UNDERCOVER The Secret of Luck (5 page)

“You are on time, and I did not expect anything less than that.” said John, getting into the cab.

The cab started off and began moving towards the office. The driver adjusted his rear view mirror to get a better look at his passenger. The young man at the back was about six feet tall and was dressed in an office suit. The suit was not exactly like an office manager’s suit. It was built for more practicality. The suit was made of expensive cotton, and it seemed to be extremely flexible. It was almost as if the owner was expecting to run and jump around any second now. The passenger’s hair was cut short, another sign of a man who seemed to be on the edge of things. At least, he would like to think so. The belt had a simple enough buckle, and his wrist watch was clashing against the rest of his attire. It was a sports watch that looked more at home in the hands of a mountaineer. The watch seemed brand new, or at least, it was maintained that way; the driver could not tell.

John was lost in thought and was intently looking outside the window at the passing traffic and group of people who were going about their everyday business. He did have a smile though, and the driver noticed it.

“If you don’t mind me asking, young man...” began the driver. He kept one eye on the road and the other on the rear view mirror which showed his passenger.

“Not at all. I don’t mind answering some questions.” said John.

“An hour ago, you were a completely lost character. Now, I can see more than just a hint of a smile. You don’t mind telling me what happened?” asked the driver.

“I took your advice. I am actually thankful that I spoke to you. I had a word with my old man, and guess what?” said John.

The driver knew that was a rhetorical question and kept quiet for the continuing sentence.

“Well, it was liberating. I feel better about the situation, and am actually feeling good about myself. Hope you don’t take it wrong that I am not giving you all the details of the situation. I only just met you, although you seem like a nice driver.” said John.

“I don’t mind if you don’t tell me everything. I am just glad that I helped you out with some problem. That does not happen all the time.” said the driver, continuing to drive at a moderate speed in an almost empty lane.

“I want to thank you. I don’t mean with words alone. How about a huge tip. In fact, give me your full name. I want to write out a check.” said John.

“That won’t be necessary, young man. Advice is always free.” said the driver.

“Don’t worry about it.” said John, pulling out his check book and signing an amount with the driver’s name on it. He put his hand over the front seat and said “Here you go”.

The driver smiled and took the check. He looked at the amount on the check and reacted.

“This is too much for free advice. Still, I will take it. Thank you, young man.” said the driver, pushing the check into the glove compartment.

“If you think that it is too much, then I have a question for you. I have this receptionist and I kind of shouted at her.”

“You sleeping with her, young man?” asked the driver.

“No.” said John, laughing. “I am not sleeping with her. In fact, I think she is a good friend of mine. Technically, I am her boss. She even insists on calling me boss, even though I have told her not to do so.”

“So, what happened then? She seems like a nice lady.” said the driver.

“This morning, I was a little confused. You know how I was. She tried to tell me something. I completely lost it. I need to go and tell her something but am not sure if I should. I need to apologize to her first. You married?” asked John.

“Yes, twenty three years and counting. Two beautiful kids to boot, young man. You should try it.” said the driver.

“I will, someday. Right now, it would appear that you would know what to do with apologies. What do you think I should do? An effective apology trick that you can suggest?” asked John.

“Just get her something that she uses every day. Whenever I upset my lady, I get her a new makeup set. My lady likes to look good, and I just get her a makeup kit whenever I upset her. I know this receptionist of yours is not even your girlfriend. There must be something she uses every day? How about a makeup set?”

“I don’t think she even uses makeup on her face. She is one of those natural beauties, and she does not need to work too hard to get that right look.”

“Okay, a makeup set is not a good idea. What else do you know about her?” asked the driver, the conversation getting a lot more interesting to him and the passenger.

“Truth be told, I don’t know anything about her. Except for work related things, I rarely talk to her. In fact, I rarely talk with anybody unless there is a strong reason to do so. That is actually sort of sad. Guess that explains why I have very few friends to speak of. Is there anything I know about...oh wait!” exclaimed John.

“You want me to stop the car?” asked the driver.

“No, don’t stop the car. I just realized something. She is always using her tablet for everything. I think she has a huge collection of them. She uses them for work, for music, for movies and pretty much everything else. Maybe, I could get her a new tablet. What do you think?” asked John.

“I think that’s a good idea. Of course, if it was me, I would actually know something about my co-worker of more than eighteen months. You know what I mean?” said the driver.

“I totally agree with you. In fact, I am going to make it a point to know more about her going forward. You know any good electronics stores nearby? I am not good at shopping. When I was young, my parents were the ones who did my shopping. In college, it was my roommate, and now, Sheila is my shopper. So, I would be grateful if you could take me to the nearest shopping center.” said John.

“No problem, young man. I know a few places around.” said the driver, putting back his hat on his head and turning around.

An hour later, John was standing in the middle of a huge electronics store surrounded by dozens of tablets of varying shapes and sizes. Frankly, John was getting overwhelmed with everything. This is why he brought along his driver to help him out. The driver turned out to be quite a shopper. John thought that the guy might have become an expert shopper thanks to spending hours and hours at many shopping malls with his wife. Like a salesman who had already filled his sales quota, the driver would explain to John the many features about each and every tablet on the shop floor. John tried his best to relate to what he had to say with what Sheila would like. An hour later, the passenger and the driver were back in the taxi with a tablet in his shopping bag. The office was only a few minutes away and John was back to thinking about what he was going to say to Sheila. Making an apology was not part of his repertoire of skills. The cab reached the front of his office building and stopped.

“Thanks for everything. I really do hope the tip I paid you earlier with the check was generous enough.” said John, stepping out and looking at his sports watch. It was already five in the evening.

“No problem, young man. Glad to help and thanks for the tip. See you around” said the driver as he started his car again. John waved good bye and watched as the car drove away. John turned around to enter his office lobby. Before he went up to his office, he wanted to do one more thing. He had to talk to the office lobby guy who smiled at him in the morning that he really respond to with good nature. He walked up to the office lobby and found the lobby handler clearing out his table. His shift was drawing to a close.

“Tom. A word with you.” said John, leaning on the table a bit.

“Mr. Russo. Hello sir. Is there a problem that I can help you with?” asked Tom, in his usual courtesy. As the lobby handler, it was his job to be the single point of contact for all its tenants, as well as visitors. He was like Sheila, except that he was in charge of the whole building, instead of just one single office.

“There is no problem with my office, Tom. I just thought about this morning. I guess I was pretty rude. Sorry about that.” said John, his words coming out of him haltingly.

Tom’s face turned into something else completely. He was actually disappointed this morning. John happened to be one of the few tenants of his building who were nice to him. Tom also looked up to John because of his job. Tom thought that it was pretty cool that John Russo was a private detective. Of course, Tom did not know that right now, John was in some kind of a career crisis.

“That actually makes me feel a lot better, Mr. Russo. Thank you!” said Tom with a bright smile.

“You are welcome, Tom. Well, looks like you are done with your shift for the day. I will see you around, Tom.” said John, walking away from the table, waving at Tom.

Tom did the same and returned to clearing out his table. “That’s three folks who are taken care of. That leaves the janitor, and finally, the office receptionist.” said John to himself. He got into the elevator, and as luck would have it, the janitor was inside it.

“Hello, sir. Glad to see you again. I was just about to come to your cleaning station at the back of the office.” said John, smiling at the janitor who was secretly something of a real estate millionaire.

“Hello, detective, how are you? You seem a lot better than this morning.” said the janitor. He was still wearing his torn jeans that were stitched in so many places. His cleaning uniform was a lot dirtier than it was when John saw it earlier that morning.

“Actually, I am.” said John, pressing the button to his floor. The janitor also seemed to be heading to one of the top floors.

“I just wanted to say thank you for the advice you gave me this morning. It has really helped me a lot. I decided to have a chat with my father and things are actually better. I have been making amends all around.” said John.

“Glad I could help, detective.” said the janitor, returning the smile.

The elevator reached the office floor. John shook the hand of the janitor and then walked straight to his office, past the client waiting room where he would normally find Sheila working on her tablet. She wasn’t there, since John requested her to leave early. John went to his office desk, picked up his phone and called Sheila. The phone rang a few times but wasn’t answered. John called again, and it was answered by Sheila after two rings.

“Boss. I was in the shower. I wasn’t expecting you to call.” said Sheila. John thought her voice sounded different, almost like someone had hurt her. John felt bad about his behavior after hearing her voice.

“Sheila, thanks for answering the call. I need to discuss something important with you.” said John.

“I will be in the office in less than an hour. I will leave right away.” said Sheila, managing half her usual voice. John was further convinced he had managed to upset her that morning.

“That won’t be necessary, Sheila. If it is alright with you, I will come and see you at your apartment. Would that be okay?” asked John.

“That would be perfectly fine, Boss. I will have coffee waiting for you when you get here.” said Sheila. John said bye and ended the phone call. He grabbed his car keys and went straight to the basement car park in the lift. John kept his gift for Sheila in the glove compartment and turned the car toward her house. The drive lasted about thirty minutes, and soon he was at her home.

The first thing that John noticed after stepping out of his car was how beautiful the house was. John had occasionally come to see her at her house. Oddly enough, he never bothered to notice the house, or her, for that matter. He was always the kind of guy who would think about work and nothing else. Earlier that afternoon, he found himself in a difficult position, where he had no idea about his co-worker. He was fairly disappointed with himself for not knowing anything about his co-worker of such a long time. From now on, he was not going to make that mistake.

John noticed that the two story house had a huge lawn in front of it. The path to the front door curved around like a snake. The lawn on both sides of the path was covered with green and purple bushes of about a foot in height. He noticed that the bushes where actually made up of two different plants. One of them was a green bush and the other was a purple plant that had very few leaves that were visible. It looked as if the bushes were trimmed on a regular basis. The house had a big balcony that stretched from one corner of the house to another. The balcony also had a number of potted plants at regular intervals. The house was painted blue, and it appeared to have a fresh coat of paint. The house was built to have natural ventilation and had more than ten windows. John figured that the house looked like it was made of windows, and the walls were there to simply hold the windows together. John actually liked this house. It was almost like a house version of his beautiful, young assistant, Sheila.

John walked down the path, keeping to its curves, and reached the door. He was just about to knock on the door when it was opened by Sheila.

“Hello, Boss. I have to admit that this is a pleasant surprise. The last time you came visiting to see me for no reason was, um…. Come right in.” said Sheila.

Sheila closed the door and walked toward the living room, and John followed her. Sticking to his promise of paying more attention to her, John observed her like he had never done before. He noticed that she was about five feet tall, which was pretty short, even for a woman. Her hair was held in place by a single band that turned her hair style into a pony tail. He also noticed that she was wearing short pants, which showed off her legs nicely. John was surprised that she was so attractive. He could not help but continue staring at her legs, even as he took his seat on the sofa. Sheila caught him checking her out.

“You checking me out, Boss?” she asked, with a haughty grin on her face. John stopped staring at her legs and looked up at her.

“I am sorry, Sheila. I did not mean to stare.” said John, going into apology mode. He had been doing that a lot today.

“No need to apologize, Boss. I know the kind of guy you are.” said Sheila, smiling. “So, what brings you to my house?”

“I am really sorry about what I did this morning. I think I stepped out of line with the shouting.” said John, getting straight to the point.