Nemesis (4 page)

There was no garage in his building; tonight he had to park around the corner on 17th Street. A strong wind off the Pacific forced him into a forward hunch on the walk to his building. He barely noticed. Weather conditions had mattered to Colleen—Seattle's chains of rainy days sometimes depressed her—but they made no impression on him unless they affected his work. Wet, dry, warm, cold, windy, foggy—you had to deal with all the variations at one time or another, so why pay attention when there were more important things to deal with?

A while back somebody had spray-painted what looked like gang symbols on the wall next to the building's front entrance. Graffiti was a big problem in the city, even out here in a neighborhood that was predominately Asian and had no serious gang activity. The landlord had whitewashed over the tags, but you could still see the outlines. A minor crime, property defacement, but it went against Runyon's grain just the same. No one had the right to intrude on others' lives for their own benefit or amusement.

Inside his flat, he turned the heat up to chase the evening chill and checked his answering machine. No messages. Seldom were except for telemarketing crap, but his home number was also on his business card. He was in a stay-connected business in a compulsively stay-connected society: you had to cover all the bases.

He booted up his laptop. Three new e-mails, none of any importance. All right. He kicked off his shoes, turned on the TV to one of the handful of channels that specialized in old movies, turned the sound down, tuned himself down, and sprawled out on the couch. The interior tuning down was a trick he'd first learned on police stakeouts, resorted to more and more as a defense mechanism over the months it took Colleen to die by degrees. The less you let yourself think, the less pain and helplessness you feel. That was the theory, anyway. Now it had become a habit, the best way he knew to get through the downtime periods that separated work and sleep.

He was no longer paying attention to the Bette Davis film, letting the drone of voices put him into a half-doze, when his cell phone vibrated.

Immediately he was awake and alert, another trick he'd learned in Seattle. The time digits on the TV cable box read 9:18. He checked the window on the phone: no caller ID. Verity Daniels, he thought. Right.

“He just called again, Jake,” she said. She sounded a little breathless, not so much upset as excited. But you couldn't always trust voice impressions on the phone. “I recorded the conversation like you told me to.”

“Everything that was said?”

“Yes.”

“Did you threaten him with the police?”

“He just laughed. He wants the money tomorrow. If I don't bring it to him, he said … he said he'd hurt me. Bad.”

“Bring it where?”

“Baker Beach at noon.”

“In what kind of container, did he say?”

“A beach bag.”

“And then what?”

“Wait for him. That's all.”

“Wait where exactly?”

“By the rocks at the north end,” she said. Then she said, “The secluded part of the beach beyond is clothing optional … you can sunbathe there in the nude. Did you know that?”

Runyon ignored the question. “Is that where he wants you to wait, on that side?”

“No. By the
HAZARDOUS SURF
sign on the main section.”

Extortionists were usually wary of meeting their victims in daylight hours in a public place. Their normal MO was a night drop somewhere private, nobody else around to witness the exchange. Baker Beach was liable to be moderately crowded at noon, given the good late September weather, which meant more risk on his part. Why, when he'd been careful to remain anonymous so far? Either he was none too bright, or he had what he considered a good reason for making such an arrangement.

“Jake … I should keep the rendezvous, shouldn't I?”

“Yes.”

“With the money?”

“That's up to you. But if you bring at least a small amount and he takes possession, it constitutes proof of extortion.”

“And you'll be there to arrest him?”

“Depends on the circumstances.”

“What do you mean?”

Runyon said, “He may send somebody to get the money for him, to avoid showing himself to you. We'll talk more about that when we meet.”

“Meet? You mean before noon tomorrow?”

“Yes. For a couple of reasons. There's a café on the Embarcadero near your place, the Bayside Java House, Pier Fourteen. I'll be there at nine o'clock.”

“Does it have to be in the morning? Couldn't you come over tonight?”

“Not at this hour.”

“It isn't that late.” Pause. “I'm scared, Jake. Really scared.”

Trying to make it personal again. He said, “The Bayside, nine o'clock. Good night, Ms. Daniels.”

No response, just a sharp click in his ear.

*   *   *

She was no longer annoyed with him on Thursday morning, and she didn't seem particularly scared or anxious, either, when she came into the Bayside Java House. Smiling. Heavily made up. And not dressed for the beach yet, unless she was planning on keeping the date with her tormentor in an expensive summer dress and high heels. The outfit was for his benefit, he thought. She couldn't even keep a simple business meeting impersonal.

The café was crowded, not a good place for the kind of conversation they were about to have. He steered her to the counter, ordered containers of coffee to go, and when they were ready, led her outside and down the Embarcadero to a bench near one of a bunch of massive public art sculptures that the city fathers seemed to think had aesthetic merit. Her smile by then had given way to a puzzled frown.

It was in his mind to say something to her about the lies she'd told, ask her to explain herself, but he didn't do it. This wasn't the time or place. And unless it had something to do with the shakedown, her moral integrity was of no real importance anyhow.

He gave her the Q-Phone. The frown deepened as she turned it over in her hand. “I already have a cell phone.”

“Not like this one. It operates like a regular cell, but it has a special program that lets me call the number and open the line without any ring or message on the display screen.”

“… I don't understand.”

“It also has sensitive built-in microphones that'll pick up any sound within a reasonable distance. Designed for listening in on cell-phone conversations, short- or long-distance. But it works just as well for picking up face-to-face conversations when the line is open.”

“Oh. Oh, I see. Even on a public beach?”

“Even there. I should be able to hear everything you and whoever makes the noon contact say to each other.”

She turned the Q-Phone over in her hand, looking at it now as if she found it fascinating. “Is something like this legal? Not that I care if it isn't.”

“Perfectly legal.” Though there were some who felt that it shouldn't be. “If the contact is somebody you know, use his name. If it's a stranger, say something to tell me so.”

“Then what will you do?”

“Depends on the circumstances. Leave that to me, Ms. Daniels.”

“Verity. Please.” Then, “You'll be very close by, won't you? On the beach?”

“Close by, yes, but don't look for me. You may be watched beforehand—don't do anything to call attention to yourself.”

“I won't. What should I say to him?”

“Just follow his lead. And comment on the alleged evidence so I'll know what it is.”

“He can't bring what doesn't exist.”

Runyon said, “Chances are he'll have something to show that he thinks is incriminating enough to buy him ten thousand dollars. Photos, documents real or faked … something tangible.”

“Yes, I see what you mean.”

“Try to get him to give it to you, whatever it is. If he refuses, don't insist. Agree with whatever he says and let him walk away with the money.”

“In other words, don't make waves. Just let the ocean do that, right?”

Runyon ignored that. “Don't call me after the exchange,” he said. “I'll be in touch as soon as I have something to report.”

“Whatever you say, Jake. I'm completely in your hands.”

She wanted to sit and talk while they finished their coffee; he didn't. Preparations to make, he said, ignored the hand plucking at his coat sleeve, and left her sitting there in a half-pout.

The meeting left him with the same off-kilter feeling he'd had after his previous encounters with her. She was scared, she'd said, but she seemed as eager to have him call her by her first name as she was to have him protect her. The nude sunbathing comment last night and the one today about the ocean waves … both inane and uncalled for, and both punctuated by a hint of girlish giggle.

She seemed reasonably intelligent, reasonably stable, but you couldn't always tell. A head case? Getting off giddily on the sharp edge of danger? Coming on to him for the same reason? He'd come in contact with a few of that type over the years, but Verity Daniels didn't display any of the usual, obvious symptoms.

He couldn't figure her out. And he had a feeling he wouldn't like her any better if and when he did.

 

4

Runyon had never been to Baker Beach. Driven past it any number of times on his restless roamings around the city, and because the road that ran past it, Lincoln Avenue, was the shortest route from Sea Cliff and other points on the far-west side to the Golden Gate Bridge. But there'd been no reason for him to set foot on the beach itself. He had no interest in scenic views, crowds of sunbathers, and families with kids and dogs. A couple of times he'd gone on picnics with Bryn and Bobby, but neither outing had been in the city. And Bryn was too self-conscious about the frozen side of her face, even covered by the scarf she always wore in public, to want to make a habit of it.

He knew a little about Baker Beach now because he'd Googled it last night after Verity Daniels's call; he'd always been leery of going into unfamiliar territory on an assignment without some idea of what it was like. The beach stretched along the foot of serpentine cliffs on the northwest shore, part of the Presidio that had once been military land and now belonged to the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Mile long, broken up into two sections, the smaller one to the north allowing nudity because it was on federal land. Unsafe for swimming: large waves, riptides, and undertow. Original site of the Burning Man festival before it moved out into the Nevada desert in 1990. More data than he needed, but he'd filed it away just the same; you never knew when bits and pieces of background information might be useful.

He'd looked at a dozen or so posted photographs, too, to get a visual sense of the place, among them several of the
HAZARDOUS SURF
sign and the little rocky peninsula that separated the two parts of the beach. So he knew what to expect when he swung off Lincoln Drive a few minutes before ten on Thursday morning, turned onto the road that led to the north parking lot.

Last night's wind had died down to a mild breeze and the day was already starting to warm. The good weather had brought people out early; the parking lot was already a third full and some of the picnic tables scattered through the cypress grove flanking the road on the inland side had been claimed. Runyon wore casual clothes—Levi's, loose-fitting shirt, the only pair of shoes he owned that were appropriate for the beach. And he had the right props: a towel, a bottle of mineral water, and his Nikon camera strap-hung around his neck. His cell phone was in his shirt pocket.

What he wouldn't take with him was the .357 Magnum he kept locked in the glove compartment. For one thing, his carry permit didn't extend to federal land. But even if it had, he wouldn't have done it. You'd have to be an idiot to bring a loaded handgun onto a crowded public beach. Even a direct confrontation with the perp, if it was the perp who showed, would be foolish in a place like this. There were only two ways off the beach, this parking lot and the other one farther south; easy enough to follow his man when he left, no matter who he was, and brace him elsewhere.

Runyon parked near the entrance to Battery Chamberlin, the remains of a WWII gun emplacement. The path down to the beach ran alongside the battery fence; he made his way past another warning sign, this one telling you straight out that people had died swimming and wading here. The beach was fairly narrow, extending south in a gentle curve to where the backsides of expensive Sea Cliff homes stretched along the seaward bluffs. The Google sites had touted panoramic views—the looming towers of the Golden Gate Bridge, the long sweep of the Marin Headlands across the Gate—but they might as well have been props, too, for all the attention he paid to them. He wandered down toward the surf 's edge, then angled over toward the
HAZARDOUS SURF
sign to familiarize himself with the area first-hand.

Some place for a blackmail exchange, out in the open and with no easy exit. Maybe the perp had picked it for that reason, but still it seemed a curious choice. There were plenty of secluded or semi-secluded places in this general area that offered more privacy.

Runyon pretended to take photographs of the headlands, the bridge, the low sloping area of dunes and sea scrub that stretched from the beach back up to high cliffs and thick cypress forest. Then he backtracked past scattered groups of people to a spot next to a post-and-wire fence at the dunes' edge—closer to the exit into the parking lot than to the warning sign. He spread his towel there, sat down in the sun. His wait would be almost an hour, but that was all right. Waiting didn't bother him, and it was always better in a case like this to put yourself in position as early as possible. He sat with his thoughts cranked down but his senses alert, watching people come and go and stroll along the waterline, dogs playing in the surf and kids tossing Frisbees and footballs back and forth.