Vials

by Alec Peche

  The FBI needed to collect information about Schmidt Industries. The meeting broke up, and the agents agreed to gather again in 3 hours to review information. Agents were available to escort Jill across the street to the safehouse. She asked that Trixie be taken outside to take care of business. The agent returned with the dog, and Jill was moved across the street. The employee who was taking care of Trixie would collect her in a few hours.

  Jill sat on the familiar couch with her laptop, overwhelmed by a sense of déjà vu. She felt like she was starring in a bad zombie movie. Each time one of the bad guys was killed, another one popped up in his place. She really needed to get some information about Schmidt Industries. She wanted to know that once Arben was captured, the saga of this case would end. She looked at the clock and knew that it was early evening in Wisconsin. She called Marie on the off chance that she had time in the next 2 hours to assist with research.

  "Hey, Marie, how’s it going?”

  "Jill, I was just going to call you. I just caught your story on the news. Tell me that you’re being protected by law enforcement at the moment. Just when I thought that the good guys defeated the bad guys, another bad guy pops up."

  "That's funny, I was just thinking to myself that I was the star in a badly-produced zombie movie where the zombies won't stay dead. I'm in the FBI’s protection so I can't say much more than that. Do you have time to do a little research right at this moment?"

  "I have plans tonight, but your safety is more important. What do you need? I can rearrange my schedule for the evening."

  "There will be a meeting in a little over 2 hours to discuss Schmidt Industries. You are the queen of people and company online searches. We are looking for information about the structure of that organization. With the CEO dead, who manages the company now, who are the employees loyal to? We’re trying to determine if Lark's team member, Arben Frroku, will continue to make attempts on my life. Whatever you can find out about him or the company in the next hour or so would be more information than I have now."

  "Arben who? How do you spell that?"

  "Apparently you can see his picture and the spelling of his name on the Interpol site. But it is spelled F-r–r–o–k–u”

  “As soon as we hang up, I’ll rearrange my evening, and then I'll start with the Interpol site. You know, I love a challenge, and this is likely more exciting than the evening I had originally planned!”

  "After the last 3 weeks, right now, I crave a boring life." With a laugh Jill ended their conversation.

  In 10 minutes, Marie was searching a number of databases. She was amazed by the lack of information available about Schmidt Industries. She had never before seen such little information on a large company. There was nothing on social media, there were no advertisements in well-placed publications, no Wall Street business intelligence on the company.

  After another 15 minutes of fruitless searching, she called Jill. Her call immediately went to voicemail, and she then remembered that she needed to communicate with Jill by e-mail. Marie got a quick response on the lack of any information available. Jill hadn’t recovered any information either.

  In the end, they decided to stop their search and approach the problem from a different angle. Arben was a smart man. He had stayed out of police custody for over 20 years. Assuming he would know that his face was captured on camera, he would know that he needed to get out of the U.S. as soon as possible. He had to know that the commercial airports were blocked as were rental car companies and trains.

  Canada was 1,000 miles away and Mexico was 350 miles away. Jill thought that he would likely head to Mexico. She asked Marie if she had access to boat, car and private plane data. She did not have access to those databases. She told Marie to give up on the search and have a great evening. The FBI meeting was in about 30 minutes. She e-mailed Agent Ortiz with an idea.

  Agent Ortiz agreed to explore the idea. Using the DMV, FAA, and the California Boat registrations databases, the Agent identified Schmidt Industries’ vehicles registered in California. It had 5 helicopters, a jet airplane, and 3 light planes listed as belonging in San Diego. It kept them housed on an airfield close to its company building. It also had at least 30 cars and trucks in San Diego and one boat moored at the San Diego harbor.

  Arben did not have a pilot’s license according to the FAA. Of course, given that he was hiding from Interpol, it was unlikely that he had used his real name. He had not been seen piloting the helicopter. The team assembled at the FBI decided to target the boat at the marina. If he had driven south directly after dropping off Lark, he would have reached San Diego by now. An agent put a call into the Coast Guard for assistance locating the boat.

  The harbor where the boat was moored was a 15-minute boat ride from the Coast Guard station. Commander Smith of the station was eager to help and immediately dispatched a crew to check on the location. The crew verified that the boat was gone and that it had been re-fueled within the last hour, judging by the gas pump at the marina. A PIN code had to be used to access the pump so that boats could be re-fueled at any time of the day or night, and a PIN linked to Schmidt Industries had been used, according to the harbormaster, who had been woken out of a deep sleep to answer Commander Smith’s questions.

  The San Diego FBI office dispatched officers to embark on the Coast Guard cutter in a search for the boat. They could go some distance into Mexican waters but not all the way to Ensenada, which had a major harbor. They had night-vision goggles, radar, and a few other tricks up their sleeves. They hoped that this was the actual route that Arben had taken to leave the country. It was good practice to look for a boat in the dark, it kept search and rescue skills sharp. The problem was that if they failed to locate the boat, they wouldn’t know if it was because Arben had gotten too far ahead of the search or if he had not chosen that route to escape the authorities.

  Chapter 33

  It had not been Arben’s lucky day. He had started off by arguing with Lark about her continued pursuit of Jill. He had lost that argument. The day had really gone to crap when Lark took the bullet in the thigh. At first he had thought it to be a flesh wound, but then she had started fading on the helicopter. By the time they transferred to the car, she was down to single word responses to his questions. Her last request of him was that he continue her quest to kill Jill.

  Her last sentence to him had been "Kill Jill because she is the cause of the decline of Schmitt Industries and Lark Sumac.”

  A small, quiet part of him had wished that her final words had been I love you, Arben.

  Schmidt Industries had no value to him with Lark gone. He knew that he had been caught on camera and that Interpol was after him. He had no desire to die attempting to fulfill Lark’s final wish. There was no upside for him to that wish. He needed to cross the border to Mexico and disappear. Fortunately, he had a number of cash stashes across the world and multiple bank accounts. He had always known that he would have to run some day, and that day had come. He had enough money to be able to never work again. He drove south toward the border. He would be there in 5 hours.

  The other men in the helicopter had been dropped off at the Greyhound bus depot and were on their way to Los Angeles. Someone from Schmidt Industries would meet them at the depot with their final pay. The helicopter was a loss. Arben was sure that the FBI would confiscate the helicopter.

  Five hours later, he reached the San Diego harbor. It was evening and the perfect time to take a small boat south into Mexico. Schmidt Industries kept a boat at the harbor so the company could train for underwater surveillance and rescue. He knew where the spare keys were kept for vehicles, planes, and boats around the world.

  He had not been on this boat before and had to walk around the harbor to find it. He climbed on board. He checked the radar and lights to see if he could see at night. After exploring the boat for nearly an hour, he felt that he had enough lights and instrumentation to safely navigate the Pacific Ocean and make it to Mexico overnight. He started the boat
and navigated the harbor, filling up the gas tanks as he departed.

  Arben safely exited the narrow waters of the San Diego harbor. He could see the lights of the coast as he followed it south. The boat’s GPS and radar indicated the international waters of Mexico ahead, and he would be free. He was headed to the Puerto Salina Marina, which was 45 miles south of San Diego. As it was nighttime, he was not steering the boat at full speed. He estimated that he would reach the marina well before dawn. He just needed to stay awake in the unending blackness of the ocean at night.

  Just then he saw a well-lit boat approaching from the north. Over the boat’s loud speaker came “This is Lieutenant Jacobs of the United States Coast Guard. Please heave to and prepare to be boarded.”

  The announcement was repeated in Spanish. He figured he had nothing the Coast Guard wanted, as he was not smuggling people or drugs. He put the boat in neutral and waited at the railing for the Coast Guard boat to come along side.

  As the Coast Guard cutter approached he noticed the FBI windbreakers on some men and knew he was screwed. He could not outshoot all the men aboard the cutter. He didn’t know enough about boats to know if he had the engine power to outrun the cutter. The ocean was too cold, and he was too far from shore to risk trying to swim away. Since he knew so much about Schmidt Industries, he thought he might be able to work a deal out with the prosecutors.

  The Coast Guard boarded his boat, and the FBI agents approached him.

  “Arben Frroku, you are under arrest as an accessory to attempted murder of a federal agent. There are likely additional charges that will be levied against you by Interpol. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand these rights as I have read them to you? With these rights in mind, do you wish to speak with me?”

  Arben answered, “I would like an attorney and to work out a deal, and after I have spoken with the prosecutors, I will be willing to speak."

  After a pat down for weapons and suicide pills, he was silently led to the Coast Guard cutter, where he was seated inside a cabin with his hands handcuffed in front of him. A Coast Guard officer boarded his boat and was prepared to follow the cutter back to the base.

  Meanwhile a call woke Agent Ortiz up from a sound sleep. She was notified that Arben was in custody. She notified her agents and Jill in turn.

  Arben was in the custody of the San Diego office of the FBI. The FBI would charge him for his assistance to Lark Sumac at the rest stop. Given the complexities of this case, they needed to buy some time so that the various law enforcement agencies and the judicial offices of the United States could reach a common deal that would bring the greatest benefit to the various agencies, and then there was Interpol.

  Arben had not requested any deal in relation to the charges against him from Albania. It was the intent of the FBI to fully cooperate with Interpol, but if he knew anything about the political dealings of Schmitt Industries, the U.S. judicial system would be cutting him a deal. The U.S. could not deal away the international charges. He would have to face those after the U.S. legal system finished with him.

  The next day, an attorney represented him while he put forth his case. In exchange for spilling everything he knew about Schmidt Industries and Lark Sumac, he would face no charges in the United States. He would, at the end of the case, be placed in the custody of Interpol. This was an acceptable deal to the U.S. Attorney as he had not killed anyone while in this country.

  Over the next several days, Arben gave testimony as to the inner workings of Schmitt Industries. He had been Lark's lover for nearly a decade and had been privy to all kinds of information about the company's dealings. After weeks of testimony, conversations, and fact checking, the U.S. was able to take down a huge political machine filled with graft and corruption. Schmidt Industries had its tentacles into several government officials, from county-elected to a governor, in one case. Those tentacles had allowed it to gain contracts that spurred the creation of large wealth.

  Epilogue

  Jill and Trixie had returned to the Palisades Valley the morning that Arben was captured. Nathan had returned that evening from Seattle. Although he had been with his favorite client, he could complete that client’s work in his home studio. Jill made a personal decision to turn down any cases until the fall. She wanted time to recover from the disruption to her life that the Graeme St. Louis case had caused. She wanted nothing more than to concentrate on her first vintage of Moscato. Her beloved classic Thunderbird had been restored to its customary beauty after a month in the body shop. The car seemed happy with its mid-life face-lift.

  She had harvested her grapes, followed her perfect recipe, and had several large barrels ready for a mobile wine-bottling service that would arrive later in the morning. She was expecting a run of 1,000 cases. She had a marketing plan that should help her sell those 6,000 bottles. If she failed, she would never have to buy another bottle of wine again.

  She had a website that Nathan had helped her design, consistent with her label. Three wine stores in town were going to sell her wine for her. Nathan had helped her create a display for the 3 stores that she thought would draw buyers, and the store owners had been pleased as well with the displays. The rubber would hit the road tomorrow when she delivered the display and 10 cases of wine to each location.

  Life was good. Nathan was a great friend and lover. He had taken her to that martial arts demonstration just after he returned from Seattle. Jill was so impressed with all of the martial arts. At first, she didn't know which one to pick to try and master. In the end, she developed 3 criteria for the art that she would study. One, she could use it for self-defense, Two, she wanted to avoid injury while learning the art. And three, she could physically continue to practice the art into her 70s and 80s. Tai Chi was her choice. She had been taking lessons for 2 months and really appreciated the spiritual side of the martial art. She felt that she could do basic self-defense moves now, and she would study the art for years to come.

  After she made her delivery to the 3 wine stores tomorrow, she was going to go back to consulting and offering others a second opinion in the cause of death of their loved one. She hoped that people had not forgotten her work. By only concentrating on winemaking and the meditation of Tai Chi, she felt renewed and ready to take on the next case.

  She and her friends were departing on a vacation in a week to spend some of their consulting money. They were flying to Belgium to explore Jo's ancestry and drink lots of beer. She was really looking forward to the trip with her girlfriends, eating, shopping, and drinking their way across the world.

  While Schmidt Industries was primarily concentrated in the United States, the corporation had had the same behavior of political graft worldwide. Interpol, like the United States, had worked out a deal for Arben’s testimony that made life difficult for other governments. In the end, it was rather ironic that Arben needed Interpol’s protection, as he had a bounty on his head. After a miserable 2 years of testimony and investigation, a bounty hunting sniper took him out one morning. Fortunately, prosecutors worldwide had what they needed to clean up political graft.

  ###

  Author’s Bio

  Vials is Alec Peche’s first crime novel. A graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, Columbia University, and the University of Florida, this is his first attempt in the crime genre. More used to writing two page business memos and three sentence e-mails, this was a labor of love.

  A second novel, "Chocolate Diamonds”, set in Belgium, is in the process of being written and is planned to be released in 2014.

  I hope you enjoy the stories!

  Alec

 

 

 
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