Page 48 of Nightshade

“Wait, what? It’s not even your case.”

“Yeah, but I get the feeling that if I don’t follow up on it, nobody will.”

“Oh, man. You dumb son of a bitch. You’re going to step in it again.”

“Maybe, but I have to do it.”

“Same old Stil. Can’t leave things alone. You should have stayed on the dive team, but no, you had to go solve murders.”

“What can I say?”

“Happy hunting, brother.”

“And good luck to you.”

Stilwell nodded toward the two women, who were whispering to each other at the other end of the pool table.

“Well, my prospects just doubled,” Saunders said. “We’ll see what happens.”

As he walked out of Jost’s, Stilwell thought about the warning Saunders had just given him. His concerns were well founded, and Stilwell had to consider what he was doing and the motivation behind it. Most cops he knew grew tired ten or fifteen years into the job. Even hard-chargers became go-along-to-get-along guys.They seemed to forget why they’d put on the badge: To be fair. To right the wrongs against the innocent. To prevent those wrongs from occurring in the first place. Stilwell never wanted to forget. Leigh-Anne Moss’s motivations might not have been completely innocent, but she didn’t deserve to end up in a black sail bag at the bottom of the harbor. Stilwell was sure that once Ahearn learned her story, he would pass judgment and leave her down there as he moved on to the next one, hoping for a victim he could like.

Stilwell was sure about one other thing: Ahearn be damned, he was not going to stop his forward motion or his investigation.

17

MASON COLBRINK LIVEDin the bluffs above Carbon Beach in an eight-figure house that overlooked the Pacific and the far-off lights of Catalina. The house had somehow escaped the fires that had come over the hills from the Palisades in January and burned through Malibu to the ocean. Stilwell arrived at the gate at 9:15 p.m. He knew someone like Colbrink would view this as very late for a visit, but Stilwell had found over the years that calling on witnesses and suspects when they were not expecting it produced the best results, whether you were looking for candid or incriminating information. No appointments, no prep time.

The voice that came from the box at the gate sounded wary about the unexpected intrusion, but Stilwell used the magic words “Sheriff’s department. We need to speak to Mason Colbrink,” and the gate was opened without another word from the box. Stilwell drove up a curving road to the top of the hill. The front door of the mansion was already open and a man stood in the light coming from within. Stilwell parked in the circle and killed the engine, hoping the Bronco would not leak oil onto the blond-brick motor court.

Stilwell got out and approached the door and the man waiting for him.

“Mr. Colbrink?”

“Yes, that’s right. What year?”

“Excuse me?”

“The Bronco.”

“Oh—’74.”

“And they don’t give you a sheriff’s car or something?”

“Well, I just came over from Catalina and it saved time to drive my own wheels.”

“What’s happening on Catalina?”

“That’s what I’m here to talk about. Can I come in, sir?”

“You have ID?”

Stilwell showed him his sheriff’s card.

“Yes, come in. I think you have to.”

Stilwell knew from DMV records that Colbrink was fifty-six years old and had never been convicted of any crime, not even a traffic violation. He now saw that he was tall and thin with salon-cut-and-dyed brown hair, black-rimmed glasses, and a Malibu tan. He also had an aura that left no doubt about his wealth and standing. He led the way into what real estate agents called the great room. It was larger than most houses, with a two-story-high ceiling and matching stone fireplaces at either end. Each had its own grouping of furnishings around it. It was the kind of space where two separate parties could go on at the same time and neither would intrude on the other. Colbrink pointed to a couch in the first grouping and Stilwell sat down.

“I guess we should start with your name and what this is all about,” he said.

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