C T Ferguson Box Set

by Tom Fowler

  I had given Brian Sellers a burner phone. It wasn’t the latest and greatest model of smartphone, but it could do a few things those phones do. Chief among them, at least for my current interests, was beacon its location. I presumed (or hoped) no one found and took the phone. I also trusted Esposito wasn’t holding Brian somewhere with a cell phone jammer in place. This was my shot in the dark, and I needed it to work.

  When I got home, I logged into my computer. I knew the SIM card ID for the phone I gave Brian. I could use software to track its location. The technology, at its best, would be accurate to about a hundred meters, so I wouldn’t know exactly where Brian (and, I could presume, Chris and Anna) was being held, but I would have a general idea. The thought came to me how Brian needed to keep the battery charged. I expected he did. Joey kept a few of the most popular charger types in the safehouse.

  If my software didn’t provide a reliable location for Brian’s phone, I would ask Joey to install and run it, too. A second point could make for a more accurate location estimate. I waited as the software ran, checking cell towers for communications. Towers in Baltimore lit up. Esposito hadn’t taken them far. After a few seconds, I had an area: somewhere at the Port of Baltimore.

  I sighed. The port was a big place with many warehouses, shipping containers, and vessels in which to hide someone, or three someones. And metal containers could inhibit cell signals. Adding another data point—or two for triangulation—may not get me a more searchable area. I needed to try, though, so I called Joey and told him what I wanted to do.

  “You didn’t find anything in the house?” he said.

  “Nothing,” I said. “My angle was Brian would have objected to what Chris and Anna wanted to do and left something I could use. No such luck.”

  “How do I get this software?”

  “I put it on an SFTP server,” I said. I gave Joey the address, confident he would know how to download and install it.

  “Ok, I have it running,” Joey said a couple minutes later. “What now?”

  I told him the SIM card, how to run the search, and how to combine his results with mine and narrow the area. “It’s working,” Joey said after a few seconds. “Hitting a few towers . . . now focusing on one.”

  “I can see it on my screen,” I said.

  “But you’re missing out on me narrating the action,” said Joey.

  “You’re no Al Michaels,” I said as the program finished. It showed me the same location as before.

  “No luck?” Joey said.

  “No. The port itself could be the problem. Lots of metal. We may not be able to get any better than this.”

  “Now what?”

  “No idea,” I said.

  “Can you get a warrant?” Rich said. We sat in my living room drinking a couple of beers. An oatmeal stout for Rich and an IPA for me.

  “Do they let you apply online?” I said.

  Rich rolled his eyes. “This doesn’t sound like a joke.”

  “It’s not. And I don’t have any proof, short of an app used to trace the location of a burner cell phone to the port.”

  “It’s a big goddamn place,” Rich said.

  “Hence, why I wanted some help in looking around.”

  “It doesn’t work on guesses.”

  “Because I don’t have a warrant?” I said. “Because your system is great and wonderful?”

  “It’s not about the system,” Rich said. “It’s not even about getting around the system. The Port of Baltimore is secure. Companies there have their own security. They don’t much like cops with warrants, but they can’t do anything about it. You go down there with your usual unauthorized snooping, even if you have cops with you, and they’re going to bounce you out. And there won’t be anything you could do about it.”

  I downed the rest of my beer and looked at Rich. He shook his head. I got myself another IPA from the fridge, then plopped back into my recliner. “So what do I do?” I said. “I can’t just sit here and do nothing.”

  Rich took a drink and thought about it. “You said the younger brother has the burner phone?” he said.

  “Yeah. He’s the only smart one in the trio.”

  “Then reach out to him. You have the signal. The phone is on.”

  “I don’t want to risk it,” I said. “It would give away he has the phone.”

  “They may already know,” Rich said.

  “I’ve thought the same thing.”

  “Then did you think the phone might be planted?”

  “Meaning what?” I said.

  “Meaning they found it and stashed it at the port, hoping you’d discover it’s there. And then when you come and look for it, you find a welcoming committee to meet you.”

  I considered the possibility somewhere in the cynical recesses of my brain. My time in Hong Kong gave me plenty of practice with worst-case scenarios, and my experience has colored my worldview ever since. “I tossed the idea around,” I said.

  “And?” said Rich.

  “And it’s one of the reasons I’d rather wait for Brian to contact me.”

  “If he can.”

  “If he can,” I said.

  It could prove to be a big if.

  Later, I settled into an uneasy sleep. Gloria called again after Rich left. I didn’t answer, but I texted her and said it wasn’t a good time with the case. While I liked Gloria, I didn’t want her to come by. To my relief, she stayed away. I would have been bad company anyway. I went to sleep wishing I could do more, knowing I was better off to wait for something else to happen and dreading the eventuality.

  I woke up around eight and lay in bed, staring at the ceiling and straining for a good idea. None came. After about fifteen fruitless minutes, I got up, changed into running clothes, and hit Federal Hill Park hard. I pushed myself for over four miles, working in even more sprints than Bobbi Lane and I did. When I finished, I drove to the dojo where I trained and wailed on a punching bag for a while. I drove my fists, elbows, knees, and feet into the bag as if abusing it would provide me an epiphany. All it did was tire me out.

  I drove back home, showered, and ate a late (and large) breakfast. I whipped up an omelet, toast, turkey sausage, coffee, and a banana. I earned the calories . While I washed my plate in the sink, my phone rang. The number looked familiar and not in a good way. “Hello?”

  “Well, well, well.” Esposito. The fucker probably called to gloat. “I wasn’t sure you’d pick up.”

  “Mystery solved,” I said. “What do you want?”

  “Seen Brian or Chris lately?” he said. I didn’t answer. “What about Anna?”

  “You have them.” I didn’t want to sound too certain and risk burning my compromise of Esposito’s router. I doubted it could last forever, but I didn’t need to lose it right now.

  “You’re damn right I do.” Laughter threatened to spill into everything Esposito said. I never wanted to punch him more and wanting to punch him had been a constant condition since our first meeting. “What are you going to do about it?”

  “I’m not begging for their lives,” I said.

  “No?”

  “No.”

  “Why’s that?” Esposito said.

  “Because you’re an asshole,” I said. “Also, I don’t beg for anything. But mostly because you’re an asshole.”

  “You know I could have them killed, right?” he said.

  “Come on. If you were going to resort to murder, you’d just do it. Me calling you a name wouldn’t be a factor.”

  “You think you have this all figured out?” Esposito said. The lurking laughter vanished from his voice. Now I heard anger replace it. I imagined him getting red-faced, and the mental picture provided me a small measure of satisfaction. I would take little bits of satisfaction where I could get them at this point. “Tell me this: if you’re so fucking smart, where do I have them? Huh?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. I wasn’t about to give away knowing anything about the Port of Baltimore.

 
“That’s right,” Esposito said. “You don’t know. You did all you could to keep them from me, and I ended up with them anyway. Now I have them, and you don’t know shit.”

  “Great. I don’t know anything. I’m an ignoramus when it comes to where asshole mobsters hide people. Now what?”

  Esposito took a deep breath. It hissed in my ear. I was getting under his skin. While I didn’t think he would hurt or kill anyone based on how our conversation went, I didn’t want to push him too far. He was about as stable as a see-saw.

  “I wanted Chris,” Esposito said after a few seconds of deep breathing. He sounded calmer, probably not red-faced anymore. Pity. “You know it. I don’t really need his brother or his girlfriend.”

  “You’re going to let them go?” I said.

  “I’m going to let one of them go. The girlfriend. I’m keeping the brother to make sure Chris does the right thing.”

  “All right,” I said. “What am I supposed to do about it?”

  “You know these people,” Esposito said. “They trust you, for whatever it got them. I’ll release the broad to you later today.”

  “Her name is Anna.”

  “Whatever. You want to pick her up or not?”

  “Of course I do,” I said.

  “Good,” said Esposito. “I’ll call you later and tell you when and where. Just you. No cops, no feds, no friends. Just you. We’ll be watching. You want to make sure I know this broad’s name, you probably want to keep her alive.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Good. Come alone, then, where and when I tell you.” Esposito hung up.

  Prick. At least he was releasing Anna. Maybe she could tell me something about where she, Chris, and Brian were being held. Presuming they were together. Even with Anna’s pending return, a cloud of uncertainty still trailed this case around.

  With luck, I might shed a bit of light on the mess.

  Gloria called again after a couple hours. I had hoped it would be Esposito calling. For the first time in my life, I felt a twinge of disappointment that a beautiful woman was calling. “You’re a hard man to reach.”

  I told her the recent developments in the case.

  “Wow. He’s going to let her go?”

  “So he says,” I said.

  “You don’t believe him?”

  “For now, I have to take him at his word. Chris is the one he wants, and I guess a younger brother is more incentive to keep working than a girlfriend.”

  “You deal with some very shady people,” Gloria said.

  “Don’t I know it?” I said.

  Gloria wanted to have lunch, but I declined. “I don’t know when he’s going to call,” I said. “And I don’t know if he’s going to do something like tie up Anna and throw her in a tub so I only have a certain amount of time to get there.”

  “You think he would do that?” Gloria said.

  “He’s an asshole, and he has a little flair for the dramatic. I wouldn’t put it past him.”

  I told Gloria I would talk to her when I found more time. She said she understood. My thoughts drifted to Bobbi Lane, and I purged them as soon as they came. Bobbi wasn’t the enemy, but I didn’t want to see her right now. Thankfully, she hadn’t called or texted since I left her apartment two days ago. It would be a complication I could live without.

  While I waited for Esposito to call, I fired up my phone-tracking program. It still showed Brian’s burner being somewhere at the Port of Baltimore. Would I have to go near there to get Anna? It would give me a chance to snoop around. The hell with Rich’s warning: if I got a chance to poke around the port, I would take it. If Esposito didn’t know about the burner, he didn’t know about my ability to track it. Maybe this would be the leg up on him I’d needed ever since I plucked Chris and Anna from him in Delaware.

  It was worth the hope.

  A few more hours into the afternoon, the call came.

  “Where is she?” I said.

  “You get right down to it, don’t you?” Esposito said.

  “How do I know her life isn’t in the balance?”

  “It’s not.”

  “I should just take you at your word?” I said.

  “I’m not a liar,” he said. “I think your buddy Tony is behind the times in a lot of ways, but he definitely taught me the value of being straight with people.”

  “All right,” I said, “I’ll take you at your word. Where is she?”

  “How familiar are you with White Marsh?”

  So much for stashing Anna at the Port with Brian. I should have realized Esposito would be too careful. Even if he didn’t know about the burner phone and my ability to track it, keeping Anna near Brian constituted an unnecessary risk. “Familiar enough.”

  “Good,” Esposito said. “She’s in a house not far from the mall.” He gave me the address on Necker Road. “It’s right near where the road dead-ends. Should be easy to find.”

  “Good. I’ll go and get her.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  I was disappointed it came to this. Esposito was doing something nice. My proper upbringing compelled me to thank people who did nice things. Esposito was also an asshole who did a lot of terrible things. Because I resisted the urge of my upbringing, he now threw it in my face. “Thank you,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “I’m sure that was difficult,” he said.

  “Good talk. I’ll be on my way now.” I hung up.

  I had a woman to rescue.

  The Caprice’s V8 surged as I got onto I-95 and stomped on the gas. It would never be much to look at, but under its hood an eager engine could get down to business on the open road. One of these days, when this damned case was over, I needed to keep looking for another car. The Caprice would be useful in spots, so I would keep it. For everyday driving, presuming my Lexus wouldn’t recover, I required something looking better and running smoother.

  I went through the Fort McHenry Tunnel, got off at Route 43, picked up Belair Road, and made a right onto Necker. It was a narrow street with houses and parked cars on either side. Other roads connected off it with names like Silver Teal, suggesting they should be in a place like Columbia. I took Necker almost to the end, where it narrowed even more and saw a squat white house. It looked pretty plain with an aging roof, nondescript shutters, and a narrow, pitted driveway matching the street. I backed the Caprice in to park in case I needed to get Anna out of here quickly.

  No other cars were in the driveway. This end of the street was isolated from the rest. There was a small cluster of townhomes at the very end of Necker. On the other sides, grass and trees surrounded the house. Esposito chose a good place to stash someone. Few people out here would see anyone coming and going. I looked at the house. No lights were lit. Dusk had settled. I would need my flashlight. I brought my .45 also. Esposito told me Anna would be here. He didn’t say the rest of the house would be free of goons.

  I expected the front door to be locked and would not be disappointed. The lock yielded to my picks in under a minute. Flashlight and .45 leading the way, I walked into the house. Picking the lock had not been a silent endeavor, and the area was quiet enough anyone inside would have heard the Caprice. I couldn’t count on the element of surprise. “Anna?” I said.

  No answer.

  “Anna, are you here?”

  Nothing. I looked around the living room, dining room, and kitchen. I didn’t see Anna, nor did I see any evidence anyone had been in this house in the last week. The fridge was empty of perishables. There were no dishes in the sink, no mail or magazines on a table anywhere. I got a bad feeling. What if Esposito chose this house because its owner wasn’t home?

  “Anna?” I called again as I reached the bottom of the stairs leading up.

  Still no answer. Not even a muffled cry or a whimper.

  I took the carpeted stairs two at a time, stopping at the landing. The flashlight showed me four closed doors and a closet. No goons. No sign of activity. “Anna?” I said again. No response came
. I flipped on a hall light. No one had stuffed Anna into the linen closet. The two small bedrooms at the far end of the hallway were vacant of all but cheap furniture. I checked the bathroom. Empty, including the tub.

  I opened the last door. It was the master bedroom. “Anna, you in here?” I said as the door swung open.

  Then I saw her on the bed.

  She had been shot several times in the torso. Her white shirt turned red with blood as did the blanket she lay on. Anna’s eyes were frozen open as if looking for a rescuer who wouldn’t make it in time. I felt her neck for a pulse. Her skin was cool to the touch.

  I found no pulse.

  The son of a bitch killed her. King had told me Esposito was ruthless.

  Outside, I heard cars screech to a stop. Red and blue flashing lights flooded the windows.

  Great. Not only did Esposito murder her, but he called the cops when he knew I would be here.

  I put my gun away. No point in making it appear I shot her. I looked at Anna. Five bullet holes punctured her chest. Any of them could have been fatal. All were small as if made by a .38 or nine millimeter. I wondered how long she had been here. Her body was cool. An hour? Two?

  The door burst open downstairs. “County police,” I heard a man shout.

  “Up here,” I said. “There’s a dead woman.”

  Three cops came up the steps, their guns held before them. “Freeze!” one of them said to me.

  “I found her like this,” I said.

  “Get on the floor!”

  “Not happening.”

  The three cops approached. “That a gun at your side?” the one who told me to freeze said. His name tag identified him as Winters.

  “Yes,” I said. “You’ll find the license in my right front pocket.” I put my hands up. There was no point in resisting. I had no intention of getting onto the floor to be sat upon and cuffed, but I wouldn’t resist a reasonable search.