Final Judgment

by Joel Goldman

  “What about a link between Rockley and Webb?” Blues asked. “Rockley is really some punk named Tommy Corcoran. Webb is really a con man named Wayne McBride who committed murder to fake his own death. The feds are investigating him for skimming from the casino. He had to have help. My money is on Rockley. Their relationship goes south, maybe because of Carol Hill’s lawsuit. Webb pops him and stuffs him in Fish’s car.”

  “Doesn’t work,” Mason said. “Fish’s car is the last one Webb would have picked because it opens up his past.”

  “What about Dennis Brewer, the FBI agent?” Mickey asked. “Where does he fit in?”

  Mason shook his head. “I can’t get anything out of Kelly about Brewer or about whose e-mail the FBI intercepted with the photograph of Blues attached to it.”

  “No wonder Abby called in the cavalry,” Mickey said. Mickey was lean and lanky. Gone was the spiked hair and soul patch of his early twenties. In their place was the buttoned-down, close grooming of a Capitol Hill staffer. Mason was glad that Mickey’s grown-up look hadn’t suppressed the cockiness that he brought to the table.

  “What did she tell you?” Mason asked.

  “Just that you were in trouble—for a change, she said. She didn’t know the details but said it had to do with Avery Fish. What do you want me to do?”

  “I need a fresh pair of eyes to look at all of this. I downloaded the arbitration file to my PC. Start with that. I’ll be back this afternoon.”

  “What about me?” Blues asked. “I’m tired of sitting on the sidelines.”

  “I thought you were going to keep an eye on Judge Carter,” Mason said.

  “That’s a nighttime gig. Nobody is going to bust down her door in broad daylight. Besides, she got the message last night. No need to repeat it this soon.”

  “Okay. In that case, get back to Mark Hill. See if he forgot to tell us anything.”

  “I may have to motivate him. You got a problem with that?”

  From anyone else, Blues’s question would have carried a trace of humor, but he didn’t joke about violence. It was a necessary tool to be applied selectively but without regret. He wasn’t asking Mason’s permission. He was just making certain that Mason knew.

  Mason let out a long breath. The walls were crumbling down and he was tossing some of the bricks. It was ugly, dirty, and wrong, but so was the mess he was in. He could argue the fine points of whether the ends justified the means until he was buried under the last brick. Even before he answered, he knew that he was breaking another of his Aunt Claire’s admonitions—if you’re in a hole, quit digging.

  “We need answers. Do what you have to do.”

  “What about you? What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to try my luck at the Galaxy. See if I can get Lila Collins to blow on my dice.”

  FIFTY-EIGHT

  Mason liked dropping in on witnesses unannounced, preferring their unrehearsed answers to the ones prepared for them by their lawyers. It had become almost impossible to do that since Corporate America had become Fortress America. Visitors had to sign in under the watchful eyes of armed security guards while being videotaped for posterity. If the object of your affections didn’t return your devotion, you weren’t getting in.

  Lila Collins had no reason to see him. If he gave her a truthful one, she’d have less reason. She would tell Al Webb, who would call Lari Prillman. Lari would bite his head off for trying to talk to her client without her knowledge. He would accomplish nothing more than to encourage them to build their wall a little higher.

  Galaxy had gone to the mattresses like so many other businesses, cordoning off its business offices with armed guards and locked doors. Mason walked past the guards without stopping to ask where they kept the loosest slots.

  It was just as well. Even if he could get past Galaxy’s security, Lila’s office was the wrong place to talk about Ed Fiori’s tapes. He needed a private place for their meeting, somewhere she would feel comfortable enough to open up. If she had the tape and was involved in the blackmail, she wouldn’t tell him even if he spirited her to a tropical island. If she knew about the tape but wasn’t involved, she might talk if he could push the right button. It could be fear, greed, or jealousy. It could even be moral outrage, though Mason considered that a long shot.

  He didn’t know what Lila looked like so he couldn’t hang around the blackjack tables hoping she’d walk by. She wasn’t listed in the phone book, so he couldn’t park his car in front of her house and wait for her to come home from work.

  He wandered through the maze of craps tables, blackjack dealers, and video poker machines, past the slots, the cashiers, and the twenty-four-hour buffet until he reached the lobby of the adjoining hotel and called Vince Bongiovanni.

  “Is Carol Hill still hiding out in your suite at the Galaxy Hotel?”

  “She went home last night,” Bongiovanni said.

  “What about her husband?”

  “She kicked his ass out.”

  “Where did he land?” Mason asked, hoping to get a lead for Blues.

  “On a bar stool would be my guess. Why the interest?”

  “I don’t like guys who beat up women, but that’s just me. I need a favor,” Mason said and explained what he had in mind.

  “Consider it done,” Bongiovanni said. “I’ll call Carol first and then the desk clerk at the hotel on one condition—I get whatever you get. Understood?”

  “Consider it done.”

  Mason waited five minutes before asking the desk clerk, a smiling young woman whose name tag said she was Brandi and her hometown was Laramie, Wyoming, for a key to Bongiovanni’s suite. She handed him the key and wished him hot dice and good hole cards.

  There was a basket of fresh fruit on a table in the living room of the suite. Mason grabbed an apple, realizing that he’d missed lunch. He ate as he inspected the living room, bedroom, and bath, indulging his paranoia in a search for hidden microphones and cameras, wondering whether Bongiovanni or Galaxy was more likely to have installed them.

  Despite his claim that he had advised his uncle to get rid of his taping system, Mason wondered if Bongiovanni had given in to the temptation. As for Galaxy, surveillance was its central nervous system, the best way to watch for card counters, cheats, and others who threatened the house’s edge. Al Webb may have wanted the suite badly enough to bug it, hoping for leverage that would force Bongiovanni to sell. Such an acquisition strategy made sense for someone who would also blackmail Judge Carter.

  After checking the lamps, the buttonholes on the sofa, the phones, and the vents, Mason was fairly certain the place was clean. Nonetheless, he couldn’t shake the feeling that history was about to repeat itself when he heard the knock at the door.

  Mason’s plan relied on simplicity, deception, and surprise. If Vince Bongiovanni had done his part, Carol Hill would have by now called Lila Collins and invited her to the suite to talk about settling her case. The ruse would get him private face time with Lila and he would dazzle her with his charm and clever cross-examination. She’d melt at his feet and spill her guts—or not. Still, it was a simple plan and he was working on the fly.

  The instant he opened the door the man who had decked Mark Hill outside the bar in Fairfax belted him in the stomach. Mason had a split second of recognition before he lost his breath and his legs. The man grabbed him by the throat, forcing him to backpedal into the living room, where he dropped Mason onto the sofa. Still doubled over, Mason glanced up as another man swept through the suite before joining his partner. Mason recognized him as the passenger in the car Hill had sideswiped. They hoisted Mason to his feet, frisked him, pulling his shirt out and grabbing his wallet.

  “He’s clean—no weapons, no wires,” the first one said, tossing Mason’s wallet to a woman who had materialized behind them.

  “He’s alone,” the other one said.

  “Wait outside,” the woman told them.

  Mason took a few tentative steps, letting the spasm in
his gut subside and rubbing his throat until he could walk upright and breathe at the same time. The woman studied his driver’s license before throwing his wallet back to him. He caught it, circled her, and retrieved a bottle of water from the bar.

  Her midnight-black hair was cut short, her spiked bristles better suited for someone twenty years younger. She had olive skin, heavily made-up dark eyes, and a mouth pulled back in a barely amused smile. Her thin body was taut like a switchblade, ready to snap open at a feather touch. She was wearing body-hugging black slacks and a matching long-sleeved top that clung to her spare frame, sharpening her hard edges.

  “What do you want, Mr. Mason?” she said.

  “I want to talk to Lila Collins. Let me know when she gets here.”

  She raised her hands from her hips, palms up. “That’s me,” she said as she retrieved an employee identification badge from her pants pocket, holding it up for him. The photograph and the name matched.

  “Why the warm welcome?”

  “I was being careful. You tried to set me up.”

  Mason tucked his shirt in. “Should have worked.”

  She smiled. “Carol Hill and Vince Bongiovanni would burn us down if they thought they could get away with it. They wouldn’t negotiate a settlement and they forced us to go through arbitration. Now, while we’re waiting for the judge to decide her case, she calls and says she wants to meet with me—no lawyers—to kiss and make up. Look at me, Mason. Do I look like someone who would fall for that?”

  “I didn’t know what you looked like. It’s a casino. I took a chance.”

  “And you shot craps. Bongiovanni may have inherited this suite, but he and everyone who uses it still have to check in. After Carol called, I checked with the hotel to make certain she was still registered. The desk clerk said she left last night and that Bongiovanni had called to say that you would be using it this afternoon.”

  “Those two guys,” Mason said, rubbing his belly. “They do sensitivity training for your employees?”

  “They do what they’re told, which includes waiting for me to tell them when and how far to throw you out.”

  “Sit down,” Mason said, gesturing to a chair as he sat on the sofa. “Don’t be in such a hurry. What do you know about me?”

  It was an open-ended question. He wanted to see where she would start.

  She sat across from him. “What I read in the papers and watch on TV, plus what the police have told me.”

  “Flatter me.

  She laughed. “It’s nothing to brag about. You’re a lawyer defending that guy, what’s his name? Fish? What kind of a name is that?”

  “The kind his parents gave him.”

  “Then tell him to change his name. People do it all the time.”

  She was keeping it light now, throwing him curves or clues with her crack about people changing their names.

  “You run into that a lot? People changing their names?”

  “I’m in human resources. I check references for a living. Some people make up their entire lives.”

  He remembered Bongiovanni’s astonishment at the ease with which Mason had gotten detailed references from Rockley’s former employers. Lari Prillman had had similar success with Keegan’s. He made a mental note to ask Lila if she’d checked Rockley’s and Keegan’s references, saving the topic for later.

  “What else do you know about me?”

  “I know that lately when one of our employees dies, your name comes up.”

  “You mean every time one of your employees is murdered, my name comes up. I assume that some of them do die of natural causes.”

  “Not in the last week,” she said. “Charles Rockley was found in the trunk of your client’s car and Johnny Keegan was trying to get ahold of you when he was killed.”

  The story about Rockley had been all over the news. The bit about him and Keegan hadn’t been reported. He wondered how she knew. His surprise must have registered on his face. She recovered quickly.

  “The police said something about Johnny having your phone number. They asked me if he had hired you. I told them I didn’t know.”

  Mason added her use of Keegan’s first name to her list of casual admissions. “How well did you know Johnny?”

  She shrugged, forcing nonchalance. “I try to get to know all our associates. Johnny was a nice guy, worked hard, did a good job.”

  Keegan’s affair with Carol Hill wouldn’t have earned him a merit raise. Lila had to have known.

  “Did that include sleeping with Carol Hill?”

  She stiffened. “I don’t know what your arrangement is with Bongiovanni, but I’m not going to give him another club to beat us over the head with by talking to you about Carol’s lawsuit.”

  “You didn’t have to come here to tell me that. You could have called Carol and cancelled the meeting. Why didn’t you?”

  “I wanted to know who was using the suite.”

  Mason shook his head. “I don’t think so. You recognized my name when you got it from the desk clerk, and you knew you weren’t going to talk to me about Carol’s case. So why did you come, and why did you bring the Gold Dust Twins with you?”

  “It’s my job to know what’s going on with my employees. You went to a lot of trouble to get me here instead of calling me on the phone for an appointment. I wanted to know why, but I wanted to make certain it was safe to find out.”

  Her explanation was reasonable and, more importantly, it was all she was going to tell him at the moment. She wasn’t under oath and she didn’t trust him. If he pressed her too hard, she’d whistle for her attack dogs. He’d have to take what she gave him, hoping to box her in. He decided to verify what Bongiovanni had told him before he drilled down to the critical questions.

  “I want to talk about something I don’t think you’d want to discuss at your office or over the phone. I met Vince Bongiovanni through my investigation of Charles Rockley’s murder. He told me about this suite. I asked him to set up this meeting. It was the only way I could think of on short notice to speak with you privately and safely.”

  “Why would Bongiovanni help you?”

  “Because I promised to tell him everything I found out about Carol Hill’s case.”

  “Did you really think I would talk to you about that?”

  Mason smiled. “Not a chance, but I can’t help what Vince might have thought.”

  Her bony shoulders relaxed and she chuckled for an instant. “Lawyers screwing lawyers. I like that. Okay, what’s so secret that you had to play spy games with me?”

  FIFTY-NINE

  “Ed Fiori. You used to work for him?”

  She nodded.

  “How long?”

  “Five years.”

  “Were you working for him when he was killed?”

  She nodded again, this time more cautiously.

  “That’s why you recognized my name,” he said. “It wasn’t because I represent Avery Fish.”

  “I never met you before today.”

  Her answer was another dodge and he let it slide. “What did you do for Fiori?”

  “I was his secretary.”

  “Which meant what?”

  She straightened in her chair, arms folded across her chest. “That was a long time ago. Why are you interested in that now?”

  “I’m going to write his biography.”

  She rose and turned toward the door.

  “Okay,” he said, holding up a hand. “Take it easy. I’m not going to write his biography.”

  “Mr. Mason, do you know what a director of human resources does all day? Deals with other people’s bullshit. I’m not interested in yours.”

  She had come to the suite knowing it was a setup, cautious enough to bring two goons along but confident enough to leave them outside the room. He’d kept her off balance, gotten her to laugh, and picked up some tantalizing hints, but he wasn’t going to chitchat her into submission. He played one of his hole cards, mixing it with a bluff, remembering Fish’s
lesson that a con works because the mark wants it to whether she knows it or not.

  “What if someone at Galaxy was blackmailing Judge Carter into ruling in your favor on Carol Hill’s case? Is that a human resources issue that interests you?”

  She stood next to her chair, gripping its high back. “I thought you didn’t want to talk about Carol’s case.”

  “I don’t. I’m working on an old case involving Ed Fiori. There may be some splash back on Carol because she was related to him. Vince Bongiovanni says you helped him clean out Fiori’s office after he was killed. Is that true?”

  She hesitated, sifting what he’d told her, gauging her reply. “I was there.”

  “Fiori taped a lot of his conversations,” he said, treating it as a fact, daring her to deny it. “You knew that, didn’t you?”

  “He was a careful man.”

  “Careful enough to tell you about the tapes and what was on them?”

  “Careful enough to know who he could trust.”

  “Did he trust you?”

  She looked him full in the eyes, her own slightly moist with a flash of memory that suggested they’d had more than a professional relationship. “Yes.”

  “What happened to the tapes?”

  “Vince took them.”

  “All of them?”

  Before she could answer, the door to the suite blew open, banging hard against the wall.

  “What the fuck is this?” Al Webb marched into the living room, trailed by the two thugs. Webb was hot, the smooth, honeyed manner he’d shown Mason at the Republican Party dinner gone; his eyes were narrow slits, chest puffed up, shoulders flared back. Lila bolted from her chair, color rising in her neck, the words not coming. Webb pounced again. “I said what the fuck is this?”

  “It’s a private meeting,” Mason said. “And you aren’t on the guest list, so get out.”

  “I run this goddamn casino and this hotel, Mason, and I’m going to throw your ass out of it.”