The Boys from Santa Cruz

the halves apart…a little farther…

Ta-daaaa again: the phone is open.

Now visualize the faceplate. Small buttons numbered like a telephone dial. Larger buttons above them marked with little telephone icons-the one on the left is for placing or answering calls. But first you have to turn it on-that’s the larger button on the right, that’s the one you need to press and hold first.

Problem: the buttons are set nearly flush with the base-you can’t tell which is which just by touch.

Solution: just keep pressing buttons and holding them down, one after the other, until you find the one that goes beep.

Okay, pressing buttons now. Trial and error: no beep…no beep…no beep…

Beep.

5

Lacking permission to request support from the Bureau’s San Francisco field office, Pender decided to try a different approach. Before leaving for Marshall County, he dropped by the Buchanan Street offices of Epstein Investigative Services. The receptionist, Tanya, an otherwise attractive young lady with Smurf blue hair, was bristling with rings, studs, and so many piercings it looked as though someone had taken a riveting gun to her face. Even before Pender tinned her, he could tell that she was as yet unaware that Epstein had been kidnapped only a few blocks away.

He broke the news gently, stressing that there was every reason to believe Skip was still alive. Tears sprang to Tanya’s eyes nevertheless. Don’t cry, Pender wanted to tell her, you’ll rust.

Minutes later, he was addressing the assembled staff in a small conference room behind the bull pen-you could tell by the ping-pong table that it was seldom used for conferences. A motley crew, casually dressed for the most part in T-shirts, bowling shirts, jeans, and cross-trainers, they sat in stunned silence after Pender finished talking.

“Come on,” he urged them. “You guys are all pros, you find people every day of your lives. If you’ve got any ideas, now’s the time to speak up.”

A tiny woman wearing a softball jersey raised her hand tentatively, revealing a heavily tattooed forearm.

“Yes, what’s your name, dear?” said Pender.

“Sandy Pollock-and don’t call me dear.”

“Sorry, no disrespect intended. What’ve you got?”

“Do you know if Skip had his cell phone with him when he was taken?”

“I believe so. I know he had it with him yesterday-he called me from it while he was driving home from Salinas, and I didn’t see it anywhere around the apartment.”

“Great. Far out. Tanya, would you get me Skip’s cell number and his service provider so I can get hold of their security people? Then assuming he has his phone turned on, if he makes a call or takes a call, it doesn’t matter how short or long it is, they can still get the GPS coordinates by triangulating from the location of the microwave relay towers.”

“Sandy, Sandy!” Short guy, big head, tragic acne, trifocals. “Give me the number. I’ve got an automatic dialer rigged up back in my cubicle-you know, for radio call-in contests and stuff. I can set it to continuous calling.”

“And let’s hook it up to a tape recorder,” the office manager suggested. Older than the others, sideburned and pudgy, he was the only necktie wearer in the room apart from Pender. “Even if he can’t say anything, they might be able to narrow down the search parameters based on ambient sounds, stuff like birdcalls, traffic noises, railroad crossings. I saw that on Tales of the FBI,” he added, with a friendly nod in Pender’s direction.

Twenty minutes later, Pender was still trying to process this new information about cellular call tracking. The implications for law enforcement in general were staggering. But then again, so were the implications for a special agent who had been thinking about calling his boss to report that he was at the San Francisco airport but couldn’t get a flight out until Monday, when he was actually calling from a rent-a-car on the road to Marshall County, because his gut told him that’s where Sweet was holed up with his latest captive-assuming, of course, that he hadn’t already killed him.

6

It should have been easier to call 911-wasn’t the 9 button at the bottom right and the 1 at the top left? But Skip’s fingertips were so numb and clumsy and the buttons set so flush and close together he could hardly differentiate them from the faceplate, much less from each other.

After several failed attempts, it finally occurred to Skip that he didn’t actually have to call 911. Any number would do. Even better, somewhere toward the top of the faceplate there was a redial button that would reconnect him with the last number he’d called. And as far as he could remember, the last number he’d called was…Pender! Pender of the Eff Bee Fucking Eye.

Of course, finding the redial button with both hands tied behind your back was no walk in the park. He had to switch the phone on, try a button, switch it off, try another. Trial and error, trial and error, story of my life. If at first you don’t succeed-

Suddenly Skip heard the skreee of the rusty, off-track sliding door. Quickly he folded up the phone and hid it between his palms. He heard footsteps coming toward him.

“On your feet, Epstein.”

Skip sat up, the cell phone concealed between his bound hands. Luke, or Asmador, or whatever he was calling himself, untied Skip’s ankles. Skip got his feet under him and tried unsuccessfully to stand up; his legs felt like fat water balloons.

“I think I’m going to puke,” he said between clenched teeth, when suddenly the Clash started playing “Rock the Casbah” behind his back-it was, of course, the ring tone of his cell phone.

“What’s that?” The phone was snatched from Skip’s hands. He heard “Sorry, dude, you got the wrong number,” followed by a rending noise, followed by two hollow thuds he took to be the sound of his cell phone being snapped in half and thrown against a wooden wall a few feet away.

CHAPTER FIVE 1

Lieutenant J. B. Sperry, in command of the Marshall County Sheriff Department’s tactical response squad, jabbed with his pointer at a tiny red-penciled cross on the topographical map spread out across Sheriff Mike Lisle’s desk.

“X marks the spot where Epstein’s cell phone was triangulated,” he explained to the recently arrived Pender. “Access is via either the county road here”-jabbing the map with his pointer again-“or this old fire trail coming in from the south”-jab-“which is going to be slower and rougher, but should provide better cover.”

“The problem is, we don’t have any information on the site itself, such as how many buildings are still standing, if any,” said Sheriff Lisle, who had graying temples and a Batman jaw. “That’s why I want to wait for the satellite photos before we mount an assault.”

“But while we’re waiting, Sweet could be on the move,” argued Sperry, a beefy Joe Montana type, dimpled