Deal Gone Bad - A Thriller (Frank Morrison Thriller Series Book 1)

by Tony Wiley

  He looked at her. Clearly, he had allowed himself to drop his guard because he trusted her.

  “You’re right,” he said. “But seeing Laura like that struck something so deep …” He hesitated for a moment. She silently egged him on. He continued. “For a moment, I saw my mother. Battered. Bruised. And scared.” He shook his head. “A real throwback to the misery of it all.”

  Cowgirl was all ears. “Your father was a scumbag too?” she said.

  He made a dismissive wave of the hand. “There was no father around. He split when I was two, so I don’t really know the guy. But the boyfriends …” He shook his head again. “My mother was very young when she had me. And she was very pretty. That was her problem. That and the fact that she was a party girl. She always had a lot of guys around her, but somehow she always picked the wrong ones. Pathetic white trash she served drinks to in the shitty little bars out in the Finger Lakes where she worked. Whenever she brought them back to our trailer, there would be these senseless, drunken arguments all the time. And physical violence too, of course. I hated it but that’s how it was everywhere in that goddamn trailer park. I didn’t know any better until I was nine or ten. Hated every minute of it.”

  “You never mentioned her before,” she said.

  He shrugged. “Those are not very pleasant memories, you know.”

  “How long since you last saw her?”

  He let out a long breath. “A long time,” he said. “A very long time. Years before I was arrested. And that wasn’t fun. Booze and cigarettes. Bad food. The occasional line of coke. They all take their toll. She used to be really beautiful, but she went downhill real fast. And as time went by, her boyfriends became worse and worse. Real scum. Last time I saw her, she looked horrible. She was with this idiot who was obviously beating her. I tried to shake her up but there was nothing left inside. She just didn’t care anymore. She was wasted all the time.”

  Cowgirl nodded gravely.

  “That’s why I have no patience for this kind of thing,” he said. “I can’t do anything for Laura right now, but I swear I’m not gonna leave her alone at Mike’s mercy. No way that bastard’s gonna have his way.”

  “I’ll be happy to help you if I can,” Cowgirl said.

  He looked at her and nodded a quiet thank you. Then they went silent and settled into their waiting position.

  *

  An hour went by before Sanford gave a sign of life. She emerged from the mouth of the driveway in her patrol car, all dressed up for the day in her sheriff’s uniform and drove all the way to downtown Acton.

  Morrison made sure to tail her cautiously, keeping the unmarked white van out of her sight. At the station, he watched her cover the distance between her car and the main glass door in a few long, powerful strides. The natural vigorous athlete. Purposeful. Ready to attack her day. “There you go. Back to work. Good little soldier,” he said. “I bet you’re gonna work your ass off in there to try to pin me down.”

  “Think so?” Cowgirl said.

  “Oh, yes,” he said. “She really needs me locked up. Big time. You should’ve seen her face last night. She was so happy. I’m sure she was pissed as hell when they had to release me this morning. Couldn’t stomach it. That’s why she stayed away at her place. Otherwise, I bet she would’ve been here at the crack of dawn.”

  And work she did. Sheriff Sanford stayed in the station all morning, afternoon and early evening. During that time, Morrison came to resent his immobility. Started to wonder if he wasn’t wasting his time, holding fort like he did in that van with Cowgirl.

  “I feel like I should do more to try to nail her down,” he said, after the boredom borne by the long wait had had time to settle in. “After all, she’s actively trying to nail me down while we’re sitting around in this bloody van.”

  “No, no, we need to do this,” Cowgirl said. “Don’t forget, Harris is working on her in the background. In the meantime, somebody has to keep tabs on her. Might as well be us.”

  “You think Harris is up to the task?” he asked.

  “Don’t worry about him,” she said. “He knows what he’s doing.”

  He cracked a smile. “That’s right. You know him better than me. Way better.”

  Cowgirl gave him a sideways glance. She knew he was only ribbing her. “Get over it, Morrison. That was three years ago,” she said.

  “Hey, I didn’t mean anything …”

  At 10:30 p.m., Sanford finally left the station.

  Whatever she’d done there during the day, it had taken its toll. She looked pale and tired. Morrison sat up behind the wheel.

  Now, at this hour on a Sunday night, following her would be tricky. There weren’t a lot of cars moving around. He would have to leave her a lot of space.

  They watched her pull out of the parking lot. Wherever she was going, Sanford was not going straight home. Instead of making a right on Main Street as she would have had to do, she turned left and slowly disappeared in the distance. Morrison and Cowgirl exchanged a glance. Then when Sanford was barely visible, Morrison started the engine and went after her.

  Sanford moved at a steady pace, heading out of downtown, past the once grand houses and the shopping center, toward the outskirts of town.

  “Wonder where she’s going,” Cowgirl said.

  Sanford offered a telepathic response when she switched on her left turn signal. Morrison squinted in that direction.

  “Looks like she’s going to the arena, no?” he said.

  “I think you’re right,” she said. “There’s not much else up there.”

  He accelerated a bit to catch up with her. As he came within a hundred feet of the arena parking, he saw that Sanford had indeed nosed her patrol car in there. He killed his headlights and pulled up to the curb in a dark spot away from the streetlights.

  From their vantage point they had a great view of the arena. Besides Sanford’s patrol car, there was only one other car in the parking lot—a big Audi SUV. White or silver, he couldn’t really say.

  Sanford rode up to the Audi and parked behind it diagonally, as if she wanted to block the way.

  Morrison and Cowgirl looked at each other, puzzled.

  Then a wide arena door was kicked open and a strange, massive hunchback figure emerged in a cone of feeble light.

  Morrison squinted, not quite sure of what he was seeing.

  At that precise moment, the red and blue lights on top of the patrol car started blinking.

  As if Sheriff Sanford was going to make an arrest.

  Chapter 48

  The hunchback figure stopped and straightened up, promptly shedding its hump. A big hockey bag dropped to the ground. Now unburdened by all this weight, the man seemed to gain an inch or two.

  Red and blue blotches kept lighting up his face in a stroboscopic pulse. Morrison thought he looked familiar. The man was calm. Stared straight ahead at the patrol car. Seemed to accept his fate. As if to prove it, he spread his arms open and let go of the two goalie sticks he held in his right hand.

  Morrison expected the patrol car door to open in a swift movement with Sheriff Sanford holding a gun to the neutralized figure. Making a move for the arrest.

  But that’s not what happened.

  First thing Sanford did was to kill the red and blue lights. Then she opened her door, but in a casual way. No rush there at all. No trace of aggression. And when she emerged from the dark Charger, she was empty-handed.

  The man stood about twenty feet away from the car. It was difficult to see his face. The exterior lights were too dim. But Morrison had seen that guy before, he was pretty sure.

  Sheriff Sanford calmly walked to the man.

  When she came up to him, she extended her arms to his sides, as if she were about to search him.

  That’s when the man started to move. Up to that moment, he had remained as still as a statue. In a position that suggested he was ready to be taken into custody. But now, he leaned forward to meet her and wrapped his arms around h
er body. Then he ran his hands down her back. Over her ass. Sanford didn’t oppose him. Quite the opposite. For all Morrison could see, she was doing the same to him.

  Morrison and Cowgirl exchanged a quick, incredulous, sideways glance.

  Sanford and the man were about the same height. Both tall and fit. Both attractive. They tilted their heads and kissed, a long deep kiss. While they were locked in their passionate embrace, they rocked gently, moving into a better light.

  And that’s when Morrison got it.

  He finally understood what had happened with their money.

  Chapter 49

  Morrison knew this guy, though not as a friend. He wasn’t sure they’d ever talked to each other. But he definitely knew who that guy was. A prominent, respected member of Acton’s community. A businessman of stellar success. And a goalie in the local garage hockey league. Some of Morrison’s friends had played against him. A very decent goalie, they’d said. You didn’t beat him with a floppy shot.

  Up to that moment, that’s all Morrison thought there was to the guy. He shook his head. How wrong he had been.

  “Now look at them,” Cowgirl said. “Aren’t they two sweet little lovebirds?” She turned to Morrison and jerked her thumb at the guy. “Isn’t he supposed to be married?”

  Obviously, she also knew who he was. If you lived in Acton, you had to.

  “Yeah. He even has a kid or two with his wife, if I remember well,” he said.

  “What does that tell you?”

  “That I have to talk with Harris,” he responded. “Like immediately.”

  Cowgirl frowned. “How come?” she asked. “What does Harris have to do with him?”

  Morrison ignored her question. He was already punching Harris’s number on his prepaid.

  “How are things coming along on Sanford?” he asked when the wily old fox picked up.

  “Good. I still had a few calls to make before I wanted to speak with you, but I’ve learned a lot about her,” Harris said.

  “Let me guess. She’s got money, right? Like a big pile of her own money. Probably some family thing.”

  “That’s right, Morrison,” Harris said. “Her father owned a string of local hardware stores in Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. Sold everything to a big box chain ten years ago. She never talks about it. She wants to be her own woman, you know. The family’s now worth like a hundred million or somethin’. She’s got plenty of money, that’s for sure.”

  And she didn’t need to steal anybody’s. Certainly not their own. How wrong he had been. Morrison kept staring at Sheriff Sanford and her lover. The respected citizen. The cheating husband. He just didn’t know about him, that’s why he’d thought Sanford had used the information on his USB key to pocket the eight million dollars. But now that he saw her still locked in an embrace with him, everything made perfect sense.

  “How’d you guess that?” Harris asked.

  Morrison shrugged. “The same way I just figured out where you sourced the equipment last time.”

  “I’m not sure I’m following you.”

  Harris’s task in their failed operation had been to source the electronic equipment they’d needed to fabricate and encode fake debit cards—magnetic strips, card readers and a whole bunch of other stuff. Harris was the go-to guy for this. And as for any other portion of the operation, he was expected to deliver the goods no questions asked. Wherever he got them was nobody’s business as long as he delivered. And delivered he did. In all their dealings, Harris had always been diligent and true to his word.

  “Sheriff Sanford,” Morrison said. “She’s having an affair with your supplier.”

  “No way,” Harris said.

  “They’re right in my face. They’ve been kissing nonstop for five minutes. Must be blue in the face, the both of them.”

  “Wait a minute,” Harris said, a reckoning suddenly all over his voice. “Are you telling me that you think they might’ve been together three years ago?”

  Smart man, that Harris. “Yep, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  “You … you think he used her to get to our money?”

  “Unwittingly of course. Now, I’m sure that she didn’t know a thing about that.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Harris said. “Goddamn son of a bitch.”

  Morrison immediately began a three-way discussion with Harris and Cowgirl on how they should now deal with the situation. This discovery changed everything. They were no longer facing a rogue law officer who had snatched their money in a vicious maneuver, and from whom it could be difficult to recover some, if any, of their money. No, now they faced an altogether different beast. A sharp and astute man—that much they knew from his official pedigree—but one who was also street-smart, as they’d just discovered. And, even better, with ample means to pay them back.

  For their target now was one Steve Perkins.

  Founder and current CEO of Perkins Electronics.

  By far Acton’s most successful businessman.

  Or so it seemed.

  Chapter 50

  Sanford and Perkins talked for a few more minutes, then they hugged, kissed again and went their separate ways. Sanford to her big but lonely country house and Perkins to his loving wife and kids.

  After they allowed enough time for both of them to disappear, Morrison and Cowgirl drove back to her place. Opened a bottle of wine in the kitchen and fixed themselves a good late meal. After a long day in the van, they needed to unwind.

  Morrison was in a great mood, as was Cowgirl. They continued to discuss their case while they drank and ate. This development opened up a great window. If they played their cards well, this could lead to a very satisfying conclusion.

  Over a bowl of pasta, they dived into the minutiae of what the next move called for. Ideas rushed up in their heads. Scenarios began to take shape.

  So much so that around midnight, Morrison had a pretty clear view of what the next day would be like.

  Cowgirl drained the remainder of her glass. Her second or third, he thought. She had that lovely look. Slightly tipsy. Rosy cheeks. “OK, enough talk for tonight, Morrison,” she said. “Let’s go up to the bedroom. Right now.”

  He smiled. “You’ve had great ideas all night,” he said. “But this is probably your finest.”

  She began to undress in the stairway. He followed closely. Didn’t bother picking up her blouse and bra as they fell on the steps. She unbuttoned her jeans with one hand. Paused in the bedroom doorway for a nanosecond to shed them. Then she literally jumped into the bed, sending pillows flying all around. For his part, he still had all his clothes on.

  “What’s the matter, Morrison,” she said playfully as she dropped her panties to the floor. “You’re not into this?”

  He cracked a thin smile. Lay still as he watched her. She was stunning. Wholesome. Beautiful. Alive. He walked up and leaned over the bed. “Now, now, let me show you how wrong you are,” he said.

  *

  Monday morning. The night had been fabulous, but now Morrison was all business. As was Cowgirl. At his request, she placed an early phone call to Perkins Electronics.

  Steve Perkins was expected to be there all day, but she couldn’t get an appointment with him. His schedule was full. Couldn’t even be booked before the following week, actually.

  “What do you want me to do?” she asked with one hand over the mouthpiece.

  He shook his head. “It’s all right, let it go,” he said.

  She hung up. “What are you gonna do?”

  He smiled. “I’m gonna finish preparing for my meeting with Steve Perkins,” he said. He spread his arms. “How do I look?”

  He had put on the closest thing he had to business casual clothes.

  “You look great,” she said, “but how are you going to meet him?”

  He shrugged. “It’s all right, I’m gonna figure something out.”

  When he wanted to meet someone, Morrison always managed to. Wasn’t that hard to do. What really mattered was to me
et Perkins on his own turf. The easiest way would have been to intercept him before or after work. But the most effective way would definitely be to confront him at his workplace, out in the open. This would help to crank up the pressure that much.

  After a good breakfast, he kissed Cowgirl goodbye and jumped into his big black Navigator.

  Seconds into his drive to the Perkins compound, he had an idea. He punched Perkins Electronics’ number on his prepaid and asked for the boss’s secretary.

  “Sheriff Sanford’s office,” he said when he was transferred. “I need to speak with Mr. Perkins. This is urgent.”

  Impeccable delivery. Unshakable confidence. Bland matter-of-factness. Perkins’s secretary could not not buy it.

  “One moment,” she said in a hurried tone. “I’ll put you through.”

  Seconds later, Perkins himself was on the phone.

  “Hi, this is Frank Morrison,” he said. “We don’t know each other very well, but you know one of my associates better, Roger Harris. Three years ago he bought some equipment from you, and now it turns out that it has created some problem for us. I’d like to discuss this with you in person. At your office.”

  There was a pause at the other end. Morrison let the information sink in. Then Perkins said, “Frank Morrison, you said?”

  “That’s right. I would’ve come to you earlier but I really could not. If you know what I mean.”

  Another pause. Of course, Perkins knew who Morrison was. It was his arrest that had prompted the businessman to commit his deed.

  “I’m pretty busy right now, perhaps—” Perkins began.

  Morrison cut him off. “You’ll find the time,” he said. “Besides, if I can’t meet you at your office, I might pick another place that’s less discreet. It’s up to you.”

  “Right,” Perkins said. “Right.”