The Paladin Book 1 Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Saturday

December 18th

After that run in with Tres I knew I couldn’t just leave things the way I did with the Paladin. I had a job to do and I wasn’t going to let my self-pity get in the way of other people suffering. So after that, I reopened the trafficking case and started a new one. The Romero File. My dad had been pretty sloppy with his file storage, even after Alicia stumbled across her mother’s file. It took me all of five minutes to pick the lock to the desk drawer in his study, and another five to photocopy the whole thing and return it exactly the way he left it. This was a good place to start, but if my dad couldn’t make it work, then I doubted I could. I needed more. In the midst of composing all of my evidence I heard the doorbell ring. My siblings were gone for the day and my parents had gone to work so I was curious as to who it might be. I opened up the door and hopping from foot to foot, doing the ‘I’m cold as hell dance’ in an attempt to stay warm, was Johnny.

“Hey… Johnny. I didn’t know you were stopping by,” I greeted suspiciously.

“Can we talk?” he asked. I had a feeling I knew what he wanted to talk about, but I let him in anyway. After hanging up his coat and taking off his boots we went up into my room where I quickly gathered up all my files and stacked them out of sight.

“So what’s up?” I questioned.

“You gotta talk to Samantha and say something man. Ever since Thanksgiving she’s been off and ever since last weekend she’s on another level. She’s been reckless, and emotional, and as her friend, I can take that, but not as her partner. She’s gonna get one of us killed,” he insisted.

“No offense Johnny, but I don’t have to do anything,” I replied. He gave me a disapproving look. “Look, I know you’re trying to help your friend. But with all due respect to Samantha, we’re done.”

“What happened on Thanksgiving? She said she screwed up and she felt terrible but you two never said why. What exactly did she do?”

“She didn’t do anything, it was just a shitty situation is all.”

“That's it? That’s the best I get?” he prodded.

“I put myself out there and she shot me down! There, happy?” I let out.

“Is that your excuse for not hitting the streets in four weeks? Broken heart? Gimme a break,” he groaned. I wasn’t about to correct him and tell him I was back on the case, I didn’t want to make any false promises.

“What? Didn’t you say that I’m a teenager, and I should act like it once in a while?” I countered. He didn’t have a response for that one. “Things have changed Johnny, time to catch up. It was fun for a bit but your dream of a super team is over,” I dismissed.

“Whatever man. I’m just telling you now, superhero or not, you want to stay friends with Samantha? Say something now, or risk losing her forever. It might’ve taken a lot to tell her how you feel but think about how much it took for her to confide in you,” he made clear, heading for the door.

“Going so soon?” I questioned, not actually against him leaving, if nothing else than to alleviate me of the guilt he was laying on.

“Some of us still got work to do, Booker. Traffickers found new ways in, and according to them the guy who's buying put in his last purchase a week ago. If we can’t find him now we’ll lose him forever,” he informed. That’s not good. It was messed up to think about, but as soon as the buyer stopped buying he became a ghost, so in a messed up way I found myself almost hoping he would keep doing illegal things so I could find him.

“You guys got this,” I assured.

“You don’t believe that,” he scoffed. I didn’t, I wasn’t even able to find him and no offense to them, they were amateurs. I had years of my father’s detective advice to fall back on where as they were playing it by ear. Whoever was ordering those people was probably in the wind by that point, never to be found. “Whatever, I’ll see you around,” he finalized, closing the door behind him. Mr. Romero wants to talk to you in his office in an hour. It was from Suzy, and if it went like the last two times someone asked me to talk, I didn’t have much to be excited about. Be right there.

I arrived in the office fifteen minutes early, checking in with Suzy who let me into his office early while he was wrapping up in a meeting. As soon as the door was closed and I could hear Suzy walking away I immediately started scouring through his office. I searched around his immediate desk area, doing a preliminary scan of any loose papers that might have given me a lead towards something, something that I could use in my case. It was pointless, he was way too organized to leave something out, and after combing through his office I realized that. The only thing left was his laptop, which sat dead smack in the center of his desk. I opened up the laptop, immediately being greeted by a password. I clicked on the hint. Father. I thought about it for approximately two seconds and punched in my first response. Alicia. Incorrect password. Alicia Romero. Incorrect password. Guess that was a bit too obvious. I channeled all of my fanboy knowledge of Alex to try and come up with an answer but I couldn’t. According to his autobiography, his dad ditched him before he was even born and he never met him. So what did it mean? I then recalled what my dad said, your grandfather was like a father to him. Shane Kelly. I was in. I instantly opened his file folder and started scanning through, trying to find anything that might stand out. Brick and Mortar JPEG. I double clicked and stretched across the screen were the blueprints for Brick and Mortar. This can’t be a coincidence. I heard voices coming from the lobby, Alex was coming. I scrolled down quickly, to the end of the file folder. Weiss Storage JPEG. That was all I needed. I quickly closed out of the document and closed the laptop, Alex walking in moments later.

“Booker, you’re here early. Please sit down,” he offered, pulling out the chair opposite to the desk. I took the seat and he took his, looking down at his laptop for a moment as if something was amiss.

“Something wrong?” I asked.

“No, nothing’s wrong. I just wanted to have a chat. You’ve been working for me for a couple of weeks now, how do you like things around here?” he posed.

“I think it’s great here. Getting a chance to work with you has been a blast, the staff here are super cool, and I get to hang out with my girlfriend during the downtime. It’s kind of a dream job,” I answered. It was true, it was a dream job, and I was the guy dumb enough to go looking for a reason to screw it up.

“That’s good, I’m glad. I’m sure Alicia’s told you by now but I like you, Booker. You remind me a lot of myself when I was younger. Clever, tough, smart, a bit of a troublemaker for sure, but plenty of potential, potential that’s wasted in the streets of Tar City,” he explained.

“Thank you?” I replied, unsure of how to take his statement.

“You’re welcome. I like to pride myself in running a close-knit company despite our size, I think of us like a giant family. Like my employees are my children, you understand right?” he continued, standing up from his chair.

“That’s a good policy to have.”

“I like to think so. I also like to think my employees feel the same way about the company. Like their coworkers are like their siblings and me, not to be too self-aggrandizing, like a father. Make sense?”

“Yes.”

“Now I don’t quite know about your family dynamics, but I trust my children, and I figure you trust your father, correct?”

“Yeah,” I answered vaguely. Loaded question, but alright.

“So you trust me don’t you Booker? If perhaps someone from another company were to… I don’t know… Ask questions about me to try and reveal something about the company, say details about SyncWare V3. You wouldn’t tell them anything would you?” he inquired. With each question I could feel his sinister intent in my gut, twisting and turning like I was on a roller coaster.

“No, I guess I wouldn’t.”

“You guess?” he asked, planting his hands on the chair behind me.

“I wouldn’t,” I corrected. He nodded slowly in agreement, gauging the validity of my response.

“So say someone claimed to have dirt on me and told you something that could affect my career, you would tell me that information, right?” he posed. The questions started crawling closer to home with each word.

“Yes, I would,” I answered, not wanting to trip any red flags. He mulled over my responses for an uncomfortable amount of time, then sat back at his desk.

“Good to hear Booker. Sorry for the third degree but I do it with all our employees, lots of corporate spies and you’d be surprised how many of them crack when their boss starts asking these questions, makes them feel like you’re on to them,” he assured with a smile. I feigned a laugh and a smile, deep inside knowing exactly why he was doing what he was doing.

“Does that mean I’m good?” I asked.

“You’re all set,” he replied, shooing me off with a gesture. I walked out into the lobby, got into the elevator and took a massive sigh, This changes things. As soon as I left, he opened up his laptop and analyzed it thoroughly, realizing something was off.

“What are you up to Booker?” he asked himself.

A few hours later Alicia and I were lying on my bed, my arm wrapped around her, each of us with an earbud in listening to her favorite band, Metallica. I couldn’t believe my luck at that moment, but I knew it couldn’t last forever. I was just waiting for the other shoe to drop, or more aptly a time for me to drop it. But for that moment I just wanted to be there and enjoy it, enjoy her. I didn’t know how many more moments like it I would have after targeting Alex. I felt her rub my shoulder gently and I turned seeing her vibrant blue eyes gaze into mine.

“Something bothering you?” she asked, immediately picking up on the turmoil behind my eyes.

“A couple of things, I had a meeting with your dad today,” I answered.

“What’d he say? Do you need me to talk to him?”

“No, no. I don’t know, he just grilled me on trust and being like a family. Asking me these hypotheticals. Then said it was all just something he did with everyone, just to root out corporate spies,” I explained. She gave me a strange look and I could tell from the look my suspicions were correct. “He doesn’t do that with everyone.”

“I don’t know why he’s acting so strange all of a sudden. I think SyncWare three is making him paranoid, starting to question the people around him. Hell, if I wasn’t his daughter he’d probably be grilling me too,” she figured.

“Maybe… I’ve just been thinking, if for some reason I pissed off your dad like really pissed him off. Would you still be into me?” I questioned.

“Why? Are you going to piss him off anytime soon?”

“Just humor me?” I insisted. She rolled over on top of me, leaned down and gave me a kiss on my forehead.

“I don’t need my dad’s approval to tell me who to like,” she assured. That gave me some reassurance. “Besides, come New Year's day when it drops, this will all be over, trust me,” she made clear, giving me one more kiss on the lips for good measure. “Now, what else is bothering you?”

“Samantha stopped by the other day, before our date when you met my family. She apologized for what she did, said she was wrong, and that she wanted to give us a shot.”

“And what did you say to that?”

“That she had a lot of balls saying that. I made it clear that I was with you, that you’re basically the best girlfriend ever, and that she was gonna have to get used to us being together.”

“Ooh, good answer, girlfriend approved. So what’s chewing you up then?”

“Well, Johnny came around last night, didn’t say much but he said I should talk to her. He was saying that Samantha was really down in the dumps about what happened and that if I wanted to stay friends with her I should make an effort to fix things,” I explained.

“Why should you have to fix things?” she pointed out. That’s a good point.

“I don’t know… I guess it’s my job to offer the olive branch?” I figured.

“Screw that! You risked a lot, telling her how you felt, and she completely disregarded that for her own feelings. Why is it that you have to be the one to fix things?”

“Yeah, you’re right!”

“You know, I think your friends are nice people and all Booker but you don’t have to bend over backward for their happiness. If Samantha wants to fix things so badly then that’s on her and as for your friend Johnny, he can deal with her himself.”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

“Alright, now that you’ve been vindicated, why don’t we do something. I don’t know about you but I could go for a movie.”

“Sure, whatcha have in mind?” I asked, as she got up and started heading towards her backpack.

“Have you seen the Batman movies?” she replied, sifting through the middle pouch.

“Screw Batman.”

“Screw Batman? Everyone loves Batman.”

“Except for this guy, let’s watch something else. Something not superhero related, how about a rom-com?” I suggested, as she pulled out a laptop from her bag. After a second of inspection, I recognized the laptop. “Is that your dad’s?”

“Yeah, my computer was bugging out and so he let me borrow his for now, just until IT can fix mine,” she explained.

“Really? A computer problem you couldn’t fix, I didn’t know there was such a thing.”

“Cute. Even I need a little bit of tech support sometimes,” she replied. Having access to her father’s laptop outside of his office was a big deal, as long as I could distract Alicia I could get anything I wanted off it.

“Hey babe, you wanna be the best and throw a popcorn bag in the microwave?”

“I thought I already was the best girlfriend ever?” she quipped back.

“Yeah but this would give you like a seriously big lead.”

“A seriously big lead, you say? Alright, in the cabinet above the oven right?”

“You know it,” I nodded, as she headed downstairs to the kitchen. God I’m an asshole. I thought to myself, guilt racking me as I quickly scoured through my room for a flash drive. I plugged it in and started copying as many files as I could. Word documents, pictures, videos, everyone I saw. Estimated download time: 1 hour. I minimized the window and folded the sheets over the flash drive. Alicia came back in with a bag of popcorn and a bottle of water for each of us.

“Find anything good to watch?”

“Still working on it,” I said, opening up Netflix as she plopped down on the bed, snuggling up under my arm. I held on to her tight, knowing that whatever I found could have the potential to drive us apart.