Tony Marcella 05 - Witch House

by Dana Donovan

  Back out in the car, I filled Carlos in on what Frank told me about women that liked to marry prison pets. “Do you see Stiles as the submissive enabler type?”

  “No,” he said. “I see her as the bitchy bossy type.”

  “Yeah, me, too. I can’t believe she kept Landau on the line for almost eighteen years only to dump him on the day of his release.”

  “Stranger things have happened.”

  “I suppose. Come on, let’s get back and see if Spinelli has dug up anything new for us.”

  FIFTEEN

  I think that sometimes I underestimate Dominic Spinelli. The calls he makes, the channels he surfs and the rocks he turns over to collect information stops nowhere short of amazing. In the old days, I used to do the same thing. My tenacity, often confused for stubbornness, was legendary. The difference is that my way used to lead me down more dead ends and fewer throughways than I care to remember. It often took me days to learn what Spinelli now finds out in only hours. Of course, in my day we did not have E.I.N.I., that electronic interface gizmo I mentioned earlier. It is such a helpful information-gathering tool that we all occasionally take it for granted. Nonetheless, what fruitful tidbits Spinelli distills from within its circuitry continues to amaze me.

  We spent the first ten minutes upon our return to the Justice Center filling Spinelli in on our trip to Pete’s Place. We relayed to him Pete’s positive I.D. regarding DeAngelo and Chief Running Bear’s photos. Then we told him about our conversation with Frank Tarkowski. Dominic said he knew about prison pets, adding that it works both ways, and that statistically, such arrangements seldom last beyond the first year or two, and almost never beyond five. “Inevitably,” he said, “the partner on the outside either regains the confidence of a subjugated will or resigns to its calling. In any case, she dumps her prison pet for someone who will either treat her right or….”

  “Or treat her like crap again,” I said.

  “Yeah, Pretty much.”

  “Okay then, that’s all we got. What do you have?”

  “Only this.” He opened a manila envelope, removed a small stack of papers and dropped them on my desk. “These are photocopies of paid receipts for Stephanie Stiles’ rent and utility bills dating back over sixteen years.”

  “Nice, so who is our mystery benefactor, Kemper?”

  “I bet it’s Powell,” said Carlos. “He’s such a snake.”

  Dominic smiled. “You are both wrong. If there is a snake in the grass, it’s William DeAngelo.”

  “Warden Bill?”

  “Yup.”

  “I don’t get it. Is he dating her, too?”

  “It’s hard to say.” Spinelli reached into the envelope and removed a handful of black and white surveillance photos. “These are from last night and this morning. Two men and two women came to see her in that time. One man came alone, one woman came alone and the other two came as a couple. We don’t know who they are, but for sure neither of the men were DeAngelo.”

  “Interesting.” I picked up the photocopied receipts and began thumbing through them. “In our interview with him, DeAngelo told us that Stephanie Stiles had only just started visiting Landau at the prison, leading us to believe he barely knew her. Stiles, however, claimed she started seeing Landau almost since day one. Why would DeAngelo lie about knowing Stephanie Stiles, and why is he fronting her tab for a riverfront apartment?”

  Carlos said, “It’s the oldest arrangement in the book, isn’t it? She’s his mistress.”

  “No, there has to be more to it than that. Otherwise, why would he allow her to visit Landau in prison, and for conjugal visits at that?”

  “Maybe he didn’t know about the visits,” said Dominic. “I’m sure the Superintendent of Operations can’t concern himself with every single visitor that comes to the prison.”

  Carlos and I both gave him the look. “You don’t think he would know about Stephanie’s visits over seventeen years?” I asked.

  He backed down easily. “Not all of them.”

  Carlos said, “You suppose that’s what DeAngelo and Landau argued about the other night in the bar? Maybe DeAngelo found out that Stiles and Landau were engaged and so he went there to kill him.”

  “No,” I said. “He didn’t go there to kill him. Otherwise, he would not have made a scene at the table. But he could have waited out back to kill him later, after getting plenty pissed during the argument.”

  “All right, then.” Carlos clapped his hands clean. “There you have it: our first viable suspect. DeAngelo had motive and he had opportunity. What more do you need?”

  “A murder weapon would be nice.” I turned and said to Dominic, “Do you think we have enough probable to get a subpoena for DeAngelo’s gun?”

  He gestured affirmatively. “Between his statements to you, Pete placing him in the bar and these receipts…yeah, I think so.”

  “Good, then do it. What about Paul Kemper and Chief Running Bear? Can we get their guns, too?”

  “Those will be harder. You don’t have anything on Kemper, and if Chief Running Bear wants to throw a roadblock up, all he has to do is petition the Bureau of Indian Affairs, tell them you’re harassing him and they will shut you down quick.”

  “I don’t care. Try it anyway.”

  Carlos said, “Speaking of Chief Running Bear.”

  “What?”

  “Well, if DeAngelo killed Landau, what do you think the big beef was between Landau and the chief’s two thugs earlier that evening?”

  “The money,” I said. “I don’t think anyone believes it has gone up in smoke. I’m guessing that the chief wanted to lean on Landau, maybe make him give up information on its whereabouts.”

  “If he refused to tell, then that might have gotten him killed.”

  “So what are you saying, Carlos? So now Chief Running Bear killed Landau?”

  “Maybe.”

  “So, it wasn’t DeAngelo?”

  “I don’t know. It could have been.”

  “Maybe they both killed him,” I suggested, jokingly.

  Carlos seemed happy with that. “Yes! They both killed him. They both had motive.”

  “Ah, but Landau died from a single gunshot wound. So, which one pulled the trigger?”

  “Which one….” He made a face, something akin to the one he makes when he tries to calculate a fifteen percent tip on a twenty-two dollar lunch tab, which is not often, since he seldom pays for lunch. I thanked Spinelli later for offering up an argument for Chief Running Bear’s plausible deniability.

  “Insurance,” he said.

  Carlos blinked his brain clear of the complicated scenario he had devised to explain two killers but one shot. “What’s that?”

  “Insurance. You asked me to check on it. Both the casino and the armored car carrier had it. Between the two, they covered the entire loss incurred in the robbery.”

  “All right then,” I said. “That takes away Chief Running Bear’s motive for murder.”

  Spinelli said slyly, “Or does it?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means what it means.”

  I smiled. “Oh, I see what you mean.”

  Carlos said, “I don’t. What’s it mean?”

  I said, “It means that just because insurance covered the casino’s losses, it doesn’t take away the fact that everyone believes there is still six million dollars out there. Chief Running Bear would love to get his hands on it just as much as anyone else would. After all, it was his to begin with.”

  Spinelli said, “There’s something else.”

  “What?”

  “Probably nothing, but it is interesting.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “Okay, remember how Chief Running Bear told you that the reason the casino was moving all that money around was because of a remodel they were doing to the vault?”

  “Yes.”

  “It turns out that it was no small remodel. The work on the vault, the upgraded security and the addi
tional wing they built onto the west end of the complex cost the casino—you ready for this?”

  “Tell us already.”

  “Six million dollars.”

  “That’s the same amount….”

  “Exactly. Coincidence?”

  “Maybe. What are you suggesting?”

  Dominic pulled a chair up to the desk, spun it around and sat in it backwards, his arms and elbows propped up on the backrest. “Okay, hear me out. What if the chief wanted to rob his own casino? Wouldn’t it be easy enough if he arranged to move a large sum of money out of the vault and send it by armored car across town to a bank somewhere? Then what if he recruited someone like Powell to run interference, delay the police just as the armored car came under attack?”

  “I’m listening.”

  “The chief works on Powell for months, lets him run up large gambling debts and then forgives them, encouraging him to gamble even more. Eventually, Powell accumulates an insurmountable debt, one the casino will not forgive. The chief then comes along and offers him not only a way out, but a way to get rich, too. All Powell has to do is place himself closest to the site of the holdup so that his is the first unit called to respond. Then when the call comes in, he suddenly develops car trouble.”

  “If you’re saying that Chief Running Bear robbed his own casino for the insurance money, then René Landau had to be in on the scam as well?”

  “Sure, maybe Powell recruited him.”

  “And what then, Landau double-crossed Powell and everyone else by stashing the money and pretending it burned in the fire?”

  “The fire he set, exactly.”

  “So you think he killed Johnny Buck?”

  “You said it yourself, no honor among thieves.”

  “It does sound possible.”

  Carlos said, “Okay, that does it. I’m changing my bet. I think Chief Running Bear and his thugs snuffed Landau. DeAngelo had nothing to do with it.”

  “Really, Carlos? You don’t want to consider that maybe Powell did it? He could have been working for Chief Running Bear, cleaning up a mess eighteen years in the making.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Carlos sat with his left butt cheek propped up on my desktop, his arms folded at his chest. “Now I’m confused. It looks like everyone had a motive and a means. What other surprises could you possibly throw at us?”

  Spinelli smiled. “You really want to know?”

  “Ho boy,” I said, “What is it?”

  He removed one last document from the manila envelope and handed it to me. It was a photocopy of a driver’s license, a young woman’s, not half-bad looking either. “Does she look familiar?” he asked.

  I read the name on it. “Maryann Gilmore?”

  “Yes.”

  “She does look familiar, but I can’t place her.”

  “She was the prosecutor’s mystery witness at Landau’s trial, the one who positively identified Landau as the get-a-way driver in the robbery.”

  “So, why is this so important now?”

  He pointed at the document, and his smile told me that it was something big. “Look again.”

  I did, and then it hit me. “Hell!” I said. “That’s her!”

  Carlos grabbed the paper from my hands. “Who?”

  “Dominic said, “Stephanie Stiles.”

  “No way.” He held the picture to within inches of his nose. Even though Dominic had blown it up three times its normal size, its graininess left him unsure. “You know, I’d do her,” he said.

  “Carlos!” I snatched it from him. “Stiles is a subject in an ongoing investigation.”

  “What? No, I didn’t mean I would do her. I mean I would do her.” He pointed at the picture.

  “It’s the same person.”

  He plowed his hands into his pockets and drew his jacket tight around his belly. “Well, forget it then. I wouldn’t do her.”

  I handed the picture back to Dominic. “You know, Stiles told us that Paul Kemper introduced her to Landau in prison. Why would he do that? As Landau’s lawyer, he knew it was her testimony that put his client behind bars.”

  “Maybe he didn’t know. She was a mystery witness for the prosecution, wasn’t she?”

  “Mystery yes, but not anonymous. Even with her identity kept secret from the public, jurisprudence provides the defense with the Confrontation Clause, allowing the accused the right to face the witness against him. Even if Landau did not meet Stiles face-to-face, Kemper would have met her during her depositions.”

  “She looked different then,” Carlos remarked. “Look at her picture.”

  “Not that different. Kemper knew that Maryann Gilmore and Stephanie Stiles were the same person when he introduced her to Landau. I am sure of it.”

  Dominic asked, “What do you suppose motivated her to want to meet Landau?”

  “Money,” said Carlos, “what else?”

  “If that’s her game,” I said, “then it’s Kemper’s game, too, and probably the motivating factor for everyone involved.” I turned to Dominic. “Got any more surprises?”

  He shook his head. “No. That’s it for now.”

  I got up and started around the desk. “Okay then. We need to get out and pay another visit to Ms. Stiles. You coming, Carlos?”

  “Of course.”

  “You gonna keep it in your pants?”

  “What?”

  Spinelli laughed. I called back to him as we headed down the hall. “Don’t forget my subpoenas for those guns.”

  He waved me on. I knew he would not forget. The kid is a machine. I suspect that one day I will be working for him. I only hope when that happens, he does not take me for granted as badly as I sometimes take him.

  SIXTEEN

  Stephanie Stiles’ condo is an easy one to watch. It is on the third floor and the only way up is the stairwell out front, directly in the middle of the building. The apartment door faces the street and metal handrail over tubular pickets stripe the cantilevered walkway on each floor like prison bars, offering no anonymity for visitors coming and going. It is a cop’s dream stakeout location. There is no slipping in and out undetected, and the reason why Dominic was able to provide me with such great surveillance photos of everyone Stephanie had seen over the last two days. As Carlos and I sat out front in an unmarked cruiser, we discussed the possibility that maybe she had killed René Landau. It was Carlos’ idea, really, and I tried like hell to put forth sufficient cause to lay waste to that theory; not that I did not believe she could do it, I simply had my hands full with enough viable suspects and I did not need to scrutinize another.

  “She had motive,” Carlos remarked, “even if she was not in it for the money. Think about it, a woman scorned that had waited seventeen years for her boyfriend to get out of prison to marry her, only to have him call off the wedding the day he got out. That would piss anyone off.”

  “It would,” I said, “however, a crime of passion would likely have unfolded spontaneously, while he was still there in her apartment.”

  “Not if she sat fuming over it after he left. Maybe she had to work up the courage to kill him. We can check her phone records, see if she called him while he sat drinking at Pete’s Place. After locating him, she could have gone down there and waited for him to stagger out and—BOOM! He’s dead.”

  “Yes, but she claims to have an alibi for his time of death.”

  “Who, Powell? Like that’s a good alibi.”

  “It’s something. Come on. Let’s see if we can rattle her cage.”

  We went upstairs and knocked on her door. She did not answer at first, though I knew she was home. I could smell cigarette smoke leaching from under the door, and a clamor of activity told me that an orchestrated movement in preparation of our unscheduled arrival was under way. After an abrupt lull in noise, Carlos tried knocking, his rap harder and louder than mine. “Ms. Stiles!” he called. “It’s Detectives Marcella and Rodriquez. Please open up.”

  Moments later, we heard the click of a deadbolt and the sou
nd of a security chain unlatching. The door opened. Stiles stood in casual posture, her weight shifted onto one hip, her arms semi-folded, one under her breasts, the other crossing at the wrist. In her hand, of course, a burning cigarette, its smoke escaping in whispers through the screen door on a thin breeze stirring from the open balcony doors out back. To our relief, we found her dressed suitably in blue jeans, a long-sleeved white cotton blouse buttoned to the collar and closed-toed shoes; a sight bountifully more presentable than the day before. She pointed at Carlos with her cigarette in a stabbing gesture like a cobra. “What do you want? I told you everything I know yesterday.”

  “No,” I said, “you answered our questions yesterday. You did not tell us everything you know. May we come in?”

  She took a drag, turned her head and pursed her lips, blowing a stream of smoke over her left shoulder, still maintaining eye contact with me. “I’m sorry. I am busy.”

  “We won’t take up much of your time.”

  “I think we should do this later.”

  “Sure, we can do this later—downtown.”

  She reached out, tripped the latch and kicked the door open. “Make it quick.”

  We followed her in, once again taking up positions as before on the sofa, with Stiles on the chair opposite. I noticed two glasses on the coffee table, both with ice and more than half filled with mixed drink. Condensation had collected on the glasses, but had not yet rolled down onto the tabletop. In the ashtray, another cigarette smoldered; it was not Stiles’ brand. I looked around the apartment. She had closed her bedroom door. “Do you have company?” I asked.

  “Just you and your partner,” she replied.

  She knew I knew. That was all I wanted to get across to her. Carlos looked over his shoulder at the same door and stared at it for a long time, perhaps expecting it to open. It did not. He was still looking when I said, “Ms. Stiles, let me get right to the point. We know about you and Sergeant Powell.”

  She tried looking confused. “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean. We know you are seeing Powell. It was his watch you threw at René the other day, wasn’t it?”