INSOMNIAC: ALAN SMITH #2 (Alan Smith series) (8 page)

‘Right’ said Ryan ‘We were actually trying to get more leads’

Kevin added before Alicia could say anything more ‘We talked to a man who told us that he saw our victim and our missing man talking animatedly in the street’

‘Really?’

‘Yeah’

‘When did he see this?’

‘I think he said Sunday evening , or was it Saturday?’ Ryan said confusing himself as he drank some more water.

‘Nah! It’s Sunday’ Kevin confirmed.

‘So what were they talking about?’

‘Ah, he didn’t hear them’

‘He just saw two men arguing on the streets , and that too from his own house, so you see? There’s no chance of hearing anything’ said Kevin.

‘Where does this man live?’ Alicia was still not wanting to  believe what they were saying.

‘Just on the opposite side of Paul Brown’s house’

‘But how did he know that we are searching for those two particular men, has he seen them before?’

‘Nope, he haven’t’ said Ryan ‘He just said that he saw us ‘cops’ searching for someone and he thought that his information might help us, that’s why he called us himself to say this thing’

‘I see. What’s his name?’ said Alicia as she sat down on her chair and started looking at the files in front of her ,on the table.

‘He didn’t say his full name, he just said Mr. McRae. That’s it’

‘Mr. McRae’ Alicia repeated it then said ‘So you think what he said was the truth?’

‘Yeah...’ said Ryan ‘I mean why would he lie after all , he’s just an outsider and has got nothing to do with the case’

‘Okay, then ’ said Alicia still not looking satisfied ‘What else did he say?’

‘He said that after the argument one of them i.e Paul Brown went inside his house, then the other man who I think was Jade Carter talked to someone from his mobile and then went back in his car and left’

‘Was it the black SUV?’

‘Yes.’ Said Kevin ‘He at least confirmed that he never saw both of the men before. But we can presume that one was Paul Brown and the other one was Jade Carter’

‘And that SUV that he drove away is the place of the crime’

‘Interesting’ muttered Alicia. ‘Something was going on definitely... and what was it?’ she asked herself resting her jaw on her wrist looking at the overlooking city from the window.

‘So McRae surely knew Paul Brown from before, I mean they lived opposite to each other and in the same neighbourhood’

‘The funny thing is that, he didn’t’ Ryan smiled.

‘Then how did he know that it was Mr. Brown who lived in that house?’

‘Well, we showed him Jade Carter’s picture and he identified it as the man with the black SUV, so we easily concluded that the other man who went inside his house was Paul Brown’

‘That is right’ said Alicia ‘But we still need more evidence in order to believe it, we just cannot keep faith in the word of a random citizen’

‘Yes, but for the time being, we should. We don’t have anything more to accuse anyone else .And what this man said does seem to be right to me’ Ryan said.

‘Yeah, to me too’ Kevin said.

‘Did CSU check Mr. Brown’s house?’ asked Alicia.

‘Yeah they’re going through it now, so we can expect the results late today or tomorrow maybe’

‘Okay, track any calls or any purchases they made for the past few days. Both our victim and our missing man’ said Alicia ‘And I will check with the list of names we got from the NY Times’

‘On it’ said Ryan as he jumped on his revolving chair and started typing something on his keyboard.

Alicia went away glancing at the list and took the elevator down.

Kevin came and stood behind him. ‘Dude, how are you goin’ to do this?’

‘Do what?’ said Ryan typing on.

‘Track the purchases and everything’

‘Why? What’s the problem?’

‘We don’t have any credit card that he used, neither any bank information or any other data. So you can’t track his expenditure, can you?’

Ryan stopped typing and leaned back thinking about it. ‘Yeah you’re right. I can’t track everything just like that’

‘So we got nothin’ to do now’ said Kevin.

‘We just sit idle?’

‘Yep, unless we get the CSU and the tech results, there is no more lead we can track’

‘Hey what are you guys talking about?’ Henderson just came in .He was wearing a black blazer with a glossy red tie.

‘Just about our case’ said Ryan more politely than the last time.

‘Right, how's it goin’ on?’

‘Pretty decent’

‘No problem?’

‘Not much as of now’ said Kevin ‘We tried to track our victim’s financial information but we failed to do so as we don’t have much data to get access to the accounts’

‘And CSU got anything from that area? I mean the murder area?’

‘No nothin’ till now’ said Kevin ‘We are still waiting for some more results’

‘Good’ said Henderson as he unbuttoned the blazer ‘But are you both gonna sit like this?’

‘I mean...’ Ryan tried to make out his intention, and say something he would not regret later. He turned to Kevin and blinked rapidly ‘We actually have nothing to do, right?’

Kevin didn’t understand what Ryan wanted to say. He said happily ‘Yeah, right .We’re free now’

‘So you’re both free?’

‘Yeah....I mean...yeah’

‘Great. I got a new case in my hand and maybe you could take a look at it’ said Henderson smiling.

‘Um..actually I am not felling well today, I should probably go home and rest’ said Kevin.

‘Yeah me too’ Ryan added ‘It was a tough day’

‘No, it’s only 4 now. You should utilise the remaining hours in any way possible’

Ryan’s phone rang suddenly. Ryan said ‘excuse me’ to Henderson and the received it.

‘Raglan’ he said.

One minute later, he said ‘Perfect timing’

‘Well, Mr. Henderson. We need to go now. Alicia got something for us’ said Ryan as he didn’t wait anymore, before running out.

TWELVE

Ryan and Kevin hurried on to the other floor before Mr. Henderson could get a grip on them.

‘It was a perfect timing, damn perfect’ said Ryan.

‘You saved us’ added Kevin.

‘What’s wrong?’ said Alicia as she stood in front of the half-blank white bulletin board that was used for summarising the facts. ‘Someone tried to kill you or what?’

‘Henderson’

‘I get it. Say no more’ said Alicia.

‘Yeah’

‘Okay whatever’ said Alicia and went on ‘Our fingerprint experts ran the fingerprint on our database and found a match’

‘Who is it? You got an ID on him?’ said Kevin.

‘Negative’ she said and took the photo from the table and pasted it on the board. ‘This is our man, Henry Roberts, male, 26. Our database scanned the fingerprints and narrowed it down to two person, then narrowed it to one .So this must be the man who left his fingerprints on the seatbelt’

‘Where can we get him?’

‘Ah, there lies the problem. We don’t have any location on him’

‘Our database usually gets the location even a small biography on the particular man’ enquired Ryan ‘Then what’s the problem now?’

‘Maybe this man doesn’t live in a place much longer. He escapes from one place to another’

‘So you are telling me that he is our killer?’

‘I don’t know’

‘If he’s not guilty about something, why would he just escape from one place to another? Normal people seldom do that’ said Ryan.

‘I know. I just said that maybe it is like that. We are not sure about that’

‘I see’ said Ryan ‘So we just have a picture?’

‘Yes, even our Crime Scene Unit cannot say anything about this man. Actually no one here knows anything about him’

‘Is he a ghost?’

‘Something related to that’ said Kevin.

‘Then it’s going to be real hard finding him’ said Ryan ‘This is a big city, and we cannot roam around the streets and ask everyone if he or she knows this man, a man named Henry Roberts’

‘If we could have gotten anything more, then it would have been easy’

The man in the photo was black and wore a cap with its backside to the front. He had dark eyes and he wore black leather jacket, which was quite large, and he looked a little weird wearing it. Only half of the chest and the face could be seen in the picture and they saw a gold chain running down his neck and hanging awkwardly in the middle.

Kevin got up and studied the picture more carefully. And at the end only thing that he concluded was that ‘Doesn’t he seem like a younger version of Jay Z?’

‘Jay Z. Maybe’ said Ryan ‘But his name is Henry Roberts, not Hey H, so he’s not related to him’

‘If he was, then it would have been real easy to catch him’

‘Of course’

‘Now are we done with the Jay Z thing?’ said Alicia irritated ‘If so, then we should start to think practically now’

‘And’ Ryan added ignoring Alicia ‘If he was by any means related to Jay Z then he would also have been famous’

‘Good point, man!’ Kevin exclaimed ‘But he does look like a perfect Jamaican Rapper’

‘Okay’ said Alicia interrupting them again ‘Can we please drop this Jay Z topic?’

‘Okay’

‘Now we should think of a way to get him’ said Alicia roaming back and forth.

‘Come on Ryan, we should consider it’ said Kevin.

‘Consider what?’

‘Roaming around the street and asking everyone. “Hey have you ever seen this black dude?’’

‘Yeah, let’s do it’ Ryan joked.

‘Guys would you please think seriously...’ said Alicia still roaming.

‘I am thinking, thinking of course. He’s distracting me’ complained Ryan.

‘Come on man, I know that you still think he’s a rapper’

‘Yeah...I mean not at all. You see he’s distracting me again’

‘Okay let’s think about it step by step’ said Alicia ‘Why would his fingerprints be in Jade Carter’s car?’

‘That’s what I was thinking, what if he’s our vic’s friend?’

‘Right. But then we would have probably found him. And Mrs. Carter said that he didn’t have any friends.’

‘Well how will she know?’ said Ryan ‘She just said what she thinks. That doesn’t mean it is so’

‘But even if he is his friend then where can we get him?’

‘We know he worked in NY Times’ said Kevin ‘Maybe this man also works there’

‘I checked the list, there was no one of this name’ Alicia said.

‘You’re sure?’

‘Sure’

‘But we should still consider it. If they both worked in NY Times then perhaps one day they went for a ride and that’s how his fingerprints landed on the SUV’

‘If they did went for a ride then it got to be in the past few days because this car was rented just one week ago’

‘True’

‘But he already had a friend form NY Times, Paul Brown, so it is improbable that he would have another friend’

‘This friend might be his personal friend, not his office partner’ Alicia sat down playing with a pirre cardin pen that was on the table.

‘You’re puzzling me’ said Ryan as he sat down on the chair facing Alicia.

‘No other way’ said Alicia standing up again. ‘We have to check on the NY Times if he worked there’

‘But...’ Ryan hesitated.

‘Let’s go’

‘Okay, let’s check it out then’ said Kevin walking towards the lift.

* * * *

When they reached the building for the second time the sun was going down the horizon .The sky was red with a few shades of purplish clouds hanging in the sky .The buildings had long shadows, the result of the long slanting light that was coming from the west region. Some sides of the skyscrapers were dark while the opposite sides were glittering with the last light.

They soon came out of the car and headed inside .This time they found no security officer to block their way. They were inside and found that there was comparatively less people than that day, and the buzzing noise was also less ,maybe because that day they came in the working hours and now it’s.....a relaxation hour, perhaps?

They headed straight to the floor where they found the director of NY Times last time. As the door of the lift opened and they went inside the floor, they saw some people busy with someone’s new cool camera, adjusting it. They ignored them and went straight to the other room. They soon realised that how weak the security system was, anyone could enter and go straight to the inner most sections of the building just like they did, only difference was that they didn’t have any foul intentions.