Brothers, Part Four

 So I drove down to Hyde Park for the second time that day, parked down the street from David’s building, and settled in to wait.

            Two hours went by before he came out. Fortunately I didn’t need to use the bottle because I’d gone to the bathroom before I left. I managed to snap a few quick images on my Minolta—smartphone cameras aren’t really that good for long-distance surveillance—and dropped down before he saw me. 

            Then, because I didn’t have anything urgent to work on back home, I decided to tail David. Because that’s what detectives do when they can’t think of what to do next, or so I’ve heard.

            He took off north on the sidewalk, passing my car, and I grabbed a baseball cap and a pair of sunglasses before jumping out. He walked fast, crossing at the first corner without the WALK light, and I had to trot to catch up to him on the next block.

            Whatever his hurry was, it kept him from spotting me behind him. He bumped into pedestrians without apologizing, dashed across streets between crosswalks, and almost got slammed by a bus once. I lost sight of him twice, then caught him again, but I was breathing hard after two miles when he slipped out of sight again. 

            I leaned against the side a bus stop shelter, catching my breath. Behind me people hustled in and out of a small convenience store, but David hadn’t gone in to shop there. I’d seen him last across the street, where the entire block was boarded off and the steel girders of a half-constructed high rise cast shadows down across the pavement. 

            A car drove past. I peered at the empty construction site. No signage announced the birth of a mighty new condo tower or office building that would transform how everyone would work and live. The plywood walls, with chain link fencing behind them 10 feet high, were stained from rain, spills, and other stuff I didn’t want to think about. A padlock hung on a door near the corner, under a big KEEP OUT sign. 

            I made a note of the address, just in case, and peered up and down the street, almost hoping I’d lost David for good so I could go home. Maybe I’d duck inside the store for a bottle of Coke and some Doritos before heading back to my car—

            Then David emerged, pushing and squeezing through a gap in the plywood. He brushed off his hands, looked left and right, then turned and strolled back down the sidewalk in the direction he’d come from.

            Now he was taking his time, so I had to hang back further to avoid being caught. By the time we reached his apartment I was more than half a block behind, and I stopped at my car to watch him climb the steps and go inside. 

Tired, I slid into the driver’s seat and grabbed a bottle of water from the holder. David disappeared, and I started the car, eager for the bathroom. But I could wait.

 

Back home again I got myself a beer and headed into the office. “Any luck?” Rachel was playing Minecraft.

            “Not sure yet.” I sent the photo of David to my client, and then I did a search for the building site address. Someone had started a condo there, but the financing vanished with the coronavirus and right now the work was paused. So I dug a little deeper, and then—“Yahtzee!”
            “What?” Rachel paused her game. “You cracked the case? You won the lottery? C’mon, tell me you won the lottery.”

            “I tailed David to a construction site. They were building a condo. Before the condo there was a hotel there. It was . . .” I paused. “A Baryar Elite.”

            She blinked. “Where the spoon came from.”

            “Right. That’s got to be—” Then my phone buzzed. Gwen Martin.

            Except it was Abel, sounding excited but in control. “That’s Drakon. It’s him!”

            Double Yahtzee. I was on a roll. 

“So now what?” Gwen asked me when Abel handed her the phone. Rachel’s hazelnut eyes asked the same question—through her usual suspicious glare.

“I have something to check out.” I avoided Rachel’s gaze. “Later tonight. I’ll be in touch.”

She punched my shoulder when I hung up. “What’s going on?”

I explained about the construction site. “It’s got to be where Abel was. And where Charlie is now.”

            Rachel crossed her arms. “And where you’re going tonight? I mean—where you and me are going?”

            I sighed. “There’s no way I can talk you out of this, is there?”

            “Not if you ever want sex with me again. Or sex in general.”

            I rolled my eyes. “I expect a little something extra next time.”

            “You’ll take what you get and love it.” But she kissed me. “What time do we leave?”