“Are you alright in there, ma’am?” the guard asked and paused. Emily suspected he was listening. “Anything we can help you with?” His voice appeared closer.
“Ah, no.” She locked the compartment box. “Won’t be a moment. I’m almost finished. Sorry for taking so long.”
She placed the cash and passports inside a hidden compartment sewn into the side of her bag then took one last look around. Everything had been put away.
“Okay, I’m ready,” she yelled out.
The curtain slid along the rail. Pulling both bags over her shoulder, she carried the box out.
After securing the box back in its proper place, she nodded at the guard and left the vault. Outside, the man who’d brought her down there proceeded up the stairs.
He didn’t look at her twice. He’d probably seen stranger things in there than her shaggy red bag.
They proceeded to the exit in silence. This time there wasn’t any urgency to get through the security checkpoints. As they approached each door, they automatically opened.
Emily glanced around. She’d noticed security cameras everywhere. Not what she wanted, but she was sure they were protecting far better secrets than her modest stash.
“Until next time, Miss Phillips.” The man held the exit door for her and nodded to Emily.
“Till next time.” She returned the nod and stepped out onto the city street.
She breathed it all in. The fumes filled her lungs again, screeching brakes and drivers blaring their horns pierced her ears.
Chapter 27
The sidewalks were empty, and so were the notifications on her cell phone. Tapping her foot, she took her time looking around. The same work van still lingered in the street. This time it was two car spaces back. It was the same van. Unlike other city vehicles, this one was distinguishable by its thick layer of red dirt. A white spray area marked the front windshield where the wiper blades couldn’t reach.
What really stood out on the van was the signwriting along the side wall, which read, Sydney’s Leak-Free Plumbing. The best place to take your leaks.
“Sydney?” Emily said. “Aren’t you a long way from home?”
Unable to see any occupants, she started down the road, turning into a tree-lined one-lane street farther down. Making sure she didn’t bump into any pedestrians, she turned and glanced over her shoulder, taking one last look at the van. Its brake lights flashed.
Although the sight of the lush green leaves made her happy, Emily was on edge. Stepping back to the corner, she leant against the building and poked her head around the corner. The van was gone.
Leaning against the wall, she composed herself.
“You’re being silly, Emily. Snap out of it,” she told herself.
Emily received a few odd looks from passersby. That was until she waved and gave them a cheesy grin. She chuckled to herself as she watched how quickly they snapped their heads back to the footpath.
The tree-lined street she was on was a one-way street. If someone was after her, she looked around, there should be plenty of places to take cover.
With nothing to lose, she walked quickly to the first laneway; it was only half a city block away. Leaning against the building on the corner, she looked down the lane. She noticed it was only a small block and ran into to a busy street.
The Sydney Plumber’s van rolled through the intersection.
Emily pulled her head back. Fingers crossed, she hadn’t been spotted. She looked around the corner again. The intersection was empty.
Her eyes on the oncoming traffic, she approached the next laneway. A dead end. It was empty besides a few trashcans and a few staff workers taking their smoking breaks.
Up ahead, she heard a vehicle’s horn being punched repeatedly at the traffic, which had come to a complete stop. Thinking nothing of the repeated honks, she proceeded up the street, moving closer to the congestion and the disgruntled driver.
She soon realized the lane she was navigating was very closed in, with few exit points.
The disgruntled driver was now two car lengths away.
Emily froze.
“This is no coincidence,” she whispered. “How on earth are they track-”
Emily looked down at her watch.
“Son of a-”
She ripped it off.
“How stupid can I be?”
Her watch was the only item on her with GPS tracking activated; it was used to help track her daily steps prior to her recommencing training.
Next to her, a motorcyclist was getting ready to close his motorbike storage compartment. When his back was to her, Emily slipped the watch in there and stepped into the closest shop.
The smell of freshly baked bagels flooded the shop and her senses. Keeping an eye on the front door, Emily edged back to the farthest corner, which wasn’t far enough in this boutique bakery, maybe only about five people deep.
The motorcyclist revved his engine before speeding up the street on his rear tire.
“Next,” a pimply faced teenager bellowed from behind the counter.
Emily saw everyone look at her. She returned her attention to the shop, realizing it was her turn to order.
“Oh.” She waved her hands in front of her. “I’m still looking.”
“Next,” the kid called.
Emily turned back to the front door.
Growing impatient, she moved a couple of steps towards the door. At that moment, the same dirty plumber’s van drove past and sped off.
There was no time to eat. As much as her tummy was detesting her, she resisted the urge. In the distance, she heard blaring horns and metal scraping against metal.
Everyone from neighboring shops flooded the street but Emily remained where she was. She knew what had just happened. It was safer to stay put.
The street soon returned to normality as people quickly grew tired of seeing the aftermath of a van careering into a busy intersection in hot pursuit of a hot-headed motorcyclist.
After waiting a minute, she grabbed a cold, flavored spring water from the drinks fridge next to her. On the way out of the shop, she dropped enough change on the counter to cover the cost of the drink.
Walking down the narrow street, she was wary of every person around her, cautious of anyone and everyone. Double-looking over her shoulder. Ensuring she was alone.
Emily took a right down a quaint little lane. Coffee aromas permeated every nook of the lane. Chairs and tables spilled out onto the street, filled with an assortment of people enjoying the many cuisines on offer.
About half way down, she found a quiet lane that was used for empty milk crates and large trashcans. Pulling a milk crate to the corner, away from the trash, she plonked herself on it, grateful to be off her feet for a few minutes.
Sipping on her drink, it dawned on her it’d been a little while since she’d heard from Harry or Sharon. She pulled out her phone and turned data back on. Straight away, her phone beeped and vibrated like crazy as all the notifications came through.
Chapter 28
Emily scanned through the notifications.
A couple of text messages from Schultz that had been sent five minutes earlier had only just come through to her phone. She shrugged, thinking it was odd they hadn’t come through until now; they should’ve come through as normal messages.
“He can wait,” she told herself, flicking past.
A little farther down the list were a couple of messages from an unknown number, received thirty minutes ago. These piqued her interest. She was curious, as she wasn’t sure how the stranger got her personal cell phone number. After the Sydney incident, she had only given her number to clients and colleagues.
By now, her phone would’ve already ran its security checks over everything that’d come in. She clicked on the first message. It read:
Sorry for taking so long to get this to you.
There’s a lot of information. Not just Harry’s case. It appears Andrew has been busy over the last six months serving to
others the same fate Harry received.
Sharon xo
“I don’t even know the cat woman and she’s sending me virtual kisses & hugs. Unique.”
A cat-face emoji followed Sharon's uncanny signature.
The signature confirmed the sender, and Emily felt reassured. The only other information was a shortened web link.
With her finger hovering over the link, Emily looked around. Everyone was busy minding their own conversations, unaware she was there.
The link opened her web browser and re-directed to a cloud server. Waiting for the information to load, Emily took a couple of swigs of her spring water. It hit the spot, leaving her feeling a little cooler and more refreshed.
The page was taking a while to load. Fumbling through her red shaggy bag, Emily blindly assembled the pieces together. She screwed on the silencer and did a quick check, ensuring it had free movement. Happier, she loaded a full round of ammunition into its mag.
She dropped the red shaggy bag to the ground as she placed the loaded gun in her other bag, checking for onlookers. But everyone was oblivious to what had just happened, Emily was relieved to see.
Emily checked her phone again. The page had finally loaded. It contained a few folders, each one labelled with a person’s name and what looked like a company name.
She touched the first name on the list and tapped her feet on the pavement while the hourglass spun on the screen. Above her, small snippets of sky poked through the tall buildings. Maybe it was just her internet provider deciding to slow the internet down. This wouldn’t be the first, nor the last time. One moment she had super-fast data, the next second it slowed down to slower than dial-up speed.
A list of files popped up on the screen. Emily scanned through the content — a variety of emails, letters, contracts, and photos, all dating back to twelve months prior.
Emily opened the contract and scrolled to the bottom.
“Six months ago, and that signature.”
She scrolled back through the files and pulled up some letters Harry had allegedly sent to Andrew.
“They’re clearly not the same signature, and a poor job at faking it, too. Very nineteen-nighties.”
In one corner of the signature, there was a small darkened patch, as if a piece of paper with the signature had been placed on the original document then copied. This small piece of evidence could well be damning Andrew. It could be argued his actions had been premeditated.
Investigating the remaining files, she soon realized there were many more farmers from Gippsland’s dairy region who had been hit by this bank. Farms who’d been held in the family for multiple generations.
Emily pulled up a map of the area and placed a virtual thumb tack on each repossessed farm.
“I’ll be damned.” Emily sat back and clasped her hand over her mouth. Looking around, she noticed some patrons looking at her, but they quickly returned to their own lives.
Before her was a screen full of virtual thumb tacks. In the center there was a bare patch... until Emily placed the last marker.
“Harry’s farm is the missing piece.”
Emily sat back, realizing what Sharon and Harry had unraveled. No wonder Harry was pissed.
Returning her attention to her phone, she scrolled to the bottom of the folder list.
The folder read: CONFIDENTIAL
”Ha, we’ll see just how confidential it is.”
Emily opened the folder and more folders appeared. The first two caught her attention. They read:
PRIVATE
PERSONNEL
She opened the PERSONNEL folder and two pdf files appeared.
EXTINCT
ACTIVE
Emily didn’t hesitate and clicked on the ACTIVE file. The document began loading. In the top left corner, a face stared at her. Emily gasped.
The rest of the page finally loaded. A simple table with headings and information formulated beside the photo.
Emily began reading:
NAME: FERNANDO DOMINIC
AGE: 45
GENDER: MALE
STATUS: ACTIVE
CITIZEN: MEXICO
PLACE OF BIRTH: SPAIN
YEARS SERVICE: FIVE (5)
SERVICE ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
Induction – Jewelry burglary followed by a 100% successful kill rate in all jobs received. Also, very accomplished in recovering bad debts.
RECENT SERVICE: Ensuring the smooth transition of the final property in North East Victoria to the investors.
Emily shuddered.
“One hundred percent,” she repeated. “So far, I’m the one percent that’s marring his perfect record. Damn. Not his day then, is it?”
She scrolled through the remaining records but didn’t recognize any of the other faces. She went through them once more, taking a mental note of their facial features, names, and jobs. She lost count of how many there were after the first ten or so, until he found someone else she recognized.
“Brian?”
She read his record.
NAME: RONALDO ALCHEZ
(Alias Brian Chalmers and W)
AGE: 35
GENDER: MALE
STATUS: ACTIVE
CITIZEN: AUSTRALIA
PLACE OF BIRTH: SPAIN
YEARS SERVICE: FIFTEEN (15)
SERVICE ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
Induction – Accessing government records. Setting up a virtual casino and accessing various global government records. Pivotal in the growth of the syndicate
RECENT SERVICE: Assisting clients with timely transactions.
“Damn.” Emily leant back onto the brick wall. “This is huge.”
An alarm sounded on her phone. In bright red, the number fifteen flashed on her screen.
“Shit, too long.”
Emily scrambled through her bag and pulled out an external hard drive. Touching a few buttons, she made a backup to her own personal cloud and sent another to her offline hard drive.
Once all backups were complete, she de-activated her cell phone data and closed all applications running on the phone. After her hard drive was safely back in her bag, she dialed the last number she’d called.
“Lee,” a gruff male voice sounded on the other end.
“Schultz. You’re not going-”
“Where are you?”
“Don’t worry about that. We have bigger fish to fry.”
“Continue.” His voice was unchanged.
“You’re not going to believe what has been sent to me in the last few minutes.”
“Look, Lee, I don’t have time for your games. Cut to the chase.”
“The hostage situation. The targeted shootings at me. They’re all linked.”
“How?” His tone was now more curious.
“Information forwarded to me shows correspondence linking them all up. Andrew and these men are all working for that International Chinese Syndicate.”
“Holy cow. This changes everything.”
“I thought you’d be impressed.”
“I need you to get that information to me.”
“On one condition.”
She could hear Schultz’s deep belly laugh.
“Seriously. If this helps our cases, we need that information. You’re not going to withhold information on me, are you?”
“You’re not going to get your hands on this. Not until you agree.”
After a moment of silence, Schultz finally said, “Continue,” his voice sounding defeated again.
“The guy holding the secretary hostage. He’s recently had his farm allegedly stolen from him and handed over to this syndicate on a silver platter. He wants his farm returned to him, and the same for the other farmers who’ve had theirs stolen.”
“That’s a tall order that we need to investigate fully first. If it does prove true and correct, fine, but if the documents have already been processed, it’s going to get messy.”
“You haven’t heard him today. When I spoke to him earlier, he was desperate. He’s been
trying to make himself heard for months but no one listened. And he claims that also includes you, guys.”
The line went silent. She could hear a dull tapping coming from the other line, like a pen hitting a desk.
“Schultz?” Emily asked, not sure if he was still there.
“I’m going to regret this,” he finally said. “But you owe me big time. You’re coming into protective custody.”
“No, I’m not. Where are you?”
“At the office.”
“I’ll be over there shortly.”
Emily disconnected the call and opened the last message from Sharon. She typed in the following message:
All systems go. I’ll be in touch.
The phone did its thing and the message popped up saying it had been sent.
She checked the time on her phone. Twenty minutes. Too long. I need to get out of here. NOW.
Chapter 29
Emily savored the lingering coffee aromas one last time before ditching the shaggy red bag, now empty, behind a trashcan and stepping out onto the bustling Collins Street.
Out in the open she didn’t feel comfortable. It was too exposed. Wide streets with traffic and trams traveling in both directions were a bad idea.
Down towards her apartment building, the police still had the road cordoned off, and officers were manning the area.
Right next to her building, outside the Subway store, she noticed a man leaning against a tree reading a newspaper. On the opposite side of the road a few people dressed in business attire walked like they were on a mission. Her eyes fell on a man dressed in baggy jeans and flannelette shirt using the pay phone.
She longed for the comfort of her apartment. What wouldn’t she give to be able to freshen up and be surrounded by her belongings? To cradle her bear, the last gift she’d received from her father, the last present before he did the unthinkable and disowned her.
Taking a deep breath in, she turned and walked resolutely in the opposite direction instead.
It was only six short blocks to Schultz’s office. Ten, maybe fifteen minutes away if she were to get caught at a few red lights. She’d then be surrounded by some of the country’s elite police force. Nothing could go wrong in that short a space of time.
The Analyst (Emily Lee Series Book 1) Page 10