Kirk Russell - Shell Games

That night, he barbecued salmon and roasted potatoes in the fire, two of Maria’s old favorites, though she said she’d stopped liking salmon as much and wasn’t hungry for it at all tonight. She made them a salad and her own separately, putting only a few drops of olive oil on the leaves she planned to eat. She cut the end of a cucumber over the lettuce while Katherine lectured her. Maria’s salmon sat on a corner of her plate throughout dinner and Marquez watched her feed it to the sink as her mom’s head was turned. Then she got on the phone with her friends, after explain-ing that she’d actually eaten a big lunch.

“Do you see it now?” Katherine asked, as Maria talked to her friend in the back room and the two of them sat out on the deck in front of the dying embers.

“Yeah, I see it. Her weight is down.”

“Way down. I’m taking her back to her doctor.”

He drank a beer and they moved off Maria. He listened to the day’s problems at the coffee bar, some of the complaints she’d fielded today, her expansion ideas. He questioned her more about the two men who’d come in, then showed her the video from Oakland and without looking very close or long she dismissed those men. He didn’t push her on it because she didn’t want to think that way tonight, and they tried to make it normal and sit out here like they used to and have it be easy and the way it used to feel, but couldn’t do it. And yet, she sat close to him, curled in the chair, resting an arm on top of his, her fingers through his fingers, everything as fragile as glass. He held her hand gently and thought carefully about the chain of events with Heinemann while staring at the fire. When his cell rang he put the beer down and Katherine said she was going to get Maria and it was time for them to go. She got up slowly, her eyes averted as he answered the phone, figured he had to answer.

“I helped load two thousand abalone onto their boat today,” Davies said. “We winched it over from a salmon trawler. The trawler dragged the catch underwater to the meeting. They had the bags hanging off the back of the boat in case they ran into any of your people. They were going to take a knife and cut the line. These people would take a knife to you, too, Lieutenant. I got some film for you if you want to meet tomorrow morning.”

“What did you film?”

“Their boat and the guys that came in to pick me up. I bought this little video camera off the Internet that I hooked up to my boat cabin. I can run it remote control. If we sit down I can draw you the hull and give you a top-down view of their boat. I can meet you around dawn in Sausalito, unless you’re done with me.”

Marquez watched Maria walk out from the back room, saw the hall light go off.

“Or I’ll meet you near that engineers’ dock.”

“I’ll be there if you’ve got film for me.”

“What did I just tell you?”

Davies hung up, not waiting for any more, a statement in that, and Marquez laid the phone down as Katherine walked out onto the deck again.

“We’re leaving,” Katherine said, and Maria was already out the door, not checking back to say good-bye. “She’s angry at me, not you, John.”

“I can be there when you take her back to the doctor.”

“The doctor wants to talk to her alone, but I’ll call you after.”

Marquez put his arms around her and drew her close. He didn’t kiss her but slid his hand under the hair on the nape of her neck and held her face against his. He felt her hold him, her fingers briefly on his spine. She straightened and he saw Maria standing in the front doorway staring at them, her hands pressed together in front of her, her facial expression one out of childhood. Maria’s eyes found his and questioned, then she turned and he heard her feet go down the stairs.

When he left the house the next morning he called Alvarez and told him he needed backup for the Davies meeting and that he was picking his boat up. It was still dark when Marquez got to the marina. He used his headlights to see as he fumbled with the gate lock, then hooked the boat trailer to his truck, backed it down to the water, floated it, climbed on board, and clicked the blowers on before firing the engines. He hit the switch redirecting the exhaust through the drive to quiet the engine noise, but it was still particularly loud and deep in the darkness. He left it idling, tied off on the dock as he parked the truck and trailer, then carried his tactical vest and surveillance equipment back down. He poured coffee from a steel thermos as he motored out past the 5-mile-an-hour signs, smooth water rippling ahead of the bow. He had other uses for the boat today, but figured it would also work well for this meeting with Davies.

Now he followed the channel buoys, sipping coffee, looking at headlights crossing the San Rafael Bridge as he aimed the boat toward Angel Island and brought the speed up to twenty-five. The boat slicked across glassy water. The morning calm probably meant it would be hot today. He concentrated on the bay ahead and thought about how to approach Billy Mauro, refusing to let himself believe Davies’s promise last night of having film to give him. The sky whitened overhead and the silhouette of the east bay hills was rimmed with pink light as he passed Angel Island.

When he tied off in Sausalito and came ashore, he didn’t spot Davies and realized he hadn’t really expected to. There were fishing boats on their way out and he checked the dock, retrieved the coffee thermos and sat on a concrete bench facing the water, drinking another cup though he hardly needed it. He watched the light change and remembered a crabber they’d busted here a year ago, the crabber’s wife berating them as they’d lifted each crab out, measuring its shell, finding twenty-seven of a hundred were undersize while she kept telling them that they were destroying the industry, that they were the problem.

Across the bay, the sun rose above the hills and a finger of light colored the smooth harbor water. Davies was a no-show. No surprise, so get on with it, he thought. Their focus today would be on the Oakland fish broker, Billy Mauro. He called Alvarez.

“Let’s get some breakfast. I’ll buy, but I’ve got to dock where I can see the boat. Maybe one of those tourist spots farther down.”

“Sounds good to me, Lieutenant.”

Alvarez ate an omelet, Marquez scrambled eggs and toast. The big room was almost empty. A party of cheerful Germans was a few tables over talking in an animated way, but there was little other breakfast traffic. He called Shauf and Roberts, who were in Oakland scouting Billy Mauro’s operation. Shauf had discovered that Mauro was well liked and well known along the waterfront. He had a dock location where he received directly from fishermen, but his office and production were in a corrugated metal building on Second Street. He shuttled two brightly painted vans, moving fish from the pier to the warehouse on Second Street, sometimes bringing the fishermen along to haggle price, then running them back down to their boats. But it looked to Shauf like most of the communication was by cell phone, a buyer meeting the boats, looking product over and communicating with Billy Mauro at his desk in the warehouse.

“So what’s the plan here this morning?” she asked.

“We’ll go see him.” Because he didn’t see any other choice. There wasn’t time to set up surveillance. “Brad is with me. He’ll hook up with you and I’m bringing my boat over.”

He kept the boat’s speed down as he crossed the bay. The only rough water was the wake from an empty outbound cargo ship flying a Chinese flag. He brought the speed up enough to plane after the cargo ship passed and now to his right as he passed San Francisco, the early sunlight reflected with the colors of copper and bronze and mirrored light off the skyscrapers of the financial district. He wore a Giants cap backwards and didn’t need a coat this morning. Well before the estuary he cut his speed and tried Davies’s cell phone once more before docking, didn’t get an answer and didn’t leave a message. Roberts picked him up in Jack London Square.