Borderline

by Joseph Badal

  CHAPTER 63

  Bill McWilliams’s offices were in a converted seventy-five-year-old home on Lomas Boulevard in downtown Albuquerque. The place had a closed-in porch with huge bay windows. The wood floors and trim inside gleamed. Oil paintings graced the reception area walls.

  McWilliams greeted Barbara warmly. Not for the first time, she thought about the lawyer’s dual personality. He was Dr. Jekyll socially and Mr. Hyde when he played lawyer.

  “Nice to see you again, Detective,” he said. “You look different. Have you changed something?”

  Barbara couldn’t figure out what he meant. “Nope, nothing’s changed,” she said. But then it struck her that maybe he had noticed she had lost weight.

  “Can I get you something to drink?”

  “A glass of water would be fine.”

  McWilliams nodded at his receptionist. “Would you please bring Detective Lassiter a glass of water? We’ll be in the conference room.”

  “Nice place,” Barbara said as they walked to the conference room.

  “Thanks. You should have seen it when I bought it nine years ago. Someone had painted over all the wood trim. The floors were in bad shape, covered by ratty carpet. I had everything restored to the original. It’s a great place to come to work to in the morning.”

  The door to the conference room was open. Barbara saw Connie seated on the far side of a long table. Her back was to a bank of windows. Connie skewered Barbara with a hateful look, then swiveled around and showed Barbara her back.

  McWilliams pointed to a chair across from his client. “Please take a seat, Detective.” He moved to a chair next to the girl. After Barbara sat, McWilliams turned on a recorder in the center of the table, recited the date and time, and the names of all in the room, and began to set the ground rules.

  Barbara interrupted him. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said, and took a pocket recorder from her jacket pocket, hit the RECORD button, and placed it on the table near McWilliams’s recorder.

  He beamed at Barbara. “I like a detective who comes prepared.” Then his smile disappeared and his poker face returned. “I will stop this session at any time I feel Detective Barbara Lassiter has asked a . . . an inappropriate question. My client, Constance Alban, has agreed to be here because she wants to see justice done in the matter of the murder of Mrs. Victoria Comstock. Miss Alban has not been accused of any wrong-doing in this matter. If Detective Lassiter has any intent at this time to bring charges against my client in the Comstock murder case, then this session will be terminated immediately. Do you agree, Detective Lassiter?”

  Barbara agreed, but then added, “Of course, if anything comes out of this meeting that implicates Miss Alban in Mrs. Comstock’s death, or in the death of Dr. Nathan Stein, then I will terminate the session myself and take Ms. Alban into custody.”

  A brief smile flitted across McWilliams face. He tipped his head toward Barbara, as though to say touché. “Okay, let’s get started.”

  Connie had jerked around and now faced Barbara. “I had nothing to do with Victoria’s or Dr. Stein’s deaths,” she spat.

  McWilliams patted her arm. “Remember what I told you? You don’t offer any information. You wait for Detective Lassiter to ask a question. If I tell you not to answer, then you don’t answer. You understand?”

  Connie pouted, but nodded. McWilliams looked at Barbara. “I think we’re ready now.”

  “You’ve really got it in for your mother,” Barbara began. She’d taken this same tack when she’d met with Connie and her lawyer the last time. She wanted to rehash the same territory because she knew it would set the girl off.

  Connie looked at McWilliams. He at her. She glared at Barbara. “My mother’s a bitch. She was responsible for my father’s death.”

  “Do you know what caused him to shoot himself?”

  “Sure, my mother kicked him out of the house. He was depressed after that.”

  “You remember all that?”

  “Well, no. That’s how it was explained to me.”

  “By whom, your mother?”

  “No! Victoria told me. My mother won’t talk about what happened.” Connie’s face suddenly turned red. “If you’re going to blame Victoria—”

  McWilliams placed his hand on her arm.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  “Okay,” Barbara continued, “if you blame your mother for your father’s death, why have you severed your relationship with your grandparents? Do you blame them also for your father’s death?”

  “Victoria told me—”

  “Ah, I see,” Barbara said. “Victoria again. I guess you believe everything Victoria told you.”

  “Where’s this going, Detective?” McWilliams asked.

  Barbara ignored McWilliams. “Tell me, Connie, how you felt when you learned Dr. Stein had been murdered.”

  Tears sprang to Connie’s eyes, her chin trembled. “I loved Dr. Stein. He was so good to me. He was the only person in the world, besides Victoria, who truly cared about me. I can’t believe they’re both gone.” She broke down and cried pitifully. Five minutes passed before she was able to continue.

  “Do you have any idea why anyone would want to kill the doctor?”

  Connie just shook her head.

  “Let the record show that Ms. Alban shook her head,” Barbara said.

  Now for the first bombshell, Barbara thought. “Did you know Dr. Stein had sexual relationships with a dozen or more of his female patients and filmed his liaisons with those women?”

  Connie screeched, “I’ll kill you, you bitch.” She leaped out of her chair and climbed across the table, her hands extended toward Barbara’s throat. Barbara calmly wheeled her chair back out of Connie’s reach and stared at the girl, while McWilliams grabbed her around the waist and dragged her back into her chair. As soon as he had gotten her settled down, he turned off his recorder.

  “I think we’re done here today.”

  Barbara waved a hand in front of her. “That’s okay.” She wanted to trigger Connie’s rage. A setup for the one question she really wanted to ask. The one that would either back up or contradict Hector’s statement about her. Now was as good a time as any.

  She stood up. “Could I ask just one more question, counselor?” Before McWilliams could turn the recorder back on, Barbara looked at Connie and asked, “What would you do if you found Hector in bed with another woman?”

  McWilliams jumped out of his chair. While he glared at Barbara, he shouted, “Don’t answer—”

  But he was too late. Connie stabbed a hand at Barbara. “I’d cut his nuts off and shove them down his throat,” she screamed.

  Barbara picked up her recorder, shut it off, and stuck it in her pocket. “That’s all, counselor. Please make sure your client is reminded she is not to leave Bernalillo County.” She turned, exited the room, and moved toward the front door.

  McWilliams ran up behind her and grabbed her arm.

  Barbara whipped around and stared down at his hand on her arm. He got the message and released her.

  “What the hell was that all about?”

  “I think I proved that kid is perfectly capable of committing murder. She’s a time bomb ready to go off. Who knows, perhaps she already has. Maybe she’s the greatest actor in the world. Maybe she got back at Victoria for something. Maybe she killed Stein because she found out about his other girlfriends.”

  “You don’t believe any of that.”

  “I’ll tell you this much; I don’t know what I believe relative to these two murders. But I am absolutely confident Connie Alban is a grenade with the pin already pulled. The problem is that no one knows whether she has an eight-second, an eight-hour, or an eight-week fuse. Watch yourself, counselor. That is one sick kid.”

  “I talked with her psychiatrist before I agreed to represent her. He told me she had made great progress.”

  “You mean the famous Doctor Nathan Stein?”

  “Right. It was a terrible thing, his murder.”


  “Did you know he screwed your client while she was his patient? Connie was just one of many of his conquests.”

  McWilliams’s jaw dropped.

  “Watch yourself,” Barbara repeated and headed for the front door.

  CHAPTER 64

  Before she got out of her car at Stein’s office, Barbara remembered Stein’s DVD in her purse. Maybe there was a player in the office.

  She’d arranged to meet Stein’s secretary at five. She was fifteen minutes late and was pleased to see the woman was still there. Her name was Gladys Montoya, a thin, elegant-looking woman, with sharp features. Her make-up didn’t hide that she’d been crying and needed sleep.

  Barbara showed her the search warrant and explained she would first perform a quick search of the office and then go through Stein’s file cabinets.

  The secretary shrugged. “Is it all right if I pack up personal things from my desk?”

  “I’d rather you didn’t until I finish my search. I don’t know how long this will take; can you wait around to lock up when I’m done?”

  The woman nodded, told Barbara none of the file cabinets in the doctor’s office were locked, and then sat behind her desk in the reception area.

  Barbara entered Stein’s office and shut the door behind her. She slowly, carefully toured the room. She looked for anything that appeared to be out of place.

  A closet held an umbrella, a canvas bag full of exercise clothes, a trench coat, and a folded easel. There were no personal photographs anywhere in the office. No desk calendar. But there was a computer. She moved the mouse to see if it was on. But no such luck. She would have to ask the secretary for Stein’s password.

  There were six three-drawer wooden file cabinets against one wall. A larger two-door credenza of the same dark wood stood in the middle of the file cabinets. Barbara opened the credenza—a television and a DVD player inside. “Hot damn!” she muttered. She turned on the player and the television, pulled the disk from her purse, and inserted it into the player. She pushed the PLAY button.

  Nathan Stein lay on his back in his bed, his hands behind his head. He hummed an indecipherable tune. He was naked from the waist up. A sheet covered the lower half of his body. Hairy bugger, weren’t you, Barbara thought. Suddenly, a woman jumped onto the bed, her back turned to the camera. It wasn’t until the woman tore away the sheet and climbed on top of Stein that Barbara was sure of the woman’s identity: Connie Alban.

  Well, well, Barbara thought. If this recording was made on the day Stein was killed, then little Miss Connie had lied about not leaving the barn on the Schiller property at any time during the past few weeks.

  Stein and Connie went at each other like two rabbits for about five minutes. No foreplay. She squealed and he grunted. They seemed to climax together. Finally, Connie rolled off Stein. He leaned up on his elbow, planted a fatherly kiss on Connie’s forehead, then bounded from the bed and disappeared.

  Slam bam, thank you, ma’am, Barbara thought. Old Stein wasn’t much of a lover. At least in this episode.

  Barbara watched Connie get out of bed, go off camera for a minute, then reappear with an armful of clothes, which she placed on the bed. She dressed. After a few more minutes, the doctor reappeared, a towel tied around his waist. His hair was wet. He hugged Connie, turned her around, and slapped her on the butt.

  “I’ll call you,” Stein said.

  “You’d better,” Connie answered.

  “You still in that barn?”

  “Yeah,” she answered. “But I’m sick and tired of the place. It smells like cow shit. I’ll move back into Victoria’s house later this week. Maybe my asshole-of-a-mother will give up looking for me by then.”

  “You’ve got quite a mouth on you.”

  “I’ve never heard you complain about my mouth before,” she said with a crooked smile.

  Stein whipped her around and slapped her on the butt again. “Get out of here. I’m expecting someone.”

  “It better not be a woman,” she said, a real threat in her voice.

  “You know there’s no other woman in the world who satisfies me the way you do.”

  Connie giggled and exited stage right.

  Stein stood in the room and looked in the direction Connie had taken. After a few seconds, he said aloud, “Fucking psycho teenybopper.” Then he turned and went off camera. The camera now showed nothing but the bed and its rumpled sheets. After five minutes, Barbara felt let down. The DVD had turned out to be just one more porn flick. They’d already seen plenty of Stein/Connie fornication on other disks. But Connie had confirmed on the video that she was still hiding out in the barn, which meant it had been made at some time within the past few weeks. Barbara turned to the file cabinets and started with the first one on the left. She pulled the first file—Aaron—and found it held several miniature audio cassette tapes and very neat handwritten notes. Barbara moved through the files to the back of the drawer in the hope she would recognize a name. The first name she recognized was Alban, Constance. She pulled Connie’s file and placed it on top of the cabinet. Twenty minutes had passed and she was about to open the top drawer of the next cabinet, when noise came from the television, which she’d failed to turn off. She glanced at the set and saw movement on the screen. She stepped in front of the television and stared open-mouthed at the torso of a man. He had to be standing just a foot or two away from the television in Stein’s bedroom.

  Voices could be heard which Barbara assumed came from that bedroom TV. Then Barbara saw the man reach forward. He now had a book in his hand. He threw the book with incredible force at the screen. Sparks flew as the book crashed into the glass. The man moved out of the camera’s range and disappeared. Then a shout: “Get the fuck out of my house? I’m going to call the police!” Then movement: Stein, who still wore nothing but a towel, moved into the picture, went toward a telephone on the bedside table. He pointed off camera and yelled, “Get out of my house, or I’ll kick your ass!” Someone laughed off-screen. Stein then extended one arm defensively. A second figure suddenly came on camera.

  Barbara’s heart seemed to stop. She wanted to scream. It can’t be! She watched the second figure prod Stein with the sharp five-inch end of a long brass candlestick holder. Stein’s hand now bled

  “You sonofabitch!” Stein bellowed. He grabbed the middle of the candlestick holder and charged the other man, who leaned toward Stein. Stein’s grip seemed to slip, but his momentum continued. He impaled himself on the spike at the end of the candlestick holder. The other man released it and Stein, impaled, fell backwards and clutched the candlestick holder that protruded from his chest. He crashed into the bedside table, struck it with the back of his head, and collapsed on the floor like an empty burlap bag. The candlestick holder stood straight up from his body. Barbara stared at the killer, who dropped to the floor and felt at Stein’s neck for a pulse before he rose and ran out of the picture.

  CHAPTER 65

  The scene on the DVD had cancelled out the need for Barbara to go through Stein’s files. And setting up an appointment with Maxwell Comstock would have to wait. Barbara felt as low as she’d ever felt. She ejected the disk and shut down the player and television. She needed to take the disk to headquarters and log it into the Evidence Room. She started toward the office door but remembered Connie’s file she’d placed on top of a file cabinet. She retrieved it but didn’t return it to the drawer. She knew she was about to violate the conditions of the court order from Judge Lynch, but Connie Alban was a common denominator to both murders. Barbara sat down with the file at Stein’s desk.

  The file was two inches thick, with notes inside that began a year earlier. Stein apparently took his professional counseling sessions seriously. His notes were detailed and they revealed a high degree of empathy for the girl.

  Barbara read slowly. She found many references to Connie’s relationship with her mother. That relationship seemed to be pretty healthy at first, but it quickly deteriorated. According to his notes, as
Connie’s manic depression escalated as she neared the end of her teenage years, her resentment of her mother grew, and Stein noted that Victoria’s influence on Connie worsened the mother-daughter relationship.

  Included in the file were notes that summarized two telephone calls Stein had with Marge Stanley. He’d called her to assess the mother’s attitude toward the daughter. After the second conversation with Marge, he wrote: “Ms. Stanley advised she had hired a private investigator who she’d known in high school to find Connie. She is very angry with me because I wouldn’t agree to arrange a meeting for her with her daughter. I felt Connie would view that as a betrayal of trust.”

  Marge had known Navarro for a very long time? She had been able to give them his telephone number from memory. And she had then called him by his first name. Neither fact had seemed terribly important at the time, but in the context of what she’d just read in Stein’s notes, it was obvious to Barbara that Navarro and Marge were more than investigator and client.

  Barbara felt sick. She knew what she had to do, but she was human enough to dread it. She’d actually thought Shawn Navarro might become an important part of her life. But that would never happen now.

  She refiled the Alban file, left Stein’s office, thanked his secretary, and told her she could remove her personal items. After she left the building, she took her notebook from her jacket and found Marge’s number in Farmington. She tapped in the number and listened to Marge Stanley’s voicemail message. She was about to leave a message, when Marge picked up. “Hello, Detective. What can I do for you?”

  “It’s come to my attention you’ve known Shawn Navarro since high school.”

  “So what? We’ve been friends since we were kids. He was the first person I thought to call when I needed help to find my daughter. I needed a private investigator, anyway. Why not go with someone you already know and trust?”