The Upstaged Coroner
Page 31
Halfway there, she realized there’d be no Piper. When Fenway had told her goodbye the night before, she wasn’t coming back.
Fenway returned to her desk, a wave of nausea coming over her, and sat down. She stared at her computer screen for a moment, then brought up her email.
Dozens and dozens of messages from Piper. Scans of documents, photographs, financial records. Detailed analyses of what everything meant—not formatted well, and with a bunch of typos, but apparently thorough and certainly voluminous.
The emails were on many different subjects—Dr. Jacob Tassajera, the financial records of the North American Shakespeare Guild, a file on each of the students. Piper had found the work history and education of Jessica Marquez, too—not an empty folder like Nidever’s hr department had.
But nothing on Nathaniel Ferris, and Fenway knew that Piper had done some digging. Maybe she had taken that work home with her.
Her phone buzzed. It was a text from Rachel.
Forgot to tell you, your gray hairbrush was on top of your desk when I walked in
I didn’t want anyone to take it so I put it in the top left drawer
Gray hairbrush? Fenway didn’t own a gray hairbrush.
Fenway opened the drawer, and sure enough, a gray hairbrush with a silver band and a mottled handle sat on top of the cables and cords. She took it out. Except for the color, it looked exactly like the hairbrush safe she had seen in The Guild office. She twisted the top, and it came off.
A usb drive skittered out onto the desk.
She put it in the computer and gasped. Dozens of financial records from Peter Grayheath were listed, and several banking records from her father as well—banking records she suspected were faked. But the trail of her father’s wrongdoing was impressive.
Fenway paused. It had to be from Piper. She didn’t know how Piper got the hairbrush there so fast, but it had to be her.
Fenway pulled her phone out of her purse. She dialed her father’s cell phone, but after several rings it went to voicemail.
She debated with herself for a moment, then dialed Charlotte’s cell phone.
After three rings, Charlotte answered. She sounded out of breath. “Hi, Fenway. I didn’t expect to hear from you.”
“I’m in the office, so I can’t talk long,” Fenway said in a low voice, “but you need to hire someone to do research for my father’s case.”
She heard Charlotte breathe out, then a man’s voice, mumbling and low—sounding an awful lot like her father—and then it occurred to her exactly why her father hadn’t picked up. She closed her eyes and felt a little nauseated.
“Sorry, sorry, Fenway. Can you say that again?”
Fenway swallowed hard, the bad taste in her mouth abating. “You need to hire a researcher for my father’s case.”
“I’m sure that Imani—”
“No,” Fenway said, “a researcher who knows financial systems well. Someone who can trace those transactions that the prosecution is saying my father made.”
“Oh—I take it you have someone in mind.”
“That’s right. She just got fired by the county.”
“She—she what? That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement of—”
“It’s because she was getting too close to the people who are trying to take my father down.” Fenway didn’t mention the trespassing incident—let Charlotte figure that out for herself.
Charlotte was silent for a moment.
“Well?” Fenway asked. “Do you want to know who it is?”
“You think this person could help prove your dad is innocent?”
“I do.”
Charlotte let out a long exhale. “I—I guess I’d better do it.”
“You’ll need to buy equipment. A top-of-the-line laptop. Access to some international financial databases. It won’t be cheap.”
“But you’re saying it’s necessary.”
“I am.”
“And she’s good?”
“The best.”
“Then I’ll do it.”
Fenway paused, thinking about Piper’s savings account going up in smoke while she searched for a job during the holidays. “And she’s not cheap, either.”
“If she’s the best, I assume it’ll cost us.”
Fenway closed her eyes. It wasn’t the most aboveboard thing to do—she knew there was a gray area here, and Piper would need to walk a fine line.
But this was her father’s best chance.
Acknowledgments
Many thanks to Max Christian Hansen and Ki Brosius, who edited the living daylights out of this book. Thank you to all the other early readers who spent their valuable time catching errors and getting my book to be the best it could be. I’d also like to thank Cheryl Shoults and A.L. Book Promotions for helping this book (and others I’ve written) rise as high on the booksellers’ charts as they have.
To all my former compatriots from the 1993 American Shakespeare Company production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream: I hope you enjoyed this, and I hope you agree that Professor Homer Swander would be delighted and (mostly) flattered by his doppelgänger. And no, none of you are in this book, despite your names showing up as characters and places.
Finally, to my wife, my kids, and my mom: I’m deeply grateful. I couldn’t have written these books without your encouragement and support.
Want More Fenway?
The Fenway Stevenson Mysteries
Book One: The Reluctant Coroner
Book Two: The Incumbent Coroner
Book Three: The Candidate Coroner
Book Four: The Upstaged Coroner
Book Five: The Courtroom Coroner (coming soon)
Collection
Books 1–3 of The Fenway Stevenson Mysteries
Dez Roubideaux
Bad Weather
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