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– in walked Detective Matt Jacobo, Emeryville P.D. Auto Theft Detail.
    Mr. Washed-up Bag Man.

CHAPTER FIVE
     

    "Hiya, baby." Jacobo squeezed my shoulder, winked, then waddled into the office on a breeze of cheap cologne. He was plainclothes tonight: gray slacks, white shirt and tie, wingtips, tan trench coat. A regular fashion rack.
    "Well, well," Deacon said. "Look what the cat drug in. Have a seat. We're just wrappin' this up."
    "You got me covered?"
    "Yeah, yeah. Take a load off."
    Jacobo sat down on the couch and settled back, clasping his hands on his gut and propping his feet on the desk. He was the ugliest goon I'd ever seen: fifty, sixty, squat and flabby, kind of pitted and lipless with turtle eyes and a sloppy comb-over. He looked like a strip-show barker, but he was a cop – a nervous cop with one hand stuck in Deacon's pocket.
    "You got a lot of stock outside, Deke." Jacobo unclasped his hands and rubbed his nose. "Some squad gets a bug up its ass and I have to go through the motions, it jacks up the price, you know? Can't be helped. The motions are getting kind of tricky these days."
    Heberto gave him a deadpan.
    "Don't worry about it," Deacon said. "They're fresh and we'll be clear in a couple hours. We're moving everything down to the warehouse tonight."
    "I got to worry about it, Deke." Jacobo glanced at Heberto. "It's tougher with your new partnership – a lot more ground to cover. More hands, more divisions. Two jurisdictions. You got Narcotics in Emeryville and Oakland, not to mention the auto-theft details, and that's just state and local. Forget Customs and the DEA." He cleared his throat. "I hear the feds got a new task force sniffing around the Port. They're checking all the manifests, or so they say. It would take an army, but who the fuck knows? It's Homeland Security. Full Spectrum Dominance. Orange alerts, yellow alerts. They're all worked up about terrorism and you're shipping through a major port, so that kind of puts you on their radar."
    "Full Spectrum what?" Deacon looked puzzled.
    "They are lying about Iran," Heberto said. "Just as they lied about 9/11 and Iraq and Serbia and Vietnam and death squads in El Salvador. Weapons of mass destruction. Bullshit. All you have to do is listen to their voices to know they are lying cocksuckers."
    "What are you?" Deacon asked. "Some kind of Berkeley faggot?" He blew smoke at the ceiling. "I say waste the ragheads so they can't pull that crap again – just bomb the whole place and grab the oil. What the hell."
    Heberto smiled at him.
    "I'm not arguin', Herb." Jacobo looked pained. "Maybe it's bullshit and maybe it's not, but that's kind of beside the point right now. Maybe the feds are just trying to scare everybody so they can take over. The point is they're all over the Port and we're kind of exposed to random acts of Fate, if you know what I mean."
    "Just cover your end," Deacon said. "We'll worry about Port security."
    "Yeah, well, you don't act too worried to me."
    "Listen." Deacon puffed his cigar. "You know damn well they can't check all that cargo. They're doin' good to check five percent of the containers that go in and out of there, so all this talk about extra security is just a lot of crap for the dumb-ass voters. We got all the stamps. As far as they know, we're a legitimate operation."
    Heberto lit another cigarette.
    "We are not renegotiating your fee," he told Jacobo. "We ship in two weeks and the costs are well established."
    "That's not what I'm talking about."
    Deacon propped his elbows on the desk, closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. He looked like he had a migraine. When he opened his eyes again, he saw me and waved at the door.
    "I've got to go," I said. I could take a hint. It didn't sound like Jacobo had heard anything about Arn or the Lexus, and Deacon didn't want me to witness the payoff. That was fine with me. I didn't want to witness anything anymore.
    "You leaving already?" The scumbag was disappointed.