The Story of Her Life, page 19
“That’s what I’m trying to explain to you. I had started to notice similarities in some of the claims that I was working. Simple break-ins really. No physical damage to property from the entry, but numerous high dollar items stolen. The claims would add up into the thousands easily. So, I started asking questions. It didn’t take long for word to get around that I was suspicious, and I was approached by a man. Don’t ask me his name because even after all this time I don’t know it. I had only met with him the one time in person.”
“I don’t remember hearing anything about these types of robberies a few years ago.” I state, starting to get suspicious that his facts are not adding up.
“That’s because it wasn’t here.” He says. “It was in Portland.” I need to look into that to verify his information later.
“So, you were in Portland at the time?”
“Yes.”
“Have you been involved in any of the robberies taking place here?”
“No.”
“Okay. So, you started asking questions and were approached by a man that you don’t know. What happened next?”
“I was given a burner phone. You know what that is right?”
“Yes, I do.”
“So, this guy gave me a burner phone and said that was how I was to reach him with information. He wanted me to get him contact information for businesses that had insurance with the company I worked for.”
“And did you?”
“I did.”
“Then what happened?”
“I began to get cocky. I was helping this group with the insurance claims, helping to doctor up the records to show more stolen than what really had been. Helping the business owners to get a bigger payout. The deal was, they would do the work, the businesses would get a claims payout, the group executing the robberies would get a cut, and then of course so would I. It was a huge scam with a lot of people involved. But like I said, I got cocky. I thought if I could get them more money, maybe that would mean more for me also.”
“I see.”
“I lost my job. I was arrested and charged with racketeering. I wasn’t the only one involved on the insurance side of it though. When the insurance company started investigating the large amounts of payouts these businesses were getting, the hammer came down and I was on the receiving end. But I wasn’t the only one.”
“So, what brought you all the way here then?”
“When I got arrested and fired, the group setting it all up moved on. I think it’s the same group here that was in Portland. It all fits. The robberies are the same. The lack of evidence is the same. I got caught, business owners were charged with insurance fraud. But the actual group doing the robberies was never apprehended.”
“Do you know the name or names of any others involved?”
“Unfortunately, no. But I do know that the surveillance systems in these businesses are the key.”
“Yeah, about that. I talked to the manager at Precision Security and he was not very much help. But when I dug deeper, I found that all the installations were done by different crews. But each install included a certain tech named Jerry that was at every job. Do you know anything about him?”
“No, I don’t. But it makes sense. That means that one person had access to every site as well as the security. They would have the means to be able to gain entry without getting caught if they knew how to disarm the system.”
“That’s true. Is there anything else you can tell me that might help?”
“No. That’s all I have.”
“Okay. Thank you for meeting with me.”
“No problem. Be careful okay? I don’t know the names of everyone involved. But I can tell you that they’re dangerous.”
“I will. Thank you.”
As soon as he leaves, I stop the recording app on my phone. I decide to not only store the audio file in the cloud, but I send it to my email as well. Not only my work email, but I blind copied my personal email too for just in case my work email was compromised in any way.
Chapter 21
Julie
I pull into the parking lot of my apartment after meeting with my source. He was able to confirm some of my suspicions and give me additional details about the burglaries. My mind is reeling with possibilities of how many people are involved in this crime. Jerry, the installation tech, has to be the key to the security systems. Obviously, they have another insider working on the insurance side. I make a note to look into the insurance company or companies that the businesses are dealing with. Then, there’s the businesses themselves. No wonder they didn’t feel comfortable talking to me. It’s deeper than I originally thought.
My plan is to finish up here and head back to Devan’s house. After I tell him what all I learned with my source, I’ll start researching what he said about the crimes in Portland. I can put together a good story with what I have and send the rest to the police for further investigation and hopefully put an end to all of it. Pulling up my email app, I type up a quick email to my contact at the LAPD to see if he knows what insurance companies the businesses are working with, hoping to make a connection. Especially if they’re all with the same company.
It’s getting late, already after nine when I finally get to my apartment. I open the car door to step out while sending Devan a text and letting him know that I made it, I know he worries about me and I’m anxious to get back to his house. There’s only a few things that I want to grab from here anyway. Mainly toiletries like shampoo and body wash. The ones that I have at Devan’s are almost empty and I don’t want to have to purchase more when I already have new bottles of them here that I can bring over. I walk up the steps to the building when a shiver crawls up my spine, freezing me in place. I turn around looking up and down the block for anything suspicious but there is nothing there. Turning back around, I push the door open and walk inside. The elevator is still not working so I take the stairs up to the second floor and enter my apartment.
No sooner do I close the door and begin putting the chain in place, than it bursts open suddenly, throwing me backward to the floor. The entry space is small enough that when I go down, I hit my head on the coffee table with a loud crack. I push myself up into a seated position on the floor and feel the warm wetness running down the side of my face. Without having to look, I already know that I’m bleeding, and my head is starting to hurt. My glasses fell off my face when the door hit me, and my vision is blurry. There is a figure standing in the doorway, tall in dark colored clothing. I can’t make out any facial features without my glasses, but I know it’s a man. A very large man, his silhouette nearly filling the open door.
GET UP JULIE! My inner voice screams at me. I need to get to my phone, but I had set my purse down by the door when I walked in. I start to stand at the same time the figure starts to walk into the room, leaving the door open. He reaches out and pushes me back down before I can make it to my feet. “What do you want?” I scream at him, raising my voice loud enough that hopefully one of the neighbors will hear it and come to see what is happening. The force of raising my voice at him causes my head to start pounding and I close my eyes, lifting my hand up to press against where I hit the table.
“Shut up, bitch!” He states calmly. “You wanted a story and we’re going to make sure you get it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” My voice is quieter now hoping to alleviate some of the pain in my head so I can think of what to do. How to get out of this.
“The time for games is over, lady. We know you have been snooping around, and we know who you work for. There’s too much at stake to have some little paper doll destroying everything we’ve worked so hard to build.” Paper doll. That was the term that was used on the notes. Was this goliath the one that was leaving the notes on my car?
He leaves me on the floor, walks slowly around my apartment throwing things around like he’s searching for something. As he enters my bedroom, I slowly start crawling toward the door, and the side table where my purse and phone are located. If I can get the phone, I can call 9-1-1 and get some help. I’m almost to the table when he comes storming out of the bedroom grabbing a handful of my hair and jerking back hard, sending me flying across the floor as he lets go. He kneels over me as I lay helpless on the floor and backhands me hard across the cheek. He walks over to the side table and grabs my purse, dumping its contents to the floor. Seeing my phone fall out he looks up at me, then stomps the phone with the heel of his boot smashing the screen. Then does it again for good measure to make sure that not only is it smashed, but it is irreparable, and he knows I will not be able to use it to call for help.
“You think you’re smart?” He asks while walking back across the room toward me. I cower against the wall, shielding my face with my hands, and my body by pulling my knees up to my chest. “Where is your laptop?” He asks as he kneels in front of me.
“I don’t have it.” I answer. My voice is shaking, and tears begin to roll down my cheeks.
“Bullshit!” He yells at me. “I know it’s not on your desk at work. Where is it?”
Not at my desk? How does he know it is not at my desk? Oh, my God. Is someone at the office involved? “I told you, I don’t have it!” I yell back.
“We’ll see.” He walks out into the hall and grabs a bag off the floor that he must have thrown down before bursting through the door. He stomps back toward me and I cower against the wall. I don’t know what else to do, if I get up, he’ll hit me again knocking me back down. My head is pounding making me dizzy and nauseated and I’m struggling just to keep my eyes open at this point. He sets the bag down at my feet and pulls out a roll of duct tape before looking up at me and cocking his head to the side.
“Please.” I plead with him while pushing my back into the wall behind me. There’s nowhere for me to go. He rips off a strip of tape and reaches for me, placing it over my mouth. Grabbing my ankles, he stretches my legs out in front of me. He runs the tape around my legs twice securing them together just above the ankles. Standing up, he grabs my hair again forcing me to stand, turns me around pulling my arms behind my back, and secures my wrists together with more tape. He wraps them so tight that my fingers start to tingle, and I wonder how long it takes for fingers to fall off from blood loss. Then he puts something over my head forcing me into darkness before he lifts me off the floor, throws me over his shoulder, and carries me fireman style out of the apartment. I hear screeching tires as we exit the building and then I’m thrown into a vehicle. I hear the door shut and him tell someone else to “go” before I allow the darkness to take me.
My mind comes back to me slowly, followed by pain. I blink a few times hoping to clear my vision or get an idea of where I am but it’s just dark. Then I remember there was something put over my head, keeping me in darkness. I’m still laying across a seat, I can feel the buckles of the seatbelt pushing into my back as I’m pressed against them. I have no idea how long I was unconscious and therefore no idea how far away from home we’ve travelled.
I feel my body roll forward as the vehicle comes to a stop. I hear the doors open before someone reaches in and grabs me by the waist, pulling me from the vehicle and throwing me over their shoulder. After being carried for a few minutes I am thrown to the ground hard, landing on my side and hitting my head on the floor with a breathless ‘oomph’ escaping my lips. I can hear chains as someone grabs me, sitting me up against what feels like a pipe before the chains are wrapped around my waist. It gets quiet as I can hear footsteps getting further away, all I can hear is my heart beating in my head and my ragged breathing.
My fingers have stopped tingling and are starting to go numb. I move my fingers and twist my wrists around trying to get more blood to flow through my hands while hopefully making a little more room in the tape. After sitting on the cold floor for several minutes, I hear a door in the distance. Footsteps approach and I hear someone whistle softly before stopping in front of me and ripping the cover off my head, taking what feels like a handful of hair along with it. I blink several times to adjust my eyes to the bright light behind my captor as he kneels in front of me.
“Just couldn’t stay away could you?” He says softly as he looks at me slowly from head to toe then back up to make eye contact. “I can’t have you snooping around anymore.” He holds my chin between his thumb and forefinger forcing me to look into his eyes. “You’ve been following us for a while now. I know who you write for and I can’t have you telling your stories about us in your little paper.” He grabs the duct tape covering my mouth and rips it away. My head falls forward, chin against my chest as I grimace against the pain. My lips feel like they’ve been engulfed in flames. “You have gotten too close and we have no choice but to stop it before you can tell your story. Who else knows how much you’ve gotten?”
“No one, I haven’t talked to anyone. I haven’t written anything!”
“I don’t believe you.” He says as he stands and starts pacing the room. “I don’t know how long you’ve been following us, but I intend to find out. Tell me what you have and where your files are stored.”
“I told you, I haven’t written anything. Everything was on my phone and your hoodlum already crushed that on my living room floor.” My head feels as if it’s being crushed slowly by a vice. My stomach starts to roll, and I close my eyes I force myself to take slow breaths through my nose. The entire area smells like mildew and broken promises. I listen to the footsteps of my captor pacing back and forth, mingled with steady drips of water in the distance from a long-forgotten water leak in what appears to be an old musty warehouse.
“I still don’t believe you.” He walks back toward me, kneeling and running the back of his hand across my cheek. I flinch and pull away from him turning my head to the side and squeezing my eyes closed tightly. “I’ll get it out of you one way or another.” As I look up at him with tears starting to run down my cheeks, he reaches his arm back and swings, backhanding me hard across the face, the impact causing an explosion of pain through my cheek and making my eyes water. My head jerks to the side abruptly from the force of his swing and I close my eyes tight to stop the room from spinning.
I turn my head back to face him again and spit blood in his face. “Fuck you!” I yell. He grabs my chin and squeezes tight forcing me to look him in the eyes.
“No, paper doll, fuck you.” He throws my head back hard, slamming it into the pole behind me. My eyes close slowly as my head lowers to my chest. Darkness surrounds me and everything goes quiet.
When I wake up again, I realize I have been moved. I’m no longer on the floor but sitting in a chair in the middle of a dark room that has aluminum foil covering the windows. There is no light aside from what little bit of sun creeps in through the gaps and tears in the foil. I try futilely to move my arms and legs and find that I’m still restrained. My arms are stretched behind me and I can feel that they’re still taped together at the wrist. I flex my hands and fingers a few times to keep the blood flowing through them. My legs aren’t together anymore but I can’t move them either assuming they have been taped to the legs of the chair. Looking down, I can see a chain wrapped around my waist, holding me to the chair securely. I try to rock the chair side to side and it doesn’t move. Leaning my head back, I bump it against something hard and slender. Leaning to the side, I can see in my peripheral that my chair is strapped to a support beam in the middle of the room. I’m not able to scream for a rag which has been tied around my face with a knot shoved behind my front teeth.
I stop struggling when I hear whistling from a distance. My captor enters the room, stopping just inside the doorway to take me in. “Don’t bother trying to break free, you’ll only hurt yourself worse.” He comes closer and runs his hand across my forehead to move the hair out of my face. “Such a shame. You are such a lovely little thing. What shall we do with you, paper doll?”
I can do nothing but glare at him, unsure what will happen to me if I fight. I don’t know how long I’ve already been here, if Devan is looking for me, or if he’ll even be able to find me. I am not even sure where ‘here’ is. This is all my fault. I should have listened to him. He tried to warn me, and I just laughed at him, told him I would be fine. I turn my head to the side, discretely trying to swallow the knot building in my throat. My hopes and dreams of a future with Devan are washed away in a manifestation of tears. I’m going to die here. What have I done?
“I told the boys they could have some fun. Maybe they can get some answers out of you, find out what you know or who else you’ve talked to. I am going to be leaving soon, you see, so I won’t be able to do it myself.” He moves his face closer to kiss my forehead. “Such a shame.” Unable to stop myself, realizing there’s still some fight left in me even though it may be my last stand, I head butt him right in the nose. I feel the blood splatter down my own face as his nose breaks from the force of my head. “You fucking bitch! You broke my fucking nose!” He stands so fast, grabbing his nose that I don’t see his other arm coming around. His fist connects with my face three times in quick succession before I black out again.
A sharp pain and blinding flash of light behind my eyelids has me waking suddenly. “Wake up, bitch!” I blink slowly as I right my head and see a man standing in front of me, kneeling so he’s at my level. The light is dull in this room and I’m not able to focus on his face, but he’s not the same man that was talking to me before. He stands and steps away from me and my head falls forward, unable to find the strength to hold it up straight. I see him swinging in my peripheral and suddenly I’m backhanded across the other cheek. “I said wake up!” He yells at me. “Time to answer some questions.” He pulls the gag out of my mouth and lets it hang around my neck.
I try to swallow but my tongue feels swollen and stuck to the roof of my mouth. “Who are you.” I manage to mumble out, barely understandable to myself.
“I think you know who I am.” He says as he stands a few feet in front of me with his hands on his hips. “Tell me what you know. Who else have you talked to?”
