The Big Con by Adam Walker Phillips

Author:Adam Walker Phillips
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781945551277
Publisher: Prospect Park Books
Published: 2018-03-10T16:00:00+00:00

A BREAK FROM THE MUNDANE

Fifteen seconds into the phone call to Phoenix, it was readily apparent that Detective Richard Fortin had a personality fitting for the common nickname of his given one.

“Who?” He made me repeat my name for the third time, at which point he added, “Never heard of you.”

“I know, sir,” I explained, “we’ve never met before.”

“Then why are you calling me?”

He overlooked the fact that technically he had called me, or in any case had returned the message I’d left on his answering machine.

“What’s this about again?” he peppered.

The retired detective interrupted my attempts to explain why I was reaching out to him with more questions, which he rattled off with barely any time in between for replies. As I struggled to get a word in, I got the sense that he found this act quite entertaining. I conjured up the image of an old man, some seventeen years off the force, utterly bored with retirement and oddly grateful to have this little one-sided sparring session with a stranger on the phone. Perhaps it reminded him of the good old days, when he could talk over anyone he damn well pleased in an interrogation room. I didn’t want to begrudge him a respite from the drudgery of retirement, but I also didn’t want to be a pushover and be bullied.

“Hello?” he asked into the phone after I stopped responding. “You still there?”

I smiled to myself for having read him correctly and because of how quickly his tune changed. There was a little fear in his voice that this pest on the phone might buzz off and actually leave him alone.

I let that fear hang in the air for a few seconds longer.

“I’m here,” I replied.

“Oh, I thought you’d hung up.”

I gave him a little more silence just so he didn’t think he could launch into another one of his bullying rants.

“What do you need from me, Mr. Restic?” he finally asked, sounding compliant enough to remember my name and in a tone that felt genuine. It was time to get straight to the purpose of my call. I dropped a few names Badger had supplied me with; this seemed to work because the detective immediately relaxed on the phone. I then asked about Margaret Fitch.

“Maggie?” he confirmed. “She was a part-time prostitute and a full-time drug addict. Lost her teeth at twenty-five and what little beauty she had long before that.” It sounded all too similar to her loser brother in Bakersfield. “She was one of our regulars. I knew her before I made detective. Every time you pick them up,” he reminisced, “you give them the same old song-and-dance about cleaning up, getting back on track. She wasn’t a bad girl inside. You warn them that they have to change their ways or else. Else what?” he asked rhetorically, perhaps even recalling the response he got from Maggie every time he uttered the warning at two in the morning. “You think there’s no way the human

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