Unauthorized Access

by Andrew McAllister

  “But it was different for you. There were lots of reasons to stay. You were married, with kids.”

  “And you don’t have reasons for being with Rob?”

  Lesley braced herself with her feet as the train slowed for a station stop.

  “I thought I did.”

  “And now?”

  “It’s hard to trust him,” Lesley said. “I mean, the way he’s acting. Like last night. We were apart, what—eight, ten hours? He ends up running to Kirsten Glanville’s place and spending the night with her.”

  Rose lifted both eyebrows, but said nothing as the train doors opened. A few new passengers boarded and found seats.

  “Then this morning,” Lesley said, “Rob phoned and tried to convince me Tim must have sabotaged the bank’s computers. As far as I can tell, all Tim has done is try to make me feel better.”

  “Does all this mean you and Rob are through?”

  Lesley sighed.

  “I don’t know. One minute it feels that way and the next minute I want to grab him and hold on tight and to hell with the rest of the world.”

  “Well I don’t want to tell you what to do—”

  “Really?”

  Rose smiled in acknowledgment.

  “Okay, I do want to tell you what you should do. The problem is I have no idea what that is. All I know is, you don’t want to spend the rest of your life wondering if things might have turned out differently if you had only tried harder.”

  Lesley spread her hands, palms up.

  “Tried harder to do what?”

  “To make things work out the way you want.”

  “Okay …” Lesley said slowly. “I want everything to go back the way it was, to find out this was all a big mistake, that Rob didn’t do anything wrong and we can start planning the wedding.”

  Rose pursed her lips and looked skeptical.

  “Too much to ask for?” Lesley said.

  Her mother shrugged.

  Lesley looked down at her lap and sighed again. What was the point of wishing? There didn’t seem to be any way out. She looked up at her mother and gave her a weak smile.

  “Or maybe for today we could shoot for something easier,” Lesley said. “Stan and Sheila have a piano in their living room. When we get back we could try to remember one of those duets we used to play.”

  Rose returned the smile.

  “I’d like that.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  ROB STARED INCREDULOUSLY across the wooden table at Special Agent Steeves. Pettigrew, seated to Rob’s right, registered a more subdued look of surprise.

  “You can’t be serious,” Rob said.

  “No one named Labadie works out of this office,” Steeves said. “And the only way any agent would visit your old girlfriend was if I sent them, which I couldn’t have done. I didn’t even know she existed until you mentioned her just now.”

  “But she wouldn’t make up something like that.”

  Steeves just stared impassively back at Rob.

  “The guy who kidnapped me,” Rob said. “He pretended to be an FBI agent at first. That’s why I went with him. Maybe it’s the same guy.”

  Steeves rubbed his chin. “Let me get this straight. Some guy drags you off to an abandoned garage last night and beats on you. You get away from him but you don’t bother to report it. Instead you spend the night with an old girlfriend you claim you haven’t seen in years.”

  “I didn’t say I hadn’t seen her in—”

  “Who by the way,” Steeves went on, “just happens to be visited by some mysterious stranger this morning. That what you want me to believe?”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “Why didn’t you call the police last night?”

  Rob opened his mouth to answer but Pettigrew beat him to it.

  “My client was severely traumatized last night. People don’t necessarily think straight in those kinds of circumstances.”

  “Your client,” Steeves said, his voice dripping with sarcasm, “has a proven track record of lying to me, so you’ll excuse me if I explore what he says from every angle.”

  Rob felt the fury and futility bubble up inside him once more.

  “He was assaulted,” Pettigrew said, “and is now coming to you for help. I expect you to do your job and provide it.”

  Steeves looked at Rob.

  “How about another possible scenario,” Steeves said. “You get out of jail yesterday and you’re all bent out of shape. So you go out on the town, have a few too many and pick a fight—which it looks like you lost big time, by the way. You end up at the old flame’s place for a little slap and tickle, and this morning the two of you cook up this story about some guy who’s after you. You figure we’ll be all impressed by your bruises and run off looking for this guy.”

  Rob’s face was a dark mask.

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Smoke and mirrors, Rob. You don’t like all the attention you’ve been getting so you get us searching for some nonexistent stranger. That way we have less time to focus on you.”

  “That’s bullshit.”

  “Really?” Steeves said. “Well here’s the part of your story that I can’t get by. You said this guy beat you for quite a while, trying to get the keyword out of you.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Same one you wouldn’t tell me.”

  “I can’t tell you what I don’t know.”

  “So here’s the thing,” Steeves said. “I can see you holding out on me. I mean, it’s a stupid move, but some people just can’t admit when they’ve done something wrong.”

  “That has yet to be proven,” Pettigrew said.

  “But what I can’t see,” Steeves said, still skewering Rob with a cold scowl, “is how you could possibly keep that up through the beating you described. You would have told him, simple as that.”

  Rob clenched his hands into fists under the table. His entire body throbbed with aches and pains. The searing headache made it difficult to contain his frustration. He looked at his lawyer.

  “I told you this would be a waste of time.”

  “It probably is,” Steeves said before Pettigrew could respond, “but I’m stuck. The Bureau takes a rather dim view of people running around pretending to be us. So here’s what we’re going to do. You’re going to show us this garage. After that I want you to sit down with one of our artists and work up a sketch of your kidnapper.”

  “With or without the wig and mustache?” Rob said.

  “Both. Meanwhile I’ll go have a chat with Kirsten, see if your stories match.”

  Rob could feel a vein throb in his forehead. He leaned close to Pettigrew and murmured so Steeves couldn’t hear.

  “You sure we shouldn’t mention anything about Tim?”

  Pettigrew shook his head. “Not until we actually know something.”

  “But Kirsten is likely to tell him anyway.”

  “We’ve been over this. It’s not the time.”

  Rob leaned back in his chair and tried to contain his frustration. He had been right; he would be tied up for hours. His talk with Tim would have to wait.

  * * *

  Lesley lifted her suitcase onto the guest bed, flipped it open and rooted around in the cloth flap that lined the inside of the lid. Her hand closed on what she was after and she hauled it out. She hadn’t really known why she had packed it when she was getting ready to escape to Stan and Sheila’s place, but now she was glad to have it.

  The photograph was old and tattered. It showed Lesley standing on the fairgrounds of a carnival with a pale blue teddy bear clutched in both arms and a huge grin on her face. Bruce McGrath stood beside her with one arm around her shoulders, the arm that had so recently toppled the milk bottles and won the bear. His smile matched Lesley’s.

  Happier times.

  The bear still sat on Lesley’s bed back at her apartment. The photo normally resided on her dresser, under her jewelry box. At times she went months without pulling it out for
a visit with her father.

  Lesley sat on the edge of the bed and entered the world of the picture. She could almost feel his arms around her. The Daddy-smell wafted at the edges of her memory, tantalizingly close, half aftershave, half him.

  “I understand better now, I think,” she said aloud to her father’s image. “You made mistakes. Everyone does.”

  She ran one finger lightly down the edge of the photo.

  “I think I’m finally ready to forgive you.”

  Lesley was silent for a bit. Her father didn’t have anything to say.

  “Sure wish you were here to talk to, though. Maybe you’d be able to tell me if what I’m about to do is a mistake.”

  She put the picture back in her suitcase and reached for her cell phone.

  Tim answered on the first ring

  “Oh hi,” he said in a surprised voice. “What’s up?”

  Lesley bit her lip and then plunged in.

  “I was wondering if it was too late to take you up on your offer.”

  “You mean …”

  “If you still want to get away for a couple of days, I’d love to go with you.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  ROB WALKED OUT of 1 Centre Plaza after spending over an hour with the FBI sketch artist. Now his first item of business was to try to track down Tim. Rob had some tough questions to ask. He pulled Kirsten’s phone from his pocket and dialed Tim’s cell. When he didn’t get an answer he tried the apartment.

  “He isn’t here,” Eldon said.

  “Any idea when he’ll be back?” Rob asked.

  “Couple of days.”

  “He’s gone away somewhere?”

  “Yep. Went out of here with a suitcase and a sleeping bag. Said he probably wouldn’t be back until Monday or Tuesday.”

  Rob groaned inwardly. His luck was running true to form. “Did he say where he was going?”

  Eldon grunted. “He doesn’t tell me anything these days if it doesn’t suit him. He was plenty happy about it, though. Packed himself up in a hurry and whizzed out the door with a big grin on his face. All he told me was he was going to pick up Lesley and they’d be out of town until the first of the week.”

  Rob felt as if all the blood had suddenly drained from his head.

  “They went away together?”

  “Yup.”

  A chill swept through Rob from head to toe. How could Lesley do this? A few days earlier she had thrown her arms around him and told him she’d be thrilled to marry him. Now she had run off for the weekend with Tim.

  “You still there?” Eldon said.

  “Yeah, sorry. Uh … I gotta go, Mr. Whitlock. Bye.”

  Rob jammed his hands into his pockets and set off down the sidewalk toward the parking garage where he had left Kirsten’s car. He lurched along slowly, unable to put his full weight on his left knee.

  How could he have been so wrong about both Tim and Lesley? Rob stopped abruptly in the middle of the sidewalk when a horrible thought rushed in. Could something have been going on between the two of them for some time now?

  “No way,” he said to no one in particular and started limping along again.

  Or could it? The person being cheated on is always the last to know. How else could Lesley and Tim have gotten together so quickly after Rob’s troubles started? But if that were the case and if Tim had framed him, then …

  No. Absolutely not. The thought that Lesley would go along with sabotaging her uncle’s bank and sending Rob to prison was just too much.

  Still, things weren’t looking good. The threat of being abducted was keeping Rob away from the places where he normally spent his life. Add in the business of Lesley going away for the weekend and the score was two points for the bad guys, zilch for Rob. Except Rob was also on the hook for some prison time and the person he most wanted to talk to about it had just conveniently skipped out of town.

  Rob made a snap decision to go after Tim and Lesley. He was tired of acting like a whipped dog. If they were going to stab him in the back, at least he’d have the satisfaction of forcing them to admit it to his face.

  Who would know where they had gone? Sheila, probably. That’s where Lesley had been the last time Rob talked to her. But what if Sheila didn’t want to tell him? No doubt he was public enemy number one in the Dysart’s home right now. Rob decided his conversation with Sheila would stand a much better chance of working if it were face to face.

  Rob arrived at Kirsten’s car. She needed it back by mid-afternoon, so he couldn’t take it out of town. Rob had an hour or so to get his own wheels back. That meant going home, which seemed risky, but then he couldn’t stay away forever.

  He didn’t have to be stupid and unprepared about it, though. Rob left the parking garage and after a fifteen-minute drive he pulled up in front of a store. The sign across the storefront said Mike’s Sport Shop, and beneath that in even bigger letters: GUNS.

  * * *

  Lesley swiveled as much as the seat belt would allow and tried to locate Leo among the jumble of overnight bags and pillows in the back seat of Tim’s Camaro. She didn’t have long to wait. Leo rocketed to the top of the back seat where he crouched in stark terror. Twenty claws gripped the upholstery for all they were worth.

  “Maybe I should have left him home,” Lesley said. “He’s not used to being in a car.”

  Tim’s smile looked a little forced.

  “He’ll be fine,” Tim said. “He’ll have plenty of room to run around when we get to the cabin.”

  They lapsed into silence. Lesley swallowed to try to relieve the dry mouth she had had ever since they left Boston. What if she was making the wrong choice? She took a deep breath and tried to relax as I-90 rolled by.

  Then the smell hit. A pungent sourness pervaded the car’s interior, an odor that had Leo written all over it. Lesley whipped around in time to see the kitten in the final moments of a squat. She saw the last few drops of urine soak into the seat back.

  “Oh, no,” she said.

  Tim looked frantically in the rearview mirror for a clue as to what was happening in the rear seat. “Tell me he didn’t.”

  “He peed on the seat,” she said.

  Tim slammed the heel of one hand against the steering wheel. “Oh that’s just great.”

  “I’m sorry,” Lesley said.

  Tim caught himself when he saw the look of anxiety on Lesley’s face.

  “I’ll clean it up,” she said. “I’m sure we can get the smell out if we do it quickly.”

  The angry Tim disappeared in an instant.

  “Hey,” he said in an offhand way, grinning now, “don’t worry about it. There’s a rest stop coming up soon. We’ll just soak it up. No big deal.”

  Lesley smiled at him weakly.

  “Great,” she said.

  * * *

  A folded metal security gate loomed to his right as Rob entered the gun shop. The cash register sat atop a long glass display case on his left. Pistols lay in great profusion within the case.

  The sales clerk behind the counter wore a white dress shirt with the collar open and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His thinning hair was slicked straight back and the buttons of his shirt strained over his substantial belly. Rifles and shotguns of every description stood sentry in a long wooden rack on the wall behind his back.

  “Help you?” the guy said.

  “I want to buy a handgun,” Rob said.

  The clerk spread his hands to indicate the choices available within the display case.

  “What you see is what we got.”

  The guns all looked the same to Rob. He checked out a few of the price tags attached by string to the trigger guards, which didn’t help much. They all seemed pricey.

  “What do you recommend?” Rob said.

  “You want it for competition or home defense?”

  “Defense, I guess.”

  The clerk gave Rob an understanding smile. “You’re not much into guns, I take it.”

  “I just need
something basic.”

  “No problem.”

  The clerk moved to his left, unlocked one section of the case and pulled out a gun.

  “This .38 automatic is a good value,” he said. “It’s compact in case you need to carry it. Comes with a ten-shot magazine and a lifetime warranty. It’s even made right here in the good old U. S. of A. Try it.”

  Rob took it and aimed at an imaginary figure at the rear of the store. He liked the heft of the thing right away.

  “Best of all,” the clerk said, “it’s on special right now.”

  “Sold,” Rob said. He set the handgun on the counter.

  “What kind of ammunition you want with that?”

  “Whatever works.”

  “Okay.” The clerk set a box next to the gun. “That it?”

  Rob nodded.

  “You got your permit with you?” the clerk said.

  Rob looked at him in confusion. “What permit?”

  “In this state you have to apply for a permit before you can purchase a firearm.” He pulled the pistol and ammunition off the counter. “I take it you don’t have one.”

  “No, I … didn’t know I needed one.”

  “Happens all the time. But hey, you can come back after you get it. I’ll even give you the same sale price. Here, I’ve got the application if you want to fill one out. Usually only takes a few weeks to get the permit.”

  He slid a paper form in front of Rob along with a pen.

  “But I haven’t got time to—”

  “Unless you’re under indictment,” the clerk said in a joking tone, “or have a warrant out for your arrest, that sort of thing. But I’m guessing that doesn’t apply to you.”

  Rob’s face flushed with realization. He wasn’t used to thinking of himself as a criminal.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  LANDRY FINISHED RELIEVING himself, then emptied the wide-mouthed bottle out the door of the Taurus and screwed the top back on. Pulling out a bottle of water, he held his hands out the door and poured some over them. It was the best he could do for sanitation under the circumstances.