems. There was the issue of Katherine believing he put his work ahead of the marriage. People that love each other get around work issues, his sister had responded. “You’re not the first person to be on the road a lot of the time. It’s ordinary. Your problem is somewhere else. You must make her feel second best. Maybe you diminish her.” He drove home and thought about it on and off through the night. It was as though Katherine wanted the distance right now. She wanted him to change jobs, transfer out of the SOU and being constantly on the road, but she wasn’t going to tell him directly. He put on music, an old Doors tape, turned the lights off, sat on the couch with the slider open, and then slept there, unable to move to the bedroom.
The next morning Alvarez was hosing the sidewalk in front of Billy Mauro’s Fresh Seafood when a white refrigerated van with two men in it drove up. Marquez watched through binoculars. The truck slowed as it hit the bump before entering the building. He got a good look at the men inside, inwardly turning the surgery-altered face of one into a much younger Eduardo Molina. Hard eyes raked over Alvarez who’d turned away with his hose.
The van backed up to the loading dock and Alvarez moved back inside, took up his new job of cleaning fish. He activated the hidden video camera and taped the men getting out of the truck, watched them go into Mauro’s office and shut the door. Marquez adjusted his earphones to hear Molina and Mauro talking. Molina wanted the van emptied now, but pressed Mauro to send one of his own vans to pick up a load of abalone coming into Pier 45 in San Francisco.
“I don’t know,” Mauro said. “I don’t want to do that.”
Molina continued as if he hadn’t heard Mauro. His voice was low and very controlled, his English almost without accent.
“They’ll look for your truck before they dock,” Molina said. “So you park where they see you easily.”
“I don’t even know if I can get in there at that hour.”
“If they don’t see a truck they’ll turn around and that’s no good.”
“What if Fish and Game is there? I never agreed to do anything like this.”
“We’re going to take care of them. You don’t need to worry about them.” Marquez heard a chair slide. “At three,” Molina said, and Marquez slipped off the earphones and dialed the number Douglas had given him.
“We’ve got Molina in Oakland,” he said, as Douglas answered.
“Let him go. Under no circumstances go near him.” Marquez didn’t respond, watched the white panel truck bounce off the curb and start down the street. “Do not follow him.” The panel truck turned the corner. “Are you hearing me?”
“We’re going to have to sit down.”
“Marquez, you’ve got to let him go.”
“He’s gone.”
“That’s what has to happen.” He exhaled. “Okay, let’s meet right now.”