Bell to Pay

by Jeremy Waldron

  “And you’re calling who, Ghostbusters?”

  Joan raised a sharp eyebrow. “Real funny, smartass. I’m calling John. Get him to come fix it. You want him to take a look at the boiler, too?”

  Maria, their maid of the past three years, walked into the kitchen holding several cleaning tools and sprays in her arms. Parker smiled and said, “Maria can keep an eye on it, can’t you?”

  “Certainly, Mr. Collins.” Maria smiled.

  “Whatever,” Joan said. “We won’t be here anyway.”

  They gathered their wallets and purse and left in Parker’s BMW. After backing out of the drive, Parker stopped to make sure the garage door fully closed. It went down with ease, and once securely in place, he turned to Joan with a glint in his eye.

  “See? Works just fine.” Parker pointed toward the house.

  Joan wasn’t amused. “C’mon, I don’t want to be late.”

  Parker drove at a leisurely pace as Joan played on her phone. His thoughts drifted to the wake they were on their way to attend for his acquaintance Richard Thompson and how Richard’s death didn’t hit him particularly hard. He wondered if he should be feeling sadder than he was, but what was this really about other than another excuse to bring people together to talk business.

  “Lee needs us to be at Metro State no later than 12:30PM,” Joan said, detailing out their schedule for the day.

  Parker took his eyes off the road and glanced at Joan’s phone. Not a second later, a car honked and tires squealed. Parker acted quickly and swerved before getting sideswiped by the oncoming car.

  “Christ, Parker?” Joan’s white knuckles clenched the dash. “What the hell were you thinking?”

  Parker had both hands on the wheel. His eyes were wide open and his heart was pounding in his chest. “That was a close call,” he said calmly.

  Joan shook her head. “That’s exactly why you shouldn’t be driving.”

  “But I like driving,” Parker shot back. “It gives me a sense of independence.”

  “We’re better people than that. We can afford to hire a driver.”

  Parker ignored Joan and flipped on the radio. He could feel her glaring at him, making certain he remained in his lane.

  “Donny Counts, dead at thirty-two,” the radio news broadcaster said.

  Joan rolled her eyes to Parker. “You don’t expect me to go to his funeral, too?”

  Parker ignored her comment and flipped the station to listen to some soft rock. Turning down the volume, he said, “We’ll pay our respects to Richard’s family and then be on our way.”

  Staring straight ahead, Joan said, “I don’t like associating myself with someone accused of charity fraud.”

  This wasn’t the first time Joan voiced her thoughts about some of the families in their circle of business associates. Parker was well aware of how she felt—especially about Richard Thompson. But his wife was good at putting on a face, and he expected nothing less from her today.

  “And what didn’t you like about Donny?” Parker inquired.

  Joan turned her head and gave him a look. “Where should I start?”

  Parker chuckled, put on his blinker, and took the next turn. “How did I get so lucky marrying you?”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  King and Alvarez were staked outside the Holy Ghost Catholic Church just north of Civic Center Park in lower downtown, making a list of faces and names of those attending Richard Thompson’s wake.

  Alvarez belched and the smells of his breakfast quickly filled the car. King glared and rolled down his window to let fresh air inside.

  They arrived early after pulling an all-nighter working a homicide in Denver East. The victim was a fourteen-year-old child, not much younger than Samantha’s son Mason, and it left King crying on the inside. The boy should have never died, but thanks to a drive-by shooting at the hands of what was probably a territorial dispute between rival gangs, he did.

  King bent over and rubbed the blood back into his swollen ankles. His feet hurt from canvasing the neighborhood through the early morning—coming up with nothing solid to go on—when Lieutenant sent them here to rest their bones and give the appearance that they were treating Richard’s death as suspicious.

  “If anyone asks, you’re there to pay your respects to an honorable man in our community,” Lieutenant had told them.

  King didn’t argue. He followed the command’s lead. It was Alvarez who was having a difficult time accepting their assigned role.

  “I can’t listen to this again.” Alvarez leaned forward, turned off the radio after another news cycle circled around about the death of Donny Counts.

  “But he’s being remembered as a man of great talent,” King said sarcastically.

  “Oh, yeah. And an infectious personality to go along with it,” Alvarez scoffed.

  “Don’t forget,” King leaned toward Alvarez and wagged his finger in the air between them, “Donny was proof that the American Dream is still possible.”

  Alvarez laughed and shook his head. “And here we are, front row seats to probably the biggest protest in town.”

  King read the picket signs that pounded the asphalt across the street and listened to the shouts for the Thompson family to give back the money Richard stole through his scam charity. Sectioned off by a handful of uniformed officers, Alvarez mumbled, “Just more of our city’s tax dollars going to work for the rich and famous.”

  King let Alvarez’s comment bounce around his head for a moment as he thought about the message Samantha said she received. Thompson is the first of many more to come. If you don’t believe me, just ask these two. King knew that her article was the reason these people were here today, but what he really wanted to know was who the digital Bitcoin wallet belonged to.

  “Where the hell is the media?” Alvarez twisted his spine and glanced through the back window. “Shouldn’t they be here instead of us?”

  “They’ll come, I’m sure.”

  Alvarez looked at his partner. “Don’t get me wrong. I can appreciate the need for working with the press when solving important cases, and I hope Samantha’s right, but I still wish she would have waited to run Thompson’s story. At least until the man was in the ground.”

  “Why? We’re having so much fun here.” The corners of King’s eyes crinkled.

  “You talk to Sam since her questioning?”

  King nodded, watching a man over six feet circle around the protestors, taking their photograph. He wondered who he was—who he might work for. He didn’t recognize the face, but made note of it in case he needed to come back and reference it later.

  More of Thompson’s friends and family arrived, moving in an endless stream from the paid parking on 19th and Welton. King watched as they filed themselves inside the holy cathedral.

  “Any one of these assholes could have wanted him dead,” Alvarez said. “I’ve read stories about these people and how they conduct their business. Ruthless, man. Manipulative and backstabbing.” He shook his head. “I don’t get how us sitting here is going to fool anyone into thinking we have a real reason to be here.”

  King took a sip of his cold coffee and told Alvarez about the key code.

  Alvarez stared at King with narrowed eyes and parted lips. “Come again?”

  King raised his brows. “Samantha figured it out. Bitcoin digital paper wallet.”

  “Well that certainly complicates the matter.” Alvarez sighed. “I hope she learned of it after we had her in for questioning.”

  King assured him she did. “She only learned about the key code during her questioning.” Now that they knew what the key code was, it was time for them to figure out who might have been trying to blackmail Thompson. “What we really need to be asking ourselves is who among these people are most likely to be using cryptocurrency?”

  “Are you kidding?” Alvarez snorted a quick laugh. “Probably every single one of them.”

  King stared, thinking the same. Except, then there was the promise tha
t more would follow, and Donny Counts—the King of Crypto—had died unexpectedly, just as things were starting to get interesting. “You know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking that Donny Counts’s death might be related to Richard Thompson’s.”

  Alvarez pushed himself up in his seat. “What other secrets did Samantha tell you?”

  King was thinking about the first message Samantha received when he said, “I just don’t believe in coincidence, is all.”

  Alvarez grinned, turned his head, and spotted Parker Collins and his wife walking hand-in-hand toward the entrance of the church. “Now there’s a real man. You know he drives himself everywhere?”

  “You read that, too?”

  “In fact, I did.”

  King flicked his gaze to billionaire Parker Collins. Real guy, my ass, King thought.

  “The only difference between him and me is the number of zeros tacked on to the end of his bank account.” Alvarez nodded. “You know he donates a certain percentage of every sale to charity?”

  King gave Alvarez a skeptical look. “You mean like Thompson?”

  “Nah, man.” Alvarez looked hurt. “This guy is different.”

  King was shaking his head when he received a call from Lieutenant Baker. “LT, what’s up?” King answered his cell. “We’re still outside Holy Ghost. Not much to report.”

  “Good,” Lieutenant said. “I need you across town. The station just received a call from Rose Wild, Donny Counts’s girlfriend. I assume you’ve heard the news.”

  King said, “Can’t get away from it, but why did she call the station? I thought I heard he passed at the hospital.”

  “He did.” Lieutenant Baker’s gravel voice lowered. “But she’s claiming Donny was murdered.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  My brain scrambled with questions as I drove to the office. Who was Loxley? Was he in Denver? Even in Colorado? Was the key code found on Thompson’s desk as important as I thought? I was terrified by the possibility that there was a hacker out there who could seemingly control everything without ever being seen.

  This story was made for movies. As I passed cubbyholes on my way to my own desk, I overheard snippets of a dozen conversations, nearly all of them name dropping either Counts or Thompson. It was the talk of the newsroom, but there was only one opinion I cared to hear.

  Joey Garcia was sitting down, facing his computer monitor, when I knocked. He turned and gave me a small smile. “Hey, sorry Sam.” He retrieved the sticky note I’d left for him yesterday. “I’m just seeing your note to call now.”

  I stepped inside his cubicle, waved off his not getting back to me as no big deal, and lowered my tailbone to the edge of his desk. Garcia didn’t look himself. His eyes seemed to be sunken further into his skull than normal, and his face looked puffy and swollen. I knew he was going through a lot at home and could only imagine the stress he must be feeling.

  “How is Katie doing?” I asked.

  Garcia’s eyelids drooped halfway over his pupils. “She’s fine, for now.”

  I gave him the best smile I could as I thought about his little girl, feeling my own heart shatter. I remained hopeful, though it was a terribly sad story. We were all rooting for her, believing Katie would beat cancer. “If there is anything I can do to help—”

  “I know. Thanks, Sam.” Garcia glanced to his computer, his cursor blinking on his login. He stood and looked around like he was waiting for someone to arrive. “Where the hell is IT?”

  “Can’t log in?”

  Garcia sighed. “I called IT but no one picked up.” He turned his eyes to me. “Have you seen Travis?”

  “Only yesterday,” I said, telling him how Travis and his new intern were working on the system.

  “New intern?” Garcia raised a single brow.

  I nodded. “Brett Gallagher.”

  “Unpaid, I assume?”

  I shrugged my shoulders, not knowing the details, and watched Garcia drop back into his chair and swivel around to face me. “Were they working on my computer?”

  “I found them working on mine and know they were making their rounds.”

  “Can they even do that without our permission?”

  “When the Times system is hacked,” I folded my arms and nodded, “they can do what they want.”

  A worried looked crossed over Garcia’s face. “Hacked?”

  I told him as much as I knew about the update in security Travis was making sure everyone’s computers had. “Apparently, someone clicked on something they shouldn’t have.”

  Garcia glanced to his blinking cursor and sighed. “And just when I thought things couldn’t get worse, now I have to deal with the possibility of someone accessing my work.”

  My brows squished. “Have any of your files gone missing?”

  “I hope not, but without being able to log in it’s impossible to know for sure.”

  “Hey, look, about the Thompson story, I didn’t mean for my reporting to contradict everything you’ve ever reported about him.”

  Garcia waved it off. “It was a good story you wrote, even if it made me look like a schmuck.” We both laughed. “But I wish you would have told me, Sam. I could have helped. Saved you time.”

  “Top secret.” I held up three fingers and gave him the Girl Scout sign for promises kept. “Direct orders from the top.”

  Garcia chuckled and glanced at his watch. “Ah, shit. I should be attending Thompson’s wake now. Instead, I have to follow orders from editorial and write up a piece on Donny Counts.” He wiped a hand over his mouth. “Apparently he died last night.”

  “I heard.”

  “And because of how well my piece about Thompson went, I’m now unofficially the obituary writer around here.”

  I smiled. “Have you heard how he died?”

  “Not the specifics, but something related to his diabetes.” Garcia shrugged.

  “Can you confirm it was an accident?”

  Garcia shook his head. “Why do you ask? Don’t hold out on me, Sam. If you know something about how he died, I need to know.”

  “It’s just a hunch, maybe the strange timing of how he died so soon after Richard Thompson, but in all your reporting do you know of anyone who might want either of these two dead?”

  “You hang out with too many cops.” Garcia smirked.

  I grinned along with him. No one but Dawson knew about my article being found inside Thompson’s house, and until I understood what was going on, I planned on keeping it a secret.

  Garcia tapped his space bar a couple of times. “All anyone ever wanted to hear was Counts’s fast road to success.”

  I recalled Garcia’s reporting and thought how his stories often made his subjects the celebrities of entrepreneurism. “What wasn’t there to like? Tons of aspiring people looked to him for inspiration,” I said.

  Garcia rolled his eyes. “You know some people are saying he might not even be dead.”

  “And what about you?” I knitted my eyebrows. “Do you think he’s dead?”

  A glimmer of suspicion flashed over Garcia’s dark eyes. “Don’t go spreading rumors, but there are whispers suggesting his cryptocurrency exchange was nothing but a well-oiled Ponzi scheme.” Garcia nodded, opened up his phone and navigated to his Twitter account. He turned the screen to me and said, “The mob against him is speaking out, and they aren’t happy.”

  I immediately thought of Loxley, the messages I’d received, and how this could be the reason Loxley called for someone’s death. I couldn’t believe the uproar I was reading, but Garcia must have more than what he was showing me to suggest Donny might actually still be alive.

  “Have you called the hospital? The morgue? Can we confirm that Donny Counts is even dead?”

  Garcia dipped his chin and shook his head. “It’s just what somebody on Twitter suggested. I’m sure Donny is dead as a doornail.” Then he leaned forward and opened up his drawer. “Anyway, you think someone is knocking off the rich and famous, here’s everything I hav
e on both Counts and Thompson. Have at it. It should cover the last year of reporting, maybe more. I can’t think of anything off the top of my head, but if someone did want either of them dead, you might find what you’re looking for in here.”

  I took the thumb-drive into my hand, said thanks, and left Garcia’s desk thinking a Ponzi scheme would be reason enough to want Counts dead. But was it Loxley who had killed him, if in fact, Counts really was dead? I didn’t know, but I sure planned to find out.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  The scene outside Donny Counts house was strikingly similar to the one outside Thompson’s wake. King approached cautiously as he kept one foot on the brake pedal while reading the picket signs being hoisted into the air from the opposite street curb from where he drove.

  “Christ, what do you think is going on here?” Alvarez asked King.

  King shrugged, his gut telling him that it had something to do with Thompson.

  “Samantha write anything about Donny?”

  “Not that I know of,” King said softly. But it would certainly explain the protestors if she had.

  Alvarez turned the radio on and scanned for more news about Donny that maybe they had missed. There was nothing new—no one reporting on the protestors or reasons why they were picketing outside a dead man’s house.

  “Coincidence?” Alvarez furrowed his brow. “Or is it just that everyone is pissed off these days?”

  King pulled into the drive and parked near the front of the house. As soon as they opened up their car doors, the roar of an angry crowd filled the air. Tensing, King remained vigilant—deciding it safer to stay on his toes than to make a wrong assumption about something he knew little about.

  Alvarez tugged on his sports coat and made his way toward the front door of the house. It seemed like the screams and shouts from the protestors were suddenly being directed at the two of them.