Nickel City Crossfire

by Gary Earl Ross

  “I don’t know yet which one was the intended victim,” I said, “but Keisha and Odell were together when these people caught up with them so each one got a needle in the arm, probably at gunpoint. Keisha survived. That makes her a witness on the run.”

  15

  I got home by ten-thirty and sat at the kitchen counter to research Sanctuary Nimbus.

  Most of the information that popped up on my Lenovo confirmed what Ileana had told me about Pollard and Omicron Seven. There was no link to Keisha. I saved everything in a pdf. Then I logged into IntelliChexx to search for Jeremiah Grace. Three of the fifty-two hits were in New York, but only one address history included the right region: Jeremiah A. Grace, thirty-three, born and raised in Celoron, adjacent to Jamestown. Other addresses included two in Erie, PA, and three in Buffalo, but there was no listing for Bidwell Parkway or Sanctuary Nimbus. Never married. Sketchy credit history. Five speeding tickets but no current driver’s license. Not listed on any sex offender registry. One DUI, at age twenty-two. Two arrests for possession, at twenty-three and twenty-six. Both drug cases dismissed. Six relatives and associates with names I didn’t recognize. Nothing suggested he had hit rock bottom, but at least Jeremiah Grace was his real name. After compiling the information into another pdf and saving it, I ran a search of the F-150 license plate I had memorized in the church lot. The truck was registered to Titus Oliver Glenroy—Tito—and had nothing more serious than late-paid parking tickets. Further digging revealed Tito lived in a mortgage-free house on Masten Avenue near the armory, inherited from his parents, and had never been arrested. Also, he owned an old Cadillac that had belonged to his father. Disappointed his other ride wasn’t a Lincoln Navigator, I closed my Lenovo and opened Keisha’s Dell.

  I started by searching for keywords like drugs, money, shipment, delivery, and product, among others, but the first twenty of the hundreds of hits led to documents in the Humanitas folder or to the church newsletter or to other appearances in text that had nothing to do with crime. Next, I tried heroin, fentanyl, and assorted street names for drugs. Again, nothing beyond professional articles and treatment summaries. After an hour I faced the fact that I would have to read or at least skim hundreds, if not thousands, of files and emails.

  I was up till half-past three reviewing reports, letters, memos, proposals, meeting minutes, articles, alerts, real estate documents, supply lists, membership lists, spreadsheets, patient evaluations, newsletters, operating budgets, pictures, and even Turbo Tax files for Keisha and her parents going back nine or ten years. I skimmed to determine usefulness, reading till my vision blurred, and drank so much coffee my stomach burned. Every now and then I had a vague sense I was missing something but the sheer volume of material I faced kept me from stopping to ponder what it was. When I reached my limit for the night, I had plowed through perhaps a third of her files and found nothing that pointed toward Keisha’s whereabouts or why someone would be after her.

  Sore and tired, I stood up and stumbled to my bedroom.

  Despite the coffee, I fell asleep quickly and stayed that way until someone knocked on my door around ten-thirty. It took a bit for the pounding to penetrate my coma. I called, “Just a minute!” as I pulled on sweatpants and stepped into my slippers. I went down the corridor and opened the door. There stood Dr. Lila Cook, who lived across the hall and taught literature at D’Youville College. Beside her was fifteen-year-old Andrea, whose dark hair and complexion must have come from her late father instead of her pale blonde mother. Both wore long coats and had large roller suitcases beside them. Lila wore the customary half-smile that revealed her perpetual nervousness. Andrea, like most kids her age—and cats—had a look of barely disguised disdain.

  “Morning, Lila,” I said. “Andrea. Sorry it took me a bit, but I was up late working.” Unable to help myself, I yawned.

  “Then I’m very sorry to bother you, Gideon.” Lila handed me a business envelope addressed to Bobby. “Dr. Chance isn’t here. We’re on our way to the airport and won’t be back until the middle of next month. I wanted to leave the January rent check.”

  “Sure.” In the few years since they had moved in, Lila Cook took her daughter away every December, returning a week or so after the charter school where Andrea was an honor student resumed classes. Long ago Bobby told me that Lila’s husband had died on Christmas Eve and travel was her way of getting through the holidays. “Where are you off to this year?”

  “Ireland,” Andrea said without emotion. “Mom’s had me reading Joyce, Wilde, and Shaw since the summer. Now I’m halfway through Dracula. I’m supposed to be looking for subtext and the Irish imagination.”

  “Don’t sound so excited about it,” Lila said.

  “I was about your age when I read Dracula,” I said. “I recall it as pretty creepy.”

  Andrea smiled—but only while her mother was looking at me instead of her.

  I carried the suitcases down to the front vestibule and left the Cooks there to wait for their taxi. Once back in my apartment, I opened the envelope and took out the check, folded inside a full sheet of paper. I had power of attorney and a card to Bobby’s business account, so I would deposit the check at an ATM later that day. But before I could discard the paper, I noticed two handwritten words near the top of the page: January Rent. The note struck me as unnecessary, especially since it was repeated on the memo line of the check. The paper was unnecessary as well. The purpose of the untouched white space had been to mask a check in a thin envelope. I suspected it was Lila’s custom to use the blank or near-blank page to hide her checks, even those delivered by hand. Then I remembered the nagging feeling I’d missed something while scanning files last night. Putting the check on the counter, I booted up Keisha’s computer.

  Remembering that many of her Word files had a blank page or two at the end, now I wondered if she had changed the font color to white so the pages appeared blank to someone going through her computer. I began reopening documents I had examined last night. When I came across a blank page at the end of something, I selected it and clicked on the font button to make sure the color was black. For more than a dozen files, this produced nothing. I began to think my idea was silly. Just then random symbols appeared in the middle of the last page of a church membership list, a collection that looked like a mix of astrological signs and mathematical symbols. Realizing I had been right, I dragged the mouse over the symbols and watched the font name change from Times New Roman to Wingdings to Wingdings 2. I selected the block and clicked on Calibri. The symbols transformed into a short paragraph:

  It is clear from the data that this proposal provides a unique investment opportunity predicated on the belief that over time exponential growth will have such an impact on the surrounding area that everything will change to keep pace with similar projects underway nearby. Together, these will foster a broad economic development that will, quite simply, change the map. (40)

  Ten minutes later, in another document, I found another paragraph:

  A chief advantage of the location under review is its proximity to other rapidly developing areas and a revitalized economic corridor. Beyond the national significance of such growth, it is also worth noting that no variances would be required to repurpose existing structures into configurations compatible with maximum marketability. (17)

  Rereading the paragraphs, I surmised that they were part of a larger document that had been divided into at least forty sections, probably more. I opened both files’ properties and saw that authorship and revision dates had been removed. There was no digital signature or company name. Wherever the paragraphs had come from, my clients’ daughter had taken great pains to hide their source. Reconstructing such a document without a key—and doing so piece by piece from hundreds of files from both Humanitas and the church—would be a long undertaking.

  I called LJ, explained what I had found, and asked when he was finished with his semester exams.

  “Thursday,” he said. “But the toughest two are on Mon
day. After that, I can squeeze in a couple of hours a day if you’ve got some more work for me.”

  “I do, but this could take a lot of time.”

  “Maybe, maybe not. Depends on whether I see a pattern. I can start Monday night, Tuesday morning at the latest. The usual hourly rate?”

  When I said yes, I couldn’t help picturing his smile.

  16

  By half past noon, I had compiled and emailed all of Keisha’s documents to LJ in the hope that he could make a meaningful reconstruction. Also, I sent copies of everything to a cloud folder labeled KS. Then I shut down the Dell and took a quick shower so I could keep my one-thirty appointment with Ileana and the office workers she had enlisted to watch shelters.

  I reached the Towne Restaurant at the corner of Allen and Elmwood before Ileana. I saw Cassidy and Yvonne seated at a round table in the center of the main dining room. They waved me over and stood to shake my hand when I reached them. Blonde hair in a ponytail, Cassidy wore an unzipped blue ski jacket and jeans. Bald head covered by a beret, Yvonne, several inches taller, wore a stylish mauve sweater and matching lipstick. I gestured them back into their seats and draped my jacket over the back of a chair facing the door.

  “Thank you for coming,” I said, sitting. “I don’t know what Ileana told you—”

  “That you need our help finding Keisha.” Yvonne’s voice was soft, slightly nasal. “She didn’t say how but said we can’t tell anybody and you would reimburse us for gas.”

  Cassidy nodded, pulling her arms out of her sleeves. “So what do you want us to do?”

  “Let’s wait for Ileana,” I said. “Meantime, if you want coffee or lunch, it’s on me.”

  A twentysomething server whose nameplate read MIA took our order—diet Pepsi and fruit for Cassidy, Greek salad and lemon water for Yvonne, spanakopita and iced tea for me. As we waited, I asked what each did for Humanitas. Cassidy was a receptionist-slash-typist who had come to the agency from a suburban training program. Yvonne was an IT specialist who shared duties with Fareed. They had attended Buff State together a few years earlier.

  “I have a friend graduating from that program this spring,” I said. “What LJ can do with a computer never ceases to amaze me.”

  “LJ?” Yvonne said. “As in LJ Doran?”

  “Yes. Do you know him?”

  She shook her head. “He came in after I finished but he’s a legend. I keep reading about him in the newsletter. They make him sound like some kind of genius.”

  “He’d be embarrassed to hear that,” I said. “But his parents would agree.”

  “I wouldn’t mind meeting him. Picking his brain.” She smiled. “He’s cute too.”

  I thought about that for a moment. Most of the women LJ tried to date were students his age or younger. Some were intimidated by his computer talents. Others were uninterested because he could still pass for a high school junior, despite having reached drinking age last summer. I had zero interest in playing matchmaker, but LJ was a friend whose loneliness sometimes seemed to swallow him. Maybe meeting an attractive, slightly older woman in the same field was just what he needed. Our drinks came just then, and before I could offer to introduce Yvonne to LJ, Ileana walked through the door and started toward us.

  “Sorry I’m late,” she said, drawing near. Peeling off her charcoal coat and folding it over the back of a chair, she offered an explanation of her delay. I didn’t hear it because I recognized the man who entered just a few paces behind her.

  Dark brown-skinned and on the upper end of medium height, he wore a long leather coat, matching black gloves, and a leather Greek fisherman’s cap. In October, when he had taken me at gunpoint to meet Lorenzo Quick, whose dry-cleaning chain fronted a complex criminal organization, he never told me his name. Since then, over drinks with homicide detectives Terry Chalmers and Rafael Piñero, I had learned Quick’s second-in-command was Lester Tolliver, AKA Spider. Never arrested, he’d served with Quick in the first Gulf War and was a suspect in gang-related murders stretching back almost two decades. Now he took a seat by the front window and looked at us as Ileana sat.

  Spider.

  I wondered why he was there. I wasn’t afraid, but I was cautious. A man who had never been connected to any of the murders he was suspected of having committed wasn’t sloppy enough to take a shot at me in a restaurant full of people, especially when he had to know I’d be carrying too. Besides, there was no reason to kill me. My last case had nothing to do with his employer, whose illegal enterprises certainly included drug trafficking. Now, however, I wondered if Spider had been following Ileana. Or was he there to keep an eye on someone else at our table? What if he—or, more specifically, Lorenzo Quick—was the one looking for Keisha? Had Spider Tolliver jabbed the needle into her arm on Quick’s orders? Of course, maybe he had come in just for lunch and noticed me across the room.

  Right.

  “Okay, Gideon,” Ileana said, snapping me back. “Tell us how we can help.”

  Unless our table was bugged, Spider would be unable to hear what we said halfway across the dining room. A bug was unlikely unless Cassidy or Yvonne had brought it, which meant Quick’s reach was farther than I had imagined. The absence of wires did not preclude Spider from having a wireless earbud. Momentarily, I drummed my fingernails on the wood tabletop and glanced at him for a reaction to the noise. Nothing. Then, taking a deep breath, I explained to Yvonne and Cassidy the idea I had shared with Ileana the night before: Keisha was on the run from someone because she was a witness and marked for murder.

  Eyes widening, both women looked at Ileana, who confirmed my story with a nod.

  “I think she’s always on the move.” Again I glanced at Spider for any sign he could hear us. His face remained impassive as a server set a cup of coffee in front of him, but he was still looking at us. “She tries not to be in one place too long,” I continued, lowering my voice even more. “Maybe she spends the occasional night in a homeless shelter. Maybe not.” I took three large notecards from my shirt pocket and spread them on the table. “Last night Ileana gave me the names and addresses of nine homeless shelters where Keisha might crash for a night. These are the places I need you to watch.”

  “Three each,” Cassidy said. “How are we supposed to be in three places at once?”

  “No, five for you and four for Ileana,” I said, sliding a card to each.

  “What am I supposed to do?” Yvonne asked before the objection could come from Cassidy’s parted lips.

  “I’ll get to that. First, the shelters.” I looked from Ileana to Cassidy and back. “I don’t want either of you to spend all night anywhere. You’re not on a stakeout. Just drive by each place a time or two every night over the next few days and look.”

  “Just look?” Cassidy asked.

  “At the people coming and going,” I said. “Stop once or twice and take a peek inside, within an hour of closing time if you can. See if Keisha’s there. If she is, don’t go to her. If possible, don’t even let her see you. Text me, I’ll come. I’ve given each shelter a two-letter code so I’ll know exactly where to go. Text the code, period. Talk to Keisha only if she sees you and tries to leave.”

  “To slow her down,” Ileana said, nodding. “Should we follow her?”

  I shook my head, mainly for Cassidy’s benefit. No matter what I said, Ileana, I knew, would follow Keisha, even if it meant straight into the arms of a killer. “Just remember which direction she was headed when you last saw her.”

  “What about me?” Yvonne’s voice held a note of impatience.

  “You’re the one on stakeout.” I slid the last card to her. “Know where that is?”

  “Not far from my apartment.” She narrowed her eyes at me and grinned. “But you already knew that, didn’t you?”

  “I want you to drive by or walk by or sit nearby in your car off and on the next few evenings. Always take a good look up the driveway. I think there’s an apartment over the garage in back. There are two upstairs windows. I
f you see lights in either one, call me.”

  “Call? Not text?”

  “Call, and wait for me to get there.”

  Just then Mia brought our order and handed Ileana a menu. As we ate, I added all their phone numbers to my cell’s contacts list. Then we sent quick texts to each other to establish threads. Cassidy’s message was a thumbs-up emoji. Yvonne texted, Meet LJ? I replied, After K found. Right now LJ was prepping for exams and then working on Keisha’s documents. He didn’t need an attractive distraction.

  When the lunch and small talk ended and the cell phones were back in purses and pockets, I told Cassidy and Yvonne they were free to leave but asked Ileana to stay behind for a minute so we could discuss another matter. The two young women rose and put on their coats. Cassidy shook my hand again and thanked me. Yvonne flashed a smile that made me want to introduce her to LJ. They went out together, laughing after Cassidy said something I couldn’t quite hear.

  Spider never even glanced in their direction.

  I thought about that as I looked at Ileana and shook my head. “What am I going to do with you?”

  “What?” she said, a now cold French fry suspended a few inches from her mouth.

  “If you see Keisha, you’re going to follow her, aren’t you?”

  She lowered then raised her eyes. “Well, I can’t just let her walk away.”

  “Even if it brings you face to face with whoever wants to kill her?”

  She dropped the fry on her plate and let out a long breath. “She’s my friend.”

  “I know,” I said. “I know too you can take care of yourself. But if these people are cold-blooded enough to force somebody into a heroin overdose, they won’t hesitate to kill you.” I watched her face tighten. Good. It meant she was taking me seriously.