She was Hispanic, maybe forty, with hips like she’d given birth to a few kids, but not in a bad way.  “We need to talk,” she said to me, flatly, as she put the car in drive and we pulled away from the curb.

“I could use a beer,” I replied, matching her tone.

“Good for you,” she responded, just as flatly as before, and headed the car down West Point Loma Blvd. out of O.B.

“Are you taking me to the hardware store?”

“I could,” she said, “but I probably won’t.  Let’s talk first.” We continued heading in silence east out of town, and after maybe a mile, she turned into a supermarket parking lot and pulled into a spot at the end of one of the rows, cut the engine, and parked as inconspicuously as an unmarked, black Crown Vic can be parked,

“We have a common interest,” she said, looking straight ahead, her right hand cutting the ignition and her left hand pushing the button to lock the doors.

“You like to surf?” I replied, but then when I saw her expression as she turned to me, I regretted it.

“We both think Wilkes and his scum should be in prison.”

“OK,” I said, feeling myself come back to earth a bit, but finding the gravity a little difficult.  “What does that have to do with me?”

“I have an idea,” she went on, measuring her words, looking me straight in the eye, “but I need some help.”

There’s a reason why I live at the beach.  There’s an open expanse of space and sky and water never more than a few scant blocks away where you can go when you feel crowded, breathe in that expanse, feel cleansed by the lightly salted air, listen to the crash of the waves and the calls of the gulls, and be silent. Sitting in that bustling parking lot, surrounded on three sides by prefabbed facades, sitting amidst the swarm of cars, minivans and SUV’s, parked and weaving, closed in on the other side by the four-lane boulevard with a fifth for turning, the motels, the strip malls, the nondescript apartment and condo tracts, I felt trapped.  The long, tall palms lining Sports Arena Blvd. only mocked me with their ability to reach into the sky and just catch a glimpse of the coast.  I cracked the window of the Crown Vic a bit, and it went down just two inches before my chaperon pushed a button and sent it back up. I caught a lick of the hot dry desert air on my cheek and neck for just a second, and suppressed a twitch. I thought again of that sidewalk, that glistening pale sidewalk with lighted droplets of water like tiny neon messages from the spirits flashing “Warning! Don’t Go There! Warning! Don’t Go There!” That first night I met Hope, when I still had a choice, that moment before I was completely gone, that last moment when I still could have walked away, could have looked away, could have not looked at Hope, not been drawn into a world where I was desperately trying to find some, and finding it hard. An image popped into my head unbidden from high school -- a lesson on Greek mythology of the fates weaving the strands of people’s lives on a loom, and I wondered, when the gods look at that moment just before my strand got intertwined with Hope’s, do they laugh, or do they cry?  I hit the button reflexively to slide the window down again, but it didn’t move.  I took a deep breath, and turned to my new friend.

“What do you need?”

She smiled, and it didn’t reassure me, but it wasn’t intended to.  “I’m Agent Torres,” she said, extending her right hand to me.  “Nice to meet you, Mr. Sapphire.”

She laid out her plan for me, and I knew why she’d picked me.  She needed someone crazy enough. It seemed that some powerful people in the federal government had caught wind of Wilkes and his merry band of deviants and their methods, and had somehow found it interesting.  It wasn’t like what they did was anything new, making murder look like suicide, but they did it so well. 

Killing by suicide. It seemed to me the height of cowardice, but then you never know what will impress some people.   She wouldn’t tell me exactly who she was working for, just that they wanted her to expose the ones supporting Wilkes and his thugs.  Internal Affairs, my cop mind said, as I looked her up and down, then scanned my eyes to the parking lot for anything suspicious, and realizing, as I was doing it, how far I was already in. She said she didn’t know exactly what Wilkes and his goons were going to be used for, but she didn’t want to find out, and that was the reason she needed me.  My part in the plan was to agitate Wilkes and his merry men, get them to start being careless and stupid, make them draw attention to themselves and their methods, with the hopes that some people in Washington who weren’t insane would take notice, and the ones supporting them would be ruined.  Of course, her plan counted on there being some.  Some who weren’t insane, that is, and I knew that my life would depend on it, too.

When she was done, I took another breath and sat there, looking straight ahead.  “I don’t suppose you’ll be able to offer me any protection while I’m pulling this stunt?” I asked, not moving my eyes from the teenage kid in front of me pushing a long snake of shopping carts diligently back toward the store and nearly running them into a minivan.

“I’ll do what I can," she answered.  "I'm acting under the directive of someone powerful, don't get me wrong, and we have some people on our side, but there are still too many powerful people supporting Wilkes and his men." At this, she paused, then continued, “Try to be careful.”

“What about Hope?” I asked, completely ignoring what she’d just said. There would be no way to be careful.

“If we don’t succeed,” she answered, turning to look straight at me, as I kept my gaze fixed straight ahead, “she’ll have none.”

“I must be the stupidest...” I began to curse, then stopped. I was doing it. I knew I was.  The swell was rising, ten to twelve feet over me and my board, and there was no way to get out of its path anymore.  I was going to ride it, or it was going to crash all around me, and take me with it.  My mind went back to my days as a lifeguard, to my first years on the force, the days before I’d seen real evil. I thought of Hope, of her dark allure, of her glowing faintly blue in the center of her living room like she fluxed somewhere between the here and whatever comes next.  And I thought of Willow, how I’d been drawn toward the white light and the comfort of her store, the safety I’d felt there, and of all that had happened since.  Agent Torres’ cell rang, and I jumped.  She pulled it out of her blazer, looked at the caller ID, and picked it up.

“He’s in,” she replied to the person on the other end of the phone, then “Yes,” and “OK,” and “I’ll get right on it.” She hung up.

“I guess the beer is out the question,” I remarked, stupidly attempting sarcasm.

“That, and the hardware store,” she answered flatly.  “I’ll take you back to O.B.”

Back at my house, cold beer in hand, I took a quick look in the surf shed for a suitable piece of wood for Hope’s door frame that I was sure I wouldn’t find, and didn’t.  I drained the beer, then got in my car.  Heading out of town on the same road I’d just been on, my head began to swim a bit, and I realized I hadn’t eaten.  I shrugged it off and contemplated my current situation.  I could easily end up smashed to pieces on the cliffs, the wave I’d picked to ride simply too big.  There was no way to know exactly what kind of support Agent Torres had, or could offer me.  My mind went back to one night when we were kids, me and Seth. We were drunk, and we went out with our boards in the full moon, weaving between the old pilings of the pier on big, roiling waves.  It was stupid, but nothing like this.  I completely missed the turn off into the lumberyard on Sports Arena, doubled back, got what I needed and was back in O.B. in less than an hour.  I was about to head over to Hope’s on an empty stomach, but thought better of it, and found a spot at the diner.  A ham sandwich, fries, and two cups of coffee later, I went over.  When I got there, she greeted me coolly, no sign of her morning’s work remaining.  Standing there, hammering the new piece of wood into the door jamb, I knew I shouldn’t ask her, but I did.

“So…what were you working on before?”

She was sitting on the couch, three feet in front of me, sipping tea.  She took another sip of her tea, then a bite of her sandwich.  I assumed that was all the answer I was going to get.  Then, to my surprise, she spoke.

“It was to restore sanity,” she answered, no sign of anger or uneasiness in her voice anymore and maybe, just a touch of sadness.  “A spell….to restore sanity.”

“For who?”

“For everyone,”

“I hope it worked.”

Chapter 20 coming 5/1 (or so…)!!!