Illicit Intent, page 20
“The laboratory opens at 10 am.” Clara cradled the sketches wrapped in the cloth. “Shall we?”
Tox, Calliope, Steady, and Cam turned right, Clara and Ren left as they filed out of her pantry of an office. The pair passed Ambrose Teller as he emerged from the men’s room, cleaning his glasses with a square of toilet paper. Other than an absent nod, he barely acknowledged them, yet Clara felt compelled to follow his retreating form until he disappeared around a corner.
The group of men and Calliope stood outside on the brick forecourt of Schermerhorn Hall and formulated a plan.
“Nathan knows the SAC at the Art Crime Team. Special Agent Godfrey or Godson—there’s a ‘God’ in the name. He can at least give him a heads-up until we have confirmation.” Steady threw out.
Behind them, the door opened and Professor Ambrose Teller exited the building. He walked past them at a crisp gait, and a safe distance. When he was out of hearing range, Cam spoke.
“We may have a problem.”
The group waited for him to elaborate.
“There was a Professor Ambrose Teller at Oxford, a decade ago, but it’s not that guy.” Steady turned his phone to show them the photo of a distinguished black man in a three-piece suit.
Steady took off like a shot, Cam hot on his heels. A minute later they jogged back to the group. “He must have hauled ass the minute he rounded the corner.” Cam shoved his hands in the back pockets of his jeans. “We saw him pull away in a cab.”
Tox pulled Calliope into the circle of his arm. She willingly tucked herself into the nook. “That could explain why there’s still a threat.”
They moved as a unit back to the Suburban. Ren joined them, exiting the building from a side door.
“Someone wants the information you swiped from Gentrify Capital.” Cam started ticking items off on his fingers.
“The files from the flash drive are out of play. Even if they had valuable intel, the Feds have them.” Tox eliminated one option.
Cam continued, “Someone wants those fancy doodles.” He nodded back to the building they had just exited. “Am I missing anything?”
Calliope furrowed her brow, thinking, then shook her head. Tox felt her stiffen in the nook of his body and wished Chat were with them. His unique intuition would be welcome.
“Well, alrighty then.” Steady clapped once. “We know the what and the why.” He rubbed his fingers together in the universal gesture for money. “We don’t know the who or the how.”
“Or the how many,” Cam added.
Steady grinned. “Fine by me. Nathan has us assigned to a diplomat heading to a UN conference,” he pointed with two fingers between himself and Cam, “but we’ll give you every spare minute.”
“Damn straight,” Cam confirmed.
Tox pulled Calliope closer. She tucked a finger through one of his belt loops and held on.
New York City
April 29
A bouquet of shot glasses clinked above the center of the table. Cam, Steady, Tox, Ren, and Chat downed their shots as the waitress set down two platters overflowing with Buffalo wings and three large pizzas. The tabletop churned like a school of piranhas attacking prey. Without pretext, Steady placed one platter of wings in front of Tox while Cam, Ren, and Chat dove into the other. The men had discovered years ago in Tah, a small village on the Morocco-Western Sahara border—when Tox had polished off a tagine meant for the entire table, leaving almost nothing for their tribal host—that getting Tox his own order of whatever food they were sharing simplified things.
“Where’s your girlfriend?” Steady teased.
Tox reached for the hot sauce and flipped him off. “Bishop Security. She’s keeping Twitch company while she runs down some leads on possible Gentrify suspects.”
“I’ll tell you what. I would rather shit in my hand and clap than have all that money. Everybody’s after it,” Steady commented around a wing.
“Van Gent was an equal opportunity thief,” Ren noted. “Some of those clients gave him their retirement fund and nest eggs. They weren’t all these billionaire players.”
“True.” Tox tossed a bare bone onto a spare plate.
“Money is the root of all evil,” Steady added.
“That’s not the quote,” Cam chimed in. “First Timothy, Chapter six: Love of money is the root of all evil.”
“Same thing,” grumbled Steady. “People who have money love it.”
“Something’s been a real bone in my throat,” Ren commented, taking a swing from his Coors draft.
Steady and Cam handed off finished plates to the waitress and made room for the two large pizzas.
“Oh yeah? What’s that?” Cam asked.
“Someone’s after Calliope. We don’t know who, but the why we can narrow down. Three men chased her down the street while someone else broke into her home. But…that someone else also walked right by the flash drive and printed reports of client lists and transaction activity that were sitting out at the time. They also left some very expensive jewelry in her bedroom.”
“Yeah, so by process of elimination, these guys were after the art,” Steady commented.
“The guys chasing her were…what did you call them, Tox?” Ren resumed.
“Dumbshits.”
“Right. Dumbshits. They were out in the open, carrying visible weapons, leaving prints and DNA in the building where Calliope hid. Meanwhile, the fourth guy, the guy who broke into her home, picked a new, secure lock, outsmarted a rottweiler, and presumably searched the entire house without leaving a trace of evidence.”
“In other words, not a dumbshit.” Cam folded a slice of pizza and crammed half in his mouth.
Ren continued his line of thought. “We were operating on the assumption that a fourth dumbshit from the dumbshit crew broke into the house…”
Tox took it from there. “But what if it was a completely different bad guy looking for a completely different thing? The dumbshits could be after the files she recovered from Gentrify, but this other joker?”
“He wants the art.” Ren finished the thought.
“But the tube wasn’t in her home because she gave it to you.” Steady.
“And it’s now secure in the vault at Columbia,” Ren confirmed.
“So, she’s safe from one bad dude,” Cam added.
“The smart bad dude.” Steady reached for a wing.
Ren wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. “Assuming he knows she no longer has it.”
“That has to be what our mystery professor at Columbia was after today.” Steady downed a shot.
“That had to have been a disguise.” Cam took over. “The man claiming to be Ambrose Teller looked old, but he didn’t move old. You know? No old guy could get from the building where we were to the taxi he left in that fast. He rounded the corner and took off.”
The sudden realization was written all over Tox’s face.
“What’s up, hermano?”
“There was a guy…the day of the dumbshits. An older guy, a neighbor who stopped us to ask if Calliope was okay.”
“Highly suspicious so far,” Steady joked.
“Calliope asked him where he lived and he said the name of the street wrong.”
“Maybe he was just old.” Cam grabbed another slice.
“It’s what Steady said. He looked old, but he didn’t move old.”
“So this guy, did you get a name?”
“Yeah. Garfunkel.”
“Seriously?”
“That’s what he said.”
“He could be the guy who broke in. He was right there, right?”
“Our perp is one asshole with an old man costume.”
“Two old man costumes. The professor and the neighbor looked nothing alike.” Tox added.
“You know what’s funny?” Cam didn’t wait for a response. “The dude looking for the art walked right by the financial information sitting out on your chica’s dining room table. Meanwhile, the guys looking for that shit, banged on that tube while they’re threatening Calliope and sort of discover the art. That’s some irony right there.”
“Technically, that’s not irony,” Ren corrected.
“What is it then?”
“Fucked up.” Steady surmised.
“Well put.” Ren tipped his beer toward Steady in a half-toast before he continued. “Regardless, the perp, the smart perp, is after the art. And, if, as we suspect, he was at Columbia today disguised as a professor, then he knows Calliope no longer has what he’s looking for.”
“One less threat,” Cam concluded.
“What else is out there? What do they want? Did Twitch miss something on the flash drive?” Tox asked.
“No way. Plus the Feds have everything. Even a dumbshit would figure that out.” Ren insisted.
“Maybe there’s some encrypted code that didn’t transfer when Calliope made a copy of the flash drive for Twitch.” Tox was thinking out loud and was met with four faces which telegraphed, sorry but no.
“Then what? What do they want?”
“Does it matter?” Chat said absently around his pizza. “She’s a client. As always with clients, there are threats. Half the time we don’t have specifics; we simply protect the target from the threat. Assuming she’s just another client, that’s all we need to know.” He resumed eating.
There was a general grunt of agreement around the table. Tox tossed down a bone and pushed the half-full platter aside. The guys all just stared.
Steady broke the silence looking at the unfinished wings with concern. “What’s wrong?”
Tox cleaned his hands with a Wet Wipe and swallowed half his beer. These were his brothers, Cam and three of his eight-man SEAL squad. He could tell them anything. They cared like brothers, listened like mothers, and gave advice like fathers.
“She’s not just another client. This thing with Calliope has me all balled up.”
“You feel yourself slipping?” Ren asked.
“It’s not that. If anything she’s pushing the accelerator. It’s just…I like her. More than like her, and that bear in a cage in my head? I let it out, you know, in Fallujah or Kandahar, but when shit happens with her…”
“The bear wants to come out,” Ren finished.
“I like that bear,” Steady added absently, reaching for Tox’s plate of wings.
Cam nodded, “We all like that bear when it’s saving our asses.”
“Dude, there’s nothing wrong with a little bit of bear in a relationship,” Steady added.
“Bear in the bedroom,” Cam joked.
“Look at North for fuck sake.” Nathan “North” Bishop guarded his family with an irrational ferocity. Ren went on. “Your problem is you haven’t had the opportunity to see how the bear behaves around civilians. Shit, the way you were with women when we were active, you wouldn’t have had time to find the key to the cage before you were out the door.”
Cam lifted his shot glass in a fuck yeah toast.
“Excuse me, ladies. I saw you sitting here looking lonely, thought I’d buy you a round of drinks.”
Finn McIntyre stood behind Chat holding a tray full of tequila shots. The men jumped to their feet and embraced their brother, grabbing a glass as they did. Finn had been injured in an IED explosion, his movie-star looks marred on half his face by scars from burns and metal fragments. His injury and subsequent capture had birthed a rage in Finn that eclipsed the happy-go-lucky guy they once knew. These days, he rarely left a bar without leaving someone unconscious on the floor. Like Cam, Finn worked as a CIA non-official cover officer, hunting down some of the worst criminals in the world. He had a lot to be angry about.
“You guys want limes and salt?” The waitress stood at the table, eager to engage the troops.
Finn downed his shot, the damaged nerves in his scarred face allowing only half a smile. “No training wheels needed darlin’.”
Steady toasted him. “Hey Spook, what brings you by? Slow day at Langley?”
Finn held his trademark poker face as he swung a chair from a neighboring table and joined the group. “Got some leave. Thought I’d head up for a visit. Twitch knew where to find you.”
“That’s convenient timing,” Ren noted.
Finn chuckled. “Need-to-know, asshole.”
Cam smacked Finn on the back. “Just in the nick of time. Your swim buddy’s been bitten by the love bug.”
Finn gave Tox an analytical glance. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Tox spun his empty glass on the table. “Nothing. It’s nothing.”
“Uh-huh.” Finn knew his friend like he knew himself. “Relax, big man. You just haven’t fucked her yet. Hell, I’m obsessed with the redhead at the bar, but I’ll be over it before the condom hits the trash.”
“Not every redhead.” Ren chuckled under his breath.
“What’s that, Ren?” Finn challenged.
“Nothing. By all means, continue your lecture on the virtues of the hump and dump.”
“Doesn’t seem like your area of expertise, brother.” Finn snapped. “The most action you see is watching the sales girls change the clothes on department store mannequins.”
“Just because you’ve conducted more research, doesn’t mean you’ve gained more insight, Finn.” Ren held his ground.
The group sat in silence waiting to see if Ren had lit Finn’s very short fuse. Finally, Finn grabbed an unclaimed shot, downed it, and smiled. “I’ll keep experimenting. Let you know when I have a breakthrough.”
Cam laughed. “Well, the redhead looks like she’s otherwise occupied.”
Finn glanced over his shoulder to see a balding guy hovering in the redhead’s personal space. Finn waggled his empty shot glass at the waitress and indicated a round for the table. “Nah, it’s too early to leave with a chump. I’ll move in when she shuts him down.” He snagged a wing. “The second mouse gets the cheese.”
The men chuckled.
“I take it you heard about our little discovery.” Ren broke the ice.
Finn shrugged. “Feds let us know. Your stolen art popped up in another investigation.”
“What other investigation? And if you say need to know, I will lay you out. I do need to know.” Tox gave Finn his undivided attention.
“The CIA does not investigate US citizens on US soil.”
Steady rolled his eyes. “Thanks for the civics lesson.”
Finn’s navy blue gaze met his best friend’s. “A person of interest in a trafficking investigation that a colleague of mine is running also seems to be acquiring stolen art.”
“Well, that was helpful as a blind sniper. Thanks, man.” Steady rolled his eyes.
Finn tossed back another shot. “The art you found is no longer in your client’s possession, correct? No art, no danger.”
Tox scrubbed his stubbled head and nodded. Finn slapped him on the back. “Damn, bro, you got it bad.”
Tox didn’t deny it.
“You keeping your head screwed on?”
“I don’t fucking know. She makes me crazy, but sane crazy, you know?”
Steady burst out laughing. “Goddammit, Tox. Well, it’s better than crazy crazy, I guess.”
Chat joined the conversation. “Tox, before, when you had some trouble, how did you feel about those women?”
“I don’t know. I think I just thought I couldn’t be without them like if they left I’d die or something.”
“What I meant was how did it feel to be with those women, not how did it feel to be without them.”
Tox thought for a moment. “You know, I don’t remember. How fucked up is that? I was so desperate not to lose Jessica, I got slapped with a restraining order, and I can hardly remember anything about her. Wait, that’s not true. I remember she used to click her fingernails together when she was thinking. That I remember.”
“And Calliope? What does it feel like to be with her?” Chat continued.
Tox thought for a second. “You know that feeling when you can’t catch a full breath? You keep trying but you can only fill your lungs. You can’t get that last satisfying last bit of air to complete the inhale?”
Chat nodded his understanding. “She’s like that full breath.”
Chat met Tox’s eyes with a penetrating stare, then gave his shoulder a quick squeeze. “It’ll all work out the way it’s meant to, my brother.”
“Ladies, my bra strap is feeling tight. Let’s get some more shots.” Finn motioned for the waitress.
“How well do you even know this chica?” Cam asked.
“I don’t know. Pretty well.”
“Let’s test that shall we?” Steady rubbed his hands together.
The guys went around the table firing questions.
“Favorite song?”
“Nina Simone, ‘Feeling Good’.”
“How does she take her coffee?”
“She hates coffee.”
“Birthday?”
“November 7.”
“What’s she like to do for fun?”
“Yoga. She’s a freaking contortionist with that shit.”
That got a wide-eyed response from the guys, their prurient minds racing.
“Oh, here’s a good one. What color are her eyes?” Cam added, “I read somewhere that like fifty percent of men don’t know what color eyes their wife has.”
Tox stared at the table. “They’re incredible. Like this pale, pale blue, but with dark blue flecks and a dark blue ring around the outside. Sometimes the blue gets brighter…” Tox drifted for a second. When he looked up five sets of eyes were staring at him dumbfounded.
“Flecks? Did he say flecks?” Cam asked without breaking eye contact.
“What the fuck is a fleck?” Steady asked.
“He wants to fleck her.” Cam fist-bumped Ren.
“Oh, fuck off. She has really cool eyes. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Damn, bro. Might be time to let the bear out.” Cam reached for a chicken wing.
Steady grabbed his mug of beer and took a healthy swig. “You fucks are nuttier than squirrel shit if you think that’s a good idea. We’ve seen the bear. Shit, me and Finn are still breathing thanks to the bear. There’s not a woman out there who could handle Tox full throttle. Find a nice girl, maybe Calliope, maybe someone else, and save the bear for the battlefield.”
