Bert held out his hand, then introduced Agent Wright.
The brief amenity over, Cosmo waved his hands, which were bigger than a grizzly’s head, to show that the men should take a seat across from his desk. Cosmo walked around to his rocking chair and sat down. Bert thought the floor shook momentarily.
Cosmo took the initiative, and said, “I assume you are here on business that you somehow think involves a client of mine who is now deceased.”
Agent Wright bristled. Bert felt amused as Cricket leaned back in his rocker, a smile on his face.
Still bristling, Wright asked in a surly tone, “So you admit that Lily Flowers was a client of yours?”
“Agent Wright, why would you think I would deny it?”
“Because lawyers are big on denial from the git-go,” the FBI man said in the same surly tone. “What can you tell us about her?”
“Why?” Cosmo asked.
“Because we think she might be part of an ongoing investigation.”
“What investigation?” Cosmo asked.
“That’s need to know, Counselor. Just answer the question.”
“I don’t answer questions about my clients until I know why you’re asking them. Since you seem reluctant to inform me, I will assume it’s because you don’t have anything to go on in your investigation of the madam out there at the Happy Day Camp. Which brings me back to my original question, why?”
“Cut the crap, Cricket. I’m not in the mood to dance around on this. It was a legitimate question, so answer it.”
“My response was a legitimate response. In fact, I answered the question for you as a show of good faith. By the way”—Cosmo pointed to a weird-looking machine on the corner of his massive desk—“this conversation is being recorded.”
“What? That’s illegal. You didn’t…”
“I don’t have to inform you of anything. I didn’t invite you here. There’s a sign right there by the machine and another one on the door saying all conversations are recorded unless otherwise stated. If you didn’t see it, that’s your problem, not mine. My employers insisted. If you don’t like it, take it up with Judge Orenstein. Next question.”
Agent Wright was beet red from the neck up. He looked at Bert, who was staring at a colorful painting on the wall behind Cosmo’s desk.
“What can you tell us about Lily Flowers?”
“She was a client, and now she’s deceased,” was Cosmo’s response.
“I know that. What I want to know is what you can tell us about her. We can’t find any next of kin or anyone who knows her. The ME told us you claimed the body, then had it cremated. Why did you do that? I don’t see that being part of attorney-client privilege.”
“My client had no next of kin. I personally don’t know if she had friends or not. No one claimed the body. Because she was my client, I claimed her and had her cremated and her ashes scattered. I felt it was the right thing to do. As my client’s personal representative or executor of her will, I stepped up to the plate. End of story.”
“You certainly didn’t waste much time, did you?”
“I take great exception to that comment, Agent Wright. I don’t think anyone, client or otherwise, should lie in a cold morgue in a drawer if someone is willing to make the final arrangements. Like I said, it was the right thing to do. If you feel I did something wrong, sue me. Or go before Judge Orenstein and take it up with her.”
Bert switched his attention to another painting. It was obvious to him that Cosmo liked bright colors.
“What did she look like?”
“Who?”
“Will you cut the crap, Cricket? You know damn well who I’m talking about, Lily Flowers. I can haul your ass down to the office and sweat you there for seventy-two hours if I want to. Now answer the goddamn question and stop screwing around.”
Cosmo leaned closer to his desk and folded his big hands as he stared at Agent Wright. “Make me.”
Bert almost laughed out loud. He simply pointed to the weird-looking machine on Cosmo’s desk. The movement was not lost on Agent Wright, who somehow managed to look properly chastised.
Bert took his turn. “Cosmo, is there anything you can tell us about Lily Flowers that won’t breach the privilege attached?”
Cosmo smiled. “Not much. I only met her once, and it was after-hours. She didn’t have an appointment and got here just as I was leaving. I don’t think we spoke for more than an hour, if that long. She asked me to handle her affairs. I have her will and her power of attorney. She said she would get back to me to tell me precisely what she wanted me to do for her. She paid me a retainer, $5,000, to be exact, then she left. A day or so later I saw a notice in the paper about the accident. I followed up on it, and that’s all I can tell you.”
“Did you make a photocopy of the check?” Bert asked, knowing what the answer was going to be.
Cosmo laughed. A great, booming sound that ricocheted around the huge room. “This is Las Vegas, Director. Cash is king. Miss Flowers paid me in a single bundle of crisp hundred-dollar bills. There was a bank band around them, which led me to think human hands had never touched them. And, no, I did not photocopy the bills. My secretary deposited the money the following day. Alas, no fingerprints, if that’s your next question.”
Bert nodded. “Can you give us a description of your client?”
“I can do better than that. I can give you a video. It goes without saying there is no sound. And, no, you won’t be able to get an expert to lip-read. My employers insist on little things like that. Would you like to see a picture of my client?”
Agent Wright almost fell off his chair in his excitement. Bert just leaned back and crossed his legs and waited while Cosmo fiddled and diddled with a remote. Cosmo pointed to a small screen that appeared suddenly over the bar. A second later they were all looking at Cosmo’s late-evening client.
Agent Wright jumped up. “I want that!”
“I bet you do, but you aren’t going to get it. Memorize it and have one of your in-house artists do a rendering. Look at it all you want, but it stays here.”
“You’re obstructing justice, Cricket,” Agent Wright snarled.
“Bullshit! Are we done here? I have a meeting and a call coming in that I absolutely have to take.” He might as well have said, “Get the hell out of my office so I can deal with real business.”
Bert was up like a jack-in-the-box. “Then we’ll leave you to it, Counselor.”
Bert understood what was going on immediately when he saw Cosmo look down at the vibrating cell phone sitting on his desk—a call was coming in from the mountain. Now all he had to do was shake Agent Wright and either take his own call, which would likely come through any minute, or wait until Wright was out of the building so he could go back to Cricket’s office. He decided to opt for the latter and when they reached the hallway Bert told Wright to go on ahead while he went to the restroom. His parting shot to his agent was, “FBI 101: you get more flies with honey than vinegar. I’ll take it from here, Agent Wright.”
If Agent Wright had had a tail, it would have been between his legs when he scurried ahead of the director. What Bert didn’t see as he turned right to trace his way to the men’s room was that Agent Wright turned left, then doubled back. Nor did Bert see Wright when he came out of the restroom and headed back to Cosmo Cricket’s office.
The moment Bert opened the door, Cosmo’s secretary was off her chair and headed toward him. “Mr. Cricket is waiting for you, Director.” In the blink of an eye, the door was locked, and she was back behind her desk. At Bert’s questioning look, she said, “Your agent didn’t leave. He’s…lurking on the floor.”
Lurking. So much for FBI stealth and having the upper hand. He shrugged because there was nothing else he could do. He pushed open the door to Cosmo’s office and waved airily. Cosmo motioned for him to sit down.
Like he was really going to sit down. He was too jittery to sit. He was too jittery to stand still, too. So, he paced first one way, t
hen the other, until Cosmo hung up the phone.
“Relax, Bert! That was Elizabeth. Seems there was a snafu at the airport when she landed. They were out of rental cars and one had to be brought to her from another agency. The translation is there was a two-hour delay. She also lost some time on the highway because of a tractor trailer accident. She is safe on the mountain as we speak, and the girls are going into the meeting now. That’s the sum total of what I know at the moment.”
“That’s it?” Bert asked, as his stomach muscles clenched and unclenched.
“Well, Bert, if you want all the details, Elizabeth said she loves me and misses me. Did my secretary tell you Agent Wright stayed behind on the floor and saw you come back here?”
“She did. I would have done the same thing if I were in his position. He’s a good agent. Top-notch, as a matter of fact. Look, I’m straddling the fence here. I have to be careful.”
“Understood. I have a private elevator if you want to leave unannounced. You could go down one floor, come back up by the main elevator and come up behind him to show you weren’t asleep at the switch. Will that work for you?”
Bert laughed. “Damn straight it will. Just for the record, were you really recording our conversation?”
“Yeah. Like I said, my people leave nothing to chance. Sorry, but it’s beyond my control. You might want to give some thought to reining in your agent before things get out of hand. All the FBI needs to know is that Lily Flowers died in a tragic car accident and has nothing to do with any ongoing FBI investigation. If you don’t do that, it’s out of my hands.”
“I’ll take care of it. Where’s the elevator?”
Cosmo heaved himself up and out of his rocking chair and walked him over to what Bert thought was a door to either a closet or possibly a bathroom. He watched as Cosmo pressed a button, and the door slid to the side. Bert knew the elevator had been constructed to fit Cosmo Cricket.
The two men shook hands. The door slid shut, and Bert pressed the button that would take him down one floor. When he stepped out, he looked around for an EXIT sign and climbed the steps to Cosmo’s floor. He almost laughed out loud when he saw his agent hiding behind a huge, bushy ficus tree that reached almost to the ceiling. Bert crept up to his agent and tapped him on the shoulder. “You waiting for a bus, Agent Wright?”
Agent Wright whirled around and for one crazy moment Bert thought he was going to try to scale the tree. “What? How?”
“I guess you thought I didn’t see you doubling back. Since when do my agents spy on their director?”
Speechless for the moment, Agent Wright just stared at Bert. “It’s in my job description. I guess I failed the test.”
“Yeah, Agent Wright, you failed the test. And you also wasted your time, my time, and Mr. Cricket’s time. All because you had a wild hair up your ass. There’s nothing here. Do we at least agree on that?”
Agent Wright drew himself up to his full height and stared at his boss. “I don’t agree with you, Director. I do think something is here, and Cricket is stonewalling us.”
Bert motioned for the Special Agent in Charge to follow him to the main elevator. “I’m going to give you two choices. One, I’m going to let you pursue this dry hole so that you can make an ass out of yourself, at which point I will have you transferred to the Mojave office, or, two, I’m going to give you a few hours to come to the realization that there is nothing here, and you close out this case because it’s a dead end.”
Going to the Mojave was a fate worse than death. Cosmo Cricket wasn’t a dead end. Wright could feel it in his pores. There was something here, he just wasn’t sure what it was. Twenty years as an agent had honed his instincts to a sharp point. And his instincts told him he was right.
The director was waiting for his response. Wright didn’t have to squeeze his eyes shut to remember what it was like at the Mojave office. He’d been there twice when a case demanded he track a trail that led him there. It was the end of the road for agents who had screwed up. “With all due respect, sir, I’d like to have a composite made up and a few days to show it around. If I come up dry, I’ll lay it to rest.”
It wasn’t an unreasonable request, and there was no good reason for Bert to deny it. “Okay, you have forty-eight hours.”
Agent Wright wanted to stomp his feet in frustration. What the hell could he do in forty-eight hours? His facial features closed tight. He was so angry he couldn’t speak, so he nodded.
“Good, we’re on the same page. I’ll meet you back at the office in an hour or so. I have a couple of stops I want to make. Don’t even think about putting a tail on me, Agent Wright. I have to admit it took some guts to double back and spy on me, but it is still going in your file.”
Agent Wright found his tongue. “Yes, sir.” As he made his way through the revolving doors, he mumbled under his breath, “Fuck you and the horse you rode in on.”
Bert grinned as he waited for the valet to fetch his car. He knew exactly what Agent Wright was muttering under his breath because he would have muttered the same thing.
Chapter 16
The moment the cable car slid into its nest on the platform, the Sisters ran outside to welcome Lizzie de Silva Fox Cricket. The greetings were loud and cheerful, the hugs bone-crushing. And then came the grumbling about missing the big event, to which Lizzie just smiled and smiled.
Annie herded them all to the dining room, where a festive table was set, the decorations homemade but made with love. In the center of the table a three-tier wedding cake that listed slightly to the side welcomed the new bride. Tears rolled down Lizzie’s cheeks as another round of hugs and congratulations were bestowed on her.
“Pineapple-coconut, your favorite,” Annie, the baker of the cake chortled. “Coconut frosting.”
“Oh, girls, it’s exquisite! I wasn’t expecting anything like this. I didn’t have a wedding cake! This is so wonderful! Thank you, thank you, thank you. Somehow, this makes it all the more official. I need to take a picture of this cake so I can send it on to Cosmo. I bet you all don’t know Cosmo can cook! He can! And he uses every pot, pan, and bowl he owns just to make scrambled eggs. He’s a better cook than I am.” More tears dripped down Lizzie’s cheeks. A moment later a picture of Annie’s slightly crooked cake was on its way to Cosmo.
“We didn’t have an opportunity to shop for a wedding gift. So, we all talked it over and agreed that we want you to have a ten percent interest in the Babylon. That’s our gift to you and Cosmo,” Annie said.
“Oh, my God!” was all Lizzie could say.
“Since you’re handling the legal end of things, make sure you work that in. Little Fish is quite happy with the deal, by the way. Now it’s time to eat this wonderful cake. Myra made fresh coffee, and it’s just waiting to be poured. Lizzie, you get to cut the cake. Give me your phone, and I’ll take a picture so you can send it on to Cosmo,” Annie said as she reached for Lizzie’s cell.
More pictures were taken and sent to Cosmo, the cake cut, the coffee poured. The Sisters babbled happily as they devoured the confection.
“You have to take some of this wonderful cake with you and put it under your pillow tonight,” Myra said. “All your dreams will come true.”
“No, you’re supposed to put it in the freezer and save it for next year on your anniversary,” Nikki said wistfully.
In the end it was decided that Lizzie would take two pieces, one for under her pillow and one for the freezer.
“Okay, girls, it’s time to get down to business. When I leave here my plan is to head back to Vegas after I make one more stop,” Lizzie said.
Isabelle and Alexis cleared the table. Yoko was making more coffee as Lizzie hauled her briefcase up and onto the table.
“Listen up, girls!”
“We’re listening, Lizzie. Tell us what’s going on. We need to know what’s expected of us,” Nikki said.
“Some of this you know, but let me give it all to you in order. We all know what went down before an
d after the election. As far as we know, the other side of the aisle is either not sure or simply can’t confirm that the dastardly deed did indeed happen. And while it is being whispered about, the media are not running with it. Martine Connor is trying to contain it and went so far as to try and bribe me to be her White House counsel. I turned her down. She implored me to intercede with the Vigilantes on her behalf. She was quite clear on what she wanted, which was for you to find the madam and pin this on her so her people could skate free. She really believed that fiasco wouldn’t get out, and her administration would remain unscathed.
“You all have the list I sent to you. Maggie forwarded the profiles of the men in question and I was astounded. I told her you wouldn’t take it on because you would be on the madam’s side. Not because you condone prostitution but because the law will let the madam’s clients get off with a slap on the wrist, and the madam will do hard time. For some reason Martine could not, would not, accept that. She threatened me with the IRS and every other agency in Washington. I have to tell you that annoyed me a little.
“Here is the ironic part. Cosmo was leaving the office a few days ago around six when a woman appeared and wanted to hire him. It was the madam, Crystal Clark, but she was going under the name Lily Flowers when she hired him. She said she was going to get railroaded and had prepared for that eventuality. Cosmo said she would have stayed and taken the heat if her clients got the same treatment she got, but she was realistic enough to know that wasn’t going to happen. She turned all her books, all her records, over to him for safekeeping. Included with the material was an authorization for him to go after the johns. She paid him a cash retainer of $5,000. Then two days later, a messenger delivered a package that contained her will and her power of attorney.
“The lady made sure she got her working girls to safety. I actually spoke to one of them, and they’re all set for a full year. I don’t know where they are, I just know they’re safe for the moment, probably out of the country. The madam told Cosmo she was leaving and would be in touch.
14. Razor Sharp Page 15
