Justice (42 page)

I
T WAS BAD
news walking through the door.

They were coming his way: five of them— three guys, two girls— all of them looking older than him by a couple of years but probably still in high school. The guys had some muscle, but none of them was steroidal, meaning he could take any of them one- on- one. Collectively, he didn’t stand a chance. Besides, Gabe wasn’t spoiling for a fight. Last time that happened, he messed up his hand— temporarily. He’d been lucky. Maybe he’d be lucky again. If not, he had to be smart.

He pushed his glasses up on his nose and kept his eyes on the book until the group was on top of him. Even then, he didn’t look up. Nothing was going to happen to him inside a Starbucks . . . staring at the page in front of him, his mind going a mile per sec.

“You’re sitting in my seat,” one of the guys said.

His dad had always emphasized that if he were about to be jumped, it was best to take on the leader. Because once the leader was gone, the others fell like dominoes. Gabe counted to five before he looked up. The guy who spoke was the biggest of the three.

“Excuse me?” Gabe said.

“I said you’re sitting in my seat.” And as if to emphasize the point, he pulled back his jacket, giving Gabe a five- second peek at the gun stuck into his waistband— positively one of the worst places to keep an unharnessed weapon. There were only two people in the world that Gabe would take crap from and he wasn’t looking at either one of them. To acquiesce would be a mistake. On the other hand, to confront would also be a mistake. Luckily, the dude gave him an out.

Gabe held up an index finger. “Do you mind?” Slowly and carefully, he pulled back the guy’s jacket with his finger and stared at the gun. “Beretta 92FS with some kind of a custom grip.” A pause. “Sweet.” He let the jacket drop. “You know the company just came out with an advanced model— a 96A or something like that. Same thing as the 92 series except it has a higher magazine capacity.”

Gabe stood up. Nose to nose, he was a couple of inches taller than the gunslinger, but the height differential wasn’t something he was about to flaunt. He took a half step back, giving them both some personal space.

“I like the plinkers . . . like the 87 Cheetah .22LR. First of all, it’s got great reliability. Second, it’s one of those ambidextrous pieces. I’m right- handed, but I got a real strong left. You know how it is. You never know which hand it’s gonna be convenient to use.”

They were locked in a staring contest, Gabe’s focus on the dude with the piece. As far as he was concerned, the other four didn’t exist. Then, with a sudden, fluid motion, Gabe stepped aside and held out his hand, magnanimously offering the dude his seat. “Be my guest.”

A few seconds ticked by, each waiting for the other to blink.

Finally, the guy said to Gabe, “Have a seat.”

“After you.”

The two of them eyed each other, then they both sat down at the same time with the dude taking up the leather chair that Gabe had formerly occupied. He kept his eyes on the guy’s face, never letting up for a moment. Dude was around five ten, one eighty, broad chest, strong arms. Brown hair past his ears, blue eyes, strong chin. Under his leather jacket, he had on a gray T- shirt and wore black, tight- fitting jeans. He was a good-looking guy and probably had a posse of admirers.

Dude said, “Where’d you learn about guns?”

Gabe shrugged. “My dad.”

“What does he do?”

“My father?” At this, Gabe broke into a slow grin. “Uh . . . actually, he’s a pimp.” The expected pause. “He owns whorehouses in Nevada.”

The dude stared at him with newfound respect. “Cool.”

“It sounds a lot cooler than it is,” Gabe said. “My dad’s a nasty guy— a real mean motherfucker. He also owns about a zillion guns and knows how to use every single one of them. I get along with him because I don’t cross him. Plus, we don’t live together anymore.”

“You live with your mom?”

“Nah, she’s in India somewhere. She took off with her lover and dumped me into the care of complete strangers— ”

“Are you shittin’ me?”

“I
wish
I was shittin’ you.” Gabe laughed. “Last year was a total nightmare.” He rubbed his hands together. “But it worked out okay. I like where I am. My foster dad is a police lieutenant. You’d expect him to be the hard- ass, but compared to my own dad, the man is a saint.” He looked at his watch. It was almost six in the evening and night was inches away. “I gotta go.” He stood up and so did Dude.

“What’s your name?” Dude asked.

“Chris,” Gabe lied. “And you?”

“Dylan.” They fist- bumped. “What school do you go to?”

“Homeschooled,” Gabe said. “Almost done, thank God. Hey, nice to meet you, Dylan. Maybe I’ll catch you on the shooting range.”

He turned his back to the group and slowly swaggered away. It took all his energy not to glance back.

Once he was out the door, he ran like hell.

R
INA WAS ARRANGING
roses when the boy came in, flushed and panting. She said, “Are you all right?”

“Just out of shape.” Gabe tried to steady his breathing. He attempted to give his temporary mother a smile, but it probably didn’t come out too sincere. He could tell that Rina was scrutinizing him, her blue eyes concentrated on his face. She was wearing a pink sweater that matched the flowers. His mind was desperately trying to figure out small talk. “Those are pretty. From the garden?”

“Trader Joe’s. The roses in the garden won’t start blooming for another couple of months.” She regarded her charge, his emerald eyes flitting behind his glasses. Something was off. “Why were you running?”

“Trying to be healthy,” Gabe told her. “I really need to do something about improving my stamina.”

“I’d say anyone who can practice for six hours a day has a great deal of stamina.”

“Tell that to my beating heart.”

“Sit down. I’ll get you something to drink.”

“I can do it.” Gabe disappeared into the kitchen. When he came back, he was holding a bottle of water. Rina was still giving him funny looks. To distract her, he picked up the paper from the dining room table. The front page showed a picture of a boy, the caption stating that fifteen- year- old Gregory Hesse had committed suicide by a single gunshot to the head. He had a round face and big round eyes and looked much younger than fifteen. Gabe started reading the article in earnest.

“Sad, isn’t it.” Rina was looking over his shoulder. “You think to yourself, what on earth could have been so bad that this poor kid was willing to end it all?”

There were lots of reasons for despair. Last year he had gone through all of them. “Sometimes life is hard.”

Rina took the paper from him, spun him around, and gave him her serious eye- to- eye contact. “You looked upset when you came in.”

“I’m fine.” He managed a smile. “Really.”

“What happened? Did you hear from your dad or something?”

“No, we’re cool.” When Rina gave him a skeptical look, he said, “Honestly. I haven’t spoken to him since we came back from Paris. We texted a couple of times. He asked me how I was doing and I told him I was fine. We’re on good terms. I think he likes me a lot better now that my mom is out of the picture.”

He took a swig of water and averted his eyes.

“Did I tell you my mom IMed about a week ago?”

“No . . . you didn’t.”

“Must have slipped my mind.”

“Uh-huh— ”

“Really. It was no big deal. I almost didn’t answer her because I didn’t recognize the screen name she was using.”

“Is she okay?”

“Seems to be.” A shrug. “She asked me how I was.” Behind his glasses, his eyes were gazing at a distant place. “I told her I was fine and not to worry . . . that everything was cool. Then I signed off.” He shrugged again. “I didn’t feel like making chitchat. Tell you the truth, I’d rather she not contact me. Is that terrible?”

“No, it’s understandable.” Rina sighed. “It’ll take a lot of bridge building before you get some trust— ”

“That’s not gonna happen. It’s not that I have anything against her. I wish her well. I just don’t want to talk to her.”

“Fair enough. But try to keep an open mind. When she contacts you again, maybe give her a few more seconds of your time. Not for her sake, but for yours.”

“
If
she contacts me again.”

“She will, Gabriel. You know that.”

“I don’t know anything. I’m sure she’s busy with the baby and all.”

“One child isn’t a substitute for another— ”

“Thanks for the pep talk, Rina, but I really don’t care. I barely think about her.” But of course, he did all the time. “The baby needs her way more than I do.” He smiled and patted her head. “Besides, I’ve got a pretty good substitute right here.”

“Your mom is still your mom. And one day, you’ll see that. But thank you very much for the nice words.”

Gabe returned his eyes to the newspaper article. “Wow, the boy was local.”

“Yes, he was.”

“Do you know the family?”

“No.”

“So like . . . does the lieutenant investigate cases like this?”

“Only if the coroner has questions about whether it was a suicide.”

“How can the coroner tell?”

“I really don’t know. You can ask Peter when he gets home.”

“When’s he coming home?”

“Sometime between now and dawn. Do you want to go out to the deli for dinner?”

Gabe’s eyes lit up. “Can I drive?”

“Yes, you can drive. While we’re there, let’s pick up a sandwich and take it to the Loo. If I don’t bring him food, he doesn’t eat.”

Gabe put down the paper. “Can I shower first? I’m a little sweaty.”

“Of course.”

Gabe could tell that Rina was still evaluating him. Unlike his father, he wasn’t an adroit liar. He said, “You worry too much. I’m fine.”

“I believe you.” Rina mussed his hair, damp with perspiration. “Go shower. It’s almost seven and I’m starving.”

“You bet.” Gabe smiled to himself. He had just used one of the Loo’s favorite expressions. He had been with the Deckers for almost a year and certain things just filtered in. He became aware of hunger pangs. It had just taken time for his stomach to calm down for his brain to get the message that he hadn’t eaten since breakfast and that he was famished.

It’s not that he had a nervous gut. But guns did strange things to his digestive system.

Completely unlike his dad.

Chris Donatti never met a firearm he didn’t like.

S
INCE THE HAMMERLING
case was aired on the TV show
Fugitive,
Decker had been getting calls, most of them dead ends. Still, he made it a habit to probe every single lead no matter how inane the tip. A serial killer was on the loose, and there was no such thing as half- assed investigation. The current tip was a spotting in the New Mexican desert in a small blip of a town somewhere between Roswell— known for its close encounters with UFOs— and Carlsbad, known for its network of underground caves. In the middle of nowhere was always a great place to hide out. Plus that region was in a direct line to Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, where, by some estimates, there had been more than twenty thousand murders in the past decade. The vast majority of the dead had been participants in vicious drug wars. But there was also a large minority of young female victims, possibly five thousand of them, called
feminicidios,
most between the ages of twelve and twenty- five, with no apparent connection to one another. The Mexicans’ penchant for violence would provide convenient cover for someone like Garth Hammerling if he could avoid getting killed himself.

Decker raked fingers through his thick head of hair, which retained some bright red highlights among the gray and white. Hannah said the streaks looked very punk. He smiled when he thought of his youngest daughter. She was away in Israel for the year and then after that would be starting college at Barnard. His children ranged from midthirties to eighteen and he had yet to experience an empty nest, courtesy of two very disturbed people who unwittingly enlisted his and Rina’s help in raising their child. Gabriel was a good kid, though— not a bother, but he was a presence.