Chapter 14 - Jenna’s Interlude
Jenna sat in the driver’s seat of her black Crown Victoria, parked in front of a hot dog joint on the outskirts of the south side, passenger side to the curb, as the moonlight reflected from the top of the windshield.
She sipped a soda through a straw in a red and white checkered paper cup as she typed on a mobile data terminal mounted in the center of the dashboard.
Now that she had a name and a family member’s address, she was able to look up county records to find any if this Monica had a criminal record.
She did.
A misdemeanor charge for a fight she’d been in.
The mug shot matched the face she’d been shown, and there was a cellular phone number associated with it. Jenna quickly got on her phone and rang up a departmental IT expert.
“Hey, Terry? I’m calling in a favor,” said Jenna as she glanced across the empty streets as a rusted old beater drove by.
“I’m gonna send you a phone number. Should be a cell.
I need you to run a live trace and send it to my car as soon as you get it—yes, right now!
Text me when you’re done. Kay? Thanks. Bye. ”
She hung up and sent the number, and then a pair of heavy knuckles knocked on her passenger side window. Jenna gasped and spun her head as her fingers found purchase on her thigh mounted pistol.
It was Special Agent Ramsey.
“What the fuck…” Jenna whispered to herself as she rolled the passenger side window down a few inches to glare sassily at him. “You’re a little far from home, Agent Ramsey. Isn’t it past your bed time?”
Agent Ramsey took a cursory glance to his left and right. “These holes in the wall have the best food; I thought I’d drop by.”
Jenna became serious. “Why are you following me, Agent Ramsey?”
“I didn’t, I had my partner follow you.”
“Semantics.”
“Mind if I join you?”
Jenna held a tense glare with the federal agent, then looked away with a sip of her soda as she pressed the button to unlock the door, announcing the act with a ubiquitous click.
Agent Ramsey opened the door and stared at the mess of fast food containers and report folders in the passenger seat, then looked at Jenna with a slight wince.
Jenna rolled her eyes with a groaning shake of her head, and swiped the offending objects onto the floor while moving the papers to the back while the smell of urban concrete rushed in from the outside.
He got seated, then took a moment to take a deep breath while taking a similar scan of his surroundings.
“You asked me what I’m doing here, Detective O’Brien. I’m going to have to ask you the same thing,” said Ramsey.
“Working.”
“Not on my case, I hope.”
“You came all the way out here just to waste my time?” Jenna scowled through the corner of her eye. “I don’t care about your case, I care about mine.”
“And maybe that’s the problem,” Agent Ramsey nodded with a grin as he turned his face away to look forward. “You care.”
Jenna rotated her head slowly. “And what’s that supposed to me?”
“I read your file, Detective,” Agent Ramsey replied while casually staring down the street at the intersection. “Police work runs in the family.”
“Don’t go there, Agent Ramsey,” Jenna warned. “You might be a Fed, but you’re still in my car.”
“And you’re chasing Alistair Gaines.”
Jenna stiffened. “So what if I am?”
“Your father did the same thing, and we both know how that turned out.”
Jenna immediately let her free hand fly and smacked Agent Ramsey hard across his face. “Get out!”
“Strong arm you got there,” Agent Ramsey remarked as he opened his mouth to wiggle his stricken jaw. “But you’re not going to avenge your father by chasing ghosts. Sometimes, you just gotta let sleeping dog’s lie.”
Jenna blurted out a bitter, sardonic laugh. “So what, Gaines got to you too? Now you’re protecting him?”
“No. I’m protecting a lot more than that.”
“Bullshit.”
Agent Ramsey replied as he smoothed his tie down with a brush of his hand. “You don’t strike me as the type of gal that cares if she lives or dies, but there are worse things than Alistair Gaines.”
“Like what? You?”
Agent Ramsey chuckled. “No. I’m the guy whose job it is to make sure that ‘worse things’ stay undisturbed, like the man you’re currently investigating.”
Jenna scoffed. “You’re telling me one guy busted that warehouse?”
“One guy,” Agent Ramsey said with a nod.
“What is he, a Mutie?”
“I wish. At least then we’d have a chance against him. For now, he’s on our side—or at least he’s not against us.”
A cold chill ran up Jenna’s spine as she eyed the special agent with suspicion. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because there is nothing that you, or I, or anyone else can do to stop him if he decides he doesn’t like something. You can’t arrest him, and you can’t kill him. You need to let it go.”
Jenna held a long silence as Agent Ramsey stared back, then she shook her head. “I can’t… I have to try.”
“Even if it kills you?”
“He’s not just a perp, he’s a material witness. Nobody has anything on Gaines, but he does. I don’t care what happens to me, there has to be justice.”
Agent Ramsey seemed to relax a little, then looked out of the passenger side window. “It’s gonna take more than just one cop to see justice through.”
A text came through with a tell-tale beep, followed by an update on the computer interface.
She had a location.
Monica was on the west side.
But with a special bonus. Her IT guy also included traffic footage of the mysterious black SUV heading out that way hours prior.
It was him.
Agent Ramsey then opened his door and stepped out, turning to bend over as he peered into the cruiser.
“So what are you going to do?” he asked.
Jenna stared at the address under the location marker. “Whatever it takes…”
He nodded in approval, then pat the top of the car twice. “See you around… Detective.”
Jenna recoiled in surprise. “You’re not gonna shoot me?”
“If you play your cards right, I won’t need to.”
And then he shut the door and went on his way. Jenna watched him through her rearview mirror until he got in his own cruiser and drove off.
She watched as he passed her with bright headlights to stop at the red light, then made a right and vanished from sight.
Jenna immediately turned the ignition key and put the car into gear, spinning the wheels as she made a U-turn in the middle of the road to head the other way.
Next stop, the Everglades.
Where a Monica Shaw and her lethal boyfriend awaited.