Ingrams & Assoc 2: Retreat Ch. 03

"Oh yes. And doing well, too. Good technique. A little obvious, but then I'm trained. So lets talk about bank robberies. A much more interesting subject."

It was then the wheels started to come off. A puzzled look went over his face.

"Talk about what??" he asked, both in an afraid tone and also with true puzzlement. For the very first moment, April started to doubt herself.

"Bank. Robberies. Oh, don't give me that blank look. We both know that's why you are here. I want to know details. And you are going to give them to me. Or you know what happens."

She gave the Taser a little spark, and gave him the same smile again.

He gulped. "I seriously don't know what you are talking about..." he said, more forcefully this time.

April considered him. Everything about his body language screamed that he honestly did not. He was looking at the Taser and her, imploringly.

"Kevin. Like I said, I don't know what your name really is, but I'mdamnsure it's not Kevin. Shall we start with that?"

She got up and immediately his eyes widened and he babbled.

"I'm Tom. Tom Smith. Honestly. Kevin is my brother."

There was silence for a second, as April considered this.

"I'm a grifter, ok? A con man. OK?"

April was taken aback. "You're a what?"

"I'm the black sheep of the family, ok? Kevin is my brother. He...owes me. I pulled his ass out of a bad situation a while back. Then he won this trip and we...I thought, I could go. Free sun. Free booze. Free sex. What the hell. He saw it a way to help me out. No one would know what he looked like. So...here I am."

"Where is your brother? Where is he now?"

"At home. He's holed up till I get home, not going out. That was the deal."

April opened her mouth, then shut it again. It was an entirely unexpected and unforeseen outcome. She made a snap decision.

"Well, Tom, lets see if you are telling the truth, shall we?"

She turned away and dug in her bag for the oversized phone. Dialing, she waited.

"International Exports. How may I direct your call?" she was asked when the call went through.

"I'd like to speak to Mr. Bond's boss please."

Call and counter call for connection to the incident room at Ingrams & Associates. Someone at the office had thought it amusing to use International Exports as the front – the same company that James Bond was supposed to work for. April could only imagine what Jessica would say when she found out this was being used for call sign verification.

A second later there was a click and a voice said, "Hello April."

"Aha, Megan! How are you, babe? I had no idea you'd be on duty?"

"I just got back. Need to decompress, so I volunteered. I'm up to date on your adventure. Honestly, April, you get all the fun ones. How's your tan?"

"Not where I'd like it to be. Megan, so glad to hear your voice. Missed you."

"Yeah my last one...will take some time. It wasn't good. Didn't end well."

There was silence for a moment. April knew what it meant, and she knew that sometime soon Megan and she needed a drunken evening out.

"I understand. I want to hear, but, this isn't the time."

"No, it isn't. Sorry. Yeah, so what do you need April?"

"I need someone to go check out something. We have anyone in Portland? I need something checked a.s.a.p. I literally have someone tied up here while we need to check his alibi."

"This that Kevin Smith thing you mentioned? Yeah, we have a contractor on retainer in Portland when you first mentioned it. Ready to go when you are."

"Ok, so this guy says he's Kevin Smith's brother, Tom. He says he's here in place of him. Some swap deal they have going on. He says his brother is hiding out at his home. We know where that is. I need someone to go find out if he's there or not, and if so, what his deal is. Can we make that happen?"

"Oh sure. Let me take care of it. Might take a few hours. You gonna be ok?"

"Less time the better. It's about 11 here, I doubt I can keep him here till more than about 4 or 5. Any later and I may have to start answering questions I don't want to."

April glared at the man tied on her bed while saying that.

"Oh, should be done way before then."

"Great. I'll be waiting here. Ping me when you have news."

"Will do, April. Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

And the connection broke, with April chuckling. What Megan wouldn't do wasn't a large amount. She was even more adventurous than April, and not afraid of situations April would never get involved in.

She looked over at the trussed up man, who was looking at her with suspicion. She realized he'd misconstrued her chuckle, not hearing Megan's side of the conversation. Not bothering to enlighten him, she just smiled her bloodless smile again and said, "Well. Lets find out if you are telling the truth, shall we? We may have to wait a bit, but I have someone checking into your story. We'll soon know if Kevin backs you up or not."

Watching him intently as she said this, there was no sense of panic in Tom – he just relaxed with a very small, very tentative smile.

"Well, good. You'll see I'm telling the truth."

April was sure now. He was telling the truth. She'd confronted him with his story being directly tested and instead of getting nervous and bargaining, he'd just relaxed. It was going to check out, she was sure of that.

Which was a problem. She'd tied him up and shocked him, and while he had been deceitful, he wasn't who she was looking for. Fuck.

But, she wasn't about to let him go until she got the word from Megan. It would carry her façade further once she was forced to let him go. She needed him scared and off balance. While she wanted to, there was zero chance she would apologize to him. To do so would mean he would think he had one over on her, and she needed him to keep quiet. Doing so because he was scared of her would be infinitely better than her putting herself in his debt.

She got up and pulled out her tablet, pulled out her ear buds and started listening to what the bugs had pulled in while she waited. There was nothing of interest to her mission, although she did find out a few choice things about the couples, and their thoughts on her, "Tara" being one of the keywords the filter software was using.

She was definitely on The List for some of the couples. Only Brenda was wary, but then, from what she could hear, Brenda was wary of everyone.

She looked up a couple of times as Tom tried to engage her in conversation, but just smiled her dead smile, very briefly and then went back to listening to her tablet.

At one point, almost two hours later, he demanded to use the bathroom, and she could see he was serious. She just looked at him, debating internally what to do. In the end, she mentally shrugged, pulled out some scissors and cut off the plastic ties from his legs and arms.

She didn't say a word as she did it, and he didn't either. He just sat there for a moment, rubbing his wrists and legs, and then got up wordlessly and went in to the bathroom. April moved her small chair and put it in front of the room door and sat down with the Taser and the satellite phone in her lap. When Tom emerged from the bathroom, he stopped, looking at her.

She gestured to the bed and said, sweetly, "I hope you washed your hands?"

His eyes narrowed, and she could see the calculation going on behind them, and so she shifted the position of the Taser in her lap, just enough that his eyes tracked down to it. He then just sat down, tentatively, on the corner of the bed.

After ten minutes of the two of them just staring at each other he said, "You can't keep me here forever, you know."

"I know." She replied, emphatically. "But I doubt I'll have to. My good friends are checking out your story and as soon as I hear back, and assuming it's as you say it is, you can go."

He rubbed his wrists again.

"And I'm supposed to what, just say nothing?"

"Oh you'll say nothing, alright. There's no question about that. Just think about this. You are not who you say you are, you are here under false pretenses. Imagine what Martin Steele would do if he found that out. I'm here investigating a bank robbery and you've gotten in the way. That's, at best, wasting police time. At worst, attempting to derail an investigation."

It was all pure bullshit and she was ladling it on with a trowel. She just hoped he didn't dig too much.

"Oh, come on. What jurisdiction do you think you have here?"

"Kevin, Tom, whatever your name is. Who is it that you think I work for?"

His eyes widened.

"Lets just say it has initials, and a long, long reach. If you really want to find out how long, then go ahead. Scream about it. See what happens. I guarantee you, you won't enjoy it. Not for long, anyway."

There was another silence. She was hoping desperately that he bought her bluff. She was also worried – the longer they sat there staring at each other, the longer he had to think. The more he thought, with her in the room, the more chance there was he would start to poke holes in the whole thing.

She needn't have worried – fifteen minutes later the phone rang. She answered instantly, keeping her eyes on Kevin/Tom the whole time, who stared back, unblinking.

"Hey Girl," said Megan without preamble or even waiting for April to say anything. "It checks out. Our contractors in Portland found his brother, skulking around his place. Took a bit for them to get him to respond, but they yelled that they knew he was there, and they'd be back with a warrant, and eventually he opened up. Turns out they are off duty cops anyway, so wasn't so far from the truth. From what they got from him, it was the same story you were given. So either this is one hell of a prepared set up, or this is real."

"Thanks Megan. What's your feeling on the veracity?"

"I think it's on the up and up. We've used these guys before and they know what they are doing. They did say he was pretty terrified that he would be arrested for something, even though there is nothing to really arrest him for. Their judgment was that this is sound."

"Yeah, my feeling, too. It could still be a set up, but I think you're right. I think Mr. Tom here just wants to get laid in the sun."

"We gonna tell the client about this?"

"The question of the hour. Don't know. What do you think, Megan? Think the client has a right to know one of his branch managers is dicking him around?" She framed the question back at Megan for Tom's benefit.

He looked back at her, imploringly, mouthing, "Please, no".

She put her hand over the mouthpiece of the outsized phone and said, "What do you think, Tom? Think he's entitled to know?"

It was a shameless use of another lever against Tom saying anything about her treatment of him, and she had no compunction about using it.

"Please... he'd can Kevin. Kevin is the only one in the family worth a damn. Take it out on me, not him."

April regarded him, making a show of making up her mind. There was no real choice here, but Tom was so off balance he didn't know that. She took her hand off the mouthpiece.

"Against my better judgment, lets keep this between us for now Megan. If Tom here breathes a word, then we offer his brother up, ok?"

Megan was silent. She was smart and knew what April was doing.

"I won't say a thing. You have my word." The desperation in Tom's voice was palpable.

"The word of a con man? Yeah, that's worth a lot." April regretted saying it, since it made her out to be harder to convince than she really wanted to seem.

"Honestly. I won't say a word."

She looked at him piercingly for a little longer, then spoke into the phone.

"Ok Megan. Thanks for looking into that for me. I'll be in touch."

"No problem April. And sorry. I know this would have been nice to put to bed."

"Well, have to keep looking. Thanks again, Megan. Speak to you later."

And with that, the call – and the evening – were done. Silently, she got up, moved the chair and gestured at the door.

"You can go. Remember, not a word. I still have to find the assholes that are holding up the banks."

Tom said, hopefully, hovering by the door, "Hey, maybe I can help?"

"No, thank you. You'd get in the way. Just go get laid and don't bother me, ok?"

He nodded, unlocked and opened the door, hesitated in the doorframe for a second, like he wanted to say something, and then left, shutting the door after him.

April sank down on the bed. She glanced at the clock and saw it was just after three in the morning.

"DAMN." She said, heatedly, then remembered where she was. Better keep it quiet. Walls had ears. In her case, literally.