Tick tock, p.3
Tick Tock, page 3
Nikki held the plate up to her nose. “Oh, my goodness. This smells divine.” She quickly took a seat. Jack pulled out a chair for Myra, then sat next to Nikki.
“Charles, aren’t you going to join us?” Myra looked up.
“I’m right here, my love.” He was busy, carefully placing the ravioli into the boiling water.
“Well, that just won’t do.” Myra pushed out her chair and carried her plate over to where Charles was cooking. She stabbed a piece of eggplant on her fork and held it up to Charles’s mouth. He graciously accepted.
“Not bad, if I say so myself.” He smacked his lips. Myra scooped out a clam and waved it under his nose. Again he graciously accepted. Once he swallowed, he insisted she take her seat and enjoy the food. “Myra, if I can’t watch you enjoy the food I prepared, I would be greatly dismayed.”
She stitched her eyebrows together and gave him a quizzical look.
“Darling, I appreciate this, but please go put your fanny in a chair.” He shooed her back to the kitchen table.
“Well, I hope you don’t plan on spending the whole evening in the kitchen.” Myra made a face.
“Not at all. I timed everything so we can all be together.” He gave her a tsk-tsk. “I don’t know why you underestimate my culinary skills.”
“I do not. But you usually have Fergus here as your sous-chef, busboy, and potato peeler.”
“The good news is we’re not having potatoes. But I believe I can manage.” He turned back to the stove and mumbled. “Ye of little faith.”
“I heard that,” Myra blurted.
“You were supposed to.” Charles chuckled.
Groans of gastronomic delight filled the kitchen as everyone consumed the first course. Nikki then cleared the table as Charles was plating the ravioli with the butter sage sauce.
More accolades and words of wonder followed as everyone brought their plates into the dining room. Before anyone could dive into the pasta, they said grace. As they held one another’s hands, Myra spoke the simple words: “It is a blessing to be here. Thank you, Lord, for this moment together.”
Amens went around the table, followed by more coos, groans, and unidentifiable words as the group dug into the pasta. The salad was served and then the pièce de résistance, the osso buco, on top of the polenta Charles had painstakingly cooked earlier that day and finished with the green beans.
The look on Nikki’s face was priceless. It was her favorite dish. Charles had tried to keep this from Myra because he wanted it to be a surprise.
“So this is why you didn’t want me wandering in the kitchen?” Myra gave him a look.
“More like lurking.” Charles grinned. “Buon appetito!”
Nikki raised her glass. “To the best dinner ever! Cin cin!”
The others heartily concurred.
Chapter Six
Las Vegas
Benjamin “Bennie” Weber pulled out a twenty-dollar bill and collected casino coins to throw in the one-armed bandits known as slot machines. He was getting antsy just staying in his motel room. Sure, it had a TV and a hot plate, but the walls were starting to close in on him. He should be used to living in a confined situation, but now that he was out of prison, being inside for too long made him anxious. He worried he would never be able to leave. He referred to it as Post-Traumatic Small Space Disorder. PTSSD, he’d joke with the two friends he had left. Well, they weren’t actually friends. Just a couple of guys he met playing the slots. They didn’t know about his child pornography conviction.
As far as Bennie was concerned, she was no child. By any means. She was a fifteen-year-old who had flaunted her long legs and ample breasts in front of the team. In front of a crowd. Despite the fact that she was a cheerleader, and part of her “job” was to get the crowd excited, he thought she was aiming her enthusiasm directly at him. That’s what he told himself. That’s what he told his lawyer. It was her fault. She was too evocative. Yeah—evocative was the right word. He liked using it. He blamed her for seducing him. Except there was no evidence beyond the photos of her on his phone. Photos he actually took himself. Photos he procured through the peephole in the wall of the girls’ gym. It was so easy. Too easy. But then again, sometimes life gives you a gift. Then, when he found out he could sell the pics online, he was all for making a few extra bucks. But life sometimes catches up with you. Especially when you’re careless.
Yes, it became too easy. He was getting careless. It was during a game when he had taken off his jacket and left his phone in the pocket. When the game was over, he didn’t notice that his phone had fallen to the ground. One of the players saw it under a bench and picked it up. Most of the time, people lock their phones, but on that particular day, the odds were not in Bennie’s favor. Before the game, he had been busy taking covert photos of the girls changing into their uniforms when his phone rang. Bennie got spooked, shoved the phone into his pocket, and sneaked out of the janitor’s closet that served as his personal photo booth. It was a narrow escape. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been shaken up like that.
As Bennie had scurried toward the field, one of the referees stopped to chat. Then the team came out, and he wasn’t able to mess with his phone. The phone he should have locked immediately. The phone with dozens of incriminating photos.
When the game was over, he walked toward the locker room and felt around in his pocket for the phone. Gone. He patted himself down. Nothing. More panic. As he retraced his steps, he came face-to-face with the linebacker who’d found it. Next to the linebacker was a referee and the superintendent of schools. By the time they got to the other side of the field, several police cars were waiting.
His lawyer argued that the police had no right to confiscate his phone. The judge thought differently. And so did the jury. He was found guilty and served five years of a fifteen-year term. But all was not lost. He made a few acquaintances in prison. Acquaintances that could prove very valuable. His only obstacle now was having to register as a sex offender wherever he resided. But it was Vegas. Land of deviance, debauchery, and vice. It was a city where he could remain anonymous. Except for the sex offender thing. But soon he could move about freely. That’s what the pretty boy had promised as payment for his protection.
Chapter Seven
Leroy and Darius
Even though he had been waiting for the call, Leroy jumped several feet when his phone clanged.
“Huh . . . hullo?”
“Hey, man. How’s it goin’?” a rather pleasant voice replied.
“Is that you, Darius?” Leroy asked.
“No. Sorry. Wrong number.” Darius huffed and disconnected the call. How many times did he have to tell Leroy not to use his real name? Even though they were using burner phones, he still didn’t want them identifying themselves. There would be plenty of other information they would have to exchange. Leaving their names out of it was minor but important.
Darius waited a few minutes and then redialed.
“Huh, hullo?”
“Hey, Mike. Todd here.”
Leroy gave the phone a strange look. Then the light bulb went on in his head, and he giggled. Just like being spies. “Well, hello, Todd. Yes, this is Mike. Yep, it’s Mike all right.”
Darius wondered why he aligned himself with such a misfit. But there had to be one in the crowd. The other two were relatively normal. Normal for a financial fraudster and a child porn offender, that is.
Darius continued. “I sent you a postcard with an address and a description. I want you to follow the mark and keep me posted.”
“You mean like on a stakeout?” Leroy was all atwitter.
“Yeah. Whatever.”
“When should I start?” Leroy asked excitedly.
“When you get the postcard.” Darius hoped he hadn’t made a big mistake enlisting this numbnut.
“Yeah. Right. Okay, boss,” Leroy responded. “How long do you want me to do this?”
“Until I get there.”
“Where?”
“Wherever you are.”
“Oh. Wow. So you’re coming here? To Virginia?”
Darius wanted to strangle him. “No names. No places.”
“Sorry, boss.” Leroy gulped. “I meant West Virginia.”
Darius was hitting himself on the head with his phone at this point. “No. Louisiana.”
“But I’m not . . . oh, right.” It finally dawned on Leroy.
“The info should arrive today or tomorrow. I should be there in two to three days. I’ll keep you posted.” Darius hung up before Leroy could blurt out more stupidity.
* * *
Fourteen years ago, Darius Lancaster was a better-than-average-looking forty-year-old man. He grew up on a ranch and had a sexy, rugged image that he maintained working as a foreman on construction sites. A likable guy with a set of smarts. Except when it came to women. He fell under the spell of a Texas beauty who was fifteen years his junior. She also had very expensive tastes. She was all his—as long as there were gifts, flowers, and trips to Vegas. He liked playing the sugar daddy, and she was his arm candy. Over time, his funds dwindled. He couldn’t keep up with her wanting and spending. When he told her they had to cut back, she made a stink. He knew there were plenty of men who could and would easily take his place, so he did whatever he could to keep her happy. He maxed out his credit cards to the tune of $50k. Then there was the big ticket of another $50k to the loan sharks. They had loan sharks in Texas—some of the biggest in the country. It was Texas, after all.
He started pulling a few heists in small towns in the Panhandle. Gas stations, mostly. A convenience store now and again. No one ever got hurt, and he managed to escape the authorities several times, but he was smart enough to know his luck would run out in that pursuit. But he was in deep. He needed more than a few hundred bucks per robbery. He was desperate.
The loan sharks had given him two weeks to come up with the rest of the cash, or he might be spending weeks in an intensive care unit. If they let him live.
His first legitimate job was working for a local demolition company, but it was dirty work, so he moved on to commercial construction, instead of destruction. Now he could put his experience to good use. Rob a bank. His employer had recently finished building a strip mall on the outskirts of town in anticipation of suburban sprawl. It included a branch of a local credit union. As the foreman, he had access to the plans, and he put his photographic memory to the test. He knew which of the walls were steel-clad and which were normal commercial partitions.
The bank shared a wall with a franchise coffee shop. The east wall of the storage room in the coffee shop backed up against the break room of the bank. He patronized the shop a half-dozen times, casing the joint as he drank eight-dollar cups of coffee. He frequented the men’s room to get good sight lines. After each visit, he would tweak his rudimentary sketches of the floor plans he pulled from his memory. He kept track of the baristas and the bus person. He watched the clock as the flow of people came through, noted the busiest time and the lulls. After two weeks, he knew everyone’s schedule, including the delivery trucks. He kept to himself, only occasionally nodding at the regulars. He tried to remain inconspicuous by acting as a normal patron. The fake wig under the western cowboy hat he wore was a good enough disguise that no one would be able to give an accurate description of him—if it came down to that.
It didn’t take long for him to build his confidence. He had everything planned down to the minute. One evening, Darius showed up at the coffee place with a hunting backpack. No one seemed to think anything of it. He had carefully packed a small battery-operated hacksaw and some plastic explosives. He casually walked to the men’s room and slipped inside the storage area, where he crouched behind a pallet of paper cups. He checked his watch. Almost closing time. He listened to the chatter as the few workers said their good nights and locked up. He checked his watch again. It had been almost half an hour. Anyone who left anything behind would have come back by then.
He moved to the wall that separated the storage area from the break room in the bank. He pulled out a small device that would check for metal and studs. So far, he was at the right place. Now, nothing was standing between him and the interior of the bank except a few layers of Sheetrock. He listened again for any sounds. Nothing. He began to put the saw together, assembling all its parts. A simple click here. A click there. Then it was ready to go.
He carefully and meticulously cut an opening between the studs. It was just wide enough for him to fit through sideways. There was no room to spare. Good thing he fought off the beer belly by going to the gym several times a week. He shimmied his way through the opening and pulled out a small flashlight. Scanning the room, he saw the door that led to the lobby and another door that led to the electrical boards. That was the first thing he had to do: disarm the grid. Once that happened, he had less than ten minutes to get the job done. Under normal circumstances, the system would allow for one recycling for it to reset. If it didn’t, then the backup alarm would sound at the security center—the place that monitored all the alarm systems.
He quickly packed the doorjamb with a small amount of plastic explosives. Just enough to loosen the lock. In an instant, a poof of smoke was discharged, and the door was free. At the entrance to the vault, he checked the panel of the security door. He tripped the wire to mimic someone getting buzzed in. So far, so good. He quickly moved over to the steel-encased safe and packed the turnstile with more plastic explosive material. According to his calculations, the fuse would burn in a coil-like pattern, and the wheel would come off nice and clean. That’s what was supposed to happen.
In an instant, his world literally exploded and sent him sailing across the room, while the shriek of alarms bounced off the walls and the ceiling. His head was reverberating in sync with the pulsating sound. He was dazed. He couldn’t feel his feet. He panicked, thinking he may have blown them off. He tried to move, but the room was spinning. He was losing his focus.
The next thing he saw was a flashlight shining in his face. The next thing after that was waking up in a hospital bed, handcuffed to the railing.
He wiggled his toes, flexed his fingers. Everything was still intact. He wasn’t sure if he was happy he was still alive. The goons would be looking for him and the money. A few days later, he was taken into custody. Once he was arraigned, bail was set at 50,000 dollars. He wasn’t sure if he could raise the money. Even if he could get his hands on the funds, would he use it to get out of jail or to hand over to the sharks? The only person who could help him—and would be willing to help him—was his sister Kate. She had a soft spot for her brother.
Instead of calling his lawyer, he phoned Kate. Luckily for Darius, his sister had money in an IRA, and she was able to arrange for a cash advance on a few credit cards. After she amassed the $50k, she drove the two hours on the interstate to get to the jail where they were holding him. The two decided there was no sense in Darius getting out of jail, only for him to be beaten within an inch of his life. They opted to use the money Kate had amassed to pay off the thugs. A few months behind bars wouldn’t kill Darius.
Bank robbery was not an unusual crime. Not in the least. It had become so rampant, the FBI developed an app just in case someone witnessed or heard of a bank robbery being committed. Because it was his first offense—-at least the first one where he got caught—Darius thought they’d go easy on him. Cut a plea deal. Regrettably, that was not the intention of the new federal prosecutor. He was going to use Darius Lancaster as an example. The use of explosives in the attempted burglary was underscored. This prosecutor and his associates were going to make their mark on the legal system. And Darius Lancaster was their target. But now, he was about to turn the tables on them.
Chapter Eight
Irvington, Virginia
Nikki leaned her head out the window of their vehicle. The wind lapped at her face. She tried to remember the last time she’d felt this whimsical. Jack reached over and patted her hand.
“Enjoying the ride?”
“I feel like one of Lady’s pups when their ears are flapping in the breeze!” She turned and gave him a brilliant smile. “I am so happy you planned this getaway.” She squeezed his hand. “Out of curiosity, what made you think of doing this?”
“All the things you and I haven’t done. The hours of work you put in. And just wanting to spend some alone-time with you. Away from everything. At least far enough away.”
“Four hours is my comfort zone.” Nikki laughed.
“Yes, I made sure I was within the perimeter of your ‘comfort zone.’” He made a one-handed air quote. “We should be there in about a half hour.”
Jack was referring to The Tides Inn. It had been built in 1947 by a couple who purchased the area originally known as Ashburn Farm, nestled between a creek and the sea. It was very upscale, but with a rural ambiance. Nikki had never been to the hotel, and Jack thought it was a good blend of luxury and relaxation—and romance. He’d booked the Ashburn Suite, with a coastal view. He made reservations for dinner on the terrace at the Chesapeake Restaurant. He didn’t want Nikki to have to exert a single one of her brilliant brain cells.
Upon their arrival, the valet cheerfully opened Nikki’s door and extended his hand. She smiled and thanked him. Jack popped the trunk, and the bellman removed their bags and placed them on a luggage cart. All that was left was to walk into the lobby and pick up the key from the concierge. The décor inside was casual with a spa-like, modern feel.
“Welcome to The Tides Inn, Mr. and Mrs. Emery. My name is Anthony. Please let me know if I can be of service,” the concierge said as he handed two key cards to Jack. “Enjoy your stay.”
