Settling the register into place, he adjusted it minutely, reluctant to test it. It had an ugly dent in the corner and he felt sure it wasn’t going to work. He righted the drawer and; still reluctant to find out that the expensive machine was broken, he put all the money back in the tray.
Finally, with trepidation, he lifted the drawer and tried to fit it back into its opening. The dented corner blocked it, but it looked like it might go if he straightened the metal. He stepped around the corner into the office where he kept a pair of pliers. Roni sat, staring at him wide-eyed. He couldn’t tell whether her look was one of trepidation or dismay.
From the look on her face she’d heard the encounter with Castano plenty well enough.
Without saying anything to his daughter, Ravinder took the pliers and stepped back to the cash register. He twisted the metal at the dented corner until he thought it wouldn’t block the opening. Setting down the pliers, he picked up the cash drawer and carefully introduced it.
The drawer fit, so Ravinder tried sliding it home.
It clicked into place and Ravinder let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
Plugging the cord back into the side of the machine, he waited a moment for the little computer inside to boot up. As if a miracle, the welcome screen appeared. Ravinder picked up the wrapper from the lollipop that Castanos’ hoodlum had stolen and passed it in front of the sensor.
The machine chirped and displayed correctly. As relief washed over him, Ravinder closed his eyes and leaned heavily on the counter.
Roni’s voice came over his shoulder, “What they’re doing… it’s extortion, not insurance. Have you called the police?”
Ravinder’s shoulders sagged, his relief that the cash register still worked fading away like wisps of fog. He turned to his daughter and measured her expression, apparently a combination of fear and anger. Quietly, he said, “Yes.”
“And?”
He shook his head. “The cops aren’t going to do anything.”
“What?!” Anger blazed over Roni’s face. “Those bastards are breaking the law! What do you mean the police aren’t going to do anything?!” When Ravinder didn’t say anything for a moment, Roni developed a look of horror, “Are the cops being paid-off?”
Ravinder shrugged, “Or threatened.”
“Threatened?” Roni said as if she couldn’t understand what he’d said. “They’re the police. They’re supposed to stand up to threats.”
Sadly, Ravinder said, “What if their families…” he swallowed, “if their families are the ones that are being threatened? Being brave for yourself is much easier than being brave for your children…”
Roni opened her mouth to respond, but a chime signaled that the door at the front of the store had opened. She glanced that way, then pressed her mouth shut and vanished back around the corner into the office.
***
Master Akita narrowed his eyes as he watched Hax. The boy—at first so clumsy that Akita had had a hard time teaching him to fall without getting hurt—was moving… better. Oh, he didn’t look like the kind of kid Akita would expect to achieve a black belt, but when he’d first come in Akita wouldn’t have expected him to earn a yellow belt.
The boy had been growing rapidly and had diffidently asked if he could trade in his gi for a larger one some months back. Since then, he’d traded up another time. In Akita’s experience, the growth spurt was associated with a decrease in coordination, rather than an improvement.
For a moment, Akita wondered whether the physical discipline of the martial arts studio had reduced the boy’s awkwardness. He pursed his lips, No, it’s something more than that. He frowned, Maybe the boy had a vitamin deficiency and it’s been corrected?
He stepped forward, “No, not like that. Here, you’ve got to rotate your body.” He demonstrated, “Like this…”
***
Roni walked into the AllNews offices and looked around. This was her second trip down here. On her first trip Charlie Sims, the crime news reporter, hadn’t been there and people of the neighboring desks had seemed surprised that she’d expected to find him. Apparently, crime reporters spent most of their time out following their stories. This time, she’d come down just a few minutes before a staff meeting was supposed to let out. She found Sims’ desk and sat down on the chair next to it to wait.
About ten minutes later people started filtering into the big newsroom from the meeting room down the hall. She watched them and soon saw a young man coming her way and eyeing her speculatively. “Mr. Sims?” she asked.
He nodded, “What can I do for you?”
“I’m Roni Buchry. I’ve been trying to contact you about…”
Sims face closed up and he quickly sat down at his desk. He glanced around, then said in a low tone, “Have you talked to anyone here yet?”
“No,” Roni said, uncomfortable about his behavior.
Sims leaned closer, “You’re the one who’s been emailing me about the Castanos, right?”
Roni nodded.
He shook his head, “Well, for God’s sake, stop it!”
Roni blinked, “What? Why?!”
Sims looked at her as if he didn’t know what to say. His jaw worked and he developed a little tic in his right cheek. Finally, he leaned closer again and said quietly, “Do you know how long I’ve been working this desk?”
Surprised, Roni said, “Um, no.”
“Just a little over a year.” He glanced around again, then said, “My predecessor had been working up a story about the Castanos.”
Relieved, Roni realized that Sims must be working the same story, but wanting to keep it on the hush-hush until he was ready to publish. She leaned closer herself, “I can give you a lot of good information…”
Sims shook his head vehemently and put up his hand. “Do you know what happened to my predecessor?” he said, fiercely.
Roni drew back, startled by his intensity. A sick feeling gripped her, “No, what?”
“Hit and run, no witnesses,” Sims said, then he leaned back in his chair. “So, don’t tell me anything about the Castanos, okay?”
“But…” Roni said, embarrassed by the plaintive note in her voice, “the police won’t do anything.”
“Exactly.”
“But… somebody’s got to do something. If you got it in the news, there’d be such a clamor the police would have to do something.”
Sims leaned forward angrily, “Joe, that’s my predecessor, he’d submitted his story to be put up on our website and run out in print the next day. He’s dead. His family’s destitute.” Sims shook his head, “And… the story never ran…” Sims looked away; then said in a tired voice, “I write up murders, and rapes, and robberies. I don’t write about the damned Castanos, and I need you to stop pestering me.” Abruptly he stood and walked away.
Disheartened, Roni stood up, trying to think of another avenue she could use to attack the Castanos. Suddenly, she saw Sims coming back.
He strode up and stopped about six inches from her though his eyes looked off into the distance over her shoulder. “Here’s something else you could try. You could try hiring a lawyer to sue the Castanos in civil court for…” Sims glanced away, “whatever.”
Roni’s spirits lifted at the possibility, though she didn’t know how she could possibly hire a lawyer, it was certainly a tactic she hadn’t considered and sounded viable. She’d heard about lawyers working on contingency. Maybe she could find one who would? She opened her mouth to ask Sims advice on this strategy, but he rode over her question, “Robert Black tried that idea.” Sims eyes turned to bore into Roni’s, “Old Bob Black’s dead now. His store burned down, with him in it. All the records he’d accumulated about what the Castanos had been doing disappeared out of the police evidence room. Mr. Black’s lawyer’s office was burgled and all the evidence disappeared from there too.” Sims’ eyes turned to look out the window again, “Black had supposedly saved up quite a bit of money his kids and grandkids were suppose
d to inherit. That didn’t happen either. His accounts had all been zeroed the night his store burned down.” Sims looked back at Roni, “No one knows where the money went. The police say it was an inside job… that one of the family members made off with the money. But,” Sims shook his head, looking away once again. “I don’t think so.”
“But, what can we do?” Roni asked with a feeling of despair.
“Keep your head down. Don’t make any waves that rock the Castanos’ boat… not if you want to stay alive.”
As Roni walked home she fell into the depths of depression. At first, when she’d understood what the Castanos were doing, she’d felt appalled that they were getting away with it. However, it’d seemed that solving the problem would simply be a matter of making the police understand what was going on.
When her father had said that the police wouldn’t do anything, that they’d been intimidated, she at first thought it hopeless. But then, after a little research, she’d read about investigative reporters bringing various criminals to justice by spreading the word about what they’d done. Public outcry could stiffen a police department’s spine. Now, she’d realized that the criminals the reporters had brought to justice had all been white-collar criminals. They hadn’t been the kind of crime syndicate people that the Castanos represented. Not the kind of people who’d kill you if you tried to publish their crimes.
Bleak hopelessness swept over her. It didn’t seem like anything could be done.
Even though she knew she needed to get home or Ravinder would be angry, she sat down on a bench for a moment, burying her head in her hands and trying to think of any other solutions. Maybe not a solution that works for everyone, but just for us? she wondered. Something that’d get us out from under the Castanos’ thumb?
Maybe we could move? she thought with a small surge of hope. We’d have to sell our store to raise the money we’d need to be able to buy a store at the new location. Before we did it, we’d need to make sure there wasn’t a different crime syndicate causing the same kinds of problems wherever the new store was going to be. Don’t want to jump out of the frying pan into the fire, after all. We’d have to ask… Suddenly, she realized they’d have to hide the problem they had with the Castanos from anyone they were going to sell their store to or they wouldn’t be able to get a decent price.
Not only was hiding that information reprehensible, but there would be no way to be certain that the people they bought a new store from weren’t doing the same thing to them.
Feeling weary, Roni got to her feet and continued her way toward home. In the distance, she saw Nick Castano’s car. She glanced around. There wasn’t anyone close, certainly not anyone looking at her, so she disappeared.
A minute later Castano’s car rumbled past. Neither Nick nor the gorilla that rode around with him even glanced her way. Since she’d developed, she’d gotten used to men glancing at her even though they tried to hide it. The fact that those particular slime-balls hadn’t looked at her was confirmation enough that they couldn’t see her. She’d hidden from Nick before when she’d encountered him on the street, but she hadn’t had the courage to look at him and see where his eyes were tracking.
Hiding from Nick Castano.
When she’d realized she could essentially make herself invisible to other people she’d thought she’d figure out something better to do with such a talent than just hiding from assholes.
She’d thought of some other things she could do, but they all seemed to be immoral. For instance, I could make a living picking pockets if I had to. If it wasn’t completely unconscionable. She glanced after Nick’s car and thought uncomfortably, If a slimeball like Nick Castano could make himself invisible he’d probably be a peeping Tom… Or, I guess, he’d actually be a peeping Nick.
Nick’s car went around the corner. She realized he was probably going to pay a visit to another merchant. For a moment she considered following him invisibly. She could see what he did to other people.
She shook her head, maybe there’d be something worth learning, but Ravinder was waiting and he was probably already angry.
Roni kept walking.
Chapter 2
Hax sat on the broad steps outside the school like he usually did during lunch. For a while he’d hoped that he’d make some friends now that he was in high school. Several middle schools all merged into the high school so he’d thought that perhaps he’d make friends with some of the kids that were merging in. They wouldn’t know that he’d been in the lower caste of his school’s pecking order practically since kindergarten. However, though he’d picked up Frankie Wong, another geek, as a friend, for the most part he remained an outcast.
Even in his long pants and a light jacket it was too cool out, and with the weather getting even colder he suspected he wouldn’t be sitting outside for lunch much longer. Since this was his first year in high school, he wasn’t sure where he might sit for lunch once it got really cold. Someone walked down the stairs and came to a halt on Hax’s left. Assuming it was Frankie, he didn’t look up, just said, “Sit down, you’re blocking the view.”
“Sorry,” said a girl’s voice. She sat down next to Hax and said, “You’re Hax Buchry, right?”
Startled, Hax restrained himself from jerking back and away. Hallie Rogers! Hallie wasn’t a member of the in-crowd. She wasn’t beautiful like those girls, more of a tomboy. She had short hair and wore pants that didn’t seem as feminine as what a lot of the other girls wore. Still, she was cute. Much cuter than any girl Hax’d ever thought he might be talking to. She lifted an eyebrow and Hax realized he still hadn’t answered her question. “Um, yeah.”
She gave a little snort, “Well, that was eloquent.” She paused and Hax wondered whether he was supposed to respond to this jibe. After a few seconds, she continued, “I heard you’re really smart.”
Hax didn’t know what to say to this. He tried not to let anyone know how well he did on tests or what his grades were. Since Vito had pounded him years ago for showing him up in class, he’d tried hard not to act like a smart kid. He figured that being the clumsy, geeky kid was bad enough without being known as some kind of brain as well. Hax had gone so far as to intentionally put down some wrong answers in a class where a teacher had been posting their grades. The teacher had asked him why he’d missed questions she felt sure he knew, and he’d told her. She’d subsequently stopped posting their grades, though he thought it had as much to do with the embarrassment of the kids who did poorly as it did with him. Nonetheless, he didn’t really want to answer Hallie’s question. He wondered if she was going to ask him for help. Was he so desperate that he’d help her just to win points with a cute girl? Would it be better to try to keep his secret? Finally, he said, “I do okay.”
“A man of many words,” she said with a crooked little smile. She turned to look out over the school grounds.
Hallie didn’t say anything more, leaving Hax’s thoughts to run wild. Hallie hadn’t been in his middle school. He wondered if she didn’t realize where he stood socially. Maybe this was his chance to connect with a girl? Finally, wondering if he was shooting himself in the foot, Hax said, “Did you need help with a class?” He immediately wished he hadn’t said it. He’d never helped anyone with their schoolwork before and had no idea how to do it. Even worse, he wondered if he’d left himself open to be asked to actually do her homework.
She turned to him with a frown. Then she grinned and thumped him on the shoulder, “No you retard.” She gave out a little snicker, “I do okay too,” she said, holding up her fingers and making little air quotes at the word, “okay.”
“Oh,” Hax said, as if he understood, though he definitely didn’t. He thought about asking her what she wanted, but decided that that question would definitely drive her away. Rather than put his foot in his mouth, he sat and waited, despite desperately wanting to know what was going on.
“I hear you’re a hacker,” she said. She clarified, “A computer hacker.”
Hax
shook his head, “I like to program. I don’t hack into people’s computers if that’s what you’re asking.”
She shrugged, “They’re kind of similar.” She didn’t say anything for a minute, then said, “Well, maybe not. I’m pretty good at hacking into other people’s computers, but I really don’t know how to write a new program.”
When she didn’t say anything more, Hax said, “Oh.”
She grinned and nudged him with an elbow. “Man of many words,” she said again.
Hax tried to think of something to say in response to this. Some conversational ploy that’d show how witty he was, but everything he came up with seemed lame.
After a bit, she continued, “I want to write a program to put on an asshole’s computer.”
Thinking that it sounded like she wanted to design some malicious software, something Hax definitely didn’t want to get involved in, he said slowly, “To do what?”
“Erase all his images.”
Hax blinked. “Why?” he asked, not sure he wanted to know the answer.
“Bastard’s got some pictures of a friend of mine.” In a low, ugly tone, she said, “Pictures he shouldn’t have.”
“Um, don’t you just want to erase the pictures of your friend?”
She shrugged, “I don’t know their filenames. I don’t think even you’re smart enough to write a program that’ll find pictures that look like my friend and only delete those, so we need to erase all his pictures.” She wagged her head back and forth, “Besides, he probably has a whole bunch of other pictures he shouldn’t have. I’d like to help those people too.”
Hax frowned, “You don’t think he’ll have them backed up?”
“I don’t think he’s that smart. But just in case, the program we write should also erase his back-up whenever he hooks it up and tries to restore them.”
The Girl They Couldn’t See (Blind Spot #1) (Blind Spot Series) Page 6