Bad Penny

by John D. Brown

  “Yes,” she said.

  “We don’t have much time,” he said.

  “I never made a doctor’s appointment for Hector.”

  “Some things men want to keep discrete. I shouldn’t have said anything, but I need the address.”

  Frank waited. He was playing a doctor. And doctors usually got their way.

  She furrowed her brow but took out a piece of paper and a razor sharp pencil.

  Footsteps sounded on the stairs. They were heavy footsteps. A man’s footsteps.

  The older gal scratched out 7-4-3.

  A heavyset white guy appeared on the stairs. “There you are,” he said. “I think you’ve got my smock.”

  Frank looked down. The older secretary had scratched 743 Lu.

  They peered across the cubicles at Frank. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s mine. Who are you?”

  “Doctor Alito,” Frank said. He looked down at the older gal.

  She’d stopped writing. The pencil was still in her hand, poised above the paper.

  The youngest gal said, “He said you lent it to him.”

  “No,” the guy said confused.

  The women in the back had been careful not to draw attention to herself. She’d been quietly watching the whole scene, which was why Frank almost missed her hand movement. She slowly reached one finger out and pushed a button on her phone and then held perfectly still.

  Odds were she’d just called security.

  The older woman put her pencil down. She said, “I think he’s still here. It’s such a big place. The receptionist can page him.”

  “We checked all over downstairs. Someone said he’d left, but I thought I’d come up here. He needs this information.”

  The old gal looked at him, and then decided to call his bluff. “I’m really not supposed to,” she said. “Talk to the receptionist.”

  “A man’s life is on the line, and I get the run around from his employees. He’s going to hear about this.”

  The women did not budge.

  He’d been seconds away. He looked at the gal in the back who’d been silently watching him the whole time. He figured he had less than two minutes before the cavalry arrived.

  “If he comes back,” Frank said. “You tell him to call me.”

  “Sure,” the old gal said.

  Frank walked passed Shawn. “I’ll leave it hanging on the hook.”

  “You’re supposed to have an escort,” Shawn said.

  “It’s an emergency,” Frank said and crossed to the stairs. He headed down before Shawn could reply. On the way he removed the smock and hat.

  At the bottom, he checked the hallway to make sure it was clear. Across from him hung the three framed photographs. He pulled all three off the wall, frames and all, stacked them up, and wrapped them in Shawn’s smock.

  He heard the static of a personal radio out in the warehouse. Heard someone running in his direction.

  Frank saw the women’s bathroom for the office folks, pushed the door open and stepped inside. Someone with petite white sneakers was utilizing one of the stalls. Frank said, “Sorry, I’ve just got to fix the door. It will only be a moment.”

  “Okay?” the woman said.

  Moments later he heard the sound of running footsteps turn into the hallway. Two people. One of them clomped up the stairs in heavy boots. The other ran past the bathroom to the front of the building.

  Frank counted to four then walked out of the women’s bathroom. At the one end of the hallway, the door to the reception area was closing. He figured the man who had run there would be back in about ten seconds. Frank turned the opposite direction and walked toward the warehouse, smock and photographs under his arm.

  Sam’s voice came on the line. “Are you okay?”

  “It’s a bust,” Frank said.

  “Do we need to come get you?”

  “The last thing we need is for our vehicle to be tagged. Just stay put.”

  He did not turn back and go the way he’d come. Instead he walked out into the aisles of pallet racks, into forklift land, and made a quick turn to put a wall of stock between him and those who had been called to take care of the intruder.

  The lane was clear all the way to the end. He could hear a forklift a few rows away, grabbing stock. Frank took long quick strides down the row back toward the loading docks and the blue door. As he walked he pulled the photographs out of the smock. He threw Shawn’s smock into one of the stock bays, then proceeded to tear the backs off the frames and remove the photographs. He left the three frames lying on boxes of butter flavoring. The large photographs he folded up and stuffed into the big front pocket of his pants.

  He was about halfway down the long row when a forklift drove through the intersection about thirty yards ahead of Frank. There was one guy driving the lift and another guy hanging on the side. The guy hanging on the side was wearing a dark blue shirt and a dark cap.

  The forklift stopped. Backed up. Then turned onto Frank’s row. There were big white letters on the one guys dark cap. They said “Security.” The security guy called something in on a radio attached close to his shoulder. He held up his hand for Frank to halt. He had a flashlight in his black utility belt on one side. On the other side he had a gun in a holster.

  Frank slowed.

  Behind Frank, at the far end, another forklift turned into the row. Another security guy hung on the side of that one.

  A lot of security guys for one bakery. But maybe they were worried about corporate espionage. Maybe H.C. & Sons had a secret million-dollar recipe they needed to protect from the French and Germans.

  Frank looked left, looked right. Saw an open stocking location ahead on the ground. The pallet there wasn’t full, just a couple of bags of sugar. Furthermore, Frank could see daylight on the other side.

  “I need you to stop,” the security guard said.

  Frank dashed for the pallet, scrambled over the sugar and found his way blocked by another pallet partially stacked with boxes full of cinnamon. Almost a dead end, but not quite. There was just enough space to slip past the boxes.

  The forklift accelerated down the row toward the spot where he’d scrambled in.

  Frank wormed his way past the boxes and spilled out onto the cement lane on the other side.

  Behind him, the forklift’s rubber wheels screeched to a stop. “He’s on the other side!” the guard called. “Aisle four!”

  “Roger,” someone called out of the man’s radio.

  Frank ran down the aisle, heard the whine of the forklift backing up on the other lane, knew the second forklift was doing the same. He suspected they might have others. Heck, they might have a whole fleet of traveling security.

  Frank reached the intersection, jumped to the next row back and kept running, but the aisle was too long. Way too long. It was going to be like playing against the rooks in chess. Sooner or later they were going to corner him.

  Frank looked left, looked right. Looked up. The shelves were stacked seven levels high. They towered over him. He saw an open pallet three levels up. He leapt to the second level, grabbed the vertical support, then hauled himself up to the third level, careful not to step on the boxes and leave a bootprint. The mostly empty pallet was perfect. Too perfect.

  The forklift reached the intersection of the cross lane back on aisle three. The rubber tires squealed to make the corner.

  He climbed up to the next level and then the next, working the supports like a gorilla, and stepped onto the location two levels above the empty one.

  The forks appeared down in the intersection behind him, and Frank slid into the location alongside a pallet of stacked and wrapped vanilla cream fondant.

  The forklift stopped. The security guard hopped off and ran through the intersection, continuing along that crossing lane, probably so he could look down all the rows. He came back a few moments later.

  Frank quietly wormed back farther.

  “Go slow,” the guard said.

  The forklift head
ed down Frank’s row. Just below Frank’s position it stopped. He heard the forks lifting. Heard them pause at the empty bay on the third level. Hear them rise a bit more.

  “You can’t be in here,” the guard called. “Come on out; it’s dangerous with all these forklifts.” He sounded so reasonable. He sounded like any security guard would when someone unauthorized needed to be escorted out. Maybe this wasn’t the lair of a drug lord and slaver. Maybe the Goroza names had been stolen. Identity theft was big business. Perfect for someone like Ed. Hector, Flor, and José could all be upstanding citizens.

  On the other hand, since when did bakeries need multiple guys to guard the Twinkies? One guy would have been plenty.

  The top of the security guard’s dark cap rose into view. He was standing on the forks, probably against all safety regulations, checking the shelf on the fourth level, the one above the empty one.

  One more level and he’d see Frank wedged along the side looking back at him like a raccoon caught between the garbage cans.

  Frank should have brought the submachine gun. He thought about shoving the pallet out onto the guy’s head. But he was alongside it with no leverage. And he couldn’t huck the buckets at anyone because they were wrapped tightly with industrial plastic.

  The guard’s cap sat there a moment more, and then he said, “Nada.” A moment later the fork motor whined and the guard’s cap descended from view. A little after that the forklift’s electrical engine revved and the driver and security guy moved on.

  If these guys followed normal protocol, they would be calling the cops right about now. In a town like this they probably had a four-minute response time. Maybe shorter. If the cops showed up, things were going to get a lot harder. He wriggled forward, slowly peeked out, watched the forklift roll down the lane, the guard scanning the shelves.

  He looked the other way. The lane was clear. But the forklift had round convex rearview mirrors, giving the driver a wide and tall view. If the driver had any brains at all, he’d be checking those mirrors; he’d notice movement.

  So Frank carefully slid back, then over the strut to the shelf behind his, and across the tops of some bags to carefully peek down the lane on the opposite side. A security guard on foot stood way down at the far end watching. The second Frank popped out of his hiding place, the guy would see him, call it in, and they’d all converge. He’d lose precious seconds climbing down to the floor.

  He pulled himself back into the center of the shelf. Each pallet location was separated by nothing more than a diagonal support strut. And while the locations all had pallets in them, the bags and boxes and buckets didn’t fill the whole space right to the top. There was a gap. And at the end of the gap was a lane that ran right back to the docking bays.

  Frank turned and wriggled in a good soldier belly crawl across the tops of the boxes and buckets until he came to the crossing lane. He peeked out. To his left, the lane ran to the back of the warehouse. Nobody that way. To his right, the lane ran to the loading dock, to the dude with the desk in the painted yellow square and the blue door that led outside. The guy at the desk in the yellow square was hunched over filling out some form. A truck driver stood next to him waiting.

  Now or never. Frank wormed out of the row five levels up, high above the lane. Then he climbed down the metal shelving to the cement floor. Aisle five with the forklift crossed behind him. Aisle four with the security guard standing watch at the far end crossed in front of him. He was going to have to cross aisle four and two others to get to the wide loading dock and the blue exit door beyond.

  Frank headed for the dock and door. He crossed aisle four, saw the security guard spot him, saw him call it in. Frank hurried his walk. He passed the next aisle watched by a forklift guard combo. Passed the next. Walked out from the rows of shelves onto the loading dock floor.

  Up ahead the guy at the desk handed the driver a slip of paper. The driver walked to the blue door, opened it. The bright light of afternoon shone in. Then he exited and shut the door behind him.

  Sam said over the Bluetooth in Frank’s ear, “A police cruiser just entered the parking lot. It’s heading fairly quickly toward the front door.”

  “Keep an eye on it,” Frank said. “Let me know where the officers go.”

  In the warehouse, the desk guy turned around and spotted Frank. He frowned. “Hey,” he said. “What are you doing out there? I told you to walk on the path.”

  Behind Frank in the warehouse someone began to run. A couple of forklifts beeped down the aisles at high speed.

  Frank said, “Dude, I got lost.”

  The guy was clearly annoyed. “You with White Transport?”

  White Transport, the truck that had been parked in the bay next to the stairs. That was probably the truck that belonged to the driver who’d just been standing here. Frank was about to answer, when a voice came over the intercom at the desk.

  “We’ve got a code four.”

  The guy at the desk looked down at the intercom. Looked back up at Frank and narrowed his eyes. The guy at the desk wasn’t some skinny pencil type. He wasn’t fat and slobbish either. He was a guy who looked like he could take care of business. Like maybe he’d taken care of business a time or two. He stepped to the left and blocked Frank’s path to the door.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  “Leaving,” Frank said.

  “I don’t think so,” he said and slipped his hand into his pocket.

  Frank didn’t wait to see what surprise he had there. He headbutted the guy in the face.

  The guy reeled back.

  Frank rushed him, put his foot behind the guy’s leg, and shoved.

  The guy tripped and slammed into the cement floor all akimbo, which made it very easy for Frank to stomp his gonads.

  The guy groaned, curled in on himself, and rolled to the side.

  Frank strode past and opened the blue door.

  “The officers are going in the front door,” Sam said.

  Back in the warehouse, a forklift with its security guard attachment rounded the corner into the lane leading directly to the loading area.

  Frank exited the building and shut the blue door behind him.

  The police cruiser was parked right in front of the main entrance some distance down the front of the building to Frank’s left. To Frank’s right the White Transportation semi and trailer was pulling out. Frank leapt over the step railing, ran around the back of the semitrailer and up alongside the trailer of the slowly accelerating truck to the front. The round drum gas tank had a step built into it to make it easy to access the passenger side door. Frank hopped up onto the step and steadied himself. He looked up into the mirror and saw the driver watching the road in front.

  The semi’s motor rumbled and the vehicle picked up speed. Back at the truck bays someone shouted. If they were shouting for the driver, he didn’t hear them. Frank didn’t think he could hear them. The guy was listening to some book on tape so loudly Frank could hear the narrator through the door.

  The road out of here curved just a little to the left, which kept the semi between him and the front of the building. A few seconds later the driver braked at the entrance to the main road facing the bakery. He waited for a group of cars to pass, then gave the truck some gas. The diesel engine rumbled; the dark exhaust rose out of the tall exhaust pipes, and the truck lumbered out into the intersection to make a left-hand turn.

  This time the driver did notice Frank in the mirror, but he was in the middle of the intersection. This was no place to stop; he had to continue forward. He began the turn, but before he could buzz down the window to holler, Frank leapt off the step, ran to the curb, and into the parking lot where Sam and Carmen waited in the minivan. He opened the door just as the semitrailer rolled by out on the road. Back at the bakery across the road, men were fanning out across the front of the building, some running round back, others to check the parking lot. The cop was talking to the old gal from upstairs.

  Frank du
cked in the van and slid the side door shut.

  “That was close,” Sam said.

  “We’re not out of Dodge yet,” Frank said.

  “Did you get anything?”

  “Nothing,” Frank said and sighed with frustration. He pulled the folded photographs out of his pocket. “Just some high-quality mug shots. A fragment of an address. We’ve got nothing.”

  Carmen was sitting in the front passenger’s seat. She held her hand out for photographs, and Frank let her take them.

  “What do we do?”

  That was a good question. They could wait here and hope to waylay that old secretary when she left and wring the truth out of her. But who knew when the shift ended? She was probably calling Hector right now, which meant the element of surprise, their biggest weapon, had just been blown.

  743 Lu—what was that?

  Lupine? Luna? Luke? Ludwig? Lucifer? Lucky? Lube? Lugworm?

  Yeah, they lived on Lugworm Drive.

  Or had that U been an O? Frank pinched the bridge of his nose then drew his hand down his face.

  Carmen unfolded the photographs. Looked at the first and second. When she saw the third, her eyes went wide. She looked again. “Mi madre,” she said in shock.

  “What?” Frank asked.

  “The woman.”

  “What about her?”

  Carmen held the unfolded photograph up and turned it around so they both could see. There were two faces looking back at them, Carmen’s above, the woman’s underneath in the photograph. She said, “The woman that came for my sister.”

  Just then Pinto took his phone off mute and the sound of the plane came in. “Look out your windshield, coming out of the bakery’s parking lot. Is that what I think it is?”

  Frank looked. It was a two-toned Nissan with cola glass. It stopped at the entrance to the main road. The Hispanic driver looked both ways, then made a right turn.

  “Is that it?” Sam asked.

  Frank said, “I believe that’s the dent I made in the side panel with Jesus’s head.”

  The two-toned car sped up and merged with the traffic.

  The license plate started with VAG. “Those first letters were on the car they took Tony in.”