30

 

 

I didn’t learn the facts until the next morning. When Gold had left the table, my first instinct was to follow him, after making sure I had my reporter’s notebook, a pen that worked and maybe a small camera at the ready. Car bomb? At the golf tournament site? Talk about catnip for a reporter!

But Mary Jane had stopped me. She saw the look in my eyes and had laid her hand, gently but firmly, on my arm.

“Sit down,” she had said. “I’m not finished with my dinner, and I want dessert and a coffee, too.”

“But—” I had started to protest. Then I looked in her eyes. And stopped. And sat.

“Not your business,” she said. “Not in any way. Nobody was hurt. You heard him say that. Could have been something wrong with the car. Nobody knows. Let them sort it out. I want a quiet dinner with my man.”

She was right, as she very often is. So I had sat back down, tucked in my napkin again and we finished our dinner. Conrad had ordered a very nice bottle of burgundy, so I refilled both our glasses, then raised mine towards my wife.

“You’re right,” I said. “Slainte.”

And we had quietly finished our meal, ordered one extra chocolatey sundae-and-brownie thing with two spoons, and enjoyed a nice cafe au lait. Then we made our way upstairs, bid Maria a pleasant evening, looked at our son sleeping on his stomach with his little butt in the air, comfy in his travel crib, and gone to bed.

The next morning, DJ was up and at ‘em early, so we were among the first of the guests in the dining room for breakfast, a little before seven. But the place was abuzz.

Shooter was standing outside the dining room, scanning a newspaper.

“Hacker,” he said when we walked up, “Did you hear about the bomb?”

“Yes I did,” I said. I introduced my wife and son. “We were eating dinner with Conrad Gold when he got the call. What happened?”

Shooter shrugged. “Not much in the paper,” he said. “But the grapevine says that a car in the employees’ lot exploded, sometime around nine last night.”

“Nobody was hurt, right?” Mary Jane asked anxiously.

“No,” Shooter shook his head. “No one in the car, or standing nearby.”

“They got any suspects?”

He shook his head.

“Cops have called in the bomb squad from the staties—they have a barracks not far from here. From what I’ve been able to learn, it sounds like it was mostly a dud.”

“How so?” I asked.

“More noise than damage,” Shooter said. “The car’s hood was crumpled and there was a small fire that hotel security was able to put out with a fire extinguisher before the fire department arrived. But nobody thinks that Al Qaida or someone like that was involved. They’re thinking more along the lines of a teenage prank.”

“Well that’s good news,” Mary Jane said. “Be terrible if they had to cancel the tournament.”

Shooter and I just looked at her. She saw the expression on our faces and laughed.

“Well, if it had been Al Qaida, they might have,” she said.

I reached over and took DJ out of her arms.

“Why don’t you go see the activities desk over there and get your spa activities arranged,” I said. “Me and the boy will go find some bacon.”

“Good idea,” she said, turning away. “But he doesn’t eat bacon yet.”

“More for me,” I called after her.

I turned to Tony.

“You had breakfast yet?” I asked. “Welcome to join us. Hope you don’t mind a little spit-up.”

He laughed. “I’ve eaten thanks,” he said. “And I’ve got three of my own. Well versed in spit up.”

He looked at his watch.

“Meeting today at eleven, right?” he asked. I nodded and he strolled off with a wave.

DJ and I went into the dining room, and I commandeered a table off in the corner, well away from anyone else. DJ was a pretty even-tempered baby for the most part, but he was capable, as all babies are, of quickly exploding with the force of a seven-megaton bomb. So we always tried to stay away from normal humans, just in case.

Today, he seemed happy and calm, smiling at everyone. Which was very effective in getting one of the morning waitresses to bring over a wooden high-chair without being asked. We went through the buffet line, and I selected a few pieces of fruit and some dry Cheerios for him, and some waffles, bacon, home fries and more fruit for me. The waitress, hovering, took my tray of food to our table, leaving me free hands with which I deposited DJ in his high chair and put some blueberries and Cheerios on the tray on front of him. He was only half-interested since it had not been all that long since his mother had fed him upstairs.

But he had a good time rolling the berries around and staring out at the bright sunshine of the day, and watching the other people come wandering in, so I had enough time to shovel down most of my breakfast. With the ever-changing moods of babies, one learns to eat fast when one has the chance.

The waitress had refilled my coffee cup and cooed over the boy when Kelsey Jenkins walked in, saw us and came over.

“Cute kid,” she said, looking down at us. “Whose is it?”

“Funny,” I said. “Go get some chow and join us. Kid seems to be in a good mood.”

She went off to the buffet line, and arrived back at the table about the same time as Mary Jane, who was clutching some brochures and looked excited. I introduced her to Kelsey.

“I signed up for a Pilates class in about an hour,” she said, looking down at her papers. “And after lunch, there’s a meditation session followed by a massage and sauna. What are you guys doing today?”

“Nothing much,” I said. “Heard there was a little golf tournament going on down the street. We might mosey over and see what’s happening.”

“The sauna and massage sounds better,” Kelsey said. “Maybe I can get Ben to give me the afternoon off.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Mary Jane said, “You guys have to work. What a shame.”

DJ thought that was funny, because he screeched loudly and pushed a blueberry over the rim of his high chair tray. He thought that was funny, so he did it again. I took away the rest of his toys, and ate them.

“I take it you have someone lined up to keep an eye on this one,” Kelsey said. She was watching the baby out of the corner of her eye while eating some granola and yogurt, the sight of which was causing my digestive track to get nervous.

“Maria is coming around ten-thirty,” Mary Jane said. “There’s a nature park just two blocks away, so I’ll let her take him for a walk there while I exercise. Then we’ll have lunch, and he’ll probably go down for a nap for an hour or so. It might just work out perfectly.”

“The best laid plans o’ mice ‘n’ men,” I said.

“Oh, shut up,” she said. “What’s your schedule?”

“We’ve got a production meeting at eleven,” I said. “Kelsey…is that up here or down at the course?”

“Down there today,” she said. “Ben wants us there at eleven.”

I checked my watch. “OK, I have time for a shower. I want to get down there a little early and check out the scene of last night’s crime.”

“There was a crime?” Kelsey said. “What happened?”

“Somebody set off an incendiary device in the parking lot,” I said. “Apparently it wounded an auto but nothing else.”

“Geez,” Kelsey said. “Terrorists?”

“Don’t think so,” I said. “If it was the real bad guys, they would have broken a few windows at the least. But I want to see for myself.”

“You have an idea who it was, don’t you?” Mary Jane said, looking at me sideways.

I laughed and held up my hands in surrender.

“Not really, no,” I said. “But it could be our murderer. The walls are starting to close in and he … or she … might be getting antsy. This could have been a diversion of some kind.”

“You mean he … or it … is planning something else?” Mary Jane said. She looked worried.

“Maybe,” I said. “This weekend offers a big stage. If the killer is trying to make some kind of statement, this would be the perfect time and place to do so. Big sporting event. National television. Hundreds of media on hand. Yeah, it’s a grand stage.”

“All the more reason why DJ and I will stay here today, thank you,” Mary Jane said. She stood up, picked DJ up out of his chair, nodded at Kelsey and headed upstairs.

“You really think something may go down this weekend, Hacker?” she asked me. “Do I need to be worried?”

I shrugged. “Worried? Probably not,” I said. “Alert? Yeah, always a good idea. You’re walking the fairways again today?”

“Yup,” she said. “Ben wants me on Scannell’s group. He’s playing with Billy Calloway and that French guy, whassisname?”

“Henri Robitan,” I said.

“Yeah, him,” she said.

“I’ve been told that he has a certain Gallic charm that drives the femmes crazy,” I said. “Is that true?”

“Dunno about the Gallic charm thing,” she said. “I mostly notice his lack of deodorant. But I hear that’s a French thing, too.”

“Ah, yes,” I said. “That stereotype goes all the way back to Pepe LePew.”

She was still chuckling when I left.

 

With my family all accounted for and spending IBS’ money like it was fresh out of a Monopoly game box, I rode the van down to the golf course at about ten thirty and had the driver let me off up near the clubhouse. The crowds were noticeably larger and more enthusiastic now that it was the weekend. People were milling about everywhere and Conrad Gold’s security people were busy keeping the great unwashed out of his multi-million dollar clubhouse.

My IBS credentials got me in anywhere I wanted to go. All hail the power of the press. I used them to make my way down into the basement of the clubhouse, where I found the security office. I was not surprised to find a number of police officers, both uniformed and wearing detective’s street clothes, standing, sitting and talking on their cellphones.

I stood there for a minute or two and watched, and when I had determined which of the plainsclothes guys looked to be the man in charge, I went up to him.

“Hacker, IBS,” I said, flashing my television credential badge at him. “What can you tell me about the incident last night?”

The head guy was a little bantam-weight, dressed in a coat and tie. He had a buzz cut on his head and a faint sheen of sweat on his face. He looked like the kind of cop who would pull out his Glock and shoot you in the head if you mouthed off to him, so I quickly decided to mind my manners.

He looked at me, looked at my badge and did a double-take.

“Hacker?” he read the name again. “Aren’t you the guy who works with the Boz? Damn, you guys are hilarious. They never show us the inside of your booth, but my mental picture is you two guys slamming down fruity drinks and just making shit up as you go.”

“Yeah,” I said, “That pretty much sums it up. Who said drunk and stupid was no way to go through life? Now, what can you tell me about last night, officer…?”

“Detective,” he snapped. Some cops are sensitive that way. “Detective Wally Howe. I can’t tell you anything about last night. It’s an ongoing investigation.”

“What kind of bomb was used?” I pressed on. Because what else could I do?

“The kind that goes boom,” Detective Howe said. “But this one just went pop, instead.”

“I heard that the device was …” I deliberately left out the last word. Sometimes cops will play the word game with you when you do that.

“Mostly ineffective,” Howe said. Not what I was going for, but I could work with it.

“Badly designed?” I said. “Or did it misfire?”

“I think it did exactly what the perp wanted it to,” he said. “Make a noise, make some smoke. Scare some people. There was some oil leakage on the manifold of the engine, and that caught fire. The device itself had very little in the way of explosives.”

“Not C4, then?”

He laughed. “More like a few cherry bombs attached to a heat source,” he said.

I looked around at the police gathered in the security office and walking in and out of the small space.

“So why the show of force?” I said. “Doesn’t sound like the general public is in any danger here today.”

“Until we catch the guy, there’s still a risk,” Howe said, his eyes narrowing, “The device from last night was not a major threat to anyone, but the wiring on it was pretty sophisticated. Some of the connections were soldered. They did a nice neat job. Showed some good design and capability.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning, if this guy could build a small device like this, he definitely could build something bigger and more dangerous,” Howe said. “So we’re out there actively trying to find him.”

I looked over at the wall of TV monitors that covered one wall. Conrad Gold spared no expense in security. It looked like he had cameras covering every square inch of the exterior of his buildings.

“Got him on video?” I asked.

“No comment,” Howe said, with a little smirky smile. I took that to mean, yes, he did have him on video.

“What do we tell the viewers?” I said.

“You should be able to tell them that we have the perp in custody,” he said. “You and the Boz should have some fun talking about it.”

“I don’t suppose you can give me a name?” I said.

He just looked at me, still smiling his evil little smile.

“No,” he said. “But I’d love for you two to come to the press conference after.”

“You sound pretty confident,” I said.

He shrugged. “Matter of time,” he said. “Just a matter of time.”