The Man Who Wouldn't Die by A. B. Jewell

Author:A. B. Jewell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2019-06-03T16:00:00+00:00

Eighteen

I DIALED LIEUTENANT GABERSON.

“I thought we agreed you weren’t calling me,” was the first thing that the lieutenant said.

“All bets are off when my husband gets kidnapped.”

This gave him pause and I explained the outlines. I gave him Terry’s cell-phone number and other key details and asked if the police might start a search; maybe they could track his phone. Presumably, Terry didn’t have it with him when he was kidnapped, but maybe he hid it somewhere. He was resourceful.

“We don’t track people’s phones,” said Lieutenant Gaberson. “That’s laughable. Absolutely ridiculous. Not without a proper warrant.”

“Jesus, Lieutenant, it’s me. Not the ACLU.”

“Sorry, we have a department policy requiring us to read that disclaimer. I’m all over tracking him. How else can I help?”

“I need to know about Danny Donogue.”

Silence.

“Lieutenant?”

“What’re you into, Fitch?”

“Background check. That’s all I need. Can you help me out?”

“Related to Terry?”

“I don’t know.”

A heavy sigh.

“We’re not supposed to know each other right now, Fitch.”

“I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t drowning.”

“Meet me tomorrow, usual place?”

“Not soon enough.”

“I’ll call you back.”

He hung up.

TWO STOPS I needed to make, one to Alan Klipper, the Shipper, and the other to a law firm that seemed to have its hand in everything, Snozzwanger, Veruca and Gloop, described to me as a firm alternately doing intellectual property work and divorce funding, whatever the hell that was. I checked the time: 5:40. Would the firm even be open? Of course, those guys go round the clock, but I was already halfway to the Shipper’s place, winding up the same hills I’d ridden to get to Tess and Lester’s place. I kept looking over my shoulder, but no sign of the Tarantulas. I guess they figured they already had me by the lapels.

After a jag down an unpaved side road, trees overhanging, I found Alan Klipper’s estate, looking stately and surprisingly unguarded, at least at first glance. There was no fence between me and the expansive home, which was brown-shingled with white trim and lit with footlights. Then I saw the sign: This Property Is Protected by a Zero-Deforestation 12-Foot-High Electric Fence. On close inspection, I could make out the occasional line of jagged blue electricity. An invisible fence. On the ground, to my right, I saw something crumpled on the ground and leaned in, and made out a UPS driver’s discarded uniform that looked crispy around the edges. No trees harmed, but humans seemed to be getting a raw deal.

I also found a doorway standing in the center of it all. No fence, just a door, steel-framed, with a doorbell. I was standing fifty yards from the house, staring at a doorway in the middle of nowhere. What a perfect damned metaphor. I hit the buzzer. No answer.

My phone rang. I pulled it from my pocket and glanced at the screen. Private number. I answered. “Fitch.”

“Fitch, it’s Fred Pern.”

“How ya doin’, Mr. Pern.”

“Call me Fred. I’m fine, but I want . . . I want to know what’s up with my tenant. Any progress?”

The tenant, right.

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