The dumber of the two spotted the bulge of the.45 automatic under her jacket, and asked, “Do you carry a loaded gun? I mean, being a girl and all?”
She remained only long enough to see that no other employee was wearing flight-deck shoes.
At the next stop of the day no one tried to take her to concerts or ask questions about her sidearm, but the owner of Haulright Vans had gone on vacation and the shift foreman didn’t have the faintest idea who’d made the run to North Island.
And so it went all afternoon. She didn’t want to go back to the office and confess to her co-workers that they were right about the waste of time, so she didn’t return to the base until 4:45 P.M., after they’d gone home.
That evening, Bobbie Ann Doggett soaked in the bathtub and thought about giving up on the shoe investigation, but she was convinced that just about any hauler she’d encounter would feel so confident or be so stupid that he’d wear, or sell to a coworker, a pair of black, steel-toe, high-top, nonskid U.S. Navy shoes. She decided to visit as many of the trucking companies as possible just to have a look at everyone’s feet.
CHAPTER 12
After Bobbie had her eggs, toast and orange juice the next morning, and after she’d studied the list of truckers she was going to try to contact, she decided to wear a skirt instead of jeans with her blazer. Maybe a more businesslike look would help discourage rock concert invitations, but actually, she wouldn’t mind seeing Paula Abdul if somebody halfway acceptable had asked her.
Until the month before Bobbie had gone home on leave she’d been kept pretty busy by a neighbor whom she’d met through her landlady. The guy was a paving contractor, older than Bobbie, but still in his thirties, and recently separated from his wife. A guy in that state of utter turmoil where he continually waffled between reconciliation and divorce.
He’d finally kissed off Bobbie by telling her that for the sake of the children he had to go back home. As they all did eventually, every married or separated guy she’d ever dated. They always got that message across, apparently thinking it was unique, that they were only staying with or returning to a wife “for the sake of the children.” It got very boring.
After the paving contractor had reconciled, Bobbie missed the weekly dinner date, the box seat at Jack Murphy Stadium, and the pretty good sex. The contractor had a nice sense of humor, and she’d actually enjoyed him as a friend and companion. Bobbie believed that she’d learned sooner than most women her age that young guys were selfish lovers, yet she’d never had the chance to go to bed with a man over forty.
One of the women on her last ship had a boyfriend sixty-three years old, and she claimed that he was so adept sexually, he could just “talk her off.” The trouble with young sailors was, they didn’t talk at all; they just rutted like buffaloes. Bobbie wasn’t sure about a guy sixty-three, but if she met an older guy she liked she’d be very curious, no doubt about it.
The third waste hauler on her list was Reggie’s Truck Line. She didn’t get to the company in Mira Mesa until 10:30 A.M., discovering that Reggie was a cop-hater who wasn’t anxious to cooperate with anyone connected to law enforcement. And he complained to her that he’d been unable to get navy contracts, except for the one job in question, because of ethnic contractors who were beating him out. After twenty minutes of bitching about how Americans were losing out to spies, spades, and slopeheads, he grudgingly gave Bobbie permission to interview the employees who’d made a pickup at North Island.
The first was a Mexican national, fifty years old. His partner was a Honduran, about the same age. Neither spoke English, so Reggie had to supply Bobbie with a bilingual secretary from his office. Both truckers were so intimidated they could hardly talk. The Honduran wore tennis shoes with soles that flipflopped when he walked. The Mexican wore huaraches with soles made of truck tires. Bobbie felt sure that they hadn’t stolen the flight-deck shoes.
After having a burger for lunch, Bobbie noted that the next contractor on the list was Green Earth Hauling and Disposal in Chula Vista. When she got there she found that it was one of the larger hauling companies. There was a yard behind the building that encompassed a square block, and the whole property was surrounded by an eight-foot chain-link fence, topped with razor wire. In this type of business it was more to protect the public from the product than the other way around.
The company office was upstairs in a U-shaped stucco building, but before going to meet the owner Bobbie stood outside the yard and counted ten workers loading and off-loading. Two vans and an eighteen-wheeler drove out during the time she remained there observing. Business was good.
Bobbie was met in the upstairs office by a very pregnant, fortyish dispatcher with a hairdo that said, Wake me up early for the curling iron. On a woman her age and in her physical condition the hairdo looked all right to Bobbie, but being twenty-seven years old, she couldn’t help wondering why, the older they got, the harder they worked on their hair, instead of lightening up on themselves.
The pregnant dispatcher said, “Can I help you?”
Bobbie showed her navy credentials and said, “I’m Detective Doggett from North Island. I’d like to speak to the owner, please.”
The pregnant dispatcher (Abel Durazo’s sometimes squeeze, who wasn’t sure if her baby was going to look like her carrot-top husband or a papoose) picked up the phone, punched a key, and said, “Mister Temple, there’s a naval person here from North Island.”
Jules Temple stood up when Bobbie entered his office, and showed her his Rotary luncheon smile: “How can I help my favorite customer, the United States Navy?”
Bobbie thought he was a good-looking guy, but she wasn’t fond of his blond hairdo, long on top but stopping halfway down the sides. It looked like something an F-14 could take off from. He was tall and had great teeth, but he dressed like a Manila car dealer in one of those ice cream suits with a black shirt buttoned all the way up. The other waste haulers she’d met wore khakis or coveralls.
His office was surprising too. There was a glazed cabinet with bookshelves, and glass shelves for decanters of liquor, as well as two leather wingback chairs divided by a lacquered occasional table. His desk was a large glass-topped, art-deco copy. This was the office of a man who hauled waste?
After she was seated in a wingback, Jules said, “Coffee? A soft drink? How about some macadamia coconut cookies? My secretary’s crazy about them.”
“Nothing, thanks.”
She knew by the way he was looking her over that he could be her first older sex partner if she but said the word. She would not be saying it, not to this guy. She could imagine him rubbing his legs together like a happy insect.
“We had a large theft at one of our warehouses,” she said to Jules. “We can narrow it down to a period last week when one of your trucks was there picking up two drums of hazardous waste. I’d like to talk to your employees and see if maybe they saw something or could help me in some way.”
“May I ask what was stolen?”
“We’re not sure,” Bobbie said.
Jules showed his wry smile and said, “Then how are you sure there was a theft, Detective? Shall I call you Detective or …”
“That’s fine,” Bobbie said, “or Ms. Doggett if you like.”
Wryer yet, and not at all discouraged, he said, “I guess you’re saying you don’t wanna tell me too much about the crime?”
“Not unless you were in the truck, sir.”
Jules loved girls like this. He figured she was the chunky cheerleader in high school. Every school had one. She’d blossomed and lost most of it, but there was just enough still showing. Maybe in the thighs, maybe under that slim little skirt. “I understand, Detective” Jules said.