Double Dealer ccsi-1

by Max Allan Collins

  Todd Oswalt, the slot manager, stuck his head in once to ask how it was going.

  "We're still working," Warrick said. "Still looking. Ricky's a big help-Ricky's the man."

  Ricky beamed, and Oswalt said, "Glad to hear it-was that address a help?"

  "Everything's a help, sir. But the maildrop he already abandoned. And the address he gave those people was for a street that doesn't exist."

  Blond Oswalt in his navy blue suit shook his head and tsk-tsked. "Well, best of luck, Detective Brown."

  Warrick didn't correct him. "I'm about due for some luck, sir."

  Oswalt ducked back out.

  They were five weeks back in the tapes now and Warrick wondered how many of these he should watch before he gave up. In truth, he wondered how many more of these he could take. It was like watching this bastard's boring life in reverse. On Wednesday of that week, Randall got up from his machine and disappeared off the screen. Warrick looked at the camera pointing up the main aisle-no Randall.

  "Whoa, whoa! Where'd he go?"

  Ricky shook his head as if he had been daydreaming. He swiftly scanned all the screens, finally spotting their man in the frame in the lower right hand corner.

  "He's over there," Ricky said, pointing. "Just using the ATM, is all."

  "Stop the tape," Warrick said quietly.

  The guard was back in his own world and didn't hear.

  Warrick said it again, louder. "Stop the tape, Ricky. Run it back."

  Ricky did as told.

  "That's it. We got him. Run it back."

  Sitting up a little straighter, the guard again ran the tape back. Then, in slow-motion, ran it forward. They watched as Randall-back to the camera-used the ATM again.

  "Yeah," Warrick said. "Yeah! What bank owns that ATM?"

  Ricky shrugged. "I don't use the ATM here. I'm sure Mr. Oswalt would know."

  "Get him. Please."

  It took the slot host almost ten minutes to return to the security room, but Warrick didn't care-he had a clue.

  Finally, Oswalt trudged in. "Yes, Detective Brown, what is it?"

  "What bank owns this ATM?" Warrick asked, pointing at the frame.

  "Uh, Wells Fargo. Why?"

  "Mr. Oswalt, thanks." Warrick patted the guard on the shoulder. "Ricky, muchas gracias for your help, man. And you can take that to the bank."

  "Hey, I remember that show," Ricky said, with a grin.

  But Warrick was already gone.

  11

  NICK LEANED OVER TO OPEN THE DOOR FOR SERGEANT O'Riley, who hopped into the Tahoe for the ride to Marge Kostichek's. As they rolled across town, O'Riley made a point of studying the features of the SUV. "Nice ride," he said at last.

  Nick nodded.

  O'Riley shifted his beefy frame in the seat. "Lot better than those for-shit Tauruses they make us drive."

  Stokes refused to rise to the bait. Though the crime lab unit had helped Homicide solve numerous cases, O'Riley and many of his brethren referred to the CSIs as "the nerd squad" behind their backs. Harboring a feeling that down deep O'Riley longed for the good old days when a detective's best friend was a length of rubber hose, Nick asked, businesslike, "What was that address again?"

  Pointing up ahead, O'Riley said, "Two more houses-there on the left."

  Pulling up in front of a tiny bungalow with peeling pale yellow paint and two brown dead bushes that needed removing, Nick parked the Tahoe facing the wrong way. The whole neighborhood looked as though it could use a coat of paint and some TLC. The scraggly grass was almost as brown as the bushes, and as they got closer Nick could make out where the stoop had started to draw away from the house, as if making a break for it. With O'Riley in the lead, they walked up the cracked-and-broken sidewalk and the two crumbly concrete stairs, the detective ringing the bell, then knocking on the door.

  They waited-no answer.

  O'Riley rang again, knocked again, with the same lack of success. O'Riley turned to Nick, shrugged elaborately, and just as they were turning away, a voice blared from behind them.

  "Well, you don't look like Mormons!"

  They turned, Nick saw a squat woman in a hot pink bathrobe and curlers.

  "We're with the police, ma'am," O'Riley said, holding up his badge in its leather wallet. "We'd like to talk to you."

  Waving an arm she announced, as if to the whole neighborhood, "Better get your asses in here then, 'cause I'm not staying outside in this goddamn heat!"

  With arched eyebrows, Nick looked at O'Riley and O'Riley looked at Nick; whatever unspoken animosity might been between the cop and the CSI melted in the blast-furnace of this woman's abrasive personality. Nick followed O'Riley back up to the house and through the front door, glad to let the cop take the lead.

  Little eyes squinted at them; her curlers formed a grotesque Medusa. "Don't just stand there! Close the damn door. Do I look like I can afford to air-condition the whole goddamn city?"

  "No, ma'am," O'Riley said, the idea of a rhetorical question apparently lost on him.

  Closing the door, Nick moved into the pint-sized living room next to the king-sized detective. Looking around, he couldn't help but feel he had just stepped into an antique mart-and a cluttered one at that. A maroon velvet chaise longue stood under the lace-curtained front window. Next to it, a fern stretched toward the ceiling, threatening to outgrow its pot. The room also contained two tall cherry end tables with doilies on them, a nineteen-inch TV on a metal stand, and the oversized Barcalounger tucked in a corner. In the opposite corner was a writing desk, and everywhere were stacks of things-TV Guides, women's magazines, antiquing newsletters, newspapers, mail.

  O'Riley, rocking on his feet, said, "Are you Marge Kostichek?"

  "That's the name on the mailbox, isn't it? Aren't you a detective?"

  "I'm Detective O'Riley," he said, either ignoring or not recognizing the sarcasm, "and this is CSI Nick Stokes."

  "Cee ess what?"

  Nick amplified: "Crime Scene Investigator."

  "Why, is it a crime to be a goddamn slob, all of a sudden?"

  "No, ma'am," O'Riley said, flummoxed. "What I mean is, ma'am-"

  "Let me see that goddamn badge again. You can't be a real detective."

  Flustered, O'Riley was reaching for the badge when the woman grabbed his arm.

  "I'm just pulling your pud, pardner." She laughed and various chins wiggled. "A big dumb boy like you couldn't be anything but a cop."

  Nick had to grin. In spite of himself, he was starting to like this cranky old woman, at least when she wasn't on his ass.

  "We'd like to ask you some questions," O'Riley said.

  "I didn't figure you stopped by to read the meter."

  Listening, Nick began to prowl the room-just looking around, stopping at this pile of magazines and mail and that, snooping. It was his job.

  O'Riley was saying, "We'd like to ask you about Swingers."

  "Oh, Jesus Christ on roller skates," she said, plopping into the Barcalounger. "I've been outa the skin racket for years now. I figured this was about that damned dog, two doors down! Goddamned thing won't shut the hell up. Bark, bark, bark, all the time, yapp, yapp, yapp. Isn't there a law against that crap?"

  "Well . . . " O'Riley said.

  "Actually," Nick said, back by the writing desk, "we're here about a girl who used to dance at your club."

  "Just make yourself at home, good-looking. You gotta pee or something?"

  "No, ma'am."

  "Are you nervous? Why don't you light in one place?"

  "Yes, ma'am. About that girl, at Swingers . . ."

  She waved a small pudgy hand. "Been a lot of them over the years. Hundreds. Hell, maybe thousands. They don't keep their looks long, y'know-small window, for them to work."

  From the file folded in half in his sport-coat pocket, O'Riley pulled out the photo of Joy Starr and handed it to the woman.

  Nick noticed her lip twitch, but she gave no other outward sign that she might recognized the girl.
/>   "Joy Starr," O'Riley prompted.

  Ms. Kostichek shook her head. "Don't remember this one."

  Interesting, Nick thought: suddenly no wise-ass remark.

  O'Riley pressed. "About sixteen years ago."

  She shook her head some more.

  "Her real name was Monica Petty. She disappeared . . ."

  Marge Kostichek cut him off. "A lot of them disappeared. Here one night, gone the next. Met some guy, did some drug, had a baby, overdosed, here a sad story, there a happy ending, they all had one or the other. So many little girls with nothing but a body and face to get 'em somewhere, hell-how could I remember 'em all?"

  Nick, still poised at the writing stand, said, "But you do remember this girl."

  The old woman looked at Nick and suddenly her face froze, the dark eyes like buttons. "Why don't you come closer, Handsome? Where I can hear you better?"

  The better to see you with?

  Something about this "granny" struck Nick funny-and something told him he was standing right where he needed to be. . . .

  "I'm okay here, ma'am," Nick said. "The detective asks the questions."

  The eyes tightened; something was different in that face now. "I musta been dreamin', then, babycakes, when you asked me that shit?"

  O'Riley said, "Please take another look at the picture, Ms. Kostichek."

  Giving it only a cursory glance, she said, "Don't know her, I said. Said I didn't, and I don't-if she worked for me fifteen, sixteen years ago, why the hell are you askin' about her now?"

  Nick, without turning, glanced down at the writing desk. Numerous piles of opened letters, back in their envelopes, were stacked here and there, overlapping, haphazard. Private correspondence, bills, even junk mail . . .

  The woman thrust the photo out for O'Riley to take; he did. "Why are you digging up ancient history, anyway?" she asked. Almost demanded.

  Nick didn't handle a thing-but his eyes touched the envelopes on the desk.

  O'Riley said, "Her name has come up in the investigation of another case."

  A cloud crossed the old woman's features and disappeared. But if she wondered what that case was, she didn't ask.

  O'Riley cleared his throat. "Well, thank you for your time, Ms. Kostichek."

  On the far side of the desk, barely within his eyes' reach, he saw it: a letter postmarked in Los Angeles, the name on the return address . . .

  . . . Joy Petty.

  Nick froze, only for an instant, then turned back to the frumpy, feisty woman. "Yes, thank you, ma'am."

  "Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out, fellas," she said.

  He followed O'Riley, as they let themselves out, O'Riley pulling the door shut behind them. Inside the Tahoe, Nick put the key in the ignition, but made no move to start the vehicle.

  "Something on your mind, Nick?"

  He turned to the detective. "She's lying."

  With a shrug, O'Riley smirked, said, "You think? That old broad wouldn't give a straight answer to a Jeopardy! question."

  "I don't think, Sarge-I know."

  The creased face under the trim crew cut tightened with interest. "How?"

  "Her mail. You see all those piles here and there and everywhere?"

  "She's a pack rat-so what?"

  "So back on that writing table, on top of one of those piles, was a letter from a 'Joy Petty.' What do you suppose the odds are that she knows a Joy Petty who isn't also the Joy Starr whose real name is Monica Petty?"

  O'Riley's eyebrows had climbed. "I think the odds are we're goin' right back up there, right now."

  "Can we do that?"

  "Was the letter out in plain sight?"

  "Oh yeah."

  "Then watch and learn, bucko."

  O'Riley was out of the SUV and going back up the sidewalk before Nick could pull the keys from the ignition. The CSI trotted to catch up, the pissed-off detective already ringing the bell, then throwing open the screen door and knocking on the inside door before Nick even got to his side. Just then, Marge Kostichek jerked the door open.

  "What now?" she bellowed. "We already gave!"

  "That's what you think, lady." Getting right in her face, O'Riley bellowed back, "Why the hell did you lie to us?"

  She backed up, inadvertently making room for both men to re-enter the house.

  O'Riley glared at her, saying to Nick. "Show me."

  Pulling on a latex glove even as he moved, Nick went to the writing desk and picked up the top letter on the stack of mail.

  "Hey," she shouted, "you can't do that! That's private property! Where's your warrant?"

  "Evidence in plain sight, ma'am," O'Riley said. "We don't need a warrant."

  Nick came over to the hair-curled harridan and held up the letter from Joy Petty for her to see. "You want to explain this to us?"

  The old woman took a step back, then stumbled over to her Barcalounger and sat heavily down, with an inadvertant whoopee-cushion effect. It might have been funny if she hadn't been crying.

  Sara Sidle and ponytailed Detective Erin Conroy caught up with Warrick in the lobby of the Wells Fargo branch on South Nellis Boulevard. The air conditioning seemed to be set just below freezing; even though it was July in the desert, the tellers all wore sweaters.

  "I've got another shot at getting our guy," Warrick said.

  Professional in a white pants suit, Conroy lifted an eyebrow. "Is this going to be like the mailbox place?"

  He looked for evidence of sarcasm in her voice and didn't find any. "I hope not, but who knows."

  "Nice piece of work, Warrick," Sara said, meaning the ATM machine.

  "Thanks. I haven't been this lucky in a casino in a long time."

  A plumpish woman of forty sat behind the receptionist's desk talking on the phone. When they approached, she held up a finger: she'd be with them momentarily. . . . At least that's what Sara hoped she meant. In her lightweight short-sleeve top, Sara felt like she was standing in a meat locker.

  Finally, the receptionist hung up the phone and turned to Warrick as if the two women weren't even there.

  But it was Erin Conroy who held up her badge, and said, "We need to speak to whoever is in charge of ATM transactions."

  The woman checked a list on the pullout shelf of her desk. "That would be Ms. Washington." She picked up the phone, pressed four numbers and said, "Ms. Washington, there are three police officers here to speak to you." She listened for a moment, hung up, and said to Warrick, "She'll be right with you."

  Sara was seething but she didn't bother to correct the receptionist's description of all three of them as police officers.

  They'd waited less than a minute before Sara heard the staccato rhythm of high heels on the tile floor to her right and behind her. Turning, she saw a woman in a conservative black suit approaching-with expertly coifed black hair, jade eyes, and a narrow, porcelain face. The woman held out her hand to Conroy and offered all three a wide smile. "Good morning-I'm Carrie Washington. May I help you, Officers?"

  Conroy showed her credentials and shook the woman's hand. "I'm from Homicide, and Warrick Brown and Sara Sidle, here, are from the Las Vegas Criminalistics Bureau. We need to talk to you about one of your ATM customers."

  "Fine. Quite a crowd of you, for one customer."

  "Overlapping interests in our investigation," Conroy said.

  Ms. Washington clearly didn't understand a word of that-Sara barely did herself-but the woman, crisply cooperative, said, "Won't you follow me to my office?"

  In the smallish suite at the far end of a wide hallway off the lobby, Carrie Washington offered them seats in the three chairs that faced her large oak desk. A computer sat on the credenza next to it, a potted plant perched in the corner, and two picture frames were placed at the edge of her neat desk, facing away from them.

  "Now," she said, steepling her fingers. "How may I help you?"

  Conroy nodded to Warrick to take the lead. He did: "We need to know the name of one of your ATM customers."
<
br />   Ms. Washington's expression conveyed her discomfort. "I'm afraid that would be-"

  "It's quite legal," the homicide detective said, and withdrew the document from her shoulder-slung purse, and tossed the warrant onto the desk. "Judge Galvin has already authorized the action."

  The woman put on a pair of half-glasses, read the warrant. "Tell me what you need."

  "The ATM at the Beachcomber," Warrick said, "that's yours?"

  Ms. Washington frowned thoughtfully. "I can find out-but I assume you already know as much, or you wouldn't be here in such an impressive array."

  "It is your ATM," Conroy said.

  "Five weeks ago," Warrick said, reading her the date from his notes, "your machine was accessed at five thirty-nine A.M. Can you tell me who did that?"

  Typing the information into her computer, Ms. Washington said, "You're quite sure about the time?"

  Warrick nodded. "Yes, ma'am."

  "This is going to take a few minutes."

  Conroy said, "That's fine. We'll wait."

  O'Riley sat across from Marge Kostichek at the plain wooden table in the center of the interrogation room. She was no longer a sarcastic handful, rather a morose, monosyllabic interrogation subject.

  Also in the cubicle were two other chairs, one on each side of the table, a digital video camera trained on the woman and an audio tape for backup on the table. A large wall mirror-nobody was kidding anybody-was really a window with one-way glass, on the other side of which were Grissom, Catherine, and Nick, who had already filled his boss and co-worker in on why he and O'Riley thought it best to bring the former bar owner in for more questioning.

  The room they were in was small with no furniture. They stood there watching the interview in the other room.

  "He's not getting anywhere with her," Grissom said.

  "Maybe there's nowhere to get to," Catherine offered.

  "No way," Nick said. "She knows something. That letter can't be a coincidence."

  "Please," Grissom said. "Not the 'c' word."