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Back Just Thieves Save as PDF
Chapters (42)
  1. Cover
  2. Other Titles
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. 1
  6. 1
  7. 2
  8. 3
  9. 4
  10. 5
  11. 6
  12. 7
  13. 8
  14. 9
  15. 10
  16. 11
  17. 2
  18. 12
  19. 13
  20. 14
  21. 15
  22. 16
  23. 17
  24. 18
  25. 19
  26. 20
  27. 21
  28. 22
  29. 23
  30. 24
  31. 25
  32. 26
  33. 3
  34. 27
  35. 28
  36. 29
  37. 30
  38. 31
  39. 32
  40. 33
  41. 34
  42. ACCOMPLICES AND EASY MARKS

“We could drive back tonight. Rent a car somewhere else. If that’s what you want. Give it to Froehmer first thing in the morning.”

“It’s all right,” Frank said.

“What about the car?”

Frank shrugged. “Just some guy not paying attention. He’s got all the information. The rental’s got all the information. None of it leads back to us.”

“Or Froehmer?”

“Or Froehmer. It’s all taken care of. Nothing to worry about.”

He wasn’t worried. He was just somewhere else. He wanted to be somewhere else. I didn’t give it much more thought than that.

And then, sometime when I was asleep, he left. Took the thing and went. That’s what I knew. That’s where it started.

19

THE KNOWN

I SPENT DAYS ON THE PHONE. Froehmer had said they found Frank in another hotel. So I started calling. I started with the credit cards I knew he had on him. He had three of them that I knew of. Actually, he had five, but two of them were still at home, on the desk in front of me. I ended up calling them too, trying to see if there was any activity, any information about where he’d gone and what he’d done. There were five different names, a different identity for each card. I called and went through the automated prompts, for once grateful for the lifeless voice on the other end. There were no current charges. Then I started calling the hotels, using the names on the cards. I called a place, asked about the names and the date and waited. Nothing. It was always nothing. But I still had a long way to go.

Frank always had different identities for each of us, passports, driver’s licenses, debit and credit cards. He kept three of them in rotation, with a couple in reserve. He fabricated some of the documents, forged others, and stole a few too. “Identity theft is too easy,” he said. “And it’s only temporary.” You could only use a stolen identity for a short while, hours at most, usually. Things were better with the fakes. Frank had bank accounts on a few of the more permanent identities, creating an elaborate (and maybe unnecessary) online shell game. We paid bills, kept the accounts clean and up-to-date. “No red flags,” Frank liked to say. “No problems, no questions.”