Almost Criminal: A Crime In Cascadia Mystery Part 17

I was at the end of the laneway waiting for traffic to clear when a thump on the pa.s.senger door nearly stopped my heart. It was Randle, his jacket collar lifted high and his hat pulled over his ears.

"You see that? Club colours on Commercial Drive. Gutsy move."

"I thought that Vancouver was outside Devils territory."

"He's no Devil. That guy's from the big club, the Tacoma chapter. What are they doing up here? This isn't their territory. First I b.u.t.t up against Sammy Jay from California, then a full patcher from Tacoma's cruising the Drive in regalia, checking out the storefronts."

I didn't care about gutsy bikers, I just wanted to do the next delivery and get back to Wallace where I could hide in the tree house for a few hours and plan my exit.

"They'll keep Bullard off balance," he said. "Which is good. If there's a turf war, that's good too. It's all good."

A compa.s.sion club was next, the Benelux, where we'd deliver the sample case. They were across town, near Main and Hastings.

"It wasn't like this before, you know." Randle said, the words coming out thin and high-pitched as he held in a lungful. "And with the cop shop right there."

I hated the downtown east side, and the corner of Main and Hastings more than anywhere. People flowed through the intersection like schools of fish, with hands palming each other to swap bills and pills and baggies of crystals. Shoulder-b.u.mps sparked murmurs of welcome or grunts of challenge.

I hated when people made a big deal of it. Yes, it was junkies and crackheads, and the whole scene was a half block from Vancouver police headquarters. Cop cars, marked and unmarked, lined the street while deals went on unimpeded. The only comment people in Vancouver ever made about it was that it was better than it used to be.

"You grew up here?"

"Twenty-five, thirty blocks south. It's all houses and lawns, nothing like this."

Randle said, "When I came up to Canada it was hippies, war resisters, people from all over. You'd blow into town and find a cheap place in Chinatown or Kitsilano, then score some weed and head to Wreck Beach. Simple times."

I slowed at a red light and jumped at a sudden agonized wail coming from somewhere near the truck. Had I hit somebody? I craned my neck to find its source. A thick-bodied, brown-skinned woman, wearing a drop-shouldered top and brilliant orange hot pants sprinted through the waiting traffic and behind the truck, running high-kneed in loose flip-flops. She wasn't the screamer - that was a white woman with heavy makeup and henna-red-hair who was close on her tail, still wailing incoherently. The white woman zigzagged in front of the truck to cut her quarry off, and stopped cold, right beside my open window. She wobbled, limbs hanging loose like a slack-stringed puppet, and wagged an admonishing finger at her pursuer. The red-haired woman moved toward her, breathing heavily, and slipped one hand into the front of her pants. It came out holding a short, dirty-looking blade.

The light changed and traffic began to move. I reached down to open my door and Randle grabbed my wrist. "You're too late, man." He was watching like it was theatre. A car beeped. Farther back, a police car made a sudden turn. The screamer made two short, punch-like stabs, low and up under the ribcage. The brown-skinned woman looked confused for a moment, then stepped backward. She was near enough for me to touch, but I couldn't move.

"She's still standing."

"She's so mellowed out on her stolen stash she doesn't feel a thing."

The red-haired woman melted into the crowd, and the other turned to face the cruiser. Her face softened into a smile at the police cruiser that had stopped on an angle, blocking two lanes of traffic. Hey, honey her voice lilted, and she strutted in front of the cruiser and slipped her top above her small, starved b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Under her ribs, a trickling rivulet of blood. The cruiser reversed with a squeal and accelerated away. She swivelled at the knees, b.r.e.a.s.t.s tracking the cops like beacons, taunting, you know you want it, boys.

I put the truck in gear. "You done gawking?"

"Don't say that, man." Randle turned to me, his eyes narrowed in sympathy. "These people, it's tragic. So much damage."

I pa.s.sed the Benelux and drove a block farther before a parking s.p.a.ce appeared.

"Bullard says this is just another market, but I won't have anything to do with it," he said. "It's a s.h.i.t market anyways. These people have no money."

"Down there. Go." Randle dismissed me with a click of the truck's radio, and settled into the driver's seat to wait for my return. Suddenly I was a salesman.

The Benelux Lounge was the centre of a small island of active businesses. Where I stood, storefronts were boarded up, and lumpy sleeping bags filled the recessed doorways, with rusted shopping carts parked nearby. In another neighbourhood I might have been afraid of being robbed, walking with an expensive-looking sample case in my hand, but not here. These people were damaged, sad and pretty harmless.

The Benelux was the centrepiece of a freshly renovated - or gentrified, depending on your eastside politics - heritage building. With fresh paint covering years of graffiti, the building also housed a French-style bistro, shoe store and a Pilates studio upstairs. Next door was a rundown head shop with a faded Bob Marley poster in the window, and the headquarters of NORML, the political action group for marijuana reform.

A small school bus was parked in front. The compa.s.sion club's front door featured a symbol of two serpents climbing a winged staff, like the ancient medical symbol, except the wings were marijuana leaves.

Inside, servers patrolled the tables delivering drinks and light snacks - they served food, apparently - and the cannabis products were dispensed from a pharmacy-style counter, where a dozen or more seniors crowded, keeping the staff busy. While a lab-coated a.s.sistant helped first-timers fill out a medical form that stated their need for weed, from glaucoma to chronic headaches, a matronly woman ticked off a checklist and stacked packages in a wheeled suitcase. I found an empty table and rehea.r.s.ed the selling points that Randle had emphasized while I waited for the right moment to approach.

"Do you know where my gloves are?" someone said.

A stooped woman in a plaid jacket was trying to get the attention of a dreadlocked server, who shook her head without slowing.

"I left my gloves here," she said loudly to whoever would listen.

She was clean and her clothes fit, but she had a bad case of the tremors. Her face was weathered and soft, and her eyes were lost, but not threatening.

"We have a lost-and-found box, honey." Dreadlocks pointed to a shelf beside the counter. "I don't think there are any gloves in there, but you never know."

The woman kneeled down and slid out a cardboard Staples box.

From where I sat, I could see a purple folding umbrella, a battered-looking cellphone, a plastic hair clip, and a.s.sorted left-behind junk.

"No, no, my gloves." She shoved the box back in frustration. "You have them behind the counter." Her voice rose in pitch and volume.

The crowd of seniors huddled as far away from her as possible.

"No, sorry."

"Behind the counter."

She looked ready to jump the counter, but she pushed her way around the side. They were too busy, and she was too out of it. I couldn't sit there and watch another desperate junkie do something stupid.

I spoke up. "Excuse me ma'am. You're looking for gloves?"

She turned to me.

"Did they fall out of your pocket? I think I saw them outside. Come on, I'll show you."

She looked uncertain for a moment, which is exactly what I wanted. I took her elbow and she trailed behind me out the door.

Outside she figured out the ruse and locked her legs. I was just trying to plan my next step when a guy ran up and took her by the waist. Filipino maybe, with a greased flattop that tapered to a mullet.

"Sharon, baby, there you are." He gently led her down the steps. "I've been looking all over for you."

"They have my gloves."

"I know, baby, but they're busy now. We'll come back and get them later, when it's quiet."

He gave me a quick, birdlike nod and a shrug that asked for understanding. His face was thin and undernourished, with deep smile lines. I returned to the Benelux to find the front door opened for me, and a hand extended to shake.

"Thank you, stranger," said a stocky woman with short reddish-brown hair and heavy horn-rimmed gla.s.ses.

"Tate. I'm from House Of Dreams."

"Awesome. I'm Alli."

She was in her mid-twenties at most. She led me to a corner booth and waved over a middle-aged man in a denim shirt and chinos.

"This is Don. He wants to open a franchise in Kamloops, so you might as well show us both what you've got."

"What's with the oldsters? A field trip to the wild side?"

She frowned through horn-rimmed gla.s.ses and took a moment to reply. A church group. A couple of them had made a small order the previous week, nervous and shy. They'd been checking the place out.

"For their second visit, fifteen of them came here in the church's bus. They all want the same thing, to get off their meds, start feeling better, sleeping better. That's what we're all about here."

I gave an understanding nod, hoping I hadn't p.i.s.sed her off, and launched into my pitch about our organic weed and our own custom varietals, cross-bred for maximum efficacy, but Alli held up a hand. She wanted to know where the product came from, where it was grown and processed. This was touchier, since anyone in the business would know we were from Bullard's territory, so I bluffed that secrecy prevented me from being specific about our grows. I a.s.sured her, however, that everything was sourced west of the Rockies. The hundred-mile diet, and all that, I smiled.

She nodded, and said to Don, "We don't buy imported product. The importers work for the mob, and you can't be certain about what you're getting." To me, she said, "Some of our hash is from two blocks from here. Brownie Man does our brownies. Watermelon makes the cookies, you've heard of her? She's famous down at Wreck Beach. Our growers are moms and pops from here to the suburbs."

I handed her a pre-rolled joint, as Randle had coached me to do, and lit it. "Have a taste. It's not mom and pop's weed. Can you pick up the raspberry undertones? The sweet aftertaste?"

I felt like a huckster as I pa.s.sed one to Don. "And this, it's light and floral. Do you get the lavender in it? Incredible that they're both pot, isn't it? The result of nearly three decades of selective breeding."

The thing was, it was the truth. For all Randle's bulls.h.i.t, he was the master. Everyone that worked for the House, or bought its products agreed. I followed with his line about people who buy French wine and go to the theatre, and it was time to close the sale.

"I'm doing a delivery tomorrow. Can I bring four or five samples? Say, three medicinals and a recreational or two."

I paused and looked away as the two of them worked out the size of the order and discussed the prices they'd set. I gave them the time to savour the smoke and envision future profits. In the corner of an eye I caught someone looking at me, then glancing away. It was Randle, with a cup of green tea and a little bra.s.s bong. He was grinning like a father whose kid had just scored the winning goal.

Outside, he was enthusiastic. "You can't teach that. When that bag lady went nuts, you were in the moment, in control, just b.a.l.l.sing your way into their confidence. That kind of skill, man, you've got it or you don't."

I felt halfway disgusted with myself for manipulating a helpless, disabled woman to help make a sale, but at the same time I was near bursting with pride for nailing it while he watched. And I knew there'd be a bonus on the way.

He drove me to Kits Beach and dropped me off. He had someone to meet, and clearly I was not supposed to know who it was.

Two hours later, I kept pushing down the nagging worry that I might be stranded. Again. The sun had set over the Pacific and sitting on a driftwood log had become stale. I'd had a beach concession meal of soggy, overpriced fish and chips, and desperately wished I'd packed the forbidden cellphone.

At last, the green pickup showed, its cargo cap like a mustard-yellow slug in the stop-and-go beachside traffic. Randle slouched behind the wheel, his baseball cap low on his forehead as if he was ogling the beach volleyball babes, but when he saw me, his relief was obvious.

"Sorry, man. Some things don't end up as straightforward as you think they're going to be." His face was shiny with sweat and he was on edge. "Time to get out of here. Good work today, but too much waiting around." He lit a joint and the flame illuminated the cab. He offered it to me out of habit, and as usual I refused.

"One last thing. Favour for a friend, since we're here and all." He drove back toward the east side. One of his thick brown envelopes lay on the seat between us.

Main and Hastings was still thronged with the usuals as he turned north, then continued east. If he kept on in this direction, he'd connect to Highway 1 and we'd be on our way back to Wallace, but he slowed, his eyes on the apartments and small businesses along the street's north side. We pa.s.sed a community theatre's garish billboard, and he pulled to a stop and beeped.

I waited. Randle eyed the s.p.a.ce between two apartment blocks.

"The guy in the red vest?"

Three figures huddled in the shade of a pedestrian path between two apartment buildings. One of them wore a vest. Randle handed me the envelope.

"This is for him. Don't let any of the others play helpful and grab it. I'll wait here."

He idled the truck while I pulled my hoodie on, but it was too warm, and I slipped it off and tossed it on the seat.

"Hustle, we don't have all day."

Fine. I jumped from the truck and walked into the dark s.p.a.ce between the buildings. They looked like low-income projects of some kind. I moved with purpose, projecting confidence. The pathway smelled of p.i.s.s and moss, and I could hear high-pitched voices of kids speaking Spanish. As I approached, the one in the red fleece turned to face me. He looked to be the leader and was probably the oldest, about my age, with coffee-coloured skin and a prominent nose. Tough-looking. I was glad Randle was there. He took a loose, casually aggressive stance, feet widely s.p.a.ced, crotch forward. The others crossed their arms and backed him up. One of them couldn't have been older than thirteen.

The leader reached out and, without comment, plucked the envelope from my hand. He hefted it, seemed satisfied, and looked past me toward Randle and the street. He raised an index finger to his forehead and gave a mock salute.

The pickup's engine surged and I turned just in time to see its taillights disappear from view. s.h.i.t, what now?

I called out, trying not to sound too anxious, and took a step toward the street. I didn't want to break into a desperate dash for safety in front of the Latino guys.

A pair of headlights swung off the street and toward me, filling the s.p.a.ce the pickup had opened. The car hit the curb at speed, its beams leaping high for a moment, then flashing full on me just as the red-and-blues lit up. I scanned behind me for an alternate exit, something that could take me far away from the oncoming cops. The Spanish-speaking kids had faster reflexes. They were already tearing to the back of the complex and it looked like they might make it, but another cop car was coming in from that end. Had Randle set me up or had he seen them coming and split? Before the kids made it out, the cruiser stopped - and another one following close behind it - and erupted officers who plugged the narrow pa.s.sage.

So that was that. I turned and relaxed into a posture of surrender, hands away from my body. Don't look threatening, don't get Tasered, don't get shot.

There were no sirens, just the sounds of racing engines and running feet, high-pitched Spanish and low-pitched English. Above me, windows slid open and faces peered down, lit by flickering red and blue.

The unmarked car pulled to a stop almost at my knees and the two officers inside took a moment to get ready, to grab their batons or something. I was trying to figure out which one to suck up to when I was thumped from behind, and pushed face-forward onto the hood. I put my hands out, but too late to spare my chin from striking something hard and metallic as a sharp knee jabbed into my armpit. Somebody leaped like a chimpanzee off my back and onto the car's crash grill. From there he scrambled up the hood and windshield while the cops gaped in confusion. It was red-vest, with Randle's envelope still clutched in one fist. One of his feet slipped on the slick roof and he went down on a knee, but he spun and b.u.m-slid over the back window and off the trunk and he was out of there. By the time the cops had cracked their doors he was long gone, but they took off in pursuit.

I pulled myself off the hood, and looking both ways, trailed the cops at a slow, careful pace, keeping to the darker side of the path. My arm stung and I could taste blood on my lip. Somewhere behind me, other cops busied themselves chasing down the smaller kids. This whole scene was a setup and Randle had made it happen. I felt sick with fear and guilt, and I wanted to get myself as far away as possible.

The red-vested kid didn't slow down at the busy street, he leaped right into the traffic, ducking and skipping through moving cars and transport trucks until he reached the far side and disappeared between a self-storage warehouse and a garage. The cops pulled up short, cursing. I kept up my steady, inconspicuous pace, creeping up behind them and praying for invisibility. The green pickup was parked a hundred feet farther up the street, its lights off, grey exhaust licking from the tailpipe.

Then the kid reappeared, barrelling away from the warehouse and back into the street. He stopped, just long enough to catch a breath, and his head turned - not at me, but maybe at Randle - and bounded forward, right into the path of a Pacific Trailways bus.

Brakes squealed and went silent. Time and traffic stopped until at last the two officers stumbled into the street. waving their arms as if to stop traffic, which was frozen in shock. One of the cops kneeled at the bus's b.u.mper and bent over the kid, whose legs were lost somewhere underneath and I backed away slowly, away from the streetlights, until I reached the pickup.

Randle's eyes were on the rear-view mirror. "Close the door."

I slumped in the seat, nauseous at the relief I felt. "Get out of here."

"Minute."

I lowered my window and twisted the pa.s.senger-side mirror. "Is he alive?" I was hyperventilating and wanted to throw up.

"He'll be all right. Here they come," Randle lifted an index finger at the sound of ambulance sirens. "Time to hit the road."

He put the truck in gear and slid out onto the empty street, driving a couple of blocks before switching the headlights on and heading east to Highway 1. I probed the meaty swelling under my lip, wiggled the tooth experimentally, and covered my mouth to hide the sudden weeping. We were near the city limits before I had my breathing under control.

"Why did you do that?" I tried to keep the wavering out of my voice.

"You just squeaked out." Randle reached over and kneaded my shoulder.

"You set him up. I fingered the guy."

"A disaster, the whole d.a.m.n thing." He stroked one side of his nose and pa.s.sed slower-moving traffic. "You're resourceful. You don't lose your head. You have no idea how rare that is. That was -" He halted mid-sentence and sucked on his lower lip. "Here's the thing." He checked the mirrors. "Some coaches give motivational speeches, you know the kind, 'get with the program, put your heart in it,' all that stuff. I'm more of a for-example guy." He rubbed his nose again, like something itched. "You asked about Ramon."

"Yeah."