Yesterday's Thief: An Eric Beckman Paranormal Sci-Fi Thriller (13 page)
Most people were following their earthquake plans, meeting up with family and loved ones. I didn’t have either of those. The woman from the bar—Jessica?—didn’t count.
Some older buildings on the waterfront hadn’t fared as well as mine. One was on fire. I’d be able to help most at the hospital, or on the way there. My commuter bike still hung from the ceiling of my condo. I reentered the building, ignoring the protests of my fellow homeless San Franciscans, and climbed the stairs to my apartment. No aftershocks now, please.
I shouldered the bike and headed down the stairs.
Passing the second floor, I picked up some sleepy, dreamlike thoughts.
Someone sleeping in a damaged high-rise? I hammered on each of the condo doors, and on the third one, I got an answer.
“Yes, thanks. I need help here. I’m okay, but I need help. No rush.” Her voice sounded weak.
No rush? I set the bike down and tried the door. Locked, as expected. I yelled, “Can you open the door?”
“Well, no, sorry. You’ll have to break it down. Can you do that?”
Good question. It was just like the door upstairs. At least I’d learned what didn’t work. I hauled back and kicked it with sole of my shoe a little to the left of the knob. The jamb splintered. One more kick and I was in. Good for me. Beckman the kick-ass detective.
“Over here. I’m okay, but I’m stuck.”
I followed the sound of her surprisingly calm voice into the living room. The central feature was an antique grand piano that had partially collapsed. The voice came from underneath. I moved around it to find a frail woman of at least ninety with thin, pink hair. She wore a nightie that was way too sheer for my liking. Her boobs were—well, you don’t want to know.
“It’s so silly, actually. The earthquake warning went off, and I got under the piano. I’m sorry to bother you, by the way, I’m really fine, but in all the shaking and sliding, one of the legs gave way, and it fell down on that side.” She pointed to her foot. “You can see it’s barely touching me, but I’m trapped like a fox in a leg trap.”
Indeed, the body of the piano formed a little bridge pressing down on her ankle. I went around and felt her foot. It was warm and not swollen. Good pulse for a woman her age.
She continued. “I’ve wiggled and jiggled, but I just can’t get loose. So I just lay here, and you know what I did?”
“You fell asleep.”
She pointed at me. “That’s exactly right, son. I fell asleep.”
It was a simple matter to free her. I lifted the piano body a few inches, and she slipped out.
“Are you feeling okay? Do you need any help?” I asked.
She waved her hand. “Oh, don’t be silly. I’ll be fine. I’m a tough old witch. You go get together with your wife or your family. I’ll be fine here.”
Out in the hallway, my bike was gone.
Damn!
I’d brought my lock, but left it in the backpack. Stupid. I sprinted to the stairwell and down to the street. A shifty-eyed twenty-something was just mounting the bike. My bike. I ran and hit him with a flying tackle. I hate bicycle thieves. I’ve had three bikes stolen.
He rolled over and jumped up with his hands in the air. “Hey, it was abandoned. The earthquake is an emergency. I need transportation.” <
Ha. Good one.
>
As I rose, I drove my fist into his solar plexus. It felt good. Best place to hit someone without hurting your hand. Score one for bicycle owners.
He doubled over, gasping for air. I checked the bike out—no damage—and hopped on. Then I hopped off again and kicked the thief in the balls.
I told you, I’m no saint.
* * *
As Viviana fell backward off the cypress branch she locked her ankles together and rotated around the bough as if performing a gymnastic move. The denim fabric of her jeans slid against the rough bark, protecting her calves against abrasions. It still hurt.
Vai!
She dropped the knife shank but held on to the all-important cylinder. She kissed it and held it against her cheek. It was the diameter of a soda can, but longer, like a thermos. She swung herself back up and yanked the large hatchet out of the bark.
Back on the ground, Viviana strained to open the stainless steel time capsule. No go. Even after being whacked with the hatchet, the lid didn’t turn. It was as if someone had welded it shut. She zipped it into her fanny pack and hiked over to Lincoln Way, where a cab sat by the curb.
She thought about the $123 remaining in her pocket and squatted down by the cab’s window. “How much would cost to take me to cheap hotel?”
The cabdriver was a gnarly woman with thick arms and a gooey cigar wedged in the corner of her mouth. She removed the cigar. “Ain’t no cheap hotels around here, babe.”
“How much would—”
“Cheapest you gonna find, about two fifty a night. You want that?” She moved her hand toward the meter.
Viviana stood up. “No, thank you.”
The rain rattled against the hood of her poncho, and cars hissed by on the wet pavement. She looked across the street. An auto-repair shop stood with both garage doors open.
She crossed over and entered the office. Grimy repair manuals filled the shelves. More littered the floor, knocked there by the quake. An unshaven brute came in from the garage, wiping his hands on an oily rag. His eyes inventoried Viviana’s body. “Yeah?” He picked up a manual and dropped it on the desk.
Viviana pulled the cylinder from her fanny pack. “I have this can here, and I can’t get it open.” She was taking a chance, getting help, but until she got it open, she was stuck.
The mechanic took it from her. “Whoa, this is heavy!” He tried to twist the top off, straining so hard he farted. That didn’t seem to embarrass him. He rapped the lid against the wall and tried again. “What’s inside, lead?”
“It’s my dad’s will. He didn’t trust lawyers or banks. He just rolled it up and put it in there.”
“What? It’s too heavy for that.” He tossed it into the air and caught it. “Funny day to be worrying about wills, ain’t it? The earthquake and all.”
“He told me he was going to put some metal toys of mine in it, from when I was young.” Tears rolled down Viviana’s cheeks.
The mechanic stared at her, chewing something that smelled like tobacco. “Hey, you can turn off the waterworks, lady. Something fishy’s going on here, and guess what? I’m going to find out what it is.” He turned his back and walked into the garage, Viviana right behind him. The wall between the office and garage held shelves of oil filters and a Playboy calendar.
He took the cylinder over to bay number one and fastened it into a vise. He pulled a pair of large Channellock pliers from a drawer and held them up. “The Persuader.” Music she’d never heard before played in the background—a heavy beat and someone talking rather than singing. He fit the pliers to the lid.
“Damn, this is tight. Ain’t this stainless steel?” He glanced at Viviana.
She didn’t reply but rotated her fanny pack to the front.
“It shouldn’t have gotten stuck like—there, that’s got it.” He removed the can from the vise and started to unscrew the lid by hand.
“No, wait! I promised my sister we’d open it together.”
He grunted. “Yeah, right. Nice try, though.” He opened the top and a roll of bills popped out and fell on the floor.
“Ho, ho, what have we here?” He bent over and picked up the roll. He stood back up and came face-to-blade with a large hatchet. He froze.
Viviana held the tip of the blade against the inner corner of his right eyeball. She pushed him against the workbench and loosened the vise with her left hand. She generally avoided violence, but the stakes were too high here. She pulled the can loose and slid it into her pack.
She’d made a mistake. Could she sacrifice the roll of cash? It would teach her to be so trusting. No.
He looked down toward The Persuader—the hatchet twitched slightly with the eyeball’s movement. That had to hurt. She slid the blade down just a bit, pulling the skin with it. The lower lid pulled away from his eye. Let him imagine it being sliced. He tried to blink, but only the upper lid moved. A car hissed by on the street.
He held out the roll of money. “Look. I …”
She took it, held it to her mouth, and pulled four bills off with her teeth, no easy task. She put them on The Persuader. The roll went into her fanny pack. She zipped it shut. “From Russian mafia with love, yes?” She rolled the “r”s heavily.
She backed out of the garage and sprinted away. Taking a convoluted route through the Richmond district, she didn’t stop until she was a kilometer away. Even then, she stood behind a wall and watched. No one had followed her.
This neighborhood of wood-frame houses had also been largely spared by the earthquake. Coming to a major road, she flagged down a cab. She stepped in and let out a deep breath. “Please take me out of city.”
The cabbie looked at her in his rearview mirror.
“North,” she said. “Take me to Marin County, please.”
The driver turned, checking out her cheap poncho. “I got to see the money up front.”
“How much will be, please?” She bit her lip. “I think I have enough.” She looked in the pack at the thousands of dollars in cash sitting atop diamonds and gold.
“How the hell do I know?”
“San Rafael.”
“Ah, jeez, probably around ninety dollars.”
“Okay. Is good.” Viviana slid five twenties off the roll and held them up.
When they passed over the Golden Gate Bridge she tilted her head back and closed her eyes. No one knew her name. She’d had some close calls, but sitting on her lap was the funding that would guarantee no one would ever find her.
CHAPTER TEN
Exactly one week after the earthquake, I arrived solo for a dinner party at Stan’s house and, as always, marveled at the decor. In contrast to Stan himself, his house was unrealistically neat. As in, you-should-see-a-shrink-about-this neat.
Glass tables and spartan chairs sat on a mirrorlike black floor. It looked like a model home but with less clutter. No Kleenex boxes, plants, magazines, or knickknacks. It was as if the place were designed for an earthquake. Very few things to pick up afterward, unless the glass tables broke.
Mei Lin, Stan’s wife and the force behind the interior design, gave me a quick-but-genuine hug, and handed me a perfectly poured microbrew. Her mind was as laconic and orderly as the house.
Craig had brought his family: his clever wife, Tess, and their precocious twelve-year-old, Olivia.
Mei Lin was an excellent cook, and we were soon seated around the dining table, serving ourselves from an array of exotic dishes.
“Moo shu pork is traditionally made with wood ear mushrooms and day lily buds.” Olivia looked around the table.
My jaw dropped even though I’d been exposed to her before. Wood ear mushrooms?—I’d never even heard of those. It was as if Wikipedia had been implanted in Olivia’s cortex. Reading her thoughts was like flipping through the pages of a dictionary.
A smile tugged at the corner of Stan’s lips as he drank his Budweiser.
Olivia continued, as if thinking out loud. “The pancake is an American addition.”
She must have boned up on Chinese cuisine during the day—no way she’d know all that. I threw Craig a questioning look.
He shrugged and tossed me his thought. <
I have no idea why she knows that, if that’s what you’re wondering.
>
Tess, stunning in a simple but elegant black dress, looked down at her plate.
Mei Lin had placed the perfect amount of filling in her pancake. She turned to Olivia. “That’s quite right, dear. I couldn’t get those ingredients today.”
Was she irked or impressed? Even I couldn’t tell. It was like trying to read a brick.
Talk turned to the earthquake. Seven days out with no major aftershocks.
Olivia filled us in, explaining that though the quake was huge, most of the damage was concentrated in the financial district, where I lived. Lucky me. Grace Cathedral and the Ferry Terminal would be closed for a while, but all the bridges and BART tunnels were okay.
The quake wasn’t even big enough to knock Viviana from the top news spot. Not surprising, since she vanished on the same morning.
We speculated about Viv’s disappearance over a dessert of custard tarts. Only I knew she was a jewel thief. I alone knew her real last name, and I wasn’t about to trust the FBI or anyone else with that critical information. Who knows what would happen if the Feds got their claws into her. I would find her myself.
After dinner, I’d have helped clean up, but Mei Ling allowed only Tess into her kitchen.
So, looking like male chauvinist pigs with a twelve-year-old mascot, Craig, Stan, and I oinked our way into Stan’s study. This room was more like Stan: organized but messy. The perfect man cave: dark wood paneling, floor-to-ceiling bookcases, and a Persian rug.