Wake Me When It's Over

by Cheryl A Head

  “Okay, you first,” Charlie challenged.

  “I know that Lin Fong works for you. I think that’s a very smart tactic, embedding him within Spectrum. But you better let me look out for him if you want to keep him out of harm’s way.”

  “The new cameras require us to make some adjustments,” Kwong said into the mouthpiece of his secure burn phone. His technicians had just completed the nightly electronic sweep of his five-star hotel suite, but he didn’t dare use the room phone. “We’ve already taken care of that. We have an alternative space in a warehouse, and our people will work from there.”

  Kwong hated having to go through the Chicago handlers to receive orders, but it wasn’t practical to convene the committee for minor operational decisions. Despite the death of Chenglei and the increased scrutiny that had followed, the work was going well. His technicians had already procured vital information through the computer networks of two General Motors contractors, and his people thought the breach had not yet been discovered. This was a strange new business for Kwong, but the experience of moving people, equipment, and information in the army of the People’s Republic of China had prepared him for the work. The difference: His soldiers were called hackers and were armed with laptops and hard drives, rather than guns.

  Kwong picked at the room-service salad. The greens were crisp and the tuna tartare well prepared, but he had little appetite. He sipped at his scotch and stared at the manila folder on the desk. The report inside was disappointing but not unexpected.

  Kwong had ordered a surveillance of Geoff Heinrich a few months ago after Amy Wu’s tearful account of his sexual advances toward her. Kwong suspected him of being a sadistic manipulator of women, and the report confirmed that Heinrich used his townhouse like a brothel, with an array of women visitors of all ages, races, sizes, and some with unusual attributes.

  “The woman in the wheelchair, he has been with her before?” Kwong directed his question to the man perched on the edge of the side chair.

  “Yes. She arrives in a van. A helper takes her to the garage door and Heinrich wheels her into the house. The driver and the helper wait in the van, one time almost two hours. She’s been there at least three times,” the operative said, reviewing his notebook.

  “Have you been able to see into the house?”

  “I was able to place a small camera outside a side window, but there was no time to test it, and it has failed. It hasn’t been easy to return because I must enter a neighbor’s yard to get to the rear of his house.”

  The hired man sweated, and his head bobbed up and down to avoid prolonged eye contact with Kwong. “One of his frequent visitors is a man dressed as a woman,” the man said revealing his contempt. “Should I continue my surveillance, sir?”

  “No. I don’t think so. Do you have the pictures?”

  “I have them on a CD. Should I leave it?”

  “Yes.”

  Kwong placed the disc in his laptop and double-clicked the icon. He watched an edited version of arrivals to and departures from Heinrich’s small corner house. The youngest woman looked like a girl really, maybe seventeen. The oldest, a stylish woman wearing a full-length fur coat, appeared to be in her late fifties. The woman in the wheelchair arrived four times. When she arrived her head was uncovered, but when she departed she wore a scarf. The transgender woman always arrived on foot, wearing heavy makeup and a flamboyantly coiffed blond wig. Even in the long-distance footage, her Adam’s apple was prominent. There were four other women on the tape, and Kwong half expected to see Amy. The last scene on the tape was of a woman he had seen with the Mack investigators.

  He ejected the CD, and poured a large scotch. He stretched out on the sofa. This furniture is too soft. No wonder Americans are undisciplined and lazy. He had taken to sleeping in the sitting room. The bed was too large, empty, and only made him more homesick. Before long the drink and his empty stomach made him pass out. The glass fell from his outstretched hand with a dull thud, and the diluted liquor seeped into the expensive carpet.

  Charlie sat with Scott Hartwell and Cynthia Fitzgerald in a booth in a Rochester Hills bar, with a line of sight to the front door. They each had two fingers of Glenlivet, a pitcher of water, and a small ice bucket; the remainder of the bottle took up the center of the table. The bar was exclusive and far enough from downtown to minimize chance encounters with Cobo staff, auto show exhibitors, or Spectrum personnel.

  Cynthia had joined Spectrum a few weeks after the company received the prestigious North American International Auto Show security contract. She had impeccable credentials as a project manager for the defense and auto manufacturing industries, and had managed university research contracts. Geoff Heinrich hired her after two interviews. He liked her obvious intelligence, understanding of hierarchy, her political connections, and her pewter gray eyes.

  In the ensuing months, Cynthia had fended off Heinrich’s occasional advances, and gained his confidence by providing various tidbits of information about DADA, staffers at Cobo, and her former auto industry clients. Much of that information had been fed to her by Hartwell who, Charlie had learned twenty minutes ago, was married to Cynthia’s mother.

  “So you already had doubts about Heinrich?” Charlie whispered even though the nearest diners were several booths away.

  “There were too many red flags,” Hartwell said.

  “Like what?”

  “Off-the-calendar meetings, being too cozy with the Chinese, ignoring protocols,” Cynthia offered.

  Charlie directed her attention to Hartwell. “And that’s why you put Cynthia in place. And why you brought me and my team in at the last minute, because you don’t trust your own man.”

  “We had doubts about him soon after we gave him the contract, but didn’t know how to proceed,” Hartwell said.

  “Why not just fire him?”

  “We’d made a huge investment in Spectrum, and we didn’t have evidence of anything he’d done.”

  “Do you believe he’s involved in the threat to Cobo?”

  “I really don’t know, Ms. Mack.”

  Charlie was annoyed. She curled her fingers around the sweating scotch glass, and scowled first at Hartwell, then at Cynthia, who took a long sip of her scotch. Charlie didn’t like being manipulated. In a case she’d had last year, an undercover FBI agent’s interference had put her at a disadvantage. She felt the same kind of duplicity at work now.

  “This is more than a hindrance to the investigation, Mr. Hartwell. Heinrich already resents our being around, and if he thinks we’re getting close to something, we’ll be at the top of his list of problems. This could be the scotch talking, but I’m trying to figure out why my team and I shouldn’t just walk away from this job.”

  Hartwell flipped to high-anxiety status. “Ms. Mack you can’t . . .”

  “I’ve lost a colleague on this case. The show opens in a few days, and we’re still tiptoeing around each other. Either you trust me or you don’t. We’re all in, or you can go it alone.”

  “She’s right, Scott,” Cynthia said in a tone she’d used before to bring her stepfather around to her point of view.

  Hartwell put up his hands in resignation. “I know. I know. But we’re neophytes in this kind of thing. We sell cars. We’re way out of our depth.”

  “Charlie, there’s more. Because Heinrich was giving so much attention to Guí Motors, we recruited a person on the inside of their operation to provide information.”

  “Let me guess,” Charlie said, the irritation rising in her throat. “The receptionist?”

  “Right. Amy Wu.”

  “She struck me as a smart girl. Observant, discreet. I assumed she was loyal to Mr. Kwong.”

  “Yes. But also to me,” Cynthia said. “Look, Charlie, we do trust you. You can have complete control. And you’ll have me, Lin, and Amy to help with Heinrich.”

  “And Mandy Porter,” Charlie added.

  “Oh, so that’s what it’s all about,” Cynthia said.

&n
bsp; “Who’s Mandy Porter?” Hartwell’s eyes darted between the two women.

  “Just another spider weaving a trap for your security chief,” Charlie said, draining her glass. “All right, we’ll stay. But from here on out, I’m calling the shots.”

  Cynthia lifted her glass in a salute. A still-conflicted Hartwell nodded his agreement.

  “I promise you this, Mr. Hartwell: We’ll make it as hard as possible for anyone to do harm to your show. We’re clearer than ever about the seriousness of the risks, and we understand what’s at stake for the city.”

  Charlie retrieved a pen and a package of orange Post-it notes from her leather tote. “Let’s talk about Kwong and Heinrich. If they’re involved in any harm toward Cobo, I’m sure they’re just middlemen.”

  Cynthia slowly shook her head. “Maybe Kwong. I’m not so sure about Heinrich.”

  “The guy likes to strut, but my gut tells me he’s not a mastermind.”

  Cynthia pointed to Charlie’s colored sticky notes. “That’s some high-tech system you got there.”

  “It ain’t retina scanning, but it gets the job done,” Charlie said with a confident smile. “By the way, I heard from Lin today that he spotted Heinrich and an odd fellow at the lounge in my condo building. He described the guy as looking like a skinhead.”

  “That might be Dudiyn,” Cynthia offered.

  “You think it’s a coincidence that Heinrich was in your building?” Hartwell asked.

  “To tell you the truth, I didn’t consider it strange. A lot of people go to that lounge because it’s close to downtown, but still sort of out of the way, you know?”

  “Considering the secret meeting we’re now having, yes, I get your meaning,” Hartwell said.

  “We should probably try to get a tap on Dudiyn and Heinrich’s phones,” Charlie said, writing.

  “Dudiyn’s a contractor. He’s mostly off-site, and Heinrich is the only one with a number for him,” Cynthia said.

  “What about Heinrich?”

  “That’ll be tricky, too. He has a mobile number for work, but he has another, private, mobile phone. I don’t have that number either.”

  Hartwell loosened his tie and removed his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose. He was beginning to lose focus. He looked at his watch and signaled for the bill. He signed an open-ended tab.

  “I should leave. I’ve reached a point of diminishing returns. If you want anything else just order it. Are you going back to the office, or home?” His question was directed to Cynthia while pulling on his coat and a wool scarf.

  “After we’re done here, I’m heading home. Tell Mom I said ‘hi,’ and not to worry.”

  The two smiled at each other affectionately, and Charlie thought about giving her mother a call tomorrow. Then she considered something else.

  “By the way, I need one more thing, Mr. Hartwell.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Fifteen thousand dollars for Josh Simms’s widow. There are funeral costs and such. This isn’t the kind of work where we have a pension plan.”

  “Ms. Mack, I’m truly sorry about your man. Just call my office and leave the name and address. I’ll have a check delivered to her tomorrow.”

  “Where you been, Mack?” Don demanded.

  The conference room was dark, and the exterior office illuminated only by the four desk lamps. Don hadn’t shaved since yesterday, and his stubble was becoming a beard. He had a Burger King bag in front of him, and the largest soft drink Charlie had ever seen. It was almost midnight, which, for a private investigator, could be the peak of your day.

  “You didn’t answer your phone. You forget the rule?” Judy said.

  “I’m sorry. But I had an impromptu meeting with Hartwell and Cynthia.”

  “Did you eat?” Judy held up a cheeseburger wrapped in paper.

  “Yep, I got a free dinner. I also got carte blanche with this case.”

  “What does that mean?” Don asked.

  “Hartwell was still holding cards up his sleeves, but we reached an understanding.”

  Don studied Charlie’s face. She was a fourth-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do. Once, he’d witnessed Charlie reach an understanding with a child molester that left the man in traction for six weeks. “Is he still standing?”

  Charlie laughed. “It’s nothing like that. He’s our client. But I threatened to walk off the case because he and Cynthia haven’t been completely honest with us. By the way, your instincts about Cynthia were right, Judy. She is spying. But she’s spying for Hartwell.”

  “Wow. I didn’t see that coming.”

  “Right, huh? And here’s something else that will blow your mind. Hartwell is Cynthia’s stepfather.”

  “No shit,” Don said, grabbing the gigantic soda and taking a ten-second pull on the straw.

  “And get this. They’ve suspected Heinrich was a bad guy all along.”

  “Noooo shit,” Don repeated with an I-told-you-so smirk on his face.

  Charlie moved to her desk, gathered up a few files, and pulled a variety of Post-it notes from her purse and desk drawer. “We’re moving in a new direction. There’s a lot to fill you in on. Where’s Gil?”

  “He’s sleeping in there,” Judy said, pointing to the conference room.

  “Well, we’re going to roust him. Grab your giant drink, Don, and follow me.”

  Heinrich spotted the boy when he left through the front door of Grant’s Lounge with a carryout bag— the Asian kid, Lin something or other, that they’d hired for his programming and Mandarin skills. He was suspicious of coincidences, and when he returned to his desk, he accessed the boy’s file on his laptop. Lin Fong’s address was in Ann Arbor, not Detroit. But he had been wearing those flannel pajama pants, like maybe he was staying at one of the condos atop the lounge. Perhaps he was visiting a friend. Heinrich punched a series of buttons to begin a search in his database. When he got no hits, he expanded the search to include Cobo personnel. The office was dark except for his Tiffany desk lamp, and he worked the remote that opened his vertical blinds halfway. The three techs in the monitoring booth were intently watching the scenes in front of them. The desk lights of another half-dozen employees punctuated the work floor. He wondered if the staff were as diligent when he wasn’t on site. He pressed the remote once more to close the blinds, and stood to stretch. He took six long strides to his pantry area, flipped on the overhead light, programmed the espresso machine, and waited patiently while a perfect blend of hot milk and coffee flowed into a blue cup with matching saucer. He dripped steamed milk into his cup in a medallion design. He was admiring the brew when his computer pinged a match. He darkened the light and balanced the cup to his desk. Staring at the screen, he found the information he needed. Charlene Mack lived above Grant’s Lounge, on the seventh floor. Heinrich studied Fong’s file again, then picked up his private cell phone.

  Chapter 7

  Wednesday, January 4, 2006

  Auto Show: 4 days

  “Tony. I need some answers.”

  Tony Canterra looked at the clock, and then to the woman sleeping next to him; she hadn’t stirred from the phone’s intrusion. He spun his legs to the floor, cupping his hand to his forehead for a moment, then walked to the bathroom, looking over his shoulder as he closed the door.

  “Charlie, do you know what time it is?”

  “It’s come-to-Jesus time. What’s Heinrich up to?”

  The pause between them might have been uncomfortable, except they knew each other so well. Charlie held the phone tautly and turned the hotel room’s desk chair so she could prop her feet on the coffee table. Her neck was stiff from tension and studying files. They’d completed their brainstorming about 2 a.m. That’s when Carter came back on duty to make his overseas calls, Gil and Don went on patrol, and she and Judy returned to the hotel for a few hours’ sleep. But she couldn’t sleep.

  “Why do you think I know?”

  “Come on, Tony. It’s too early in the morning for bullshit. What can yo
u tell me?”

  There was another long pause. Charlie took a swig of water. She had to be careful not to get dehydrated. It happened when she wasn’t exercising, wasn’t sleeping, and, like yesterday, drank way more scotch than water.

  “Guí Motors’ presence at the auto show is just a cover for the cyber-espionage stuff I told you and your partners about, and Heinrich is helping the Chinese.”

  “He’s helping? How?”

  “Logistics. Supplies and staffing support. He’s basically been part of their advance team.”

  “I’m confused, Tony. You’re telling me that DADA’s head of security is aiding a foreign automaker to spy on American manu-facturers? Why would he do that?”

  “Money. Plain and simple. It’s an elaborate scheme, and has the full force of the People’s Republic of China behind it. That’s all I can tell you now.”

  “Does Hartwell know?”

  “No. He just suspects something’s fishy with Heinrich.”

  “Why not just tell DADA so they can fire Heinrich and ban Guí from the show?”

  “The State Department doesn’t want to strain their relationship with the Chinese.”

  “What are you doing about the spying?”

  “I can’t talk about that. I need you to keep this between the two of us, Charlie. You can’t even tell your partners.”

  “Aww, Tony. I can’t promise that.”

  “That’s just it. I need you to promise.”

  Charlie had been sleeping fitfully. The new information about Heinrich and the Chinese was troubling enough, but an unnamed distress was pushing at her subconscious, and she was too tired to make sense of it. A sound in the hallway made her sit upright. She leaned forward to look at the broken seam of light at the bottom of her door, then reached over to the nightstand and pulled her revolver from the holster. The tapping came again not with authority, but persistent.