Authors: R. E. Bradshaw
RAINEY DAYS (5 page)
“Rainey Bell,” she answered.
“Did you get the package?” JW sounded breathless.
“Yes, and I have looked at the notes. I don’t see anything really threatening in them, but I do believe he is ramping up to something,” Rainey said, into the cell, as she continued up the street.
“Yeah, that’s kind of what I thought, too,” JW said, breathing heavily through his words.
“Are you running a marathon?” Rainey asked, as the heavy breathing continued in her ear.
“No, I’m on the treadmill in my office. I have to exercise when I can,” he gulped. “I’m on the last uphill section. Sorry about the heavy breathing, but I can’t put you on speaker phone.”
“I understand,” Rainey replied. “I’m walking around your block. Katie just got home a few minutes ago.”
JW stopped breathing so hard in her ear. He must be off the treadmill, she thought. She stopped and sat on the low rock wall that ran through the neighborhood. She put the backpack down beside her, getting the water bottle out and taking a drink.
“Did you see anything today that worried you?” JW wanted to know.
“Nothing out of the ordinary. I do have a few questions,” Rainey said, reaching for the pad in the backpack, where she had scribbled some notes earlier. “Do you have time to talk?”
“Sure. What do you need to know?” JW answered, letting out a final burst of air accompanied by the sound of him plopping into a chair.
“I noticed your backyard is surrounded by those tall boxwoods. It’s a great place for a perp to hide and take pictures. I was wondering… do you have an outside dog?” Rainey asked, and then crossed the question off the page.
“No, we don’t. We’re both so busy, we opted for fish. They don’t really mind our being gone from home,” JW said.
“Well, if you’re going to leave the boxwoods, and I’m sure the historical district organization would frown on their removal, you might consider getting a big dog, one with a loud bark,” she said. Then she giggled a little adding, “A black Lab makes a great family pet and looks good on a political advertisement.”
JW laughed, too. He said, “I’ll take that into consideration.”
“Okay, next,” Rainey said, looking down the page. “Where is Katie’s classroom located in the school?”
“She teaches first grade. Her room is on the front of the school. It’s the first one on your left when you go in.”
Rainey made notes before asking, “So, her classroom windows face the parking lot, by the road, right?”
“Yes, that’s correct,” he answered.
“Okay. Does Katie carry mace or some kind of pepper spray?”
Rainey looked up, watching the cars and people, even as she was talking on the phone. It was her training. Be observant. Notice every detail. Remain in a state of constant vigilance. These things had been pounded into her at Quantico.
“No, she’s afraid one of the kids at school might get into it,” JW answered.
“Well, I went to the Literacy Center and I’m recommending that she put some on her key chain and know how to use it. It’s worth the risk, I think,” Rainey said, trying not to scare him, but make the point anyway. “I can tell you what to buy, if you like.”
“No, that’s not necessary. I’ll buy it and put it on her key chain myself,” JW said, sounding forceful. “She’ll just have to listen to me.”
Rainey liked the image of big old JW being protective of his wife. He should be. Katie Wilson was stunning and charming. Rainey could tell that even from a distance. She guessed there was more than one man with his eye on Mrs. Wilson.
“Well, that’s it, so far,” Rainey sighed. “I’ll be around the house all night and follow her to work in the morning. I think she’s safe there at the school, so I’ll pick her up again when she leaves work tomorrow afternoon.”
“That sounds like a plan.” He sounded relieved.
Rainey continued, “You have my private number. I don’t usually give it out.” She hesitated, and then blurted out, “You can give this number to Katie, in case she needs me in a hurry.”
JW took a deep breath before saying, “I don’t know Rainey. I thought we decided she shouldn’t know about you.”
“Just tell her I’m a friend she can call in an emergency. I can be there before the police. She doesn’t have to know the particulars,” Rainey assured him.
“So, she should call you instead of 911?” He sounded confused.
“No, she should put 911 on speed dial, if she hasn’t already. I’m the backup, just in case,” Rainey said. Although she was thinking, “If she has a chance to call.” She kept the thought to herself. Then she had another idea. “I’d like to give you a GPS chip to slip in her phone. I’ll have her location at all times. If she gets in trouble, at least we’ll know exactly where she is.”
“That sounds like a good idea. I’ve always wanted to do that, just to be able to keep up with her.” JW seemed a little too eager to track his wife.
Rainey quickly added, “The chip comes out when this is over.”
“Yeah, I guess that would make me a stalker too, huh,” he said, sheepishly.
Rainey was ready to move on with her surveillance, so she ended the call, “I guess that’s it for now. Email me if you think of anything else. I’m online in the car.”
“Okay, let me know if you find anything.” He paused, then added, “Be safe out there,” before hanging up.
Rainey spent the next hour taking pictures of the vehicles parked in the area, careful to get tag numbers. She appeared to be snapping shots of the flowers blooming in the manicured lawns. With the powerful zoom lens on the digital camera, she was able to capture details from a great distance and then review them on the larger screen on her laptop. She always marveled at the things she had missed, at first glance, even though she took the picture.
Around six o’clock she headed back toward the car. Her stomach growled, as the smells of supper cooking, in the South, wafted through the trees. She stopped in front of JW’s house and took a picture of the front lawn. She then took pictures going three hundred and sixty degrees from that vantage point. Rainey had just dropped the camera from her eye when she heard a voice behind her.
“May I ask what you are taking pictures of?”
It was not a demand, but a gentle inquiry, complete with Southern lilt. Rainey was shocked that she had been unaware of the woman, who had somehow appeared on the other side of the wrought iron gate. It was Katie and she was glowing in the evening sun. Not only was Rainey surprised by her presence, she was taken aback by the sheer attractiveness of this woman. Katie had changed her clothes and was now wearing old gray shorts, rolled up at the waist and a Tar Heel tank top. She must have been pulling weeds, because she was wearing gardening gloves and carrying a small spade. She had a little dirt on one cheek, which only made her more beautiful.
Rainey smiled and put the camera away, before she answered, “It’s such a wonderful street and I love your wild flowers.”
“Why, thank you,” Katie said, extending her hand in greeting. “My name is Katie Wilson.”
“I’m Caroline,” Rainey replied, shaking her hand. “Caroline Lee.”
Rainey lied, because she could not say her real name. It was too unusual, too easy to remember. Katie was not supposed to know Rainey was there. She removed her sunglasses from the top of her head, where she had put them while she took pictures, and placed them over her eyes. She had to get out of there fast.
“It was nice to meet you, Katie,” Rainey said, moving off.
“You too,” Katie said. “Hope you got some nice shots.”
Rainey looked back over her shoulder, at the smiling Katie. “Thanks,” was all she could manage to say.
Rainey berated herself all the way back to the car. How could she have been so stupid? She was shaken by the fact she had not heard Katie approach, and then she had stammered like a nervous schoolgirl when Katie spoke to her. That was such an odd reaction, because Rainey was always in control in situations like that. She told herself it was because she let Katie get so close to finding out who she was and what she was doing. JW would not have been pleased. Rainey decided not to tell him about her little slip up.
Once in the car she started it up and let the air blow on her face. She drank the rest of the water from her backpack and collected her thoughts. She drove around the block, finding a shady spot with a frontal view of the house. The tinted windows on the car made it nearly impossible for Rainey to be observed inside. At night, if she kept the laptop shut, she was all but invisible. She left the air running while she hooked the camera up to the laptop and downloaded the pictures. Usually the heat did not bother her so much, but she had to remember she was sweating out quite a lot of alcohol, as well. It crossed her mind that she should stop drinking, but only for a second.
From Rainey’s vantage point, she could see Katie occasionally, when she would stand, spade in hand, and then disappear again behind the Crepe Myrtles and Hydrangea bushes, in search of more weeds to pull. Rainey ate another sandwich and the watermelon from the container, while she watched the blonde woman work in her garden. Rainey realized she had been staring at Katie for quite some time, when an alert tone sounded on her laptop. The woman was mesmerizing. Rainey was star struck and she had to shake it off. She could see right away how someone could become obsessed with watching Katie Wilson.
The alert was for email, from Mackie. Everything was going fine on his end and he was just checking in with her. Rainey wrote back, telling him about her day and her plans to watch the Wilson house for the evening. She gave him the address, so he could stop by later if he wanted, but she knew he would be too busy picking up skippers tonight. Just after the first of the month was always a good time to hunt for a bail jumper. Momma would have the kitchen table full of food for her little baby criminal and maybe a little cash left over from her monthly check. Oh yeah, crooks love their mommas. She closed the email with, “I better let you go. It’s almost suppertime in the hood.” She knew he would read it right away, because his Escalade was tricked out with a built in laptop, and he was probably doing the same thing she was. Sitting and watching.
It was true that they could instant message, text, or talk to each other on the phone, but none of those methods were as secure as the encrypted network she set up for their business. A degree, in Computer Forensics, came in handy more than once, in Rainey’s line of work. She used it to secure her insulated life from outside intruders, to erase her existence. It allowed her to live apart from the world, venturing out only at the times and places of her choosing.
Rainey had chosen to be on this street, alone, at the coming of darkness. She removed the Glock from the camera bag and re-holstered it, sliding the leather straps back over her shoulders. She took the taser out of the console, checked the charge again and placed it on the passenger seat beside her. The message on the laptop screen said the pictures from the camera had been downloaded, so she removed the adaptor, and placed the camera back in the bag.
She took a small USB, night vision webcam out of the camera bag and hooked it up to the laptop. Snapping the camera into the holder already on the dashboard, Rainey opened a window on the laptop screen and focused the camera on the scene, in front of her. She pulled a second USB cable out of its hiding place next to the center consol. When she plugged it in, another window was called up, displaying the image from an identical webcam, permanently mounted in the rear window. It peered through a small square, cut out of the tint on the window, but had a wide-angle lens so Rainey’s back was always covered.
Rainey settled into the seat and began reviewing the pictures she had taken earlier. She reached for the thermos of coffee and prepared for a long night of vigilance.
CHAPTER FIVE
The final rays of the sun slipped below the tree line and only then did the heat begin to relinquish its grip on the day. Katie Wilson had retreated into the house when JW’s car pulled in the driveway. Rainey, knowing JW was in the house, took the opportunity to drive around the neighborhood, with the webcams sending the images to the laptop. She would do this drive once an hour, throughout the night, recording each trip. Later she would compare the videos, looking for vehicles and people moving in the night.
Twice she had to drive over to Franklin Street to locate a restroom and get more coffee, but for the most part, Rainey remained in front of the Wilson house, watching. She sat in silence, windows rolled down just enough to catch the breeze and so she could listen to the sounds of the neighborhood. As the hours grew later, the streets around her quieted. Chapel Hill was a college town, so it never completely went to sleep, but the pace slowed and parts of the town, not occupied by bars or athletic venues, took on a hushed, studious mood. It was summer, which meant the student population had taken a significant dip. Rainey thought she could almost believe she was in a quaint little southern village, if she did not know the mighty Tar Heel basketball team resided right next door. People either loved them or hated them, but even non-basketball fans knew what that tar heeled foot represented.
You could not live in North Carolina and not know something about basketball. With Carolina, Duke, Wake Forest and North Carolina State all within its boundaries, this state worshipped basketball, like they do football out in Oklahoma. Ask anybody where Michael Jordan played college ball. Rainey laughed at the old joke, “Who is the only person who could stop Michael Jordan? Dean Smith.” Dean Smith, the man who built the Dean Dome. Rainey was a closet Tar Heel fan, but had refused to attend the University under her mother’s nose.
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