Irrefutable Evidence

by Melissa F. Miller

  She’d done what she could. The rest was up to Yim.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  “You did fine,” Phillip assured Laura as they left the lawyer’s offices and navigated the narrow staircase to the first floor. “Better than fine, in fact.” He stopped at the bottom of the stairs and checked the time on his gold wristwatch. “Do you have time for lunch?”

  “No, I’m sorry, I don’t.” She braced herself for a barrage of follow-up questions asking what time her flight was and how she planned to get to the airport, but he apparently wasn’t all that interested.

  “Maybe next time.”

  “No offense, but I hope there’s not a next time.”

  He laughed at that. “Fair enough.”

  She let out a shaky breath. Her mind was racing, trying to explain away the information it had just acquired. She had to get rid of her lawyer so she could think.

  She glanced toward the entrance to the coffee shop, just a few yards away. “But I do want to get some tea, so I’ll say my goodbyes now.”

  “Oh, of course.” He shifted his briefcase into his left hand and offered her his right. “It was nice to meet you, Laura. I’ll be sure to let the folks at Mid-Atlantic know that you did a very nice job.”

  She pumped his hand and ignored the sickly, guilty feeling her plan was causing in her belly. “Thanks.”

  She watched him stride along the hallway and waited until he pushed through the heavy front door and stepped out on to the sidewalk. Once she was sure he was gone, she forced her shaky legs to carry her into the coffee shop across the hall. The small shop was nearly empty, except for a cluster of artsy-looking young guys leafing through an oversized portfolio, admiring an array of glossy black and whites. From the glimpse she caught as she passed the table, the photos appeared to be pictures of buildings taken at unusual angles, mainly extreme closeups.

  She neared the counter then hesitated, unsure if she should order. What if Sasha didn’t come down for her coffee refill? Stop it, she scolded herself.

  “What’ll it be, ma’am?” the olive-skinned girl behind the counter asked.

  “Uh, I’ll have a chai latte, please.”

  “Sure thing. Is that for here or to go?”

  “Here. No, wait, to go. Sorry.” Laura’s cheeks flamed.

  “No worries. I’ll give it to you in a to-go cup, but you’re welcome to grab a table, of course.” The girl gave her a comforting smile.

  Get a grip. Whether or not Sasha McCandless showed up, she needed to pull herself together. If the data said what Sasha claimed … She let her thoughts trail off, unwilling to follow the logic to its inevitable conclusion.

  “Here you go,” the barista chirped, plunking the cardboard cup down on the counter.

  Laura shook herself out of her musing and dug a five-dollar bill out of her wallet. As she was dropping her change into the tip jar by the cash register, she heard the sharp staccato tap of high heels against tile as someone walked into the room.

  “Hi, Vera,” a woman’s voice called out.

  Sasha McCandless. Laura willed her hands not to shake as she reached for her cup.

  “Hey, hey. You need a warm up?” Vera asked rhetorically, already reaching for the carafe of dark roast.

  “Always, V. Always.” Sasha handed her ceramic mug across the counter for her refill and turned to smile at Laura. “A little caffeine for the road?”

  Something about the way the lawyer asked the innocuous question struck Laura. Sasha knew she’d come here looking for her. She felt it in her bones. She nearly rolled her eyes at herself—feeling it in her bones? She sounded like her ancient nai nai, her ridiculously superstitious paternal grandmother. “Actually, I was hoping to run into you.”

  Sasha’s green eyes went wide for a moment. “Let’s grab a table,” she said.

  She retrieved her coffee mug from Vera and led Laura to a tiny wrought iron table jammed into a nook by the window—far enough away from the photography buffs to afford them some privacy but tucked away from the entrance. The lawyer was no dummy.

  They situated themselves. Sasha raised her mug to her lips and locked eyes with Laura. ‘Well?’ her expression seemed to say.

  Laura tapped the fingernails of her left hand against the side of her cup and replayed Sasha’s claims from the deposition in her mind.

  “Is it true—what you said about the same group of individuals paying out a hundred percent of fire claims?”

  “If the data your company provided are accurate, then yes, it’s true.”

  “The numbers are right.”

  “You sound pretty sure.”

  “I’ve sliced and diced all those numbers myself. I can’t believe … How could I have missed something that blatant?” Laura’s voice quavered, but she was powerless to stop it.

  “Listen, you weren’t looking for evidence of a crime. I mean, you weren’t, were you?”

  “Of course not. I was doing a profitability analysis. Were you looking for evidence of a crime?”

  Sasha shook her head. “No, I sure wasn’t.” She lowered her voice and leaned across the table. “I sorted all the claims arising out of the fire every way I could think of to highlight that your decision to deny the Maravaches’ claim was an outlier. I didn’t expect it to stand out as starkly as it did. But it was the only claim that was denied. And the only difference between their claim and the rest was that you were the adjuster, not James Moraine. Then when I stepped back, I saw that, historically, all the claims handled by Mr. Moraine and a consistent group of other players were paid, not just the claims stemming from the Strip District fire. Then I knew.”

  Sasha stared at Laura as if she expected Laura to try to argue with her. But she didn’t. She couldn’t.

  “There are no coincidences,” Laura said flatly.

  “Agreed.”

  They sat in silence and sipped their drinks. Sasha spoke first. “I think you’re in danger.”

  “In danger?” Laura echoed.

  Sasha waited.

  Reality hit Laura and she struggled to breathe. “You mean the message carved in my driver’s door?”

  “Probably.”

  Laura was about to ask who would do such a thing, but she stopped herself. She knew full well who. Jim Moraine, that’s who. All of his stupid helpful tips and veiled suggestions that she approve fire claims flooded her memory. He’d been watching her all along, trying to get her to comply with whatever scheme he was mixed up in. She rested her cup on the table and clasped her shaking hands together as if she were praying in a futile effort to still them.

  “This is more than plain vanilla insurance fraud, isn’t it?” she whispered.

  “I think so. Arson for profit? That’s usually the mob.”

  The mob. As in a network of career criminals, sworn to silence, all gunning for her to keep her quiet. Laura wasn’t sure she’d be able to speak. “What am I going to do?”

  “I have an idea.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Sasha kept one eye on Yim, who sat to her left, legs crossed at the knees, swinging her top leg so violently that Sasha half-expected to see her achieve airborne status and fling herself out of the chair. With her other eye, she watched Charlotte Cashion’s secretary whisper into her phone’s handset. The woman murmured something into the phone, replaced the receiver, and stood up.

  She walked around to the front of the desk and gestured for Sasha and Yim to stand. “Ms. Cashion can see you now.”

  They followed her across the plush carpet to Charlotte Cashion’s office door and waited while she gave it a quick double-rap with her knuckles. After a brief pause, she opened the door inward and ushered them into the office. Charlotte was making her way across the office toward them.

  “Sasha, this is a nice surprise!” She smiled broadly and offered a restrained hug. “What’s it been—at least a couple years?”

  “Probably. I think the last time I saw you was at Matt and Darla’s wedding,” Sasha answered. She inspected
the Assistant U.S. Attorney. In the two-plus years since their lovebird classmates had tied the knot, Charlotte hadn’t changed much. She was maybe slightly blonder and somehow slightly more moneyed-looking than she’d been at the wedding. Presumably, she was supplementing her government servant salary with infusions from her trust fund.

  “Speaking of weddings, I heard you had one of your own,” Charlotte enthused. “Congratulations!”

  “Thanks. We’re coming up on a year in just a few weeks, so, you know, so far, so good.” She waited until Charlotte finished laughing and then introduced Yim. “Charlotte, this is Laura Yim. She’s a claims adjuster for an insurance company headquartered in Jersey City.” Mid-Atlantic was one of several insurers to maintain New Jersey headquarters, so Sasha felt comfortable sharing that level of detail without securing any assurances first.

  “Pleased to meet you, Miss Yim,” Charlotte said, all business now, as she shook hands with Yim. “I’m Assistant United States Attorney Charlotte Cashion. Please, have a seat and tell me what I can do for you.”

  They all traipsed over to the corner of the room, where two Queen Anne-style chairs and a short loveseat were arranged in a tasteful seating area. Sasha and Yim took the chairs, leaving the divan for their hostess. She settled herself on the middle cushion, leaned back comfortably, and appraised them.

  “We’re here to talk to you in your capacity as the head of the Organized Crime Task Force,” Sasha replied. She figured she may as well get to the point of their visit.

  Charlotte’s cool demeanor evaporated. She leaned forward, suddenly alert and interested. “Oh?”

  Sasha jerked her head sideways toward Yim. “Before we begin. Ms. Yim here may have come across evidence suggesting the existence of a criminal conspiracy. She’s going to need some protection or confidentiality—something.”

  Charlotte nodded gravely. “Of course. If the information you provide is credible, the Department of Justice will provide reasonable protection.”

  Yim, who had neither moved nor made a sound up to that point, exhaled loudly, in clear relief.

  “Hang on, stop right there. We’re bringing this to you personally, Charlotte, because we want your personal involvement in taking care of Ms. Yim. You may have heard that the Justice Department’s view of reasonable protection nearly got me killed.”

  Yim gasped and swiveled her head to stare at her. Charlotte pursed her lips and the skin around her eyes tightened. Careful, Sasha thought, all the pricy wrinkle cream in Saks Fitfth Avenue isn’t going to get rid of crow’s feet. She immediately felt ashamed for even thinking such a thing. She wasn’t usually so petty, but something about Charlotte’s golden perfection brought out her inner alleycat.

  After a short, but charged, silence, Charlotte smoothed her expression into a reassuring smile and said, “I don’t know the details about your … mishap … other than what I read in the press, of course. But I can say this. One, I think you’ll find I’m a little more hands on than my counterparts at Main Justice. And, two, I tend not to avail myself of WITSEC. I don’t find it to be the best means of protecting a witness while enabling her to continue to lead a somewhat normal life. In other words, I’m not a fan.”

  “That makes two of us. But what would you propose instead?” Sasha pressed.

  Before Charlotte could respond, Yim found her voice. “Wait—what’s WITSEC?”

  “WITSEC is the formal federal witness protection program run by the Marshal’s Office. It’s what you see in the movies—when someone, usually a mobster, turns state’s evidence and is relocated and given a new identity—“

  “Relocated? New identity? I don’t …” Yim trailed off and gave Sasha a helpless look.

  “Right, none of us wants that for you,” Sasha soothed. “Let’s hear what Charlotte’s proposing instead.”

  “While WITSEC does serve a purpose, in my view, it’s a very limited purpose. It’s just one tool in the arsenal available to prosecutors to protect witnesses and victims. It’s hardly the best one. If you provide information that can support a prosecution and it’s clear that your doing so has placed you in danger, we can do one of several things. I can order round-the-clock security for you and round-the-clock surveillance of the individuals you implicate. That’s really the best practice, I think. It’s a sort of belt-and-suspenders approach. We’ll know from both details if someone makes a move against you.”

  That approach seemed to mollify Yim, but Sasha wasn’t convinced. “What if someone simply orders a hit against her? There’s no guarantee a named defendant would get his own hands dirty.”

  Charlotte’s left eyebrow arched toward her hairline. “Ordering a hit? Are we being just a touch melodramatic?”

  “I don’t know, you tell me. Her employer designated her as the 30(b)(6) representative in a plain vanilla insurance coverage case. The deposition was today. Yesterday afternoon, someone etched ‘SNITCHES DIE’ into the side of her car.”

  “Oooooh.” Charlotte drew out the syllable mournfully. She turned toward Yim, “Where did this happen—here in town?”

  “No. At my lawyer’s office in Jersey.”

  “Wait. Isn’t Sasha your lawyer?”

  Yim cut her eyes toward Sasha, who leaned forward. “It’s a little more complicated than that. I deposed her.”

  “Oh, come on. You represent her opponent? You can’t represent her. Good Lord, even you should know better than that.”

  Sasha blinked. Even her? Her face grew hot as she wondered exactly how much damage her reputation had sustained as a result of her highly publicized escapes from death. She pushed the concern aside to obsess over at a later date. Right now, she had to focus on Yim.

  “Don’t be pedantic. Ms. Yim isn’t a named defendant. She’s simply an employee of the defendant. And the existence of the crime doesn’t negatively impact my clients’ claims—in fact, a government indictment and prosecution would likely help their case.”

  Charlotte made a sour face and shook her head. It was time to put her to a decision.

  Sasha stood and motioned for Yim to do the same. “Maybe I misjudged you—or you’ve changed. Ms. Yim has solid, unassailable evidence that a local mortgage broker and fire inspector are conspiring with certain of her colleagues to pay out fire claims. I think we both know that the remaining player in this little vignette is going to prove to be someone you’ve been actively looking at for other crimes. But if you’re not interested in hearing her out, I’m sure she’ll be more than happy to keep her mouth firmly shut and move on with her life.”

  Charlotte held up her hand and patted at the air. “Let’s not get swept away on a wave of righteous indignation, okay? Sit down, please, and let’s talk this through. But if you aren’t officially representing Ms. Yim, then we both owe it to her to see if she would like independent representation for this discussion. Don’t you agree?”

  She did, actually. “Yes, of course. Laura?”

  Yim shook her head frantically. “No, I don’t want to find another lawyer. Please, I understand Sasha can’t officially represent me. It’s okay, though. I didn’t do anything wrong, so I don’t need an attorney.”

  Classic layman’s misunderstanding. If you haven’t done anything wrong and you’re talking to the feds, you definitely need a lawyer.

  “Tell you what,” Sasha said. “I’m going to step out and call my clients in the insurance coverage case. I’m sure they’ll waive any conflict—actual or imagined—that might result from my helping Ms. Yim in this limited capacity.”

  “That’s an excellent idea.” The color was returning to Charlotte’s face.

  Yim opened her mouth as if to protest, but Sasha shot her a look that seemed to do the trick. The claims adjuster clamped her mouth shut. Sasha excused herself as Charlotte drew on her deep well of social propriety and started to prattle to Yim about her Christmas plans.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Sasha found one of the innumerable, inexplicable nooks that were scattered throughout the pre-wa
r building—a small bump out, just five or six feet, set off from the hallway near Charlotte’s office. She leaned against the smooth, marble wall and pulled out her phone to dial the Maravaches’ telephone number.

  “Hello?” Tamsin answered almost immediately.

  “Hi. It’s Sasha. Do you have a minute?”

  “Sure. How’d the deposition go? Should I put you on speaker so Pete can hear, too? He’s right here.”

  “That’d be great.” She waited until she heard Pete’s greeting then continued, “Hi, Pete. I can give you two all the details about the deposition later, but right now I have a quick question for you. The corporate representative—“

  “Laura Yim? The woman who denied our claim?” Tamsin interjected.

  “That’s the one. She didn’t say anything new or surprising about your claim, but it became clear to her as she testified that Mid-Atlantic has been caught up in some criminal activity. Again, not with regard to your claim, but it involves her department.”

  There was a silence on the phone while Tamsin and Pete digested that information.

  “They’re criminals?” Pete asked in a hushed tone.

  “Well, maybe. Some of them appear to be.”

  “Okay. What does that mean to us?” Tamsin asked.

  “I’m not sure. It may not change anything. But Ms. Yim decided to take the information to the authorities, so there’s a chance Mid-Atlantic might reconsider fighting your coverage case if they have to focus on defending a criminal prosecution. Please understand, though, I can’t promise that will happen. But I want to ask your permission to help Ms. Yim through the reporting process. Technically, that could be viewed as a conflict of interest, so if you don’t want me to, I’ll tell her she’s on her own.” She waited. She suspected she wouldn’t have to wait long, and she was correct.

  “Of course you can help her,” Tamsin said in a tone that suggested she was offended Sasha had even asked.

  “Even if helping her would hurt our case, you would still have to help her. It’s the right thing to do,” Pete said.