Don't Look Twice

by Andrew Gross

  He had seen it in his own mother. In all his life, he had known nothing else.

  “What does this mean?” the woman asked, running her tongue along the strong, hard lines of his chest and the colorful tattoos that ran onto his neck.

  “This, this is for bravery,” he said, pointing to the Komodo dragon. She kissed it. “This one’s for secrecy,” he said, pointing to the ornate red and blue serpent. She kissed that too. “And this one is for you,” he said, drawing her hand to his taut erection.

  She bent down and kissed that one too.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” she said, climbing off, skipping into the bathroom. “Don’t you go away.”

  Hector grinned, conjuring up what was about to happen next. “Don’t you worry about that, mama.” He closed his eyes. He had done so many bad things, it scared him every once in a while when he shut them. The dark. It was why he had to drown himself in tequila just to go to sleep at night.

  He conjured an image of when he was a boy. In Quisqueya, just thirty minutes from here. He lived in a shack with six others in his family. They had no power. Only a water basin outside. They used to kick around a tightly wrapped bundle of paper as a football on a rutted field. From the time he was ten he carried a knife and was known by the police. At fourteen, he learned to use a gun shooting at sparrows in the trees. Now he could buy any car he wanted, live like a king, dress in fancy clothes.

  He heard her come out of the bathroom and felt her crawl on top of him again.

  Have any girl.

  He liked the feel of her warm body over his and kept his eyes closed. His hands traveled down her waist and found the curve of her smooth, hard ass. His prick sprang alive.

  He felt her trace his lips. “So what is this one for, Hector?” He opened his eyes.

  Pressed in his face was the barrel of a 9 mm gun.

  Hector held back a laugh. Was this a turn-on? She must not know who he was. “You’re kidding, right, mama?”

  “Yeah.” She smiled back. “I’m kidding, asshole.”

  She squeezed the trigger and Hector’s head rocketed back against the wall, his mind hurtling back to times when he was not afraid of darkness, sparrows scattering.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Brenda buzzed in Hauck’s office. “Lieutenant, call for you. Line one.”

  They’d been looking at everyone over the past days. The bank accounts, credit cards, phone records of everyone involved. Airlines and immigration for Hector Morales. Requesting a list from the warden at Otisville for anyone who had visited Vega over the past three months.

  They were growing frustrated. Coming up empty. They’d found no link to the gangs, nothing to tie to Josephina Ruiz. Nothing in David Sanger’s caseload or Sunil’s past. The news reports were saying everything had stalled. And they were pretty much right. Hauck was even thinking about giving in and reaching out to the FBI.

  “See if someone else can take it, Brenda…”

  “It’s a Captain Pecoric, from up in Madison…”

  Madison was a small, picturesque town up the Connecticut coast, maybe twenty miles north of New Haven. Rustic inns, boat builders. The captain’s name didn’t ring a bell.

  “He says it has something to do with the case.”

  Hauck picked up the flashing line. “Hauck here…”

  “Thanks for taking the call. I’m Chief Pecoric, actually. I run the local PD up in Madison.”

  “How can I help you, Chief?”

  “I think it’s more like how I can help you. We found the remains of someone up here yesterday. In the Hammonasset State Park. A couple of mushroom pickers stumbled onto it deep in the woods. Looks as if it’s been dumped there a couple of days…”

  “Okay…”

  “Homicides aren’t exactly the norm up in Madison, Lieutenant. Especially ones who have been shot in the back of the head at close range. Twice.”

  Hauck arched up and removed the phone from the crook of his neck. “I’m listening…”

  “The victim was a pit boss up at the Pequot Woods Casino. He and his family lived in town here. His name was Keith Kramer. The name mean anything to you?”

  “No,” Hauck said, jotting it on a pad and underlining it three times. “You were saying it had something to do with my case…”

  “Yeah. That guy who was shot down there, in that drive-by. The prosecutor…”

  “David Sanger?”

  “Sanger!” the Madison chief exclaimed. “That’s the one. Turns out my guy up here had a bit of a connection to him. We went to speak with the victim’s wife. All upset, as you’d expect. Two kids. The guy had been missing for two days. Never came back from work. She muttered something about what a terrible coincidence this was. ‘First that other guy from downstate, Sanger…Now Keith.’ Seems they knew each other…”

  Hauck wheeled around and snapped for Munoz’s attention in the squad room. He pushed on the speakerphone as the young detective rushed in.

  “Knew each other exactly how, Chief?” Hauck asked, feeling the lift when something that heretofore had been hidden and opaque now began to come clear.

  “They were actually at school together—back at Wesleyan, in the early nineties. Apparently they kept in touch. According to the guy’s wife, the two of them were even roommates for a while.”

  It was Sanger. Hauck suddenly saw it. David Sanger had been the target all along. Josephina Ruiz was merely a diversion. The red truck had pulled up as soon as he stepped in line. Hauck looked at Munoz.

  Now he had to find out why.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Wendy Sanger shuffled into the kitchen and stared at the three large boxes from David’s office in Hartford that two of his colleagues had driven down last Wednesday. His files, mementos, and tchotchkes that he’d kept in his office. Personal mail. They’d been sitting in the corner of the family room since then. She hadn’t had the heart to go through them. Not just yet. She knew she should move them out of sight and into the basement, but it felt like burying him all over again.

  She poured herself a cup of coffee.

  The two weeks since her husband had been killed were like a blur to Wendy. One day they were getting ready to drive to Vermont and David was prepping for an important case. A week later she was faced with confronting the rest of her life alone. Her sister had left the day before, having to return home to New Hampshire, where her husband taught at Dartmouth and she had two kids of her own. When all the attention died down, the house was eerily quiet. Now there was just the long, dimensionless expanse of time that loomed in front of her, somehow learning to think of David in the past. She didn’t know how she was going to handle it. Not to mention Ethan, who didn’t understand much of what was going on.

  Or Haley.

  Her daughter had been so angry since it happened. Wendy couldn’t blame her. David had always been her “guy,” a role Wendy could never fill. Imagine being jealous of your own daughter.

  She had been hanging out with friends after school, not coming home until after dark, no matter how much Wendy scolded her. Things don’t change, Haley, just because of what’s happened. Not doing her homework, staying in her room by herself and playing music, saying she had eaten and not coming down to dinner.

  It was just a phase, Wendy knew. Haley was always the closest to David. She had leaned on him a lot, in a way Wendy could not compete with. She knew her daughter always thought of her as weak, strict, always getting flustered over the littlest things. Always putting Ethan’s well-being before hers.

  Now who was going to be there for her?

  Not to mention the financial situation. Wendy had always managed the bills. David was one of the smartest people she knew, but he didn’t know an adjustable rate mortgage from the prime. They didn’t have a lot of money. David was a government lawyer. He barely pulled in ninety grand. The house took most of it, living where they did, and now they were in contract on this new place. There was the insurance; her dad could chip in for a while. But it was
n’t much.

  If he’d just gone into private practice like so many of his friends, he’d have been worth ten times as much by now…

  “Balloon!” She heard a shout from the TV room. Ethan. He had stayed home from school today. “Mommy, look, balloon.”

  “Yes, Ethan…,” Wendy called wearily. He was watching a recording they had made of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. He loved it. The colors, the floats. He was having a difficult time figuring out what was happening, why his father was gone. Death was a state his six-year-old, handicapped mind was having a hard time comprehending. “Daddy’s on a trip,” he said. “He’s coming home soon?”

  “No, honey, no he’s not,” she said.

  She took another sip of coffee. You’re gonna get through this. She sighed.

  She felt so overwhelmed. She looked at the boxes.

  Oh, David, how could you leave me alone…?

  Empty, needing to feel close, Wendy stepped over to the cartons against the wall and sat down, pulling open the top of the box closest to her. She took out a photo. The four of them kneeling around a giant sea turtle they had come upon in Hawaii. It almost made her cry. Wendy remembered how she had given it to David on their anniversary.

  Wendy buried her face in her hands. Would she ever have moments like that again? She reached back inside.

  She pulled out a large, stuffed envelope. From Michelle, David’s secretary up there, marked RECENT MAIL. Wendy unfastened it and slid out the contents.

  Letters. Bills. Bundled with rubber bands. Some legal documents, publications he received at the office.

  David’s things.

  She dropped the bundle on her lap. It was too overwhelming. She bunched her lips, fighting back tears. She just wasn’t ready to do this…

  Ethan yelled, “Mommy, Mommy, look, Kermit!”

  “Yes, Ethan, Kermit!” she heard herself yell. Crossly. She wiped her eyes, knowing that she shouldn’t take it out on him. “I’m coming,” she called back, stuffing the mail back in the envelope. “Mommy’s coming.”

  Something caught her eye. She pulled it out of the pile.

  An envelope from Bank of America. In Hartford.

  The envelope read, STATEMENT ENCLOSED.

  They didn’t have an account with Bank of America.

  All their banking was through Fieldpoint in Greenwich. She pretty much managed everything. David had never spoken to her about another account up there.

  That didn’t make sense.

  She slit it open, thinking maybe he had something put aside for the kids through work. An IRA. That would be just like him, Wendy thought. Not ever mentioning it.

  She took another sip of coffee and unfolded the statement. The account was made out to David Sanger. Not in trust. No Minors Act. Wendy put the coffee down. Her eye scrolled to the balance.

  She froze.

  There was $427,000 in it.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  You believe in coincidence, Lieutenant?”

  “No,” Hauck said to Chief Pecoric, “not when it comes to murder.”

  The Madison chief nodded and the young tech from the local ME’s office pulled out the body drawer; the pale, bloated body of Keith Kramer rolled into view. The victim was short, a little pudgy around the waist, with wiry, reddish hair. His face was youthful, affable, set in a calm that would have been in sharp contrast to his final moments.

  Hauck kneeled, ran his hand along the railing next to Kramer’s head. The sight of the corpse made him uneasy. Not just the stark, white body—never an easy sight—but that the two seemingly unrelated victims were now connected. Which didn’t make this a random shooting any longer, but a double murder, and if he ran with that, it made David Sanger the target that day, not just an unfortunate bystander.

  Which also implied that there was something these two had been hiding and made this a whole different case.

  “You say his wife had no idea why anyone would want to do this?”

  “Not a clue,” Chief Pecoric said, standing behind him. “We went through the whole laundry list. Maybe they were a little hurting for money of late, she admitted. His wife had apparently been the breadwinner the past couple of years, sold real estate…”

  “That game’s over.”

  “Yeah,” Marty Pecoric agreed, “it is. But they didn’t seem to have any sizable debts. No threats she was aware of. No drugs, gambling. No history of cheating on his wife. You’re welcome to talk to her if you want.”

  “Thanks.” Hauck stood up, his knees cracking. “You got any gangs up here, by any chance?”

  “Gangs?” The chief laughed. “Book clubs, maybe. Why?”

  Hauck shook his head. “Just thought I’d ask. You say he worked for the Pequot Woods up in Uncasville?”

  “Pit supervisor. Blackjack, roulette. I spoke to the guy in charge of security up there. Raines. He said Kramer was well liked, didn’t miss his shifts, never attracted trouble. A model guy. He’d just ended his shift up there—midnight to six A.M.—never made it home. It’s likely he was abducted somewhere en route home. You see that burn mark on the chest? It seems he was Tasered. I know they’d like to keep this under wraps as best they can.”

  “Did he happen to be carrying any amount of cash?”

  “Still had his share of the night’s tips in his pocket. Wallet in his pants.”

  “One thing I do know”—Hauck nodded to the tech, indicating he’d seen enough—“model guys don’t generally get whacked in the head on the way home from work.”

  Kramer’s stark torso disappeared.

  “Tasered. No robbery. This was no random killing,” Hauck said. “You mind if I call that guy up in Uncasville, just to check it out? What did you say his name was?”

  “Raines. Heads up security for the casino,” Pecoric said. “Maybe you can get something out of him I couldn’t. Be my guest.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  When Hauck got back to the station, Munoz jumped out from behind his desk. He and Steve Chrisafoulis followed him in.

  “You had us checking into Sanger, LT…”

  Steve dropped a thick folder on the round table next to Hauck’s desk. Steve was short, barrel chested, with wiry, graying hair and a dark mustache. He was a ten-year veteran of the NYPD who did the crossword puzzle every day, had moved up here eight years ago for an easier life, and handled most of Hauck’s fraud and bunko cases.

  “What’d you find?”

  Steve arranged a couple of piles. They seemed to be photocopies of bank and telephone records bound together with black clasps.

  “First, I took a look at the guy’s phone records, Lieutenant…” He picked up a stack and put the sheets in front of Hauck. “His cell. What you’re seeing goes back to April…

  That’s as far as I pulled.”

  There were dozens of handwritten annotations Steve had made in the margins, identifying most of Sanger’s calls. Most of them seemed to be office related or to his home. Several had been highlighted in green marker. Hauck noticed these all belonged to the same number.

  203-253-7797.

  “Guess whose?” Freddy Munoz rested his foot up against the table.

  Hauck shrugged.

  “Kramer,” Steve Chrisafoulis said. “Victim Number Two.”

  Hauck leafed through the calls. There seemed to be twenty or thirty of them going back six months. Sometimes in clusters—two or three in a matter of days.

  They’d been speaking a couple of times a week up to the day Sanger died.

  “Then there’s this…” Steve brought over a new stack, feeding Hauck individual sheets. “I looked through his bank records…You can see for yourself, they’ve got several accounts in the Fieldpoint Bank, right here in town. Checking, savings, a couple of CDs, fifteen, twenty thousand, one for each of the kids. Under forty grand, the whole ball of wax. He and his wife are the lone signatories on all accounts. There’s also an investment IRA at Smith Barney in his and his wife’s name. A shade over a hundred and fifty
grand in it…”

  Hauck shrugged. “The guy’s a government employee, not a hedge fund manager.”

  “Yeah.” Chrisafoulis nodded. “That’s what I was thinking. So then what do you make of this?”

  He pulled out another couple of pages. He slid them to Hauck. “He’s got this other account…Not in Greenwich. Not with his wife’s name on it. But up in Hartford. Bank of America. And just him on it—no one else.”

  Hauck leaned over the detective’s shoulder and read.

  “I mean, the guy’s a federal attorney, right? So I figured, he’s just parking away a few bucks for the kids’ college fund.”

  At the top, where the current balance was, it read $427,651.

  Hauck stopped on it.

  Freddy Munoz was grinning. “Like you said, LT, the guy’s just a government employee, right?”

  “Check out the size of these deposits,” Steve said, sliding a pencil down the page. “Forty-three K, thirty-one thousand. Twenty-eight…And the withdrawals…Generally thesame—fifteen to twenty grand. Why does a government lawyer keep a private account with twice what they have jointly to their names stashed away there and totally separate from his wife?”

  “And more to the point, where does a guy who pulls in ninety, maybe a hundred grand even get those kinds of funds?”

  In itself, it didn’t prove anything. It could all be family money he didn’t want to commingle with his wife’s. Or investment income from something they hadn’t found yet.

  “I don’t know,” Hauck said, “but I think we’re going to find out from Wendy.”

  “Before you do…” Chrisafoulis took a last sheet out of the folder. “There might be one last thing you want to ask her, sir.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Wendy Sanger was heading back up the walk to her house from the mailbox, leafing through envelopes, when Hauck pulled up, taking her by surprise.