“No. No thanks. We’ll recharge the other one and take our chances.” I glared at James. I knew very well he’d demand an equal split of the money, but he had yet to pay a cent. “A fake smoke alarm and we’re in business. That’s all we need for now.”
“Fake?” Jody looked very disappointed. “Skip, not so fast.” He pulled a pack of matches from his pants pocket and tore one off. He struck it on the pad, let the flame burn down and held it up to the ceiling. The piercing siren started immediately.
“What the heck?” I plugged my ears.
“It actually works.” He was shouting against the loud noise. He waved his hands, apparently stirring up an air current, and the noise abruptly ceased. “Nothing fake about it.”
“Son of a gun.” James had that toothy grin on his face. “That’s even better.”
Jody walked back into the rear of the store, and James put his arm around my shoulders. “Wise decision, my man. Wise decision.”
Em rolled those eyes. “I doubt if you’ve ever made one yourself, James.”
“Teaming up with your boyfriend, miss. That’s always been a good decision.”
And what was she going to say about that?
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
O n the way back I pulled out the laptop, stuck in the card, pulled out the short antenna, and logged on. With the stroke of a key I had Feng’s car. “James, you won’t believe this. He’s back at the laundry.”
“Guy has issues with clean clothes. Maybe it’s the place all the guards have their uniforms cleaned. You’ve got nine guards over there, pally.”
“And,” Em pointed out, “you can’t be sure he didn’t figure out you had installed a GPS on his car. He might have planted it somewhere else and we’re following someone else.”
That would mean he was as smart as I was, and I doubted that. “We’ll know in a minute.” I pointed at the screen. “He’s leaving, and-” I waited, watching the little blip on the map, “it appears he’s headed back to Synco Systems.”
“We should arrive about the same time he does, pard. We’ll just see.”
Everyone was quiet as we drove back. The truck ran rough, and James managed to hit most of the potholes in the narrow streets, but other than that the ride was uneventful. We were probably going to arrive about twenty minutes late, but no one from my company was watching the clock. Wireman would probably notice, but he’d never say anything. He never seemed to sweat the small stuff. Until after work when he was loaded.
I was thinking how I could get the smoke detector installed. It was similar to the ones my company used, but ours were connected by phone line. I would have to concoct some story about how we had to install a separate detector in office one.
“James,” I broke the silence, “Jody seemed to be pretty sure that no one installing this thing would know it contained a camera.”
“Pretty sure.”
“So there’s only the one drawback.”
“Getting that chip in and out. Yep. There’s that.”
We didn’t say anything else until we got back to Synco Systems.
When we pulled into the parking lot, Feng’s car was there and our UPS truck was parked in front of Synco Systems. I wondered if the little guy had figured it out yet. Or was he tracking a large brown truck and a guy with brown shorts and shirt? And the scary part was, if he knew we’d switched the GPS unit, then he’d figured out that we knew he was a suspicious character.
Em left in her brand new powder blue 335i BMW, heading back to her luxurious condo, and James and I went back to work. Eden gave James a big smile when he walked in, and I had a hunch that their date on Friday would go very well. She was a good-looking girl, even in her uniform, and if I didn’t have two girlfriends at the moment, I would have been interested.
J.J. came up and patted me on the back. “Hey, Skip, we got all the old cabling out of the ceiling and the walls. It was easier than we thought. So, we’re ready to start installation this afternoon. Thought you’d be happy about that.”
I nodded, looking around for Andy Wireman.
“You looking for Andy?”
“Um, yeah, sort of.”
“Got pulled off the job this afternoon. I guess you guys needed him at another location. He asked me to kind of run the show till tomorrow when he gets back.”
I couldn’t believe it. Andy Wireman had turned over this job to Jim Jobs? I was as surprised as I was pissed off. This was my project, and I trusted Andy. And furthermore, I needed to get someone to do my dirty work. I studied him for a moment, then figured he’d have to get it done. “Listen, Jim, did you know that we are short a bunch of smoke detectors?”
“We’re short twenty some motion detectors. We have enough smoke detectors, but they’re the wrong style.”
Where did this guy come from? I was in charge of the project and I couldn’t even remember that.
“Regardless, the president, Sandy Conroy, needs a smoke detector in office number one.”
“You want me to install a smoke detector that’s the wrong style? Why would we do that?”
Andy would have just done it. This guy was taking his temporary power way too far.
“I’ve got one I’d like you to install.”
“If we put it in, we’ll just have to take it back out when the actual ones arrive.”
“Jim, I don’t care.” I held out the plastic bag with the detector/camera/microphone inside. Can you have one of the installers put this detector in office one?”
J.J. glared at me. His face was red and the spiky hair on his head made him look like a short devil.
“Please.”
“Am I in charge or not?”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t think it’s a good idea to switch things all around like that. That’s why.”
“Then no. You’re not in charge. I am. And if you have any questions about that, call my office.”
“Okay, okay. No need to get all upset.” He was scratching himself between his legs. I handed him the plastic bag, and he looked inside. Reaching in he pulled out a piece of paper.
“No.” I panicked and grabbed it from his hand, tearing the receipt in the process. I glanced down and saw I’d managed to snag the part that said Spy Store and the price.
“This is highly irregular.”
“Irregular?” If he’d seen that receipt, he would really have thought it was irregular. “You’ve never worked for us before in your life. You’ve already pushed us back by two or three days because of your little ‘discovery’ that a third system was in the walls. And now you’re telling me how to run my operation?” I surprised myself as I got worked up. Pushing my index finger against the guy’s breastbone I continued. “You have no idea who we are or how we operate. All I’m asking is that you have someone install this smoke detector in office one. Is that clear?”
J.J. stared right through me.
I continued. “Because if it’s not clear, I can arrange to have you back at your apartment by the end of the day. Maybe you could spend the afternoon fixing your rear screen door.”
My neighbor gave me a frown, brow all wrinkled. “Jeez, Skip. I’m just trying to do my job.”
“So am I.” I was breathing fast and my heart rate was up. Just getting my cardio exercise. “Then I guess it’s clear.”
He nodded.
“Great.” I started to walk away, aware that Eden Callahan had observed the entire interaction. I was hoping she wouldn’t mention it to Feng. Or worse yet, mention it to Sandy Conroy.
“But I will mention this to Andy.” His back was to me. “This isn’t the way I’d run an installation if this was my
