The Wrong Side of Dead sj-2

by Jordan Dane

  “Mr. Jenkins is on the second floor. Number 204.” The woman smiled and pointed down the hall. “The elevators are to your right. And you’ll find signs upstairs to help you locate his room. Is there anything else I can do for you?”

  “Actually, I’d like to speak to someone about Uncle Max. One of his nurses maybe. I live out of town, and this is my first visit. I’d like to get an update.”

  “Then you’ll want to speak to Bernice Withers. She’s the second-floor nurse on duty. Her station is by the elevators. You can’t miss it.”

  “Thanks.”

  When Jess got to the second floor, she found the nurses’ station, but no one was there. That left her only one option. She took a deep breath and went looking for room 204, Max’s room. When she got there, his room was empty, but that didn’t stop her from looking around.

  She wandered in and checked the view from his window, noticing his room faced the front entrance, a convenient situation for the stakeout she had planned. Even though seeing Max had been a huge part of why she’d come, the other reason for her visit left her feeling guilty. Jess had come to track down his son. And no amount of justifications or sugarcoating would change that fact.

  “Excuse me. Can I help you?” A woman’s voice. Jess turned to see a nurse at the door.

  The nurse wore a name tag, and Jess smiled when she saw it. Bernice had found her—a sturdy woman in white uniform and sensible shoes. She looked to be in her forties, with short brown hair streaked with gray. And she had a no-nonsense expression with the twinkle of good humor in her blue eyes—a face easy to trust.

  “Yes, I’ve come to see Uncle Max. Is he here? I just got to town and wanted to see him before I headed out again.”

  “I’m Bernice, honey. What’s your name?”

  “I’m Michelle. Hi.”

  “Michelle, come with me, dear. I took him to the dayroom. I’ll show you where it is.”

  Jess accompanied the woman down a corridor toward a large sunny room at the end of the hallway. She took advantage of their time together by asking Bernice about Harper.

  “I was hoping to see his son Seth while I was here. Has he been in lately?” She took the risk that this woman hadn’t seen Harper’s booking photo in the paper, but she’d know soon enough.

  “You know, he missed last week, and that’s not like him. He comes every Friday, the last visiting hours of the day.” She smiled. “I told him once that his father isn’t aware of his punctuality, but he always said he wanted Max to count on him. Something about a promise to his father that he wanted to keep. I never had kids, but if I knew mine would turn out like that boy, I might’ve reconsidered.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean.”

  Jess wondered how badly Seth wanted to keep the promise he’d made to his father. Getting arrested for murder had mucked up his last visit. And the cops seeking Harper as a person of interest in a second killing had “train wreck” written all over this week’s visit. And black humor aside, Harper would probably avoid daytime hours as too big a risk. To play it safe, she’d made up her mind to stake out the nursing home at night for as long as it took.

  One thing she knew to count on was Harper’s loyalty. He’d told her once never to question it, that some things about him never changed. Of course at the time he was talking about his peculiar devotion to all things Jerry Springer, but she knew he’d intended to make a point, and she totally got it.

  People who mattered to Harper got his full attention—the legacy of a father’s unintentional neglect.

  Bernice led her across an airy room of sofa and chair groupings, card tables, and two televisions set to low. Windows along the far wall looked onto the grounds behind the nursing home, a pristine setting. Other residents took advantage of the inviting room and the view.

  But one man in a wheelchair captured her attention. It had to be Max.

  He sat alone, staring out a window. His body twitched and moved, and he muttered words she couldn’t hear. When she got close enough, his frailty shocked her. She remembered, as a child, being carried in his strong arms and hearing the comforting reassurance of his voice. It was all her young traumatized mind had grasped.

  Time had changed everything—for both of them.

  “Max, you’ve got a visitor.” Bernice raised her voice to make sure he heard. And to Jess, she gave advice. “It helps not to expect too much, honey. He’s got good days and bad. But you have a nice visit.”

  She waited until Bernice walked away.

  “Hello, Max.” She knelt in front of him and touched his hand. Nothing about this man triggered her recollection of his face until she looked into his eyes. Then it all came back in a rush, a flicker of images that connected.

  “You may not remember me, but I sure as hell can’t forget you. You’re the man who saved my life. My name’s Jessica Beckett. You used to call me little Jessie, remember?”

  For a brief instant, she saw recognition in his eyes. And he stopped his fidgeting and looked straight at her. But as quickly as their connection came, it faded away when his eyes glazed over again. Maybe it was only wishful thinking on her part that it had been there at all.

  Undaunted, she pulled up a chair and began to talk—without a plan and without any expectation he’d understand. She would search for the words to explain what it meant to see him again and how things had been for her, then and now. And Jess wanted to tell him about his incredible son.

  She hoped he would hear her.

  10:15 P.M.

  The stakeout looked to be a bust. Harper was a no-show, and the nursing home would soon shut its doors for the night. Jess finished the last of her cold coffee and stretched her aching back one more time. She’d moved the van down a side street and now sat steeped in the murky shadows of her vehicle. A bruise on her cheek throbbed with an aching heat, the aftermath of Pinzolo’s message from Nadir Beladi.

  But Jess killed time by replaying the afternoon she’d spent with Harper’s father.

  It had been a long day. Emotionally draining yet cathartic. Jess had told Max things she hadn’t even admitted to herself, knowing the one-way conversation had all the privacy of confessing to a priest. At the end of her visit, she had no delusions the truth would set her free, but it felt like a step in the right direction.

  When she was a kid, the counseling sessions provided by the state had seemed like nothing more than a requirement, a box for an adult to check on a form. She preferred silence and isolation to the lip service of a state-provided psychiatrist. But after all these years, she felt ready to reopen the wounds that had never healed because talking to Max had been her choice.

  The rush of emotions, old and new, had been instigated by Seth’s impact on her life. She was still grappling with those feelings when she noticed movement at the entrance to the nursing home. With binoculars, she confirmed the night nurse had shut the front doors for the evening. Visiting hours were officially over, and Harper hadn’t made an appearance. She took a deep breath and reached for the key dangling in the ignition to give it a turn when her cell phone rang.

  “Yeah.”

  Without any semblance of a greeting, Alexa got down to it. “You do realize I still have that tracking beacon on your van, right?”

  Jess started to smile, but the effort hurt too much. “Yeah, I kind of like you knowing. You’re my anchor to a saner world.”

  “That’s a scary thought,” she said. “What’s so fascinating? You’ve been in one spot for hours.”

  “And you apparently have no life. Who’s worse off?” She sighed, and added, “I’m parked outside a nursing home.”

  “You catch many bail jumpers in the blue-hair set?”

  She would have made an effort to laugh, but she didn’t want to encourage her. “No, my money is on Harper keeping a promise. And I want to be here when he does. What’s up?”

  “I received an encrypted file for the background checks and financials you requested. I’ve been digging into them today. You want the short
version?”

  She hoped having more information on Beladi, Burke, and Mandy would leave bread crumbs to follow. Harper could use a break.

  “Yeah. Short works.”

  “As you might have guessed, the smoker is cagey. We had to modify our searches to only his last name, and we found links to a series of corporations. Sleaze goes Wall Street. If I had to speculate, I’d say the man has family. And he’s been generous doling out his assets for the legitimate side of his enterprises, a way to launder his more lucrative business dollars.”

  “You’ve got a list of assets I can see?”

  “Yeah, I’ll send you what I’ve got. Give me an e-mail address.”

  Jess gave her what she needed. And as curious as she was to see the material, she wouldn’t sneak a peek via her high-tech cell phone. These documents would require downloading and quality time for her to focus on each page.

  “Hard to imagine Mandy hitting this guy up for cash.”

  “Yeah. Now that’s a scary thought.”

  Nadir Beladi certainly had the maliciousness and the deadly connections to be the bastard behind Harper’s frame job. But why? Had Mandy been stupid enough to blackmail him and drag Harper into her mess, guilt by association? Sure the smoker had deep pockets, but someone like Beladi would squash her like a roach underfoot. And he’d get Pinzolo to do the dirty work. She’d seen that firsthand.

  Jess had a hard time imagining the self-destructive nerve it would have taken for Mandy to demand money from the smoker. But good sense was the first casualty when it came to drug addiction. More than likely, the crank did the thinking and talking for her.

  “I’m thinking aloud here, but what would Mandy have on Mister Nicotine?” Alexa asked. “It wouldn’t take much for a guy like him to kill her. He doesn’t need a reason. Did she witness something that made her a target?”

  “Could be. And Pinzolo looks like a guy who’d have a tattoo. Body art would be an improvement to butt ugly.” Thinking of him made her ache all over. “Anything on Mandy?”

  “No, not much. She wasn’t exactly living on the grid like you and me. Well, like me,” she corrected. “I figured she did everything on a cash basis. Not much of a trail, and nothing current, but Burke is another story, one of the reasons this couldn’t wait for morning.”

  More lights blinked off at the nursing home. And security lights kicked on.

  “What’s up with Nipple Rings?”

  “He’s not a financial wizard. No surprise there. But if he’s got cash stashed, it’s not showing on his bank statements or being reported to the IRS, which could be a nice club for the feds to wield if we find out otherwise. A couple of steady payments do stand out. Automatic debits. Nipples has a safe-deposit box and a storage unit he’s maintaining.”

  “Nice. We won’t get close to the safe-deposit box, but that storage unit is another story.”

  “That’s what I was thinking. And with him under wraps for forty-eight hours with the cops, I thought we could check it out. I dug up the address for the facility.”

  “The address is one thing, but unless you’ve got a unit number…”

  “You’re gonna have to trust me on this one, but I’ve got his number. I just can’t tell you how I got it. So if you can spare a few hours off geezer patrol to break and enter, you can meet me.” Alexa gave her the address. “And gloves are the new black. Bring ’em if you’ve got ’em.”

  “No problem. I’m on my way,” she said, indulging in a smile as she ended the call and hit the ignition. “Harper…until tomorrow, my fine friend.”

  Luís Dante remembered one important thing about Seth Harper from the bail hearing—he had an old man who meant something to him—Detective Max Jenkins—someone he might risk coming to see at the Golden Palms Villa Nursing Home. Checking out the nursing home would be worth a shot since he’d come up empty on Harper’s background. And being a private investigator, he knew how to research the kid’s visiting routine, if he had one. Earlier, Luís had called the nursing home to ask about Harper’s father over the phone, getting his room number on the pretense of sending flowers, which he did. The cheapest batch of carnations he could find. The administrative staff had been very accommodating, especially when it came to the kid’s visiting pattern.

  Not taking anything for granted, Luís also had done his homework on the Millstone case by searching newspaper archives and making copies to read later. His client might appreciate his initiative if he found something worthwhile in the old news articles.

  Now all that remained to track Seth Harper was setting up a vigil both day and night outside the nursing home. Since the kid was more savvy than he’d first thought, he’d have to play it smart if and when he got a second shot at him.

  But near dusk, Luís spotted an ugly blue van when he first staked out the facility after cruising side streets looking for a good surveillance spot. From a distance, he’d taken a few discreet photos as he sat in his car. A woman sitting alone had caught his eye, but when she stayed parked, it made him wonder enough to ask for help from an old buddy.

  “Yo, Frankie. How’s it going?” He chatted up his cop friend, a guy he’d known since high school, and caught up on family and sports until he got down to business. “Can I get you to run me a tag, pendejo?”

  “Sure, dickweed. Shoot.”

  He gave his friend the tag number for the blue van. After a few minutes, his old pal Frankie came back with the make and model of the vehicle.

  “It’s registered to Seth Harper at Pinnacle Real Estate Corporation. You need the address?”

  “Yeah, give it to me.” After he took down the information, he asked, “You sure the van isn’t registered to some chick? Maybe it’s a company vehicle, but if that’s so, business must not be good. It’s a piece of crap, bro.”

  “Hey, you asked for the registration, I gave it. You need anything else?”

  “Nada. That’ll do it.” And with a grin, he added, “Give a kiss to that beautiful wife of yours for me. Use some tongue. She likes that.”

  “And if you had a woman, I’d have more to say than fuck off, Dante. Later, bro.”

  After the call ended, he puzzled over why a woman would be camped out at the nursing home and driving Seth Harper’s van. Luís kept watch at the location through the evening, looking for the kid and maintaining surveillance on the blue van. The longer the woman stayed, the more she fueled his curiosity.

  “What are you up to, chica?” he muttered, snapping a few night shots to give a time reference.

  Now he had more to say to his client than merely reporting the van color. And he had a feeling he’d be coming into bonus money if he worked it right. The man answered on the second ring and wasn’t pleased to hear about the added wrinkle.

  “A blue van?” the man asked.

  “Yeah, she’s still here,” Luís said. “But vehicle registration is under Seth Harper. And there’s more.”

  He told his client about Harper’s connection to the old Danny Ray Millstone case, even reading some of the news articles over the phone. The man sounded pleased by what he’d found.

  “So what do you want me to do?” he asked.

  “She may lead you to Harper. Use your judgment, but your priority is the same. Find him. And call me when you know where he is.”

  The man ended the call, leaving it up to him to decide what to do where the woman was concerned. So when she started her vehicle, Luís followed and gave her plenty of room. He didn’t want to lose her or give himself away. But the mystery surrounding Seth Harper deepened.

  And his new case just got more interesting.

  South Chicago

  11:20 P.M.

  Burke had a commercial storage unit near the Dan Ryan Expressway off 87th Street. Located amid a cluster of warehouses and local businesses, it was a middle-of–the-road unit. Not too high-end to make his brand of sleaze stand out as a patron, but upscale enough to have decent security measures. The units had video cameras and were gated with keycard acces
s at the entrance and at each unit.

  From experience, she knew such facilities gave after-hours and weekend access upon request. But with her twenty-four/seven five-finger skills, she didn’t have to worry about that. All she had to do was figure a way in and not get caught in the flesh or on digital.

  Alexa pulled behind her van, no doubt aided by her active tracking beacon, and joined her in the front seat. She dumped a knapsack on the floorboard and slipped on a pair of black gloves and a stocking cap to cover her blond hair. But after getting a good look at Jessie’s bruised face, the woman had plenty to say.

  “You look pretty rough. And I know you’re not getting enough sleep.” She turned to face her. “Tracking your friend may take time. You gotta pace yourself.”

  “I’ll sleep when I’m dead.” She looked across the street, avoiding the woman’s stare.

  “Suit yourself.” The blonde got down to business. “Burke doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who’d lease a unit like this. He must have something worth stealing to pay the extra bucks, which I’m expecting to find a little ironic by the time we’re done.”

  “Yeah, I was thinking the same.” She retrieved the night-vision binoculars from her glove compartment and checked out Burke’s storage facility. “Looks like we’ll have the place to ourselves. I don’t see anyone else on the property, but video poses a problem. It might limit our time.”

  “Not so, grasshoppa.” Alexa rummaged through the rucksack at her feet and pulled out her gear. “I’ve got countersurveillance to take out the video. We won’t have all night, but whoever is monitoring will think it’s a power outage, at least for a while.”

  “Slick.” Jess tied back her hair and tugged on her gloves. “I saw one of those on eBay.”

  “And I’ve got a device to plug into every keycard lock. It’ll pop it in seconds. No climbing over the gate or crowbars.” Now the blonde was just showing off.