Tahoe deep, p.23
Tahoe Deep, page 23
part #17 of An Owen McKenna Mystery Thriller Series
It was obvious that Spot loved it.
It was also obvious that Ivan was breathing more deeply, a common relaxation that happens to people around Spot. They lose their ability to focus on what previously had them tense, and they become completely lost in the new world of His Largeness.
After ten seconds, I said, “Okay, you’re getting perilously close to the rescue dog transfer threshold,” I said.
“What’s that?”
“A person at a shelter once explained it. If a person pets a homeless dog for more than thirty seconds and the dog keeps loving it, then the shelter can invoke the rescue dog transfer statute and require the person to take the dog home with them.”
“You’re joking, right?” Ivan still hadn’t taken his eyes off Spot. He sidled backward up to the Jeep and next to Spot, and put his arm around Spot’s neck. Spot shut his eyes and leaned into the headlock.
“Maybe not,” I said.
“Sorry, I’m monopolizing your dog. What’s his name?”
“He answers to Spot or His Largeness as much as any other.”
Spot turned and glanced at me for the briefest moment, then went back to concentrating on the new man in his life.
Ivan didn’t hesitate. His voice was a mezzo soprano squeak. “Oh Largeness! What a giant head you have. You want to come home with me?”
Spot wagged.
Ivan said, “In grad school, there was a girl named Barbie who had a Harlequin Dane named Brutus. Brutus, like Largeness here, was beyond regal. Beyond imposing. Even beyond Barbie who was no slouch herself. So we started calling him Brutus Beyond. Then we made it a phrase. If we had any experience that was really incredible, it was ‘Brutus Beyond Barbie.’ I became fixated on the black-and-white patterning of Harlequin Great Danes. That’s why I developed a fascination with Franz Kline and decided to take his concept in a new direction. Most people don’t see it, even after I point it out. But now that I’ve said it, you will.”
I must have frowned.
Ivan pointed back at his studio. “Look through the window at the black marks on the inside wall. You can see the resemblance from here.”
I turned and saw it immediately. The bold, black, kanji-type figures were an abstracted version of a Harlequin Great Dane’s blotchy black marks. There was no specific outline of a dog. But once I saw it, the image emerged. Legs, chest, an ear, the snout, the black nose.
“Wow, impressive.”
“Do you think Largeness would sit for me?”
“Sit for you like an artist’s model?”
“Yes. What do you think?” Ivan sounded very eager. “I’ve been hoping to start a new painting series. He could be immortalized on canvas. Although they’d have to be big canvases.”
“Well, first of all, he wouldn’t stay sitting for very long. Too much work to hold up one hundred-seventy pounds. But he can lie down for a long time. We could maybe work out a date. But it will cost you a lot in dog treats.”
“No problem. I could talk to my agent and get you a licensing cut. And I’ll definitely look for that abstract tattoo artist who did the dead man’s back.”
I thanked him for his time, said I’d call, and left. As we drove away, Spot looked longingly back toward the man with the flowing blond hair.
I told Street about it over wine. “Spot fell in love with another man today, a tattoo artist. And now the man wants Spot to be his artist’s model.”
Street made a little grin, then bent over to reach Spot, who was lying on her bare floor near Blondie, who was on her dog bed. “Oh, Spot, you should know that there is a long history of artists taking advantage of their models.” Street turned to me. “Maybe Spot should be accompanied by a chaperone.”
“A common dilemma for the guardians of artist’s models,” I said. “Do you have a suggestion?”
“What about Blondie? If this artist took both at once, you and I could go on a romantic getaway.”
“And I could search for more treasure.”
Street narrowed her eyes and gave me a demonic grin.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
That night after I left Street and Blondie, Spot and I sat out on my deck. I drank a beer. Spot watched me.
“Sorry, boy. I know you love the stuff, but I only brought out this one.”
The evening chill at 7200 feet of elevation is remarkable, so I was wearing my leather jacket. I looked across the vast expanse of lake and thought about how the Tahoe Steamer Festival was shaping up. Despite its potential, it seemed I should be doing something else. I’d been charging around asking questions, but it didn’t seem like I’d made much progress.
I was thinking about my visit to lemon country when I realized I hadn’t ever called the number I’d gotten for Flyboy Jeff Bosstro when I was at Reds Place.
I dug it out and dialed.
After five rings a generic robot voice came on asking me to leave a message.
“Owen McKenna calling,” I said. “I’m looking for Jeff Bosstro. I believe we have a mutual desire about a certain valuable item. We could join forces and help each other. I help you. You help me. You could get rich. So call me back.” I left my number and hung up.
I tried to look at it from the Bosstro side of things. They, or maybe the man who hired them, had already hurt Daniel and Mae by scaring them to death. They’d hurt Street by pushing her into a truck. Maybe next time they’d want to hurt me directly. If so, they might want to stake me out. What better way than to watch me and follow me to pick a good spot for doing the hurting?
Maybe they even staked me out late into the evening. I thought about how fishermen caught big predator fish. They baited a hook and went trolling. Perhaps my phone call was the bait.
Time to troll.
It was 10 p.m. when I let Spot into the Jeep. I drove down the mountain and turned south toward Cave Rock. I kept a close watch on the rearview mirror. They could be parked anywhere. When they saw me, they could pull out and follow me from way back. Or they could vary their distance and, if there was any other traffic, move farther forward or back to confuse me. Or they could be sleeping off a drunk in a campsite, planning to take me down the next day.
The late evening light of July had faded to nothing more than a memory of a dark orange glow across the lake as I approached the Cave Rock tunnel, which was illuminated inside with its new modern lighting. As I got near the entrance, I saw a pickup up ahead, possibly maroon, going my direction, though much slower, and weaving as if the driver was only one drink short of passing out.
Well, look at that. You try to entice a fish into following you, and you end up following him.
I slowed a bit and came up to within ten car lengths, close enough that I could see well, but the driver wouldn’t be able to see much of me in the rearview mirror.
The pickup went into the tunnel, taking up both southbound lanes. In the lights of the tunnel it seemed that the pickup had smoked windows like the one I’d seen before. But I had no way of knowing if it was the same truck.
The pickup went through the tunnel, still weaving. It had a pattern where it slowly veered to the left, and just before it went off the road, it made a sudden over-correction to the right and came back into its lane. Then the process repeated.
When the pickup emerged from the tunnel, it went the equivalent of a long block and then made a quick turn into the Cave Rock State Park parking lot entrance. The driver misjudged the road, clipped a sign, ran off the pavement, then jerked back. The pickup made a sudden stop.
If I was careful, it was an opportunity for me to engage a man who might be Daniel’s tormentor and maybe Colin’s murderer. In addition, an advantage was that drunks are easy to subdue, especially if they aren’t armed and firing.
I pulled over on the highway, shut off my engine and the Jeep’s lights. I opened Spot’s door, took his collar, and shut the doors quietly.
The driver’s door of the pickup opened, and a man stumbled out, leaving the pickup’s engine running. The man tripped and almost went down, then caught himself. He slammed his door in a dramatic gesture. The parking lot was sloped. The man did a lurching run down the incline, got to the side, bent over hands on his knees, and vomited long and hard.
The park was closed and there were no lights. The ambient light from distant houses was very dim. But I could see that the pickup’s driver was a big enough guy that it must have taken a lot of beers to get him in this state.
Spot and I walked slowly into the trees to the side of the parking lot. Then we came out well away from the running pickup and angled across the lot toward the man.
From what I’d seen, I was fairly certain the drunk was one of the Bosstro brothers.
Spot was tense at my side, his rigid muscles transmitting high-alert status through his neck and up my arm. He knew that this type of drunk man in an empty parking lot at this time of night was highly unusual. I knew it, too.
But it wasn’t until we’d gotten closer to the man, far enough from the pickup that its engine noise wasn’t filling the air, that I heard its passenger door open and shut. I knew then I’d been incredibly stupid and fallen for an ancient trick.
The drunk man straightened up, no longer drunk. He turned a tactical flashlight toward me, its beam like the high beam on a modern car. The light shined in my eyes before I could look away or block it with my hand. I quickly looked down, but not before my night vision was temporarily destroyed.
I too had one of the super-bright lights in my pocket, but it was of little advantage when you’re outnumbered.
Another light came from behind me. I turned just enough to perceive the second man’s position and size, which was larger than the first. Two Bosstro brothers, here to beat me to a pulp or death or both.
The breeze off the lake became brisk in a moment, the kind of crispy cold that made for runny noses. It smelled less like a lake and more like an approaching snowstorm. But I knew the real reason for my chill was my fear. Two men, armed at the minimum with baseball bats, were going to crush my skull and maybe fill me with enough compressed air to crush my organs from the inside.
I tried to take a long, deep breath, a calming technique to still the fear and minimize the panic.
“You were warned, McKenna,” a voice from behind me said. “You were told to go away. But you didn’t. Now you learn what happens.”
“Good luck with that,” I said as I quickly pulled my tactical light out. I figured I was as good as dead, which meant I had nothing to lose. That gave me license for bluster that I didn’t feel. I turned my light on with one hand and, while shading my eyes with the other hand, looked up and shined my light toward the Bosstro below me. Then, my eyes still shaded by my hand, I quickly spun and shined my light toward the Bosstro above and behind me. I couldn’t see anything clearly. But I hoped that my light may have returned the visual assault. The men might now be compromised like me. The light behind me wavered. I kept mine shining at eye level and moved it back and forth.
Through the camera-flash purple dots that comprised my impaired vision, I sensed no guns raised. Of course, it’s nowhere near as much fun to shoot a guy as it is to break his bones with a club. In the sweep of my flashlight, I saw that the man below me was huge and held some kind of club. It seemed about the heft and size of a baseball bat. He no doubt had held it in front of him as he performed his weaving walk, shielding the bat from my view. And the man behind me also had a club.
I said, “The Bosstro brothers from Lemon Hills, right?” I called out. “You in front of me are the big one, right? Lemme think. Chinless or some dumb name to go with your size. And you behind me is Flyboy.”
The man in front of me said, “It’s unfortunate for you that you said that. Because we don’t leave witnesses who know our identity. And my bro, up there, has a little thing about using his fly swatter, which has the word Slugger burned into it.”
“Maybe I got your ID wrong,” I said as I turned a second time, sweeping my light toward their eyes. “I heard the big bro was supposed to be smart. That would be you, Chinless. But clearly you’re an idiot, going around with your enforcer brother and his bat like some kind of TV show bad guy. Smart people are more inventive than that.”
He shouted up at me. “I’ll make sure to invent some new ways for you to enjoy severe pain before I’m done.”
It seemed that the light shining on me wavered. I got the sense that both men were advancing on me, one coming up from below, one coming down from above. That meant that my life was dependent on how Spot and I acted in the next few seconds.
Time makes weird compressions and expansions in moments of life-or-death stress. In the space of a few seconds, I realized that when I want Spot to be aggressive, I normally point him toward a suspect. But I didn’t have the suspect’s clothes to scent him on. I couldn’t see with the blinding lights shining on me. Most of all, the men had baseball bats. And a club breaks a dog as easily as it does a person.
My instinctive calculation had me thinking that I had to get between Spot and the baseball bats before I started my defense.
Like most animals, dogs understand aggression. They react differently to a friendly approach than they do to a tense, combative approach. Spot was already taut with tension, a quality I could feel with my hand that held his collar.
Instead of Spot running out in front of me, I wanted Spot to run with me. If he watched my lead, he would sense my trouble and respond accordingly. My hope was that I could draw the swing of the bat before Spot got to the man.
I bent down next to Spot’s head and used a low, rough voice.
“Ready, boy?” I stopped shading my eyes, pushed my fingertips down into his neck, and vibrated my hand to give him a sense of agitation. “Let’s go!”
I ran toward the man down below us. I held tight to Spot’s collar so he couldn’t get ahead of me. Spot pulled me as I sprinted, forcing me to go faster than I thought possible. I concentrated on not looking at the blinding flashlight. Instead, I focused on where I thought the man was. For no particular reason, I imagined the man as right-handed. Which meant he held the light with his left hand.
Or with his teeth.
I held my light up above my head as I ran, and I shined the beam where I thought the man’s eyes would be. My goal was for him to think that I was higher above him than reality and that he should swing higher.
I wanted him to swing the bat horizontally instead of vertically. So I ran with a tall, awkward posture, hoping I could get the man to swing for left field.
When I sensed that I was close, I made a running leap, trying to gain enough height to make him swing higher still. I hoped I was just in front of the man when I landed. I collapsed my legs and pulled Spot down with me. I released Spot as I hit the ground rolling. I used my arms to continue the roll. I heard a grunt of effort. My side ribs struck shin bone just as wood swished the air above both me and Spot.
I heard a growl. Then came a man’s scream, followed by a thud of a body hitting the ground. I knew that Spot would hang onto the man he grabbed unless the man played dead and another person attacked Spot. If the man moved or raised his other leg to kick at Spot, Spot would bite down harder, crushing the bones.
I shot my arms out, flailing in the dark. My forearm hit the bat. I pulled my arms in to the side, got a grip on the bat, and jerked it away. I jumped to my feet.
Spot had the man on the ground just as he had with Mo in Reds Place. There was another grunt. The man kicked up into the air and landed a hard blow on my hip bone. My upper body went numb. I lost my grip on the bat and it clattered away across the parking lot.
The brother raced down from above us. He shined his light as he ran toward the loose bat. I jumped up and ran limping after him. The man reached down and scooped up the wayward bat. It was a big mistake trying to hold two bats. He should have tossed it into the lake. Instead, the second bat slowed his moves.
I launched and landed a flying kick on the side of the man’s knee. Tissue squeaked and a bone snapped. The man screamed. He fell, twisting, dropping the second bat, which clattered toward the lake. He swung his remaining bat with ferocious intensity. The wood hit a glancing blow on my upper quadriceps. If it had been a direct blow, it would have crushed the muscle over the femur. Even so, it was my turn to holler. The pain was electric.
I grabbed for his bat. But his grip on it was like a vice. So I did a half-fall, half-jump onto his writhing body. I landed butt first on his abdomen. His breath went out in a big whoosh. His grip on the bat loosened. I jerked it away and scrambled to my feet, the tremor in my leg still making it jump. Incredibly, the big man kicked out with his good leg and struck me just to the side of my groin. It wasn’t completely incapacitating, but it was brutal. I bent over in a partial collapse. I was unable to breathe. My balance was off, and I knew I was falling. But as I went down, I managed to make a small rotation. He still held his light, pointed at distant trees. I used the reflected glow to guide me as I made a hard swipe with the bat, angling low.
My bat hit the ankle of the same leg with the knee I’d kicked, crushing Bosstro’s bone and tissue and maybe denting the asphalt as I went down.
This time his scream was tighter and shorter and eventually morphed to a growling, angry threat escaping through gritted teeth. “You’re dead, McKenna. You are so dead.”
My turning fall took me seven or eight feet away from the man. I kneeled on the pavement, still paralyzed from his kick to my groin. I still couldn’t get air. Vertigo seemed to haunt my perceptions. I couldn’t tell up from down.
Somehow, the man got up, hopping on his good leg, and hit me from the side like an NFL tackle. My body folded like a rag doll around the blow. It blew me to the side. My head hit asphalt. My ears were singing a high note, obscuring all inputs. I tried to hear through it, sensing the world. I couldn’t see and couldn’t hear. I felt the man grab the bat from my hands. I sensed him standing up tall, hopping on his good leg.
