Except this wasn’t a joke.
This was real. This dog was bait. Plain and simple. Its suffering meant nothing to the shark hunter. I was tempted to reach in for the dog but I was certain of a few things. First, it was going to attack me, as the creature was nearly out of its mind with fear. And second, it needed to be sedated to remove the hooks.
I stood slowly and turned, shaking nearly uncontrollably myself. I pointed to the shark hunter. “Let him go,” I said to Sanchez.
But my friend shook his head. “You’ll kill him, man.”
“ Let him go.”
But Sanchez shook his head. “I can’t do that, Jim. If I let him go, then you’ll never leave this country again.”
“ Fuck him.”
“ I agree,” said Sanchez, who had placed his body between the man and myself. “But he’s not worth it, man. He’s just a shit bag. Shit bags aren’t worth going to jail for the rest of your life.”
My frustration was nearly overwhelming. Frustration and anger. I stepped up to the guy currently pinned against the wall by Sanchez’s forearm. There was no fear in him; in fact, he was grinning at me. Although I doubted he recognized me, I was now certain he was the same piece of shit who had removed the hammerhead’s fins, the same piece of shit who had dumped the still-living and helpless shark back into the ocean. The same piece of shit who had grinned at me in much the same way.
“ Translate this for me,” I said to Sanchez. He nodded and I went on, speaking slowly enough that Sanchez wouldn’t miss a word. “If I ever see you within a hundred feet of a dog, cat, or fucking hamster, I will come for you. If I ever see you hunting sharks or even sardines, I will come for you. Do you understand, motherfucker?”
He blinked, waiting for Sanchez to finish translating. Then he grinned again, wider, and hocked a nasty lugie straight into my face.
“ Okay, one punch,” said Sanchez, “and make it a good one.”
He released the guy, who charged me instantly. One punch for every dog to have ever been thrown overboard to the sharks. One punch for every shark who’d been butchered alive.
One punch didn’t settle the score.
But it sure as hell felt good.
I hit him just under his right eye, so hard that I heard his cheekbone shatter. His legs turned to rubber and he promptly sank to the deck where he lay unmoving.
Breathing, but unmoving.
Sanchez nodded, impressed. “Helluva punch.”
Chapter Thirty-one
I gave my statement to the Ensenada police investigator in charge, a Detective Hermenio.
I told Hermenio that I was a private investigator working on a murder case. I told him everything I knew, or thought he needed to know, and told him that my investigation had led me here to Mexico. Detective Hermenio, an older guy who spoke fluent English, asked if the guy on the boat was a suspect. I told him it was still early in the investigation.
Meaning, no.
He let it drop, maybe because Sanchez was an investigator with the LAPD. Or maybe because he recognized a low-life scumbag when he saw one. Truth was, I had no business being on the shark hunter’s boat, who had every right to protect himself. Basically, I had assaulted a man defending his own property.
A man who had caged and tortured a dog on his property.
Sometimes cops look the other way. Sometimes laws fly out the window when something heinous has been committed. In Mexico, animal cruelty laws were vague. But they were in place, and the language of the law was simple: “no unnecessary suffering.” A bleeding and caged dog with hooks in its muzzles and paws certainly qualified.
Not to mention, one didn’t need a law to see the extent of the cruelty.
Right is right. Wrong is wrong.
Sure, I had overstepped my bounds, and had Sanchez not been here, I could have very easily ended up in a Mexican jail. But I wasn’t in a jail.
Instead, I was in a brightly-lit veterinarian’s waiting room in Ensenada, a twenty-four hour emergency clinic. After the police had cited Juan Trinidad for animal cruelty, he was taken away in an ambulance to treat his broken face. Next, they had carefully loaded the caged and terrified animal, and delivered it to the local vet.
Which is where Sanchez and I were waiting now.
My big, Latino friend was sitting back on the wooden bench, eyes closed, long legs stretched straight, crossed at the ankles. He looked asleep, but I knew he wasn’t. My friend had an uncanny ability to rest and be alert at the same time. We were alone in the small waiting room, which wasn’t much of a surprise since it was just a little past three in the morning.
“ You got lucky,” said Sanchez without opening his eyes.
“ I’ve been told that before.”
“ I saved your ass.”
“ That’s why I keep you around,” I said.
We were silent some more. I heard someone talking urgently behind a closed door that led deeper into the facility. A plump woman with round cheeks sat behind a desk. She wore a powder blue uniform that seemed to be the mandatory uniform of vet assistants everywhere.
“ Detective Hermenio says he’ll come down on the bastard as much as he can, but something like this only carries about a $30 fine.”
“ So he’ll keep the boat?”
“ No doubt.”
“ And still hunt sharks.”
“ I’m guessing yes.”
“ So what did we accomplish?”
“ You broke his face,” said Sanchez.
“ That felt good,” I said.
“ And saved a dog.”
“ Yes,” I said. “I did.”
Chapter Thirty-two
Cindy and I were in my apartment in Huntington Beach.
It was two days since my return from Mexico, and my life had taken an interesting turn. Mainly, I was now the proud owner of perhaps the world’s most damaged dog.
Cindy was sitting at the marble-top counter, drinking wine. She seemed to be enjoying the wine. Go figure. Every now and then she would look off down the hallway where small, pitiful sounds occasionally emitted. Cindy had come over bearing tin dishes filled with veggie burritos, topped with cheese, guacamole, and sour cream.
“ You didn’t have to order yourself a vegetable burrito,” I said. We were sitting next to each other at the counter. A half-full glass of Tecate was foaming comfortingly in front of me. I had taken to the stuff.
“ I like veggie burritos,” she said. And to her credit, she was attacking it energetically, despite the distraction of the whimpering dog in the next room.
“ Since when?”
“ Since forever.”
“ I’ve never seen you order a veggie burrito before. Chicken, yes. Beef, yes. Carnitas, yes. Even lobster.” I shuddered slightly at the thought. Years ago, I had tried it. Hideous.
“ Okay, okay, I ordered it today because…it seemed like a good idea. Maybe you’re rubbing off on me. But don’t expect a complete change. I like my meat.”
I nodded, pleased for some reason. I took a big swig of beer. “Well, as long as you know I’m not encouraging you one direction or the other. What you eat is up to you.”
“ Agreed,” said Cindy, then looked over at me, then laughed. “It’s hard to take you seriously when you’re sporting a foam mustache.”
“ Being taken seriously is overrated.”
She used a napkin to wipe my upper lip. “The burrito just sounded…good. And kind of healthy.”
“ They are good and healthy,” I said.
“ Just as long as you don’t expect me to suddenly…convert,” she said.
“ It’s not a religion. If anyone should know that, it’s you.”
“ I like my fish,” she said.
“ Good for you.”
“ Sometimes I like chicken.”
“ I understand that.”
“ I don’t want to feel guilty if I eat it in front of you.”
“ No guilt,” I said.
“ Sometimes I’ll order vegetarian,” she said. “But only sometimes.”