“Lucas was the shooter?” J.D. asked.
“No. Erickson had somebody from Miami lined up for that job. He was trying to keep it separate from our people in this area.”
“Then how did Lucas get involved in shooting Bannister?”
“The guy from Miami got held up in some way. He couldn’t get here on Sunday, so Erickson called Lucas in to do the job.”
“Why did you decide against the murder-suicide plan?” J.D. asked.
“It was a good plan, but Shorter called me on Sunday and refused to come to the condo that night. Erickson had a deadline he had to meet, so we had to do Nate that night. That’s when Erickson called Lucas in and we went to our backup plan.”
“How did Abby Lester get involved?” J.D. asked.
“She was my backup plan. After I met with Shorter, I was afraid he would back out or just not show up. He was flaky as hell, and I didn’t think I could trust him.”
“How did you get the glass with Abby’s fingerprints?” J.D. asked.
“I called her and set up a meeting on Saturday before the murder. We had a glass of wine and talked about her helping me with a historical motif for the buildings in Lakeland. When we finished, I slipped her wine glass into my purse and took it with me.
“After Shorter backed out on us, I put plan B into operation. I couldn’t take the chance that Nate would find the wine glass, so I waited in the car until Lucas killed him and came out of the building. I went right up and put the wine glasses from the bedroom in the dishwasher and turned it on. I put the glass from the restaurant on the bedside table and left.”
“You didn’t know about Linda Favereaux being in the condo?” J.D. asked.
“No. She must have slipped out between the time Lucas left and the time I got there. It couldn’t have been more than a few minutes.”
“How did you manage the emails that supposedly came from Abby Lester?” J.D. asked.
“My techie friend set those up.”
“Give me the name of your friend,” J.D. said.
“He wasn’t involved in this. He thought it was all a prank I was pulling on a friend. An April Fools’ joke.”
“Give me his name,” J.D. said.
“Okay. Frank Pilsheimer, but he was only helping me because I was screwing him. I think I was the little nerd’s first. He never knew what hit him.”
Harry Robson thought for a moment. “I don’t think I have anything else, Tori, but as part of this deal, you’ll have to answer any other questions I have, up until and after you’re sentenced. Am I clear?”
“Yes.”
“J.D.? Anything else?”
“Tori, did you order Wes Lucas to kill Shorter?”
“I passed on the order.”
“From whom?
“Mark Erickson.”
“Did he tell you why he wanted Shorter killed?”
“He said it was a loose end that needed to be tied off. He sure was pissed when Lucas blew it.”
“Why didn’t you try again?”
“Shorter disappeared. We couldn’t find him.”
“One more question, Tori,” J.D. said. “Why did you pick Abby Lester as your scapegoat? How was she even on your radar?”
“Do you know who my father was?” Tori asked.
“I just know he was a big-time drug dealer who got busted and sent to prison years ago.”
“His name was Howard McCann. When he went to prison, my life changed completely. I was ten years old when I was jerked out of private school and put in a lousy public school that was run more like a reform school than a place of learning. My mom and I had lived with my dad in a large house on the Gulf in Clearwater Beach. The feds confiscated the house, and Mom and I ended up in a dismal trailer park in Tampa. My mom had to hook to feed us, for God’s sake. Sell her body to any shithead with enough cash to get her back to our trailer. She got AIDS and died because we couldn’t afford health care.
“My dad died in prison, murdered during his first month there. Do you know who killed him? No. Because nobody knows. The state didn’t even try to find out who murdered him. It was probably a hit, set up by the guys he worked with before he was busted. The last time I saw him, he was in handcuffs being dragged out of our house on the beach. They wouldn’t even let me hug him good-bye.”
Tears were streaming down her cheeks, her voice breaking as she tried to control her emotions. She sobbed, caught herself, and said, “I’ve missed him every day of my life since then. And knowing that I’ll never see him again, is almost more than I can bear. I targeted Abby Lester because I wanted her husband to experience the same pain I’ve lived with for thirteen years. I wanted him to know his wife would never be back in their cute little house on Longboat Key, to know that sooner or later, the day would come when she would be taken to the death chamber and executed. That is, unless I could figure out how to put a hit on her in prison. Like they did to my dad.”
“I don’t understand,” J.D. said. “What did your pain have to do with either Bill or Abby Lester?”
“You don’t know, Detective? You haven’t been told or figured it out?”
“No, Tori. I’m sorry you’ve had such a miserable life, but I don’t know why you would take it out on the Lesters.”
“The undercover cop working with the Pinellas Sheriff’s department? The one who weaseled his way into my dad’s life, whom my dad trusted completely, who had dinner at our house two or three times a week, and who busted my dad? You don’t know?”
“No,” J.D. said.
“He was a Longboat Key cop named Bill Lester.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
Just like that, it was over. The conundrum had been solved. We had the answers, and like many solutions found in the sometimes addled brains of criminals, they made an odd kind of sense. But there are always disconnects in those confused minds, missing pieces of the puzzle that trouble the sane person who has to unravel the disparate threads of illogical thought. I always wonder what fuels the criminal mind. Perhaps it was some childhood trauma, such as the psychological devastation experienced by Tori Madison, or physical abuse suffered by some of the young people who grow into monsters, or just plain old greed as evidenced by Mark Erickson. In the end, the reasons don’t matter. It’s the fallout from the choices made by the crazies that hurt so many innocents.
* * *
The day dawned hot and bright and still, a typical August day in the subtropics. J.D. had taken two days off and we ran Recess two hours south to Cayo Costa Island, a state park just south of Boca Grande Pass. We had flat seas on the way down, a pleasant run in the sunshine, the salt air flooding our senses and bringing a feeling of relief that the whole ordeal had finally come to a conclusion. We anchored just offshore in waist-deep water and were standing near the stern of the boat, enjoying the relative coolness brought by the onshore Gulf breeze.
“Matt,” J.D. said, “this all started because Bill Lester was an undercover cop working a drug ring. How did he end up working with Hillsborough County? I thought he’d spent his entire career with the Longboat Key police.”
“I think the problem was that Hillsborough needed someone who had no ties to the community to go undercover. An out-of-towner would have less chance of being compromised. Sometimes, when the potential bust is a big one, one agency will borrow a cop from another. You must have seen this in your career.”
“Nope. Miami-Dade didn’t borrow or lend. I guess we were big enough that we didn’t have to do that. You haven’t talked much about the trial, and it’s been over for more than a month. Do you want to talk about it?”
“There’s not much to say. I think justice prevailed, and a lawyer can ask for no better result than that.”
“But how do you feel about the trial itself? Did you find that you miss the courtroom?”
I laughed. “I found the exact opposite. I used to love the battles, the mental gymnastics, the intellectual give and take, the drama of it all. But, time moves on. I’ve thought for a long
time that I was happily finished with that part of my life. It was interesting and productive, but being a beach bum is so much better. No, I don’t miss the courtroom. It’s not a place for me anymore.”
“So, I don’t have to worry about you going back into the practice of law?”
“And take time away from being your boy toy? Not in this century, lady.”
“Good. I like having you available on a regular basis.”
I’d made reservations at South Seas Island Resort for the night. We’d take the boat into the marina, check into the lodge, have a fine meal in one of the restaurants, walk the beach, or not, sleep late in the morning, and then take our time meandering up the Intracoastal Waterway to Longboat Key. The life of a beach bum, or a boat bum, or a happy man looking into the future and seeing a long road of indolence and peace and happiness, is a pretty good life. The memory of the courtroom with all its stress was fading, but my resolve to never again enter the pit grew stronger every day.
I hugged my girl and thought I was the luckiest man on earth. As I felt her arms tighten around my neck, I knew I would be happy as long as she kept hugging me back.
Chasing Justice: A Matt Royal Mystery Page 35