Hounded

by David Rosenfelt

  “Never mind,” he says, “I got it.”

  “So I should get up?”

  “Okay.”

  I work my way back to a standing position, not the easiest thing to do. Then, “Hey, next time I take Tara and Sebastian to the park, you want to come? There’s a whole bunch of people with dogs there.”

  He lights up. “Yeah!”

  “Great … that’s a plan. We’ll have fun.”

  If you’re a big shot in need of a root canal, you call Dr. Robbie Hambler.

  His office is on Central Park South in Manhattan, and if you think that your “canals” are worth three times as much as anyone else’s, but you want to get rid of the root, then Robbie’s your guy. At least that is what Pete told me, and there is nothing about the office, or its location, to make me think otherwise.

  I’m afraid of a lot of stuff—snakes, bugs, mice, guns, Laurie, Marcus, you name it—but for some reason I’ve never been afraid of dentists. Unless, of course, I’m in the chair, and they have a drill in their hand.

  But Robbie is waiting for me in his private office, with no drills or needles in sight. Pete had called and told him what I wanted to talk about, so I didn’t need to do much in the way of a preamble.

  “Why do you think your father was murdered?”

  “He was the picture of health. He ran marathons, never sick a day in his life, and had a complete physical six weeks before he died. They found nothing wrong.”

  “Heart attacks happen, very often without warning.”

  He nods, but frowning as if he is talking to a dope. “Of course they do. They can be unpredictable.”

  “Right.”

  “But he predicted this one,” he says.

  “Tell me about that.”

  “My father owned gas stations; he bought one about twenty years ago, and slowly was able to expand by buying more. About seven years ago, it became advantageous to merge with his chief competitor, a man named Lawrence Winters. Their businesses were of equal size, and so they were equal partners.”

  “How big a business are we talking about?”

  “Last year they did a billion one in sales.”

  “That’s a lot of gas.”

  “Yes it is. During the past year, or at least a year ago is when my father first mentioned it to me, he came to believe that there were serious problems with Winters. He was acting erratically, possibly drugs, possibly not. But he was uncharacteristically detached from work, often not showing up for meetings without explanation. He also often talked about people he knew, friends he had, making them sound like they were dangerous people.” He continues, “But that was only part of it; my father came to believe that he was stealing from their company.”

  “Did your father confront him?”

  He nods. “He did, and Winters denied it. So my father offered to buy him out. This was just three months ago.”

  “But Winters refused?”

  “Yes, and he professed to be outraged. They had a huge fight about it, and my father told him that he would be bringing in outside auditors to check the company books. Soon after that, he and I had a conversation that I will never forget. He told me that Winters might be capable of dangerous things, and that he was going to look into hiring private security. But that if anything should happen to him, it was Winters who would be behind it.”

  “Did he hire the security?”

  “He never got the chance.”

  “So what happens to the company now?”

  “There is an automatic buyout triggered, partially funded by life insurance that the partners held. The rest comes from the company; my mother will be a very rich woman. But of course she was already a very rich woman.”

  “You’re a smart guy,” I say, “so I’m sure you see the problem here.”

  He nods. “I do. No matter what threats might have been made, the death appears to be of natural causes.”

  “Right.”

  “I understand all that, but I don’t buy it. The coincidence is too great, and there has never been a heart attack in my family. My father’s parents lived into their nineties. When someone tells you that they are afraid they are going to be killed, and then they die days later, it is not something you can just let go. At least I can’t.”

  At this point I understand where he is coming from, but I don’t think he is correct. Of course, Pete claims to have more information, which I will certainly consider. But I’m not about to tell Robbie about other possibly related deaths, at least not at this point.

  “In your situation, I would feel the same way,” I say.

  “So now let me ask you a question,” he says. “Pete’s in jail for a murder that there is no way he committed. And you’re defending him.”

  “What’s your question?”

  “What the hell does that have to do with my father?”

  They should have killed the cop.

  He knew he wasn’t second guessing, not Monday-morning quarterbacking. Alex Parker told his people back then; he told them they should kill the cop.

  They were worried that his sudden death would get fellow cops to pick up his investigation, and might see his unexpected demise as part of a pattern. But they weren’t giving Alex enough credit for his abilities; he would have done it in a way that no one would have realized what had taken place.

  There was no doubt they had to get rid of the cop. He was getting too close, even if he didn’t realize it. But he needed to be dead, and instead they had gotten cute. They used Diaz, who knew too much anyway, and his wife, who fell into their laps. The plan was complicated, but Alex had executed it perfectly, as he was paid to do.

  Nevertheless, they seemed to be back at square one. The lawyer, Carpenter, was obviously picking up on the investigation, and he had the cop to provide a road map. So in that sense they brought on the worst of both worlds.

  Not that it couldn’t be managed. It would take Carpenter a very long time to get close to them, much longer than the trial would take. After that he would probably drop it, but even if he didn’t, it was unlikely he could ever prove anything.

  And if need be, Carpenter would have to die.

  He would tell his people that, and this time he would be believed. So he’d kill the lawyer, and they’d move on. And it wouldn’t be by slipping him a pill. Parker was tired of that; he wanted to go back to his roots, kill the way he had always killed.

  And killing was his specialty.

  It’s a perfect day for the park.

  Which is probably why the entire city of Paterson seems to be here. But Eastside Park is a pretty big place, and for every person, there’s a hell of a lot of open grass.

  This is Tara’s favorite place on Earth, and she seems to take pleasure in showing Sebastian her favorite sniffing spots. We’ve been here way more times than I can count, and she has never once done anything but wag her tail and smile happily.

  If Tara were to die, Eastside Park is where I would spread her ashes. But since she is going to live forever, there will never be ashes to spread. Enough said about that.

  If Ricky had a tail, he’d be wagging it as well. The park has tennis courts, and baseball fields, and a small zoo, and a few playground rides for kids. It’s nothing special as parks go, but Ricky reacts as if it were Disneyland.

  I have a brief moment where I think it would be nice to take him to the actual Disneyland, but it passes quickly. From what I’ve seen of it, people smile way too much there; it would get on my nerves.

  We head down to the lower level, where I show him Dead Man’s Curve, a steep winding hill that we used to go down on our bikes in the summer and sleds in the winter. Then we meet up with a group of people, mostly women, who come with their dogs almost every day.

  I introduce Ricky and Sebastian, and everyone spends a few moments greeting Ricky warmly and petting Sebastian. When it’s finally time to leave, Ricky says, “Do we have to go?”

  I nod. “Sorry, but I have to do some work. But we can come back, if you want.” />
  “I want to,” he says.

  It’s on the way home that he drops the bomb. It comes from nowhere, in the middle of a conversation about dogs.

  “My dad is dead,” he says. It’s not a question, but rather a statement of fact.

  I don’t know what to say; my instinct is to be vague and noncommittal, but Laurie’s therapist friend said that honesty is absolutely crucial.

  I take a deep breath. “Yes, Ricky, he is. I’m very sorry about that.”

  “So he’s not coming back?”

  “No, I’m afraid not.”

  “That’s not fair.” He says it calmly, as if he is simply stating a fact, which I guess he is.

  “No, it’s not fair. It’s not fair at all.”

  We walk a little more, and then he asks, “Do you have a father?”

  “Not anymore.”

  I’m holding Tara’s leash with my right hand, and I put my left hand on Ricky’s shoulder, and we walk the rest of the way home, just like that.

  Danny Diaz made 641 calls in the last two months of his life.

  And that was just from his cell phone; he made another 247 from his home phone. He received 227 calls on the cell, and 109 at home.

  And of course, he might have made some calls from work, or even from a pay phone, if he could find any.

  The point is, we have a huge job on our hands to find something significant in this mass of information that Sam has provided. And he hasn’t even given us the GPS data yet.

  Sam has done an amazing job. He has attempted, mostly with success, to assign a name or place to the phones that Diaz called and that he received calls from. But just having those names doesn’t solve the problem. In virtually all cases we don’t recognize the names; they could be, and mostly like are, benign in nature.

  Then there are businesses that he called. Was he calling to order something, to complain about bad service, to ask a question, to apply for a job? Or was there someone at that business that would be significant to us if we knew who it was? Even Sam couldn’t tell us who Diaz actually spoke to on each of these calls.

  And to complicate matters a bit more, there are a few numbers that Sam couldn’t get names for. Were they perhaps phones purchased without a contract, to use and dispose of? Or is the fact that they did not have names attached in itself suspicious, and might therefore make them priorities for us?

  Last but not least, maybe there’s no one that Danny talked to on the phone that we have any reason to give a damn about.

  But all these numbers have to be regarded as leads of some significance, and require our checking them out. Our group is already strained. This kind of investigating is not Marcus or Willie’s forte, and Sam is tied up working on the GPS data, which is crucial.

  Hike has been working on the more traditional aspects of Pete’s defense, our trying to rebut the prosecution’s case without pointing to any other suspects. That leaves Laurie and me, and we already have a lot on our plate.

  “What about Pete?” Laurie asks.

  “What about him?”

  “He can run down this stuff as well as we can, probably much better. He’s a trained detective, he’s got access to a phone, and way too much time on his hands. And if there’s anybody that he thinks needs to be checked out in person, one of us can do it.”

  It makes such perfect sense that I’m not surprised I didn’t think of it. But I ask Edna to make copies of all the lists, so I can bring them to Pete and fill him in on what he has to do. My guess is he’ll be thrilled at the chance to actually do something concrete to aid in his own defense.

  The phone rings, and when I hear Laurie say, “Hello, Richard,” I experience a sense of dread. Wallace doesn’t call with good news, and the calls have been getting progressively worse. This time he’s probably alerting me to evidence that Pete has been identified as second in command of the Yemen chapter of al-Qaeda.

  “Break it to me gently,” I say, when I pick up the phone.

  “No bad news this time. Just a report on the search for Juanita Diaz.”

  “Good. What have they found out?”

  “Not a hell of a lot. There was one sighting that they considered credible in Spring Valley, someone said they saw her a couple of weeks ago, but there’s no sign of her there now.”

  “That’s it?” I ask.

  “For now. Andy, you need to understand that this isn’t a high priority for the police. She’s not considered integral to the investigation, and she’s not even really considered a missing person. There is ample evidence she left on her own free will.”

  “She’s the stepmother of a little boy who needs her.”

  “Well, she doesn’t seem to see the urgency in that,” he says, with more than a little bit of truth. “I’ll let you know if I hear any more,” he says. “But I’m not really in the loop on it. There barely is a loop to be in on.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Richard.”

  I update Laurie on the conversation with Richard, of course doing so out of earshot of Ricky. I have mixed emotions about the situation regarding Juanita. While I generally think it’s a good thing for mothers and sons to be together, even stepmothers, I’m not sure that’s true in this case. If Juanita does not want to be with Ricky, he just might be better off without her in the long run.

  But it should come as no surprise that I have a more selfish interest in the matter. There is a decent chance that Juanita is somewhat involved in what happened to her husband, particularly since they seem to have been going to see her the night of the murder. At the very least, she might have some information, or an educated guess, about who might be his killer.

  I head over to Pete’s and bring him up to date. As Laurie predicted, he is very pleased to get on the phone and trace down as many of these numbers as he can. He’s also worried that there might be a tap on his phone, but knows someone that can make sure that’s not the case, or disable it if the tap exists.

  He doubts that Juanita holds much of a key to his own situation; in his eyes it was simply a case of a bad marriage gone worse. If she and her family were planning to reconcile around the time of the murder, then that is fine, but unlikely to have anything to do with her husband’s death.

  I also tell Pete about my meeting with Robbie Hambler, and he asks what I think about it.

  “Not a high priority,” I say. “But if you really have other deaths that you think tie in, then I want to pursue it. Hambler’s death involves big money, and it took big money to set you up, so that alone makes it worth following up on.”

  “Okay. I’ll get the information out of my file and email it to you. There are a couple of deaths I was looking into that were similar, also of wealthy people. One in particular was very interesting to me. And there is a state police detective that I talked to about it.”

  “Why?”

  “He called me, because he had information that I was looking into one of the deaths.”

  “The one you said was interesting?”

  “Actually, yes. It was out of my jurisdiction, but he didn’t care about that. The deceased was a wealthy woman, and he was looking into it as well. He wanted to make sure I didn’t do anything that would compromise what he was doing. It’s common practice. I’ll send you his name and number as well, but I doubt it will come to anything.”

  Pete is far more interested in Sam’s information, and he starts looking at it while we’re talking. After a couple of minutes, he looks up at me. “Have you gone through these?”

  “No,” I say, “I just got them. We’ll need to split them up among you, Laurie, and me.”

  “Well, we might want to start with these.” He points to some numbers on one of the back pages. “These were the calls on the day that Danny died.”

  There are nine calls made either to or from three numbers on that day; all were made using Danny’s home landline. Two of the numbers are listed as being in Spring Valley, New York, one seems to be a hotel named the Oakmont Gardens, and the other is listed in the name of Carl
a Alvarez.

  The name listed on two other calls, both received by Danny, is Juanita Diaz.

  Daniel Mathis simply could not take it anymore.

  Ever since the horrifying discovery that the euthanasia pills were missing, he had not experienced a peaceful night’s sleep. He had never bought into Blackman’s rationalizations that there might be a benign reason for their disappearance, or that perhaps they would not be as deadly to humans as to animals.

  Mathis knew with certainty that the pills were stolen; the fact that the records of his work were also gone certainly proved that. And he was just as sure that they would kill anyone who ingested one.

  For a long time he pored over newspapers, checking the obituaries to see if any deaths could be connected to his work. But it proved impossible; there was simply no way to know.

  Heart attacks are the listed cause of death for more than a million Americans each year. Only seventeen pills were stolen, yet Mathis imagined that each and every death was the result of his work.

  He finally came to the conclusion that he had to go to the authorities. It no longer mattered what the repercussions would be, business and personal, though he recognized that they could be severe.

  The fact that he had delayed coming forward for months made matters far worse. How would he explain why he waited? Could he be culpable for any deaths that had happened in the interim? These were the kind of questions he had no good answer for, but they didn’t matter.

  He could no longer sit back, which meant he had no alternative but to come forward.

  But even with all that, he couldn’t make himself pull the trigger. His fear of going to jail as a result of his admission was intense. He was even afraid of going to a lawyer, since that would in his estimation start the ball rolling, and he would be unable to pull back.

  Daniel had become friendly with a coworker, a young woman named Sharon Dalton. Their relationship grew to something more, and even though she left the company, they saw more and more of each other.