“Where did you get this?” I asked Romeo.
The young detective swallowed hard. “You don’t want to know.”
“Of course not. That’s why I asked.”
Huddled together, the crowd streaming around us into the hotel, Romeo and I examined a small piece of foil he had carefully unfolded and spread on the top of the car. The foil looked slightly off-color, and it was easy to tell it had been crumpled.
I read the words aloud. “Pigs to find a feast so rare. But eat a morsel taking care. A bit is fine but take heed. Death will come to those with greed.” The little ditty had been scrawled on the foil in black ink—the writing looked familiar, but I was no expert. “Is that the same handwriting as the first note?”
He nodded. “That’s not official, of course. The analysts are looking at both notes right now, but off the cuff, they said it sure looks like the same perp wrote them both.”
“Have you compared the handwriting to examples from any of the potential killers?” My brain was spinning, but thoughts whirled just out of reach of reason. Stress—it’d either send me off the deep end or run me out of town if I didn’t learn to handle it better.
“The notes are printed using block letters. Most people don’t write that way.” Romeo ran a hand through his hair, making it worse. Amazingly, the kid looked worse than I felt.
“Loosely translated, that would mean you’re working on it, but don’t hold out much hope the comparisons will tell you anything. Guess my wish to remove Jean-Charles from the suspect list isn’t going to happen.”
Romeo gave me a tired smile and a shrug. “That’s how these things usually go. These days, a clever killer can run on a long leash.”
“We’ll pop him when he hits the end.” I gave him a reassuring smile that I didn’t feel. My personal take on that whole if-you-build-it-they-will-come thing was, if you believe it, it will happen, so I went with it. And if Jean-Charles turned out to be in this up to his toque blanche? I’d deal with it—but I would totally swear off men for a while. Could my picker be that far off? Oh yeah, it sure could. That was my MO in the dating game. “I got something for you.” I rooted in my pocket, then deposited the chips from The Grape Spot into Romeo’s hand.
“Where’d you get these?”
I gave him the short version. Satisfied he didn’t need to preserve any fingerprints, Romeo dropped the chips into his pocket. “You know we’re having some trouble reading the first chip you gave us. I’ve got forensics working on it.”
“You’d better hurry, my ass is on the line. I lied by omission to Homeland Security. You’ve got my back, right?”
Romeo gave me a half-hurt look. “Of course. What did the feds want?”
“They’re wise to some of this rerouting game and are worried about the continued safety of the food supply.”
Romeo’s eye shot up. “First I’ve heard. I’m low on the totem pole, but normally, that sort of thing would cross my desk.”
“The feds are your problem,” I said, although I wasn’t entirely sure that was true. Agent Stokes had knocked on my door—I wouldn’t be able to shrug him off that easily. “They have even fewer answers than we have, so help from that quarter probably won’t be forthcoming . . . not that they ever play nice with us peons.”
Romeo rubbed his eyes. “I don’t know about you, but I’ll take all the help I can get.”
“I’m on my way to get Dr. Phelps and his geek squad on board right now. Somebody has to know how to read those damn chips.”
“Right.” Romeo looked like his thoughts weren’t exactly tracking today. I knew the drill. “So, Brandy told me somebody stole your paperweight thing, and is taking pictures and posting them on the Internet?”
“Apparently.”
“Who?” Romeo actually looked like he expected a real answer.
“I’m pretty sure it’s Jean-Charles. I spoke to him briefly, and he told me he would tell me how to find the chips. I followed the first photo to the Grape Spot.”
“Pretty oblique.” Romeo frowned. “When did you talk to him?”
I told him.
“And you didn’t tell me because?”
“He didn’t tell me anything you needed to know.”
Romeo narrowed his eyes at me as he thought, then he shrugged.
I’d won that round. What I told him was true . . . technically. But the same argument didn’t quite cover the fact that I hadn’t told Romeo about the note Jean-Charles had sent me with the first chip, and I didn’t feel like explaining why at the moment—none of it would matter, anyway. We needed proof, not protestations of innocence. “Jean-Charles or whomever, right now, it doesn’t matter. The only thing that does is that they are leading me to the chips. I have a feeling once we have them all, and we can read them, a key bit of this sordid tale will be in there.”
“I can buy your theory that your chef might be the one helping you. That doesn’t get him off the hook, though.”
“That pesky little proof thing, I know.” I opened the driver’s side door. “Get in. You can tell me the rest of the story about that note on the way. That way, I don’t have to look at you while you tell me which orifice you had to probe to find it.”
Traffic flowed at a snail’s pace, then got hung up entirely in the ever-present knot in front of the Bellagio, which was okay since the fountains fired off every fifteen minutes at this time of day—so at least we’d be entertained. “Okay, I think I’m ready.”
“Actually, it’s not as bad as you think. The note was wadded up and stuffed down Richard Peccorino’s throat.”
I swallowed hard and fought a shiver of revulsion. What kind of person would do that? The kind of person who would stuff a guy in an oven, I guessed in answer to my own question. “Not as bad as I think? I’m sure that depends on perspective.”
“I should arrest you and Teddie for tampering with evidence. You do know that, don’t you?” Romeo stared at the fountains and sighed heavily.
“Teddie, maybe. I gave you the chip as soon as it came into my possession, remember?” I shot him a serious look. “But I’ll let you handcuff me if it would make you feel better.”
That didn’t lighten Romeo’s sad face even a little. He turned and stared out the side window. “This job is getting to me.”
I wanted to wrap him in a hug and protect him from the world—a surprising reaction, actually. Impossible, and it would most likely be unappreciated, so instead, I let his statement go without a response. “Let’s think about this. Read the note again.”
“Pigs to find a feast so rare. But eat a morsel taking care. A bit is fine but take heed. Death will come to those with greed.” Romeo recited the lines, his voice a monotone, like a child trotting out a hastily memorized poem, the words correct, the meaning all but lost.
“These things make my brain hurt. And I’m getting really tired of this little game.” I inched the car forward, then jumped at the opening salvo of the fountains—the noise always reminded me of a cannon shot.
“Jumpy, are we?” Romeo leaned to the side and turned to get a better look.
“Just running on fumes, as usual. I need a vacation.”
“Considering our lives lately, a staycation is about the best you can hope for.”
“We live in Vegas, how bad could that be?” I drummed my fingers on the steering wheel as I glanced at the time on the newly erected neon monstrosity in front of Planet Hollywood. The sign was so bright, I felt sure the astronauts could read every word from the International Space Station.
“Not for most people, but you have two bodies in your hotel, a lover who has disappeared, and another who has reappeared, and a mother who . . .”
“Stop, you’re making me want to hurt myself.”—I pointed to the note in Romeo’s lap—“I’m assuming no prints on any of these things?”
“None that shed any light.”
“You’d think, just once, we’d get a break,” I groused.
“Wasn’t it you that used to quote that female baseball movie? What was it you said?”
“It’s the hard that makes it good. From A League of Their Own. A great flick, by the way.” For our Tuesday movie nights, Teddie and I had watched that movie . . . several times. I flipped on my blinker to move to the left. Why did I always forget that driving in the right lanes along the Strip was impossible—cars inevitably wanted to turn, but the constant flow of humanity on the sidewalks rarely ceded an opening.
“You know, taken out of context, there’s some innuendo there . . .” Romeo trailed off when he caught my glare.
“Those are my lines. I’ll thank you not to poach.” I didn’t worry about telling him I was kidding.
“I’ve been spending too much time around you. Apparently, I’m turning into you.”
“God help you.” Finally a guy in a white Prius let me move over, but not without a wolf whistle. With an upstanding member of the police department ready to defend my virtue, I smiled and waved. “Okay, what I want to know is why the killer seems to think I’m in the know.”
“I’m curious about that as well.” To Romeo’s credit, he didn’t act like I was hiding anything.
Feeling slightly guilty, I mentally ran through what I knew. No secrets. Then a thought dawned. “If you didn’t send Homeland Security to play in my sandbox . . .” I looked at him for confirmation.
“Nope, I’m too low on the totem pole for them to give me much attention.”
“Then I wonder how they singled me out,” I mused out loud.
“You mean since you’re so low profile and all.”
“It’s just odd. They usually work through Jerry and Security.”
“They had some story about tampering with the food supply?” Romeo pulled out his crumpled note pad and pencil, jotting notes as I recapped my conversation with Detective Stokes. “That does seem odd, poisoning the food supply? In Vegas? Hardly the large-scale kind of thing the terrorists go for. You’d think they’d be more interested in the water supply or something. I take it you can’t offer any clarity on this new note?”
“Give me time. I’ve never been all that great at these word puzzle things.” Finally, the light changed and the crowds clustered on the sidewalks, freeing a path for the cars. When my turn to move came, I took full advantage, whipping around the cars in front of me and accelerating down the Strip. The traffic always eased south of Flamingo—bunching briefly at Trop, then opening completely south of the intersection.
“Where are we going, by the way?” Romeo asked, but didn’t seem too concerned.
“I’m feeling the need to play with heavy equipment.”
“You know, at any other time, I would take a cut at that curve ball.” Romeo tried to banter, but he came off sounding defeated.
I joined the innuendo game. “Probably something along the lines of look no farther, you’re the complete package.”
“Always one step ahead.” Romeo leaned his head back.
“I play to my strengths.” Letting the horses run, I tried to let my brain freewheel.
Pigs to find a feast so rare.
* * *
The Mojave Desert.
Most folks forgot, or perhaps never knew, that Vegas was a carefully cultivated and nurtured oasis in a vast sea of land unsuitable to human life. And once one ventured beyond the watered environs, the landscape changed. Scrubby plants barely eking out an existence, sand and dirt, maybe a cactus or two, but little else—the perfect place to pretend to be a dirt mover.
The Big Hole wasn’t too hard to find—just navigate toward the cloud of dust. With next to no moisture anywhere, the sand became airborne with the slightest movement, and usually remained so for some time, carried on the ever-present breezes. This often had interesting results: while the rest of the world had rainstorms, we had sand storms. Just the other day, I was less than a quarter of a mile from Mandalay Bay Hotel and I couldn’t see it—a Vegas brownout, as it were.
Cars packed the parking lot, an unlined dirt square cordoned off with rope and cones. With no painted lines to supply order, there was none. Reluctant to toss the Ferrari into the melee, I reached across in front of Romeo, my hand open.
With a cockeyed grin, he put his badge in my open palm.
The parking attendant didn’t look at me—instead, he drooled with thinly veiled car lust as he let his eyes rake its length. If I’d been the Ferrari, I would’ve slapped him. When he finally looked at me, he seemed only slightly chagrined, and I waved the badge under his nose.
“Man, guess it really pays to be on the public payroll. Glad you guys are living the good life on the backs of us working stiffs.” Lifting the rope, he slid the low-slung car underneath, then motioned me to a safe spot behind the food trucks.
As Romeo extricated himself from his “ride,” he shot me a quip. “You do so much for Metro’s public image.”
“Just doing my part. You know, increase recruitment . . . maybe attract a higher-class crowd.” My disdain for the local cops was no secret. As he usually did, Romeo ignored me, but I caught a smile before he covered it with an important look.
Romeo—an iconoclast in a conformist’s uniform—a sista by a different mista, if you ignored the whole gender thing.
I threw my arm around his shoulders as we met in front of the car and turned to take in the spectacle. Normally a fairly straightforward, sedate affair, today the Big Hole had the look of a sideshow. Crowds packed the hastily erected grandstands on two sides of the big pit where the heavy equipment crawled on giant treads. No expert, I tried to identify the major pieces—a grader, a huge backhoe, a front-end loader, and a new addition—a crane swinging a wrecking ball, presumably against the triple-thick cinder-block wall bisecting the pit. Today, a shaky-looking platform had been erected atop the wall.
One side of the pit lay open, a gentle grade rising from the floor to accommodate the passage of the equipment to and from the storage shed fronting the road and protecting the casual passersby from the slight chance of runaway machinery. A conglomeration of several food trucks and a mobile reporting van from each of the major television stations pressed together, forming a perimeter on the fourth side, completing the whole stadium effect. One station had even brought the boom truck with a bucket, which now dangled out over the pit, the hapless reporter crouching inside and a cameraman looming over him, his camera pointed down.
Shielding my eyes against the low-angled sunlight from the west, I scanned the crowd looking for someone familiar . . . anyone . . . Jean-Charles. Not seeing that particular someone, nor anyone of pertinence, my mood plummeted. “Man, all we’re missing is the marching band.”
“I’m taking it something special is happening today,” Romeo remarked.
I felt no need to dignify the obvious with a response. Instead, finally spying a friend, I galvanized myself into action. Stepping to the window of the farthest food truck, I feigned interest in the menu. “Give me a number seven, extra hot.”
Without looking up from his grill, the chef began a perfunctory answer. “There’s no number . . .” He stopped and looked up, recognition lighting his face. Quick as a cat, he bolted down the steps and caught me in a bear hug. Holding tight, he rocked me back and forth until I laughed. Then he held me at arm’s length.
I let him have his look while I did the same.
As always, Beanie Savoy looked good enough to eat. Mocha skin, a wicked wide smile, short dreads, and a hard body covered in a loose Hawaiian shirt, khakis tied at the waist with a rope, and Tevas: he had a Lenny Kravitz mojo. Under that shirt, he sported some of the most perfect abs in the business—no, I will not tell you how I know that.
“Don’t you eat?” I asked. “You do know skinny chefs do not inspire confidence.”
He rewarded me with a wider grin. Letting his arms fall to his sides, he took a step back. “Where they been keepin’ you, girl? Why haven’t you come ridin’ with me? Remember that time the cops chased us damn near to the California line? Man, that was wild. Who knew those hookers . . .”
I cleared my throat, stopping him as I threw a glance over my shoulder. “This is Detective Romeo with Metro. Romeo, this is Beanie, the very best gourmet taco maker this side of Montego Bay.”
The two men shook hands.
“Tacos and Jamaica?” Romeo looked skeptical.
“Food-doo, voodoo, mon. Lucky, she gave me that name a long time ago.” With that, Beanie raised a finger, then bolted back into the truck, where he stirred and flipped and mashed the ingredients cooking on his grill. He stuck his head out the window: “You want your special?” His eyes locked onto mine.
“Extra hot.”
A moment later, he handed me a plastic bowl lined with white wax paper. Nestled inside were two of what I knew to be the most succulent, sublime, spicy pulled pork tacos. He gave a bowl to Romeo as well, but his eyes stayed on me. “Soft and tasty, just like you like it.”
Romeo took his food. “You guys are doing a great job of ruining my appetite.” But one bite, and I could see his attitude change. “Oh, man,” was all he managed through a full mouth.
Beanie and I exchanged knowing smiles.
“It’s so good to see you, girl.”
“You, too.” I took a dainty bite, anticipating the firepower inside the tiny taco. “Even better than I remember—and I remember it all.”
Beanie gave me a lopsided grin and a cock of his head as he waggled his eyebrows in silent appreciation of the memory of “it all.”
“How’d you get wrangled into this little soiree?” I asked as I blinked back the tears of appreciation for the Jamaican spice. My game had gotten rusty—I used to be able to eat Beanie’s stuff until I couldn’t feel my lips, and I was sure I’d lost at least the first couple of layers of skin from the inside of my mouth.
“Girl, all high and mighty you’ve become—lost your toughness.” Beanie handed me a paper napkin. While I was struggling, Romeo silently powered through, popping a taco at a time into his mouth and then groaning with happiness. Age, or lack thereof, sometimes created a chasm.
Beanie looked at me as if he could read my thoughts. “The word went out there was some kind of show. You know me, I never miss a party—I was the first one here. Well, except for that guy over there.” He nodded toward Brett Baker, the sushi truck guy and Jean-Charles’s second in the cook-off.
A school of painted fish in different shapes, sizes, and colors swam across the rear and the side of the food truck. The large, open mouth of a grouper encircled the order window. The words one fish, two fish were stenciled above the window in bright red, childlike letters—like the cover of a kid’s book. Dr. Seuss. One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish . . . Two chef, one chef . . .
Chills chased down my spine. “Cute.” I tried to be flip, act like nothing had creeped me out. From the looks of Beanie and Romeo, I pulled it off, although Romeo eyed me a bit more intently. I watched Brett Baker, using his wide, white smile and easy manner to lure the passersby, mostly women. “What’s his story?”
Beanie leaned on his arms, resting his elbows on the shelf of the order window. “Don’t really know—he keeps to himself mostly. But I can tell you he showed up here out of the blue—none of us had even seen him around or nothing. He’s got serious shit though, top quality. And I heard people say he’s trained with the best in Japan, learned his sushi skills from masters.”
“Wonder why he’s driving a food truck then, if he’s so good,” Romeo added, making me fight the urge to dive out of the line of fire.
Beanie bristled. Pushing himself up off his elbows, he glared down at the detective. “You just ate my food, yet you still think we’re all glorified burger-flippers.”
Romeo shot a look of distress my way.
“Nothing like a faux pas to get a friendship off on the right foot, eh?” I teased, knowing Beanie wouldn’t take offense. “Kid, I love you, but I’m not falling on your sword.”
Putting on his most hangdog look, Romeo returned his attention to the guy he’d just stuck a knife in. “I’m sorry. You’re right, I’m afraid. I don’t know what I was thinking.” The kid actually looked contrite..
I’d lost that ability decades ago. “Not thinking at all, I should think,” I added just for fun.
Beanie beamed—he had that wonderful Caribbean ability to laugh insults away. “No worries, mon.”
“If you say ‘be happy’ I’ll slap you,” I added, stopping him before he could trot out that overused lyric—one of his favorites. “He showed up with good shit, you say? I sure would like to know more.”
Beanie gave me a sage nod. “I’ll ask around.” Inclining his head, he directed my attention behind me. The line had been growing while we chatted.
I stepped to the side, motioning the man behind me to the front. “Sorry.”
Beanie gave me another full-wattage grin. “Been doing some interesting things with exotic fish lately that’s been going over pretty good. Great to see you, girl. Don’t stay away so long next time. Like I said, my ceviche tacos are killer.”
* * *
Romeo and I wandered through the crowd. The show, whatever it was, had drawn quite a crowd, one that was still arriving. In a space designed to hold far fewer, the swelling throng pressed tightly together, making movement difficult. A cool breeze wafted through carrying smoke and tantalizing smells from the gathered food trucks, making the crush bearable and my mouth water.
We ambled a bit, absorbing the atmosphere. Romeo dogged my heels chivalrously, allowing me to cut a path as I turned back toward the food trucks.
“Care to go for Round Two?” I asked him as we ambled, angling my head toward Brett Baker’s truck, which held the primo spot closest to the action. Personally, I thought Romeo was way too thin, but I’d already commented on that and I didn’t think I needed to hit it again.. “Want some sushi?”
“Can’t stomach the stuff.” He tossed off the line like the true burger man I knew him to be. “So, what did you get from your friend? Whatever it was, I missed it, but I can see your wheels grinding.”
“Nothing concrete, just a hunch.” I kept my eyes scanning over the crowd as I talked. “One of the frustrating things about a tourist town like Vegas is, the local restaurants often can’t get the quality products they’d like. All the top-end stuff is reserved by the big-name chefs and the hotels.”
Romeo caught on quickly. “That must make it doubly hard for these truck guys.”
“And Brett Baker breezes into town with ‘good shit,’ taking the street food world by storm.”
“And?”
“Wonder where he gets his good shit.”
A second person poked her head out of Brett Baker’s food truck window. Chitza DeStefano.
Romeo and I glanced at each other. “Interesting,” we both said.
Chitza caught me looking at her. She held my gaze for a moment. She didn’t smile. Breaking eye contact, she ducked back inside the truck, out of sight.
On my second pass over the crowd, my eyes hit on another familiar face. “Wonder what Chef Gregor is doing here.”
Apparently unaware he was being watched, the chef pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and mopped his face. He stepped back into the cover of a shadow.
Romeo followed my gaze. “Gregor looks pretty hot around the collar, especially on such a cool day.”
As we watched, another man joined him, smaller, bald, twitchy. Chef Gregor bent down to hear what the man was saying—the chef didn’t look happy.
I narrowed my eyes. The shorter guy looked familiar—something in the way he moved, his mannerisms. It took me a moment, but I finally placed him—Mr. Livermore, without the bad toupee.
“You know that guy?”
“He came snooping around the office. He wasn’t who he said he was.” Romeo started to speak, but I raised a hand, stopping him. “Let’s give him some rope just yet—I’ve got my people working on it.”
Romeo didn’t argue—he was well aware that sometimes my network worked much more efficiently than the rusty cogs of the ponderous Metro bureaucracy.
Both men stayed in the shadow.
“Guess the crowd is big enough to draw the paramedics.” Romeo nodded toward an ambulance that had backed to the festivities, its rear doors folded back. One of the EMTs sat on the bumper. “Isn’t that . . . ?” Romeo trailed off as if he’d forgotten the paramedic’s name.
This was a weak ploy to draw me out, so I cut him off at the pass. “Nick. His name is Nick, and yes, he’s cute. Yes, he asked me out. Yes, it’s none of your business.”
Romeo seemed happy with that. “Are you going to tell me what this circus is about, or am I supposed to be surprised?”
“I don’t know, and I’m not sure I care, although with all the interesting people gathered in the crowd, I am curious. But, right now, my goal is to find Dr. Phelps, he’s running this show.” Shielding my eyes, I scanned the crowd. On my third scan across the crowd, I spied another one of our chefs. “Look over there.” I pointed for Romeo’s benefit. Christian Wexler seemed to be angling toward Chef Gregor and Livermore, still arguing in the shadows. Time to see what they were up to. “Follow me.”
Wexler paused in front of Gregor, stepping into the larger man’s face. He spat some words, punctuating them with pokes to the chest. Gregor looked incensed, his face an angry red. I moved faster, trying to get closer but losing sight of the three of them as the crowd moved and surged around me.
By the time we reached the spot where the men had been standing, the little party had broken up. “Damn.” I scanned the crowd anew.
“There!” Romeo’s hand appeared over my shoulder, pointing in front of me.
I followed the line of sight and spied Dr. Phelps climbing up a thin metal ladder that shook with each rung he took. At the top, he stepped off to the side and onto the platform over the cinder-block wall. Grabbing a wireless mike, he tapped it with his finger. The thing was on, the volume up. He held it pressed close to his lips at a ninety-degree angle—he’d done this before. “Hello, I’d like to thank you all for coming to see our little demonstration. Frankly, I’m a bit amazed there are so many of you interested in the obscure construct of RFID technology.”
The crowd, including me, waited in rapt attention. When the crane engine cranked to life, belching black smoke, I think we jumped collectively. Once the engine had settled into a smooth thrum, Dr. Phelps continued. “Refining and miniaturizing existing technology, my team at Cal has added some economically viable, industry-needed features that are quite impressive.”
He raised his shirt, showing the world his washboard abs—a geek god. A black band encircled his chest. He raised his hand and shook a white tag dangling on a chain. “This chip contains our new technology. It will monitor my heart rate, my temperature, and my position via GPS. The power source is supplied through the radio beam of the reader, and all of this for less than a penny a tag, readable using readily available RFID readers.”
Dr. Phelps gave a cue to the technician working the soundboard. He flipped a few switches, and the rhythmic sound of Dr. Phelps’s slightly elevated heartbeat reverberated through the speakers placed around the pit.
“See and believe.” Dr. Phelps thumbed off the mike. Bending, he handed it to a young man who stepped to the platform—I thought I recognized him as one of the UC-Berkeley guys from last night.
A flexible banner unscrolled behind him. The crowd collectively gasped when the white sheet sprang to life, revealing that it was in fact a video screen. Dr. Phelps’ heart rate, temperature, and latitude and longitude coordinates appeared in large numbers.
Romeo fidgeted at my shoulder, glancing at his watch—thankfully, he resisted adding an exaggerated sigh. “What are we here for, exactly?”
“Haven’t a clue.”
A tall man standing in front of me turned and gave me a disdainful stare. “You are watching history being made. This will revolutionize the food industry and save this country from contaminated food products.”
I smiled in return. “Thereby saving Fast Food Nation and its contribution to the exalted tradition of Escoffier and its fellow artistes gastronomiques.”
To my delight, his face softened into a grin. “Our lasting legacy.”
The sound of the crane’s engine deepened and grew louder, forestalling more banter and grabbing our attention. I could see a figure in the glass cage at the base of the crane’s arm working the levers, but I couldn’t make out his features or any identifying trait—I assumed he was another of Dr. Phelps’s colleagues.
The arm, from which the chain and wrecking ball dangled, extended high above us, then eased the iron ball over to Dr. Phelps, who stepped on the ball and grabbed the chain. After testing his footing for a moment, he gave the thumbs-up sign to the operator. Lifted from the platform, he soared over the crowd. I shaded my eyes against the ever-lowering angle of the sun, trying to follow his path arcing above our heads.
The staccato rhythm of his heartbeat sounded through the speakers, which I found vaguely disconcerting—the audible manifestation of Dr. Phelps’s increasing fear, which did little to allay mine. In an instinctive, sympathetic response, my heart rate accelerated.
“Holy shit.” Romeo sounded awestruck.
Glancing at the large screen, I realized the readout of Dr. Phelps’s vital signs was updating, the page scrolling as new information accumulated.
“How’s he doing that?” Romeo asked as we both watched the crane swinging him in what looked to be a defined pattern.
“It seems new info is added at the apex of each arc. Other than that, you got me.”
The guy in front of us was no help, either.
After watching a few more passes, which I suspected was the entire show, I decided to heed the lure of all the whiffs of delicious foods wafting through the crowd while I waited for Dr. Phelps to finish. As I turned to go, I caught the ball as it reached yet another apex. The young scientist hung on with one hand, waving to the crowd with the other.
At the high point, the ball suddenly dropped, a jerky hitch to the fluidity.
Slack in the chain. The crowd gasped. I probably did as well, which was a challenge, considering I was holding my breath.
Startled, Dr. Phelps clutched the chain with both hands. His heart rate zoomed. A pulsing rhythm booming through the speakers, it pounded through my chest until my heart syncopated.
The ball hit the bottom of the new length chain with a jolt. Dr. Phelps had bent his knees to absorb the impact, but it wasn’t enough. One foot lost its grip. He swung wildly as he tried to regain his footing. After a few failed attempts, he worked his foot back under him, but he stayed crouched.
The crane moved, pulling the ball, increasing the arc. As the ball started down, slowly at first, then building speed . . . it headed straight for the cinder-block wall in the center of the pit. Mesmerized, I watched in growing horror.
Finally, with pulsing certainty of the scene unfolding, adrenaline freed me, propelling me forward. Pushing people aside, I moved, driven by the need to stop the disaster unfolding in slow motion in front of me. I sensed Romeo behind me, but I didn’t look.
As I ran, I shouted, “Jump!” to Dr. Phelps as he accelerated overhead in a downward arc. I knew he probably couldn’t hear me. And even if he could, he was most likely too scared to let go, but I still had to try. At the edge of the pit, I launched myself in the air. Hitting the sand, my feet sank a bit, stopping my momentum. Putting my hands out, I rolled, letting the momentum carry me until I hit my feet again and ran.
The ball was coming down hard and fast now. I could see the terror on the young doctor’s face as he curled up, putting his back to the wall, cringing for impact.
I had no idea what I was going to do. It didn’t matter.
I was too slow.
The ball, with its precious human cargo, hit the wall.
The wall crumbled. Dr. Phelps disappeared in a cloud of dust.
The world went quiet.
Without thinking, I hit the hole in the wall. Grabbing at pieces of blocks, digging, scraping, I followed the chain into the pile of rumble. Romeo pushed in next to me. Together, we fought like panicked rescuers in a collapsed mine.
“His heartbeat has stopped,” Romeo gasped through labored breathing.
“No. It can’t have. Just the sound has stopped.”
Romeo didn’t argue. I grabbed a huge chunk of stone, struggling with the weight. Romeo grabbed the other side. We turned to toss it behind us. Other hands grabbed it. Like a bucket brigade, others joined, helping to move the stones and clear a path for the paramedics, I hoped.
The next time I reached, my hand hit cloth, then flesh. “I got him.”
Romeo and I increased our pace—working as fast as we could, as quickly as we dared. First, we uncovered his legs; one was badly broken. Bone protruded from his thigh. Blood had pooled underneath his leg, staining the light sand a dark, ugly reddish brown. The wound only oozed now . . . not a good sign. Romeo shucked off his shirt, ripping off a strip. Feverishly, I tied it tight above the wound, then kept working. It seemed like an eternity, but we finally cleared his chest, then his head.
Two fingers against his neck, I felt for a pulse. Nothing. With a hand, I stilled Romeo and concentrated. Still nothing.
Someone pressed in behind us. A hand squeezed my shoulder and a gentle, calm voice said, “Lucky, we’ll take it from here.”
Turning, I met the blue eyes of Nick the paramedic. He’d ridden to my rescue several times before.
Pressing to the side, I eased out past him—a very tight squeeze. It was funny how desperate need facilitated the normally impossible. On the other side, Romeo also flattened himself, allowing Nick’s colleague to join him. The path now clear, we backed out on our hands and knees, first Romeo, then me.
The crowd huddled around, silent, round-eyed. Several of the men were dusty and bloodied. Glancing down, I realized I was the same. Several fingernails ripped and torn, the skin on my hands and arms scored with ugly bright red gashes as if I’d been mauled by an otherworldly beast—the clothes I stood in soiled and torn beyond repair. Thought stalled as I floundered in the aftermath of the adrenaline rush. Without a word, Romeo reached out, pulling me into a hug. Putting my head on his shoulder, I tried to breathe.
An eerie silence enveloped us.
Absorbing his strength, I finally pulled away. Holding vigil, we all waited.
Raking my hand through my hair, I scanned the crowd. Christian Wexler stood above me on the other side of the pit, staring at me. We locked eyes. He tilted his chin in challenge, then stepped back, and the crowd swallowed him.
Romeo filtered through the crowd, wandering, searching. Casually, I kept track of him as he talked with random folks, questioning the media people in the crowd. Occasionally, he pulled out his pad to jot a note. Other Metro officers arrived. Romeo directed them, and I watched as they fanned out through the crowd. I let Romeo do his thing—if I tried to help, I’d only be in the way—he’d told me that several times before.
Distracted, I let my eyes wander over the crowd—they couldn’t find anyone else familiar to settle on. I struggled through the loose sand, clambering up to the edge of the pit. Putting a hand down, I sat on the edge, my lower legs dangling. I concentrated on keeping myself still, quieting my mind, and slowing the hammering of my heart. The needling pain of each shallow cut and scrape was a sharp reminder of the fine line between life and death and comforting evidence of which side I fell on.
Romeo returned, looming over me as he stuffed his note pad back in his pocket. Dropping down beside me, his mouth was set in a hard line, his face closed and angry.
“From the looks of you, I’m guessing nobody saw who was in the cab of that crane.”
Romeo snorted. “With our luck? Nobody saw anything. None of the camera crews had any footage, either—everyone focused on the drama.”
“Figured.”
“It coulda been an accident.” Romeo sounded hopeful.
“Right.” I looked him in the eye.
His hope deflated. “But you don’t think so.”
I turned my attention back to the pit and the hole Dr. Phelps had disappeared into. “Kid, there’re a lot of things I don’t believe in, even though I’d like to: Santa Claus, Cupid, the Tooth Fairy. It’s a long list that includes coincidence and easy answers.”
He mulled that over for a moment. “You don’t believe Cupid is flapping around piercing us all with arrows tipped with the elixir of true love?”
“Hell, no—the little fairy is long gone. Some dissatisfied customer strangled the life out of him centuries ago.”
“That’s not like you at all.”
“Someday, I had to grow up.” I shot him a hopeful smile. “I’m done looking to anyone else, real or imaginary, for my happiness.”
He returned my smile. It was still his turn to dole out the hugs—I took it like a man.
A figure behind us cast a shadow, blocking the heat of the sun as it dropped lower toward the west. The sudden coolness tickled the nape of my neck. A shiver chased through me as I turned, shielding my eyes with one hand.
Brett Baker gave us a tight, worried smile. “May I join you?” He motioned to the spot next to me.
“Sure.”
He crouched, levering himself with one hand as he dropped his feet over the edge and settled in. “What’s going on?” he whispered.
I brought him up to speed.
“Wow. You think they can bring that dude back.?.”
“Right now would be a great time for a miracle.” I took a deep breath, marshaling my thoughts. Romeo glanced at me, but didn’t say anything. The floor was mine. “Brett, I know this is an awkward time, but would you mind if I asked you some questions?”
“Questions?” He glanced at me, his expression open. “I guess so.”
“How do you know Jean-Charles?”
“He recruited me to work for him in New York. I’d just finished training in Japan, and really had few contacts in the States.” As he talked, Brett stared into the pit, watching the paramedics work. “I interviewed with Chef Bouclet. He hired me. I rotated between his three restaurants refining the fish preparation, adding some sushi where appropriate. He has been a wonderful mentor.”
“And Adone Giovanni? Any bad blood between you two?”
His eyes flicked to me. “Not for me. I can’t speak for Adone. He is a great chef, very talented. But he’s an ass.”
Romeo nudged me—I got the hint. “How so?”
“Too much ego. Too much anger. This is a tough business—we all have put in many years of long, hard days. He thinks it is his time.”
“Is it?”
Brett gave me a knowing look. “That is for time to decide.”
“Ah yes, timing is everything.” I trotted out this little banality as I watched the paramedics working around the hole where Nick and Dr. Phelps were hidden from view. Talking helped. “Do you still do any work with Jean-Charles in New York?”
“No. I left about a year ago. Moved to L.A.” He rubbed his thighs with both hands—the evening had turned a bit cool for shorts. “Loved the restaurant I worked for there, but I fell in love with the whole idea of this food truck thing. You know it’s really big on the West Coast.”
“And here as well.” I tucked my hands under my thighs. Mr. Baker had made me aware of the chill. “Of course, trends travel the short distance between Southern California and here pretty quickly.”
“I bought a truck, and here I am.” Brett seemed amused by that fact.
“Who is your supplier here?”
His smile faded. “Not sure now. It was Fiona Richards.”
“How was her quality?”
If he thought the question odd, he didn’t let on. “The best. She could get anything, even the most rare stuff.”
“And Chitza? Where did you meet her?”
“I’d never heard of her until I came here. I met her at the meeting earlier, the one you held.” He must’ve sensed my next question, or he saw it in my eyes, I don’t know which. “She came by today. Wanted to see my truck. Just curious is all.”
Silence enveloped us once again, and time slowed to a crawl. To be with this many people with no sound other than the passing of the traffic sorta creeped me out a bit. And worry was making me twitchy. Metro had set up a perimeter, moving the crowd back farther so the paramedics could work. Nick was taking an awful lot of time—I didn’t know whether that was good or bad. I chose the former on the theory that manifesting, or “wishful thinking,” as I liked to call it, really worked.
After a seeming eternity, I heard a sound. Cocking my head, I waited. It came again. One beat, then two. Then a steady rhythm pulsed through the speakers.
The crowd cheered. We all reached for those within hugging distance to share the joy.
Romeo jumped down and began giving orders. He pointed to a couple of officers, young guys with strong backs and large arms. “You two, come here.”
Nick had left a metal cage stretcher next to the opening Romeo and I had cleared. Romeo nodded toward it. The young men bent and eased it into the hole, one of them carrying the front, the other guiding the rear.
Romeo returned to his spot next to me. We both continued our vigil.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Yeah, you?”
“I’ll be better when I know he’s okay.”
With nothing else to do, I silently bartered with the universe, offering anything if he could just come through this whole. Glancing around, I noticed others doing the same thing, their lips moving in silent prayer or incantation. Beanie’s food truck sat open yet abandoned—I assumed he was waiting somewhere in the crowd.
Everything looked pretty normal. Except for one noticeable exception:
Brett Baker and his truck were gone.