by Mark Gilleo
“The three guys who just came in gave me an idea.”
“The bailiffs?”
“Yep. You have a picture of this dead juror of yours? The one you suspect was on an anonymous jury.”
“I can get one.”
“Well, it may be a shot in the dark, but if you’re talking about an anonymous jury, there is a chance someone may remember the case without remembering the case number. There are a lot of people in the courtroom during a trial. Even during an anonymous jury trial. You have judges, lawyers, bailiffs, court reporters. Hell, there’s probably even a janitor or two who may have seen something.”
“You have someone specific in mind?”
“No, not really. You’re the private detective. You figure it out.”
Dan looked over at the bailiffs.
“And that is free of charge. I will roll it into the price of the next job,” Jerry said, heading towards the door again.
*
An hour later, Dan stepped up to the front door of the art gallery on the first floor of his two-story brick building in Old Town. The small bell attached to the top of the door jingled as the door swung open, beckoning the resident artist from the rear of the shop. Lucia stepped into the showroom, her smock covered in a plethora of colors.
“Dan, how are you?”
“I’m good. You?”
“Good enough.”
“No date tonight?”
“Tomorrow.”
“How are things going with the new guy?”
“Fingers crossed, I’m quietly hopeful.”
“As am I. He seems like a nice guy. Relatively truthful.”
“You didn’t…”
“I just poked around a little. You know I can’t help myself…”
“I asked you to leave him alone.”
“Actually, you asked me to let you know if he was a felon. He wasn’t, so I didn’t mention it.”
Lucia stared at her landlord for a long minute. “You got me there.”
“I need a favor. You can say no, but I’m hoping you won’t. I wanted to ask your boyfriend if he would take a look at the photos of some people. See if he recognizes anyone in the photos. Maybe have him send the photos around to his friends. People who work the courts.”
“Courtroom artists?”
“He said he knows everyone in the art sketch world, let’s see who he knows.”
“I’ll ask, Dan. But I can’t guarantee you’ll get an answer. And if you don’t like the answer, you’re going to have to drop it. Go somewhere else. Find another way for whatever it is you’re after.”
Dan pulled a thumb drive from his pocket. “Your computer or mine?”
“Am I that predictable?”
“Not at all. I’m just that charming.”
“No you’re not.”
Dan jiggled the thumb drive in the air.
Lucia wiped her hands on her apron and motioned for Dan to sit behind the large stone desk. She slid into the leather chair and inserted the thumb drive. Seconds later the screen filled with several photos.
“What are these?”
“Driver’s license photos. Photos from a military ID. Stuff from the web. Facebook. Whatever I could get.”
“What are they involved in?”
“Dying.”
“That’s enough information for me.” Lucia’s eyes danced across the screen again, scrolling from picture to picture.
“You don’t recognize any of them?” Dan asked.
Lucia’s attention floated from Sherry Wellington, Marcus, the EPA lawyer, and Carla the waitress.
“This woman looks familiar,” Lucia said, pointing at a good-looking blond.
“Let’s hope your boyfriend or one of his artist colleagues also recognizes her.”
Lucia finished looking at the other photos on the screen. “The rest of them I have never seen before.”
“That’s okay. I only need someone to remember one face.”
“Okay. I’ll send it.”
“And can you call him after you send it and ask him to check his email?”
“You’re pushing it.”
“I’ll owe you one.”
“You’re damn right you will.”
Chapter 46
Dan knocked on the door with a pink stuffed bunny under his arm. He watched as the light through the peephole momentarily vanished and then reappeared. Seconds later the door swung open.
Amy Conboy smiled and Dan noted the weight loss since he had last seen her.
“I brought your daughter a gift,” Dan said, extending the pink bunny.
Amy’s daughter poked her head over the arm of the sofa and then disappeared back into the cushions.
“Come in,” Amy replied. “Can I get you something to drink?”
“Sure. Whatever you have. Coffee, tea, water.”
“The coffee was made a couple hours ago, but I can warm it up.”
“That works for me. I don’t consider coffee old until it has sat in the pot at least two nights.”
Dan watched as Amy stepped into the tiny kitchen of the small apartment. She moved slower than he remembered, every step measured, labored. He could see the bones of her arms clearly, her elbows protruding like weapons. His eyes fell to her overly large sweatpants and then dropped further to her ankles.
“How is the home detention monitor?” Dan asked. “You can’t see it, for what that’s worth.”
Amy paused and pulled up the bottom of her pants leg, revealing the black square monitor attached to her left ankle. “It’s fine. It’s the least of my worries. I’m home with my daughter. That’s all that counts.”
“I’m glad it worked out.”
“It’s as good as it gets,” Amy said, topping off the coffee mug. She put the mug into the microwave and hit the start button.
“Can I ask a hard question?” Dan asked.
“At this point, no question is that hard.”
“Was it worth it?”
“Worth what?”
“The risk.”
“It was a calculated risk.”
“It could have easily turned out worse than it did.”
“Perhaps.”
“Anything could have happened. You could have tripped on the way out of the bank. A security guard could have been itching to try out his service weapon.”
“You mean I could have been killed?” Amy responded with mock concern, her mouth open.
“Yes,” Dan replied, his train of thought coming off the rails with the realization his client had already considered the worst-case scenario.
“I’m already dead, remember? The threat of being killed isn’t that daunting.”
“No, I guess not,” Dan replied. “There is something else I can’t figure out.”
“What’s that?”
“What were you planning to do with the money? You must have had a plan. You must know that when you die, you can’t just leave fifty thousand dollars in cash in a suitcase for your daughter. Someone will ask questions. The IRS will want its share.”
Amy exhaled with a pronounced wheeze. “I was wondering when you were going to ask that question.”
“You were?”
“You wouldn’t be much of a lawyer if you didn’t. Let me answer your question with another question. What would you do with the money? But before you answer, ask yourself that question as if you were a person without means. Without the financial options available to people who do have money. Imagine you don’t know anyone who can send the money through a bank in the Caribbean or hide it in a legitimate business venture.”
Dan thought about his client’s situation for a moment before answering. “If I had to hide fifty thousand dollars, I would buy a shitload of lottery tickets and hope for the best. If you win, at least you would have an explanation for where the money came from.”
“Close,” Amy replied, stepping away from the refrigerator to reveal a smattering of artwork, papers, and messages attached to the refrigerator door with dozens of magn
ets. She waved her hand in front of the room’s largest appliance. “Let me know when you figure it out,” Amy said, smirking with a painful expression on her face. As Dan’s eyes danced around the overloaded door and the myriad objects, Amy removed the coffee mug from the microwave and placed it on the counter.
Dan’s eyes stopped moving and came to rest on the promotional poster attached to the middle of the refrigerator door. He leaned over and pulled the poster from the magnetic clip that kept it in place. He held it at chin-level and digested the photograph. The shiny new hotel in the photo was not immediately recognizable, but when Dan’s eyes reached the large statue of a face and arm emerging from the sand on the beach in front of the new hotel, he realized what he was holding.
“You work in the Westin at the National Harbor,” Dan said, a picture in his mind clearing from the mist.
“That’s right. And what’s the biggest draw at the harbor?”
Dan’s eyebrows rose slightly. “The new casino.”
“Very good, Counselor. The casino. I prefer a mix of blackjack and roulette. I did all right for myself.”
Dan reached for his coffee as he processed what his client had just told him. With a grip on the handle of the mug, he paused and slowly looked over at Amy. “What do you mean, ‘you did all right’? You haven’t been out of police custody since the day you robbed the bank. You were arrested, processed, spent one night in jail, and then a couple of days at GW Hospital under police supervision.”
Amy shrugged her shoulders and pushed a small jar across the kitchen counter in Dan’s direction. “Do you take milk or sugar?”
Dan stared in disbelief at the offer for coffee condiments. “I think we need to talk.”
“About what, Counselor? Your job is done.”
“I don’t think it is.”
Amy patted Dan on the shoulder. “It’s done. From here on out, no one can help me.”
“Don’t count on it.”
“Not with this.”
“Give me a try.”
Amy mulled the offer for a long second, her hand tracing one of her daughter’s pieces of artwork on the fridge door. She wiped away a tear as it ran down her cheek and then looked over at her daughter on the sofa. “Let me put my daughter to bed. Grab a seat. The TV works but I don’t have cable so you’ll have to deal with whatever is on.”
*
A half-hour later Amy shut the door to the bedroom she shared with her daughter. She turned off the small hallway light, stepped across the living room, and fell onto the sofa before wrapping herself around one of the large cushions. Dan finished his now-cold coffee and placed the mug on the small table in the corner.
“Sorry it took so long. Sometimes getting her to bed can be difficult.”
“No problem. It gave me time to think,” Dan said.
“What did you think about?”
“I was thinking about how many other banks you’ve robbed, in addition to the one I know about.”
Amy stared stoically at Dan before she looked away, her gaze facing the darkness of the small hallway. “Just one,” she said, her voice distant.
“Where?”
Amy answered. “Not far from Manassas, Virginia.”
“A different jurisdiction from DC.”
“That’s right.”
“Disguise?”
“The authorities will be looking for a man.”
“Smart girl,” Dan said. “Crazy, but smart.”
“You know most bank robberies are never solved,” Amy said.
“And sometimes they are, which is how we met.”
“I don’t need to be reminded.”
Dan sighed and rubbed his hands across the stubble on his jawline. “How much did you get away with?”
“Just over sixty grand. Allegedly,” Amy admitted.
“‘Allegedly’ just disappeared in the rearview mirror.”
“Attorney-client privilege. I’m starting to enjoy it.”
“And I’m enjoying it less,” Dan said, forcing a smile. “So you took the bank in Manassas for sixty thousand. Plus the fifty thousand from the BB&T downtown.”
“Yes. A hundred and ten thousand dollars. Two banks. And I was only busted for one of those. A fifty percent success rate.”
Dan let the seriousness of the felonious admission sink in for a moment before formulating his next question.
“Was the plan to rob a few banks, play some poker and roulette, and hope you won?”
“All I needed was a little luck. If I won, the casino could cut me a check, the IRS could take their share, and no one would know any better.”
“There are a lot of people who think they’re going to get lucky at the casino. It’s what keeps them in business.”
“I was different.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because lady luck fucking owed me.”
“Did she?”
“Yes she did.”
“Did she pay up?
“I doubled the money from the first bank robbery in a weekend. In my third hour at the roulette wheel I hit on red seven, which pays thirty-six to one. I took that money to the blackjack table.”
“And…”
“I doubled it over another six hours.”
“You are incredibly lucky.”
“Really? I think maybe, just maybe, the universe tried to break even with me.”
Dan nodded.
“I could have won a lot more. A lot more. I was trying not to raise suspicion. But if I had started with twenty or thirty thousand dollars the night I won, I could have walked away a millionaire.”
“But if you started with twenty thousand dollars, people would have noticed. Hotel maids don’t carry around twenty thousand dollars in cash.”
“That’s right.”
“So what did you do with the money?”
Amy didn’t respond.
“What did you do with the money? The police searched this place when you were arrested for the BB&T robbery. I didn’t hear anything about them finding cash.”
“Because it’s not in the apartment.”
“Where is it?”
“Now is not the time.”
“Did you keep the receipt when you cashed in your chips at the casino?”
“I did.”
“And it has a date and time stamp on it.”
“It does.”
“Well, if the police never make a connection to you and the bank robbery in Manassas, your money has been successfully laundered.”
“And what happens then? When I die, and you turn into a lawyer again, I don’t think the authorities are going to let me keep the money from the casino.”
“I wasn’t planning on telling them.”
“Not while I’m alive.”
“By law, I can’t tell them. Even after you have passed.”
“You are one curious man, Counselor.”
“Do you want your daughter to have the money?”
“That was my goal.”
“Then you’re going to have to tell me where the money is. I’ll handle the rest.”
“You would do that?”
“With some help,” Dan said, plotting his next move. “But the deal is off if they connect you to the other bank robbery.”
“They’re going to have to hurry.”
“You know something I don’t?”
“I know what all my doctors know. In all likelihood, in a couple of weeks I’ll be incapacitated. Medicated up to my eyeballs. Unable to recognize my daughter. Bed-ridden in the quiet corner of a hospice somewhere. And that is if I’m lucky.”
“More the reason to tell me where the money is. As your attorney, I’ll see to it that your daughter receives it.”
“I’ll think about it. As of now, only two people know the money even exists—you and me.”
“You know what they say. ‘The only way two people can keep a secret is if one of them is dead.’”
Amy smiled. “Don’t rush me.”
Dan tried
to return the smile and failed. “When did you decide to become a bank robber? It’s not the logical criminal choice for someone who works in housekeeping at a hotel.”
“Let’s just say I was offered a lot of money to do something for someone else. A lot of money to do something illegal.”
“And… ?”
“I turned down the job offer. But the idea stuck with me. I couldn’t get it out of my head. After a few sleepless nights I figured, what the hell? What’s the downside? So I considered my options, did a little research on the computer at the public library, and figured robbing a bank was as good a choice as any. I pulled the trigger a few days later.”
“Did this job offer you receive have anything to do with the man in the cap and sunglasses?”
Amy looked Dan squarely in the face. “I never said I knew the man in the cap and sunglasses, and I still don’t.”
“Okay, Amy. Okay.”
“I think it’s time you left.”
“I had a few more questions.”
“Not tonight, Counselor. I’ve had enough questions for one evening.”
“Fair enough. How about I come back tomorrow? Check in on you?”
“Call first.”
“I can do that.”
“And thanks for the pink bunny.”
Chapter 47
Amy dried herself off in the shower and then wiped the humidity off the bathroom mirror over the small sink. She didn’t recognize her own reflection. She ran her hand along her jawline, feeling her cheekbone. Her eyes seemed more sunken, more distant than even the day before. She removed the towel from her body and stared for a moment at her cancer-ravished torso. Her natural curves had been replaced with the muscle tone of a skeleton. She turned slightly in the mirror and peeked down at her bone-thin derriere. For all the times she had wanted to shave a couple of pounds off her butt, her wish was now fulfilled.
Finished with depressing herself for the evening, she slipped on another pair of large sweatpants and an equally oversized sweatshirt. She hung the bath towel on a hook on the back of the door and stepped into the hallway.
With the thought of a glass of wine dancing through her head, Amy stepped into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water instead. Pancreatic cancer and wine only caused pain. Pain she could avoid. When she turned towards the living room, a muscular hand fell across her mouth. She could feel the strength in the arm, the power almost lifting her off her feet.