So I slide down low and lay my head back against the seat and bump along in Angel’s Tundra-nice truck, Toy ota does a good job on the suspension, which is firm but nimble, and the lumbar support is just right though I can’t enjoy it slumped down like this-wondering if we’ve gotten onto the 710. But the hood is truly blinding so I finally just give up and try to breathe slow and shallow because it’s hot in here, even though I sense Angel, always the gentleman, adjusting the AC vents to blow directly at me. Slowly, going by feel, I move my GPU from the right-side waistband of my jeans-hidden by my loose blouse-to the seat.
“You could have made me happy, Angel.”
“I was too old and saggy and temperamental.”
“True.”
“But I would love to be young again, with you,” he said.
“That’s what you say to all your hotties.”
“It won’t be too much longer, Suzie. Be comfortable. You didn’t bring something unnecessary like a cell phone with a camera?”
“Of course not.”
“And the derringer in the purse?”
“It’s in there. You said-”
“It’s okay. It’s okay. I’ll make sure Guy knows.”
“I hate people who think they’re important.”
“His privacy is our privacy. It benefits all of us.”
“I really don’t like this hood, Angel. I’m claustrophobic. It makes me feel trapped and I hate that even more than people who think they’re important.”
“It won’t be long.”
“I’m going to recline the seat and meditate,” I say. What I do is recline the seat and dangle my GPU down between the door and the seat, then drop it. “Put on the news, would you?”
“Of course.”
“What do you think of that Murrieta chick?” I ask.
“She saved an old man’s life, so I admire her. The police will kill her, though. It’s unavoidable.”
I’m sitting on a leather sofa. It’s soft and smells good. When Angel lifts the hood from my head I look up at a beefy middle-aged man sitting on a dais above me. He looks like a cop even though I know he’s Guy, the fence, the man who will “buy and sell anything.” There’s a very long desk in front of him and the desk is littered with computers, monitors, printers, faxes, scanners, the works. The computer cases are made of a brushed aluminum and engraved with an abstract pattern that shimmers like the play side of a CD. The lights behind and above Guy cast long shadows down his face, and though his hair and forehead and cheeks are visible in bright relief, his eyes are hidden.
“Hello, Laura,” he says. His voice is clear and powerful. “I apologize for all the security. Thanks for making it easy. I’m Guy.”
He stands and leans over the desk and extends a hand. I stand and step forward and stretch out my own and we touch fingertips. He doesn’t bend very well and I wonder if he’s injured or just likes making me work hard to touch him.
A black man with a shiny head and a nice suit appears at my side.
“Relax,” says Guy. “This is Rorke.”
“There’s a gun in my bag,” I say. Rorke the dork.
“Yes, the scanner told us that.”
Rorke pats me down, gets close to overly personal but not quite. He wands me. He smells like those men’s magazines that Bradley’s worthless father used to bring home.
“Turn around please, Laura,” he says.
When I turn my back to Guy I can see that this room is elevated-part of a tower, maybe, or built on a hill-and through the high windows the port unfolds all the way to the ocean. Port of Long Beach, or of Los Angeles? In the cold blast of light from the incandescent light banks, the cranes are pivoting and the immense stacks of containers are either growing or shrinking as the megatonnage of goods flood into America or wash back out. My Mustang GT is probably out there in one of those containers, packaged up with more of Angel’s vehicles for sale in the Middle East. I look down on what appear to be miniature trucks but I know they’re actually full-sized tractor trailers filled with all things imaginable. Perfect setting for Guy, I think, the man who will buy and sell anything.
“Thank you, Anthony,” says Guy. “Rorke will take you down for coffee or breakfast while I talk to Laura. Will that be okay with everyone?”
“See you in a while, Anthony,” I say to Angel. “Save me a donut.”
In the darkness to my right a door opens to a neat rectangle of light into which Angel and Rorke pass.
“He has nothing but the highest praise for you,” says Guy.
“He speaks very highly of you, too,” I say.
“The port is fascinating, isn’t it?”
“It makes me feel small and slow,” I say.
“Me too. It’s pure capitalism-controlled chaos. Just barely controlled. I’m sure you know that very few of the containers are inspected, coming or going. Which of course is good and bad. It helps me in my business. It saves me money when I purchase foreign goods. But it may someday allow in a dirty bomb that will blow me and my little world here into eternity. Or an anthrax dispenser. Or ten thousand rabid vampire bats all hungry for blood, bursting out into the night when the container is opened.”
“The cost of freedom,” I say.
“May I see the diamonds?”
I tap my jacket pocket. “We sort of do things together.”
“I understand. Join me up here. There are steps if you go to your left.”
A moment later we’re standing across from each other, on either side of a worktable built off his long curving desk. The desk and table are a dark wood with red tones in it-mahogany, or maybe Hawaiian koa. Ernest has a decorative Hawaiian spear with a koa shaft.
I see an aluminum-cased laptop on the desk, turned away from me to face Guy. It’s got the same finish as the desktops, shiny and brushed. It’s very unusual looking. It’s also identical to the one I saw in the safe house in Marina del Ray. Is Guy a cop? A flush of suspicion breaks over me and for a moment I can’t look at him. I turn and watch the port. I calm myself as the skyscrapers of cargo containers grow and shrink under the powerful lights.
Guy is a large man and he’s tan-an outdoorsman? He’s got a thick upper body but when he brings a chair for me I see that his legs are slightly wrong and he moves slowly. Being from Bakersfield I think of a bull rider who mashed up some discs over the years, or maybe a guy who crashed his BMX bike one too many times.
I sit and remove the parcels of diamonds from the jacket pocket and set them on the black velvet jeweler’s pad that Guy has thoughtfully supplied. There’s a jewel er’s loupe, too. I smile at him.
Starting with the smallest stones I tap them out into discrete groupings. With a fingertip I swirl each group. You can imagine how dazzling they are in the fierce incandescent light beaming down from above. They’ve never looked this good, not even when I danced with the two-carat monster in my Hotel Laguna room. By the time I set this mondo rock on the black pad I can sense Guy trying to keep his breathing deep and even.
“This is the gemologist’s writing on the papers?”
“It is.”
“I’d love to hear the story of how you got them.”
“You won’t hear it from me.”
“I know. I know. I wish our business could be lighter and less formal, don’t you? I’d love to hear the stories behind things. All the tales of how we work and how we steal and how we get what we want.”
“Tales can be testimony.”
“You’re right, of course.”
Guy is staring at the rocks. He reaches out with a blunt fingertip and rearranges them slightly. The newly revealed facets throw back the light in new ways. He uses the loupe, taking his time, finally setting it down to look at me.