Drawing Blood

by Deirdre Verne

  I looked at Frank. “Any chance there’s a body in there?”

  Before Frank considered the possibility, Charlie reached for the doorknob. “And behind curtain one …” The door opened with a rusty creak.

  The room was stacked, floor to ceiling with old computers. A coiled cord sprung out aimlessly from the top of the pile. Apparently whoever emptied the warehouse had forgotten about the office.

  Charlie turned to Frank. “Can we get this emptied?” He motioned to the open floor of the warehouse. “If we could place the items in rows by equipment type and model, I’ll go through it.”

  “What do you think you’ll find?” I asked.

  Charlie frowned. “Don’t know.”

  “I’m game,” Frank said as he texted instructions to Cheski and Lamendola.

  Harry Goldberg strolled back into his warehouse as we were leaving. He did a bit of a jig before he announced that David’s warehouse was also empty. How convenient, I thought.

  “Case closed,” Harry said, wiping his hands of the e-waste mess.

  “Not just yet, Mr. Goldberg,” Frank said. “We’ve got another issue that might be related to this missing equipment. Until I’ve ruled out a connection between your warehouse and another case I’m working on, you’re not going to be able to rent the warehouse.” He then proceeded to rattle off a to-do list that would prevent HG from re-renting its warehouse for the next thirty to sixty days. The list included access to the unit to study the remaining computers, interviews with HG employees, and a report on account activity for United Eco-Systems.

  Harry Goldberg quickly lost the spring in his step as Frank’s directions sunk in. “I’m not comfortable with this,” he said.

  Frank ignored Harry’s comment and continued, “Do your employees wear clip tags?”

  “No.”

  Frank’s smile dropped, and he added, “I’ll need a copy of your security footage. Last forty-eight hours.”

  “We don’t have cameras,” Harry said.

  Charlie pointed to a mounted camera on a pole facing the warehouse.

  “Like I said, we’re not one of the big guys. No name tags, no uniforms and, as for the cameras, I can’t afford to turn them on.”

  Not without cutting into your margin, I wanted to add.

  So much for HG Space Savers’s glossy brochures promising twenty-four-hour security. No surprise that psychedelic rave parties went on undetected. I wondered what other shenanigans took place at the isolated storage facility. As I pondered the possibilities, I saw a pregnant woman running toward us, arms flailing.

  Is that the universal sign for labor?

  “Trina?” I yelled running toward her. “Stop running, we’ll get you to the hospital.”

  Frank threw the keys to Charlie. “Get the car.” Charlie took off. Frank made it to Katrina steps ahead of me.

  “I’m not in labor.” She bent over but was unable to stretch her palms to her knees. She leaned back, instead using her hands as support on her hips. Harry found a folding chair and dragged it out from the warehouse.

  “Phew,” she exhaled and took a seat. “Wow. I didn’t know I could still run.”

  Katrina’s hair was matted, and her cheeks were bright red. Her stomach was undulating in waves as if a baby’s foot might break through her belly button at any second.

  “Why were you running?”

  “I took a catnap,” Katrina wheezed. “When I woke up, I saw someone forcing the door on the main office, but I think I scared them off.”

  “David,” Harry spat. We all looked at Harry. Why did he think his cousin would break into his office?

  “A woman,” Katrina corrected. “I saw the back of a woman.”

  My eyes were still on Harry. He turned his shoulder to me.

  “Were her pants tight?” I asked.

  Katrina was flummoxed. “Who are you? Charlie?” she asked.

  I was about to explain the significance of tight pants when I saw Frank’s jaw start to move. He took a few steps forward and raised his finger at Harry Goldberg. “I want information on those tuba people you talked about.”

  “Excuse me?” Harry snapped, as his true personality surfaced. “Do I work for you?” he asked Frank. “You’ve been demanding things from me, but you haven’t even explained how my empty warehouse is part of your problem. Why do I have to do anything for you?”

  That was mighty defensive, I thought.

  “You’re correct. You don’t work for me,” Frank said. He took a giant step into Harry’s personal space, pushing his finger into the storage king’s chest. “As a public servant I work for you, and if you want me to figure out who attempted to break into your office, you’ll get me what I need to ensure another crime does not take place on these premises.”

  Harry hesitated. You didn’t need to be a shrewd business person to see where Frank was going, but just in case Harry overlooked the obvious, Frank elaborated.

  “Let me put it another way,” Frank said, moving an uncomfortable half inch forward. “HG Space Savers’s liability will increase if it ignores crimes that impact the safety of its tenants and their belongings. You’ve already got a toxic complaint. I don’t think your insurance company would like to see additional infractions. And since you’ve asked, there’s been a death at the recycling center that might be connected to the e-waste in your warehouse. I’d say it’s going to be hard to drum up new tenants while a murder investigation remains open.” Frank pointed to the empty warehouse. “I’m assuming you want to rent this eventually?”

  Harry scraped his polished wing-tipped shoe along the cement a few times while he evaluated Frank’s assessment. “Who died?” he asked.

  Frank raised his eyebrows in my direction. He wanted me to look closely at Goldberg’s face when he revealed Bob’s name.

  “Do you know Bob Rooney?” Frank asked Goldberg. The second before Frank mentioned Bob’s name, Harry Goldberg shoved his hands in his pockets and closed his eyes. It was an extraordinarily sly move on Harry’s part. In the time it took Frank to say Bob’s name, Goldberg had a chance to take a deep breath before opening his eyes. His face, as a result, appeared completely relaxed when he answered, “No. Do you want just the tuba player’s name?”

  “I’ll need a list of your day trippers with contact information by tonight.”

  Harry Goldberg’s shoulders rolled forward in defeat. “Fine,” he said as he headed back to his office. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  It was a small victory for Frank. With no cameras, you need eyes, just like Katrina’s. If one of the day trippers was playing tuba or shooting pool or taking a dunk in a storage unit hot tub, they might have seen something. Something like ten trucks unloading a warehouse of toxic computer equipment or a woman in tight pants.

  I waited until Harry was out of earshot.

  “That was weird, the way he closed his eyes,” I said. “He also didn’t seem to care that someone tried to break in to his office.”

  “I think he hoped Frank would let it all go,” Katrina added. “He’s just happy his warehouse is empty.”

  Frank strolled around Katrina’s chair, one hand shoved deep in a pocket and the other clutching his iPad.

  “Maybe,” he finally said as he came to a stop.

  twelve

  sunday, april 20

  “Seems like old times,” Cheski reminisced. He cleared the work table to make space for Katrina’s homemade chips and dip. “It doesn’t even seem that bad coming in on a Sunday.”

  Lamendola grabbed a handful of chips.

  “No double-dipping this time around,” Cheski ordered his partner. Then he wheeled in a filing cabinet. “Same place as before, CeCe?”

  “Sure, by the window.” I pointed. “But don’t block the view. We need to see the water.” I pulled back a set of threadbare curtains circa Betsy Ross.

&nb
sp; Frank and I had emptied one of the extra bedrooms in Harbor House earlier in the day. It was the same room we had used for Teddy’s investigation. The last time the police had descended upon Harbor House, the arrangement had made sense; my life had been threatened by Teddy’s killer, and the police had been on-site for my protection. This was different.

  “This is completely unorthodox,” I’d said, fingering the ancient curtains. Frank nodded his agreement. “Then why are we doing it?”

  “It feels right,” he’d said, and shrugged. “Plus, I think I’m going to need regular access to both you and Charlie. It seemed to work out for us the last time.”

  I was skeptical. Charlie was a computer whiz, but my contributions at this point in Bob’s case were some rough drawings of a doughy man and a pair of calves. Helpful, but not crucial.

  Frank crawled under a computer desk and fiddled with loose cords. “Maybe we could talk about Dr. Grovit’s next steps when we’re done here,” he called from the floor.

  Well, I certainly didn’t expect that comment from Frank. I stared at his feet wondering if the rest of him would make an appearance so I could evaluate his expression. May we talk about Dr. Grovit’s next steps? Do you even need to ask? I took a quick inventory of the newly converted room. Hmm. Was it possible Frank’s secondary office had nothing to do with Bob’s case? A seed of an idea was planted. Was Bob’s case just a cover to be closer to me?

  Frank came out from the under the desk. “Will you have time later?”

  “Of course,” I said. I worked hard to soften my face to hide my surprise. It was a ridiculous question—I had nothing but time. I didn’t have a regular job, and my only responsibility was self-sustainment. My mind, in response to Frank’s questions, spit out sarcastic zingers, but I held back.

  I wondered if Frank was practicing his own form of transference. If he treated the whereabouts of my potential child like a real case, he could work on it like a cop and remove himself emotionally. I realized he had been doing this since we originally learned about my missing genetic material. He always referred to the whereabouts of my eggs as “your child” as opposed to “my niece or nephew.” In reality, I suspected the theft of my eggs and Teddy’s sperm was highly emotional for him. It might explain why he had moved his office to Harbor House. He needed me for support, because if he discovered I had a child and that child was the product of my eggs and Teddy’s sperm, then he’d be meeting his niece or nephew. Since Frank was adopted and learned about Teddy only after his death, he’d never had blood family around him. If it were me, I’d want to be holding someone’s hand when I made the discovery.

  Fine, I thought. Let’s do it your way. We’ll pretend you’re here for Bob. In the end, Bob’s case will probably benefit. I wanted to kiss Frank, but then he’d know that I knew his true motivation for setting up a secondary office in Harbor House. I turned my head back to the window and allowed myself a gotcha smirk.

  thirteen

  “Frank, should I start?” Cheski asked. Charlie, Frank, Lamendola, and I were seated at the conference table. Bits of tortilla chip dust covered our workspace. The guacamole bowl looked like someone had licked it clean.

  I handed Cheski a cloth napkin. The general public thinks nothing of overusing paper goods, as if rolls of toilet paper were dropping out of the sky by the truckload. I blame the warehouse-style box stores for selling paper goods at cut-rate prices and advertisers for training people to use a full sheet to mop up a teaspoon of water. Cloth—a rewashable, reusable alternative—is the way to go if you have a conscience with more depth than a single-ply square of bathroom tissue. Cloth napkins make the food taste better too.

  “I love eating here,” Cheski admitted. “I’m getting really good at ignoring the source of your food. Whatever Katrina does in that kitchen works for me.” Frank’s face pinched up. “You’ll get there,” Cheski encouraged him, as he wiped a blob of green goo off his lip. He looked at the monogrammed S on the napkin, meaningless since none of our family names started with an S.

  I shrugged at Cheski. Who knows where I picked up half of the stuff we reused?

  “Let’s start with badges,” Frank said, ignoring Cheski’s food fest. “You’ve made a list of large companies in the area?”

  Cheski nodded to Lamendola, who ran through a group of local name-tag toting organizations. He paused awkwardly and looked at me. “The labs are on the list. After your brother’s death, they started to require electronic badges.”

  “I guess that was the right thing to do,” I said, wondering if a simple name tag could have prevented Teddy’s death. “Go on.”

  “There’s a midsized software company about ten miles east of here. They employ seventy-five people and produce software that manages employee efficiency.”

  “Totally Big Brother,” Charlie said, shaking his head. “I know a few guys that work there. The software monitors the activity on your work computer and spits out efficiency scores to weed out the slackers.”

  “Oh god, we’d last a day,” I laughed.

  Lamendola smiled and then continued. “The local hospital requires badges. The county court house in Riverhead requires badges.”

  “Nothing I didn’t expect,” Frank said. “Keep going.”

  “All the banks in the area,” Lamendola continued. “Even those with just an ATM and small back office require badges. And we’ve got one insurance claims center, a satellite office with headquarters in Albany.”

  “Ha, a satellite office,” Charlie said, stabbing his finger in the air. “You know those guys are racking up hours a day on Facebook.”

  “What about the software company?” I asked. “If they can monitor efficiency, then they must know what employees are doing when they’re not doing the job. You know, like plotting a murder?”

  “Charlie,” Frank said, “can you feel out your contacts there, see who their clients are?”

  “Sure thing.”

  “CeCe, did you get anything out of Katrina?”

  “Nothing, really. She got a quick glimpse of the woman’s back and then a brief profile view as she took off.”

  “Hair color?”

  “Scarf with some dark hair underneath.” As I said it, it sounded weird. Who wears a scarf these days? “And Jackie O sunglasses,” I added.

  Cheski laughed. “How about a fake nose and mustache?”

  “I know,” I said. “It’s like this woman picked the most obvious undercover outfit of all time.”

  “Amateur,” Frank commented. He was probably right. “Age and weight?”

  “Eighteen to fifty, 120 to 140 pounds.” I raised my palms. “Basically, everyone who’s not a male.”

  The group fell quiet as we mulled over the first batch of information.

  Charlie raised his hand. “I’m going to just say it, because I know we’re all thinking the same thing: Is it possible Bob was involved in a green-washing scam?”

  And just like that the flood gates opened. If fact, dozens of variations on the same theme spilled forth, none favorable.

  Lamendola took a shot at it. “What if Bob had skimmed tech equipment off the recycling centers’ haul and sold it directly to a trash trader?”

  “Maybe the equipment in the warehouse was his,” Cheski added. “Maybe Bob tried to cut out the middleman and got stuck when the market fell.”

  “Could be,” Charlie said as he rubbed his face. “We should check the volume of tech waste processed through the recycling center. I wonder if we’d see big swings in the past couple of years.”

  “I’m on it,” Lamendola said, eagerly turning to his partner, Cheski. “Let’s hit up the recycling center today and chat with Jimmy.”

  The color in Cheski’s beefy face rose as the possibilities swirled. “Then we’ll swing by the storage place and find out if the Goldberg cousin knew Bob,” he added.

  Charlie leaned back
and ran his fingers through his healthy head of blond curls. “Shit. What if they all knew each other? I got a bad vibe from Goldberg. That dude had something to hide.”

  With my sketchpad open, I listened to the crucifixion of my friend Bob by well-intentioned but seriously misguided assumptions. As the accusations escalated, my drawing pace picked up. Finally, I slid

  my sketchpad into the middle of the table. In the few minutes it took my crime-stopping team members to lambast Bob, I had sketched every roll on Bob’s chins in exquisite detail. I captured his grin, his kindness, and his mirth.

  “This is an honest face,” I said, tapping my pencil on the page.

  Frank’s head was in his iPad.

  “Frank?” I implored. “Say something nice about Bob.”

  He looked up. His face was pale. “The EMT found faint needle marks on Bob’s arm.”

  Dead air wafted through the room.

  “Maybe something in the garbage punctured his arm?” I winced.

  “A syringe, maybe,” Frank mumbled, “but not likely from the garbage.”

  Cheski and Lamendola darted their eyes in every direction but mine. Charlie excused himself and left the room. The mention of drugs always sent Charlie running for an alibi. I can’t do this, I thought. I can’t keep defending my world alone. I’d chosen an alternative path, and I was drawn to others who lived outside the lines, like Bob. By definition, you can’t cross lines without ignoring a few rules. Now, some people might refer to rules as laws, but I liked to think of them as hurdles. Whatever Bob’s actions, I certainly wouldn’t let Bob’s memory be disgraced.

  “So?” I snorted.

  “We’re cops,” Frank said as he nodded to Cheski and Lamendola. “Evidence of track marks is important to us. If Bob had a drug problem, it will change the nature of this investigation.”

  “Sure, now it’s an investigation,” I shot back lamely. What had I just said? I wasn’t even making sense. I had drowned in my inability to defend Bob. Of course, this was an investigation. I knew that, but I was angry and embarrassed. I had no idea whether or not Bob had a drug problem. I considered Bob’s dioramas for a second—intense, emotional, deep. An artistic lay person might add bizarre, psychedelic, scary, drug-induced.