Mark Taylor: Genesis (Prequel in the Mark Taylor Series) (9 page)

It had been about twenty minutes and when a tow truck passed him and stopped near where he thought the car had been parked, he let out a breath of relief. He hid in the alcove of an art supply store for a little while longer, allowing the tow truck time to haul the vehicle away.

When the coast was clear, he returned to his apartment and found the photographs on his kitchen counter still, only now they showed a double-parked truck—the very same one that had been in that spot last night.

With a whoop, he pumped his fist in the air. He had done it! He had changed the photo. His cheeks felt like they were going to split from the strain of his grin. Would the driver even know that Mark had saved his life? For a second, he felt a sense of loss. It would have been nice to have a little recognition, but in his dream, he had seen a car seat in the back of the car along with a few small toys. The man was a father—Mark was sure of it—and now he wouldn’t leave his child fatherless. That was worth it even if he was the only one who would ever know it.

After that first incredible save, Mark couldn’t resist using the camera every day. It was never a given that he would get a future photo, but that was half the draw. Some days, he developed the exact same photos that he had taken, but other days, a photo that didn’t belong would show up—sometimes more than one of the same incident. After studying the photos in the evening, he’d sleep, and the photos would come to life in his dreams. Day after day, he took the photos, and day after day, he made the saves. Like notches on a gun belt, he kept track, saving the photos of the ones he’d changed in a box under his bed. Someday maybe he’d tell someone about the camera, but for now, he kept it to himself. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to share the secret—he did. The desire to tell someone was always coiled inside of him, ready to spring out, but as badly as he wanted to tell someone, he didn’t dare. What if someone stole it? He couldn’t bear to lose it, but he was sure that if news got out, it would be a target for theft. Who wouldn’t want a camera that showed the future?

Another fear was, even if he gave in to the temptation to show someone else, what if it didn’t work when he tried to demonstrate the power? He would look like a fool. His greatest fear was that the government would get a hold of it. He knew what they would do. They would tear it apart to find out how it worked. It would be studied and tested and meanwhile, people who might have been saved would die while they ran their damn tests. Nope. Sharing the secret wasn’t an option. At least not at this time.

About nine months after the first save, Mark sat on the edge of his bed and studied the latest photograph. It showed a clerk at a gas station in the process of being robbed at gunpoint. In the next photo, the clerk was on the floor behind the counter in a puddle of blood. He had taken the pictures the day before and the corresponding dream was still fresh in his mind. Taking his notes with him, he moved into the kitchen and sat on the stool at the breakfast bar.

 So far, most of his saves had involved accidents, not crimes. Could he prevent this? And if so, how? He didn’t own a gun and even if he did, he wasn’t about to get in a gunfight. He would probably do more damage than the criminal. No, he would have to notify the police about it. Somehow. His first challenge was nailing down the precinct where the robbery would take place. He pulled out the phone book and looked up the addresses, and picked out the precincts closest to the gas station. He stared at the numbers on the pad of paper, tapping the end of his pen against the pad. Now what? Just call them and report a robbery before it happened? They would either think he was involved or that he was a nutcase. The dream image of the murdered clerk popped into his mind’s eye. He would have to risk it. Better to be thought a nutcase than to carry the guilt of doing nothing and letting the woman die.

He called a precinct and tried to explain that he had overheard some man planning a robbery, but the person he spoke to transferred him to a detective.  Just great. He had planned on delivering the tip to some random dispatcher.

“Detective Bishop speaking.”

“Uh, yeah—“, he broke off and cleared his throat. He hadn’t counted on speaking with a detective and wondered if he should just hang up and try to take care of it himself. His story was thin and wouldn’t hold up under close scrutiny.

“I uh, I want to report a conversation that I overheard this morning. A guy was planning to rob a gas station at Lake Street and North Green.”

“Really?” The skepticism crackled through the line and almost bit him in the ear.

He shook off the nerves and kept his voice firm. “Yes,
really
.”

“Where were you when you overhead the conversation?”

“I was…I was at a bar.”

“What bar?”

His mind went blank. “Just some bar over on…on Division.”

“What block on Division?”

Mark stifled a groan of frustration. “I don’t know. Just a place on West Division.”

 She sighed. “You don’t sound too sure of yourself. Were you drinking at the time?”

“Sure, I’d had a beer, but I wasn’t drunk if that’s what you’re asking.” Denying drinking would be suspicious, so he felt clever admitting to a beer.

“Okay. Well, give me the details. Time? A description of the person?”

Relieved to have the answers to these questions, he rattled off information on the man in the picture, right down to the brand of shoes he was wearing.

“You noticed his
shoes
?”

“Well…yeah. Once I heard the plan, I tried to take note of as much as I could to pass along.” He took a sip of his coffee, his mouth suddenly dry.

“And this guy just stood there while you took notes?” She was smirking. He couldn’t see it but he could hear it. “Maybe you should have just taken a picture—it might have been less obvious.”

Mark inhaled the hot coffee and coughed uncontrollably while he held his hand over the receiver.

“Hello? Are you all right?”

“Yeah, sorry. Coffee went down the wrong pipe.” A lingering cough punctuated his reply.

“Okay, and your name?”

“What? My name? Why? I would prefer to give the tip anonymously.”

“I need it for the report. I could take it anonymously, but we don’t have time to run around checking out bogus reports and anonymous reports could come from a criminal looking for a diversion. ” Any concern that might have been in her voice had evaporated and replaced with suspicion. “Is that what you’re doing? Creating a diversion?”

“No, of course not.”

“You got something to hide?”

If only she knew. He took a deep breath. “Mark Taylor.” Resigned, he gave her his address and other details then said, “So you guys will stop it, right?”

“Listen, Mr. Taylor, if this information has a shred of truth to it, we’ll find out and stop the robbery, but if you’re yanking our chain, you are going to be in a world of hurt.”

“No…I’m not…I’m not yanking your chain.” He ran a hand through his hair then bit back a curse when his knee bumped against the bottom of the breakfast bar.

At the time of the robbery, Mark stood on the corner outside the gas station pretending to wait for a bus, but ready to do what he could if the police didn’t show.  When the bus stopped, he waved it off, ignoring the bus driver’s irritated shake of his head.

Where were the cops? Any minute the robber would show up. Not five seconds later, a man matching the image in Mark’s photo stepped out of a car, looked around and entered the gas station.

Mark jogged across the gas station lot, but as he reached for the door, two cop cars barreled into the lot. He halted and backed away from the door. A dark sedan followed the marked cars and he was pretty sure it was the detective. He hoped that meant they had been watching. The way the police cars were parked, the robber wouldn’t be able to get away. One officer pressed his shoulder microphone as he read the numbers off the license plate aloud, and Mark glanced through the window, catching a glimpse of the robber. So far, he was only standing in the back, holding a cooler open, a soft drink in hand, but his attention was on the police cars outside. His gaze swung towards Mark, so Mark ducked out of the way, deciding that the police had things under control and didn’t need him getting in the way. He retreated to the other side of the street where he could watch without attracting notice.

It seemed to take forever, but the police finally exited with the guy in handcuffs. Puzzled, Mark wondered what had happened to produce that result. He was sure no shots had been fired. Still, his plan had worked. Maybe he hadn’t done it himself, but the end result was all that mattered.  He took a deep breath and blew it out in relief. The robbery had been averted.

The next day, he was at his desk preparing to send out contact sheets to some clients, when the phone rang.

“Mark Taylor Photography.” He sealed the envelope in his hand and tossed it on the desk, then reached for another client’s contact sheet.

“Hello. This is Detective Bishop. We spoke yesterday.”

He stilled with his hand poised over the contact sheet, his task forgotten for the moment. After observing the arrest, he had been confident that everything had come out okay. What if he had been wrong and the clerk had been murdered anyway? “I…uh…I hope my information helped.”

“That’s the thing. It did help, but it also means I’d like to ask you a few questions regarding how you acquired the information.”

“Am I in trouble?”

“Not necessarily. I’m just curious because the guy we booked swears he wasn’t in any bar on Division in the recent past. In fact, he claims he never spoke of his intentions to anyone and that the robbery was a spur of the moment thing.”

Caught flat-footed, Mark could only stare across the office at framed photographs of a few Chicago celebrities. “Oh.” Brilliant.

“I’d like to keep this unofficial, and if you have a satisfactory answer, we’ll drop it but if you don’t cooperate, we may have to go through official channels.”

“Okay.” As if he had a choice.

  “I’m about to go for lunch now, so why don’t you meet me?”

Although phrased as a suggestion or request, Mark wasn’t fooled. It was an order. “I can do that. Where should we meet?”

“The burger place on the corner of Ohio and LaSalle. What do you look like?”

“Excuse me?”

“I doubt we’ll be the only two people in the restaurant and I’d rather not ask every man there if he’s Mark Taylor.”

 “Right. Well, I’m about six-one, dark hair.” He glanced down. “And I’m wearing a dark blue polo shirt and jeans.” He was going to ask what she looked like, but thought better of it. She was a detective and this was her idea, so she would have to find him, not the other way around.

“Okay, not the most detailed, but it’ll do. I’ll find you.”

Mark set his cup of coffee on the stainless steel counter and peeled off the lid. He was hungry, but decided to wait to eat. It wasn’t like she had actually invited him to eat with her, and it would be awkward if he already had a meal, so he ordered a coffee. He couldn’t go wrong with that. Taking a sip, he turned to find who could only be Detective Bishop a few feet away. Something about her demeanor made him think she had been watching him, but she approached as soon as he made eye contact.