really provide any more new insights. Still, I was energized by the fact that I could fit Linc, the skinheads, and the gang into the same puzzle now and I decided to drive up to Linc’s apartment.
My conversation with Liz had made me anxious to see the end of the case, so I could get on with my life. I’d been to Linc’s during the day and hadn’t learned much of anything and I wondered if the evening would show me something else.
It didn’t.
Three hours of sitting and watching gave me no Linc, no gang members, nor any skinheads. As I headed home to bed, that rush of energy I’d gotten from Liz was turning into frustration.
I got up early the next morning, my body feeling refreshed from the tough session the day before in the water and my mind feeling clear from Liz’s visit. I was disappointed by the fruitless time I’d spent outside Linc’s apartment, but I was determined not to let that slow me down.
I was pondering how to be more fruitful when the phone rang.
“I know where he is,” a female voice said after I picked up.
I didn’t recognize the voice. “Who is this?”
“It’s Dana. I know where he is,” she said, rushing her words.
“Linc?”
“Yeah. I’m in Ocean Beach. Can you get here?”
“Tell me where.”
I took I-8 to the point where it ended, down past the Sports Arena and south of Quivira Basin. Robb Field, normally packed with soccer players and their families on the weekends, stood eerily empty on a weekday morning as the freeway dumped me onto Sunset Cliffs Boulevard.
Dana’s call had surprised me, to say the least. I was skeptical as to what I’d find when I met up with her, but it was better than sitting around and doing nothing. And she had sounded pretty sure of herself on the phone.
I hung a right on Narragansett, then a left on Bacon, taking me into the heart of Ocean Beach.
OB prided itself on being different than the other San Diego beach communities. No beachfront hotels, no chic eateries that hung out over the cliffs, and no signs that they had bowed to the commercialization that had overwhelmed many of the other seaside areas. Locals only. Local eateries, local merchants, and local residents. Nobody got into anybody else’s business and as a result, the neighborhood had become an eclectic mix of aging hippies, college students, artists, and folks who viewed society with a skeptical eye.
I turned left at Santa Cruz and spotted Dana’s Xterra just past the stop sign. I pulled in behind her and she jumped out and ran to the passenger side of my Jeep.
“I think he’s in there,” she said, out of breath, pointing up the block and across the street.
It was an old bungalow, the exterior weathered by the proximity to the ocean. A dilapidated wooden deck fronted the house, decorated only with a red sofa that had seen better days. There was no yard to speak of, just clumps of bushes that had taken up residence. The shingled roof was in disrepair, with rotting corners and a sagging middle. Still, the place wasn’t much different than the others around it.
Character, I believe the residents called it.
“You think?”
She nodded. “This morning I heard some banging around in his apartment and it woke me up. I got up and looked out the window and I saw him getting into that car.” She pointed again and I saw the brown pickup in the driveway. “I waited until he pulled out of the lot and then I followed him.”
“Was he alone?”
“Yeah. But he was already out of the car when I pulled up. I didn’t want to get too close. But I’m guessing he’s inside.”
“Any idea whose house this is?”
“No.”
It occurred to me that Dana was really eager to play junior detective and I thought I knew why.
“Did you call Carter first?” I asked.
Her face reddened. “Yes. But he didn’t answer. Then I called you.”
Impressing Carter had become a priority for Dana.
“Stay here,” I said, getting out of the Jeep. “I’m going to go up to the house.”
“Wait-he had a bag with him,” she said.
Wellton told me the apartment had been cleared out. “Guns?”
“I couldn’t tell. But why else would he have been back at his apartment?”
I nodded and closed the door.
Walking up the sidewalk, I came to the front edge of the house and moved carefully along the porch. I stepped onto it gingerly, hoping to avoid creaks and rattles. Nothing emanated from the wood, so I continued up, moved next to the screen door, and listened.
Quiet.
I grabbed my gun from my waistband, held it at my side, and knocked on the door.
Nothing.
I tried the screen, but it was locked. Moving down off the porch, I retraced my footsteps to the fence and looked over it. An empty backyard.
I put my gun back in my waistband and hoisted myself over the fence. I fell to the ground and rolled close to the house and pulled my gun out again, creeping low next to the home until I came to the edge, and peered around the corner.
A small patio. An old hibachi barbecue sat on the ground. No tables or chairs.
I moved near the sliding glass door on the back wall of the house. Taking a deep breath, I crouched down, raised my gun, and pivoted so I was looking straight in through the door.
No Linc.
I rose up slowly and tried the slider. It started to move, but then caught. An old lock making it a little loosey-goosey.
I was starting to doubt Dana. Maybe she’d smoked a little too much pot the night before.
I rattled the door some more, seeing if I could shake it loose.
A figure darted out from the hallway on the other side of the door and sprinted for the front of the house.
I spun and ran back the way I’d come, throwing myself over the fence. I came around the corner of the house to see a young man sprinting parallel to the property in the opposite direction, glancing back at me.
Which explained why he never saw Dana step out from the side of the house and clothesline him with a straight right arm.
The guy fell to the ground in a heap.
Dana looked down at him, then at me. “This is Linc.”
Thirty-seven
Dana had stunned him and he was a little woozy, so I picked him up off the ground.
“I got bored waiting in the car,” she said.
I was annoyed that she had ignored my directions, but it wasn’t the time to argue. “We’ll discuss it later.”
I set Linc on the couch. I sat down in a ripped leather chair across from him and Dana stood next to me.
Linc looked a lot like the photo Peter had given me and, in person, a lot like his older brother-same dark hair and intense eyes-just a little rougher around the edges. Dirty jeans and a black T-shirt hung listlessly on his body.
His eyes cleared and he looked like he had shaken off the blow.
I was so angry with this kid I didn’t know where to start.
I glanced at Dana. “You heard him in his apartment this morning?”
She nodded, staring at him. “The walls are thin. The noise woke me up.”
