Chapter 13

FREEDOM PLUS

The next day, after checking in to the office, Cole and Aaron went to the motor home. When they opened the door, a large briefcase was sitting on the drivers’ side seat. A manual and a sealed envelope were sitting on top. The envelope contained 2 American Express Gold Cards with a yellow sticky attached that said “for business expenses, unlimited balance available, receipts not required.” The front page of the manual said T O P S E C R E T. They looked at each other and drove on out to the shooting range.

“I wonder what this is all about,” said Cole as he opened the manual.

“There are bottles of some kind of liquid, syringes and a package of latex gloves in here.”

“Don’t touch anything,” ordered Cole. Then he read the first sentence out loud to Aaron.

“DO NOT OPEN THE BRIEFCASE UNTIL YOU HAVE READ THIS MANUAL. DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE HANDLE ANYTHING IN THE CASE WITHOUT LATEX GLOVES! I’ll read this manual while you get the pistols ready, then you can read it.”

After both men had read the TOP SECRET manual, they looked at each in silence for a moment.

“Poisons, I never even considered poisons,” said Aaron.

“Me either, but when you think about it, if we are taking out bad people, there may be situations where poisons could be the best method. According to the manual, they’re all colorless, odorless and induce different kinds of medical symptoms. A drop of bottle A and you have a heart attack. A drop of bottle B, you have a stroke. A drop of bottle C and you go to sleep for 12 hours and forget whatever happened the previous 24 hours. A drop of bottle D and you simply stop breathing after about 30 minutes. In all cases there is no residue to indicate that it was poison. Is there a place in the ceiling where we can put this case?”

Aaron said, “Yeah, there is a place that looks like it was made for it.”

“Let’s put it away and do some shooting.”

Their shoulders were still tender, so they spent a couple of hours with the pistols. The Glocks from the Mexican brothers handled the best. Even with the silencers, they were accurate and deadly. Their unseen mentors on the radio seemed to be impressed with the pistols and one man, the same man who had helped them before, came to the motor home for a look at the pistols. “I’m supposed to instruct you in any way that I feel is helpful to your ability to use the firearms in your possession. I just wanted you to know that I’ve seen a lot of shooters with a lot of different pistols. Your consistency and accuracy now rank right up with the best of them. With regular practice, you guys will be exceptional world class shooters. Now I need to get out of your office.”

“That makes me feel good about that part of our job,” said Cole.

“What do you mean by that part of our job,” asked Aaron?

“I mean accuracy and consistency is one thing, but being able to pull the trigger and shooting the same every time no matter what the target I’m shooting at is probably as important as anything. If I can hit every target dead center, but miss when I have a drug dealer in my crosshairs, then I’m not worth a damn.”

On the way back to town, they discussed the list. They tossed a coin and Cole took #1 while Aaron took #2. Cole would call Poulson construction and set up an appointment to go see them. Hopefully he would meet the boss, Charles Poulson, and see what developed. They would meet for lunch.

Aaron would follow Ms. Robertson and enroll in the exercise facility where she went daily. Ms. Robertson was pulling out of her estate as Aaron drove down the street. He backed off and followed at a discreet distance. He thought that he knew where she was going, but he kept her in sight just in case. Her driver pulled up in front of USA Fitness. Ms. Robertson got out and the driver pulled the car into the parking lot and sat there with the motor running. Aaron had pulled into the parking lot as Ms. Robertson was getting out of the car. He got out and went into the building. He could feel the eyes of the driver on his back as he opened the door. Inside he got his first good look at Ms. Robertson. She was checking in at the front desk. She was a middle aged woman and even at her age of maybe 50 years old, she was a knockout. She looked Aaron up and down and gave him the “I’m available” look. Aaron turned away and told the attendant that he was looking for a place to exercise and to get back in shape. Ms. Robertson laughed and said in a sultry voice, “you look to me like you’re in pretty good shape already.”

Aaron turned and looked at her again and trying not to think about the fact that she was old enough to be his mother, winked and said, “You’re the one that doesn’t look like you need any exercise.”

“We all need all kinds of exercise,” she purred.

Just then the door opened and a young Arnold Swartzinnegger clone stepped in and said, “I’m ready for you Rhonda.”

“Maybe we can get together sometime,” she whispered to Aaron as she brushed beside him pressing her breast against his arm.

Ms. Robertson followed the clone through the door. Aaron looked at the young attendant, smiled and said, “What’s that about?”

The attendant, her name badge said Jill, laughed, “She has had at least 5 husbands and is currently looking for number 6 or 7. We call her Elvira. You may not be qualified for her. You need to be rich and hopefully in bad health.”

“Well, I think I fail the test on both counts. Is she always …. Like that?”

“Every time I’ve seen her meet a man in here, it’s the same. It’s almost like she practices her lines, her body movements, and her closing line as she rubs her breast against the subjects arm”, she said as the both laughed.

“Does she come here every day?”

“She comes in just about every day during the week. She comes in at 10:00 AM and leaves at 1:30 PM. Her car will pull up in front at exactly 10:00 AM. She will come in and check for any male prospects. About the only time she misses is if she has to go have a little more nip and tuck at the plastic surgeons. If you fit her qualifications, you could probably go home with her.”

“No thanks, I’m happily married so I’m not applying. Is it possible to learn where she will be so I can make sure to avoid her?”

“I don’t know exactly what she does in the exercise rooms, but I know that she reserves the suntan booth at 11 and then goes in the sauna from 11:30 till 11:45 AM. Then it’s a shower and make up. “We laugh about her daily schedule. She needs an hour and 45 minutes to shower and prepare her face for the hunt.”

“The hunt?”

“The hunt for the next husband.”

“I’m going to be coming in at about the same time for awhile. I’ll try to avoid her,” said Aaron. “Anything else I need to know?’

“We supply bottles of water, just help yourself from the cooler.” Just then an executive type came in the front door, looked at both Aaron and Jill like they were something that had crawled out from under a rock, ran his card under the sensor, and went into the locker area as the door clicked open.

Aaron looked at Jill, “maybe we should hook him up with Elvira.”

At that comment Jill exploded, “Very good, in fact they were seeing a lot of each other for awhile, but it seems their romance has cooled off. He’s an arrogant prick, his name is Charles Poulson, and he builds houses all over the area. I’ve heard that he’s married, but you wouldn’t know it from the way he chases every attractive woman who comes in here. He even hit on me!”

“Does he come in here at this time every day as well?”

“He misses some days, but probably 3 out of 5 days during the week he’ll be here at this time.”

Aaron went back to the lockers and then into the rest of the building. He wanted to see the layout of the entire facility. The sauna and suntan room was next to the locker room. He went into the door marked Suntan to see how it was set up. There was a dressing room with an unlocked locker for clothes and a swinging door into the actual suntan booth. It was being used at the time. There were some gym shoes on the floor and a bottle of water on the table. The sauna was next to the suntan room and it was set up a similar fashion. First a small room with lockers, a table with towels, and a door marked SAUNA. There was also the standard warning about temperature and how long to stay inside. Aaron had just enough time to get up a good sweat and take a shower before time to go meet with Cole. He looked in the main equipment room; Poulson was running on a treadmill. A half full bottle of water was on the floor beside him.

At lunch, Aaron told Cole about following Ms. Robertson to USA Fitness and how Poulson also showed up.

Cole told Aaron, “I wondered where he had gone. I was in his offices talking to a salesman when he came out of his office and told everyone that he was going to work out.”

Poulson brusquely said “I don’t want you people slacking off just because I’m not here! I’ll be watching you!”

“I assumed it was Poulson, because of how he acted. I asked the salesman “do you get that kind of respect all of the time around here?”

The sales guy said, “Yes, that’s pretty much standard treatment. In fact it’s probably the exact words he says each day when he leaves the office. If I could afford it, I would tell him where to go and leave right now. But since I can’t afford it, let me show you some pictures of the homes that we now have available.”

“I felt sorry for the salesman, but he was trying to make the best of a bad situation.”

Aaron sat looking at his hamburger, “I have an idea. We may be able to kill 2 birds with one stone here!”

“I’m listening.”

“What if we could poison one of them and put the blame on the other one?”
“Go on, you have my attention.”

Ms. Robertson goes into the suntan booth and then into the sauna. Both times her water bottle is outside the room. “If I could get a water bottle that had Poulson’s fingerprints on it, we could fill it back up with water and some stuff from our new case, and substitute if for the real water bottle. She would expire and the police would discover Poulson’s fingerprints all over the bottle. With a little luck he would be convicted. If he got off, we would have to think of something else for him. The front office attendant told me that Poulson and Robertson had some history. “I would rather try to get both of them at once, but I don’t know if Poulson would give me an opportunity to switch water bottles.”

“I like it; do you want to go in every day until you can get a bottle with his fingerprints? It may take a couple of days or weeks. The critical thing is to get a bottle with Poulson’s fingerprints on it” said Cole.

Friday lunch, “finally, I got a water bottle with Poulson’s fingerprints. Each day he has his water bottle, but he hangs on to it. One time he threw it into the trash but by the time I could get to it, there were 3 bottles and I couldn’t tell which one was his. Today, he threw it in and left, nobody else was in the room. I went to the trash bucket and carefully grabbed it by the cap and took it to my locker. I wrapped it in a towell and tried not to wipe or smear the fingerprints. If he and Ms. Robertson are both there Monday, I’ll try to make the switch.”
“Have we decided which poison to use?”

“I figured that because of her age, the heart attack would be best. She appears to be in good physical condition, but I hear about lots of people who are in prime condition having heart attacks or strokes all of the time,” said Aaron.

The weekend passed and Monday morning after a short discussion with Cole, Aaron took his workout clothes and headed for USA Fitness. He had put the amount of poison in the bottle per the instruction book for heart attack. They figured Ms. Robertson would’ve been drinking water during her workout, so he thought that the bottle should be about half full. It should take 15 to 30 minutes after drinking the poison before the victim collapsed. Aaron planned on leaving as soon as he had made the switch. It went like clockwork.

Robertson came in at 10 AM and started her routine. She went into the suntan booth just after Poulson arrived. Robertson and Poulson snarled at each other as they passed in the main exercise room. Aaron gathered up his stuff and walked back to the locker room, made a detour into the tanning room, saw Robertson’s half full water bottle, switched bottles and then continued on down to the locker. He took a quick shower and left. As he went out the door, he noticed that Jill wasn’t at the desk. She wasn’t there when he had checked in either. He didn’t know if the security system recorded everyone who passed through the locked door each day, but if it did, he would be questioned by the police after the murder was discovered. There was always a chance that the police might not even check for fingerprints and assume that the death was caused by natural causes. If that was the case, Charles Poulson would have to be handled separately.

Cole and Aaron met for lunch just down the street from USA Fitness. They were eating when an ambulance came roaring by with lights flashing and siren blaring and turned into USA Fitness. The ambulance was followed by a police cruiser. A few minutes later, the ambulance came back, lights off and no siren. There was no hurry since the passenger was dead.

“Let’s get started on Mr. Trong the drug guy,” suggested Cole.

RIZZO

Rizzo didn’t get the call to investigate the death of Ms. Robertson, but since the victim was on his list he told the computer to copy him in on everything that happened with the case. ‘The guys were doing just fine.’ The report said that cause of death was Natural Causes-heart attack. Then it was amended to say that due to evidence found at the scene, the Cause of Death was now suspected Homicide. In a routine sweep for evidence, fingerprints of a former lover were found on the water bottle. The former lover, Charles Poulson (another person on his list-this is great!) emphatically denies any involvement. The medical examiner couldn’t identify any poison in the woman’s body, but because of her physical condition and past physical exams, a heart attack was unlikely. The water bottle had traces of an unidentified toxic substance that was strong enough to induce a heart attack. Charles Poulson was arrested and charged with the murder of Rhonda Robertson.

‘These guys are exceeding all of my expectations. Wonder whose idea it was to set up poor Mr. Poulson.’

The hand written message from JUSTICE FOR ALL said “great, whose idea was it?”

That night at the trail-head Rizzo asked, “Ok, whose idea was it to frame Poulson anyway?”

Not being able to tell from his tone whether he was happy or mad, Aaron hesitated and then said, “It was Cole’s idea.”

“Since I can’t see you guys, I think that it’s Aaron talking. Is that right?”

Cole jumped in, “Wait a minute, let’s give credit where it’s due, I wish it had been my idea!”

“So it was Aaron’s Idea?”

“That’s correct, sir.”

“You don’t have to call me sir; Just because you have been around some military types the past few days, doesn’t mean that I expect a salute or to be called sir. That was an exceptionally good operation. Eliminating one target and implicating another at the same time is a stroke of genius. I even got a question from my contact in JUSTICE FOR ALL wanting to know if I was responsible. I told them that of course it was my idea!” Then laughing, “No, I wouldn’t do that; my report to them will give credit where it’s due. We are all impressed and wonder what you will come up with to top that one.”

“Well old buddy, you have screwed up this time. They’re going to expect this kind of thing every time,” said Cole laughing.

The newspaper headline and article said, Socialite Poisoned, Lover Arrested. Prominent millionaire socialite Ms. Rhonda Robertson was poisoned at USA Fitness in Draper. She died at the scene. Her reported former lover, well known businessman Charles Poulson, was arrested and charged with her murder. Police would not release any additional details. It’s expected that a vigorous and timely legal action will be pursued by the prosecutor’s office.

2 months later, Charles Poulson was convicted of the 1st degree murder of Ms. Rhonda Robertson and sentenced to 20 years to life in the Utah State Prison in Bluffdale, Utah. That means he will probably be out in 5 years if he survives the prison population.

Aaron went to USA Fitness the next day after the death of Ms. Robertson and was greeted by Jill, “you missed all of the excitement.”

“I heard in the paper that Elvira died of poisoning here yesterday.”

“Yeah, I was in the back room when I heard a scream; one of the clients went into the sauna and found her lying on the floor. At first we thought that she had passed out from the heat, but when someone checked her and found that she wasn’t breathing they told me and I called 911. I didn’t see you yesterday.”

Realizing that there must not be a record of who had come and gone, Aaron said, “I got busy at the office and missed my window to be out of the office. Did the police want a list of everyone who was here yesterday?”

“Yeah, I made a list of every one that I had seen. I guess they’re calling everyone on the list to see if anyone saw that prick put the poison in her water bottle.”

“I’ll probably see you tomorrow, take care.”

‘It looks like I’m not even on the list of people who were at USA Fitness. Lucked out again, thought Aaron.’