“Yes, Jack was amazing that way.”
“At the time of his disappearance, were you aware of any other major stories he was pursuing?”
“Ummm, I’m not sure what you’re after. He was always on to something new.”
“I’m referring specifically to the death of Dale Fox, an Air Force pilot. Wasn’t he looking into that?”
“Oh, that thing. Yes, he came to me about it, but it was a dead end. The police ruled Fox’s death an accident and that was the end of it.”
“Did Jack tell you why he was so interested in a run-of-the-mill auto accident?”
Gross sighed, and glanced at Grant Marshall. It was obvious he was uncomfortable discussing the subject.
“Mr. Gross.” Suzanne prodded.
“Jack was way out in left field on this one,” Gross replied, reluctantly. “Supposedly, this Dale Fox had given Jack information about some government program that involved spraying chemicals into the atmosphere. I knew Jack wouldn’t just let this go, so I contacted the Air Force and the Environmental Protection Agency. Both categorically denied that anything of that nature was taking place. I told Jack to drop the story.”
“Hmmm,” Suzanne replied, pensively. “When Jack was working on the protection racket story, did you call Carmine Marchetti and ask him if he was breaking the law?”
“No, of course not. There was no way he would have admitted he was involved in illegal activity.”
“And yet, isn’t that exactly what you did when you called the Air Force and the EPA?”
Gross knew he’d been had. “Well --- that was different. It was the government.”
“And the government doesn’t lie? Is that what you’re telling me, Mr. Gross? It seems to me I read an article in your paper about the NSA lying about snooping into our emails and phone conversations. Come on, Mr. Gross. If what Dale Fox had told Carson was true, it would have been the story of the century, and yet you told him to drop it?”
You could see the beads of sweat popping out on Gross’s forehead.
“It was no different than when Salvatore Salucci disappeared. With Dale Fox dead, there was no one to corroborate his information. End of story.”
Now it was Suzanne’s turn to move in for the kill.
“As I recall, Mr. Marshall characterized Salucci’s disappearance as ‘convenient’ and alluded to the possibility that Carmine Marchetti had orchestrated his demise. The death of Dale Fox might also be thought of as convenient. I wonder if there’s any possibility the government could have orchestrated Fox’s death to prevent him from exposing any more of their dirty little secrets. Oh, wait! Like you said, it’s the government and they’d never do anything wrong!”
Now it was Grant Marshall jumping to his feet. “Objection! Ms. Romero is testifying.”
“Withdrawn,” Suzanne replied, smiling. “No further questions.”
It was a victory of sorts. She had gotten the chemtrail conspiracy in the door.
A big part of Grant Marshall’s plan was to impugn Carmine Marchetti’s character and reinforce in the jury’s mind that he really was a bad apple and perfectly capable of murdering Jack Carson.
So far, he had done an admirable job and he wasn’t through yet.
Nick Valenti was Marshall’s next witness.
“Mr. Valenti, who is your employer?”
“I work for Mr. Marchetti.”
“And what do you do for him?”
“I manage one of his clubs, The Rat Pack Lounge.”
When I was on the force, I had been in the Rat Pack a few times. In keeping with its name, the walls were filled with photos of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Joey Bishop and Peter Lawford. New York, New York, That’s Amore and all the other iconic classics were constantly being played in the background. Everyone on the force knew the place was a mob hangout, but there were relatively few trouble calls there. Carmine’s hired muscle kept a lid on things so the cops would have no reason to come snooping around.
“Tell me about the lounge, Mr. Valenti.”
He looked confused. “What’s to tell? It’s a bar. We serve liquor and a light menu. There’s live music on the weekends.”
“Tell me about the VIP room.”
Nick glanced at Carmine. “Oh that. It’s just a room we set aside for some of our regular customers.”
“Why do they need a special room? What goes on in there?”
“Oh, just stuff. Sometimes they have a friendly card game.”
“Card game? You mean like poker?”
“Uhh, sometimes. Penny-ante stuff. You know what I mean.”
“Come on, Mr. Valenti. Isn’t the VIP room used for high stakes gambling? Before you answer, remember that you’re under oath and perjury is a criminal offense.”
Nick looked at Carmine, obviously scared to death. The poor guy was between a rock and a hard place.
Carmine threw up his hands and nodded.
“Uhh, maybe sometimes, I guess.”
“Thank you for your candor, Mr. Valenti. No further questions.”
He turned to the jury. “Looks like we can add illegal gambling to Mr. Marchetti’s résumé.”
Suzanne declined to cross examine.
Marshall’s next witness was Melina Abadondo.
A murmur went through the courtroom as she took the stand.
Melina was a gorgeous blonde. She was the closest thing I had ever seen to Marilyn Monroe. If her boobs weren’t store bought, they should have been in the Guinness Book of Natural Wonders, and as the song from South Pacific states, “She was broad where a broad should be broad.”
I looked at the jury. The women were shocked and I could see them mouthing the words, “Oh, my!” The men, on the other hand, were desperately trying to keep their eyes from popping out of their sockets.
Grant Marshall approached. “Ms. Abadondo. May I call you Melina?”
“Sure, Sweetie,” she replied coyly. “You can call me anything that makes it work for you.”
A snicker went through the courtroom.
“Order!” Judge Weathers barked, slamming his gavel.
“Melina,” Marshall continued, red-faced. “Are you employed?”
“I’m a working girl, if that’s what you mean.”
Another snicker.
“Where do you work?”
“For Elite Escorts.”
“And what do you do there?”
“Duh! I’m an escort!”
I wondered if Marshall was regretting calling Ms. Abandondo to the stand.
“And what exactly does an escort do?”
“We escort people, of course. That’s why we’re called escorts.”
Marshall was getting nowhere fast.
“Who do you escort?”
“Men mostly, but sometimes we get a woman who’s looking for something different, if you know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t know what you mean. What do you do when a woman calls?”
Melina looked puzzled. “Escort them! That’s what we do.”
“If I wanted to hire you as an escort, how much would it cost me?”
“How long do you want to be escorted?”
“Let’s say two hours.”
“That would be fifteen hundred dollars.”
Another murmur went through the courtroom.
“How much of that do you get?”
“I get five hundred and the company gets a thousand.”
“And who exactly is the company. Who do you work for?”
“Mr. Marchetti, of course. Hi Carmine,” she said, giving the defendant a little finger wave.
“And what does the client get for his fifteen hundred?”
“Two hours! Isn’t that what you asked for?”
Marshall was getting exasperated.
“During that two hours are you expected to offer your client sexual favors?”
Ms. Abadondo was shocked. “My goodness no! That would be illegal!”
“Melina, you’re under oath. Y
ou swore to tell the truth.”
“I did tell the truth,” she replied indignantly. “It is illegal to take money for sex.”
Marshall must have figured he was beating a dead horse.
“No further questions.”
When Suzanne declined to cross, the judge banged his gavel. “Court adjourned until nine o’clock tomorrow.”
It wasn’t good, but the first day hadn’t been a total loss.
CHAPTER 13
After the long day in court, I was beat. Since all I had done was sit on my butt all day, I wasn’t physically tired, but the emotional strain of the trial had drained me.
Once again, Dad and I pulled up in front of our building at the same time.
“Hey, Sonny! I got it!” he called out cheerfully.
“Got what, Dad?”
“The Teamster’s Hall --- for the big wing-ding --- you know --- the bachelor party that I’m doing because you’re too busy.”
“Oh, right. Exactly what do you have planned for the big event?” I was curious because sometimes Dad’s ideas were suspect.
“Just the usual,” he replied with a twinkle in his eye. “That ex-cop friend of yours is catering with his bar-b-cue, and one of Jerry’s friends is going to DJ.”
“That’s it? Nothing wild and wooly?”
“Why would you even ask that?” he replied in mock surprise.
“Because I know you, that’s why.”
Then I noticed a new sticker on the bumper of his car. In bold letters it proclaimed, “This vehicle protected by Smith & Wesson.”
“Dad, that sticker ---.”
“It’s a dandy, isn’t it? I got it at the gun store where I bought my 9mm. Nobody will mess with my car now.”
“Actually, Dad, just the opposite is true. Think about it. All that sticker does is announce the fact that the person who owns that car is a gun owner. If some mope sees it, and nobody’s around, he’s likely to bust out a window thinking there might be a gun under the seat or in the glove box. Ox and I had calls like that all the time.”
That took the wind out of his sails. “Well crap! I hadn’t thought about that.”
I headed into the building leaving Dad rubbing his chin and staring at the sticker.
When I entered our apartment, I found Maggie, Veronica and Judy sitting around the table chatting and looking at magazines.
“What’s all this,” I inquired, noticing right away that there wasn’t a hint of my supper lingering in the air.
“A meeting of Wedding Planners Anonymous,” Maggie replied, throwing me a kiss. “We’ve been at it all afternoon. Still have a long way to go though.”
That was a gentle clue that I was probably on my own for supper.
“Judy, what’s Ox doing tonight?”
“Probably just moping around the house. Why don’t you give him a call? Maybe the two of you can go do something.”
Another gentle clue that my presence wasn’t needed at Wedding Planners Anonymous.
Actually, it wasn’t a bad idea. On the way home, I had been thinking about the trial. If we were going to use the hired assassin scenario, we needed more evidence, and I had thought of something I should check out, but to do it, I would need Ox.
“Good idea,” I replied. Then, seeing Veronica reminded me of Melina Abadondo. “Veronica, since you used to be in the business, what do you know about Elite Escorts?”
“Elite, sure I know something about them. All the working girls do. It’s a high class operation, big bucks, but it’s run by the mob. Girls can make a lot of money, but the downside is that once you go to work for them, they own you. I knew one of the girls. She let me look at her little black book. It read like a who’s who in Kansas City, politicians, CEO’s, even clergy. Another downside is that you’re expected to take care of the owner’s needs, if you know what I mean, and from what I hear, Carmine can be pretty kinky.”
That certainly made sense. Every time I met with Carmine, he had a gorgeous woman on each arm. One of the perks of being the godfather.
I called Ox and headed out the door. “I’m leaving.”
To be fair, Maggie did reply, “Be safe. I love you,” but her head, along with the other two girls, was glued to Modern Bride.
On the way to my car, I noticed that Dad was on his knees busily scraping Smith & Wesson off his bumper.
I heard him mumble, “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
I picked Ox up and we headed to Denny’s. I would have preferred Mel’s, but Denny’s is Ox’s favorite and I needed a favor from him.
While we were waiting for our Grand Slams to be served, I ran my idea by Ox.
“You know, once Jack realized he was in danger and being pursued, he must have abandoned everything that could lead the assassins to him, his car, his apartment, credit cards, cell phone, everything. That’s what I would have done.”
“Makes sense,” Ox replied. “The government has ways of tracking us we can’t even comprehend.”
“Since we know the feds caught up with him, it was most likely either in his car or where he was staying, probably a motel.”
“Okay, so?”
“So let’s go to the precinct and check out disturbance calls at motels around the time of Jack’s disappearance.”
Ox grimaced. “I don’t know. The brass want Marchetti real bad. If they find out I’m helping you get him off, my butt’s in a sling.”
“Come on! We both know Marchetti didn’t do this. I don’t like the guy either, but we can’t let those government thugs get away with four murders.”
He sighed. “Okay, but if I get my ass fired, you have to hire me at Walt Williams Investigations.”
“It’s a deal!”
Thankfully, there were few people roaming around the precinct at that late hour.
Ox booted up the computer and after pouring through fifteen minutes of disturbance calls, he said, “I might have something. The Royale Inn, Independence Avenue and Paseo.”
I remembered the place. It was a real dump and a crime magnet.
Ox continued, “Says here that a woman from the cleaning crew found the door of a unit bashed in. Apparently the tenant left nothing behind. The room was clean.”
“Does it give the tenant’s name?”
Ox scrolled further. “Yeah, it was registered to a Fred Fenton. That name sounds familiar.”
“Of course it’s familiar,” I exclaimed. “That was the name Kevin used when he lived in Phoenix! That’s Jack for sure. I remember him talking to Kevin, getting some back story for his article since Kevin was involved in our investigation. He used that name to let us know where he was hiding.”
“Pretty clever!” Ox observed.
Then it hit me. “Not really. Kevin used that name when he was in witness protection. The US Marshall’s gave it to him. The Feds had access to that information. That’s how they found him.”
“Holy crap! There’s no hiding from those guys.”
“I don’t suppose there were security cameras?”
“At the Royale Inn? You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Maybe not at the motel, but Independence and Paseo is a major intersection. Let’s check the traffic cameras for the night of the break-in.”
Ox pulled up another screen.
Fortunately, the camera’s angle was wide enough to catch the entrance to the motel off Paseo. We started the morning before the break-in and fast-forwarded through the day.
“There! Back it up.”
A new model black SUV was seen pulling into the hotel lot. Twenty minutes later, it left. It was too far away to get a license number or see the faces of its occupants.
“That’s gotta be the feds,” Ox said. “Nobody driving a rig like that would be caught dead in the Royale Inn.” Then he thought about what he just said. “Sorry, not the best choice of words.”
We knew without a doubt what we had, but it couldn’t be used in court. There was no way to prove that Fred Fenton was really Jack Carson, and anybod
y could have been driving the SUV.
I was back to square one.
CHAPTER 14
We were on our way back to Ox’s apartment when my cell phone rang.
“Walt, Suzanne here. Can you come by my office? It’s important.”
I looked at my watch and figured the girls would still be immersed in bridal stuff.
“Sure. Ox is with me. Is that okay?”
“Actually, that’s perfect.”
Twenty minutes later we were sitting in Suzanne’s office being introduced to a middle-aged Latino woman.
“Walt, Ox,” Suzanne said, “This is Maria Lopez. Maria is --- uhhh --- a working girl, and she has some very important information for us.”
Once she said that, I recognized the tell-tale signs. It was obvious Maria had once been a beautiful young girl, but life on the street, and most likely drugs, had aged her beyond her years. Her eyes were dark and sunken and had that faraway look of a person wishing she could be anyone and anyplace else.
Suzanne continued. “Maria was with a customer at the Royale Inn the day Jack Carson disappeared. Maria, why don’t you tell Walt and Ox what you told me. They’re friends. It’s okay.”
“I --- I work Independence Avenue,” she started in a halting voice. “I keep a room at the Royale Inn. On that day, I had just finished with a customer and we were about to leave when we heard the door of the room next to us bashed in. We were afraid, so we just waited to see what would happen next. Maybe ten minutes later, two men came out of the room pushing Jack in front of them. They took him to a black SUV where they were joined by two other men who must have been behind the building. A few minutes later, they drove off.”
“I noticed you called Mr. Carson, Jack. It sounds like you know him.”
“I do. Jack was a crime reporter for the paper. One night, a customer got really rough and I hit him on the head with a beer bottle. Somebody called the cops. Jack must have heard it on his scanner because he showed up about the same time. They sent both of us to the hospital and just left us there. Jack followed, and after we were treated, he offered to drive me home. I was a real mess. He wasn’t a jerk like most guys are with hookers. He was kind. I never forgot that.”
The Chemtrail Conspiracy Set (Lady Justice Book 22) Page 22