Unexpected Gaines

by S L Shelton

  “Now! Lift it,” he repeated, the tension in his voice growing.

  I did as I was ordered. He saw my scars and a broad grin appeared on his face.

  “So you’re the one, huh?” he laughed. “The Boy Scout who took out Jovanovich and Popovich. Tech support, my ass.”

  “I don’t know what you’ve heard, but those were accidents,” I replied defensively.

  “Scott! Shut the hell up!” John yelled again from behind me.

  Gaines pointed his gun in the direction of our SUV, indicating he wanted me to move that way. Once beside the vehicle, he pressed his gun against John’s head and then unlocked one side of the cuffs.

  “Cuff yourselves through the wheel,” he ordered.

  John leaned across the front seat and we complied with the command.

  “You didn’t have to give me up, Captain,” Gaines accused. “It cost me my family.”

  “I didn’t give you up, Mark,” John replied sincerely as he closed the cuff around my wrist through the wheel. “I got a flagged call for an all-agencies search on the Tranum ID last week and ordered it zipped up unless there was a warrant attached. If someone gave you up, it wasn’t anyone at the Agency.”

  He paused and looked at John, measuring his statement. “You should have warned me,” he muttered finally.

  “I know that in hindsight,” John replied with a pained expression. “But you have to remember, we didn’t leave on the best terms. I didn’t know if a call from me would help you or hurt you.”

  Gaines stared at John for a second longer before he turned and walked away toward his stolen vehicle.

  “I’m sorry about your sister and her family, Mark,” John called to his back.

  “Hey, Boy Scout,” Gaines barked as he stopped and turned back toward us. “He’s not your friend. You’re a throwaway.”

  I saw the set of John’s jaw change as Gaines got back into his Bronco and sped away, tires squealing. John was embarrassed; I could tell—I just wasn’t sure if it was because he had been caught by Gaines or because Gaines had told me he wasn’t my friend.

  John reached under his shirt and down into his waistband with his free hand before extracting a small cloth pouch. He tugged on the opening with his teeth and then dumped its contents on the center console, retrieving a key from the small pile of items. He unlocked the cuffs and then got out without a word, leaving me to unlock my side of the cuffs. He went to the back of the SUV and opened the hatch.

  “What now?” I asked across the back seat.

  “You're going home,” he grunted as he pulled his bag out.

  “I’ve still got two days,” I protested.

  He reached into a side pocket of his luggage and retrieved the spare key for the Explorer as I got out and started to walk back toward him. He tossed his bag back in and marched to the driver’s side.

  “In,” he commanded.

  I stood there, staring at him.

  “Scott. Despite what he said, I had no intention of putting you in harm’s way. We’ve lost our tracking on him now anyway. No need for you to be here,” he said sincerely. “So get in the car. I’m taking you to LAX.”

  I grudgingly started to get in, but then remembered my phone. I turned and ran toward the spot where the Bronco had been parked.

  “Scott,” he yelled. “What are you doing?”

  “Getting my phone and T-shirt,” I replied without looking back.

  My phone was still there. I picked it up and checked it.

  Whew! I thought. It still worked.

  I bent to retrieve my Melvin’s T-shirt as well, and then, as I stood up, a ‘recall moment’ struck me. I froze and stared at the location the Bronco had been in.

  After a moment of virtual playback in my head, John yelled at me. “Scott. Car. Now.”

  I forced my legs to move against the ‘zone out’ I was experiencing and walked back to the SUV slowly, letting the memory roll out.

  John’s expression indicated he was in no mood for screwing around. “Get in,” he ordered.

  I did, mechanically, my mind still spooling the imagery and playing back one frame at a time. As soon as I closed the door, he backed out aggressively and sped toward the exit on the opposite side Gaines had fled through. We were on the street heading toward LAX without a word.

  My eyes closed as I continued to review the images in my head.

  I saw something. What was it? I asked myself. The gun, the newspaper it had been wrapped in, the other papers folded into the crease: a map and a brochure.

  My mind replayed the scene. It slowed down the moment and focused on the papers wrapped around the gun. My mind froze on the brochure, and I mentally zoomed in on the writing.

  Bad Hare Studios.

  I smiled to myself and then turned to John.

  “If you’ll let me stay, I’ll tell who he’s going after,” I said with a confident smirk.

  “What?” he asked incredulously. “Did he tell you his plan before he locked us up and sped away?”

  “Yes, he did,” I said, smiling.

  John raised an eyebrow as he pulled the truck over. “Okay. Spill it.” A fresh batch of agitation shaped his face.

  “Then I can stay?” I asked, verifying his intent.

  “Only until Sunday afternoon,” he said. “I made a promise…remember?”

  “No sense in me staying, then. I’d be surprised if you caught up to him before Monday.”

  “Why Monday? Enough games. What do you know?”

  “He’s after Buck Grimwall,” I said. “If he hasn’t been spooked, he’ll probably hit him during his broadcast on Monday. You’ll have the weekend to pick him up again.”

  “What makes you think that?” he asked, not doubting me but wanting my logic.

  I looked at my watch. “Buck’s show ended two hours ago,” I said. “Unless Gaines is here to follow him, my guess is he’s going to set up an automated firing system.”

  You’re getting warm, my other voice said. I ignored it, not wanting to break the momentum I had just established with John.

  “What makes you think he’s going after Grimwall?” John asked doubtfully.

  “He left Colorado Springs and came straight to Burbank, home of Bad Hare studios after making a stop to procure rockets and remote equipment,” I said, explaining my theory. “His sister was just killed by three men whose only connection to Burbank is Buck Grimwall. He’s on a crusade.”

  “Flimsy,” John muttered.

  My voice had said I was getting warm. So far, my voice had been an asset, though annoying. I had to trust I was working in the right direction.

  “Yes,” I replied firmly. “Very flimsy. Not worth a call to the police even as a passing thought. But since we’ve tracked him across the whole country and ended up here and since that is the only tie we have at the moment, don’t you think it’s worth checking out?”

  “Okay. It’s more than anything I have. Let’s work with that,” he said after a moment of thought, making me smile inwardly. “The range on those projectiles is short, so the first thing we have to do is find out where Grimwall broadcasts from and see if there are any suitable places to fire from.”

  We drove to the Bad Hare studios and parked in the garage across the street.

  “We should change,” John said.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Tourists don’t dress like G-Men,” he replied.

  I squinted one eye at him and then thought of an idea to confirm my theory.

  “No…but family visiting from out of town for a Marine award ceremony might,” I said with a grin.

  He looked at me for a moment, his mouth open, poised to say something. Then, he smiled. “Okay, son,” he said through a smirk. “Don’t go showing up your old man. It makes for awkward Thanksgivings.”

  “Yes, Pa,” I replied as we started out of the garage toward the studio.

  Once inside the building, we crossed the lobby and approached the guard desk.

  “My son and I ar
e stuck in town over the weekend and thought it would be nice if we could get a tour,” John said leaning on the counter. “We’re both huge fans of Buck’s. It would be such a thrill to see where he broadcasts from.”

  “Sorry. No tours after office hours,” the guard replied, barely interested enough to look up from his Tom Clancy novel. “Come back on Monday. When the office is open, they sometimes allow meet and greets. But it’s rare.”

  “That’s a shame,” John said in disappointment. “Like I said, we’ll only be here over the weekend. We were here for an award ceremony for my other son. He’s a Marine. He got the Silver Star this afternoon.”

  “Sorry. Can’t help you,” the guard said, unimpressed.

  “Well can you tell me what floor the studio is on?” John asked. “Maybe we can see it from outside if we know where it is.”

  “Dad,” I said, mocking his cover story. “Leave the man alone. He’s just doing his job.”

  The guard looked at me and then back at John. “Buck broadcasts from the fifth floor. He has his own studio,” he replied to John. “But your son is correct. I have to do a job, and I can’t while chatting with you.”

  “Right. Right,” John mumbled. “Sorry to be any trouble.”

  The guard rose from his chair, standing to an impressive height of about six four.

  “I’m going to have to ask you to leave now,” he announced, walking toward the door, clearly about to usher us out.

  “I think Mark said he was going to tour the studio earlier,” I said to John, and then turned to the guard. “My brother might have come in earlier. You couldn’t miss him; he would have been in Marine fatigues.”

  “Yeah,” the guard replied impatiently. “He came in during business hours, so he got a tour. Now I’m going to have to ask you to leave so I can get back to work.”

  “Would it be alright if I used your bathroom?” I asked, pointing at the restroom by the lobby.

  The guard looked at me for a second before deciding it would be okay and nodding.

  Having been granted permission, I walked behind the security desk and through the bathroom door. On my way, I glanced at the reception kiosk and noticed a stapled bundle of fire evacuation instructions taped to the inside wall of the cubicle.

  Once in the bathroom, I urinated and washed my hands before slipping my right shoe off my foot. On the way back out, I stopped at the reception desk and bent over, leaning against the cubicle and knocking the shoe on the floor as if to get a pebble or something out.

  John and the security guard looked over to see me leaning against the cubicle, putting my shoe back on. They turned back to each other without noticing my hand had slipped to the inside wall of the low cube.

  With my shoe back on, I stuffed the now-rolled packet of pages into the back of my waistband as if I were tucking in my shirt, and then straightened my jacket over them.

  “Thanks,” I said gratefully as the guard opened the door for us.

  I heard the click of the lock as we exited.

  As we walked back to the garage, I pulled out the papers I had stolen and began to go through them. John looked over and smiled.

  “Okay,” he muttered. “I’ll give you that one.”

  “Just one?” I asked.

  “Don’t get greedy,” he replied with a grin as we reached the SUV. “Let’s find something close by and set up surveillance.”

  nine

  Saturday, July 24th

  Early a.m.—Burbank, California

  John got us a hotel room outside of what he considered to be the range of the rockets Gaines had obtained. The room was at a suitable angle to view the windows on the broadcast studio from which Grimwall did his daily radio show, and the buildings were close enough to effectively shoot from.

  We had set up wireless cameras, delivered to us in a nondescript-looking cardboard box at the hotel. Within an hour, we had all the equipment up and running; a nearly 180-degree view of the buildings surrounding and facing the studio side of the building.

  John was convinced any attack Gaines would launch would be frontal. I wasn’t so sure. My biggest problem with John’s scenario was the fact that it would take a great deal of effort for Gaines to configure a launch array to fire on and kill his target using the rockets. It would be far simpler to sit on a rooftop and shoot the man with a high-powered rifle—something that would be easily attainable.

  “Windows on a broadcast studio would be thicker than regular glass,” he said to me, “with multiple layers to deaden the sound in the booth. A rifle could be his end game, but he has to blast though the windows first. The rockets, on the other hand, could all be fired at once, or in two volleys, one after another.”

  I wasn’t convinced. “It just seems like a really complex scenario for what would otherwise be a straightforward attack,” I said. “Why wouldn’t he just wait outside for Buck to show up for work and put one through his head from the roof across the street?”

  John shrugged. “He got rockets… If he had picked up a rifle in Barstow, I’d agree with you, but he picked up eight rockets.”

  Mini rockets, my other voice suddenly inserted in my ear.

  “Mini rockets,” I repeated for John’s benefit.

  He didn’t respond as he continued to watch the monitors for the wireless cameras he had set up facing various directions.

  Over the next several hours, we saw nothing of interest—in fact, we saw little activity on any of the monitors. By 2:00 a.m., my eyes had started to cross from trying to pull together other clues from the data I had on my computer.

  Shortly after 2:30 a.m., boredom and hunger finally got the best of me.

  “I need a break,” I stated. “Mind if I go down to the street and find some food?”

  “Bring back some coffee,” John replied without looking away from the monitors. “We already used up everything the hotel gave us for the room.”

  “Cool,” I replied, grabbing a handful of bills off the table. “Back in a bit.”

  “Scott,” he said as I was about to leave. “Be careful.”

  “Will do, boss,” I responded before closing the door behind me.

  Once on the street, I located a greasy-looking pizza shop next to a medical marijuana dispensary. As in other cities where marijuana was legal, entrepreneurs had long ago discovered you could make as much money on food as you could with marijuana if it was located in close proximity to the marijuana. California towns were no different.

  One could find all manner of food establishments selling overpriced munchies only feet away from dispensaries. Another benefit of selling food rather than marijuana was that there was no chance of DEA raids. As long as California considered it legal and the federal government did not, the safest way to make money on pot was to sell food next door to the pot.

  As I entered the restaurant, I wondered what John would want. I had left my phone charging in the room, so there was no way for me to call and find out. I decided he was a roast beef sandwich man.

  “Two roast beef subs, please,” I said to the cute, but tired-looking, girl behind the counter.

  She smiled weakly, punching the order into the computer.

  “Everything?” she asked.

  “Please,” I said. “I’m going to get four waters from your cooler as well.”

  She nodded and rang them up.

  While I waited for her to make my sandwiches, I took one of the waters and strolled leisurely back to the street. There I stood and drank my water as I looked around at the strange night creatures.

  Early morning on a Saturday in Burbank was interesting to observe. A number of people, dressed in their finest club attire, staggered down the sidewalk, most likely looking for breakfast or an after-party to crash.

  After a moment of people watching, I turned to go back in, but as I did, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end and a shiver rolled its way up my spine. I turned quickly to look around, but saw no immediate threat. I shrugged it off and went inside to collect my
food.

  Just as I exited the pizza and sub shop and was heading toward the small convenience store on the corner, I felt someone approaching me from the right side. I felt the gun in my ribs before it occurred to me to look.

  “Hi, Scott,” Gaines said in a friendly voice. “Let’s take a walk.”

  Thanks for the warning, I thought crossly to my other voice. I looked at him, noting he had changed into civilian clothing—black jeans, a T-shirt, and a black zip-up hoodie.

  “Hi, Mark,” I said in a similarly friendly tone. “Want a sandwich? I have enough for two.”

  “No thanks,” he replied, placing his arm across my shoulder. “I’ve eaten. But keep a firm grip on those bags.”

  In all the rush to find him and thwart his plans, it had never occurred to me to be on guard—though it should have. He had already detected our presence once and let us go—or maybe I was just a computer geek playing spy and didn’t really know what the fuck I was doing.

  “Down here,” he muttered, steering me into an alley.

  He walked me down a narrow driveway between buildings and then around a corner so he had some privacy.

  “Twice in one day,” he said. He was behind me, the barrel of his gun now pressed against the base of my skull.

  Slowly, non-threateningly, I raised my hands as I turned. When I was about halfway into my turn, I lifted my hand, gently, without sudden movement, and began to push his barrel away from my head.

  The subtle movement seemed to confuse him for a moment. He shoved me away from him and brought the barrel back in line with my face.

  Damn, that's a big gun!

  “Don’t think you know me, boy,” he barked threateningly. “You’ll end up a chalk outline.”

  “I don’t claim to know you, but I do understand what you are doing,” I claimed, trying to lower my heart rate and appear calm.

  “You don’t know shit.”

  “I know more than you think I do,” I said—maybe a mistake.

  “Yeah?” he questioned, suddenly looking at me with curiosity. “No way did John find me twice. It had to be you. Maybe I should just pop you here and change directions again.”

  “Then you wouldn’t be fixing anything. You’d just be another psycho with a gun,” I stated coldly, having to flip a coin and guess his motivation—I went with “he's bat shit crazy”.