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Around one Wakefield locks up and wanders down the boardwalk to a burrito place and has one with a beer. I get some discreet shots of him with his mouth full. Sexy stuff. Helmut Newton would be jealous.

Another dozen ­people go in and out of his shop. No one stays very long. Either his business is on its last legs, or he charges enough for the stuff he does in the back that he doesn’t need much tourist trade and he just likes being at the beach. My guess is it’s the second. He looks like a man who truly does not give one single fuck.

It’s a sunny January day in L.A., but still technically winter. The sun starts going down around five. By five thirty, the sky is dark and Wakefield hasn’t had a customer in an hour.

At six thirty on the dot, Tamerlan Radescu and his crew arrive at the shop. Wakefield meets them outside and ushers them in. I put the camera on infrared and snap away.

Tamerlan is inside for all of twenty minutes. Then he’s out again. He and Wakefield shake hands warmly at the door. Tamerlan’s men scan the crowd like nervous meerkats in case a vicious skateboarder or some bikini girls decide to race up wearing dynamite vests.

After Tamerlan and his men leave, Wakefield starts to lock up. Faced with a choice between watching Wakefield have another cigarette or following Tamerlan, I go for door number two.

Just as I pull out of the parking lot, my phone goes off. It’s Candy.

“How was your day?” she says.

“I longed for Gojira to rise from the sea and put me out of my misery. But things are looking up. Tamerlan Radescu just showed up and I’m following him.”

“Aren’t you supposed to stay with the other guy?”

“He’s a stiff and Tamerlan was in and out of his place real quick. Just long enough for a shakedown. I want to see if he hits any other Dead Head shops.”

“I guess that’s a good idea. You should call Julie.”

“Why don’t you call her for me? I don’t want to lose him.”

“Don’t spook him. Stay cool.”

“Don’t worry about my cool. I’m Steve McQueen riding a polar bear.”

“Okay. I’ll call Julie.”

“How was your guy?”

“Boring too. He went to a bar down the street like ten times during the day. I kind of felt sorry for him after a while.”

“Weren’t you going to send me smut if you were bored?”

“Yeah, but I got depressed watching him. I’ll mail you dirty pictures from the kitchen when I get home.”

“Then I’ll make this quick.”

“You do that.”

I hang up and concentrate on Tamerlan’s limo. It heads onto the San Diego Freeway, then over to the 10. The fucker gets off in Boyle Heights and I have the strangest feeling I know what?

??s going on. The limo pulls over, one of Tamerlan’s men ducks into a coffee shop and comes out with a whole tray of cups. They head back on Whittier Boulevard, then turn north, straight toward the Sixth Street viaduct and the goddamn White Light Legion.

I let Tamerlan go on ahead of me. The street at the railroad yard near the Sixth Street bridge is dark, so that’s where I park the Crown Vic. The dirt by the side of the road is loose and easy to pick up. I use it to draw a protective ward—­a mean one—­on the car’s roof. Anyone who comes calling will go home sad, but wiser.

Over on Mission Road, I hunker down behind a lamppost and wait. I’ve been waiting all day. What’s a little more wasted time between friends?

It’s seven thirty when I sit down with a Malediction. It’s nine when I spot the first Golden Vigil vans and Humvees coming across the bridge. I even have a cigarette left. That has to be a good omen.

There’s a slight breeze blowing down off the river channel. It smells like exhaust and ashes. A ­couple of rats run ahead of me down the road. I’m still a football field away from the warehouse, but don’t want to be seen by White Light shitheads or the Vigil, so I take a step to the right, into the hurricane, and make the walk backstage the whole way.

The smell coming off the river is more intense in the storm wind. Strange tattered things blow by, grab at my legs. The walk down the road feels like I’m climbing a mountain with a pickup truck on my back. I swear the hurricane is stronger out here, maybe because of all the baleful magic at the warehouse. By the time I get to the White Light’s parking lot, I’m exhausted. My chest hurts and it’s hard to breathe. But I still have a long way to go.

It took me longer than I thought to get up the road. The first Vigil cops are already in the fight club and more pour in ultra–slow motion from the vans, moving like ants in liquid amber. Civilians sprint out of the club—­­couples, bikers, mean-­eyed blue bloods. They scramble out the door, frozen in place like snapshots of pants-­wetting fear. Getting inside the club is like swimming upstream through human-­size salmon, all going the other way.