Blood and Roses

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Blood and Roses Page 10

by Douglas Pratt


  Instead, while I took Angela downtown and booked her a room at the Peabody Hotel, Leo spent the night eliminating any evidence of a shooting in Angela’s apartment. Malcolm, Mama’s walking boulder, turned out to be a handyman in another life or something. He repaired the door, quietly and discreetly while Angela’s neighbors slept. He and Leo carried the couch, complete with a dead body stuffed inside, downstairs. I didn’t ask what he did with either the couch or the body, but knowing the efficiency with which Leo works, I doubt either will ever cause a problem.

  The apartment looked as if nothing unusual had happened there. The only thing missing was the couch, but Leo assured me that a replacement was arriving this morning. He found one for sale online, and a cash transaction meant there would be nothing to trace.

  Leo did find a cell phone in the gunman’s pocket. With no contacts or messages of any kind on it. Only two incoming calls from a blocked number. A burner, we both guessed. He also had a wallet with a driver’s license registered to a Jackson Ocansey and a thousand dollars. Malcolm took the cash for his troubles.

  After a few hours and half a bottle of whiskey, Angela calmed down enough to fall asleep. I stayed the night, resting on the small couch. Surprisingly, she was taking almost being murdered in stride. I suggested that she take the next few days off. The room was booked for the rest of the week, so she could stay around the hotel. There wasn’t a great chance that she was still in danger, especially if I wasn’t around, but no need to risk it.

  Now, with no real clues to follow, we sat watching the house where Lieutenant Bryant lived.

  “The guy, Ocansey…what kind of name is that, anyway?”

  “I don’t make them up,” Leo said. “He probably did, though. The ID was good but it was fake.”

  “Made up or not,” I said. “He made a comment about you being my backup. Bryant said the same thing about you being my backup at Roxie’s.”

  “That’s a little thin. Bryant certainly would refer to backup as ‘backup.’ This guy was probably cut from the same cloth.”

  “I was grasping at straws, and I told him I knew that Bryant was involved. He tried to remain cool, but he flinched. For just a second.”

  “He flinched?” Leo said. “That’s where you got this. The guy used a common phrase, and he flinched.”

  I shrugged. “I didn’t like Bryant,” I explained.

  “I don’t like most people,” Leo exclaimed. “That doesn’t mean they are involved in kidnapping and prostitution.”

  “Doesn’t mean they aren’t involved in something,” I pointed out.

  His head turned to stare forward at the house. “Didn’t this lieutenant bust a big trafficking ring though?”

  “He did,” I said. “But the interesting thing is that the case never went to trial. The initial arrest made a big deal. Even got Bryant the spotlight and, probably, a promotion. But only one guy was convicted. And that was only for contributing to the delinquency of a minor. None of it ever made the news, which means no one cared after the big arrest. The whole thing was forgotten by everyone involved.”

  “Then the plan is what?” Leo asked. “Are we hoping that Bryant somehow leads us to the girl?”

  “I’m thinking a little more proactive.” I waved the burner phone that Leo took off Ocansey before flipping the phone to Leo.

  I handed him one of Bryant’s cards that had a cell number on it. “Call this number.”

  “You think he’ll know the number?”

  “He probably doesn’t know it, but if I’m right, it’ll be in the burner phone he used.”

  “Assuming the blocked number is his.”

  “Yep,” I confirmed.

  A Cheshire Cat grinned formed on Leo’s lips. “We just tip him off then, right?”

  Nodding, I said, “Tell him Ocansey’s dead. Then hang up.”

  Leo lifted the phone to his ear. The ringing on the other end was loud enough for me to hear.

  “This is Bryant.” I could hear the lieutenant answer through the earpiece.

  “Nice try,” Leo said, altering his voice by dropping it a couple of octaves. “Ocansey’s dead.”

  “Who is this?” Bryant said as Leo disconnected the call.

  “We need to destroy this so he can’t track us,” Leo suggested.

  Shaking my head, I took the phone from him. I wiped the phone down to remove any fingerprints.

  “Drive around the block,” I told him.

  As the truck passed Bryant’s house, I rolled the window down and tossed the phone like a Frisbee into the bushes along Bryant’s drive. Leo drove the rest of the block and turned on the cross street three blocks down from Bryant’s house. He turned around in a driveway and parked so that we could still see the front of Bryant’s house.

  My best estimate was that if Bryant was involved, then he should be spooked. He might make another run at me. In fact, if he was involved, that was a pretty solid bet. That would cement any doubts and confirm my theory.

  If I was wrong, then he might be a bit confused. He might trace the phone and find it in his yard. He’d have a difficult time tying it to us.

  The whole situation seemed, as my father would have said, squirrelly. Ocansey, or whatever his real name was, had the markings of a professional. Well, he had the eyes at least. Not to mention, the professionalism with which he stalked me last night.

  Thankfully, Ocansey underestimated Leo, a mistake too many people make only once.

  A figure walked out of Bryant’s house. From this distance, I could tell it was the lieutenant. He stood on the front porch and looked around his yard. His right hand gripped what looked like a 9 mm handgun. He was looking around his yard. His left hand held a phone, and he glanced at it before looking around. His head froze for a second before he walked to the bush where I tossed the phone. He holstered the 9 mm and reached into the bushes.

  “Looks like he traced the phone,” Leo commented.

  “It would seem so.”

  Bryant looked to be dialing a number.

  “Wonder who he’s calling?” Leo questioned.

  Bryant was nodding as he spoke into the phone. He walked up and down his driveway nervously. He stopped at the sidewalk as he continued his conversation with whoever was on the other end. He glanced up and down the street. We both slipped low in the truck’s cab, hoping three blocks was enough to remain inconspicuous.

  “We would have been smart enough to have a second car,” Leo said. “That way we could tag team him.”

  Lifting an eyebrow, I said, “What a good idea. Shame that our second vehicle was the target of your biker friends’ rage.”

  “I think he’s looking our way,” Leo said pointing toward the lieutenant.

  Bryant was staring down the road toward us. Or maybe, he was just looking down the road. He turned and walked back into the house.

  “He is definitely looking our way,” I said.

  “I’m not sure that sitting here is the smartest thing,” Leo said. “If he knows we are associated, then it won’t take him long to figure out what kind of truck I’m driving and piece it together that we are behind it.”

  “I can’t say I disagree with you. We need a different approach.”

  “Such as?” Leo asked.

  “Think we can get Malcolm’s help again?”

  “Maybe,” Leo said. “I’ll give him a call.”

  “Let’s move. Take me around the block.”

  When it appeared that the lieutenant’s attention moved from our direction, Leo backed the truck up. He used the same driveway to turn around. He drove through the neighborhood so that we didn’t pass Bryant’s house again. Especially with him still standing in his driveway.

  “Stop here,” I told him when we were one street over. “Get a hold of Malcolm. See if he can make his way over here.”

  Peering over the back seat, I found an empty Pepsi can exactly where I figured one would be. Leo was consistent. He had a tendency to toss his trash into the backseat until he stopp
ed at a gas station. Then he would clean it out while he pumped gas. With the aluminum can in hand, I opened the door and jumped out.

  “What are you going to do?” Leo asked.

  “Keep watch until Malcolm gets here,” I answered. “Stay close in case I need my ‘sidekick.’”

  “I like ‘backup’ a little better,” Leo said with a scowl before he drove off.

  The house in front of me was obviously vacant. The real estate sign had a few too many days of grass growing around it. The windows were all closed. Everything about the house indicated it was empty.

  The realtor’s key box hung on the back fence next to the side door. Crushing the can, I began to bend it until the creased metal ripped away. I repeated the process a few more times being extra careful not to slice my fingers. When I was finished I had molded a slender strip of aluminum.

  This was a trick I learned from a less than scrupulous college associate. Tim Something, I tried to recall his name. He would throw parties at vacant houses that had been on the market for a bit. He’d come in on a Saturday night, remove the realtor’s “For Sale” sign, and open the key box. He’d charge $5 a person and offer a couple of kegs. The freshmen would fill the house and his wallet. Most of the time, he’d leave after he made enough money and before the police ever showed up.

  The technique wasn’t difficult to learn, and he showed it to me one night in exchange for some homework help. The key box was a combination style. I reset the combination to “0-0-0-0.” The metal strip slips next to each dial as the perpetrator, that’s me right now, turns the dial until the aluminum strip drops slightly. After all four numbers are set, I adjust each one up a number and test the lock. After three increases the lockbox opens revealing the keys.

  I’m not entirely sure I understand how it works, but it does.

  With the keys in hand, I made my way into the empty house and upstairs where I had a clear line of sight to Bryant’s house.

  15

  Nearly 45 minutes passed as I squatted in the empty house. My time was spent near the upstairs window where I had a clear line of sight to Lieutenant Bryant’s front door. He was already back inside when I got to the window. Hoping that he didn’t leave while I was fashioning my makeshift lock pick, I had no option but to wait. Finally, my patience was rewarded, the garage door opened to let out a navy blue Toyota Four Runner. Bryant was at the wheel, and unless there was someone in the back seat, he appeared to be alone.

  “Dark blue Toyota Four Runner,” I texted Leo from the prepaid phone I picked up at Walgreen's earlier.

  “K.”

  “Tell Malcolm to pick me up,” I messaged back.

  “K,” he responded again.

  Taking the stairs two at a time, I hopped down to the first floor. When I reached the side door, I froze. There was a conversation on the other side of the door.

  “The keys don’t seem to be here,” I heard a woman say.

  I cursed quietly.

  “Let me call the realtor back,” she said to someone. “The last person must have taken the keys with them.”

  No time to lose, I thought as I opened the door. I didn’t have time to wait on them to leave if I was going to catch up to Bryant.

  “No need,” I said with a sense of surety in my tone. “Here they are.”

  The keys dropped from my fingers into the hand of the woman I guessed to be a real estate agent.

  “Uh,” she stammered.

  “I was just looking over the home for an out of town investor. I hoped to be gone by now, but he really liked the video tour.”

  “No one said you were going to be here,” the real estate woman said.

  I offered a shrug of apology. “It’s all yours,” I said. Then I looked at the couple with her and said, “But if you like it, I’d get an offer in quick. My client sounds like he’ll want to put one in by this afternoon.”

  Offering a nod to all three, I hurried to the black Lexus that pulled up to the curb. Malcolm acknowledged me as I slid into the front seat. He looked at the three people in the driveway that stared at me with a fair amount of confusion on their faces.

  “What’s going on here?” he asked.

  “I got out by the skin of my teeth.”

  “Leo said he has eyes on him,” Malcolm informed me.

  “Great,” I said, “I appreciate your help.”

  “Alice said to tell you that I’m all yours,” he said. “Figuratively speaking that is.”

  “Thanks. We need to trade out with Leo. We were pretty sure that Bryant made his truck earlier.”

  “On it,” Malcolm assured me as he sped up.

  He drove deftly through the traffic until we saw Leo’s truck in front of us. Bryant was about six cars ahead of Leo. As we passed the truck, I gave Leo a wave, signaling him to pull off and let us take up the trail.

  Leo took the next right and vanished down a side street. He was going to try to stay close by following us on a parallel street. Malcolm and I attempted to remain unnoticed by keeping a number of cars between us and the lieutenant’s Toyota. The hope was that even if Bryant made Leo’s truck, he would see that Leo was gone and relax. The black Lexus was a great deal less conspicuous than the four-wheel-drive truck.

  A sign for the interstate pointed to the right. Bryant followed the ramp to the interstate. With six cars ahead of us we were left stuck at the next red light. Thirty seconds into the light, I was tapping my fingers nervously. Stupid to lose Bryant over a damned red light.

  “We’ll get him,” Malcolm said. He had a serene quality to his voice. Very calming.

  Still, I was ready for a green arrow. I’d risk a ticket by running the red light, but we weren’t even the first car at the line.

  Finally, the green arrow came, and Malcolm casually took the ramp to the interstate.

  “Do you do this kind of thing often?” he asked me.

  “Not really,” I said. After a second of thought, I amended myself. “Although, yes, I guess I do.”

  “Alice thinks you two are probably trouble magnets.”

  “She’s right,” I said.

  “Do you like it?” he asked.

  My forehead furrowed as I considered that. “I guess, maybe, I do like it. Life is rarely boring.”

  “Think it will ever get old?” he asked. “I mean, don’t you ever think a simple comfortable life might be nice.”

  “It might be,” I said. “How about you? How did you get to work with Alice?”

  “I was a hell of an athlete in high school. Boxed, wrestled, tight end. Even got a scholarship to college for boxing. Then I tore my ACL during a pick-up game of basketball.”

  “Ouch,” I said. “That sucks.”

  “I could have recovered and kept boxing, but I started popping Oxy like it was gum. Lost my scholarship, after I spent all the extra money on more pills. Eventually, I was giving blow jobs for a handful of pills.”

  I listened as he weaved in the lines of cars. He stuck his finger out forward, pointing out the blue Toyota taking the ramp toward Highway 385, heading east out of Memphis toward Collierville, a suburb city.

  “Told you we’d catch him,” he said.

  “Is that when you met Alice?” I asked.

  “No, but I started crashing with Christy. She works for Mama now. Back then though, Christy was into ice something bad. She was stripping until she couldn’t make it to work regularly. Then, it was working the street. That’s when Mama found her one day and got her cleaned up. I was back on the street for a few months before Christy and Mama came around and found me.

  “That woman saved my life. Got me clean. Back in shape. Too late for a scholarship, but really, college was never for me. Now, I’d do anything for her.”

  Inhaling a deep breath, I considered how most people might view Mama and her entourage.

  “Do you enjoy the work?” I asked.

  Malcolm turned to look at me. He smiled. “I am just protection. I don’t turn tricks anymore.”

  “Not j
udging,” I said.

  “I know,” he replied. “It’s probably stupid, but after losing control, I like being the intimidator. I like knowing I’m protecting them.”

  Looking at the large man, I had to admit that I wouldn’t want to go up against him.

  “Mama seems genuine then,” I said.

  “What kind of trouble have you been in?” he asked changing the subject.

 

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