A Killer’s Kiss

17

I was alone in one of the empty offices at Inner Circle Investments, sitting at an empty desk, surrounded by empty walls, with a single thick file in front of me. The phone was disconnected, the hallways were deserted, the hush of failure settled over everything like a dank, foul blanket. There is nothing sadder than a business in its death throes, except maybe a business that is already dead. And have no doubt, Inner Circle Investments was dead.

Julia had left to absorb the fact that she was penniless, and Ernest T. Nettles, after escorting me here and giving me the file, had returned to his own office to continue his liquidation of the company and the search for the missing preference payment. He was a jaunty fellow, Ernest Nettles, yet I wouldn’t want to be on his wrong side. I could just imagine him in a skiff, with an eye patch and a wooden leg, scanning the horizon for his prey.

“Thar Cave blows.”

Yes, of course, the one point seven mil had been paid to the mysterious Miles Cave. Who else was so much in demand? I wondered who would find Miles Cave first, Ernest Nettles or Gregor Trocek. I’d have bet on Nettles, and for Miles’s sake I hoped I was right, because Gregor wouldn’t follow the niceties required by the Constitution. When Sandro sticks hot poker in your eye, Gregor would say in his harsh Eastern European accent, you have right to scream and scream and scream.

It wasn’t so hard to figure out what had happened. Gregor was probably chin-deep in some nefarious enterprise, maybe involving those young Portuguese girls he went on about so rhapsodically. The problem with nefarious enterprises is that the cash they generate is dirty. So how, then, to keep your assets growing? Find an old friend in the investment business, have him bring in another old friend as a straw man, invest the money in the straw man’s name as a way to launder the cash. All quite simple, until the straw man withdraws the investment and then withdraws from the face of the earth.

But it wouldn’t be only Ernest Nettles and Gregor Trocek on Miles’s tail, if I had anything to do with it. Soon I would have to find a way to put Sims and Hanratty on the Miles chase, too, because who was a better suspect for Wren Denniston’s murder? If Wren were still alive, he could have pointed the authorities in the right direction, and, once caught, Miles would have had no choice but to give the money back, either to Nettles at the point of a lawsuit or to Trocek at the point of a gun. One point seven mil was a healthy motive for murder.

But there were other suspects now, too, weren’t there? A whole mess of impoverished investors, looking for a pound of flesh in exchange for their now-worthless investments. Which was why I opened the file Nettles had given me and delved into the sad trail of destruction that seemed to follow inevitably in Wren Denniston’s wake.

The letters in the file were originals, typed on bond or hand-scrawled, and heartbreaking all. They were shouts of pain from the friends Wren had induced to invest in his firm, the letters requesting, demanding, begging. Where is my money? Give me back my money. My daughter is sick. My wife is dying. I have children to put through college. You’re an old friend. My oldest friend. Don’t do this to me. I’m going to a lawyer. I’m going to the police. Please, Wren, I’m pleading with you, get me back my money. The emotions were still so wet and raw it was as if moist, red blood were staining each page.

They were all fools, as far as I was concerned, so rich they couldn’t find anything better to do with their money than give it away to a pug like Wren Denniston for him to lose. Yet I couldn’t help but feel sorry for them all the same. Who better than I knew the bitter taste of spectacular failure? But I wasn’t in that office to exercise my empathy. One by one I read the letters, one by one I wrote down the names and addresses, one by one I created for myself a batch of suspects that would make any cop think twice before dumping a collar on a clever lawyer or give any jury pause before the altar of reasonable doubt.

But wait, what was this? Another letter, stuck in the middle of the pack.

Dr. Wren Denniston

Principal Partner

Inner Circle Investments

Philadelphia, PA 19103

Re: Account #67855

Dear Wren,

As our recent conversations have not gone well, and you have lately been refusing to take my calls, I am having this letter hand-delivered in hopes that I can avoid taking action that you would find distasteful.

We want our money, all of it, and we want it now. We don’t want to hear about shortages or preferences or problems with some stinking bank in Taipei. And don’t talk to me about lawyers. We don’t want to hear about lawyers. We want our money, all of it, and we want it now.

This is not simply business. You owed me, and I trusted that you would live up to your obligation, and now I feel betrayed. You have screwed me again, and this time I will not sit back and allow you to keep what is mine. Return the money, all of it, or there will be no recourse other than violence.

You will receive no more calls, no more letters, there will be no more attempts at polite conversation. Have the funds wired to my account immediately, or I promise, you will pay the price.

Sincerely,

Miles Cave

There he was, in the flesh, the mysterious Miles Cave. I almost yelped when I saw the letter, it was like discovering evidence of a long-lost brother. So Miles had made his threat and gotten the one point seven mil out while the company teetered on the brink of bankruptcy and the other investors went hungry. It looked like he was demanding it for himself and for Gregor, but once it was wired, he decided to keep it all. Why the hell not? I’d probably do the same. And by now, with money in hand, he was no doubt long gone. He had his own lawyers, he was surely advised about what a preference was, he knew that if he was ever found, by the government or by Trocek, the money would have to be returned, so he found another way. Grab the money, kill Wren Denniston, spend the rest of his life on some beach in Brazil, doing the samba with tawny girls in blue bikinis.

Son of a bitch, I had to admire the guy.

And here, now, in my hand was just the tool I needed to send Sims and Hanratty to join the chase for Miles Cave. Let them all rush off in search of the great white whale, while Julia and I floated into the sunset on our boat, a smaller, tawdrier boat than I had hoped, absolutely, but a boat nonetheless. I was imagining the scene, the ocean breezes, the gentle waves, Julia’s lips pressed upon my neck, when something stopped me.

There was an address at the bottom of the letter. It was a bit smudged, which was why I hadn’t noticed right off, but there it was. And from what I could tell, it was a familiar address.

It was my address.

The son of a bitch had been living in my building.

Wait a second. There was something about the signature. The small i in Miles. The first two letters in Cave. What the hell?

I took a piece of paper and signed my name and compared the two. Close enough to get my nerves a-snapping. It didn’t make any sense, unless…

At that very moment, I sensed someone close. Instinctively I dropped the letter to my lap at the same time I looked up. There was a woman in the doorway. She wore a print dress that looked like wallpaper on her sturdy body. She seemed somehow familiar, though I couldn’t quite place her.

“Mr. Carl,” she said, her voice both high and dismissive. “My name’s Margaret. I’m the secretary here. Mr. Nettles asked me to see if you needed any assistance.”

“I’m fine, thank you,” I said.

“Do you need something to drink?”

“No, really, I’m fine,” I said. I looked at her for a moment. Short hair, thick nose, the jaw of a wrestler, knuckles. “Do I know you?”

“Do you dance? Ballroom dancing, I mean. There are monthly events that our club sponsors. You might have seen me competing.”

“No, definitely not. I have the grace of an aardvark – after it’s been hit by a car. The only thing worse than my dancing is my singing.”

“Then I won’t bring out the guitar.” She looked down at the file open on my desk. “Do you need any copies?”

“Yes, actually.” I closed the file and pushed it forward. “The whole file, please. One copy of each letter would be perfect,” I said.

“Of course, Mr. Carl.” She stepped forward, took the file off my desk, clutched it to her chest.

“Margaret,” I said, “has anyone else looked at this file in the past few days?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Were the police here?”

“Two detectives, one big and one not so big. They came to talk to Mr. Nettles, and they examined the financial records. The big one left pretty quickly, but the little one stayed quite a while and made plenty of copies.”

“But he didn’t see this file?”

“No.”

“Okay, thank you.”

“I’ll be right back, and I’ll put the copies in a folder for you.”

When she left, I lifted the paper that was still on my lap. My address. A signature that had much in common with mine. I read it again and picked out what I hadn’t noticed before. You have screwed me again, and this time I will not sit back and allow you to keep what is mine. Return the money, all of it, or there will be no recourse other than violence. The letter was a neon arrow pointing right at my heart.

I took a quick glance at the empty doorway and then folded the letter in half, in quarters, in eighths, and stuck it in my pocket. Destruction of evidence, sure. Obstruction of justice, absolutely. But I was in trouble. Some son of a bitch was setting me up.

And by the date of the letter, that son of a bitch had been setting me up from when Wren Denniston was still very much alive.