“Hello, Mr. Towers,” Jared answered. He was surprised at how quickly this call had come. As though anticipating his reaction, the voice continued.
“Phil said it was urgent.”
“It is, I guess.” Jared was unsure how much to share with a voice over the phone. Maybe he could shorten things up. “Mr. Towers, have you got any experience with banks or banking?”
The soft voice answered, almost apologetically, “Some.”
“How much,” Jared pressed.
“I worked at the Piper Lincoln Bank in Chicago.”
“How long?”
“Twelve years.”
That was unexpected. “What did you do there?”
“I was a vice-president.”
Jared could hardly suppress his surprise and answered stupidly, “Vice-president of the bank?”
“Yes.”
What was a former bank vice-president doing as a P.I.? “Mr. Towers, why’d you leave?”
“Mr. Neaton,” the voice said haltingly. “I can email you a copy of my resume if you’d like, and references. But Phil said you needed help, and I’m—um—available now.”
At Paisley, you wouldn’t hire an expert until after reviewing his resume and references and completing an interview. But this wasn’t Paisley. Besides, Jared was still circling the case and only needed limited information—not a testifying expert.
“How much do you charge?”
The voice on the line cleared its throat. “Uh, Mr. Neaton, Phil and I, we do each other favors; help each other out when we can. I’m working things off with Phil just now, so just tell me how I can help.”
Jared thought for a moment. The records from Goering would be a starting point.
“Let me tell you something about the case,” Jared said, then proceeded for the next fifteen minutes, finishing with a summary of the bank records he’d scanned the evening before. “I’m coming back to Minneapolis later today and can messenger you the records from my office in the morning. I didn’t see anything there, but I’m not sure what I’m looking for.”
The voice remained silent for several seconds. “You have until Wednesday to decide on taking the case?”
“Yes.”
“All right.” Towers gave him an address for the documents.
“Mr. Towers—what will you be looking for in the records?”
“There are only two bank records of any importance,” Towers responded, his voice still barely more than a whisper. “Those are the history for the account where the deposit was made, and documentation of the bank depositing the ten-million-dollar check with the Federal Reserve Bank in Minneapolis. Every bank sends its checks to the local Fed for clearing, and they’d have a record of this deposit if it was cashed. If those records don’t exist, then either the bank has chosen not to produce them or they’ve destroyed them. Or of course,” he continued, the apologetic tone creeping back in, “the deposit slip is a forgery.”
Jared thought again about the three days until he had to make a decision. “Is there any way to quickly find out whether Ashley State Bank deposited the money with the Federal Reserve? Because I haven’t got the power to subpoena any records unless I take the case, and time’s running out.”
“It’s not public information,” Towers answered. The pause extended longer than before. “But I can do that.”
For all his reticence, Towers didn’t lack confidence. “You can find out?” Jared asked.
There was a pause so long Jared thought he might have lost the investigator.
“Yes. I know . . . someone.”
He didn’t sound eager, and Jared wondered if Tower would have to call in a favor for the information. He needed information and maybe Towers was a lucky break, someone who could shortcut the process without emptying Jared’s thin pocketbook. He tried another question.
“Is there any way the bank could have deposited this money and not created a record we could trace?”
“Yes. It’s possible.” The long pause returned before Towers finally continued. “Mr. Neaton, if I were trying to do something like that, the bigger problem wouldn’t be hiding the document trail. It would be hiding the people.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s one thing to hide records—cleanse computers, shred documents, all that—in a way that auditors could not find. It’s another thing to hide it from employees.” There was a sigh on the line. “I’ll check the records you’re sending, Mr. Neaton, and I’ll make some calls. But my advice is to look for someone who’ll tell the truth about it. The honest man the bank can’t keep quiet. Or maybe,” he finished, trailing off, “the one the bank overlooked.”
As Jared emerged from a long shower, he heard the ping of a text arriving on his phone. It was Erin.
Found a box of bank documents that I didn’t give Mort Goering. They relate to the mortgage on the farm, so probably irrelevant.
Jared weighed his response and realized he felt no hurry to leave. He answered the text: Meet me for breakfast at Orsi and Greens.
The restaurant sat a block south of the bank in downtown Ashley. It had once been the town drugstore, with a lunch counter serving sodas and ice cream. The pharmacy was closed now; the store and counter converted to a café.
Twenty minutes after the text, Jared stood waiting inside, staring at the twin stools at the end of the counter farthest from the door. He’d come here years ago, on his first date. Susan Gladhart was a curly haired, skinny legged beauty, who had sat with him for a soda on those very stools in sixth grade. It’d cost him three dollars and a week’s quota of nervous sweat. But it was worth it. He could still feel her cool, dry hand in his as they walked home afterward.
“Jared?”
He turned to Erin’s smile and couldn’t help but return it. She held a folder of documents under her arm, which he took after being seated and ordering.
Jared paged through the papers Erin had brought. They consisted of statements and notices relating to the Ashley bank debt and mortgage on the Larson farm.
The papers were disorganized. Shuffling through them, hoping to create some order, Jared saw that Paul Larson began to fall behind in his mortgage payments four years ago, early in 2007—a year or so before the deposit date. At first the payments were a few weeks late. The slippage accelerated until, by February 2008, the farmer was four months behind.
Dunning letters from the bank began immediately with the farmer’s late payments in 2007. As the payments fell further behind, the word foreclosure began to appear, sandwiched into threats of legal action. The last bank letter was dated February 3, 2008—warning that foreclosure would now begin. There were no more documents.
“Erin, is this all you found?”
“Yes. Why?”
“Because the bank stopped dunning your dad about his mortgage deficiencies the same month the deposit was made.”
“Okay. What’s that mean?”
“I don’t know. But you said Ashley only started to foreclose after your dad died last winter?”
“Um-hmm.”
“That was three years later. Ashley State Bank stopped threatening him the same month as the deposit.”
“So you’re saying that proves the bank got the deposit?”
“No. But if it’s not related, it’s a pretty strange coincidence.”
The waiter arrived with their order and Jared set the papers aside. As he dropped his napkin onto his lap, he glanced out of the front window. Erin’s car was parked across the street.
“How do you drive with the broken glass?” he asked.
“Slowly,” she answered between bites.
Jared smiled. “Erin, why’d you come back here? I mean, why did you move back here after your father died?”
It seemed like a simple question, but Erin was slow in responding. “I guess I thought I could help the attorney more from up here.”
“Did you give up your job in the Twin Cities?”
“I went on ‘sabbatical.’ No guarantees the job w
ill be waiting for me when I get back, though.”
Jared didn’t press, but focused on his breakfast. Erin spoke next.
“I know something about your family’s problems in Ashley,” she said cautiously. Jared froze, his throat tightening.
“I mean, not a lot,” she went on. “I just remember some of the things in the paper. I’d read about it when I’d come home to Ashley from school that year.”
“Well . . .”
“I’m sorry to bring it up if it bothers you, but it’s just that . . . you must have gone through some tough times up here too.”
Jared looked up at Erin for a sign she was manipulating him. After years in the courtroom, he thought he would detect being played. Her eyes looked back with concern and nothing more.
“Yeah, it was pretty rough for about a year,” he answered. “My last year in high school. I haven’t been back much since.”
Erin dropped the point and finished her breakfast.
They parted on the sidewalk. Jared was grateful she didn’t press again about whether he would take the case. He watched her cross the street in the light traffic and get into her car. As she started to drive away, he saw her lean into the window, straining to see through the shattered windshield.
Once she was gone, Jared glanced back through the window of Orsi and Greens. The romance with Susan Gladhart, he recalled again, had lasted a month before summer vacation arrived. Then her family moved to Atlanta. He was miserable, and his summer might have been ruined. Only the merciful beginning of Little League baseball season a week later rescued him from a pool of self-pity.
He began a slow walk back to his car—retracing the first block of the stroll he’d taken that day holding Susan’s hand. Her departure had broken his heart. But despite that, it was one of his fondest memories of his hometown—untarnished and never shared. It had nothing to do with his father, or money, or all the tumult that followed in the years ahead. He clung to it as the best of Ashley.
As he drove back to Minneapolis later that afternoon, Jared felt weariness descending over him again. Maybe it was all that work waiting back in the office. Maybe it was the difficult choice he had to make in this case over the next day or two. Each mile increased his sense of claustrophobia, and an irrational desire to just keep on driving built in him.
Despite his feelings about Ashley and the impending decision, the past few days had felt like a break—or at least a welcome change. By the time he reached the freeway and the final leg to the city, Jared came to an abrupt decision. He pulled out his cell and dialed Jessie’s home number.
“Jessie? I’ve been thinking that I’m going to stay up here another day or so.”
“Why? What else can you learn?”
“I don’t know. Probably nothing. But I’d like the break. Just a day or so to think over the case. Can you keep the wolves from the door one more day?”
“I suppose.” There was concern in her voice.
“Don’t worry, Jessie. I’ll keep in touch and be back in the office on Tuesday.”
Jessie said okay.
Immediately, his anxiety eased. The decision felt terrific. He needed this. Tomorrow, he’d drive to Mission Falls and Federal Express the bankers boxes to the investigator, who’d have them to review early Tuesday. That would still leave enough time for Towers to give him his impressions by Tuesday or Wednesday—so that Jared could make a decision.
This felt right. He’d turn around at the next exit. One more day away from the office. One more day of a change.
“Neaton’s gone. I followed him till he got on the freeway. He’ll be back in Minneapolis in another hour.”
It was late Sunday afternoon. The Paisley attorneys were seated again in Stanford’s office, the speakerphone between them, with Mick Elgart on the other end.
“Good,” Marcus responded to the phone. “Franklin’s making progress on the motion for sanctions against Neaton. We’ll have it done in time for the hearing tomorrow.”
“I have some other information,” the investigator continued. “About Neaton. The ex-con, his old man, still lives in Ashley.”
It was probably irrelevant: Jared Neaton likely wouldn’t be a factor after tomorrow, Marcus thought. “Don’t do any more on that front until we see how the hearing goes.”
“Think it’d be a problem if I attended the hearing?” Elgart asked.
Marcus pondered for a moment. Neaton wouldn’t be in attendance: there was no way he would have enough time to get to Mission Falls from Minneapolis once he got notice of the emergency motion. It couldn’t hurt to have Mick in the courtroom. He said the same aloud.
After Elgart hung up, Marcus pushed the motion papers he had been reviewing back across the desk to Franklin. “Good job. Serve Neaton’s office in the morning—say nine o’clock. Twenty-four hours, this will be over.”
11
Back away, now!” Walls thundered; a door crashed. The piercing, terrified voice of his mother cried, “Samuel!”
“Get away from him, ma’am, now!” Ragged sobbing and more shouts.
Jared jumped up from his desk, spilling books and a glass of water onto the floor. He threw the bedroom door open, slamming the knob against plaster, and hurtled into the hall.
His dad lay spread-eagle on the floor by the front door. A man crouched over him, a knee on his spine, wrenching his dad’s arm across the small of his back. Another man stood behind him, waving a badge in the direction of his mother, who was wailing in the kitchen door.
Samuel’s face, small and pale, was pressed against the tile floor. His eyes locked on Jared. With spittle running to the floor, his father cried in a strangled voice, “For God’s sake, Merilee, get him out of here!”
Through the turmoil, a tune, a lyric. He knew it, but the words escaped him, leaving an empty buzz.
Jared’s eyes opened onto the face of his alarm clock. Ten thirteen. So late. And the buzz, he realized, was his cell phone, vibrating on the table beside his bed.
The images faded now.
He hadn’t had that dream for years.
The phone. Jared fumbled to grasp it and pushed the button to take the call.
“Jared?”
“What’s up, Jessie?”
“Did I wake you?”
“It’s okay. What is it?”
“They’ve brought a motion. It’s against you, for sanctions.”
The sudden rush of adrenaline made his temples pound. “Slow down. What motion? Who brought it? What case?”
He heard Jessie take a breath. Her tone: it wasn’t panic. It was anger.
“ ‘Erin Larson, as personal representative for the estate of Paul Larson v. Ashley State Bank,’ ” Jessie read. “It’s a motion for sanctions, against you, personally. It’s signed by Stanford and Whittier at Paisley.”
“I don’t get it. I’m not even in the case yet. What’s the basis for it?”
“It’s for interviewing a bank employee without a subpoena.”
“I haven’t done that.”
“Well, they’ve got a photograph.”
A photo? “What’s it show.”
“It looks like you, standing in front of a red building. The motion claims you were talking to a bank employee, Willis Severson.”
The motel room faded in a flush of fury.
“I’ve got some more bad news,” he heard Jessie continue. “It’s scheduled as an emergency motion, set for two thirty this afternoon, in front of Judge Lindquist in the Mission Falls Courthouse.”
“Today?”
“Yep. Today. This afternoon.”
Jared tried to clear his head.
“Was Severson a bank employee?” Jessie asked. “Did you talk to him?”
“Severson was a high school classmate of mine, and we talked for five minutes about his wife and kids. He never mentioned working for the bank.”
“Well, it doesn’t look good. Especially talking to this guy at the bank.”
How did they know he would be at the bank? He d
idn’t even know he was going to be there until he got to town. Did someone in the bank spot him? Even if they did, how would they know he was considering taking the case? And who took the picture?
Jared shook his head. Slow down. Think. Even sharks like Whittier and Stanford wouldn’t do something like this unless there was some payback for the effort. Because he realized, as his heart rate began to slow, it’s not likely the judge would grant the motion and sanction him as long as he responded and explained. Especially if he could show that he wasn’t even in the case—might not even take the case. Maybe the judge would hand out a warning, but not a sanction.
But the Paisley boys knew that too. So what could a move like this accomplish against someone not even in the case yet?
His head cleared, and it suddenly seemed obvious. They were telling him to stay out.
That thought set his pulse rising again. Well, he was going to respond, so it was fortunate he was up here, in Ashley, instead of down in his office. It would have been tough to get back up here from Minneapolis to appear for the motion.
Jared was sitting at the side of his bed now, fully awake. The sun glinted around the rims of the closed shades of his motel room window.
They served the sanction motion at his office in Minneapolis at ten in the morning, four hours before a motion that was to be heard two hundred miles away. Jared shook his head as something else became clear. Stanford and Whittier didn’t expect him to be able to respond to the motion. They didn’t expect him to still be anywhere near Mission Falls. They thought he’d gone home. But this time their info was wrong.
“Jessie, I want you to scan the motion and send it to my email address.”
“All right. What can I do to help?”
“I’m heading over to the library to use their computers. I’ll have a response roughed out in two hours. I’ll want you to clean it up, serve it on Paisley, and get a copy up to me by fax so I can file it with the court.”
This day wasn’t going to be what he had planned. But he’d make sure it wasn’t what the Paisley boys expected either.
The Deposit Slip Page 7
