January 31, 2010
“Hello is Mr. Jenkins, Sr. there, this is Joanne Bo”, Sally said into the prepaid cell phone that Jack, Sr. gave her. “No trails for her husband if he came into the dealership snooping around”, she thought. It was the code name the two of them had agreed upon. “Hello, this is Jack Jenkins”, came a familiar voice into the headset. How are you today darlin’?” “Not so good”, she answered. “Beau saw me leaving the bar and saw you there, and he is jealous as hell. He already suspects something, but so far he’s not there yet”, she continued. “Hmmm, we’d better take a few days off and see what old Beau is up to. He can’t take too much time off from work to follow you around, or he’ll be unemployed. I know the ole coot that runs that Service station he works at, and he’d fire his daughter if he was mad. Let’s change our meeting place to that diner on 5th Avenue at about 9:30 a.m. tomorrow. Drive a circuitous route and not be make you paranoid, see if any car appears to be following you. He’ll be hard at work and that’s on the other side of town from his garage, so he’s not likely to go there for lunch and stumble on us. But if you see someone following you, just stop at the nearest grocery store, buy some groceries and go home. Then we’ll head out from there. You know your going to have to leave that SOB sooner or later, or you’ll end up dead, he’ll be in prison and your kids will be in foster care”, Jack added caringly. “I know, but I don’t want to leave into the arms of another man as attractive as that man might be”, she said in a sad tone of voice. “I understand”, Jack said. “Well I see you tomorrow then at the diner”.
That night, at the garage in the car dealership, Jack, Jr. had the pully system employed in the garage to hold up the engine while he swapped the good motor mount brackets for the old worn ones. He used latex gloves.
February 1, 2010
“Hey Sally, glad you made it.” Jack said. “I ordered us some coffee. Its pretty good.”
“I wasn’t followed, I swear”, Sally said. But someone had followed Jack.