Nickel Package

by David Chill

  I grabbed the gun with my left hand and was about to transfer it to my right, when I saw Malcolm lunging at us out of the corner of my eye. I moved my right arm across my chest and unleashed a vicious back punch that caught him flush on the nose. There are few better places to land a blow. A punch in the nose is painful and disabling, and it's the type of hit that only an experienced combatant can shrug off. Malcolm might have been a good corporate infighter, but in this realm, he was out of his league. He spun around and dropped to one knee, raising his hand to his face. After a few seconds, his body slumped over onto the floor and he began to moan slightly as he writhed on the ground.

  Stepping back a few paces, I put some distance between us. Still looking at Adam, I finally moved the gun to my right hand. I didn't think Adam would take a run at me, but if he did, I wanted enough time to point and shoot. Fortunately, he was still wincing, holding his wrist, a pained expression on his face.

  "Hey Adam," I said.

  "What?" he managed through clenched teeth.

  "You didn't really think I was going to let you take the fall for all this, did you?"

  "It sure sounded like it," he grimaced.

  "Well, I wasn't. I can assure you of that. I hope you believe me."

  "I don't know what to believe, man."

  "Understandable," I shrugged. "Hey. Would you do me a favor? Go into Malcolm's pocket and hand me my phone? I think someone should call 911 and give Malcolm over to the cops, don't you? Might be quicker if I did that."

  Chapter 16

  It took about 20 minutes for Roberto De Santos to walk through the door of Celestial Productions, followed by a coterie of uniformed officers. My guess is he left the Purdue Division shortly after my call. Saturday afternoon traffic along Olympic Boulevard was almost always light.

  "Glad you're working the weekend shift," I remarked as the uniforms handcuffed both Malcolm and Adam. "Otherwise I might have to endure getting hauled in twice in one week."

  "Juan usually takes Saturdays off, so I cover for him," he said. "He likes to watch the college basketball tournament. March Madness and all that."

  "Glad one of you is around to lend a helping hand."

  I took Roberto through the details of the past few days. While Malcolm had admitted to the murders of Hector, Jay and Kitty, the only thing he had to go on was my word and Adam's. Ballistics would comb through Adam's Ford Explorer, and I thought it was likely they'd find DNA evidence confirming Malcolm's presence behind the wheel. It wasn't solid proof, but it might be enough for the police to secure a confession. And there would surely be Malcolm's DNA on the watch he left behind in the hotel room. And perhaps even video evidence from the hotel's surveillance system in the lobby. A suspect, faced with life imprisonment at the very least, might eventually come clean, regardless of whether he possessed a guilty conscience.

  "Still leaves us with the issue of Adam Gee's involvement," Roberto mused.

  "My own sense is he was probably a bystander in all this," I said. "He had no motive to kill anyone. But accessory to murder is still an option. If he turns state's evidence against Taylor, you can cut him a deal."

  "Given what he's facing, I think he'll cooperate with us."

  "Funny how things work out," I said, "Adam basically admitted to grand larceny when he said he took Malcolm's Rolex. That would remove him from the crime scene. That is, if you were to buy into Malcolm's lame story, that Adam didn't steal the watch, but lost it when he shot Jay in the hotel room. So Adam won't even have to face charges of grand larceny for stealing a $10,000 watch."

  Roberto shook his head. "Show biz. Who needs it."

  "Pays well."

  "Yeah. I know it's a crazy business, but I never figured it would be this dangerous. Say, let me ask you something. We were talking about Eric Starr and Laputa earlier. Cold case. Ten people on board the yacht, and no one saw anything. You learn anything more there?"

  "Well, I think Eric's partner, Jack Beale, didn't exactly fall off his yacht and into the ocean. Proving it is another matter, but I'm not so sure there's a guilty party here. We won't be getting a confession. I still need to poke around a little more."

  "Okay. Keep me in the loop."

  "Sure."

  "Hey, one more thing," he said, holding up a finger. "I did you a solid yesterday."

  "How so?"

  "That warrant that was out for you, the one down in Orange County? I called Irvine P.D. Had it quashed."

  I raised my eyebrows. "They were okay with that?"

  "Told them you were an ex-cop. Let things get a little out of hand. They got it. When push comes to shove, most police departments will side with an ex-cop over some deputy dog working for a security patrol. And given the amount of stress you've been under this week, I figured you deserved a break."

  Stress indeed. The last thing I needed to do was spend another half-day sitting inside a police station, explaining my lack of adequate respect for others and my willingness to settle verbal disputes through physical altercation. But I recognized I also needed to take stock of my actions, even if that meant trying to prevent future events from devolving into brawls and gun battles.

  I recalled a former LAPD colleague who was in an officer-involved shooting once, the unfortunate timing being that it happened a few days prior to his wedding. On the night before he got married, he woke up at 3:00 am to see a strange, dark figure looming over his bed. He grabbed his service revolver and ordered the person to put their hands in the air. When they didn't move, he fired twice at their midsection, turned on the lights and discovered he had just blown two holes directly into his tuxedo. Sometimes we don't realize just how jangled our nerves can be.

  I nodded appreciatively at Roberto. "Thanks," I said. "I owe you."

  "I owe you, too," smiled Roberto. "For closing this case. But I'm looking forward to seeing the Dodgers as well. Up close."

  "Done," I said, returning the smile. Box seats were a small price to pay.

  I answered some more questions from the detectives, and after some wrangling and Roberto's intervention, I was allowed to leave and also allowed to keep my backup .38. Good thing, because it looked like they were going to keep my other pistol in the evidence locker for a while, until some department bureaucrat formally closed the Mike Black case. I made a mental note to go buy myself a new gun. Maybe this time I'd upgrade to a .357 Magnum. I liked the way it felt in my hand.

  It had been a long day and a long week. But there was something else I needed to finish. And since I was already next door to Beverly Hills, I decided to swing by and pay Anna Faust a visit. Maybe I could wrap up one other thing today, too.

  Anna lived in the area some people joke of as the poor section of Beverly Hills. This was south of Wilshire Boulevard, an older neighborhood filled with relatively nice homes and apartment buildings. Anna lived on Linden Drive, between Wilshire and Olympic. It was close enough to the Century Plaza Towers that I could have practically walked there.

  The yard in front of the adobe-style house was nicely landscaped, with a clump of vivid red bougainvillea hanging from a white latticed fence surrounding the property. This served to shield the house from being viewed from the street, in addition to adding some charm and grace. I opened a wrought-iron gate and walked up a small flagstone path to the front door and rang the bell. A minute later, Anna opened the door.

  "Mr. Burnside. This is a surprise."

  "I hope I'm not disturbing you. And I apologize for not calling first. Occupational hazard."

  She frowned, but invited me in. Her home was tastefully decorated, and the furniture looked fairly new. In my neighborhood in Mar Vista, a home like this would be worth a fraction of the price it could fetch in Beverly Hills. Location was everything in real estate.

  "Is anyone else home?" I asked.

  Anna Faust frowned again. I smiled and told her not to be alarmed. I just needed to ask her some questions.

  "What is this about?" she asked.

  "Laputa," I said. "It's
really about Jack Beale. I think you probably know why I'm here."

  She took in a long, deep breath and then let it out slowly. She sighed in a way that signaled she was someone who was carefully protecting a long-held secret. We sat down on a sofa.

  "What do you know about it?" she asked softly.

  "I know you went to the police about Jack. And I know you were laid off from Laputa shortly afterward," I said and eyed her carefully. "And I know Jack Beale is still alive."

  "Interesting," she said carefully, trying to keep her cool, but her lower lip began to quiver. Everyone has a tell. "So where is he then?"

  "He moved Down Under. Melbourne, Australia. A small town in the suburbs there called Mount Eliza. Supposed to be a very nice place. Very temperate, a bit like California. Doesn't snow there."

  "Yes," she said, and a tear started forming in the corner of one eye. "How did you find out?"

  "I learned about Wanda, Jack's girlfriend on the side. Came across one of Wanda's colleagues at a Starbucks down the street from Laputa. Never got Wanda's last name, but you know, Linked In is a very good way to find people. Not too many Wandas were former Laputa employees now living in Melbourne. I matched the photo she used on her profile page with some images on Google. And I found one with her and Jack Beale."

  Anna's mouth opened. "You recognized him?"

  "He had grown a beard, but it was him, all right. They were at a football match. Or whatever it is the Australians call football, they seem to have made up their own rules. I searched some more, and it turns out that Jack Beale is now calling himself Rich Caan. I thought that was a nice touch."

  "My goodness," she said. "You've pieced it all together."

  "Most of it anyway. You could help fill in the details."

  "And then you'll tell the police?" she asked, eyes wide, a tear streaming down her cheek.

  I looked at her. "I'm not a lawyer, but I'm not seeing how any big crime's being committed here, by you or anyone else. As far as Beale's concerned, there's no law against moving to another country and changing your name. No law against leaving your wife either, although he might have engineered that a bit more tastefully. I imagine he had his reasons. Maybe he's happier now. Near as I can tell, Jack Beale didn't do anything illegal."

  "I don't think so, either," she whispered.

  "I haven't dug further on him, and I'm not sure I need to. I might not, if you can satisfy my curiosity on a few matters. And I honestly don't think you've done anything illegal. I don't think you filed a false police report. Or withheld evidence in a police investigation, because there was no real investigation. It was deemed an accident. But I would like you to answer some questions. I'm not here to hurt you. I just need to know. I've had a long, long week and it's almost over. I'd like to get some closure on this."

  "All right," she said quietly.

  "So you went to the City Attorney with what you saw on the boat that day. Why didn't you go to the police?"

  Anna shrugged. "The police acted so busy. And they were making jokes about it, a rich guy falling into the ocean."

  I nodded. "Coping mechanism. It's hard for outsiders to get."

  "I suppose. So I knew Steve Reinhart from college. We went to UCLA together a long time ago. Oh, he wasn't the City Attorney when all this all happened but he was high up there. I just let him know what I saw. That I witnessed a man swimming away from the boat that day. I honestly didn't see who it was. We were all really loaded."

  "What happened next?"

  "Well, a few days later, Eric called me in to his office to ask what happened on the boat. I told him what I saw. I thought it might have been Jack in the water."

  "And then you got laid off," I said.

  "Well, the company called it a layoff. You might call it something else. But I signed a severance agreement, for a package that paid me enough money to buy this house and start a business doing what I wanted to do. As you might imagine, most Human Resource Directors can't afford to buy in Beverly Hills."

  "So Eric Starr paid you for your silence. You struck a bargain with him."

  "Essentially, yes," Anna admitted. "I was planning to leave Laputa anyway. I was sick of the place. The atmosphere was toxic. As an HR person, I was swimming in it. People were marching into my office every day complaining about harassment, poor management, nobody doing any work, and everything else under the sun. It was a miserable place to be, a living hell at times, and I didn't have a future there. I'm not sure anyone there does."

  "Did you know Wanda?"

  "Sure. And I knew about Wanda and Jack."

  "So why didn't Jack just divorce Darcy and get on with his life, the way most people do?"

  "Jack hated Darcy. H-a-t-e-d her. Bad marriage, never should have happened. But if he divorced, she'd get half his stake in Laputa. California law. I guess when they got married there was no pre-nup. So Jack and Eric made a deal. You need seven years before a missing person can be declared legally dead. And so Darcy is in limbo. She gets to live in a nice house and has some money. But she doesn't get Jack's equity position in the company."

  "It worked out well for you," I said.

  She sighed. "It did, although it wasn't quite how I planned it. I really did see someone swimming away. There was another boat nearby. I couldn't be sure it was Jack at the time, but in hindsight, of course it was. This was his way out. Eric paid him a lot of money to go away, and then Eric proceeded to plan his own exit from the company. By the time seven years pass, Eric will have looted the company and there won't be much left of Laputa. He'll be gone, and he can blame the failure on the executives who took over after he left."

  "So what became of the City Attorney's investigation?"

  "Mr. Burnside, I have a feeling you know how the world really works. Take a look at who Steve Reinhart's campaign contributors were in the last election. Eric bankrolled him. Donated millions, helped raise millions more. Nothing illegal about that on the surface. Businessmen always donate to politicians."

  "And," I said, looking around her house, "it looks like someone else got a sizable donation, too."

  Anna nodded in agreement. "When Eric called me into his office, he told me how it would work. There would be a layoff of a few dozen employees around the company in the coming weeks. I'd be one of them, the only difference being that my severance package would be radically different. The requirement would be that I never go public with anything negative or detrimental to Laputa or any Laputa executives, past, present or future. If I did, I'd have to return the money."

  I sat back. "So it all works out. Jack Beale gets to start a new life, Eric Starr gets control of the company while he strips away all of the assets, the employees have a fun environment because no one cares anymore, and you get to live your dream. Everyone's happy. Except for Darcy and the few people who actually care about their jobs. And I suppose anyone who owns stock in Laputa."

  "Yes, that was the plan. You know, for Jack it was like that story of climbing the mountain, knowing there was this single, perfect rose at the top. But by the time Jack had gotten there and plucked it, he had lost his sense of smell. He couldn't appreciate it. He just had to get out, make a course correction. There are indeed some things money can't buy. It was a good plan. No one was supposed to know about all this. Then you came along."

  I shrugged. "This is what I do. I was hired to find out about Eric, then piece it all together. BMB has a right to know what it's getting if it hires Eric."

  "You did a good job," she said.

  "And I probably messed up my son's chances of getting him into an elite preschool. I guess I've ruptured his bright future. The Ivy League might now be a pipe dream," I said, wondering how obvious my sarcasm was.

  "No, nothing changes," she insisted. "The slot is open to you if you want it. There's no reason for me to recommend anything different to Applewood. It's in everyone's best interests to keep you happy."

  I thought about this. "I want to be happy, certainly," I replied. "I'm just not sure th
is is the right path. And I'd like to be able to smell the roses too, at some point."

  *

  A few days had passed and the weather had gotten a little cooler. With the BMB and Laputa investigations over, I gave myself a couple of days off as a reward for my efforts, not to mention dealing with adverse work conditions. So I treated myself to something I always liked to do. Being the President of my company afforded me that luxury. If I kept doing a good job, maybe I'd promote myself to CEO soon.

  The USC football team was suited up in its practice gear, the offense wearing white jerseys, the defense wearing cardinal, and the quarterbacks wearing gold, to signify they were untouchable. There were a few dozen visitors in attendance; practices these days were largely closed to outsiders. Years ago, these practices had become a scene, with hundreds of fans and even some celebrities milling about on the sidelines. With that came the plethora of agents and their runners, business people whose goal was to ingratiate themselves with the players. That, of course, led to improprieties, sanctions, and a future of practices closed to all but University donors, the media, and select members of the Trojan family. Once in a while an agent slipped in. It didn't take me long to recognize one of them across the field. Cliff Roper was having an animated conversation on his cell phone. I put off going to say hello. I knew he'd find me soon enough.

  I watched the team go through various scrimmages and workouts. The offense frequently lined up in a three wide receiver formation, one that typically meant a pass play was coming. I looked around at the secondary, those cornerbacks and safeties I had coached the past three years. There were a couple of new jersey numbers, but I recognized most of the kids. I had spent a lot of time with them. And I especially kept my eyes on number thirty, the aspiring filmmaker.