Disruption: A River Of Secrets And Betrayal

by J. B. Jamison

  "Do we know anything about this Alex guy yet?", Emily asked as Loren drove east on Brownsboro Road.

  "Nothing yet," Loren said. "When we found Alma, I put more of the team on him, so hopefully we'll hear something soon."

  "Good move. How did you find Alma?"

  "We started at the house and saw her standing on the patio; just got lucky."

  "We'll take that when we can get it. She didn't notice anything?"

  "We just drove by, so I don't think so. We've got two cars watching the place, but from a distance. There's one of them now."

  Loren turned onto Hite Avenue, pulled alongside a sedan parked against the curb.

  "Anything going on?" Loren asked the man in the parked car.

  "Nope. Quiet as can be."

  "Ok, we're going in. Stay put for now."

  The man nodded as Loren drove up the road and turned into the curved driveway leading to the small patio.

  "I'll follow your lead," Loren said to Emily as they walked up the neatly trimmed brick sidewalk. Emily knocked on the door, and after a few moments, they heard footsteps inside.

  "Yes?" As Alma Hendricks opened the door, Emily immediately thought of Aunt Bee from the Andy Griffith show she used to watch as a kid. Though probably quicker and smarter than Opie's aunt, Alma had the appearance of someone more likely to be working out a new chocolate chip cookie recipe than falsifying business documents.

  "Alma Hendricks?" Emily asked.

  "Yes, I'm Alma Hendricks." She smiled weakly and looked at the two women. "Come in. I imagine you are from the police? I've been expecting you."

  Emily and Loren glanced at each other.

  "We're with the FBI Mrs. Hendricks. We'd like to ask you a few questions if you don't mind." Emily followed Alma through the small kitchen to a very tidy living room.

  "The FBI? Oh, my. I had no idea." Alma pointed to chairs and slowly found one for herself.

  "Yes, ma'am. I am Agent Graham, and this is Agent Erickson. Are you willing to speak with us for a few minutes?"

  "Yes, of course. As I said, I was expecting someone from the police. Where should we begin?"

  It was rare that Emily had felt so welcomed by someone she was investigating.

  "Well, first all, are you feeling well enough to talk right now? I understand you came home from work because you were not well."

  "Oh my, no, I'm fine. When Alex came in this morning and told me someone was coming about the reports, I just thought it was better if I got today’s reports finished and came home. I didn't want to create a problem for Gil, Mr. Arbel, there at the office you know."

  "Alex told you we were coming this morning?" Emily asked.

  "Well, not that you specifically were coming; not the FBI. He just said that things had changed. Someone had found out about the reports and would be coming in."

  "Did he say how he knew someone was coming this morning?"

  "Oh no." Alma waved a hand in the air, "he never explained things like that to me. He always seemed to know more than he told me, and that was fine with me. I really didn't want to get involved in any of that stuff; whatever he was doing."

  Loren took notes as Emily continued.

  "Do you know where Alex is now, Mrs. Hendricks?"

  "Why no. Isn't he at the office?"

  "No, ma'am. Apparently, he left before anyone was there as well."

  "My goodness. Maybe he felt like I did and just went home. I don't think either of us wanted to embarrass Gil."

  "Yes, ma'am. We're checking his home too. Why don't you help us out by explaining just what it was that you did; what it is that might be embarrassing at the office?"

  "Certainly. Well, I guess it started shortly after Alex came to work with us. He was responsible for the new computer system for fleet traffic you know. Before that, we had to do it all by hand, one page..."

  "Yes, ma'am. What happened when Alex joined the company?"

  "Well, that was about the same time I was having more problems with my health. Everyone at the office thinks that Alex is kind of, you know, cold or unfriendly, but he has always been very sweet to me, always asking how I am doing, he is really a very nice boy."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "Well, as I said, it was when I was having some problems. My husband, Harvey, had gotten this rare form of cancer. We tried everything we could, but nothing helped. There were other treatments, but the insurance company wouldn't let us try them. They said they were too experimental. Then, when Harvey died, I had all kinds of troubles getting the insurance company to pay the bills they had said they would approve. They threatened to sue me; even take away our house, the one we had lived in for forty years. If Gil hadn't gotten involved, I'm afraid that they might have really done that. At work, Alex always listened to me talk on and on about all of it. He was a real comfort for me. Not that the others weren't too; Alex just always seemed to go out of his way to check on me, you know?"

  "Yes ma'am, that must have been a big help."

  "Oh, it certainly was. Especially as things got worse."

  "Ma'am?"

  "Well, just after we finally got things worked out with the insurance, I went for my annual checkup for the company, and I was diagnosed with the same kind of cancer that Harvey had."

  "I'm so sorry."

  "Oh, thank you. But you know, honestly, I think I was more worried about having to go through all of the insurance problems again than I was about the cancer itself. Isn't that silly? But it’s true."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  “And that's why when Alex talked with me about his idea for teaching the insurance company a lesson I thought it sounded like a good idea. We both felt that no one else should have to go through what I had gone through. At first, I wasn't sure. I mean, I didn't want to do anything that might hurt Gil, after all he had done for Harvey and me. But the more I thought about it, if we could get the insurance company to change, then Gil wouldn't have to deal with them again for any of his other people. So I agreed to help Alex."

  "And change the traffic reports?"

  "Well, not at first. When we started, he just wanted copies of the reports so he could look at them."

  "For the Francis B.?"

  "Oh no, for all of the boats. It was about a month later that he talked to me about the Francis B. He showed me a report he had made up himself, and he asked me to look at it and see if I saw anything wrong with it. I made a few suggestions, and he seemed happy."

  "What happened next?"

  "Well, nothing happened for a long time. In fact, we didn’t even talk about again it until last week. He came in early and asked me to take another look at a report to see if anything had changed, and then said that we were going to start our little lesson for the insurance company. We actually started it three days ago. Since then, every morning I ran the normal traffic reports for all the boats, but for the Francis B. I substituted Alex's pretend report for the real one."

  "Three days ago."

  "Yes, that's right. I still don't understand how that little report is going to teach the insurance company anything, but Alex and his friends seemed to know what they are doing."

  "His friends? There are others involved?"

  "Oh, I don't know who they are, or where they are, but sometimes he mentioned that he had talked with others who were helping with his plan. I don't think any of them were around here, though."

  Emily and Loren had a brief side conversation.

  Alma looked to the floor, shaking her head, "I know Gil will be so disappointed in us. I just hope he understands that we were trying to make things better for everyone, especially for him. I hope he understands. He's a good man."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "So, what do we do now? Do I have to pay a fine or something? Has Gil said anything about my job? I hope changing that one report hasn't created too much confusion at the office. It was just the one boat."

  "Before we go, ma'am, how are you doing? You mentioned the results of your checkup earlier."

&nb
sp; "Yes, well, I'm afraid it’s not good. I had tests yesterday, and it seems the cancer has spread. After seeing everything Harvey went through, I've decided to not do all of those expensive treatments and fight more with the insurance. The doctor tried to get me to change my mind, but no, I just don't want to do that. He says I have another month or two before things start getting bad, so I'm going to make the best of it. I'd like to travel; maybe go to New Orleans. I hear its wonderful down there."

  "Yes, ma'am, it is. Alma, Agent Erickson will be back in touch with you this afternoon. I'm going to ask that you stay here until she comes back, ok?"

  "Why certainly, if you need me too. Oh my, am I under arrest or something?"

  "No, ma'am. But we do need you to stay here until we sort things out. Until Agent Erikson comes back, there will be another agent outside, just for security."

  "Security? I don't understand."

  "Yes ma'am, but until we can get everything sorted out, this is standard procedure. We need you to stay here. Ok?"

  "Yes, of course."

  As Loren pulled out of the driveway, "Do we take her in?"

  "Not right now. I don't think she's going anywhere. Plus, I think we probably know as much as she can tell us anyway, at least until we find this Alex character. And until we find him, I think she's safer with someone watching her right here."

  "Safer than in our office?"

  "I don't know. There's something going on here that I don't like."

  "You mean these other people with Alex?"

  "Well, maybe. Somebody told him we were coming this morning. And who knew that? Lennie and I knew it, the jet pilot knew it, and you knew it. How the hell did Alex find out?"

  "This is getting weird."

  "Weird is the right word. We've got a bunch of guys on a boat, with devices that anyone would say would be impossible to build, somehow bypassing all existing security measures for that kind of thing, and now we've got some other group of people who seem to be involved here, and to top it off, somebody in there seems to know what we're doing before we even do it. Yeah, I'm going with weird for that."

  "Do we have a mole?"

  "Somebody talked. Right now that looks like either me, or Lennie, or the pilot, or you."

  "Or..."

  "Or, there's somebody else in here that we don't know about."

  It was quiet as they drove past the Arbel building on the way to the interstate.

  "Where do you want me to take you? You look like you could use some rest."

  "Yeah, it was a short night for sure. Where's the nearest decent hotel?"

  "There's a Hampton, or a bunch of others at the airport."

  "Nah, let's stay close and make it easier. The Hampton is fine."

  "Ok. Then I'll get an update from my team looking for Alex, and head back to talk more with Alma. You still OK with letting her stay at home?"

  "For now, yeah. Unless you find something that changes things. At this point, I think she's more of an innocent victim in all this. But if you find otherwise, it’s your call."

  Emily got out of the car and checked in at the Hampton downtown. She put her bag on the table and stretched out on the bed to rest her eyes. In ten seconds, she was back on the beach. There was a boat floating offshore with three guys throwing nukes in the surf, and some woman in the chair next to her, editing a spreadsheet and baking cookies. Jimmy Buffett was nowhere in sight.

  Chapter 53

  "Hey boss, how's the media circus going?". Emily had seen the little sign about the complimentary buffet and wine bar when she checked-in, so after her two-hour nap, she decided to go down and call it dinner. While munching on the free food, and enjoying a rather nice local red wine, she called Lennie.

  "You ever see those videos of a bunch of sharks eating something? That's about how it’s going. Somehow, they are getting information we've not released yet, so we're mostly running around playing catch-up and stopping rumors." Lennie sounded tired.

  "That's something we need to talk about. Who knew that we were coming to Louisville today?"

  "I'm not sure, why?"

  "Well, the reason those two Arbel people weren't at work today is because they knew we were coming."

  "How'd they know?"

  "That's what I'm saying we need to figure out. Who besides you, me, Loren and the pilot knew about our trip? I didn't tell anyone other than dad, and I doubt he remembered."

  "Geez Em, let me think. The only people I talked to about it were Dasilva and Reyes. Of course, our guys at the office knew, and our pilot, like you said."

  "Neither Dasilva or Reyes seem to be the type that talks."

  "Unless there's a microphone in front of him." Lennie said, "Oh, did I say that out-loud?"

  "Ha, having fun with Mr. Super-agent there Lennie?"

  "Nah, we're alright. He just really likes polishing his image. I guess there's nothing wrong with that; its just not my style."

  "Good thing; otherwise I'd have to shoot you."

  "Yeah, thanks. Ok then, until we find out what’s going on, I think you and I had better keep a tight lid on things."

  "Do we tell Reyes and Dasilva?"

  "Em, at this point I trust two people; you and me."

  "Sounds like a plan. By the way, it sounds like you need to get some rest."

  "Yeah, got a bit of sleep on the plane, but otherwise I've been going since yesterday. I'm heading home now to try and stretch out for a while."

  "Good. I'm at the hotel here, going through notes from the interviews today catching up on messages from Reyes and others."

  "Right. Let's talk in the morning."

  "Yep."

  Emily put the phone on the table and sipped her wine. Lennie was a nice guy. He was a bit older, but not that much. He had got a nice sense of humor, which was one of the things on Emily's list. He was in good shape, and was serious about his work. Her mind screeched to a halt; she looked out the window and shook her head to clear the haze. What was she thinking? It was Lennie. He was her boss, which created all kinds of issues if they were to...to...besides, they're both full-time career people. Maybe she needed more sleep, or maybe it was the wine, but it kind of surprised her when she realized she had never thought about Lennie like that before.

  As she came out of the haze, she became aware of the man standing next to her table. He was older, decently dressed, and had a smile on his face; a cross between a college professor and a traveling salesman.

  "You look lost in thought. May I join you?", the smiling man asked.

  "Oh, yeah, I guess I was." Emily glanced at the folder on the table. "But honestly, I have a lot of work to do here. I don't mean to sound rude, but I really don't think..."

  "Agent Graham, just a few minutes, please," he pulled up a chair and sat down, still smiling.

  "How do you know my name?" Emily made eye contact and felt her body become tense. "Who are you?"

  "I'm Steve. That will do for now."

  Emily sized him up. He appeared calm and at ease, like someone experienced in introducing himself to women at hotel buffets. His hands were on the table, so there was no immediate threat there. His smile was well practiced; good enough to pass for real. Maybe he's a regular here, someone at the desk told him her name, and she was next in line to enjoy his hospitality. So, maybe this was an opportunity to put the jerk in his place. Emily smiled.

  "Steve. Ok Steve, just what can I do for you?"

  "Agent Graham, we need you to give us time. It’s important that you don't act too quickly."

  Emily had responses for most every pick-up line, but this was the strangest one she’d ever heard.

  "I'm not sure what you mean. Act too quickly; about what?"

  "The Francis B., Agent Graham. We need more time before you do anything about it."

  Emily paused.

  "What about the Francis B.? Who are..."

  "We're on the same team here, Agent Graham, I assure you. And I'm asking you to..."

  "Same team? What are you; CI
A, Homeland Security, something like that?"

  "I'll let you get back to your work there," he nodded at the folder on the table. "You're doing a fine job, by the way. Perhaps this will help you with one part of your journey." The smile was still there as he handed her a business card, stood up, put the chair back where he got it, walked out of the lobby, and out the front door.

  Emily saw that it was not a business card at all, but just a piece of paper with a handwritten note on it: Shippingport Drive, 1.3 miles. She ran to the parking lot that had cars but no Steve, then remembered her folder. She walked back to the table and called Loren, telling her about the note.

  "That's a road on Shippingport Island, west of town by the locks," Loren said. "We'll check it out."

  Emily grabbed her folder and bag of popcorn and headed back to her room. As she pushed the elevator button, she realized that Steve was the guy at the coffee shop this morning. How had she missed that? Although it violated a rule she never broke, as she stepped into the elevator she heard herself say, "What next?"

  Forty-five minutes later her phone rang. "Agent Graham, it’s Loren. We're at the address on the note, and I think you need come out her. A car will pick you up in ten minutes."

  And that's why Emily never violated her rule.

  Chapter 54

  The barge they were picking up was tied up to the east side of the river, alongside a bunch of other barges carrying rock to rebuild the shore. The river made a wide, sweeping turn near Chatham, and the currents were constantly eating soil away from the shore and redepositing it as sandbars on the south side of the bend. The rock slowed it down, but it was just part of the ever-changing river that made a boat pilot pay attention. It was another twelve miles to the bridge at Greenville.

  Four hundred and fifty miles to the northeast, if you were a crow, Emily's car crossed the McAlpine Locks Bridge and turned onto a road with a large security gate. The gate was open. Signs said to stop, and keep out; all of the normal messages that accompanied a government area surrounded by a tall fence with barbed wire on top. But the gate was open. From the looks of the massive equipment, Emily decided it was a construction site for the locks and the hydroelectric dam nearby.