Head Games

by Thomas B Cavanagh

  “I need to check some activity on a credit card and bank account.”

  There was a long pause.

  “You got a problem with one of the ex-wives?” Jim said.

  “No. They’re both cool. This is somebody else.”

  “Anyone I know?”

  “I doubt it,” I said. “Some freelance work I picked up.”

  “Do I want the details?”

  “Probably not. It’s nothin’ shady. At least I don’t think so. That’s one of the reasons I want the accounts checked.”

  “And what’s keepin’ you from goin’ down to the credit bureau your own damn self?”

  “You mean besides the fact that I’d have to forge a consent signature? And that happens to be against the law?”

  Jim snorted, knowing as well as I did that nobody ever checked those signatures. People ran unauthorized credit checks every day.

  “Yeah,” he said, “’sides that.”

  “Well, I can’t afford the five grand if I get caught. But, mostly, I’m afraid the name on the account might get recognized. I’m trying to avoid attention.”

  “Oh, yeah? This somebody famous?”

  “Yeah. With a certain crowd.”

  “Who is it?”

  “TJ Sommerset.”

  “Never heard a him.”

  “It ain’t your crowd. I figured that if the check came through the department, it had a better chance of staying quiet.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” Jim said. “Say I do this, what’re you gonna do with the info?”

  “Try to figure out where the guy is. He’s a runner and I’ve been asked to find him.”

  “And suppose I give you this info and you do find him. Then you pass that along to whoever asked you. Any chance the runner winds up with a toe tag?”

  “Nothin’ like that. This is straight up. I wouldn’t take a job like that.”

  “You could be gettin’ played.”

  “No chance,” I said. “This is clean.”

  “Parents looking for a runaway?”

  “Not exactly, but you’re in the neighborhood.”

  “Y’know,” Jim said, “last time I checked, you didn’t have no PI license.”

  “This is kinda under the radar.”

  I could tell Jim liked that. “Okay, James Bond, gimme the numbers.”

  I read him the credit-card and bank-account numbers, along with the other particulars he needed. Name, address. Jim said he’d see what he could do and would get back to me.

  “This gonna put you in a spot?” I asked, knowing that every credit check shows up in a management report. Jim could get asked some uncomfortable questions if he got caught running a check on someone not part of an active investigation.

  “I got a few favors owed me,” he said. “Let’s just say you’re lucky you have cancer or I’d probably tell you to go jump in a gator pond.”

  “You’re the best, Jimbo.”

  “Ass-kissin’ don’t suit you.”

  “So,” I said, “what’s your sister’s number?”

  “I wouldn’t wish that on either one of you,” he said, and promptly hung up.

  I drained the coffee and gathered up the file. As I stepped outside, I glanced down the row of cars and saw that the blue Mustang was gone. In another minute, I was in my truck and pulling out of the parking lot. I made a quick stop at Home Depot for a couple of things, then swung into Publix to pick up a rotisserie chicken for dinner.

  Three blocks later I spotted it, trailing two car lengths behind me. I kept going, my eyes flicking up to the rearview every few seconds to see if it was still back there. It was. I changed lanes, and a few seconds later the Mustang followed. Without signaling, I abruptly turned right at a Vietnamese restaurant and watched the Mustang make the same reckless move.

  I learned two things: one, I was definitely being followed, probably by an amateur; and two, there was only one tail on me. If I were being tracked by a pro, he wouldn’t have pulled an obvious move like that turn. If I hadn’t made him before, that decision would’ve put a big red flag on top of his car. Likewise, if I were being tracked by a team, the Mustang would’ve never followed me like that. It would’ve kept going and I’d have been picked up by another of the team’s unknown number of surveillance vehicles, trackers peeling off and on seamlessly to avoid detection.

  I decided to stick to my original plans and headed home. I wondered how far the tracker would go. Would he follow me into my apartment parking lot? Would there be a confrontation? Who was this dude?

  I parked in front of my building and debated whether I should make a move. Doing so would eliminate whatever advantage I might have by knowing I was being followed. I decided that, unless confronted by the tracker, I’d play along until I could figure out who was on my tail. Or why.

  I went upstairs and, from my living room window, watched the Mustang pull into my parking lot. It circled my building three times before it turned back onto the road and drove off. I squinted and strained, but couldn’t get a read on the license tag. I didn’t own a pair of binoculars. Never needed them until now.

  I picked up the phone to call George. If that A-hole Eli had someone on my tail, I was going to be pissed. There would only be two reasons. Either Eli wanted to use me to find TJ’s trail and then have his own man locate him to avoid paying me the big check, or he didn’t trust me. Whichever, I didn’t want anything to do with it. My medical condition afforded me the luxury to piss away a quarter-million-dollar opportunity without regret.

  If it wasn’t Eli who was behind the tail, then I had no other ideas. Things could get interesting.

  However, before I could dial, there was a loud knock on my front door. I dropped the phone and crouched down. Every time the Mustang circled, it was out of view for several minutes. Plenty of time for a hidden passenger to slip out.

  I removed my nine-millimeter Glock from the holster in my nightstand and made my way slowly to the front door. I peeked through the peephole but saw no one there. I backed around the side of the entry and stood in the archway to the kitchen, pistol raised.

  “Who is it?” I ordered.

  The answer that came back filled me with both relief and apprehension.

  CHAPTER 7

  “It’s me!” came the voice through the door. Female. Annoyed.

  Jennifer.

  I opened the door and saw her in her green FOOD COURT shirt, name badge pinned to the front.

  “I forgot my key at Cam’s,” she said, stepping in.

  “You okay?” I asked, looking past her at the outdoor stairway that led down to the parking lot.

  “Yeah,” she said with equal amounts of annoyance and confusion.

  “You alone?”

  “Yeah … Jesus!” she yelped when she saw the gun in my hand.

  “It’s okay,” I said, closing and locking the door.

  “What the hell?”

  “Nothin’,” I said. “How’d you get home?”

  “Gwen drove me.”

  “What kind of car does Gwen drive?”

  “What’s going on?”

  “Nothin’. It’s okay. What kind of car?”

  “A Sentra. You’re freaking me out.”

  “Sorry. I’ll put this away.” I disappeared into the bedroom and replaced the Glock into the holster. I made a mental note to start carrying it, concealed, until I knew who my new friend in the Mustang was.

  “Why did you have your gun?” Jennifer said when I returned to the living room.

  “Paranoia. If you’re a cop long enough, you get a little jumpy.”

  “Looks like you got out just in time.”

  “Not soon enough,” I said.

  Oddly enough, the tension created by greeting her armed completely dissipated the tension I’d expected when she returned. My ill-advised foray into her room was suddenly far less important than whether I was going to shoot somebody.

  “I got a chicken for dinner,” I said.

  “Okay.”
/>   I boiled some carrots and threw a couple of potatoes in the microwave. Although still a little awkward, dinner was almost pleasant. We made small talk, mostly about her job at the mall. A couple of times I almost apologized for poking through her purse. But the timing never seemed right and I didn’t want to snap the thin line of civility we were balancing on.

  “Listen,” I said, “I got this today.” I opened the Home Depot bag and pulled out a door dead-bolt kit encased in plastic. “It’s for your room. It’s got two keys and they’re both yours.”

  She took the kit and studied it. I couldn’t read her face but I almost detected a slight nod.

  “I didn’t want to open it before you got home,” I said, “so you could see I didn’t copy the keys. I was gonna install it tonight, unless you want to get it rekeyed.”

  “No, that’s okay.”

  “Then I’ll put it in tonight.” It didn’t look hard to install and I certainly had the tools for it. My tool kit was one of my most prized possessions. It had come with me after I’d been kicked out of the only two houses I had ever owned, and it had survived the sticky fingers of lawyers through both divorces. The longest relationship I’ve ever had has been with my cordless Makita drill.

  “I’ll get the dishes,” Jennifer said.

  I nodded. If the dead bolt was my lame attempt at an apology, then washing the dishes was her acceptance of it. We were speaking in Garrity code, but at least we were communicating.

  I helped with the dishes. When we were done, I found my shoulder case and dug around in it.

  “I have something else for you,” I said.

  Jennifer looked skeptical, but remained silent. I found the CD of the new Boyz Klub album that George had given me and handed it to her. It took a moment for it to register. But then it clicked and her eyes widened.

  “Oh. My. God.” She looked at the back of the jewel case and then up at me. “Do you realize what this is?”

  “Yeah. The new Boyz Klub album.”

  “This isn’t even available yet. You can’t even buy it until next week.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh. My. God. How did you get this?”

  “I know a guy.”

  “A guy? What guy?”

  “A guy. I used to work with him.”

  “I can’t believe this. I just—I can’t believe this.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “I gotta call Gwen. She’s gonna die. I mean, she’s gonna die.”

  Her eyes still boring into the CD case, holding it with both hands, Jennifer started toward her room. After a step she stopped and turned back.

  “This is really cool,” she said. “Thanks.”

  With a smile on my face, I headed for the Makita.

  * * *

  “All right, G. Who’s this runner, really?”

  Big Jim Dupree sat across from me in a downtown coffee shop positioned in the shadow of the SunTrust skyscraper. He had a hand the size of a dinner plate resting on a sealed manila envelope.

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I had a hard time watching Jim take manly bites of a blueberry muffin, crumbs sprinkling onto the table. I’d discovered, to my dismay, that the antiseizure meds made me nauseous. Plus, Bob had the skull jackhammer going full speed this morning.

  Normally, given how I felt, I would never have agreed to meet Jim for coffee like this. But he’d called early this morning and told me he had the info I was looking for. If I wanted it, I needed to get it in person.

  “Garrity?” he said, after I failed to respond for a moment. “You okay?”

  I opened my eyes. “Yeah,” I said, and felt the wave of nausea subside.

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah.” I stirred my black coffee. I nodded at the envelope. “What did you find?”

  “Who’s the runner?”

  “Just a kid.”

  “A damn rich kid. Who?”

  “Like I said before, his name’s TJ Sommerset. He’s in a band called Boyz Klub. One of those all-boy deals from Global Talent.”

  Jim nodded. “George Neuheisel.”

  “He hooked me up. Asked me to find the kid before their upcoming tour started. He kinda went AWOL.”

  Jim opened his mouth and inserted the remaining two-thirds of the muffin. A couple of chews and it was history. He slid the envelope across the table at me.

  “Don’t know if this is gonna help or not,” Jim said.

  “What’s the quick and dirty?”

  Jim shrugged. “Boy’s got a fifty-grand limit on the credit card, but there’s been no activity—at all—in the last two weeks. Before that, goin’ back a ways, mostly furniture and big-screen TVs and shit. A computer, too.”

  I thought about the furnishings at Arlene Sommerset’s Isleworth mansion. TJ not only bought her the house, but filled it up, as well.

  “What about the bank account?” I asked.

  “That’s the interestin’ part. Dude’s got almost seven hundred grand in the bank. ’Bout a week and a half ago, he withdraws almost a half a mil. Cash.”

  I let out a low whistle.

  “Damn right,” said Jim. “Dude can get himself pretty good and gone with that kinda coin.”

  “He took off once before. Nothing in there that might tell me where he went?”

  Jim shook his head. “Like I said, don’t know if this is gonna help or not. But it was fun reading.” Jim drained his cup of coffee. “You say he’s a kid?”

  “Twenty-two. Worth maybe ten million from the first album, with a new one about to be released.”

  “Ten million. Damn. Maybe I should call Georgie. I got a good voice. Sing every week in the church choir.”

  “You don’t exactly have the look Global goes for.”

  “What’re you sayin’? My tan’s too dark?”

  “I wasn’t thinkin’ that. But, now that you say it, all their bands do seem pretty pale. No, I was thinkin’ more about your, uh … Face it, man, you weigh more than all four of those Boyz Klub kids combined. My advice: keep the day job.”

  Jim shot me a mock-angry look and a knowing smile. “I’m still saving your desk, G. Place ain’t the same without you.”

  “Please. Don’t waste your time.”

  “Ain’t no waste of time to sit on it while I’m working. Gotta sit anyway.”

  “Then don’t waste your ass. I’m sure you could put it to much better use.”

  “Doubtful, bro,” said Jim. “Doubtful.”

  * * *

  It was a reception area, but a far cry from the reception area of Global Talent. A couple of secondhand chairs sat along a hand-painted wall decorated with appliqué stickers of local theme-park characters. One-half of the room was filled with kid-oriented paraphernalia: tiny chairs, plastic bins of toys, puzzles, dolls, and a small TV with an older Sony PlayStation attached.

  The suite looked like it had once been a doctor’s office, complete with sliding-glass window at the receptionist’s desk. The window slid open and a sandy-haired guy in his late twenties poked out.

  “Mr. Garrity?” he said. “Marian said she’ll be right with you. You want a soda or something?”

  “No thanks,” I said, and returned to the seven-month-old Ladies’ Home Journal in my lap. The day was getting better. Although not exactly what I’d hoped for, the information Big Jim had provided had been helpful. My nausea of earlier in the morning seemed to have subsided, and Bob’s famous “brain pain” had been reduced from a piercing stab to a dull ache. And, as a bonus, I was now learning all about Celine Dion’s brave battle with infertility.

  A few minutes later a door opened.

  “Mr. Garrity?” It was Marian Cooksey, executive director of Journeys of Hope. She was late fifties, early sixties, African-American, and short—maybe five foot three—but seemed taller in her bearing and heels. Her demeanor was businesslike, but unhurried, and after two seconds with her I had no doubt that she was in charge.

  “Mike,” I said, shaking her hand.

 
“You mentioned that this was about TJ?”

  “Yeah. I’m from Global Talent and I just have a few questions.”

  She offered a genuine smile. “Of course. We can talk in my office.”

  She led me through the adjoining hallway, past photos of kids posing with theme-park characters: Mickey Mouse, SpongeBob, Goofy, Shamu. I saw a couple of shots of young girls standing with TJ.

  Journeys of Hope arranged free Orlando theme-park vacations for terminally ill children and their families. Creating memories to last a lifetime, however long that might be. It wasn’t lost on me that the kids in the pictures were probably all now dead.

  We walked by several small offices where young workers talked on phones. Sitting in one office, chatting with a worker, were two adults and a young girl with a completely bald head. My hand involuntarily touched my biopsy scar.

  This visit was definitely a long shot, but besides the few financial records, the letter from Journeys of Hope was the only real lead I’d found in TJ’s apartment. Marian Cooksey led me into her office, a cramped but cozy space filled with inexpensive furniture. She cleared some papers from a chair and I sat. She left the door open and sat next to me in the other guest chair, one leg crossed precisely over the other.

  “So TJ’s finally changed his mind?” she said.

  “Pardon?”

  “I assume that’s why you’re here. I’ve been telling him for ages that he should be more open about his charity work. He would set such a positive example, and honestly, the publicity wouldn’t hurt our fund-raising.”

  “He never wanted the publicity?”

  She shook her head. “He said that wasn’t why he was doing it. It wasn’t about him. You should make that very clear in whatever promotion you intend to do. He was very sincere. To him, it’s only about the kids.”

  “Can you describe his involvement with Journeys of Hope?”

  “It started when one of our kids asked to meet him. She was a fan. As soon as he learned about us and what we did, he became actively involved. He made himself available whenever a client asked to meet him. I recall one time when he flew back on a red-eye from Los Angeles in the middle of shooting a music video, just to spend an hour with one of our kids. Then he was back on a plane by lunchtime. He probably didn’t sleep for three days.”