Bayside Boom

by Alex Cage

  Toben’s eyes brightened, lips parted. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m certain.”

  Toben clapped his hands together. “Great! Finally, a break,” he said in a raised tone.

  At that, the office door flapped open and Black saw a woman entering whom he had never seen before. She walked straight to Toben, giving no regard to Black or anyone else in the office for that matter.

  “Good afternoon, Agent Toben. I haven’t seen you all morning,” she said.

  “Good morning, Director,” Toben greeted.

  “I heard the bust went smoothly last night. I want to talk to you about some—” she started, then noticed Black. She glared at him. “Who are you?”

  Black didn’t answer.

  “Excuse me, sir. I’m Barbara Hanten, the director, and I asked you a question.”

  “Oh—you talking to me?” Black mocked.

  Hanten continued to glare at him. “Who do—?” she uttered.

  Toben quickly jumped in. “Director Hanten, this is Orlando Black.”

  Hanten’s eyebrows raised, her mouth fell open, and her head jerked back. “Who?” she said in a tone of disbelief.

  “My name is Orlando Black,” Black repeated, sarcastically.

  “Oh, I know who you are,” Hanten said, taking a step toward him. “What I’m confused about is why you’re not in cuffs,” she ended, looking back at Toben.

  Black shrugged. “Because an innocent person shouldn’t be in cuffs.”

  Hanten moved her sights from Toben, placing them on Black once again. She stared at him coldly for a couple of moments. “Agent Toben. I need to go upstairs and handle something. It shouldn’t take more than ten minutes. When I get back, I want to see you in my office,” she said, taking her eyes from Black and tramping out of the office.

  Toben looked at Black, shaking his head before walking over to his desk.

  Boyar, still seated at his own desk, exhaled. “Oh boy.”

  “What?” Black shrugged.

  “Argh… unbelievable, Black,” Ashley disapproved. “Why were you acting like a jerk to her? She’s the director—you know what? Don’t answer. I forgot being a jerk is just in your nature.”

  “Look, she’s not my boss. I don’t have to answer her questions. Especially when she’s insinuating I had something to do with the bombing.”

  “Good for you, but the rest of us actually have to work for her. Keep that in mind, Black,” Ashley said, snatching her tote bag from the chair.

  Toben called over to Boyar. “You have the ID number for the tracker I gave you yesterday. Track it and keep an eye on it. I’m going to the restroom. I’ll stop back by before going to Hanten’s office.”

  Boyar nodded. “Got it.”

  Toben headed for the office door. As he opened it and went through it, he turned and spoke to Black and Ashley. “You two should get on the road.”

  Having gathered her things, Ashley moved to follow Toben out.

  “Ash,” Boyar called, standing up at his desk. “Be careful.”

  She turned around, “I’ll be okay, Victor,” she said, winking before stepping out of the office.

  Black was about to pass through the doorway before he heard Boyar’s voice sweep over his shoulders.

  “Hey, Black,” he said. “She’s your responsibility now. If anything happens to her—”

  Black looked over his shoulder. “I won’t allow anything to happen to her. You just focus on finding that kid and digging up what you can on Stokes.” Someone has a crush, Black thought, leaving the office and catching up with Ashley at the elevator. Inside, Ashley poked the button for the lobby. The elevator thumped closed and rasped downward. The silence inside the elevator was thick, nearly suffocating. Both Black and Ashley were facing the elevator door; neither spoke nor looked at one another. The elevator bumped to a stop and the doors slid apart.

  Ashley stepped out and headed straight for the parking garage. Black dropped his visitor card at the front desk before following her. He spotted her waiting for him near a column and walked across the pavement to her. On his way, he noticed a parking spot labeled Director Hanten. There was a silver Mercedes-Benz parked in it. Although it was a slightly older model, it gleamed like a brand-new car. Black paused to look the car over and something caught his eye. On the front bumper was a decal plate which featured a picture of an eagle sitting on top of a shield. The word Quantico was written next to it, and underneath a date of twenty-one years past. Black continued toward Ashley, keeping his eyes on the car.

  “Remember, Black, meet me at that address no later than an hour and a half from now,” she warned.

  Black pointed his thumb behind him to the silver Benz. “Is that Hanten’s car?” he asked.

  “It says ‘Director Hanten,’ does it not? Just don’t be late,” Ashley said before storming off, in the direction of her own car, Black guessed.

  He watched her until she disappeared. He then walked to the visitors’ parking, found his car, settled into the driver’s seat, and streamed out of the garage.

  UPSTAIRS, TOBEN RECEIVED a folder from Boyar and walked into Hanten’s office, closing the door behind him. She was waiting for him, leaning against her desk with arms folded.

  “Mind telling me what you’re thinking, Agent Toben? Your unit is already in the hot seat and you have one of the persons of interest in a high-profile case walking around freely.”

  Toben raised his palm, chest height, as he moved closer to her. “Wait, wait. It’s not like that,” he pled. “Black has nothing to do with these bombings.”

  “But he’s still a person of interest, is he not?”

  “No. Not anymore. Black’s last address of residence shows North Carolina. I had Boyar check and there’s no record of him buying a plane ticket.”

  “Okay,” Hanten said, hunching her shoulders and slightly shaking her head.

  “We know that Petrak is the only one dealing the sauce in the entire country. And you said it yourself that the sauce was used in the attack over in New York. To orchestrate an attack in New York then here, Black would have had to have flown. But I can tell you who we did find a plane ticket for,” Toben said, handing Hanten the folder. “Johana Petrak. She’s on the first picture in the folder.”

  “Petrak?” Hanten echoed, opening the folder. “Is she—”

  “Yep. Petrak’s daughter. And she worked for him, but under a different last name. It’s clear she had access to the sauce and a lot of other contraband.”

  “You’re saying Petrak and his daughter are behind it?”

  “Not necessarily. We don’t believe Petrak had anything to do with planning the bombings.”

  “So his daughter, Johana, acted alone?”

  “We believe she’s the mastermind, but she wasn’t alone. In the folder you’ll see another image of a young man in a cap and sunglasses. We believe he’s working with her.”

  Hanten shuffled the documents around in the folder, staring into it for a long moment. There was one document that seemed to hold her attention, but Toben couldn’t tell which one from where he was standing.

  “Director Hanten,” he said to get her attention.

  “Huh? Y—yeah,” she stuttered, looking up at Toben before adjusting the contents of the folder. She walked around her desk to her chair. “This other guy. Have you ID’d him?” she asked, sitting behind her desk, looking through the folder.

  “Not yet, but we’re close. All I know is he goes by the name Ty.”

  “Ty. Who gave you that name?”

  Toben was quiet for a second. “An anonymous source,” he finally said, shrugging before taking a seat at the desk.

  “Hmm. Well, please let me know when you’ve ID’d him.”

  “We’re actually in the process of tracking him as we speak. We have reason to believe there’ll be other attacks at the Fantastic theme parks with his involvement. The local authorities have already been contacted.”

  Hanten thumbed through the documents in the fold
er. Toben sat quietly watching her.

  “Is there anything else?” she asked, eyes still in the folder.

  “There is something, but I’m not sure how to tell you about it.”

  “What?” Hanten inquired, looking up with furrowed eyebrows.

  “It’s about… Agent Stokes.”

  She leaned forward. “Jake, I know you and I don’t always see eye to eye, but you have to know I’m on your side. So you can tell me anything.”

  Toben exhaled, fixing on her eyes for a few seconds. “While following a lead, we went to the home of Johana Petrak—”

  “Who’s we?”

  “Black and myself.”

  Hanten bobbed her head.

  “When we arrived, we saw Agent Stokes leaving the residence.”

  Hanten reclined in her chair, inhaling a labored breath.

  “I know it’s thin, but how much do you really know about him?”

  “Apparently not as much as I thought.”

  “Did he mention anything to you about going to the home?”

  “Why? Do you think he has something to do with this?”

  Toben nodded. “Yes. I think he has something to do with it. Not exactly sure how. Where did you guys meet?”

  Hanten leaned forward in her chair. “We met years ago. That bastard… If he has something to do with…” she sighed, shaking her head. “See if you can keep an eye on him. I want to know what angle he’s playing.”

  Toben, a bit surprised, responded, “Sure thing.”

  “Who’s privy to this information?”

  “Myself, Boyar, Chapp, you, and Black.”

  “Okay. No one else needs to know about this. I’ll hold on to this,” Hanten said, fanning the folder before dropping it into her desk drawer.

  “Of course,” Toben said. He stood and walked towards the door before thinking of another question. “Director Hanten,” he said, pivoting to face her.

  “Yes.”

  “Do the names Reeves or Guo mean anything to you?”

  “No. Should they?”

  “Probably not,” Toben said, turning around and leaving the office. He paced down the hall, removing his phone and placing a call.

  “Hi, sweetheart,” Kristi’s voice jumped on the line.

  “Hi, honey. Is everything okay?”

  “Yep. Just checked on Matt. He’s in his room doing some assignments.”

  “What about you, how are you feeling?”

  “I feel okay, just a little tired. What time are you coming home tonight?”

  “Not sure. I’m deep in this case.”

  “Jake, please be careful.”

  “I will. Hey—why don’t you and Matt take a trip to Sacramento to visit your brother and his wife? I’m going to be busy probably for the next few days and I don’t want you two home alone.”

  “That’s a good idea. I think we’ll do that. I’m sure they want to see Matt, and being around his cousins will be good for him.”

  “Yeah I think so. Just let me know when you finish packing, when you take off—”

  “I know the drill, Agent Toben. I’ll call you back in a little. Love you.”

  “Love you too, bye.”

  14.

  BLACK WAS FINISHING a meal. It was a club sandwich with sides of fruit and fries. He washed it all down with a bottle of water. The sandwich shop was furnished with five small square tables. The place was more or less a hole in the wall, but the sandwich tasted great, seasoned nearly perfectly. He disposed of his trash and used the restroom before exiting the shop.

  On the other side of the street was the building Ashley had given him the address of an hour ago. He crossed the street. The building was composed of many units, the number Ashley had given to him being the largest of them. It had two large glass windows on either side of the door and the business name Combat Krav Maga was painted above a logo of a fist with two swords crossing behind it. Black looked through the window and observed two lines with five people in each punching, grappling, kneeing, and kicking the person in front of them. He reached for the doorknob but noticed the reflection of a car stopping at the curb behind him. He turned around to see Ashley sitting at the wheel of a teal-colored Toyota Camry. In his periphery, he also noticed a green pickup truck creeping up the street in the same direction from which Ashley had come. It was one of those newer hybrid trucks, really good on gas. The truck backed into an intersecting street three blocks down, parking at the curb.

  Ashley rolled down her window and Black walked over. She was wearing blue jeans and a white long-sleeved button-up shirt, sleeves rolled up to her elbows.

  “You’re early, good. Get in. We have a six-and-a-half-hour drive,” she said by way of greeting.

  “What am I supposed to do, just leave my car here?” Black asked. He nodded towards his car parked in the small lot beside the sandwich shop.

  “Yep.”

  “You want it to get towed?”

  Ashley exhaled in annoyance. “It won’t get towed. Here, put this on your dash,” she said, poking a rectangular sheet of paper out the window.

  Black grabbed the sheet of paper and read it. The paper had a design emblem with an eagle and a shield that read Citizen Protection Administration. Next to the emblem was the number 751 and under that the word OFFICIAL, and under that, Vehicle Identification. “A parking permit?” he said.

  “Yes,” Ashley responded. “Now hurry up, Black.”

  “Okay, give me a minute,” he requested, before crossing the street back to his car. He placed the permit on his dashboard, opened the trunk, removed a small travel sack, and hiked back to the Camry, opening the front passenger door and relaxing into the seat.

  “Are you ready now?” Ashley said.

  “Yep.”

  “Are you sure?” Ashley asked again, sarcasm in her voice.

  Black rested his travel sack on the back floorboard and set his attention on Ashley. “Are you sure you weren’t tailed here?” he asked just as wryly.

  Ashley grinned. “Smart mouth…” she grumbled, throwing the car into drive.

  As they pulled onto the mildly crowded road, Black looked into his side mirror and noticed the green truck easing into a subtle pursuit. The truck continued to tail them as Ashley wheeled the car a few blocks, making a right turn, a left, and another left onto I-80 East. As I-80 East eventually became I-580 East, the highway widened to about five lanes in both directions. Ashley carefully found a middle lane, riding it as traffic raced by on both sides. Black noticed the green truck, a couple cars back, move into the same lane. Both he and Ashley were quiet. Neither said a word to one another, only exchanging looks of discontent and disapproval.

  A little over an hour into the drive, Black figured him and Ashley not talking wouldn’t be good if they ran into trouble. He looked at Ashley and exhaled. “I think Boyar likes you,” he said aloud.

  She swung her sights from the road to look at him briefly. “Excuse me?”

  “I think—”

  “Yeah, I heard what you said. Just wondering why you said it.”

  “Before we left, he seemed concerned about you. I told him, don’t worry about it.”

  “Well, I’m pretty independent—I don’t need anyone’s protection. Not his and definitely not yours, okay?”

  “Not saying you need our help. Just thinking it’s nice to have someone who’s looking out for you like that.”

  “I heard you, so let’s drop it.”

  Black shrugged and looked through the windshield at the blue sky blotted with fluffy white clouds before glancing out his window and seeing the trailer of an eighteen-wheeler droning past.

  “Plus, he’s not my type,” Ashley added in a low tone, eyes on the road.

  Black looked at her. I thought she said to drop it… She’s complicated. “Not your type, huh? What’s that? Caring, kind, considerate, single?” he replied.

  “I’m not even going there with you. Wait—what do you mean, single?”

  “I don’t know.
There’s a lot of research that suggests that single women are attracted to married men.”

  Ashley sat quiet, facing the windshield.

  “Something about social validation,” Black continued.

  “Well, I—I don’t need society’s validation, or a man. Never have.”

  “Of course you have, we all have. If not for parents, we wouldn’t have been born. A man and a woman each played a role in bringing us into this world.”

  “That’s about all a man is good for. Most don’t stick around after that.”

  “I take it your mom and dad are not together?” he said, concern in his voice.

  She looked at him before placing her sights back on the road. “How about you worry about your… multiple parents and I worry about mine.”

  Black glared at her.

  Ashley locked eyes with him. It was a brief stare, but the tension made it feel like minutes. She timidly settled her eyes back on the road. Black continued to watch her for a minute. All the while, Ashley just peeked at him from the corner of her eye.

  The car hummed up the highway for another thirty minutes, the interior silent again. Black shared his attention between his window and the windshield. Ashley was fixed on the road the entire time. She checked her mirrors repeatedly before exiting off the highway and making a left turn onto a road in a commercial area. They drove for a minute before making another right. They followed that road for a few miles, sitting quietly and watching as the commercial buildings rolled by.

  Black checked his mirror and noticed the green truck was three cars back.

  It wasn’t long before open fields started to appear. Ashley slowed down and steered left onto a country road. Farmhouses, cow pastures, worn fences, and leaning power line poles welcomed them. They continued up the narrow, winding road. The green truck kept behind at a safe distance, trying not to be seen, Black figured. After another ten minutes of driving, the scenery changed. The road was still winding, but the cow pastures and farmhouses were replaced by open, hilly, grassy fields with the sun glowing above in a nearly cloudless sky. They passed a field with a community of windmills spinning in the far distance. The views were breathtaking, majestic, and maybe even moving, because Ashley began speaking to Black again.