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“You see that guy?” Letty asked. “He had a gun in his hand, in his jacket, before he climbed the gate.”
“I dunno, I don’t know what that looks like. Maybe call 9-1-1?” Baxter suggested.
“We don’t know what’s going on...”
“We need to call...”
“And tell them what? The cops aren’t gonna hurry over because we saw somebody hop a fence. And if they went there to rob or shoot them, they’ll be gone before the cops get here,” Letty said. “If they’re not out in ten minutes, we call 9-1-1, but if they come out in the next minute, we get our guy to track them.”
She fished the camera bag out of the backseat and pushed the zoom lens all the way out.
Baxter: “You’d get a better angle from the backseat.”
Letty clambered into the backseat, pushed the door open a few inches.
The two men came back through the gate four or five minutes after they crossed through it, one of them carrying what looked like one of the grocery sacks the couple had taken inside. He carried it with both hands, as if it were heavy. Letty ripped off a series of frames, getting both their faces and the SUV’s license plate before the SUV pulled away.
“They’re in a hurry and they’re nervous,” Baxter said. “Something happened in there.”
Letty called the NSA tracker and read the license number to him. “They should be heading south on Sepulveda...”
When that was underway, Baxter said, “I should call Able. I’ll ask him to call Barron. If Barron answers, we’ll know he’s okay. If he doesn’t... we gotta go in there or call 9-1-1.”
“Call him,” Letty said.
Baxter called and Able picked up. Before Baxter could ask about Barron, Able asked, “Have you guys looked at SlapBack?”
Baxter: “Yes. It’s down. Listen, can you call your friend, the tall guy? Bob? Call him, ask him if everything’s okay. We’re worried. Charlie thinks somebody might have followed us away from your house. We lost them, but if somebody was tracking them...”
“All right. Call you back in a minute.”
Letty and Baxter sat looking at the house, but there was no activity. Able called back and said, “I don’t get an answer, from either of them. I called his girlfriend, too.”
“All right. We gotta be careful. It’s possible that the feds picked them up if they were watching you and then saw SlapBack go down.”
“What...”
“Stay low,” Baxter said. “Tell everybody you know to stay away until we can get them on the phone.”
“Dude, you really think...?”
“Dunno, but I’m worried,” Baxter said, and he hung up.
“Okay. I’m going in,”Letty said. “Is your box of covid masks still under the backseat?”
“Yeah...”
“I need to cover my hands and face when I go over the gate. I’ll open it from the inside and let you in. We don’t want to touch anything with our bare hands, we don’t want to be recognizable on a camera.”
Sepulveda Boulevard was busy, so they’d have to go in with other people watching. No way to avoid it. “Gotta look confident,” Letty said, as they came up to the gate. “Confident and quick.”
She’d pulled the masks over her hands—“We should havethought of buying real gloves”—and at the gate, without breaking stride, she put her hands on the top, pulled herself up and flipped over. The gate had a latch lock and she unlatched it and let Baxter in.
“Back door’s open. Not good,” Baxter said, looking down the side of the house. “Wouldn’t be good in anyplace I’ve ever lived.”
Letty led the way to the door, and then called, “Loren? Are you there?”
There was no sound or movement, so she stepped inside.
