Beneath The Surface (32 page)

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”

They went to the apartment and knocked on the door. When nobody answered, Black tried the doorknob. To his surprise, the door was unlocked. He took out his gun. “Stay behind me,” he told Carmen and went in.

“Hello. TR,” Carmen said and was immediately met with gunfire.

Black pushed Carmen down behind the couch.

“Aren’t you gonna shoot back?” Carmen asked as the bullets
rained over their heads.

Black looked up and saw where the bullets were hitting the wall. He held up his gun and blindly fired one shot. More gunfire followed. “He’s not a very good shot. But keep your head down,” Black said and waited. When he heard the clicking of an empty gun, he stood up in time to see a man run into another room and close the door.

“Wait here.”

Black ran to the door and kicked it in. There he found the man huddled in a corner of the room, fanatically trying to reload his weapon. When he saw Black coming toward him, he threw the gun at him and tried to run. Black grabbed him before in could get anywhere. Black punched him twice in the face and threw him to the floor.

“You TR?” Black asked.

“Yeah. Who are you?” TR shouted as Black came toward him again.

“I’m the guy you just shot at.”

Carmen peeked in the room.

“What do you want?”

“I wanna know about Tangela House.”

“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about!” TR shouted and covered his head.

“Lie to my again and slamming face first into that wall will be the least painful thing I do to you.”

“Okay, okay. “

“I wanna know about Tangela House.”

“What you wanna know about Tish?”

“Tell me what you know,” Black said and took out his gun.

TR glanced over at Carmen. “You’re that TV reporter, aren’t you?”

“That’s right.”

TR looked relieved. “Then Yasir didn’t send you?”

“No,” Carmen said. “I just wanna know about Tish.”

“And I’m losin’ patience,” Black said and held the barrel of his gun to TR’s head.

“Tish is dead,” TR said quickly.

“Why do you think Yasir sent us?” Black asked.

“I heard what happened to Tish, but I don’t believe that the couple killed her.”

“Who killed her?” Black asked.
 

“I think it has something to do with the scam we ran on Yasir.”

“Tell me about the scam,” Black demanded.

“We setup a thing we called a bank debenture trading program.”

“How did it work?” Black asked.

“We setup a Web site called highyeildinvest.com. The site said that the program was formerly available only to very wealthy investors. It offered investors a guaranteed high return with no risk of loss. It said the high-yield returns it earned came by purchasing promissory bank notes issued by key prime banks. It invited the serious investors to join by investing in one thousand dollar increments, and we were promised 120 percent annualized return. The money we got was funneled to a bogus shell corporation in Costa Rica. That money was used to payoff old investors with new investor’s money, and we’d skim some off the top for ourselves.”

“Good hustle. How does Yasir fit into that?” Black asked.

“One day Tish comes to me and says she has a mark that wants to invest fifty grand.”

“Yasir,” Carmen said.

“Yeah. I told her that fifty grand was too big a bite. I told her that we were doing fine just like we were, but she insisted that we could make it work, and that she would take care of everything.”

“What happened?” Black asked.

“Tish rented an office and hired a couple of guys to play like they were traders; and we setup a meeting at the office at 8 o’clock with Yasir, to bring the money. Things were goin’ all right, and out of the blue, Yasir started yellin’ that something wasn’t right; that we were tryin’ to cheat him.

“Tish tried to calm him down but he just got madder. Then he hit Tish and took out his gun. He shot one of the guys; then he shot the other. Tish grabbed me and we ran out of there. He took a couple of shots at us, but we ran down the stairs and got away. So when I heard about Tish gettin’ murdered, I knew it was Yasir, and that I was next.”

“Where can I find Yasir?” Black asked.

“I don’t know. He was Tish’s mark. I only met him that one time,” TR said.

Now that they had heard TR’s story, Black and Carmen left the apartment. On the way back to her apartment, Carmen asked a question. “You believe him?”

“I’ll tell you this. He believes that Yasir killed her, and that he’s next. But something about his story sounded a little funky to me.”

“What about it?”

“The scam they were runnin’ is one of the oldest scams in the book. Same scam Bennie Madoff was runnin’. And the way they setup the office to take Yasir’s money, that’s an old one too. But the way it usually works is that after they get the money, somebody gets shot, but the mark gets away. Since what he was doin’ was not only illegal, it now involves a murder, so the mark doesn’t go runnin’ to the cops,” Black explained.

“But it was Tish and TR that got away,” Carmen said.

“True, but the result was the same.”

“I’m not following you.”

“Let’s say that this was a setup for TR.”

“Okay, lets.”

“TR gets away, and since what he was doin’ was not only illegal, but now involves a murder, TR is scared he’s next and doesn’t go runnin’ to the cops.”

“I follow you now, but my question is why?” Carmen asked as they arrived at her apartment building.

“I don’t know.” Black looked at Carmen. “You think Yasir killed her?”

“I don’t know if he did it himself, but I think it’s all connected and has something to do with Congressman Redding.”

“What makes you think that?”

“With Yasir’s involvement with the investment scam, and the congressman’s involvement with the investment group that Yasir is a part of, I’m pretty sure that the motive for the murder lies there.”

“So what now?”

“I’m goin’ out with Monika again tomorrow to see if Redding meets with anybody else.” Carmen smiled. “If you’re not too busy with your woman, you should
come
hang out with us.”

“I just might do that.”

“Which reminds me, why didn’t you tell me about Jackie?”

“What about Jackie?”

“Monika said that Jackie is gay.”

“So?” He thought about correcting her, and telling her that he knew for sure that Jackie was bisexual, but thought better of it. “I’m sure she’s not the first gay woman you’ve run into.”

“Far from it, trust me. But you still could have told me.”

“How did I know you two were gonna get drunk and sing show tunes and start dancin’?” Black asked and started laughing.

“What?”

“Y’all were dancin’ kinda close.”

Carmen swung at him.

“Good night, Carmen.” Black started to get out of the car, but Carmen stopped him.

“Hey. Thanks for hangin’ in here with me on this.”

“No problem.”

“I know you don’t have to do this, and that you’re taking time away from your family to do it, and I just want you to know that I appreciate it.”

“You’re welcome.”

“One more thing I wanna say. More like something I realized.”

“What’s that?”

“That as much as I want it to be me, this isn’t our time, either,” Carmen said and looked away. “I think you know that too.”

“I do,” Black paused. “I care a lot about you, but—”

“But I can see that your relationship with your daughter is important to you. I understand that.”

“I’d just be in your way.”

“How?”

“Look at us. Look at what we do when we’re together. We investigate this woman’s murder. Because what you’re doin’ is important to you.”

“It’s my job.”

“And you’re dedicated to it. Driven by it.”

“That’s how I am. Once I get into something, it has a way of consuming me. Its how you made me,” Carmen said, and Black touched her hand.

“I just ain’t the kind of guy to be hangin’ around to carry your camera. But if you ever need me for anything, I’ll be there for you.”

“I know you will. I’m just glad to have you back in my world,” Carmen said and kissed Black on the cheek. “Now go on and get outta here before I start to cry.”

“Good night, Carmen. Maybe I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“But I’ll understand if you don’t.”

Black got out of the car and Carmen drove into the parking garage, where she sat for a while and cried.

At 9 o’clock the following morning, Carmen waited outside her building for Monika to pick her up so she could continue her surveillance of Congressman Redding. After Black left the night before, she sat in the parking garage and had a good cry, before finally going up to her apartment and going to sleep. Her last thought before she drifted off to sleep was,
This
may not be our time, but there will be a time for us.

When Monika arrived that morning, she was driving the surveillance van. Carmen was impressed. “How come we didn’t use this yesterday?” Carmen asked.

“Nick was using it,” Monika replied.

“Nick Simmons?”

“Yup.”

“I haven’t seen Nick in years,” Carmen said and thought about asking what he was doing with the van, but she knew from their experience the day before that Monika was good at asking questions, not answering them.

They got to the congressman’s office just in time to see him going into the building. He was walking and talking with Josh Fillmore.

“Who’s that with Redding?” Monika asked.

“That’s Josh Fillmore. He’s one of the congressman’s aides.”

“Let’s see if we can pick them up,” Monika said and moved to the back of the van.

“Yeah. I’m dying to see how all that stuff works,” Carmen said and followed her into the back.

Monika took a seat behind the console and began making
adjustments. “This is a parabolic microphone,” she began. “It magnifies distant sounds so I can locate the source and suppress background noises. Because of its special design, it is capable of picking up and magnifying signals up to 75 times that of a normal omni-directional microphone,” Monika told Carmen.

“Are you sure about the congressman?” The microphone picked up.