Hot Wire (14 page)

"Does he work for that NewsWire deal?"

"Hell, I can't remember." A lighter scratched on the other end of the line and he coughed into the phone. "The NewsWire. Yeah. The Berkeley NewsWire. One of them Lefty rags. He writes about crime stuff: police brutality, sex scandals, business scams, crap like that. If some politician gets popped in a vice raid, Brownie's all over it." Vincent took a sip of whatever he was drinking and smacked his lips. "Told me he used to cover politics for one of those big papers in D.C., but he got canned for some reason – doesn't like to talk about it." He snorted. "Drunk again, most likely. He's OK, I guess, not that I ever trusted reporters. Bunch of blow-dried whores for city hall and doing good to get their own names right, you ask me."

"OK, Vincent. Thanks."

It wasn't much to go on.

"Just call later next time," he said. "And be careful."

I told him I would. He was a nice old coot for all his bluster.

"One more thing," I said, making up my mind.

"Yeah?" He coughed again. "What's that?"

"You still got those things for sale? The ones you told me about a couple nights ago?"

"Sure do," he said. "You in the market?"

"Yeah, but I might need some credit." I checked my watch. "Can I drop by in a couple hours?"

"Any time," he said. "I'll be here all day."

I hung up and took a drink of coffee, spacing on the rain and traffic. My hands trembled a little. I felt wired and burned out, too fried to think straight, but I had to make a decision and I was running out of time. I figured I had a day or two before Matthews got tired of his game or Heberto caught up with me or Baldy and Crewcut tracked me down again, so I had to decide if I was going to book or stick around. I didn't know what to do, but one thing was pretty clear:

After last night, I needed a piece.

#

"Berkeley NewsWire," a chick answered when I called to make sure Brown actually worked for them. I could hear office sounds in the background – phones ringing, voices, fingers tapping on keyboards – but they could have been a tape recording for all I knew.

"I need to talk to Adam Brown," I said, keeping an eye on the street. The rain had died down and traffic hissed through the fog, kicking up spray on Solano.

"Mr. Brown is one of our stringers." The chick knew him, all right. She spit out his name like a scrap of gristle. "He doesn't work in this office."

"What's a stringer?"

"A freelance reporter," she said. "Would you like to leave a message? He has voice-mail here."

I hung up, staring at the phone. Brown worked for this NewsWire rag, but that didn't tell me jack. For all I knew, he was fronting for the cops or Matthews or even Heberto, trying to lure me out so they could grab me or pick up my trail again. I thought I'd lost them, but there was no way to know for sure. Watching the traffic slice through the puddles on the street, I called Brown's number and got ready to run if the wrong car pulled into the lot.

"Adam Brown." He picked up right away.

"This is Emma Martin." No point in keeping it a secret. If somebody was listening, they'd recognize my voice, and if Pac Bell had a trace on his phone, they already knew my location. "What do you want?"

There was a long pause.

"Emma...you got my message." He sounded like he'd been caught off guard. "Where are you? Give me your number and I'll call you back. The battery's almost dead in this cell phone."

"Forget it." I checked my watch. "You've got thirty seconds to tell me why I should want to talk to you."

"I can save your life. That's why."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Headlights passed in the fog. An old man in a tan slicker crossed the street, glanced in my direction, then walked into the grocery store.

"Not on the phone." Brown had a smoker's rasp and he came off jumpy, but he sounded sober enough. "We need to set up a meeting. Anywhere you want, but we've got to be careful."

"You're out of time." I scanned the street and sidewalk. "
What do you want?
"

"An interview. Off the record."

"Not a chance."

"You're in over your head, Emma." He lowered his voice. "You got caught in the middle of something, but it's not what you think. They killed that stripper in your apartment and they'll find you again, sooner or later."

That gave me a shock.

"Where'd you get this stuff?" My hands were sweating. "I don't know any strippers." The cops must've told him about Steffy.

"I can help you," he went on. "I saw you at the station, all right? I know that fed you talked to and I know the guy who was in your car when you got arrested. I know who they are, anyway." He was talking fast now, trying to keep me on the line. "This is big. The biggest. I used to work in D.C. and I still keep in touch, OK? I think this is related to a story I was working on a couple years ago."

"What're you talking about?"

"It's bad news, believe me. All these factions are colliding around your case, but I can help you if I can find out what they're looking for. It's something you saw, maybe. Something you have, but you don't know it. Talking to me is your only chance to get out of this."

"How? How's that help me?"

"They'll back off if their op goes public."

"What the hell does
that
mean?"

"Not on the phone," he said. "They'll abort their operation if the story gets out, but I've got to talk to you first. I know part of it and you know the rest. Talk to me off the record and I can blow this wide open without bringing your name into it. Getting it out in the open's your only chance." He hesitated. "You can trust me, Emma. I'm doing hack work now, but I used to be the real thing and I never reveal my sources. Just ask around. Last year, I spent a month in the Alameda County Jaill because I wouldn't give up a source to the Grand Jury. You'll get the same protection."

Protection. Right. I was about to hang up when I thought of something.

"You know that fed Matthews?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said. "I've met him before."

"Can you get in touch with him?"

"I can reach him if I have to."

That almost made up my mind. Brown sober came off serious and half-ass bright, nothing like the bleary drunk I'd talked to in the bar, and Vincent said he had a lot of contacts with the cops and feds. He must've had contacts with Emeryville, at least, because he knew about Steffy. It was risky, but maybe I could use Brown to give the Lexus back to Matthews without getting Deacon involved or turning myself in. If I could cut a deal with Matthews, using Brown as a go-between, maybe I could smooth things over with Deacon and Heberto, but the truth was that I didn't have much of a choice. I didn't have enough money to hit the road. Paying for motels every night, eating out all the time, buying gas, stealing cars – I'd go broke in a couple weeks if I didn't get busted first. And maybe, just maybe, I could help Arn if he was still alive.

"OK," I said. "How do we set it up?"

"I'll meet you anywhere you like," he said eagerly. "Find another pay phone, then call the NewsWire and leave the details on my voice mail. Berkeley NewsWire. The number's in the book. They gave me a line for confidential stuff; I can check it from here. Just tell the desk you want to leave me a message and they'll put you through." His signal started to fade. "I'm in the East Bay, so give me enough time to get there, OK? I'll be driving a dark green 1995 Chevy Lumina with a missing hubcap on the right front tire. When you see me, flash your lights."

"They could tail you from your place."

"I know how to check for that."

"Yeah, well, what if you miss them?"

"I'm a reporter," he said with a touch of pride. "I'm a hack, yeah, but I'm still a reporter and I used to be a damn good one, OK? The last thing they want is media involvement, so they'll keep their distance. I guarantee it."

#

I headed west on Solano, then circled through the neighborhoods below Albany Hills, driving around aimlessly and watching for tails. The exercise was pointless with all the fog and traffic. Headlights pulled up behind me at every stop sign and the vans and delivery trucks all looked the same; any one of them could have been following me and I would never know it. Giving up, I drove over to Gilman and followed it back towards the highway, pulling into a Quick Trip by the Berkeley Solid Waste Center. Neon signs steamed in the drizzle. The customers gassing up at the pumps all looked like cops.

I backed into a space by the dumpsters and sat there for a while, watching the traffic and trying to figure out a safe place to meet Brown. Call it fifty-fifty he'd show up with the feds, but I had this feeling that they could pick me up any time they wanted, so it probably didn't matter. I couldn't run out on Arn, but I couldn't stick around much longer and I couldn't just turn myself in. Getting busted was a death sentence. They'd charge me with Steffy's murder, force me to make a deal, and Heberto would hire some
chola
to clip me while I was sitting on my butt in jail. Besides, if I didn't meet Brown, I couldn't think of anything else to do except run around in circles until they hauled me in.

Just then, a white van with a pair of whip antennae drove by the Quick Trip, slicing through a puddle. It stopped for a red at Gilman, then turned right and vanished in the rain and traffic. The van had looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't remember where I'd seen it before. I thought about the 12 hours I'd spent crashed at the motel. Anyone could have planted a beeper in the truck while I was sleeping. The cops had them. So did the feds. And Deacon had that kind of stuff floating around all the time. Anyone could make one.

I don't know why, but I kind of lost it. Something popped in my head and the bugs that had been crawling all over me for the last two days suddenly started up again, swarming over my arms and legs and gnawing at my skin. I couldn't breathe. My hands got clammy. I thought I was going to freak out stuck in that truck with the fogged-up windows and leaking vents, too scared to move, too nervous to just sit there. I flashed on these nasty pictures: Arn getting stomped in the rearview, Steffy gaping like a dead fish covered with burns and cuts and blood.

I had to do something.

I had to make up my mind.

When I got my head together, I called the NewsWire from a pay phone outside the store and left the meeting instructions on Brown's voice mail. Then I split in the Nissan, a rolling target with a beeper in the tail pipe for all I knew. I drove around until I found a teller machine and withdrew the limit from my checking account: three-hundred dollars, the last of my rent money. Wallet bulging with twenties, I made for the highway.

Traffic stalled on the 580 on-ramp. I turned on the radio, skipping past the news, a Viagra commercial, some Hip Hop and a spot for the latest diet pill. A shock jock asked a stripper her cup size, cracked a fart joke, then cut to a break. A political hack ranted about mullahs and nuclear weapons.

I turned the radio off and tried to relax, but I felt like someone had just lit a fuse inside my head. The window vents dripped. A cracked wiper blade scraped across the windshield. Outside, the Berkeley Hills had vanished in the fog and the storm churned whitecaps across the Bay.

The traffic started to move again. I merged onto the highway, the Nissan rocking in gusts, engine pinging, tires hissing on the pavement. I felt grubby, damp and stiff, a mess of nerves and bruises, but I knew what I was going to do now, more or less.

Brake lights flashed in the slow lane and when I checked to see if I could pass, I saw the Deacon tow truck go by in the other direction. They were heading east – back towards the motel. I couldn't make out the driver, but I saw the logo on the door before the traffic blocked it from view. They probably hadn't seen me, but I got this flash of panic and had to choke it down again. I'd worked for Deacon for years and this was my payback – hunted like a rat by a pack of greaseballs with no trial and no appeal.

For the first time, I started to get really mad.

#

Vincent lived in Emeryville a couple blocks from the Hot Box and Deacon's storage lot. I took the long way around to avoid driving by the Nite-N-Day and parked the Nissan on a side street near the highway. Bleary headlights passed on 580. A foghorn moaned on the water. I walked by Aquatic Park and cut through an alley, hands in my pockets, hunched against the rain. The weather had cleared the sidewalks.

Vincent's place had a bay window in front and a flight of stairs leading up to an arched doorway. An amber light glowed behind the window and his Ford sat in the driveway, collecting rust. I waited in the alley across the street for a couple minutes, watching the sidewalks and parked cars, then I walked over to the gate in the chain-link fence surrounding his brushy yard. Nobody was around. A loose tile flapped on his roof and water from a busted gutter stained the weathered siding.

The house was old – like Vincent. After a lifetime of driving trucks, smuggling, years in prison, two wives and a kid somewhere, he'd landed in this dump, fencing guns and running a blue-collar bar across the street from a chop shop in Emeryville. I loved Vincent like a father, but I knew a dead end when I saw one. I walked up the rotten steps and knocked on the door, checking my back, my hair dripping on my collar. Nothing happened for a while, then a chain rattled inside and Vincent opened up, peering at me through the screen.