“You were parroting the lines. You repeated exactly what the man said to you.”
In any case, the police would probably check on the hotel we had used. There was no place else where you could monitor Hakozaki Junction. Plus, you could get to the guest floors of that hotel from an underground parking lot via an express elevator. Even if you were leading a girl who was wearing a blindfold and headphones, you could get through without anyone wondering about her strange getup.
The police would probably go to inquire at the hotel, but the staff would never figure out who we were. We’d left nothing they could latch on to.
“And lastly, the time we got the ransom money.”
“Once again, I had a blindfold and headphones on when I was put in the car.”
“Right. However, this time, you tell them you stayed inside. You were forced to call on the cellphone like that.”
“Without going anywhere?”
“You felt that the car was constantly moving. Sometimes it stopped, but not for long. The police will interpret that as the criminal group traveling along the expressway while giving instructions for seizing the ransom. They won’t be able to tell from where the group was watching Komagata PA or the whole expressway.”
At that point, I heaved a sigh.
“That’s it for you aiding the culprits.”
“But actually there was one more time. A key part—my role in receiving the ransom.”
“You didn’t go as yourself, did you?”
“I did as you told me. I put on the plainest clothes ever, and you saw how I could change my makeup.”
I nodded, satisfied. “That’s fine then. That wasn’t you. The woman named Matsumoto that Nakamura from Nissei Auto’s Mukojima branch handed the cargo to was simply someone else. Her hair was long, and she had sunglasses on.”
“A woman like this,” Juri put on a wig that was by her side, and dark sunglasses.
“Not even the slightest resemblance to Makiko Esumi,” I said with plenty of sarcasm, taking the items away from her. “We’ve got to dispose of these too. And the burner. What else do we have to dispose of—”
“Probably our history.” Juri looked into my eyes as she said that.
Chapter 15
Two full days had passed since we’d obtained the ransom money. There was no change in the bills. I timidly tried touching them with my hand, but nothing strange happened. It seemed no trap had been set.
I put my thirty million yen into a grocery bag. “This is my cut. That makes the rest of it all yours.”
Juri laid her eyes on the tabletop and breathed a small sigh. “It’s pretty cumbersome. And it looks heavy.”
“It means we had that big of a match.”
I passed a department store paper bag to her. She started putting the bills into it. Two hundred seventy million yen. It really would be quite heavy.
“What should I do with this money?”
“You can do whatever you want with it. It’s yours. But you shouldn’t use it in a flashy way.”
Juri shook her head. “That’s not what I mean. I can’t just carry this money home. Am I going to keep it in a coin locker or something? And then get it after things have cooled down?”
“Coin lockers are dangerous. If by chance they find the key, then you’re done for. And we don’t know how long it’ll take for things to cool down. Once the storage time has passed, it’ll be opened. Game over.”
“Then what should I do?”
“Do you have a sanctuary somewhere? A convenient place where only you go and only you know of? If you have a place like that you can store it there for a while.”
After thinking for some time, she grinned. “There’s just one place. A good place.”
“Where?” As soon as I asked her, the answer came to me, and I frowned. “You want to say this condo, but we can’t do that. After getting you back safely, we won’t ever get in touch again. We said so from the beginning, remember?”
“But there’s no other good place.”
It seemed she really had set her sights on my room. “Okay. Get ready to go out.”
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll know if you follow me.” I stood up. “Don’t forget the two hundred seventy million yen.”
I left my room and headed to the parking lot. I looked at the clock. It was nine thirty at night.
“Hey, where are we going? You can tell me, can’t you?”
“Yokosuka.”
“Yokosuka…again?”
“You said that you had that friend who went to America, right? Was her name Yuki? We went to erase your message.”
Ah, comprehension finally came over her face. “So we’re going to hide it in Yuki’s room.”
“That’s the safest, isn’t it?”
The answering machine incident had been a headache, but now I was glad that room existed. I’d been worried about the hiding place for the money the entire time.
We got into the MR-S and, like we had that night, drove with the roof up. Juri was preciously hugging the money in the paper bag on her knees. It was her livelihood from here on out.
“Hey, I wonder if the police investigation has started,” she said.
“Of course. It should have when we sent the kidnappers’ fax.”
“Do you think they’ve found a clue?”
“There’s no way they would.” I curled my lips. “If they did, it’s a fake clue. The faint sound of ships in the background, and such.”
There was no worry about them coming at us via the emails or cellphones. The sole witness was Nakamura from the Nissei Mukojima branch, but if Juri was to be believed, the man wouldn’t be able to furnish useful information to the police.
“But there is one clear clue,” Juri said.
“What’s that?”
“The culprit speaks English. With a British accent.”
At that, I jerked the steering wheel. The body of the car swerved widely off the centerline. I immediately righted it.
“Are you good at English?” I asked, feigning calm.
“Not really. I honestly don’t know much about accents. I just thought it kind of sounded British. Am I wrong?”
“Well, maybe.” I felt sweat running down my leg.
She was right. I’d lived near London for a year. You could say that was when I’d become proficient in English. Some people could tell.
I changed expressways, and we arrived at Yokosuka. I saw the restaurant we had stopped at before. I remembered that someone had sprayed my MR-S.
“Could you wait there again?” Juri said.
“No, that place is bad luck, so let’s not do that. I’ll drive up close tonight.”
“Close…”
“Next to Yuki’s condo. Carrying a package that big is difficult, isn’t it?”
“I’m fine. If you wait next to the condo, with this kind of car you’ll stand out.”
“I’m more scared of you standing out. You’re just leaving the package in the room, right? If I’m only parked for a short time, no one will get suspicious. Tell me the way.”
“Oh, uhh, turn right at that corner.”
“Right, is it?” I turned on the blinker and entered the right lane.
However, from that point it was a disaster. Juri’s navigation was unreliable. She made mistakes about which corners to turn on and we got lost. In the end it took over thirty minutes to get to the condo after wandering around. Juri’s excuse was that she’d never gone there by car.
“Even so, that was terrible. Oh well. It’s that condo?” I turned my eyes to the right side of the road. There was a white building that looked at least four stories high, but it seemed like there weren’t many units. It was almost midnight, and about half the rooms still had lights on in the windows.
“Well, I’m going.”