The next step was to find and interrogate all the drivers and passengers in the hope of finding someone who had information that could lead them to their prey. Cain had taken forty of his most trusted men and designated them as field agents. Their directive was to find and apprehend the subject by whatever means necessary. They made their approach in civilian clothes, and under a variety of guises. Over the next few days, these agents spread out across the country following up leads and interrogating the drivers.
By the fourth day, they found two eyewitnesses who saw a black semi-truck pick up a hitchhiker on the road at about the right time. Checking back with the surveillance photos, the list of suspects was filtered down to two. But at that point, their luck went south.
Of the two trucks, one was licensed to a small outfit out of Flagstaff Arizona. The driver was carrying a load of electronics across the border to Mexico City. It seemed logical that that would be the route the fugitive would take. Cain assigned half his force to finding the truck. But the driver hadn’t followed his itinerary. When the trucker didn’t arrive at his destination on time, there was a bit of panic. The agents eventually picked up the trail by backtracking and following the fuel receipts. It took them the better part of the week, but they finally found the driver. He was passed out, drunk, in a whorehouse outside of Guadalajara. After a full day of physical interrogation, the agents were convinced that the driver hadn’t picked up any hitchhikers and had no knowledge of the fugitive. And they had wasted too much time.
Meanwhile, another team worked on finding the other black truck. This one was registered to an owner-operator from Barstow. He was a freelancer, so it was difficult to determine who he was working for and where he was going. Eventually, they learned that the driver picked up a load in Brownsville and was driving it to the East Coast. They called the company he was delivering to and found they were too late. He’d dropped the load there two days before. It was assumed the driver had picked up another load in that area but finding the right place quickly would be a matter of luck. It was impossible to know where he was now. Too much time had passed.
Cain hoped to avoid attracting attention from outside, but he had no choice. Colonel Pope used his contacts in the National Security Agency to issue an all-points bulletin through the State Police network for the driver of the truck. The Indiana State Police intercepted the truck near Fort Wayne. Captain Cain personally flew out for the interrogation. The driver claimed ignorance at first, but after four hours alone with Cain in a soundproof basement room, he told them everything he knew.
Cain and his search team quickly moved out to McAllen, Texas to set up shop. But now the trail was ice cold. The subject could just as easily have gone across the border into Mexico or caught a ride and be in hiding halfway across the country. It didn’t matter. This was their only lead and they needed to work it. If he’d gone into Mexico, he was gone for good, and the chances of finding him there were slim. So the search would stay on this side of the border. If the subject stayed in the U.S., without money or identification, he had limited options. Cain had his agents check the homeless shelters, immigrant centers, and sweatshops of the town; any place that a man could hide by blending in. They showed Ramon’s picture around and offered a reward for any good information. They came up empty.
Next, Cain sent his men into the surrounding areas, the farms and ranches. At first, it looked like this too was a dead end. But then, three weeks after they started the hunt, they finally got lucky. One of Cain’s agents was in the farm country north of McAllen, when he heard a story about a very peculiar “wetback.”
The agent heard how this Mexican worker had attacked a foreman for no reason, hurting him so badly the foreman had to be hospitalized. The incident happened just a day before. The worker fled, but the other foreman and the police were actively searching for him. The story sounded worth checking out, but the next statement sealed the deal. The Mexican had blue eyes.
When he heard the news, Parker Cain smiled for the first time in weeks. Their prey was still nearby. Cain took a helicopter back to the Installation to meet with Colonel Pope. The colonel was going through some papers when Cain entered the office.
Colonel Pope looked up and gestured for Cain to sit. “Have a seat, Parker. You have good news to report?” Pope pushed aside the papers and sat expectantly awaiting the account.
“Well, sir, in a way I do…”
“In a way? Have you located our rabbit yet?”
“No, sir, not exactly. But we know he’s still in the area. Just yesterday, he ran away from a work-farm up in Duval County.” Captain Cain leaned forward in his seat.
“So you know where he was yesterday, but you do not know where he is today? Is that correct?”
“Well, sir, that is the long and short of it.”
“Then whether we know that he is still in this vicinity or not is really immaterial.” Pope shook his head with irritation. “Where we are is exactly where we were three weeks ago when this fiasco started.”
“Well, sir, I wouldn’t put it quite like that.” Cain calmly leaned back in his chair. “I think we’re a whole lot closer now. What I’d like to do, sir, we’re goin’ to need some help from our friends on the national scene… I think I know how to catch this guy.”
Pope gestured. “Go on.”
“When I go hunting, sir, sometimes you can take your prey and just track ‘em down. Just follow the signs, find ‘em, and take ‘em. Other times, the prey takes to hiding. ‘Specially if you’re tracking small game—rabbit and such. They’ll hide down in a bramble patch and you won’t have a clue where they’re at. At a time like that, what you gotta do is flush ‘em out.”
Colonel Pope nodded. “I see. And with our rabbit? This is what you are proposing?”
Cain sat back in his chair and folded his hands on his lap, quite relaxed, “That’s right, sir. We need to flush him out.”
12
Barry Resnick’s office was on the forty-seventh floor of the Sunoco building. It was a large corner office, befitting his position with the firm. There were full-length windows on two sides, and the view of the Houston skyline was spectacular. But today, Barry got no enjoyment from the view. He leaned back in his chair and stared vacantly out the window, totally engrossed in his phone call.
“Okay, Richard, we agree that there is a fiduciary responsibility on the part of my clients. The total compensation you proposed in your last correspondence is acceptable, but my clients cannot accept a lump sum distribution. We propose to pay it out over a ten-year period…”
He listened intently to the voice on the other end of the line before speaking again. “Sure, but if they take it in one payment, the taxes are going to kill them. Taking it in installments means that they’ll keep more in their pocket…”
Barry smiled as the other attorney responded. This settlement was going better than he’d expected. He tried to keep satisfaction from his voice. “Well,” he paused for effect, “I think I can convince them to accept a five-year payout. But that’s the absolute best we can do.” Barry noticed the red light on his phone glowing to show he had a call on the second line. He ignored it.
“Great, Richard, that will be quite acceptable. There’s one more thing we need to discuss…”
Barry was cut off by the intercom, it was his secretary’s voice. “Barry, I hate to disturb you…”
“Richard, can I put you on hold for a moment? … Thank you.”
Barry put the call on hold and spoke to his secretary over the intercom. “What is it, Maria?” He didn’t try to hide his irritation. She was new, but this was inexcusable. She should have known better.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, but there’s a man on the line who insists on speaking to you.”
“Who is it?”
“I don’t know. He wouldn’t give me his name; he keeps saying he has to talk with you.”
Barry sighed. “Look, Maria, I’m in the middle of a negotiation on the Lamson file. Until I’m done, I
don’t want to be bothered unless someone has died. Understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Just put him in to my voicemail. I’ll call him back as soon as I get a chance.” Barry cut off the intercom and punched the button on his phone to return to his conversation.
“Hello, Richard? I’m sorry about that. What I was saying is that I can get my clients to accept this deal, but we’re going to need to have a confidentiality agreement. No details of the settlement will be released and your clients will be banned from disclosing any of the details…” The conversation continued for several more minutes. When they were finished, the deal was substantially to Barry’s satisfaction.
“Great, Richard, I’ll work up the changes and have them couriered over for signatures. Talk with you soon.”
Barry hung up the phone and leaned back contentedly. The agreement would allow his client to settle the lawsuit at a much lower cost than they’d budgeted for, and without the negative publicity that a trial would have brought—an altogether satisfying solution. As he reached for the phone to inform his client, he saw the red voicemail light was flashing. Remembering the phone call, he went into the system to retrieve the message.
He froze as he heard the voice – a familiar voice with a slight Hispanic accent. “Barry, Como esta, amigo. I really need to talk with you, man. You’re not going to believe this. I’m still not sure that I do. I’ll get back to you soon.”
Barry realized he was shaking, his forehead damp with sweat. Could it be? The voice sounded so familiar, but it wasn’t possible. He reached down to replay the message, but in his confusion, he hit the wrong command and deleted the message. “Shit!” He hit the intercom button. “Maria?”
There was no answer. He tried again, this time nearly shouting into the intercom, “Maria!”
“Yes, Barry. I just stepped away for a second.”
“That call? Did he leave a name or a phone number?”
“The one I put in your voicemail?”
“Yes.” Barry tried not to sound frantic. “Did he leave a number?”
“No, I just put him in to your voicemail.”
“Did he say when he would call back?”
“No, he just said that he needed to speak with you. Is something wrong?”
Barry hesitated before answering, “No… no, it’s nothing.” He hit the intercom button to end the conversation.
Barry took a deep breath, slowly exhaled, and tried to regain his composure. It was just a voice on the phone. It sounded like Ramon, but that was impossible. He’d seen Ramon die with his own eyes. The body was pronounced dead and taken out for cremation. Ramon was dead. It had to be a mistake. There had to be another explanation.
The man on the message hadn’t identified himself. It sounded like Ramon, but that could have been a coincidence. Lots of people sounded similar. It could have been anyone. Or maybe it really was Ramon’s voice, but it was a tape—someone had taped an earlier message and put it on his voicemail as a form of sick joke. But that didn’t make sense either. It was more likely it was someone who just sounded like Ramon. Barry remembered a contractor who had done some work on his home and talked the same way. It was probably him.
Barry relaxed a little. He hadn’t realized how stressed he’d been. It had been ages since he’d taken any time off. The long hours were bound to take their toll. Your mind could play strange tricks when stressed. Stress, and maybe guilt. It wasn’t his fault, but Barry wondered if Ramon would still be alive if a more experienced criminal attorney had handled the case. It wasn’t logical. He took the case because no one else would, but it was a hard thing to deal with when a client died.
The phone on the desk rang again. Barry hesitated. Was it the same man calling back? What if it really was Ramon? His heart racing, he picked up the phone on the third ring. “Hello?”
He relaxed when he heard the voice on the other end of the line. It was another associate calling to ask about a project involving a mutual client. Barry cut the call short. This is ridiculous, he thought, acting like a kid afraid of the dark. The problem was he’d been working too hard. He packed his briefcase and told Maria to hold all his calls. He quickly left the office before having a chance to change his mind.
Outside the building, he felt better. The air was hot and thick—sweating weather. But it was real. In the BMW on his way home, Barry cranked the air-conditioning on high and opened the windows just to feel a connection to the outside world. That was the problem. His whole life was artificial. He always left for work early in the morning. Drove his air-conditioned car to his air-conditioned office, where he stayed late working under fluorescent lights. Long hours were expected of a partner and that was what paid for their lifestyle. But was this really how he wanted to live? His daughters hardly knew him—his relationship with his wife was mostly through phone calls. The man that called wasn’t Ramon—it couldn’t be—but it was a wakeup call. What he needed was a good vacation, some time off alone with his family. Maybe they'd go someplace real, a place with no phones or computers or fluorescent lights. A quiet place where he could rediscover what was really important.
By the time he pulled into his driveway, he was excited about the possibility of getting away. Barry pulled the car into the garage next to his wife’s van. The house was a sprawling brick Georgian on a large lot in a gated community. The homes were beautiful, but the neighborhood always seemed deserted. Lawn care workers and deliverymen were the only people ever outside. Barry entered his home through the garage, shutting the door behind him.
“Hello?” he called out. “Anybody home?”
He walked through the kitchen into the family room. The house was quiet. Some toys were scattered on the family room floor; otherwise, there were no signs that anyone had recently been there. His wife’s car was in the garage, and she hadn’t told him of any reason she’d be gone. Barry felt a tinge of apprehension in the pit of his stomach. The ground floor was empty. He glanced out the window into the back yard. No one was there.
He went upstairs to check out the bedrooms, but they too were deserted. It was probably nothing. But it was irritating that he made the effort to come home early and no one was there. Maybe they left a note? He hurried back down to the kitchen, but there was no note. Then again, why should there be? Who could have expected him to come home so early?
Barry opened the refrigerator and took out a Diet Coke. He’d resigned himself to waiting until his family came back from wherever they’d been, when he heard the noise. It sounded like talking and it was coming from the other side of the house. He walked toward the noise. Suddenly, he was nervous again. It was so quiet just a minute ago.
As he approached the source of the sound, he realized it was coming from his den. It sounded like the TV was on. The den was off limits to the kids, but they must have been inside and left the set on with the volume blaring. Barry opened the den door. He was right, it was the TV. He strode across the room to turn the set off. The return to silence was jarring.
It wasn’t until Barry turned to leave that he saw he wasn’t alone. A tall hard-angled man wearing mirrored sunglasses was sitting in Barry’s favorite chair.
And the gun in his hand was all too real.
Norma’s Café was a little diner near an industrial park just south of Houston. It was a local institution that had survived, under a series of owners, since the fifties. Norma was long gone from the picture, but no one ever bothered to replace the sign. When it first opened, Norma’s was a shiny beacon of future promise. Now the décor was the same, but the Formica had faded and the chrome long since lost its sheen. The latest owner added one modern touch, a big screen TV that sat on a shelf overlooking the counter, and was always turned on.
Ramon discovered Norma’s a week before, when he’d first come to Houston. After leaving the farm, he hitched a ride most of the way and took a bus at the end. Some of the workers back at the farm talked about places they knew where a man could find work without documentation. This area
was high on the list. There were hundreds of factories and warehouses here that hired workers off the books at less than minimum wage. Ramon found a job within hours of arriving, and he’d wandered into Norma’s soon after that. To conserve money, Ramon was eating only one meal a day. The food here was filling and cheap—a taco with a plate piled high with beans and rice cost less than two bucks. He’d stopped in every day since his arrival a week before.
Ramon ate his dinner at the counter . It was just after a shift change at the local factories and the room was full. The diner echoed with the sounds of a dozen different conversations, all competing with the TV, which was set to full volume. The set was tuned to a game show, but no one was paying attention.
The room was noisy and chaotic, yet Ramon found it comforting—it was strange. It reminded him of his time in the prison. TVs there were turned on first thing in the morning and blared out all day long. Wall-to-wall noise, just part of the background. Ramon had waited so long to be free. Now, when he finally was, he was thinking back to his jail time with nostalgia.
He glanced up at the screen. A blonde was turning letters on a board. Ramon looked away. He was free now, but for how long? The men chasing him were surely still after him. What he knew was too critical for them to take chances. Maybe they were closing in ? Ramon fought the urge to look behind him. He knew he was safe here. In this place, he was just another laborer, invisible. But he couldn’t hide out forever. He had to tell someone what happened to him. What was still going on at the Installation. It was important enough that Green had given his life trying to expose the conspiracy., Ramon had no idea what they were planning to do at the Installation, but he knew it was dead wrong. Lives were at stake.
Living Proof Page 14