Photo by Jose P. Ortiz on Unsplash
As their bodies shrink into tiny dots on the horizon, my sympathy for them grows with each passing wave. On the one hand, Ezekiel’s career is dead in the water now, and Sade, I mean, I taught her enough to get by if she moves cities, but she definitely can’t show her face at any of the high end spots now.
Of all the people I’ve made my pawns, I probably enjoyed working these ones the most.
***
Ezekiel
When I found this kid, his desk was layered in so much paperwork, I doubted he’d ever see the field. Not that he minded, of course. He’d insist everyone stop pawning off their files and reports to him, but from the other side of his web camera, I could see what no one else did.
The hairs on this kid's neck stood tall every time he got close to clearing his desk. With every filed paper, the need to strap up and get to catching the baddies grew and filled Ezekiel with fear.
Nothing crazy though. Petty theft suspects. Traffic violations. Most rookies would count themselves lucky if they scored a felony case, but last time a suspect fell in Ezekiel’s lap, he all but handed him the keys to his freedom. Having chased down the perpetrator from the scene of the crime, he lost his bearings as he followed the suspect into a barbershop with no exits. Any cop worth their salt would know they had him cornered, but as he walked into the shop he froze at the sight of a dozen men who to him all looked the same. Like a deer in headlights, not sure what to do, who to arrest or who to call, he raised his gun to the roof, emptied the clip and yelled, “Everybody get on the ground and put your hands on your head.”
Watching from his body cam, it was a sad sight to see. He tried his best to identify the perpetrator, but it was to no avail. His stall tactic? Cuffed everyone and called for backup so he could identify them at the station. Having made a blunder of epic proportion, he teetered on the heels of his boots as he waited for his reprimanding. Ezekiel’s face was flooded with so much blood I hoped his captain would cut him some slack. Alas, he bit his head off in front of the whole precinct for interrupting half the department's operations just to let a murder suspect go because of his bad memory. Even from a couple dozen miles away, it was tough watching as laughter and snarky remarks from colleagues forced his head to hang low. The 360 surveillance cameras gave me a live feed of degradation and suspension. After sitting through that, I knew he would be the perfect pawn in my master plan.
It took a while for him to take my advances seriously. Every email I sent him he would send to his spam folder. In my defense, I had to keep things as vague as possible, which often means coming across as a Yahoo Boy fishing for a chump to scam. There is no good way to say I’ve been watching you fail at serving and protecting from miles away through your web and body cam. The police do not take kindly to hackers. However, he eventually caught on.
One fateful day, with the sun's dying embers illuminating his corner of the office, and everyone logging off for the weekend, Ezekiel stayed behind to download a box set of Two and a Half Men using the office's Wi-Fi. As he set up his home laptop, I hit him with the ‘I know what you are doing’ email, and he bit like a fish in freshwater.
‘It’s not what you think.’
‘Oh, but it is. You think you are the first one to stay behind and ‘work late’ on Friday night?’
‘Okay, you got me. But please. Don’t report me to HR. If it’s banking details you want, I have my ex’s card details, you can do whate-.’
‘Lemme stop you right there. I’m not here to extort you. I’m here to help you.’
‘Help? With what?’
‘Your sorry excuse for a career. You think no one else has noticed your handcuffs and pistol gathering dust ever since your last field hiccup a couple months ago?’
‘Oh, you mean that? Nah, no one is talking about that anymore. Everyone’s cool now. Water under the bridge.’
‘So you think.’ And with that I attached dozens of screenshots from conversations amongst his co-workers about how much of a loser and waste of space he was. ‘Fast File’ was what they were calling him now, since the only thing he’d become good at was doing everyone's paperwork for them.
For a while, he sat, mouth wide, and eyes squinted at his screen as he scrolled through the messages. He couldn’t believe his eyes. Having sunk into his seat, he eventually returned to his keyboard,
‘Okay, so where do we start?’
Fine tuning our approach to his stagnant career was a series of trial-and-error episodes that saw me teaching him how to approach a target without getting made, what to do when your suspect covers all his blind spots, and if not the hardest part of all, mastering our communication as he traversed the city through short cuts I identified for him and loopholes I created for him. It was not long before he cleared his name and began earning the respect of his coworkers.
‘Jeez Zeek, if I knew you were this good in the field, I would have sniped you as my partner months ago.’
‘So, where has this side of you been hiding all along?’
‘Who’s gonna do our paperwork now that you’re Mr. BigShot?’
The compliments were raining in and he was finally the cop I knew he could be. It was at this moment when I began implementing the next phase of my dual plan.
Having solved more cases than any rookie in such a short space of time in the department's history, Ezekiel earned the prize of being assigned to a case that had alluded everyone in the district, but not for the reasons, he thought.
The suspect in this case was as cunning as they come. A bank robber who had dribbled a dozen wealthy men and made off with millions of their money.
Beautiful. Seductive. Silver tongue. All her victims had more or less the same to say. Everyone believed if anyone was gonna bring it home, it was going to have to be Ezekiel. Little did anyone know he was about to go up against someone just as good, if not better than him.
Sade
Small girl in a big city. Impressionable and naïve. The perfect target to make my own. When I first spotted Sade, she was dropping resumes in every casting office she could find. Eager to work and pick up any job she could come across. Little to her knowledge, her target market wanted nothing to do with her.
College dropouts don’t exactly signal perseverance. Especially when they do it to chase a career in film. With bills piling up and barely any call backs from her auditions, Sade took to the bars. With a few days left to cough up her rent, she was able to snag a couple of shifts at a sports pub near her apartment building. The clientele were as basic as they come, working-class men with just enough money left over from bills to splurge on anything that would ease their minds, something Sade knew all too well about.
The way she worked the counters, you could tell she was raised on the fundamentals of servitude. She came from a good home where the men did all they could to provide and protect their families, and the women played supporting and stabilizing roles. But when The War hit, many families were left without men to take those leading roles. With no one to serve but herself, Sade took her life by the horns and traveled to the big city where her servitude has come in handy once again, but this time its evolution is taking a dark, villainous turn.
She’s gotten good at working her crowd. All it takes is a conversation or two for her to figure out whether it’s work or marital stress that guys are trying to drink away. She’s picked up on the postures that signal an employer from an employee. Quickly learning how to pick out which one in a group of males was the alpha by measuring who took up the most space in a section. It didn’t take long for her to come into her own and start making big bucks off her talents.
Big tips. Persistent attempts by potential suitors. Assistant job offers from men who couldn’t get enough of her. She was reeling it all in, and it was at this point that I decided to make my introduction.
After a slow night, with barely any tips and no one offering to drive her home, Sade was finishing up in the back office, balancing the books and throwing the night's take into the safe.
‘I see you’re doing well for yourself these days,’ my message dropped into view on the office computer, startling her in the process.
Staring at it for longer than I would have expected, she eventually responded, ‘Excuse me?’
‘That Sade who came to town to chase her acting dreams never stood a chance. But this new you is what this city needed.’
Glancing around to see if someone within the building could be sending her the messages, but she had locked herself in before going into the office. ‘Have we met before?’
‘Yes, and no. You have a lot of people who come into your bar. I doubt you would remember me.’
Smirking, ‘Try me.’
‘How about we focus less on who I am and more on what I can do for you.’
‘Which is?’
‘Make you rich, beyond your wildest dreams.’
‘What do you have that I don’t?’
‘Vision. Foresight. Tact. If You want to find out more, smile at the camera and I’ll know to be in touch within a couple of days.’
And with the biggest grin, Sade bid me farewell before switching the computer off and packing it in for the night.
With every passing week, my grins grew closer to the lobes of my ears. Her acting aspirations prompted her to try on different personas in her spare time, which made my life easier since I needed not walk her through how to get into different characters for the sorts of jobs I had lined up for her.
The document scouting and signature copying is what took eons to teach. Granted, it’s not every day you have to impersonate someone's wife, but for the sorts of scores we had lined up, she could have made my life a tad bit easier.
‘Now read it back to me,’ I ordered through her ear piece.
‘08..4854857..6297212… damn it!’
‘That’s the fifth time we’ve gone over this. Do you need to take a break?’
‘dO yOu nEeD tO tAkE a BrEaK. No sir, what I need is for you to get off my back and stop reminding me how bad I’m doing.’ Though I wasn’t physically present, I could still make out the way her veins were pulsating on the edges of her forehead. With the way she gripped the ends of her dining room table, it was probably a good thing I maintained my distance.
‘Okay, how about this. In psychology, they say the best way to remember something is to either attach an emotion to a memory, or group information together. Considering the nature of the work we are soon to be doing, you are going to need to do both.’
‘Oh, so like, with these numbers? I just what, bunch them up or whatever?’ She said as she ran her finger across the practice bank statements.
‘Basically yes. Generally people work with clusters of 3, but because you are gonna be pressed for time and don’t want to give yourself away, we are gonna work with 5.’
With a huge inhale and a shot of 1818, she finally replied, ‘Let's get to it then.’
As the leaves fell to signal winter's arrival, so too did Sade’s resignation from her bar job stamp her shedding of her old, less rewarding life. Even though we were only about to tackle our first job together, her surety about the damage we were about to do exuded through my earpiece.
‘I know I tend to draw the boys in with my knockers, but even this is new territory even for me,’ she said as she examined the different ways light bounced off her loosely covered bust and back.
‘Your mark’s favourite colour is red. If we are going to get him to notice you, we need to pull out all the stops. We need him to think he chose you, and not the other way around.
‘Yeah yeah I hear you. This isn’t my first rodeo.’
Even the prettiest of faces couldn’t just walk past this particular red velvet rope. I tracked our mark’s movements, Havier, from his home till the club, making sure Sade arrived long enough before him to see her beg and plead with the bouncer to let her in, before he could put on his cape and save a damsel in distress.
‘It’s okay, Roco, she’s with me,’ Havier announced as he pulled up beside her, staring her sharply in the eye as he unhooked the rope.
‘What a gentleman.’ Holding his stare, smirking as she waltzed in before him.
‘More like an angel, but I’ll take it.’
Necks almost broke as the locals drooled over Harvier's latest score. Keeping with his reputation of surrounding himself with fine women and expensive liquor, that night seemed like a regular for him at King of Diamonds, a gentleman's club revered by many, but accessed by few.
‘So this is where powerful men come to get away from the stressors of the world?’ Sade asked, with one hand on his knee, the other pouring a perfectly balanced glass of Courvoisier and apple juice.
‘No my darling, this is where we come to concoct the stressors of the world,’ exhaling with his whole body before taking a double sip of his drink and locking in on Sade’s smirk ridden face. ‘This is really good. You enjoy fine liquors?’ his interest peaked.
‘No, not really. But I do know men. What they like. What they need.’
‘Oh is it, my dear?’ He said as he shimmied over, closing the gap between their two bodies.
Running her fingers through his curls, sizing him up from his Carvelas to his Cubans, the links shining under the purple lights.
‘I know that you like a good teasing, a bit of a chase. You’ve made it so big in your career, you just get handed opportunities, money, women,’ with every word, pulling him slightly closer, his hands now running up her arms. ‘You miss the thrill of the game. Being out on the hunt. Playing your best moves, switching up personalities and trying different lines on different women. Getting the biggest kick out of the hardest seductions.’ And as he leaned in to agree, his warm breath barely breezed past her neck before she subtly slid out from under him to nest by the railing overlooking the dance floor. Her back to him, silently celebrating the grip she now had over him. Though her eyes sparkled like a firework that just went off, her deep inhales and long exhales signaled she was working to calm herself down before she went for the jugular.
‘You, madam, are like no one I’ve met before.’ He managed to let out, drink in one hand, phone in the other.
‘So what are you going to do about it?’ Finally turning to face a man whose face screamed more. Please. More.
‘I’m gonna call my driver to come round,’ motioning to the phone, ‘and we are going to go back to my place where you are going to give me the chance to win you over and show you the best time of your life.’
‘We’ll see about that. Lead the way, sir.’
Men like Havier make the best marks. They work soul crushing hours and over indulging in any pill, powder or liquid that will help keep the edge off. When that doesn’t work, they turn to youthful women with loads of energy, curious minds and sensational bodies to help them briefly escape their mental hells. The whole ride home, he barely got a taste. With men like him, it’s more about everything that happens in between start and finish. The slight touches, dirty talk, body talk. All Sade had to do was keep his throat wet and his nose chalked up. Supporting but never participating.
‘You are gonna need a lot more than that to keep up with me. I’m not easily pleased.’ And by the time they pulled into his garage, she knew all the hard work was done. His driver didn’t get involved after getting home. Last driver to do that barely had a career in the city. Last thing you want to do is meddle in the affairs of the rich and powerful.
She was his for the taking, and within an hour of drunken cat and mouse, he was tuckered out and crashed into the sofa bed, releasing her to scavenge his home for what she really came for.
‘Could a man be any more careless?’ Sade whispered as she made her way through Havier's office. Sticky notes with passwords and account details sparsely populated the peripheries of his desk. His wife eyeballed her from picture frames that screamed overcompensating. ‘Something tells me I’m not the first, probably won’t be the last either.’ She said to the pictures, ‘but don’t worry, I’m not like the rest. I’m with your mans for different reasons.’
It took her about 30 minutes to gather all the information she needed, before leaving a note to Havier thanking him for showing her a wonderful time.
We should do this again sometime. You’re such a generous, carefree man.
Like a fish in water, Sade cleaned out all the gentlemen in the clubs. Carefully picking our targets, subtly seducing them before putting them under and rummaging through their most personal spaces for the gold we came for. Sade was in her element, but she was starting to make a name for herself. People were beginning to talk, and that was my cue to wrap things up and start moving on.
‘You know what you have to do, right?’ I asked as she fixed her wig in place.
‘Yeah yeah, I’m the wife, looking to make a withdrawal on my husband’s behalf.’
‘Great. You remember what Lewinski’s signature looked like, right?’
‘Yeah yeah yeah. Gosh, when did you become so OCD?’
‘Since we started the most crucial part of our plan. This is the final leg.’
She knew I was right. This was not a regular bank we are about to rob. Coffee and tea upon entry. Chandeliers dressed in diamonds and customer service so good you would think you own the place. The whole nine yards. Understandably so considering every one of their clients was worth at least seven figures, and we were about to take one of its clients for almost all they had.
‘Good morning Mrs…’
‘Lewinski. Howard, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten me already?’ gasping and pulling back from the desk as she let the words jump out from her.
‘No, no. It’s just, you look so different, and we were not expecting you back so soon, since yo-’
‘Why are you acting like I’m the first woman to gain a couple pounds in all the right places? Where is your manager, I bet he would love to hear how judgemental you are being right now.’ She said with her sunglasses low enough to pierce his soul with fear of firing.
‘No, no. That won’t be necessary. Let me know how I can be of service and we’ll get straight to it.’
‘I thought you would never ask. I need to take out 500 000.’ Letting the figures sprawl out into the air between them as she scrolls through her social media.
‘In…in cash?’
‘Would you prefer it were in donkeys and baboons?’
‘No, no. It’s just that you have never taken out so much, and I don’t know if we even have protocols for that sor-’
‘Listen Howard. You see this?’ Sliding her phone across the table to him, a photo of a red velvet lingerie set lay on a bed, next to a bottle of champagne and cigars. ‘This is a photo I just sent to my husband to thank him for letting me run his business proceedings for him whilst he enjoys some much needed rest. So you can either walk me into that vault and count up my money, or you can drop the ball and risk losing one of your biggest clients. Choice is yours.’
And like any man who appreciated his secure, high-paying job, he quickly abided. It took about 10 minutes to load the stacks of cash into two duffle bags. Howard was surprised she could carry both without breaking a sweat.
‘This was way too easy,’ Sade Whispered to me as she waltzed out of the bank and back to the car.
‘So what’s next?’
The Template was flawless. We hit 10 banks and made off with 11 million in 3 weeks. We had to act quickly before word spread faster than we could swindle. All the desk boys were none the wiser. Some needed some extra convincing - a slight flirt. A nip tease. Nothing was too much for Sade, and I cared less about her morals and more about the cash. As much as she was a star player, I had hit my target, and now it was time to cash out.
***
‘I heard you’ve been having a hard time solving a case that has everyone's panties in a twist.’
‘More than you know. Whilst you’ve been ghost, I’ve been tasked with tracking this con artist who’s made off with millions from a bunch of private banks.’
‘Unlike you, some of us don’t have someone on the other side of the screen doing all the work for them.‘Any leads?’
‘Barely.’
‘Need help?’
‘I thought you would never ask. If there’s one person I’m sure can find her, it’s you.’
‘Sure, but if I do this for you, I need you to do something for me, to prove your loyalty.’
‘What is it?’
‘Kill her.’
***
‘You know, now that I’ve finally met you in person, I’m a bit overwhelmed. I envisioned you being this scrawny, hunched geek with thick lenses and bad acne.’
‘So the typical hacker stereotypes, huh? Well, I’m glad I under delivered’
‘Yeah well, with all the time we have on this next trip, I’m sure you can think of some ways to make it up to me’ She said as she leaned in, trying to spark some sort of moment, but all I could focus on was the shore line getting closer and closer to us.
‘As fun as this has been, I can’t wait to do damage in our next city. Are you finally gonna tell me where we are going?’ Eyes gleaming, her palm nested on my forearm.
All I could do was stare past her unassuming eyes and smile.
Then came the hardest part. As I carried my luggage onto the boat, I sent a message to Ezekiel to come and close his case.
‘So you’re gonna let me carry my own bags?’ Sade said as I returned to land.
‘No no, there is a man coming to get them,’ which was infact the truth. ‘Why don’t you go wait in the car whilst I get the boat running? It’s pretty chilly out here, the last thing we need is for you to catch a cold.’
Her obedience is probably what I’m going to miss most. For a second her cheshire smile gripped me through the windshield of the SUV we came in, but the gleam of Ezekiel's squad car caught my eye from the top of the hill, signaling me to make my departure.
With only a few minutes to get the boat running, I turned my back on Sade and headed down to the control room.
‘I need us up and out of here ASAP!’
***
‘I swear on everything that is good in this universe, Take another step and I’ll shoot you where you stand.’
‘Calm your tits. I’m obviously not going anywhere.’
‘Good, 'cause carrying you to your grave would have been so much harder if I had to kill you here.’
‘Excuse me? Killing me wouldn’t give you the chance to catch that bastard who's just made off with all my money.’
‘I doubt that highly. I’ve been looking for you. Last I checked, you didn’t have any accomplices. Now shut your mouth and get in the car.’
‘You’ve got it all wrong, pal. I am the accomplice. The mastermind behind all this pulled the strings for the comfort of his desktop. I met him for the first time today.’
‘Wait what?’
***
Sade didn’t owe me any loyalty. After the way I left her for dead, I’m not surprised that she sang like a bird. Luckily for me, she’s dealing with a man cut from the same cloth. It’s just unfortunate he wasn’t cop enough to shoot on sight. I should’ve known better.
‘So let me get this straight. You met him…..’ Points to laptop.’
‘Mmhhmm’ Arms crossed.
‘And he trained you to steal…..’ Points to seized documents.’
‘Mmhhmm’ Nods head.
‘And he took off with all the money?’
‘Mmmmhhhhhmmmmmm.’ Head in hands.
The disbelief in Ezekiel's face was assuring. He knew he had to let the case die where he stood. Sure, he had the girl that everyone had been looking for. He had all the evidence he needed to track me down. But to pursue things further meant his own downfall.
He knows what bringing me in means.
He knows what I can do to his career.
Sure, millions were stolen, but no value could be put on how much he would lose if his truth got out. So he did what every selfish, sane man would do, and let Sade loose.
‘You’re letting me go?’
Yeahp.’
‘But why? You have everything you need to go after him.’
‘I do.’
‘So what gives, Sherlock?’
Staring in the depths of his eyes, she can sense a familiar sadness. Like he’s scared or fearful of what lies on the other side.’
‘Just like you, I was a pawn in his game, too. We were the marks.’
And with those words he returns to his cruiser. Her jaw dropped and mind blown as she watched him ride off into the sunset.
‘Well played, Simeon. Well played.’
