Cole Shoot Page 15

  It was the homeless guy Cal called ‘Wiki’. She had recruited him to keep an eye out for the kids.

  Cal rolled down her window and leaned back from the grizzly face and malodorous breath in her window. “Wiki, what’s up?”

  “I found them. I know where and how. Gonna cost a bit more for the keys to the kingdom.” The matted beard and moustache parted as he opened wide for a grin that exposed rotted, snaggled, and broken teeth.

  “First I get them.”

  “What you gonna do with a couple of mongoloid children? You one sick lady.” The man’s vile breath made Cal wince and pull back involuntarily.

  “I’m a P.I. and I am finding them for the family. Nothing sick about that,” Cal reprimanded.

  “Whatever you say.” The Wiki giggled. “I’m jist concerned about Mr. Franklin taken a nice nap in my pocket.”

  “Mei first, money later.”

  “OK, OK. Pull into the alley here,” he indicated an alley on her right three car lengths ahead. “I’ll show you where you wanna go.”

  It took several minutes, but Cal found herself in the alley next to 415. She pulled up tight against the wall and got out. The homeless man stood quite proud of himself in front of a steel door. Cal realized she had been down this alley and had even tried the door. What’s he trying to pull, she thought.

  “It’s locked,” Cal said sarcastically.

  “That’s why I am so valuable, Miss Fargo.” Wiki laughed at his joke.

  “Alright. I give. What’s the catch?”

  “I know where the key is and you don’t! Catch of the day, huh?”

  “You can get me in without blowing a hole in the wall or knocking the door down? I want the kids, but not enough to comment burglary.” Cal knew he had him.

  “So, I get a Franklin?”

  “I guess you do. If I come out that door with the two kids.”

  “We got a deal?”

  “Yes. We have a deal.”

  “Then leave General Grant here to keep me company.” Wiki’s voice grew dark and ominous.

  “No can do,” Cal said, reaching in her pocket and pulling out a money clip. “How about the Jackson twins and Mr. Hamilton?”

  “Michael and Latoya?” Wiki burst into laughter. Cal grinned to see someone enjoy himself so much.

  Cal handed Wiki the three bills. He turned and moved quickly to the electrical boxes on the wall. He popped open the box where the key hung and nearly glided to the door. Wiki unlocked the door and disappeared into the dimly lit room. A few moments later, another door opened casting a wide beam of light into the room. Cal followed and, as she entered the lobby area, saw Wiki standing at an elevator.

  “I followed them to the elevator. The numbers above the door said 14. That’s as far as I went. Figured that would do. It’ll do, right?”

  “You are a regular Sherlock Holmes, Mr. Wiki.” Cal smiled.

  Wiki hit the down button, turned without a word and headed back outside. Cal glanced around the lobby. The sound of the cables and their mechanism echoed through the empty building as the elevator reached the lobby.

  Cal looked at herself in the shiny elevator walls. She turned her head slightly and looked at the scar along her jaw and neck. The door opened, the brass plaque across the hall read ‘14th Floor’.

  The hallway must have run a hundred feet in each direction. Cal stood silent, eyes closed for a long moment. Silence, in all directions. She moved forward, pausing briefly at each door. “Don’t rush,” she said softly, “no hurry.” As she reached the windows at the end of the hall, Cal leaned against the rail. She knew she would find them, but her heart raced. She felt like a dog that chases cars, never giving a thought to what he would do if he caught one. She was minutes from finding two kids who are mentally impaired. How would they react? What if they were noncompliant? What then? Cal sighed deeply and made her way back toward the elevators.

  Door by door, she listened for a moment, then moved on. As she approached a door that stood half open, Cal thought she heard something. She stood at the door for a long moment. Then, ever so gently, she squeezed through, not touching the door, not chancing a noise from a potential squeaky hinge. She froze as she heard what seemed to be sobbing.

  The sound was coming from a door just down a short hall past the office’s reception desk. As she made her way along the wall, she spotted a girl with jet black hair sitting in a break room. In front of her, a pair of thick horn-rimmed glasses sat on the table. Her face was buried in her hands.

  “Mei,” Cal said softly, “it’s time to go home.”

  The girl looked up and squinted at Cal. She wiped her eyes on her sleeve and put on her glasses. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Cal. I’m a friend of your parents. They are very worried about you.

  “I want my momma,” Mei whimpered.

  “It’s okay, you’ll be home soon.” Cal smiled.

  “Who are you?”

  “The booming voice behind her made Cal spin around defensively.

  Marco stood in the doorway like an angry bull. His territory was threatened.

  “A friend,” Cal said as calmly and cheerfully as she could.

  “Who are you?” Marco stammered.

  “My name is Cal and I have been looking for you guys. It’s time for you to go home.”

  “This is my home,” Marco said defiantly.

  “No! This is a pretend home,” Mei said, standing from her chair. “I want my real home.”

  “We can live here,” Marco said, his anger turning to pleading.

  “No! I want to go to my house.” Mei raised both her hands and crossed her chest.

  “It’s OK, really. I will give you both a ride home.”

  “We can go home by our selfs,” Marco insisted.

  Cal’s mind raced. She can’t let them just wander off. They live in different parts of the city. She had to get them into her car and safely delivered home.

  “What if I follow you to make sure you get home, OK?

  “OK. But leave us alone!” Marco was showing signs of agitation.

  Cal wasn’t sure how far to press Marco. He transitioned from frightened and compliant to openly hostile in seconds. He wasn’t her assignment, but if he became unmanageable she could have a real problem on her hands. A problem she was ill equipped to handle. He was a big kid, and being uncertain of what he was capable of doing was a bit unnerving.

  “I tell you what” Cal began, “What if you guys get your stuff together and we’ll all go downstairs together? That way we can be sure the door gets locked.”

  “I can lock the door!” Marco shouted.

  “OK. OK.”

  Mei was sobbing softly. “I want to go home.

  “You come to my house. My mom will take you home.”

  Marco moved to where Mei stood. He gently stroked her arm. “Are you cold?” he asked softly, “You’re shaking.” Marco unzipped his bright red San Francisco Forty-Niners hoodie and gave it to Mei. Without a word, she slipped her arms into the sweatshirt and zipped it up. Cal silently watched as the pair gathered their few belongings and put them in their backpacks.

  “All set?” Cal asked.

  There was no reply. Marco took Mei’s hand and walked toward the door.

  “We don’t want you,” Marco said not looking back.

  That may well be, Cal thought, but you are not getting out of my sight for a minute.

  The elevator ride was made in complete silence. Cal watched Marco in the reflection of the doors. He stared straight ahead, motionless. Mei looked down at the floor all the way to the lobby.

  Outside, Marco left Mei by the door and went to the electrical box. Without saying a word or looking at Cal, Marco locked the door, returned the key, and went back to take Mei by the hand. They walked silently down the alley and to the street.

  The morning fog was thick, damp, and cold. The sun struggled to burn through the moist air. Even the slight breeze that came through the canyon of buildings seemed to ch
ill the damp air further. Visibility was cut down to less than half a block horizontally and three stories vertically. The sounds of the city were muffled and eerily quiet. The pair made their way toward the corner and the Muni Bus. Cal rolled slowly behind just within the edge of the fog.

  Cal pulled up behind the bus as close as was legally permissible. Stop by stop, she watched passengers board and depart. The kids were safely crossing the city and were never more than ten yards ahead of her.

  The farther from downtown they traveled, the thinner the fog became. As the bus crossed Mission the sun burst through the last wisps of fog.

  * * *

  Ricky woke with a stiff neck and a full bladder. He relieved himself between two cars in the parking lot across from where he had spent the night. The fog in the air was nearly as dense as the fog in his brain. He tried to smoke and drink away the visions of Trick sprawled dead across the floor; killed by the bullet he had fired. In the end he was unable to keep his eyes open and pulled over on a neighborhood side street.

  His rage grew more focused and his shame was so heavy he could barely raise his head, while fragmented images of the attack on the apartment continued to swirl across this thoughts. Time and time again the door was kicked in, and his friends fell broken from the attack. He did not act, he hid. In his mind he saw his frail shaking form hiding behind a chair. Ricky was haunted by the cowardly way he had tried to shoot between the legs of chairs, instead of standing like a man and taking on the enemy man to man. He should be dead.

  He returned to his car, resolute in his anger and determined to inflict damage on Norteños. They all shamed him and violated the FCBZ home turf. Ricky started the car, drank the last inch of Sloe Gin from the bottle still open in the seat next to him, and tossed it out the window. The sound of breaking glass hitting the side walk was drowned in his revved engine as he pulled from the curb.

  The trip across town in the morning, foggy, rush hour traffic only added to Ricky’s frustration and rage. He swore and pounded the steering wheel as the traffic slowed and came to a halt for minutes at a time. He made obscene gestures at drivers who dared try to pull into the traffic ahead of him or made maneuvers he felt slighted his dominate position on the road.

  As he turned onto Mission Street, Ricky began to scour the streets for red. He was like a shark searching for the first hint of crimson in the water. The “Colors”, so proudly worn as a public claim to their gang loyalty, would provide him his target. He entered the neighborhoods controlled and aligned with the Norteños and their affiliates.

  Up and down the streets as far as Potrero, he circled in search of his prey. 24th, 25th and 26th streets rolled past his window with empty sidewalks. Careful not to stray into Sureño territory, Ricky nearly took a wrong turn at Jackson Park. Straying too far north could be fatal. He found it strange that the gangs claiming North and South, as their names imply, in fact, controlled the polar opposite sections of the city geographically. Empty street by empty street, his anger burned hotter with his inability to find a release for his revenge.

  As he rolled through the lifting fog, he determined he would have to bring his targets out from the safety of their curtained windows and locked doors. Ricky rolled down the passenger side window. He now focused on finding one of their precious Lowrider cars. It seemed a car lowered close to the pavement, with custom paint, and sporting fancy gold spoke wheels would be easy to spot. A round racked into the chamber of his gun, Ricky went in search for the car he would fill with holes.

  The sun began it flood the streets and the neighborhoods seemed to rise up through the haze. Ricky couldn’t find a lowrider. He was so angry, as he reached the end of another street without a lowrider or a gangster in red, he burst into tears. He wiped his eyes with the backs of his hands and turned down 23rd street.

  As he rolled down 23rd street, to his right, Ricky saw the giant XIV of gang graffiti and fired three times, his arm outstretched from his window as he passed.

  “That should bring them out!” Ricky screamed.

  Somewhere on I-5, Luis, Carlos, Juan, and Chuey rode along listening to music on their way home. All the anger and hatred Ricky focused on the Norteños of San Francisco and the Mission District had nothing to do with the four Mexican’s from Southern California who drove north to free their friend. They had never claimed or gave the slightest indication they claimed red, Norteño allegiance, or even gang membership. Ricky just saw Brown and went to the avowed enemies of the Fire Cracker Boyz.

  As he pulled through the intersection of 23rd and Shotwell, Ricky saw his target at last. Two figures, a hundred yards away, on his side of the street, walked along, their backs to him. One wore a bright red hoodie.

  “They’re going to die!” Ricky laughed hysterically, as he jammed down the accelerator.

  The only thing blocking him was a lowered Subaru Impreza. Ricky down-shifted and passed the Subaru, barely missing an oncoming car. Fifty yards, he began to slow. His hand shook he squeezed the gun so tight.

  The distance closed. Fat Mexican guy and his girlfriend, Ricky thought.

  “Kiss her good-bye. Kiss her ugly ass goodbye!” he screamed, as he pulled up alongside the pair.

  The thunderous blast of his automatic weapon inside the car nearly deafened Ricky. As he fired the second and third shots, the girl in the red sweatshirt spun wildly, eyes wide, gasping for air, and looking right into the car. The black bobbed hair, the thick, black-rimmed glasses; Ricky was looking into the face of his little sister, Mei. As the plate glass windows behind her shattered and fell to the sidewalk, Mei’s jerking body fell into the sparkling rain of glass shards.

  Ricky jumped from the still rolling car and fiercely threw his gun, hitting a car across the street. Marco was kneeling next to Mei on the sidewalk, rocking back and forth violently and screaming her name. Ricky approached and Marco stood and began swinging at Ricky, hitting him solidly in the face, neck, and chest. Ricky was no match for the size and wrath of Marco’s blows. He turned and ran back to his car.

  Cal slammed on her brakes, leaving a string of cars, screeching and nearly colliding, behind her. She ran from her car to where Mei lay on the sidewalk. Marcos swung at her violently. He cried, blindly swinging one second, gently stroking Mei’s arm the next.

  Cal knelt across from Marco and felt Mei’s neck for a pulse. It was weak, but still there. Cal quickly examined Mei’s thick torso for wounds. One bullet struck her rib cage, another just above her naval, and the third struck the thick part of her arm below the shoulder. Cal fumbled for her phone but her hands were too wet and slippery with blood to be able to dial.

  “Call an ambulance!” Call screamed at a man standing by the car stopped behind her Subaru.

  Ricky’s car had rolled several lengths up the street and had come to rest against the bumper of an SUV. The alarm from the SUV added to the frantic noise and ramped up Ricky’s panicked confusion. He felt his pockets for his phone, dialed three digits and waited.

  “I shot her!” Ricky yelled into the phone.

  “Calm down, sir. Who did you shoot?” The 911 operator asked.

  “I shot her! I shot Mei. Send help, send an ambulance.”

  “What is your location, sir?”

  “23rd Street. I don’t know, uh, Shotwell. Hurry! Send an ambulance.”

  A crowd began to gather around Mei and Marcos. A large woman in a raincoat knelt next to Mei. She took a large blue scarf from her pocket and applied pressure to her stomach wound.

  People were pointing and screaming at Ricky. Others spoke into their cell phones. Two were taking pictures of him. In the distance, the sound of approaching sirens grew louder. The swirling kaleidoscope of sounds and visuals around him, and the constant replaying of Mei’s face as she fell into the sparkling waterfall of glass, was pushing Ricky to the edge of madness.

  Ricky pushed his fists tight against his temples. As the owner of the SUV approached the scenes, Ricky jumped into his car and slammed it into reverse. Without looking
back he floored the accelerator and disappeared into a blue haze of smoke and burning rubber.

  FIFTEEN

  “Lieutenant Chin on line one,” Hanna said, sticking her head in Cole’s door. “Nice to have you back.” Her sarcasm was not lost on Cole.

  “Cole, got something for you.” Leonard Chin’s distinctive voice carried a strange ironic tone.

  “Hold on, let me grab a pencil,” Cole said looking down at his tornado ravaged desk. “Ready.”

  “It seems once again the law of the jungle has prevailed. In spite of our best efforts to solve the Parade shooting, the answer has been dropped in our, make that, my, lap.”

  “This should be good.”

  “Yeah, get this. It seems a group of really ballsy Norteños kicked in the door to the Fire Cracker Boys playroom and beat the hell out of them. Slashed one with a razor blade or something, broke a couple of arms and cracked some heads, but they didn’t kill anybody.”

  “That doesn’t sound quite right.” Cole smiled, knowing Chin couldn’t see him.

  “They didn’t use guns. They beat the shit out of them with baseball bats. Even the guy that got slashed, half dozen or so cuts all across his chest and stomach and only an eighth of an inch deep.”

  “What about the attackers?”

  “One guy shot, we don’t know anything about him.”

  “OK, so back up. How is it we know all this?” Cole asked, not sure where this was all going.

  “This is the part you won’t believe. This morning I get a call from a kid named Ricky Chou. His father’s on the edges of the Tongs. His kid, it turns out, is a Fire Cracker!” Chin shows an unusual outburst of excitement. “He says he’s shot his sister. Two seconds later I get a call about a shooting on Shotwell. It’s her, or at least it fits.”

  “That’s not a very Chinese thing to do. I mean, to take out someone in your own family? Right?”

  “Exactly. Seems she was wearing a red sweatshirt, he was out for blood and...”

  “So he kills his own sister?” Cole interrupted.

  “She’s not dead, took three bullets, but she’s still alive. She’s in surgery at San Francisco General right now.”