Accelerated Page 9

  Juan Ortega searched my eyes and his frown deepened. It made him seem villainous. He glanced around the shop and then nodded, indicating I should come with him.

  We passed a gray-haired mechanic clattering sockets in his giant red toolbox. He glanced at Ortega, at me and with a jingle of metal opened a drawer. I followed Ortega through a door into the reception area where a fan rotated lazily overhead and then followed him into an office, his probably.

  As he turned around, sitting on the corner of his desk, I noticed the pictures on the wall. Several were of him and a pretty, dark-haired woman in a lowrider convertible. One showed him as a young Marine with others just like him. They held M-16s and pistols. I knew the background of the picture all too well, big familiar mountains.

  “You were in Afghanistan?” I asked.

  He raised an eyebrow and turned around, glancing over his shoulder at the picture. “Marines,” he said.

  “Tough hombres,” I said.

  His squint tightened. “You?”

  “Green Beret.”

  “Almost as tough as Marines,” he said.

  I laughed, nodding.

  He breathed through his nose and he studied me a third time. “You were in Afghanistan?”

  “In the Khasra Region during the Holy Prayer attacks.”

  “That was before my time, but I heard about them.” He cocked his head. “Did they really skin our soldiers like the stories said?”

  “It was a grim time.” The way he watched me, it seemed he wanted details. “A very nasty time,” I said. “Tribesmen slit the belly of a soldier and peeled until they tied the skin over his head. It was my bad luck to see their handiwork twice.”

  “You pay them bastards back?” he asked.

  “Unofficially?”

  “Tell me the truth.”

  “We pinpointed the particular tribe. Then we brought cash, had a midnight talk with the village chief and showed him the greenbacks. Trouble was, the money didn’t work.” I shrugged, remembering. That had been a bitter time and very nasty. “We used option B to get him to talk. Later, we found the three culprits, the three who did the skinning. We paid them back all right in a coin they would understand.” It still gave me nightmares what we had done to them.

  Juan Ortega gave me a hard smile. Too many on our A-Team had been like that. They had definitely been men any sane person would not want to cross. I think my time with the Shop had burned some of that hardness out of me. It cost a lot to be tough like that. It dries out the soul.

  “Polarity Magnetics was interested in your friend,” Ortega said. “They send a man to ask me questions. He asked too much, fanned some bills in my face and then made threats. I told him go to Hell. I tell you the same thing if I think you lying to me.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “The newspaper said I work at Midas on Hunter Street. I don’t work here. I own the shop. You understand?”

  “Yes.”

  His nostrils flared. “I watch the latest Tom Cruise film with my woman. It’s in Spanish on Center Street. I liked the movie, although my woman don’t care for his smile. Cruise think too highly of himself.” Ortega shrugged. “The movie was over and we come out last. I like to watch all the credits, see who did what. I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. I’m not sure what I saw. But then somebody jumps out from between two parked cars. There’s a squeal and a thud. It’s the kind of sound you know someone is hit. The first thing I think is, ‘Oh no, my wife is pregnant. I don’t want her to hear someone die.’ Then I hear a scream. You know what I do?”

  I shook my head.

  “I pull out my cell and call 9-1-1. The operator says she knows all about the accident, that I’m the third person to call. There were people out there, but I didn’t see anyone else with cell phones. It doesn’t matter. That happened to me before on the freeway. I see a car wreck right in front of me. I call 9-1-1 right away, but I’m the second person the operator tells me. How can people phone so fast? Are they waiting for an accident to happen?”

  “Did you notice anything strange?”

  Ortega studied me. “I heard another scream. It was the man driving the laundry trunk. He jumped out. Then he was vomiting, probably sick at killing someone. I see that happen in Afghanistan. I bet you have too.”

  I nodded.

  “I wanted to get my woman out of there. It couldn’t be good for the baby in her. But she grabs my arm and says, ‘Juan, we have to help.’ So, we hurried over. There’s a crowd just like in high school during a fight. Everyone is staring. I bull through and kneel by the woman. She was hit bad, with blood everywhere, and her legs sticking at the wrong angles. Then I see she’s blinking, her mouth trying to work. I lean my head over her mouth. She says something like ‘ark’ or ‘arse.’ I’m not trying to be crude.”

  “No offense taken, Mr. Ortega. I’m grateful for you remembering so well.”

  “The police didn’t care about any last words from her. They just wanted to know what I saw. The one I talk too had an arrogant attitude, reminded me of one colonel I know in the Marines.” Ortega’s eyes tightened, giving him that villainous look again. “She was still alive, struggling to breathe when the ambulance came.”

  “Do you think she ran into traffic?” I asked.

  “What else?”

  “Nobody pushed her?”

  “From between parked cars?” He shook his head. “I would have seen someone running away, or someone would have seen that.”

  “Was she crouching down there, do you think? Waiting for the right time to leap in front a car?”

  He shrugged.

  I glanced at the Marine picture again. According to Ortega, Kay had still been alive after the laundry truck had hit her. “How fast do you think the truck was going?”

  “Twenty, twenty-five, I’m not sure.”

  “Mr. Ortega, you’ve been very helpful. Do think it’s possible to show me where it happened?”

  “That’s on Center Street.”

  “I realize it’s an inconvenience.”

  A wary look entered his eyes. I might almost have said fear, but Juan Ortega didn’t look like the type that scared easily.

  “What do you know about Polarity Magnetics?” he asked.

  “Kay—my friend worked for them. They’re into government contracts, maybe military.”

  “The bastard threatened me,” Ortega said. Then he grinned so his Pancho Villa mustache suited him. “Yeah, I’ll show you, but you’ve have to wait until lunchtime.”

  “No problem.”

  “I don’t like to be threatened.”

  “You’re a Marine,” I said.

  The slightest grin showed. “Semper Fi,” he said, his way of telling me Marines were the best in the world. He thumped himself on the chest to prove it.

  ***

  I drove him later after he had finished a huge burrito and beer.

  “Your car needs new brakes,” he said as they squealed at a stoplight.

  “It’s a rental.”

  “It still needs new brakes,” he said.

  I followed his directions and we soon parked on Center Street near the movie theater, El Toro Grande. The block had old buildings from the Forties, two under renovation, with their crews finishing lunch. As we walked past the buildings, I smelled the fresh sawdust and saw piles of two-by-fours and plywood sheets inside. It was a typical dying, downtown Californian shopping area. One the city planners had decided to try to breathe some life back into it. There were red cobblestones instead of cement sidewalks and there were freshly painted trash receptacles. I spotted a Sanchez Jewelers, a shoe store and tucked away between them a small comic-and-used-video-game store.

  We slammed our car doors shut and walked under old palm trees.

  “I came out over there,” Ortega said, pointing at the theater.

  A teenager with his pants hanging lower than seemed reasonable had a bucket and squeegee. He was washing the marquee glass, where Tom Cruise grinned at us with his tradema
rk smile. The words were all in Spanish. By the looks, El Toro Grande ran four movies at a time.

  “It was dark,” Ortega said. “That light is broken.” He pointed at a streetlamp, an old towering kind. Somehow, it had failed to be renovated. Or maybe the city council hadn’t gotten around to paying for lights yet.

  “That’s right,” Ortega said, nodding to himself. “The cars were parked under that broken light. So it was even darker there.”

  We approach the lamp. There were meters, with several cars and a motorcycle parked in the slots. The motorcycle’s meter showed red, but the police hadn’t ticketed him yet. The vehicles were parked diagonally, not parallel, giving more hidden area between them and ensuring more dings over time from car doors opened too far.

  “There’s where she was hit,” Ortega said.

  I glanced both ways and waited until a truck carrying lumber revved past. Then I walked out and squatted on the street, with Ortega beside me.

  “Right here,” he said, squatting beside me, patting the blacktop.

  I squinted behind my sunglasses and spied darker spots. I rubbed one and sniffed my finger. It smelled like oil.

  “Look out,” Ortega said, standing. He grabbed my shoulder and tugged, and his eyebrows lifted when I didn’t budge.

  I finally got the idea and hurried back as traffic advanced toward us.

  “You must be all muscle.” Ortega flicked his hand against my arm. “You’re heavier than you look. What do you weigh?”

  I ignored his question. “Did she stumble out from between these two parking spots?” I asked.

  Ortega frowned, glanced at the movie theater, up at the broken light and nodded.

  “No one hurried away?” I asked.

  “I wasn’t looking for that.”

  “Did anything strike you as unusual?”

  “What are you hunting for?” he asked.

  “I’m just trying to help jog your memory,” I said. “We all see more than we realize. I know you know that. It’s something your drill instructors probably taught you.”

  “There is one thing,” he said, looking angry. “I’ll tell you, but you’re probably not going to believe me.”

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  “Because I try to tell the police about it and he never believe me.”

  “What did you see?”

  Ortega kept scowling as he said, “The car that had been right here on that night was big like a lowrider, but it was a limo. I noticed because I’m always fixing up big cars at home. My wife kept tugging my arm, distracting me. But I realized it was a foreign job, Mercedes Benz. When I ran to the girl, I tripped. My foot kicked against the tire. That tire was rock solid.”

  “A lot of air pressure?”

  Ortega shook his head. “I used to drive a colonel around in Afghanistan. He was a cold man. He never yelled. He just stared right through you, made you nervous, your palms sweaty. I hated him. He was a cold stone killer if ever there was one. So, even though I hated him, I admired him. Know what I mean?”

  I nodded.

  “I was the best driver in our unit. We had a heavy-duty car the colonel liked to drive around, ride around in. He never drove. It had reinforced tires, special armor plating and plate glass for the windows you wouldn’t believe. The tire I accidently kicked the other night, it was just like the colonel’s car. It was bulletproof.”

  “Just the tire?” I asked.

  “I didn’t study the car, but I remember now thinking it was a diplomat’s limo or some other big shot.”

  “Are there many limos around here like that?”

  Ortega stared at me. “You joking, man? Look around you. You see many Mexicans driving bulletproof limos?”

  “Who do you think it was?”

  Ortega stared longer, nodding slowly. “I’ll tell you what I think. It’s that Polarity Magnetics man. He would drive a limo like that, I bet. But what would he have been doing here, before your woman was killed?”

  I gripped his forearm. “Thanks for telling me that.”

  “You think he killed her?”

  “Someone did.”

  Ortega swore, shaking his head. “I wish I could think of more.”

  So did I. But he’d given me a lead. Now I had to find out who owned that limo.

  -10-

  I drove Ortega back to his shop and called Blake. He hadn’t gone to the airport yet, having first scoped out Polarity Magnetics. Neither of us had eaten lunch and it was nearly two o’clock.

  We met in a Safeway parking lot and walked to a taco truck on the corner. Smelling Ortega’s burrito and later the lunch of the men renovating the buildings on Center Street had given me an appetite for authentic Mexican food.

  Taco trucks were a true mark of any Californian city. They were the size of a big laundry truck and had the kitchen behind the cab. One or two workers were usually inside. One man took the order and the other cooked the tacos, burritos and enchiladas. Most trucks had a dingy quality and the menu was often painted on the outside of the vehicle. Ours was blue and white, and the man taking the order couldn’t speak a word of English. He had a huge mustache and a shiny forehead.

  “Two burritos,” I said, loudly, speaking up to him through a square opening.

  The man rapidly fired several words at me. I didn’t catch any of it. I glanced at Blake.

  “Everything!” Blake shouted up. “And give us two Cokes.” He put up two fingers.

  We waited and my belly rumbled at the smells and frying sounds.

  Soon enough I gave the man a twenty and took the change, and I pulled down two big burritos wrapped in tinfoil, lying on oil-soaked paper plates. There were other tinfoil-wrapped entrees: pickled carrot slices, radishes, hot peppers and slices of lemon.

  We sat at a plastic picnic table with an awning overhead as traffic sped by.

  I unwrapped my burrito and took a bite. It was good, with beef juices trickling over my tongue. I sprinkled on salt, squeezed the lemon and popped a carrot piece into my mouth.

  “You eat like the Galloping Gourmet,” Blake said.

  “Come again.”

  “I used to watch the show as a kid in Canada,” he said.

  “When did you live there?”

  “I was born a Canadian.”

  “Yeah?” I said.

  “The Galloping Gourmet would spend the entire show preparing a meal. He’d talk as he chopped onions or made a mix. I’d come home after school, throw down my books and just listen to his friendly patter. The end was always the best. He’d pull his special meal out of the oven and set it on a nice dining room table. Then he’d leap into the audience and drag someone to the guest chair. He’d watch them take their first bite, with a half-smile on his lips, waiting for their complimentary nod. But it was nothing like watching him taking his first bite. The man was good. He’d lift his fork as if it was the greatest prize on Earth. And he’d pop it into his mouth, close his eyes and ooh and ah. He’d make you want to taste his meal more than anything in the world.”

  I filed Blade’s revelation away, then I told him what I’d learned, about the armored limo and how Ortega thought it had belonged to someone from Polarity Magnetics.

  “I didn’t notice anything like that there,” Blake said.

  He told me how most of the industrial park belonged to Polarity Magnetics. Twice, security people had asked him what he was doing loitering around the area.

  Blake took another bite of his burrito, chewing thoughtfully. “I told them, ‘I’m just sightseeing.’ They gave me hard looks, but went away each time. The last time they brought along Doberman Pinchers. Now there’s an alien-looking dog. There’re too nervous and high-strung, and they watched me with hungry shark’s eyes. I got the message and left.”

  “I still want you to check the airport,” I said. “Afterward, see what you can find on the internet about armored cars, Mercedes Benzes in particular and dig deeper into Polarity Magnetics.”

  “What are you going to do?” Blake asked.


  I rattled the ice cubes in my Styrofoam cup. “I think it’s time to pay Doctor Cheng a visit.”

  “Think she’ll talk with you?”

  “Definitely,” I said.

  “Something you want to tell me?” Blake asked with a grin.

  “It’s not what you think.”

  “With you, it never is. Good luck.”

  We parted company, each of us heading for his car. I wrinkled my nose as I climbed into the Ford. Then I started it up and headed for Polarity Magnetics.

  ***

  I didn’t sense anything wrong when I stopped by the guard shack. A tall, chain-link privacy fence guarded the industrial park. Barbed tape in menacing curls sat on top of the fence. It was also known as razor wire, although it wasn’t razor sharp. Barbed tape was better than barbed wire, as the tape was designed to inflict serious cuts on anyone attempting to climb over. It was difficult to climb through or over without special tools. I knew, as I’d tried to do that on more than one occasion.

  A hundred yards beyond the shack was a large parking area with plenty of BMWs, Cadillacs and organic-looking electric cars that pretended to be the wave of the future. There were no pickups, however, large or small, which I found odd. Beyond the parking area were large, perfectly kept lawns and a massive, glass-fronted office building.

  Two guards were in the shack, one watching a monitor inside and the other standing by the half door, staring down at me. She was whipcord lean, with sucked-in cheeks and intense brown eyes: a femme fatale who was probably a black belt in some hard-to-pronounce mixed martial arts. She wore a tight blue uniform with a patch on her left front pocket. It showed a circular magnet with a sword stuck to it. She had small breasts, which seemed appropriate to her manner.

  “What is your name?” she asked in a clipped tone. She had an accent, although it wasn’t Lithuanian, maybe somewhere from South America.

  “Gavin Kiel,” I said. “But it’s not on any of your lists. The reason—”

  I stopped because she darted into the shack. I shifted just enough in my car to peer through the half-door. She picked a tablet computer off her desk.

  She reappeared with the tablet tucked under her arm. “Could you please step out of the car, Mr. Kiel?”