But what she said instead was much worse.
“One way or another all of these accounts can be tracked by to this one guy, a lawyer.”
You know that one missing puzzle piece? The one your cat ate or that got stuck to your ass or sucked up by the vacuum and never found again? I think I’d just found it.
“Let me guess. Daniel Raske?”
Her breath caught.
Fergus couldn’t even lift his chin. “Oh boy.”
I looked at each of them in turn and sighed. “I know Daniel Raske. Of course he’d do this.”
For the next hour, Nice and Fergus laid out their evidence, and it did indeed point back to Daniel Raske, the slimy fuck who pimped out transsexuals in Duluth while also protecting others who were worried about coming out — like Paula, and even Hannah. He played both sides of the fence, one testicle firmly on each, to avoid getting all the bad pinned on him by the very people he catered to. He kept their secrets, they kept his.
Two of his protégés had beat the living shit out of me for asking around about Hannah once I’d seen her frozen body going back into the lake, along with my first partner. Later, when confronted, Raske had admitted to being a middleman for the relationship between Hannah and the retired — now dead — Police Chief Neudecker, but none of those scandals ever stuck to the slippery old fuck.
And now it turned out he wasn’t just supplementing his income by dealing in some good, wholesome internet porn. This sadistic ass-wipe was doing something much, much worse. The only positive aspect of all this was that I didn’t have the words to say how much worse this deviant shit was. Surely that meant there was hope yet for me to come out of this with my soul intact. But whatever the odds, I wasn’t yet willing to go silently into the night.
Nice clicked through a few more screens. “I don’t think I’m the first one to figure this out. It seems that before he died, Marquette’s brother had found out that Raske had a ‘little black book’ of clients for both a secret transsexual nightclub and for the Fancy Rooms.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“Same way I know about you. Same way I know about the Fancy Rooms. Opposition research. If you haven’t noticed, I’m pretty good with computers.”
“But still.”
“Hans Marquette sent some emails, asking about some rumors he’d heard. I have no idea where he’d heard them, but, wow, what he’d heard was pretty spot on. The only trouble was he asked the wrong people to confirm them.”
“We’re talking some deep shit here.” Fergus raised his hands as if to halt the course of history. “Does anyone really believe Hans died on the slopes? He was a great skier. It’s not like Tofte is some sort of expert mountain or anything.”
If they didn’t know, I wasn’t going to be the one to tell them, so I kept my mouth shut.
Nice shushed Fergus. “We think Hans went to the police chief in Duluth, the last one, the one who killed himself? He went to ask about Raske. Not long after, he’s gone and seconds later the chief dies. Don’t you think that’s weird?”
Time to lead them along a little. “Can you tell if Hans told his brother about any of this? Are there any emails suggesting that?”
“Well, no, but those two wouldn’t need emails. They were always talking to each other …”
“So, what you’re accusing him of is that, instead of busting Raske, or exposing him to the public right away—”
“He wanted to build a stronger case against Raske, and punish his clients all at the same time. When it happens, it’s going to be brutal.”
The glow of the computer on her face reminded me that I’d caught her on the Mac in my office. “Wait, earlier, on my computer, what were you really looking for?”
“Please, don’t change the subject.”
“I don’t think I am.”
“I already told you.”
“No, I think you know more than you’re letting on. You know that I’m staying at Hans’ old place. You know that he left it fully furnished. What did you want?”
Fergus leaned across her. “Hey, that’s enough.”
“I don’t think so.”
Inched closer. Nice pulled back. “I said stop.”
I grabbed his face with my right hand, gripped his cheeks together. “Pipe down, boy. Let the grown-ups finish talking.” Then shoved him back against the wall.
Nice patted his hands and said it was okay and asked him to go get us some Red Bull or something. Fuming, he left the room.
Then this young lady, who had built a pretty convincing front as a plain jane, aw-shucks, sort of wallflower, took the mask off. “Hans was one of the trannies from Raske’s club, you already know that, but what you don’t know is that she knew a lot more about Raske’s empire of perversion than you think she did.”
“So she already knew …”
“She found out about the Fancy Rooms and the club and all that the rest months before she started actually going. As far as I can tell, she’d come to terms with living two lives — one in public, one behind closed doors. She couldn’t risk coming out while her brother was still climbing the ladder. But when she found out about this, she used it for her own purposes.”
“Which were?”
“Andrew wanted a clear path to the governor’s mansion, but there were some potholes in the road along the way. More like craters. First, filthy-rich Christians who thought the governor should be the State’s Top Preacher. Then, of course, our own team, the Democrats, who thought Marquette was rotten all along. Hans thought she could weasel her way in and help avoid them, while also making preparations to reveal her womanly side in public. It was a nice two-for-one.”
“But?”
Nice leaned back, propped on her arms, chest thrust out, as though she was trying to reel in some poor shmuck like Fergus. I could see it working, too, just not on me, darling. I gave her an appreciative smile. “You catch on fast.”
“Always a B-plus student.”
“Yeah, I can see that, so let’s keep our eyes on the prize. What’s the one thing that Hans could’ve found out that threw it all into the shitter?”
Have you seen those movies, the ones where you watch all two hours only to find out at the end that nothing is as it seemed? All along you’re feeling pretty comfortable with what you think you know, then BANG, the last few minutes pull the rug out from under you? That’s what I was feeling. Everything about Hannah’s death that had been tied up so neat and tidy into a sad but sensible bow was quickly coming unraveled.
I ventured a guess. “Daniel Raske wasn’t in it alone. His partner was … Andrew Marquette?”
She leaned her head to the side. “Feeling sick?”
She was right. Right about then a cramp started on one side of my guts and tap-danced its way along the entire length of my large intestine.
Andrew Marquette and Daniel Raske.
Please, no.
Daniel had the network in place to bring in those big fish, make some money, and grow himself a pretty side-garden of political influence. Andrew Marquette had the money to help out, the power to protect the club and the websites, and the ambition to draw his enemies into a trap of their own desires. No wonder he’d made it this far as a Republican without any major challengers from his own party. Exactly how incestuous was this web of his? Take down one chief of staff, and the whole chain of command might go. Whisper to a woman rep that her husband was a flaming queen, or liked to watch hardcore BDSM in a Fancy Room and make requests for pretty disgusting acts … Marquette had them all by the short and curlies. The essential question then was where did his ambition and ruthlessness end? If at all?
I looked over at Nice, who seemed transformed now. A vixen. A dominatrix. I noticed that Fergus hadn’t come back with energy drinks. Maybe her request had been a code.
“So, what you were looking for was proof that Hans’ own brother was part of Raske’s empire?”
“Not part of it. The boss. Raske answers to Marquette.”
Her smile was pure-bred Cheshire Cat. “She had always wanted a way to bring her brother down. They hated each other. Andrew thought Hans was a science experiment gone wrong. Hans thought Andrew was a spoiled robot, every move in his life pre-planned by their parents, a Manchurian child.”
Another light switch in my brain clicked on. I began to worry that if any more did, the fuse box in my brain would short-circuit. “Were you really Dylan’s girlfriend?”
A blank face. “Sure.”
“But also …”
“I was the obvious choice. I went at him aggressively, introduced him to the right people, and I was the perfect go-between to collect any info he brought us on his boss. It didn’t take much for him to tell me the real stuff from the fake.”
“Jesus.” I slid off the bed and paced around it. This was too much. Too much at once. I had gotten the whole thing wrong. If this had been ‘paint by numbers’, I would’ve painted a masterpiece … with all the wrong colors in all the wrong places, just the way Andrew Marquette had wanted me to. The same way he’d …
It was just so outside the bounds of fair play. So wrong, so unthinkable.
Again: “Jesus.”
Andrew Marquette had ordered the Chief to kill Hannah. Maybe she had trusted Neudecker somehow, having no idea he was already tied into Raske’s club. Or, if Hannah already knew he was in the club and tried to use that as leverage … she had never imagined her own brother would go through with killing her.
You know that feeling you get, the one of falling in a dream? The one that wakes you up before you hit the ground? The sudden scream as you sit up in bed?
Now it made sense. All this time I’d believed Joel ‘finished the job’ in the Chief’s cottage. Believed that was one thing Marquette could hold over us if we’d ever tried to escape his circle of influence.
But I got it now. Neudecker really had been trapped. He might have taken the only out that felt right to him. Almost a sense of relief. Nice, reclining on her elbows now, legs crossed. Was she trying to seduce me? Or did all this conspiracy talk get her hot-and-bothered regardless?
“Why haven’t you told anyone yet?”
“We’ve got to have our October surprise, don’t we? It’s far too early.”
“But people’s lives are on the line here. Dylan! Konzbruck! What about them?”
“Don’t worry. We’ll get to them in time.”
“We don’t know where they are!”
She raised her eyebrow. “I know more than you think, remember? Looks can be deceiving. I’m a black hat hacker. Why don’t you get it? I’ll trade you.”
“What?”
“I’ll tell you where I think they are if you get something for me.”
I stopped pacing. Crossed my arms. “You didn’t find it on my computer.”
“You stopped me before I could finish, but I don’t think it was there.”
“What?”
“The proof. The proof that Hans had found. The proof that links Raske with Andrew. Official, unassailable proof.” She rubbed one calf against the other. “It exists. That’s the only way Hans would’ve kept going. Bring me that proof, quickly, and we can trade.”
Her voice was changing. More throaty. Cured in candle smoke and whiskey, her breaths longer, deeper.
I tried to imagine where Hannah might have hidden those files. They were nowhere to be found when she’d left those flash drives for Paula to find.
Or were they?
“I’ve got to go.”
“I take that as a yes? To our deal?”
“Yes, it’s a yes.”
“Good. Call me when you have it.”
We exchanged numbers and I was about to open the door, when she called my name and said, “Would you, um, send Fergus back in, please?”
I could only imagine what he was in for. She was ravenous. She wasn’t just going to break this kid’s heart, she was going to rip it out of the bleeding flesh of his chest with her vixen fangs and make him watch as she ate it. But not tonight, and either way, it wasn’t any of my business. Thank fuck. I nodded and turned away.
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay? You can watch. Or you can … play with us, too.”
“What about Fergus?”
A laugh. “He won’t mind. He’ll do anything I tell him to.”
I swallowed hard. “I’ve got to go.”
Turned out I didn’t have to tell Fergus anything. He’d been waiting outside the whole time, holding her Red Bull, waiting his turn.
I avoided eye contact to spare him the shame and sneaked past sleeping interns and political staffers, the people not rich or influential enough to one day run for office. The ones who did the real work. Used. Abused. Eager for more.
I couldn’t use my compromised phone, and yet it was the only lifeline I had to my new allies. For now, however, I wouldn’t give Marquette the satisfaction of letting him know where I was. So, instead of getting an Uber, I had to walk a few blocks to a hotel in order to find a few cabs hoping for a late night fare — yep, even at four in the morning — to the St. Paul HQ. If I was right and my apartment was wired for sound, then I needed to jump ship fast. I needed to get the proof Nice wanted to hand over to whoever it was she really worked for at the DFL. I needed their protection. And I needed to get in and out of Marquette’s sanctum to retrieve whatever dark secrets I could use to bring him down before anyone in the campaign got to me, because I was done here. There was no coming back from this. Andrew Marquette was a murderer, regardless of whether he had been the one to pull the trigger.
Not to mention that we’d been one of his triggers, Joel and I — if Joel had indeed taken out Neudecker, as I suspected, rather than innocently witnessed his suicide, as the official record would have one believe.
My skin vibrated. All my nerves were on edge. Maybe it was the hormones, too. The initial shock to the system of taking them. Fuck Dr. Stravinsky, fuck her opinion, fuck all that noise. I knew who and what I was better than she ever would.
I climbed out at the HQ and took one of the back entrances, which the staffers had figured out was faster than having to unlock two sets of glass lobby doors and the elevator if they stayed later or came in because they forgot their phones or purses or whatnot, or because that’s just the sort of people who work for campaigns — workaholic insomniacs.
I wasn’t he only one creeping around the HQ that night, and it wasn’t my first time, either. I’d gotten used to roaming in the shadows, so I would sometimes come up to the office at two in the morning, all alone, to do some research, homework, whatever you wanted to call it, as I learned the previous job. But I didn’t think I would have the same grace period as LGBT spokesperson — spokeswoman, say it right, Manny. In fact, I was pretty sure I’d resign by sunrise, especially if I found what Nice said I might, somewhere in the depths of our own campaign computers.
That’s where Hannah would’ve hid them.
Why they weren’t on the flash drives, I had no idea. Why Nice hadn’t been able to find them on Hannah’s own Mac, which I’d barely touched since moving in, I had no idea. But I threw some ‘detective pixie dust’ on the problem and wondered if she had thought it was too dangerous to risk it getting out. If she hadn’t had a clue that her own brother would have her killed, then where would she have hidden the real damning stuff?
Right at home, or at least at his HQ. Right under his nose. Right where Andrew kept his enemies: closer than his friends.
Unfortunately, I was no computer whiz. It occurred to me that it might have been expedient to bring Nice along to help with that. But I didn’t trust her. She was a master at the double-cross, it seemed to me, like a spy out of Le Carré. Able to change her moods, at least externally, on a dime. I wondered if she felt anything on the inside.
What if she was going for a triple-cross? What if this was a trap? I could imagine that strategy from either side right now. Everyone seemed to be looking to catch
Manny fucking up.
Off the elevator, onto my floor. We’d never bothered to really clean up much of the stacks of newspapers or leftover building supplies, all the debris from the shutdown of the newspaper that had been here before us. Rooms and rooms filled with crap. I almost laughed, knowing that here were the remains of a once important newspaper now housing a campaign hiding some Pulitzer-winning bombshells.
Through the maze of cubicles to my office. Some of those cubicles had been left unchanged from when reporters occupied them, yellowed clippings of their bylines tacked up beside cartoons in bad taste, sports schedules from a decade ago, faded inkjet printer photos. Why they didn’t take any of it when they left, or just thrown it away, I can’t tell you. And why none of us had … I don’t know. It felt like an archaeological dig. We didn’t want to mess with history.
I thought about Kristi Ferrari, wondering if she had toiled away in one of these cubicles, maybe as a junior reporter or intern before her star started to rise and the other paper in town had hired her on to keep our state’s politicians honest, or at the very least, try to squeeze a juicy quote from them.
I had waved and nodded to a few of the staffers still hanging around this time of the morning — or maybe they were in early — but closed my door once I got to my office, then rushed to the desk and fired up the computer.
We all worked on a connected network so that we didn’t end up with all sorts of drafts of speeches or statements to the press or internal info leaked to show how we worked, or to reveal that we’d worded something differently in earlier drafts. All the stuff that political reporters get wet about. We tried our best to edit everything in the cloud and keep everything centralized.
I was betting that Hannah had used that to her advantage, hiding her dangerous discovery deep and saving it for a rainy day. And while I had no clever high-tech tools to help me find the files, I thought I had learned enough about Hannah to employ some low-tech tricks.
I’d found the flash drives with the original info hidden under a pair of skis outside her cabin — now my cabin. So wasn’t it likely that she would do something similar this time around?
Castle Danger--The Mental States Page 15