“When was this?”
“What do you mean?”
“How long before Jonny was killed?” I asked.
“Let’s see … I think I first began hearing the rumors … It was at Evelyn’s New Year’s Eve party. A very somber affair. It was the first time the company hadn’t paid profit sharing ever. That kind of fed into the rumors. It didn’t help that the economy was in the toilet at the time, either. Our customers losing all that disposable income; our high-end products in particular took a beating. That was what? Five months, six, before Jonny was killed?”
“Neil Lohn wanted the sale to go through, didn’t he?”
“Neil is a small player with a big mouth.”
“But he would have made money.”
“A few bucks, sure.”
“How ’bout you?”
“Oh, McKenzie, I would have been swimming in it.”
“You wanted the sale to go through, too, then.”
“It was never going to happen. The only way the corporation could be sold is if somehow the Szereto family lost control of the board.”
“How would that happen?”
“I don’t know, McKenzie. How would that happen?”
“I heard the term ‘corporate malfeasance’ bandied about.”
“Neil Lohn and his big mouth again. Yes, that’s the easy way. If it can be proven that a member of the board of directors is unfit to serve because of behavior that compromises the corporation’s fiduciary credibility, she can be voted out.”
“Even if she has a majority of stock?”
“If the board’s existing fitness-to-serve protocols allow it, sure.”
“Does the Szereto Corporation have such protocols in place?” I asked.
“The old man put them in decades ago when he made his IPO. He wanted to make sure that he could remove directors who were … disruptive. Not only that, once a director is removed, he still retains his stock; there’s nothing you can do about that. But he’s no longer allowed to vote his stock; he no longer has any say in how the company conducts its business. That way the old man would avoid a potential coup from the disgruntled. ’Course, he never meant for the protocols to be used against his own family. Or maybe he did. Who knows?”
“Could these protocols have been used against a womanizing president like Jonny?”
“He wouldn’t have been the first corporate officer to be dismissed over allegations of extramarital affairs and inappropriate personal relationships.”
“So it’s possible that he might have been attempting to sell the Szereto Corporation before someone took it away from him.”
“Depends. Was he involved in activities that made him unfit to serve? I mean besides doing a lousy job as president?”
“Damned if I know,” I said.
“In other words, you’re not going to tell me.”
“Honestly, Pamela…”
“I understand. You’re a very good liar, McKenzie. But a liar nonetheless.”
“Do you know many of the employees at Szereto?”
“The worker bees? Not many, no. I only socialize with the little people at Evelyn’s year-end soirées.”
“How ’bout Barek Cosmetics?”
“Hardly.”
“So you don’t bother to associate with those whose hard work actually produces the wealth you enjoy?”
“It would be unbecoming of you to rant against the one percent, McKenzie, especially considering that you’re a member of the club.”
“Have you ever met a woman named Rebecca Denise Crawford?”
“No. Who is she?”
Did you see it? my inner voice asked. She hesitated just for an instant. Those appraising eyes of hers flicked away and returned; a pink tongue tip became visible in the corner of her mouth—just for an instant.
“She’s another scoundrel, like us,” I said. “Pamela, let’s say for argument’s sake that I have a few bucks lying around in low-risk index funds gathering a nice, safe amount of interest. If I wanted to turn them into a lot of bucks in a hurry, where would you suggest that I invest them?”
Pamela studied me for what seemed like a long time, a frown of doubt on her face that slowly gave way to the comforting smile I had noticed before.
“Rule of thumb,” she said. “There’s always a predictable short-term effect on the stock prices of both companies when one buys another. The acquiring firm will lose value, while the target company will gain. But again, that’s short-term. If the acquisition goes smoothly, it will also be very profitable in the long run for the acquiring company. That, after all, is why people buy and sell.”
“So if I were to buy stock in both companies…?”
“Win-win.”
“You wouldn’t know of two such companies that you’d be willing to recommend, would you?”
“Nothing off the top of my head. Why do you ask?”
“You accused me of being a member of the one-percent club, and I suppose I am. A junior member. But the thing about running with Evelyn and Vanessa, and you, too, for that matter—you start to wonder why you’re standing still.”
“Is that right?”
“Lately, I’ve been thinking how much fun it would be to own a minor-league hockey team.”
“Give me a day or two and I’ll see what I can come up with.”
* * *
There was more chitchat after that, Pamela trying to determine if I might be of some use to her. I hoped I left her with the impression that anything was possible.
Fifteen minutes later, I walked to my car. I reached to open the door with my left hand before switching to my right, thinking the cast was going to be damned inconvenient over the next six weeks.
Wait, my inner voice told me. Pamela—she didn’t ask about your wrist.
Why would she?
It’s only natural. You see someone with a broken wrist, broken arm, broken leg, hobbling around on crutches, whatever, you ask “What happened to you?” Maybe not the first thing you say, but during a long conversation …
So why didn’t she?
Because she already knew what happened.
How could she?
Someone told her.
I wonder who.
SIXTEEN
I was anxious to confront Diane Dauria about Rebecca Denise Crawford, but I knew she wouldn’t return to her office for at least another ninety minutes, so I returned to my condominium with the idea of making lunch. I found Erica there. She was sitting at her mother’s piano and slowly picking out a tune with one finger. She wasn’t the player Nina was, but she was a lot better than that.
“Hey,” I said from the door.
She waited until I was standing near her before she replied, “Katie Meyer was raped.”
“No. No. C’mon.”
“At the ballpark when Malcolm and the others were kids. They never found out who did it. That’s what he told me, and I didn’t ask for more.”
“I don’t believe it.”
I didn’t recognize the tune, but Erica kept picking at it even as she spoke to me.
“Somewhere in America, a woman is raped every two minutes,” she said. “One out of five women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetimes. My chances are one in four because I’m in college. You act surprised that you actually know someone it’s happened to.”
“I know more than one.”
“So do I.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. And I meant it. Erica didn’t seem to care one way or another. She kept picking at the song. It followed me across the condominium to my desk. I finally recognized it, surprised that I hadn’t earlier since it was one of my favorites: “What a Wonderful World.”
* * *
Detective Clark Downing seemed happy to hear from me.
“Still working at it, huh McKenzie?” he said. “Atta boy.”
“I need a favor.”
“Another one?”
“Katherine Meyer was raped. From what I heard, it
was probably at the baseball fields in New Brighton about seven or eight years ago. What can you tell me about it?”
“I don’t know anything. Seven years ago was before I came on. We’re talking about Critter’s mom, right? Slight woman with glasses and a sexy librarian vibe?”
I winced at Downing’s description of her, but that’s what I had thought, too, wasn’t it?
“Yeah,” I said.
“I’ll get back to you.”
* * *
Downing called ten minutes later.
“Meet me,” he said.
“Where?”
“Same place as before.”
* * *
This time Downing was drinking vodka, never mind that it was in the middle of his workday. I joined him, ordering bourbon, forget the ice.
“The incident report, the supplementals—they were so thin as to be almost invisible,” Downing told me. “Just the facts, ma’am.”
“Not everything the responding investigator knows or thinks he knows goes into his reports.”
“Except this time—the man did the bare minimum, McKenzie. The rape kit wasn’t even processed.”
“Why not? Was it because of the backlog?”
It was discovered recently that there were thousands of untested rape kits gathering dust in Minnesota police and crime lab evidence rooms. They piled up because some crime labs were financially crunched—it costs about a thousand dollars to test a kit—or because the suspect confessed to the crime or the victim decided not to proceed.
Downing shook his head sadly. “The investigator didn’t follow through,” he said.
“Why the hell not?”
“He was short, man, just putting in the time before he got his thirty.”
“C’mon.”
“I don’t know how else to explain it.”
“Do you still have the rape kit? Is it viable?”
“Yes, but it doesn’t matter.”
“Why not?”
“The statute of limitations—”
“No.”
“Expired last year. The suspect could confess tomorrow; there’s nothing we could do about it.”
“Do you have a suspect?”
Downing shook his head some more and took a sip of his drink.
“What happened,” he said. “Katie—Ms. Meyer arrived early at Veterans Park, something she often did, getting to the ballpark before the players. She went to use one of those portapotties near the picnic pavilion. Suspect forced her inside, took her from behind. She did everything we ask of a rape victim. Reported the crime immediately. Went through the sexual assault exam. Consented to multiple interviews; and you know how that can go, the personal questions that are asked. Studied mug shots. We did nothing for her in return.”
“Who was the investigator?”
“I spoke to the man maybe a dozen times, mostly about old cases. He was gone before I arrived; it was his slot that I filled.”
“Who?”
Downing told me.
“McKenzie,” he said. “I know what you’re thinking because I’m thinking the same thing. But you can’t go over there and punch him out. I’ll arrest you if you do.”
“Do you know what’s wrong with the law?”
“Give me twenty minutes and I’ll make you a fucking list.”
* * *
I found Timothy Olson roasting marshmallows over a fire that he had built in a large metal saucer set on an iron stand in his backyard. There was a small TV table at his elbow stacked with a bag of marshmallows, graham crackers, and Hershey’s chocolate candy bars. There were half a dozen preschool kids dressed in snowsuits running around, and he called to them.
“Who wants another?”
“Me.” One of the kids broke away from the group and ran to his side. “Me, me.”
Olson carefully scraped the marshmallow on top of a graham cracker, and topped it with a slab of chocolate and another graham cracker.
“Don’t drop this one,” he said.
The kid promised he wouldn’t and ran off to roll around in the snow with his pals.
That’s when Olson saw me.
“Help ya?” he asked.
“Detective Tim Olson?”
“Not for a long time now.”
“My name is McKenzie. Detective Downing said you might be able to help me out.”
“Clark?”
“It’s about a case you caught right before you retired.”
He waved his hand at the kids like a magician showing off a trick.
“I’m doin’ the grandfather thing,” he said. “If you don’t mind talkin’ out here…”
“That’d be great.”
“You want to ask about the homicide?”
“No. A rape at Veterans Park.”
Olson stared into the fire for a moment.
“Hey, you want a s’more?” he asked.
“No, I’m good.”
“How is Clark doin’ over there, anyway?”
“Pretty well, as far as I know.”
“I used to drop by the shop once in a while during the first couple of years after I retired. Just to say hello, you know how it is. Now I stay away. You think when you retire you’re going on to a better life. One where you ain’t likely to get shot in the face during a traffic stop or knifed in the back while tryin’ t’ break up a domestic. But you miss it. The action. The camaraderie. You know, I still have my old uniforms hanging in my closet.”
“So do I.”
“You serve?”
“Almost twelve years with the St. Paul PD.”
“Yeah, yeah, now I remember. McKenzie. You retired about the same time I did, I think. Took the reward after catching some embezzler, was that it? Yeah. Everybody was talkin’ about it back then. I remember thinkin’ at the time, Damn, that would’ve been somethin’ to go out on. How’d that work out for you, anyway?”
“Not too bad, except—what is it they say? You don’t actually retire from the cops, you just leave active duty.”
“I know what you mean. So you workin’ private now?”
“Little bit.”
“Clark thinks I can help you?”
“The rape…”
“Katherine Meyer. Pretty little thing as I recall. Said she couldn’t ID her assailant, except that he was big and white. Found that hard to believe.”
“You did?” I asked. “Why?”
“The portapotty. Awful small space. She said he took her from behind, shoved a rag or something into her mouth t’ keep her from screaming. But she couldn’t turn her head to take a look? Made me think something else was goin’ on.”
“Like what?”
“Like maybe it was consensual and her partner got a little rough and marked her, tore the buttons on her shirt, and she needed a story to tell the husband and kids? Just a feelin’ I had at the time. The woman was so cooperative. You don’t usually get that, the vic bein’ so cooperative.”
I had suppressed most of my rage during the drive over there, but now it was bubbling toward the surface. I couldn’t allow that, not while I still needed Olson’s cooperation. I turned to the TV table.
“May I?” I asked.
“Help yourself.”
I popped a rectangle of graham cracker into my mouth and chewed slowly while I watched the kids making a competition out of snow angels. I spoke around the remains.
“What you just told me, none of that was in your supplementary report,” I said.
“No, no, man, of course not. You don’t write that down. Besides, maybe Meyer was tellin’ the truth. You don’t know.”
“What did you do?”
“Not much I could do. No witnesses. No physical evidence. I had her act it out for me, you know; go through the motions. She was pretty good about that. Then she spent a couple days going through the mug shots on the computer. Nothin’ came of it, though.”
“What about the rape kit?” I asked.
“They take f
orever, you know how goes. I get so pissed off at those TV cop shows where the evidence is analyzed on the spot; people thinkin’ that’s how it’s done. It’s civil service work, man. The rape kit, it was going to be like three weeks before anyone could get around to testing it. By the time it was sent in—”
“It was never sent in.”
“The hell you say?”
“Downing found it in the evidence room.”
“No kidding? Well, goddamn, that’s on me. I was going to send it to Ramsey County. Can’t remember why I didn’t. Musta forgot cuz by then I was into somethin’ more important.”
“More important?”
“Raymond Bosh. Worked for the Park and Rec Department. Someone caved his skull with an aluminum baseball bat. That was going to be the cherry on my sundae, you know? Solve a homicide my last case; go out in a blaze of glory. Can’t always get what we want, though, can we.”
“No, we can’t.”
“Thought I might’ve had ’im, too. The person or persons unknown. The call, 911 got the call must have been moments after it happened, some of Bosh’s drug buddies or gamblin’ partners givin’ it to him. Some black kid. What was his name, now? African name. Jalen. Jalen Phillips. That’s it.”
Wait, my inner voice said. What?
“Friends called ’im Philly,” Olson said. “Philly called it in, claimed he saw a guy get it over the head with a ball bat. We had it on tape. Everything you say to 911 is on tape, you know that. When the operator asked for his name, though, the kid refused to identify himself and hung up. Except the 911 operator, she thought he mighta been in danger, the way he hung up so quick. What she did, she called him back. She captured his phone number, right? But the kid didn’t answer. Instead the call was transferred to the voice mail on his cell phone, and the voice mail message said, ‘Jalen Phillips can’t come to the phone right now,’ somethin’ like that.
“Eventually I got all this intel from the communications center, and I tracked the kid to his house. But I was a cop, see, and a white one to boot, and African kids today, they’re taught from the get-go not to talk to the po-lice. ’Course, it mighta had somethin’ to do with the ol’ man, too; a twice-convicted felon named Dwayne, standin’ right there. You don’t interview minors without a parent present, you know that. Jalen not only wouldn’t tell me what he saw, he wouldn’t even admit that he made the 911 call in the first place, and we had his voice on tape.”
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