by D. L. Line
Bobby shrugged while he scanned the neighborhood. “I don’t have a clue, Terri, but I don’t like it. If the Bureau is involved, then motorcycle woman is into something bad. I don’t like seeing her around all these kids—wait. It looks like she pulled over up ahead.” He frantically looked around for a place to stop. “Shit, there’s nowhere to park.”
Terri pointed out the window to a vacant driveway on the right. “Over there, Bobby, driveway. Just pull in and pretend we’re the plumber—oh wait, she’s off the bike and walking. Just pull it over. I’ll take the sidewalk and you can hang back and follow me.”
“Terri, wait—”
Bobby never finished the sentence. Terri was out of the van, pointing to the sleeve of her black leather jacket to indicate that Bobby should turn on his wire. Her earpiece crackled to life, and he checked in.
“You with me, Terri?”
She gave him a thumbs up sign, opting to remain quiet as she followed their suspect, hanging back about half a block, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible without scaring the hell out of the residents of the neighborhood. Terri stopped at the next corner and slid in close to the bricks of the house, peeking around the building to determine the destination of her target. She watched the woman trot up the steps leading to a converted house and let herself in. Terri slipped back around the corner to stay out of sight while she checked in.
“Bobby, suspect entered a house about halfway down the block. There’s a driveway across the street. Pull in and park there. You should be able to see out the back of the truck. Let me know if I can get closer without being spotted.”
“Roger that, Terri.”
She peeked around the corner of the building one last time as Bobby turned left down the street past her and pulled right into the driveway that Terri had spotted earlier. She knew that the advanced electronics in the van included a rear-facing surveillance camera that would allow Bobby to check out the building with a minimum of crawling around inside the van. She gave him a minute to look around before she called back in.
“Bobby, talk to me.”
“Okay, you can move again. Head down the street. Suspect is on the first floor. I can see her through the window, and she’s obviously looking for something. There’s a lower entrance to the building. You can hop the fence and hang under the steps until she’s done. Hurry, go now.”
Terri did just that. She scooted quickly down the street until she reached the house, hopped the knee high wrought iron fence that protected the lower entrance of the building, landing hard in a crouch on the concrete below, and waited while Bobby continued to watch the activity inside.
“Bobby,” Terri whispered into her sleeve microphone, trying to remain as quiet as possible, while she stood to move further under the steps.
“Go ahead.”
“Check the address on the computer. See if you can find out who owns the building.”
“Doing that now. A rental company owns the building. I’m going to call them and see if we can find out who lives in the apartment.”
Terri waved, letting him know that she understood. She slid in under the steps as she heard the door to the apartment open above her, followed by the sound of boots on concrete, stopping halfway down in their descent. Terri ducked a little further into the cramped space, cringing at the noise her leather jacket made as she moved, hoping that the ambient noise of the neighborhood would provide cover for the sound. It seemed to work as Terri heard a Zippo lighter and noted the empty red Marlboro pack as its crumpled remains sailed past her to land on the concrete below the steps. She almost jumped out of her skin as her earpiece crackled to life with Bobby’s whispered warning, “Hold tight, Terri. Suspect just sat down to make a phone call.”
Since she had absolutely no choice but to do exactly that, Terri held tight and listened while the biker babe made her call.
“Hey, boss.... No, it wasn’t here. She called me on her way to class, and I think she’s there for a while, but I was hoping she’d left something behind.”
Terri shifted to hear better, wishing that she could make out the other end of the call.
“Whoa, easy there. I know what I’m doing. I just wasn’t planning on her going to class with everything.”
Terri could hear the agitation in the biker’s voice as she shot comments back to the person on the other end.
“Listen, dude. You’re paying me a lot of money and I’ll take care of your problem, but you need to back off and give me a little room to work here. I’ll get the goods, and you can pack up your shit and head back to Whatthefuckistan before the end of the week. Chill, okay?”
Terri silently mouthed “whatthefuckistan” to herself, wondering what it meant. “Okay, Kazakhstan, whatever. I really don’t care. What I do care about is getting you off my back so I can do what you pay me to do. We’re all good here, so there’s no need to get your panties in a knot. I’ll call you later.”
Terri heard the phone snap closed as the biker babe muttered a single word, “asshole,” just loud enough for Terri to hear, before she was back on her feet and heading down to the sidewalk. Terri ducked back under the steps one last time, watching as a burning cigarette butt flew past her, following the same trail as the empty Marlboro pack from a few minutes earlier. She peeked out around the steps and waved to Bobby, who answered, “Okay, the whole thing is on tape and I’ve got a name for you. Don’t answer me ’cause Ms. Slutbomb isn’t clear yet. The rental company gave me the names on the lease for the three apartments in the building, so I ran them through the database while our suspect was on the phone. I think you may be interested in one of them. The studio apartment on the first floor is rented to an AU grad student, one Denise Robertson, formerly of Staunton and Harrisonburg. I don’t believe in coincidence, Terri.”
Terri almost choked on the name, clapping her hand over her mouth as she fought not to blurt it back to Bobby. She waited until he told her she was clear and then responded.
“Holy shit, Bobby. Did you say Denise Robertson? Is there a photo with the record?” Terri struggled not to dash across the street and shake the information out of him. She shifted nervously from foot to foot while she waited for him to answer.
“Yeah, Terri, there is. Ms. Tightpants is around the corner if you want to high tail it over here and see it. You should get moving anyway if we need to take off again to follow.”
Bobby didn’t have the comment all the way out of his mouth before Terri was moving, hurrying across the street to sort the mess out. It didn’t help though as she jumped up on the driver’s side running board of the van, reaching through the open window, across Bobby to get a better look at the picture on the onboard computer monitor, immediately recognizing the driver’s license photo on the screen.
“Oh, shit, Bobby. This is not good.”
“What? I told you I didn’t believe in coincidence. How is she related to Jen besides the same hometown?”
Terri fought past her own panic to try to piece together an answer for him. “Bobby, Denise Robertson, otherwise known to her friends as Denny, is Jen’s graduate assistant.” Bobby mouthed a silent “oh, shit” as Terri continued, “Jen told me a while ago that someone approached Denny about some kind of cryptic job thing. She was concerned that it was one of those college hacking-for-cash deals, so she tried to talk Denny out of it. Well, evidently, Denny didn’t listen, and now there’s some babe on a motorcycle, working for some Kazakhstani bad guy, tossing her apartment looking for something.” Terri stopped as she registered the sound of a motorcycle starting up around the corner.
“Oh, shit, Bobby. We need to stay with her, but I have to contact Jen and keep Denny from going home. Shit!”
Bobby tried to calm her down. “Terri, get in the truck. We’ll follow her and you can call Jen and tell her—”
“No, you follow her. I’m going up to campus to talk to both of them. It’s only six blocks north of here. I can walk it in ten minutes.”
Bobby reached out of the window
of the van, grabbing Terri by the front of her jacket. “No, Terri, you can’t do that. McNally will have your head. You know we have to do this by the book.”
“Bobby, stop. Let me go,” she shot back through clenched teeth as she twisted out of his grip. “You stay with Ms. Slutbomb; follow her. You don’t need to check in with the office until we get relieved at six o’clock. It’s just now two. Don’t say anything to anybody until then. Just stay on the suspect. I’ll talk to Jen and Denny. Jen’s in class until three. I’ll text her and have her call me back and make sure she keeps Denny in the office until I can sort this mess out. I’ll call you by four, and we’ll figure out the rest of it then.”
Bobby set his jaw and responded, pointing a finger at her face for emphasis. “Agent McKinnon, as your partner and best friend, it’s my duty to tell you when you’re acting unprofessionally. And believe me, sister, unprofessional doesn’t begin to describe the crazy shit you’re talkin’ about now.”
“Bobby, please,” Terri pleaded. “We don’t know what’s up or why we’re following the babe on the bike. We’re totally in the dark and McNally seems to be okay with that. Well, I’m not. And now there’s a possibility that someone close to Jen and, for all I know, maybe even Jen herself, is in on some bizarre shit that I can’t even begin to understand. We’ve got mysterious babes on motorcycles tossing computer hacker’s apartments, making cryptic phone calls to guys from Kazakhstan, and believe me, none of that adds up to someone wanting to buy Tupperware and ship it to Asia to store their Camel Chow.” Terri fought back the tears that she felt coming on as her panic began to bubble through to the surface. “There’s something big going on here, and someone I love more than anything might be involved. I can’t sit in this fucking truck and wait. So unless you have a better idea, I’ll call you at four o’clock.”
Bobby hesitated, apparently unsure what his next move should be. The sound of a motorcycle passing their location snapped him into action.
“All right, Agent McKinnon, but if this goes south...”
“It won’t, Bobby. It’s just a side trip to find out what’s really going on. Please trust me.”
Bobby nodded, but the set of his jaw told Terri she was skating on thin ice. He threw the transmission into reverse and pulled out of the driveway. Terri began to walk north toward campus, hesitating as her earpiece crackled to life with the sound of Bobby’s voice. “Please be careful, Terri.”
She answered, talking into her sleeve. “I will. Thank you, Bobby.” And just like that, he was gone, roaring off in the opposite direction to chase after the mystery woman on the motorcycle. Terri pulled her cell phone out of her pocket, flipping it open to send a text message to Jen, walking and typing at the same time.
“Call me ASAP. Minor 911.”
Terri quickened her pace, striding purposefully toward campus, and hopefully some answers. Her first problem was solved quickly when her phone rang. She flipped it open and answered, listening as Jen launched into a barrage of questions.
“Baby, what’s wrong? Are you hurt? What’s going on?”
She slipped into the closest approximation of her soft agent demeanor as she could manage. “Jen, I’m okay. Do you know where Denny is?”
“Denny? Yeah, she’s in debugging class with me. I left her in charge so I could call you. What’s going on?”
“I’ll explain it all when I get there. I’m on my way to your office right now. Whatever you do, don’t let Denny leave before I can talk to her.”
“Terri, what the hell are you talking about?”
She stopped walking long enough to collect herself to answer. “Jen, please, just do this for me. I’ll explain it all when I get there. I’m only about ten minutes away. Go back to class and make sure that Denny comes to your office as soon as it’s over. Maybe you can get her to stay with the class right now and I can explain everything in your office before she gets there. Please, sweetie, trust me on this.”
Terri heard Jen’s frustrated huff of breath on the other end. “Okay, Agent McKinnon, whatever you say. I’ll get Denny to take care of class and I’ll meet you outside.”
“Thank you. I’ll be there in a few minutes.” Terri started to close the phone, but stopped, offering up one last thing. “I love you, you know that?”
“Yeah, baby, I do. See you soon.”
Terri kept walking, resisting the urge to run. She crossed the street, and passed the sign that welcomed her onto the main campus of American University. Once on campus, she took a moment to collect her thoughts. Part of her knew that Bobby was right. She should have stayed in the van, but the bigger part of her, the part that couldn’t deal with the fact that Jen might be in danger again or worse, somehow involved in this whatever it is, won out. Maybe she shouldn’t be back on the street again, but that didn’t matter anymore. It was too late to worry about it now. For now, she had one objective: get to the bottom of this mess with Jen and Denny and sort out her career later.
Chapter Fourteen
Terri kept her head down and her sunglasses on as she marched purposefully across campus toward Jen’s office. Her black leather jacket was quickly proving to be too warm for the early fall day, but she opted to leave it on rather than to advertise to the student body at large that she was an FBI agent, and one that was armed and wired for sound at that. She could feel the sweat start to break out between her shoulder blades, but ignored it as best she could, focusing on her goal. Passing Bender Library as she crossed the Quad, Terri spotted Jen on the front steps of McKinley Hall, pacing nervously with her cell phone in her hand.
As happy as she was to finally spot the understandably agitated Jen, Terri couldn’t help but be a little nervous, still unsure of what she was going to say beyond the obvious, “Hey, sweetie, did you know that your grad assistant is hacking databases for a Kazakhstani mystery man and his motorcycle riding babe of a henchman? Oh, and by the way, I just had a major panic attack meltdown of some kind and are you working for him too?” Despite what she’d said to Bobby earlier, she knew that Jen would be as clueless as she was, but still felt more than a little bit of concern that mistrust was the first place her thoughts had gone.
Steeling her resolve against her own discomfort, Terri spoke quietly to herself, “Again, Agent McKinnon, it really is kind of late for that now.” She watched Jen’s expression change when she spotted Terri. The worry and agitation drained away. Terri wished she could say the same. She purposely left her sunglasses on, a line of defense that she used frequently to hide behind when she was unsure of her feelings and how to present them. Jen reached for Terri and gave her a comforting hug.
“Hey, you.” Jen pulled back, but didn’t let go, in an apparent attempt to ascertain Terri’s problem and the level of her concerns. “What’s going on here?”
Terri took a deep breath to try to center herself. She resisted Jen’s attempt to pull her up the steps by the hand and into the building. “Can we just stay out here for a minute? It’s quiet and we can talk.”
“And you don’t have to take your sunglasses off, right? This must be really bad.” She grabbed Terri by the hand, this time not accepting no for an answer. “Upstairs, Agent McKinnon. You yanked me out of class for a so-called ‘minor emergency,’ so I’m entitled to some answers.”
Terri reluctantly gave in and allowed herself to be pulled into the building and up to Jen’s second floor office, passing the computer lab full of debugging students along the way. Jen ushered Terri into the office, closed the door behind her, and offered her a chair next to the desk. After removing her sunglasses and storing them safely away in the inside pocket of her jacket, Terri welcomed the opportunity to shrug out of her black leather, hanging it on the back of the chair as she adjusted the weapon holstered in the small of her back in order to sit more comfortably.
“Again, Agent McKinnon, what is going on? And why did you need to talk to Denny?”
Terri hesitated, trying to pull all the disparate pieces together in her own head. “It
’s a long story, so I’ll just cover the high points. Okay, you know that Bobby and I have been out on surveillance duty, right?”
“Well, I did figure that out, yes. I know you can’t talk about the who and why kind of details, but I know you’ve been following some bad guy around for a few days.”
“Right. That’s it. Anyway, the person we’ve been following decided to take a ride into town and make a little stop at the apartment of an AU grad student named Denise Robertson.”
The look of utter shock on Jen’s face confirmed Terri’s belief that Jen knew nothing about Denny’s activities, whatever they might be. “Wait, it gets better. I got out of the truck and followed our subject down the sidewalk. The details aren’t important, but I managed to get close enough to listen to this mystery person while she made a phone call to her boss.”
“She? You didn’t tell me—”
“Yes, she. Sorry I left that part out. Unfortunately, I don’t think this was just a social call from Denny’s biker babe friend. While I was outside, listening under the stoop, the suspect tossed Denny’s apartment looking for something. She did that before she made her phone call. She sat out on the stoop, called her boss, and made some comments about not finding what she was looking for. She figured Denny must have taken whatever she was looking for to school with her. Then she said that she’d get ‘the goods…’” Terri punctuated the last two words with air quotes, “and that he could pack up and head back to Kazakhstan by the end of the week. I remembered that you told me something about Denny and a strange job offer, so I put two and two together and wound up here.”
Jen just stared, dumbfounded. Terri had never known her to be at a loss for words. “Does this make the slightest bit of sense to you, sweetie?”
“Well, I’m not sure. I mean, I can only assume that Denny took the job, and now she’s gotten herself way in over her head. Terri, this is just weird, and I’m honestly not sure what to think. Kazakhstan? Really? I did tell her to stop by here when class was over. I didn’t tell her why, but we usually do that anyway, so that part doesn’t worry me.”