My cell rang. It was Demetrius Smith.
“How fast can you be here? I think we can get him.”
I could get there in fifteen minutes, the freeways running lighter thanks to the recession. I met him in the parking lot of a shopping center near the grandly named Chandler Crossing Estates, which was just more suburban schlock no matter the moniker. I found the Mercedes and climbed inside.
“They’re in there, grocery shopping.”
“They must have good taste and lots of money.” It was an A.J.’s, the upscale food store in town. Its parent company, the last locally owned grocer in Arizona, was in bankruptcy reorganization.
I noticed he appreciated firepower: a.44 magnum Colt Anaconda with a six-inch barrel sat underneath his sport coat. It was the big brother of my Python.
“He’s only got one of these kids with him. So we ought to be able to take him. But don’t take anything for granted, Mapstone. He’s dangerous. Hell, these young ones today are dangerous.”
And here they came, thankfully macho, grocery bags in both hands, paper not plastic. They walked toward a Kia, purple with black-tinted windows. We got out and made as if we were walking toward the store. We were one parking row away and they didn’t even notice as we passed them, then we quickly cut over and came up behind them.
“Freeze.” I said it in a conversational voice, my hand on the butt of the Python but the weapon in the holster. Tom Holden turned his head, betraying high, wind-burned cheekbones and cold, light-blue eyes. He tossed a sack at me but that was the oldest move in the world, one you learn as a young deputy serving warrants. I sidestepped it, moved quickly to his side and put a foot behind his leg before I pushed him backwards. He fell hard to the pavement and expensive victuals fell all around him.
Smith stood over him with the long-barreled.44 magnum. It’s a very unpleasant view for someone on the receiving end. Holden didn’t move.
“Hello, Tom.” His voice carried an amiable lilt. “Susie’s Bail Bonds sends her greetings.” He swiveled the barrel toward the teenager, whose face was pasty with fear between two grocery sacks. “Kid, if you even move, I’ll blow your guts all over this parking lot.”
I heard a murmur behind me. A pair of elderly women was watching us. I pulled the wallet and flashed my P.I credentials. “Maricopa County sheriff’s deputy. Stand back, please.” They complied. To Smith, in a lower voice, “get moving.”
“I know my job.” He already had Holden on his stomach handcuffed. Smith removed a semi-automatic from the thug’s waistband, then painfully lifted him off the ground by his bound hands and marched him toward the Benz.
“Remember our deal.”
He gave a little wave.
I was using the car keys that had spilled out of Holden’s hand to check the trunk. I found what I had hoped for. “I’ll give this young man a ride home.” I ordered the teenager to walk to the Prelude carrying the grocery bags. It didn’t look as if he was armed but you never knew.
Once he was in the passenger seat, I used an old pair of cuffs that Lindsey kept in the glove box to shackle his hands behind him, locked the door, walked around to my side, and drove. The entire operation had taken maybe three minutes.
“Where are we going?”
I ignored him and got out of the parking lot fast, then crossed the freeway into Phoenix jurisdiction, just in case the old ladies weren’t so trusting of counterfeit authority. If Chandler P.D. rolled in, my move across the city limits would complicate things. The downside: I was in the Ahwatukee district, or All-White-Tukee as the cops and firefighters called it, the world’s biggest cul-de-sac with only three ways in and out, all from the east.
“Am I under arrest?”
I didn’t answer. He was tall and skinny with a dusting of acne on his nose, the barest stubble on his chin, and curly brown hair. Just an all-American boy.
“I’m only sixteen.”
I found another shuttered Washington Mutual branch and swung behind it. There was nothing but empty parking lot and a side view of the South Mountains over red-tile-roofs. Turning to him, I took his wallet and gave him a more complete pat-down.
“Hey, don’t do that. I’m straight, so don’t think I’m gonna suck your cock or anything.”
Dr. Johnson said, “Nothing so focuses a man’s mind as the knowledge that he is to hang at dawn.” Lacking a rope, I had to use the tools at my disposal. My hand went gently behind his head and slammed it violently into the dashboard, which had been hardened by years of exposure to the Arizona sun. He was handcuffed and his abdominal muscles didn’t even put up token resistance to the sudden forward movement.
“Ahhhhhhhhheeeeee!”
Blood came out of his nose but he otherwise looked fine except for a vague, terrible comprehension in his eyes.
Still, he put up a brave front. “Do you know who my dad is? You’re out of a job, asshole.”
“I don’t give a fuck.” I bounced his face into the dashboard again, harder this time, provoking another wail. Now he was bawling.
“Son,” I began, momentarily taken back by the word. I had never used it before in my life to refer to someone. “We’re going to have a conversation, and you have a choice. Either answer me honestly or I’ll beat the shit out of you, literally. You people wanted a tough new sheriff. Now you’ve got him. If you get blood on my car, I’ll shoot you and plant a gun on your dead ass. See what daddy thinks about his little junior then.”
He sniffed hard and painfully.
“What’s the old man’s name?”
“Fuck you!” It was said more from surprise than bravado. “I’ll get killed.”
I reached for his head again to continue to build rapport with the suspect.
“Okay, okay. Sal Moretti. His name’s Sal Moretti.”
Something fired inside my brain. “Sal ‘the Bug’ Moretti?”
“That’s right, motherfucker.” He was still weepy. “Now you’re gonna get yours.”
“That dashboard really likes your face.” I banged him into it again with slightly less force, but with all his pain centers running on high I might as well have thrown him off an overpass.
“Please! Arrrrrrrwwwwwwwwwwwwwwggggggg…”
“What the fuck is Sal the Bug doing in Chandler?”
“Witness relocation. But he got bored playing golf. He’s a real-time gangster.”
“What a little honor student,” I said. “Now ace the test. What…is…he…doing…here?”
His wet eyes were now full of fear at having his perfect nose irrevocably vandalized. “Black tar heroin, dog. He’s got a hell of a connection. We sell it around to the high schools. What the fuck? There’s ten of us. He picked us all by hand. All our parents have money and they’re bored shitless with their lives. They don’t give a fuck what we do. Anyway, we’re all straight-A students, go to church, that shit. Cops ain’t gonna bother us.” He sniffed his bloody nose, making a disgusting sound. “You haven’t even read me my rights. I’m a juvenile. My dad’s gonna sue the county for a hundred million dollars…”
I moved my hand and he shut up. “I can drive an hour and there’s a hell of a lot of desert where they’ll never find your body. And if they do, they’ll just think you’re another illegal who died coming norte. The animals out there eat everything but your bones. You’ll be just another wetback buried in an unmarked county grave.” My voice wasn’t hard; more of a reverie, which sounded scarier, even to me.
He was crying hard by this time. “What do you want?”
“Why did you follow us that night, outside the Sonic on McDowell?”
“Mr. Moretti wanted us to cruise by your house at night, just check on things. We saw you leave. So we waited near the Sonic. Tom wanted to do you both. Not, me, dog, I was scared, honest to god, I didn’t want to be involved in a killing. But two of the older guys had guns, too.”