Final Act

by Van Fleisher

  She used the pantyhose to tie the gunman’s wrists behind him, and then his ankles, with knots she’d long since forgotten about from her Girl Scout days. She then quickly re-dressed as she called 911, only a little bit concerned that the beige carpeting would probably have to be replaced because the gunman’s flattened nose was bleeding profusely. Then she retrieved the gun, checked in on Karima, who remained sound asleep, and went downstairs to wait for the police.

  The police arrived, got a full report from Jennifer, and half- dragged the still mostly unconscious gunman down the stairs and into their car. She was pretty sure there was a look of admiration on the face of one of the officers as she described the scene when she took the guy down, but maybe he was just picturing the scene a little too vividly. The police asked about the ‘Final Notice’ comment, which she briefly explained, although she didn’t understand the context of the demand.

  Jennifer poured herself another glass of wine and called Vijay. Hearing about her ordeal, he wanted to come back immediately, but she reassured him that a police car was parked outside and would remain until the next morning. Vijay was also puzzled by the gunman’s demand, but for the moment, the fact that his wife and daughter were OK was enough. He was immensely proud of Jennifer’s bravery and skills, but he did ask her to promise him that she wouldn’t open the door without checking first. She readily promised, upset with herself for her carelessness; then, she finished her wine, put on her pajamas, and went to sleep. Karima even cooperated and slept through until morning.

  ***

  Vijay arrived home just before noon. He hadn’t been able to sleep well that night following Jennifer’s phone call, which was both extremely worrying and puzzling. What did the guy with the gun mean by “Final Notice names?” On a simplistic level, it could mean the names of people who have received their ‘Final Notice.’ But why would they want those names, and why was it so important that a brutal threat was made?

  He and Jennifer discussed the situation, but for him, the first order of business was to have a sophisticated alarm system installed. Jennifer agreed, primarily for the safety of Karima.

  Vijay got the number of the police from the card they had left and called. He was transferred to the detective handling the case, who told him that the guy they were holding was a small-time crook, who had been arrested a few times for theft and battery charges, both in New York and Boston. The police were pretty confident that he was acting for someone else, but so far, all they knew was that he’d been instructed by someone to intimidate Vijay’s wife and issue the threat. He had no idea what it meant, and the detective asked Vijay if he knew any more about the context of the ‘Final Notice’ mention. Vijay explained that he was puzzled as well.

  The detective continued, saying that a lawyer had not appeared to defend the attacker, which meant that he probably had little or no connection to a larger organization, or that they wanted to keep well below the radar. At some point, a public defender would be appointed, and then they might have more leverage to negotiate in exchange for more information.

  Vijay thanked him, but before they hung up, the detective laughed and said, “By the way, your wife really did a number on his nose.” And then, still chuckling, “We’ll let you know if we learn any more, and if you figure it out, please let me know.”

  ***

  CHAPTER 7 – THE ACCENT

  Quincy, Massachusetts. Alek buried himself in his work and knew that this would be one of his late days, capped off with vodka, but not at Sully’s. He did not want to run into Vik.

  Early in the evening, the security guard came to Alek’s work-station desk and told him that there were two FBI agents out front who wanted to see him. Alek froze for a moment, took a deep breath, and said, “OK, send them back.”

  The two men, one in his thirties and the other younger, perhaps mid-twenties, came in and showed their badges and a search warrant. They explained that they were investigating the Thomas Sheehan murder and had some questions. The older one said that they would need to check his computer or, if they had to, take it away for detailed examination. He suggested that to make things easier and faster, his colleague could check the computer while he asked some questions. He also asked if Alek was currently logged in. Alek explained that he was automatically logged out within sixty-seconds if he was not interacting with the machine, so, “No.”

  The agent explained that to ensure Alek didn’t carry out any actions to delete data, he wanted Alek to give his colleague his password, let him sign in with it to search for various items like e-mails and financial transactions and then, assuming they didn’t find anything incriminating, sign out. Alek could then reset his password in private.

  Alek was uncomfortable with that, and although he understood the logic, he balked at the suggestion. The agent then discarded his friendly nature and flatly announced, “We are investigating the murder of the man who killed your wife and son. You have just deposited a check for a hundred thousand dollars, and last night the wife of an associate of yours was threatened at gunpoint. You will either answer my questions and allow my colleague to access your computer, or both you and your machine will come with us.”

  Alek was rocked back by the change in demeanor, the mention of the check, and a threat to a colleague. “Who was threatened?”

  “We are not at liberty to reveal that. Do we do this here or at our office?”

  Alek felt guilty, although he didn’t know why, and he decided to please them, “OK, here is my password.”

  The younger agent went to work clicking away while the other one began his questions. He started with questions similar to those the police asked the other morning. No, he didn’t poison Sheehan or have someone else do it. He didn’t know anything about it other than what he had read or seen on TV.

  “What about the hundred-thousand-dollar deposit?”

  Alek explained about receiving the check and calling the lawyer. The agent asked him for the lawyer’s name, and number and Alek looked at his cell phone for the number of Mr. Annikov and read it off.

  Finally, the agent asked Alek if he knew why anyone would threaten a VitalTech employee? Alek squirmed in his seat, and it seemed like the oxygen had left the room. He asked for more details, and when the agent refused to provide any, Alek told him that he didn’t know.

  The younger agent pushed away from the computer and announced that it was clean and that he hadn’t found anything. They asked Alek to sign in and reset his password to confirm there was no problem with the machine. He did, and there wasn’t.

  The older agent announced they were finished for the time being and thanked him for his cooperation. After they left, Alek did some random searches and operations with his computer, but it seemed fine. What he really wanted to know was, Who was threatened? Could Vik be involved? How could he find out without someone knowing that he knew something? But there was something else. Did the agent checking his computer say, “There vus nothing?” And then he realized that they didn’t leave their cards or ask him to call them if he had further information, things that the other police did. They had put him on the defensive, and he became compliant.

  He went to the lobby and asked the guard if the police or FBI had been out to the VitalTech offices today or yesterday to see anyone else? The guard hadn’t heard of anything. Alek asked if the agents had shown him their IDs, and the guard said they had and that he’d gotten a good look at the older guy’s but not as good a look at the other’s – “the younger one with the accent.” When Alek asked about the accent, the guard said that he’d heard them talking when he went back to let them in, but he hadn’t thought anything of it.

  ***

  Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. That same evening, Vijay was alone in his office, mulling over the attack and the message. He felt that an alarm system would help keep Jennifer and Karima safe, but he didn’t understand how the aggressive attack on Jennifer related to VitalTech and the Final Notice names? What was the link? Unless the police could ge
t the attacker to talk, it would remain a mystery. Should he ask Mike Kalin?

  Following the IPO and sale to the private equity firm of Konig, Konig & Litt (KKL), Vijay was given a seat on the VitalTech Board and a new CEO, Mike Kalin, was appointed. Initially, Vijay had been impressed with him. Kalin was self-deprecating and passed along any credit for his accomplishments to his great teams. He wanted to play down the announcement of his appointment and keep it minimal. No lengthy articles, pictures, etc. He felt that VitalTech was doing so well that any news of a changing of the guard could only hurt. Everyone seemed happy, except Jennifer. She didn’t like him at all, although she couldn’t explain why, just that It was “something about him.”

  It had all started well, but then stories began to surface about Kalin’s management style and personal stability, particularly regarding sexual harassment and business ethics. Several of Vijay’s original team began to leave, and as the stories mounted and defections continued, Vijay became concerned. In his straightforward, sometimes unfiltered way, he raised the problem at a Board meeting and asked Kalin, point blank, to comment on the accusations. Kalin tried to gloss over them and called them empty and false, but to Vijay, this was personal, so he persisted, demanding better explanations. That’s when Vijay realized that many on the Board wanted to turn a blind eye. Business was good, don’t rock the boat. Even J. Edward Konig, the Chairman of both KKL and VitalTech, tried to steer Vijay to calmer waters.

  Vijay had backed down, but his concerns were even greater and real, for now, he knew that he’d made a powerful enemy. After the meeting, Kalin had called Vijay and threatened to remove him from the Board if he ever tried to make a move on him again. Vijay held back his anger and told him that he would not bring up the matter again without concrete facts. Kalin wasn't placated and sneeringly told Vijay that he was looking to move the VT2 production from India to China. Vijay started to erupt, but held back and asked Kalin why?

  Kalin taunted him, “Are you concerned about your little brother losing his cushy little job?”

  Vijay’s brother, Sanjay, was the Production Manager at the Pune factory in India, and Vijay knew that Sanjay had done a super job setting up, ramping up and managing the VT2 production line. Wade Thomas, VitalTech’s COO, had nothing but praise for Sanjay and the Indian operation, but Wade, too, was being replaced. The Indian production unit had achieved, and in some cases exceeded, their output, quality, and cost goals. Vijay understood that the real reason for Kalin’s threat was personal.

  Vijay kept his cool and replied, “You can look into whatever you want, Kalin, but I’ve invested too much into this to let someone tear it down for spite. See you at the Board table.”

  In addition to his Board position, Vijay had another reason to fear Kalin. Vijay, along with his small team of scientists, continued to push the capabilities of the VT2 to provide additional health benefits. They couldn’t afford not to. Apple had picked up the scent of the potential market and was adding health capabilities to its watch. His team’s efforts had been rewarded with significant advances, including a diabetes monitoring feature, advanced blood analysis for recovering cancer patients, and arrhythmia detection. These were laudable accomplishments, but of lesser importance to Vijay. He managed the team, setting its direction and goals, to develop new healthcare capabilities, but he alone was working on a single, “off the books” issue: finding a consistently accurate set of markers that would identify, in advance, those Final Notice recipients who were emotionally pre-disposed to kill before they died.

  So far, each ray of hope had been dashed when anomalies appeared, and as scientists, they hated anomalies. For example, the data and readings from one incident puzzled Vijay and the team – Senator John McAdam. He had killed three fellow senators without displaying what was emerging as a signature combination of cortisol-serotonin imbalances. McAdam’s VT2 data was so diametrically opposite to that of a killer that Vijay and his colleagues questioned the evidence.

  Vijay was convinced that he would find a reliable set of markers. He was less confident, however, that the patterns would be detectable early enough to help the FBI stop crimes. To succeed, he needed time, and he needed access to VitalTech’s data.

  Zoe Brouet had shared with him the highlights of a meeting with her boss and his serious concerns about more high-profile murders by Final Notice recipients. She had also asked him about getting employer information for VT2 users. VitalTech had that information from most of their users, and Vijay understood that those details could be useful to the FBI, but he was hesitant to expand the report right now.

  When VitalTech originally agreed to offer the FBI information about users who had access to guns, Vijay owned the business. Now that VitalTech was owned by KKL, and given his less than rosy relationship with Kalin, he was pretty sure that if he asked Kalin, he would say, “No.” Even worse, if he asked and Kalin didn’t know about the cooperation, Kalin might pull the plug on the FBI information entirely. Could J. Edward help? Vijay didn’t think that he would say “Yes” without running it by Kalin, and as he’d witnessed at the Board meetings, Kalin was golden.

  Vijay said to himself, “Just a few more days,” as he looked at his own VT2 and was pleased that his pulse rate was normal.

  After Kalin’s threat about moving the VT2 production out of India, Vijay called his brother Sanjay. He was undecided about sharing the potentially bad news, but Kalin’s mention of his brother made Vijay realize that it had been a while since they had spoken. And that fed his guilt. Despite his generosity – he had purchased houses for his parents and his brother, allowing them to move from their slum community – when Vijay compared his lifestyle to theirs, it made him feel awful. The reality was that it was not a fair comparison. Their lives were simpler but, at least, as fulfilling. Intellectually, Vijay knew that, but it didn’t help assuage his guilt.

  Sanjay updated Vijay on their mother and father. They were in good health and were happy enough. He related that now that their father had retired, he visited the bank every day, to check on Sanjay’s account. “It makes him happy, and it gives him a sense of purpose, I guess.”

  That was a gut-punch to Vijay, but he forced a laugh and asked, “Fathers are still doing that in India? I’m glad he can’t see my bank account, although I could always tell him it was in rupees.”

  That got a laugh from Sanjay, and Vijay decided to keep the Kalin threat to himself.

  They chatted a bit more, and Sanjay told him that he was seeing a girl, but it was still early days. Vijay was happy for him and kidded, asking if he needed any advice from his big brother. After the call, Vijay was overcome with conflicted emotions. While it had been good to talk with Sanjay, Vijay was now under even more pressure to avoid ruffling Kalin’s feathers.

  He began to think about the upcoming trip that he and Jennifer had agreed upon, following her recent ordeal. They would all go to California to visit Jennifer’s parents in Mountain View, and Vijay would make a detour while they were there. That was something he’d wanted to do for a long time, and it boosted his mood considerably.

  ***

  CHAPTER 8 – LONDON, KY

  Lexington, Kentucky. Marianne Abbott had felt strangely calm as she drove south on I-75 from Lexington. She’d flown into Blue Grass Airport the day before, rented a car, and did her required shopping. Then she booked into a local hotel, had a bite to eat in the restaurant, and retired to her room for an early night, partly because she was tired but also because she wanted to be on the road very early.

  Before going to bed, however, Marianne prepared the items she’d purchased, carefully loading one of the three ten round magazines with the 9mm rounds. She didn’t think she’d need the other two magazines that came with the gun. She briefly thought about how easy it was to buy a lethal weapon as she snapped the magazine into the cold, black Glock 19, and reviewed the instruction leaflet. Then again, this was Kentucky.

  At 4:00 a.m., her bedside alarm rang, so she showered, made herself a cup of c
offee for the road, and took her purse and small overnight bag to the car. The drive to London, Kentucky, would take her an hour and twenty minutes, and during the trip, all she could think about was her mission.

  It had been twenty-four years since Marianne and her mother had escaped from London, leaving behind her father and older brother, to go into hiding where her father couldn’t find them again. Six months earlier, they had managed to escape, but within a week, her father and brother had tracked them down and dragged them home. Her father beat her mother until she was close to death while her brother held Marianne down by sitting on her, grinding himself sensually into her butt as she helplessly writhed in horror as her mother was beaten.

  Afterward, her father locked her mother in the bedroom, and he and her brother took Marianne to the motel to earn their beer money, just as they’d been doing since she was twelve. There was a week’s backlog of clients, so Marianne’s night of horror was even worse than usual. Her brother made it even more disgusting by capping off the night with his aggressive, cruel style of brutalizing sex.

  A few months later, she and her mom snuck out again, and, with the help of a friend, they flew out of Lexington to Chicago, where they stayed with her friend’s parents. That was a long time ago, but Marianne would never forget the terror, pain, and shame of London.