Shakedown

Chapter Twenty-five

“Tell me more about Thomas Rice,” Grisnik said.

We drove past Kansas City International Airport. The Platte City exit was only a few more miles north.

“Rice sold insurance, stocks, bonds-any kind of investment you wanted. Had his own company, a one-man operation. A buddy of his did outplacement consulting. One of his big clients offered early retirement to its employees with at least twenty years of service. A lot of them took the deal, which meant they had profit-sharing accounts they had to roll over.”

“Rice’s buddy hooked him up with the retirees?”

“It was a sweet deal for Rice. Most of these people didn’t know their ass from third base when it came to investing. The stock market was hot so anyone with a series-seven license and a computer looked like a genius.”

“Market cooled off,” Grisnik said.

“It’s called a correction.”

“I remember. I got corrected right up my ass. Put my retirement off by at least five years.”

“Same thing happened to Rice’s clients. Except they hired a lawyer who told them she could get their money back because Rice put them all in high-risk, high-tech stocks that were inappropriate for their retirement plans. They sued Rice and won.”

“Didn’t he have insurance that paid the claims?”

“Yeah, but he lost his licenses to sell investments and insurance.”

“So he couldn’t think of anything else to do except sell drugs?”

“I guess he thought it was just like anything else. Buy low and sell high. He knew someone who knew someone and- boom-he was an instant coke dealer. Really got into the lifestyle, using and selling, got himself a girlfriend. The wife found out and turned him in. Told us that for better or worse didn’t include criminal and stupid. He pled and it was all over pretty fast. His entire career as a drug kingpin lasted all of about eight months.”

“What kind of a deal did the U.S. Attorney make with him?”

“Five years and forfeiture of everything traceable to the money he made selling drugs plus cooperation on other investigations.”

“Which left him with what?”

“A lot. His house was already paid off before he started his life of crime.”

“That all the feds got?”

“Rice helped us make cases against a couple of small-time dealers. Didn’t make much of a dent in the traffic.”

“How was the wife able to hold on to the house?” Grisnik asked.

“Before the lawsuits were filed, he put it in his wife’s name, same for his car, a Lexus. We couldn’t tie her to the drug money, either, so she got to keep it.”

“Was it your case?”

“They were all my cases since I ran the squad, but I wasn’t directly involved with this one,” I said.

“Who was?”

The question threw me. I hadn’t thought about it until Grisnik asked me.

“I assigned two people to every case, rotated the assignments so everybody worked with everybody. Troy Clark and Ammara Iverson ran this one.”

“Either one of them house hunting?”

“Nope.”

“You have squad meetings, talk about all your cases?” Grisnik asked.

“Sure. Same routine as every law-enforcement agency in the world.”

“So your home buyer would have known all about the Rice case. No problem looking at the file, knowing what’s what.”

“Of course.”

“Any reason for your home buyer to have had contact with Rice or his wife while the case was going on?”

There it was. Grisnik was a smart cop. He kept asking the right questions, tugging and tickling a problem until a door opened. Colby Hudson wouldn’t have known anything more about the Rice case than we had discussed at our squad meetings. He wasn’t an investigator on the case; he wasn’t a witness at the trial. He wouldn’t have had any reason to meet or talk to either Thomas or Jill Rice. Neither did I.

Yet Colby claimed that Jill Rice had called the Bureau out of the blue to offer her husband’s car for sale and that he just happened to have taken the call. The house was next. If she had called anyone, it would have been Troy Clark or Ammara Iverson. Even if Colby had taken the call, she would have asked for someone she knew, not offered a sweetheart deal to a stranger.

“No good reason,” I said.

“That’s what I don’t get,” Grisnik said.

“What’s that?”

“Even the ones who should know better almost never do.”

***

It doesn’t take long for prison to leave its mark. For some, it’s ragged tattoos and rippled biceps. For others, it’s shoulders stooped in surrender or backs stiffened in defiance. For Thomas Rice, it was his bleak face with its pale and sagging skin.

He was average height and heavy, probably going around two-fifty until he started eating on the prison meal plan. Down by at least fifty pounds, he had a loose wattle beneath his chin, his clothes hanging on him like sheets hung out to dry.

The visiting room was as washed out as he was-vanilla?oor tile worn dull, walls painted off-white, scuffed and stained; and?uorescent ceiling light with more glow than any inmate had. Stand Rice against the wall and he was more pillar than person. Still a salesman, he summoned old habits, pumping our hands with a firm grip as he struggled to make a connection between his new life and us.

“I’m Tom Rice,” he said, fumbling with his hands like he didn’t know what to do with them. “But I guess you guys know that. I mean you’re here to see me. I don’t get many visitors. Not that I mind, you know. A lot of guys, they’ve got family come up here all the time. My wife, she, well, we’re divorced. No kids. So, there’s really no one who’s likely to make the trip, you know what I mean. Hey, I’m sorry. I know I’m rambling, but I don’t get the chance … much…anymore …”

“To work a room,” I said.

He brightened, laughed. “Yeah, I guess so. Curse of the salesman, huh?”

Grisnik hadn’t asked for an interrogation room. There was no need since visitors weren’t allowed on Thursday. We had the place to ourselves except for the guards and the video cameras.

I grinned and nodded. “Got to sell yourself before you can sell anything else.”

“That’s the truth,” he said, gathering himself, his hands clasped at his belt line, rocking slightly on his heels. “Now what can I do for you gentlemen?”

“I’m Detective Funkhouser. This is Detective Grisnik. We’re with the Kansas City, Kansas, police department. We’d like to ask you a few questions.”

We showed him our IDs and he pointed at two empty chairs, taking one for himself.

“Knock yourself out. I promised to cooperate with the FBI and you can see what a good deal that turned out to be,” he said, smiling and waving at the cameras.

“Actually, we’re more interested in real estate,” I said.

“Real estate. Really?” He leaned back in his chair, keeping his distance. “I never did any real estate deals. Just stocks, bonds, and insurance.”

“And cocaine.”

“Yes, Detective Funkhouser. I am a bad man. I sold cocaine and I cheated on my wife. She caught me, cleaned me out in the divorce, and here I am. I never was certain whether she was angrier about the drugs or the adultery.”

“Ever sort that one out?”

He shook his head. “Not really. The money was good and I needed it. My wife could spend money in her sleep. She had no appreciation for the risks I took for her, for us. I was entitled to a few perks. You’d think she’d have cut me some slack.”

“Hard to figure some women,” I said. “So ungrateful.”

He leaned forward, studying me. “I know you’re pulling my chain. You think I’m just a self-centered shit who blames everyone else for my problems.”

“You should feel right at home in prison.”

“Okay, Detective. The only thing I’ve got left to sell is bullshit and you aren’t buying. So what do you want?”

“Your ex-wife has something to sell. Your car and your house and she’s letting them go for a lot less than they are worth. What do you know about that?”

Rice studied me some more, turning toward Grisnik, who stared back at him, his face a mask, not giving Rice a clue about how to answer my question.

“This is a federal penitentiary,” he said quietly. “I’m here because I violated federal law, not state law. My problems are federal, all the way around. My wife, my car, and my house are all in Johnson County. I’ve got nothing to do with anyone or anything in Kansas City, Kansas, or Wyandotte County.”

“Actually, Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas, are the same thing. The county and the city were consolidated a few years ago,” I said. “And it doesn’t matter to me where you and your wife live. I still want to know why she’s taking a bath on your house and car.”

“Thanks for the civics lesson,” he said, his voice low but hard. “My wife got the car and the house in our divorce. What she does with them is none of my business or yours.”

“Your wife says she’s selling them on the cheap to piss you off. I’m wondering how that’s working out for you?”

Rice hung his head, shaking it, chuckling at the?oor, another mood swing. I couldn’t tell which ones were real and which ones were for show. He straightened in his chair, his drooping face a fresh shade of gray.

“You can’t help me with this.”

“I can’t help you if you don’t tell me about it. Once I know what’s going on, you’d be surprised what I can do.”

He stood and took a short tour of the visiting room, hands clamped under his arms, and came back to his chair, rubbing the edge of the hard plastic mold with his fingers.

“It’s like I told you,” he said, letting out a long breath. “She got the house and the car in the divorce. What she does with them is up to her.”

“You’re right about the car, but not the house. According to your divorce settlement, she has to notify you of the sale of the house, which has to be for a fair price, and you get half the money. She’s screwing your lights out and you’re rolling over like she still has you by the short hairs. What’s up with that?”

He bit his lower lip and pulled on the?ap of skin dangling from his chin as if he was trying to distract himself with self-in?icted pain.

“What do you think I’m going to do, Detective? Start jumping up and down, call her a miserable cunt, and say something that will make you happy? Then in a day or two, I’m on my way to the shower and two overgrown guys with serious steroid habits come up to me, throw their arms around me, and one of them says how’s it hanging, bro, while the other one sticks a sharpened spoon between my ribs. No thanks, Detective. I was stupid enough to land my sorry ass in this joint. That doesn’t mean I’m not smart enough to get out of here alive.”

“You don’t have to jump up and down. Just tell me what’s going on and I can help you, keep you safe.”

Rice laughed. It was high pitched, nervous, and afraid. “Trust me, Detective Funkhouser, you don’t mean shit in here. I’m done talking.” He marched to the door and banged on it. “Guard! Guard!”

The door opened. The guard swung it wide. Rice was almost gone when I took my last pass at him.

“Hey, Tom. The guy who’s buying your car and your house, you think he’s just fucking you or does he get to fuck your wife as part of the bargain?”

His neck and face shot full with blood as he ran at me. The guard grabbed his wrist, wrapped it around his back, kicked his legs out from under him, and put him on the?oor before he’d taken two steps. Two more guards materialized, one of them putting a knee in his back, the other poised over him with a Taser. Rice managed to lift his head.

“You son of a bitch!”

He spit at me as one of the guards stepped on his head, pressing his cheek hard against the?oor.

“You’re right about that,” Grisnik said.