by Dan Arnold
“You have ten seconds to get to the point, Walter, eight now, when I get to one, I’m going to throw you out. You’ve got three seconds now.”
He held up his hands.
“OK, OK! I’ve called off my watch dogs. That’s the point. I just wanted you to know I’m not having them follow you anymore.”
“What, exactly, was the purpose of that, in the first place?”
“I just wanted you to know what real surveillance feels like. I wanted you to see what resources I have at my disposal. You’re supposed to be this big shot security expert. I figured you might enjoy seeing real professionals in action.”
I looked him in the eye. There was nothing there. It was like looking into a lizard’s eyes. No, a lizard has more soul. Looking into his eyes, was like looking down, into an empty well, a deep, deep, well, containing nothing but emptiness, entombed in darkness.
“I’d have to say, I’m not impressed.”
He looked… disappointed.
“John, I have personal control over nearly two hundred security agents.”
“The one’s I’ve seen so far might make pretty fair school crossing guards, but that’s about all they’re good for.”
“Well, John, if you’d done your homework, you would have learned I personally founded the World Wide Security Agency, but, you’re not that good a detective are you?
I shrugged. “Maybe not, but once I learned you were the CEO of Strategic International Corporation, I got distracted. I decided to look into your life a little deeper. Why are you working as Mr. Simpson’s personal assistant?”
Walter looked startled for a second, and then anger clouded his features.
“Oh, John, you’ve surely put your foot in it now. I came to give you the chance to bow out gracefully, without getting hurt. I may have to re-think my position.” He growled.
“Leave now, Walter, or I can promise you won’t like where I put my foot.”
He showed his teeth in a snarl, which might have been mistaken for a smile.
“Yes, of course, if that’s the way you feel about it. Well then until we meet again…” He stood up and pointed his finger at me, as though it were a gun. “I’ll be seeing you.” He dropped his thumb.
I got up and followed him out the door into the reception area. Christine went white as a sheet, when she saw him coming out of my office.
Walter looked over at Lori and waved. “Bye, bye, cutie pie,” he winked.
“Oh, there you are, Christine! It looks like old John here has better taste in women than I thought. See you around.”
When he had left, Christine and I went back into my office to talk.
“What was he doing here?” Christine asked.
I sighed.
“I’m not sure. At first it was as if he were gloating about how smart and powerful he thinks he is. When he left, he was sort of threatening.”
“Why? What’s all this about?”
I shook my head. “I think, in his mind, he’s playing some sort of game with me. I don’t get it. I think I know what motivates him, but I don’t know why this is personal for him.”
We both sat and thought about Walter Farley for a while.
“What do I have to do to get that tongue flicking snake out of my life?” Christine asked.
“Christine, I don’t think this is about you. I don’t think he’s capable of really caring about anyone, but himself.”
“You’ve got that right,” she said.
I looked at the monitor. Lori was talking to someone on the phone. I saw her laugh.
I got the call at about 9:30 that night.
“Well, Mr. Tucker, you were right, he showed up. He rang the front door bell, and caught me flat footed. I opened the front door and there he was, big as life.”
“Mr. Murphy, are you saying Orlando Cruz was there, at your house? Are you and your wife OK?”
“Yes, we’re pretty shaken up, but we’re OK. I just didn’t think he would walk right up to the front door and ring the bell. It was as if he just showed up there to pick up his date, or deliver a pizza, or something.”
“Then what happened?”
“He saw me look at my shotgun as I was trying to shut the door, but he slammed his body into the door, and it knocked me off balance. The next thing I knew he was standing in our foyer, holding my shotgun.”
I closed my eyes, and took a long slow breath.
“He pointed the gun at my wife and told me to call Lori downstairs. I told him Lori wasn’t home, that we had sent her away. He didn’t believe me, so he forced us to go upstairs to Lori’s room. It was obvious she hadn’t been there for some time.”
“OK, did you call the police?”
“Yes, they’re here now. They’re going through the house, the yard and the neighborhood, to be sure he’s not here anymore, but he’s long gone.”
“Did Orlando ask you where she was?”
“Yes, but I lied. I told him Lori had showed up on our doorstep, looking like a tramp, and we had told her to go away. I told him we had no idea where she went. He believed me. That’s when it got scary.”
“… In what way?”
“We could see he didn’t know what to do next. He was holding the shotgun, and I think he wanted to shoot us. I’m not sure he knew how to work a semi-auto shotgun, because he never took the safety off. He finally just took off running down the stairs and out the front door. He took the shotgun with him.”
“He’s in deep grease now. He’s guilty of breaking and entering, robbery and use of a firearm in a crime, among other things. He’s on the run, and he’s armed and presumed dangerous. The cops are going to want him, real bad.”
“That’s what they said. Your friend Lieutenant Escalante is here, he’d like to speak to you.”
“Put him on.”
“J.W., these folks are safe, and ‘lover boy’ is on the run. You might want to stay vigilant for a few more days, but I think this deal is over. We’ve got an APB out on him; he won’t be able to run for long, before somebody catches him. Until then, he’ll run like a scalded cat.”
“Thanks, Tony. Let me talk to Mr. Murphy again.”
“Mr. Murphy, I just wanted you to know Lori is safe with my partner Christine. I’ll let Christine know what’s happened. We’ll talk again tomorrow. You folks try to relax. You’ve done very well under the circumstances. I’m terribly sorry Orlando showed up, and that he broke into your house, but, again, you handled it as best you could. You can thank God, you and your wife are still alive. All is well. Good night.”
“Thank you, Mr. Tucker. Good night.”
I called Christine and gave her the news. She said she thought we ought to wait till morning to tell Lori.
We didn’t get to wait until the morning. Lori was watching TV. The story about the home invasion, the invasion of her family’s home, was on the ten o’clock news.
Twenty-Six
When Christine brought Lori into the office the next morning, they were both subdued.
I still haven’t learned to ignore women’s moods, so I asked.
“Good morning ladies, why the long faces?”
As usual, wrong question and bad timing.
“You should mind your own business,” Christine snapped.
Ouch, I thought I was minding my own business.
Think again.
“OK, is now a good time for us to talk about planning for Lori’s return to her family. Lori, school starts in a few weeks, and I’ve been talking to your mom and dad about that…”
“No, John now is not the time to be discussing this,” Christine interrupted, between tightly clenched teeth.
“Right, sorry, I’ll just be in my office if you need me.”
I retreated, with some haste. After all, I’m easily frightened.
I was reading the story in the Tyler paper, about the home invasion in a south Tyler neighborhood, when Christine came in.
“John, I’m sorry I snapped at you. We stayed up pretty late la
st night, and Lori and I have been arguing this morning.”
I waited.
“Lori’s not sure she wants to go home, or go back to school. After the story on the news last night, she was pretty upset. We sat up and talked about a lot of things. At first it was about how unhappy she was because she had endangered her parents. Then, she talked about how horrible Orlando is, but how he still has some pull on her. She’s been through a lot, John, and she doesn’t feel like a typical high school girl.”
“I understand.”
“No, John, you don’t. You’ve never been a teenage girl, and you’ve never been through what she’s been through.”
I nodded.
“… Fair enough.”
“Lori doesn’t want to have to face her friends, and she’s afraid Orlando could still find her. She feels like she’s more grown up than she actually is. She wants to get her own place and continue to work here.”
“Is that what you were arguing about?” I checked the monitor, which was still showing the view from the camera in the reception area. It looked like Lori was talking on the phone.
“No, we were arguing about Walter.”
“Walter…?”
“She thought he was cute and charming. I told her he was a dangerous jackass. I offended her, and I made her feel little, and… I think I hurt her feelings.”
“She’ll get over it.”
Christine was thoughtful for a moment.
“Anyway,” I said, “She has to go home. She has to go back to school, and she can’t continue to work here.”
“Maybe we could work something out. At least until we know Orlando Cruz can’t come after her. She really can’t go home, until he’s in jail.”
She had a point.
“OK, that part hasn’t changed. If you’re still willing to have her stay with you, we’ll keep her with us, until Orlando is in jail. I’ve been talking with her folks about school. They want to put her into a private school. It could be a new beginning. She’d make new friends and be in a safer environment.”
Christine smiled.
“It’s perfect. I’ll tell her about it.”
“Wait, there’s more. Her folks are thinking about the possibility of moving away from Tyler altogether, maybe to Houston or Austin. They’ll need to be the ones to talk about those things with Lori.”
Christine nodded.
“Probably even better, it really would be a new beginning.”
“Sometimes, we all need a new beginning. The bible says when we are born again, old things are washed away and we are new creations, spiritually re-born as children of God, and no longer slaves to sin.”
“Here we go again!”
“What? I’m just saying Lori has a new life. Is she still reading her bible?”
Christine sighed.
“Yes, she reads it every morning, for all the good it will do her.”
“Do you read it?”
“No, John I don’t. I wouldn’t even know where to start. It’s just a lot of poetry and superstitious blah, blah, blah.”
“And, you know this without ever having read it? You are able to stand on the platform of complete ignorance and deride something you know nothing about?”
She made an annoyed snort. It sounded sort of like “Humph!”
“If you’re willing to at least look at it, I’ll suggest some places to start, and I would love to discuss it with you. You’re a bright, intelligent and literate person. What are you afraid of?”
“Nothing, it just seems pointless.”
“What harm could it do?”
“It could turn me into a right wing, brainwashed, hypocritical, zombie.”
“Is that what you think I am?”
She looked me in the eye.
“No, John, I’m sorry, it just came out wrong.”
“Christine, I love you… Relax, I’m not hitting on you. The point is you must know I love you, as a friend and colleague. I have no desire to ever see you hurt or ‘brainwashed’. Do you believe me?”
She hesitated.
There it was. She had doubts.
“Yes, John, I know you aren’t trying to brainwash me. I’m just not interested in reading the bible.”
“No worries. It was just a thought.”
“How did we get on this subject in the first place?”
“We were talking about new beginnings.”
“We were talking about Lori.”
I nodded.
“So, are you two ladies going to work it out?”
“Of course, but let’s hope Orlando goes away soon, and I mean very soon.”
“Amen, to that.”
Twenty-Seven
Orlando Cruz was stopped for a traffic violation in College Station. Once identified, he was arrested on the spot, but not without a struggle. He attacked one of the arresting officers with a knife. A search of his car revealed he was in possession of the stolen shotgun, and several controlled substances. Eventually, as the wheels of justice turned their course, he would be returned to Tyler to stand trial on the home invasion and theft charges.
As soon as we learned of his arrest, we had a little celebration in honor of the occasion, at “Currants” restaurant. Mr. Murphy hosted the event.
“I’d like to propose a toast.” He waited for us all to raise our glassware. “Here’s to our daughter, Lori, as strong and courageous a person as I’ve ever met, we love you, honey!” We all bumped glasses and bottles.
Lori was beaming.
“And, here’s to the fine work of the police, in catching that… suspect,” I added, gesturing toward Tony.
Tony bowed slightly, willing to take the credit due all policemen, everywhere.
“Hear, hear!” everyone said.
“How long do you think he’ll be in prison?” Lori asked.
Tony considered the various possibilities.
“Well, first there’s the issue of his Probation violation. He’ll have to serve out the full term for the previous crime. Then there’s the drug possession charges, he’s looking at two to five years on that. Possession of stolen property, breaking and entering, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, assault on a police officer, use of a firearm in a criminal act, resisting arrest… he’ll be sentenced to a minimum of 25 years, I would guess, maybe a lot more, depending on the jury.”
“Do you think the judge might probate his sentence?” Mrs. Murphy asked.
Tony shook his head.
“No, there’s no chance. His lawyers will tell Orlando to make a deal with the DA, though.”
“What does that mean?” Lori asked.
“They’ll tell Orlando to plead guilty to some of the charges, in exchange for the District Attorney dropping or reducing some of the other charges. That’s why he’ll only get 25 years or so. Otherwise, the sky’s the limit. He could spend several decades in prison.”
“Isn’t it possible he could get out early?” Mr. Murphy asked.
“Yes, with good behavior, his sentence could be cut in half. He’d be out in about twelve years. But Orlando doesn’t strike me as the model prisoner type.”
“What about bail?” Mr. Murphy asked.
“I don’t know who’d bail him out. He has no family. Because of the nature of his crimes, his bail will be set high, at least a hundred thousand dollars, probably more. After they transfer him back here, he’ll sit in the Smith County Jail, for months, waiting on his trial. Then, it will be off to the big house.”
“I’ll drink to that.” Mrs. Murphy said.
I thought about the thing we weren’t discussing. Lori would not have to testify in open court. Because Orlando wouldn’t face any charges related to what he had done with and to Lori, she would never have to appear in court at all.
I smiled to myself, but evidently Christine saw it.
“You look kind of smug, John. Shouldn’t a religious person like you want mercy for Orlando?”
“I’m not his judge, Christine. I’m just happy Lori won’t ha
ve to testify in court.”
“Oh, right, I see your point. How wonderful!”
She smiled too. She held up her hand for a “high five.”
“I saw that, Christine!” Lori said. “You’re just happy you’ll be able to have me out of your apartment.”
“No,” Christine said. “We’re just happy you’re safe from that bum.”
“As are we all, honey,” Lori’s father added.
“We’re very grateful to you for all the two of you have done for Lori and us. You went over and above any service we could possibly have hoped for.” Mrs. Murphy said.
Christine and I looked at each other.
“It has been our pleasure,” we said, in unison.
Everybody laughed.
“I’m afraid there is still the issue of payment.” I said.
It would have been a wholly inappropriate time to mention it, but…
“… It seems to me Lori will have to spend the rest of the summer in our office, working off her portion of our fee.”
Lori’s face lit up!
“Can I, please?” she asked her folks.
Her dad smiled.
“Well, I only see one complication with that…”
“What, can’t we figure out some sort of car pool arrangement?” Lori asked.
Her father grinned.
“That’s the complication. If you’re going to go through driver’s education, you’ll have to figure out how to fit it into your schedule.”
“Oh, yeah, I nearly forgot, I can get my driver’s license now!”
We discussed various ways to solve the scheduling crisis.
Then Lori’s father brought up a new topic.
“We want ya’ll to know our plans. We’ve discussed it as a family, and we’re not moving away from Tyler. We’re not giving up the life we’ve made here, because of this time of trouble we’ve had. Lori will start back at high school in the fall, at a private school. By this time next year, she’ll be looking forward to her senior year.”
We all applauded.
Redemption is cool.
Twenty-Eight
I asked Christine how often she practiced with her handgun. She indicated she only shot two or three times a year, probably even less often. In my experience, more is better, so I invited her to come along the next time Tony and I were scheduled to shoot.