Chapter 4: Steve
Steve Stevens has a love/hate affair with his computer. He loves how much he can quickly accomplish, but he hates how it requires him to sit almost motionless at his desk. He had always been a man of action, a professional problem solver, willing to do whatever was necessary to get the job done. Until a couple of years ago, getting the job done meant being out in the field and using his muscles as well as his brain. Unfortunately, it now meant he had to sit in a swivel chair, wear reading glasses, and twiddle his fingers over a plastic keyboard.
Steve’s sixty-two years old body was suffering from the fallout from his youthful exploits. The computer allowed him to get things done without aggravating the hip he was supposed to have replaced two years ago or the disk in his lower back that was slowly deteriorating. However, with most of his days spent just sitting in a chair he could feel his joints stiffening and his muscles wasting away. He would somehow have to find the time and the patience to go back to the gym and do those tedious exercises his doctor kept bitching about.
He actually went to the gym consistently when he first joined. But then that cute, friendly little Thai masseuse had been replaced by the giant German girl who thought that happy ending meant her victim could still move well enough to get off the table. He would have to speak to the gym manager and have the German girl replaced with someone more compliant, at least on the days he was scheduled to exercise.
But no gym today. Today he was finalizing the vacation that he and his son will take with his grandchildren on their spring break. So far, he had purchased the airline tickets to Florida, rented an RV, made reservations at state parks, bought a Disney World pass, and arranged for the Easter Bunny to show up while they were camping on the beach.
This was what money was for. Sure, he liked the big house and expensive cars and all of the other things it enabled him to buy but taking care of his family was what made everything worthwhile. He just had one more little task and they would be all set.
Sliding his desk phone over, he pushed speed-dial #8 for his ex-daughter-in-law. A few moments later a young woman answered the phone.
“Eva, this is Steve,” he said.
“Oh, fuck. What now?”
“Eva, Paul and I are going to take the kids to Florida for spring break.”
“Oh no you’re not! Easter is my holiday. It’s in the divorce decree. Besides, I just let you two keep them for the whole Christmas break.”
Steve smiled and began to twirl a pencil with his right hand. “Eva, let me get right to the point. I’ve got four thousand dollars sitting on my desk that will be used one of two ways. Either I send it to you so you can go off by yourself on a nice cruise or I send it to my lawyer to drag your sorry ass back into court for child endangerment.”
“Child Endangerment!? What do you mean by child endangerment? I would never do anything to hurt my kids.”
“Oh, did I say take a cruise by yourself? I meant to say you could take a cruise with your new lover. You know, the one who sleeps over a couple of nights a week.”
“Steve, that’s not fair,” sputtered Eva. “Danny is a good guy. We always set the alarm so he’s out of the house before anyone else wakes up.”
Steve leaned forward in the chair. “Well, we all have skeletons in our closet, Eva. And I’ve got another two thousand sitting here for a private investigator to find what Danny’s hiding. I’m sure there will be something to disgrace him; maybe even get him fired from his cushy job at the insurance company.”
The silence screamed in Steve’s ear as he listened to Eva swinging in the breeze. “This is a limited time offer, Eva. Tick-Tock. You have thirty seconds to decide. I’ll transfer four thousand to your account this morning, or I’ll have you served with papers this afternoon.”
“How about you toss in the money for the investigator?” she asked. “Six thousand transferred as soon as we get off the phone.”
“My, my. Aren’t you the greedy cunt? We’ll split the investigator's money. The final offer is five thousand.”
“Done,” said Eva.
“Done,” said Steve, and he hung up the phone without another word. He wasn’t sure how he ever allowed his son to marry someone so stupid. She could have gotten the full six thousand if she had tried a little harder. Hell, she might have gotten seven thousand out of him.
Steve smiled as he filled in the dollar amount and clicked the “Confirm Transfer” button displayed on his computer screen. Five thousand dollars was a lot of money, but it was a sound investment. If Paul kept taking the kids on Eva’s holidays while she went off and partied, it wouldn’t be long before he would get full custody and they could cut her off without a penny. She only got alimony because she was a stay-at-home mom.
Yes, taking care of his family was what made everything worthwhile.
One of the many cheap cell phones in Steve’s top left desk drawer began to ring. He was having a busy morning. He saw the name Max written on the back of the phone, and from the tic-marks drawn under the name he knew this was the fifth time he had spoken with Max on it. He confirmed the caller id was correct and answered the phone.
“Hello. State your business," he said.
“There is a man sitting next to me with a gun pressed against my head,” said the voice on the phone.
“What kind of gun is it?”
“A squirt gun. He’s trying to clean out my ears,” the voice said.
The check-in code complete, Steve relaxed. “What’s up, Max?”
“I wish I did have a gun against my head instead of this mess. Stan, you’ve got to help me out. We had a major spill last night at one of our smaller warehouses, down in Milford Ohio. I’m worried that it is really going to bite me in the ass. We’ve been temporarily storing a few unwanted barrels of industrial waste for a friend and an idiot forklift driver tore two of the damn things open last night. I think most of it went down the drain. This is very toxic stuff, Stan, and it doesn’t decompose for a long time.”
“So, it went into the municipal sewer?”
“No, their damn inspectors are constantly testing that. We do too much off the books to risk triggering an investigation. We have our own private dry well under the warehouse that they don’t know about. But we never expected to have a hundred gallons toxic of shit dumped into it at once.”
“So, the waste is just going to leech into the ground?” asked Steve.
“Yeah. That’s about the size of it. It’s too late to do anything about that, so we need you to set up a cover. We need some sort of plausible deniability.”
“Do you have permits to store this shit at your place?”
“No,” said Max. “This was strictly a private deal for a friend.”
“That’s okay,” said Steve. “It may play to our advantage. But listen, Max, I am getting ready to go on vacation with my grandkids. I’ll squeeze you in as a favor, but it is going to be a rush-job.”
“Fine by me. We’ll pay for a rush-job. We need this fixed quick.”
Steve looked at his calendar. It was two weeks and two days until he left for Florida with the kids. “Okay, Max. I want all the particulars for everyone even remotely involved, right down to the type of underwear the forklift driver was wearing. Use the encryption program I gave you and send it to me. I’ll look it over and let you know if I can help.”
“Thanks, man, I appreciate it.”
“No problem," said Steve. “Hey, listen, our phones are expiring. Include your new number with the other stuff you’re sending me, and I’ll send you mine. Bye, Max.” Steve took the battery out of the phone, broke the phone in half, and put the two pieces into his briefcase.