by Jane Hinchey
I stood there, motionless in the middle of the sidewalk, feeling awkward and exposed. What if the cops arrived and thought I was a robber? What if the robbers decided to leave no witnesses and shoot me after all? I wasn’t a huge fan of either of those scenarios. The sound of screeching tires caught my attention, and I swiveled, lost my balance and staggered across the sidewalk while spotting a white van tearing down the road. It pulled up at the curb.
“Lets go!” The three bandits bolted out of the bank, pushing past and totally ignoring me as they climbed into the van and it tore off with another screech of rubber. I reached for my phone to snap the number plate. Belatedly remembering I no longer had my phone, they’d taken it with them. Instead, I tried to memorize the plates, only they were already too far away to read. In the distance I heard the wail of sirens and sure enough a cop car came hurtling around the same corner the white van had mere moments earlier. I pointed. “That way! They went that way. White van. Three men, armed.” I shouted. The officer in the passenger seat rolled down the window “Thanks ma’am, another patrol unit is on its way. Stay put.” And they were gone, tearing off after the white van.
I made my way back into the bank where the hostages were getting to their feet. Everyone rattled and talking at once. Jennifer-Judith-Jessica came rushing up to me. “Oh my goodness, Audrey, are you okay?” She slung an arm around my shoulders and led me to her workstation, practically shoving me into a chair whether or not I wanted to sit. Another police car arrived, its strobe lights reflecting in a kaleidoscope of red and blue across the interior of the bank. Officer Walsh and Sergeant Powell appeared in the doorway, guns drawn. A dozen people all sucking in their breath at the same time was the only sound. We froze, not wanting to make any sudden moves and accidentally find ourselves shot.
They swept the room then holstered their weapons before radioing in their findings and then began interviewing witnesses. Jennifer-Judith-Jessica fussed around me while I sat silently and watched Sergeant Powell interview the male staff member who’d punched in the code that let the robbers into the rear of the bank. I strained to listen, thought I heard him say he’d added an extra hash key, which was a trigger to indicate the door was being unlocked under duress.
Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a pair of black denim-clad legs stroll through the front door and my heart did a little skip in my chest. Detective Galloway made his way to the employee who’d punched in the code that simultaneously opened the door but also triggered the alarm. As he listened to the man’s story his eyes swept the bank, brushed over me, then did a classic double take. “Hold that thought.” He said to the young man.
“Audrey Fitzgerald.” I wasn’t sure if that was a greeting, or a question.
“Yes?”
His gray eyes burned into me, taking in every detail, from my worn jeans, to my Abba T-shirt, to the fact that I was being pressed into my seat by Jennifer-Judith-Jessica’s firm hand on my shoulder. I don’t know why she felt I needed to sit, but each time I’d tried to shrug off her hand she’d merely gripped harder. I figured it was easier to give in. “You’re hurt?”
Again, I wasn’t sure if it was a question or a statement, so I merely shrugged. “You know me, always getting into scrapes.”
“I’ll call an ambulance.” He was already reaching for his phone. My hand shot out, fingers wrapping around his wrist, a brief jolt of electricity shooting up my arm at the contact. “No! Please, I don’t need an ambulance. I’m fine. I’m not hurt at all, I think Jennifer-Judith-Jessica here is in shock and has deemed it necessary to keep me pinned to this chair. Seriously, I do not want or need another trip to hospital, I’m one visit away from winning a set of steak knives and a free trip to Bermuda.”
His lips twitched. “And that would be a bad thing?”
“Hello? Have you even heard of the Bermuda triangle? And seriously? Me? With steak knives? Now that’s just asking for trouble.” I had what my family liked to call the clumsy gene. I’m usually sporting a bruise from some minor altercation with an inanimate object, and if there’s a beverage to be knocked over, you could guarantee I’d be the one to do it.
Galloway held up a finger in front of my face. “How many fingers am I holding up?”
“One.” I promptly replied. Now was not the time to mention that a headache was starting to pound behind my eyes, as a result, I’m sure, of the sudden adrenaline rush that was now receding. As soon as I showed the slightest sign of weakness, I knew what would happen. He’d have me in a patrol car and up to the hospital before I could say Captain Cowboy Hot Pants. Plus, I needed to remember that I was mad at him. Just when I was softening my stance about cops, he goes and does this. And by this I mean he doesn’t ask me out on a date.
3
“Jeez, Fitz. I can’t leave you alone for one second without you getting into trouble.” Ben materialized by my side and I shot clean out of my chair, a garbled yelp that had everyone in the bank turning to look my way. I cleared my throat. “Sorry. I’m fine, really, go back to what you were doing.” I told them, tugging at the hem of my T-shirt self-consciously.
Galloway gave me a searing look, and I blinked. “What?” I said defensively, feeling a wave of heat travel up my neck and into my cheeks.
“Is there anything you want to tell me?” He asked, crossing his arms.
The corners of my mouth turned down, and I shook my head. “Nope, don’t think so.” I absolutely did not want to tell him I could talk to ghosts. He’d have me locked in the looney bin faster than I could blink.
“You’re sure?” He pressed.
I nodded. “Positive.” Then added, “any idea how long this will take? Only I have a new client that I’m meant to be meeting...” Anything to distract him from the fact that I was twitching and jumping like a raccoon on crack.
“A new client?” Galloway and Ben spoke simultaneously. I ignored Ben in favor of Galloway. “Yes. Jill Murray. Missing goldfish.”
Ben snorted, and I jerked my head to shoot him a glare. Okay. So it wasn’t a big case, in fact it probably wasn’t much of a case at all, I mean it’s highly unlikely the goldfish had gotten out of his bowl and gone for a walk, but still, Jill had phoned me in a panic and it was my duty, as a PI, to investigate. And I took my duty seriously. Although admittedly I was itching to investigate the bank robbery I was unwittingly a part of.
“Right.” Galloway nodded, then glanced at his watch. “This will take a while, I’m afraid.”
“Oh.” This would not look good, me standing up a prospective new client. I chewed my lip, thinking. I couldn’t call her, the thieves had taken my phone. Just as I had the thought Galloway shoved his phone under my nose. “Here. Use this and call them. Reschedule.”
I took the phone from him, felt the spark of heat where our fingers brushed, felt the color in my cheeks intensify and ignored Ben who was back to teasing me about my reaction. “Why don’t you just kiss him already?” Ben asked, nudging me with his elbow, which resulted in an icy blast to my ribs and internal organs.
“Quit it.” I whispered, wriggling to dispel the icy sensation.
“You say something?” Galloway asked.
“I said, thank you. Ummm. You go ahead, I’ll bring this back to you once I’m done.” I really needed him to walk away so I could talk to Ben, and not about a missing goldfish. Galloway cocked his head, seemed to have some sort of internal dialogue himself, then gave a brief nod and swiveled on his heel, returning to the young employee who’d punched in the code.
“You better make it quick.” Ben said, “he’s going to need his phone back.”
“Right.” I googled Jill Murray, found her phone number and called her, explaining that I wouldn’t be able to keep our appointment today.
“I left you a message, dear.” She told me, voice dripping in sadness. “Mr. Murray just called me to say that Kevin had died, and he’d flushed him down the toilet before he left for work. He didn’t want me to get up and see Kevin floating belly up, so he took car
e of it, only the silly man didn’t think to tell me.”
“Oh, well, that’s great. I mean, not great that Kevin is dead that’s awful and I’m sorry for your loss. But at least now you know...” I trailed off.
“Thank you, dear.” Jill sniffed and then hung up. I kept the phone to my ear and turned to look at Ben. “Where were you? I could have used you here today.”
“Yeah sorry, your rendition of the great gnome catastrophe was my undoing. I went to check on dad.”
“It wasn’t a catastrophe.” I grumbled. “It was a mystery. But never mind that now. How about you go see what’s on the other side of that door? I assume a safe? Is there anything else back there? Safety deposit boxes? I want to know what the thieves were after because once they realized the alarm had been triggered they said they didn’t get what they came for. And how did they know the alarm had been triggered?”
Ben stood and stretched. “Okay, okay, I’ll go take a look. As for the alarm, they’d probably be a light, alerting the back office staff.”
“Back office staff?”
“Yeah, the staff who aren’t out here. The Manager, for one. There’s work that has to happen in a bank that isn’t customer facing.” He glanced around. “And I’m not seeing workstations out here, just service desks, so I’d say there’s probably an office pod back there.”
“Right. Well, go look. Please. I’ve got to give this phone back—” I gasped, a thought suddenly striking me. “My phone! We can track it. I have the find my phone app installed.” Ben grinned at me giving me a knowing look like he’d already thought of that but was letting me have this little victory.
“I’d imagine almost everyone whose phone was taken has some sort of tracking app. It was a rookie move on their behalf, taking your phones.” He said, then crossed the room and walked straight through the security door. Shaking my head, I stood and carried Galloway’s phone back to him. “Thank you. Crisis averted; Kevin the goldfish has been found.” I said.
“A water burial?” Galloway asked. I nodded. “Sadly, yes. He’d died and Jill’s husband disposed of his body before leaving for work but didn’t think to tell his wife. But, I had a thought, the robbers took our phones—we can track them.” I finished in a rush, excited with my idea.
“No need. We have recovered the phones.” Galloway said, grinning at my shocked expression. “Patrol got reports of a white van dumping something in a bin down near the wharf. They recovered six mobile phones. They’re on the way back here now so the phones can be identified and returned to their owners.”
My shoulders slumped. I’d had the crazy notion that we’d be able to track the phones right into the thieves’ den. Sadly, it was not that easy. But I perked up at the thought that I’d have my phone back. “And the van?” I asked.
“No sign of it. Probably parked up in a garage or warehouse.”
“It’s my fault.” I muttered, scuffing my foot on the carpet. If only I’d gotten the number plate. But it had all happened so fast and I’d been convinced they would shoot me. I hadn’t been thinking clearly, and that worried me, because a PI needed to be thinking clearly at all times.
“What is?” Galloway paused doing whatever he was doing with his phone, one dark brow arched.
“I didn’t get their plate number. I was right there.” I pointed out the front windows. “I was in the perfect position to get their number and I didn’t.”
He crossed his arms. “Did you try?”
“Well... yeah. I reached for my phone, thinking I’d snap a photo and get the plates from that. Only I didn’t have my phone and by the time I realized that they were too far away for me to make out the plate.”
“Then that’s all that matters.” He said, “that it occurred to you to do that.”
“That’s not useful.” I grumbled, still annoyed at myself. I didn’t want platitudes or words to make me feel better. I dropped the ball, and that’s all there was to it.
Galloway sighed, “I wasn’t going to tell you this because I really don’t want you investigating this one, yet somehow I get the feeling you’re not going to be able to help yourself.”
My head snapped up. “Tell me what?”
“The plates had been removed from the van. So even if you had managed to snap a photo, it wouldn’t have made a difference.”
“How do you know that? About the plates being removed, I mean.”
“The patrol car got close enough to see.” He rested a hand on my shoulder. “But I mean it Audrey, you need to stay out of this one.”
I bristled. What? He didn’t think I was smart enough? “Why?” I demanded, ready to be outraged.
“These guys are armed and violent. Consider yourself lucky you didn’t get shot. You have had no arms training, don’t have your gun license. This one is dangerous and best left to the police.”
“Oh.” He had a point. I’d never shot a gun in my life. Despite Ben offering to teach me on several occasions I’d always shied away from them, figuring a person as clumsy as me should never be in charge of a firearm.
There was a commotion at the door and I turned to see Officer Collier walk in, plastic bag in hand, carrying our phones. Galloway dropped his hand from my shoulder and said, “wait here,” before joining him. I turned my attention to the young man who’d sounded the alarm.
“How are you holding up?” I asked him. He slid his hands into his pockets and studied his feet, mumbling “Okay, I guess.”
“It was pretty scary.” I continued. “I’ve never been involved in something like this before... have you? Do they train you for this? Because I thought you were very brave. And smart.” I added, nodding toward the keypad on the wall.
He straightened a little at the praise, his blue eyes carrying that dazed look where you can’t really believe what’s just happened.
“To be honest, I was shitting myself.” He admitted, running a hand around the back of his neck. “I was cursing that they picked me, out of all the staff out front.”
“All the staff? Isn’t it just you and Jennifer-Judith-Jessica?” I asked, glancing around the bank, my eyes landing on the female staff member who I’d been here to see. I did a quick count in my head. Two staff and four customers, including myself, had been out front during the holdup.
“Who?” He frowned, then turned to where I was looking. “You mean Susan?” Then he shrugged. “Well yeah, she’s senior to me. Man, I feel bad that I wished they’d chosen her instead of me... but it’s the truth.”
“What’s your name? I’m Audrey Fitzgerald.” I offered, holding out my hand. He shook it, his handshake weak, his fingers clammy. “Jacob Henry.”
“At least you remembered the code thing, Jacob,” I smiled, trying to put him at ease. “That saved us.”
“I’m just glad it worked.” Jacob was pale under his lightly tanned skin, his short brown hair standing up randomly where he’d run his fingers through it. I figured he was in shock and patted him on the back in what I hoped was a soothing gesture.
“Any idea what they were after?”
He snorted. “Money!” The way he said it, as if I were a simpleton, had me bristling, but then maybe he hadn’t overheard what I had, that the robbers themselves didn’t get what they came for.
“But you have safety deposit boxes here, right?” I pressed. “Did they try to access any of them?”
He looked down at me, blue eyes puzzled. “No, straight to the vault.”
“And the vault was open?”
“It was. It has a two-minute delay, but we were expecting a cash delivery so the manager opened it early so as not to waste time.” My eyebrows shot up. I bet that was a big breach of protocol. Kinda negated the entire purpose of having a time delay lock. I made a mental note to talk to Ben about it.
“What time is the delivery due?”
“It was meant to be here at nine but they called to say they’d been delayed in traffic. A six car pile-up out on the highway, so they were running late.” So the robbers had known cas
h was being delivered to the bank today and what time it was expected. What they didn’t know was that it had been delayed.
“Who else knew about this? That the bank was getting a cash delivery today?”
Jacob shrugged. “It’s not exactly a secret, but we don’t advertise the fact either. All the bank staff knew. Some customers too. We don’t need to order cash in that frequently, maybe twice a year if that.” Before he could say anything more Officer Collier approached with the plastic bag.
“Audrey. Jacob. I need you to identify your phones please.”
“We get them back, right?” I asked, “You’re not keeping them for evidence or anything?”
“You get them back. We’ve logged them. I will get you to check your call logs to double check the suspects haven’t used them to make a call or send a message—in which case, we will hold the phone.”
I searched through my phone, showed Officer Collier my call log. The phone hadn’t been used since this morning when Jill Murray had called about her missing goldfish. There was one missed call from the same number—her ringing back to say the mystery had been solved I assumed. He nodded, made a note of it and turned his attention to Jacob. Jacob’s phone was in a Star Wars case and I leaned over to get a closer look. He had a lot of outgoing calls to the same number. And I mean a lot. At least twenty this morning alone.
“Whose number is that?” Officer Collier asked, examining the call log with interest. “Did you make all these calls?”
“It’s my wife. Emily.” Jacob said defensively. I blinked in surprise. Jacob looked way too young to be married.
Officer Collier stared at him. “You always call your wife this much?”
“She didn’t pick up.” Jacob muttered, looking at his shoes. Officer Collier and I shared a knowing look. She didn’t pick up because she didn’t want to talk to him—obviously—only why keep calling? Why not leave a voicemail and get on with your day? Ah, the perils of young love.
