by Chris Knopf
“I’m saying nothing without counsel present,” she said.
“Fine,” said Ross. “Then I’ll do all the talking.” He decided in favor of lighting up the cigarette, ignoring Oksana’s disgust. “About a year ago, Jaybo Flynn was approached by the Southampton Town Police on suspicion of drug trafficking. Mad Martha’s wholesale seafood business had provided the ideal distribution point for heroin coming in off the fast boats, like Joey Wentworth’s, to be sliced up and packed inside bags of frozen shrimp and local bluefish for shipment Up Island and parts west.
“Flynn revealed to the investigating officer that he had knowledge that would seriously compromise the standing of a certain Suffolk County assistant district attorney. Fatally compromise, from the standpoint of her career. Flynn was desperate for any leverage he could use to avoid arrest, or at least mitigate the subsequent charges. He had no idea just how fortuitous his gambit was. Because, rather than bring this knowledge to the appropriate authorities, the officer approached the ADA in question. He had in mind a deal of his own.”
“You have quite an imagination,” said Oksana.
“Actually, I don’t,” said Ross. “I find it gets in the way of logic and reason.”
It didn’t seem like a good time to bring Einstein into the discussion, so I kept my mouth shut.
“Veckstrom,” said Jackie.
I thought the chief would tell her to keep her mouth zipped as well, but instead he said, “Go ahead, counselor. We’re listening.”
“It wasn’t for the money,” she said. “He had all he’d ever need courtesy of his wife. What he needed was a way to keep that wife happy. He needed status, a position in life commensurate with her place in society. For that, your boss’s job would do just fine. His qualifications were thin, but his rich wife was more than willing to fund a serious campaign against an opponent who hated campaigning, and could be easily portrayed as used up and out of touch.”
“It was still a long shot,” said Ross. “Edith wouldn’t just wilt away in the face of a fight. But maybe she could be taken out some other way. Maybe there was something damaging in her performance as DA, or in her private life, that only her most trusted colleague would know. And as it turned out, like Jaybo Flynn, he hit pay dirt.”
Oksana’s face stayed set in stone, though a touch of pink started to show on her cheeks and on the small bit of skin exposed by her modest silk blouse.
“It was a tidy quid pro quo,” said Jackie. “Jaybo Flynn stayed out of jail, Lionel Veckstrom had a way to eliminate Edith from the race when it was too late for another candidate to take the field, and you got to keep your career. Enhanced when the grateful new DA took the helm. Each of you had something on the other, but that would just strengthen the bond.”
Since Jackie was allowed to blather away, I decided to weigh in.
“Things weren’t quite tidy enough, though, from your point of view,” I said to Oksana. “There was still some cleaning up to do. A few loose ends, in particular Alfie Aldergreen, who set things in motion by spilling your secret to Jaybo while eating a free meal out of the back of Mad Martha’s. With access to the police files on confidential informants, you knew he was Sullivan’s snitch. That was too big a vulnerability. So you circled around to Jaybo, gave him his options, and the son of a bitch took it from there. Eliminating the other two CIs was an extra precaution, and for Jaybo, a nice bonus, since it allowed him to take over Joey Wentworth’s leg of the drug run. Lilly Fremouth was just an innocent bystander.”
“Like Allison,” said Jackie.
I let that sink in before continuing.
“She rang you in,” I said. “You and Jaybo. It was my fault. I told you she went to RISD. I was already another loose end that Jaybo tried to deal with by smashing in my rear windshield with a meat mallet from the restaurant. And running me down with the fish van. And you tried to sic Bennie Gardella on me with some nutso story that I was out to take down the Southampton cops. It was clear that Allison had no memory of the attack, but Jaybo and his partner were committed by now, and gave it another try out on Oak Point, knowing I was gorging myself on fried flounder back at their restaurant. But like Sullivan said, the Acquillos aren’t that easy to dispense with.”
I didn’t share another of Oksana’s strategies for dealing with me, though I’m sure the thought crossed Jackie’s mind.
“I don’t need to sit here and listen to this,” said Oksana.
“I’ll bet we’ll find your DNA in Allison’s apartment,” said Ross. “And Jaybo’s. So yes, you do have to sit here, because in a few minutes you’re going down to processing where we’ll take a sample of your blood, after we snap your picture and get a set of prints. You are familiar with that little ritual, am I right?”
The pink on her cheeks bloomed into red.
“I need an attorney,” she said.
“You do,” said Ross. “Maybe Miss Swaitkowski’s available.”
“Not on your life,” said Jackie.
Ross let Oksana make her call from the interrogation room while the two uniformed officers waited outside. The rest of us walked down the hall to the conference room next to Ross’s office where he met with people he’d rather not have stepping over his stacks of paper.
Edith Madison was already there, holding a Styrofoam cup of coffee between two hands. She looked up at us as we settled in around the table, her face notably thinner and more wrinkled than when I’d seen her last. She was in casual clothes, and her white hair, never fully tamed by the tight bun, was pulled back with a felt-covered headband.
“I owe you all an apology,” she said, without preamble.
“No you don’t,” said Ross.
“Oh, but I do,” she said, in a quiet voice. “Especially for the rough treatment I gave these two.”
“You had no choice,” said Ross. “Oksana had to believe you were appalled by your decision to ask for their help.”
“Apology accepted,” said Jackie, “though I agree it isn’t necessary. I’m used to rough treatment from the DA.”
She didn’t bother including me in all that.
“When did you suspect Oksana?” I asked.
Apologies aside, she didn’t seem to relish speaking with me.
“Veckstrom seemed to know too much about the DA’s office. Nothing that couldn’t leak out one way or the other, but he was too knowledgeable, too in command of our day-to-day challenges and issues. He’s a smart fellow, and I expected him to be good on the stump, but not that good. I didn’t know anything about his relationship with Mr. Flynn or any of that. It wasn’t until I spoke with Ross, who’d heard rumors of police on the take, that the greater suspicions arose.”
I wanted to get more out of her, but Ross got extra fidgety and moved to shoo us out of the room. Before that could happen, I pulled the folded piece of paper out of my back pocket, unfolded it, and put it down in front of her. She took awhile reading it, then looked up at me.
“Where did you get this?” she asked.
“It showed up in my mailbox,” I said. “Don’t know who sent it.”
I told her I’d kept it to myself, so she could stop looking at Jackie and Ross Semple as if we were all in on some conspiracy.
“What do you intend to do now?” she asked.
I shrugged.
“Nothing,” I said. “It’s your decision. I’m not dumb enough to stick my nose into something like that.”
She folded the paper up again and slipped it into her purse.
“Don’t sell yourself short,” she said, and let Ross usher us out the door.
I could hear Jackie sputtering something like “What the hell was that all about?” quietly enough that I could pretend not to hear it.
When we got to reception I asked Ross about Veckstrom. He told me two uniforms had been dispatched to wait for him at his big house on the ocean. They’d pick him up there, presumably away from the eyes and ears of the media.
“I want him to myself before the shit entirely hits the f
an,” he said. “That boy’s got some explaining to do.”
“He’s not the only one,” said Jackie.
Back in the fresh air, she didn’t waste a lot of time before saying, “Out with it.”
“It was for your own good,” I said.
“I doubt that.”
I waited until we were safely away from anyone coming in or out of the HQ to tell her.
“After we paid that visit to Fenton’s cousin Mike Gilliam, an envelope showed up in my mailbox, and like I told Edith, nothing inside but a single page.”
She didn’t bother asking the next question, so I didn’t insult her by holding back the answer.
“It was a copy of a bill from Edith’s veterinarian,” I said. “It covered the three days her cat was being treated for some intestinal blockage.”
“On one of those days her husband went out the window,” she said.
“Gilliam probably figured I’d get there eventually, so he did what he could and hoped for the best. If I’d showed you that invoice, you’d be obligated to bring it forward. Not an ideal way for a defense lawyer to build rapport with the district attorney’s office. Anyway, like I said, I want Edith to make the decision herself, either way.”
“This is what Veckstrom and Oksana had waiting as an October surprise,” she said. “Leaking Edith’s grief counseling was just a shot across the bow.”
“I’m guessing Oksana was the only person outside Gilliam’s squad who knew the truth. When Veckstrom approached her, she knew she held the ticket to paradise.”
Jackie absorbed all that for a moment, then asked, “How do these sociopaths manage to find each other?”
“Secret handshake?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Edith Madison wasn’t the only one moved to issue an apology. At least mine was more sincerely felt, consumed as I was by self-reproach. On the way back to Oak Point, I ran through the usual string of what-ifs, beginning with my full-out quest to uncover Alfie Aldergreen’s killers. The way I made myself a conspicuous target, hoping to draw fire, to force an error by the opposing team.
Instead I managed to get my beautiful daughter beaten up and nearly killed, the person whose safety and well-being was to me the most cherished in the world.
I’d piled up a pretty big mountain of regret and remorse over the years, but this time it felt like the thing had grown big enough to topple over and bury me forever.
Allison would have none of it. Neither would anyone else after I’d gathered the Oak Point crowd out on Amanda’s patio to break the latest news. I had to listen to my daughter and Amanda, well supported by Joe Sullivan, beat me nearly senseless with claims of my good intentions and admirable tenacity, until I had to concede a few points to get them to knock it off.
After that the vodka, wine, and wet, early autumn breeze off the Little Peconic worked their sorcery and all talk turned to the happily inconsequential.
This worked out well until I got a call from Jackie Swaitkowski, who’d heard from Ross Semple moments before. Apparently when Lionel Veckstrom failed to show up as scheduled at his house, the uniforms went to look for him, an easy job since he’d never left the hotel room his people had booked Up Island to plot his ongoing campaign strategy.
They found him in the bathtub with a bullet in his head, delivered by his service weapon through the soft tissue under his jaw, which an experienced cop like Veckstrom would know was the surest way to commit a successful suicide.
It turned out that Oksana used her phone call in the interrogation room to alert him that disaster was on its way, rather than contact her attorney, which in hindsight was the better choice. There was plenty of time to secure representation, but only that moment to effectively claw her partner in venality into the abyss that awaited her.
What should have been a triumph for Edith Madison turned out to be a crisis for the New York State Board of Elections, after Edith withdrew from the race stating that the grief caused by her husband’s death had, in fact, affected her more than she realized, and thus she no longer felt confident in her ability to fulfill her duties as Suffolk County district attorney.
So the governor appointed an interim DA, and the board scheduled a special election on a date agreed upon by the two parties, who had a bitch of a time scrounging up viable candidates.
None of whom I knew, which I hoped was a good thing.
I only heard this on the radio, having no interest in the proceedings, preoccupied as I was with my healing daughter, goofy dog, self-contained girlfriend, and the capricious acts of nature enacted daily over the sacred Little Peconic Bay.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’m deeply grateful to my military counsel, who not only provided technical verisimilitude but had a material impact on the story itself, and the development of several key characters. My brother, Lieutenant Colonel Whit Knopf, US Army Reserve, Retired, helped me with various details and nomenclature, and importantly, put me in touch with Colonel Christopher Carney, also of the USAR, who saw active duty in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Afghanistan; and his son, Captain Shannon Carney, a 1994 West Point graduate, who served five years in command of a platoon of Bradley Fighting Vehicles in the Republic of Korea.
Invaluable help with crime scenes and the people who inhabit them (dead and alive) was provided by Michelle Clark, Medicolegal Death Investigator with the Connecticut Medical Examiners Office, and an inspiration to crime writers across New England. Other insights into police practice and procedure came courtesy of Connie Dial, mystery novelist and former journalist, undercover narcotics investigator, and commanding officer of LAPD’s Hollywood Division, and Lieutenant Art Weisgerber, of the Norwalk Police Department Crime Scene Unit.
In the colorful English-accent department, thanks to Matt Hilton, mystery writer and Cumbrian lad in good standing with the Geordies. And for all-out translation, thanks to adman Erkan Kurt, adviser on all matters involving Turkish tough-guy expletives.
Back stateside, legal adviser (strictly fictional) Rich Orr again helped quite a bit on what you can and cannot do within the law, as well as what you can and cannot get away with in the political realm.
Psychologist Dr. Mark Braunsdorf informed the passages relating to mental illness—behaviors, attitudes, and the professional world that surrounds it all.
Food and beverage maven, and former stinkpot operator, Tim Hannon, gave some excellent insights into illicit transport behaviors among the marine trade, as well as alternative applications of certain kitchen implements.
Additional nautical support was provided by Kip Wiley and Chick Michaud, service managers at Brewer Pilots Point Marina in Westbrook, CT.
Thanks for the briefing on student life at Rhode Island School of Design by graduates Jane Cleary, graphic designer at the Chrysler Museum, and Shana Aldrich Ready, of the “Ropes of Maine” nautical bracelets.
Any errors or misrepresentations anywhere in the book are the author’s responsibility alone.
Special thanks to my esteemed presubmission readers Jill Fletcher, Sean Cronin, Randy Costello, Leigh Knopf, Mary Jack Wald, and Bob Willemin, who work hard to keep me out of editorial trouble. And of course Marty and Judy Shepard and their exemplary Permanent Press team, notably copy editor Barbara Anderson, cover designer Lon Kirschner, and production artist Susan Ahlquist.
And as always, thanks to my wife, Mary Farrell, whose brace of Lakeland Terriers does so much to focus a writer’s concentration.