Chapter 16

 

The fire near Goleta wiped out nearly a hundred acres of brush and oak trees on the east side of the 101, near the foothills. At least three firemen were hospitalized due to smoke inhalation, and the flames destroyed five homes in an exclusive hillside development. The county Fire Marshall confirmed that the blaze was an act of arson. The incendiary device used to start the blaze in Goleta matched the one used in the arson fire at the car lot in Laguna Beach. So Jeff Moon, aka Professor, was the prime suspect.

Cyrus spent most of the next morning writing reports on the Ombudsman homicide. He had Max take the squad car to the repair shop to get the windshields replaced and two bullet holes repaired. Afterwards, they drove up to CMC and took Dana Mathers into protective custody. Cyrus convinced Rudy that bringing Dana to the station and holding him there as a material witness was necessary to protect him. Rudy hesitated at first, but after Cyrus also agreed he and Max would have someone watch him twenty-four seven, he relented.

It wasn’t until the early evening the next day that Max and Cyrus arrived at the address Briana Carswell had on her driver’s license. Her apartment was located in Carpentaria, a couple of blocks from the beach. It was part of a dog-yellow, flat-roofed, box-shaped, duplex. Six domiciles lined a horseshoe shaped roadway just off Main Street.

The blinds of the apartment in question were closed and there were no cars in the driveway. The sections on either side were dark, but the windows and doors were wide open. They could hear young girls laughing inside the cottage next to Briana’s on the right. A couple of wind boards lay out in the front yard of the cottage. The apartment manager’s office sat across the street.

“I’ll check out the manager and see what he knows about Briana and her visitors,” Max said.

Cyrus nodded and then walked over to the duplex from which they had heard the girls laugh. “Hello, hello,” Cyrus called out in a pleasant tone, “anybody home?”

He peered inside the open door. The pungent smell of sweetly perfumed board wax mixed with the odor of popcorn swirled about him. Two young, sandy-haired, girls who were sitting on an old futon in the middle of a very small, dimly lit living room, sat up and stared at Cyrus with a mystified look: like curious natives seeing a stranger for the first time.

First thing Cyrus noticed about them was that they weren’t poor. This dilapidated shack, located so near to the beach, was probably renting for a couple of thousand a week. They were wearing IZOD t-shirts and high-priced, worn-look, fashioned jeans. The smaller girl had on a large earring of solid high-quality, yellow gold. The watch she wore was worth more than the police cruiser.

“We’re home. What do you want?”  The big girl with the pearl blue eyes and tan swimmer’s shoulders said in a serious tone, like she was scolding a bad dog.

“I am looking for a young lady named Briana Carswell; she told me that she lived next door. Do you know her?” Cyrus stood back from the doorway as he spoke and tried his best to not look intimidating. He didn’t want to get the big girl on the defensive. She got up, walked over to the doorway where he was standing, and quickly tried to shut the door in his face. Cyrus stuck his foot in the entrance before the door built up enough momentum to hurt his foot.

“I’ll take that as a no,” He said.

“Go away, before I call the police,” The big girl said.

“I’m a detective with the Santa Barbara Police and I need your help.” Cyrus said.

The big girl stared at the badge Cyrus was holding out for her. After reading it very carefully, she opened the door and stepped out onto the small slab of broken concrete that served as a front porch. She stood eye level with Cyrus, which was somewhat intimating for him since most of the women he met, even in California, didn’t usually grow that tall.

“Yeah, we know Briana; she’s a good friend of ours, why? Is this about that surf-bum Mathers?”

“Not really, I just wanted to ask you if you knew where Briana usually went in the evening.”

“You can ask her yourself,” the big girl said as she pointed towards Briana’s apartment, “She’s pulling into her driveway now.”

Briana got out of her flat brown, vintage Chevy S-10 pickup and waved to Cyrus smiling. Her wind board and sail were in the bed of the truck.

Cyrus noticed by the way she shivered that she probably had been in the water for a long while and was tired. She grabbed her sport bag and walked over to the porch where the big girl and Cyrus were standing and said, “Hello Detective Fleming, what a nice surprise to see you”.

Cyrus’s face flushed pink. “Hi Briana,” he said, “I was just asking your friend here-” He looked up at the big girl, “I didn’t catch your name.”

“Lisa. I am Lisa and this is Ramona.” The big girl responded and then smiled. Briana’s presence evaporated the tenseness of the moment. Ramona got up from the futon and walked over to the doorway. She was giggling and laughing so hard there were tears in her eyes. Lisa also seemed to be holding back a laugh. Cyrus assumed that the giggles they were suppressing had something to do with Briana being so friendly with an old timer like him, or maybe that is just what girls do sometimes for no reason whatsoever.

“Nice to meet you both. As I was saying, Briana, I just needed to verify some minor details about the Mathers case. Just routine paperwork. I have some papers I need you to sign, and some discrepancies in my report that need to be clarified.”

“Oh,” Briana said, “I was so hoping this was not an official visit.”

Cyrus’s face turned a bright scarlet. Lisa and Ramona walked out of their doorway past Cyrus and Briana, onto the front yard and headed for the beach.

“See you on the beach Briana, nice to meet you Cyrus!” Lisa called out as they walked away, giggling and laughing. It seemed to Cyrus that they were amused by some inside joke. Cyrus and Briana nodded to them as they left.

“Please come over to my apartment, Cyrus. I will be glad to answer any questions that you might have. Just give me some time to shower and change,” she said as she walked toward her apartment. Cyrus could not help but watch her as he followed behind. She walked with a graceful, feminine stride, her one hand on her sports bag and her other hand arced in the air to keep her balance. When she reached the rear of the truck she put her bag down, lowered the tailgate, and grabbed the sailboard.

“Let me help you,” Cyrus said as he reached across her and took hold of the sailboard. “In fact I’d be glad to put this up for you, if you just tell me where.”

“There’s a rack on the side, the top rack is for the sail and the bottom is for the board. I will go and change. Thank-you, Cyrus- you are such a gentleman.” She kissed him on the cheek and hugged his neck. She walked quickly into her apartment, leaving the door open. As he was putting away the sail, his cell phone rang, it was Max.

 “She knows Duncan. You were right; the manager described him perfectly and said he comes around all the time-yeah, O.K. buddy, here you go.”

“Who’s your buddy?” Cyrus asked.

“It’s that homeless guy, you know the one that Dana knows and the one who ripped me off for twenty bucks; he was here in the lobby watching T.V.”

“You sure it’s the same man?”

“Oh yeah, you can’t miss the odor. I gave the guy five dollars.”

“Tightwad. How come you’re friends now?”

“Who says we’re friends? You want to waste time on this guy?”

“Right. Do me a favor Max, keep your phone on and listen in while I go talk to Briana.”

For several moments Max did not answer, Cyrus said, “Max did you hear me?”

“I wish I hadn’t. We need a court order to place a bug.”

“I know. You got your PDA?”

“It’s in the car.”

“Get it and tell Rudy to go ahead with the warrant. I applied for it a couple of days ago. They can issue it on the PDA.  It’ll take five minutes.”

“Five minutes? How’s that possible?”

“One of the five houses Moon torched belonged to the State Superior Court judge who issues these warrants. It won’t take much for Rudy to convince her we need a warrant for a roving wiretap.”

“I’ll go out to the car and get my recorder.”

“Whatever you do, don’t hang up the phone.”

“Got it.”

Cyrus walked back around to the front of the apartment. Briana walked out onto the front porch and asked him in. The sun was already getting low in the sky and the wind was picking up.

Once inside, Cyrus looked around the living room and saw an impressive array of beautiful oil paintings hanging on the walls. He noticed that the initials BC and the date were clearly marked at the bottom of all of them except one, which was marked DJ. All the BC paintings were of ocean related subjects: a man holding his daughter playfully up in the air just high enough to escape the impact of a blue and white foaming, breaking wave, a group of sea lions and seals lounging peacefully on some grey colored boulders with the sea crashing in the background, a dilapidated fishing vessel bedecked with brightly colored chaffing gear on its large wing net and a lone windsurfer tacking against the wind into the curve of a large wave in the purple and pink rays of the morning sun.

“These are wonderful. I like paintings about the sea. How long have you been at it?”

“Since I was twelve years old. It’s just a way for me to relax. I have been able to sell one or two on occasion. I had a display at the art center in Ventura once. I did okay.” She pointed to the one painting that didn’t have the initials B. C. on it. “That one is by Deidra Jones,” she said, “She is a very famous writer. Have you ever heard of her?”

“Yes I have. It’s somewhat melodramatic, don’t you think?”

“You mean stupid, don’t you?”

Cyrus just shrugged his shoulders. It was a large portrait of a blonde-haired woman’s face, sort of. The facial proportions were unbalanced and the features were exaggerated so that it looked more like a caricature than a painting. He guessed it was an attempt at cubism, but he wasn’t sure. All he could tell from the “My Scarred Heart” portrait was that the woman had white-blonde hair, thin, blue, slits for eyes, and a long, pronounced jaw. In the middle of her cleavage was a faint outline of heart. What caught Cyrus’s attention was the shape of the break in the woman’s heart. He’d seen that shape somewhere before, he just couldn’t remember where.

“It’s all right, I agree with you. I bought it because of her celebrity.”

“I guess she realized she wasn’t going to be so famous a painter,” Briana said. “That may be the only painting she ever sells. Who knows, one day it might be worth something.”

 “Not until after she’s dead, right?”

Briana laughed, but when she nodded in agreement, she put her hand to her eye and bent her head down.

Cyrus drew close and put his hand on her shoulder, “Are you all right, Briana?”

“Oh, yes I am fine. My stupid contact lenses.” She blinked her eye several times as she adjusted her lens back into position. “There,” she said, “I’m good now.”

Briana brought Cyrus a cup of vanilla bean coffee. He sat down on her large, white leather couch; it filled up a good portion of the room. She sat down across from him on a matching chair and set her coffee on the end table. The apartment was a sophisticated arrangement of live plants and polished hand-made oak furniture. It was the typical California beach house-plain and worn on the outside, but well built and eye-pleasing on the inside. Cyrus took a sip of coffee and set it down on the glass covered table in front of him. He didn’t want to interrogate Briana; he really wished it had been a social call.

“Briana, did you ever belong to an organization known as Black Bloc?”

“Yes, I did,” Briana said, “When I was young and I did not know any better. Why do you ask?”

“Just curious,” he said, “I saw an old documentary a couple nights ago with you as the star.”

“A documentary about what? I do not remember anything about being in any documentary. If it was about the WTO riots then yes, that was probably me. The old me, I am not proud of those things I did. I told you before, I was young and I made a mistake.”

“I made a few mistakes myself when I was younger; I guess everybody has. Why did you join up with a group like Black Bloc?”

“Is this part of your investigation? Do you have to bring up something from so long ago?”

“No, and you don’t have to answer. I was just curious about it that’s all.”

She sat back in her chair, took a sip of coffee, and then said, “It is not all that unusual, you know. My white father adopted me because he and my mom both thought she could not have children. They were on vacation in Jamaica. They were helping out the missionaries from their church and I was a two year old orphan that the church had taken in.

The reason for joining up with the black blockers had nothing to do with politics. I really didn’t understand much of it anyway. They said they were for global peace and I was for that. So what could be wrong with being for peace? I did not know they were going to go out and break people’s heads and destroy things. I was a black woman with rich, white, parents. I had to prove to everyone I wasn’t an Oreo, you know, black on the outside and white in the middle.”

“When did you decide to leave Black Bloc?”

“When I found out who my real parents were, it changed everything. My real father was a prominent leader in the Jamaican Constabulary Force. He and my natural mother were murdered by a gang of drug dealers. The missionaries convinced my adoptive father to take me away to America so they would not find me and kill me too. I did not worry about being an Oreo anymore after I found out about that. I no longer wanted to throw things at policemen and give them a hard time. So I quit.”

Cyrus was about to ask her about the blonde she saw standing over Mike Tanner’s body, when her face changed to one of surprise. Turning, he saw a man standing in her doorway. He did not like to be sitting down when anyone else in the room was standing, so he got up.

The young man wore thick soled, dirty construction boots, a plain light blue shirt, and rough look Wrangler jeans. They were dirtied at the knees, like he had been climbing. He strolled through the small hallway and into the living room, leaving big dirty footprints on the wood floor. Cyrus disliked him instantly. He could not abide a man who had no respect for another person’s property.

“Hi Briana, who is this?” he said stopping in front of Briana and staring at Cyrus, “What are you doing here? Do you have a warrant? Is this cop bothering you Briana? Do you want me to call your lawyer?”

“There’s no reason to get excited. I was just asking Briana a few simple questions. She invited me to come in.” Cyrus said as he stepped forward and closer.

The man looked surprised and stepped back from Cyrus without a word. He stood there in the middle of the living room with Cyrus, looking at Briana, as if he expected her to say something in his defense. She sat silently, took a sip of coffee, and smiled. Exasperated, the young man spoke first, “You’re socializing with cops now, Briana?”

“This is Detective Fleming, Duncan. He is the nice man who helped me with my testimony against Dana Mathers, remember?”

“Oh yeah, that playboy surfer who whacked Mike, I remember. He confessed, so what is there to ask about?”

“We were just chatting, Duncan, don’t worry.  I’m just glad it’s over. No more annoying reporters. Would you like a cup of coffee?” Briana asked.

“No thanks, no time, I have to get you to the airport remember?”

“Oh yes, maybe you should go back to your truck and wait until Cyrus and I are finished talking.”

As Briana and Duncan continued arguing about whether or not he should return to his pickup, Cyrus walked over to the kitchen area and dropped his cell phone into Briana’s purse, sitting on the bar. When he turned around he walked up slowly behind Duncan.

Involved in their squabble, Briana and Duncan didn’t notice him. Cyrus spotted a small spider tattoo on Duncan’s wrist, there were three small blood colored teardrops which circled the spider’s legs. He observed that Duncan had a slight bulge near the top of his jeans in the back. He could see a small piece of his holster that he had on his waist under his shirt. Deftly reaching under the back of Duncan’s shirt, Cyrus pulled out a nine millimeter Glock 17 pistol. When Duncan turned around, Cyrus brandished the weapon in his shocked face. Cyrus glared at him and said, “Do you have a permit?”

Setting down her coffee, Briana quickly slipped behind Duncan and Cyrus, and went into the kitchen. Cyrus glanced back toward her and once he saw she wasn’t going anywhere, he returned his attention toward Duncan. He pressed down on the magazine release lever and it fell to the floor, full of cartridges. Cyrus inched up closer to Duncan and backed him against the wall. He really did not like rude and intrusive people. He hoped sincerely for Maverick to make a wrong move so he could have an excuse to hurt him.

“I don’t have a permit, Detective; I had just finished using the weapon out on the range. I never go anywhere with it concealed. I just forgot I had it with me, it was a mistake.”

“What’s it for?”

“Just for protection, I take Ms. Carswell to the airport through some rough sections sometimes at night.”

Cyrus chuckled, stepped away, and then he said, “There aren’t any rough sections in Santa Barbara. Go down to a firearms dealer and have him help you fill out an application for conceal and carry.” He motioned for Duncan to have a seat on the couch and he complied.

Cyrus remained stood in front of him and said, “You work for the Senator now?”

“Yeah, driving cars is a lot safer and easier than flying a chopper. My flying days are over thanks to Tanner ratting me out to the FAA.”

“Then it should be no problem. In the meantime keep the weapon in the limo. If you get stopped tell the officer you have a gun immediately.”

“Thanks.”

“So what do you mean about Tanner ratting you out?”

“The jerk fired me. He did his best to make it look like I killed those three roustabouts.”

“You were the pilot, weren’t you?”

“It’s not my fault the engine stalled. I performed the auto rotation emergency procedure just like you’re supposed to. I crashed into the sea and nearly drowned. I couldn’t help those guys on the pugh. They were dead the second the engine stalled.”

“The County Sheriff’s department thinks Tanner killed those roustabouts because of you.”

“Why don’t they arrest him?”

“They’ve got no proof. You know anything that we could use to prove Tanner was behind that accident?”

“He hated me, for one.”

“For trying to unionize TANOCO?”

“That and being his son’s closest friend. That’s why he had to try to kill me. He couldn’t just fire me and give his son another reason to hate him.”

“Mike hated his father pretty bad?”

“Oh yeah, and he heaped all kinds of abuse on the old guy, I felt sorry for him actually.”

Cyrus turned and sat back down in the chair opposite Duncan. He picked up his tea from the coffee table and said, “I feel sorry for the guy, too.”

“Why’s that?”

“I guess he was getting stung from both ends. I mean he had to deal with the hostile takeover and you trying to unionize the company.”

“Well, employees have rights you know. There’s nothing illegal about forming a union.”

“Sure, what kind of a deal did the stockholders offer you?”

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

Cyrus held up Mike’s nine mike and said, “Glock 17, the best 90 two on the market. Probably cost about eight hundred, maybe nine hundred. It’d be too bad if I had to run you in and confiscate this illegally possessed firearm.”

Duncan raised his hands, “Look, I don’t know nothing about any stockholders or deals. I wasn’t included in any of Tanner’s business meetings.”

“You just said you were Mike’s closest friend. And you don’t know anything about the stockholders trying to take over TANOCO?”

“All right, Mike said a couple a things about it, but why would I care?”

 “Maybe those stockholders taking over the company meant you got another chance to bring in the union?”

“Maybe, but they didn’t contact me about it. Believe me; if they had I would have jumped at the chance.”

“Oh, I believe you. So if you were Mike’s closest friend, you must know Jeff Moon.”

Duncan looked down at the carpet before he responded, “I never heard of him.”

“Well, I guess you weren’t as close a friend to Mike as you thought.”

Cyrus put Duncan’s nine-mike down on the end table next to the chair and then walked over to the small bar between the living room and the kitchen where Briana stood. She had been watching them with her elbows on the bar supporting her head with her hands. She gave Cyrus a stern glance as he passed by her and headed for the door.

“You didn’t have to be so rough; he’s just a kid.” She said.

“I know,” he responded flatly, “I just don’t like him. I’ll talk to you later.”

Briana smiled and nodded as Cyrus walked out. When he got to the squad car, Max started the engine. Cyrus got in and they drove off, back down Main Street toward the 101. He rolled down the car window and sat back in the seat. Noontime always made the car hot; it smelled of leather cooked in sweat. He stretched and yawned. He felt his blood sugar going low and he was shaking a little. “I am getting too old for all this drama,” he said.

“You’re addicted,” Max replied, “same as me.”

Cyrus nodded. “Could you hear anything on the phone?”

“I heard everything; I still have the phone on. Say, aren’t you worried that they will find it and trace it back to you?”

“No, it’s not my primary phone. So what did you think?”

“I think you’re wrong about Santa Barbara, for one thing.”

Cyrus gave Max a bewildered look and then he said, “Oh, you mean about the rough neighborhoods. You forget I spent twenty years working in Long Beach. Anyway, I meant about Duncan.”

“He’s lying through his teeth.”

“That’s what I thought. He got real quiet when I asked him about Jeff Moon.”

Max was about to take the turn off Main St. that led to the 101 when Cyrus stopped him “Keep going straight and make a right at the first corner. We can see them from there when they pass by. Give me the cell.” Max handed Cyrus his cell and he put it to his ear for a moment. “I don’t think they’re talking right now,” he said, “but I can hear some traffic noise. What’s Duncan driving?”

“A black Ford pickup, just like the one the masked man drove.”

“I heard car doors slamming. You didn’t get a look at the license tag did you?”

“Yes, it says GOO; you think maybe Duncan is the masked perp and he changed it from ALGORE and GREEN?”

“Duncan is Jeff Moon, give me a break.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know. Duncan doesn’t impress me as the academic type,” Cyrus replied.

“What does GOO mean?”

“I think it probably stands for Get Oil Out.”

“What does that mean?.”

“It’s from the seventies. Bud Bottoms started the organization just after the ’69 oil spill. You didn’t notice if the rear windshield was riddled with bullet holes did you?”

“No, too dark.”

They drove for a while in silence, with Cyrus listening intently to the cell phone. Then he turned to Max and said, “When you interviewed Briana before she pointed Dana out in the line-up, did you ask her anything about what she did for a living?”

“Sure, she said she did the usual: typing, filing, arranging lunches, and keeping track of Dunbar’s appointments.”

“That’s all, nothing else?”

“Yes, she said once in a while she would participate in a focus group.”

“Did she mention what the focus groups were about?”

“The moratorium on offshore oil exploration, she said she was always picked for the environmental issues.”

“You check on her education?”

“She has an MBA from Stanford.”

Cyrus took the phone from his ear and said, “She is FBI, and that Sherriff friend of Dana’s was right, the FBI is all over this case. That administrative assistant job is a cover, has to be. Nobody with her education and background would settle for a mundane job like administrative assistant, even if it is with the Governor.”

“You sure you’re not just trying to rationalize away her being a part of framing Dana?”

“Maybe, a little, it’s true I like her.” Cyrus said. “I think she just made a mistake. When I was talking to her about her paintings, one of her contacts came out. Maybe she didn’t get a good look at the man standing over Mike. Maybe Dana wasn’t framed.”

“What do you mean? You think he’s guilty now?”

“No, of course not. I mean the murderer didn’t frame Dana. He was actually framed by himself. Think about it, the people who are friends with Dana are enemies with Mike. Suppose it was Jack Tanner. He had a strong motive to kill his son-he had to stop him from associating further with Jeff Moon and prevent him from printing any more negative articles about the company. But he had no motive to pin the murder on Dana. He needs Dana to find the oil.”

“What oil?”

“According to Grigoryan, Dana knows where a lot of oil is just offshore. He said that Tanner was counting on him. That’s why everyone is so hot to get stock in his company.”

“Thanks for filling me in, partner.”

“You were out on his front lawn, literally.”

“But why did Tanner ask Dana to take a plea?”

“I think he was genuinely interested in protecting his daughter.”

“The real problem is we got all kinds of suspects and lots of motives, but no proof of anything except Dana is innocent.” 

Cyrus put the phone back up to his ear, “Well, we still have the mystery fingerprints. We need to get Jack Tanner and Grigoryan’s prints and see if they match. Meanwhile, we follow this Duncan clown. I know he’s headed straight for Moon.”

“Maybe Moon killed Mike Tanner; he’s responsible for every other murder committed in Santa Barbara the past three days.”

When the Ford took the sharp turn off from Main St. that leads to the 101 freeway, Max pulled away from the curb and sped up to catch them. They got a few cars behind them and watched to see which exit onto the 101 they would take. Cyrus noticed there was somebody riding in the bed of the pickup.

“Max, can you see who that is in the back of their pickup?”

“Yeah, I think it’s the homeless guy, the one who was hanging around the lobby of the Condo Manager. He sure gets around, doesn’t he?”

When they took the south exit toward Rincon Beach and La Conchita, Cyrus nodded his head toward Max.

“Just like I thought, he’s going the wrong way to be taking her to work.”

Cyrus kept the phone to his ear as they were driving along. He could hear only muffled tones and traffic noise. They kept behind them at normal speed as they went south on the 101 until they got to the turn off that led to an old oil farm just north of La Conchita. The Ford stopped as soon as it cleared the freeway. The homeless man jumped off the truck and started walking south, toward La Conchita. The Ford continued north for a mile or so and then turned right and then through the open gate of a more-than-head-high steel fence. They were trespassing on the property of the Mobil Company’s oil farm.

Max parked the cruiser in front of the gate.

“I don’t think they’ve spotted us,” Max said.

 “You mean you hope they haven’t.” Cyrus listened on the cell phone for several minutes and then he heard the doors of the truck slam. No one was talking, or at least he couldn’t hear them.

“They parked and got out of the truck,” Cyrus said.

Max started up the squad car and slowly passed through the gate of the oil farm. It was a large parking lot. There were five, water tower sized, plain white, holding tanks for oil scattered from north to south. Cyrus spotted Duncan’s truck near the southern most holding tank, adjacent to an orange grove. He pointed out to Max a windowless, round, white, building the size of a football field. It was to the north of where Briana and Maverick had parked.

“I’m sure they won’t catch sight of us here,” Cyrus said.

Max parked the cruiser as close to the orchard as possible. Taking the binoculars out of the glove box, he and Max got out of the squad car and starting walking south through the orchard field. When they cleared the white, oil container building, Cyrus brought the binoculars to his eyes and searched for them. He pointed south at a row of orange trees directly in front of where they had parked.

“They are heading east towards Ranch Road,” Cyrus said, “They are probably going to La Conchita from the backside, down the slope of Rincon Mountain. Let’s go.”

As he crossed over a small ditch between the end of the parking lot and the orchard field, Cyrus noticed the displeasure on his young colleague’s face, “Don’t worry Max, I don’t intend to confront Maverick or Moon, I just want to see what they are up to.”

Max shook his head. “It’s not them I’m worried about; it’s the farmer that owns this orchard who worries me. If he spots us cutting through his field like this he would have every right to shoot us and we’d go to jail if we shot back at him. It is times like this that I wish I was still wearing a uniform.”

Cyrus nodded and darted between two rows of orange trees, Max following behind. Cyrus kept Briana and Maverick in view with the binoculars and Max took the cell phone. They were a comical sight, trotting through an orchard, one with a pair of binoculars raised to his eyes and the other with a cell phone plastered to his ear. The last lumen of sunlight had faded out by the time they reached Ranch Road and Cyrus could no longer see them through the binoculars. Ranch Road ran north and south along the lower portion of Rincon Mountain; below it lay the town of La Conchita.

La Conchita was a small community of about four hundred homes, settled at the foot of Rincon Mountain. In 1995, after an unusually long spell of rain, a large segment of the mountain softened and came sliding down on top of several houses instantly killing their occupants. The slide occurred on the section of Ranch Road which ran two hundred yards above the last row of houses bordering the foot of Rincon Mountain. One of those houses sat on the edge of the large dirt mound created by the landslide. It had been condemned and vacated, but had not yet been torn down. When they got near the end of Ranch Road that had been split by the cave in, they heard some rustling noises in the brush off to their right. They were heading for the condemned house.

“I see them,” Cyrus called to Max in a loud whisper, “They are down there in the abandoned house next to the earth mound. I saw them pass under a floodlight and into the house.”

They stumbled and slid their way down the side of the mountain to the backyard. Running across to the north side, they leaned against the wall and waited. Cyrus was wheezing like a freight train. 

“I can hear someone talking now Cyrus.” Max whispered. He held the cell phone out so they could both hear.

“Wait here. Jeff will be up in a minute.” The voice on the cell phone said.

“That was Duncan’s voice, Max, I’m sure.”

A voice came through on the cell phone again, “I need to go to the bathroom, Duncan.”

“That’s Briana of course,” Max said.

They heard footsteps.

 “She’s been there before, Max.”

“How do you know?”

“She didn’t ask him where the bathroom was. I hope she left her purse with Duncan.”

A loud voice cracked through the silence, “Hello Jeff, good to see you, my brother.”

Cyrus smiled. “She left the phone in her purse in the room with Duncan and Jeff alone.”

“Where is Briana?” The voice on the cell phone said.

“Relieving herself,” a second voice answered, “So what is going on? Are we ready?”

“Soon Duncan, everything will be ready. We won’t miss our deadline. Were you able to get our parts?”

“I have them in the truck, I’ll go get them.”

“Wait, I don’t want Briana to see them.”

“You don’t trust her? I thought you two go way back?”

“That’s the problem. We go too far back and I haven’t heard from her since the 99 WTO riots, after I bailed her out of jail.  I think she has changed. I was hoping we could use her to spy on Dunbar and keep tabs on what he was up to. That was before I spied on her earlier today. She was talking to that pig, Fleming. I heard her tell him that she no longer belonged to Black Bloc and that she was sorry she ever threw rocks at cops. Seems her Daddy was a cop, too.”

“I was just with her-”

“This all went down before you got there, my man. Maybe it’s time we dumped Miss Briana, what do think?”

“Fine with me, Jeff. Where’s a good place to dump an old girlfriend?”

“The ocean is big and cold and stormy right now. Sometimes people fall into it and they’re never seen again.”

Several minutes of tense silence ensued from the last remark. Cyrus worried about Briana. Just as he was about to signal to Max that they should break into the house, a voice blared out from the cell phone.

“She’s taking a long time in the bathroom, even for a woman.”

“Let’s go see where she...”

The cell phone went silent.

“Max, I think they found the phone. I think they know we were listening to them.”

“Maybe not, Cyrus, they could have thought it was Briana’s phone and she was spying on them, or the battery may have run down.”

“We need to get in there now before something happens to her.”

Before Max could answer, they heard a door slam from the rear of the house. Cyrus saw the shadows of two people running through the portion of the backyard lit up by the floodlight. They were heading toward the slope of Rincon Mountain from where they had just come. It looked like one of the shadows he saw was waving a weapon around.

“Go after them, Max, they got Briana!”

Max dropped the cell phone and headed for the bushes on the mountain’s slope; Cyrus picked up the cell and followed. Halfway up Cyrus heard him stumble, and then he heard a loud hiss and then a long, mournful, groan. By the time he got to Max, he was flat on his back, holding the calf of his leg and wincing in pain.

“Watch out! Rattlesnake!” Max said.

Remembering the LED flashlight he carried on his key chain, Cyrus got it out and looked around, “I think you scared him off Max.”

“I stepped right on top of him! Don’t stop, Cyrus, go after Briana. I think she is in a lot of danger!”

“So are you, besides I need you with me when I catch up to them.”

 “I’ve been bit by a rattler before. I will be all right. My leg will swell up the size of a basketball and I’ll be on crutches for awhile, but I’ll live. The one thing I can’t do is move; that will speed the toxin through my body.”

Cyrus called the station, told them about Max and requested back up. “There’s a chopper on its way. You sure you will be all right?”

 “Yes, get out of here, go after Briana. You heard them; they are going to kill her!”

Cyrus tossed him his LED flashlight and left. By the time he had made it up the slope, down Ranch Road and back through the orange orchard, the black Ford pickup was gone. He ran for the squad car, got in, and sat there disheartened. Where could he be taking her? The ocean is big, Moon had said. Where is a good spot to dump someone in the ocean around here? There’s no pier, not boat dock. Oh yes, there is a pier, an oil pier five minutes south of here, it extends a half mile into the Pacific to a manmade island. Rincon Island, that’s where he’s taking her.

He started up the Dodge and headed south on the 101. He pushed the throttle to the floor to squeeze out every one of the Charger’s four hundred horsepower. Cyrus slowed down and got behind the pickup. He dropped back pretty far so he wouldn’t notice him. He was afraid Duncan would panic and shoot Briana if he spotted someone tailing him.

The pickup turned off at the Old Pacific Coast Highway exit, the road that leads to the oil pier, with Cyrus following. They made a left on to Ocean Avenue and drove up the causeway in the center of the pier. Cyrus slowed down, turned off his lights, and followed in the darkness. The full moon lit his way. He saw the tail lights of the Ford get bright about mid way down the 3,000 foot causeway. Two oil pipes, like large pontoons on a hydroplane, straddled each side of the pier. He stopped and got out. He heard the car door of Duncan’s pickup slam and he could see the shadowy image of Briana being forced to the side of the causeway and over the large pipeline. Cyrus ran as hard as he could until he reached a position a few feet from the pickup that was far enough away so Duncan wouldn’t notice him and close enough for him to get a good shot off. When he saw Duncan raise his gun to Briana’s head, he aimed and squeezed the trigger of his chief’s special.

His shot missed, but the crack of the round going off startled Duncan, and when he lowered his gun, Briana wheeled a roundhouse leg kick square onto the side of his head. Duncan went over the side and down into the ocean, about thirty feet below. Cyrus ran to the oil pipe and tried to jump over it, like he had seen Duncan and Briana do, but he couldn’t. He had to run back down the causeway until he found a large piece of a bolt that was protruding from a pipe connection. He grabbed it and pulled himself over clumsily. He slid out of control to the other side of the pipe onto a narrow strip of pier deck and nearly fell over the side himself. He picked himself up and then ran over to where Briana was standing.

They looked down over the edge to see if they could find Duncan. The wind was blowing pretty hard and it felt like it was just above freezing. The ocean was rough and large ocean breakers smashed against the pillars of the oil pier. It didn’t look to Cyrus that anyone could have survived a fall into the churning seawater below. If the drop didn’t kill you the fifty degree water temperature eventually would. Briana put her arms around Cyrus and buried her head into his chest. He could feel her shaking.

“I didn’t see him, did you?”

“No, and I don’t have time to worry about him either. My partner is down and needs my help, let’s go.”

They walked along the narrow strip of pier that was just wide enough for Cyrus and Briana to walk along single file and leave little more than a couple of feet pier deck before disappearing into the darkness. Cyrus intended to go back to the place on the pipeline that had the protruding bolt in one of its connections. He was about to tell Briana to go ahead and jump over the pipe, when a bright spot light shined upon them both. Tracing the bright light back to its source, Cyrus observed a sea-water drenched Maverick Duncan standing on the deck of a large powerboat, holding a Glock MP5 automatic and aiming it at them. The next moment the clang, clang, clang, of metal hitting the oil pipeline startled them, causing them both to hide down below in the crevice between the pipe and the pier.

He’s a professional all the way; three bursts at a time, only an amateur fires more, he said to himself as he led Briana down the side of the oil pipeline. The light followed them and then Duncan squeezed off three more rounds. They missed by a few inches. Those rounds are close considering the shooter is standing on a bouncing deck in six foot seas, Cyrus surmised. Sooner or later he was going to get lucky and kill one of them. Cyrus didn’t want it to be Briana.

“Briana, climb over and get over behind the pipe here; I’ll catch up with you down further.”

“I won’t leave you, Cyrus.” She clung to his side as they continued to sidle their way down the small strip of pier that ran along the outer edge of the pipeline. Cyrus didn’t have time to argue or the strength to fight her, so he kept going with her right behind him, bent down to hide as much as possible beneath the bottom curve of the oil pipe. When he got to the pipe connection that had the protruding bolt, they stopped.

Exposing himself to light from the boat, Cyrus jumped up onto the pipe, grabbed hold of the bolt, and started to hoist himself over the top. When he was nearly over it, the rapid clang, clang, clang of automatic gunfire striking the steel oil surprised him and caused him to let go of the bolt. He fell back down to the deck of the pier. Landing sideways on his foot, he dropped on his side, and rolled to the pier’s edge. Briana screamed and then scrambled over to him, reaching for him unsuccessfully.

Cyrus grabbed the pier deck as he fell over the edge of the pier and hung over the ocean. The spotlight caught up to them and Cyrus could see Briana straining with all of her strength to keep him from falling and pull him up. The spotlight from the boat shined directly on her. Realizing that she could not possibly pull him up and that it was only a matter of seconds before he pulled her over the side with him, Cyrus grabbed her hand with his hand and broke it free from her grip, purposely causing his own fall.

Waving his arms wildly to correct his trajectory as he went, he dropped down the thirty feet into the white-capped ocean. He managed to land in the water feet first. The sudden immersion into the cold brine felt, oddly enough, like an intense burn, as though he had fallen into a lake of fire instead of nearly frozen ocean. Fighting his way back to the surface, he gulped in as much air as he could. The spotlight from the boat lit up the area.

They saw me fall off the edge of the pier and are looking for me, and they don’t mean to save me, either, Cyrus said to himself. He knew the next big wave would probably send him crashing into the pier pilings and it wouldn’t matter anyway. This is as good a way to die as any other, I guess, he said to himself. Observing that the waves had calmed down for the moment, he struggled to get to the piling nearest him, thinking that it would be a safe refuge against the pounding waves and good place to hide from Duncan.

Once he reached the concrete piling, he grabbed hold of one of its corners and was instantly pierced through the hand by razor sharp barnacles. His hands and fingers were by now too numb from the cold to feel any pain, but he realized that the blood flowing from his wounds meant that he was now prime shark bait. The next instant, he heard a splash.

He was under the pier now, floating between the pilings. The next big wave would smash him into them and kill him for sure. Maybe it would be better to let Duncan shoot me, he said to himself. He could see the enormous, black, face of an ocean breaker heading for him. He froze, transfixed by the fast approaching, watery, behemoth and then he felt a strong tug at his waist and he took a deep breath as whatever it was pulled him under, deeper and deeper. For a moment he believed he had been caught in the mouth of a giant shark. When the mystery fish let him go, he swam with him back to the surface. Briana was waiting for him.

“Why did you pull me under?” Cyrus shouted.

 “To let the wave pass over you, that’s why. It’s the only way to avoid being crushed by the waves. It’s called duck diving.”

“Duck diving, are you crazy?”

“Hold on to me, I am going to get us out of here and back to the shore.”

Cyrus started to protest; he was certain he was too heavy for her to rescue. He wanted to tell her to get to shore without him, but before he could answer she pulled him under the water again. Realizing that if there was anyone who knew the ocean well enough to save him, it would be Briana, he relented. They went through several more sequences of duck diving under the wave as it passed over them and then swimming toward shore. Soon they passed beneath the pier to the north side. She caught Cyrus by the shoulder and held on to him in order to guide him through the waves. Again they had to dive down deep as far as they could under the water to avoid the crush of the incoming waves and then come back up for air and swim as hard as they could for the shore. They repeated this arduous drill over and over as they struggled toward the safety of the beach. The strong ocean current pulled them northward, back toward La Conchita.

After several more minutes of duck diving beneath ocean breakers and swimming toward the beach, they came within sight of their destination. Cyrus could feel the current of water rushing out to sea and pulling him back into the deep water. He knew another large wave was on its way. Briana grabbed him by the shoulders to push him under, but she was too late. The water mountain picked them both up and elevated them high into the air and then tossed them over its face. They skipped over it several times to the bottom. The wave’s thick edge came down on top of them like a hammer and pushed them end over end. Cyrus felt like a piece of clothing going through the spin cycle in a washing machine. When the force of the wave had dissipated to the point he once again had control of his body, he stood up and to his amazement he was in only a little more than knee-deep water. He searched for Briana, and found her already on the beach, walking around and calling for him.

Shivering and exhausted, he had never before felt so happy to be alive. He trudged several feet to the dry beach and fell into the sand. His numbed feet ached and he could barely move. His arms felt leaden, his ribs ached from holding his breath, and his light blue, mouth swelled from drinking too much salty ocean. Bits of sand filled the crevices of his nose, ears, and teeth and a trickle of blood flowed from his frozen hands. Briana followed behind and sat down next to him. Covering her eyes with her hand to protect them from the whirling sand, Briana shouted to be heard over the howl of the wind, “Are you all right, Cyrus?”

Shaking from head to foot, Cyrus lay in the sand, holding his hands on either side of his face he shouted back to her, “I’ve never been better!”

“We can’t stay here long, Cyrus, we’ll freeze to death!”

Pushing himself up into a sitting position, Cyrus nodded his head in agreement.

“Briana, I think we drifted pretty far north of Rincon Island, we must be almost parallel with La Conchita.”

“Head for the rocks, I know a way back to the other side of the freeway that runs underneath!”

As Cyrus was about to enter a protest and suggest that they try to get back to the Dodge, a bright light distracted them both. Estimating the distance to be close to five hundred feet, Cyrus spotted the power boat, from which the light came. Just beyond the impact zone of the breaking waves, it bobbed up and down violently. The blurred, barely visible, image of Duncan holding the MP-5 spiked his adrenalin.

“Let’s go!” Cyrus shouted as he gathered himself up and started running toward the freeway. Puffs of sand caused by the shots from the automatic, which were being fired at them from the boat, followed them as they ran for boulder-lined cliff that ran along the edge of the 101 freeway. He remembered that the MP-5 had a maximum effective range of only about three hundred feet, but its actual range was one or two hundred yards farther. It didn’t matter, he wasn’t going to take any chances of Duncan getting a lucky shot, especially now that they had made it alive this far, so he kept running.

The run made Cyrus feel warmer. He followed Briana to a large concrete doorway that protruded from the wall of rock. The wind whipped through the opening, creating a steady, high-pitched, mournful, howl. The doorway was only three and a half feet high and inside it was pitch black. Cyrus stopped short, but Briana stooped over and crawled into the opening without hesitation. I think she’s done this before, Cyrus said to himself as he hunched down and with great effort began to slowly duck-walk down the drainage way.

“Cyrus, are you all right?” Briana’s voice echoed back to him.

“I’m good, I just can’t see anything,” Cyrus replied, “I am just glad to be out of the wind and out of sight of that boat.”

“Keep your hand along the wall; we will be on the other side very soon.”

As she was speaking, he noticed a light at the end of the drainage way. It’s probably from a street light, Cyrus surmised.

When they got to the other side, the first thing Cyrus observed was how much the onshore winds had died, it was as if God had pulled a switch and shut it off. The temperature rose slightly, but not enough to stop his entire body, from his knees to his jaws, from shaking. His shoes were filled with flesh numbing seawater. He walked over to the embankment near the edge of the freeway and sat down. He took them off and dumped the water out of them. Briana sat down beside him and put her arms around his shoulders. Her body felt warm and to his amazement, she appeared to him to have been invigorated by their recent activity rather than exhausted, like him.

“Did you enjoy your workout?”

“The swim wasn’t so bad, but I didn’t care for the style of our trainer-his motivation technique was a little scary.”

“I didn’t like that either.”

Cyrus admired Briana’s calm demeanor. She didn’t shiver and her breathing was normal, while he trembled and wheezed. She may as well have been for a stroll in the park, instead of a quarter-mile swim through six foot, fifty five degree temperature seas. Cyrus had endured more physical action the last thirty minutes than he had had in thirty months combined.

Once he had finished putting his shoes back on, she took his hands in hers and held them tightly. Two kids on bikes stopped and stared at them while they sat there on the embankment under the street light.

“You guys running from the cops?” the oldest one, a freckle faced carrot top with a front tooth missing, asked.

“Why do you think that?” Cyrus asked.

“Because I know you haven’t been swimming in your clothes just for fun, that’s why and there’s been a bunch of cop cars driving around here all night. Don’t worry, mister we won’t tell no one we saw you.” The boy looked frightened and started to get back up on his bike.

Cyrus reached into his back pocket and retrieved his wallet. Flashing his badge at them, he said in a gruff voice, “We are cops! Where did you see the cop cars?”

“Up by the landslide, near the abandoned house, it’s on Carpenteria Street.”

“We saw a helicopter too!” The younger boy said.

 “Yeah, they had spotlights and everything.”

“The helicopter landed right on Carpenteria Street in front of the abandoned house; it was pretty cool.”

“My Dad said it was the kind of chopper they use for doing medical stuff, a metalvac I think he said.”

“Thanks, boys… say you aren’t out past the curfew are you?”

“No, it’s only 9:30 and we got until 10, besides we had to watch them put the cop in the stretcher and take off,” the carrot top replied as he got back up on his mountain bike and rode off.

Cyrus assumed the cop that was medevaced was Max, but he was still worried. Rattlesnake bites aren’t often deadly, like Max said, but they are dangerous and you can suffer permanent damage from them. He prayed that the medical help arrived in time to prevent that. He and Briana stood up from the embankment and started walking up the street towards Moon’s hideout.

“We were out there fighting those waves for thirty minutes at least,” he said.

Briana shook back her head and laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“It was more like five minutes, not thirty.”

“That was easy for you, but I don’t swim, at least I haven’t in about ten years. I don’t even know how I did it.”

“Adrenalin, that is how.” She placed her hand on his arm, “And I think you are also a strong man.”

Cyrus nodded. Fishing in his pocket as they went, he pulled out his cell phone. Water dripped from it everywhere. He sighed and put it back. He smiled at Briana and then said, “Isn’t it nice to be able to breathe without choking back seawater?”

Briana nodded and then said, “So you think I am a policeman?”

“No, I think you are an FBI agent,” he said, imitating her speech.

“How did you know?”

“At first I just guessed. Lots of things about you don’t make much sense. You’re too smart and too well-connected to be working for minimum wage as a secretary and you’re too poor to be renting a nice condo on the beach. Now I’m sure you’re an agent of some kind.”

“And why is that?”

“Back there on the oil pier, when you stayed calm and gave that Duncan clown a kick in the head just at the right moment-very professional.”

Briana hung her head and said, “I do not feel very professional right now. I was supposed to be working undercover. I guess I have messed that all up now.” She stopped and put her hands over her eyes.

“What’s the matter?” Cyrus said.

“Oh, I had my contacts in the ocean and the salt makes my eyes feel like they are on fire.”

They stopped walking and stood on the corner under a street light. When she finished she tossed them on the ground and they continued walking.

“You always take your contacts out before you swim?”

“Yes, if I can remember. I do not always remember, and this is what I get. I don’t use them in the water; I’m nearsighted so I can maneuver my wind board fine without my contacts.”

When they reached the back street that ran along the foot of Rincon Mountain, where Moon’s hideout was, a black and white met them. The patrolman inside shined a spotlight on them. Cyrus flashed his badge and the patrolman signaled for them to get in. The uniform told Cyrus that Max was at Santa Barbara General and the last he heard from the dispatcher, he was going to be O.K. Max had been conscious only long enough to tell them that his partner needed help and that Cyrus was in pursuit of a kidnap victim. The sedative they gave Max for the snake bite made him drowsy and he passed out, so they couldn’t get any more information out of him.

“Get an APB out on a Maverick Duncan with the following description…”

When he had finished, Cyrus leaned back in the seat of the black and white. He shivered and his teeth chattered uncontrollably. The warm air from the heater felt so good he ignored the thousands of painful needles that pierced his thawing hands and feet.

“I left my squad car on the causeway at Rincon Island Pier. Send someone over to pick it up. I really need some water. Is there a convenience store open around here?”

The uniform drove to the Mini Mart and got them both a couple of waters and some coffee. Cyrus drank down both of his waters and Briana did the same. Going back to the trunk of the squad car, the uniform returned with a couple of blankets.

“Where to, Detective?” The uniform asked.

Cyrus didn’t respond. He had taken the blanket and wrapped himself up in it and fallen asleep.

“The Beachside Condos in Carpentaria,” Briana said. “I’ll show you which one when we get there. I have got to get him into some dry clothes before he freezes to death.”