Lottery 1
“A half Billion? Are you talking about the lottery?” Lou questioned into the phone. “Where’s this video? I’m on it.” he looked up the news website and watched the video. “Where is this? What intersection is this? Well find out. Then tell Marv to go out and canvas the neighborhood, get any live feeds the store owners might have. No. ALL of them. It was three days ago, they better still have copies.” Lou hung up.
Aston scoured the internet and found out which intersection the camera was at. He texted Marvin Devine on his cell phone. “I need you to find the woman in this video” he sent the location of the camera with the video file.
Marvin looked at the incoming text through his stubby fingers as he manhandled his phone clumsily. He could read the texts just fine, but he couldn’t ever send one back. He watched the video as he walked out from the Hotel Galvez straight into an empty taxi. He repeated the intersection as he read it off his phone.
Marvin was a stout man, it would take more than a few bullets to slow him down. He was more muscle and brawn than anything else. Slow to anger, and slow to understand. He didn’t listen to the manipulations of people who thought they were smarter than him. With Devine you were either up-front and direct or you were ignored. He was used to collecting loans for his boss, he had a direct approach to getting things done. You give Marvin what he came for, or he breaks your legs, or your arms. If you were a woman, he’d probably only break your fingers though. He wasn’t a big fan of violence against females. He was always on to Artou about branching out and bringing in more female staff.
The cab stopped at the intersection and let him out. Marvin took a quick look around. To the left was the freeway. To the right was a strip mall, with a convenience store, dry cleaners, vacant slot and a computer repair shop.
He crossed the street and walked to the convenience store. There were two outside cameras on the building facing the parking lot, but the street would have been out of sight. Inside the first store was a camera pointed at the parking spaces in front of the store, but nothing beyond that. The dry cleaners had several cameras pointed in many directions, as did the repair shop. Marvin took note of the opening hours of both places and walked back across the street.
In an attempt to retrace Barrett’s last footsteps he walked under the freeway and looked at what lay on the other side.
Various businesses and eating establishment lined a shopping center. Marvin knew what it was like to be down on your luck and hungry. He knew the kind of places where you could sucker a waitress with a sob story and get a few free meals. A national chain diner would have to balance the books, and be inspected by an over zealous corporation. The trendy places wouldn’t listen to a sob story, they would have you escorted out by the police.
A local greasy spoon though, run by a mom and pop type deal. They’d be more likely to float a meal or two. There just so happened to be such a place at the corner.
Marvin showed the picture of William Barrett on his phone to several waitresses, and got the name “Jenny”. He sat in a booth, in the section she was working and waited.
“Can I take your order?” Jenny questioned as she walked up. “I’m Jenny.” she pointed to the kittens on her name tag. “I’ll be your waitress for this evening.”
“I’m lookin’ for this guy.” Marvin held out the phone so she could the picture.
Jenny’s smile faded and was slowly replaced with mild fear.
“So you know this guy?” Marvin questioned.
Jenny took a step backwards, but Marvin would not hear of it. He reached out and grabbed her wrist quickly.
“Mam’.” Marvin pulled her back to the table. “I’m going to do a lot worse than hold you here if you don’t tell me all I want to know about the guy in this picture.”
Jenny was shaking under his grasp, silent tears were almost welling up.
There was no way she would tell him all she knew of Willy. For years he had been there at her booth, he had shared laughs and tears. He had a wife whom he loved with all his heart, and children he thought hung the stars in the sky. When times were good, he would often bring her a small gift or another. In fact the very kitten stickers on her name tag were a gift from his daughter, whom he brought in often for pink milkshakes. No, she would never betray that little girl, not even for her own life.
She hurriedly started talking as if the rapidness of her words would buy her freedom faster. “I don’t know anything, Sir. He just comes in here, we chit chat, about the weather, the baseball team, nothing important. I haven’t seen him days. I don’t know where he is.”
“And this all you know?” Marvin did not believe her. “What about his wife and kids? Did you know he had a gambling problem?”
Jenny stopped shaking and her face paled when she heard the word gambling. She confessed without hesitation what she had seen the last night he was there. “He had a lottery ticket. I think it was the winning lottery ticket.”
Marvin released her wrist.
Jenny rushed to the manager’s office to phone the police.
Marvin walked out of the diner and under the freeway, he waited two hours til the dry cleaners opened. But the cameras there were just for show. They were nothing more than a live camera feed showing on monitors above the desk, wires connected them directly. Marvin made note of it for future use, he would send someone in there later to shake the place down.
When the computer repair shop opened, Marvin had to use his normal persuasion to get the hard drive he needed. He took it to Aston, who looked at the videos and found the girl they were looking for.
In HD quality.