2019-11-04 - Running Out of Leads

Gabriel slides into one of the booths, tucking away his phone after firing off a text to someone or something. "Hey," says the detective to Charlie, who is already here. "Good seeing you and Georgie for Halloween. She was adorable. Permanent sugar coma?" He grins, in his usual uniform of blazer and slacks and white button-up shirt. "Anyway. Got the results of those database searches."

"Nope." Charlie replies with a shake of her head, "Two pieces a day until it runs out...I'm a mean mom." She sets her coffee cup down before she pushes her plate of bacon over, offering him some of it. "What'd you find? Also, she says she really likes that one flower...I've no idea which one she means, though.

Gabriel picks the bacon off the plate and chows down, asking for some toast from the waitress that comes over. Who knows whether he will get it! That's the fun of the Grizzly. Oh, and some coffee, too, please. "We've got no real obvious suspects. No one with a particularly violent past. No special forces that I can find." He takes a sheet out of the portfolio he is carrying and passes it over, with print-outs of driver license copies. "A bunch of guys around six feet, but, you know." It's not the best lead to go by.

"So we're yet again up shit creek?" Charlie slouches back in her seat, shaking her head, "This entire case is just...bullshit, and frustrating bullshit. Nothing seems to go right." She reaches for another piece of bacon while reaching for the portfolio to look through it, "So you want to run these guys down, or what?"

"I mean, unless you've got a better idea," says Gabe with a sigh as his coffee (miraculously!) returns. He adds some milk and sweetener to it. He certainly does not. "Problem is how we do this without spooking Foster. We can crash into Bulldog Security and start asking for shift logs and run sheets and records for the van, but then they're going to know we're onto them and start cleaning up the trail."

He looks thoughtful. "One option is to case these guys' places. Pull credit reports. See who might have paid off some debt or got a new boat or whatever."

"I wish that I had a better idea, honestly. But I don't even have an idea any more." Charlie replies as she raises her bacon up for a bite off it, shaking her head, "Not tipping him off is the big thing. But then again, what about what that lawyer said?" She finishes the bacon, then wipes offer her fingers as she chews and swallows before continuing, "We could try and put a tail on them, see if they do something."

"Eight?" asks Gabriel as he looks down at the printouts in front of him. "Shit. That's going to take a ton of manpower. And it means uniforms, which means someone's going to fuck up and tip them off." Sorry, uniforms. "I don't know. Maybe. They've probably ditched evidence by now."

"I doubt just watching these guys would get us anywhere, honestly." Charlie reaches for her coffee, but doesn't pick it up to drink from it yet, "And it'd be a lot of manpower, and a huge waste of time to boot, too." She shakes her head, leaning forward to rest her forearms on the table, sighing, "So what do you think? Maybe it's time to kick the door in and see which roach scurries first."

"Well, want to try the drive-bys and the credit reports? See if anyone's got a new boat or paid off some credit cards, that sort of thing?" Gabriel looks down at his papers. "And then, if not that, I don't know. Then I guess we just go hard and try to get our shooter, even if it means Foster goes poof." He clearly doesn't like it. "I'm running out of ideas. And the longer this goes, the harder it gets to put down."

"Question becomes if we're even going to get the okay to actually get their financials. We've nothing...it's all bullshit smoke and mirrors, and anyone will say it could just have been another car jacking. He used a stolen car once, why not twice?" Charlie shakes her head, frowning before she slams her cup down a little harder than needed, "So fucking frustrating."

"Yeah. Well. We can always just do the drive-bys. I don't know." Gabriel looks down at his papers, but then up when the toast arrives. "Hey. Thanks." He then goes and puts some jelly on the bread. "We start hauling them in and asking for alibis. Then word gets back ..."

It all comes back to the problem: How do they not tip off Foster?

"And if Foster is involved, he hides the evidence. We keep coming back to the need to follow the money, and not being able to." Charlie gives the waitress a quick smile, then she shakes her head, "We can, but not sure we'll find anything, and then...we're still here. Moving on Foster without worrying about being spotted, and maybe that's exactly what we need to do."

"If I didn't think Foster was involved, I'd figure out who was at the Security garage that night. Figure out who signed for the the vehicle. Haul that person in." But, of course, this is a different issue. Gabriel bites into the toast. "What do you think, Charlie? Try something low impact and then go hard as a last resort?"

There is a faint shake of her head at the question, her fingers tapping along the surface of her coffee mug as she thinks. "I don't know, we've been pretty gentle about this so far, right? But we haven't actually managed to get anywhere with it, small pieces, little bits that seem like they might fit. And don't ever quite fit."

"All right. So what, then? Start hauling these guys in? Go for the Bulldog Security records? I'm following your lead on this one." Gabriel arches a brow. He seems wary about it, of course, but also seems to accept that they need to do something different.

Charlie shakes her head, glancing upwards, "I guess?" It's clear that even she isn't as certain about it as she might have sounded. "You think we can run this by the Captain? Not sure he'll have any better ideas, but he was saying something about trying something with Foster...so maybe he's got an idea."

"Yeah. Maybe run it by the Captain. Can't hurt to get a fresh pair of eyes on it. Also be good to have some backup in case this blows up spectacularly and we need some cover." Gabriel sighs and looks at his papers, as if the driver's license records will somehow spontaneously name the murderer for him.

"Yeah. So. You going to approach him, or should I?" Charlie wonders with the faintest of twists to her mouth, "Or I guess that we could approach him together, two against one..Wait, wrong scenerio."

"It's your case, Charlie," says Gabriel, tossing it into her lap. "But I'm happy to be there with you. Totally. We can go over this together." Crunch goes the teeth in the toast. "Knock three heads together. Maybe something will shake out."

"Yeah, yeah...my case." Charlie shakes her head, "You know that it wasn't supposed to be?" She finishes off her coffee, then reaches into her pocket to pull out her phone, checking the time, "I'll see if he's in the office now, if not...when."

Gabriel shrugs his shoulders. "Maybe it was and maybe it wasn't, but it's yours now, and you're doing the best you can with it. I don't see anyone else with better ideas," says Gabriel with a little grin. "All right. Let me know when you get him?"

"Oh, am I?" Charlie wonders with a laugh, shaking her head, "I'm doing the best I can...yeah." She doesn't seem to get a quick answer on the text, so tucks her phone back into her pocket, "As soon as I know, I'll let you know. Until then, I guess that's just more time to try and think."

"Yeah," says Gabriel as he puts down some cash for his breakfast and then begins to slide out of the booth. "Text me if you have any breakthroughs. I'll do the same." He grins at her. "We'll crack this. Promise."

"I will." Charlie pulls out the cash for her own breakfast, tossing it down onto the table as well, "We'll figure this out...and be able to take a whole two days off."