by Eric Flint
“That girl is a certified fuh-reak,” Temple said.
Jasper couldn’t take the mystery any longer. “Seriously, Carlos, what’s the story with the waitress? What’s her name? Where does she live?”
“Who cares? I thought you wanted information about the accident and the driver of the van. The kidnapping.”
“Wait, you know the driver of the van?”
“The crazy girl’s name is Eulalia, but she goes by Lali.”
“Okay, Lali. Wonderful. But what can you tell me about the driver of the van?” Jasper sipped his water.
“The rumor going around says a chupacabra ate him, drank his blood.”
Jasper felt one corner of his mouth creep upward, but Carlos wasn’t laughing and no hint of a joke rested in his eyes.
“A chupacabra,” Temple said. “Up here in Indiana? Doesn’t seem likely.”
“Who would have thought those Chinese fish would be loose in our waterways destroying the native species here in the United States?”
“Touché,” said Temple, nodding in acknowledgement of his point.
“So, a chupacabra ate the driver,” Jasper said. “Why?”
“Wrong place, wrong time I suppose.”
“Come on. A chupacabra, a blood-drinking cryptid. But I thought the blood came from livestock?” Temple leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table.
“A what? A crypt?” Carlos’s eyes and mouth crinkled, confused. “Word gets out. The old man who lives in the house, the one where the chupacabra did its thing, came out after you left and told the group all about the mess in his backyard, and how a mangled body lay back there drained of all its blood.”
The old man shouldn’t have been talking to anyone, but stopping people from flapping their gums always proved difficult. What were they going to do to him anyway? He wasn’t impeding the investigation. The concern here was if Carlos was hiding something else—he didn’t seem to want to provide any details about the driver.
“You think your BFF, what’s her name, Lali, would know anything about the driver?”
“She probably hooked up with that freak, you know, they’re pretty much cut from the same freaky cloth,” Carlos said.
A plate slid in front of Jasper. The heat of the cheeseburger and fries rose up, as did the very pleasant scent. The diner had a limited menu, but what they did, they did well.
“So I’m a bit freaky,” the waitress said, “who isn’t?”
“How do you keep appearing out of nowhere?” Jasper asked. “Delivering food and joining the conversation—a private conversation.”
“Secret talent.”
“You know the driver of the van that crashed last night? Or anything about the kidnapping?” Temple asked.
“Or anything about a chupacabra?” Jasper added and took a sip of his water.
“A what? Chipacabra?” The waitress’s eyebrows knit together. “What the hell are you talking about? Something that steals all the tortilla chips?”
Jasper nearly spit the water out of his mouth. Temple’s smile expanded beyond the boundaries of the hand covering her mouth.
“Ay.” Carlos covered his face and shook his head.
Jasper wiped the corner of his eye and took another bite of the cheeseburger.
“Anything else?” the waitress asked.
Temple eyed her Caesar salad and held up a hand.
“Something wrong?” The waitress put a hand on her hip.
Temple’s smile vanished. “You didn’t answer my questions. The driver? Kidnapping?”
“Ran into the driver once, if it’s the guy everyone’s talking about.” She put the pencil eraser first between her red lips, thick and a little pouty, holding it for a minute as her gaze roamed. She shook the pencil at them like a wand. “Can’t say I know who was kidnapped, but I ran into the driver at a party once. Can’t remember his name, though, if I ever knew it at all.” She shrugged.
“If you think of the name, let us know,” Jasper said.
“Sure thing.” She walked off and attended another table.
“Anything you care to add?” Temple asked.
“That’s probably where I know the driver from—”
“Where from?”
“Like Lali said, probably some party.”
They ate in silence for a few minutes and Jasper made quick work of his cheeseburger and French fries. Temple picked at her Caesar salad. Carlos sucked down his water and jammed a toothpick between his teeth.
“I gotta get going. Sorry I couldn’t be much of a help today.” Carlos slid from the booth, half-saluted them and exited the building.
“Odd,” Temple said, “but then, the entire meeting was not how I remembered source meetings.”
Lali appeared out of nowhere with an expectant look on her face.
“We’re fine,” Jasper said, “oh, you want to take your salad to go, Temple?”
“No, I’m good.”
“So sorry to see little Carlos go so soon.” Lali dropped the check on the table.
“You know him? Date him? Anything him?” Jasper asked.
“Date him?” Lali turned her head and cocked an eyebrow. “Hate’s much more accurate.”
“You a jilted lover maybe?”
“Heh. I’m the jilter, not the jiltee.” She bumped Jasper’s shoulder with her hip and strolled off.
“Somehow I can see that,” Jasper said, watching the waitress and her swaying hips, “despite the bruise and marks she’s covering with the shit ton of makeup.”
“Ah, you noticed,” Temple said, reaching for the check.
“You’re paying? But Carlos is a local CHS.”
“You’re temporarily assigned to SAG, remember? This meal will come out of our budget, and we’ve managed to secure quite a nice little war chest for this fiscal year.” Temple paid with cash and took the second copy of the check.
“Care to head back to the Euclid? Have a look around?”
“Sure, let me pick at the salad for another minute,” Temple said.
Jasper polished off his water.
“Ready?”
They both slid from the booth and exited the diner. Lali leaned on the counter, and each time Jasper stole a peek, she was still watching them, all the way to their vehicles.
Chapter 20
They rolled up on the traffic light across from the Euclid Hotel around three in the afternoon. The intersection, teeming with police, firefighters, and EMTs the night before, stood eerily quiet for a weekend day. The mayhem and destruction and death were thoroughly erased, as if the kidnapping, accident, and pointless deaths had never occurred.
Jasper shivered despite the heat of the day—and the hotbox Temple created out of the rental vehicle. They waited for the light to change.
“Hard to believe.”
“Yeah, not so much as a piece of glass out here. Hey, you think your Evidence Response Team descended on the old man’s residence this morning?”
“They’re probably at the scene now. But they’ll be by the numbers and not extrapolate, I’m sure.” Bile crept into the back of Jasper’s mouth just thinking about the Senior Team Leader of the ERT program for the Indianapolis Field Office, Special Agent Morris Chan. Jasper swallowed, but the sour taste lingered. “Got any breath mints on you?”
“No, but I bet the woman in the hospital, Hazel, had Certs or LifeSavers.”
“Wow, your grandmother did that too?” Jasper grinned.
“All the smokers did.” She laughed. “I have some gum if you’re so inclined.” She rustled in her bag with one hand, but kept her eyes on the road. “Here.”
The light turned green after what had seemed an interminable amount of time.
“Once you’re through the intersection,” Jasper stifled a shudder as they crossed over the spot of the accident, “flip a U-turn and pull up to the side of the hotel.”
“Ten-four.”
Temple swung around and Jasper peered at the alleyway behind the hotel as she drove past—the sam
e alley he’d seen the haze resembling an Asian-style dragon.
“Hey, I think Carlos’s truck is parked behind the Euclid—an off-white Toyota pickup. Pull up a little more and park.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, pretty sure.” Jasper frowned and propped his chin up with his fist as he rested his elbow on the armrest. “I wonder what he’s doing here.”
“I think learning more about Carlos should be on our list,” Temple said. “The same goes for that Eulalia chick from the diner.”
“Agreed.” Jasper rubbed his chin. “I remember saying the same thing to Pete during the first meeting with Carlos.”
“What should we do? Go in? See what he’s after? Confront him?”
“I was hoping to get out of this hot box and walk around the perimeter of the hotel, but now I don’t—”
The nose of Carlos’s truck poked from the alleyway.
“Get down,” Jasper said. “Let’s hope this rent-a-car is generic enough that he didn’t notice it at the diner.”
They both ducked. Temple had pulled almost to the intersection—not far from the alleyway, but far enough that Carlos might not think anything of the vehicle.
“I wonder what he was doing here, anyway.” Temple asked. “You think the hotel’s still buttoned up, crime scene tape, and so forth?”
“Beats me.”
The sound and smell of ragged exhaust poured into the rental car. Carlos had pulled up next to them—hopefully waiting for the light at the intersection. Neither of them dared poke their heads up. For a moment, Jasper wondered why they cared so much, but if Carlos had anything to do with the mysterious cult, it’d be better to not alert him to their presence.
“We can come back to the hotel later,” Jasper said softly. “We need to follow Carlos.”
“But what if he left a signal or a mark or something?”
“Sounds like spycraft to me, and we’re not after spies, are we?” Jasper raised an eyebrow.
“It’s called tradecraft—but why can’t anyone use signals? Gangs do, right? How is graffiti any different than a spy leaving a chalk mark on a telephone pole?”
“I see your point.”
The truck’s rumble deepened and for a moment grew louder, but trailed off.
They both sat up.
“He’s westbound on East Chicago Avenue, I bet, uh, turned right—”
“I’m aware of which way west is.” Temple frowned and started the engine.
“You never know,” Jasper said, “so many people have no idea about the points of a compass. Anyway, we can always come back here. Let’s see what he’s up to.”
“All right.”
They followed Carlos, which was simple when he stayed on major roads and other vehicles provided cover between his pickup and themselves. But after a quarter mile or so he made a southbound turn on Huish Drive.
“Interesting,” Jasper said. “He isn’t heading home. Staying on East Chicago Avenue for a while would have been a safe bet. Okay, this road turns into Kennedy Avenue down here.”
“Maybe he’s going to his place of employment.” Temple glanced at Jasper.
“Maybe. It’s a weekend, but…maybe his shop is working overtime. If he gets on the interstate, following will be easy.”
But Carlos didn’t. Instead he went under the interstate and looped around to head west on Michigan Street and then south on Indianapolis.
“There are quite a few shops—not department stores—”
“Yeah, I understand—I didn’t think we’d find a Nordstrom’s over here.” Temple rolled her eyes.
“Sorry. Don’t have to bite my head off.”
“I won’t, if you stop acting like I’m some dizzy broad,” Temple said.
“Fine. I’ll try. I’ll try to try.”
“You may be right; his employment might be over here. It’s kind of a mini-industrial area.”
They had taken a few turns with Carlos where no other vehicles offered cover, and now approached a wide band of railroad tracks with an approaching train.
Carlos’s Toyota pickup belched a black glob of smoke and he accelerated over the tracks before the arms came down.
“Damn. He must have spotted us.”
“Or he rushed to beat the train?” A bit of hope crept into the sentence as Temple finished.
“I hope you’re good at reacquiring after losing the eye,” Jasper said.
“Maybe you worked some spy stuff in the past after all.” Temple turned and raised an eyebrow at him.
“Once or twice. Interesting stuff, but slow.”
“Counterintelligence isn’t for everyone.”
“Well, I say we head down to Summer Street. We can roll through the parking lots of a few businesses over there. With luck, we’ll spot him.”
“If not,” Temple said, “we can always head back to the Euclid.”
“Roger that.”
Mercifully, the train passed in short order. They hit Summer Street and Jasper directed her westbound.
“Up here, turn right at the next street, I’m not sure of the name.”
Temple laughed as they approached. “Hump Road.”
“And people say men are crude.” Jasper grinned. “Stop thinking about Ed.” He leaned away, expecting a poke, but received her disapproving stare.
They crawled past the first building, all brick, but with thick, smoked-glass windows and unlike some of the other businesses nearby, still in business. A fence surrounded the property so one couldn’t drive on to the complex, but the front of the building remained accessible by walking right up and ringing the front bell.
A row of vehicles populated a parking lot behind the building.
“Holy shit,” Jasper said.
Temple glared at him.
“Fine: why, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle! That better?” He pumped his eyebrows up and down.
“A little.”
“And besides, you made a hump joke!”
Temple’s mouth twitched, an almost smile.
“Anyway,” Jasper said, “I can’t believe we found him—the Toyota parked in back is Carlos’s. Keep rolling up this road and we’ll pause before turning around—looks like Hump Road dead ends anyway.”
Temple swung the car around at the end of the road. Buildings resembling hangars lined the road. Some appeared empty and dilapidated, while others were dilapidated but still in use.
“What should we do?” Temple asked.
“I don’t know, what do you think?” She’d been allowing him to make a lot of decisions today, and he wondered if this was her way of apologizing or making him feel like he was part of the Scientific Anomalies Group.
“All right.” Temple drummed the steering wheel. “What are the odds he’s part of a cult whose members commit suicide at the first sign of cops?”
“I’d say low.”
“And what are the odds he’d phone in the tip on the kidnapped girl if he were part of this cult—which, by the way, we haven’t proven exists yet?”
“Pretty low.” Jasper chuckled. “Thank you for the bit about the phantom cult. I thought you made up your mind on the cult’s existence.”
“I think the cult’s real. It fits. Demons, cults, ritual suicide. We even have a working name for them now, the Phantom Cult—I like it.”
“All right.” Jasper suppressed a laugh. “I’m not sold, but I suppose one of us should be a skeptic, right?”
“Sure,” Temple said.
“So, if this goes sideways on us, I’m not wearing any body armor, my Kevlar’s baking in the trunk of my bucar, and I doubt you’re wearing any.”
“Let’s hope this doesn’t get ugly on us and let’s hope Carlos isn’t a bad guy.” Temple smiled. “We’ve all done stupid things over the course of our careers, what’s one more?”
“Yeah, unless this time is the last stupid thing we do. You know what? I’m gonna call us in with the Merrillville office’s switchboard, so they know where we’re at.”
Jasper w
ould have called in on his bu-radio, but again, it was installed in his bucar, so he used the smartphone. Boy, he wished he’d talked Temple into taking his car rather than the rental, but he’d been so out of it this morning.
“All right, we’re set.”
* * *
A metal sign attached to two metal poles jammed into the ground identified the business as Wayland Precision. No witty tag line, only the name of the business with a blacksmith’s hammer beneath. Spartan, but word of mouth and reputation rather than advertising likely brought them business.
Crabgrass littered the patchy strip in front of the red brick building. A cracked sidewalk and brick steps led to an imposing metal door, which wouldn’t have been out of place in Fort Knox.
“The door must weigh a ton.” Jasper pointed. “They expecting to repel an assault or outlast a siege?”
“Maybe they’re a bunch of doomsday types—”
They ascended the steps and the tiny porch provided a respite from the pummeling waves of heat.
“Oh, there’s a doorbell and intercom, exciting.” Jasper jammed the button; a buzzer inside the building was loud enough to elicit a wince from both him and Temple.
“Makes sense for a machine shop, eh?”
They stood for a few minutes and still no one answered the door.
“All right, I’ll give the intercom a whirl.”
He reached for the button, but the speaker rattled: “Yes?”
Jasper pressed the button: “I’m Special Agent Jasper Wilde with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I’m here with my partner, Temple Black. We’d like to speak with someone.”
A long pause.
“What is this about?”
“Carlos Ochoa, He works for you. His Toyota is parked out back. No one is in trouble.”
Longer pause.
“Yes, Carlos is an employee of Wayland Precision. What is this about?”
Jasper pinched the bridge of his nose. “A few questions regarding some kidnappings, is all. We need to speak with him.” Jasper hoped for Carlos’s sake his employer was not part of some criminal enterprise—which was why he didn’t reveal Carlos was an FBI source. The Bureau protected the identities of sources, but in this case, they needed to get to the bottom of Carlos’s activities and motivations. Jasper would only reveal Carlos’s role if necessary.