The Bubble Gum Thief

by Jeff Miller

  “Dutton stayed behind,” the Professor noted.

  “But why?” Dagny asked.

  “Another suicide,” the Professor said. “First the senator and now Dutton.”

  Victor wasn’t listening to any of them. He was sorting through his documents. “Got it!” he exclaimed, waving a piece of paper in his hand. “A property in Tracy, California. Probably only a couple of miles from the Altamont racetrack.”

  Dagny grabbed the page from Victor’s hand. “I’m off to Dulles.”

  “I’m coming, too.” Brent said.

  The Professor grabbed Dagny’s arm before she could reach the door. “Can I talk to you in private for a second?”

  He led her down the hallway to the kitchen.

  “I know what you’re going to say, Professor.”

  “You do?”

  “This is where you remind me that I shouldn’t let my emotions get in the way. That I may want to shoot him, but that’s not how we do things in the Bureau. That there is a system of justice in place and we should let it work. That Draker may have valuable information, and that we can’t get it from him if he’s dead.

  “Well, I can’t make any promises, Professor. Every second Draker breathes is another second evil lives. The man has killed children. He raped a woman. No matter what a bullet from my gun might do, any human being named Noel Draker is gone. The last thing the world needs is a trial where he sits in his suit and tie, dapper and suave, and women write to him in prison, visit him, fall in love with him, go on the talk shows and maintain that he is innocent or misunderstood, or that the world failed him before he failed the world.

  “Yes, this case is personal for me. I know that killing Noel Draker won’t bring Mike back, or undo anything else he did, but it will let me move forward. So I can’t make you any promises.”

  The Professor cocked his head and smiled. “Actually, I wasn’t going to say any of that. I was just going to give you some food.” The Professor opened a drawer and pulled out a brown paper bag. “I’m happy you’ve been eating again, and I just want to make sure you keep it up. As for killing Draker, I couldn’t care less. Go ahead and shoot the bastard.”

  CHAPTER 48

  May 1—Tracy, California

  “Ever read Kerouac?” Brent asked, sitting shotgun.

  “Kerouac?”

  “Yeah.”

  “No.”

  “Really? You’re a smart, accomplished woman.”

  “Isn’t he mostly for boys going through a hipster phase?”

  “No,” Brent huffed. “No.”

  “I didn’t realize black men read Kerouac.”

  “That’s right, Dagny. We just read Ralph Ellison and Ishmael Reed.”

  “Who is Ishmael Reed?”

  “Typical.” Brent drummed his fingers on the passenger door.

  A moment of silence, and then Dagny asked, “So what about Kerouac?”

  “Oh,” Brent said. “He wrote, ‘Tracy is a railroad town; brake-men eat surly meals in diners by the tracks. Trains howl away across the valley. The sun goes down long and red.’”

  “Word for word? You’re not paraphrasing?”

  “Word for word.”

  “You have a photographic memory?”

  “Close to it.”

  “Me, too. I don’t think it’s true anymore, though.”

  “About your memory?”

  “About Tracy.” The trains still stopped in Tracy, but it wasn’t just a railroad town anymore. Some of the town’s seventy-five thousand residents worked for Amtrak or the industrial parks and corporate farms that kept the rails bustling, but most commuted by highway to San Francisco or Sacramento and worked with their fingertips, not their backs.

  They parked ten blocks away from the house. Dagny patted her gun, grabbed her bags, and hopped out of the car. Brent followed. They trespassed through dozens of backyards toward the Draker property. Like all the homes around it, Draker’s house was a white stucco bungalow with an orange clay-tile roof. There was no car in the driveway. The lights were off and the shades were drawn. The house was at the end of a cul-de-sac, on a quarter-acre lot. Behind the property was a weathered picket fence, six feet tall. The fence hid a busy four-lane road.

  Because children’s toys littered the backyard of Draker’s neighbor on the left, Dagny and Brent decided to camp in the yard of the neighbor on the right, crouching behind a row of shrubberies. “I’ll circle the home with the scope. Wait here and watch,” Dagny said.

  “Why you?” Brent asked. “Why not me?”

  “Draker doesn’t want to kill me. You, I’m not so sure about.” Dagny crouched close to the ground and scampered over to the side wall of Draker’s house.

  The Radar Scope was invented by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and designed for urban warfare. Soldiers used it in Iraq. The Bureau hadn’t gotten in on the action yet, but Dagny had a connection. In technical terms, the scope sent out stepped-frequency radar and read changes in the Doppler signature of the returned signal. In layman’s terms, it blinked if someone was inside the house.

  Dagny pressed the scope against the wall and turned it on. Nothing blinked. She walked a few feet and tried it again. Still nothing. When she passed the back sliding glass door, she noticed that it had been painted black. She held the scope to the window. Nothing. After a few more tests around the perimeter of the house, Dagny was convinced that they had beaten Draker to Tracy. She wasn’t surprised. With the whole country looking for him, Draker wasn’t going to fly. He’d be coming from Atlanta by car.

  Dagny ran back to Brent and told him the house was clear. “What if the scope doesn’t work?” he asked.

  Dagny held it to the side wall of the neighbors’ house and pressed the button. The red light blinked. “Looks like someone’s home. Let’s ask them for their house.”

  Brent stood watch on the driveway while Dagny knocked on the front door. A short, elderly Mexican woman answered. She was wearing an apron, and her hands were covered in flour. Dagny flashed her creds. “Would you mind if I come in?”

  The woman’s elderly husband hurriedly hobbled in from the other room and fell to the floor, screaming, “We’re legal!”

  “No, no.” Dagny grabbed his arm and pulled him to his feet. “You’ve done nothing wrong. I just need to borrow your house.”

  The woman started to cry. “But I’m baking a pie.”

  After twenty minutes of explanation, the promise of a suite at a luxury hotel in downtown San Francisco (“Room service, too?” “Of course”), and assurances that Dagny would remove the pie from the oven when the timer went off, Mr. and Mrs. Fernandez threw some clothes into a suitcase and drove away. Brent jogged back to their rental car while Dagny stood watch. When Brent returned, he parked the Impala inside the Fernandezes’ garage, and they removed their bags.

  There was only one window in the Fernandezes’ house with a clear view of Draker’s, and it faced the front door. If Draker were to enter through the back of his house, they wouldn’t see him. “I can make some calls,” Brent offered. “Get a camera in the back.”

  “Word would get back to Fabee,” Dagny replied. “I’ve got another idea.” It meant making a phone call that she didn’t really want to make. Dagny pulled out her cell phone and scrolled through her history of received calls. The voice that answered was every bit as pompous and patronizing as she’d remembered.

  “Calling to apologize? Or maybe you’ve been having naughty dreams about me, and you just needed to hear my voice.”

  “Hello, J. C.”

  “Saw your picture on the news. You’re looking pretty fine.”

  “I don’t believe for a second that you watch the news. You in LA?” Dagny asked.

  “You bet.”

  “Want to drive up to Tracy and help me out?”

  “Where the hell is Tracy?”

  “A little east of San Francisco.”

  “Shit no. That’s five hours, maybe six.”

  “I think it migh
t be worth it to you.”

  “Why’s that? You going to get down on your knees and—”

  “Don’t you dare say something sexual.”

  “—beg me for forgiveness?” Adams said.

  “No.”

  “Okay, then, why would I want to drive up there?”

  “To help me catch the guy who kept framing you?”

  Eight hours later, J. C. Adams backed his Escalade into the garage. “I gave up a date with two chicks for this,” Adams said.

  “Well, I’m sorry that a mass murderer has interfered with your social life.”

  Smiling brightly, Brent sidled up to Adams and stuck out his hand. “Hey, J. C., I’m Brent Davis.” All men swooned for J. C. Adams, it seemed. Men were idiots, Dagny thought.

  “Nice to meet you, B. D.”

  The back of the Escalade was stuffed with boxes of electronics. “This is, like, ten thousand dollars’ worth of stuff. It’s more than it normally would be because of the remote battery. You said you need this stuff powered for days?”

  “That’s right.”

  “So do I just give you my receipts, or should I—”

  “Why don’t we get this stuff set up first, J. C., and then worry about reimbursement?” She wasn’t sure how any of her expenses were going to be reimbursed, and she didn’t really care.

  “Cool.”

  Adams unpacked four television monitors, set them on the kitchen table, and plugged them in. Then he and Dagny took the cameras from their boxes and sneaked through the dark to plant them around Draker’s house. Each of the cameras was no bigger than a stick of gum. Dagny fastened two up in the trees, along with external battery packs that would keep them filming for days. Adams attached one camera to the top of the neighbors’ swing set, and taped another to the fence in Draker’s backyard, burying the external battery in the ground and running a thin cable from the battery along a fence post to the camera. Brent stayed back in the Fernandezes’ house, watching the monitors. He confirmed that the cameras were working by cell phone, requesting slight adjustments to improve the camera angles and picture quality.

  “I don’t get it,” J. C. said to Dagny as they walked back to the Fernandezes’. “Why don’t you just get a warrant and go in? Check it out. Maybe wait for him from the inside.

  “He might have wired it for an intrusion,” she explained. “An alarm or motion sensor. I don’t want to risk scaring him away.” That wasn’t the real reason, but it was the only one she could give.

  Dagny saw a car’s headlights approaching. She grabbed Adams’s arm and pulled him to the ground. They stayed low until the car pulled into a garage several houses away.

  When they returned to the Fernandez home, Dagny studied each of the monitors and was impressed with the surveillance system. They had a clear view of each side of the house. Draker couldn’t enter without them seeing. “Nice job, J. C.”

  “What else do you need?”

  “That’s it.”

  “For real?”

  “For real.”

  “I don’t get to stick around and watch you catch this bastard?”

  “It could be days. And it could get ugly. Why don’t you give me your receipts?”

  Adams flashed his big white smile. “As long as you catch him, consider it a gift.” The curly-haired quarterback hopped into his Escalade and drove away.

  “Fuck,” Brent muttered. “I forgot to get his autograph.”

  “I’ll take night shift if you want to get some sleep.”

  “Forget it, Dagny. I’m taking night shift. You need to get some rest.” Dagny didn’t argue. She was tired. Brent sat at the kitchen table watching the monitors and Dagny crawled into the Fernandezes’ guest bed. She slept soundly, until someone opened the garage door.

  CHAPTER 49

  May 2—Tracy, California

  Dagny grabbed her gun from the nightstand, hopped out of bed, and peered out the bedroom door. The hallway was empty and quiet. She heard something—a car door, or a trunk—open. She edged along the wall until she came to the door to the garage. With a swift kick, she threw the door open and charged gun first.

  “Just me!” Brent shouted, throwing his hands in the air and dropping the suitcase he’d been stuffing into the back of a blue Ford Explorer, newly parked next to the rented Impala.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m...I’m...” he stammered. Before he could finish his sentence, a cold hand grabbed Dagny’s shoulder from behind.

  “Your shift.” It was a familiar Texas accent.

  When Dagny turned, Justin Fabee was standing behind her. She turned back to Brent. “You called him?”

  Brent shrugged. “We’re all on the same team, Dagny.”

  “That’s right, Dagny. We’re on the same team. Now why don’t you watch the screens while I rest up? That red-eye is a killer, even on a Bubird.”

  Brent closed the back of the Explorer and climbed into the driver’s seat. He refused to meet Dagny’s eyes as he pulled out of the garage. Dagny turned to Fabee. “Give me ten minutes to shower, and I’ll take my post.”

  “Thatta girl,” Fabee said, patting her on the back. “I know you want to get Draker just as much as I do, so this is going to work out just fine.”

  The hot water felt good. She closed her eyes and basked in the steam, thinking about the case, and mostly about Brent Davis. Why the betrayal? Maybe he’d become nervous now that they were close to catching Draker. By keeping information from Fabee, they were violating the ground rules established by the Director at the beginning of the investigation. If Fabee became director, their careers would be over. Even if Fabee never became director, they’d certainly be punished for this. Dagny didn’t care about her career, and the Professor’s career was essentially over. He’d have to use every last bit of goodwill with the president to protect Victor, leaving little for Brent. In calling Fabee, Brent was cowardly, but his actions were understandable.

  As her fingertips began to prune, Dagny had a more troubling thought. Maybe Brent had been betraying her all along. Maybe Fabee asked Brent to befriend her, to share little bits of information to build trust, and then to infiltrate their investigation. Maybe it wasn’t mere coincidence that Brent was at Percy Reynolds’s house in New Mexico, or even that diner near Bethel.

  Dagny dried off and dressed, and then headed to the kitchen and handed Fabee a Radar Scope. Fabee seemed puzzled. “It tells us if he’s inside his house. For all we know, he slipped in while you were trying to scare me in the garage.”

  “I wasn’t trying to scare you.”

  “Regardless. Take one of these and circle his house to make sure he isn’t inside. To get it to work, you press—”

  “I know how these things work,” Fabee said, storming out the back door. She enjoyed giving orders to an assistant director. If she was going to throw away her career, she might as well do it in style.

  Fabee returned a few minutes later, tossed the Radar Scope onto the kitchen counter, and pulled up a chair next to Dagny. “Davis is right, you know. We’re on the same team. No reason for you to be upset.”

  “I’m not upset,” Dagny lied.

  “He was just following orders.”

  “An order to spy on us.”

  “Considering the Professor’s background, I don’t think you have any right to complain.” Fabee paused for emphasis. “Besides, you were supposed to keep us informed of what you were doing. Director’s orders.”

  “It seemed like you had your hands full.”

  “You know what I think, Dagny? You’ve got your own agenda, and you’ve been using the Professor and Victor, and you were using Brent, too. This case is personal for you. I’d feel the same way if I were you. But our job is to catch Draker, not kill him. That’s why you want to keep a few steps ahead of me. Because you know that I’ll catch him, but you’ll kill him.”

  She hated Fabee for saying it, even though she knew it was true. “We all have our own agendas, Fabee. Even you.” There w
as a reason he had come to Tracy, California, alone. Fabee wasn’t looking to share credit with anyone. He wanted to be the one to catch Draker. So why was Dagny still there? Maybe he needed her.

  Fabee smiled, rose from his chair, and walked to the refrigerator. “It’s time for breakfast. You want eggs? Scrambled okay?”

  Dagny sighed, keeping her eyes on the monitors. “Weren’t you going to take a nap?”

  “Hey, you and me—we may be here awhile,” Fabee said. “So maybe we ought to be civil.”

  “Scrambled is fine.”

  They sat at the kitchen table, watching the camera feed. It wasn’t easy to keep scanning from monitor to monitor, surveying static pictures, watching nothing happen for hours at a time. And it wasn’t any easier sitting next to the man she’d viewed as a rival since the start of the case. She’d worked hard to try to get ahead of Fabee, and yet here they were, approaching the finish line together.

  He made quesadillas for lunch and stuffed them with a blend of cheeses, chicken, peppers, and tomatoes. The tortillas were perfectly crisp. It was a good lunch, Dagny had to admit, but not out loud, since they weren’t talking.

  Finally, Fabee broke the silence. “I liked his paintings, you know. He was very, very good.”

  “Yes. He was.”

  “He really could capture the human spirit. Most painters try to capture the human condition, or the human pathos. I hate that stuff.”

  “Me, too.”

  Fabee pulled out his wallet and removed a picture of a little girl. He handed it to Dagny. “Her name is Veronica. She’ll be three in July.” She was standing next to a rocking chair full of stuffed animals, her hand grasping one of the spokes on the back of the chair, steadying her stance. She had big cheeks and an even bigger smile.

  “She’s adorable.”

  “I saw her yesterday for the first time since this whole thing started,” Fabee said, tucking the picture back into his wallet. “The things we do...”