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“My room. There’s a table in the same spot.”
Most criminals were not smart. Ballard knew that it was usually a criminal’s stupidity rather than a detective’s great work that led to solving cases. Delsey and son were not shining examples of the criminal mind.
Ballard looked around and saw a bottle of Corona on a pass-through counter to the kitchen. She grabbed it and took it back to the living room. She carefully placed it on Delsey’s back between his shoulder blades.
“You move, I’ll know it,” she said. “You won’t want that.”
She walked into a short hall that led to two bedrooms with a bathroom between them. In the first bedroom, she found her wallet with her ID card in the top drawer of the bedside table. She was surprised by how relieved she felt at recovering it. The badge was the main thing and that was still out there somewhere, but the ID card got herthrough security at all city facilities. She could go back to using the front entrance at the Ahmanson Center. All the credit cards that had been in the wallet were gone, but her driver’s license was still behind the plastic window. She got another mood lift from that.
Ballard checked the living room to make sure Delsey had not moved, then went into the other bedroom, opened the bedside table drawer, and found the scratch pad. Bobby Delsey had written down seven phone numbers; six of them were crossed out. As Ballard typed the seventh number into her phone, she wondered how long the Delsey duo had been ripping off surfers and fencing the goods through the Lion. She tore the page off the pad and stuffed it in her pocket, hoping it would cut off communication between the Lion and the Delsey duo.
When she put the pad back in the drawer, she noticed a watch with a metal band; it had been hidden behind the scratch pad. She lifted it out and studied the face. There was a brand mark: Breitling. She realized it was probably the watch stolen from Seth Dawson. The watch his father had given him. She turned it over and checked the back. There was an inscription:To Seth from Dad 12-25-21.
She pushed it over her hand and onto her wrist.
When she returned to the living room, she saw the beer bottle still in place between Delsey’s shoulder blades.
“You and your father were using the Surf’s Up app to pick your locations,” she said.
“Is that a question?” Delsey asked.
“Not really. I’m just telling you I’m onto your game. Is there any code used when texting the Lion?”
“I don’t know. My dad always did it.”
“Don’t move.” She put one foot on either side of his body and used a key to remove the handcuffs.
“You should have reached farther under the seat,” she said. “You would have gotten my cuffs.”
“It wasn’t me,” Delsey said. “It was my dad. I was just lookout.”
“What a team. My guess is you actually knew some of the surfers you ripped off.”
Delsey said nothing. Perhaps he felt guilty, but Ballard doubted it.
“Don’t tell your dad or anyone else about me. You warn the Lion and I’ll fucking come back and find you. You won’t want that.”
“I’m not going to say anything.”
“And I’ll tell the Lion it was you who snitched him off. You and Bobby won’t want that either.”
“I told you, I’m not going to say anything.”
“And you’re not going to rip off any more surfers. I’ll be reading the crime reports every day. One more rip-off at a surf beach and I’ll put together a case on you myself.”
“How do I tell my dad we have to stop without telling him about you?”
“Just say your probation officer came by and asked questions about the thefts. Convince your dad it’s time to move on.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“I’m a little short on sympathy for you, Dino. In fact, I want to put you and your fucking father in jail and throw away the key. But you got lucky this time. It won’t happen with me again.”
Ballard went out the door. She was halfway down the stairs when she heard the glass beer bottle rattle and then roll across the apartment’s terrazzo floor.
When she got back to Speedway and headed toward her car, she saw a tow truck parked in front of it; the hook was being lowered. A man with white hair pulled into a ponytail stood between the car and the garage door it was blocking. He wore sunglasses and had his arms folded across his chest as he watched the tow truck operator lower the hook. Ballard trotted over before her Defender got attached.
“Hey, hold on!” she yelled over the sound of the truck. “I’m moving it.”
