8At four o’clock on Friday morning, Bella and I were poised to kidnap Woody.
He lived on the eastern slope of the Berkeley Hills. His split-shingled A-frame was secluded in an upper canyon off San Leandro Creek near the border of two East Bay counties.
I was a hundred feet away in the rear seat of a black Grand Cherokee. I wore dark clothes like a commando, though I had an elegant shoulder bag perched in my lap. At least it was black.
The engine grumbled, idling on the paved two-lane road. A mile back, our driver had lowered all four windows.
The only other sound was a tree cricket chirping from the cluster of coastal live oaks screening us.
The hay-like scent of sunburnt grass filled the car, reminding me that California had been suffering from severe drought for the past four years.
