by Jim Heskett
She wished him a good day and then hung up the phone. Layne stowed the pistol and boxes of rounds behind the dresser, then he left the room to explore. A few deep breaths out on the sidewalk, his eyes taking in the surroundings.
Across the street, a cop car turned into a small parking lot at a tourist overlook into a valley. When the car parked in a spot, an idea sprang to life. An unusual way to begin an investigation, but he figured he didn’t have the luxury of time. Harry had been missing for two days now.
Layne slid out the door and waited at the crosswalk, then crossed the street toward the scenic outlook. Layne could now see inside the car. Only one cop there, his head facing the valley and the cliffs beyond.
Layne pulled his wallet out of his back pocket before he approached the car. He knew better than to make that sort of movement in front of a police officer.
When Layne approached the window, the cop started, then glared up at him for a few seconds. Eventually, he rolled the window down. He had a crew cut and a mustache as close to the cop stereotype as you could get. He also had mirrored aviator sunglasses. Like he’d ordered everything out of a catalog.
“Yes?” the cop said.
Layne noted his name above his badge. It read BRENDALL.
“Officer Brendall? I wondered if you could help me with something.”
Brendall let out an exasperated sigh as he opened the car door. Layne stepped back to let him out. Brendall was short and stocky, with a beat cop uniform that hugged his ample belly. He had arms like tree trunks, though. Skinny legs and a thick neck. He looked like a powerlifter.
“What?”
Layne held his wallet open, showing his fake ID. “My name is Larry Primrose, and I’m a private investigator from Denver. I represent a client who is interested in recovering property stolen from him, and it’s a matter of urgency. We have reason to believe this stolen property is currently in Sedona.”
Brendall sucked on his teeth. “Pawn shops. Everything always ends up at a pawn shop, so start there.”
“Ahh, right. You see, I don’t think we’re going to find what we’re looking for in a pawn shop.”
“Why is that?”
Layne put away his fake ID before the cop could study it any longer. “Sugar gliders.”
“Sugar what?”
“Sugar gliders were stolen from my client. A dozen of them. They’re a small marsupial, a little like a bat.”
“You’re trying to recover stolen bats?”
Layne took a breath and tried to speak evenly. This cop was not the friendly sort, given the perpetual sneer on his face. “No, sir, not bats. Sugar gliders. They’re pets, and my client has a lot of time and money invested in them. It’s hard to place a dollar amount on their lives.”
“Alright, so what do you want from me?”
“I’m hoping you could point me in the right direction.”
Brendall gave a slow, passive-aggressive shake of the head. “I don’t know the first thing to tell you about some kinda black market animal smuggling ring. Maybe you can talk to Fish and Wildlife?”
“I have an idea where to look, but I just need a little help. There’s a criminal organization known as DG-9, and they operate up and down the southwest. They’ve been known to trade in stolen animals like this.”
The cop now lowered his arms to his sides, his fists flexing and unflexing. Layne had invented the name of this gang on the spot, so he had to hope Brendall would buy it. Layne spoke with confidence, and that was often enough.
“Never heard of them," Brendall said.
“I just need a push in the right direction. Is there a part of town I can go to maybe overhear conversations, to see a little seedy underbelly? The sort of place where you would buy coke or smack. That’s always a good place to begin.”
“Sedona doesn’t have a seedy underbelly. I’ve answered enough of your questions, Mr. Primrose. It’s time for you to walk away.”
“If you could help me out, I’d—”
“Enough,” Brendall said, and he balled his fists. He leaned forward, baring his teeth. Full-on aggression in his body language. But, Layne noted, he kept his feet rooted in place.
Layne took a step back. “Okay, man. Sorry for wasting your time.”
Layne slipped his wallet back into his pocket and backed away from the cop. Brendall didn’t relax his tensed shoulders until Layne was at least ten feet removed. As Layne turned, Brendall finally took his eyes off him and returned to his car. Head forward, a blank expression as he looked out to the valley.
As Layne crossed the street, he took note of the license plate number of Brendall’s patrol car. An interaction like that wasn’t pure happenstance. Layne would need to keep an eye on this guy.
9
Harry Boukadakis sat on the floor in front of the door. He stared at the crease running up and down, separating the door and the doorjamb. It was wide enough to slip a credit card through, but Harry knew those things didn’t work in real life. Only in the movies.
Maybe Layne or Serena knew how to take a paperclip and turn it into a deadbolt hacking device, but they’d never shared that secret before.
There was a lock on the other side of the door and Harry could only see the plate on the inner side. Maybe if he could somehow pry the plate off, he could access the deadbolt. What if, instead of retracting the deadbolt, he could widen the space around it by carving out the wood? With a little wiggle room, he could possibly then use the momentum from the deadbolt to break the doorjamb. He’d have to shove it with great force.
It could work. Maybe.
But, the first problem would be how to remove the deadbolt plate. He didn’t have a screwdriver or anything like that. They didn’t even leave the plastic utensils after meals.
He sighed and leaned back on his hands, staring. Before he had time to react, footsteps stopped outside the door. Harry scooted back as the door opened. There stood Ronald and his wiry henchman Cornelius. Their eyes trailed down, both of them with raised eyebrows.
“What are you doing down there?” Ronald asked.
“Nothing,” Harry said as he rose to his feet and backpedaled across the room.
Ronald pointed to the bed, and Harry sat. Ronald shook his head as he grabbed a chair and set it opposite from the bed. “It’s not worth your time, Harry. Trust me.”
“I have nothing better to do.”
Now, Ronald grinned. Corn stepped into the room and shut the door behind him with one hand because the other was holding a tray with a burger and french fries.
“I know it’s a little early to eat,” Ronald said, “but I have a lunch date today and wanted to ask you a few questions first. I’ve mostly left you alone since you’ve been here, haven’t I?”
Harry gave a little dip of the head because he knew he couldn’t refuse. Not as long as Ronald held those two Polaroid pictures over his head. But, he needed answers. “Tell me my wife and son are okay. Please. I need to know they haven’t been hurt.”
Ronald took out his phone and unlocked it. “I thought you would say as much.” He swiped along the screen a few times. “Today is Wednesday, and your wife goes to yoga on Sager Avenue, correct?”
Harry gulped as he nodded.
Ronald held the phone out. “It was tricky to get a picture of the yoga studio and the bank clock across the street, but we did it.”
Harry looked at the picture, his wife through the glass. He could see the date on the tower next to the US Bank building. “My son?”
“We don’t have a picture of him, but he’s fine. He’s in school. Second week, third-period history class, if I remember right. They are going to learn about the US Constitution today. Isn’t that sweet?”
After Corn set the tray down, he pulled a knife from his pocket and set to work digging at his fingernails. He did this with his body facing Harry, the knife out in front. Deliberate, so Harry would see. Working for Daphne’s team of shadows, Harry didn’t do this good cop-bad cop interrogation thing himself, but he ha
d studied it. Except Corn and Ronald weren’t exactly playing those roles. More like physical menace cop and implied menace cop.
“What do you want to know?” Harry asked.
“Tell me about your team. Daphne Kurek and the people you work for.”
“I do consulting work for a few agencies in Washington. A little bit of CIA, some FBI, on rare occasions, Secret Service. It’s mostly data analysis related to budgetary stuff. Spreadsheets.”
Ronald frowned, with a hint of a sour smile in it. When he did, the strangest feeling struck Harry, as if he knew this man. As if they had met somewhere once or twice, a long time ago. But Harry couldn’t place it, and the feeling evaporated from his memory too quickly for it to solidify beyond that vague sensation.
“No, Harry, I’m asking about who you really work for. Not the story you tell your wife’s friends at her office Christmas party. You’re part of a small team, currently only you, Daphne Kurek, and Serena Rojas full time, with a revolving crew of others who come and go.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Daphne is my manager, yeah, but I’m a freelance consultant. I’ve been telling you that since your people took me. You’ve got the wrong guy.”
Ronald’s pleasant tone evaporated. “Cut the shit.” He took a deep breath, and it came out in an aggravated shudder. He removed his wallet and drew a business card which he rolled into a little tube. He tightened it with his fingers, making the paper grunt as it became smaller and smaller.
“I know about the work you do. There’s no point in lying to me. Do you need a stronger reminder than the Polaroids?”
“No,” Harry said, butting in before Ronald could say anything else. His heart thumped inside his chest, and a trickle of sweat ran down his back. “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. I mean, there’s not much to tell. Daphne recruited me not long after college. I do sometimes do work for those other agencies, but it’s all like hired gun stuff. Quid pro quo. It’s just to secure funding since our team has no official standing. We have to siphon off budget that falls through the cracks of other agencies.”
“Good, good. Now we’re opening up and sharing. And you do operational support for your team.”
He didn’t like admitting to any of this, but what choice did he have? Ronald seemed to know everything already.
“Yes. It’s mostly watching satellite feeds, sometimes hacking into CCTV cameras. Studying routes targets take and trying to predict where they’re going to be. Every once in a while, I’ll write code for apps to help our shadows in the fields. That’s the truth. I’m a code monkey. I don’t do in-the-field stuff except for very rare occasions.”
“Your friend, Layne Parrish. I’m interested in him.”
“He’s an interesting person.”
Ronald nodded. “Divorced, single, one child. Has a condo in Boulder as well as a cabin in Rio Grande County. Is that correct?”
“I think so.”
“He retired from your little organization about six years ago. Why is that?”
Harry shrugged. “You’d have to ask him. We haven’t talked about it much.”
Ronald’s face turned dark as he crumpled the tube of the business card and leaned closer. The menace in his eyes sent a pulse of fear through Harry. “I’m asking you.”
“We had an op in London that went bad. Innocents died. Layne turned in his resignation after that.”
“And now he’s back?”
Harry shook his head. “No, not officially. I don’t think he wants to be back.”
“He had a security business for a few years, but now, he’s fully retired from that, as well. His house and condo are paid for. Where does he get his money?”
“For that, you’re really going to have to ask him. I have no idea how Layne has money.”
Ronald sat back in the chair, his eyes darting over Harry’s face. “Interesting. What can you tell me about the operation in Littlefield, Texas, eight years ago?”
The change in topic jarred Harry. He sputtered for a second, which made him worry Ronald would think he was lying. “Nothing. I mean, nothing. I wasn’t involved. All I know is that Layne was there as well as a woman named Juliana Dewalt. Juliana was killed during the operation, but I don’t know how. I was on vacation that week, so they probably had someone from another agency working remote support.”
“What was the name of that person on loan?”
“No idea. I don’t know for sure they had op support. I’m just guessing. They could have been totally blind.”
Ronald stuck out his lower lip. “Are you telling me the truth? Don’t forget what’s at stake here.”
“I am telling you the truth. Our boss used to swap out personnel all the time. If you weren’t part of an op, you were also left out of the intelligence, permanently. It was for our protection.”
Ronald’s eyes narrowed, which made Harry’s heart thump. He considered saying something else, to convince Ronald he knew nothing about Littlefield, but he didn’t want to seem too eager. Didn’t want to make it seem like he was trying to overcompensate. All these different questions kept knocking him off balance.
Ronald checked his watch and stood up. “Okay, Harry. That’s all the questions I have for now. Maybe I’ll come back after my lunch date, and we’ll see if your memory hasn’t improved a little.”
10
Layne noticed the black car tailing him within a minute of it entering the street. He walked with his hands in his pockets, actively monitoring his peripheral.
As he passed the Tlaquepaque shopping area, he turned into it, to see what the car would do. With only footpaths through the outdoor mall, they would have to make a choice. Layne slipped his phone from his pocket and pointed the selfie camera behind him to watch the sleek car pull into a parking spot along the street. A man emerged from the front and opened the rear door, allowing an older man with silvery hair to step out.
The man crossed the street, headed directly for Layne. Layne turned around and met the man’s eyes. This didn’t surprise the man at all, so Layne decided to have a seat at a nearby patio chair outside a coffee shop. All around him, tourists in shorts and t-shirts strolled with bags full of mementos. The noon sun beat down, and Layne pulled his baseball cap low.
The man across the street did not break eye contact as he crossed. He was sharply dressed in a linen suit, with expensive shoes. Not a scuff or speck of dirt on them.
“Mr. Primrose,” the man said as he approached. He spoke with a hint of regality in his voice. Sounded more like an attempt to change his speech than a natural accent.
Layne tried to show no expression as the man pulled back the other chair at the little table. It screeched across the brick pathway. The man unbuttoned his suit and sat down.
“Hot today,” Layne said.
“It sure is.” He reached out and extended a hand. A large hand, which seemed a little too big for his body. Bony knuckles and thick digits. Looked like he held a lot of power in that grip. “Ronald Gaynor.”
Layne didn’t shake, but he did nod his head. So, the person responsible was not another former member of the team, as Layne had suspected. He didn’t know this guy at all. There was nothing familiar about his face, but Layne could tell he’d had some work done. A little on his chin, maybe his nose. He was probably over fifty, but the plastic surgery made him look about ten years younger.
“And you already know my name, and you probably know it’s not Primrose.”
Ronald grinned. “It’s not up to me to expose anyone. It’s not my style.” He paused to wipe sweat from his brow. “You ever been to summer camp?”
Layne shrugged. “Why do you ask?”
“When I was in college, a long time ago, I was a camp counselor. This was back east, but for some reason, coming out to the desert reminds of that experience. No idea why, because I was in the woods of Maine, not the red rocks.”
Layne kept his face neutral. Good chance these details were entirely fabricated, made to make Layne inco
rrectly narrow his search when trying to find out details about Ronald.
“I liked working with the kids,” Ronald said. “I was never much interested in having children of my own, but I do have fond memories of seeing those kids at camp. Especially the shy ones who came out of their shells over the course of a summer. It was quite a wonderful thing to see.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. And, don’t you find that nostalgia is like a spiderweb? One song from the glory days, one smell you haven’t smelled in a long time, and it triggers all sorts of other memories to go along with it.”
“Sure, man,” Layne said. “It’s state-dependent memory retrieval.”
Ronald raised his eyebrows. “That’s an interesting term. Never heard it before.”
A server in a half apron approached their table. “What can I get for you?” she asked.
“Nothing for me,” Ronald said. “I won’t be staying long. How about you, Larry?”
Layne shook his head. “No thanks.” He waited a moment for the server to return inside. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m glad you came. I had a suspicion he found a way to get a message across to you, in that voicemail. I didn’t know for sure it would be you who would listen to it, but I’m pleased.”
“Why is that?”
Ronald took a break and smoothed out a few wrinkles in his pants. “Because of all the government operatives who work or have worked for Daphne Kurek’s little clandestine team, you are the most puzzling to me.” Ronald wagged a finger, as if lecturing. “And I don’t like puzzles.”
“Where are the missing shadows?”
“Oh, they’re not missing, they’re dead. They’ll be found, soon enough. I staged it so it would happen in bursts. I thought it would have more impact that way.”
Layne shook his head. “You have no idea the trouble you’ve unleashed by killing government agents.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Larry. I know how secretive you are. I know these deaths won’t end up on the front page, will they?”
“If you’re telling me the truth, you’ve made a big mistake.”