“Brad?” he said when the connection was made.
“Hey, pardner,” Brad replied. He wasn’t using his attorney-client voice. His friend, Kyle, was hurting and there was little anyone could do.
“She just left,” Kyle said.
“Okay, Number 42,” Brad said in a resigned tone. “Jimmy is already at the airport. I’ll call him and get the ball rolling and then we…shall see what we shall see, okay?”
“Yeah,” Kyle said dejectedly. “Thanks, Brad. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Bye,” Brad said shortly.
There was nothing else to say. The important things had been covered in a half dozen face-to-face meetings over the past few weeks…ever since Peggy had let drop the information she had been rescheduled for the training seminar.
********
The nondescript little man was ordinary in every way. His clothing was plain, neither too hip nor so unfashionable it would attract notice. Nothing about his features, his body, or posture would catch anyone’s eye. He walked about the luggage carousel almost unnoticed. He seemed to be looking in vain for a suitcase; he held a baggage claim ticket in his hand as his anxious eyes watched for the next bag to appear from the conveyor belt.
He seemed to be a man mired in an office job that promised nothing beyond a gold-plated watch at the end of a long series of dreary days and years. He had accepted it though. He no longer fought the tedium. He’d long ago surrendered and embraced it.
That was not who he was though. His name was Jimmy. He was a private investigator and a good one. He’d just come to Orlando on the American Airlines flight. Brad Carson, Kyle’s attorney, had used him in the past for discrete projects. He’d thought first of Jimmy when Kyle talked about getting enough evidence on Peggy to give him a reasonable likelihood of winning custody of the children in a divorce settlement.
Brad knew there was little chance of that but he thought if there was enough embarrassing photographic evidence, Peggy might not contest the divorce to avoid letting those photos and videos out. He and Kyle talked long and hard about that–one friend to another. Brad knew it was unethical but some things transcended ethics. Number 42 was the closest friend he had in the world and Brad would go to hell and back for him.
Jimmy had been surveilling Peggy Whitley from the time she got to the airport at home and he was still covertly studying her as she collected her luggage here in Orlando. It was easy to do. Mrs. Whitley showed no sign she’d even considered there might be anyone watching her. Jimmy might as well have been one of the wheeled luggage carriers in the rack for all the attention the woman gave him.
When the tall, middle-aged man burst in the outside door, he created enough of a stir for everyone to glance his way. Since 9/11, people don’t ignore noisy disturbances. When they saw he was not a young middle-eastern male with a bulky vest on and didn’t have an automatic weapon in his hands, most lost interest. Some continued to stare at him though, wondering why he’d created the initial commotion. Jimmy kept track of him; he had a hunch about the new arrival.