The Voxlightner Scandal

by Don Travis

  I grabbed my phone to call Chillicothe PD while Paul got on the trail of Roy Guerra. Anderson still had Rider’s desktop and soon found TeamViewer had been downloaded.

  “Great. Now take a look at her cell phone,” I said.

  “Didn’t find one,” he came back at me. “She had a landline at the house, but I didn’t find a cell.”

  “Thanks.”

  Roy called back a few minutes later and said Socorro PD found TeamViewer on Herrera’s machine. Bingo! We’d learned how the bad guys—as Paul called them—passed messages back and forth… even if I hadn’t yet figured out how they’d exchanged passwords. Burner cell phones we hadn’t yet located probably held the answer to that.

  Chapter 13

  AFTER WE went to bed, I was trying to get a reluctant Pedro to come out and play when Paul suddenly sat up. “What was that?”

  “I didn’t hear anything.” I liked the way one of the dragon’s inked claws clutched Paul’s left nipple.

  He swept back the covers and stepped into a pair of Levi’s. I was slower, so he reached the front hallway before I got out of the bedroom.

  “Fire!” he yelled. “Front porch.”

  He went for the fire extinguisher, but I ran for the flower beds along the driveway. This wasn’t the first time my house was firebombed.

  He slowed the flames, and my flower bed dirt finished the job. We must have been a little noisy during our labors because lights up and down Post Oak Drive flared as the neighborhood came out to see what the detective fellow at 5229 was up to now. By the glow of the porch light, we stared at the remains of a Molotov cocktail as a siren screamed in the distance. One of the neighbors had called 911.

  “Good thing it didn’t go through the window,” Paul said. “Woulda been lots worse.”

  “Take a look at the screens. I replaced the regular mesh with something more substantial years ago.”

  “Hey, this is like when Puerco and his Santos Morenos tried the same thing during the Zozobra caper.” Paul and I had only recently met at that time and were cautiously feeling our way toward a relationship.

  “Exactly.”

  “Belhaven died because someone set his house on fire,” he reminded me.

  “Belhaven died because someone hit him in the head before setting him aflame in his garage. I don’t think the perpetrator believed this would kill us. But it would cause us some distress and possibly injure one or the other of us.”

  “Harassment?”

  “Warning.”

  A fire truck and an EMT team arrived to find there wasn’t much to do other than write a report. A police unit arrived on their heels, and I asked them to let Lt. Gene Enriquez know everything was all right. Too late. His brown Ford eased to the curb within minutes, Roy’s blue one right on its tail.

  “You guys okay?” Gene called as he walked up.

  “Fine. I take it you heard the police call and recognized the address.”

  “You got it. Looks like you’re gonna need a new paint job.”

  “And some bricks sandblasted.”

  “Way I figure it, you pay someone to firebomb your porch every five years or so as an excuse to redo the outside.”

  Roy didn’t understand the inside joke. “See who did it?”

  “Nope, we were in bed.”

  “You called it in?” Gene asked.

  “One of the neighbors must have.”

  “They mighta seen something more than flames.” He turned away to instruct the patrolmen to call in help to canvass the area.

  My across-the-street-neighbor—the area’s one-woman neighborhood watch—appeared in her nightgown covered by a heavy robe. “Are either of you injured?” Gertrude Wardlow asked.

  “Just fine. Did you see anything?”

  “Heavens no. I was asleep until the sirens woke me. But I’ll bet someone did, and I’ll find out who.”

  I didn’t call her off. She’d do a better job than the cops.

  Gene finished dispatching his troops and greeted her courteously. He had a lot of respect for her years in the DEA.

  A few minutes later as we stood in my front yard discussing things, a patrolwoman walked up to Gene. “Neighbor across the street and two houses down heard a car at 11:00 p.m., about the right time. When it pealed out, he looked through the window. But all he saw was a dark shape. SUV, he thought. Couldn’t identify it again. Aside from that, nothing.”

  “Wick Pillsner?” Paul asked. “We’re beginning to close in on him, and he knows it.”

  “How does he know?” I asked.

  Gene answered, “How does he not know? Wick’s connected in this town. You’ve been asking questions, so he’s bound to have heard about it. A dime to a donut, he knows you’re running down three electrical meter readings and trying to tie them to whoever rented the house on Georgia Street. That’s too close. Raises too many questions.”

  “Maybe.”

  I declined the police minder Gene wanted to leave outside my door. Even given the events of the night, I didn’t feel unduly threatened. Something wasn’t right. Tossing a Molotov cocktail onto a fellow’s porch was a pretty inefficient way of getting rid of a target. Delivering a message? Now that was another thing altogether. Leave me alone or I’ll come at you for real!

  No one could convince me this was Wick Pillsner’s method of doing business. I’d watched him when he coached me as a kid. He went right for his opponent’s jugular. Take care of him. Get him out of the game.

  And I’d known of a few business deals he’d been involved in. Ride right over the opposition. Hit them where they were vulnerable before they even knew they were vulnerable. No warning. No waving a fellow off. Simply take care of him before he became a problem.

  My mental exercises convinced me of one thing. Wick Pillsner did not firebomb my house this evening, but I was closing in on him, so I’d better watch my back. And Paul’s back, as well. That left me with another puzzler.

  Who firebombed my home… and why?

  THE NEXT morning Hazel went into her mothering mode when she learned of the fire. I think she was more concerned over Paul’s carcass than mine. Ah well, he was a loveable cuss.

  Once we got past that little piece of drama, Charlie, Hazel, and I gathered around the big table in our conference room. Paul and Detective Guerra sat in on our session. After Paul finished explaining the TeamViewer theory, Roy came up with the same question I asked Paul last night. “Why do they need this TeamViewer thing? If they had unregistered cell phones, why not just talk?”

  Charlie nodded to emphasize Roy’s questions.

  “Because the mastermind behind all this is a very cautious man,” I said. “In all likelihood he simply texted a date and time for contact, nothing more. At the appointed time, each party activated TeamViewer, and the party on the receiving end entered his code, texted the caller his password, and they were in contact.”

  “I still don’t understand,” Roy said. “Talk, deliver your message, and hang up. How is that any riskier than this other thing?”

  “Let’s say someone found one of the unregistered phones. The authorities could use them to establish contact between point A and point B, that is, say, Albuquerque and Chillicothe, but not to determine who the individuals were. And if they texted everything, there would be no voices on record anywhere, simply a text of times and dates and what was probably passwords. But passwords to what? Not many people would connect that to a TeamViewer. It would be a mystery within an enigma thing. Smart as hell, in my opinion.”

  Roy scratched his head. “But like you said, a text would be evidence of contact.”

  “My guess is when—or if—we ever find one of those cells, you’ll see it was purchased in California or Wisconsin or Tennessee or somewhere, so it carried a prefix not associated with any of the conspirators. You might be able to prove a text pinged off an Albuquerque tower, but that would be all.”

  Paul asked Roy to drag his laptop from his attaché case, downloaded the TeamViewer software on i
t, and demonstrated what we were talking about.

  “Be damned!” was all Roy said. Apparently convinced, he moved on to other matters. “What do we do about Wick Molotoving your house?”

  I kept my doubts to myself. “We’ll never hang the firebombing around his neck… or anyone else’s. A car in the night.”

  “You’re probably right,” he acknowledged.

  Charlie rubbed a hand over his balding scalp and adjusted his glasses. “Don’t see why Wick would do such a thing. What did it gain him? He knows BJ’s not going to let go of anything. Damned dumb reaction from a damned smart man.”

  “That’s got me puzzled too,” I said.

  Hazel spoke up. “He had something in mind, you can bet on it. BJ, you better ask Gene to put a patrol car in front of your house… at least at night.”

  “He’s already offered, but it’s a poor use of manpower. If Wick wants to deliver a message, he’ll find a way to deliver it.”

  “That’s all it was?” Hazel asked, her voice rising on the last word. “A warning?”

  I managed to get us off the subject by pointing out the attempted firebombing ended up in this morning’s Albuquerque Journal. In light of that we decided it was time for another report to Dorothy Voxlightner, our client.

  I decided to deliver it in person while Roy and Paul drove down to Socorro to take another look for a stray cell phone. As soon as Hazel transcribed my dictated report, I asked her to arrange a meeting for two that afternoon.

  DOROTHY VOXLIGHTNER answered the door herself and invited me into the drawing room, where a silver carafe of coffee and a porcelain pot of tea waited. I chose tea. As soon as we were settled, she scanned the report, placed it on the coffee table, and looked me in the eye.

  “What is the report not saying?”

  The report I’d handed her did not contain the name Hardwick Pillsner. That was the only fact I’d omitted. Why? To give her cover in case she and Wick came face-to-face. But in the clear light of day, I changed my mind. She was entitled to know.

  “It fails to say Hardwick Pillsner is the man who originally rented the Georgia Street address.”

  “Why omit it?”

  “Did you read the Journal this morning?”

  “I did. I saw the article on the attempted arson at your home. That was Wick?”

  I shrugged. “I can’t ignore the possibility it might have been. I hope the fact you engaged me to look into Belhaven’s murder isn’t common knowledge. I take it neither you nor your daughter is accustomed to discussing private affairs openly.”

  “You are correct.”

  “Good. Keep it that way.”

  “This makes sense to me,” she said after taking a sip of coffee. “Wick—using my son’s contacts—put together the metals company. I gather from your report you assume the assays were phony.”

  “Is there any other explanation for conducting assays at Georgia Street? Wick… or more likely, Dr. Stabler… got his hands on some high-quality ore. They probably mixed in some of the Morenci ore to keep the reports from being too rosy.”

  “So it was a scam from the beginning?”

  “Judging from the independent assays Everett Kent had done prior to his murder, I’d say so.”

  “Does this exonerate Barron?” she asked in a small voice.

  “No, ma’am. This just points us to an unexpected player, the brains behind the scheme. It doesn’t prove anyone’s innocence.”

  “How do we do that?”

  “You allow me to continue. We’re not near the bottom of the barrel yet.”

  “By all means keep on digging.”

  “That, Dorothy, I fully intend to do.”

  She was struck by another thought, or perhaps it was there all the time, waiting to be given voice. “Does this mean Wick killed my son?”

  “The temptation to say yes is strong, but we’re lacking proof. I’m sorry to say, it does mean Barron is probably dead. But as agreed, we’re not through digging yet.”

  “Assuming you are right, is it likely Wick also killed Pierce?”

  “We need to clear up the precious metals recovery scheme first. That will possibly lead us to Belhaven’s killer.”

  THE NEXT day I attended a business meeting at Wick’s office building on Lomas. I wasn’t totally an interloper. A week ago a friend of mine asked if I was interested in a new venture Wick was putting together called the Rio Puerco Land Development Project. I’d not given him an answer, but I had written down the time and date of the meeting. The whole town knew my late father left me a sizable trust, so I was always getting tips for “great deals.”

  Wick seemed surprised to see me but didn’t question why I was there. He knew my history, and a buck is a buck no matter where it comes from. The pitch for a residential real estate venture on the Westside was of interest because of the availability of a sizable tract of land purchased from heirs to an old Spanish land grant. The mayor’s office was represented, signaling his support, as was the chairman of the Bernalillo County commission.

  At the conclusion of the meeting, I kept my seat, speaking briefly with some acquaintances until the room gradually emptied and Wick gravitated to me.

  “Surprised to see you, BJ. I hear it’s hard to get you to part with any of your inheritance.”

  I stood in order to be on a level with him… minus a couple of inches. “My father was a wise man. He invested his funds well, and I’ve made very few changes in lo these many years.” I realized with a start my parents died in a car wreck on Friday, January 31, 2003, more or less at the beginning of the Voxlightner scam. No wonder some of it was so hazy in my mind. I’d been wrapped up in grief and settling my parents’ affairs while holding down a job as a cop at the time. “Still, there are some discretionary funds, so I occasionally make investments.”

  “You’ll never make a better long-term investment than the $10,000 minimum it takes to get in on this one.”

  “It sounds interesting.”

  “Good. Take a brochure and make the right decision.”

  Then he made it easy for me. He brought up the Voxlightner thing—indirectly—instead of me having to introduce the subject.

  “I hear you’re investigating Pierce Belhaven’s murder. Making any progress?”

  “You know anyone who’d want him dead?” I asked.

  “Pierce? Nah. He was harmless.”

  “Someone didn’t think so.”

  He squinted as he looked at me. “He and his son were crossways.”

  “Do you really think Harrison would kill his dad?”

  “Is it true he left his secretary and his yard boy a quarter of a mil each?”

  I ignored his question and introduced a new element. “He also announced on TV he was reopening the Voxlightner Metals incident.”

  Wick let that lay for a second. “Nobody’s anxious to relive that painful stuff all over again. Like I told you the other day. I got hurt, but I want to let sleeping dogs lie. Doesn’t benefit anyone to stir up that mess again.”

  “True for most of us, I suppose.” I let a little pause develop. “Especially anybody with dirt on his hands who wasn’t caught up the first time around.”

  “Barron’s and Walther’s disappearance wrapped the mystery. Bastards are probably living it up somewhere spending our money.” He slapped the back of the chair beside him. “I’ve got to get moving. Have an appointment. You think about the Rio Puerco investment, okay?”

  “I’ll give it due deliberation.”

  I watched his retreating back as he left the room. He didn’t seem tense.

  BEFORE I escaped my office—hopefully for the entire weekend—the mayor’s office called to press for an answer as to whether I would serve on the civilian police oversight board. I declined. My concern was I was too close to the police department, and my decisions would constantly be second-guessed by the press and others because of my relationship with Gene. I recommended another highly respected confidential investigator in town who had once been a
cop but whose ties were more cleanly broken.

  As I headed down the back stairway for the parking lot, feeling liberated by my decision, Gene called my cell and proposed a drink. I agreed and asked where.

  “How about 5229 Post Oak Drive?” he asked. “You still have bourbon, don’t you?”

  “Sure. Be home in twenty or so.”

  “Be there in half an hour. Will Paul be home?”

  “Probably. He pretty much works out of the house except when he’s somewhere with me or with Roy.”

  “How’re they working together?”

  “Good. Think they’ve decided they trust one another.”

  “Okay. See you soon. But I want some alone time.”

  I puzzled over the request. Gene occasionally came over for a drink, but he seldom invited me to my own home for libations.

  Paul’s Charger was gone from the driveway, so he was out somewhere, and I couldn’t help but wonder where. I managed to get into more comfortable clothes before Gene rang the doorbell.

  We took seats in the den where the wet bar was handy. His tumbler held bourbon rocks; mine, Scotch neat. He got right to what was on his mind.

  “I’ve decided not to put in my papers.”

  “Does this mean you’re going to accept the promotion?”

  “Not sure about that yet, but I can’t retire. The department’s in bad shape, BJ. Ever since we got hit by pay cuts to balance the city’s budget last year, we’ve lost a lot of officers. Morale’s lousy—not just because of the pay thing, but because the public’s raising hell over the police union’s financial hijinks and wrongful deaths claims and whistleblower harassment.”

  “People are jumping ship?”

  He rubbed the cool glass across his brow. “Not so much that as attrition and people leaving for better pay.”

  “How high are the personnel losses?”

  “Ten percent. Heading for twenty, most likely. I’m pretty sure there’ll be a Department of Justice investigation sooner or later. Hell, some of the rank and file are asking for one.”