Romeo's Town (Mike Romeo Thrillers Book 6)

by James Scott Bell

  “Yes. Can you call—”

  “You drunk?”

  “Police. Call the police.”

  “What?”

  I started limping across the street, leaving a trail of blood spots.

  The man backed up.

  When I got to Spinoza I was afraid of what I’d see, like getting to a wounded soldier on a machine-gunned battlefield.

  It was bad.

  The seats in back were ripped apart. There was a ragged hole on the driver’s side. Shards of shrapnel were embedded everywhere.

  The man was looking at me from his porch. He had his phone to his ear.

  I unlocked the trunk. I took out the first aid kit and wiped down my wound with a couple of antiseptic towelettes, then wrapped gauze around my calf and taped it.

  The man said, “I called 911.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “What happened?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said.

  “I mean, look at your car.”

  “I know,” I said.

  “Did something explode?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Like what?”

  “If you don’t mind, let’s wait for the police,” I said.

  “Sure,” he said. “Can I get you a bottle of water or something?”

  “That’d be great.”

  I sat on the curb and called Ira.

  “There’s been a little setback,” I said.

  “Oh dear,” Ira said.

  “Somebody tossed an exploding device in my car.”

  Pause.

  “When?”

  “Just now. While I was driving.”

  “Michael! Are you hurt?”

  “A rip in the leg, not too bad, but Spinoza’s in bad shape.”

  “Where are you? Can I come get you?”

  “Encino. The cops will be here soon.”

  “Who did this?”

  “I don’t know. A van was following me. But I have more than a sneaking suspicion that Adrian Hart had something to do with it.”

  “Why?”

  “He started talking in his office. He was stalling. Enough time for his assistant to get a message out to somebody.”

  “Did you get a plate on the van?”

  “It didn’t have a front plate,” I said.

  “Give me an address. I’m coming to get you.”

  I looked across the street and read the number on the house.

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Ira said.

  The man came back and handed me a bottle of water.

  “That’s very neighborly of you,” I said.

  “That’s a funny thing to say.”

  “It is?”

  “You don’t look like somebody who’d say that.”

  I opened the water and took a drink.

  “You live around here?” he said.

  “Paradise Cove,” I said.

  “You’re a long way from home.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  “You don’t seem to be worried about the police,” he said.

  “I don’t have any reason to be.”

  “Things like this don’t happen in our neighborhood,” he said. “Nearest thing was some kids shot off fireworks in the street last Fourth of July and set one of the pine trees on fire.”

  A few neighbors were out now, surveying the scene. I stayed on the curb. I was there when the black-and-white arrived a few minutes later.

  The officer who questioned me—a thirty-something man named Congreve—had an incredulous look I couldn’t blame him for. I laid it all out, described the van as best I could.

  “We’ll have the car towed to the station so forensics can have a look,” Congreve said.

  “Take good care of him,” I said.

  “Of who?”

  “My car. His name is Spinoza, and I want to save him. Treat him gently.”

  “It… he looks pretty bad.”

  “Just keep him safe until I can get him back.”

  Congreve smiled a little. “Now about your leg. You should have it looked at. We can take you—”

  “Not necessary,” I said.

  “You sure?”

  Ira’s van was coming slowly toward us.

  “I’m sure,” I said.

  I introduced Ira to the officers. He gave them his information and said I would be staying with him until further notice. He worked in some legal mumbo jumbo to protect my interests.

  Then the tow truck arrived. I got the duffel from the trunk before they hooked up Spinoza. As they drove him off I thought I saw his taillights flicker with fear and trembling.

  “Let’s get you home,” Ira said.

  “The Cove?” I said.

  “My house.”

  “I don’t want to bring trouble to your house,” I said.

  “We’ll be ready for it,” Ira said.

  Good enough for me. Truth be told, I wanted to be with Ira. He’s my rock. It’s been that way ever since that time in Nashville when I saw him, in his wheelchair, being accosted by some teen thugs. I took care of the thugs. From then on, Ira began to take care of me.

  We went to the Motel 6 where I gathered my stuff and checked out.

  On the way to Ira’s, he said, “You need a few days’ rest.”

  “We can’t afford that,” I said.

  “I’ll do the assessing.”

  “Maybe I need to get out of this place.”

  “L.A.?”

  “California. Go someplace where there’s no trouble at all.”

  “There is such a place,” Ira said.

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s not a place you can get to by a boat or a train. It’s someplace far, far away, behind the moon—”

  “All right, stop.”

  “There’s no place like home, Michael.”

  “I could become a monk,” I said.

  “It’s not in you,” Ira said. “You’re a scale balancer.”

  “A what?”

  “You have to balance the scales. It’s what drives you.”

  “I’m tired of being driven,” I said.

  “You also wouldn’t make it as a hermit,” Ira said. “Despite what you think, you need people in your life.”

  “Do I?”

  “Me,” Ira said. “You’d be a sad case if you didn’t have me around, wouldn’t you say?”

  He was right about that. But I flippantly said, “So sad.”

  “And that young man you’re helping in Paradise Cove. What’s his name? Dog something?”

  “C Dog.”

  “You’re making a positive difference there.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “What about Sophie?” Ira said.

  “Don’t ask me about her.”

  “And this DEA agent?”

  “Or about her.”

  “And then there’s—”

  “Don’t talk about anything,” I said. “Just drive.”

  At Ira’s he assessed my wound. “You’ll have a nice scar,” he said. “It’ll be like a divot on a golf course.”

  He patched it up fresh, then said, “Grab a book and go outside and read for awhile.”

  “I don’t want to read,” I said. “I don’t want to think. I’m tired of thinking. What can I do to not think?”

  “There’s always TV.”

  “Perfect,” I said. “One of those old sitcoms. How about Gilligan’s Island?”

  “I can’t allow that,” Ira said. “There is down time, and there is melt-your-brain time.”

  “A little brain melt might be nice.”

  “How about an old movie? Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, All About Eve?”

  “Dramas?”

  “Or comedy. Some Like it Hot, Duck Soup.”

  “Marx Brothers.”

  “That’s the ticket,” Ira said. “I have the DVD.”

  He set me up in his den. I sat in his recliner and got nice and comfortable. He put in the DVD of Duck Soup and said, “I’m right here if you need anythi
ng.”

  The movie started up. Intrigue in the land of Freedonia. They were expecting a new leader, one Rufus T. Firefly. Groucho, of course. He comes on scene with soldiers holding up their swords in anticipation. He joins them and holds up his cigar.

  Then Mrs. Teasdale, played by the redoubtable Margaret Dumont, spots him. “Oh, Your Excellency, we’ve been expecting you. As chairwoman of the reception committee, I extend to you the good wishes of every man, woman and child of Freedonia.”

  “Never mind that stuff,” says Groucho, spreading a deck of cards. “Take a card.”

  “Eh? What’ll I do with the card?”

  “You can keep it. I’ve got fifty-one left.”

  I smiled. A good sign. And I kept that smile as Rufus T. Firefly is introduced to a beautiful dancer, who proposes they dance together sometime.

  “I could dance with you till the cows come home,” he says. “On second thought, I’d rather dance with the cows till you come home.”

  At which point Ira said, “You may want to look at this.”

  “I’m watching the movie,” I said.

  “Michael…”

  Groaning, I got up and trundled to his living room office. He pointed at the monitor. It showed a map of the Valley. Two red dots blinked at disparate locations. A blue dot blinked and was on the move.

  “Hart,” I said.

  “He’s stopped at two locations, and is on his way to another.”

  “Now I have to think,” I said.

  “Good to have you back.” He hit a key and a box with two addresses popped up. Ira clicked on the first, and a Google street view photo appeared.

  A gas station.

  He clicked the second. The address was in the rural residential area called Box Canyon, at the west end of the San Fernando Valley. The photo showed a house of eclectic design. It may have once been an inviting Spanish hacienda, but now it was more neo-biker what with the overgrown weeds and a Harley parked in the driveway.

  I said, “Can you find out who owns the place?”

  “Give me a minute.”

  He clacked away. In under sixty seconds he found a page with the property listing, its dimensions, date of build (1964) and title holder. Someone named Paul Jenkins.

  “He bought the place in ’97,” Ira said.

  “What can we find out about him?”

  “It’s a common name. I can try some cross checks.”

  “You do that. I’m going back to Groucho.”

  Which is what I did. Rufus T. Firefly called his cabinet meeting to order. A minister says, “Your Excellency, here is the Treasury Department’s report. I hope you find it clear.”

  “Clear?” says Firefly. “Why a four-year-old child could understand this report.” He leans over to his secretary and mutters, “Run out and find me a four-year-old child, I can’t make head or tail out of it.”

  It struck me that this could very well be mistaken as a documentary about California politics.

  “It’s a rental,” Ira said.

  I went back to the office. “This is no way for me to watch—”

  “Paul Jenkins is the owner, but the place is a rental. It’s been that for a long time.”

  “Wait a second,” I said. “Go to the street view again.”

  Ira returned to the photo of the house in Box Canyon.

  “Click on the timeline,” I said.

  Ira put the cursor on the little clock icon, and brought up the street view timeline. The photo we were looking at had been taken five months ago.

  “Click on the one before that,” I said.

  He did. It was taken over a year earlier.

  “How about that?” I said. The photo showed the house, only this time a blue van with tinted windows was in the driveway.

  “Is that the van?” Ira said.

  “It has to be. And now we have a Hart connection.”

  “Good,” Ira said.

  “Let’s see where Mr. Hart is now.”

  Ira went back to the GPS map. The blue dot was heading south, nearing Ventura Boulevard in the Studio City area.

  “How about Tibet?” I said.

  “Hm?” Ira said.

  “I could move to Tibet and become a holy man. People can come to me and ask for the secret to life.”

  “And what will you tell them?”

  “I’ll think of something,” I said.

  “Stay with me,” Ira said. “You’ll do less damage.”

  We watched the dot. It crossed Ventura and proceeded up a street, took a turn.

  And stopped.

  We waited until that dot turned red.

  “Let’s have a look,” Ira said.

  He brought up the street view.

  “I know that house,” I said. “It’s where Bianca Aiken lives.”

  “Remind me.”

  “She’s the girl who broke up with Clint and goes around with Gavin McGuane now. I started talking to her, then her father showed up. He got a little pushy.”

  “So what might be his connection with Hart?”

  “Can you get the title?”

  “Sure.”

  Ira brought up the property listing.

  “It was bought five years ago,” Ira said. “The name on the title is Timothy Aiken.”

  “Why don’t we drive out there and have a meet up with them?”

  “Uh-uh,” Ira said. “We don’t have enough connective tissue yet.”

  “Then let’s deep dive,” I said.

  Which is done through Ira and his self-designed search engine. With a few keystrokes we had some pages about Timothy Aiken.

  A LinkedIn profile was on top. It listed Timothy Aiken as a “serial entrepreneur and private equity investor with expertise in digital commerce, digital currency, crypto currency, entertainment media and telecommunications industry experience.”

  “Crypto currency,” I said. “Media. Not exactly sure bets for a serial entrepreneur.”

  “Let’s have a look at his entertainment presence.”

  Ira clacked over to IMDb, the Internet Movie Database, and typed “Timothy Aiken” in the search box.

  No results found for “timothy aiken”

  “Well,” I said, “at least he talks a good game.”

  “Let’s see what else we can find,” Ira said, and started finding.

  I sat and watched the master at work. After sixty seconds or so he said, “Looks like he went to high school out in the Valley. Reseda High. Here’s a yearbook photo.”

  Indeed, there it was. A senior photo of a young, unsmiling Timothy Aiken.

  “The whole yearbook is online,” Ira said. “You want to flip through it?”

  “And see if he was in Chess Club?”

  “Michael, our currency is information. Every bit helps.”

  “Let’s roll,” I said.

  We flipped the pages and found Timothy Aiken on the baseball team.

  And the History Club. This was a group photo, with six students and a teacher wearing costumes. A girl was decked out like Marie Antoinette. One of the boys was a cowboy. The teacher wore a white wig and blue uniform, a la George Washington.

  Our boy Timothy was dressed in an Army uniform of World War II vintage.

  “You thinking what I’m thinking?” Ira said.

  “Military fan,” I said.

  “This yearbook came out half a year after the 9/11 attack.”

  “Can we find out if he enlisted?”

  “Military service records are kept at the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, and are private.”

  “What about FOIA?”

  “Yes, the Freedom of Information Act applies. Limited access, though, unless approved by next of kin.”

  “Can we get anything?” I said.

  “If he served, we can get his final duty status, assignments, decorations, things like that.”

  “How long does it take?”

  “You have to submit a request, in writing. Of course…”

  “Go on,” I
said.

  “I can make another request, to one of my contacts in intelligence.”

  “It’s helpful to have a network,” I said.

  “You have no idea,” he said. “Go finish your movie.”

  That’s what I did. Freedonia wins its war with Sylvania, and the Marx Brothers pelt the villain Trentino with fruit. Mrs. Teasdale begins singing the Freedonia National Anthem, in her bellows-like voice, and the boy begins pelting her with the fruit.

  The End.

  And I was refreshed, ready to put Groucho Marx in charge of the city. My leg divot was sore and itchy but I was in otherwise fine shape.

  Ira called me in. He’d prepared some tea and insisted I take a cup.

  “A calming tea,” Ira said.

  “I am most serene,” I said.

  “There are things you are most of,” Ira said. “Serene is not one of them.”

  “Say that to me again and I’ll tear this office apart.”

  “Sit,” he said.

  He showed me the monitor. “Timothy Aiken’s service record.”

  A form on the screen showed several boxes.

  The first showed service in Iraq and Afghanistan.

  The second listed a Good Conduct Medal.

  The third was the most interesting: Qualified Sharpshooter, M24.

  “That’s our shooter,” I said.

  “Circumstantial evidence,” Ira said.

  “Strong circumstantial evidence,” I said. “Let’s confront him with it.”

  “Easy. We form a theory of the case first, then build on it.”

  I got up. Went to the window. Looked out. The day was overcast. Like me, the city needed clarity. We both needed light.

  Ira was working the keyboard again when something flashed in my brain.

  “T,” I said.

  “You want more tea?” Ira said.

  I turned around. “The letter T. Timothy. The letter B, Bianca. What if the T and B in Clint’s drawing was for them?”

  Ira swiveled around. “Could be.”

  “There’s your theory of the case,” I said. “Bianca is involved in selling cheating materials at Elias. What if she was also a moving part in the drug traffic? Daddy running the show, with enforcement help from Adrian Hart.”

  “It’s a good theory. Now we need evidence.”

  “Let’s have a look inside Aiken’s house,” I said.

  “And how are you going to do that?” Ira said.

  “Let myself in,” I said.

  Ira rubbed the bridge of his nose.

  “After all,” I said, “that’s not a crime.”