Hidden Agemda (Kate Diamond Adventure) (11 page)

“You mean that you stole a fake?” Mercedes slid her gaze over to the big red crystal that sat in the middle of the table.

Kate flushed with anger—the small brunette sure did have a way of getting to her.
 

Mercedes looked back to Kate, her lips curled in a smile, her eyes warmed, and for a split second, Kate thought the warmth might be genuine.
 

“You don’t need to get touchy about it.” Mercedes laughed lightly and touched Kate on the arm in an almost friendly gesture. “There’s no way you could have known. And, no, I haven’t told the FBI yet.” She turned a quizzical eye to Gideon. “Should I hold off on telling them?”

Gideon shrugged and looked at Kate.

“I guess not, I mean we are supposed to be working with them.” Kate ground her teeth together. She
had
to share the information with them but she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was going to do all the work and the FBI would swoop in at the last minute and take all the credit.

“Were you going somewhere?” Mercedes bent down to pet Daisy, who, Kate noticed grudgingly, had trotted over to greet her.
 

Kate glared at the dog.
Traitor.
Then she looked back over at Mercedes who was staring up at her with her doe-brown eyes.

“I was just goin—”

Ding!

“It found something.” Gideon bent over the computer, tapping on the keyboard.

Kate rushed to his side, elbowing Mercedes out of the way to get closer to the computer whose screen showed the picture Kate had given Gideon side by side with a license. The man in the license was an exact match. Caleb Summers.

“Caleb Summers,” Kate said. “Does that name ring a bell?”

“No.” Gideon and Mercedes replied in unison.

Kate made a face. “Let’s look through the database of gem thieves and con men. We need to find out just who he is and why he stole the ruby and, more importantly, where we can go to get it back.”

Gideon, Kate and, much to Kate’s dismay, Mercedes, spent the next hour huddled over the computer. Daisy lay quietly on the floor at their feet. They searched every database and case file for the name Caleb Summers but came up empty.

“I don’t get it.” Kate scrubbed her fingers through her hair. “How could an unknown pull off a heist like that? He doesn’t seem to have any experience or knowledge … unless he’s been very good at keeping his activities hidden.”
 

“Maybe someone hired him,” Mercedes said.

Gideon’s face lit up. “Of course! Why didn’t we think of that before?”

Yeah, why didn’t we?
Kate wondered as she watched Mercedes fold her arms over her chest with a satisfied smirk.
 

“I’ll check his financials. If someone hired him, he might have had some unusual activity in his bank account,” Gideon said as he tapped away on the computer.

Kate slid over to one of the other computers and started her own search into the background of Caleb Summers.
 

“I can’t find anything unusual about him,” Kate said about twenty minutes later. “He’s just a struggling actor.”

“Struggling?” Gideon’s forehead pleated as he stared at his computer.

“That’s what it says here.” Kate pointed to her monitor.

“Oh, really?” Gideon pointed to his own monitor. “Then why does he have a hundred and fifty thousand dollars in his bank account?”

The money that appeared in Caleb Summers’ bank account had been a cash deposit. There was no way for Gideon to trace it, so Kate decided to go straight to the horse’s mouth. He lived in one of the less affluent sections of Boston, his twelve story high-rise apartment building loomed over Kate as she weaved her way around a child’s plastic big-wheel that had been left carelessly in the walkway.

The main door to the building was propped open with a brick so Kate didn’t need to wait to be buzzed in, which was fine with her. Somehow, she felt like she’d have a better chance of actually talking to Summers if he didn’t have advance notice of her visit.

The elevator was broken, so she walked up to the fifth floor. The stairway was dirty, the air heavy with the spicy aroma of dozens of tenants’ meals, the walls dotted with spurts of amateur graffiti. Kate was glad she brought her gun and a bottle of hand sanitizer.
 

She emerged on the fifth floor and stopped to suck in some air, promised herself that she’d spend more time at the gym, then proceeded down the threadbare carpeting to apartment 512.
 

Kate knocked and then cocked her ear toward the door to listen for movement inside. She didn’t hear any, so she knocked louder.

“Mr. Summers?” She yelled through the door.

No answer.

She rapped her knuckles as hard as she could, but still no sounds from inside and no one came to the door. Kate’s stomach sank—it appeared as if Caleb Summers wasn’t home, but she wasn’t one to waste a trip and she figured she might still find some answers inside his apartment.

Kate glanced at the hallway on either side of her. It was empty, though surely someone must have heard her knocking and yelling—the walls were thin and she could hear muffled sounds of children crying and adults yelling. But no one came out to see why she was knocking so loudly, which was good. Kate didn’t need nosey neighbors interrupting her.
 

She pulled her leather lock-pick case out of her coat pocket and zipped it open. She bent down to inspect the type of lock and select a tool from the kit. Pulling off her leather glove so she could feel the tool more easily, she inserted the pick into the keyhole and worked it back and forth, her heart jolting when one of the apartment doors on the other side of the hall was ripped open.
 

Kate palmed the lock pick and stood back as if she was waiting for someone to answer the door. A short, dark-haired woman pulled a toddler down the hallway.

“I don’t think he’s home,” she said as she brushed past Kate.

“Oh, really?”

“He said something about a trip,” She called over her shoulder. “I’ve been taking in his newspaper.”

“Okay, thanks,” Kate called out as the woman disappeared into the stairwell.

A trip?
 

That could make it difficult to track him down. But it would give her more time to search his apartment. Kate put the pick back in, jiggled it around until she felt the satisfying click of the lock releasing, then opened the door and slipped in.

Summers’ apartment was sparse, decorated with second-hand furniture and crates, plus one whopping sixty-inch big screen TV. Exactly what you might expect from a struggling actor who hadn’t had time to spend the extra hundred grand in his bank account yet.
 

Kate started in the kitchen, not really sure what she was looking for, but hopeful she’d know it when she saw it. She put the glove she’d removed in the hallway back on before touching anything. She probably didn’t have to worry about leaving prints, but she’d learned in the FBI that one could never be too careful.

The sink was full of food-encrusted dishes. From the looks of things, they’d been there a few days. Probably not too unusual for a bachelor though, and the neighbor did say he was on vacation. The fridge held a half gallon of sour milk, a loaf of bread, ketchup and peanut butter. Not much different from Kate’s own fridge.

The cabinets didn’t yield any results so she moved into the bedroom. She looked under the bed, in between the mattress and box spring and then started on the bureau with one ear cocked toward the living room, in case Caleb came home. She wasn’t sure what she’d do if he did, but it would be good to have extra warning … if she could even hear him coming in over the sound of her heart pounding in her chest.
 

She opened the last bureau drawer and her heartbeat kicked into overdrive. The gray wig, makeup and other fittings Caleb had used to transform himself into Jon Nguyen sat on top of a stack of white t-shirts.
 

So, it was true, someone
had
hired him to impersonate Nguyen and steal the ruby. Did Summers still have it? Was it somewhere here in his apartment? Kate felt a rush of adrenalin and she kicked her search into high gear.

Two hours later, she’d searched the whole apartment and no ruby was to be found. Now she needed to find Caleb Summers more than ever … but if he’d gone on vacation like the neighbor said, he could be anywhere. And he might not be planning on coming back.

Kate pressed her lips together as she made a final sweep of the table Caleb was apparently using as a makeshift desk in the living room.
 

If he went somewhere, why hadn’t he taken any money out of the bank?

Kate flipped through the calendar that lay on the desk. It was filled with times and dates, all with the designation “Actors Studio.” Apparently, Summers spent a lot of time there—he probably had friends that could tell Kate something. But the rest of the calendar was disappointing. There were no appointments out of the ordinary and nothing to indicate a clandestine meeting with whoever hired him to play the part of Jon Nguyen.
 

A pile of Actors Studio pamphlets, which included the phone number, address and a schedule of shows, lay on the desk. Kate took one last look around the apartment, then swiped a pamphlet and headed out the door.

***

The Actors Studio was on Tremont Street so Kate hopped in her Toyota and made her way toward Boston’s South end. She lucked out and got a parking spot across the street from the old brick building.

She jumped out of the car and scooted across four lanes of traffic, marveling at the fancy carved cement work next to the two-story tall rounded window above the Actors Studio doorway as she stepped onto the brick sidewalk. The attention to detail in the centuries-old buildings of Boston never ceased to amaze her—it was one of the things that made the city so unique.

Grasping the large brass door handle, she swung one side of the oversized oak double door open and walked into a cavernous lobby. She stepped onto the aged hardwood floors polished to perfection and looked around at the old brick walls. Inside there were several cathedral arched doors, which had been retrofitted with glass doors in-between the arches. One of them had “Actors Studio” in old-fashioned gold lettering on the front and she headed in that direction.

“Hello there.” Kate was greeted by a tall thin blond man wrapping a long fuzzy fuchsia scarf around his neck and then holding his arms out, the ends of the scarf wound around them. “You like?”

Kate tilted her head. “It’s you.”

The man smiled. “Thanks. Can I help you?”

“I’m looking for Caleb Summers,” Kate said.

“Yes. Caleb.” The man screwed up his face and tapped his index finger on his pursed lips. “I don’t think I’ve seen Caleb for a while. Let me get Amanda.”

He floated off toward a doorway, ducked his head in and yelled “Mandy!”

Seconds later, a mime appeared in the door. She looked at both of them with an exaggerated quizzical look and fuchsia-scarf said. “She was asking about Caleb.”

The mime’s eyebrows shot up and she made those annoying motions with her hands like she was trying to get out of a box.
 

Kate shot a look at fuchsia-scarf. She hoped she wouldn’t have to receive all her answers from Mandy in mime.

“I’m his cousin visiting from out of town and I was wondering if you know where he is?” Kate said to the mime.

She stopped with the hand motions and puffed out her cheeks. “No. It’s the strangest thing. He was supposed to be here last night for rehearsal, but he never showed. Come to think of it, he hasn’t been here all week.”

“Is he usually?” Kate asked.
 

“Yes.” Amanda’s face wrinkled with concern. “I hope nothing’s wrong with him … did he know you were coming?”

“What?” Kate’s brow creased at the question. “Oh, no. It’s kind of a spur of the moment visit. Did he mention anything … like a vacation, or anything he had going on?”
 

“No” Mandy looked at fuchsia-scarf. “Did he say anything to you, Darrel?”

Darrell shook his head. “No. You must be here with Uncle Roger.”

“Uncle Roger?” Kate tilted her head at Darrell.

“Yeah. Isn’t he your uncle too?”

“Oh, yes, of course,” Kate said. “What about him?”

“He came to take Caleb to lunch last week and Caleb sure seemed nervous. It was almost like he was afraid of him or something.”

“Uncle Roger can be a little intimidating,” Kate said. “Well, I guess I’ll be going, then.” She turned toward the door.

“Do you want me to tell Caleb you were looking for him?” Mandy yelled after her.
 

“Sure,” Kate tossed over her shoulder as she pulled the door open. “Tell him his cousin, Ruby, was here.”
 

Kate’s brow creased with worry as she balanced the pizza in her right hand while pressing the elevator button for Gideon’s lab. There was something strange about this ruby heist … things weren’t adding up. She hoped Gideon could help shed some light on things, which was why she was bringing him pizza for supper.

The smell of tomato, basil and baked dough made her stomach grumble as Kate jabbed the button repeatedly trying to make the elevator go faster. She’d forgotten to eat lunch and had spent the whole afternoon searching Caleb Summers’ place and then trying to track him down at the Actors Studio.
 

Finally, the elevator dumped her out in the basement and she keyed in the code for the lab door, which whooshed open to reveal Gideon bent over his lab table as usual.

“Soups on!” Kate said as she laid the pizza box down on the table and ripped the lid open. Thankfully, Gideon had the foresight to put some paper plates and napkins on the table. Kate liberated a slice of pizza from the box and bit in.

“Thanks for picking this up.” Gideon joined her at the table, picking out his own slice of pizza.

Kate simply nodded and wiped a string of cheese from her chin, her mouth too full of pizza to speak.