Ardmore Green

by Jeff Siebold

  Angela was looking away, turned in the other direction. She was holding her face in her hands, crying. “She was like family,” she sobbed.

  “I know, I’m sorry,” said Zeke. “Let’s move on.”

  They walked away from the outdoor kitchen, and Carla led them through a door into a mudroom off the kitchen. Angela recomposed herself during the short walk. “Coffee or tea for anyone?” she asked as they entered the kitchen.

  “None for me,” said Carla, looking at her watch quickly. “I’ll be going now. You’re in good hands,” she said to Angela. Then she quickly walked out the door.

  Zeke took Angela up on the offer, more to keep her mind occupied than anything else. Kimmy walked around the kitchen while Zeke sat at the large island. The coffee pot started up and burbled, and the coffee smelled strong with a faint scent of cherries.

  Brandon smelled the coffee and joined them in the kitchen.

  “What about team security?” asked Zeke.

  “Well, we have that, but we’re not sure we trust them, totally,” Brandon said and looked at his wife.

  Angela was a tall woman, maybe five foot eight, but next to Brandon she looked small. Her auburn hair was cut in an expensive style and her clothes, although casual, fit perfectly. Zeke noticed that her makeup was subtle and accentuated her large eyes and her full mouth. Somehow it gave her an innocent look. Or naive, he thought, like a little girl.

  She shrugged. “Team security is mostly made up of guys that want to hang around the practice field and be seen with the players. They’re OK, but their experience is more with drunks and streakers than it is with kidnappers.”

  Zeke nodded.

  “And I’m not sure I’d be able to count on them, anyway,” she continued. “I mean, what if they got drunk and didn’t show up one day? Or if they overslept. We’re not always dealing with the most reliable people in that line of work.”

  “Yeah,” said Brandon, “this is all above their pay grade. Our team’s security isn’t equipped for something like this.”

  Chapter 37

  “So we moved to Great Falls. It’s a good neighborhood. We love it here,” said Brandon.

  “And it’s convenient to everything,” said Angela.

  “I just want to be sure Angela’s OK when I’m not here,” Brandon said.

  Angela had served the coffee and taken a seat at the island, on the far side of her husband. Zeke moved his chair around the side of the island to a place where he could watch them both as they talked.

  “Understood,” said Zeke. “We’ll protect Angela and work on neutralizing the threat.”

  “I’m sorry we don’t have more for you to work with,” said Angela, a bit awkwardly. “I didn’t have a recorder or anything when the call came in.”

  “Tell me about the threat you received,” said Zeke.

  “The voice was altered by some electronic device, I’m sure,” said Angela. “It was like a monotone, metallic sound, like you’d hear in a movie or something.”

  “What time did the call come in?”

  “It was just after lunchtime. I remember looking at the clock and seeing 1:18 PM,” said Angela.

  “Was anyone else here?” Zeke asked.

  “No, just me. Brandon was at a team meeting.”

  “Uh-huh,” said Zeke. “Close your eyes for a moment.”

  “What?”

  “It’ll improve your memory for sounds.”

  She did.

  “What else do you remember about the voice?”

  “Well, it was metallic, but it was intimate,” she continued, thinking. “Like almost sexual. Very creepy.”

  “What did the caller say, exactly? How did it happen?” asked Zeke.

  “Well, the phone rang last week, and I answered it. The Caller ID said ‘Out of Area’ so I thought it might be a wrong number,” said Angela. Then she said, “This is a little bit embarrassing.”

  “It’s OK,” said Zeke. “It’s not about you.”

  She nodded and shook it off.

  “So it was really weird. It was a sort of artificial voice, like on Star Wars or something. The guy said, ‘We’re watching you, Angela. We can have you any time we want.’ After a short pause, they hung up.”

  “That’s unnerving,” said Zeke. “And then the dog was killed. But there were no demands, no request for money?”

  “None,” said Angela.

  “How do you feel about what happened?” asked Zeke.

  “I was upset at first, but since then I’ve been pretty angry about it.”

  “I can understand that. We will do all we can to protect you.” Turning to Brandon, Zeke asked, “Can I ask you about the dog? Privately?”

  “Yeah, I guess,” said Brandon. “Step over here with me.”

  They walked out of the kitchen while Angela busied herself at the sink, washing her cup. Zeke thought he saw a tear run down her face.

  “How long have you had Zoe?”

  “We’ve had her since we moved in here, right after my first pro season was over. She was here to protect Angela and the house.”

  “Did you have another dog prior to Zoe?”

  “No, she’s our first,” said Brandon.

  “Was she trained for protection?” asked Zeke.

  “Yes, she was trained for police work, K-9, but I guess she didn’t make the cut. She still had skills, though. Enough for what we needed.”

  “Was she an outdoor dog?” asked Zeke.

  “Both,” said Brandon. “She spent time inside, mostly when we were home, and outside in the yard when we were away.”

  “How did she die?” asked Zeke.

  “Someone broke her neck.”

  * * *

  “Yeah, so in the draft the Texans passed me up for a defensive guy, and the Redskins took me in the first round.”

  Zeke nodded. They’d moved to a cavernous room with a pool table in the center of the floor and a very big screen TV on the wall. The ceilings were twelve feet high.

  “But I had to buy my number,” Brandon continued.

  “Buy it from whom?” asked Zeke.

  “There was a running back named Holdsworth, a second year guy on the team who was wearing number twenty-two. I paid him for it, and a week later, he got cut.”

  “How much did you pay for it?” asked Zeke.

  “Not a lot. Five grand,” said Brandon, casually. “And he kept it all after he was cut, too. You’d think he would have prorated it or something.”

  Zeke nodded.

  “It’s OK, I’ve had a good couple years with Washington,” he continued. Angela entered the room holding a glass of water.

  “Is this your Heisman ring?” asked Kimmy from across the room. She was looking at a shelf along the wall opposite the TV. It was covered with trophies and plaques.

  “Yeah, it’s there somewhere,” said Brandon, apparently disinterested.

  Kimmy picked up the big ring and put it on her ring finger. It fit comfortably over the ring she was already wearing. “I’ll be switching off with Carla,” she said. “One of us will plan to be with Angela whenever she goes out. It’s probably nothing, but let’s just be careful about it.”

  “I hate to be restricted like that,” said Angela.

  “I know, but it won’t be for long,” said Kimmy.

  “No offense,” said Brandon, quietly, “but you’re pretty small. Are you going to be able to protect Angela?”

  “I think I will,” said Kimmy, smiling.

  “Kimmy was with the Mossad before she came to work with us,” Zeke said. “I don’t think you’ll need to worry.”

  Chapter 38

  Zeke walked into the Lower Merion Township Police Headquarters, showed his identification, and was escorted to Detective Harrison’s desk.

  “Sit down,” mouthed Harrison, holding a black phone handset to his ear. He pointed at the chair across from his desk. Zeke sat.

  A moment later, Harrison grunted and hung up. He looked at Zeke, who was waiting.
r />   “I’m here to talk with Kevin McCarthy,” said Zeke.

  “Yeah,” said Harrison. “So glad you called us about that one. Ever since we arrested him, his wife and attorney have been down here insisting on his release. The attorney’s quite a hotshot as a criminal defense guy.”

  “Who’s paying for that?” asked Zeke.

  “Yeah, I wondered that, too,” said Harrison. “Well, he’s still here, so follow me.”

  They walked down a long corridor that connected the police station with a jail wing and entered the guard area through a locked metal door, apparently buzzed open from some remote observation location. A large guard sat behind the desk. Harrison handed him his gun and said, “Hi, Randy. We need to talk with McCarthy.”

  The guard looked at Harrison, whose badge was hanging around his neck, and then at Zeke. “ID?” he said.

  Zeke gave it to him and Randy processed them in.

  “Wait in Interrogation Room 2. I’ll have him brought out to you,” said Randy.

  They opened a second metal door with a small window about eye height, and Harrison led Zeke to a room marked with a large number ‘2’ in red on the gray door. A few moments later there was a knock on the door, and Kevin McCarthy came in, accompanied by a guard the approximate size of Randy.

  “You keep the big guys for jail service?” asked Zeke.

  “Mostly they volunteer,” said Harrison, looking at Kevin.

  * * *

  “You had nothing to do with the drugs?” asked Harrison. He had been lead interrogator thus far in the questioning, and now he was circling back to the fundamental issues.

  “No, you know where I work. I don’t know about any drugs. I’m a family man,” said Kevin. “I have nothing to hide.”

  “Well, maybe,” said Zeke. “But once we started looking, started talking with people, we found a whole other side of you, Kevin. Like a second identity.”

  Kevin glared at him.

  “The college kids identified you as the head of the drug ring, and as the guy who was selling to Nathan Frost.”

  “I don’t know a Nathan Frost,” said Kevin. He touched his nose and mouth with his right hand as he said it.

  Lying, thought Zeke.

  “But we think it was someone else, Kevin,” said Zeke.

  “Well, yeah,” said Kevin, sarcastically.

  “We know you’re a good guy,” said Zeke.

  Harrison said nothing.

  “So, what do you want from me?” asked Kevin.

  “A name,” said Zeke. “And then we can let you go.”

  “No way,” said Kevin, shaking his head.

  “The alternative is that we pin it all on you, and we charge you as the head of the drug distribution organization,” said Harrison.

  “You can’t make that stick,” said Kevin with false bravado.

  “We don’t have to, Kevin. The press will pick it up and run with it. You’ll be tried and found guilty in the papers,” Zeke said.

  Kevin was silent for a long moment.

  “Hypothetical?” he asked, looking for an out.

  “For now, sure,” said Zeke.

  He looked at Harrison, who said, “For now. OK.”

  “OK, hypothetically, here’s how it worked,” said Kevin. He spent the next few minutes filling them in on the organization.

  “So who ran it?” asked Harrison.

  “If it were me, I’d look at a guy named Dylan Jones,” said Kevin.

  * * *

  “I’m bored,” said Carrie. She was standing, looking out the window of their hotel room, naked. Seth was looking at her tattoo, Seth Gordon Forever, written in cursive.

  “Let’s go walk on the pier,” said Seth. “We’ll smoke some of this and get something to eat.” He handed her the unlit joint. “Oh, sorry, you don’t have any pockets.”

  She smiled a sarcastic smile over her shoulder, as if to say, “Ha, ha,” and turned back to the window.

  Seth was lying in the unmade bed in his boxers, looking between a reality show on TV and Carrie’s naked back.

  “OK,” she said, still looking at the ocean. “I’m hungry. That Molly made me hungry. And horny.”

  “Yeah, I noticed. I’m hungry, too. It was probably all the exertion,” said Seth.

  “What are we gonna do next?” she asked.

  “Probably need to find a place to stay, an apartment or something,” he said.

  “I want something by the beach,” she said.

  “Yeah, I know,” he said. “I think we can hook up with some locals, you know, get a sense of the scene here. Meet some surfers like me. Maybe find a job, or deal some weed or something until we do.”

  “I can waitress. Or work in a Burger King or something. What was that place we stopped called?”

  “Jack in the Box,” said Seth.

  “Yeah, I liked their food. I’d work there. Probably get food free.”

  They were silent for a minute, then Carrie turned back toward the bed.

  “How about that guy you know? Should we get in touch with him?” asked Carrie, pulling on a t-shirt, getting dressed.

  “Maybe,” said Seth. “I’ll try to call him after we eat.”

  “You said he moved to L.A.? So he’s around here somewhere...”

  “Yeah, his family moved out here from Philadelphia last year. He said his dad got a new job or something. I think he said he worked for the government.”

  “What’s his name again? I never met him.”

  “Nathan Frost, but everybody called him Jack,” said Seth. “Yeah, we’ll catch up with him. I still have his number in my phone. He’ll have some good stuff, I’m sure.”

  “He will?”

  “Sure. He used to supply pills to Alan and me. He went to Penn before he moved out here.”

  “Alan?” asked Carrie.

  “Alan Parker,” said Seth. “He used to hang out with my sister, Amy.”

  * * *

  “Dude, how’re you doing?” asked Jack Frost. “Wicked cool that you’re out here!”

  “Yeah, we decided on an extended trip,” said Seth. “To try out my new wheels.”

  They were standing on the Santa Monica Pier. The bright sunshine reflecting off the Pacific Ocean seemed to warm the morning breeze. Carrie was standing next to them in her short shorts and a swimsuit top, puffing on a joint.

  “I was totally surprised when you called, man,” said Jack.

  “Yeah, I know. How’re things going for you here?”

  “Oh, it’s OK. I’m taking some classes at USC,” said Jack. “The traffic’s pretty bad sometimes, but the weather’s great.”

  “No snow, right?” asked Carrie, absently. She was taking a picture of the Ferris wheel with her phone.

  “That’s right,” said Jack. He was tall, maybe a half foot taller than Seth, and very thin. His face was bony and his eyes were deep set. In his Billabong t-shirt and Reef board shorts he looked like the skeleton of a tall surf rat. He was staring at Carrie.

  “So this is my girl, Carrie,” said Seth, emphasizing the “my.”

  “Hi, Carrie,” said Jack. “I’m Jack.” His gaze lingered on the girl.

  “You know, you’re the reason we came out here,” said Carrie. “We heard you left town, and we all got curious about L.A. So my girlfriend and I decided we wanted to vacation here. Who knows? Maybe go to college here.”

  “How’d you know I moved here?” asked Jack.

  “Seth told me,” said Carrie.

  “You still doing business?” asked Seth.

  “Sure,” said Jack. “It didn’t take me long to get set up here.”

  “Did your dad get a new job or something?” asked Seth. “That’s what I heard.”

  “No, that’s what he told everyone. But when Alan got busted, we knew he’d give me up, along with Harry and Darrell. I told my dad what was going on, and he decided we should get out of town. When I posted bond, we left.”

  “Just up and moved?” asked Seth.

  “
Yeah, well, it was just me and my dad. Mom divorced him a few years ago. He’s a car salesman, so he says he can get a job anywhere. Mom’s family lives in Philly, but Dad doesn’t have any family.”

  “So you guys moved to paradise,” said Seth, looking around.

  “Yeah, it’s pretty cool,” said Jack, looking at the ocean for a moment. Carrie offered him the joint; he took a puff and passed it to Seth.

  “And the cops haven’t found you?” asked Seth.

  “The Philly cops? I don’t think they’re looking anymore. My disappearance was small potatoes for them, not worth a trip across the country.”

  “Yeah, they probably have enough to do at home,” said Carrie, as if she knew about these things.

  Jack looked at her again, paused, and said, “Yeah.”

  “Where are you staying?” asked Carrie. “With your dad?”

  “No, I got an apartment. I share it with my girl.”

  “We’re gonna need to find a place to stay,” said Seth. “Any ideas?”

  “You got money?” asked Jack. “Or a job or something?”

  “I’ve got some money put aside,” said Seth.

  “Well, there’s a couple vacant apartments where I live. You could check into that. They rent them furnished, and the manager doesn’t watch too closely. He doesn’t care what you do as long as you don’t make trouble for him.”

  Chapter 39

  “He likes to be aggressive,” said Zeke. “He likes to intimidate people. So he was probably a pretty good choice to be the ‘straw man.’”

  “Straw man?” asked Sally. They were in Clive’s office in Washington, DC; Kimmy was on the speakerphone from Maryland; and Zeke was debriefing them on the findings of his previous visit to Philadelphia.

  “We think the true leadership of the organization stays behind the scenes, while they use someone at a lower level in their business when they set up their distribution chains. By operating that way, the buyers think that one guy is in charge, when in fact it’s someone else, a fake boss or so-called ‘straw man’.”