So that was it.  Or so I thought.  In two days, I was released and out in the water again on my favorite board.  Wilkes and his goons were put on ice.  The FBI needed to hush it up a while, until they tied up loose ends.  That’s what they said, anyway, and I had no reason to doubt it.  But it continued to nag at me that I was the one that had to go in and get the photo album of all those “suicides.”   Seth assured me everything was being taken care of, though, and I took him at his word.  Hope and I tried to be more than just friends, but eventually gave up.  The mystery of her son’s death solved, some of the fire went out of her and she just often seemed cool, and frankly, sad.  Still, we saw each other from time to time on a friendly basis, and it was pleasant, though painful.

I went back to my private investigator’s life.  Seth tried to get me to rejoin the force, but I wasn’t interested. Maybe the fire had gone out of me a bit, too. I didn’t blame Seth for what had happened, but nothing seemed pure anymore, not even the police department I’d once belonged to. Still, we renewed our friendship and began getting together once a week to surf.  I met his wife and kids, and all seemed well.  For a while.

Then one day, about six months later, as I was starting to get worried that things were taking so long, even for a government case, I saw Wilkes. I was filling up on fish tacos outside the Sunshine after some rather successful rides, and he got out of a car and started walking up Newport.  I inhaled the last of my tacos and a forkful of yellow rice, almost choking, then got up. I followed twenty feet behind him as he went up to Cable and into the diner and started chatting it up with the help. I watched from across Cable as he sat down in a booth across from two guys in very Fed-looking dark suits.  I stood there, staring maybe a little too long, when one of the girls coming to open up Willow’s store startled me with a friendly wave. I waved back, then realized I’d left my board back at the stand, so I went to retrieve it.  When I got home, I called Seth and left a very troubled message on his voicemail.  I wanted to start drinking, but had a court appearance in the afternoon, so made coffee instead.  The early September sun hit the backyard unreassuringly as I hosed off my board and suit.  My coffee, black, because I was out of milk, went down like hot brown sludge into the pit of my grinding stomach.  When I got back inside, there was a message on my answering machine which I’d apparently missed over the noise of the running water. It was the one I’d expected – and dreaded.  I picked up the phone and called her.

“Hi.”

“Jay, they’re back.  I’ve seen two of them.  They walked by my house!”

“I know.  I saw Wilkes.”

“What’s going on?” she cried, and I could hear the desperation in her voice.  “They killed my baby!”

“I know.  I called Seth.  Where are you, at work?  I’m coming over.”

“No.  I’m busy.  I want to be alone.”

“I don’t care.  I’m coming by tonight.  When will you be home?”

“I don’t know.  Six, I guess.”

“I’ll see you then.”

I got home at five, my court appearance not going long, cracked a beer, thought better of it, spilled it out, then cracked another one.  I needed air so I took it out to my front step, Gray, uncharacteristically affectionate, came and curled in my lap, purring, and that’s when I noticed the unmarked car across the street.  The late afternoon late September San Diego sun was starting to fade toward the ocean where it would rest for the night.  I looked up and west, then back at the car. The beer went down cold, like metal on bare skin and I relished it.  At 6:05, the second beer gone with one last swallow, I got up to head for Hope’s, but first I crossed the street and cast a casual glance to see the federal plates on the black Crown Vic.  Interesting, I thought. And not necessarily good. The windows were tinted and I couldn’t see in without being obvious, so I decided not to push it.  As I walked north on Cable, I caught two of Wilkes’ goons turning the corner headed south toward me from Long Branch.  I resisted the urge to flinch and kept walking. One of them bumped my shoulder as we passed, giving a leering look to his partner as he did, but I shrugged it off and kept walking, grateful for the two beers in my stomach. I turned south down Voltaire toward Hope’s little house, catching the sun sinking into the water framed by the tall palms along the street like sentinels that do no good.

I arrived at Hope’s front walk just as she was getting out of her car.  Several of her little cactus had been kicked over.  She didn’t seem to notice.  Behind her at the front door as she fumbled with her keys, I grabbed her arm.

“Listen.  We’ll figure this out.”

She twisted away, stepped inside, dropped her leather daypack on the floor and bent to plug a cord into the wall.  The twilit room lit with a faint blue, pulsing glow.  I walked up behind her and touched her shoulder.  This time, she accepted my touch and my hand stayed there. But I remember almost wishing that she had just shrugged me away again. This dark-haired woman, this beautiful woman, was now a part of my life. And we were becoming accustomed to each other. And the danger.

“Get me a glass of wine, please,” she said calmly, now flinching my hand off, and moving toward the blue couch, almost purple in the glow of the Christmas lights and the fading evening sun.  There was a bottle already opened in the fridge, and I was back in a minute with two glasses of cheap white wine, one for her and one for me.

“Jay, I want to be alone,” she said, nodding toward my wine glass, in a voice that was almost completely lacking in emotion. “Please leave.”

“OK,” I said, a little unnerved. “But I want you to know that I’m going to get to the bottom of this.  These guys will pay for what they did.  I promise you.”

“Thank you, Jay,” she answered, continuing in her emotionless tone.  “Now please go.”

“Promise me you’ll call if there’s any more trouble,” I said, moving toward the door.

“I promise,” she said, in a faraway voice, and I placed my now empty wine glass on the faintly pulsing coffee table, and turned to leave.

Chapter 18 coming 3/1 (or so…)!!!