Blessed be the Wicked

by D. A. Bartley

  They reached the parking lot at the station. Abbie climbed out of Clarke’s squad car and into her Rover. She felt something she hadn’t in a long time—the excitement of a real investigation. The unease she’d felt earlier because of the blood atonement connection was still there, but the part of her that loved the puzzle and the challenge of the hunt had joined the swirl of emotions.

  Abbie drove to the bank and parked in front of a square brick building that had been a mediocre architect’s idea of a modern financial institution in 1982. The glass doors seemed dated, and the utilitarian beige carpet needed to be replaced. The clock on the wall was slightly off-kilter. The entire effect was depressing.

  Behind the tall reception desk sat a cheery-looking young woman with a plastic name plate declaring her to be “Tiffany.”

  “May I help you?” Tiffany asked in exactly the perky tone Abbie would have expected.

  “Hello. I hope so. I’m Detective Abish Taylor of the Pleasant View City Police Department. We’re investigating a suspicious death. Is your manager in?”

  The young woman’s smile disappeared from her lips, but her inherent happy disposition left the look on the rest of her face unchanged.

  “Yes, just a moment please.” Tiffany picked up the phone. “Mr. Browning? A detective is here to see you.” She then looked back at Abbie. “The first door on the right.”

  The bank manager probably wasn’t as overweight as he seemed, but something about his soft hands and puffy face gave the impression of immense roundness. He was wearing a cheap suit—the kind that had a sheen in the right light—and aftershave to match. His stomach strained at the buttons on his pale-yellow shirt (an unfortunate color choice, given his sallow complexion). The fabric was so thin Abbie could easily see the outline of his temple garments underneath. Garments were different from regular underwear that gentiles—aka non-LDS—wore. They had sacred markings embroidered on them: the mark of the square over the right breast, the mark of the compass over the left, along with a marking over the navel and the knee. After you’d been through the LDS temple, you were supposed to always wear them. Abbie had heard her fair share of stories about the protective powers of wearing these garments. There were tales of missionaries in terrorist bombings getting shrapnel everywhere but where the garments covered their bodies, of burn victims being spared where their bodies were covered by the sacred underclothes, of bullets not penetrating soldiers’ special brown military-style garments; the stories of miracles went on and on. Beyond their supposed protective powers, the garments enforced a code of modesty on Mormons: no sleeveless dresses, no short-shorts or skirts, and nothing cut too low.

  “Can Tiffany get you anything to drink? Water, Diet Coke … coffee?” the rotund manager asked.

  “Nothing for me, thank you,” Abbie answered.

  Offering coffee was a quick way for a member of the Church to tell if you were LDS or not. Even though there had been some recent clarifications by the Church about the Word of Wisdom’s position on caffeine in soda, the basics remained the same as always: no alcohol or “hot drinks,” which officially meant no coffee or tea. Caffeinated sodas and hot cocoa lived in the realm of personal choice. Abbie remembered a neighbor who’d taken to peeling the Pepsi labels from her soda bottles so the trash collectors wouldn’t know she drank it. In Abbie’s own house, her mom had let them drink both cola and cocoa. Her dad had abstained from the cola but happily sipped hot cocoa with homemade whipped cream if it was on offer.

  Abbie didn’t want to draw attention to herself as being non-LDS. Since she’d started working in Pleasant View, Abbie had made it a policy not to accept an offer of coffee, tea, or even soda from someone she didn’t know. She didn’t wear anything that revealed she wasn’t wearing garments. And she smiled … a lot, which was the Mormon way.

  “Mr. Browning, thanks so much for making time in your busy schedule to see me on such short notice.” It was obvious the banker didn’t have much to do. The place was completely empty except for Mr. Browning and his friendly receptionist. You could actually hear the clock ticking above the banker’s desk.

  “Oh, but of course. We here at Zion Commerce Bank are happy to help the police department in any way we can. I must admit to you, though, I’ve never been involved in an investigation where there’s been a death.”

  Abbie’s comments about how busy the manager was—and consequently how important he was—had hit their mark. Some LDS men believed that the sheer fact that they held the priesthood endowed them with a sense of authority, warranted or not. Abbie had watched her mother and grandmothers err on the side of humility, even to the point of meekness, so as not to threaten. It made life easier. A lot of men, including the banker sitting in front of her, couldn’t distinguish actual deference from a good imitation.

  “So,” he asked, “what can we at Zion Commerce do to help in your investigation?”

  “I’d like to get your records for all of Stephen Smith’s accounts, both personal and professional.” Abbie held her breath. She wasn’t sure whether the self-important banker was going to demand a warrant or not.

  “That shouldn’t be a problem. Let me see what I can pull up here.” The banker looked at his screen as he typed. “I’ll have Tiffany download everything to a thumb drive for you.” The way he said “thumb drive” made it sound as though it were fancy newfangled technology of which he was rather proud. The man raised his voice so that the young woman at the reception desk could hear him. “Tiffany! Would you pull up Steve Smith’s accounts?” The manager squinted at his screen. “They’re all linked to the account number KT 0225-00-0511-03. Download them onto one of the complimentary Zion Commerce thumb drive key chains.”

  “On it, Mr. Browning,” Tiffany said.

  “Mr. Browning,” Abbie continued, “how well did you know Steve Smith?”

  “I knew him better than most of our clients. He was special, of course, not only because of the amount of money he entrusted with us, but also because of the number of accounts he had. He’d been through some bankruptcies in the last few years, but it seemed things were turning around for him financially. All on the up and up, of course.” Abbie thought the last comment was strange.

  “Do you happen to remember the last time you saw him?” Abbie asked.

  “As a matter of fact, I do. It was about two weeks ago.” The bank manager stopped himself for a moment. “I guess it’s okay to discuss confidential things, because Mr. Smith has passed away. Of course, I would never be indiscrete.” Abbie doubted the truth of this last statement but said nothing. The manager went on with his monologue. “Mr. Smith came to check on the money he’d wired to some of his accounts. He had one in the Cayman Islands, one in the Isle of Man, and two more in Costa Rica.” The banker typed something on his keyboard and looked at the screen. “Yes, it was Costa Rica. Mr. Smith opened two accounts with the Banco de Costa Rica last year; one he said was for business, and the other was personal.”

  “You don’t happen to know how much money he transferred into those accounts, do you?” Abbie asked.

  “It was in the millions, that I know for sure.” A few clicks on the keyboard later, he said, “Five-point-five million to the account in the Caymans, three million to the account on the Isle of Man, and ten-point-seven-five million to one account in Costa Rica.”

  “The ten-point-seven-five million in Costa Rica? Was that divided between the two accounts?”

  “No. It looks like it all went to one account,” the banker said.

  “Can you tell whether it was the personal or the business account?” Abbie asked.

  “I’d say it was the personal one—” the bank manager continued with a pompous tone in his voice, as though the fact that he knew a man who made multimillion-dollar bank deposits somehow made the manager himself a more significant human being. “As I said, Mr. Smith entrusted us with large sums of money. He certainly deposited more money than anyone else did at our Pleasant View branch. He preferred working with me.”

/>   “I can understand why,” Abbie said. She hoped she sounded impressed. “How much did he keep here with you usually?”

  “If I remember correctly, he usually kept around twenty thousand in his personal checking account. He had another account for his wife so she could take care of the family expenses. There was usually around ten thousand there for her every month. His business accounts were separate, of course,” the banker answered. Again, he typed something and looked at his screen.

  Abbie didn’t want to interrupt this speech. Sometimes when you were a detective, you got lucky. Middle managers were particularly susceptible to the desire to appear knowledgeable, even if prudence—and in this case client confidentiality—should dictate silence. Some people liked to feel important in front of the police.

  “Hmmm … it looks like there’s about eight here right now,” the banker said.

  “Eight thousand?” Abbie asked.

  “Eight hundred.”

  “Eight zero zero?” Abbie repeated to make sure she’d heard correctly.

  “Yes. That’s a bit strange. Mr. Smith’s account requires him to maintain a balance of five thousand. I wonder if there’s a mistake.”

  Abbie didn’t think there’d been a mistake. After having been to Smith’s over-the-top house, she knew his was a family who liked to spend money and spend it obviously. From what she had seen, there was a carelessness in their consumption: the widow in her cashmere and diamonds, designer kids’ shoes and backpacks dropped on the floor, new cars parked in the driveway. Abbie had seen plenty of families who “only bought the best,” as if the expense of their possessions reflected who they were as human beings. Abbie had known families in New York whose net worth threw off enough financial excess to ensure their capital was never threatened. These were people who could afford constant mindless consumption, but generally their consumption was discrete. They would never be seen with LVs printed on their luggage. Abbie was fairly sure the Smiths’ net worth was nowhere near the number needed to support the material indulgences she’d seen at the house. Although, the numbers the bank manager was talking about were nothing to sneeze at, particularly in a place where the cost of living was a low as it was in Pleasant View, Utah.

  “Mr. Browning, I’m curious to know what your opinion was of Mr. Smith. You seem to be a good judge of character. What kind of man was he?”

  The banker inhaled dramatically; he did appreciate his ego being stroked. He leaned back in his chair and said, “Well, Mr. Smith was the kind of man…”

  The banker’s phone buzzed. He glanced at the number, and his facial expression shifted from self-satisfaction to anxiety in an instant. He looked at Abbie and then at the caller ID one more time.

  “I need to take this call.”

  “Of course; I’ve taken too much of your valuable time already,” Abbie said. She stood up, mouthed the words “Thank you,” and closed the door quietly behind her.

  “Here’s the thumb drive, Detective Taylor,” Tiffany chirped as she handed Abbie the bulky device. The words “ZION COMMERCE” were inscribed on the blue plastic in bright gold.

  “Thank you so much.” Abbie was walking toward the door when she heard the sound of Tiffany’s voice shift to that of an apologetic child. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Browning, I already gave it to her. I can probably catch her in the parki—”

  Abbie lengthened her stride. She let the front door of the bank shut behind her without looking back. She dashed to her car and drove away before Tiffany could possibly move from her perch behind the front counter of Zion Commerce.

  EIGHT

  “What did you find out at the bank?” Clarke asked when Abbie walked into the station.

  “More than I expected to,” Abbie said. “Smith had filed for a number of bankruptcies but recently came into some serious money. He had moved millions of dollars to offshore accounts in the Caymans, Isle of Man, and Costa Rica within the last few months. I don’t have a full grasp of his finances, but at this first pass, they don’t pass the smell test.”

  Much as she was still livid about the whole ID thing, Abbie knew nothing good would come of openly antagonizing Henderson after he’d warned Clarke and her to be discrete about this investigation. “Let’s look at this in my office.” Abbie showed Clarke the clunky thumb drive.

  Clarke followed Abbie down the hall and shut the door behind him. Abbie opened the laptop on her desk and inserted the thumb drive. The screen opened up to a spreadsheet labeled “Celestial Time Shares” with columns identified only by letters. There were rows and rows of numbers, none of which made any sense to Abbie.

  “Celestial Time Shares?” Clarke asked.

  The reference to the Kingdoms of Glory—the LDS version of heaven—was impossible to miss. Joseph Smith had explained that there were three levels of heaven: the telestial, which was the lowest kingdom; the terrestrial, the middle one; and the celestial, where, according to 132:20 of the Doctrine and Covenants, those who made it in were Gods. If you were going to name a real-estate development after one of the Kingdoms of Glory, celestial would be the way to go.

  Abbie heard Phillip say, with a twinkle in his eye, I prefer to invest my money in Outer Darkness Time Shares. Outer Darkness was the equivalent of Mormon hell. It was where Satan, his angels, and the sons of perdition would dwell eternally.

  “Something funny?” Clarke asked.

  “No.” Abbie hadn’t realized she was smiling. “Smith transferred millions to offshore accounts just in the past few weeks. He left less than a thousand dollars in his account here.”

  “Could there be a legitimate reason for Smith’s offshore accounts? I mean, lots of people have them, right?”

  “Sure, lots of people have them,” Abbie answered with a deadpan face. She was far less sanguine than her partner about the possibility that these accounts had been set up for legitimate purposes. Anyone who’d lived among a certain socioeconomic class in Manhattan knew that when Americans sent their money abroad, it was rarely for reasons they’d want to discuss. Perhaps the reasons were legal, but they were rarely principled.

  “I studied accounting in college,” Clarke said. “Do you mind if I take a look?”

  “I’d love that.” Abbie was relieved. She was good with neither numbers nor Excel spreadsheets.

  Clarke sat in front of Abbie’s computer and stared intently at the screen. He scrolled between spreadsheets with columns of numbers that meant nothing to Abbie.

  Clarke whistled. “Wow, Smith was some sort of magician.”

  “What do you mean?” Abbie asked.

  “Well, it’s amazing he managed to keep his businesses afloat at all, let alone for as long as he did.”

  “Does it look like Smith was doing anything illegal? Any sort of financial fraud?”

  “Heck yeah.” This was the closest Abbie had ever heard Clarke come to swearing. He recovered his composure quickly. “I’d like to take my time going through all this more carefully, but from what I can see so far, Smith was up to his eyeballs in, well, you know.”

  Abbie thought about what Clarke was saying. A certain subset of Utah businessmen had earned a reputation for being less than honest. To this day, she remembered a heated debate at the dinner table when her mom had brought up an article in Sunstone magazine with her father. Even as a child, Abbie had intuited that Sunstone was controversial. Now she knew that the periodical was independent of Church control but was devoted to LDS history, culture, and doctrine. Reading it indicated you could be someone who didn’t always share the views of Church leaders. The article that started the debate was about the history of LDS fraudsters and con artists. Abbie remembered clearly that her mom had read a quote from an expert in fraud saying the Utah penny stock market was the slimiest financial market in the entire country at the time. Her dad couldn’t disagree, but he wanted to shut down the conversation. From what Clarke was describing, Abbie wondered if there was something about the combination of wanting to appear successful—and therefore more perfect—w
ithin a community of people with a shared faith that made Utah particularly fertile ground for fraud.

  “Take your time, then,” Abbie said. “Use my office. It’s probably better to be discrete about all this. Call me on my cell.”

  Abbie walked out into the parking lot. The sun was beginning its descent on the west side of the valley. Abbie climbed into her old green Rover and headed up the canyon, all the while wondering if swindling your investors was sin enough to warrant blood atonement.

  Wouldn’t it depend on who was swindled? Phillip’s baritone voice asked.

  Yes, Abbie thought, it just might.

  NINE

  Abbie felt relief as she drove the Rover past the rusty gate at the end of her long, gravel driveway. She always left it open. There was no sense in shutting it. If anyone wanted to cross onto her property, it wouldn’t be hard. Most of the forty acres were wooded and steep. Unless someone knew there was a building up the winding road, almost anyone who drove past the entrance on the drive up Ogden Canyon would have assumed it was empty land used for deer hunting. Even in the winter when the aspen and cottonwoods had dropped their leaves, the house wasn’t visible until you were nearly up the private drive.

  Abbie called the place a cabin, but that wasn’t accurate. Wealthy Swedish converts from Salt Lake had wanted a sommarstuga and built the place in the early 1900s. It had traditional white trim and red wood siding. At some point during the house’s history, someone had winterized and expanded it. Now there were five bedrooms (all with en suite bathrooms), a sun-room, library, eat-in kitchen, dining room, living room, and a den. Abbie had fallen in love the moment she saw it. She had already sold the house on Nantucket. She’d never really been a beach girl anyway. That was a remnant from Phillip’s childhood. Abbie was happily willing and able to pay the full asking price for this private luxury. She had imagined she could have her entire family over for holidays and lazy Saturdays. Swimming, sitting around the fire pit, hiking. Since she’d moved in, though, only her older brother John had visited.