by Ted Galdi
He asks Bo, “How would it even work?”
“I did some research tonight. Darrington Farm. It’s perfect.” He shows Glen a photo of a one-story building on his phone. “This is what we move on. A dozen farmworkers are bunking in this barrack.”
Glen takes the phone, scrolls through additional pictures of the farm, capturing the barrack, woods, and service roads from a variety of angles. “What sort of security does Darrington Farm have?”
“No armed guards or anything like that. Too much land for them to cover. I noticed cameras though. Mounted high on poles near the barracks. Nothing a couple masks over our heads tomorrow night couldn’t get around. I doubt anyone is actively monitoring that security feed. After the workers don’t show up for their shift the next morning and someone checks on them, sees the mess we leave behind, I’m sure they’ll review the tape. But we’ll be long gone by then.”
Glen stares at the face of Ulysses S. Grant for a while. “All right. I’ll do it.”
Thirty-Six
Tommy and Jordana sit on her couch, her laptop open on her knees. The neon from the glass heart on the wall mixes a purple glow into the darkness of the apartment. On her screen is an informational website about organ donation.
“Like I thought,” she says. “The federal government manages the national transplant waiting list.”
“Which must make it obscenely inefficient.”
“It’s not the government’s fault. There’re just not enough donors. Says here a new person is added to the list every ten minutes, outpacing the rate of new organ givers. Every day twenty Americans die as a result. So sad.”
“What is the government’s fault is mismanagement at the VA. Where this guy works. A few years ago, the problems were national news.”
“There’s definitely room for organizational improvement at the VA. So what?”
“Check out their transplant program. I bet it’s a mess.”
She does another Google search. Clicks one of the results, a news article with the title, “VA Delays Turn Deadly.” She scans the page. “You’re actually right. Various organ-deteriorating medical conditions are rampant among vets. Due to excessive waits at the VA between stages of the transplant process, many patients wither away before their surgeries.”
“Those patients are more than statistics to this guy. He’s experienced this shit firsthand. But was powerless to change anything inside the bloated government bureaucracy.”
She performs another search, clicks a result. “Over a hundred grand for a liver or kidney on the black market. Way more for a heart or lung. The average soldier doesn’t have that sort of cash.”
“So he created a black market within a black market. If he kills people, he can cut out their organs for free. Sell them to soldiers for way less than a hundred K without going broke. Like you said before, this is about more than money to him. He wants to help these people. And he’s sidestepping the bureaucracy to do it.”
“He sort of sounds like you.”
“What?”
“I didn’t mean it to be offensive. Sidestepping—”
“He murdered my sister. I’m nothing like him.”
“You’re not a murderer. Of course. I just…it was silly. Forget I said it. You good?”
“I’m fine. It’s getting late. Think I want to go to bed.”
“Tommy, I really didn’t mean—”
“I said it’s fine. I’m just tired.”
She stands. “You need an extra pillow or anything?”
“No.”
“All right. Good night.”
“Good night.”
She steps into her bedroom with the laptop. Closes the door. Tommy lies on the couch. Unable to fall asleep.
Thirty-Seven
Glen’s arm reaches to the side of the bed where Cora sleeps to pull her in for a good-morning kiss. But his hand drops to the mattress. She isn’t here. Odd. She never wakes up before him.
He rips the covers off himself, attaches the prosthetic foot he keeps bedside, a sliver of sun squeezing its way between the closed curtains onto him.
“Cora,” he says toward the master bathroom, its door open a bit.
No reply.
He peeks inside. Nothing but marble, porcelain, and glass.
“Cora,” he yells louder, toward the hallway.
Again, no response.
He snatches his phone off his night table. No calls or messages from her. He clicks her contact, “Cutie,” and calls her.
No answer.
A second attempt. Same result.
He exits the bedroom, the head atop his nude body scanning the second story for signs of his wife.
“Cora,” he shouts, louder yet, his voice echoing through the big house.
Nothing.
She’s probably outside by the pool, can’t hear him. He crosses into the guest bedroom, sticks his hand between the slats of its blinds, widening them for a view of the backyard. No movement down there except for a raft drifting about the water. No Cora on any lounge chair.
Maybe an emergency compelled her to leave the house. Though she hasn’t experienced morning sickness since her first trimester, it could’ve returned today. She could’ve driven to Whole Foods for some of that ginger supplement she’d take for the nausea.
He descends the stairs to the first floor, veers into a room with a piano they refer to as the music room, and pulls open the curtains for a view of the driveway. Her Porsche is gone. She’s probably at Whole Foods. Relaxation sets in.
But it’s torn away when he notices one of the planters in the driveway is toppled, soil spilt all over the pavement, flowers strewn among it.
He rushes into his study, logs into the website of the security-system company. He finds the recording of the camera above the front door. Speed-rewinding through it, he notices motion around seven AM.
Cora’s arm and leg flail. Then the planter falls. About ten seconds after, a door and wheel of her Porsche come into view. The vehicle backs out of the driveway, disappears from sight.
A gangster must’ve been lurking in the bushes, waiting for him to leave the house this morning. Instead, Cora must’ve come out first, the gangster deciding to abduct her as part of Glen’s payback.
He rewatches the video. Since she’s at the edge of the frame, he can only see some of her and none her attacker. But he can imagine it all. He interrupted them with that girl in Tijuana. For his punishment, they’ll possibly do to Cora what they planned for her. Maybe mail him photos.
His knees weaken. He clutches the piano to keep himself from falling. He stays drooped over the big, dark instrument for about a minute, remembering all those times he played it while singing to her.
An overwhelming hotness courses through his body. It impels him through the hallway into the kitchen. He clutches the Williams Sonoma blender and hurls it into a wall. He grasps a glass canister where Cora keeps her green-tea bags and smashes it on the floor, fragments swarming in all directions across the kitchen, some spilling over the dip into the den. He kicks the microwave with his prosthetic foot, bashing through the door, then heaves its tray into the den, the TV screen spider-webbing as the objects connect.
He glares at his reflection in the broken screen. “You’re a pathetic man.” He picks up a piece of jagged glass. And pounds it into his thigh. His screams fill the empty home.
Thirty-Eight
Tommy’s legs pump through a set of crunches on Jordana’s rug. In prison, he grew accustomed to working out in his cell. He can do plenty in a tight space without gym equipment. He stands, his reflection staring back at him in the dark television screen, veins running down the muscles of his forearms. His hands lower onto the sofa and he begins a set of dips.
Jordana emerges from her bedroom in a work outfit. “Morning.”
“Morning.”
“You sleep okay?”
He slept for just a couple hours. That comment she made about his similarity to the leader stewed in his head, kept him
awake.
“Yeah,” he says. “Slept fine.”
“Good. I’ve got a coffee maker in the kitchen. You can help yourself.”
“All right. Thanks.”
“I’ve got to head to the office. I’ll see you after—”
“The idea of the leader isn’t as generic as you think. You know a lot more about him than his skin color, gender, and age.”
“Like?”
He picks up his phone from the coffee table, clicks a few buttons. The leader’s voicemail to Ayala radiates from the speaker. “His voice,” Tommy says. “You know the sound of his voice.”
“That’s true. But—”
“If the FBI played this at the VA, his coworkers could tell you who he is.”
“Maybe. But even if that was a success, we’d blow the only advantage we have.”
“Which is?”
“Comfort. He knows the FBI is still just after an idea of him. If we had his name, we would’ve questioned him by now. We want him to continue feeling comfortable. Want him to surface on schedule tonight to kill again. Then capture him in the act.”
“He wouldn’t know you had his name. Like you said, thousands of people work at the VA. You don’t need to play the voicemail for all of them. Just select twenty at random. The probability he’d be one is super low. Then you can put surveillance on—”
“Imagine if you were in that twenty. A team of FBI agents tells you one of your coworkers is a mass murderer. Gossip would fly around the hospital. Within minutes the leader would hear we’re looking for him. And go on the run. We likely couldn’t get an arrest warrant by the time he fled the country.”
“Fine. Whatever. Don’t do it.”
“I’m not.”
“Only trying to help.”
“I know. But that wouldn’t help.”
“Nice to know. Have a good day.”
“Yeah. You too.”
She leaves the apartment. He cranks out a set of push-ups, then goes into the kitchen, notices the coffee maker. He scoops some grounds from a canister, brews a pot. The machine hums. He peers at the rack of Velatti wines. Then the “Stanford University Alumni” magnet on the refrigerator.
Thirty-Nine
Tommy walks through the San Diego VA Hospital. He batted the dust from the Tijuana junkyard off his suit pants, washed his dress shirt in Jordana’s laundry machine, and now wears the clean outfit.
His eyes scan the names and titles on office doors. He knocks on one labeled “Brandy Cho – Senior Human Resources Administrator.”
“Come in,” a female voice says.
He enters. Staring at him from a desk is an Asian lady in her early forties. “Can I help you?” she asks.
He places a box of convenience-store chocolates on her desk. “Hi. I’m Dean Ruserri. From PuroGrip Surgical Instruments. I need just a minute of your time.”
She eyes the chocolates, then his grinning face. “A minute is all I have. But I’m not sure if I’m who you’re looking for. What’s PuroGrip Surgical Instruments? I never heard of them.”
“We’re only a few years old, but growing. Like crazy. All because we view the surgical instrument differently than anyone else. An operation can be one of the most important events in someone’s life. If it doesn’t go perfectly, it can mean their life. So when it comes to the medical instruments slicing and stitching and all the rest, we should demand perfection. Not generalities.”
“Yeah. I suppose. But what…is it?”
“We do to a pair of forceps what a tailor does to a pair of pants. We create bespoke surgical tools, none the same, each custom-fitted to a surgeon’s hand, going off the width of the fingers, the rise of the heel, the flex of the knuckles, and eleven more data points. A comfortable hand is a steady hand. And a steady hand can save a life.”
“Huh. Cool concept.”
“I didn’t come up with it. Our CEO did. I’m just an account executive. Which leads me to why I’m here today. The representative who was covering the San Diego VA account recently left the firm to pursue his passion, hang gliding. Though we wish him all the best, he soared out of the office rather abruptly, pardon the pun, which created a bit of confusion at PuroGrip. He’s virtually impossible to get in touch with, living on a mountaintop somewhere in South America. I’ve been tasked with taking over his accounts.”
“Okay. Where do I fit in?”
“The last couple days I’ve been going through all his unanswered company emails and voicemails and reaching out to clients he…left in the wind. One message was from a San Diego VA phone number, left by a man who unfortunately didn’t provide a name or extension. Since you’re in HR, I presume you speak to a lot of employees, would be familiar with their voices. And could hopefully tell me who left the voicemail once I play it for you. Sound good?”
“No guarantees. But I can try.”
“Fantastic.”
From his pocket he removes his phone and opens a snippet of the original message file he edited. He plays it. The voice says, “I need more…supply.”
She kicks her head back. “Eeh.”
“Once a hand gets used to a PuroGrip, it’s difficult to go back to generic instrumentation. Patient safety is on the line, here. Please, think as hard as you can, Miss Cho.”
“Play it again.”
He does.
Her brow creases. “Once more,” she says. He lets her hear it a third time. “It’s not a super-distinct voice. And a lot of people pass through this office.”
“Anything could help.”
“Three…no, five men…come to mind. Who that voice could belong to.” She scribbles on a piece of VA stationery, rips it off, and hands it to him.
He reads the five names. “Much appreciated. Do you happen to know where in the hospital these guys work? I’d be happy to introduce myself.”
“Let me see.” She types on her computer for about two minutes. “Four are here now. And one…it says he’s out sick.” She taps a few more keys. The drone of a printer behind her. She collects five sheets, gives them to Tommy. “This is the info on who’s who, their schedules today, plus their office locations. Anything else?”
“That’s all, Miss Cho. Thank you again.”
He leaves the office and visits the first man on the list, a radiologist. Tommy asks him if he’d like to hear about a new and exciting product. When the doctor says no, Tommy decides his voice isn’t quite a match, tells him to have a nice day, and visits the second name on the list. Same result, similar to the suspect’s voice but not exact. He concludes the same with the third and fourth names.
One remains, the man out sick. Cho didn’t provide his cell number or home address. Tommy jogs through the hospital, out to the parking lot, and climbs into his car. He pulls from the glove box the FBI phone Jordana gave him in Mexico, finds her number, and calls.
She says, “Hey.”
“Hey.”
“You all right? You seemed a little…pissed at me this morning.”
“You’re good. I need a favor.”
“I’m swamped, Tommy. The telecom report on the second US burner number came back. Same deal as the first. It’s been completely off since yesterday. No texts sent or received, calls only to and from Ayala and the first US burner. Cell-tower activity was concentrated near a busy shopping mall in Imperial County, no second high-usage zone to cross-reference against. I’m leading a brainstorm for new ideas. And I’ve got to get back to the team. Maybe we—”
“You guys may not need a new idea.”
“What?”
“I might know who the leader is.”
A pause. “Where are you right now?”
“It’s fine. Everything is fine. He has no clue I’m looking for him. All I need is his address. If I speak to him for just a few seconds, I’ll know if it’s him or not.”
“Do you remember the promise you made to me when I let you stay at my apartment?”
“Yes. And—”
“You were supposed to run everything y
ou did by me. And you did not run this by me. You broke the promise.”
“I did run this by you.”
“What?”
“A version of it. Then I came up with a better version. And it worked.”
“You didn’t answer my question. Where are you right now?”
“The VA.”
“What’s the matter with you? Did you not listen to a word—”
“I didn’t mention anything about a crime. There’s no hospital gossip. I didn’t cross paths with the FBI investigation. Your boss doesn’t know what’s going on. You’re not in any trouble. Everything is fine, Jordana. Please, I just need—”
“It’s not fine. You lied to me.”
“We can…debate that later. For now, let me capitalize on this opportunity. Take his name from me, look up his address in the FBI database. All I want is to go there and verify if it’s him. If it is, I’ll call you ASAP. Keep my eyes on him from a distance until you show up, then you take over from there. I’ll let you finish this, let you get credit for the arrest.”
“I thought I could trust you.”
“Give me shit for that later. If the HR rep talks to him for whatever reason and brings me up, he could get suspicious and hit the road. Time is an issue. Please, give—”
“I thought everything was fine? Why would he get suspicious?”
“He won’t…it’s…I’ll explain later. Okay? Please. Before this slips away.”
Silence on the other line for a while. “What’s the Goddamn name?”
“Glen Brent.”
Forty
The American flag on Glen Brent’s lawn waves in the breeze. Tommy pulls up to the address, 873 Laredo Drive. He puts on his sunglasses, grabs his FBI phone to text Jordana from after hearing the voice. He walks onto the driveway, spots a mess of dirt and flowers near a tipped pot. Weird.
He rings the bell. No answer. He rings it again. A flash of motion in the window. Tommy takes in the image of a middle-aged naked man for an instant before the curtains reclose. Also weird.
“Doctor Brent?” Tommy asks, stepping up to the glass.
