AHMM, September 2007

by Dell Magazine Authors

  "You're an idiot,” said the captain.

  "That's the second time today.” I pulled up a chair. “Maybe you're right."

  "Doesn't matter what McClellan says, this wasn't routine. You're not wearing armor. It's just the narrowest kind of luck you're not dead now."

  "Well, I've come through some scrapes before—"

  "Not your luck,” he cut me off, “mine. I don't care how justified, the last thing I need is another body. Law enforcement everywhere and paperwork forever. I'd like to go home one of these nights."

  "Your guys are pretty good. A little slow, but they kept it under control. A different operation, there'd be a thousand rounds in the wall."

  "We try.” I swear he still hadn't blinked, not once. “People are on edge right now."

  "On the other hand, what's with all the firepower? I have to admit, I wasn't expecting much more than a stun gun."

  "I don't believe in half measures."

  Indeed. A buzzer sounded quietly in the hall. I watched through the door as men came and went. A smell of coffee brewing drifted in. The captain made a short call, and a few minutes later a man came in with a dustpan, duct tape, and a clear plastic sheet to fix the door's window.

  "I do a lot of corporate work,” I said, ignoring the captain's sardonic eyebrow lift. “Your operation here, it's more what I'd expect at a transfer facility or a mint. They don't actually have cash money upstairs, do they?"

  "No more than usual. Data protection is a bigger priority than most places, though, and physical security is part of that. Also,” he hesitated, “also, the partners, they worry about their own safety. Kidnapping wealthy executives doesn't just happen in the Philippines."

  "Fair enough.” I studied the floor plan for a while. “So did McClellan say it was okay for you to share?"

  "To a point.” He sighed. “Ask away."

  We spent a half hour going over the captain's operation—nothing that would too seriously compromise the structure, but enough for me to understand the details and get a sense of his professionalism. In the end, I decided he was either a straight arrow or a smooth and practiced liar. The fact is, sometimes you just can't tell.

  The third time his phone rang he didn't put off the caller, either because he couldn't or because he'd tired of answering questions. He held one hand over the mouthpiece and looked at me.

  "Okay, I'm done,” I said.

  "Thanks for the little drill earlier.” He had that blank-faced irony down nicely. “Helps to keep everyone on their toes."

  "I feel good about it too,” I said.

  * * * *

  I had Loreta's cell number from the dossier McClellan had provided, but she wasn't answering, so I fired up my laptop instead. The underground garage was a black hole, but there was plenty of unshielded WiFi in the blocks at street level. I found a parking space, caught some nice clear bandwidth from some dope in a travel agency, and called up a cellular tracking service. Basically, the wireless companies can triangulate your phone, even if you're not talking, simply by matching strength readings from the repeaters that can hear your passive signal. Nothing illegal about it; not cheap to access, but that's what expenses are for, right? I overlaid the results on Google's satellite imagery, and in a few minutes I was, in effect, watching Loreta walk down Essex Street. Isn't technology grand? Worth every penny I pay the teenage misfit who sets this stuff up for me.

  Despite the quick start, it was nearly half an hour before I could find my way through downtown Boston's senseless one-way streets. Fortunately, Loreta seemed to be out for a power stroll. I finally caught up to her down Marlborough Street in the Back Bay, striding along the brick sidewalks under magnolia trees in full bloom. A parking enforcement officer was ticketing her way down the street, using some kind of electronic device that scanned the plates and printed out the citations. Joggers and ladies with tiny dogs went in and out of the immaculate townhouses. It had been a long day, and I was getting hungry.

  "Hey there.” I stopped just ahead of her and called out across the BMW parked between us. “How about a drink?"

  She spun around, perfectly balanced, one hand in her purse and the other in a defensive block. “What?"

  "Hi!"

  A hard stare. “Are you stalking me?"

  "No, no.” I held my hands up. “It's just a nice day and we're off the clock. What do you have in there, mace?"

  She glanced up and down the street. “No, a Beretta 92."

  "Really?"

  "I'll put a round through your tire if you like."

  "Not necessary, thanks."

  She took some convincing, but we ended up in a sidewalk cafe on Newbury Street, sitting in the cool evening breeze. A table of Europeans was chattering in French to our left, some Japanese women were comparing purchases from their Armani shopping bags on the right. It was all so civilized I almost forgot and took off my jacket, only just remembering the hardware I had strapped around my back.

  "So,” she said, as woodsmoke from a grill somewhere drifted past, “make any progress?"

  "Talked to some people.” I shrugged. “Routine. Do you always take a cannon to work?"

  "It's registered. I spend a couple hours at the range every week."

  "I don't doubt it."

  "I work late a lot. I used to walk home through the Public Gardens, even after dark.” She hesitated, looking into my eyes. “I had some trouble once. You know?"

  I couldn't hold her gaze. Unusual, for me. I looked at the street instead. “Yeah,” I said. “I guess I do. So this is all about that not happening again."

  "The Girl Scout motto,” she sighed. “Be prepared."

  "I thought that was the Boy Scouts."

  The waitress brought wine, and we tapped our glasses.

  "Long life,” Loreta said.

  "And a glorious one.” I sipped. It tasted like wine. “Listen, there's a guy Richard, in Compliance. Know him?"

  She snorted, which in anyone else would have been unladylike.

  "Richard."

  "I mentioned your name, and he had a lot to say ... did he ask you out once? And maybe you turned him down, like in front of his friends, with a deeply wounding remark? Something like that?"

  "He has friends?” She finished her glass. “Yeah, more or less. He seemed to be making certain assumptions, which I found necessary to disabuse him of."

  "Good thing he doesn't hold a grudge."

  That got a laugh. “I am so glad to be putting Freeboard in the rearview, I can't tell you."

  Our food arrived, fish and chicken, basically. I'm no gourmand. I told her about my visit in the garage, and she told me something about McClellan, who was just the sort of Machiavellian schemer you'd expect. What with one thing and another, pretty soon I'd laid out the whole story. Every now and then, for no good reason, I decide to trust someone.

  Sometimes, they even trust me back.

  "So who are your suspects?” she asked.

  "I'm going to take the corporate security force off the board. They could have done it, I think, but the captain seems to have too much sense. And what would be in it for him? Money, maybe, but if it was a straight contract, they'd find someone outside. More distance, less risk."

  "More distance, less trust, though."

  "True.” I sawed away at my fish, which seemed not to have been cooked enough. Maybe it was supposed to be that way. “Here's the thing, though. The captain wasn't really surprised to have me do an unannounced inspection. Like he's used to having someone look over his shoulder. I bet there's a more elite group of specialists, even just one or two, working for the senior levels."

  Loreta watched me grimacing at the food. “You don't like it, don't eat it. Order something else."

  "It's fine. I don't usually stray too far from beef and bread, that's all."

  "I know a good steakhouse by Faneuil Hall."

  We looked at each other.

  It was one of those moments when the world goes dead silent and suddenly it's all tension an
d anticipation and tunnel vision. I have to admit, this usually happens to me right before everyone pulls out automatic weapons, which shows you the kind of personal life I have. Loreta was completely rewiring my day.

  "Near my dojo,” she added. “Nothing like a bloody strip steak after an hour of full-contact sparring."

  I was totally outclassed. “I'll keep that in mind."

  The waitress showed up with an afterdinner drinks menu, looking for that extra fifty bucks on the tab, I suppose, and Loreta shrugged, leaving it up to me.

  "No thanks,” I said. “One more meeting tonight. I think I ought to be sober."

  "You're putting in a long day."

  "I'm not getting a per diem,” I said. “Want to split the check?"

  * * * *

  No way I was going back to the hospital, so after grumping around, McClellan agreed to meet me at Rowes Wharf on the harbor a few blocks from Freeboard. I called to reserve a water taxi. It was waiting at the dock when we showed up, almost at the same time, from different directions. Not only had darkness fallen, but a light fog had risen over the harbor, blurring views of the airport and South Boston. I gave the taxi operator a hundred bucks to drive us around for a while, and we sat at the stern, beside the flapping sheet-plastic windows. The small boat rumbled out into deeper water, the diesel picking up as we slipped past the ranks of moored yachts and cruisers.

  "Subtle,” McClellan said over the noise of the engine. “Discreet. Your assignment was supposed to be damage control, not the opposite."

  "Oh, give it up.” I sat close so we could talk easily. Spray drifted through the windows as we bounced along the low waves. We might have taken the eavesdropping avoidance too far. “You checked me out more thoroughly than just about any of my clients. You knew exactly how I'd approach the question."

  "You were to figure out the source of our problem and deal with it, not put the entire company into an uproar."

  "No, I don't think that's true. You hired me to do exactly what I did—get it out in the open. Hey, let's stop beating around the bush here. You already knew why they were killed when you contacted me. The only thing I'm not sure of is whether you were in on the order itself. The incentivization idea was always ridiculous. Not even the Mafia shoots their employees for screwing up.” I paused. “Well, hardly ever. And mostly in the movies anyway. No, Freeboard is a lousy bet for its investors, like any active-management fund company, but I don't really think it's run by murderous criminal lunatics."

  McClellan made that hacking sound again. “You should join our board in closed session sometime."

  "I went to Loreta Danieli first because you suggested her, and she pretty much gave the game away. They were running scams on their funds, screwing both the investors and Freeboard itself. But the real problem was that someone dimed them out to the SEC."

  "What they were doing was illegal. We live by our reputation. We wanted them in jail no less than the Feds, just to prove that the bad apples get culled."

  I shook my head. “Don't worry about it,” I said loudly, above the engine roar. “Even if I was wearing a wire, there's too much ambient noise to catch anything you say. The last place you wanted them was in the U.S. Attorney's office, cutting deals to save their own worthless hides. Putnam lost more than half its asset base after its little scandal. Someone at the top of Freeboard wasn't going to let that happen here."

  McClellan sat silently for a while. We passed a massive container ship moving slowly out of the harbor, the bridge lights barely visible ten stories above the water. The taxi swung in a slow loop back toward the skyline, our wake frothy in the moonlight behind us.

  "Do you think our security division was involved?” he said finally.

  "No. I don't think the captain would stand for activity like that. And it would be too risky anyway—too many possible leaks. No, I'm sure it was an outside contractor. A friend of mine in the business hinted as much. Someone got hired, they did their job, and now they're far, far away."

  "So what happens now?"

  "There are two parts to that question.” I sat comfortably in the occasional wash of salt spray. “First, do you really want me pushing further, walking the line all the way back to whoever gave the order? I could—well, we'd have to talk fees again—but I don't think you do. I think you wanted the pot stirred just to let them know you were in the game. Onto them. That point has been made clearly enough, in my opinion."

  McClellan nodded slightly. He was hunched over, cold in the wind and showing his age. “What's part two?"

  "How does it play out? No matter what, the killings make for a huge PR issue. Now, I'm no media relations expert, but like anyone else who watches the news, I know one thing—reporters are morons. So it seems to me you might as well run with the Robin Hood angle. Direct action for the defrauded little guy. Consumer protection vigilantes. It'll make a great story, people will be thrilled that some caped crusader is standing up for them, and best of all, it will go absolutely nowhere."

  "You might be right."

  The taxi was paralleling the waterfront now, lights twinkling in all the wharves renovated into condominiums.

  "Head it in,” I called to the driver. “Stop at Long Wharf first."

  McClellan looked up. “My driver's waiting back where we started."

  "I know, but I've got something else to do.” I looked at my watch. “Someone's going to show me a steakhouse."

  * * * *

  But Loreta wasn't hungry, not after our dinner earlier, so we walked through Quincy Market and down past the marina instead. This late at night, past ten, the tourists were either in the bars or their hotels. The locals were all asleep, Boston being Boston. As a landlubber, I could identify the moored sailboats as big, pointless, and expensive. Loose ropes and fittings clanged softly as they rocked in their berths. Salt air and a persistent smell of burnt fuel drifted from the airport across the harbor.

  "Vent shafts,” Loreta said, pointing up at the blank brick structures looming over the end of the wharf. “For the tunnel."

  "Charming.” We watched the exhaust flare of a red-eye taking off. Gulls slept on the concrete deck around us.

  "I can't believe you're finished already,” she said.

  "Some jobs are easier than others."

  "So who did it?"

  I was tired, done in by the long day's exertions. I leaned forward on the bench, elbows on my knees, not looking at her.

  "Wrong question,” I said. “I don't know. Some specialty contractors, like me. Doesn't matter."

  "Oh.” She paused. “Then, who hired them?"

  "Wrong again.” I looked out at the dark water. “It was a board-level decision, but who, exactly, is just politics. As far as I'm concerned, they're all implicated. McClellan got what he wanted, which was for me to whack the beehive with a stick."

  "I don't understand."

  "Why.” I said the word slowly. “The important question is why were they killed."

  "I told you, they were stealing."

  "No.” I sat straight and shifted to face her. “It was because of the leak to the SEC. That raised everything to a new level. The wheels of federal enforcement grind slow, but they grind exceedingly fine. Freeboard could handle anything internally, but not an SEC probe."

  "So.” She mirrored my posture—on the edge of the bench, hands resting loosely on her thighs, legs braced for a leap or a strike or a block. I kept quiet, half wondering how good she was, half worrying we were about to find out.

  And then, of all things, she laughed and sat back and crossed her knees, and put one elbow up on the back of the bench, like she was taking her ease in front of the TV. She'd have had to lie face down on the ground to be any more defenseless. I made a puzzled face.

  "Yes, it was me,” she said. “They have a toll-free hotline, you know that? Rat out your colleagues, you don't even have to pay for the phone call. That's why I quit, about two seconds before being fired."

  "Your bosses knew it was you?” I was in
my usual spot during a conversation with Loreta: three steps behind.

  "Not for sure. But the dead men, they were stupid greedy, not stupid careless. I only figured it out because I was working directly for all three of them as an analyst on their portfolios. Once I made the call, the partners fingered me quick enough."

  I thought about it. “Why didn't you call them, instead of the government?"

  Her jaw tightened and a wave sort of rippled over her, like a cat bunching to leap. “They would have covered up. I wanted justice."

  A Coast Guard zodiac puttered past the wharf, its small searchlight flickering over the moorings. One of the gulls startled awake, squawked, and flapped to a position farther into the darkness.

  "Justice.” Finally, it was my turn to laugh. “Is there really a ninety million—dollar hedge fund?"

  She stood up. “Come on, I'll buy you an Indian pudding."

  "Justice,” I said again, as I held out my hand and she pulled me to my feet. “How about that—we're in the same business after all."

  Copyright (c) 2007 Mike Wiecek

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  BLOOD ON THE SNOW by Jim Ingraham

  I'm not vindictive, not inclined to waste energy on revenge. But when Dickey Mayfield put a hole in me, I spent long hours dreaming about getting back at him. I was even fool enough to tell a policeman I wanted retribution, and that wasn't very smart.

  It began on a February evening in the north woods of Maine. I was standing with a trooper on railroad tracks, nothing but trees and mountains and lakes for miles around us. He was wrapped in a fleece-lined parka, sour-smelling mist puffing from his mouth.

  "No question in your mind this is Paul Morin?” he said, shining his flashlight on what remained of Paul's face, barely recognizable under a mask of black matted hair. It was protruding from the broken driver's-side window of a tumbled-over black Ford 150.

  I didn't look down, didn't have to, didn't want to. I wish I could have wrenched the image from my brain. But it will remain with me forever—a broken body in a leather jacket inside a smashed truck in a snowy ditch beside the railroad tracks.