Cut and Run

by Allison Brennan

  “They are more than sufficient,” Ryan said. “It’s the time involved. A case like this you can’t cut corners.”

  That was true, Max thought. If Ryan and Eve weren’t in her life, she’d rent a condo here in San Antonio and stay as long as necessary to finish the case. She’d done it in the past.

  But now she didn’t care. Well, she cared, but not enough to uproot her life and miss out on so much time with the people she loved.

  “It’ll be a couple more days,” Max said, “maybe a week. If I know Lucy is taking the case, I can walk away.”

  “You must trust her.”

  “I don’t trust many people to do as good a job as me, but Lucy is one of them,” Max said.

  Eve said, “Maybe Ryan and I can come out there this weekend if you can’t leave.”

  “If I can’t leave, that means I’m working.”

  “You can have dinner with us, right? And you can’t work every minute of the day. And besides, Ryan misses you a lot.”

  “Shh,” Ryan said in a stage whisper. “That’s between you and me, kid.”

  Eve smiled. She had been through a rough patch in April and had had to adjust to a whole new life after learning that the people she loved and trusted the most had lied to her.

  Max knew how she felt. The difference was that Eve’s uncle had lied to her for the right reasons, to protect her and give her a safe life. Max’s mother had lied to her for her own selfish reasons.

  But Eve had accepted her new life, embraced it, and looked at the past as a learning tool. A lot like Max would have done, and she was proud of her.

  “If I can’t leave on Friday, I would love to see you both in person. I have a suite, so there’s plenty of room.”

  “It’s a date,” Ryan said. “I need to feed this kid, and you have no food. Let me know what Agent Kincaid says and if you need to talk, I’m here.”

  * * *

  Though Max often irritated Lucy in how she approached an investigation by jumping in without looking, Lucy was always impressed with how she organized her information. Lucy was very visual, so viewing Max’s timeline and all the relevant data clearly listed helped her see the whole case. Though she was exhausted and just wanted to go home and sleep, Lucy was glad she’d come by the hotel.

  In the forty-eight hours that Max had been in town, she had done a lot.

  “What is HFM?” she asked. She was both upset and angry that Sean and Max had been followed this afternoon after Max’s meeting with Harrison Monroe, but she understood why they hadn’t called the police. There had been no crime, and proving to the authorities that someone was tailing you was virtually impossible. “On paper it looks legit.”

  “It may be legit,” Max said. “At least on the surface. He buys a lot of property, holds it for a year, and sells it—all through HFM. But it’s impossible to tell—without a federal warrant—where his original money came from. Sean doesn’t think we have enough to turn over to your people. Neither does Ryan.”

  “You don’t,” Lucy said. “On the surface there is nothing illegal about any of this. You drew a pretty picture connecting Victoria’s murder to the discovery of the Albrights’ bones, but that’s not even enough. Stan’s comment about Monroe being a straw buyer—even if we could get the judge to let you testify to his statement—means nothing. He didn’t flat out say he didn’t know Monroe, he just didn’t make it sound like he did.”

  Lucy looked at the list of names that had been running around in her head ever since Max laid out her theories last night. Six friends from college … involved allegedly in an illegal gambling operation years ago … what were they doing now? Had their crimes caught up with them? Could these murders be revenge … for someone they hurt more than two decades ago?

  “You’re thinking,” Sean said.

  “It’s … nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing.”

  “If we assume they had committed crimes together in college, maybe one of their past acts caught up with them.”

  “That’s a long time to wait for revenge,” Max said.

  “And almost impossible to follow up on,” Lucy said. “Unless there was a complaint filed.”

  “That, I can find out,” Sean said. “I’ll dig around and see if anyone filed a complaint in college about any of these people. It won’t take much time—a few calls to the right people.”

  “Revenge is a solid motive,” Lucy said, “but I keep coming back to Denise’s family being murdered. It’s … overkill. Unless the kids saw something, but Tori got Becky out of volleyball practice Friday and that tells me that they were either planning on running or … or what if Glen was taking the kids out of town for safety because Denise was planning on going to the authorities about whatever she knew?”

  “But they didn’t get out fast enough,” Max said.

  “The revenge angle is worth looking at,” Sean said, “but our working theory—and no, we can’t prove it—is that Harrison Monroe created HFM to launder his illegal gambling profits.”

  “Which you learned from this Tompkins guy who hasn’t seen Monroe in over twenty years,” Lucy said. “I’m sorry to play the devil’s advocate here, but no judge is going to give us a warrant based on an unproven—and uninvestigated—accusation more than two decades old.”

  “That’s your world,” Max said, “not mine. I know there’s a story here. I can expose the illegal gambling, I can report anything I want as long as I can support my claims with evidence. We talked to Ryan shortly before you arrived, just to run a hypothetical situation by him. In a nutshell, land transactions generate a paper trail. But to unravel something like this would take months, if not years, of work, and there’s no probable cause for a warrant. Victoria being dead doesn’t seem to count.”

  “Because Monroe isn’t a suspect in her murder,” Lucy said.

  “We don’t know that, because Detective Reed doesn’t share.”

  “With you,” Lucy reminded her.

  Sean said, “Ryan had a good suggestion—to focus on the murders, not the gambling or land transactions. A reverse Al Capone, where technology and forensics will yield more evidence than a white collar investigation in the short run.”

  “He’s right,” Lucy agreed, “and I’m more comfortable investigating violent crime over money laundering.”

  “We need access to all the reports from Victoria’s murder,” Max said.

  Lucy couldn’t help but smile. “We?”

  “We’re a team,” Max said. “I share, you share.”

  Lucy knew what she meant, but she didn’t like their arrangement. “I will talk to Detective Reed tomorrow after I interview the bank manager in Kerrville. I don’t think Denise embezzled the money. We have a handwriting expert comparing a known signature to the authorization forms that granted her exclusive signatory powers. The original investigation already proved that Kiefer’s signature was forged.”

  “We have a lot of dots, but few connections,” Sean said. “What we need is one of those people to talk.” He gestured to the list.

  “Three of them are dead,” Lucy pointed out. “I find it hard to believe that they were all party to murder. It takes a special coldness to kill someone you care about—like a sister or even an ex-wife. And even colder to kill an entire family.”

  “We were talking about that earlier,” Max said. “What if they didn’t know or consent to Victoria’s murder? What if they bought into the Stanley Grant confession? When I saw Simon at the courthouse yesterday, he was truly grieving for his sister and clearly blamed Grant. Yet that doesn’t mean he didn’t know they were doing something illegal—or that he was a part of it. But what part? The gambling part or the land part or both?”

  “You’re making a huge leap, Max. You haven’t established that Harrison Monroe even runs an illegal gambling organization.”

  “I had wanted to go in undercover,” Sean said, “but because I was at the courthouse and Simon saw me with Grant’s sister, and the shooter saw me with both Marie a
nd Stan outside, and then I confronted Monroe’s goon who followed us, I can’t go in. And you’re the face of the Denise Albright investigation, so you can’t go in, either.”

  “In where?” Lucy rubbed her eyes. She really was tired.

  Sean walked over and massaged her shoulders. She wanted to sigh in relief but held it back. “I talked to Tia this afternoon, off the record. She knows of a premiere underground casino. It’s in the county, very low-key, high stakes. Harrison’s name isn’t attached to it—but I suspect his goon squad is all over it. I would be perfect because I count cards and I’m a damn good poker player.”

  “They know your face.” Now she was getting it.

  “After we talked it out with Ryan, that’s when he suggested focusing on the murder case. But he was intrigued, I could tell.”

  “And knowing most feds as I do, he’s going to stay out of it unless invited by our office.”

  “Maybe you can sweet-talk Laura into asking for him.”

  “She’s not in charge. Something like that will have to be decided higher up the ladder, and our White Collar Crimes unit is pretty good. I thought Ryan specialized in art crime?”

  “He does,” Max said, “but he works a variety of cases. He assisted the Secret Service with a counterfeit money operation last month. He has a sharp eye for forgeries, and not just in art.”

  Max sounded impressed with her boyfriend’s talents, which made Lucy smile. Max had mellowed since she met Ryan. Already Lucy liked him.

  “Still,” Lucy said, “an operation like this could take weeks—months. And if I were Monroe, I would lay low right now. You already set Monroe off—he had you followed—why would he risk exposure now?”

  “All we need is one of these people,” Sean said. “Just one to talk. Either we bring in someone undercover or we bluff—I think Mitch Corta is the weak link, Max thinks Simon.”

  “Why?”

  “Your husband seems to believe that Mitch is still in love with Victoria and can be more apt to change loyalties and turn state’s evidence because she was murdered. I think Simon, as her brother, will flip out of guilt when confronted with our belief that Monroe ordered a hit on her. We agree that they probably had nothing to do with her murder but may now suspect—after Grant’s assassination—that Monroe was behind it.”

  Lucy opened a folder. It was the crime scene photos of Victoria’s murder. “You shouldn’t have this. Where did you get these?”

  “Long story.” Max didn’t elaborate.

  Lucy hoped Sean hadn’t broken the law. She looked through them.

  Victoria had been stabbed and pushed into the pool at the house she had listed for sale while the owners were out of town. She would have bled out, but the pool quickened her death and the COD was drowning.

  There had been no wine, no food, no sign that Victoria intended to meet anyone at the house. Why had she gone there at night? To check on something? To meet someone? Was she having an affair—except she was single.

  Harrison Monroe isn’t single.

  “Do you have the autopsy report?”

  “Next folder.”

  Lucy read the autopsy report. Victoria had been stabbed twice in the stomach, fully clothed, then pushed into the pool. Chlorine had destroyed any evidence on her person. The knife hadn’t been recovered.

  Lucy held the autopsy photos under the hotel lamp. The coroner had measured the wounds and determined the angle. Whoever stabbed her had gone for center mass, slightly on Victoria’s left side, suggesting the killer was right-handed—like 90 percent of the population. He held the knife at waist level and stabbed Victoria, up close and personal. Once, twice. Knife wounds were always messy and Victoria may have been able to survive the attack if she’d had immediate medical attention—her heart had not been compromised. But the killer pushed her into the pool and she drowned, secondary cause blood loss.

  “This was personal,” Lucy said. “Whoever killed her waited to ensure she didn’t get out of the pool. The water hastened blood loss, loss of consciousness, and subsequent death by drowning. But theoretically, Victoria could have pulled herself out of the pool, so the killer would want to make sure she was dead. It wouldn’t take long. Five, ten minutes tops.”

  She closed the folders and put them back on the desk. “The killer was face-to-face, inches away. He stabbed her in the stomach twice. She didn’t see it coming. There were no defensive wounds on her hands or arms, and the only other injury was a cut on her ankle from when her foot hit the edge of the pool as she was pushed in. She trusted whoever killed her, or didn’t see him as a threat.”

  “She expected to meet someone there,” Max said.

  “Yes, or when he showed up she wasn’t surprised or he had a good reason for being there. Which can point to Grant or Monroe or her ex-husband or her brother. It isn’t a random act of violence. Not a break-in, and I can’t see at this angle of wound, and the depth, that it was someone she didn’t know. If you encounter a stranger and they get close enough to stab you, you’re going to back up. If they’re running at you or attacking you, they’re going to stab overhanded, using their strength and momentum to penetrate. But underhanded, you get close, and the victim may not even notice you have a knife. It was dark, they were outside, Victoria knew the killer, was likely having a conversation with him. She didn’t run away when he got closer. Nothing was disturbed—at least from the pictures you have, I couldn’t see that there was overturned furniture or anything broken. But the killer would have had blood on him—his hand, his clothes. You can’t stab someone that close and not get blood on you.”

  “Two months have passed,” Max said. “Wouldn’t all that evidence be gone?”

  “Most likely,” Lucy said. “The knife would be a key bit of evidence, and the chances that the killer wore gloves are slim to none. Not in early September. I’d think Victoria would have noticed.” SAPD would have completely printed the house, the yard, anything the killer might have touched. Any fingerprints would be gone two months later. But the reports Max had didn’t show the house, only Victoria’s body and immediate area. There had to be a blood trail. The killer had left the property. Touched a door or a gate. Wouldn’t the police have checked?

  She shook her head. She couldn’t second-guess SAPD—they were a competent department that had investigated thousands more homicides than she had. She didn’t know Detective Reed, but she was a senior detective and would have done due diligence. And Max didn’t have everything here, only a small part of the investigatory detail.

  Grant confessed … What happened after his confession? What other inquiries had they started prior to the confession that stopped because they thought they had the killer in custody? Time … time was not a friend of evidence. Evidence disappeared. Disintegrated. Became corrupted.

  She could talk to Ash Dominguez. They were friends, he would let her look at the evidence on the QT. Though she didn’t want to go that way. She wanted Reed’s cooperation.

  “You’re thinking about something,” Sean said.

  “I need to handle the bank tomorrow, then I’ll talk to Reed and the crime scene investigators.” Not necessarily in that order. “They don’t have to share anything with me, but I’ll be on my best behavior.”

  “Don’t mention my name,” Max said. “I may have irritated the detective with my questions.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised,” Lucy said with a smile.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  THURSDAY MORNING

  Lucy was surprised when Laura’s direct supervisor, senior agent Adam O’Neal, joined them to serve the warrant on Pollero’s bank. Leo Proctor, the head of FBI SWAT, was there as backup with another agent, though not in SWAT capacity.

  “We have certain protocols we follow,” Adam explained. “Because this is a single-branch situation, I spoke with the bank president this morning to alert him as to our intentions and our target. He is cooperating fully. And no,” he continued when he saw the look on Lucy’s face, “he isn’t going to ca
ll Pollero and warn him. He’s on his way, however, and it’ll be much easier if he helps us process the warrant.”

  Lucy wasn’t as familiar with White Collar Crimes as Violent Crimes, so deferred to those who knew better.

  Laura pulled her aside. “It’s SOP, and we already know from corporate headquarters that Pollero called in sick—before Adam spoke to the president.”

  “It seems to give an opportunity for a suspect to get away.”

  “My unit takes months, sometimes a year or more, to build cases against white collar criminals. Lots of paperwork, records, interviews, tracking money, the whole nine yards. It takes time. We work very closely with banks and have a terrific relationship with all the VPs in our area. In fact, we usually have a dedicated contact in every corporate office. Getting a warrant like this in less than twenty-four hours—pretty amazing. We’re a totally different animal than Violent Crimes.”

  “If we took a year, more people would die,” Lucy said.

  Serving the warrant went smoothly, and Lucy recognized the advantage of having the bank president on-site.

  She and Laura searched Pollero’s office.

  “He planned on leaving,” Lucy said.

  “Excuse me?” Laura asked.

  Lucy hadn’t realized she’d spoke out loud. “Pollero.” She pointed to his desk.

  “I don’t see anything.”

  “Yesterday there was a photo on his desk of his daughter at her wedding. It’s missing. I need to talk to the staff—whoever works closest with Pollero.”

  Laura talked to Adam, who talked to the president, and in five minutes Laura brought in Stephanie Robertson, the head teller who worked the same schedule as Pollero. The bank president, Mr. Shreve, was there with her. “I hope you don’t mind, Agent Kincaid. As my employee, Ms. Robertson has rights.”

  “Of course not. I have some questions about Mr. Pollero’s demeanor yesterday.”

  “Anything I can do to help,” she said, nervous. She was in her fifties, trim, and dressed in a black skirt and white blouse.