Chapter 7: Footprints

Rebecca

It had been a pretty good weekend. In fact I think I'd have to say it was the best weekend I'd had since Michael had died. A year, hell, six months ago, I would have felt guilty for even thinking that.

My first week with my new partner had been enlightening to say the least, and I had to admit that Henslith had some pretty good ideas on where to start looking for our man. Contacting Kenneth Riley's former employers had gotten us nowhere. He had not been seen or heard from anywhere since the night of the explosion. Not a single appearance at a single clinic, doctor's office, pharmacy, nothing. He might as well have blown up with the house. His bank accounts were just barely enough to cover the monthly bills for two months if something went wrong. Hardly in keeping with his persona as Kenneth Riley: over fifty percent of his take home was unaccounted for. Checking small businesses in the area placed him as an inconsistent shopper at best. A few people remembered seeing him infrequently in the local restaurants and convenience stores but hadn't seen him in several weeks.

Assuming that he was still in the general area may seem like wishful thinking but when that's all you have, you run with it. If he had truly cut and run then we were wasting our time. Not to mention up the creek without a shred to tell us where he may have fled to. As it was, the flowers he had sent me after I escaped the explosion, and the fact that he followed me to the airport, both screamed that not only was he still in the area, but very close. Henslith assured me that money was not a problem even without Kenneth Riley's income. His estimated worth was somewhere in the low seven figures, you know, two-comma land. We started with the assumption that with his carefully crafted identity blown to hell he had to be taking time to re-establish and set up a new life under a new identity. Getting phony ID in Los Angeles isn't nearly as hard as a finding a good dry cleaner, but finding real quality papers, that took a little more effort. We had people quietly keeping an eye on any of the known high end paper pushers. Knowing our boy's penchant for gadgetry I also took a photo to Dillon and asked him to very, very, carefully keep an eye out for anyone suddenly wanting a lot of video tech.

The problem was that the Sandman knew exactly what steps we would be taking, the signs we would be looking for. He was trained to blend in convincingly. Money was our first target, he would need cash and lots of it to re-establish quickly, you could do it on a budget if you had time but the faster you go the more expensive it became; the old adage that nothing greases the gears like cold hard cash is true. However a federal warrant works pretty well too. We already had a watch on the bank system, looking for large cash transactions. What we were particularly interested in was a large volume of cash coming into a bank from off shore, then going back out fairly quickly. We were also checking out the real estate market looking for single men suddenly buying houses, particularly those putting down a lot of money. That was a long shot. On the one hand, single guys do buy houses, and sometimes they have a lot of cash to invest, but most of those will have just sold their former homes. Unless they were spec buyers looking to flip the house for a quick profit, but fortunately most of those are known and we could eliminate them quickly. He would need a new car but thousands of people buy cars every week in Southern California. Something like ten percent of the new cars sold in America are sold here. Chances are he would go for something used anyway, probably a private party sale, or an out of the way used lot, where IDs wouldn't be checked that closely. Hell, there were places he could flash my drivers license and no one would notice; places were the only pictures they were interested in verifying were dead presidents.

We had our end of week wrap up meeting with Rod at three o'clock Friday to go over all the latest developments in the case. We gave him the ups and downs of the week in one neat thirty minute package.

"Good work, I look forward to hearing about all the progress you're making, soon." He looked us each in the eye. "Very soon. Is there anything else going on I need to know about?"

I hesitated a little too long. He cocked his head to one side, holding my eye without speaking. I glanced at Henslith and she quickly headed for the door with a smile.

"If you will excuse me, Director Rodriguez, I think I need to go polish my badge."

"I was wondering if it would be a problem if I brought a guest to dinner on Sunday?" I said after she was gone.

"You're taking him to see Amy aren't you?"

For some odd reason I couldn't help feeling like I was seventeen years old sneaking back in my bedroom window at three o'clock in the morning only to find my father sitting on my bed waiting for me. Not one of my finer moments but it was one I would always remember. Which did nothing to explain why I felt this way now. Rod wasn't my father, damn it!

"No, I'm not your father."

"Stop that!"

He chuckled. "I've known you too long, Bex. Let me guess ... the bedroom window?"

If I'd been any redder I'd have been bleeding. Rod looked like he was on the verge of having a case of the blistering giggles. Suddenly he stood and got very serious, walked around the desk and pulled the blinds. To anyone paying attention on the outside the look on his face as he closed the blinds would have spelled trouble for me, but when the room was as secure as he could make it from outside eyes he stepped up, hugged me close to his chest, and kissed the top of my head.

"Michael would be very happy that you have found someone. By all means, bring him by. Selena has been dying to meet him, and so have I, for that matter. You can't really count that run by his place to pick up the Osborne girl. I was in and out in like three minutes. But I'm warning you, you better be ready. That woman is going to dragging out her book of wedding invitations so she can help you pick one. That's assuming of course that he passes Amy's inspection."

If Amy had any reservations about Bob, she kept them to herself. The ride down was terrible. The only time I could remember being that nervous was when Sylvia and I got caught with a copy of Playgirl at school. Sister Agnes had been so shocked I thought she was going to faint, but instead she just confiscated it and marched us straight into Mother's. Mother Superior Constance Patrice, affectionately known as Consta-Pracion by all the girls, took it calmly. Sister Agnes fainting would be funny. Mother looking calm scared me to death; there were stories. We waited patiently as she called first my parents, then Sylvia's and invited them to stop by the school to discuss an opportunity for some special education that she had just learned about. "Not to worry," she told both our parents, "the girls seem very excited about it and they are going to stay after school until you arrive. Don't worry, I'll find something to keep them busy ... Yes, five thirty would be fine ... No, it's no trouble at all, I don't mind. God bless you and keep you safe until we meet again."

We spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning every blackboard, bathroom, and closet in the school as well as something I was pretty sure used to be a dungeon. When our parents arrived she had us stand off to one side as she greeted our parents and got them seated, offered them tea, and then handed each of them a folder. Apparently she had been busy while we were cleaning. Each folder contained half of the magazine.

"Now this material was brought to my attention this afternoon by Sister Agnes. It seems the girls have been working on some independent study material and she wanted my opinion on whether it might be too advanced for them. So I wanted to get your opinions before I allowed them to proceed with this particular line of study. Please be honest, you don't have to worry about offending me. I know my limitations and I'm afraid this is over my head, so I'm counting on you to guide me in helping these remarkably bright and inquisitive young ladies in their studies.

Thank God my mother didn't get the other half in my folder. I thought Mrs. Polusi was going to faint when she opened Sylvia's folder and found Mr. November, spread out across two pages in all of his tanned, chiseled and exceptionally tumescent glory. I wanted to die.

This wasn't quite that bad but at least in school I knew why I was embarrassed. I tried making conversation a couple times but I just couldn't seem to focus. Bob was nothing if not understanding, sensing my unease and charming his way through a rough situation.

"What is wrong with you? You're acting like you're out on a date and changed your mind but don't know how to break it to the unlucky guy. Relax; this is going to be fine. I promise I won't embarrass you in front of your sister."

My first real surprise came when I tried to direct him to the hotel I usually stay at when I visit. It seemed Bob had other plans and had called around and gotten us a room at a local bed and breakfast. What can I say, it was a lot nicer than the place I usually stayed, with a beautiful view of one of the small local lakes. Mrs. Fields -- yes, that really was her name -- not only served us real home made biscuits with breakfast, but she made a peach cobbler that was to die for.

When we arrived at the hospital, Bob was the picture of professionalism and poise, chatting with, even flirting with, all the nurses, talking to the doctors about Amy's condition and treatment. Even bringing up some experimental treatments he had read about that had been tried with varying degrees of success in other countries. He even told Amy to eat all of her vegetables. Dinner at Rod's was everything I had hoped it wouldn't be, as well as everything I had been warned about. Selena was all smiles and questions and not so subtle hints. She stopped short of asking if we'd set a date, but I kept waiting for the question to come out. All in all the weekend was a huge success. It also turned out to be one of the biggest mistakes I had ever made in my life.

Monday morning we opened up with a bang. After talking it over extensively with Rod we decided to go ahead with Henslith's suggestion to alert the casino crowd in Vegas as to the identity of our man. Not directly of course, that just wasn't done. I had overnighted some information, including a photo that Interpol had provided, to Atlantic City to get the ball rolling. Rico was thrilled to finally have a shot at finding out how his security had been compromised and hopefully nailing the bastard who had dumped a dead girl in one of his hotels. He was also nervous as hell.

"What the fuck is this really about? Why is the almighty 'FB of fuckin' I' all of a sudden handing out information to the dark side? And how the fuck did you get a name and a face on a guy no one's seen? Your only witness got blown up and almost took you with her."

"C'mon Rico, give me a break. I've got a source, he's the one that brought me the case, and he tipped me off to where the girl was. I don't know where he gets his information but so far it's all been good. He got enough on the guy that someone was able to tag him. Rico ... promise me you won't do anything stupid if he shows up, okay?"

"Whoa. Why is it I suddenly get the notion you ain't telling me something?"

"Rico, listen to me. If he shows up, you watch him, and you call every cop you can find, and you stay the fuck away from him. I don't want to have to call Sylvia and explain that you were collateral damage on a case I was working, capisce?"

"Okay, I'd say that about covers the part you weren't telling me. I'll be a good boy. I'll call you if he shows up anywhere, hold on a second..." Apparently someone else had come into the room. "Shit! I knew it. Yeah, just leave the file." Then he was speaking to me again, "Hampton, you are not going to believe this; your boy worked here."

"What? When?"

"Not here-here. Vegas; four and a half years ago. Want to guess where?"

"You're kidding?"

"Nope, ground zero. Get this, hired under the name of Keith fucking Richards. You want to double your money and guess what he did?"

"Oh gee, let me guess? He worked for security?"

"Even better, he helped install the system."

"That would explain how he got around your system when he dumped Amanda. Can you fax me that file."

"Oh, I don't know babe, you know, personnel files are confidential. I could get in a lot of trouble for something like that."

"Okay, I understand. I wouldn't want you to get in any trouble. By the way, did you ever get around to telling Sylvia what really happened at that bachelor party?"

"Damn, Hampton, you ever consider just sayin' please? I don't think I want this on the fax, I'll have Shirley copy it all and overnight it to you. Meanwhile I'll get the word out to the people that count to keep an eye out for your boy. Look but don't touch."