And then she realized, when he was saying ‘I’ll always have your back,’ he really meant, ‘you’re on your own’.
Robin was not going to give me anything easily. The disc did not contain a series of scanned documents or video files or anything so helpful. She was careful, putting a lot of distance between herself and the evidence. I might be able to link her to it if I tried, but it would be a hard sell. It would require people to know, or believe when I explained to them, a series of inside jokes and specialized references. And they’d have to believe I was telling them the truth, and this is where I got the information. Which, if I were them, I wouldn’t believe. It’s always easy to say you got something from a dead person, because no one can go back and hurt them. You don’t lose a source. It’s the oldest trick in the book. Not even Nate would believe Robin had given him up, because he was too egotistical to believe that anyone would turn on him. No, I was best off leaving Robin out of it and making them believe I’d stumbled upon whatever she had left for my strictly by chance. And, oddly enough, given my career and sting of luck, they’d probably buy it.
First thing, though, I had to decipher the mystery Robin had left on the DVD. It was a series of movie clips, seemingly random. There was no commentary, no hidden data that I could find. It seemed to be leading me somewhere. If I wrote out the scenes in the movies and the landmarks they showed, and translated them into landmarks in our city, like substituting the taco stand we frequented for the one in the show, it formed a neat trail from the office down to the docks. It took me a few times watching through, and I had to guess on some of the clips based on the path I’d drawn on the map, but I think I had it. It wasn’t the most direct route, it wound through a few odd places, but it was definitely a trail of breadcrumbs. By the time I finished, it was morning, and I hadn’t slept a wink. My eyes were gritty from lack of sleep, but I was wired with adrenaline. I dismissed the idea of trying to get a few hours of shut-eye, and instead decided to start following the trail before some little birdies came and ate the breadcrumbs.
I copied the audio file to a jump drive, then stashed the bug and the disk in my hidden safe next to the papers I’d hoped Sandra would never see. Sure, it was cleverly hidden and had a near-tamper-proof lock, but I would never underestimate that girl’s abilities. By now I was pretty sure she hadn’t been involved in her boss’s dealings with Edward Gaust, nor in his attempt to muddle the issue by involving Jason, and I was worried that wherever she was, she was planning on… not revenge, really, but clearing her name and bringing down the bad guys. That might be why Jason had picked her, of all of her team, to try to prove his innocence. She was by far the smartest, and the least trusting of the rat-faced George. I’d never liked him, but of course hadn’t been able to say that to Sandra. Because when would a graphic design artist have met an agent of his standing? And why would I know so much about his background? The lies still weighed heavily on me, and I made a pack that if I ever saw her again, I would tell her everything. She’d probably guess a lot of it when we put George and whoever he was working with behind bars. I was pretty sure Nate was pulling the strings, but I needed proof. If I could take down Nate and George, the rest of the rotten operation would come tumbling down. I had no idea how far the rot ran, but I could be pretty sure the rest of the underlings would roll as soon as we took out the leaders.
I tidied everything up, making sure I hadn’t left any notes that showed the real direction of my research, and headed out the door to follow Robin’s trail. The sun had just risen and it was a beautiful day, but all I felt was cranky and sleep-deprived. I promised my body and entire week in bed if it would just carry me through the next few days. The pep talk, or the bribe, seemed to work, and I managed to pick up the pace and make reasonable time along the path I’d traced out on my map.
When I got to the first location, a small, quaint stone bridge in the park, I was stumped. I walked around it a few times, searching for whatever it was that Robin would have left as a clue. There had to be something, somewhere. I was sure each of the locations would hold a piece of the final puzzle, and only by gathering it all up would I be able to get whatever it was she had stashed. She was being careful, and I just had to be clever enough to decipher all the clues.
It was on my third trip around the bridge that I saw it. Etched into a stone low on the bridge was the crude figure of a robin. I hopped down and, sure enough, the small stone wiggled free. Behind it was a small slip of paper with a single word written on it. I stashed it in my pocket, and headed for the next destination, my eyes on the lookout for small, red-breasted birds.
Robin had been very clever. There were places I found slips of paper, other places I found that there was a store nearby with a sign that boasted a robin. Sometimes the robin she’d drawn contained a letter or a number, and in one impressive piece of graffiti, the only think I could come up with was the number five, since it was a stylized picture of five robins. At the end of the trip I had a pile of clues that amounted to the following choppy sentence:
“Weston Crown 4 7 Park Level 5 Blue Benz 5 1 1 2 G P S”
I was exhausted from walking and searching for robins all day, and hadn’t eaten a thing. The Weston on 47th was a long was away, and my apartment was on the way. As much as it pained me to rest for even a short time, I knew if I didn’t get any sleep I’d be useless. I was on my way to catch a few winks when Daniel called me. I almost didn’t answer the phone, but curiosity got the better of me.
“What?” I yawned.
“Find anything good today?” he asked cautiously. “We haven’t heard from you in awhile.”
“Not yet, though I have some solid leads,” I told him. “Why do you ask?”
“I was hoping you’d be in a good mood,” he said. “And you wouldn’t get too pissed.”
“About what?” I was too tired and hungry to muster up enough anger to sound threatening. If anything, it came out sounding decidedly apathetic. I shook my head and tried to temporarily wake myself up.
“We finally got the evidence to nail George,” he said.
“That’s… good news.” I was confused. I didn’t think I was that tired. “There must be something else.”
“He’s gone. Slipped the net. We’re watching all possible escape routes, so he’s still in the city. But he knows we have him, so he should be considered very, very dangerous.”
I was suddenly a lot more alert. I made a quick scan of the area, and didn’t see anything suspicious. “I understand.” I checked my watch. It was three in the afternoon. If I gave myself a few hours, I might be able to recover whatever it was Robin had left for me. But I needed a place to stash it if George was on the run. It wouldn’t be long before he had Nate after me. And I didn’t have time to be as clever as Robin had. “Hey, Dan, do you fancy a game of racquetball? You know, like back when we were at the academy? I could blow off some steam.”
“Now?” He sounded surprised, and I could almost hear him thinking.
“No, not now. I need to catch some shut-eye. What about, say, tomorrow afternoon? I bet I can still kick your ass.”
“I doubt it. Unless you want to invoke those absurd out-of-bounds rules again.” He understood what I was saying. I felt relief wash over me.
“It’s like Calvinball. We make it up as we go along.” I chuckled.
“You, maybe. Okay, then, tomorrow, and I’ll show you I still have it, old man.”
“Who are you calling old man?” I retorted in mock-anger.
He chuckled and hung up the phone. I pulled myself together and tried to shake off the lingering cobwebs of exhaustion. A quick trip into a small coffee shop got me caffeine and sugar. Hopefully that would be enough to keep me going as I tried to unravel the mystery Robin had left for me. I could only hope the next step ended in something easy, unmistakable, and dead simple. Like a giant red X.
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