Marty cut loose with a belly laugh. “Damn, it’s good to see I’m not the only one she picks on!”
Alice threw a wad of paper at him. “You hush! Wilbur’s a sweetie pie compared to the rest of you. He just knows who’s the boss around here.”
I slid into my chair and turned on the computer, smiling at the good-natured kidding. Nice to see everyone so cheerful under the circumstances. Still having to go places with at least one person along wasn’t the way I wanted to live. Not for much longer, hopefully. Good incentive to locate that piece of shit Franks.
My desk phone rang. “This is Francis, may I help you?”
“Hey, Francis, it’s Nate. We got picked up by the Auburn cops.”
I stood. “What happened?”
“To make a long story short, we thought the two men in a car outside our building were bad guys. Turned out they were cops.”
“You all right?”
“Yeh, just embarrassed. Got some pissed off cops here that want to stick us in the slammer and throw away the keys. Think you could come down to the station and vouch for us?”
* * *
I wheeled out of the police department’s parking lot, Marty sitting next to me trying to control his mirth. Nate and his buddy Jonas were in the rear. “I got some of the story from the shift supervisor,” I said. “At least their side of it. What’d you two do to get the entire department in an uproar that way?”
Nate gave a long sigh. “Not much, really. Just carjacked two cops and rousted ‘em a little. Till Jonas, here, thought to check their I.D.”
Marty swung around, a disbelieving look on his face. “Carjacked? You mean you actually ambushed ‘em?”
“Yup,” Jonas said, a proud smile on his face. “Had ‘em out and on the ground before y’could say oopsie. The dumb shits had their windows down and doors unlocked.” He shook his head. “Deserved what they got, y’ask me.”
I suppressed a smile. “According to their supervisor, you stuck their own guns in their face and demanded to know who they were working for. Once you saw the badges, positions were reversed.”
“Damn fools,” grumbled Nate. “We said we were sorry. Wouldn’t give us a chance to say anything more, ‘specially when the car we were driving turned up on their stolen list.”
“What were you doin’ driving the repo car around? You know it’s supposed to be taken to the repossession lot first thing,” Marty said.
“Hey, it was a great ride,” Jonas said. “We were only gonna drive it here and show everybody, then take it back. We never picked up a car worth a hunnert grand before.”
Marty shook his head. “I bet the FBI doesn’t get the Auburn cops to do them a favor like watchin’ our place for bad guys again.”
I sighed in resignation. Another call to Al, this time to apologize. “Not entirely your fault. We have to know when the good guys are watching us, and what their car looks like at least.”
Minutes later we neared our office. “That’s the car there, on the right,” Nate said.
I pulled behind the plush-looking Mercedes. “Think you two can make it back to the repo shop without pulling over any more cops?” I asked when they got out.
Once I steered into our garage, I breathed a sigh of relief. What a nightmare that could have been.
“Those two are lucky they didn’t get shot,” Marty said, shaking his head.
“Amen, brother. I’d better call Al and have a little talk about making sure we can I.D. who the good guys are that’re watching our place.”
Alice was on the phone when we entered, and gave me the high sign. “They just walked in, Al. I’ll let you talk to him.”
Once in my cubicle, I picked up the phone. “Hey, Al. Seems we have a problem.”
“That we do, my friend. I apologize for not letting you know we had a security watch on your place. And I accept your apology for how your men scared the shit outta the town cops. Now that we got that out of the way, I just as well give you an update. The Secret Service checked out the back room in the basement of that church you alerted us to in Charlotte. No joy, I’m afraid. There were signs someone had recently been there, but that was all.”
“Ah, well. Easy come, easy go. A reward would’ve been nice, but maybe next time,” I said.
“At least the Secret Service has more of an appreciation of your group. They probably would’ve made rude noises about sending ‘em on a wild goose chase, but they found a couple torn bills on the floor of the place.”
“Any hint about Willie’s whereabouts? We’re getting cabin fever waiting for that sonofabitch to show up.”
“Sorry, not a word. I really expected some kinda movement before now. Maybe his moving the counterfeit money is a beginning of his takeover of Crosby’s old territory.”
“Seattle’s a plum for him,” I said. “It’d mean a significant increase in his power base. Maybe he’s going to use that two hundred mil to grease the skids for taking over.”
“Could be.” Al cleared his throat. “By the way, I heard you’re callin’ Lenora almost daily. Next time you talk to her, send my love, would you? I just heard about her being medically retired. Damn shame, if you ask me.”
“Thanks, Al. I’ll do that.”
Soon as I hung up, I punched in Lenny’s number. Almost forgot about calling her today. After several rings, I gave up. Have to remember to try again in a little while. I busied myself sending everyone a message about the latest information Al had passed along.
It was mid-morning the next day before we caught a break. I’d reclined my chair and was just drifting off when a hand slapped my desk, bringing me upright with a jerk. “What the hell?”
“Up and at ‘em, lazybones,” Tony said with a smile. “While you were catching your much-needed beauty sleep Alice heard something interesting
