Hollow Point

by Robert Swartwood

  I volunteer at the library a couple days a week, mostly helping to restock shelves. It gives me something to do during the day. Otherwise, I’d sit alone in my apartment and stare at the wall and think about things I don’t want to think about.

  The library keeps short hours on Saturdays—opens at nine, closes at noon—so I pull into the parking lot right at nine o’clock on the dot. Thanks to Meredith, I’ve had time to return to the apartment to take a shower and change into some fresh clothes. My hair is still damp as I step out of the car and make my way toward the entrance.

  Despite the fact the time is now 9:01, the door is locked.

  I lean close to the window in the door. The place is dark inside. Nobody around.

  “Jen?”

  Gloria Ruskin’s voice drifts from behind me, and I turn slightly to glance over my shoulder to watch the old woman shuffle up the walkway.

  “Good morning, Gloria.”

  She squints at me.

  “Are you feeling okay?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “You’re wearing a sweatshirt. It’s the third week of June.”

  The sweatshirt, of course, is to conceal the SIG I still have pressed against the small of my back, but Gloria doesn’t need to know this.

  “I haven’t been feeling so good the past couple days. Think I might be coming down with a cold.”

  Gloria’s hand immediately flies to her face.

  “Then stay away from me, young lady. I don’t want to get sick.”

  “Don’t worry, I promise not to sneeze on you. Is everything okay? You’re usually here before nine.”

  I step away as Gloria approaches the door, a ring of keys in hand. She sighs as she slides a key in the lock and pulls open the door.

  “Howard wasn’t doing so well this morning. I thought I should maybe stay home with him, but … you know how it is.”

  Howard is Gloria’s husband, a sweet old man who’s been battling Parkinson’s the past three years. Both of them are retired, children and grandchildren spread out around the country. Gloria runs the library with a sort of strict dedication that makes me envious. She’s here every day, from open to close.

  “If Howard isn’t feeling well, why don’t you take the day off? I can cover for you.”

  The moment I say the words I regret them, as clearly I have much bigger things to worry about. Still, Gloria is one of my favorite people in Alden, and hence so is her husband whom I’ve only met once, and if Gloria needs to take care of her husband, then so be it. Besides, today the library is only open for three hours. It would give me more than enough time to do what I need to do and then close up.

  Gloria waves a dismissive hand as she leads me into the library, flicking on light switches as she goes.

  “That’s very kind of you, Jen, but Howard will be okay.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m sure.”

  The door behind us opens, and Mr. Tucker enters. He wears an Astros baseball cap and lifts his hand in a quick hello as he breezes toward the table of four computers.

  Gloria calls over to him.

  “Good morning, Frank. I haven’t had a chance to turn on the computers yet. Do you mind waiting a minute?”

  Mr. Tucker lifts his hand again in acknowledgment and takes what I’ve come to think of as Mr. Tucker’s Seat at the computers. He’s almost as old as Gloria’s husband. A widower with no kids, he spends most of his time at the library watching YouTube videos. His favorites are cat and dog videos. Sometimes when I’m restocking books I’ll hear him chuckling at one wacky video or another.

  I follow Gloria into the office where she hits the button to provide power to the computers out in the main room.

  Gloria says, “What brings you in this morning, anyway?”

  “My Internet’s acting weird at home. I was hoping to use your computer here for a couple of minutes. I’d rather not deal with Mr. Tucker out there, if at all possible.”

  “Certainly. Just do me one favor.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Wipe the keyboard and mouse down with a Clorox wipe once you’re done.”

  The great thing about Gloria—she likes me so she doesn’t care what I do. I’m always on time, always clean up after myself, never give her or anybody at the library attitude. Her trust in me is so high she’d probably give me her social security number if I asked for it.

  As Gloria heads back out into the main room, I sit down at her desk and turn on the computer. It’s an ancient PC, and takes forever to power up, the gremlins in the computer box clicking and tapping away as the screen runs through its usual nonsense before the Windows logo finally appears.

  The real reason I want to use Gloria’s computer is because I’d installed the Tor browser on it several months ago. Gloria doesn’t know much about computers, and I made it so the browser can’t easily be found. I could have done the same to one of the four computers out in the main room, but there’s always the chance somebody might stumble across the program. Mr. Tucker prefers his YouTube animal videos, but maybe he’s a computer genius when nobody’s looking. Better to keep the program isolated.

  Once the Windows logo disappears and the desktop pops up, I click the mouse several times to bring up the Tor browser. It’s something that Scooter—an old friend and team member, who died saving my life—had once advised me to use what feels like a lifetime ago, but every time I use it now I think of Gabriela. It’s been almost a year since she was killed by narcos. Gabriela knew being a journalist was dangerous, especially where she lived in Mexico, but that hadn’t stopped her.

  Tor is designed to keep websites from tracking your movements or location. Whenever I use the Internet now—and I rarely do—I use the browser.

  I bring up Google and then do a search for “leila simmons” and “little angels adoption agency.” The main website for Little Angels Adoption Agency is the first website listed. I scan the site, which looks legit. Real pictures of real people, not stock photos.

  On the staff tab, I find Leila Simmons listed as an assistant director. She looks to be in her late-forties. Hispanic. She has a warm smile with dark eyes and curly black hair.

  The phone number and email address below her picture match the same ones on the business card.

  The number scrawled on the back of the business card, however, isn’t anywhere on the website. Not that I expected it to be. It’s probably a cell phone number. Most likely her personal cell phone number.

  I close out of the website and Google Leila Simmons’s name again. She has a LinkedIn account as well as a Facebook account. A few other websites mention her name, too, websites focused on adoption. One site congratulates her on winning a humanitarian award.

  I close the Tor browser, wipe down the keyboard and mouse with a Clorox wipe, and head out into the main room. As expected, Mr. Tucker is chuckling at something on his computer.

  Gloria stands behind the counter, checking in the books and DVDs from yesterday.

  “Did you wipe everything down?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Very good. I suggest you head home and get some sleep if you’re not feeling well. Maybe make yourself some chicken noodle soup.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I hope Howard is feeling better.”

  Gloria’s ever-present smile falters for a second.

  “Yes, dear. So do I.”

  I swing by the computers to wish Mr. Tucker a good day. He lifts his hand in my direction as he continues to chuckle. When I get close enough, I see a hedgehog on the screen, balled up and floating in a tub of water.

  The second I get in my car I pull out one of the disposable phones. I’ve already loaded this one with minutes, and as I pull out of the parking lot, I’ve dialed the number on the back of the business card and listen to it ring four times before somebody answers.

  “Hello?”

  A soft voice. Feminine.

  “Is this Leila Simmons?”

  “Yes, it is.”
/>   “I found something you may be interested in.”

  “Who is this?”

  “What I found was in a duffel bag, along with a yellow Velcro wallet.”

  A long pause on the woman’s end. When she speaks next, her voice has become a low whisper.

  “Is the baby okay?”

  I’m not shocked by her question. Somehow I knew she would know about the baby. Still, it’s unnerving to hear her ask it so simply.

  “Yes.”

  “And what of Juana?”

  Juana is presumably the girl I saw last night covered in blood. The one who thrust the duffel bag—and the baby inside it—in my arms minutes before she was struck by a car. The girl who had five crisp one-hundred dollar bills in her wallet along with a card for the woman I now have on the phone.

  When I don’t immediately answer, Leila Simmons sucks in air and sounds like she’s ready to cry. Her whisper becomes somehow even quieter.

  “She’s dead, isn’t she?”

  Seven

  At ten minutes to noon, Leila Simmons pulls into the parking lot of the roadside diner. She drives a forest green Volkswagen Jetta, its left rear hubcap missing. She steps out of the car wearing sunglasses, but I recognize her from the pictures on the Little Angels’ website. She’s a bit taller than she looked from the picture, but maybe that’s because of the heels. Despite the fact it’s the weekend, she’d dressed professionally, like she’s about to attend a meeting. Which in a way is true. Only it’s not the type of meeting the woman probably has in mind.

  Leila enters the diner and looks around the place, up one row and down another, and when she doesn’t see anybody wave to her she lets a waitress lead her to a booth. The waitress returns a minute later with a mug of a coffee, and Leila thanks her as she reaches for the creamers on the table.

  I wait until twelve o’clock exactly before I dial Leila’s personal cell phone.

  By that point she’s sipping at the coffee, glancing at her watch every thirty seconds, sometimes reading something on her cell phone. Leila is about to take another sip when her phone rings. She pauses, squints at the phone lying on the tabletop, sets the mug down and hesitantly holds the phone to her ear.

  “Hello?”

  “Change of plans.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I’ve decided I want to meet someplace else.”

  “What do you—but this is where you said you wanted to meet.”

  “Yes, originally. Now I’ve changed my mind.”

  I’m positioned across the highway in a truck stop parking lot. Parked so I’m facing the diner across the highway. I have a good view of Leila from where I am, so I can see how frustrated she’s getting, closing her eyes as her hand reaches up to pinch the bridge of her nose.

  She says, almost too quietly, “I don’t like games.”

  “Me neither. But last night I saw that girl you mentioned murdered so I don’t want to take any chances.”

  “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  “You’re not the one I’m worried about.”

  Leila drops her hand from her face, quickly looks around the diner.

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying I want to make sure you haven’t been followed. That you won’t be followed when you leave there. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Now leave a couple bucks for your coffee and head back to your car.”

  Her head whips around, the woman suddenly realizing that I’m watching her. First she looks around the diner again, then out through the window at the parking lot, and then across the highway at the truck stop.

  “Don’t worry about where I am. Just pay for the coffee and head to your car. Believe me when I say I want to get this over with just as much as you do.”

  Leila pulls three dollar bills from her pocket and lays them on the table as she slides out from the booth. The phone to her ear, she starts toward the exit.

  “Where am I going?”

  “Turn right out of the parking lot and head west.”

  “How far should I go?”

  “I’ll tell you.

  “Will you call me back?”

  “No. You and I are going to stay on the line until you get there.”

  Am I being overly paranoid? Maybe overly cautious is the better term for it. There’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to trust this woman, but the simple fact is I don’t know anything about her other than the little I’ve read online this morning. Her card was found in the bag of a dead girl, along with a Velcro wallet containing five crisp one-hundred dollar bills and a pinkie finger. Oh, and a baby.

  No red flags have gone off in regards to this woman yet, but that doesn’t mean I still shouldn’t be cautious. There’s no reason to believe she has anything to do with the men who killed the girl from last night, but I still have to be certain before I allow myself to put Star in her care.

  Less than a minute later Leila has pulled out onto the highway heading west. I watch the diner parking lot for a moment, then double-check the truck stop parking lot. As far as I can tell, nobody rushes to follow her. In fact, nobody even coincidently pulls out of either parking lot.

  Keeping the phone against my ear, I start the engine and pull out onto the highway.

  Eight

  I don’t draw this out any longer than I need to. Soon it becomes clear Leila Simmons—and by extension, me—isn’t being followed. I keep watching the rearview mirror, but the cars back there look as normal as cars typically look on a weekend afternoon driving miles and miles in the middle of nowhere.

  We don’t speak. Leila tried asking more questions, but I kept telling her to wait, that I would talk to her when we got there, and finally she fell silent. She doesn’t have the radio on in her car, and neither do I. Besides the noise of the highway whipping past beneath our tires, the only sound coming from the phone is the woman’s soft breathing.

  After several miles on the highway—nothing in the desert around us except buffalo grass and creosote bushes and cholla—a rest area looms ahead. It’s so small and pathetic you might miss it if you blinked.

  I make a split-second decision and pull off into the rest area. Leila’s probably already a good half mile farther down the highway.

  “Did you see the rest area you passed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Make a U-turn and head back to it.”

  Leila doesn’t answer, but I sense her frustration on the line between us.

  “Leila, did you hear me?”

  “I’m making the U-turn now.”

  The rest area doesn’t have a bathroom. Just two weathered picnic tables and a trash bin. A slanted and rusting aluminum overhang that looks like it was built fifty years ago shadows the tables.

  There aren’t even any parking spots, just enough gravel for cars to temporarily park so that people can stretch their legs for a few minutes.

  I’m already parked and waiting by the time the Jetta pulls into the lot. As Leila Simmons eases her car to a stop next to mine, I open my door and step out into the dry summer day. The cloudless sky above a dark blue, the only imperfection a 747 leading a puffy contrail.

  I keep my door open, the P320 resting on the seat.

  Leila watches me from behind the steering wheel, clearly trying to gauge the situation. She doesn’t step out and instead lowers the Jetta’s passenger side window.

  “Where’s the baby?”

  “She’s not here.”

  Despite the sunglasses on her face, I can tell her eyes dart past me at the empty car. She shakes her head, her jaw tightening.

  “What is this bullshit?”

  “Relax. The baby is fine. She’s in good hands.”

  “What is this—some kind of shakedown? Do you expect me to pay you money?”

  “No. Like I told you, I witnessed the girl you mentioned—”

  “Juana.”

  “Yes, Juana. I saw two law enforcement officers murder her last night.
As far as I could tell, they didn’t seem like good law enforcement, either. So I want to be careful.”

  Leila Simmons doesn’t answer for a moment. Finally she seems to make a decision. She undoes her seat belt and steps out of the car. Crosses her arms and looks around the rest area like there are a dozen people standing nearby.

  “Why did you bring me all the way out here?”

  “I told you—I wanted to make sure you weren’t being followed.”

  “Who would follow me?”

  “Who were the men who killed Juana last night?”

  She doesn’t answer at first. A slight wind picks up, blowing her curly black hair around, and she pushes a few strands from her face.

  She says, “Who are you, anyway?”

  “I’m just a woman who likes to mind her own business.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  So I tell her. I tell her about how I was heading home from work last night when I heard the girl calling out behind me. How I turned and saw the blood, and how the girl placed the duffel bag in my arms before darting into an alleyway. How she was hit by a car and then murdered.

  Leila takes off her sunglasses, wipes at her eyes.

  “Jesus. That poor girl.”

  “I found your card in the duffel bag.”

  “Yes. I met with Juana the other day. I’d written my cell on the back of the card so that she could reach me directly at any time, day or night. I do it for all the girls.”

  “What girls?”

  “Just”—she pauses, spreads her hands—“girls. Pregnant girls. Desperate girls.”

  “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I visited the Little Angels website. It looks like a legit adoption agency.”

  “It is a legit adoption agency.”

  “Sure. Then do a lot of your girls get tortured by law enforcement before being hunted down and killed?”

  Her sudden paleness is amplified by the bright afternoon sun.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I told you how she was covered in blood. Well, along with your business card in the duffel bag, I found a severed pinkie finger. I can’t say for sure because everything happened so fast last night, but I would imagine it was Juana’s.”