“Jameson.” He didn’t even think about it, which was very annoying.

  “Great. Whatever. Will Jameson flies an old biplane.”

  “Justin Dieter has something fast,” Duarte said.

  “Like part ownership of a jet?”

  “Yeah. A jet. Justin Dieter likes fast sleek shit.”

  Twenty minutes later, Will and Justin had Facebook accounts. Duarte embellished whatever details were visible on private accounts. I started searching the Twitter and Instagram for the names on Boyd’s list. The coffee kept me from dozing off, but it couldn’t combat the utter boredom of typing in names and getting absolutely no viable hits. Literally. I went through the entire list without finding a Twitter or an Instagram account. When I was finished, I went back to reading N-numbers to Boyd. Once he got a name, I’d punch it into socials. In total, there were nearly fifty planes. Not one hit.

  “You finished with those accounts?” I asked Duarte.

  “Yeah, sure. Is it time to start searching with them? I can be done.”

  “What are you doing?” I leaned over to look at the accounts up on his screen.

  “Well, I gave Will some hints of white supremacy,” he said matter-of-factly.

  “What the fuck, dude?”

  “I wanted him to fit in.”

  “So Justin isn’t racist?” I asked.

  “No, but Justin is misogynistic. And he’s cool with the gays—capital T, capital G—The Gays—but he’s pretty transphobic. I figure the misogyny feeds into his transphobia.”

  “We are a delightful pair.”

  “We certainly are. We followed the local EAA chapter Facebook page, which super fun fact, has a noose in the logo. I love that for us,” he said.

  “What’s an EAA chapter?”

  “You know, Will, I tried to find that out, but their website was less than helpful. I’m thinking one of the As stands for aviation.”

  “Hmm. Good reconnaissance, JD.” I nudged him with my shoulder.

  “JD?”

  “Yeah. I figure you go by JD.”

  “Totally. Of course I do.”

  Boyd’s printer came to life. He grabbed the sheet and handed it to me. “When you two are done with the circle jerk, here’s the list of plane owners.”

  “Is it technically a circle jerk if there are only two people?” I asked.

  “I think technically it’s just mutual masturbation.” Duarte hit the “technically” just right to imitate my usage. I turned around to check the room. Laurel was in her bedroom. We were still alone. “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “Laurel already gave us shit for discussing masturbation. If it happens again, she’ll never let it go. But we’re clear.”

  “Yeah, she would be insufferable.” Duarte looked around.

  “Paranoid?” I whispered.

  “Aren’t you? She’s everywhere,” he whispered back.

  “Focus, you two,” Boyd said.

  “Yes, sir.” I saluted Boyd.

  We split the list. I started at the bottom and Duarte started at the top. Five in and I had seen enough footage of small planes on big horizons for a lifetime. Every single name on the list had a Facebook account. And every single one of them had posted a video or a photo album in the last month. These were the people fueling Facebook. It was depressing as shit. In my first ten names, I found one woman, one Black dude, but seven significant mustaches. Which tracked for both my assumptions about Placerville and small plane owners.

  By one in the morning, Duarte and I were closing in on the middle of the list. I’d started drawing mustaches on the list next to the names when I found particularly distinctive facial hair. Duarte misunderstood my poor drawings and his first five had little planes drawn next to them. “I thought the planes meant you were crossing them off the list,” he’d said. For all our searching, we weren’t finding anything. Too many of the accounts were private. We couldn’t get any real information. Plus, we didn’t really know what we were looking for.

  “Done,” Jalen said quietly.

  “With what?” Boyd asked.

  “Cross-referencing the Raphael messages with FAA registered flight plans.”

  The three of us stopped what we were doing and looked at her.

  “So do you have the pilot?” Duarte asked.

  “Gavin Frank,” she said.

  “No shit?” I said.

  “No shit.” She nodded with authority. “Gavin Frank is the only pilot who could have conceivably made the runs referenced in the text messages.”

  “Frank comma Gavin. Motherfucker is on the list.” Duarte pointed to a name near the top of the list. “I went right past him. Nothing stood out.”

  Duarte and I typed the name into the search. Gavin Frank’s account was mostly private. His banner looked like the majority of the other accounts. It was two-thirds Photoshopped violet sky and one-third plane. We could see a few years’ worth of cover photo changes. We scrolled through them. In December two years previous, Gavin’s cover photo was him and another dude who looked like him kissing opposite sides of an old woman’s face. She had to be their grandmother. I kept scrolling, then went back and stared.

  “What’s up?” Duarte leaned over to look at my screen even though his showed the same information.

  “I know this guy.” I pointed at the guy with Frank. “But I don’t know where from.”

  “Looks like they’re related. Brother or cousin, probably,” Duarte said. “Does Frank have any brothers or cousins close in age?” he asked Boyd and Jalen.

  “Give me a minute.” Jalen typed and scrolled. “A brother, Travis Frank.”

  Duarte looked at me. I shook my head. It wasn’t ringing any bells.

  “Oh, shit,” Boyd said.

  “What?” Duarte asked.

  “Fuck. Jesus Christ,” Boyd said.

  “What is it, man?” I asked.

  “Travis Frank is an El Dorado County Sheriff.”

  I looked back at the photo. “That’s it. That’s the motherfucker who was arresting Melody Brewer and let her go so she could kick me in the face.”

  “Wait. Melody Brewer is the grandmother who kicked you in the face?” Duarte asked.

  “I’m sorry. Isn’t Melody Brewer Henry Brewer’s grandmother?” Boyd asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “How did a grandmother kick you in the face?” Jalen asked.

  “You know what, Randy Jalen, grandmothers are capable of lots of things. Even kicking people in the face,” I said.

  Duarte put his hand on my forearm. “She’s a little touchy about the subject,” he said to Jalen.

  “I am not. I’m just saying people write off grandmothers and they are exceedingly capable. Also, Henry Brewer’s grandmother is a terrifying woman. The face kick was nothing. She also tried to shoot me and Laurel with a shotgun.”

  “I think I see why she’s so touchy,” Jalen said.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  The shouting woke me at the ungodly hour of eight. It was excited shouting though, so that was probably good. I brushed my teeth, glared at my hair, pulled on some shorts, and padded out to the common room.

  “A fucking sheriff. I knew he had help,” Michelson was saying.

  “Well, actually,” Laurel and I said simultaneously. She whipped around to look at me. We grinned.

  “I hate when you ‘well, actually’ me,” Michelson said.

  “Wow. Yeah. That must be really annoying,” I said.

  Jalen laughed. She was still behind her laptop, but she wasn’t pretending she wasn’t listening anymore.

  “They are the ones who said he had help,” Duarte said.

  Michelson sighed. “Yes, they did. But we all agreed that they were correct.”

  I smirked and poured myself a cup of coffee. I sat at the counter so I could participate in the conversation without actually participating. Laurel moved from the couch to sit next to me. We angled away from the counter so we could see the makeshift conference table. The move put Laurel in front of me. She was wearing a gray linen short-sleeve button-up. It looked textured and soft. I refrained from touching it to check.

  Reyes and Duarte were at the table with all the FBI agents. Behind Boyd was a freestanding whiteboard. It was probably six feet wide. It was a new and not altogether welcome addition to the already crowded common room.

  “What did you find out about the sheriff?” Malone asked.

  Boyd scrolled through his notes on his laptop even though he didn’t need them. “We don’t have much to go on. His digital footprint is pretty shallow. We do know he was present at Melody Brewer’s house when she was arrested.”

  “How do you know that? Did you contact EDSO?” Michelson asked. He didn’t look happy at the prospect.

  “No. He’s the one who detained Mrs. Brewer and let her escape long enough to assault Cash. Cash remembers him,” Boyd said.

  “No way.” Laurel turned to look at me.

  “Yeah, I remember the sheriff who removed me from the house yelling at Frank when he let Grandma Brewer go,” I said.

  “Wait. What does he look like?” she asked.

  Boyd flipped his laptop around. “Here.” He had a photo of Travis Frank in uniform.

  “Shit.” Laurel reached for the laptop. “I know him too. Reyes, you see this?” She turned it so he could see.

  He leaned back to look. “Oh, shit. That’s the sheriff who helped us conduct interviews.”

  “Which interviews?” Michelson asked.

  “All the EDSO interviews. He also escorted us around when we were interviewing Brewer’s family and friends,” Laurel said.

  “So he’s probably been obstructing all along. Or at least monitoring our investigation into Brewer,” Malone said.

  “Dammit.” Michelson wrote some angry notes in his leather notebook. “Okay, what else do we know?”

  Boyd read from his notes. “Both Frank brothers attended Union Mine High School. No connection to Millard or Brewer there. Travis went to Chico State. He was hired at EDSO soon after graduation.”

  “And the little brother?” Michelson asked.

  “Gavin went directly into the Navy after high school. He attended community college for a few years when he got out. We can’t find any connection to Brewer,” Boyd said.

  “So either we haven’t found it yet or Brewer and Travis Frank became buds at EDSO. They were hired around the same time,” Jalen said.

  “Can we contact EDSO? Is there anyone we can trust there?” Duarte asked.

  Michelson thought about that for a minute. “Not yet. Let’s do a deeper dive into the Franks. Get me addresses. I’d like to set up surveillance at their residences.”

  “You think Brewer is living with one of them?” Malone asked.

  “It’s possible. Even if he’s not, maybe one of them will lead us to him,” Michelson said.

  “Okay, I’ve got current addresses for both. Gavin has a condo in Cameron Park. Travis owns a small house in Diamond Springs.” It had taken Jalen ninety seconds to find out where they lived.

  “Are they in neighborhoods? How populated is the surrounding area?” Malone asked.

  “Gavin’s place is just off a golf course. He’s in a small development with about ten other units. Older places built in the eighties, but still pretty pricey.” Jalen passed her iPad down the table. I caught a glimpse of Google Street View.

  “So that’s unlikely if Brewer is trying not to be seen.” Malone passed the iPad back.

  “Travis is in a neighborhood. It’s a bit more ramshackle but quite suburban overall. Same issue there.” She handed the iPad down the table again.

  “No garage?” Boyd asked.

  “Doesn’t look like it,” she said. “But he could have come in at night.”

  “Yeah, but it looks like the neighbor across the street has security cameras.” Boyd zoomed in on something and handed it back.

  “If they still have them, it might be a deterrent,” Michelson said.

  I leaned forward and whispered to Laurel, “See, this is why I didn’t want to go to a safe house. We could go stake out those fuckers in like two minutes.”

  She turned her head a little. “I know. You and Nate were always more effective at this shit.”

  “We also weren’t bogged down by laws and warrants and shit.”

  She shrugged and laughed quietly. “Minor details.”

  “Has anyone considered what a geek, a pilot, and two sheriffs—one disgraced—are up to? Because their texts aren’t illuminating, but they clearly are doing something,” Jalen said.

  “Exactly,” Michelson said. “This is why I want surveillance on them yesterday.”

  “It’s got to be drug distribution, right?” Duarte asked. He looked back at me for confirmation. “That’s what he told you?”

  “Yeah, totally. When he broke into my place, he said he had suppliers in place to get us up and running within a week,” I said.

  At a look from Michelson, Boyd stood and adjusted the whiteboard. He wrote the suspects’ names and their aliases. “What do we know?” Boyd asked.

  “Frank—Raphael—is flying something all over the state,” Malone said.

  Boyd wrote it on the list. “And into Nevada and Oregon. There were a few airports across the state lines.”

  “Brewer has drug suppliers,” Duarte said.

  “Frank, cowboy variety, is the inside man. He’s providing information on local law enforcement,” Reyes said.

  “Both for whatever drug ring they’re developing and to keep Brewer from getting caught,” Duarte said.

  “Brewer’s got to be managing this whole thing,” Malone said.

  “Why else would Gavin be telling Brewer his flight plans?” Jalen asked.

  “That’s what I’m thinking,” Malone said.

  There was a lull as everyone stared at the board. Curtis Millard had a whole lot of nothing under his name.

  “So, aside from a childhood obsession that I happen to remember about Curtis, is there any reason to think he’s included here?” I asked.

  “Well, no,” Boyd said.

  “Yes,” Jalen said. We stared at her and waited. “I used Will Jameson’s account and sent a friend request to Gavin. He accepted. I went on a deep dive and found this.” She handed the iPad down the table again.

  It got to Boyd and I nudged Laurel. She sighed and got up to grab it. We looked at the photo, then looked at everyone around the table. They also looked confused.

  “Smoke meth and hail Satan?” Laurel asked.

  “Yep. That is a photo from two months ago of Curtis Millard wearing a T-shirt that says ‘Smoke meth and hail Satan’ with his arm around Gavin Frank.” Jalen stood to take the iPad back from Laurel.

  “Hmm.” Boyd nodded and wrote Meth? under Curtis Millard’s name.

  “Well, this took a turn,” I said.

  “It certainly did,” Laurel said.

  “Okay. Hypothetically, let’s say Millard is making meth. Gavin is flying it out. Travis is greasing the wheels. And Brewer is managing them,” Malone said.

  “There are a lot of questions there.” Michelson was not sold on any of it.

  “Absolutely. What are they?” Boyd held his dry-erase pen at the ready.

  “Meth is not Brewer’s usual jam,” Laurel said.

  “But he’s morally bankrupt and would have no problem distributing meth,” I said.

  “But if he wanted to use your contacts, which he clearly does, then meth isn’t a viable product,” Reyes said. “Your customer base was very specific.”

  “Yeah, that’s true. I can’t imagine any of your customers buying meth,” Laurel said.

  My phone started vibrating. I pulled it out and saw Robin’s name. I held it up. “Sorry, I should take this.” Laurel nodded. Everyone else seemed unconcerned. I swiped it and headed to my room. “Hey, pal.”

  “Hey yourself.”

  “Where have you been all my life?” I shut the door and flopped on my bed.

  “Just pining for you, of course. Come rescue me from my mother.”

  “I thought you liked your mother?” I asked.

  “I do, but I haven’t lived with her in twenty years. She never stops making breakfast food. Everything smells like bacon. My hair, my clothes. My absurdly expensive face cream that used to ease me to sleep with the scent of jasmine and ylang-ylang smells like bacon.”

  “Robin Ward, my love, I will buy you more face cream that smells like jasmine and ylang-ylang. I will buy you a whole tub of face cream.” I didn’t know what ylang-ylang was, but I felt confident I could figure it out.

  “Aww, you do love me.”

  “Did you doubt it?”

  “Never.” She sighed. “So, what’s going on? We are missing prime summer grilling and drinking beer time. They need to wrap this up.”

  “Agreed. I haven’t been outside in like six days.” I missed sunshine and also air that wasn’t shared with a bunch of smelly boys.

  “That’s horrible. How are you holding up?”

  “Well, I kissed Laurel.”

  “No,” she shouted.

  “I had a talk with my mom about why she came back.”

  “Holy shit,” she said.

  “And I made a Facebook account.”

  “Okay, that’s it. I’m on my way.”

  I laughed. “It was a dummy account. So we could Facebook stalk someone.”

  “Oh, thank God. I thought that was you giving a code that you’d been kidnapped.”

  “No, but good instincts,” I said.

  “You kissed Laurel?”

  “Yes, I needed to talk about it, but I called you and you didn’t pick up.”

  “Is that past tense? Do you no longer need to talk about it?” she asked.

  “Heck no, man. I still absolutely need to talk about it.”

  She laughed. “Okay. How did the kissing come about?”

  “I offered to take out her stitches.”

  “You did what?”

  “Her stitches were annoying and she missed her appointment so I offered to remove them for her. I did so good.”

  “How does removing sutures lead to sexy kissing?”

  “Honestly, no idea. She was topless and…” I tried to expand, but I couldn’t think past topless. I couldn’t be that stereotypical. There had to be more.