The Fourth Rule of Ten: A Tenzing Norbu Mystery (A Tenzing Norbu Mystery series Book 4) (37 page)

I turned off Stadium Way onto Academy Road, and we drove by a children’s park in a grassy area to our left. The climbing structure was full of toddlers and kids sliding, climbing, and running around. I had a moment of happy fantasy, imagining that the little boys we had rescued from that squalid Venice dormitory might someday play with the same freedom and joy. Gus had traced them back to the ring of Bosnian traffickers Sasha had first followed, and Sasha had confirmed that two of the boys were the ones on the plane. Stephanie assured me they would at the very least receive shelter and care, and whenever possible and appropriate, be returned to their families.

Not everyone had been rescued: the workers from the bus had vanished into thin air, and countless other victims of trafficking were still out there. But Agvan Supply was shut down, along with the Oceanview Vista Motel, and the ripples were still spreading as the FBI pulled what it could from the smashed computers.

Gus had called me again two weeks later with another piece of news.

“We may have found your Yolanda Wiggins.”

“Tell me.”

“Remember that Crip raid I never mentioned?”

“I do.”

“Well, after eighteen months of multiagency investigating, we completed the operation, with flying colors I might add. Forty-five gang members from six different gangs, Los Angeles all the way to Riverside: we got them on racketeering, prostitution charges, trafficking across state lines, kidnapping, you name it, we caught them doing it.”

“That is incredible news. Congratulations.”

“Well, it’s only one raid, but it was a doozy. Sends a pretty strong message.”

“What about Yolanda?”

“She was with a pimp called Bone, right?”

“Right.”

“Well, the bad news is, she’s under arrest. She was part of his recruiting team, you know, they had her bringing in other girls. But I’m pretty sure a good lawyer can get most of the charges thrown out. You did not hear this from me either, Tenzing, but it shouldn’t be too hard to prove she was acting under duress.”

So I’d finally been able to make a full report to Tory, who wept like a baby at the news. He’d been visiting Yolanda at the women’s correctional facility almost every day. He’d also insisted on doubling my fee. I’d donated the money to various organizations in Los Angeles that addressed the trafficking epidemic, from safe houses and free counseling to groups that were bringing yoga and meditation into juvenile halls. All I could hope was that their good works, like scattered seeds of goodness, would grow and flourish, balancing out the bad.

“You’ve gone very quiet,” Julie said.

I reached for her hand. “Thinking about stuff,” I said.

We passed a woman and her dog jogging along the road. The dog leapt and barked joyfully. So far, the Tank and Homer experiment was going splendidly. My theory was that Tank actually thought Homer was
his
pet. He certainly acted as if Homer belonged to him, and if it was a ruse, Homer went right along with it. They also required the same enormous amount of sleep, which helped.

Academy Way had become Academy Drive. I parked in the visitor’s lot. We climbed out of the Shelby, and I took Julie’s hand.

“You ready?”

Had I even been back here since the graduation ceremonies? I couldn’t remember. I did remember that I was sworn in by a newly elected mayor and his newly appointed police chief, a controversial appointment in reaction to the Rampart scandal that had rocked the force and the city. It was an August day, scalding hot, and we were all dripping with sweat in our uniforms.

Hand in hand, Julie and I strolled to the entrance, a gray stone turret on the left, a stone and tile information booth on the right.

“Los Angeles Police Academy,” Julie said, reading the sign, her voice amused.

“It’s not what you think,” I said.

The security guard waved us through. He gave me a wink and a thumbs-up—I’d called ahead.

The year of my graduation ceremony, 42 of us had successfully completed our 900-plus hours of training: 36 males and 6 females. For some reason, I could even recall the cultural mix: 22 Caucasians, 16 Hispanics, 3 African Americans, and 1 half-Tibetan ex-monk. For reasons of its own, the Police Commission had decided for the first time that year to replace the traditional public prayer with a moment of silence. That suited one of us just fine. I took the opportunity to express gratitude to all who had gotten me to this point: my teachers, my fellow cadets, Lama Yeshe and Lama Lobsang, even Arthur Conan Doyle.

I gave Julie the quick tour: “Pool.” “Gymnasium.” “Shooting range, up there to our left.”

Julie nodded, pretending all this made sense.

“Oh, and there’s a café that makes unbelievably good pea soup.”

“Good, I’m starving.”

“Nope, not here for the soup,” I said.

That night in July, the night of so much violence and confusion, I’d crawled into bed an exhausted, un-centered wreck. Julie had woken up, listened until I could talk no more, and then held me in her arms. I finally slept, but my mind must have kept on working, sorting and moving the pieces, because the next morning I had solved another puzzle question.

“It’s Indra’s Net!” I’d shaken Julie awake. “The site is Indra’s Net. Not an acronym. A bunch of consonants, in search of vowels.
N D R S.
Indra’s.
N T.
Net. Like the vanity plate! Like making love!”

Julie, to her credit, hung in there with me, and after I’d explained and explained, finally agreed that my interpretation made sense.

“But what
is
Indra’s Net?” she’d asked.

“It’s like a web, a vast web of interconnection. Indra is an ancient Vedic god, and it was believed a giant net hung over his palace on Mount Meru, the center of the Vedic universe. Every gap in the net held a jewel, supposedly, and every jewel held within it a reflection of every other jewel. Infinite reflections, infinite connections. It’s a Hindu concept originally, but Buddhists adopted it as well, only they called it
dependent origination
.”

“Everything connected to everything else,” Julie had mused.

“Exactly. So if you touch one jewel in the net, it affects all the others.” For a moment, I’d felt a rush of respect at the ingenious choice of name. Then another realization hit. “So maybe DNA-coins stand for dana. The practice of generosity! For Buddhists, the giving of and receiving of dana is part of our eightfold path.”

Julie had kissed me then, a deep, long kiss that filled my body with light.

“What was that for?”

“For being you,” she’d said. “For the way your mind works.”

Much later, I’d called Mike with my theory, and he’d been momentarily excited before he reminded me that Indra’s Net had vanished from the dark web.

“Maybe when we destroyed Agvan Supply, we took down the whole thing,” I’d said.

“I highly doubt it,” Mike had answered. “Web directories like Silk Road and Indra’s Net? You can call them jeweled cosmological networks all you want, but really they’re more like intestines, huge coils capable of moving all sorts of shit around. And Agvan Supply? That’s just a polyp, you know? If it starts to go bad, develops cancerous cells, say, the dudes behind the directories just cut it out. Excise the problem. The rest of the organism keeps on keeping on. Even the Internet lives by Darwinian laws.”

Despite Mike’s pessimistic outlook, I’d been pleased at my aha experience. As for Irena’s dire last words, I could only hope it was her madness talking. Whoever the “he” was, the one she thought was coming, he hadn’t bothered showing up.

Julie and I passed a final building on our right, an attractive Spanish structure housing offices and display cases of ceremonies and heroes from the past. My heart was beginning to race. I covered her eyes, and guided her the final ten feet.

“Okay. You can look.”

It was every bit as unexpected—both stunning and incongruous—as my memory-based expectations. And maybe even better.

“Oh,” Julie said. “Oh my.”

Water cascaded down the layered rock configurations—fountains and falls created by carefully placed confections of stone. Back in the 1930s, the parks department had commissioned a famous landscape artist to design and build a rock garden that would do their city proud, and he had responded by creating a hidden treasure. There were cascades and pools and recessed stone seats. Pine trees and an amphitheater. Steps and stairs leading up to more fountains and scalloped falls, and carved stone benches amid the splashing water.

“This is amazing,” Julie said.

“Come on, it gets better.” I pulled her by the hand up the stone steps to a second level of garden, a more intimate setting, where the rock overhangs created a kind of private grotto with a deep pool water nymphs might visit at night to dive and splash in secret. I led her past these, too, up yet another, steeper set of stone steps, and onto a footpath that doubled back on itself, climbing steeply.

“There.”

Behind and below us, the waterfalls splashed and played. To our right, the green carpet of Elysian Park, and the stadium, where so many gathered to cheer and hope. Beyond us, the Los Angeles skyline shimmered in the afternoon sun, the city that had taken me in, and that I had vowed to keep safe. While I no longer wore the badge, I was every bit as committed to protecting this city’s peace and serving its higher good.

A city of angels, and demons, too. My time here had not always been easy, but it had exceeded all expectations, especially when I remembered to let go.

Now I needed to do so one more time.

Whatever she says, everything is as it should be.

I surrendered the outcome. I breathed in the silence, and I felt Julie, beside me, somehow doing the same. Spacious listening. Spacious loving.

So this is what it feels like, when two people are as one.

Waves of love met, danced together, amplified each other. I had never felt this close to another human being.

“Julie?”

“Yes.”

“Will you marry me?”

She kissed the underside of my wrist, the sweet spot just below the palm. It turns out I have more than one sweet spot. Many, in fact.

“Yes,” Julie said.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

GRATITUDE FROM
GAY HENDRICKS

With each book we write, my appreciation for Tinker Lindsay, which started out as lavish, grows even more so. Tinker, you’re brilliant, wise, funny, big of heart, and impeccably responsible; Katie and I treasure your loving presence in our family.

A deep bow of gratitude to Reid Tracy, Patty Gift, and the Hay House team—your support has been invaluable. I’m so grateful to have a publisher who has no upper limit on their vision.

My mate of the past 35 years, Kathlyn “Katie” Hendricks, hears every word of every Ten book first. The gift of her generous listening and thoughtful feedback is a highlight of the creative process for me.

Many thanks to two masters of the crime-writing field, Robert Ferrigno and Diane Mott Davidson, for their enthusiastic support for our Ten books. It felt deeply satisfying to be welcomed into a community I’ve admired since I picked up my first Hardy Boys mystery in the second grade.

Thanks also to Jack Kornfield, teacher of Buddhist meditation for 40 years. It meant a great deal to us to have a Buddhist teacher we admire so much read our book and say he loved it.

I send love and gratitude across eternity to the memory of my writer mother, Norma Hendricks. She turned out a newspaper column every day throughout my growing-up years. The clack of her old Underwood typewriter was part of the soundtrack of my childhood. I learned so much from her about the value of meeting deadlines and other important aspects of being a professional writer, but the one absolutely indispensable thing she taught me was to take time and pleasure looking for just the right word. I’d see Mom sitting at her typewriter, always accompanied by a cup of coffee and a Camel cigarette, staring out the window for minutes at a time. When I’d ask her what she was doing, she’d say, “Waiting for the right word to come.” Although I didn’t really understand the full meaning of it at the time, now I surely do. Now that I’ve spent many hours of my own writing life waiting for the right word to come (thankfully minus the cigarettes!), I know what Mom was talking about. It’s really the sacred space of writing, the honoring of the craft enough to wait for the magic to happen. To honor the craft and meet your deadlines at the same time; it’s a gift from Mom I use every day of my life.

I would also like to honor the memory of my first writing teacher, Dr. Stephen Sanderlin, who taught English composition at Rollins College back in the ’60s. He was the most mild-mannered of men, but he taught composition like he was the only one standing between Western Civilization and the barbarians. He was passionate about how to write a topic sentence and construct a cogent paragraph, tireless in his willingness to give you feedback until you got it right. It paid off; I wrote and rewrote the first paragraph of
Conscious Loving
more than a hundred times, even before I sent it out for anybody else to look at, but I was rewarded for all that benign obsession in ways I could never have imagined at the time. Thank you, Dr. Sanderlin.

I’ve been blessed to have Sandy Dijkstra as an agent in these new fictional endeavors of mine. Her experience in the area has been most useful in the new field. May our collaboration, spanning back 25 years now, continue long and fruitfully!

GRATITUDE FROM
TINKER LINDSAY

First, last, and always, I am grateful for Gay Hendricks, my co-author in crime. The longer we work together, the more I appreciate him. His wicked humor, easy flexibility, and immense creativity inspire me, and his generosity of spirit makes our collaboration pure pleasure, not to mention a boatload of fun. And speaking of fun, his wife and partner, Katie, only makes the dance more delightful.

Big thanks to my intrepid writer’s group: Monique de Varennes, Kathryn Hagen, Emilie Small, Barbara Sweeney, and Pat Stiles. Accomplished writers all, they once again read and critiqued our latest work promptly, and responded with the perfect balance of enthusiasm and careful criticism, making sure every plot point, tonal shift, and character arc fully satisfied. Friends, knowing you are there gives me the confidence to stretch my writing wings.