Moral Hazard (Southern Fraud Thriller)

by J W Becton

  “We’re not here to investigate you,” I assured him. Maybe that would help him relax enough to answer Vincent’s question.

  Workman sighed. “For a time we employed a local guy, Jacob Dawe. He never told us how, but he was able to get photographic proof. Video too.”

  “And you suspect it was illegally obtained?”

  “The footage was taken from inside the fence,” he said. “Dawe claimed he’d been invited inside, which would have made the evidence legal, but….”

  “You didn’t believe him?” I asked. “Why not?”

  “Over all the years that we watched Blissett, he rarely left the house. He didn’t have guests. Ever.”

  “So you know Blissett is faking, but you can’t get anything on tape?” Vincent asked.

  “Oh, we have all kinds of legal photos and video of him driving motorized carts around Walmart and Home Depot, but those are hardly useful.”

  Vincent straightened. “You’re saying that in seven years, Randy has never made a mistake? He never left the gate to his yard open? Never raked the front yard, swept the sidewalk? Never left the blinds open while changing a lightbulb?”

  “No, I’m saying he has never been caught doing any of those things in public view. Not by me or my investigators,” Workman said. “Look. You also have to realize that I haven’t exactly been riding this guy’s ass for seven years. I got other cases, you know. I can’t investigate one case 24/7, can I?”

  “And that’s why your company hired Dawe in the first place?” I asked.

  “Obviously,” he said. “Dawe has a reputation for thorough surveillance, but after three months of us paying his crazy fees, he came up with the questionable evidence, and we had to terminate the contract. We can’t do business with a guy like that.”

  “Did you keep copies of the illegally obtained evidence?” I asked.

  “Hell, no,” Workman said. “Can’t keep stuff like that around. We could get in serious trouble for that.”

  “How is that possible?” I wondered aloud. “How could one man deceive the whole state for seven years? And why haven’t you been on him like white on rice once you knew he was faking? Seems like you should have had eyes on him 24/7.”

  “Blissett obviously knows all the angles into his house and yard, and he’s cunning enough to maintain his cover. He hasn’t left the house, except to go to the doctor, in ten months.”

  “Those are your only explanations?” Vincent asked. “You think one man, on his own, has been able to deceive your company, his employer, the state, and even his doctors for this long? Seems unlikely. Seems to me that someone might be helping him out.”

  “And you’re wondering if I’m that man,” Workman spat. “Typical. Accuse the insurance company man of being on the take.”

  Vincent and Workman stared at each other in silence.

  “You didn’t answer my partner’s question,” I pointed out quietly. “Are you sheltering Blissett?”

  Workman crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “I’m not sheltering anybody,” he said. “If I were, why would I have told you about Dawe and his shady proof? It would be pretty dang stupid for me to admit that he’s faking if I were involved. If I were getting a cut of that dough, I’d keep my trap shut.”

  Vincent stood upright, and I shrugged at Workman.

  “Is the alternative any better? I mean, you’ve basically just admitted that your fraud department is useless at catching a man you know is guilty.”

  “It ain’t as easy as it sounds. Just wait. You’ll see that I’m right.”

  “Doubtful,” I said.

  He snorted.

  “Wanna bet on it?” he asked, looking interested for the first time that morning. “You get the goods on Blissett, and I’ll give you a thousand bucks. You fail; you go out with me.”

  I gaped at him. Basically, the man just offered to wager on an investigation with a state law enforcement officer and suggested a date with him as consolation if I lost the bet.

  Wow.

  I was speechless, but Workman clearly didn’t see the flaw in his plan and continued to meet my eyes eagerly. Beside me, Vincent barked out a laugh.

  “You aren’t serious,” I finally said, making no attempt to hide my incredulity.

  “Dead serious,” Workman reiterated, picking up his onion sandwich again and using it to emphasize his next words. “If I couldn’t do it and Dawe couldn’t do it, neither can you. Once you admit defeat, we go out. Dinner and a show. You pay. And I’m not a cheap date.”

  He waggled his eyebrows at me suggestively, and I suppressed my gag reflex.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, “but a law enforcement professional does not place bets on cases.”

  “And neither does a competent fraud investigator,” Vincent added from behind me. “Especially not one who fears being accused of ethical violations.”

  Was it wrong that I sort of enjoyed the hint of jealousy in his tone?

  “Besides,” Vincent continued, “gambling is illegal in this state. Or did you forget that?”

  “Sure, sure. Whatever you say, Special Agent Lurch,” Workman said, mouth full of food as he turned and spoke to me. “So you in or what?”

  I stifled a giggle at Workman’s insult and did what any responsible LEO should do when faced with the temptation to punch an interviewee: I turned for the door, ready to be out of his presence as quickly as possible. We already had his reports, and he obviously wasn’t interested in providing additional information. Who knows? Maybe he didn’t really have anything more to share.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” Workman bellowed.

  Vincent growled at Workman and then followed behind me, one hand barely brushing the small of my back as he escorted me out the door.

  Neither of us replied to Workman or even spoke again until we were outside the Southeastern Insurance building, but Vincent’s hand never left my back.

  “What a charmer,” I muttered as we hurried through the rain to the parking lot.

  “Ashley Wilkes, he ain’t,” Vincent said.

  “Oh, Gone with the Wind reference for the win,” I said, grinning up at him. “Very cheeky coming from a man who doesn’t carry an umbrella in his car.”

  He returned the smile, and his hand slid away as he unlocked the truck and ushered me inside.

  Once he was settled behind the wheel, he started the engine and blasted the heat.

  I warmed my hands at the vent and said, “Terrance Workman is the sort of person who gives insurance-industry employees a bad rap.”

  Employees of any big insurance company—and especially insurance agents—have the reputation of being slimy salesmen, coming door to door to scare people with the evils that might befall them and then refusing to pay out when the worst did happen. They are often viewed as unhelpful, uncooperative, and unsympathetic to human tragedy. And, truly, some of them are.

  But most of the people Vincent and I dealt with on a daily basis were not so unlike us, regular folks with problems, just trying to earn a living. Terrance, though, was every bad stereotype rolled into one slovenly package.

  And he wanted to date me.

  Yuck.

  “That guy was pathetic,” I said with feeling. “But at least he gave us something to go on.”

  “Yeah, now we know why the state has stuck with this case for so long. Blissett is faking, but there’s no evidence that can be used to prove it.”

  “No one wants to go on the record as having knowledge of illegally obtained proof, either. That explains why it was left out of the files.”

  “And we still have to consider the question of how it’s possible that no one could get any legal proof.”

  “It’s an important question,” I agreed. “That fence is a good barrier, but we found a decent vantage point. Of course, it comes with a time limit. Maybe that’s the problem.” I shrugged. “But all reports indicate that Blissett used to go out, perform regular errands. Now he rarely leaves his house, even to get groceries.
Everything is delivered. Doesn’t that strike you as odd?”

  Vincent nodded. “What if Dawe decided to use his illegal proof to blackmail Blissett? Maybe Dawe has him convinced that he could end his gravy train with that proof. Maybe Blissett’s being forced to become a hermit.”

  I mulled over the possibility.

  “But I haven’t found any evidence that Blissett is paying anybody off,” I said after a moment. “His bank statements show that most of his money goes to alimony and child support. He doesn’t have enough leftover cash to make blackmail worthwhile.”

  “We’re still missing something,” Vincent said. “Maybe Jacob Dawe can shed some light on the matter.”

  “Can’t wait to meet him.”

  Ten minutes later, we arrived at the antebellum house that held the offices of Dawe Investigations.

  “Is there anything more clichéd than a PI with a shady past?” I asked Vincent as we pulled into the small parking lot.

  I pointed at the deteriorating street lamp on the corner. The protective glass shield had partially fallen away from the bulb and now hung crookedly from the housing.

  “I’ll bet that light flickers ominously while Dawe smokes cigarettes and leans on the post,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Vincent agreed. “But only when he’s not in his office talking to busty blond broads by the light filtering through the mini-blinds.”

  I laughed, enjoying the release of tension that came with it.

  Dawe Investigations reminded me a little of the DOI’s setup. Both were housed in old residences, but Dawe’s furnishings were much nicer. In fact, it looked as if someone had taken the time to buy antiques suitable to the pre-war period during which the house was constructed. Or at least they bought furniture that gave the feel of antiques. I wasn’t sure which.

  My mother would have known.

  I shook that thought from my mind. Focus on the case. Family later.

  An administrative assistant smiled brightly at me from behind the tall desk. She wasn’t the buxom femme fatale that Vincent and I joked about earlier. Middle aged and neatly coiffed, she was old South done right.

  “Can I help you?” she asked in a Charlestonian accent that had me amending my assessment to old Southern money done right.

  “Special agents Mark Vincent and Julia Jackson from the DOI. We have an appointment with Mr. Dawe,” Vincent said.

  “Oh, how lovely,” the assistant said, and she actually sounded as if she meant it. “I’ll let him know you’re here. Why don’t you have a seat over there? Can I bring you something to drink? Sweet tea?”

  That was definitely preferable to onion on rye, but we declined the beverages and waited for Dawe on a blue and gold upholstered sofa. I brushed a hand over the shiny wooden accents. If it wasn’t a real antique, at least it was pretty.

  A few moments later, Jacob Dawe strode into the room, walked straight to our sofa, and shook our hands.

  Nope. No onion sandwich in sight.

  I liked him better than Workman, even if he did use less than legal surveillance measures. Of course, we had no proof of that yet.

  “Come on back,” Dawe said. “You’re here about Randy Blissett, right?”

  I nodded, and we followed him down the hallway and into his office.

  He pointed to two large leather chairs.

  “Did Mrs. Marston offer you a drink?”

  “Yes, she did, thank you,” I said.

  “So you’re going after Randy, huh?” Dawe asked as he slid into the chair behind his large oak desk. “Tough case.”

  “Yes,” I said. “We understand there have been numerous reports over the years that he is faking his injuries, but no one can seem to find any proof.”

  “Unfortunately, that was my experience as well,” Dawe said. “Don’t much like admitting it, though.”

  Vincent raised an eyebrow. “I understand that you excel at surveillance,” he noted casually.

  “It’s a living, but obviously I’m not perfect,” Dawe demurred, “or you wouldn’t be on the case now.”

  “What kept you from being successful?” I asked. “You had three months to get proof. That’s a long time.”

  “If I recall correctly, Blissett rarely left the house during the course of my contract with Southeastern. Eventually, most fakers start getting twitchy, but he seems to have taken this on as a serious lifestyle choice. He had most of his day-to-day supplies delivered, and if he did venture to the grocery store, he was never without a motorized cart.”

  That agreed with what we already knew.

  “Anything physical was done behind closed blinds or that privacy fence of his,” Dawe continued. “I heard saws, hammers, and whatnot back there often, but I never did find a legal way to see inside.”

  “What methods did you employ in your attempt to gather proof?” Vincent asked.

  “I tried darn near every one I could think of. I drove every square inch of that neighborhood, trying to find a vantage point. I checked out the neighboring houses. I even tried Dowell Heights, the public housing high-rise on the main drag. It would have worked in the winter, but it was spring, and trees obscured the view. We hired a helicopter one day, but Blissett didn’t come outside. Huge waste of budget.”

  Vincent and I exchanged wry looks.

  “Tell me about Dowell Heights,” I prompted.

  “Not much to tell. The manager let me poke around, but like I said, I couldn’t get a line of sight at that time of year.”

  “The manager helped you. Do you recall his name?”

  Dawe leaned forward to scroll through a file on his computer and then lifted his gaze back to me.

  “Peters. Is he somehow involved in this?”

  I responded with a question of my own. “You didn’t have any difficulty working with him?”

  “Not that I recall.”

  Interesting, I thought. That didn’t jibe with Ted’s assertion that Peters was unreasonable. Or the fact that Peters wasn’t exactly helpful to us, either—at least once he knew we worked for Ted.

  “So when you failed to find a vantage point in the Heights, how did you proceed?” Vincent asked.

  “I tried some more creative techniques,” Dawe said in a careful tone.

  “By creative, you mean…?” Vincent prompted.

  Dawe studied Vincent languidly and then leaned forward, laying his arms on the desk. “What are you implying?”

  “I’ve known some PIs to operate in a gray zone morally and ethically,” Vincent said. “How gray is that zone for you?”

  “Most clients hire me so they can get information to use in court. That information must be legally obtained. I can’t claim that none of my clients ask for services of questionable legality.” He shrugged. “Not everyone is interested in legal admissibility. Some just want the truth, whatever the cost.”

  I narrowed my eyes.

  “Look,” he protested, “don’t go calling the state licensing bureau. I’m not wiretapping or putting cameras in public restrooms, but if I take a job, I get it done.”

  I shifted in my seat. How could I fault his logic when I’d used the same reasoning to justify stealing evidence?

  “So what did you do that might be of ‘questionable legality’ in this case?” I asked.

  “Oh, all the dirty little things we PIs do. Went through Blissett’s garbage, hoping to find dance lesson receipts. I don’t know. We tried a couple of pretexts to lure him out of the house. Nothing worked….”

  “We know why Southeastern severed their ties with you, Mr. Dawe,” I said.

  “Ah.” He leaned back, openly assessing us. “Well, as I said before. If you hire me, I get the job done one way or the other.”

  We let silence do its work, leaving a gap in the conversation for Dawe to fill.

  “Look, I don’t have anything legal to show you,” he finally said. “But Blissett is definitely faking, and he’s unusually clever about it. Frankly, I’m surprised that the state is putting more money into the investi
gation. At this point, it’ll be cheaper just to pay his workers’ comp claim.”

  I raised an eyebrow at Dawe’s assessment, wondering again if he were blackmailing Blissett.

  “What about his ex?” Vincent asked, purposely changing the subject. “Did you interview her? Get her take on his situation?”

  Dawe leaned back in the chair again. “Didn’t anyone tell you that exes don’t make good witnesses? You ever been married, Agent?”

  Vincent kept his gaze level and remained silent. Dawe glanced at me and winked.

  “Yeah, I spoke to her first thing,” he said, “but considering the fact that she got most of his workers’ comp payments in alimony and child support, she didn’t have much of a reason to talk.”

  And I knew she still wouldn’t. Blissett’s workers’ comp financed her lifestyle too.

  “Well, it sounds as if we have our work cut out for us,” Vincent said.

  “If you like a challenge, this guy will certainly give you a run for your money.” Dawe grinned. “Figuratively speaking, at least in public.”

  “It’s only a matter of time before he screws up,” Vincent said, sounding confident.

  “How do you know that?” Dawe asked.

  “It’s always only a matter of time before everyone screws up. Fact of life, my friend.”

  We left the office, and, as an afterthought, I turned and reentered the room alone.

  “Mr. Dawe,” I said, closing the door behind me and making a show of ensuring that Vincent couldn’t hear me, “I’d really appreciate seeing what you were able to get on Blissett, if you wouldn’t mind sharing.”

  He studied me, suspicion written on his handsome features. “I don’t usually turn things like that over to cops who don’t have a warrant.”

  “Oh, well, I understand,” I said, my voice innocent. “You have no reason to believe we wouldn’t use this against you somehow, but I had to ask. Our boss is really pressuring us, and even if we can’t use your photographs in court, then maybe they would help us in some other way. Like maybe tell us where to look.”