Copyright © 2019 by Lance Charnes
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
Wombat Group Media
Post Office Box 4908
Orange, CA 92863
https://www.wombatgroup.com/
First Printing November 2019
ISBN 978-1-7333989-0-9
Cover design by Damonza.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
No animals were harmed in the writing of this novel.
Printed in the United States of America
For Betty
Who’s decided this really is a thing
Other Books by Lance Charnes
The DeWitt Agency Files:
The Collection (#1)
Stealing Ghosts (#2)
Doha 12
South
For bonus chapters from Chasing Clay, reading group questions, an interview with the author and an art gallery, check out https://www.wombatgroup.com/dewittagency/chasing-clay/
CHASING CLAY
The DeWitt Agency Files #3
Chapter 1
25 APRIL
My phone rings. This doesn’t happen a lot these days; not many people call me other than Chloe, my roommate. The number’s blocked. “Hello?”
“Where are you right now?” A voice like coarse sandpaper on steel. Gotta be Len, my federal probation officer.
It’s nine-ish on a cloudy, cool Monday morning. I sigh. “At work.” I opened the store at five, and since then I’ve been dealing vente Caramel Macchiatos and other caffeinated candy drinks to the usual going-to-work and post-gym crowds.
“You sure?”
I’m sitting at my usual place on the sidewalk along Hill, two tables up from Santa Monica’s version of Main Street, with a cup of two-percent milk and a marked-out onion bagel from yesterday’s baked goods. Breakfast.
When I got out of prison in 2014, I was ordered into three years’ supervised release—kind of like probation, but different—with a few special conditions of supervision, including community service and paying restitution. I’m a few weeks away from finishing my second year. Len had been slacking off on me until a couple months ago when some of the Central District of California’s probationers violated out spectacularly. Now he’s doing these random spot-checks to see if I’m secretly cooking meth on the side.
Because he’s my PO and he’s been okay until this mess started, I don’t say the first four or five things that come to me. “Let’s see. I’m wearing a green apron. I’m sitting here in Ocean Park where I have no other reason to be. I had to get up at four in the fucking morning to help open.” Bring it down… “Yeah, I’m pretty sure.”
“I don’t see you.”
“You’re here?” I look around in a near-panic, but all I see is some woman in a crop top and yoga pants walking away with a trenta something that’s mostly whipped cream. Len must be in the store. Grilling my boss comes next. “Is this the start of my audit?”
“It is if you don’t sell me some coffee in the next five minutes…”
“I’m on break.”
“You going with that, Friedrich?”
The new employment audit’s got me crapping cinder blocks. Some of those violators were slaving away in jobs that apparently didn’t exist. Len tells me he has to look at work product, time cards, and the other bread crumbs you leave behind when you have a real job. I really work for Starbucks, but the money I use to pay my fiscal debt to society supposedly comes from a New York City architectural/engineering firm I supposedly do freelance design work for. The firm exists, but I’ve never seen it and I’ve never drawn a single plan for them.
Len’s waiting next to the cashier station, arms folded, doing his bulldog imitation. He’s only five-nine and looks like a bald Sam Waterston, but I know he’s made of old steel cable and iron filings. He growls, “Finally.”
This is getting old. “I’ll ask again—is this my audit?”
“Not yet. Like I told you, I’m doing the real shitbags first. Your time’ll come. You’re a felon—shit happens to you. But while I’m here, I’ll watch you pull my drink.”
“Like you haven’t seen that before.” He ordered a grande Americano with an extra shot of espresso. Not hard to do unless you’re being graded. I think about slipping him an extra extra shot so he’ll have a heart attack. With my luck, I’d end up with a real asshole for a PO.
He sips and nods. “Good enough.”
“You gonna interrogate my boss next? She loves that shit, you know.” Not. I always get crappy shifts afterwards.
“Not this time.” He leans over the serving counter toward me. “Color inside the lines. They’re looking for reasons to twist our shorts. You got a year left—don’t fuck it up.”
Another year of this. It was just about tolerable until recently. I’m back to reporting by phone three times a week (I’d been down to once a week) and (a new wrinkle) monthly in-office interviews. I still have to file monthly written reports, get permission to leave Southern California, and I can’t leave the country… legally, at least.
And now this employment audit’s heading my way. This is bad… real bad. Like, going back to prison bad. I have no idea how I’m getting past that.
I fill a few more orders, then get the boss to let me take the last ten minutes of my break. I stew about Len’s visit and the short leash he’s put on me again. At least in prison you know where you are and what the rules are. Outside, it’s almost like being free until they remind you you’re not.
I get into such a dark place that when my phone rings again, I bark into it, “What do you want now?”
Silence. Then, “One-Seven-Nine?”
This is so out-of-context that it takes me a moment to figure it out. “Olivia? How’d you get my number?”
“Do you truly need to ask?” Olivia has this creamy Oxbridge accent on a smooth mezzo voice that usually makes me feel all warm and safe. It’s not working right now because she’s calling me out of the blue on my personal phone. “You didn’t answer your agency mobile.”
“That’s because I’m not working for you right now.”
“Nonetheless. When can you be at the airport in Santa Monica? Allyson wants to see you immediately.”
Oh, shit. “What’d I do?”
“Nothing… yet.”
Chapter 2
I cover a lot of ground over the next three hours.
I don’t leave work until 12:30—I have a full shift, and Allyson won’t pay me for leaving early—then go home, change into my new slate-gray Canali Siena suit, and pick up my agency phone and laptop. Olivia’s arranged a town car for me so I don’t have to take the bus everywhere. Allyson’s Cessna Citation XLS is waiting at the Santa Monica airport when the limo drops me outside the executive terminal. I’ve never been on a business jet before—it’s a pretty sweet ride, with a bar and snacks and everything. Not having to deal with TSA is a bonus.
A limo collects me at the Eagle County (Colorado) Regional Air
port and hauls me to the Sonnenalp, a huge faux-Bavarian hotel/resort in the eastern half of Vail’s ski village. I have an impression of stone fascias, heavy-timbered balconies, and tiled hip roofs on my way from the limo into the lobby. Allyson left me a present at the fake-half-timbered front desk: a key card to a room.
The room’s on the third floor. An entry hall lined with paneled, stained doors; an arch into the white-plaster bedroom; a king bed facing a large pine armoire and matching cubbyhole desk. It’s nice, quiet, comfortable. Am I staying here tonight? It’s past six and getting dark out.
Then I notice a royal-blue Vail Executive Forum registration folder on the desk with most of its guts taken out, and a black roller bag stowed between the desk and armoire. I catch a whiff of jasmine and sandalwood when I open the closet. Allyson’s perfume. The closet’s full of women’s clothes—nice women’s clothes. The kind she’d wear.
This is Allyson’s room?
Allyson DeWitt owns the DeWitt Agency. She’s my other boss. We “fill needs” for people or organizations rich enough to hire us to fill them. The things I do for her aren’t always legal, but that’s where I really get the money I use to pay off the banks and the feds. I’ve worked for the agency off and on for a year and I’m not in prison again. I must be doing something right.
The white-painted washstand in the bathroom is crowded with all the magic potions Allyson uses to keep herself from looking like the portrait she hides in her attic. The armoire holds the TV, safe and minibar. The desk’s also a three-drawer dresser. Allyson still wears very nice lingerie. The other two drawers aren’t as interesting.
While I wait, I look up the Vail Executive Forum on my work phone, a big quad-band Samsung. It’s an annual by-invitation “gathering of corporate and public opinion leaders” put on by the Vail Global Coalition toward the end of April, when the resort’s between winter and summer seasons. A pit stop between Davos and the Milken Global Forum, I guess, so CEOs can avoid going back to work.
I startle when the front door lock clicks and the door swings open.
It’s Allyson. Her eyebrows jump. “Mr. Friedrich. You’re here… finally.” A little irritated, not fatally.
Allyson’s in her late-ish forties. She’s everything I love in a woman: almost black hair, dark eyes, olive skin, great cheekbones, better legs, and a smooth alto voice that’s stuck in my dreams for years. Not beautiful, but striking, with the kind of presence that makes you look when she comes into the room. Like now.
“They had us flying in circles around the airport for, like, forty-five minutes. Some dude had to have his jet towed off the runway. That’s gotta be embarrassing, you know? You’re out there trying to impress last year’s Miss Universe and your airplane dies.” Stop babbling. Allyson does this to me.
She plops her purse—a black D+G Sicily top-handle satchel that costs only 170 hours of me pushing coffee—on the green-and-white plaid bedspread. “I’d planned for you to arrive before cocktail hour, not after.” Her tone says miffed, not mad. Mad’s not a good look on her.
“Sorry.”
Another thing I like about Allyson is that she wears clothes well. I had to learn a lot about fashion at the art gallery where I used to work so I could tell how much money our clients had. Allyson’s outfit is a long-sleeved, above-the-knee sheath with red, white, and black geometric print blocks by Prabal Gurung, one of Mrs. Obama’s designers, and black Prada ankle boots with cone heels. She’s wearing a few months of my Starbucks pay.
She hauls in a deep breath, then lets it out slow. She waves away my sorryness. “Can’t be helped. My apologies. This conference always brings out the worst in me. Did you have a pleasant trip?”
“Yeah, it was good. Thanks. Why am I here?”
“Yes, of course.” Allyson steps to the armoire, opens the safe, and pulls out a slim manila folder that she hands to me. “Please read the top document. I’ll change while you’re at it. They never schedule enough time for the women to change for dinner.” She tosses her conference badge and lanyard onto the bed as she quick-steps to the closet.
“Why change? You look great.” A little flattery never hurts.
The corner of her mouth turns up. “Thank you. It’s formal.” She braces a hand against the closet doorjamb and unzips her left boot.
“Would you like me to step out?” Not that I object to watching Allyson undress; it’s just good form to ask.
She drops the left boot and goes to work on the right. “That won’t be necessary. You won’t see anything you haven’t already, and I’m confident you can control yourself.”
Wow. That’s the first time since my job interview that she’s referred to… that night.
I’ve lusted after Allyson for the almost six years since our one-nighter. My little brain still wants a replay. It’s arm-wrestling my big brain, which knows a black widow when it sees one.
The other boot clunks to the floor. She starts fiddling with her zipper, which is apparently in an especially awkward place.
The little brain wins a round. “Here, let me get that.”
She gives me a look. Not The Look, which is lethal, but a look. “Read.”
It’s on Department of Justice letterhead from the United States Attorney, Northern District of California. Nothing good ever comes from DOJ. Addressed to a federal judge at the courthouse in downtown San Francisco. Re: United States v. Matthew Benjamin Friedrich.
I stop breathing. I’ve seen too many of these. They were never good news.
It’s the typical legalese written by somebody who’s never been exposed to standard American English. The first paragraph’s the usual throat-clearing and recitations. The second paragraph…
Seriously?
I read it three times. Some of it is blah blah blah, but one line explodes in my brain: “…recommend to the court a modification to the terms of the sentencing agreement under Rule 32.1(c)(2) to effect early termination of the supervised release judgment order…”
Early termination.
Freedom.
With this letter, I wouldn’t have to care about that employment audit anymore. I’d be free. I’d get my passport back. Len wouldn’t come randomly to where I live or work to ambush me, my landlord, my boss, or my roommate.
I know: it could be worse. But seriously? I want to be a grownup again.
I skim to the end to see if there’s a part where they say “just kidding.” There isn’t, but there’s no date and no signature. “Ally—um, Ms. DeWitt?”
“Yes?” Her voice echoes out of the bathroom.
“What’s with this letter? And how come you have it and not my lawyer?”
“Does it please you?”
“So far. I need to read it carefully. They forgot to sign it.”
“That wasn’t an oversight.”
I read the rest of the page-and-a-half letter carefully and finally spot what I’d missed the first time: Mr. Friedrich is supposed to render valuable service to the Department of Homeland Security. “If this’ a quid, what’s the quo?”
“What you read is the reward for successfully completing the project I intend to assign to you.”
She doesn’t explain. I lean against the wall next to the bathroom door. “Can I read the project description?”
“Not yet. Our client has become interesting to one of your federal law enforcement agencies. He—”
“Arrested?”
“Not yet, but possibly soon. He’s been negotiating with the two lead agencies and has come to an understanding with them. He’s agreed to fund a discreet private adjunct to their investigation and supply information to them. In return, they’ll grant him immunity. He’s been a steady client of ours, which is why he hired us to manage the investigation.”
Alarm bells started ringing somewhere around private adjunct. “Hold on. We’re gonna run an off-books operation for some three-letter agency? That’s nuts.”
“We’ve done just that before, though
not recently.” The calm in her voice makes it sound like she thinks this is just business as usual. “I want you to be project lead.”
Another explosion in my head. “Don’t I have to be an associate to do that?” I’m a junior associate now, the lowest of three pay grades in the agency.
“Yes. That’s why in addition to the gift from your government, I intend to give you a provisional promotion to associate, with this project as your probationary period.” That’s a €500-a-day pay bump. She really wants me on this thing. “You did excellent work on the Portsmouth project, though a bit… unconventional. Understandably, the client is less than pleased by the outcome. The client’s representative, though, is extremely pleased with how you worked with her and saw to her needs.”
I wonder if she told Allyson about the… personal services I provided that weren’t about burgling museums and forging paintings. “Thanks for the feedback. I’ll assume this project has something to do with art.” What I learned at the gallery gets me Allyson’s art-related projects.
Right then, I realize something’s missing from the offer letter. I comb through it word-by-word while I try to listen to Allyson.
“In a manner of speaking, it does. The client may have done something… irregular with antiquities from Southeast Asia. Pottery, in this case.”
I don’t know anything about pottery, and most of what I know about Southeast Asia came from watching Apocalypse Now. I’m about to mention it when a little voice whispers “early termination” in my ear. I’ll lay off on the honesty for now. “He’s in trouble with ICE?” That’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of DHS. If this guy’s smuggling, they’re the ones who care.
“Among others, yes. I believe the IRS is also interested. Our investigation is to identify the people trafficking this pottery and relay the information to the client.”
Chasing Clay (The DeWitt Agency Files Book 3) Page 1