AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“How about a description?”
“Skinny. White. Medium height. Thirty-something. Bitchy attitude.”
It wasn’t much to go on, but she doubted pressing him for more details would do any good. A wordsmith, he was not. She asked him for other details—names of additional lieutenants, addresses where Wilson stored or processed drugs—but he didn’t have much to offer. Any addresses he knew, he’d already turned over to his new boss. The scuffles over those sites were long since in the past, and Wilson was using new locations now, ones that Razor didn’t know about. As for lieutenants, there were only a few high up enough to be able to ID Wilson, and Razor made it clear that it would be a waste of her time to try to talk to them.
Her twenty minutes were almost up, and she still didn’t have the smoking gun she was hoping for—the crucial piece of evidence that would tie everything together and give her all the proof that she needed of Wilson’s crimes. Razor’s account on its own wouldn’t cut it. He wasn’t the most trusted source—not in the eyes of her editor—so she needed irrefutable proof against Wilson.
“You haven’t told me much that I can verify,” she said, pushing him a little. “For all I know, you’re making all of this up because of some personal grudge against Wilson. Don’t you have any kind of hard proof? Come on, give me something I can use.”
The guy had an ego, which meant he didn’t like that she was dismissing what he’d shared. He was either going to walk away or give her something concrete if he had it.
“Jesus, lady. What the fuck? You ever satisfied with anything?” He got up and paced back and forth in the small shelter. Sophie stayed silent and still, willing Owen not to react to the change in the drug lieutenant’s tone and behavior.
She knew her strategy had paid off when he sat back down. “You want proof? I can get you proof.”
“You don’t have it with you? How do I know it really exists?” She let her tone be a little disbelieving.
“It’s on an old phone that I’ve got tucked away for safe keeping. Insurance, you know.”
“What’s on this phone that’s worth so much?”
Razor leaned across the table. “There was this shipment that came in and got held up in the port. Wilson had to go in person to get it through if you know what I mean.”
“He bribed a customs agent?” That could be gold for her investigation if she could substantiate it. “When was this?”
“End of January sometime. I don’t know the exact date, but I took a picture of the shipping manifest that day. Wilson wanted me to know who could be bribed to let things come through in case I needed to take care of that for him another time.”
“If you retrieve this old phone, you could send me that picture, is that right? Because if what you’re saying is true, it’ll really screw Wilson.”
“Damn straight. Might be able to get Quinn at the same time.”
“How?”
“Bitch was in the background one day when I snapped a picture. She told me to delete it, got real pissed about it, but I didn’t. Could be on that phone, too.”
“Will you email me those pictures?” She held her breath. He could be leading her on with this story, but she suspected it was true, and he certainly seemed angry enough at Wilson and Quinn to supply evidence against them.
“I’ll send it to you later this week.” That was as close to a promise as she was going to get.
“Thanks, and thanks for meeting with us.” She knew she wasn’t going to get more out of him, so she stood, and Owen did, too. They walked away with Owen a step behind her, making it clear to her and to Razor that he had her back.
Before they were even out of the park’s driveway, she was already composing the story in her notebook. She barely noticed the drive back to the retreat since she was so caught up in getting the lead just right. As soon as they were inside the cabin, she went to her computer and started typing.
“Anything I can do?” Owen asked after doing his security sweep.
“See what you can find on Quinn from your sources. I’ll check mine.” They worked in silence until mid-afternoon. At one point a turkey sandwich and a can of soda appeared next to her. She usually forgot to eat at this stage, so she was grateful for Owen’s care.
“Find anything?” she finally asked him when she was done with her first draft. Her next step was to contact her editor, but she wanted as much information as she could get before she did that.
“Not much so far. I located a public relations company that appears to be a shell company. There are some whispers about it online, if you know where to look. Enough to make me think that she’s been a discreet fixer for a while now. But the only contact info I could find was a PO box. I can’t link any more to her. No personal or legit professional history, no police records. Nothing. How about you?”
“Same. The shell company’s name might connect her to Wilson if we could get our hands on his financials.”
“Or the museum’s. He might be paying her through the museum.”
“Damn, you’re right. Bastard.” The museum was privately held and directed by a board. If it had been a public institution, she could have gotten access to audits. “All right. We made progress. I’m going to send what I’ve got to Jude and see what he thinks.” She attached her draft to an email and put a note on it saying that she hoped to be ready for print by the end of the week. Once she had those pictures from Razor, she’d be ready to splash this across the front page.
She hit send and polished off her soda, feeling empowered. It had been an amazing day from beginning to end. She’d had the interview of her life, and now an almost ready-for-print story. She was on a high, so when a videochat came in from Jude, she opened it with a huge smile on her face.
