by Glenn Rogers
June nodded. “And I have a nephew.”
Lyell looked at me again. “And the father?”
I shook my head. “I don't know yet.”
“Well, at this point,” he said, “I'm not sure it even matters.”
From one point of view, I thought, it might not make much difference. From another point of view, though, it might make a great deal of difference.
Chapter 48
June and I left the Lindell Industries corporate offices and headed back to my office in Studio City. I paid close attention as I drove, watching for the white Mercedes. I didn't see it or notice that any other vehicle was following us. I pulled into the parking lot of the complex where my office is located and parked where my Jeep was within the range of my security cameras.
Mildred had already left and had taken Wilson home with her. June and I had the place to ourselves until Alex showed up at seven.
“I know you'd probably prefer to go out somewhere nice to eat, but we really shouldn't risk it.”
June smiled. “Not a problem she said. I've had lots of late evenings where I ate pizza at my desk as I worked.”
“I like pizza,” I said.
“Me too.”
“What do you like on yours?” I asked.
“I'm easy,” she said. “Whatever you like is fine.”
I called Papa's Pizza and ordered a large pepperoni, an antipasto salad, and a two-liter bottle of Coke Zero. They would deliver it within thirty minutes.
While we waited, I broached what I thought might be a delicate subject.
“Mind if I ask you a personal question?”
She shook her head. “Not at all. Ask away.”
“You and Greg never had children?”
There was a small smile and a fleeting look of regret. “No. We tried. It just didn't happen. We both saw doctors to be sure we were okay. They said we were. But I just never got pregnant.”
“Your father seemed really pleased to learn that he had a grandson.”
A bigger smile brightened her face. “He did, didn't he?”
“Jane told Eric about her family,” I said. “He knows who his grandfather is, but he didn't really seem to have any desire to be part of the family.”
“He hasn't been invited yet,” June said.
“True. What if he did want to be part of the family? Would that create any problems?”
“He's my sister's son. He is part of the family. He has inherited her share of the company and of the family fortune.”
I nodded. We were silent for a moment.
“You know,” June said, “with all this other stuff going on, we got kind of sidetracked, didn't we? We haven’t really been very focused on Jane recently.”
“Not really,” I said. “I've been thinking about Jane.”
“And?”
“And given the time frame of Eric's birth, even if the father was someone she met at Harvard, she didn't get pregnant until the two of you were both back here.”
“So the father was someone from here?”
“Most likely. Or someone who was here on business or visiting.”
“But in the beginning, you couldn't find anyone here who was a viable candidate.”
“I knew less then than I know now.”
“So how are you going to proceed?”
“I have to multitask,” I said. “I have to focus on catching the killer and I also need to focus on discovering who Eric's father is.”
She nodded.
“Are you still sure you want to know?” I asked.
“Yes.”
The pizza and salad came and we dug in. After a moment, June said, “You asked me a personal question. Can I ask you one?”
“Sure.”
“What happened to make you leave the FBI?”
I hadn’t considered that it might be that personal. But I guess my question to her about having kids had been pretty personal, hadn't it?
“Someone died,” I said. “And it was my fault. The guilt got in the way of doing the job. So I quit.”
She nodded. We were both quiet for a moment. We ate some pizza.
“Sounds like there might be something else to the story” she said.
“The person who died was my partner,” I said, “Elaine Bristol. I was in love with her.”
More silence.
Then June asked gently, “What happened?”
“It was a sting operation,” I said. “An arms deal. But somehow they knew it was a setup. When the shooting started, Elaine was killed.”
“So you resigned and started fighting,” June said.
I nodded. Then I said, “The first day you came into my office, you said you thought you knew why I started fighting.”
“I remember,” June said.
“What did you know?”
“I didn't know the details. It just seemed to me that a career move like that must have been related to some very painful event that resulted in a lot of anger.”
“That about sums it up.”
“You fought for two years?” she asked.
“Um-hum.”
“How many fights you have in two years?”
“Forty-two.”
“How many did you win?”
“Forty-two.”
“So you were obviously good at it,” June said. “Why’d you quit?”
““Lost my temper in the cage. Almost killed a guy.”
She nodded thoughtfully and we were quiet for a moment. Then she said, “I'm sorry if I upset you.”
“You didn't. I don't mind talking about it with you.”
“Thank you for telling me.”
I smiled and took a big bite of pizza. She ate some salad.
“Mind if I ask another question?”
“Not at all.” I noticed that it was nearly seven.
“After you left the FBI, why’d you become a private investigator? Isn’t the work you do now very similar to the work you did as an agent?”
“Yeah, in some ways it’s similar. But it’s also different.”
“How?”
“A lot of the work I do now involves helping someone with something. Someone comes to me and needs help. So I help them. It’s more people-oriented, more personal.”
“The way you’re helping me,” June said.
“Sure. I like helping people. In the agency, it was mostly legal. Now it’s mostly personal. Also, I don’t get cases assigned to me. I choose what cases I work on.”
“But why a detective?” she asked. “There are lots of ways to help people without being a private detective.”
“My dad has asked me that same question on a number of occasions. The lawyer thing.”
“Wouldn’t have been as dangerous,” June said.
“That’s for sure. Most people don’t like lawyers, but most people don’t shoot at them, either.”
“So the question remains: why did you become a private investigator?”
I thought for a moment. “Partly, I suppose, because I’m good at it; partly because I like it. I like the excitement.”
She nodded. We were silent for another moment. Then she asked, “You ever find the mole?”
“What mole?” I asked.
“The one who told the bad guys about your sting operation and got your partner killed.”
Her eyes held what might have been a challenge.
“There was no mole,” I said.
“How do you know?”
“Because I planned the operation myself. And only a few people knew about it.”
“And none of them,” June said, “would have told anyone else who might have been a mole.”
I looked at her. “Right,” I said. But in truth, at the time, I had not considered that.
After a moment she asked, “Was there an internal investigation?”
“Yes,” I said. “An agent died. There was an investigation.”
“And what was the conclusion?”
My eyes wandered from hers. The conclusi
on was that the operation had been a failure due to poor planning and execution. I didn’t think it had, but I didn’t have a better explanation.
Lost in my thoughts, I had not responded to June’s question. So she said, “Did the bad guys just guess that it was a sting?”
Her question brought me back to her. “The official report said that the operation had been a failure due to poor planning and execution.”
June took a bite of salad. “Was it?”
I shook my head. “I don’t think so.”
“Maybe you should find out,” June said. “Might provide some closure.”
I nodded, my eyes wandering again. “It might,” I said.
Alex’s arrival at seven pulled me back into the present. I introduced June and Alex to each other.
June said, “Jake tells me you and he went through the academy together.”
“Yep. Jake's the only reason I graduated.”
“That's not true,” I said. “You just needed a little help with the physical aspect of the training.”
After a few minutes of getting to know you conversation, I asked Alex, “So where are we going to bunk for the night?”
“I was thinking Embassy Suites in Glendale.”
“You get the bedroom,” I said to June. “We'll share the living room.”
“Wow,” she said. “I've never shared a hotel suite with two handsome men before.”
I said, “Actually it's one handsome man and his faithful sidekick, Tonto.”
“Hey,” Alex said.
June laughed.
“What names?” I asked.
“Michael, James, and Eleanor Smith, from El Paso, Texas.”
“You got a credit card in the name of Michael Smith?”
“Special card. Just for this case.”
I looked at June. “Special treatment. You should be honored.”
“I'm impressed,” June said. “I will, of course, reimburse whoever's paying for this.”
I cleaned up the dinner stuff. There was some leftover salad that I put in the little office fridge.
“Okay,” I said to Alex. “We'll take both cars. I’ll lead. You follow and watch for a tail.”
At the hotel, Alex said that no one had followed us.
Chapter 49
The next morning, after breakfast in the hotel restaurant, I suggested that June stay in the room with Alex for the day, so she'd be safe, while I went to Lindell Industries and questioned Joel Moffat, Ben Simpson, and Gordon Baker. Her response was a simple and emphatic, no.
June and I left the hotel first. Alex followed, staying a hundred or so yards behind, watching for the white Mercedes or any other car that appeared to be following us. We had worked out a route that involved a lot of getting on and off the freeway and a lot of turns on surface streets. If someone were following us, Alex would know.
I pulled into the Lindell Industries underground parking structure and found a parking spot. We waited for Alex. He found an empty space several cars down the row from us. I got out of the Jeep. As Alex approached, he shook his head. No one had followed.
June was dressed casually but when she walked into her building at ten after eight with Alex and me in tow, she was all business. Once in her office, she called Ingrid in. June explained that she wanted to see Moffat, Simpson, and Baker, each for thirty minutes, beginning with Moffat at eight-thirty. The summonses were not contingent upon convenience.
After Ingrid left, June asked, “Will thirty minutes each be enough time?”
“I'm pretty sure it will be,” I said.
“Logistically,” she said, “how should this go?”
“As casually and friendly as possible,” I said, “at least to start with.” Pointing to the conversation area across her office, I said, “We can sit over there. You can introduce Alex and me as private investigators working for you in an investigation of corporate cover-ups, stressing that you expect and will appreciate their full cooperation. Then I will handle the interview. Alex will listen closely, analyzing the responses so he can give me feedback later. But if something occurs to him, he'll jump in. If you hear one of them say something that you know to be inaccurate, speak up.”
She smiled. “You got it. I'll get Dad and explain it to him.
When June stepped out, Alex said, “Nice office.”
“Hundred and twenty billion buys a lot of nice,” I said.
She returned with her father and introduced him to Alex. Lyell looked composed but serious, as did June. We all sat and waited for Moffat. Just before he arrived, I said, “Uh, I just remembered something.”
The rest looked at me.
I looked at June. “Perhaps we should have this meeting in your father’s office instead of here.”
I could see in her eyes that she understood. “Yes,” she said. “I think we should. Dad, can we move this meeting to your office?”
He looked a little uncertain but said, “Of course.”
We all moved to Lyell’s office and June told Ingrid to send Moffat to her father’s office when he arrived.
Moffat was on time for the meeting. From what I had learned about June in the last couple of days, I doubted many of the people who worked for her would keep her waiting. She handled the introductions as I had asked, including specifically saying that she and her father wanted him to be entirely honest, holding back nothing. His job would not be in jeopardy because he spoke forthrightly. June then looked at me, signaling everyone that it was my turn.
Joel Moffat, the director of research, looked to be in his mid-sixties. He was slender, tan, and in shape. He wore an expensive navy suit and a white shirt with a red and blue-stripped tie. His gray hair was cut short in a no nonsense style. His brown eyes were sharp and serious, especially after what June had said about corporate cover-ups.
“Mr. Moffat,” I began, “thank you for coming.”
“Sure,” he said. “How can I help?”
“Do you remember Cole Jamison?”
“I do. I hired Cole.”
“What do you know about his sudden departure twenty-nine years ago?”
Moffat took a deep breath. His eyes wandered over the ceiling on the far side of the room. “I remember he seemed agitated. He was a good engineer. He was working on a new device. I don't remember exactly what it was. But he had requested access to the archives. I don't remember what he was looking for. But I remember that after that he seemed more stressed, more distracted.”
“And he didn't share with you what he found in the archives?”
“No.”
“When was the last time you had any kind of a contact with Cole Jamison?”
“The day he left.”
I nodded and paused a moment, mostly for effect. Then I asked, “Are you aware that in the 1970s Lindell Industries participated with the government in experiments with brain implants?”
“Yes.”
“And are you aware that the corporation sought to cover-up that participation?”
“Yes.”
“What was your role in that cover-up?”
“Same role as everyone else who knew about it,” Moffat said. “Not to talk about it.”
“How many people knew about the experiments?”
“Three. Maybe four. I'm don't remember exactly who knew.”
“Are you familiar with the L211?”
“Yes.”
“Are you familiar that it's failure cost people their lives?”
“Yes.”
“Would it be fair to say that from one point of view it would be in Lindell Industries' best interest to keep the failure of the L211 secret?”
“Yes.”
“Could we describe the desire to keep the failure a secret as a cover-up?”
“I think we could say that.”
“And what was your role in that cover-up?”
“Not to talk about it.”
“Did someone tell you not to talk about it?”
“No. No one needed to.”
&nb
sp; Were there other mistakes and failures of which you were aware?”
“Yes.”
“And were those covered up as well?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” I said. “So we've established that there were cover-ups. How far would you go in keeping the secrets, secrets?”
For the first time Moffat hesitated. “I'm sorry. What do you mean, how far would I go?”
“Did you know or suspect that Cole Jamison discovered some of the company's mistakes and secrets?”
“I didn't know. I remember wondering if it were possible. I wondered if maybe that's what was bothering him.”
“And what did you do about it?”
“I didn't do anything about it.”
“Did Cole Jamison send you any letters or communicate with you in any way as to what he had discovered?”
“No. I already told you that.”
“Did you hire someone to kill Cole Jamison?”
“I most certainly did not,” Moffat said emphatically, his volume rising proportionately with his anger and resentment.
“Someone did,” I said.
“It wasn’t me.”
“After the attempt on his life, did Jamison communicate with you that he'd made multiple copies of the evidence he had regarding the Lindell Industries cover-ups?”
“I had no contact with Cole Jamison” he said, struggling to remain calm.
“Did Cole Jamison extort money from Lindell Industries through you? Payment for his silence on the cover-ups?”
“He did not.”
“Have you been paying Cole Jamison for his silence on the cover-ups for the past twenty-nine years?”
“I have not.” He pronounced each word separately and forcefully.
“Any ideas who might have been doing that?” I asked.
It was almost as if the question confused him. After a brief hesitation, he said, “Did someone really try to kill Cole?”
“He says they did.”
“And he's been blackmailing the company all these years?”
“Some people would call it that.”
“And you want to know if I have any idea of who it is?”
“Yes,” I said.
“I've no idea. How could I know something like that?”
“I don't know,” I said. “Think about it. If you weren't paying Jamison, who might it have been? Who had the means and authority to write a check for a hundred thousand plus dollars a year for twenty-nine years?”