Geek Mafia: Mile Zero by Rick Dakan (reading tree txt) 📖

“No, I don’t think so. She came in and out a few times while I was there, but always by herself.”

“And she checked in yesterday?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok. Did you see anyone else come in who was unusual? Or who you didn’t recognize?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Are you sure? Maybe a man? This would’ve been last night, before 9 or 10.”

“I get off at 10.”

“Right, before that then. A man, or maybe two that you didn’t recognize. He would have walked right by the front desk probably. Probably didn’t even look at you.” Chloe was just guessing here, but that’s how she would’ve done it.

“Oh, yeah, that guy! I was on the phone at the time. Yeah, I know who you’re talking about.”

“What did he look like?”

“Middle-aged. Maybe late middle-aged. Kind of a big guy. He had a beard, I know that.”

“And did he come back out?”

“Not while I was there. But I got off about half an hour later.”

“And you got a good look at him?”

“Yeah, pretty good.”

“Are there security cameras where you work.”

“No.”

Chloe thought for a moment, then asked, “Were you talking on your cell phone?”

“Yeah,” Riva admitted. “Making plans to meet up with Gary. My boyfriend.”

“Can you get the phone?”

“Why?” asked Riva, confused.

“I just want to check the exact time of the call.”

“Oh…” said Riva, suspicion creeping into her voice. “Sure, I guess…”

“Thanks,” Chloe said quickly. “I’ll wait out here.”

While Riva went to get her phone, Chloe thought things through, picturing Bee’s camera network and wondering if anything was close enough to have caught this guy on video. There was nothing within five or six blocks (they didn’t have much coverage in the more residential areas). But there might be something close by that caught him on his way here. After a minute, Riva returned with her phone. She scrolled through her call history and then showed Chloe the display, which showed a call to a local number at 9:27 p.m. last night.

“So,” said Chloe. “How long after you started your call did he come in?”

“I dunno exactly. Maybe ten or fifteen minutes?”

“And he came in through the front door?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Do you remember what he was wearing?”

“Um, sure. Nothing special. He had on a blue shirt and dark pants. Maybe black jeans?”

“A T-shirt or a button-down shirt or…?”

“A T-shirt. I don’t think it had any writing on it.”

“Ok, Riva,” said Chloe. “That’s great. Do you remember anything else about him? Tattoos or jewelry or anything like that?”

Riva thought for a moment before saying, “No, not really.”

“Not really?”

“No.”

Chloe flashed Riva a wide, reassuring smile. “Ok, Riva, thanks so much. That should do it. I’m sorry I woke you up.”

“Oh, it’s ok. I’ve gotta go to work in a couple hours anyway. Is there anything I should…?”

“No, no, you’re fine. You should be able to stay here for at least another couple weeks. Sandee will let you know for sure, and then I’ll make sure we find you another place if you need it, ok?”

“That’d be great,” said Riva with a smile, no doubt happy to have her free housing continue as long as possible.

“Ok, I gotta run,” said Chloe, shaking Riva’s hand. “Have a good one.”

“You too,” Riva said as Chloe climbed back on her Vespa.

That was something useful at last, thought Chloe. The guy with the beard sounded like a good lead. At the very least it was a place for Bee to get started with her search.

BACK at the house, Chloe found Bee scanning the living room for listening devices.

“Hey,” she said to Chloe as she walked in. “Any luck?”

“Nope,” said Chloe, even as she made a quick chopping gesture with her hand below waist level, which Bee should recognize as code for “yes.”

“Too bad,” said Bee.

“How ‘bout you?” Chloe asked.

“No luck here either,” Bee replied, her own hand making a slight, downward motion that confirmed that she had not, in fact had any luck. Either there were no bugs upstairs, or she couldn’t find them.

“Ok, well I’m going to go upstairs and lie down. I’m beat.” Chloe, who was looking right into Bee’s eyes, gave a meaningful glance upstairs and then balled her hand into a quick fist and released it just as fast. This gesture indicated that Bee should follow her as soon as was convenient.

“You look real tired,” said Bee, not acknowledging Chloe’s gesture.

“Yeah. Is Paul back? Or Sandee?”

“Neither one,” said Bee.

“Ok, I’ll be upstairs. Don’t wake me unless the world ends.”

“Gotcha.”

Bee’s bug detecting equipment was as good as it came, just like the rest of their security measures. Chloe doubted that Isaiah had actually gotten inside the house, no matter how good he was, and he probably couldn’t track their movements inside. So she figured it was a safe risk to go directly into Bee’s secure room rather than actually going to bed. Although going to bed sounded really, really tempting.

About ten minutes later, Bee came up and joined her. They said nothing until they’d sealed the room once again, ensuring their privacy as much as they could.

“What’s up?” asked Bee “What did you find?”

“I’ve got a time and a place and a description.”

“Those are all good things,” Bee said as she sat back in her chair. Most of the screens were black, having gone into power-saver mode. As soon as she touched her keyboard, three of them sprang into life, including the big screen with the city map on it. There were no longer dots for her, Paul or Sandee. They’d all agreed to turn off the trackers on their phones in case Isaiah had hacked their system. There had been no new contacts on Eddie’s RFID tag.

“Where and when?” asked Bee.

“He was outside Raquel’s guest house around 9:35 last night, give or take fifteen minutes. He’s a middle-aged guy with a beard, wearing dark pants and a blue T-shirt.”

“I don’t have any cameras there,” said Bee.

“I know,” said Chloe.

“Well, I’ve got cameras there now, but I didn’t last night.”

“I know.”

“Still nothing on those in her room and outside by the way,” Bee said as she called up an activity log for the cameras in question. The one in the room had a motion detector that only picked up the maid service, and there was nothing suspicious there.

“Ok,” said Chloe. “Do you think you…?”

“I’ll start searching right away,” said Bee. “If we had a picture of him, I could try out that facial recognition software.”

“But we don’t have a picture. Just a guy with a beard and a blue shirt. How many of those could there be?”

“Hopefully just one,” said Bee, sipping at a warm Red Bull she’d left beside her keyboard. “Or I’m going to be here a while.”

“Hopefully it’s at least one,” said Chloe. “Otherwise we’re fresh out of leads.”

One of the other screens that had been dark flashed to life, displaying an image of the outside of their house. This was part of their own security system, which was right now showing Winston and Lily standing on their front porch.

“Hey,” said Bee. “That’s your friend.”

“It sure is.”

“I didn’t know you’d told them where we lived,” said Bee.

“I didn’t.”

“Well, they sure know.”

“They do,” said Chloe, wondering if it was Isaiah or Paul who’d told Winston, or if her mentor had been spying on her as well. The doorbell rang. “I guess I better go let them in.”

She padded downstairs, glancing around out of habit to make sure there wasn’t anything lying out in the open that she didn’t want Winston and Lily to see. Of course, since Bee had just swept the place, there was nothing. She opened the door to see Winston smiling widely at her.

“Fuller brush man,” he said.

“You’re so fucking old,” Chloe joked in reply. “Does anyone even know what the hell a Fuller brush is anymore?”

“I’m not even sure I remember.”

“Hey Lily,” said Chloe.

“Hello, Chloe. Thanks for setting us up in the house. It’s great.”

“No problem.” Chloe looked past them at the midsize RV parked in the middle of the road. “Did you two bring that?” she asked.

“We did indeed,” said Winston. “We’re here on official business, I’m afraid. We’re going to take Raquel off your hands.

“In an RV?” she asked.

“It was all I could find on short notice that was big enough,” said Lily.

“It certainly is big enough,” Chloe said. “What’re you going to do with her?”

“Lay her to rest in a dignified manner where no one will ever find her,” said Winston.

“Sounds good to me. Do you need help finding a place?”

“No, we have everything well in hand, fear not.”

“If you say so,” said Chloe. “She’s your problem now. Follow me, and I’ll show you where she is.”

Chloe led them through the house to the back yard and over to the workshop. She was relieved beyond words to have the body gone from her house. She’d only seen two other dead bodies in her life, and she’d never had to hide one like this before. It was unnerving. She’d pushed her worries deep down where they couldn’t distract her from the tasks at hand, not thinking about what she would actually do with the body long-term. To have someone take that responsibility away from her lifted a tremendous weight from her shoulders, and the fact that it was Winston, someone she trusted, made it all the better.

“I just had breakfast with Paul,” said Winston.

“Oh?” said Chloe. “He give you and Isaiah the updates on everything that’s happened since we last met?”

Winston chuckled as he said, “Not everything, I’m sure, but he gave us the highlights. We’re leaning toward either Eddie or an associate crew of his as the most likely suspects.”

“We?” asked Chloe.

“The three of us agreed with Paul’s analysis.”

“It was Paul’s analysis?”

“Yes,” said Winston. “He’s developed a rather intriguing theory of the crime. Isaiah of course gave away nothing as to his true thoughts, but he agreed that it was a good starting place.”

“Paul’s a smart guy,” said Chloe. Sometimes she forgot that about him. Well, she never forgot that he was smart. He was, in fact, brilliant. But his strengths were in imagining crazy schemes and coming up with outlandish yet ultimately workable ideas. Like the party for example. But she often forgot about the flip side of his gift, that Paul also had developed a keen eye for unraveling other people’s crazy schemes. Of course he hadn’t bothered to share his theories about Eddie with her yet. She’d have to question him on that whenever he got home. She wondered where he was now. Why hadn’t he come back with Winston? She almost asked her old friend but decided against it. She didn’t want to let outsiders - even friendly outsiders - know that she wasn’t totally aware of everything her Crew was doing at any given moment.

Chloe unlocked the workshop, disabled the alarm and turned on the light. “She’s in there,” she said, pointing to the large freezer against the wall. Right next to the large portable generator that had seen a lot of use last hurricane season. “How do you want to get her out of there?”

“Do you think she’s frozen?” asked Lily.

“I don’t know. It’s been a few hours.”

“We’ve got an oriental rug, a steamer trunk and an oversized suitcase in the RV,” said Lily. “Whichever one works best, I suppose.”

“Ok,” said Chloe. “Let’s get it done.”

They ended up using the rug, which offered the least cover but was the most flexible.