The Unspoken

by Smith, Ian K.

  My cell phone rang. It was Mechanic. I sent him an automatic reply to text me. I went back to the monitor.

  Ten twenty-nine a.m. A black Suburban with tinted windows came into view. I told Rayshawn to slow the tape and let it run at normal speed. The Suburban headed east down Seventieth. It drove slowly, hitting its brake lights several times like someone who was lost. My phone buzzed. It was Mechanic. I asked Rayshawn to pause the tape.

  Two guys sitting outside your office building in a Ford Taurus. Different plates than the last time.

  I texted back, How long have they been there?

  About an hour.

  Stay with them. Let me know if anything happens.

  Copy.

  “Okay, let it roll again,” I said to Rayshawn.

  The Suburban stopped for about ten seconds where Seventieth intersected with South Wallace; then it continued east under the viaduct and was gone.

  The next hit came at 11:03 a.m. I expected this from the CPD footage. I knew it would be the old woman driving the minivan. Rayshawn did his tricks, slowing down the video, zooming in on her license plate and the front seat. There was another old woman sitting beside her, wearing a white dress and matching hat—two little church ladies. The CPD cameras on Sixty-Ninth hadn’t captured the passenger.

  We sped through the next several hours of tape, watching cars continue to cross Seventieth heading north or south, but only a few headed east down Seventieth toward the train tracks. Those that did drive east continued straight and didn’t turn left down South Wallace.

  “Not much traffic on these streets,” I said.

  “Only Sunday morning,” Rayshawn said. “Otherwise, not too many people drive through here. Most people living in the neighborhood walk over to Sixty-Ninth or Seventy-First and catch the bus.”

  “Have you ever driven down South Wallace?”

  “Never,” he smiled. “Nothing down there but some empty lots and old houses with addicts hanging out.”

  The video continued to roll on the monitors.

  “You wanna hear something cool?” he said.

  “Sure.”

  “Keep this between you and me, okay?”

  “No problem.”

  When he tapped the keyboard a couple of times, one of the monitors went dark; then a colorful graph soon appeared on the screen. He clicked the mouse, and the room exploded with sound.

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “The sound from outside.”

  “You have microphones out there?”

  “Only the camera facing the parking lot,” he said. “Sometimes Bishop likes to hear what people are saying when they leave church.” He brought up the feed from the camera in the back of the building. There were only three cars in the parking lot, mine being one of them. Two men walked into view on the sidewalk.

  “Watch this,” Rayshawn said. He moved the mouse, and their voices came through speakers as if they were in the room with us. They were talking about the Bulls and bemoaning the fact that it had been too long since the last championship. They decided that a new version of Michael Jordan could end the drought.

  Everything was clear, from horns blowing and birds chirping to car doors closing. The surround sound speakers literally made it feel like we were standing outside. I got an idea listening to the audio.

  “Let’s go back to the video on Seventieth,” I said.

  Rayshawn punched the video back up on the monitor. The outdoor sounds disappeared. I asked him to speed it up a little. The minutes started ticking away at a rapid pace. We got all the way through the evening. No cars had turned down South Wallace. Ten cars had driven down Seventieth and through the viaduct. I copied all their license plates. I spotted JuJu’s Caprice Classic at 11:21 p.m. Rayshawn slowed the film. Everything JuJu had said was captured on film. He turned down Union. Thirty seconds later he backed up onto Seventieth and headed east. He turned onto South Wallace at 11:23 p.m. and disappeared. The CPD camera had captured him leaving South Wallace and entering Sixty-Ninth Street at 11:25 p.m.

  For the next forty minutes absolutely nothing moved. No cars crossed or traveled down Seventieth. Headlights flashed at 12:05 a.m. A black SUV came into view. It slowly headed down Seventieth.

  “Pause it,” I instructed Rayshawn. He clicked the mouse, and the video froze. He stared at me. I stared at the screen. I had seen this car before. “Put it in slow motion and zoom in for me,” I said.

  Rayshawn knew what I was after. “Looks like the same truck from earlier in the day,” he said. “Somebody’s ballin’.”

  “Yup,” I said.

  The truck continued slowly down Seventieth. When it reached South Wallace, it stopped for a few seconds, then turned in: 12:06 a.m.

  “This time it went down South Wallace,” Rayshawn said.

  My cell phone buzzed. It was Mechanic. I told Rayshawn to pause the video.

  Mechanic texted, They just got out of the car. Split up. One heading to the back of the building. Other walking around the front. Time to have some fun.

  I’m still at the church. Be careful.

  I returned my attention to the monitor. “Rewind the video back to the point where the Suburban just comes into frame,” I said. We watched it again. He paused the video when the car disappeared onto South Wallace.

  “What now?” he asked.

  “Bring it up on the camera facing west so we can see it heading toward us,” I said. “I want to see if I can see who’s inside.”

  Rayshawn rewound the tape, then rolled it in slow motion. The Suburban came into view about a block away. Rayshawn did all kinds of tricks to capture the driver. He zoomed in, shot a freeze-frame, changed the contrast. The face was still hidden in the darkness. All that we could see was a flash of fingers on the steering wheel. It was impossible to make out their color or if they belonged to a man or a woman. But there was the glint of a ring on the fourth finger of the right hand. It looked like a simple band. The passenger seat looked empty.

  “Let’s go back to the Seventieth Street video,” I said. “Release the pause, and let’s see what happens.”

  Rayshawn clicked the mouse. We both stared at the monitor. Seven minutes and fifteen seconds went by before a flash of light popped at the corner of South Wallace and Seventieth Street. Three seconds later, the Suburban backed out of South Wallace, then turned east down Seventieth. It passed through the viaduct and was gone.

  I texted the license plate number to Carolina.

  “Now to the microphones,” I said. “Can you bring up the microphone on the bishop’s special gossip cam?”

  Rayshawn smiled. He ran his fingers across the keyboard, and the audio-recording graphic popped up on the screen. He moved the time code so that it matched the time code on the Seventieth Street cameras.

  “Synchronize both the parking lot camera and the Seventieth Street cameras,” I said. “Start everything a minute before the Suburban comes into view, then let the tape roll. I want to make sure I don’t miss anything before it arrives.”

  Rayshawn set everything up and hit “Play.” The room filled with natural sound as the Suburban rolled down Seventieth Street. A distant horn, a car door closing, the wind rushing through the trees—it was like standing outside. Just as the Suburban turned into South Wallace, I asked him to turn up the volume. The Suburban disappeared. I closed my eyes. Faint street sounds continued to fill the room. There wasn’t any loud popping, like you would hear from a gunshot. I closed my eyes again. I thought I could hear the slamming of a car door, but I couldn’t be sure. I opened my eyes again. The Suburban was backing up out of South Wallace. In seven seconds, it was back on Seventieth Street and through the viaduct.

  “Can you capture some still photos of the Suburban?” I asked.

  “Sure, which ones?” Rayshawn asked.

  “The one with the fingers on the steering wheel. One from behind with the license plate in focus. One where it turns down South Wallace. And the last one when the driver backs out of South Wallace
.”

  Rayshawn went back to work on the computer, and in only a few minutes he had all the shots captured and printed.

  “You think that Suburban has something to do with the dead guy?” he asked as I stood up.

  “I can’t be sure, but doesn’t it seem a little suspicious?” I said. “It shows up early in the morning, and it’s moving down the street like it’s lost. Then it shows up late at night. Might not be anything, but something just doesn’t feel right.”

  I walked to the door, admiring the quality of the printouts. Bishop had made a serious investment in the church’s technology. The photos were much clearer than what the CPD cameras had captured.

  “Nice cars like that don’t drive through here very often,” he said. “And when they do, it’s usually a dealer.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me,” I said.

  “If you need anything else, let me know.”

  “Thanks for all your help.” I slipped him a twenty-spot.

  “And about the microphone,” he said with a big smile. “Let’s keep that between you and me.”

  I did the double chest tap with my right fist for solidarity and left.

  41

  “WE HAVE TO STOP meeting like this,” Carolina said, smiling her perfect set of whites. “Something you’ll never regret might actually happen.”

  Carolina had pulled up behind me in her silver F-Type Jag convertible, a car she had splurged on after an entire year of working a ridiculous amount of overtime. Her hair fell to below her shoulders, and her skin glowed under the dim garage lighting. She looked like she was ready for a photo shoot. I had just gotten out of my car and was about to enter my building.

  “People who live their lives worrying about regrets aren’t really living,” I said, walking over to her car and looking through her open window. She wore a small sparkly skirt and a sheer silk blouse that had been unbuttoned enough to get attention but not enough to give it all away. The way her hands gripped the leather steering wheel gave me adult ideas.

  “The work-around with that phone number you gave me finally came through,” she said. “This will cost you more than a dinner at the top of the Chicago Stock Exchange.”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “Something like a weekend trip to a Virgin Island.”

  “What if a weekend isn’t enough?”

  “I’ve never been accused of not being reasonable.” She pulled her car in next to mine, then got out and walked to the garage door. Her skirt rode up her toned legs each time she stepped forward. The click of her heels echoed with great precision.

  I looked at her in disbelief. She had never been inside my building, let alone my apartment. I wasn’t exactly sure what was happening, but I was quickly starting to like it and getting nervous at the same time. It would’ve been much easier if I didn’t like her so much. But no matter how hard I wanted to be ready for a new relationship, I simply wasn’t there yet. It had been almost two years since my fiancée had abandoned me. The wound was still too deep and too fresh. I had enough sense to know that a casual fling with Carolina would all but eliminate my chances of something more meaningful. I wanted the long play.

  “I can’t get in without a key,” she said, turning toward me.

  Once we had made it to my apartment, Stryker sniffed and accepted her. Good training. Carolina stood and watched as I rummaged through the kitchen, putting together a charcuterie board. I pulled out my nicest cutting block and began assembling cured meats, a variety of hard and soft cheeses, olives, grilled artichoke hearts, a pepper-and-fig spread, bruschetta, crackers, a combination of fresh and dried fruit, and a strawberry jam. My father had given me a bottle of Australian wine with the advice attached that I open it only on a special occasion. He cautioned it would be a terrible waste to drink it with someone who couldn’t appreciate all its subtleties. I set everything up on the table in my breakfast nook. We sat facing the balcony and a quiet city beneath us. I kept the lights turned down low.

  “You never told me you had a perfect view of Navy Pier and the Ferris wheel,” she said, moving her head slightly, which caused her hair to brush my shoulder. I could smell her shampoo of honey and jasmine.

  “You should see the fireworks on Wednesday and Saturday nights,” I said. “Right over there in the harbor with just the lighthouse behind them.”

  “Too nice a view to enjoy alone,” she said with a smile. Her eyes said a whole lot more.

  “I always have Stryker,” I said. He lifted his head from the couch for a moment, waiting for a command. When none came, he returned to his outstretched legs, his eyes remaining focused on our fetching visitor.

  “I was talking the human female variety,” she said.

  “That can be complicated sometimes.”

  I carefully picked up a cracker and a piece of cheese with a slice of salami. Once I was certain it wouldn’t fall apart, I quickly slid it all in my mouth and crunched. She pierced an olive with a toothpick and nibbled on it.

  “It took a lot of work to get that number,” she said. “I had to get really creative.”

  “Did you protect yourself?” I asked.

  “Even though I often find you irresistible, I’m no fool. I still like my job.”

  I smiled.

  “So, who was our mystery person?”

  “It wasn’t a person. It came back as a business. The Gerrigan Real Estate Corp., just like the license plate.”

  I wasn’t surprised. That meant there was a decent chance Gerrigan had known about his daughter’s pregnancy the entire time—or at least that Tinsley wasn’t afraid of him finding out. Violet Gerrigan had said she didn’t know, but I didn’t believe her. Maybe she hadn’t known when she first hired me, but I felt like she knew at the time she fired me.

  “What are you thinking?” Carolina asked.

  “How treacherous this guy really is,” I said. “If he would send a couple of guys to follow me, and I’m trying to find his supposedly beloved daughter, what would he do to a rehabilitated street kid who had gotten caught skinny-dipping in the family gene pool?”

  “Not throw him a welcome party.”

  “I’ve called that number several times, and no one answered.”

  “Doesn’t make sense she would give the number to a phone he doesn’t answer much,” Carolina said after another perfect nibble of her olive.

  “Unless he wasn’t answering because he didn’t recognize my number.”

  “But it also makes sense that it’s him, considering it was protected behind an F1 clearance. Who else at the company would have the connection to Mayor Bailey that would warrant this kind of protection? Gerrigan’s at the top of the food chain.”

  I confidently smoothed some of the fig-and-pepper spread on a piece of bread and took a reasonable bite so that I would appear somewhat mannerly. It had been a long time since I had enjoyed this view with a woman whose beauty outshone it. At that moment I was feeling damn lucky.

  “I don’t want to know how or where you got that number,” she said.

  I thought about what my father had first told me at the tennis center. Better understand the relationship dynamics, and you’ll do a better job of making your pieces fit together.

  “It’s all starting to come together,” I said.

  “Are you gonna be all right?” she said, taking another nibble of an olive. “I’m a little worried. Two of his men are following you, his wife has tried to buy your silence, and now we find out you had what must’ve been his private cell number and didn’t even know it. I know I don’t need to tell you this, but I will anyway. You need to be careful. Randolph Gerrigan is a very powerful man with very powerful friends.”

  “Every time I turn a corner, he’s there,” I said. “Every thread I pull, he’s at the other end. It reminds me of what Arthur Conan Doyle once wrote about Professor Moriarty. ‘He sits motionless, like a spider in the center of its web, but that web has a thousand radiations, and he knows well every quiver of each of them. He
does little himself. He only plans.’”

  “So, what are you going to do next?” she asked.

  “The only thing I know how to do. Quiver a radiation.”

  42

  ON AN EARLY Saturday morning, Mechanic and I were set up outside of an elegant stone mansion in Oak Park, a suburb ten minutes west of the city. Mechanic had drawn Dr. Patel’s name out of my White Sox hat, which meant I was left with her husband. Dr. Weems was the first to drive down the cobblestone driveway in a dark-blue S600 Mercedes sedan. I gave him a block’s lead, then quickly fell behind him. He seemed to be in a hurry as he got onto the Eisenhower Expressway and immediately started bobbing in and out of traffic on his way into the city.

  Fifteen minutes later he pulled off at Division and headed west toward the Wicker Park neighborhood. He turned down North Wood Street and pulled into a small parking lot behind a row of storefronts. I kept my position on the street and surveyed the premises. There were three buildings next to each other. The buildings to the left and right appeared to be a mixture of retail and residential, with the apartments occupying the second and third floors. The middle building was only a single-story structure, but it was wider than its neighbors. It didn’t have any signage or windows, and it offered only a solitary black door. Weems jumped out of his car, wearing a leather jacket with pale green surgical scrubs underneath. He pulled a Louis Vuitton duffel bag from the back seat and carried a silver coffee thermos as he quickly walked toward the middle building. He pulled a key card out of his wallet and used it to unlock the black door. I noticed two surveillance cameras posted on the building he entered, which struck me as a little odd, since the other two buildings didn’t have any.

  I pulled back around to Division Street. A Boost Mobile store was on the ground floor of the building to the west, and a guitar shop occupied the storefront to the east. Unlike the entrances to the other buildings, the entrance to the middle building didn’t directly face the sidewalk. Instead, there was a small walkway leading down the side of the building adjacent to the wireless store. Just like the back, there wasn’t any signage or any indication what might be inside. The number 1757 had been quietly painted on the corner of the building. The three windows sat behind metal bars, their black shades permanently drawn. I took a couple of photos with my cell phone, then circled to the back of the building, where I had a clear view of the parking lot. I wanted to be ready whenever Weems left.