Carat Capers

by Dan Kelly

  “I agree with you, but slips of the tongue do happen,”

  “Now who’s the worrier?”

  Turning his back on Amos, he says nothing and heads for the den and the TV. “Wait a minute, Felix. We have another matter to deal with. What about Jacob’s house and other assets? What’s going to happen to them? He has no living relatives that I’m aware of. Another point in both Abe’s and Ramon’s favor is neither one asked me why Jacob wasn’t involved in what we are doing. They not only know how to keep their mouths shut, they’re not nosy either.”

  Felix says, “Jacob wasn’t into owning a lot of things, except for cash. He just bought his house a year ago with a minimum down payment, so there’s not much equity in the place. He got tired of dealing with landlords always raising his rent and not returning his phone calls when something needed fixing and he liked the idea of getting some tax write offs. Otherwise, he’d never have bought it. Let the bank repossess it. There’s no need for us to get involved.”

  “Okay, things are falling into place rather nicely. All that’s left for us to deal with now is boredom. What are we going to do with ourselves for the next three months cooped up most of that time in this house?”

  “We still have to come up with a safe way to get the ruby to Pierre. After that, I don’t have any idea what we can do to keep from going stir crazy. I guess we’ll just have to leave that up to providence. Something will pop up.”

  Little do they know that Mickey intends to take care of that problem for them. If he has his way, something is definitely going to pop up.

  Chapter 55

  Thanksgiving Day can’t go by fast enough for Mickey. He’s chomping at the bit to put his ideas into action. Although he’s enjoying himself with his family and his mom has outdone herself with the dinner, he can’t keep his mind off what he has to accomplish tomorrow. His sister Cheryl senses something is bothering him and while his mother, aunts and cousins are helping clean up after the fabulous meal and his father and uncles are in the living room talking about sports, politics and just about anything else they can think of to good naturedly argue about she manages to get him off alone to give him the third degree like only a sister can.

  “Okay bro. What’s bugging you?”

  “Nothing that can’t wait until tomorrow. Let’s just sit back and enjoy these nuts we call family.”

  “Mickey, don’t stonewall me. Whatever is on your mind is ruining this holiday for you. Talking about it might help salvage some of the day for you.”

  “If I do, it’s going to take off some of the shine off the day for you too.”

  “Hey, that’s what being brothers and sisters is all about. We share the smooth sailing days as well as those with troubled waters. Give it up.”

  Mickey unloads everything that has transpired since they’ve last talked and then hits her with his plan to panic them into a frenzy and hopefully into the clink. “I want to mess with their minds so much it’ll take a dozen shrinks a dozen years to bring them out of the trees I’m planning to drive them up.”

  “I can help you with freezing their assets and Chuck should be able to help you find those assets. You already have their home addresses so that’s a good start. Once you have a list of what you want to freeze, pass it on to me and I’ll prepare the brief for a judge I know who goes out of his way to make things a little easier for the DA’s office.

  “I can’t help you with the rest of what you want to do. You’re going to have to hope Vicki can convince her advertising friend to join the party and the NYPD is going to have to come through with the rest. It’s going to take some fancy talking to convince the FBI to jump on board, but if you can show them that you have everything else lined up they just might lend you a helping hand.

  “As for finding an investigative reporter who’ll put some added spin on the ball you’ll be throwing done the alley, it’s a good idea, but I don’t know any reporters of any kind nor do I know anybody that does. I think on that score you’re going to have to hope some newshawk’s curiosity gets sufficiently piqued to join the fray on his/her own. From what I’ve heard about reporters, they’d rather have exclusivity than be one of many journalists pursuing the same threads of a story.”

  “Thanks for your input and willingness to help, Cheryl. If this is to work, I’ve got to get everyone to sign on and complete their assignment in the next few days or it might be too late to do any good. If I were them, I’d be planning to get out of the country as soon as possible. If they manage to do that before I can get my act together, I’m up the proverbial creek without a paddle.”

  “Mickey, I think you’ll do it. You’ve got the determination and some terrific people on your team already. The first thing tomorrow morning get everyone moving on what you need from them. Stress the urgency, although I’m sure they know the need for speed already, and while they’re doing their thing you can be informing Captain Clancy on what you’re up to and perhaps he or someone he knows has a contact at the FBI who can tell you who to call to ask for assistance. This will speed things up for you when Vicki and Chuck get back to you with what you need from them.”

  “Thanks for the encouraging words, sis and thanks again for your willingness to get involved.”

  Their clandestine chat is brought to an abrupt halt by their Dad yelling for them from the living room. “Cheryl, Mickey, where have you two gone off to? Come in here and tell your Uncle Joey that pigeons, homing pigeons, any kind of pigeons are carriers of all kinds of diseases that don’t just make you sick; they can kill you. He’s claiming there are some pigeons that are as clean as a cat.”

  Cheryl, with an unbelieving look on her face whispers, “Pigeons? How do they come up with this stuff to argue about? On the Fourth of July it was Cousin Tony claiming wearing hats causes baldness.”

  Laughing, Mickey says, “This is going to be good for at least an hour and no matter what anyone says, as usual, there will be no outright winners. No one ever admits he’s wrong no matter how strong the facts are to refute their position.”

  “You’ve got to admit though that some of the outrageous claims made to support a position can be hilarious.”

  “Our relatives certainly are creative when it comes to throwing the manure around.”

  They join the crowd in the living room and almost instantly Mickey forgets what will be facing him tomorrow, at least for a couple of hours. Cheryl’s thinking, “If I could find a way to bottle the therapeutic qualities of the Morretti family gatherings, I’d be a very rich woman. Enjoy, Mickey. It’ll put you in the right frame of mind for what lies ahead tomorrow. You’re gonna get these guys. They have no idea what they took on when they took on a Morretti. Go get ’em bro.”

  Chapter 56

  Early Friday morning Mickey is up before the pigeons they were arguing about for over two hours last night. He was in his office before seven, had left messages on Chuck’s and Vicki’s voice mail to get cracking ASAP by seven ten and by seven thirty had prepared his agenda for the day which includes convincing Captain Clancy he isn’t delusional about his chances of getting these people to screw up big time without appearing to be trying to bamboozle him.

  One of the things Mickey has on his agenda is to call in some favors from his counterparts in other police departments along the East Coast along with approaching the other members of the joint task force for their input. He’s also going to coordinate a joint effort between himself and others to get a lock on Feldman’s and Kadden’s assets.

  By eleven o’clock, things are starting to come together. Surprisingly, after doing his dog and pony show for the Captain, he received no static from him whatsoever, a sure sign of abject desperation, but Mickey figures if their roles were reversed he’d be grasping at any life line that was tossed his way too. His counterparts he’s been able to reach have jumped at the chance to play a role in driving these guys over the brink of caution and their eagerness gave a big boost his morale.

  Vicki has called in to say her friend is
already contacting clients to ask them to put some pressure on the media to run the BOLOs on a saturation basis and has already received some positive answers. Chuck called in to report he has found some residential rental property, some commercial real estate property, a cabin cruiser, a private plane and a half interest in a resort in Boca Raton owned jointly by the three aficionados of other peoples gems and would be forwarding the info to him shortly so he could pass it on to Cheryl.

  By noon, he has received the information from Chuck and passed it on to Cheryl. However, at two in the afternoon, his bubble of enthusiasm is burst by a call from his sister. “Mickey, these creeps have outmaneuvered you again. All of the assets on the list you emailed me have been sold within the last ten days, including the houses of Felix Feldman and Amos Kadden. Jacob Kessner’s house is in probate and will probably be repossessed by the bank holding the paper.”

  “Do you know who handled the sale of the property?”

  “It appears that some real estate investment firm was involved in a lot of the transactions and there are multiple corporations involved in the resale of same. The sale of the plane and cabin cruiser was handled by a Mr. Abraham Elliott. I’m sorry, Mickey, there’s nothing for me to do if these assets are now owned by someone else. All of the transactions appear to be legitimate.”

  “I sure would like to know where the funds from the sale of this property wound up. I might be able to freeze the balances in the accounts. I’m in the process of contacting all of the banks in Manhattan to see if I can locate where they have banking relationships. If nothing else, they most likely have a business banking relationship for the Paragon with someone local. You know, sis, I’m getting sick and tired of these guys always being a step or two ahead of me. The only shot I have left are the BOLOs.”

  Mickey pauses for a moment and then says, “I’m going to hang up now, Cheryl, because I’m going to let loose with a string of very bad words that are even going to embarrass me.”

  Hanging up, he grabs his coat and storms out of the office, hoping not to run into anybody on the way to his car. He barely manages to get into his car and slam the door before he explodes. The vituperation aimed at his enemies must have set some kind of world record and after ten solid minutes of this invective he feels cleansed of the frustration foisted upon him by these !@#$%^&*, well almost cleansed.

  Mumbling to himself, which has gotten to be a habit with him ever since these jokers entered his life, he says, “This Abraham Elliott is the only link I have with Feldman and Kadden. I think I’m going to pay this guy an unannounced visit. Maybe I can shake him up little, at least enough to loosen his tongue.”

  Mickey calls his sister back and asks her for any contact info she has on Elliott and the real estate investment firm that handled the sale of the real property. She gives him the addresses and phone numbers she has and suggests that he hold off talking with anybody until he has cooled down and he assures her that he has vented sufficiently to avoid getting arrested for assaulting anybody.

  Several surprises await him at the real estate firm. His first surprise is to find out that the head of the real estate investment firm is none other than Abraham Elliott. His second surprise is Elliott doesn’t appear to be the least bit upset to have a cop show up on his doorstep asking a lot of questions about his business affairs. The man is being selective about the questions he’s answering; some he’s answering completely, to others he’s giving evasive answers and is outright refusing to answer others. He didn’t hesitate to offer the information up front that he had a durable power of attorney to act on behalf of both Feldman and Kadden, but that’s where his full cooperation ended. He’s pretty sure Elliott is lying when he says he doesn’t know where the two men are and he’s refusing to provide details of the transactions he initiated, including the ultimate purchasers and the methods of payment and the destination of same.

  “Mr. Elliott, only their doctor or their attorney can refuse to provide personal information that they are privy to on the basis of patient/client confidentiality. Refusing to completely and truthfully answer my questions is interfering with a police investigation into numerous felonies, including murder. You can get in serious trouble if you insist on going down that road.”

  Surprise number three has him in its sights and is about to clobber him. “I’m well aware of the law, Lieutenant. You see I am an attorney and I’m Mr. Feldman’s and Mr. Kadden’s attorney, so I and they are protected from interrogation under attorney/client privilege. You’re going to have to go on a fishing expedition elsewhere.”

  “Thank you for your time, Mr. Elliott. I’m sure we’ll be talking again.”

  Leaving Elliott’s office he’s thinking, “That might give him something to think about. One good thing is going to come out of this visit. Elliott is going to tell Feldman and Kadden about it and the fact that I’m starting to close in on them should nudge their nerves a little.

  Sure enough, as soon as Mickey leaves his office Elliott is on the phone calling Kadden.

  “Amos, a homicide detective just paid me a visit asking a lot of questions about you and Felix. He’s zeroed in on your major assets and is looking for the funds from the sale of them. I knew you two were into something shady like always but murder is something I never suspected. I’m not a criminal attorney and even if I was I wouldn’t sign on to defend you in this situation. He seems to know a lot about you and is convinced you’ve committed a lot of felonious crimes and is now looking for the rope to string you up.”

  “Abe, we …….”

  “Stop right there, Amos. I don’t want to know anything about what you’ve been up to. That’s safer for both you and me. Also, as of now I’m no longer your attorney and want no further involvement with you. You will not be receiving an amended durable power of attorney from me, so you’re on your own with respect to the store lease and the inventory in the store. This Lieutenant Morretti didn’t ask any questions about your inventory, so it may still be off their radar for the time being. I will arrange for the safe to be put into storage with the rest of your stuff, but that will be the end of our relationship. I’m sorry, Amos, but you guys have gotten too deep into some serious shit that I want no part of.

  “You said this detective’s name is Morretti?”

  “I did and he’s definitely not someone I’d want to tangle with.” Abe broke the connection and Amos broke out in a cold sweat. Mickey would have been ecstatic to know that.

  Felix’s reaction to the news, however, was as though someone had just told him it was going to rain later in the day, annoying but not something to get worked up over.

  “Felix, did you hear what I just said? The cops know all about us. We’ve got to move up our plans to get out of the country or wind up in cuffs.”

  “Cool it will you Amos? No one but Abe and Ramon know where we are and they won’t rat on us. If we stay with the plan, we’ll be fine.”

  Amos is thinking, “Staying put is just like putting our heads in the sand. Even though we refuse to look at what’s coming at us, it’s still going to knock us on our asses. You can tough it out if you want to, Felix, but at the first sign of this Morretti guy on our horizon, I’m out of here.”

  Chapter 57

  By the time Mickey gets back to his office after his encounter with Abraham Elliott it is close to 4:30 in the afternoon. Before he calls it a day, he decides to have one more try at contacting the rest of his counterparts he hadn’t connected with earlier in the day. An hour later he has managed to reach everyone he wanted to talk to and they all agreed to use whatever influence they had with the local media, network affiliates and print media in their areas to participate in the BOLO blitz he was trying to put together.

  When he completes his last call, he clears his desk, which entails one large sweep with his forearm of every loose item on it into his top desk drawer except for his coffee cup which he puts in the sink in the break room, puts on his coat and heads out to his car and a weekend of doing nothing but go
ofing off.

  Vicki Valance’s advertising agency friend has other ideas however. He manages to take three steps before his phone starts to ring. “I can’t remember the last time I made a clean get away for a weekend.” “Homicide, Lieutenant Morretti speaking.”