You Do What You Have To - 12

 

Darren held his phone to his ear, waiting for his call to go through. He'd been home two days now, and was feeling like he really would live. Despite his protestations to Olivia, he had been in a fair amount of pain. Even more so when the painkillers had worn off. Thankfully, he had his own stash of them at the house. Something he was pretty certain Olivia was aware of, although she didn't say anything when she dropped him off, other than to suggest he spend the next couple of days resting and healing.

 

At the moment he was doing the busywork Olivia had given him to keep him occupied. Not that he really minded. He had a long list of restaurants she had emailed him—a quarter of those that were being checked to see if Micky was employed by one of them. Other organization members were working on the rest of the list. She said, in the email, all fast food places had been eliminated, as well as high-end restaurants. Then calls had been made to dispense with any of them that didn't have a Micky or Michael on their wait staff. It was all presumption, of course, based on Micky's comment to Darren that the place where he worked was nice but not classy.

 

"Classy is in the eye of the beholder," Darren grumbled, just at the manager of the restaurant he was calling answered. "Good afternoon, ma'am," Darren said. "My name is Alan Forman. I'm calling on behalf of the Bureau's scam division. We're trying to locate a man who registered a complaint. Unfortunately the only information he gave us about himself was that his name was Michael and he is a waiter. The scammer in question is targeting restaurant workers."

 

"What sort of scam?" the woman asked.

 

"I'm sorry, I'm not at liberty to tell you. We would like to get in touch with Michael however. Do you have an employee by that name?"

 

"I do."

 

"Can you tell me anything about him? The scammer is targeting younger men, within the twenty-five to thirty age range."

 

She chuckled. "Then it's not our Michael. He's fifty-six, and honestly not the sort who would report something to the FBI. He thinks he's above things like that and wouldn't waste his time."

 

He let the "FBI" comment pass. If she assumed that's what he meant by "the Bureau", well, that's why he'd phrased it the way he had. "You might be surprised. People fall for these every day. Anyway, thank you for talking to me."

 

He hung up and moved on to the next call. So far he had found four men who came within the parameters he'd set up. Each time, casually, he'd asked for a description. None of the people he'd talked to had found that strange, despite the fact he'd implied Michael had filed the complaint online, meaning he wouldn't know what the man he was searching for looked like.