Wicked Break Read online

“You got a key?” Carter asked.

  “No,” I said. “That’s why I brought you.”

  I knocked on the door and got no response.

  I looked at Carter. “All yours.”

  He grinned and motioned for me to step aside. I did, and he took a couple of steps back from the door. Then he stepped forward, lifted his right leg, and jammed his foot into the door near the lock. The door snapped open and slammed against the wall inside.

  Carter swept his arm toward the door. “Right this way.”

  I looked at him. “I meant that I wanted you to pick the lock.”

  “Oh.” He shrugged. “Shoulda been more specific.”

  I shook my head and went into the apartment. Carter followed. I inspected the door and saw that the lock was still in place. Carter’s big foot had just splintered the wood in the frame. I shut the door behind us and it closed like nothing had happened.

  The apartment was as neat and clean as Rachel and Dana’s was messy and dirty. An expensive-looking leather sofa rested against the longest wall, a square glass table in front of it with several magazines stacked in the middle. A flat-screen TV hung on the wall across from the sofa and several audio and video components were lined up beneath it. Large photographs of the ocean hung in dark wood frames. A computer hutch with an office chair stood in the corner near the kitchen.

  Noticeably absent was the presence of any photos of people. It all looked nice, but it felt empty and lonely to me.

  “Place is nicer than yours,” Carter observed.

  “I don’t have a trust fund.”

  “Guy doesn’t live in a shitty complex like this when he’s clearly got the means to move somewhere else unless he’s got a reason.”

  “Yep,” I said, thinking the same thing. “Check the bedroom. I’m gonna look at the computer.”

  “What am I looking for?” Carter said, walking toward the hall.

  “Big black things that shoot bullets. They’re called guns.”

  “My specialty.”

  I sat down at the chair in front of the hutch, saw the lights on the monitor and CPU that indicated the computer was dormant, and jiggled the mouse.

  “Christ,” Carter hollered from the bedroom.

  “What?”

  “Kid’s got, like, twelve-hundred-count sheets. Softer than a monkey’s ass.”

  “Familiar with the texture of a monkey’s ass, are you?”

  “No. But these are awesome.”

  Carter was easily distracted.

  “Keep looking,” I said.

  The computer’s main screen came up. I looked through the files on the desktop but didn’t find anything other than what looked like school homework.

  I found the directory and checked the Internet history. Nothing out of the ordinary—a few porn addresses, some sports websites, the SDSU address, and a couple of news sites.

  Until I got to the last one.

  The line read www.whiteisright.com.

  The phrase immediately brought goose bumps to the backs of my arms. It was like I was looking right at Mo’s big forehead again.

  I found an AOL icon on his desktop and clicked on it. The main menu came up and I logged on as a guest. After entering my password, the computer connected and I typed www.whiteisright.com into the search bar.

  “Jackpot,” Carter yelled from the other room.

  I watched the screen continue to load. “What’d you get?”

  “Come see for yourself.”

  “Hang on a sec.”

  A very real image of a burning cross flashed onto the screen. The image dissolved into a smiling black man’s face. A gun emerged near the man’s ear and two cartoon bullets moved toward the side of his head. The bullets hit the face and the smile disappeared from the man’s face. The image faded away.

  WHITE IS RIGHT!!! flashed on the screen.

  My stomach tightened from both the image and my decidedly unpleasant memory of the phrase.

  A menu bar loaded on the screen, offering tabs for history, donations, and to find out more.

  “Shit, Noah,” Carter yelled again from the bedroom. “You gotta see all this.”

  It wouldn’t be hard to remember the address. I closed down the Internet connection, shut off the computer, and walked into the bedroom.

  Carter was sitting at the foot of a queen-sized bed in the middle of the room.

  He pointed at the oak dresser next to the closet. “Take a look in there.”

  The top drawer was pulled halfway out.

  It was filled with AK-47s and handguns, probably a dozen total.

  “All the drawers, dude,” Carter said. “Same shit.”

  I opened the next one down and found sawed-off shotguns. The three remaining drawers were filled with semiautomatics and boxes of ammunition.

  “Kid likes his toys,” Carter said.

  “Apparently.”

  “Guy doesn’t have that much metal unless he’s selling. Or holding.”

  I nodded in agreement. This wasn’t somebody taking an interest in guns or owning a few for protection. An arsenal like this could bring in some serious cash.

  Carter stood up and walked over to stand next to me at the dresser.

  “Look at this shit, Noah,” he said, rummaging through the open drawers, admiring the collection. “Half of these you can’t even get on the street. You’d have to go to Mexico or Central America to get your hands on them.”

  “We know the kid’s tied to both a gang and the Nazi boys,” I said. “Gotta be the middleman, right?” I nodded at the dresser. “Why else does a college kid build up an armory in his bedroom?”

  “Maybe he’s afraid of something,” Carter said, still perusing the drawers. “Or maybe he’s got something that doesn’t belong to him.”

  “Like?”

  “Well nothing goes with guns as good as money does.”

  “But why?” I said, still not sure. “What the hell was this kid into?”

  He shrugged.

  “I can tell you,” a voice said from behind us.

  Carter and I froze and then turned slowly around.

  Dana stood in the doorway, the dreadlocks on her head sticking out in awkward angles, the gun in her hands pointed squarely in our direction.

  Fourteen

  Dana motioned for both of us to sit on the bed. She wore a tight camouflage tank top and cargo pants cut off at the knees. The small silver rings were still in her eyebrow and lower lip. With the gun, she looked like some sort of Rastafarian commando.

  “I thought you were an investigator,” she said, looking at me, her green eyes flashing.

  “I am.”

  “Investigators don’t break and enter.”

  I nodded at Carter. “He did that.”

  Carter smiled at her. “I like to show off how strong I am.”

  She looked him over the way she had checked me out the first time she met me. She nodded approvingly. “You do have muscles.”

  “And in all the right places,” he said, the smile getting bigger.

  “That remains to be seen,” she said. She looked at me. “So why are you back?”

  “Because I haven’t found Linc.”

  “Did you think he was in the dresser?” She focused on my face a little harder. “And who knocked the shit out of you?”

  I took a deep breath, tired of the questions about my appearance. “Dana, look. I have no idea what’s going on with Linc. I know he’s not here and your roommate ended up in the hospital. I’m just trying to piece all of this together.”

  The corners of her mouth twitched down and she shifted her gaze to Carter, then back to me. “Do you know anything about what happened to Rachel?”

  I shook my head. “No. I don’t know if it’s all tied together or what. Like I said, I’m just trying to unscramble all of it.”

  Her shoulders lost some of their carriage. “I went to see Rachel yesterday. She looks terrible.”

  I remembered sitting with Rachel and couldn’t disagree.r />
  Dana’s arms dropped to her sides. She glanced down at the gun in her hand, as if she’d forgotten she was holding it. She tossed it toward me, but Carter reached out and snatched it in midair.

  “It’s not loaded,” she said, sinking down to the floor and resting her back against the wall. “I think it goes in the top drawer.”

  “You got it from Linc?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Gave it to me about a month ago.”

  “Why?”

  She shrugged and pulled on one of her dreads. “Not sure. He came over and said we might want to keep it. Just in case.”

  “In case of what?” Carter asked.

  “He said the people he was working with could be a little freaky and if they ever came to bother us, I could flash it at them and scare them away.”

  “People he was working with,” I said. “Who exactly were they?”

  “Don’t know.” She shook her head. “He constantly had people in here, though.”

  “Gangs?”

  She nodded. “A lot of those guys. I think it started because one of them used to live here.”

  “Deacon Moreno?”

  She looked surprised. “Yeah. Linc started hooking up with him and it just grew.”

  “What grew?” I asked.

  “Whatever he was doing,” she said. “I think he was buying and selling the guns.”

  “You know that for sure?”

  “I heard bits and pieces,” Dana said. “Pretty sure that’s what was going on.”

  “Where was he getting the guns?” Carter asked.

  “No clue.”

  “Did Rachel know about the guns?” I asked.

  Her face sagged a little at the mention of her friend. “Well, yeah. I mean, everyone kind of knew. It was hard not to know. But it’s not like any of us talked about it. But because she and Linc were…whatever…yeah, she knew what was going on.”

  “Did she have any part in it?”

  Dana tugged harder on the dreads. “No. No way. I love Rachel, but she’s totally naïve, you know?

  “Did you have any part in it?” Carter asked, turning the gun over in his hands.

  She leveled her eyes at him. “No. I knew what was going on. That was it. Got it?”

  Carter smiled. “Got it.”

  I tried to imagine my neighbors in college trading guns as some sort of part-time job, but I couldn’t make it work.

  “Dana,” I said, thinking about what Mike Berkley had told me. “You ever see any skinheads come in here?”

  She thought about it, then shook her head slowly. “Not that I can remember. Mostly gang guys, some white drug-dealer kids. That’s about it.”

  Carter looked at me. “So if the guns were here and the bangers were here…”

  “Then the bangers were buying and the skinheads were supplying,” I said, finishing his thought.

  “And none of this tells us where old Linc might be,” Carter said.

  “You have any ideas?” I asked Dana.

  “No,” she said. “It’s like he vanished.”

  “He ever have money trouble?” I asked, looking around the room.

  “No,” Dana said, pushing off the floor and standing up. “He always seemed fine. I guessed it was from the guns.”

  “Did you ever meet his brother?” I asked.

  Her eyes widened slightly. “Didn’t even know he had one.”

  I looked at Carter. “The more I look, the less I find.”

  “You are wicked good at this detective stuff.” Carter shrugged as he handed me the gun. “Guy doesn’t wanna be found.” He paused for a moment. “And if your client is no longer looking for him, then maybe it’s time to give it a rest.”

  I knew he was referring to Peter’s death. Everything was simple arithmetic for Carter. Two plus two equaled four. If Peter was dead, he couldn’t pay me. Why waste my time? Carter wasn’t completely wrong, but I wasn’t ready to let go just yet. Like it or not, I was now involved. Lonnie and Mo had seen to that. Dumping the case wasn’t going to remove me from whatever I’d stepped into.

  And it wouldn’t keep me from looking over my shoulder for my skinhead friends.

  I placed the gun back in the top drawer and closed the dresser.

  “Did you tell the police about any of this, Dana?” I asked.

  She hesitated, the tip of her tongue tickling the ring in her lip for a moment. “I didn’t. They didn’t ask about Linc. And if they had, I still probably wouldn’t have said anything. I don’t wanna rat him out.”

  Her logic was misplaced, but right on for a young college kid.

  “You know anyone that bought a gun from Linc?” I asked Dana.

  She was staring at Carter and he was staring back. Two people a little off-kilter, caught in each other’s tractor beam. I snapped my fingers between them and got her attention.

  She looked at me. “There’s this one kid. He’s in a class with me. I saw him walk out of here with a package two weeks ago, I think.”

  “Know where he lives?”

  “No, but the class I have with him starts in five minutes. I’m bailing today but you could talk to him there.”

  It wasn’t the kind of forward progress I was looking for, but it would have to do for now. There were still more loose ends than I cared to think about, but at least it felt like I was doing something.

  Dana moved her gaze from me back to Carter. “You know what?”

  Carter smiled. “What?”

  A reluctant grin curved her lips. “I’m glad that you’re here. You make me feel safe.”

  “It’s my muscles.”

  I looked at both of them, thought about telling them to knock it off, and then realized what a futile effort that would be.

  “Come on, kids,” I said, walking between them and out of the room. “Let’s go to school.”

  Fifteen

  The San Diego State campus is a myriad of gray concrete buildings and asphalt. The administration, in trying to upgrade, courted a major cable company to build an on-campus arena for sporting events, hoping that it might serve as a focal point for the students and foster a new sense of school spirit.

  So far, it had led to nothing more than a bunch of empty seats and tuition hikes.

  Claphorn Hall was just to the west of the arena and that’s where Dana took us to meet her classmate.

  “We can wait here,” she said, pointing at a stone bench adjacent to the building. “They should be out pretty soon.”

  “If he went to class,” Carter said, taking a seat on the bench.

  Dana stood in front of him, pulling her dreadlocks back into a fat ponytail. “He’s one of those pretty-boy fraternity types. Trust me. He doesn’t miss too many.”

  “Unlike yourself.”

  She smiled at him. “Some of us don’t need class all the time.”

  “That happens to be Carter’s motto,” I said, easing myself down next to him.

  “Oh, I’ve got class,” he said, stretching out his long legs, crossing them at the ankles. “I’m just selective about when I show it.”

  I looked at Dana. “Once in a lifetime would be my guess.”

  She placed her hands on her hips. “Are you always so selective about showing everything?”

  Carter pointed a finger at her. “Depends on what I’m showing. Got something in mind?”

  Her smile widened. “I’ll let you know.”

  I shook my head at both of them.

  The doors to the building opened and a steady flow of students streamed out into the afternoon sunlight.

  “That’s him,” Dana said, nodding at the last guy out of the building. “I’ll go get him.”

  She headed toward him before I could suggest otherwise.

  “I think I’m in love,” Carter said.

  “I think I’m gonna be ill,” I said.

  “I think she and I were meant for one another,” he said.

  “I think she’s more than a decade younger than you.”

  “People say
I seem younger than my age.”

  “They mean you’re immature.”

  “Still.”

  Dana came back to us, the guy on her heels.

  “Guys, this is Donnie,” she said, stepping to the side. “Donnie, these are the guys. The good-looking one behind the bruises is Noah and the white-hot-looking one is Carter.”

  Carter turned to me. “White-hot.”

  I ignored him.

  Donnie was about five-ten, a little on the thin side. A raggedy mop of brown hair sat on his head. A red T-shirt said AZTECS across the chest and his white shorts were fraying at the bottom. The well-worn black flip-flops were almost too small for his feet. One of those biker messenger bags was flung over his shoulder.

  “Dana says you guys are looking for a DJ?” he said, his voice higher than I expected.

  I shook my head. “Not exactly.”

  He looked at Dana, then back to me. “Then what?”

  “We’re looking for the gun you bought from Linc Pluto.”

  His cheeks flushed and his eyes darted in several different directions. “What? I mean, dude, I don’t know what you mean.”

  Donnie was a bad liar.

  “You bought a gun from Linc,” I said.

  “No. No, I didn’t. Who told you that?” he said, shifting his weight from one leg to the other.

  “I did, dumbass,” Dana said, clearly annoyed at his lack of bravado. “They’re not cops. Relax.”

  He turned to her, the corners of his mouth pinched. “Really? You told me they needed a DJ for some party. So fuck you if I don’t believe you, okay?”

  Carter sat up a little on the bench. “Easy, there, Backstreet Boy.”

  Donnie looked at Carter, unsure of how to take him.

  “Look,” I said. “She’s right—we’re not cops. I’m a private investigator. I know Linc was selling guns and that you bought one from him. I’m not looking to bust you. I just have some questions I need answers to.”

  Donnie’s threw his chest out, adjusting the knapsack. “If you’re not cops, I don’t have to talk to you.”

  I nodded. “True.”

  Donnie tilted his chin upward slightly. “So why don’t you and Donkey Kong just fuck off?”

  “Because then we’ll have to follow you until we get you alone,” Carter said. “Then we’ll take turns kicking you in the nuts until you feel like talking to us.”