“Probably does,” she agreed, as she slipped out of the 4-Runner. “Thanks Mac, I had fun.”
He waited until she got into the apartment building, and then he went home to spend some quality time with his new Facebook friends. He rolled his eyes.
Wednesday morning, there was a note taped to his computer from the other police reporter, Seth Conte: Rodriguez wants you to call him.
Mac frowned. Rodriguez had his phone numbers. All of them. Why was he passing notes through another reporter?
He made all of his blotter calls, typed up the stories, and filed them with Janet. Then he called Rodriguez.
“Wanted to check in with you about those two domestic violence cases with the arsenals,” Mac said. “Any updates?”
There was a pause. “You got time to come by? I’d rather answer that question in person. Dunbar might have something to contribute,” he said.
“Give me 30 minutes,” Mac said, already heading out the door. He could walk it faster than he could repark.
He liked walking in Seattle’s Pioneer Square. This had been where he and his friends hung out in his teen years during the evening and into the night. Thinking they were cool, tough. His grin was a bit twisted as he thought about those days. Maybe Toby was due a call. He seemed to be on his mind lately.
The police station was less than a mile from Examiner’s offices, tucked up under I-5. He had left his backpack at the office, carrying a notebook and a pen. He’d forgotten once, and brought the backpack along, setting off the security alarms when he went through. The cops had not been amused to find a weapon at the bottom of the bag — in spite of his license to carry concealed — and he’d had to have Rodriguez come down and vouch for him. Rodriguez had grumpily done so and called him a dumb shit reporter. He couldn’t even argue.
So, the backpack stayed tucked under his desk, and he passed through the security check with just a nod from the cop who was standing there.
Dunbar was in Rodriguez’ office when he knocked on the door frame.
“Come in and close the door,” Rodriguez said. Mac complied, and sat down in the only vacant chair. Obviously, meetings didn’t happen very often in Rodriguez’ office.
“So, what’s up? And why didn’t you call me direct?” Mac asked. He hadn’t updated Rodriguez on his weekend either, he realized.
Dunbar tossed him a thumb drive and he caught it.
“Didn’t want a record of me reaching out to a reporter,” Rodriguez said. “Saw Conte, told him. So, here’s the deal. Joe, here, did a records search. You’ve got the result, in part because your use of the term arsenal made the search possible. We looked for cases in the last year where that term or gun cache or gun stash came up.”
Mac looked at the thumb drive with a raised eyebrow. “And how many did you find?”
“Fifteen,” Joe Dunbar said, quietly. None of his usual banter. No jokes.
“Fifteen arsenals? What kinds of cases?”
“Mostly domestic violence,” Dunbar said. “A few weird ones, like the burglary. But mostly, cops getting called in on a DV call and finding the guy had a room full of guns.”
Mac was silent for a moment. He couldn’t decide if he was appalled at the number or thought it was too few. “I’m surprised it’s so low to be honest,” Mac said. “Let me tell you about my weekend.”
The two men absorbed what he told them.
“I think it would be interesting to run a similar search in the divorce and child custody cases, Mac said slowly. “I bet we’d turn up a whole bunch more.”
Dunbar nodded. “Don’t know that I can do that,” he admitted. “But you probably have someone at the newspaper who can.”
Mac nodded. “Maybe,” he said, thinking of the Special Project guys. Would they run it for him? Or blow it off because it was about women? And wasn’t that an ugly thought to pop up about colleagues. Maybe Mike Brewster?
“Norton sounds like a piece of work,” Rodriguez observed.
Mac wished he’d brought one of Angie’s photos. “My photog said he had set up a persona, the John Wayne one, and then when you got past it, and saw the jock who just drifted into law enforcement you thought you’d discovered the real Pete Norton and you didn’t look any further. But when I pushed his buttons and he got angry? There’s a coldly intelligent man in there with a wide streak of cruelty.”
“And yet he believes in that constitutional sheriff’s bullshit?” Dunbar protested.
Mac shrugged. “He believes he’s the ultimate power in the county. That no one can question him, or gainsay him. The constitutional sheriff thing just props that up. Lends a bit of credibility. I’m not sure he believes in anything except Pete Norton.”
“And you’re going out on one of their survivalist weekends,” Rodriguez said. “That’s not wise or smart — not that it has stopped you in the past.”
Mac laughed. “Get this, Andy Malloy told Anderson he wouldn’t be going. Malloy is the sane one of this group.”
“Malloy wasn’t insane, just racist. Extremely racist. And trigger happy,” Rodriguez said.
Both of the younger men looked at him with identical expressions of disbelief.
“He pulled a gun on me because I asked about the Sensei,” Mac pointed out.
“Well, OK, maybe that does add up to being on the edge of insanity,” Rodriguez conceded. “But he likes his life now. He’s running a gun range, hangs with the local cops. Probably 90 percent of his membership are white, and 70 percent are men. He’s making decent money, I’d guess, and life is good. Why risk it to go play survivalist? He knows a clusterfuck coming when he sees it. And you should think about that.”
Mac nodded in agreement with Rodriguez’ assessment. And wasn’t that rich? Malloy was his canary in the coal mine for trouble ahead. But he shrugged. “Can’t not go,” he said.
“Why? Because of the story or because you’re too
