With a step down onto the center aisle, Sal picks through the assorted breakfast tray and tops off his coffee. A moment later, back into this leather seat, Sal quickly figures out how to extend the small work table . . . cleverly stowed in the sidewall. Smiling inwardly, Sal takes another big bite of the fresh breakfast taco . . . this is mighty nice, he thinks, as he takes a sip of the strong black coffee.
After the last bite of his breakfast, Sal takes a short stroll up to the flight deck. He waits and watches the crew, not wanting to interfere with their primary duty of flying the aircraft at a bit over 500 miles an hour. Sensing the proper time to speak, Sal offers up a quick, “hello.”
“Well, hello back to ya’” pops off Scotty, and “you are welcome up front,” Bill offers.
“Where are we and where is your airspeed indicator in this fancy glass cockpit? I used to fly a bit in, even logged a few hours in fighters back in the War, but this thing is a space capsule compared to the stuff Uncle Sam flew in Vietnam.”
“Right here,” replies Scotty as he points to the proper flight instrument. “We’re cruising at 35,000 feet and doing a tad over 565 MPH. We currently have a 72 knot tailwind pushing us along.”
“Wow, that’s pretty damn good for a civilian airplane,” offers Sal.
“Yes, 565 MPH will do us for now,” says Bill. What did you do in the War?”
“Well, I was a crew chief on the fighter bombers mostly. I started out on the F-100 Super Sabers back in ’66 and then finished up with the F-105 Thuderchiefs. This is a fine airplane you boys get to fly around.”
“It’ll do, but I miss my days flying freight in the old twenty series Lear Jets,” says Scotty. “They were all rocket ships, compared to this lumbering beast.”
“Compared to the old fighters and C-130s cargo planes I rode around in, in the Air Force, this is a Cadillac ten times over,” replies Sal. How about an ETA to Jackson, Mississippi, boys?” asks Sal.
Bill pushes a of couple keys on the aircraft’s Flight Management System and the small screen has his answer in a flash. Pointing with his left hand, Bill says, “Two hours and twenty-two minutes, if this tail wind holds.”
“Terrific, can I get you boys anything? There’s still plenty of breakfast left back here and I’m stuffed,” asks Sal. A quick look at each other, the crew communicate without saying a word.
“Why, yes sir, a bit of breakfast would be excellent . . . we had to leave awful early out of Dallas in order to make it to Las Vegas by 09:00 local time.”
With his left hand, Sal grabs the food tray and holds it up between the two crew members to pick and choose. After the pilots both make their selections, Sal makes his way toward the rear of the fuselage to the head to take a quick leak and wash up a bit after breakfast. A few steps later, and Sal is almost back toward his seat; he settles back into his big comfortable leather chair.
While he stares out the side window, Sal decides now is the time to go over the latest developments in the case. His gut, his sixth sense tells him that certainly something does not add up with this latest robbery scenario. These two hijackers are the very best he has ever come across in all of his years of chasing bank robbers. They certainly would not have gotten careless this late in the game . . . their game.
Old Vince is salivating over this new case, but he’s a rank amateur at chasing bank robbers. “If I had to add up all the info I have stored in my head I can only offer one logical explanation to this mess,” thinks Sal. “Copycats . . . it has to be fuckin’ copycats trying to make a score. Some Bozo the Clown jerks are trying to capitalize on the hype and blame my two boys. Seen this stunt before and sort of figured full well this should have happened some time ago.”
“Hell, if my boys get caught, every unsolved bank robbery case from Los Angeles to Boston will be blamed on my hijackers. Hell, every open robbery case in every big city detective squad will be cleared off the books by some hot shot detective along the way.” He laughs at his last thought, since he, too is guilty of playing the game, the game of clearing as many cases each month as possible. The numbers game of keeping the statistics as high as possible so the Police Chief and politicians always look good. Furthermore, the Divisions can boast of how good a job they’re doing by clearing lots and lots of cases to keep everyone safe, blah, blah, blah.
In the midst of a quick sip of coffee, Sal laughs out loud as a thought flashes through his mind. One year during the City’s budget season, some of the guys in Robbery got together and made a little in-house bet as to who would clear the most cases . . . both real and those they could pile on. As he recalled the month, he and his partner Det. CW won the bet. Their devious plan was to simply add or attach two, three, or four extra open cases to each legit case they turned in to the squad Lieutenant. If the two Detectives had a robbery with a blue get-a-way car, they would clear any case that had anything whatsoever or kind of remotely close . . . light grey, white, light brown, tan and so on. If the truth be told, the two sneaky Cops stretched the facts a little.
The scam, the con, got to be a real inside joke until the squad Lieutenant caught on and put a stop to the deal, but took the scam in jest and let the high clearance rate pass on up the chain of command, but made everyone in the Robbery Squad go back and work on all the cases for real. The real laugh came when the Robbery Division received a unit citation from the top brass for doing such a good job. The Lieutenant made all the boys in the squad swear to keep their damn mouths shut on this one or we would all be in hot water making the top brass look like fools. To this day the scam is still an inner squad secret . . . one of many.
Coming back to the present, Sal comes to his conclusions on the case. The new robbery has to be a copy-cat and two minutes after he plays the surveillance videos he’ll be sure. This trick has happened before and damn sure will happen again. In actuality, they happen more in homicides and burglaries than in armed robberies, but it can and does happen with armed robberies from time to time. With a murder, usually the police show up after the fact and start their investigation. If a city has a string of murders, then every other sicko out there may decide to get a little action. If, for example, a department might be getting a rash of serial killers slicing open hookers and dumping their bodies in a particular part of town, well, some deviant may figure he, too, can kill a whore or two and not need to worry about getting caught.
The same scenario works with burglars—professional burglars who do the high end crimes, like the ones who can get past high-tech burglar alarm systems and the like. The last one Sal can recall was a crew who were breaking into the multi-million dollar homes in the exclusive River Oaks area of town. The pros never hit while the residents were at home . . . the professional burglars were always extremely careful and on no account left a single clue behind for the B & T guys—the Burglary and Theft Detectives.
This one copy-cat crew kept making little mistakes here and there. Nothing much, nothing major, perhaps a set of pair of pliers at one house and a brand new glove at another one left by the entry point. Their screw-ups became easy to spot and the police could tell that they were amateur crooks. Hell, the stinking glove still had part of the sales bar code tag on it. Of course the tag led back to a local Home Depot store, and therefore, with the new lead, the Detectives didn’t take long to figure out someone else was trying to capitalize on the local crime spree.
Then, as Sal recalls, these idiots broke into an occupied house that was supposed to be vacant. Basically the family scheduled with the security company at all times if or when they were away on vacation, but one of their kids came home early from college and was sleeping on the couch. The amateur crooks had to beat up and bound the poor 19 year old kid in order to make their escape. By using physical force, the fools turned a basic B & E—a breaking and entering into an armed robbery with a side order of kidnapping.
The funny thing about this rash of cases was, because o
f all the heat being drawn into the area, the pros had to move on . . . and the experts, I’m telling you, were not too happy about this. The very next crack of dawn, the Senior Detective assigned to the case received an anonymous call snitching on these two bumbling crooks. The caller gave the location of the motel where these two amateurs were staying, what kind of car they were driving, and even the address of the house where the kid had been tied up.
The curious detective asked this anonymous caller why he made the decision to give up all this information. The person on the other end of the phone simply responded with, “These guys are giving us professional thieves a bad name.” He further offered up that if these two clowns had been observant, they should have noticed the extra car in the driveway. This informant even told how his crew was on a nearby stake out casing their next job when they realized these two punks were fucking everything up for the pros. Finally, the caller advised said detective that due to all the heat brought on by the amateurs, his crew were moving on to another city . . . out of the Houston area. The informant finished the call with a casual comment, “See you in about a year.”
Looking out the side window, Sal estimates they should be somewhere over Texas by now. A short stroll up to the cockpit, he asks, “Are we over Texas?”
“As a matter of fact, in the past few minute, we passed over Austin, head toward Houston next, and after that New Orleans,” replies the Captain.
“Terrific,” says Sal.
“We should be in Jackson in about an hour . . . is the cabin comfortable in back . . . not too hot or cold?” asks Bill.
“Fine, I am absolutely fine back here, thanks, boys,” replies Sal as he turns toward the coffee pot and returns to his seat.
“Impersonators, copycats, whatever you want to call them . . . must be,” thinks Sal. “Boy, I’d sure like to talk to Bob before we land . . . to get his input on the new case. Hell, I’ve got an hour . . . I’d sure like to call him.” Looking about the cabin, Sal wonders if this jet plane has a telephone in the cabin . . . it must be here somewhere.
“Uh, Captain,” he asks, “does this airplane have a way for me to make a call . . . maybe a telephone on this bird?”
“Yes, sir the phone is hidden underneath you right elbow. Just lift up the little shelf and you’ll see the phone. After that, dial zero, one, followed by the number you want to call.”
“May I use the phone?” asks Sal.
A chuckling Scotty replies with a quick smart, “Yes sir, go ahead; this is your airplane and that is your telephone.”
“Fantastic and thanks,” says Sal.
“Ok, let me check this thing out here. Ok, got it,” whispers Sal, as he talks to himself. He pushes the numbers to call the Houston office of the FBI while mouthing out jokingly, “One eight hundred call the FBI office.” The headset starts to ring, once twice, followed by three rings.
“FBI Houston Office—may I help you,” says a female voice.
“Uh, yea, Special Agent Bob Irby, please,” asks Sal.
“One moment sir, may I tell him who is calling please?”
“Tell him it’s Detective Salvatore . . . he knows me.”
“Ok, one moment, sir, may I place you on hold?” she queries.
“Yes, but tell him I’m calling on a real long distance call, please . . . and hurry.” Sal requests.
“Yes sir.” Sal hears a few clicks and the phone starts to ring Bob’s extension.
“Special Agent Irby here,” snarls out a somewhat agitated Bob.
“Bob, hey Bob, Sal here. Did you find out about the new case?” Sal asks.
“Where are you this time? This time you sound like you are ten thousand miles away,” asks Bob.
“Actually, I’m flying overhead . . . I mean literally overhead right now at 35,000 feet in a private jet headed toward Mississippi . . . did you hear about the case?”
“Yea, I heard . . . and you’re not going to like what I am got to tell you . . . it’s not your boys. I’ve already scrutinized the surveillance video here in my office. The guy is a bit too short, too old, the uniform is an old worn one, and his beard is real.”
“Fantastic, I knew the case didn’t make sense and it wasn’t them . . . it had to be a copy-cat crook,” responds Sal.
“Oh, I thought you might be upset,” says Bob.
“No, hell no, I’m not upset, but I bet old Vincent will be. He called me a few hours ago and was adamant he had a big break finally . . . and that’s why he sent for me in a private jet. I figured right off, copy-cats—as soon as I heard a hit on the same bank. My boys would never be utterly stupid or careless,” says Sal.
Bob next adds, “And they used a fake hand grenade . . . one of those paperweight things looking like an old World War Two pineapple hand grenade. Even the female teller thought it was a fake piece of plastic junk. She was so sure that she ran out and got a partial license plate and the color of the get-a-way car. I figure the local cops will have this case all wrapped up in a day or two.”
“Good, good,” says Sal.
“I agree, your hijackers are real pros and even the bus driver’s uniform this guy wore was an old shabby outfit. Your boys always wear carefully pressed uniforms and trousers. The man in this case is rather clear in the video . . . you’ll play the videotape I am sure when you land. Give me a call later if you have any other questions,” says Bob.
“Ok and thanks again, I recognized they weren’t my boys . . . talk to you later, and thanks . . . bye,” Sal responds, as he hung up the receiver. “Ha! I recognized it all along and Bob just confirmed that.”
Settling back into his chair, Sal grins as he enjoys the ride. Content now, his instincts are still firing on all cylinders, and this energy makes him smile. “As a matter of fact, the sixth sense is still working better than well, it’s fine. Hmm, how long until we land,” he asks softly out loud. In a devious little way, he wants to reel in Vince so they don’t spend a lot of wasted time and energy chasing down the wrong bad guys. He’s ready to catch the bank robbers . . . the real bank robbers, not some copy-cat jerks trying to hone in on the good thing Sal’s fly boys have going.
Figuring he has perhaps twenty minutes left, he relaxes and tries to clear his tired mind. He doesn’t want to burst Vince’s bubble; “maybe Vince has a chance already to watch the video; possibly he’s been given an update by the local authorities and has calmed down. Maybe, just maybe,” thinks Sal, at least he hopes so, as he peers out the window at the passing multiples of different cloud formations. Detective Sal is more than ready to get on the ground and to go over everything for himself.
Closing his eyes for a moment, he senses the power reduction on the engines and fells the aircraft start its descent. This is a good sign, for he recognizes they should be landing rather soon in Jackson, Mississippi. With his eyes still closed, he allows himself to enjoy the last few minutes of his private jet ride. All this has been fun, but he figures he will probably be back riding in coach tomorrow or next week. Especially if he somehow makes old Vince mad about the new case. He makes a quick mental note to take it easy and try to allow Vince to discover the true and real facts of the case by himself. “Vince would somehow conclude this new bank robbery was not pulled off by my boys,” thinks Sal as the plane touches down on the 8,500 foot long runway, one six left. The plane abruptly slows with the help of the air brakes and thrust reversers. Next, the big airplane taxies up to the general aviation ramp and glides to a gentle stop at yet another Atlantic FBO.
“We’re here, Det. Joseph,” bellows a voice from the flight deck. A second or two later the guy in the right seat has the door open and grabs Sal’s carryon bag. On the ramp is even a light blue Ford Taurus rent-a-car waiting for Sal to sign and drive, all arranged by Vince. Sal is somewhat impressed by the trip. He thanks the flight crew and signs the rental car agreement before heading off toward the
small branch bank.
Knowing the way, the short journey doesn’t take Detective Sal long to arrive at the bank. Taped across the front door is a large X of police crime scene yellow tape. Off to his right is a lone marked police car in the parking lot. Sal taps on the glass and a tall female clerk advises in a snooty voice that the bank is closed for the rest of the day.
Sal tries to advise her that he is one of the insurance investigators, but she does not budge from her position. “Sir, I told you the bank is closed, come back tomorrow.”
A bit aggravated, Sal bangs on the glass, hoping for the lone officer inside to walk over and open the door. In short order, the uniformed police officer complies. With a frown on his face, he barks out, “Hey, mister, didn’t you listen to the little lady, the bank is closed?”
“I’m from the insurance company, and I’m a detective working on the case,” says Sal as he pulls out his Police ID.
The officer, Rookie Police Officer Sammy Smith looks the identification over, points to his right and says, “Ok, well then that’s different . . . the lady standing over to my right is the area bank manager, Mrs. Jones.
“Mrs. Jones, this is a detective from the insurance company assigned to work on the case,” says the officer as he backs out of the way.
“Well, we saw the local cops, the Sheriff’s Office, and now we got an insurance investigator . . . what are they going to send me next?” she says not trying to hide her indifference to the ordeal.
“Glad to meet you too,” says Sal as he holds out his hand to shake. Mrs. Jones makes a feeble gesture, a weak, half assed extension of her right hand, but it is dreadfully evident that she is not having a good day today.
Without missing a beat, Sal asks in a commanding voice to view the surveillance video of the robbery. Mrs. Jones has assigned the local bank manager to help him out, a Ms. Watson.
“Right this way, Detective,” says Ms. Watson as they head into a small back storage office.
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