Annabel Lee Page 15

  She turned from the computer and slid open the drawer that held her Beretta 3032 Tomcat pistol. She loved this little weapon. Contoured tang. Notched rear sight and blade front sight. Lightweight yet powerful. Easy to conceal. It was everything she needed and wanted in a gun.

  She paused a second to choose between her ankle holster and the hybrid hip holster before finally settling on the hybrid. It fit snugly and comfortably behind the back waistband of her jeans, without bulging too noticeably on the outside or pressing too deeply into her skin on the inside.

  She slid the gun in the holster, secured the holster inside the back of her jeans, and stood. She’d gotten what she came for; now it was time to go. She let her eyes sweep the top of her desk in one last, longing look.

  Then she frowned.

  When Dr. Smith and that goon Samir had abducted her from her house, she’d had to leave her cell phone at home on the kitchen counter. She was certain of that.

  So why was that selfsame cell now sitting prettily beside her desk phone, as if placed there like a vase of flowers, waiting to be appreciated?

  She glanced at the clock on the wall and decided to risk a few minutes more.

  Trudi passed over the cell phone for the moment and instead brought up the archived video surveillance footage from the past few weeks. She quickly searched through the files until she came to the one marked “Monday, September 7.”

  She clicked play.

  23

  The Mute

  Trudi Sara Coffey.

  That was the name of Samuel Hill’s ex-wife. Once The Mute had the name, it was fairly easy work to track her down to Atlanta, Georgia. She had a modest but reasonably nice home in an old neighborhood on the northwest edges of the city’s center. She kept an office in a small strip mall less than three miles from her home. She ran a small detective firm, Coffey & Hill Investigations, out of that office. When The Mute saw “Hill” in the name of her business, he figured Samuel Hill had lost more than just a wife in his divorce. He almost felt sorry for the grunt.

  The Mute had arrived in Atlanta late Friday night. He’d thought about getting a hotel but knew he’d feel better sleeping in his Jeep Wrangler with his guns and supplies in close reach.

  He kept his SIG716 sniper rifle under the seat, with ammo in the glove box. He’d brought along both live rounds and rubber bullets for the SIG on this trip. In an urban setting, it was often better to subdue with rubber bullets than to kill with real ones. Hard to move a body, and with security cameras everywhere, hard to avoid being seen with the gun that killed the body. But if you just scared that body, bruised it, and let it leave the scene under its own power, then the shooting hardly ever got reported to police, which meant authorities almost never checked that ubiquitous surveillance footage and saw that you were the guy with the gun.

  Also in the glove box was his .22 short mini-revolver with spare ammunition. It had been uncomfortable to drive the freeway with it stuck inside his boot, so he’d put it in the glove compartment. He kept the Kahr handgun nearby but had taken it out of the leg holster and instead tucked it inside the side waistband on his pants. His knife, as always, hung low inside his shirt on a thick metal chain wrapped around his neck.

  The first thing he did in Atlanta was stop at a Burger King and get something to eat. There he called up the address for Trudi Coffey’s home on his military-issue portable GPS device. It looked to be a small house on Center Street Northwest, in the West Midtown section of Atlanta. He studied the surrounding area, checking entry and exit arteries and noting nearby landmarks. He also correlated it with the woman’s office on Howell Mill Road Northwest, diagramming routes, estimating traffic, memorizing the whole map in case he needed to have it at hand in a hurry. Then he drove around to the Coffey home to scout out the neighborhood.

  He cruised straight through first, getting a sense for the layout and the general tenor of the area. It appeared to be a basic residential honeycomb. Judging by the abundance of mature trees growing everywhere, and the quaint, efficient architecture of the homes, The Mute guessed this neighborhood had been built sometime in the 1930s or 1940s, endured a decline, and then been slowly renovated over the decades. Now it was a simple, homey, middle-class enclave in this big city. Most houses were darkened for the night, and plenty of family cars were parked up and down the street. The only vehicle that seemed out of place here was an expensive Audi TT RS sports car parked just around the corner, at the end of Coffey’s street.

  A midlife crisis car for some suburban dad? The Mute wondered at first.

  Then he noticed that the car was parked uncomfortably close to the stop sign at the corner. He soon surmised that the parking spot its driver had chosen would be mostly out of sight from the front of Trudi Coffey’s house but would keep her painted-red front door and slightly creaky porch swing still in view of the driver. When he saw the glowing red dot of a cigarette butt flash hot and then fade in the darkened car, his suspicions were confirmed.

  Somebody out there, probably the same somebody behind the attack on Truck’s farm, was keeping an eye on Trudi Coffey. Or staking out her home, waiting for her to return. That made more sense, considering the outcome of the raid that killed his commander.

  The Mute drove out of the neighborhood, then circled back in until he was obscured from obvious sight lines inside the Audi but still able to watch that car from his own vehicle.

  When you can’t find the hen, he thought, you follow the fox that’s hunting the hen.

  He settled in behind the steering wheel and let his mind drift toward blankness. Spending long days and nights at Truck’s security outpost, he’d learned how to almost sleep-wake, letting his body relax into a near-sleep state, staying just focused enough to come alert at any sign of trouble or any movement that was out of the ordinary. That was the talent he used now, giving his body rest in the night while also staying just watchful enough to be of use in this impromptu stakeout.

  Around 6:00 a.m. on Saturday morning, a slate gray BMW 7 Series car pulled slowly into the neighborhood and parked behind the Audi. The BMW driver got out and walked to the window of the other car. The Mute watched the two drivers talk for a minute or two and then saw the Audi start up and pull away. The BMW driver got back in his car and nudged forward until he took over the prime parking spot.

  So, Trudi Coffey isn’t here, The Mute told himself, and she’s been gone long enough that they have a stakeout rotation working on the home. Likely there’s a similar stakeout at her office. So which location should I be watching? And for how long?

  He decided to wait through this day in this place to see what might happen. Then he let his eyes close for a nap. The hours passed uneventfully, with a few breaks for food and bathroom duties. The Mute was always careful to leave and enter this neighborhood out of view of his quarry and made sure never to park in the same place twice. Suburbanites like the folks in this block might be the suspicious type.

  It had been just after 8:00 p.m. Saturday night when The Mute finally saw something worth waiting for. A black Mercedes GL-Class SUV had rolled into the neighborhood and parked right next to the BMW.

  I know that car, The Mute thought. He sat up for a closer look, eventually taking the scope off his sniper rifle to use as a telescope. Things were getting interesting.

  Sure enough, through the rifle sight, The Mute made out a familiar face. A Middle Eastern man, with an Americanized style. Muscular and well-dressed. The same bodyguard who had surveyed the aftermath of the attack on Truck’s farm alongside the old man with the cane. Above the Arab’s neatly trimmed beard, The Mute could make out bruises under the eyes and a small, X-shaped bandage taped across the bridge of his nose. If it wasn’t broken, it had almost been.

  Wonder what the other guy from that fight looks like? The Mute thought absently before focusing on the man’s eyes. Despite the wounded nose, the eyes were clear, alert, and busy.

  The Arab spoke sharply to the driver in the BMW, and it was clear the Arab was in
charge. After a moment, both cars pulled away from the curb and headed out toward the main roads.

  The Mute moved into action, following the mini-convoy from a distance, trying hard to keep them in sight without letting himself be seen. After only a minute or two, at one indistinguishable point, the BMW split off from the Mercedes, leaving The Mute to decide which car was worth following and which one wasn’t. He took a peek at the GPS map in his head and realized that the Mercedes was on a route toward Trudi Coffey’s office building. He followed the Mercedes.

  It was only about five minutes more before The Mute and the Arab both arrived at the Kroger grocery store on Howell Mill Road Northwest, situated across the street from Coffey & Hill Investigations. The Mercedes was not as careful about staying out of view, and parked itself at the edge of the grocery lot, next to an Arby’s fast-food restaurant, where it faced toward the front door of Trudi Coffey’s office across the street. Whether that position was from carelessness or arrogance, The Mute couldn’t tell. But it was obvious that if Trudi Coffey came to her office, the Arab would see it happen.

  What the Mercedes wouldn’t see, might not ever notice, was the Jeep Wrangler that followed it into the Kroger shopping center. There was a Taco Bell located just north of the Arby’s in the grocery lot, so The Mute parked his car behind the burrito palace, out of sight of the Mercedes but still able to keep a nice, side-angle view of the tiny parking area in front of Coffey & Hill Investigations.

  A few moments later, the man inside the Mercedes never knew when The Mute, wearing dark jeans and a sea-green jean jacket, exited his Wrangler and used parked cars to cover his movement in order to get a closer look. When he was only about ten yards away, The Mute paused and stared through the darkness into the Mercedes, reading movements, studying gestures.

  It was the same Arab, all right. He was watching Coffey & Hill Investigations with a singular focus, unaware that other people were in the parking lot around him. The Mute guessed he could probably walk right up to the man and never be noticed until he’d fired a bullet right into the man’s skull.

  Guy deserves worse than that, The Mute told himself, after desecrating Truck’s body like he did. But The Mute knew he wouldn’t do it, not here, at least. Not where surveillance cameras from the nearby fast-food restaurants would see him commit the crime. Not in a place where the body would be found and explanations would be demanded.

  The Mute circled back to his Jeep without being seen. He popped inside Taco Bell and bought a XXL Grilled Stuft Burrito and large Mountain Dew to go, then returned to his parked car and settled in for the night.

  He pulled the sniper rifle out from under the seat, keeping it low and out of sight of random passersby. Without looking, he loaded the SIG with rubber bullets, then returned the gun to its home beneath the bench. He might not kill this arrogant bodyguard tonight, but he might have a chance to hurt him a little, to scare him. Maybe add to the pain that somebody caused when they broke the man’s nose.

  That thought made The Mute smile. He reached into the Taco Bell bag and chomped down on a few bites of his burrito. It was good and helped him unwind. He chewed slowly and let his mind relax, let his senses savor the moment. He would wait and watch. Maybe something would happen in this place, here, tonight.

  It was just a few minutes before 2:00 a.m., in the wee hours of Sunday morning, when The Mute saw a silver Ford GT sports car pull into the parking lot of the strip mall across the street. The rest of the world around him was silent, empty, unmoving. Nothing happened for a moment or two, and then the car door opened on the GT.

  The Mute sat up in his seat, eyes taking in the prelude to drama happening on the other side of the road.

  A woman got out of the car.

  24

  Trudi

  The emotional part of Trudi Coffey wanted to just pick up that cell phone and begin inspecting it to see why it had been left here for her to discover. The intellectual side of her knew that was a bad idea. As her old PI mentor had taught her, it was always better to get background on anything unusual rather than just diving in and seeing what happens. So her first act was to try to put this telephone thing in some sort of context. She let her mind run through the sequence of events from recent days, following the mobile phone on expected paths.

  The last person to see this cell had to have been Dr. Jonathan Smith, she said to herself, at my home, in my kitchen, while I was otherwise occupied with his stupid goon, Samir. So that was where she intended to start.

  She cued up the surveillance footage from Coffey & Hill cameras on Labor Day and then began scanning the video. It wasn’t long before she saw herself enter the office, captive of Dr. Smith and his goon. She fast-forwarded through the electrocution; she’d seen that firsthand already. Then, after seeing her and Samuel run out of the office to safety, she set the video to normal speed once more. She studied the two unconscious men left in her office, waiting to see what had happened next.

  After only a moment or two, Dr. Smith started twitching, and then he sat up creakily on the floor.

  The old man was tougher than she’d thought. Trudi couldn’t tell if she was impressed or disappointed by this new fact. She decided to be both.

  A moment later, Samir came up suddenly, shouting. It looked as if Samuel might have broken his nose. Trudi hoped that was the case. The Arab was apparently angry at the treatment, and angrier at having been beaten so easily by her ex-husband.

  “This guy hates to lose,” Trudi whispered to herself. “Have to remember that in case I meet Dr. Smith’s goon again sometime in the future.”

  Whatever it was the old man said, it calmed his associate down long enough for him to go to the little bathroom in the office and clean himself up a bit. While he was gone, Trudi watched Dr. Smith recover his senses. He stood and made his way—albeit unsteadily—around until he was behind Trudi’s desk. She noticed that he seemed to need the cane this time. That made her feel slightly pleased.

  He didn’t touch anything, but she could see her visitor’s eyes inspecting the setup from her side of the desk, figuring out exactly how she’d prewired her office to run electricity through the guest chairs. After a moment, he looked around the corners of the room until he spotted the surveillance camera. He nodded toward the camera with a slight tilt of the head, as if tipping a hat in her direction.

  When Samir returned, he looked better but now had two black eyes forming and a bandage on his nose. Trudi squinted at the man and realized he’d reset his nose all by himself while in the bathroom. “High tolerance for pain,” she muttered. “Another thing to remember about this guy.”

  There was a moment when the two men seemed to be arguing. From what Trudi could tell, Samir wanted to trash the office, but the old man wasn’t ready for that, not yet. When they’d reached an agreement, the old man sent Samir out into the lobby.

  It was then that Trudi saw Dr. Smith reach inside his coat pocket and produce her cell phone.

  She saw him begin checking out the contents and cursed herself for turning off lock mode on the phone when she was at her home. Bad habit, she told herself, but it was too late, the damage was done. Still, she always kept in mind that a mobile phone was easy to lose, so she deliberately kept only the barest minimum of information on there. What would he find, really? Speed dial to Menchie’s frozen yogurt? A grocery list on her note pad? Her Wordament high score?

  After only a moment, Dr. Smith seemed to arrive at the same conclusion that Trudi had just reached. There was nothing of value to be found on this little piece of equipment. He looked up into the camera again, then he reached down and picked up the landline telephone sitting on her desk. He dialed a number, and Trudi saw her cell phone flash to life.

  He’s calling my cell, even though it’s right there in his hand?

  Dr. Smith never took his eyes off the camera while he spoke into the voicemail box that eventually answered her mobile phone. She tried to read his lips, but that was a skill she’d never mastered. After he wa
s done with the message, Smith hung up the desk phone. Then he held the cell phone where the camera would clearly see it and made a show of shutting it off and then placing it carefully on the desk next to the landline.

  Just then, Samir reentered the scene, swirling his fingers and pointing toward the door. The old man nodded, and in a moment they were gone.

  “Must’ve heard the police coming,” Trudi said to herself. When uniformed officers entered the scene a few minutes later, she knew she was right. She switched off the video and let it revert to real-time images. She could guess what happened next. Atlanta’s finest had checked through the office, found nothing out of the ordinary, took a few notes for a report they’d have to file later, and then went on their merry way.

  Trudi looked at the cell phone still sitting placidly on her desktop.

  “So, you left me a message,” she said to the now-invisible Dr. Smith. “Interesting play.”

  She reached for the cell and held it in her hands. She powered it on and tapped it to bring up the home screen. She was just about to hit the voicemail button when something on the computer caught her eye.

  In the real-time surveillance image that flicked on the screen, she saw movement outside. It took a moment for the face to fully register, and then it came to her like a bolt.

  Samir the bodyguard was striding angrily across her parking lot and toward the front door of Coffey & Hill Investigations.

  25

  The Mute

  The Mute watched the Arab crossing the street in front of him and decided it was time to act. He reached under the bench seat of the Wrangler and retrieved his sniper rifle, unlatching the safety without bothering to look at it.

  He exited his vehicle, never letting his eyes stray from the figure now walking away from him, carefully choosing appropriate targets on the back of the man’s body. With rubber bullets, he wanted to hinder this guy, not murder him. But it would also have to be enough to stop the threat to the woman. He identified spots that would hurt and temporarily disable but not cause the Arab to lose consciousness.