Nick Stephenson - Eight the Hard Way

I cleared my throat. “And I’ll need that check.”

“Of course.” Mira pulled a beautiful wallet out of her matching designer handbag and quickly wrote out the amount and the numbers, and then signed it. She left the TO line blank when she handed it to me.

I stared at the check for a moment. That tug again. My conscience, or my cop sense? Sometimes they were hard to distinguish. I folded it in half, slipping it deep into my money clip, which resided in a tight front jeans pocket. “Thank you. I’ll be in touch by dinnertime at the latest. Please don’t do anything before then without calling.” I stood.

“Of course. Thank you so much.” Mira reached for the bottle again.

“And Mira...go easy on that, all right?” I held up a hand in apology. “I’m not judging. Just because you need to be clearheaded today. For your daughter. For Talley.”

“Yeah. I’ll...I’ll put it away.”

“Is there anyone who can come stay with you? That you can trust?”

Mira shook her head. “No. No one.”

I wasn’t huggy with women, but I made myself reach across to take Mira’s hand. “If you want me to look into this, I have to go now. You’ll be all right? You’ll be strong?”

A tear rolled down Mira’s cheek, quickly wiped away. “I think so.”

“Okay, then. I have to go find your daughter, if I can.”

“I know. Go on.”

I let herself out the back way with relief. Adrenaline already zipped around my veins like a road full of rally cars, making me feel like going, doing . I dialed Mickey’s desk phone before I had reached Molly, speaking as I picked my way across the wet unmowed grasses of the vacant lot, avoiding the muddy BMX paths. “What you got?”

“Miranda Almone Sorkin, née Herndon, thirty-five years old, married once to Dennis Wilson Sorkin. Divorced two years ago, no criminal record for either of them. Graduated Stanford pre-med at twenty and then UOP Doctor of Pharmacy at twenty-three. Married shortly after graduating, and then she went to work for Arkin Medical Distribution, a big wholesaler. One child, Talley, about a year later.”

“What does the ex do?” I asked as I fobbed open the car with a beep and got in. At this point I really didn’t think Mira was being watched. In fact, given that the heist—the presumed heist—had not taken place, and Mira supposedly had not heard from the kidnappers, and I had found no bugs, I doubted they were watching the house at all.

“MBA, stockbroker. Flew high for a while then lost a bunch of his clients’ money on some bad trades right before the divorce. Dodged criminal charges but the trading house dumped him hard. Looks like she was paying his bills for a while. Then they split up and he moved to Seattle, where he works now at a small firm managing for peanuts. Less than two mil in client assets. That’s nothing. He might be pulling fifty K in commissions, max.”

“Huh.” I popped the phone into its hands-free cradle and stuck the headset on. “So he either learned from getting burned and is on the straight and level, or he’s got something else going, something not obviously traceable, and is working as a cover.”

“Does that mean you want me to start tunneling?” Mickey sounded eager to put his skills to use, and incidentally to up his rates quite a bit.

“Yeah. Dig away on both of them. I got an advance, and as long as the check doesn’t bounce, you’re good for a couple of days of work.”

“Sa-weet.”

I revved the Impreza’s engine, spun the wheel and hit forty in the twenty-five zone in two seconds flat, twisting through the narrow car-lined streets. Unlike more modern suburbs, garages and driveways were small in this neighborhood, seldom holding more than one car, and curbside parking was the norm. “I need you to take a look at Sorkin’s landline records for the last week, incoming and outgoing. Flag repeat calls, and try to match all the numbers to names. Then cross-reference them with the ex’s. Also,” I kept my voice casual, “pull up Cole Sage’s records. Any numbers he has, including his office number at the Chronicle. See if anything lines up. Print those all out, will you?” If I was going to pay Mickey to hack, I might as well feed my favorite obsession. Okay, maybe second favorite, or third, after racing and poker.

“Okay, boss. I’ll have all this before lunchtime.”

“That’s my boy.”

“I wish.” Mickey hung up.

I heard the undertone of truth in his words. Poor guy had had a crush on me since I’d hired him for an early case, but I figured it was a hopeless nerdy fanboy thing, like having the hots for Halle Berry because she’d played superheroes and supervillains. I didn’t even have to flirt with Mickey to keep him interested; unrequited hope seemed to flow like caffeine through the whole gamer crowd’s veins, a pathetically familiar poison.

Then I thought about Cole and realized I might have more in common with Mickey than I’d thought. What did some marina-dwelling cougar with perfect hair and a plastic-surgery body have on me? I massaged the area around my right ear with the heel of my hand. That part that still felt like it was asleep, and my thoughts turned dark as I answered my own question.

Objectively I know I don’t look that bad. Children don’t run screaming, people don’t flinch away. When I look in the mirror or at a snapshot someone has taken of me I look completely normal, but what woman doesn’t obsess over her flaws, at least a little?

Breaking out of the cramped neighborhood, I floored it onto Miller Avenue and raced through the midmorning traffic as if I was at Le Mans. My fuzzbuster showed green, and lasers didn’t work very well in the drizzling rain, so unless some overzealous uniform got eyeballs on me, I should be fine. Adrenaline still sang through my veins like joy, mixed with frustration and anger.

I found myself ignoring the on-ramp to 101 and staying on the surface streets all the way to Bridgeway, which just happened to be Sausalito’s main artery that ran past the marinas with their cabin cruisers and speedboats and fishing boats...and houseboats.

Bitch. Bitchbitchbitchbitchbitch. Five times seemed like the right number to name her. Only the fact that I didn’t know exactly where the wench’s vessel berthed kept me from turning in and...

And what, Cal? I asked myself. Even if I did know, what would I do? Kick her ass? That’s really going to get Cole to throw her over and...and what?

Acting like a stupid schoolgirl again, crush and all.

I pounded the steering wheel, then slowed down with deep breaths as I spotted a pair of Sausalito PD parked at a 7-Eleven, windows open and facing opposite directions so they could chat. The sight of the two representatives of my former profession hit me like a bucket of cold water in the face. Professionalism slammed shut on my emotions like a falling steel door.

Screw Cole, I thought. Get a grip, girl. Plenty of fish in the sea.

I proceeded down Bridgeway until it turned into Alexander and then met 101 again. The state highway was still lightly traveled and should remain so in the misty daytime until rush hour and ocean fog made their inevitable rendezvous on the Golden Gate before dusk.

I was happy to live and work in the same neighborhood where I grew up, the Mission District, now a bit more gentrified than it used to be but still full of character, and not have to commute in to work as I used to. Beat cops, even detectives, didn’t make enough to live alone in the City, but now I owned my office free and clear, as well as Molly and Madge, a 1968 Mustang that I kept in Mother’s garage. Mom didn’t drive, so I wasn’t worried about that.

I’d also paid off Mom’s house and stayed on there, and all it had cost was my career, a damaged hand, an eardrum and some skin.