Dewey had first encountered him at the cyber café, where he’d met most of his business associates. Hatch was clearly an ex-convict, the jailhouse body art attesting to that. He was a tall white man, bald, gimlet-eyed, and ripped, probably from pumping iron in a prison yard. He always wore a tight T-shirt, greasy jeans, and metal-studded boots. From watching prison documentaries, Dewey figured him for the Aryan Brotherhood. His facial art consisted of a spider on his forehead and tattooed drops that ran from the corners of his mouth down to his jaw line, like blood dripping from fangs. Under his lower lip was a thick soul patch. Dewey imagined that “Hatch” was short for “Hatchet” and that he’d probably earned the sobriquet.
The fact that Hatch appeared alone at their meetings was somehow more frightening than if he’d had an equally scary partner. Hatch would always show up on time in a black van. After Dewey got him admitted into the storage facility and the deal was consummated, Dewey would help carry the merchandise to Hatch’s van. Being alone with him filled Dewey with dread and foreboding. As soon as his van was loaded, it would be easy for Hatch to cut Dewey’s throat and clean out whatever merchandise he could carry alone. Dewey wondered how long his body would lie there in the padlocked room before the stench alerted other tenants.
When he drove over the hill to the San Fernando Valley and the storage facility in Reseda, Dewey found the black van parked on the street in front. Hatch sat behind the wheel, wearing mirror sunglasses and smoking a cigarette. Just the sight of him got Dewey’s bowels rumbling. Dewey punched his driver’s license number into the gate code and the gate opened. He waved at the woman in the office and pointed back to the black van with an OK sign. She nodded, and after going through the ritual of showing an ID to this woman whom he’d never seen before, Dewey, followed by Hatch’s van, motored to the rear of the yard.
After parking, Dewey unlocked the storage room padlock and said, “Morning, Hatch.”
“Bernie,” Hatch said, nodding at him and flipping his cigarette butt onto the pavement in front of the double storeroom.
Dewey made a mental note to pick up that butt after Hatch was gone. They kept a clean storage facility here and Dewey didn’t want any complaints about his guests. For an instant Dewey thought, Yes, I’ll pick it up after he’s gone. If I’m still alive. Then he told himself to get a grip. He’d dealt with Hatch and others like him for the past several years and he was still breathing. That brought it home to him yet again: Dewey Gleason was losing his nerve. He had to get out of this business.
“Do you have everything I ordered?” Hatch asked.
“Everything,” Dewey said. “And I’ve got a few video cams I can sell you. Got them last month. Top of the line.”
“Sure,” Hatch said, grinning. “As long as you let me take them on consignment.”
Dewey hadn’t thought of Hatch as a tweaker, but the bastard had gaps in his grille. Crack maybe. Or maybe he got them knocked out in a prison rumble. The consignment remark was obviously meant as a joke, since nobody in their world did anything but cash business.
Dewey forced an obligatory guffaw and said, “Maybe next time. Just let me know in advance what you might need.”
After Hatch took a perfunctory look at the merchandise and checked the invoice sheets, he said, “Let’s load.”
When they got the plasma TV and the home entertainment center into Hatch’s van, he gave Dewey the agreed-upon price of $3,100 and said, “I can use as much of this quality as you can deliver.”
“At the rock-bottom prices I charge, I’m sure you could,” Dewey said, trying to smile, much relieved when Hatch got into the van and drove away.
After he picked up Hatch’s cigarette butt, holding it by the ash end in case Hatch had a communicable disease, Dewey padlocked the storage room, got into his car, and drove away. He never saw the old Chevy Caprice parked on the street, a Chevy that had followed him from his apartment to the storage facility and was still shadowing him all the way back to Hollywood.
When Dewey pulled the Honda into the underground parking garage at his apartment on Franklin Avenue, Tristan Hawkins parked as fast as he could, got out of his Chevy, and sprinted to the security gate in front of the building. Tristan tried to stay concealed as much as possible behind a hibiscus plant beside the gate, and he watched his quarry emerge from the parking garage onto a common patio. He saw his man stop at a soft drinks machine, where he bought a can of soda, and climb the exterior stairway to the third floor, where he entered what looked to be the last apartment on the east side of the apartment building. For the first time, Tristan was seeing his boss in a different disguise, but he’d have known him anywhere.
Tristan went to the gate phone, chose an apartment number on the digital directory, beginning with number one, indicating the first floor, and began punching in the code next to the apartment numbers, most of which were no doubt occupied by tenants who were at work. It took three tries before he reached someone who was at home at that time of day.
Her voice was an elderly croak when she said, “Hello?” and Tristan knew she’d be no problem.
In Los Angeles, apartment dwellers came and went and seldom knew who was living next door, so he knew he could pull a name out of the air. “Hellooo, UPS,” he said. “I’ve been trying to reach Mr. Brandon in apartment number one-twenty.”
“This isn’t number one-twenty,” the old woman said.
“I know, ma’am,” Tristan said, concentrating on keeping all traces of street from his diction. “I delivered a parcel there a few minutes ago just as he was leavin’ for his job, and I stopped at the drinks machine for a Coke. And darn it, I left my keys on the table beside the machine. I’m locked outta my truck.”
“Why’re you bothering me with this?” the old woman said, and for a moment he thought it wasn’t going to work.
“I tried six other numbers but there’s nobody home. Look, would you mind walkin’ to the machine and gettin’ my keys and bringin’ them to the gate?”
“Well…,” she hesitated.
“Or better yet, ma’am, if you would please buzz me in, I’ll get the keys myself. Please. I’m gonna get in trouble with my boss!”
“Well, all right,” she said. “But you should be more careful next time.”
“Thank you!” he said, hearing the electronic tone and the click of the lock.
Tristan hurried through the unlocked gate, scaled the outside staircase, taking the steps two at a time, and walked briskly to the last apartment on the east end of the third floor. It was number 313. He descended the stairs even faster, went back to the directory, scrolled the digital directory, and rang number 313.
“Hello,” a familiar voice answered.
Tristan recognized Jakob Kessler minus the German accent, hung up the phone without a word, returned to his car, and called his boss on his cell phone.
The phone rang several times before Dewey could get out of the bathroom, his trousers at half-mast, and check the taped-on label on his GoPhone to see which of his characters the call was for.
“Jakob Kessler,” he said, after getting the cells sorted.
“Mr. Kessler, it’s Creole,” Tristan said. “Do you have any jobs for Jerzy and me?”
“Not for the rest of the week, Creole,” Dewey said. “I shall call you on Monday.”
“Mr. Kessler,” Tristan said. “I have somethin’ to talk to you about. Can we meet somewheres this afternoon?”
“What is it about, Creole?”
“Nothin’ I can talk about on the phone,” Tristan said. “You’re gonna be real glad to hear about it.”
Dewey thought about his meeting with Clark, but there was no way to fit Creole in before that meeting, because Clark was expecting Bernie Graham, not Jakob Kessler, and a costume change was too much.
“I cannot do it today.”
“Okay, Mr. Kessler,” Tristan said. “How ’bout tomorrow?”