by Mark Pryor
Money meant freedom. And pleasure. It meant that to everyone, of course, but to me it meant I could live more like myself, not worry so much about the people around me finding out who, or what, I was. And as question nine on the Hare PCL-R indicates, living off other people was just another part of me, one of the internal cogs that worked in synchronicity with the other elements of sociopathy. Which is to say that money wasn't just alluring, getting my hands on it was a biological imperative.
After a morning docket at the JJC, I took off my tie and drove across town to buy a disposable cell phone, what the bad guys call a “burner.” Gus didn't answer when I called, perhaps he didn't recognize the number, so I left a message for him. Deciding which number to leave gave me pause, because my regular cell phone was issued by the county. We were allowed to make personal calls—they didn't expect us to lug two phones everywhere—but using them to foment criminal conspiracies would no doubt be frowned upon.
He called my burner two hours later. “Get a new phone?”
“Borrowed one. You have plans tonight?”
“I'm guessing I do now.”
I looked at him over my grapefruit and tonic. We'd not talked about the van in the field, other than that night when we'd watched our co-conspirators drive away. Gus had said, “What the fuck are we doing?”
I'd just patted him on the back, and said, “Nothing. Yet.”
I took a sip and asked him the same question, kind of. “Why did you go out there that night?”
He shrugged. “I don't know. It seems so stupid now.”
“Daylight can do that,” I said. “I'm wondering if you really think stealing your client's car is a good idea.”
“This might surprise you, Dom, but I do. I mean, look how easy it was, a frigging twelve-year-old managed it.”
“A twelve-year-old with plenty of practice.”
“That's what the Internet is for,” he said. “You can figure out anything nowadays.”
“True. You need the money that badly?”
“Things aren't good. Seems like every kid out of law school is jumping on the immigration bandwagon, and they're using daddy's start-up money to undercut my prices. In business, or even criminal law, clients care if you're experienced, if you're actually good. In my line of work, not so much. The clients are all poor as hell, and frankly I don't do much more than fill out the paperwork for them. If they can get some recent grad to do that for half the price, why wouldn't they?”
“And if you get caught?”
“I've thought about that, yeah. But like you've said a million times, idiots get away with crime every day. We're not idiots, so…” He drank some of his beer. “Plus, he's my client. I could say I was out there looking for him. I'll have some paperwork in the car for him, something like that.”
“Sneaky.”
“And you also said that no one ever goes to prison for a first-time offense, right?”
I nodded. “Unless it's murder or something like that, true. If you just steal a car, you'd get probation for that, absolutely. But you'd also lose your law license.”
Gus waved a dismissive hand. “And not be allowed to fill in forms for the rest of my life? Poor me. Maybe I could play music full-time. How cool would that be? And I'd have a bad-boy reputation, too. That'd help with the crowds. Or just move to Costa Rica and play my guitar on the beach.”
He was good enough to play full-time, for sure, but we both knew the romance of doing so wasn't the same as the reality, though he seemed to be ignoring that fact. With no job to fall back on, with a wife to support and kids to plan for…
“And Michelle, how does she feel about all this felonious activity?”
“You think I haven't told her?”
“Yes, I do.”
Gus smiled. “I did kind of bring it up last week. No specifics, just how she'd feel about me being a secret master-criminal and showing up with wads of cash.”
“And?”
“Made her horny.”
Fucking Gus, and his perfect wife.
“Okay, Mr. Master-criminal, how would it work? Seriously, if you think it can be done, tell me the details.”
Gus chewed his lip for a moment. “We watch him. Follow him on a day he's collecting rent, see how he does it and when he leaves his car.”
“Stupid plan,” I said.
“Why?”
“Still speaking hypothetically, of course, there's no point stealing the car before he's collected any money, it only makes sense to do it at the end of the evening. So I don't see any point in following him all day and risking being seen.”
“Ah, right. Didn't think about it that way.”
“Plus, it's summer and we should probably do this in the dark, later at night.” I smiled. “Maybe you can leave the master-criminal thing to me.”
“Fine, how would you do it?”
“It'd be like preparing a case for trial, except in reverse. When I get ready for trial, I go through the police report and pick out the witnesses and evidence I can use, make a list of both. And I make a note, too, of the evidence that likely won't be admissible, and a list of flaws in the case. The trick in planning a crime, I think, would be to make sure that second list is nice and full, and that there's as little as possible on the first.”
“The perfect crime?”
“No such thing.”
“I disagree. I talked about that with Michelle, actually. She thinks the perfect crime is one where no one even knows a crime's been committed. That way, the perpetrator gets away with it, keeps the money or whatever, and never has to worry about looking over his shoulder. Makes sense to me.”
It didn't to me. I couldn't fathom doing that much work and planning, putting my neck on the line and taking potentially deadly risks, only for no one to know about any of it. My narcissistic streak, perhaps, but it would be like that tree in the woods, falling without anyone hearing. I would want my crime to make a noise, a crash, I would want people to know that it had been committed and then have to suffer the torture of not knowing who did it. But Gus was right about one thing, I certainly wouldn't want to live my life looking over my shoulder, not any more than I already did.
As I sat there nursing my drink, I had an idea how to address that particular issue. Then I tucked it away for future use and went back to the subject at hand. “Michelle's perfect crime makes me wonder,” I said, “if maybe your client might be a little hesitant to call the cops and report all that money missing.”
Gus's eyes lit up. “That's a great point. If he reports it, all of it, there's a good chance the IRS would come poking around. The immigration people too.”
“Precisely. It's possible that he's better off losing a month's takings than losing his business altogether. So maybe the perfect crime is one that the victim doesn't dare report.”
Gus painted trails in the condensation on his beer glass. He looked up at me. “You really serious about doing this?”
“I guess you can say that I'm serious about exploring it. You?”
“Seems crazy, but…yeah.”
“Cool,” I said. “Although I would have one condition.”
“What's that?”
“Our new lady friend is kept out of it.”
Gus thought for a moment, then asked, “Are you being sweet and protecting her, or…?”
“The other. I don't trust her.”
“That so?” He smirked. “I thought you wanted to—”
“We both want to do that. And I'm happy to, I just can't tell what she's up to, and I don't like that. Have you talked to her since last weekend?”
He shifted in his seat. “No.”
“But you've tried.”
“Once. I called and left a message.”
“Do me a favor and leave it alone, will you? Just for a while.”
“Sure.” Gus cleared his throat, then looked me in the eye. “Are we really going to do this?”
We were, because the elements of my true nature had already collided, a rolling
snowball of sociopathy gathering momentum. Impulsiveness picking up on my need for risk, rolling onto my lack of fear and the deceptiveness and sense of self-worth that convinced me I could get away with it. And on top of it all, I got to manipulate another human being into playing soldier under my command. Not to mention all that cold, hard cash.
“Let me plan it out, check out the end of his route. I'll take lead and let you know, okay? We're just stealing a car, not even really stealing it for long. Borrowing, like you said.”
“Right,” he said. “And I have a condition, too.”
“Oh?”
“No guns. I know how you like to carry everywhere you go, but on this, no guns.”
“Yeah, okay. No guns is fine with me. You said before that he carries, though.”
“I think so….” He snapped his fingers. “Come to think of it, he might not. He picked up a DWI a year ago, which means he has to wait another four years to get a concealed carry license. He's not allowed to carry a gun.”
“Which means he shouldn't, not that he doesn't.”
“True. But if he's trying to fly under the radar, he'd be stupid to take the risk.”
“On the other hand, he'd be stupid not to carry. He's more likely to get jacked by a civilian than by the police. Anyway, just do your thing and I'll let you know if it's feasible.”
He left me there in the bar, to go home to his wife and work on those kids. Truth be told, I didn't trust him much, either. For a decent, conscientious, loving man to commit a serious crime and jeopardize his future and his family…well, there was a lot about empaths I didn't get, and this went on the list.
I thought about going home and beginning the feasibility analysis, but I wanted to start then, that very second. I also didn't want the distraction of my new roommate, Tristan Bell.
I'd recently rented a room in a condo that Tristan owned, to save money. He was the IT guy in the main DA's office downtown and had posted a note saying he wanted a roommate. I asked around about him, and people told me he was quiet and would be easy to live with. So far that had been true, excessively true almost. The name “Tristan” reminded me of the dorky vet of the same name in the English show from when I was a kid, called All Creatures Great and Small, and this Tristan fit the mold. A modern version, he was a classic computer nerd, complete with glasses and reclusive streak. He spent almost all his time in his bedroom, and when he wasn't there he kept his bedroom locked. It seemed odd at first, paranoid even, but I figured that we didn't know each other that well and, if he had expensive gadgets or porn in there, I could see why he wouldn't risk a stranger nosing around in his room.
The best thing was that he didn't bug me, ask me questions, or want to be my friend. He left me alone the same way he liked to be left alone. I'd worried about my guitar playing, but he told me he liked the muffled strum coming from my room. “And I do have headphones,” he said, “if I don't like the song you're playing.”
So I probably could have gone home and thought about this little caper, but I wanted some immediate answers. Or if not answers, some decent lines of inquiry and maybe a list of supplies. I borrowed a pen from the waitress, reached for a paper napkin, and opened it up.
Let the planning begin.
Three weeks later, I walked into my office to find Tristan sitting at my desk, his nose in my laptop. I stood in the doorway until he noticed me, eyes blinking in surprise.
“Something wrong with my computer?”
“Doing some updates. Security stuff and new software that allows downloads straight from the APD servers to your computer. You'll be able to watch in-car videos minutes after they're shot. Assuming the officer downloads them properly.”
“You couldn't do that remotely?” I wasn't tech savvy by any means but, in the past, the folks in IT had been able to help me with problems from where they sat, taking over my computer somehow and doing what they needed to do.
“Almost done.” He typed for a second, then stood up. “Sorry, but you should be good to go. If you have any problems just let me know.”
“Thanks.”
He ducked out and nodded to Brian McNulty, who was on his way in from court. McNulty dumped his briefcase on his desk and sank into his chair with a groan. “Be thankful you don't have my judge for your dockets. He's an asshole.” McNulty suddenly leaned forward and looked both ways through the door. “And speaking of assholes, you just met a prize one.”
“Oh? Being a computer nerd makes you an asshole?”
“He's a nosy fucker, is what he is. And not above a little blackmail. Threatened to report me for using my work computer for my music.”
“You mean your illegal downloading of music.”
“I don't illegally download, I sample songs and create my own mixes. Just because I don't pluck at a guitar and croon to the ladies, doesn't mean I don't make music.”
I didn't have the energy to argue. “Whatever. You were saying Bell threatened to report you?”
“Yeah, like I said, he's nosy. I'm pretty sure he peruses our Internet history, looking for dirt to use against people. He made me write him a letter of recommendation for a job application.”
“He's leaving?”
“The county's letting a few people go in that department. I guess he might be one of them. This was only two weeks ago, so I don't really know.”
“Huh, I had no idea,” I said. “Which is weird, when you think about it.”
“Why?”
“The chap's my roommate. He's never mentioned anything about that.”
“Wait, he's your roommate?”
“That's what I said.”
“Seriously? How did that happen?”
“Long story. Anyway, he's fine, keeps to himself.”
McNulty snickered. “That's what they say about serial killers.”
He might have been right about Tristan but I doubted it, even though my roommate and I still barely spoke. Not through any animosity but because of our schedules. I was either at work, playing music, or chasing women. Even when I was at the apartment, I barely saw him. He was an odd duck, still locking himself in his room most hours of the day and subsisting on Cheerios in the morning, delivered pizza the rest of the time. Once, I brought him back a salad plate from Whole Foods. Not because I cared about his diet but because I wanted to see what he'd do. Like feeding a monkey couscous instead of bananas. And he did what I'd expect a monkey to do: eye it warily for a moment, eye me warily for another moment, then disappear into his room with it. Only difference was, Tristan grunted a thank you. He was odd enough that I'd gotten interested in him, wanted to understand him.
When McNulty turned away, I sat down and looked over my computer, noting a new icon on the desktop but nothing else to worry me. I double-clicked it, and APD's Versadex system opened on the screen, asking me for log-in information. It seemed to be exactly what Tristan had said it was. And truthfully, I didn't care whether Tristan was a nosy bastard as I hadn't been doing my private research on my work computer. I knew enough about technology to avoid that trap. Every morning at work we logged in using individual usernames and passwords, so I figured our online activity could be tracked. As a prosecutor, I probably could have explained away most of it as job-related, but I went in the opposite direction. Call it paranoia, but I'd bought a cheap laptop that I used solely for researching the theft. And once it was done, the computer would find itself at the bottom of a lake or…somewhere that wasn't my apartment. And I'd double-deleted the early searches I'd done on my work computer weeks ago.
Gus had been right, of course, the Internet was invaluable. Within days, I knew how to break into a car in seconds, using a small ball-peen hammer to punch out the lock. I also knew how to start it with just a screwdriver, jamming it into the ignition the way twelve-year-olds apparently knew how to do. As a backup plan, and in case we had time, I also knew the theory behind hot-wiring a car. Just for fun, I studied the art of lock picking, researching the theory online and ordering a pick and tension wrench.<
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Gus and I had swapped a couple of e-mails before he read that a politician cheating on his wife had devised a safer communication method: sharing an e-mail account and leaving messages in the “drafts” folder. Apparently, or so he said, if e-mails never actually got sent, they left no trail. So we both cleared our earlier e-mail exchanges as best we could, and we did that, instead. Safe for work, even, Gus said, and he knew more about those things than I did.
Toward the end of the month, I spent a couple of hours on a Thursday evening following our intended victim, Ambrosio Silva. Gus had given me a list of parks where several of his mobile homes were located, as well as his address. I figured he'd either start nearest his home and work his way out, or start farthest away and pick up his rents on the route home. I exercised my love of surveillance cameras and researched battery-powered ones, finding a nice line in camouflaged cameras.
The day before Silva made his rounds, I put one at the entrance of the park nearest his home and one at the park farthest away, testing my theory. I forced myself out of bed at dawn and spent a boring two hours in front of my computer, but eventually I spotted him at the park closest to his home. I knew he'd be there for thirty minutes at least, which gave me time to drive out there. I did what I told Gus I wouldn't: I followed Silva. I'd realized that knowing his route was vital. Not every minute, not every twist and turn, but to know basically which trailer parks he went to in rough order. So I followed him, at a distance, for two hours, making sure my supposition about his route was correct, and by the time I turned back toward central Austin, I was sure it was. The final piece of the puzzle fell into place when he turned into what I'd assumed to be his final destination at ten o'clock that evening. As I'd suspected, it was the rundown heap of a place that sat right next to the deserted field where I'd last set my eyes on a stolen Transit van. Which is precisely where I figured the getaway car would wait.