I let the old red jeep coast to a stop just outside of the restaurant. On the second floor, I could see my classmates bound in dress-wear, laughing and dancing behind the glass walls. I took a breath to keep my emotions in check and slipped out of the jeep. They could do whatever they wanted, I didn’t care. I started toward the bonfire on the beach. It was almost beautiful the way the waves lapped the shore under the moonlight. I spared another glance up at the restaurant, and spotted Veronica on the deck in her blue dress, chatting with her friends.
“Connor?” A soft voice called to me from the shadows. I saw a girl in a white dress sitting on a driftwood log out of reach of the firelight. The sand made it difficult to look graceful as I drifted over to her. My heart froze.
“Jess?” Her face was streaked with tears, and she looked completely frayed. I ran the remaining distance, dropping to my knees in front of her. “What happened?” I took her hands.
“Sam.” Her sobs halted her. I slipped off my leather jacket and wrapped it around her. I was going to kill him if he did this to her. “We were just playing, but he didn’t want to stop. He…” I pushed her hair aside and kissed her forehead. I stood and started for the restaurant. Veronica was not going protect him this time.
Jess called after me, but I was already on the patio under the ornate strings of lights. I spotted Sam and his sandy blonde crew cut on the far side of the deck with his friends. He only had a couple of inches on me, and no one to interfere this time. I charged him. I felt the impact of my shoulder into his chest. The momentum carried both of us over the railing and down onto the beach. I gave him three quick jabs to the ribs before I pulled back. Sam coughed a couple times as he climbed to his feet.
“I guess this means she told you, huh?” I met his smirk with a right-cross that put him back on the beach. I kicked him in the ribs and he lunged to tackle me. He got in a couple of lucky punches, but I grabbed his wrists and vaulted him over my head. I got to my feet again as he did.
“Connor!” Jess shouted from my left near the bonfire. I hesitated. “Please.” She needed me, more than I needed this.
“Forget this.” I resolved to deal with him later, and turned my back on him. I heard his friends cheering him on as I put my arm around Jess and walked with her back to the jeep. “Next weekend is the trip anyhow. You don’t need this stupid dance.” She climbed in, and I hopped in the driver’s side.
“Thank you.” I gave Jess a glance, and wiped the blood from my lower lip. She pulled the jacket tighter as I threw the jeep in reverse. On the front deck, I saw Veronica watching us. The engine started clacking as we accelerated away.
The clacking solidified, and forced me to open my eyes to the fogged windshield of the truck. My whole body ached, and Veronica was leaning into me, still sound asleep in my arms. Someone knocked on the fogged driver’s window again. I tried to shift, but Veronica refused to stop hugging my right arm. Twisting my left at an odd angle, I wiped a bit of the condensation away to see a pair of familiar dark eyes squinting at me.
“Veronica,” I whispered in her ear. She only shifted. I struggled to get free, but only ended up with my hand on her chest. She wasn’t budging. Contorting my free arm again, I hit the door handle and fell backwards. I ended up hanging out of the truck, looking upside down at Alison. She loomed over me with a scowl.
“If you’re through groping Miss Sunshine, we need to talk.” Alison stalked past me toward the front of the truck. Struggling with Veronica, I untangled myself, managing to both dump myself on the ground and get her to hit her head on the steering wheel. Veronica let out a squeak. I climbed to my feet and brushed off, while Veronica rubbed her forehead. Stepping around the open door, I met Alison leaning on the front of her rover.
Any investigator that takes more volatile cases needs to have a back-up plan when things go awry. Dedicated investigators set-up meeting locations within a reasonable distance of any site just in case they need to fall back and re-evaluate their plans. Archer Field was really peaceful at two in the morning. There were a couple of jogging paths through the marsh, but no one really knew of the place. Old-growth trees surrounded the marsh with a narrow stream flowing through the eastern side out to sea. Trying to massage out the pain in my shoulder, I leaned on the truck hood across from her.
“So you’ve got a weird idea of clubbing.” I ignored her comment. “Are you alright?”
“A few scrapes, you?”
“I’m fine.” I heard my shoulder pop, relieving some pressure. “The goon?”
“He was the same.” Alison brushed out her vest with a frown.
“Are you sure?”
“I really hope so.” She scrutinized a bruise on her forearm in the moonlight. Picking a piece of gravel out of her arm, she let out a sigh. “If he’s not, then we’ve really got issues.”
“Run into anymore problems?”
“Yeah, roadblocks.” Shifting, she placed her right heel on the bumper. “They’re looking for the truck.” I shook my head. Not good.
“What did you find?” Veronica called from the open door. Stepping out, she zipped up her jacket and wrapped her arms around herself. I watched Alison adopt a defensive posture, with a glare at her.
“We’re lucky they write dates on the back of their photos.” Alison retrieved a wadded up receipt from her back pocket. “The name Heather Meyers mean anything?”
“Maybe it’s the girl in the photo with them,” I conceded.
“Yeah but we don’t even know if she’s involved in any of this at all.” Veronica groaned and shifted in the cool air. “A professional tried to shoot us, you said it yourself, and last time I checked, they don’t sub-contract.”
“Give me a break,” Alison grumbled.
“She has a point.” I tried to keep the peace. “Let’s focus on what we have in front of us right now. We have a professional shooter and some really large bikers who jumped us outside of a tattoo parlor. Now what are the factors involved in the shooting?”
“I’d say they’re an amateur that knows what they’re doing.” Alison stated.
“Fair enough. So what does that mean in context?”
“Nothing,” Veronica sputtered. “Either it’s personal with us or someone couldn’t find a professional. This gets us nowhere.”
“Not true, I think we can assume this is a solid lead. Both Rostern and Sargent were involved in the cult and if she was with them then it’s a safe bet she knows something. Either this girl is involved in this, or she knows who else might be.” I watched the tree branches bobbing.
“So we need to track her down and find out what she knows.”
“What about this shooter or whoever it was that sent those thugs after us?” Veronica’s tone changed with irritation. I watched Alison, but all she did was shrug.
“I don’t know. The shooter is a physical lead. We just keep following the names and whoever paid those goons can be anywhere in a hundred miles. There’s nothing we can do other than try and identify if there might be a few more coming our way.” Alison sighed, staring at the clouds.
“It’s all we’ve got.”
“I really don’t like…” Her phone rang interrupting her train of thought. Scowling, she fished her phone out of her coat. She hit the button and pushed it under her hair. “Yeah?” She made a face at me and rolled her eyes. I gave her a curious look and she tossed me her phone.
“Hello.” I watched Alison tap her foot making the anklet jingle on her boot.
“Mister Maitland?” A deep woman’s voice asked. “Salem Sound Consulting?”
“Yeah.” I gave Alison a shrug. “How can I help you?”
“We’d like to hire your services.” Alison stopped tapping her foot when she saw my expression change.
“Ahem, for what?”
“You do work in the Boston area, right?”
“A bit of all over, but yeah.”
“Recently we’ve had some problems with transportation, and we really cannot afford any more problems.”
“Uh-huh.” I thought about it.
“So far these incidents have been contained to smaller deliveries, but we are concerned that it could escalate with our next one.” The woman was perfectly clear and concise. Repetitive hits on deliveries is a far-cry from random.
“What do you think is going on?” I scratched my head. Someone on the inside? A shipment that’s drawing too much attention?
“We had a special development, a week ago and the incidents started after that. So we believe that something may have happened then.” Behind the caller, I heard another pair of voices that were encouraging the spokeswoman.
“What did you want us to do about it?” I lowered my gaze from Alison to Veronica when she let out a heavy sigh. She was shifting impatiently, with a steady glare at me. Alison dropped her foot to the grass, and leaned forward with a scowl.
“We want to hire you to help facilitate the next delivery and identify the cause of these incidents.” The woman hesitated, adjusting her tone. “And if possible, prevent any future disruptions from happening.”
“Uh-huh.” I covered the phone. “It’s a job.”
“Ah.” Alison clasped her hands and dropped her head. “When it rains…”
“Mister Maitland?” The woman called me back.
“Yes.”
“Will you consider helping us?”
“I’m in the field on a case right now, we might be able to get to you next month sometime. I’ll have to check our schedule.” We already had enough to deal with right now. Heading to Boston and trying to figure out how to provide transport security for them wasn’t anywhere on my list, even if they were paying.
“Mister Maitland, this is very important to us and we would really appreciate having your help in this matter.” The woman was adamant, and seemed sincere that she thought that we could help. Maybe we had worked with one of her associates before, and they knew we could handle it.
“We are more than willing to help if and when our schedule allows, but we are currently swamped. We have a couple of very high priority cases right now that require our full attention.” I didn’t like putting off cases. That could harm our reputation, but we had little choice.
“We’ll have the initial retainer forwarded into your account by close of business today.” I heard her speak with someone in a choppy manner. If the client treats you with a sharp professional attitude, and can cut a check for thousands in the span of a phone call, it’s probably in your best interest to take the case. Something told me this was another of the cases that was more trouble than it initially seemed.
“That’s very considerate of you, but we will also require all of the information regarding the delivery, individuals involved, and everything you have on the incidents as well as any observations by you or your team before…” I heard the woman bark an order to someone.
“The information is being emailed to you as we speak.” I heard the phone chirp out an alert for a new email. This wasn’t good. It was probably going to involve the police or mob. They didn’t just want help, they expected us to provide a solution immediately. Not good.
“Uh, thank you. Please understand that we are currently on a case, so we won’t be able to get into the field on your case until sometime later this week.”
“That’s fine, we would just like your assistance with the delivery next week and our issues resolved before there are any more incidents.”
“We will start reviewing the information as soon as we can, but as it stands, we’re in the middle of a case right now. So please understand there will be a slight delay, Miss…”
“Genevieve McDowell. I will be your contact for this.” The woman responded with the sound of years of authority. No doubt she was probably affiliated with any number of prestigious authorities.
“Genevieve, I will call you tomorrow and give you the account number for the transfer, and we will start reviewing the information as soon as we can. We should be in the field within the coming week.”
“That is great to hear, Mister Maitland.” Genevieve sounded genuinely pleased. A bit like a mob boss would be pleased, but pleased.
“Yes ma’am. I thank you for your patience in this matter, and we will do everything in our capacity to help you.” I tried to politely wrap up the conversation. The woman was certainly someone with power and being her contractors, we needed to play nice.
“No. Thank you for taking us as a client. It is appreciated.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“We’ll be in touch, Mister Maitland.” Genevieve hung up on me with a sharp politeness that made me wary. Maybe I wasn’t far off with my mob-boss assessment. I gave the email a once over before closing it and tossing the phone back to Alison. What did I just accept?
“Reminds me, you don’t answer your phone?” Alison pushed off the rover and rubbed the back of her neck. I watched the elegant tattoo on her shoulder as she stretched. She moved back to rummage through the rover and returned with her worn out black denim jacket. She slipped into her jacket and fixed her hair. “Hm?” She cocked her head at me.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, the battery is dead.”
“Then you don’t know.” Alison straightened the collar. My blank expression made her continue. “The Fergusons called, or rather Cassie called. We have to go back out there tonight.”
“What?” Veronica squeaked.
“When was that?”
“Hour and a half, give or take.” Alison leaned on the rover again. I rolled my eyes. We were stuck heading back to deal with a peeping-tom. At least it would be easy enough to fix. The truck was too hot to take south though.
“Veronica, you want to take the truck back to the loft?”
“What? Why?”
“The cops are still looking for it, and he doesn’t want to leave it here.”
“Sure.” Veronica gaped. I tossed her the keys and walked over to the rover. Tugging the door closed, I rolled down the window.
“So what’s the case that’s so dire?” Alison scrutinized me.