Dangerous Friends (A Carlos McCrary novel Book 4) Read online

  “At North Beach. There’s a big off-street parking lot there where nobody could see me.”

  “I know the place. I used to have a girlfriend that liked to go to North Beach.”

  She smiled. “That’s the topless beach.”

  I ignored the remark. “Was your phone turned on the whole time you were in the boat and waiting for the train?”

  “No. Katherine told us to take the batteries out of our phones before we got out of our cars.” She put a hand in front of her mouth. “Oh my God. She knew that the police could trace the phones after the explosion, didn’t she? I’ve seen them do it on TV cop shows.”

  “Yes, they can.”

  Her face fell. “That’s proof she intended to set off a bomb isn’t it?”

  “Yes. There’s one other thing you need to think about. You’re in danger.” This would be a tough subject to broach.

  “I know that. That’s why I called you.”

  “I don’t mean from the cops or the FBI or even Homeland Security. You’re in danger from someone else.”

  “Who?”

  “Katherine, Steven, and James knew about the bomb. You didn’t.”

  “That’s what I want you to tell the cops.”

  I put a hand on her forearm. “Let me finish. You’re the only one who can identify them.”

  Michelle’s eyes got wide.

  “They committed two murders,” I said.

  “Two? The radio said the train’s engineer.”

  I shook my head. “There’s a second person in the engine. Safety precaution. They killed two people. You’re the only witness.”

  “Omigod. What am I gonna do?”

  “You have go into hiding until I handle this situation.”

  “Should I unfriend them?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “On Facebook. Should I unfriend them on Facebook?”

  She was serious. I thought about it a moment. “No. Unfriending them would look suspicious if the feds check your Facebook page—and they will. It would look like you knew they were involved and wanted to distance yourself from them. But, since you mention it, stay off Facebook and all other social media until I give you the all clear. No posting and no logging in.”

  “What about school?” she asked. “Spring Break is over next weekend.”

  “It can’t be helped. You have to keep your head down for a while.”

  “But I have mid-term exams coming up.”

  “Michelle, listen to me. This is not UAC; this is the real world. The world I live and work in. A world where good people are killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is not a news story on the local television. This is real life and death—your life and death. Forget about getting an education right now; I’m trying to keep you alive. These are not peaceful protesters you’ve gotten involved with; they’re stone cold killers.”

  “Omigod.” She stared into the distance, but I think she was looking at a picture in her own mind.

  I gave her a moment for that to sink in. “Now tell me: When did you turn your phone back on?”

  Michelle shook her head as if waking from a bad dream. “When I got in my car near McKinley Park, I tried to call you and I realized my phone was off. That’s when I put the battery back in. Then I decided to get away from there. I started driving and wound up at North Beach.”

  “Hand me your phone.”

  She pushed it across the table.

  I popped off the back and removed the battery and SIM card. I jiggled the pieces in my hand while I thought.

  “Will that stop them from tracing it?”

  “It will from now on, yeah. With the battery out, it’s off the grid.” I stuck the phone and its parts in my coat pocket. “But the phone company keeps records for every second you ever had it turned on. The cops can access them, and they will find out that you were near McKinley Park before the explosion and after the explosion. But that’s a mile from the bridge. You might slip under their radar.”

  “And they’ll know the same thing about the other three won’t they? They’re bound to know I was with them.”

  I shrugged. “Can’t do anything about the other three. Maybe I can figure out a way to keep them separated from you with the cops, maybe not. Sometimes you get lucky.”

  Veraleesa showed up with two pieces of pecan pie a la mode. “Chuck, can I give you the bill? I get off at seven.”

  “Sure, and thanks.” I handed her a credit card and she left.

  “What are you gonna do with my phone?”

  “You don’t want to know.” The truth was that I didn’t know what to do with it. But I didn’t want the cops to find it on Michelle. For now, all I could do was make it invisible to the cell network. Of course it had been on until a minute ago and it was right next to my phone. Odds were that I’d hear from the feds in due course. So would Michelle.

  Veraleesa brought my bill and credit card. “Thanks, Veraleesa. See you again soon.”

  She patted Michelle’s shoulder. “Honey, I don’t know what you and Chuck are talking about, and I don’t need to know. But I can read you like a large-print book from clean across the room. I’d bet my next paycheck that you’re in big trouble.” She held up a hand. “Like I say, I don’t need to know. Believe me, you have the right guy in your corner.” She patted me on the shoulder and walked away.

  Chapter 12

  I had Michelle stop in the parking lot of an all-night discount store on the way home. I told her to wait in her car while I went inside. I bought her a new burner cellphone. Paid cash, of course, although the store had security cameras.

  The sun had risen when I pulled to the curb at John and Penny Babcock’s house. Michelle turned into the wide driveway and parked on one side.

  John Babcock opened the door as we approached. He was dressed for the office in a pin-striped suit, cotton dress shirt, and striped tie. “Good morning, baby. Good morning, Chuck. Come on in.” He hugged Michelle and kissed the top of her head.

  Penny was pouring coffee into China cups as we entered the dining room. She was dressed like the schoolteacher she was. She had set four place settings with Danish pastry, sterling silver utensils, and linen napkins, as if she expected important company. I could tell she’d been crying. She squeezed Michelle tight but didn’t say a word.

  John gestured me to a chair. When we were seated, he cleared his throat. “You said on the phone that Mickie was in serious trouble.” He glanced at Michelle, then back at me. “What kind of trouble?”

  “Have you seen the news on TV this morning?” The explosion had happened too late to be in the morning newspapers.

  “We don’t turn on TV in the morning.”

  “This morning you should.” I glanced around the dining room—no television, of course. I remembered where I had seen one the previous day. “Let’s move this meeting to the breakfast table and turn on the local news.”

  I found the remote on the kitchen counter and flicked on the TV.

  A female announcer sat at a news desk with an orange and red fireball frozen on the wall-sized screen behind her. The tag line on the back screen said Bridge Bombing. “—at 11:30 last night, as the freight train approached the Seeti River Bridge. Here is footage from a nearby security camera. I warn you, these images are graphic and disturbing.” The picture switched to a dark, grainy image of the automatic railroad bridge. A headlight from a diesel locomotive showed in the background, oscillating as it approached the camera. Suddenly the bridge was lit from below by an orange light an instant before it flew into the sky in three giant pieces of twisted steel. The orange and red fireball expanded and morphed into a cloud of smoke and debris. The engine’s oscillating headlight flashed on the smoke cloud, then disappeared as the diesel roared into the cloud and plunged off the track into the river. Three more railroad cars followed and piled on top of the engine, their rear ends jutting above the water.

  The female announcer was back in the picture. “Authorities are looking for thre
e persons of interest that were captured in this security video.” The picture showed a still shot from the video with three lighter circles highlighting images of three people standing on the south side of the bridge as the fireball was frozen in mid-explosion. I could make out the three figures and the banner as a black rectangle backlit by the fireball. “We’ll have a report from Oscar Reynosa at the scene.”

  Three, I thought. The security video showed three people at the scene. I couldn’t believe we’d been so lucky. Where was the fourth person? Even if one of the three in the video was Michelle, if I could deliver Wallace, Shamanski, and Ponder, maybe I could leave Michelle out of this.

  I clicked off the television.

  John put his hand on Michelle’s arm. “Michelle Teresa Babcock, what on earth have you gotten yourself into?”

  I raised a hand. “Don’t answer that.”

  John stood and turned to me, disbelief written on his face. “What is this, Chuck? I’m the client, not Michelle.”

  “Sit down, John. I’ll explain.”

  John shook his fist. “Mickie is my daughter, dammit. I hired you to find her. I have a right to know what she’s involved in.”

  “Yes, you do, John. If you’ll sit down, I’ll explain the situation.” I waited.

  Penny tugged his sleeve. “Sit down, John. Let him talk.”

  John scowled at Penny, then Michelle, then me. He made a sound between a moan and a growl, but he sat.

  “John,” I said. “I told Michelle not to talk to you or Penny about what happened last night. She can talk to you both about anything else in her life, but not last night.”

  He started to stand again, and I made a stop gesture. “Look, this is to protect both of you as well as Michelle. The police, the FBI—even Homeland Security—may interview any or all of you. It is a federal crime to lie to a federal official, even if they haven’t given you a Miranda warning and even if you’re not under arrest. You and Penny should tell the absolute truth to any official who comes here. You truthfully say that you don’t know what happened last night or what Michelle did or where she was. But if they ask, you tell them I told you that she was at John Ponder’s house last night. That’s the truth, and they’ll find that out anyway.”

  “How?” John asked.

  “They’ll track the cellphones of everyone involved.”

  “Involved in what, for God’s sake?”

  “Can’t tell you.”

  “I’ve seen that cellphone tracking thingy on NCIS,” Penny said. “I didn’t think it was real.”

  “It is,” I told her. “Most smartphones have GPS built in. Unless you turn it off, the cops can locate your phone to within a few feet. So, if anyone asks, I told you Michelle was at Ponder’s last night, and that’s all you know until I arrived with her this morning. And that’s the truth.”

  I handed Michelle the burner phone I’d bought and activated in the store. “Here’s your new cellphone, Michelle. The only people—and I mean the only people who are to have this number are your parents, your grandparents, and your attorney.”

  Michelle looked at her father. “Do we have an attorney?”

  I raise my hand again. “We’ll get to that in a minute, John.”

  I turned back to Michelle. “You are not to give your new phone number to anyone else, no friends, no cousins, no school buddies, nobody. Is that clear?”

  John frowned again. “A new cellphone. I don’t understand. What’s wrong with her old one?”

  “I can’t tell you. Just make a note of her new number.”

  John started to object, but Penny put a hand on his arm. “Dear, let’s let Chuck handle this any way he wants. After all, he was a police detective and he knows how these things work; we don’t.” She looked at me. “How can we help, Chuck?”

  “Moral support and money—a lot of both.”

  Penny’s mouth stretched into a wan smile. “Thank God we have an ample supply of both. Where does that support begin?”

  “Do you and John know a good criminal defense attorney?”

  Penny looked to John, who shook his head. “We never needed one.”

  “I know a good one and I always carry a few of his business cards with me.” I fished a card from my pocket and handed it to Michelle. “As soon as I leave here, call this number and ask for either Abe Weisman or Diane Toklas. You don’t have to write that down. Both of their names are on the card.”

  I turned to her parents. “You’ll have to pay them, but don’t be surprised when they won’t discuss Michelle’s case with either of you. Michelle is of legal age and she’ll be the client, so any conversation the attorneys have with either of you about her case would not be privileged.”

  “We understand,” Penny answered. “What else can we do?”

  “Let’s make my relationship clear. First, my assignment was to find Michelle and make sure she was safe. I did that yesterday and I reported to you both last night on that assignment.” I waited for John to acknowledge me.

  He waved a hand. “Yeah, yeah. Go on.”

  “That assignment is finished and I’ll send you a bill for that when I get to my office. So that’s over now; Michelle is back home safe. Agreed?”

  John waved a hand dismissively. “Agreed.” He made a get on with it gesture.

  “I won’t tell you how I know this, but Michelle has a problem of her own.” I glanced at Michelle. “She wants to hire me to help her solve this problem. I can’t tell you what this problem is, but solving it will require all my skills, contacts, resources, and a lot of luck—if I can solve it at all.”

  John frowned. “So Mickie wants to be your client. So?”

  I put both hands flat on the table. “She’s a college student without a job, living at home. She can’t afford me.”

  Penny made a funny expression, not quite a smile, like she had just gotten the joke. Penny’s father was Hank Hickham, a Port City legend as the owner of Hank’s Bar & Grill & Bodacious Ribs. Tourists from all over the world lined up to eat at the waterfront icon. The place churned out over a million dollars a year in profits, and she had been raised in a life of privilege. Hank was a good friend of mine and an occasional client.

  She said, “You need us to pay you, but you work for Michelle. This means you don’t answer to us anymore than the attorneys do. You answer to Michelle. Is that it?”

  I spread my hands and shrugged. “I don’t care who pays me, Penny. You and John are the logical ones. Next to Michelle, you have the most at stake. It could be Hank or the President of France, as long as I get paid. I have to make a living.”

  Penny walked over to a kitchen counter. She pulled a checkbook out of a drawer. “How much do you need to start? If you need much more than thirty thousand, I’ll have to transfer funds.”

  “Twenty thousand is okay for the first week or two.”

  John stood up. “Now wait a minute, both of you. I don’t mind paying, but I’ve got to know what’s going on. Otherwise, it ain’t gonna happen.” He posed as if he’d faced down a bully.

  Penny pulled a pen from the drawer. “Who do I make this out to, Chuck?”

  “Just a damn minute.” John stalked over to the counter. “I said I’m not paying until I know what’s going on.”

  Penny smiled at John. “I know, dear. I heard you.” She patted him on the arm then turned to me. “Will you excuse us for a moment?”

  John raised both his hands.

  Penny set the check and pen on the counter. “John, may I speak with you privately?” She walked from the room without looking back. John grunted, but he followed.

  I turned to Michelle. “What do you think will happen?”

  She smiled. “Daddy will cave like a sand castle when the tide comes in. He’ll come back and make the check out himself. He’ll act like it’s his idea. All my life, Grandpa Hank has smiled at Grandma Lorene and said ‘Happy wife, happy life.’ I know Daddy got the message.” She grinned at me and looked about twelve years old.

  Ten min
utes later, Michelle’s parents came back. John pulled a Montblanc pen from his shirt pocket and picked up the check Penny had laid on the counter. “Why don’t I include what we owe you for yesterday. How much is that?”

  I did a quick mental calculation, added five hundred dollars for the fight with Ponder. “Three thousand will cover yesterday.”

  John handed the check over. “Chuck, I don’t know you as well as Hank does, but he swears you’re the greatest detective since Sherlock Holmes. Take care of our girl.”

  “I will.” I pocketed the check. “Someone may come by here looking for Michelle. That person may intend to hurt her.”

  “Who? How? Why? You’ve got to tell us,” said John.

  “Sorry. The FBI might ask you about it, and you’d have to answer. Just know that anyone you don’t personally know as a family friend is a potential danger. Don’t tell anyone where she is, and don’t let anyone in to see her. Take her to Hank and Lorene’s ASAP. Leave her car here. Hide her away for a few days, maybe a couple of weeks. Get Hank or Lorene to take her over to Mango Island and keep her under wraps there until I give you the all-clear.”

  “But what about school? Penny asked. “It starts next Monday.”

  “Her life is more important than UAC.”

  Chapter 13

  James Ponder’s hands trembled as he punched the cellphone keys. It didn’t help that he was coming down off the Oxycodone Michelle had given him the previous night. He had dreaded making this call ever since Michelle freaked out beside the railroad tracks and ran into the night. She’s a true believer like me, isn’t she? I even told her that you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs. She agreed with me. How could I have figured her so wrong?

  He had made his way home from the railroad track and collapsed on the bed, but he hadn’t slept. He smelled Michelle’s fragrance on the bed from the previous day and night. He was simultaneously aroused and appalled that he was thinking about sex. Especially now, when both their lives were subject to Redwood’s “repercussions.” He rubbed the place where his little finger had been amputated.