Likely Suspects

by G. K. Parks

  “You got him on multiple counts of conspiracy and murder.” I stole the big reveal.

  “It looks that way, but we can’t really say. It’s all official police business,” O’Connell continued. “So I’m not telling you we have Denton for a laundry list of crimes from murder to conspiracy to B&E. The state plans to throw the book at him.”

  “Then it’s over?” Martin asked, his posture becoming more relaxed in the chair. I was sure he was already planning on going back to work the moment O’Connell gave him the all clear.

  “It looks that way. Give us some time to verify he has no other private accounts we haven’t uncovered and no one else has been paid to make your life miserable,” Thompson told him.

  “What about Griffin?” I asked. Not all the loose ends were explained yet. “Was she a professional hit?”

  O’Connell and Thompson exchanged a look. “We’re still working on it. The mercs deny they were hired to do it. Maybe Denton did it himself, but we haven’t been able to identify or locate the murder weapon,” O’Connell admitted.

  I tried to think. Denton’s prints, along with Griffin’s and Jackson’s, were on the box. “Any prints at my place?” I asked, but O’Connell shook his head. “If there’s a secondary contract killer, that might be who carried out the hit on Griffin.”

  “Do you think Blake will talk?” Martin asked. The cops looked at him as if he were mentally impaired.

  “Not much incentive. We’ve already got too much on him. If he’s half as smart as he seems to be, he’ll keep his mouth shut and deny everything,” O’Connell replied. Thompson and O’Connell got up to leave, and Martin thanked them for their time and hard work. I walked them to the door.

  “After hearing about last night, I don’t think you need a gun right now,” O’Connell quietly said. He reached into his jacket pocket and removed a small object. “Just promise me you won’t electrocute my guys.”

  “I’ll do my best.” I shut the door and looked at the taser. It wasn’t much, but it’d work in a pinch.

  Again, Martin was fighting with his pill bottle. Opening it, I handed him back the container. “It seems like things are coming to a close.” He swallowed his pill, looking positively ecstatic.

  “It’s getting there,” I said noncommittally. “They need to solve Griffin’s murder before you go traipsing back to work. So I would suggest you use this time to recover. It’s only been about a week since you had surgery.” My heart leapt into my throat, and I swallowed. “Just give it some more time.”

  He agreed, acknowledging his own limitations.

  * * *

  I spent most of the day contemplating the murder of Suzanne Griffin. Griffin had been a part of Denton’s plan. She had left the MT building before the explosion with various means of transportation away from the city and away from the scene of the crime. Denton had been with her at the B&B, and both of their prints were on the box recovered from my apartment. It seemed reasonable to assume Griffin had informed Denton who I was and why I was working for Martin, which led to him paying Jackson to take the photos.

  All of the pieces fit nicely, but why kill her? Maybe it was because she knew too much and her loyalties seemed fickle. My guess would be if Martin had batted his green eyes at her, she would have caved and confessed to everything. Did Denton kill her himself? I thought about my nightmare with Denton holding the assault rifle. Real-life Denton would be just as willing to pull the trigger, especially given his predilection for hiring people to do it for him. The only problem was finding the weapon.

  I was pacing the length of our hotel room, from my bedroom to the kitchen, when I noticed Martin was asleep on the couch. He had tired himself out by spending the bulk of the day calling Marcal and lining up contractors and architects to meet with him in the next week. He hoped to begin repairs on his compound as soon as possible. The fact that he was asleep now was just another indication he was not ready to go back to work, and he still needed more time to properly recover. Hopefully, he realized this and wouldn’t overdo it too soon.

  In desperate need of an escape from my thoughts and the confines of the room, I opened the door and slipped into the hallway. Now was as good a time as any to apologize to our protection detail. I knocked on their door, and one of the guys answered, grinning.

  “If it isn’t sleeping beauty,” he joked.

  “I just wanted to thank you for the prompt response last night.” I stared at the floor. “I um…it’s….” I looked up at the cop.

  “We get it,” his partner said from inside the room.

  “Okay.” I turned on my heel, ready to retreat.

  “Just for clarification, if we hear screams, but no one entered the room, should we still come busting in?”

  “Might as well, just to be on the safe side.”

  The guys were willing to obey my request, and hopefully, they wouldn’t be inadvertently tazed for their trouble.

  After last night, Martin deserved a chance to get some sleep without me disturbing him, so I stayed outside our room, pacing the length of the hallway. In the middle of my pacing, the elevator dinged and a maid exited. The protection detail emerged and checked her and the cart to make sure everything was kosher. She cleaned their room and asked if we needed anything. We were okay, so she headed back to the elevator.

  The entire exchange reminded me of the surveillance footage of my office being broken into. A thought gnawed at the corners of my brain. I went back into my shared hotel room and slumped in the chair. Martin was still sound asleep, but my brainstorming wouldn’t wake him up unless he was telepathic.

  The break-in at my office occurred at least three days before Griffin was murdered. So why was I convinced the janitor’s cart and the missing murder weapon were linked? My brain must not be working properly, I thought as I stared at the upholstery and picked at a stray thread. Going into my room, I shut the door and phoned O’Connell.

  “Did you check Denton’s office?” I asked.

  “Yeah, we didn’t find anything.”

  “Did you check Griffin’s office?”

  He was getting agitated. “You know, they don’t hand out detective’s badges based on good looks alone,” he remarked.

  “Did you check her other office?”

  “What other office?”

  “The one on the fifteenth floor, next to Denton’s.” With extension 325, but I kept that to myself.

  “We’ll check it out,” he promised, but before he could hang up, I continued with my last few remaining thoughts.

  “Maybe you could lean on Jackson. Martin had the metal detectors rigged to allow security and the like to enter without tripping the alarm. Depending on her TOD, maybe he carried the gun back into the building for Denton. He wouldn’t have tripped any alarms.” It was a stretch because Todd Jackson had been in custody before I found my apartment ransacked, but Griffin could have been murdered Monday night prior to his arrest. It was worth investigating since I didn’t know exactly how long Griffin had been out in the dumpster.

  “It couldn’t hurt,” O’Connell mused. “Any other brilliant ideas?”

  “Did Agent Jablonsky ever give you the photo enhancement from the day of the manufacturing sabotage?” I still had no idea where Mark was or what he was doing. It was work related because, given the circumstances, he would have checked in if he could.

  “Actually, yeah. I received an e-mail attachment two days ago. The watch in the picture might be a match to Denton’s, but the quality of the image makes it a crapshoot. It’s not conclusive when compared to everything else we already have on him.”

  I nodded, even though he couldn’t see it. “Okay. Well, that’s my two cents.”

  Thirty-nine

  A few days later, Thompson and O’Connell came to deliver the good news in person. The murder weapon used on Suzanne Griffin was found in the MT building in the desk of her fifteenth floor office. Todd Jackson insisted he had no idea how it got there, but twenty-five grand should buy more than a
few photos and moving a box from one room to another. The gun had been wiped clean, and the serial number was filed off. But a partial print had been found on a bullet casing in the magazine. The partial print was a three-point match to Denton’s fingerprints, and given its location, it wasn’t too much of a stretch to assume Blake Denton had used it in the commission of Griffin’s murder.

  Most likely, Denton intended to set Jackson up as a scapegoat. Jackson had broken into my office. He had access to the box left in my ransacked apartment. The stolen funds from MT had filtered back into his private account, or at least twenty-five grand had. Then the blocked phone calls, followed by the stalker-like photos that were e-mailed to Martin, all culminated with Griffin’s murder weapon being taken back into the MT building by Todd Jackson. This would have made a very nice frame-up job had the mercenaries been successful and Denton hadn’t pulled that bullshit act at the banquet, making it onto my radar. Luckily for us, Denton’s own paranoia and trigger-happy escapades worked in our favor instead of his.

  “We just need to make sure the ‘I’s are dotted and the ‘T’s are crossed,” Thompson said, but Martin didn’t hear a word. He had a faraway look and was experiencing his own euphoria by finally being divested of this mess. “The DA’s office is finalizing the case now. You’ll have testimonies and depositions to deal with, but it’s a small price to pay, given the outcome.”

  To my surprise, Martin nodded. Maybe he actually was listening.

  “Just between us,” O’Connell turned to me, “how’d you know?”

  “How’d I know what?”

  “You had it pieced together, or mostly pieced together, without any hard evidence. And the gun, how’d you know it would be in the office?”

  “It was the only thing that made any sense.” I couldn’t rationalize or explain my gut feelings. “What I still don’t understand is why he didn’t dump the gun. Why keep it around?”

  “We’ve speculated on that too. The only thing we could come up with is maybe he was hoping it would add to the frame-up. Denton clearly wanted to pin the murder on Jackson, but the whole thing fell apart before he got the chance,” Thompson interjected.

  “We’ll let you get back to whatever you were doing,” O’Connell said, standing up, and Thompson followed suit. “We’ll be in touch.” They let themselves out of the room.

  Martin let out the breath he’d been holding for the last month and a half, and I could visibly see the weight lift from his shoulders. “You did a damn good job,” he said, flashing his brightest smile. I didn’t quite agree with his assessment, but I kept my mouth shut. Now was not the time to argue. He noted my lack of cheering. “What?” He knew he didn’t want to hear whatever I had to say.

  “I think…” I wanted to be diplomatic, but I couldn’t come up with the proper terms.

  “I know what you’re going to say.” He held up his hand. “Don’t worry. The doctors won’t clear me to work for another couple of weeks. My house is…well, I don’t really have any place to live, and the media circus surrounding this will be a bitch.” I raised an eyebrow in confusion. “The point I’m trying to make is I’d like you to stay on as my private security for the next two weeks, maybe a month, until everything gets straightened out.”

  “No one else is gunning for you, but you have me for as long as you need.”

  He offered a crooked smile. “I might always need you, Alex.”

  “What you need is to hire an actual full-time bodyguard. Mark can recommend someone trustworthy,” I suggested, and he looked thoughtful. “Are you going to live at your house after the repairs are completed?”

  “Of course. It’s getting renovated. I’ll change some things around, but it’s home.”

  “Then might I suggest having a safe room installed.” I was just full of great ideas today.

  “I’ll take it under advisement.” He winked.

  * * *

  The next two weeks flew by at light speed. Martin met with contractors and architects, who started on the repairs and restructuring his compound. Marcal was given the task of supervising and making sure everything shaped up properly. Martin kept himself busy by coordinating press releases through the public relations department at Martin Technologies. The other board members, the ones who didn’t try to kill him, had been instrumental in reassuring shareholders the company remained in good working order, despite the homicidal maniac who had been vice president. The stocks declined slightly but stabilized, much to Martin’s relief.

  After Mark completed his undercover assignment for the OIO, he spent quite a bit of time holed up in the presidential suite with us, searching for an appropriate bodyguard for Martin. I was adamant the man be named Bruiser, but unfortunately, Mark didn’t know any Bruisers. I wasn’t completely unreasonable, and as long as whoever was offered the job was willing to legally change his name, that would be acceptable.

  While Martin was busy dealing with meetings and press releases, I called my insurance company to have the damages in my apartment assessed. A check was in the mail. Once again, I was facing unemployment, but things weren’t quite so bleak this time. Martin paid me handsomely, even though I felt partially incompetent and one hundred percent responsible for him being shot. Despite my obvious flaws, I decided rather spur of the moment to start my own investigation and consulting firm and filed the paperwork for a private investigator’s license. The only rule was absolutely no more bodyguard work ever.

  There was a small office space for rent at a strip mall, and I called the real estate office and expressed my interest. All I needed to do was sign the paperwork. Things were shaping up for everyone. Life was returning to normal, and I was beginning to dread that notion. Normal could be a lonely existence. I had lived with James Martin for over a month. Solitude would be an adjustment.

  “I ordered champagne,” Martin declared as we sat at the table, eating dinner. Tomorrow, he was going back to work, and I was going home. “I thought we should celebrate the excellent job you did.”

  I smiled sadly. “Martin, you almost died. That is not an excellent job. In fact, I’m pretty sure that’s the opposite of excellent.”

  “I lived because of you.” He took my hand in his. “You figured this whole thing out. You stopped Denton. You found the gun. You did everything I hired you to do. You got my life back.”

  “No, I’m alive because of you,” I corrected, borrowing from his own declaration.

  “We are not arguing about this.” He dropped the subject. “Plus,” he adopted a wolfish grin, and his eyes sparkled, “I’m no longer your employer.”

  I laughed. “You are unbelievable.”

  “So I’ve been told.” There was a swagger to his voice, and I was beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable when the knock at the door provided a wonderful interruption.

  “I’ll get it since I still work for you,” I said pointedly, and the room service guy rolled in a cart with champagne and strawberries. I sighed audibly at the cliché.

  “Can’t blame a guy for trying.” He poured the champagne, and he clinked his glass with mine. “To you,” he toasted.

  I took a sip. I would miss Martin, even his irritating, drive-me-up-the-wall expressions and habits.

  The next morning, he dressed and left for the office, his arm still in a sling. He said I could stay as long as I liked, but it was time to go home. I retrieved my car and left the posh hotel. On the way, I stopped and signed the lease for my new office which had been in the works for the last couple of weeks.

  Pulling into the parking lot outside my apartment, I reminded myself the place was an utter disaster. I checked my mailbox and carried an insane amount of mail up the six flights of stairs. Thankfully, I had automatic bill pays for all of my expenses.

  Unlocking my door, I was confronted by the destruction and the remnants of the crime tech’s investigative tools. “I came home, why?” I asked my empty apartment.

  Setting the mail down on the only empty counter space I could find, I pulled out
a huge garbage bag. Beginning in the kitchen, I methodically discarded anything that was destroyed. Everything else was tossed into the sink to be cleaned at a later point. I called a haul-away service to get rid of my couch, bed, and other ruined furniture. I needed to go shopping and replace a lot of things.

  Almost seven hours passed. I was getting ready to start on the bedroom when the phone rang. “Want to get dinner?” Martin asked, and I smiled.

  “You miss me already?” I teased, looking around my room.

  “Of course. Bruiser just isn’t as sarcastic. He doesn’t keep me on my toes the way you did. Plus, he can’t pull off a dress very well.” I couldn’t help but laugh. “Come on, meet me. You have to eat. I have to eat.” How could I argue with that kind of reasoning?

  “Fine, but I swear to god, if gunmen try to rob the joint, I will hold you personally responsible.” I flashed back to my interview.

  “No gunmen. You can even pick the place.”

  I looked around my apartment. I had no furniture and very few nice things left. “How do you feel about a diner?” Eating cheaply would be a priority until everything was replaced.

  He agreed to meet at the place around the corner from my building. I changed out of my clothes and into one of the clean, new outfits Marcal had supplied. Then I headed down the street to wait for him.

  We sat in a booth and ate cheeseburgers and fries. It wasn’t an elegant dinner, but he didn’t complain. “What did you do today?” he asked, and I explained the attempt to clean my apartment. He listened intently, and when I was finished, he looked thoughtful. After paying the check, he asked Marcal to bring the car around, and I noticed Bruiser in the passenger seat.

  “You took my advice.” I was astounded.

  “I had to. You’re a damn good security consultant,” he complimented. “Now get in the car.”

  “I’m just a couple of blocks from here. I don’t need a ride.”