Chapter 17… Death At The TipTop Lounge
“And don’t forget that we need to call Officer Nekel so I can get my gun back.”
“We?” said Harry.
“Okay, I got the message. I’ll make the call. Hopefully we can pick it up on our way out of town.”
The ride back to Jersey would take almost four hours and Harry was planning on using the time to figure out their next step. The last three days had been at quite productive, while at the same time they had created another set of loose ends. One of them was the white envelope with the words Harry, use precaution written on it. He’d drawn the conclusion that the list of ten-letter gobbledygook words inside the envelope were account numbers written in some sort of code. Now, packing that envelope into his bag, he didn’t think Hutch would ever give him something he wouldn’t be able to decipher, so the key was out there somewhere. It wasn’t in Hutch’s laptop, however, that much he knew.
The laptop: another loose end. He wondered if there was any way to recoup what was on that hard drive. Why had Hutch erased it, assuming it was him that did it? And why would he have done it if there wasn’t something incriminating on it—something that someone wanted very, very badly. Standing there holding that laptop, it suddenly dawned on Harry that someone could be waiting outside their hotel room right now, waiting to do harm to him and Denise, maybe even kill them, to get their hands on it—that is, if anyone knew he had it. He glanced at the molded case which still contained his Sig Sauer P320 automatic. Taking it out of the case and shoving a fully loaded clip into it, he put it into the outside pocket of his bag. Denise watched him do it, but didn’t say a word.
And then there was the phone call Hutch took before he died. If it could be verified that the person in the ATM footage was indeed Hutch, as they all suspected it was, then it was entirely possible that he could have said something to whomever he was talking to that would shed some light on who his murderer might be. They needed to find out who was on the other end of that call.
Finally, there was the conversation with Walter, Harry recalled, which sounded eerily like the conversation he’d had with Doc Eisenberg the day after Hutch’s funeral. Harry had not shared Doc’s conversation with anyone else, specifically because it sounded, well, pretty outlandish. OSS, CIA, Advanced Research Projects Agency: how did Doc’s source, this Doctor Kadam, know about these institutions and what they worked on? Who was this Doctor Kadam, and why should he, Harry, or anyone else put any credence in his story about governments around the world having developed technology aimed at assassinating people so that they appeared to die from natural causes? Even Doc said it sounded “really spooky.” Yeah, spooky enough to be true, Harry thought unnervingly, and Walter’s story was strikingly similar right down to the time lines and the technology. Something else to consider was that the stories came from two totally disconnected sources. Coincidence? Harry was beginning to think there was no such thing as coincidence in this affair.
“Officer Nekel said we can meet him at the Wallingham police station in half an hour,” Denise said as she put down her cell phone. “He says if we’re involved in another firearm violation in Massachusetts after this, we’re on our own.”
“All we can ask for,” Harry said as he zipped his duffel bag. He knew he’d be in violation of the statute with his own weapon as soon as he got in the car. He slipped on his jeans—the same jeans he’d been wearing for last three days—and asked Denise to tie his running shoes for him. His ribs were aching again, the result of Nekel having wrenched his arm when he tore Indigo’s .45 out of his hand. “After we go to the station, I’d like to go back to the spot you three girls looked at yesterday.”
“I thought—”
“Humor me,” said Harry. Walter’s and Kadam’s stories were sticking like wallpaper inside his head.
They checked out of the Wallingham Inn and were at the police station in ten minutes. Officer Nekel was already there in his street clothes and he gave Denise her pistol back, along with a lecture. He was entitled, thought Harry, and they headed back to Newberry Street after Nekel made sure the weapon was in their trunk and not readily accessible. The street was busy on this beautiful Wednesday morning and people carrying lattes were zipping to and fro. Harry pulled up to a metered spot just a few spaces away from where Hutch’s car had been parked on the night of his death, and also within a few spaces of where the black BMW had pulled out the night before last. He could still envision the driver’s face and his contemptuous sneer as it rolled past him.
“What are you looking for?” Denise asked.
“I’m not sure, exactly. I was hoping something would come to me.” Having said that, Harry looked up and across the street, wondering to himself: If I was an assassin here to kill someone with a weapon that shot high frequency waves of some sort, where would I be located? “From what we saw on the ATM video, where is the spot where Hutch stopped and went back to his car?”
Denise pointed through the windshield. “Half a block up, in front of the revolving door that sticks out onto the sidewalk.”
Harry exited the car and leaned in through the open window. “If you see anyone in a black BMW come near me, shoot them,” he said, indicating his duffel bag in the back seat. It was meant to be funny, but it wasn’t. He made his way up the block and stopped directly in front of the revolving door Denise had indicated. Analyzing the area, the sidewalk was wide at that point, Harry noted, and it wasn’t like anyone could have popped out of some alley or from behind a tree to surprise Hutch; no, if Hutch turned around on this spot, he must have been told to do so, which means he must have known the person he was talking to on the phone. It also means he knew he was in danger. Otherwise, why would he have headed back to the car at all, assuming his intent was to meet the rest of the brothers for the reunion at Slick’s, which was still a block away? Not only that, Hutch was no pussy. He would have confronted anyone, so why would he have gone back to his car and made himself a sitting duck unless he thought that locking himself inside would have prevented him from being harmed?
Harry walked back to the car as quickly as his aching ribs would let him, and pulled Hutch’s laptop from the duffel bag. Turning it on, he looked at the icons on the desktop. There were the usual icons for Word and Excel, PowerPoint, and other apps, but there was no icon for a backup program like Carbonite or some other similar service. But certainly the contents of the laptop were backed up somewhere, probably on the bank’s own backup system, Harry surmised. That meant that if Hutch had erased his own laptop, he did so because he didn’t want that one device, that specific laptop to fall into the wrong hands. He would have known the information he erased was not permanently lost, but still available on the bank’s system. There was only one person who could have known as much about what was on Hutch’s laptop as Hutch did.
“What the hell has got you all wound up now?” Denise asked.
Harry shut down the laptop and stuffed it back into his duffel bag. “Do you have enough clothes to last another couple of days?” he asked as he popped the car into drive.
“Why?” Denise asked. “Aren’t we going home?”
Harry squealed rubber down Newberry Street and said, “We’re going Boston.”
* * * * *
Checking in with Mary back at the office, Harry said, “And please tell Karen and Jack that I’ll be gone for the rest of the week. How are they doing, anyway?”
“Nice of you to inquire, Harry. They’re working their butts off.”
Uh-oh. Mary sounded a little peeved. That wasn’t like her. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Well, something happened on the Gordon case.”
The Gordon case was the biggest lawsuit ever brought by Curlander and Curlander. It was a breach of contract case where the owner of a horse farm in Upper Freehold was suing a developer for damages when runoff from a new housing development poisoned the water supply on the farm. Several valuabl
e horses had to be put down after the developer failed to comply with contractual obligations that would have prevented the catastrophe. The suit probably meant about a million bucks to Curlander and Curlander and Harry had been the lead on the case up to now. “What happened?” Harry asked, almost not wanting to hear the answer.
“The developer produced another copy of the contract which is different than the one we’ve been working with. It’s thrown everything we’ve done into a total tizzy.”
That was Mary’s way of saying they were now in a clusterfuck. “Why didn’t anyone call me?” Harry demanded.
“I did call, and so did Karen, and all we got was your voicemail. Is there something wrong with your cell phone?”
Harry swallowed hard, realizing that he’d forgotten to inform the folks back at the office that he and Denise were using new phones with different numbers and that he’d turned his regular cell phone off. “Yes, there is,” he replied curtly. “I’ll explain later. I’ve got another cell phone number you can use.”
“I can see that on the caller ID,” Mary shot back, again not bothering to hide her annoyance. “And why are you heading toward Boston?”
Taken aback for a moment, Harry looked at his phone as if that would answer her question. “How do you know that’s where we’re headed?”
“The GPS on your regular cell phone is still working. I can see your location on my computer screen as we speak.”
“But the phone is turned off,” Harry explained.
“It doesn’t matter. The GPS feature still works if the phone is turned off and even if we change the privacy settings on the phones. It was one of the features we liked about these phones when we signed up for this plan.”
“It was?”
“Yes, it was. We knew we could always find each other if we had to—you know, in case of emergency or something. We talked about that.”
“We did?”
“Yeah, and it was you who was the most adamant about the idea.”
“I was?”
“Yeah, you were. What’s going on Harry? Why don’t you want us to know where you are?”
Wanting to escape the current topic, “What about the case?” Harry asked bluntly.
“Karen got a continuance to give us time to examine this other version of the contract, but that means a whole other round of interviews and depositions. We’ve only got two weeks, Harry. You’re the lead on this. Are you coming back in time to complete this work before the new trial date?”
Harry’s ears were suddenly burning and he could feel his heart beating faster. “Tell Karen to stay on the case full time and get Jack to pick up on Karen’s load.”
“Jack is already on it, Harry, but he’s up to his eyeballs. He worked all day Sunday and he’s been here ‘til ten o’clock the last two nights.”
“Then call Norm Tellison and see if he can give us a few days. Hopefully his case load is down and he’ll be able to help us out.”
“That will cost us a fortune,” Mary protested. “Are you sure about that?”
“Just call Norm,” Harry ordered. “Everything will be fine.”
“All right,” said Mary, her voice lilting higher. “If that’s what you want to do, but when are you coming back, Harry? We need you around here and you’ve been essentially out of commission since your fraternity friend died. That was almost three weeks ago.”
The lump in Harry’s throat was as big as a baseball. “I’ll be back soon, Mary. Everything will be fine, you’ll see. I have all the confidence in the world in all of you.” It sounded fake, and he knew it.
“We’ll do the best we can,” Mary said skeptically. “Do you want us to use this new cell phone number if we need to get hold of you?”
“Yes,” Harry replied, “and I’ll have Denise text you her new cell number as well.”
“Denise has a new number too?” Mary asked inquisitively. “Why—”
“Gotta go,” said Harry, cutting her off. “I’ll have Denise text that number right away.” He tapped the end call button and looked at Denise in the passenger seat. “I feel like a total ass.”
* * * * *
They found the U.S. headquarters building for First International Bank on Boylston Street near Boston Common, and parking proved to be a thirty-two-dollar bitch. Being early afternoon, the street was jammed with people going or coming from lunch, and they decided to grab a bite around the corner from the bank building coincidentally near Newbury Street, spelled differently than the Newberry Street in Wallingham with which they’d become so familiar. They both ordered New England clam chowder and salad and moments later their cell phones were out. Harry’s job was to contact Fighting Al, while Denise was to find out if Jerry Brennan was going to be in his office that afternoon. Al didn’t answer on the first try and Harry tried twice more.
“Jesus Harry,” Al blurted without any greeting, “I’m at lunch with a client. Whatever it is, can’t it wait?”
“It’ll only take a minute.”
“Shit, Harry, hold on a second.” Al was back a moment later. “What?”
“The phone number, the number belonging to whomever Hutch spoke to before he died?”
“Is that a question?”
“Yes.”
“What about it?”
“I need you to find out who that number belongs to.”
“I already did that, Harry. As I recall it was one of the numbers I highlighted in yellow, one of the numbers that couldn’t be tagged to anyone.”
“Yeah, I know. Not good enough. We need to know, and I know you have ways.”
“Gee Harry, I really appreciate the confidence you have in me, but what the fuck, huh? What if it was one of those burner phones, you know, prepaid, untraceable, like that?”
“Even if someone paid cash, a person had to buy it, right? Someone with a face and a name?”
“And you expect me to find out who that was.”
“Right.”
“It could have been purchased anywhere, months ago even.”
“And I know you can find that out.” Harry paused. “If the tables were turned and you asked me, I’d do the same for you, Al.”
Al said, “Damn it. You must have some Fiorello blood in you. Only my grandmother could make me feel this guilty.”
Harry smiled. “You’re the best, Al.”
“Save it. I’m gonna have to call in a lot of chits to make this happen.”
“Just keep thinking that it’s for one of us,” Harry responded. “Try to get back to me in a couple of days.”
“A couple of days?”
“Yeah, is that a problem?”
“Hey, Harry?”
“Yes Al?”
“Up your ass, Harry.”
“Oh, stop it, Al. You’re making me blush.” Harry ended the call and waited for Denise to finish with hers. “Well?”
“Jerry is in meetings all afternoon, but he’ll see us at the end of the day. We have an appointment with him at six o’clock.”
“That’s great, honey. How did you wangle that?”
“I told his executive assistant that I was from Curlander and Curlander and we were filing a $200 million lawsuit against the bank in connection with Hutch’s death. She put me right through to him.”
Harry grinned. “You’re amazing, but I already used that on him when I met him at Hutch’s wake.”
“Yeah, he mentioned that, and he remembered you and Fish both.”
They made room for the chowder and the salad after which Harry said, “I’m surprised he didn’t refer you directly to their legal department.”
Denise stirred her chowder. “I think he wanted to, but I guess he changed his mind when I told him we were the same two people he followed all the way to Bridgeport after the funeral.”
* * * * *
So this is where Hutch worked, thought Harry as he sat on what had to be a ten-thousand-dollar couch. It was one of two leather c
ouches in the waiting area outside Brennan’s office, which was different than the general reception area with the inch-thick glass entrance doors and huge FIB initials etched into the glass. The place was a sea of glass, leather, and chrome with spears of sunlight glinting powerfully through floor-to-ceiling glass walls. Harry made the mistake of getting too close to one of those walls and his half-digested clam chowder lunch started gurgling inside his stomach.
“Some office,” said Denise. “Did you see that FIB takes up the top six floors of the building?”
Harry just grunted, wondering if Hutch was comfortable working in such ostentatious surroundings. It just wasn’t his style. “I’ll betcha Hutch made a lot of enemies in this place,” he muttered under his breath.
Denise said, “What?” but he was saved from repeating as Jerry Brennan came out of his office and extended his hand.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” said Jerry. “We’ll take the small conference room down the hall if that’s okay with you.”
Harry shrugged and said, “Yeah, sure,” wondering what the hell was wrong with talking in Jerry’s office. They took a small room with a single table and four chairs, and the air was close in there. Jerry took a seat but didn’t make eye contact, instead dropping glances from spot to spot as if he was looking for something—probably something like a hidden microphone, Harry thought instinctively, noticing there was no phone or other communication device in the room. Harry got the distinct impression that people at FIB used this room when they didn’t want others to know what they were talking about.
Jerry pulled back nervously on a clump of his reddish hair. “What can I do for you, Mister Curlander? Surely you’re not serious about that lawsuit.”
One of the guy’s thumbs was shaking, Harry noticed, and... was he sweating? Old Jerry didn’t look too good; looked like he was about to come apart at the seams. “I’m very serious, Mister Brennan. Mister Hutchinson died of a severe myocardial infarction shortly after being examined by one of your physicians. If there was something wrong with him that should have been detected, Mister Hutchinson might still be alive and I think we can make a reasonable case of malpractice or incompetence, or both, against both the examining physician—and the bank.”
“I don’t understand,” Jerry said nervously, the bags under his eyes suddenly draining of color and making him look ghost-like. “We’re not doctors. How can you possibly hold the bank liable for what happened to Todd?”
Once again Harry remembered that Hutch was Hutch only to his close friends. To the rest of the world he was R. Todd Hutchinson. “The bank could be liable if there was something wrong with Mister Hutchinson’s heart and the bank was aware of it—which it should have been if it obtained a copy of the physician’s report after the insurance physical. If so, there is no way Mister Hutchinson should have been under such extensive pressure that it became a threat to his life.” Harry paused dramatically. “Don’t let my jeans and running shoes fool you, Mister Brennan. Curlander and Curlander has prosecuted many cases like this over the years and we know what we’re doing. We’re confident that the punitive damages to the family could be in the hundreds of millions.”
Jerry literally choked on his own inhale.
“I need to know what Mister Hutchinson was working on that caused him to have that heart attack.”
Jerry went into a sudden tailspin, his eyes travelling everywhere. “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” he spat out.
Harry leaned in, elbows on the table. “Then why don’t you enlighten me? What are you hiding, Mister Brennan?”
Abruptly, Jerry got up and knocked his chair over behind him. “We can’t talk here. Not now. Meet me at nine o’clock tonight.” A drop of sweat tracked down his cheek and splashed onto the table.
Harry looked at Denise who was just as nonplused as he was. “Where?” he demanded with as much bravado as he could muster.
In a virtual panic Jerry said, “Give me your cell phone number and I’ll text you the location as soon as I make sure we won’t be followed.”
“Why would we be followed?”
“I can’t talk about that now. Just give me your number.”
Harry did so and Jerry left the room hurriedly. He looked at Denise and said, “What the hell was all that about?”
* * * * *
Jerry’s text didn’t come for another two hours. When it did, Harry noted that the location was in Saugus, ten miles north of Boston at a place called the TipTop Lounge. “Sounds charming,” said Denise. Right. It was a skanky little place off of a skanky stretch of Route 1 called Broadway at that point, and the first thing they noticed was that a couple of letters were burned out and the flickering sign spelled out Ti-Top -ounge. Harry didn’t think that mattered a whole lot to the regulars at this dump. He parked and they navigated around some broken beer bottles that littered the parking lot, noting the wonderful bouquet coming from the dumpster just a few feet from the front entrance. Harry took hold of the swinging door handle which was barely held there with a single screw, not daring to take hold of the stained door itself. Once inside, it became evident that the proprietors didn’t think the state smoking ban inside bars and restaurants was important.
“Stay behind me,” Harry said to Denise, noting that not a single person looked at them. Clearly this was a place where people didn’t see anything, and didn’t want to be seen. Denise held his arm as he did a scan of the place looking for Jerry. A stringy-haired waitress with an obvious meth habit came over and asked, “Are you Harry?”
“Yeah.”
“In the back,” she said, and she moved off quickly when a biker type blowing smoke through his nostrils snapped his fingers at her.
They moved past a couple of fat guys wearing sleeveless flannel shirts who seemed to be negotiating with a couple of fatter hookers, stepping deliberately toward where they imagined “the back” might be. Again, no one made eye contact and a couple of people—supposedly—actually looked the other way. It was suddenly obvious that they were passing the bathrooms, and they moved into another room with a few high-backed booths and some battered tables in a horseshoe arrangement.
“Over here.” It was Jerry’s voice, and it came from one of the booths in the far corner.
Harry did a brief check-out dance, noting that they were the only ones in the room. Tentatively, he and Denise slid into the booth opposite Jerry who was wearing the same suit he’d been wearing that afternoon. Harry took one look at him and recognized all the telltale signs, just as he had with the stringy-haired waitress. “How long have you been doing meth?”
“I’m in detox.”
“Doesn’t look like it’s working.” Jerry’s eyes were like black marbles, dilated to the max.
“What would you know about it?”
“Enough to know that you’re binging and that it’s a fast slide to the bottom from where you are now.”
Jerry took a quick swig from the bottle of beer he’d been sliding from one hand to the other. “That lawsuit thing is a bunch of bullshit, isn’t it?”
“What makes you think that?”
Jerry didn’t answer, but looked at Denise and said, “If you’re smart, you’ll get out of this before it’s too late—for both of you.” She said nothing, but squirmed in her seat.
Hitting Jerry right between the eyes with it, Harry said, “Hutch’s death was no heart attack.”
“I figured that,” said Jerry, looking down at the table.
“What else do you know?”
“I know your friend Todd, or Hutch, or whatever you called him, was an idiot. He couldn’t leave well enough alone. He got himself killed, is what I know.”
Harry nearly came out of his seat, but Denise held him back. He reached across and grabbed Jerry’s lapel. “Tell me what you know, you bastard. Hutch was my friend!”
Jerry shoved his hand away. “With friends like that, pal, you don’t need enemies.”
“Your friend, as you call him, is about to get you killed.”
Harry retreated, and he could see Denise out of the corner of his eye ready to jump across the booth and pick up where he’d just left off. He put his arm out and held her back.
“There were other ways,” Jerry went on without further prodding. “But he had to go to the feds. He had to be all high and mighty and proper—the dumb fuck. All we had to do was to create another layer of transactions. We have plenty of banking partners all over the world that would have been more than happy to reinvest that money into legitimate businesses, and they wouldn’t have asked a fucking million questions about where it came from.” Jerry wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “It would have been virtually untraceable.”
Harry gave him a second. “So you know the bank is laundering money.”
Jerry offered a smile one would give a four-year-old. “I’m the fucking CFO. I looked at the same audits, at the same reconciliations as Todd did when he was CFO; it was only a matter of time before I figured it out. He just couldn’t get with the program.”
Harry glanced at Denise and he tried to alleviate her concern by taking her hand, but it didn’t seem to work. He redirected back to Jerry. “The program—so it’s common knowledge that the bank is taking dirty money.”
Jerry shook his head. “Not common knowledge, no. The operational people have no clue, but the financial people at the very top, the CEO and the CFO, if they know what they’re looking at, they’re bound to see it.” Jerry swigged his beer. “All your friend Hutch had to do was pay attention to what happened to Brendan Phillips and he’d still be alive.”
Denise sucked in some air and covered her mouth. Likewise, Harry reeled back in the booth.
“He blew it,” Jerry said snappishly. “All he had to do was play ball.”
“Play ball with whom?”
Jerry shook his head. “I don’t know specifically, but they’re everywhere, and if they want something they’ll let you know, trust me.”
In his mind’s eye, Harry suddenly pictured a black BMW. “Do you know if Hutch told anyone about what he’d discovered?”
Jerry snapped his head up and stabbed Harry with a vague stare. “Don’t you know?”
“Know what?”
Jerry just chuckled and looked down, shaking his head back and forth. “Oh my God. It’s unbelievable.” He chuckled some more.
“What’s unbelievable?”
Jerry looked him in the eye. “That day, at the wake, when you and that other guy laid this lawsuit thing on me for the first time, you didn’t have any idea of any of this? Todd hadn’t given you any information or account numbers at that point?”
“If that’s a question, no, but I have a feeling that’s what he was planning. Why?”
Jerry leaned back and let out a belly laugh now. “Because that’s why they’re after you too. Don’t you see? You were Todd’s backup plan. He wanted someone else to have the information so that if something happened to him it could still get to the feds.” Jerry waved his hands hysterically. “Some friend he was. He put you and your entire family in danger. Wait, no, not danger, he put you on a death list, and you don’t even have the fucking information!” Jerry’s laughter echoed off the walls.
Harry waited for him to regain his composure. “You said they’re after me. Are they after you too, whoever they might be?”
Tears suddenly pooled in Jerry’s eyes. “It’s already over for me. I don’t know how, but I think they’ve got someone monitoring my calls and emails and they know every move I make.” Jerry reached down and pulled out a small automatic pistol from inside his jacket. “I’ve been carrying this to protect myself, but sooner or later they’re going to get me too.”
Seeing the pistol, Harry stiffened as his adrenaline level shot up immediately. Denise put a hand on his arm and spoke for the first time. “What about your family?” she asked softly.
“I’m not married,” Jerry replied. “But if I was, my family would be in just as much danger as I am.” He paused and took a breath. “That’s how they work, you see. If you don’t do what they want, you suffer more because your family suffers. They’re animals.”
Harry took a moment. If what Jerry was saying was true, he wondered how Hutch had hidden all this from Suzanne who’d never given the first indication that she knew Hutch was in danger. He’d shielded her from it completely. “After the wake, why did you follow me halfway back to Jersey?”
Jerry exhaled and looked up. “I was supposed to set you up.”
Harry’s features hardened. “Is that right?”
“Do you remember the dark-skinned dude that was with me?”
“That was my next question.”
“He was one of them. He’d just gotten done warning me that as CFO I needed to get those accounts out of the spotlight and get them cleared of any more scrutiny from the government. He said that was his deal and if I didn’t cooperate I was going to suffer the same fate as the real Brendan Phillips and your friend Hutch. When you and your other friend foolishly came up to us and started asking questions and threatening that lawsuit, he told me to follow you after the funeral and find out where you lived.”
“You were going to follow me all the way to New Jersey?”
“He didn’t care how far I had to go, but when it became apparent that you had detected me following you, I called him and simply gave him your license plate number so he could figure it out from that. That’s when you walked past me outside that rest stop.”
Harry felt the hair on the back of his neck start to tickle. “So the part about him knowing Suzanne was a ruse,” Harry concluded. “But why did you introduce him as Brendan Phillips?”
“I was hoping you’d know that the real Brendan Phillips was already dead. It didn’t work, and now I have no choice.” With that, Jerry put the barrel of the pistol under his chin, and fired.
The Brothers Page 18
