by Diane Kelly
Well, what, Tara? I tried to rewind my brain by several years and access the girl I’d been back in my college days.
“I think he’s the same guy I met in a bar a couple of weeks ago. He asked me to call him but I lost his number. I’d sure like to see him again. We really connected.” I hoped that excuse sounded plausible.
Devon simply stared at me. “What was that guy’s name?”
“Um … I don’t remember that, either.” I took a cue from him, rolling my eyes and faking a giggle. “It was a crazy night.”
Devon tugged on the waistband of the jockstrap and let it go with a snap. “I don’t remember anyone saying they hooked up with a cougar.”
A cougar! I was only in my late twenties, hardly old enough to qualify as a cougar. But given that I was dressed in work clothes, I probably looked a lot more mature than the college girls. At least that’s what I told myself. I sure as hell didn’t want to admit I was beginning to age.
“Look,” I said, my patience running thin. “Can you just tell me who’s been driving your truck?”
Another tug, another snap. “Hell, I don’t know,” he said. “I leave my keys right here.” He opened the door farther, showing me a hook on the wall just inside the door with a set of keys hanging from it. “The guys just come and borrow the truck when they need to move things or whatever.”
I was tempted to ask whether his parents knew he was lending his truck out willy-nilly, but that was a mature, adult thing to say. It would get me nowhere and would raise his suspicions that I wasn’t the love-struck bar-hopper I claimed to be.
Devon cocked his head. “What did the guy look like?”
“Brown hair,” I said. “A little bit of beard stubble.” A paltry amount, really, when compared to those crazy-eyed Kuykendahls. “Average height.”
“Brown hair? Average height?” He grunted again. “That doesn’t really narrow it down much.”
Damn. He had a point. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to identify the thief even if he was standing right in front of me. “He mentioned something about being into computers,” I said, assuming anyone who’d be able to pull off the phishing scam and use that onion router thingy Josh mentioned had to be a computer geek. “Does that help?”
“Not really.” Tug, snap! “Everybody around here’s got computers and laptops.”
Turning my head, I glanced down the hall. There appeared to be five rooms on this floor, and there were likely just as many on the third floor. I didn’t have probable cause to go into all of the rooms, yet I still didn’t know which one belonged to the driver. Walking down the hall and knocking on doors would likely get me thrown out. If any of these boys figured out I was law enforcement, they’d surely demand that Josh and I leave. With all the hazing pranks and underage drinking that went on at frat houses, these boys learned quickly how to keep cops out of their hair, demanding to see search warrants before they’d let law enforcement officers inside. It was also possible that the driver was a member of the frat, but lived elsewhere. He might have returned the truck and left the house.
I was trying to figure out where to go next with my questions, when—tug, snap!—Devon solved the problem for me.
“We’re having an open party here Friday night,” he said. “Classic toga theme. All the guys will be here. Why don’t you come back then?”
Why not, indeed?
chapter twenty-five
Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are
On the drive back to the office, I zipped into a car wash, hoping the place might sell sunglasses along with the pine-scented air fresheners and polishing cloths. With all the squinting I’d been doing all day, it was a wonder my eyeballs hadn’t popped out of their sockets. I was in luck. A display on the counter by the register offered six or seven styles, though all were in standard black or brown. The sunglasses were even on sale, two pairs for twelve bucks. I selected a black pair with large, round lenses, along with a brown rectangular pair. As many pairs as I’d gone through lately, I figured it couldn’t hurt to double up.
“Need any oil?” the male clerk asked. “Maybe some wiper fluid?”
“Nope,” I replied. “Just the sunglasses.”
He rang up my purchase, I swiped my debit card, typed in my PIN, and was on my merry way.
After Josh and I returned to the office Wednesday afternoon, Eddie stopped by my office.
“I cashed in that lottery ticket.” He held out a twenty-dollar bill and five singles. “Here’s your share.”
“Thanks, buddy.” I took the bills from him. As soon as my schedule slowed down—if it ever slowed down—I’d swing by the Brighton store and treat myself to the designer pair of sunglasses I’d earned.
As Eddie left the room, an idea popped into my mind. I hopped onto Facebook and typed up a post.
Woo-hoo! I just won $15K in the lottery! This is my chance to do some real good. Trying to decide which charity I should donate the proceeds to. I’m considering an animal sanctuary, but I’m not sure. Anyone have a suggestion?
I hit the enter button and the post popped up on my page for all the world, and especially the daisy-fresh “Laurel Brandeis,” whoever she really was, to see. I hoped Laurel would come to me with the suggestion that I donate the proceeds to the nonexistent U.S. Red Cross. If that didn’t work, I’d approach the U.S. Red Cross directly via a Facebook message. I didn’t want to go that route unless I had to, though. The more direct I was, the more likely the Facecrook was to become suspicious. It would be much better if I could lie low, subtly draw the bad guy out of his cyber hidey-hole.
I stayed late at the office that night, ordering dinner in for myself and the night watchman perched on his lonely stool in the building’s lobby. Josh had downloaded the video clip of the thief at the bank. As I ate, I watched it all the way through five times, freezing it several times to take a closer look at the young man. No matter how closely I looked, though, no distinguishing characteristics popped out. All of his features were proportional and average-sized. No scars. No birthmarks. No tattoos that I could see. Straight teeth.
Remembering Josh’s earlier point about organizations posting membership rosters online, I Googled the address of the frat house and learned that it belonged to Gamma Gamma Theta. Logging on to the fraternity’s Web site, I was able to search by school and find the SMU chapter’s roster. Sure enough, it included not only a list of the members’ names but also a color headshot of each boy.
My eyes slowly made their way down the column of photos. The first photo depicted a white guy with brown hair. He was a definite maybe. The next photo was an African-American guy. Nope. The third was another white guy with brown hair. Another maybe. White guy with blond hair. Nope. Another white guy with brown hair. Maybe.
The problem was, any guy who belonged to a frat came from a family with enough money to fix things like oversized noses or crooked teeth. You know, the things that made people unique and identifiable and even interesting. Seriously, these frat rats might as well be clones.
Nonetheless, I continued on down the list, past Devon Peabody. When I’d reached the end of the listings, I had only eight nopes and thirty-two maybes. Not a good ratio. So much for the process of elimination.
Since I’d gone as far as I could on the phishing case for now, I moved on to the Unic case. It took me until eleven P.M. to work up the numbers, but once I’d computed taxes, interest, and penalties, Rodney Fowler would owe over a hundred grand on the payments made to Jackson, Hunter, and Aly. Being in the highest tax bracket sure did suck when you got hit with an underpayment. I added another line showing the additional ninety grand that would be owed if Sharla’s salary were adjusted downward to the average for directors of art museums. I’d found the salary data online. Seriously, what did people do before the Internet?
I typed up a cover letter to go with the spreadsheet I’d drafted. In the cover letter, I noted that, per our professional art consultant with the fancy degree and Guggenheim pedigree, the Unic did not quack
like the duck it purported to be. If the Unic didn’t want to lose its tax exemption, it had ninety days in which to start quacking. In other words, it needed to buy more art pieces, rotate its exhibits, and serve as more than just a tax-exempt space in which Aly Pelham could throw parties and Sharla Fowler could plan her next vacation. Yawning, I e-mailed a copy of the letter and spreadsheet to Rodney and Sharla, then dropped another copy in the mail to each of them as per IRS policy.
I raised a hand to the security guard as I exited the building. “Good night, Gordon.”
“Stay safe, Agent Holloway!” he called, raising his hand as well. “And thanks again for dinner.”
* * *
I woke Thursday morning and did what I’d done first thing every morning since Nick had gone undercover. I checked the secret phone for a message.
Nothing.
The screen was blank.
My heart slumped inside my chest. They say sometimes that no news is good news, but such was definitely not the case here. No news was definitely bad news. At worst, it meant that Nick was dead. At best, it meant that Nick was so imbedded with the bad guys that he couldn’t find a moment of privacy to contact me. The thought that he was working so closely with El Cuchillo made my blood freeze in my veins. If El Cuchillo wanted to lick my blood off his knife, he’d have a plasma Popsicle.
I went into the bathroom and took a look at myself in the mirror. Urk. Big mistake. Whatever good the glycolic treatment had done had since been undone by stress and worry. The bags under my eyes were back, carrying their own second set of bags. The worry lines on my forehead were so deep and pronounced it looked like my eyebrows were playing a skin accordion. Poor Nick. If he came back, he’d come back to this? I decided then and there to schedule another glycolic treatment. Maybe I’d buy some of those teeth-whitening strips, too. With all the coffee I’d been drinking lately to fuel my late hours, my teeth had lost their sparkle.
After cleaning out the litter box and picking up the stray turds Henry had kicked across the bathroom floor, I took a shower, fixed my hair, and dressed for work. Downstairs, I set the coffee to brewing and fed my cats. Anne expressed her appreciation for the meal by performing figure eights around my ankles, while Henry expressed his disdain by sniffing the wet food, flicking his tail to indicate his disgust, and waltzing off.
“You’ll be back!” I called after him.
I fixed myself a bowl of Fruity Pebbles and decided to take it into the living room so I could catch up on local and world events by watching the morning news. I’d been so busy lately I hadn’t had time to glance at a newspaper or watch TV. Finagling the remote out from between two couch cushions, I clicked on the television and plopped down on the sofa.
A handsome male anchor filled the screen. “In international news this morning, the bodies of three people who disappeared in the Mexican city of Culiacán last month have been found in shallow graves twenty miles outside the city. Though the bodies were largely decomposed, medical examiners were able to determine from marks on the victims’ bones that the throats of all three had been slit. All three victims were suspected members of the Sinaloa drug cartel, which has experienced a power vacuum since the arrest of its leader in early 2014. Mexican police believe the killings were carried out by a well-known member of the cartel known as El Cuchillo.”
My cereal stuck in my throat, refusing to go down. My hands shook so violently that milk sloshed over the edge of the bowl and onto my pants, the sofa, and rug. I forced the cereal down, set the bowl on the coffee table, and put my head between my legs, trying not to hyperventilate.
If El Cuchillo had no qualms about slitting the throats of fellow members of the cartel, what would he do if he suspected Nick and Christina were undercover agents out to nail him? That Alejandro, his trusted ally, had double-crossed him? I didn’t even want to consider the possibilities.
Thankfully, before my mind could go too far down that horrific trail, a buzz sounded from the coffee table. Bzzz.
The secret phone!
I grabbed the device from the table. My heart soared when my eyes took in a text.
Hope to see you soon. XO.
What?
See me soon?
Was that Nick’s way of telling me they’d made quick progress on the case and he’d be returning shortly? Dare I hope that was the case?
Though it was only seven A.M., I immediately phoned Bonnie and gave her the news.
“‘See you soon,’” she repeated. “Do you think that means he’s coming home?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I hope so.”
To be honest, I was afraid to get my hopes too high lest they be dashed. And the last thing I wanted to do was give Bonnie false hope. If something went wrong, it would only be that much harder to take.
“These investigations can change on a dime, though,” I cautioned. “You might think you’re making progress, then bam, you hit a wall.”
“My, aren’t you a killjoy?” she snapped.
I hated to be negative, and I hated to renege on my promise to Nick that I would remain strong for his mother, but anything could happen. We should hope for the best but expect the worst. We had to be prepared for anything.
“I’m sorry,” I replied. “I’m just trying to be realistic.”
“I know, honey.” She sounded deflated now, which made me feel guilty. “I shouldn’t have snapped at you. I’m sorry about that. I just—” Her voice broke and it nearly broke my heart. “I want my boy home.”
Tears rimmed my eyes. “I want him home, too.”
Hell, I didn’t just want him home, I needed him home.
Despite my attempts to maintain my independence in our relationship, I realized then that I’d become dependent on Nick in so many ways. While my parents had once been my rocks, that role had shifted to Nick over the past few months. He was the person I counted on to be there for me no matter what crazy things were going on in my life. He provided me with an emotional release, letting me vent on him like an active volcano. While I used to take my problems to Alicia, since she’d become engaged to Daniel I’d done so less and less, instead taking those problems to Nick. On a more base level, when the stress of my job and life in general needed an outlet, Nick provided me with a physical release. The stair-stepper at the Y was a poor substitute, though it did provide a similar up-and-down motion and used many of the same muscle groups, such as my quads and glutes.
The epiphany that I needed Nick in my life made me feel vulnerable and frightened and alone and incomplete. He was no longer simply my favorite toy and a sexy accessory, he was as vital to me as one of my organs. Not a kidney, though, because apparently a person can live with only one of those. He was more like a heart or a liver, something you only have one of and will certainly perish without.
Ugh. The thought of organs led me back to El Cuchillo and the numerous victims he’d gutted. What kind of person could kill with a blade like that? I’d been forced to shoot people before, but firing a gun at a human target from a distance was much less personal than shoving a blade into another human being at point-blank range while looking them in the eye. Besides, even when I’d fired my gun previously, I was a good enough shot to know that none of the bullets would be lethal. Pulling a trigger was much easier when you knew it would only stop someone temporarily, not end their life.
I did my best to force those disturbing thoughts from my head as I bid Bonnie good-bye. As soon as we ended our call, I texted Ajay and told him I’d heard from Nick. Ajay texted me back in less than ten seconds.
Thanks. When they get back let’s do something special.
My first thought was to get tickets for opening night of the Texas Rangers baseball season. Nick and Ajay would enjoy the game and the bratwurst, while Christina and I would enjoy the frozen strawberry margaritas. But opening day was next week. I doubted they’d be back by then.
Rather than suggest the baseball game, I simply typed back Great idea.
* * *
; Though I parked in my usual spot in the federal lot, instead of heading into the Federal Building I trotted over to the Department of Justice to see if I could round up an attorney. Even if I went to the toga party Friday night, the chances of me recognizing the guy who’d dressed in the mop and flowery shirt at the bank were slim to none. After all, the photographs of the frat rats I’d reviewed online hadn’t narrowed things down any. What was I supposed to do? Make my way around the party, sidle up to the guys and say, “Hi, I’m Tara. I’m a Sagittarius. Which one of you drunks is the A-hole who ripped off a bunch of people through a phishing scam?”
Not likely.
Fortunately, Ross O’Donnell, our usual counsel, was in his office. The stack of files on his desk was high enough to rival my own, though Ross never seemed to get flustered. He was either naturally calm or hooked on quaaludes. Given that he managed to get to work every day and successfully prosecute the majority of his cases, my money was on naturally calm.
I rapped on his door frame. “You busy?”
He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got to be at the courthouse in half an hour to argue a pretrial motion, but I’ve got time for a quick chat.”
In other words, he’d appreciate it if I got right down to business.
“I need a search warrant.” I gave him a fast rundown of the phishing case and how Josh and I had tracked the pickup truck to the frat house. “The thief might live in the frat house. We just don’t know his name or which room is his.”
Ross tilted his head one direction, then the other, as if tossing ideas back and forth in his mind. “It’s going to be a hard sell. You know how Judge Trumbull is. But I’m willing to give it a shot. The worst she can do is say no, right?”
An hour later, Ross and I were standing in front of Judge Alice Trumbull, arguing why she, in her infinite judgely wisdom, should give me a search warrant for the Gamma Gamma Theta house. Judge Trumbull was a diehard liberal, a leftist who’d engaged in war protests and bra-burning back in the 1960s. Though I knew she took her duties seriously and respected her for that, I had to admit that her refusal to rubber-stamp our requests made our jobs infinitely more difficult.