Page 41 of Goose

Goose

“Idon’t need every dumb fucking idea under the stars thrown at me,” Baker complained. “I need something that’ll work. We’ve got a fucking detective nosing around, and his curiosity with us is keeping us from moving forward on the Bakersfield job. We need to get this resolved, and we need to agree.”

I found it amusing that Baker’s opinion on matters changed drastically after talking to me about the situation with the dead cop. In the past, I’d been referred to as skittish, scared, and over-the-top when it came to precautionary measures.

My caffeine intake was typically to blame, at least according to Baker. He claimed my all-day consumption of coffee left me “on edge” and jittery, which, in turn, caused me to believe everyone was after me.

I didn’t believe “everyone” was after me. Only the ones that were clearly after everyone, me included. I was informed. At times, I wish I wasn’t. If the general public knew what I knew about the government’s listening and watching abilities, it would make them skittish, too.

“Reno’s idea wasn’t terrible,” Tito said. “But the existence of DNA remains, albeit diminished, when a body is decomposed through the use of acid. The acid must be disposed of somewhere, and wherever that somewhere is, the soil could be sampled, any DNA would be present. Dumping acid in the Mojave Desert isn’t a great idea.”

Cash grinned from ear to ear. “What if the acid was dumped in the ocean? That shit would be diluted in a fuckin’ minute.”

“Only problem with that is gettin’ the acid on a boat,” Reno retorted. “It’d have to be a 55-gallon drum. Loading something that big on a boat will raise a lot of eyebrows. ‘Round here, they’ll think your either smugglin’ a body, or smugglin’ dope. Either way, Coast Guard would be on you like shit on a wheel before you got that shit dumped.”

Reno was right. A vessel large enough to house all the body parts would be huge. Loading it on a boat wouldn’t go unnoticed. Secondly, we didn’t own a boat.

“A 55-gallon drum filled with fluid would weight five hundred pounds,” Tito declared. “It would be impossible to dolly it down the boardwalk and get it loaded without being noticed. Half of San Diego bay would be calling 9-1-1 before the boat left the dock.”

“And, you’d have to wear one of those suits to keep that shit from splatterin’ on ya,” Reno added. “All the whale huggers would call the EPA if nothing else.”

“I know you all think I’m overly cautious, but I can only come up with two plans I like. One is cremating the body. We don’t have access to a crematorium, so that’s pretty much out. The second is loading the concrete blocks onto a boat, taking the boat twenty miles out, and tossing them. We could carry the body parts onto the boat in beer coolers. Act like we’re taking a fishing expedition. The water’s two and a half miles deep out there. The only problem is we’d have to buy a boat.”

“I like it,” Baker said. “Why don’t we rent a boat?”

“Any rental boat would have a GPS on it,” I said. “They could use that data to take them right to the location where we dumped it. If we bought one, it wouldn’t have to be fitted with anything. As long as we don’t take our cell phones on the trip, they’d never know where we dumped the shit.”

“As vast as the Pacific Ocean is,” Tito added. “The odds of anything being found would be in the trillions to one. Actually, taking depth into consideration, it would be incalculable. That’s the best idea, so far.”

Baker looked at each of us. “Anybody have a connection at a mortuary?”

“Crematory,” Tito said, correcting him. “A mortuary may organize the cremation service, but the crematory does the act.”

“Okay,” Baker sighed. “Crematory.” He glanced from man to man. “Anyone?”

“Can’t the ashes be checked for DNA?” Cash asked.

Tito shook his head. “The eighteen-hundred degree temperature destroys any DNA evidence.”

“That sounds like our best bet,” I said. “What about building an oven?”

“Our welder is no longer with us, Goose,” Baker said. “We don’t have anyone that can fabricate steel.”

Remembering that Ghost was gone wasn’t an easy thing to do. I hadn’t gone two or three days without seeing him since the day I met him in elementary school. The five of us had truly been inseparable. His absence was something I needed to continually remind myself of.

I glanced at my watch. It was damned near five o’clock. I had somewhere I needed to be at six. Being late wasn’t an option.

“The longer we bump our gums on this deal, the greater our odds are of getting caught,” I said. “Let’s make a goddamned decision. All we’ve done so far is waste precious time.”

“What’s it matter?” Baker asked. “We’ve got all night.”

“You might. I don’t. I’ve got something in the works.”

His eyes narrowed. “What?”

It was damned near as important as disposing of the dead body, but it was none of his business.

“I’ll let you know as it gets closer to fruition,” I lied.