Jonathon Redding

Chapter 3

An APB was sent out immediately for the man formerly known as Douglas Rayer and/or Rodger Saulay, but with only a description, there was little chance of anyone finding him. Lisbon had ordered a Forensics sweep of Rayer's room at the Ragged Branch, but it was unlikely to be fruitful. Motel rooms were terrible for forensic evidence. Too many guests over too many years, even after diligent cleanings in between. Det. Sergeant Nelson himself had been surlier than usual on the drive to the docks, barking orders into his cell phone, but saying little to either agent or consultant. Lisbon wasn't surprised. All cops took pride in their job. Failure was personal, no matter the circumstance.

"So, tell me again how this one played out," said Lisbon from the passenger seat of Nelson's sedan.

The big man grunted. "911 gets a call at 6:12am from a Rodger Saulay, saying there's a dead guy on the East End dockyard. Says he was fishing off the pier and found some blood, took a quick glance between the storage cabs and saw what he thought to be a body. Then he waited for the cruiser to show up. I mean, most guys wouldn't. Most guys would just call it in and run."

"But for some reason, Rodger Saulay sticks around," said Lisbon. "He wants to be a part of it. He wants the rush."

"But he's gonna get caught if he keeps doing that."

She grimaced. "That's part of the rush."

"Polley," came a voice from the back seat. The only thing in view was a pair of dark grey knees. "Is that pronounced 'pole-y' or 'polly'?"

"How the hell should I know," grumbled Nelson. "His girlfriend just called him Nick."

"One can assume that 'Nick' is short for 'Nicholas', yeh?"

"Geez…"

Lisbon sighed. "Yes, Jane. One can assume that."

"But we don't know that, now do we?"

"No, Jane. We don't know that."

The back seat hmphed, and there was the sound of pencil on paper.

"You got a genius on your hands here, Agent Lisbon." Nelson grunted. "A regular idiot savant."

Her smile was growing thin. "He called Rodger Saulay, didn't he, Det. Sergeant?"

Nelson grunted again but said nothing.

It was almost dark as they rolled onto the wharf, but at least the fog had lifted. It was a cool evening, and damp, and she was grateful for the peacoat she had brought on the trip. It had been a second-thought, but it was serving her well now. Jane, on the other hand, had only his waist-coat and jacket, and she wondered if he would feel the cold.

"Right," said Nelson. "Here we are…" Both he and Lisbon exited the car. Jane did not.

The cop threw her a look. She sighed, leaned back into the car.

"Jane? Are you coming?"

"Oh? Are we here?"

"Yes, Jane. We're here."

He frowned, crumpled up one last piece of paper and tossed it into the driver's seat before slipping out and to her side.

They walked down a narrow side dock beside the water, and the smell of salt was strong in the air. It was a service road for forklifts and other dockyard vehicles, dimly lit and hidden from most eyes. She could see her breath now, tossed a quick glance at Jane. He didn't seem cold. As usual, he was looking around, taking in the atmosphere, the scene, the bigger picture. It was almost as if he spoke a different language when it came to police work. Evidence was only one letter in a vastly different alphabet.

They finally stopped at a section where cabs were stacked four high and twenty long and a countless number deep, making a labyrinth of metal, dock and moonlight out of this section of pier. The yellow tape had been taken down, the area cleaned of all evidence, and other than an APD sticker on one of the cabs, there was nothing to commend this spot as a murder scene. She could see lights from all around the harbour, and even farther out, the lights of San Francisco twinkled like stars.

She sighed, not sure what she was meaning to intuit from being here. Jane had wanted to come. It had been his idea.

"Nick Polley," she began, as Jane was saying nothing, content to just look around. "He was a trucker?"

"Yeah. For EMP Trucking. It's a local firm, big in the Bay area, but really small potatoes considering."

"And he lives in this area?"

"Yeah, with his girlfriend downtown."

"And what is her name?" asked Jane.

Nelson swung around, bristling. "What is it with you and names? You Autistic or something?"

Jane smiled the smile that reminded her of diamonds, brilliant, glittering and very, very hard. "Just paying attention. Her name?"

Nelson grunted. "Peggy Daniels. I got her address in the file. The real file. The paper file, if you want to double check."

"No, no. Thank you." He glanced at Lisbon. "I'm going to take a walk. This part of the wharf reeks of rotting fish."

And he turned his back to them, becoming little more than a silhouette in moments before the shadows of the cabs swallowed him up.

Lisbon swung back to Nelson. "You're an ass," she growled.

"I'm an ass? He's the –"

"Shut up or we'll take the case and you'll be pushing parking tickets at the next Raiders' game. Got that, Det. Sergeant?"

He grumbled but thankfully, said nothing.

"Okay, he works for EMP Trucking. Was he picking up or unloading? What was his cargo?"

"He was picking up a load of text books from a Taiwan freighter."

"And no one else was around?"

"No, that's not the deal. His rig was back there, at the loading docks. This area is just storage for the empty cabs."

"And so he just left his rig and went for a walk?"

The big man shrugged. "I'm not his girlfriend. If he wants to go for a walk by the water at night, he can go for a walk."

She stared at him, wondering how many Det. Sergeant Nelsons there were in the state of California. Officers who simply did their job and went home to a beer and a game. How many perps walked the streets because guys like these simply 'did their jobs?'

"Okay, I'm going to need the names of the men who loaded his rig, the supervisor who signed off on it, the captain of the freighter, where the shipment was headed…"

"Gotcha," he said, a little too quickly.

"You have a problem with a little police work, Detective?"

"No ma'am. It appears I have a problem with you people."

"Deal with it." She shoved her hands in her pockets and gazed out over the water.

A chill ran down her spine. And somehow she didn't think it wasn't caused by the cold.

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Hands in pockets, Patrick Jane shivered. It was cold and damp and dark, but at least it wasn't raining as it so often did in the area by the Bay. And in fact, he didn't mind overmuch, as he loved walking at night. It was almost as if his mind slowed down, took a breath, changed its pace from the constant racing of thoughts that sped like cars at rush hour. Yes, at night his mind was Sunday morning. At night his mind sighed.

He needed a scotch.

There was something not clicking with this case, with these damned names, and he knew now that he was trying too hard. He needed to relax, for the answer was surely there. It just needed freedom to peek out, like a groundhog on February 2. Something about this case had thrown him, whether it was the grisly nature of the crime, the echoes of Red John, the needling of the Forensic guy, or this particularly abrasive cop, something was preventing his normally sharp mind from picking up on what it needed to do.

He was tired.

No, it was more than just that. He was tired, to be sure, but he was distracted. He didn't want to be here. He wanted to be in a dusty attic, pouring over files and making notes. He wanted to be chipping away at the mountain that was Red John. He was losing this game - he had realized this over the summer - and he had begun to realize that it might not be his brilliance that closed part of his life, but rather, his belligerence. Red John would make a mistake and he would simply be there to find it. It was the only thing he could hope for.

He paused at a corner of the pier, looked out over the water. Black upon inky black, with lights reflecting, moving up and down with the waves. Lights from the docks, lights from boats, lights from the city so far away. The sound of lapping water and heavy boats rising and falling. Sometimes he wished he could leave. Just walk away and disappear into the night, with never another thought of Red John, his life, his wife or daughter, Krystina Frye, his job, his sanity. On a night like this, he could leave. But there would always be a dawn, and everything would come back in a maddening rush, and the traffic in his head would start up once again.

And then there was Lisbon. She deserved better than he gave her. Kept her close enough to be his anchor, but far enough to keep her safe, but even that was becoming dangerous. At some point, Red John would realize how much she grounded him, and he would cut that string without a thought. And that would be decidedly bad for both of them.

He sighed, feeling the familiar knife of guilt stab into him again. Just being in the same unit with her made her a target. He was a fool for staying. Revenge was for fools and madmen, he had told her once. But 'fools and madmen speak the truth', or so the saying went. Yes, he was quite certain he was both.

She would be looking for him. He had left her with that mustachioed buffoon. It wasn't fair on her. She deserved so much better. He sighed and turned around.

There was a man sitting on the ground, staring at him.

It was dark, and he was huddled, but there was a glint of something on his arm, something else in his hand, and Jane had seen that glint often enough in his sorry life to know what it was. Slowly, the man rose to his feet and the glint rose with him.

Jane swallowed, knowing Lisbon and her gun were far, far away. He raised his hands, purely by instinct.

"You…?" groaned the man and he stepped into the moonlight. Jane swallowed again, wondering if anyone else in the world had such bad luck or whether it was just himself. For the man standing before him, brandishing a blade, was the man formerly known as Douglas Rayer and Rodger Saulay.

"How the hell did you know, man?" he moaned, the knife glinting in the moonlight. "How the hell did you find me?"

"Ahh," said Jane carefully. "Well, it wasn't really a 'find', so much as a 'here I am going for a stroll on the dock at night and oh my, we meet again'… kind of… find."

Rayer took a step forward, knife bloody, his own arm even bloodier. "It's not your turn."

"My turn?"

"You're last. On the boat."

"Oh the boat. I know, I, I do," said Jane quickly, for in truth, he didn't. "And I'm not really the type for butting in front of others, so ah…" He glanced behind him. Only a thirty-foot drop and then water. "We should wait, yeh? For the boat…"

"I can't do this any more. This was a bad idea."

Jane brought his eyes back to Rayer, glanced down at the slices across his forearm. "Is that why are you cutting yourself, Doug?"

"That's not my name."

"I know, but it suits you. Kind, clean, earthy. It's a good name."

"My name is Mark. Mark Mooney," and the man stared down at the knife in his hand.

Jane frowned. It was a regular kitchen boning knife, with short sharp point and black handle. Not the kind that had been used on Aniston Chapman. Or Chapman Aniston. Or whatever the man's name was.

"It's not your fault, Mark," he said evenly. "He made you do it…"

The blade swung up, dangerously close to his face. Jane leaned back, dangerously close to the edge.

"No, I didn't do it, man! They did!"

"No, no, of course you didn't. That's not what I meant…" He cursed his choice of words, needing to be sharper, needing to be present. He couldn't afford another mistake. "No, they made you watch. They made you stay."

The man's eyes grew glassy for a heartbeat. His breathing changed. Jane pressed on.

"They were teaching you, weren't they?"

"No, it's just a part of the lessons, that's all. We were going to publish someday."

"Ah. Publish. Yes. Publishing is good."

"But I don't think I can."

"No. No publishing."

"I can't do it."

"No, you can't." Lisbon? His eyes flicked to the far end of the docks and not for the first time in his life, he wished he truly were psychic. "You have boundaries, you have limits, standards…"

"Yeah…"

"It was the intestines, wasn't it?"

"...yeah…"

Jane made a face. "That was just wrong."

The young man sobbed. "I knew he would do it. He was totally game for it. And it's written that way, but when I saw it…I just…I just…"

"It's written?"

"In all the books. I knew it. I know it."

"It's written that way…" Jane muttered to himself.

"The one here, that was good. I could handle that, I could do this, but the one in the park…"

Jane was not paying attention, for he was thinking. Mark Mooney could have been on Mars. "It's written…" he repeated. "...in the books…"

"In the text books."

"Yes, in the text books."

And suddenly he knew.

His stomach lurched at the knowing.

"Mark," he began in a voice low and lulling. "There is no point in the path they are following. No one will publish this. There is no point, and there is no peace."

"But there is a point. It's the beginning. It's very important."

"Okay, sure. It's very important. But there is no peace, Mark. There is no harmony. There is no quiet. And you are a man of peace. Of harmony. Of quiet. You love the water, the peace and harmony of the water, the harmony of the waves, the quiet sound of the waves…"

He began to lower his hands.

Mooney's lids were blinking slowly.

"You want peace, the sound of the water, the sound of the waves. Can you hear them, Mark? Hear the harmony in their voice, hear the quiet—"

"Police! Put your weapon down!"

It was Lisbon and it was sudden and the young man named Mark Mooney snapped out of his stupor and lunged forward, grabbed Jane's sleeve and yanked him into a stranglehold, blade pressed deeply into the consultant's throat.

"No way man!" shouted the man. "It's not my fault!"

"Put down the weapon and we'll talk. NOW!"

He could see her in the darkness, moonlight reflecting off her shiny hair and gun. In fact, it was a study in roundness, her round eyes, pouting mouth mirroring the round muzzle of the Glock in her hand. Her brow was low, jaw determined, and he thought with a detached sort of thought that she was rather pretty when she was scary.

"Stay away or I'll cut his throat!"

"But it's not my turn, remem—"

Mark yanked him even tighter, glanced down at the water below them.

"I say again, put your weapon down!"

"Shut up!" and Mooney took a step back, keeping Jane between the Glock and himself.

"Mr. Rayer, you don't want to do this. Put it down, let Jane go and we can see if we can talk to the DA about—"

From the other side, a shot rang out and Mooney's head snapped back. A split second later, his body snapped back and the pair of them, both student and consultant, pitched backwards, plunging into the cold, black darkness that was the Bay of San Francisco.

End of Chapter 3