Active Shooter (5 page)

He unfolded his arms and pushed off the wall.
Still smiling, he came toward me and took a seat across the table.
“Some people get nervous when they can't keep tap on things.”

“But not you, obviously.”

“No, it unsettles me, too. You of all people
should understand why.”

“Yeah, but that's why you have me there,
isn't it? Some things can't be monitored with your toys. They
require a human touch.”

“What did you and Bridget talk about?”

“How she wants me to tell her about my past
life.”

“Which she somehow knows about.”

“No thanks to me.”

“Did you ask her how she came into that
information?”

“I did.”

“And?”

“She did her clam impersonation. Something
about journalistic integrity and protecting her sources, which she
then turned into a pitch for how she'd do the same for me.”

“What sort of details did she give you? About
your past, I mean.”

“Same thing she fed me at the restaurant.
Song and dance about TechOps.”

“Anything more specific?”

I looked up at the ceiling for a couple of
seconds, then back down. “Nope. Drawing a blank.”

He cupped his hands behind his neck and slid
down the chair until he was almost lying down.

“It's very late, Andre. We're all very tired
and would like to go home.”

“So would I.”

“Are you in?”

“Yeah, I'm in.”

“All the way?”

“What else is there.”

“What changed your mind?”

“The money you're going to pay me. In
cash.”

He craned his neck this way and that, then
straightened up in his seat. In another second he was resting his
elbows on the table and looking at me with calm, tired eyes. He
asked me how much, I told him a figure I knew they wouldn’t pay, he
said he’d take it up the chain.

“Fair enough,” I said, figuring most numbers
above zero would suit me.

He regarded me for a second. “How did you two
leave it?”

“I told her I had to think about it. Gave her
a lot of reasons why I shouldn't do it. I figured playing hard to
get would seem more natural.”

“Yes, it would,” he said with a weary smile.
“It is like riding a bicycle, isn’t it?”

“So long as that means I don’t need a
refresher course. I hear those are expensive, and I would want to
make sure the U.S. taxpayers can spare every penny to secure my
financial well-being instead.”

His smile broadened. “We're going to put you
on a charter back to L.A. First thing in the morning. It will be
better than first class.”

“Are the flight attendants extra-cute?”

Still smiling, he twisted his lips a bit and
shook his head. “Maybe next time.”

“Ah, something to look forward to. So long as
I'm a good boy.”

“Take care of the mission, and we'll take
care of you.”

Right, like they took care of me last time, I
wanted to tell him. Somehow I managed to say, “Fair enough.”

***

I arrived at my Marina del Rey apartment
shortly before noon the next morning. I didn't get there alone.
They drove me there in one of their shiny black sedans. They helped
me carry my luggage, now including a silver gray briefcase, up to
my front door. They came into my apartment and did a scan. They
told me it came up clean, and they left, but not before they
reminded me to use the secured cellphone that now hung heavy and
warm in my shirt pocket.

I took it out and played with it a bit. From
afar it would look like a nice, name-brand smartphone. In my hand
it felt heavier, denser. Was I imagining that, the weight of it?
No, I probably wasn't. It came with a few more capability and a tad
more shielding and ruggedness than your average street smartphone.
With all that, it's battery didn't seem like much. In merely an
hour of use since landing at LAX, which included little more than
turning it on, its power indicator had run down to the 70 percent
mark.

I dug up the phone's charger, plugged it in,
and it was then time to deal with my compensation.

I opened the silver-gray briefcase and
unpacked the stacks of 100 dollar bills into the safe in my bedroom
closet. Before I locked the safe, I stared at my two Glock pistols.
I shook my head and slammed the safe shut. A minute later I was
spinning the dial, opening the safe again to take out one of the
guns and a case of ammunition. I loaded the pistol's clip and a
spare clip, and I slid them both under my bed.

A minute after that I was shopping online for
a couple of hand-keyed gun cases, the kind that only open when you
stick your hand into a slot. I placed the order, and that consoled
me a bit. I might have been a killer, but at least I could ensure I
followed proper gun safety.

Then it was time to check my email. I saw
straightaway that my spam filter rules needed serious updating. A
particularly abundant bombardment overcame my inbox since… yeah,
just in the last three days. Coincidence? Maybe
withheld
could shed some light on that. I pushed this thought aside. I
didn't want to face it, the possibility of someone
dampening
me and my story.

I took the time to wade through the barrage,
one email message at a time. After a while, my pinky finger more or
less kept reaching for and pressing the delete key. I almost did
this with an email titled “Fine-art photography: partnering
proposal.” My finger hovered over the delete key with just enough
hesitation to tell me I needed to review the message. It was short
and to the point:

“
My name is Lucia Fuentes. I represent
artists in the L.A. scene. Checked out your website, impressed by
your vision. Let's chat. Text, email, your choice.
” Her cell
number and email addresses followed. I searched my memory. In the
weeks since the LAX shootout, I'd received a high volume of emails
through my website. I thought her name, Lucia Fuentes, sounded
familiar, but I couldn't place the context of whatever she had
communicated before

I stared at my screen reflecting how a month
ago this would have been the type of contact I would have jumped
on. Just the thing I needed to kick-start my faltering career as a
fine-art photographer. Now it seemed like a distraction. Maybe a
distraction was just what I needed, I told myself. I added her as a
contact in my smartphone and entered a calendar reminder to call
her later in the day.

It took me another hour to tame my Inbox.
Then it was time to see how my on-screen persona was doing. I
paused. Did I really want to wade through countless Tweets,
Facebook wall posts and Google+ messages? I pushed myself away from
the computer and took my smartphone to the couch. Maybe it would
all seem less daunting on a smaller screen.

I was about to get rolling when I noticed a
text message. From
Withheld
. “Keep playing along,” it
said.

I set the phone face down, as if that would
help me get away from it and what it contained. I thought back to
the days when I developed the gadgetry that generated text messages
from untraceable sources, along with other assorted tricks. My mind
wasn't ready to contemplate all that stuff again, I told myself as
I felt the onset of another panic attack swelling in my chest. My
breath grew shallow and hard to draw in. I closed my eyes in my
best effort to restrain the onslaught. My neck pulsated to the beat
of my heart.

A second later my cellphone started buzzing,
almost in perfect sync to that rhythm. It kept on buzzing until the
call went to voicemail. A few seconds later it started buzzing
again. The impertinence of whoever was calling managed to distract
me and bring me out of the sinking spiral. Looking back, I realize
now this was the intent.

I checked the cellphone, still buzzing, and I
didn’t recognize the number. The previous call, I saw, originated
from the same number. I let it go to voicemail. Sure enough, it
started buzzing again. Same number.

“Hello,” I answered the call.

“Is this Andre Esperanza?” a woman’s voice
asked.

“Yeah.”

“Since this is your business line, shouldn’t
you say something like, ‘Hello, Andre Esperanza speaking’?”

“I’m two millimeters away from hanging
up.”

“I’m just trying to help you with your
end-user experience,” she replied. “Your first touch point is
sucking big time right now.”

At this point I should have hung up. But her
halfway between abrasive and assertive manner along with her
confidence kept me on the hook.

“What about your touch point?” I asked.

“What about it?”

“I haven’t heard your name either.”

She laughed. “Nice. I think you and I can
work together.”

“Why? Based on the fact that we have lousy
touch points?”

“My name is Lucia Fuentes, Andre. My friends
call me Luz, and it my gut feeling about you proves right, you’ll
be calling me Luz before the night is over.”

“Before the night is over?” I peered through
my window. Out to the west blazing sunlight still prevailed.

“I’m going to be at a local gallery, over in
Venice,” she said. “Not too far from you. I’m checking out the
space for an upcoming show I’m doing. I was wondering if you could
drop by and we could chat.”

I pulled the text she’d sent me earlier. “I
guess you couldn’t wait for me to text you back?”

“Oh, I could. But something came up, and I
thought we might do better to chat sooner rather than later.”

“That something that came up, does it concern
me?”

“It could. But it’s better seen than
discussed, know what I mean? I rather show and not tell.”

I thought about her offer for a moment.
Again, I felt the compulsion to decline. I didn’t really need this,
not right now. By the next morning, Bridget would be in town,
expecting me to provide her with information and clues for her
reportage. She and I needed some alone time to plot our way
forward.

Nonetheless, Lucia’s offer intrigued me. I
didn’t allow myself to waver with indecision.

“What time would you like to meet?” I
asked.

“I’m planning to be at the gallery around 5
PM. I can’t really make it out there any earlier.”

"Sounds doable," I said.

“OK. How about dinner afterwards?”

“Sounds good.”

I arrived at the gallery just shy of the
appointed time. Lucia met me at the front door. She shook my hand,
and the way she leaned in made the overgrown shoulder bag she
carried swing forward and almost fall. Lucia caught it and righted
herself.

As I followed her into the gallery, I noted
that her shoulder bag hung heavier than it should.

As soon as we went in, Lucia dropped her
purse on a small bar counter by the door. She returned to the door
to lock it. I took a few seconds to scan the space, which currently
featured a sparse smattering of abstract art.

“You own the place?” I asked.

“No. A good friend of mine does.”

“Good enough to trust you with the key.”

She gave me a sideways look, but the rest of
her ignored my remark. She walked over to a wooden bench, sat and
tapped her fingernail on the empty spot. I accepted her invitation
and sat next to her.

“I like to be straight with people,” Lucia
said. “So I’ll get the awkward stuff out of the way first.”

“Sounds ominous.”

“I didn’t chase you down because I have some
crush on the guy that cleared LAX of terrorists with his wits, a
handgun, an AK and some flash-bangs. Sorry if it sounds like I’m
assuming things, but this is not a social call.”

“I didn’t say it was.”

“But you might be thinking it.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning I don’t mix business and romance.
Meaning I am a Lesbian and I don’t care for your type, no matter
how sexy you look or promise me to be.” Lucia smiled and gave me a
slight slap on the knee. “See, I told you I get right to the
thing.”

“Thank you for clearing things up.”

“Not disappointed at all?” she asked, no
coiling her smile into a grin.

“There’s no way I can answer that question
and come out ahead.”

She slapped me on the knee again, harder this
time. “Perfect. I knew you were a sharp one.”

“How do you figure?”

“A couple of answers you gave during that
interview. My personal favorite? When asked why you were reluctant
to give an interview, you said
it wasn’t modesty.
Did you
want the attention? We all
want
attention. I didn’t
need
it.
Perfect.”

“You give an interesting IQ test.”

“It’s what it means, what it says about you.
I like how you stayed the hell away from any social media. Most
saps would have been so drawn to the instant-celeb flame, they
would have gone up in one bright splat.”

I didn’t reply. Instead my gaze drifted to
her purse, slumped at the counter.

“Now I’m here to show you how you can be
smarter about the whole thing. Use the moment to draw people to
what matters.”

I waved at the room. “My art.”

“Your art, yes. But first, you, the person,
the visionary, the dreamer of images that move and console the
soul.”

“That sounds inspirational.”

“You know what your problem is, Andre?”

“Please, do tell.”

“You have a confused brand. Portrait sessions
here, headshots there, weddings when the booking comes, some event
photography if you can score the gig, fine-art photography if
anyone dares order through that cluttered site of yours. You’re all
over the map, unfocused, blurry as all get out.”

“But you can change that.”

“How in the hell would I do that?” she asked,
leaning back and away from me. “No, man. You change that. You have
to figure out who you are as a photographer, as a person, as a
visionary, as a dreamer--”

“Fine, fine. I get it.”

“Yes, fine. As in fine art.” Now she waved at
the walls. “This gallery or one like it can be full of your work.
Photos that are crisp, simple, to the point. Images that tell a
clear story. I see that in your fine-art collection, even if it
does need a bit of culling.”