“I’ll check your platforms and see if you’re lying or not. And when I’m satisfied, I will call.”
She smiles at Casey, then strides out of the bar, trailed by her escorts, who drop money on the counter and hustle to catch up.
Casey gets his mom and his barback to handle the rest of happy hour, and races up the outside stairs to the third-floor Barrel apartment/office to double ensure all his shark-finning posts and pictures and videos are in fact down. He can’t lose Mae on a technicality.
Five minutes later, he’s back on duty on the bar.
When his phone rings he almost fumbles a Lapu-Lapu on its way to a customer, then yanks out the device—vibrating ecstatically and playing the first notes of a Jack Johnson song.
“We have small wrinkle,” says Bette.
When he hears her pirate talk his heart speeds up in a bad way.
“There better not be!” blurts Casey, as adrenaline and anger burst through him. “It’s all down. Every clip, picture, post, and word.”
“We ask twenty-five thousand dollars to give back Mae. Twenty. Five. Thousand. Jacksons only. If you call police, Mae goes overboard at sea. Or maybe smuggle to a buyer far away.”
Casey feels his deepest fear for Mae landing on him like an avalanche. “I’ll get the money.”
“Call me tomorrow at this number at noon exactly. From your home in Laguna Beach. If you don’t, your dog will disappear.”
She gives him a number, which he writes on a Barrel napkin and slips into his wallet.
“Miss Wu, the second commandment says to love your neighbor as yourself. But I don’t love you. I’m closer to not liking you at all.”
“I’ll cry myself to sleep.”
Casey’s ear gets two kisses; then Bette rings off.
He calls Brock, who answers with an obscenity, sirens in the background.
“Mae got dognapped by pirates and they want twenty-five thousand dollars or they’ll throw her overboard. I’m calling them at noon tomorrow.”
Silence as the sirens whine. Casey can’t believe his own words: Would they really do that? The idea makes him queasy. Jelly kneed. Helpless. Like he’s being stranded in a leaking dinghy while Mae dogpaddles for some distant shore.
“Do you have the money, Case?”
“I can get it.”
“Mahina and I will be there tomorrow morning by six thirty.”
“I’m praying this works out,” says Casey.
“Prayer won’t do you one bit of good, brother.”
“No guns.”
“Don’t argue,” says Brock. “Don’t speak. See you soon.”
10
Casey distractedly fills drink orders and tries to yak with his customers while checking his balances. His thoughts are spinning and he can’t slow them down. Tessie and Aurora have stayed late. Tessie asks after Mae, who is often on her pad in the Barrel lobby, leashed to the ankle of the bronze statue of Casey’s dad.
“She’s at home, resting,” he says. “Worn out from the fishing today.”
Tessie looks at him doubtfully. “You okay tonight, Case?”
“Worn out, too, I guess. That was a big fish.”
“I’m ready for that surfing lesson whenever you are!”
“You got it, Tess. Maybe next week.”
Keeping track on the back of a bar check, he logs in the $648 in his checking account down at Wells Fargo, easily gettable in the morning. It’s mostly from tips and his small bartender’s hourly.
There’s another account with various sponsorship and endorsement money in it, about $4,000.
And $10,000 in CDs he opened with signing bonuses from a hip young clothing company and a start-up watchmaker. It will cost him an early withdrawal penalty of who knows what, but he thinks he can get most of that money tomorrow because the bank manager likes him.
Subtotaling $14,648, exactly $10,352 short.
“Fudge,” Casey mutters.
He’s got $1,500 in a savings account. And about a thousand in undeclared tips safe under the towels in a bathroom cabinet at home.
He adds it all up and writes the new $171,480 total excitedly, then takes a breath of deep relief. Checks his addition to find he’s slipped in an extra zero so the correct amount should be $17,148.
Still almost $8,000 to go.
