Body Broker

by Daniel M Ford

  I shrugged. “Let’s go over this whole deal first. You’re going to want to go pick up a Dr. Thalheim.”

  Chapter 37

  The rest of that afternoon and evening was spent endlessly recounting my investigation. First, to Bob, then to other members of the sheriff’s department at a station, then to a state cop in plain clothes. She didn’t look happy to be there or to be talking to me. At every stop, I elided any mention of Liza, simply telling them that I’d picked up on a “rumor” that a member of the school’s counseling staff had been willing to supply drugs to the students of Farrington.

  “And how’d you know it was him?”

  “Well,” I said, “he was the only one wearing a twelve-thousand dollar watch and driving a ninety-thousand-dollar car. He sorta stood out.”

  The cop had looked at me over her reading glasses then. “Consulting psychiatrists can make a lot of money.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Especially when they’re selling drugs on the side.”

  She frowned at me then, but nothing much sterner than that.

  “You’ve picked him up and he’s started blabbing, right?”

  The frown became a full-on disapproving stare.

  “For what it’s worth,” I said, “he gave me the address of the place where you found those kids. And he did it at a risk to his own well-being.”

  “How’s that?”

  “He slipped it to me while the Aesir MC was stomping around his house and ordering him around like a lackey.”

  When I said Aesir MC she flipped through her legal pad. “You ever heard of this Aesir MC before? Know anything about them?”

  “Only what I gathered from their symbols, dress sense, and nomenclature.”

  “And what’s that?”

  I shrugged. “Neo-pagan, but the kind that gives the rest of them a headache and a bad name. Most of ‘em are just folks, but these guys have a racial purity hard-on for Odin and Thor and Freyja.”

  She stifled a laugh. “Meaning what?”

  “They’re assholes?”

  “What else?”

  “Well, they used archaic terms. Thrall for prospect, Huscarl for full-patch, Jarl for chapter president, I think. I didn’t exactly see the organizational flowchart.”

  She jotted a few notes with her fountain pen. “Look, you hear from these guys again, you remember anything they said, maybe you give me a call.” She took a card from a pocket and handed it to me.

  It had her name and rank: Detective Sergeant Janine Dominguez. I slipped it into my wallet. “They a big club?”

  “Don’t know. Haven’t dealt with them much in Maryland. Bigger presence in Pennsylvania.”

  “Seemed like a pack of poseurs and cosplayers to me.”

  “Well,” she said with a professional smile, “you serve on a few organized or gang-crime taskforces and maybe I’ll care about your opinion, Mr. Dixon.”

  I felt a little stirring of the hair on the back of my neck, but I wrote it off. Jarl Troy had seemed a little frightening, but surely he had bigger fish to fry than a PI who blew up a scheme he admitted wasn’t working.

  Finally, well into the evening, they cut me loose. Brock had long since disappeared, so Bob drove me back to the restaurant/marina in Port Deposit.

  I went silent and waited for him to talk. It took a few minutes.

  “You didn’t do too bad with this one, Jack,” he finally said.

  “Don’t go burdening me with compliments now, Bob.”

  “You found the kid, I’ll give you that. And in pretty short order. And you probably only committed a couple felonies along the way.”

  “Everything was exactly where I found it. Anybody with injuries fell. Except me,” I said. “In case you’ve forgotten, I’ve got facial contusions and back spasms. Possibly broken ribs.”

  “Dr. Thalheim made some noise about unlawful entry but he shut up about it pretty quick. I’m not real sure of the legality of you busting open the door of the second address. But there was some real shit going on in there. I don’t see how the county or state is going to want to prosecute you for any of it.”

  I was silent throughout. My capacity to deal with cops — even cops I liked, and I certainly liked Bob — was wearing thin. “Hooray,” I said weakly.

  “As for this Aesir MC, I did a little reading of some internal files.” Bob steered a while. “Nothing I can share with you, but these guys seem like pretty bad news. You might want to keep your eyes out.”

  “I’ll sail into the middle of the Chesapeake,” I said. “And wait until they develop an amphibious motorcycle.”

  “You got to come to shore sometime. And we’re not that far off from winter. You got a place to stay?”

  “I’ll figure something out.” We were silent but for the steady drone of the SUV, the crackle of the radio. “I, uh, I’ve got some evidence you’re going to want. Notebooks, ledgers, maybe? Written in some kind of code. Runes, I think, now that I know what I know about the club. And receipts. I took them from the first house.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “Probably at the firm. Brock’s got as much imagination as a sled-dog, but that means he’ll also take absolutely anything I left in the company car and lock it up inside the firm.”

  “You probably shoulda told this to the state cops.”

  “Leaves you with the big collar. Makes you look good. Least I can do, given that you put me on this job.”

  “Well,” Bob said, “I knew if there was something to latch on to, you’d be the one to do it.”

  “I’m touched.”

  “Don’t be. If it had gone on much longer, it would’ve become my problem.”

  “Ahh, you can try to distract and divert, but I know what you meant. It was a compliment to my investigative prowess and perseverance. I know it. You know it. The world knows it.”

  “Before you go congratulating yourself, Jack, I don’t think you’re hearing me about the MC.”

  By then we’d reached the parking lot of the restaurant, which was jam-packed. Bob idled behind a few parked cars. I sat up a little straighter.

  “They’re mostly out of eastern, southern, and central PA,” he went on. “And they don’t really screw around. They drop bodies, and local law enforcement seem to have a hard time making cases stick.”

  “Well,” I said, “since they all carry knives, and I have a permit to carry a weapon with currency in this century, I’ll let them worry.”

  “There are members of the MC called ‘Utlagr,’ or some shit like that,” Bob said. “And they carry the guns. Best I can tell, those members operate entirely outside the rules the rest of the MC has to follow.”

  “Huh.” I was too tired and too hungry to really work myself up into a lather about this. “This sounds like something I can worry about tomorrow.”

  “And the day after, and the day after. But I can’t convince you to take your life more seriously than you do.” He hit the button that unlocked the door.

  “Thanks for the ride.”

  “I’ll want all that paperwork tomorrow.”

  “Yup.”

  I walked through the restaurant and went straight to the bar. I found a bartender I knew, ordered two pints of Guinness and the largest cheeseburger on their menu, in a box. With the vegetable of the day instead of fries, because I didn’t deserve quite that much joy.

  I finished both pints by the time the box came. I took it to the Belle with a couple more cans of Guinness the bartender slipped me. Then I crawled into my bunk, set an alarm for nine a.m., and drifted off to sleep with the muted sounds of late-night diners drifting over the water of the Susquehanna.

  Chapter 38

  I was slow to wake up the next day. The alarm music was Steve Earle today, and it took till the second verse of “Mercenary Song” for my brain to grasp it was time to get up.


  “Well they say a man’s got to do what he’s best at, ain’t found nothin’ better so far…”

  I let the rest of the song play as I stood, stretched, and immediately shouted in pain.

  “Goddamn,” I said aloud, putting a hand to my tender ribs. “I might have to get that prescription filled after all.” I made my bunk, rooted in the fridge for the good peanut butter, savored all three tablespoons of it I could eat.

  My phone had two missed calls and a voicemail, but I elected to ignore all of that, hit the gym, do some grocery shopping, and head into the office at my leisure.

  I was briefly confused when I went outside and saw the stacked chairs and empty tables of the restaurant’s deck.

  “Huh.”

  Then I remembered I wasn’t at my regular marina, and that a walk to Waterfront Fitness was probably more of a cardio workout in and of itself than it would typically be. And I hate cardio.

  I made the executive decision to punt working out till later in the afternoon, after I figured out what I could and couldn’t do with my current injuries. Then I got myself a ride and headed to a grocery store.

  Grocery shopping was easy. A half-gallon of milk, as many jars of expensive high-protein/low sugar peanut butter and almond butter as my wallet could stand, a bag of carrots, another of apples. Shopping for Wellington ingredients could wait until after I got paid, I decided, after checking my bank balance. That led to putting back one nine-dollar jar of coconut almond butter.

  I was checking out and waiting for another ride when my phone rang again. It was a work number. I almost flicked it away, but decided to answer. Three calls in one morning was a little much.

  “Good morning, boss,” I began brightly. “Calling to congratulate me on a job well done, no doubt.”

  “Jack.” There was an edge in Jason’s voice. A couple of hairs went up on the back of my neck. “Where the fuck are you?”

  “The grocery store?”

  “Get to the office. Now.”

  Luckily I already had a ride arranged. I just had to change the destination.

  Chapter 39

  When I shuffled into the office carrying my grocery bags, the place had a pall over it. People were gathered in knots talking in hushed tones. A few turned to stare at me.

  I set the bags down on a nearby chair. “What?”

  Jason stalked out of the management hallway and waved me to his office. He shut the door behind him carefully.

  “Where the hell have you been?”

  “Sleeping off an adventure like a hobbit, and then grocery shopping.”

  “Brock got shot last night.”

  Silence reigned. I could hear his wristwatch ticking. My heart thudded loudly; I was surprised he couldn’t hear it.

  “What?”

  “He was ambushed and shot on his way back to the office in the company car. He’s at Union.”

  “How is he?”

  Jason shrugged a little. “He’ll live but he’s hurt. He got shot, for Christ’s sake.”

  “He talking?”

  “Pretty doped up. Not making a lot of sense.”

  “Notebooks,” I said. “I’d taken notebooks from one of the rehab houses. Were they in the car?”

  Jason raised an eyebrow at me. “What do you think?”

  “God. Dammit.”

  “Those should’ve been turned over to the cops right away.”

  “I know. I just…”

  “Wanted to go sit on your boat and drink whiskey and meditate on your brilliance by yourself,” Jason said. That he wasn’t shouting — that he was, instead, speaking in a quiet and clipped way — indicated how angry he really was. “You were lazy. And your partner got shot for it.”

  I immediately wanted to protest the use of the word partner but wisely thought better of it. If nothing else, he’d been my responsibility. So had the notebooks.

  “How do I make this right?”

  Jason’s nostrils flared at me. “There are loose ends to tie up. Make sure the cops have everything they need. Make sure the client has everything she needs. Then go see Brock at the hospital.”

  “I’m gonna do the last one first.”

  “No, you’re not. Corporal Sanderson and Detective Sergeant Dominguez are on their way over. You’re gonna go over this stuff top to bottom with them.”

  “And do myself for B&E?”

  “Oh please, you had reason to believe people were in distress in the house.” He waved a hand vaguely. “Trooper’ll have bigger fish to fry on the narcotics side and you set up a pretty nice high-profile bust for her. Bob’s not going to grab you for penny-ante shit like this. Just be up front with them.”

  “Fine. Let me go make a list.” I turned for the door.

  “Stop. Sit right here.” He tossed a pen and a pad at me and pointed to a chair in front of his desk. “Make your list. If you walk out that door I know you’re gonna make a run for it, and I’ve had enough of that shit from you for a while.”

  Privately I admitted that he was almost certainly right, so I did as he said. I wasn’t happy about it, but it sure seemed like my continued employment depended on it. I started the list.

  1. Cops.

  2. Talk to Ms. Kennelly.

  3. Talk to the school?

  4. Talk to the dad?

  4b. Call Gen.

  It was starting to look unlikely that I’d make my date of Wednesday to make Dani and Emily dinner, but I had enough threats hanging over me at the moment. While I was writing my list, though, the seed of a plan started to form in my mind.

  It was about then that Detective-Sergeant Dominguez knocked on the door and she and Bob ushered me into a conference room.

  Chapter 40

  “Are you willing to go to jail over the identity of the student or students who told you Doctor Thalheim was selling drugs?”

  “How many times are you going to circle back to that, Sergeant?”

  “As many times as it takes before you realize I’m serious,” she said, leaning forward over the desk. We’d been in the conference room for an hour by that point, and I’d laid out everything except Liza’s name.

  And one other thing, but they didn’t seem willing to ask about it.

  I looked with pleading eyes at Bob, who sat silent, with his arms folded over his chest.

  “I’m not giving up a kid’s name unless that kid specifically tells me they are willing to speak with you.”

  “We can compel that.”

  “You can try,” I said. “Throw me inside if you want. I like spending time by myself, lifting weights, and reading.”

  “I meant the kids.”

  “Oh,” I said, now leaning across the table myself to go eye to eye with her. “And how’s that going to work? Uniforms all over a boarding school full of the richest kids in three states? How are the parents going to feel about that? How many of those parents make big donations to the Police Athletic League and the Policeman’s Ball and to the campaigns of the legislators who make your budgets?”

  I could see I had her then. She sat back and turned to look at Bob, who shrugged.

  “I have a preexisting relationship with the school,” I said. “Let me go in, talk to the administration, maybe some of the kids, and see what they are willing to do without making a big production out of it.”

  “Because you’ve been so good at avoiding that so far,” Dominguez said.

  “Look, I’ve handed you something pretty big. And I think Thalheim would cooperate if you lean on him.”

  “If his lawyer doesn’t have everything thrown out because you muscled him and broke into his house.”

  Hmm. That changed the calculus a little, but only a little. “Do you have to have kids to make the case?”

  Dominguez and Bob glanced at one another. “No,” Bob finally s
aid. “I doubt it. He has made indications he wants to cooperate. But we’ll sleep better if we do.”

  “So we’re still on the same page as before. I’ll go to jail rather than give you a kid’s name. But I will go to the school and see what they want.”

  “And do what,” Dominguez said, “collect a consulting fee from their parents?”

  “No,” I said.

  “We’re not paying you.”

  I sighed. “I don’t expect to be paid to go to the school. I need to do it anyway as part of my wrap-up.”

  The detective-sergeant raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “And who do you need to talk to there?”

  “Do you really think I’m that stupid? I’ll go to the school and talk to who I need to talk to, and if any of them are willing to talk with you, I’ll let you know.”

  “Just trying to figure out your angle,” Dominguez said.

  “His angle is that he already fucked up on this thing once, and he wants to make sure he finishes the rest of it,” Bob said. “Neatly.”

  “That’s part of it,” I said, nodding in agreement. “And the sooner you let me go, the sooner that process can start.”

  “Fine,” Dominguez agreed. “Go on. But I want to hear something by Friday.”

  I left the conference room and went to gather up my groceries. I lingered outside the door to try and talk to Bob on his way out. He shot me a glare.

  “Should’ve given me the damn notebooks right away,” he muttered on his way out the door.

  I didn’t really have a response to that, so I just let him walk out.

  I took a set of company keys and made my way to the hospital.

  Chapter 41

  When I got there, visiting hours had been suspended and I could do nothing but sit on my hands for an hour or two. I ate an apple and cracked open the first jar of peanut butter from my new stash. It was a heck of a lot tastier than the protein-added stuff. I decided now was as good a time as any to knock another point off my to-do list and call Ms. Kennelly.