“I see him, Nick.” Smith sounded calm.
“Good. He’s probably moving to a particular location with lots of people; the busier the area, the more he can do without being noticed.”
“That means there’s an ebb and flow to the crowds of shoppers in the arcade,” Ames mused.
“Right, Cally. And remember that, guys – there’s a pattern, a flow, to every shopping arcade like this, and it pays to know what it is. He’s studied it already and worked it out, so we’re going to cheat: we’ll watch his actions to tell us what that is.”
“Ooo, Nick, nice call,” Jones said. “I hadn’t thought of doing that before.”
“I had a detective mentor as a kid,” Ashton explained. “My homeworld didn’t have a lot of violent crime, but there were a reasonable number of pickpockets in the cities. That – and a chance to run the show and see how I do – is why I got the lead on this assignment.”
“Gotcha,” Jones said. “That’s great. No wonder you got fast-tracked.”
“But why did he come in the west entrance?” Ames wondered. “I thought his dossier said he lived in Imperial Park South.”
“He does,” Ashton explained. “But the majority of people coming to this arcade will be coming in from the residence structures in Imperial Park West. So he goes around and joins them by coming in the west entrance so he doesn’t stand out.”
“Ohh, that makes sense. Ah! Here he comes my way,” Ames said, as she walked between adjacent storefronts. “Oh, but he’s going right past. Hugo, heads up!”
“I got it,” Weaver noted. “I think I’m gonna go over to the food cart and get a snack and a drink. I can wander around and window-shop, and still look busy, while I keep an eye on him.”
“Good plan, Hugo,” Ashton agreed. “Everybody, just relax. We’re gonna be here for a while. If you actually see him do something, well and good, but from what I read in this guy’s dossier, you probably won’t, ‘cause he’s damn good at what he does. Right now, we’re just here to get a feel for his movements, so we’ll know where to set up our sting. Tomorrow, we’ll rotate through the arcade areas, so he never sees the same face in the same area. Not to mention, you’ll have different clothes and hair each day...”
After several days of this, they had a good feel for Droppoint Murphy’s pattern. He arrived around ten in the morning each day on the west people-mover cars – which, as Ashton had pointed out the first day, comprised the main entrance from the residential district in the area – after which Murphy made his way to the far side of the arcade, stayed there until around noon, then meandered over to the higher-end restaurants off the food court, usually picking up a small, inexpensive wrap to eat himself, from the same food cart that Weaver had patronized. When the lunch rush passed, he moved back toward the west arcade entrance, where he’d be sure to catch all of the departing shoppers. His preference seemed to be the south side, Ashton noted, since most of the jewelry stores were there, also.
“...So based on all that, here’s what we’re gonna do,” Ashton said the next morning, as he briefed his little team. “Cally, are you up for playing target?”
“Sure am, Nick!” she decreed with a cheerful grin.
She was a petite little honey blonde, adorably cute at times, very pretty without being a drop-dead beauty, spunky and strong despite her small stature, and definitely not someone to underestimate in any sense – not only did she take down most of her classmates in the sparring-combat class at Academy, she’d accepted the instructor’s challenge and fought him to a stalemate. She also had more than her fair share of gray matter, so she was taking to investigative work like jam to bread. Ashton had to admit, if he hadn’t been soured on relationships by Tabby, he might consider asking her out. Fortunately the whole ‘fraternization’ thing went out in police work a long time ago, he thought. As long as we’re aboveboard about it, and neither of us plays faves, nobody would blink twice. But that’s a moot point. He got his train of thought back on track.
“Good. I brought Adrian back in to turn you into a hoity-toity rich chick,” Ashton said with a grin of his own. “Complete with some nice shiny baubles and everything.”
“Ooo, sounds like fun,” she decreed, grin growing wider. “Tell me more.”
“The rest of the team is going to go in during lunch, while he’s busy, and set up in the hiding places we discussed yesterday after we finished the surveillance,” Ashton explained. “Cally is gonna come in after lunch, in her disguise as Ms. Pampered Rich-Priss, and Cally, you’re gonna hit up all the high-end stores, starting with Bianchi’s first.”
“You mean the big, top-end jewelry store?”
“Exactly. Colonel Peterson has already worked something out with them for us, at my suggestion, and they have a set of excellent simulated diamonds for you to ‘buy’ and wear – ring, earrings, necklace, maybe bracelet, I dunno – but all matching, and all looking really ritzy...but not. And you’re gonna put ‘em on and waltz around with ‘em, in and out of the clothing stores, where – since he doesn’t actually enter the stores – we also have some undercover cops waiting, disguised as shop clerks. They’ll have shopping bags for you, with junk in ‘em that will look like designer clothing and stuff, in case anybody
