Innocent Conspiracy

by David Archer

  “Well, anyway, he said he wanted to talk to me about the difference between the totals from my office and the totals that were being reported from accounting. I said they should match, and that’s when he told me that he was setting up something special, and needed to move a little bit of money every day into a secret account. In order to do that, he said that my totals had to match what accounting said at the end of the day. Well, at first I told him there was no way I could do that, because our reports are finished before the money is released to the accounting department. That’s when he told me he knew that I could edit my reports, and that he wanted me to start doing it. He told me about setting up the new email account for me, and said that I had to check it every day at quitting time, and then edit my reports to match what it said in the email.”

  “And what did you say then?” Jade asked.

  “Well, at first I tried to say I couldn’t do it anyway, but he promised me it wasn’t anything bad and that it would be something that was going to make him and Annie richer than ever. He said it was something really good that everybody was going to want when he finally told the world about it, but that he had to keep it a big secret until then, so nobody else would steal it and beat him to it.”

  “So you agreed?”

  “Well, yeah,” Jackie said. “Like I said, he promised me it wasn’t anything bad and that nobody would get in trouble, and then he told me he’d give me a raise if I would go along with it.” She shrugged. “I got kids, and it’s expensive to raise them. I said okay.”

  “Jackie,” Jade said, “you said it was dark in the office. Are you sure it was John Morton you were talking to?”

  “Well, yeah,” Jackie said. “You can’t work there more than a week without getting to know his voice perfectly. He walks around through the building all day, every day, just talking to everybody. He’s the best boss I’ve ever worked for, and I’m not just saying that because I got the big raises. He’s just a great guy, he really is.”

  “Jackie,” Summer said, “I’m just curious, but did he happen to tell you never to mention this outside of that meeting? Even to him?”

  Jackie narrowed her eyes. “Yeah,” she said. “He said he didn’t want to take a chance on anybody else overhearing it, so if I had any questions or anything, I was supposed to send them to him with the email, from the email address he gave me. He said that was a super secure email, so nobody could get into it.”

  Jade patted her hand. “Jackie, you’ve been a great help. Now, you need to do what the doctors tell you and stay put, and when they let you go, our security guards are going to take you to stay somewhere safe.”

  “But, my job,” Jackie said. “I have to go to work tomorrow.”

  “No, what you have to do is be safe. Right now, I don’t believe going to work is the way to stay that way. As you pointed out, this attack probably happened because somebody wanted to shut you up. Apparently they just didn’t realize how hard it is to fatally overdose on meth. I’m pretty sure they meant for you to die, Jackie, and I don’t plan to let that happen.”

  Jackie nodded, but they could see that she was still somewhat confused. Of course, she was still suffering some of the effects of the methamphetamine she’d been injected with, and that was probably having some effect on her thinking processes.

  Jade and Summer promised to check in on her again, and left. When they got outside the exam room, they found that Karen had been holding back the officers with Jackie’s children, and the doctor was fuming as he stormed past them.

  “I told him it was important that you girls interview her alone,” Karen said. “He said it was important that he get in there to treat his patient. I asked him if she was about to die, and he said no, so I told him that forcing his way into that room would constitute interfering in a police matter.” She grinned. “Be sure to tell Sam I did that for you. I’m sucking up for the next time you guys have an opening in the investigations department.”

  Both the girls chuckled, and promised they’d relay the message to Sam. “We’ll tell him as soon as we get back to the office,” Jade said. “That’s where we’re headed right now.”

  “Cool,” Karen said. “I think I’ll follow along.”

  28

  Jade, Summer, and Karen walked into Sam’s office. When he saw the three of them, he motioned for them to follow him to the conference table and they all sat down.

  “Okay, here’s the situation,” Jade said. “Jackie can’t be certain that it was truly John Morton who told her to fudge the numbers. She was told one night to go up to his office, but his secretary was gone and when she went inside, the lights were out. I guess Morton gets migraines, so that didn’t surprise her all that much, and she said she was confident that it was his voice she was hearing. Personally, I think it was somebody who could either impersonate his voice very well, or who was using a voice changer that was programmed to sound like Morton.”

  Sam nodded. “That would make sense. That’s probably the only way somebody else could enlist her cooperation. On the other hand, you said she got raises for going along with this. Wouldn’t Morton have to approve those?”

  “Maybe not,” Jade said. “From what I was given to understand, Annie Porter actually handles a lot of the personnel matters. She could probably authorize a raise, but it could also be that the payroll department simply got a call from somebody who sounded like John. If they thought they knew his voice, they probably would do whatever he asked without questioning it.”

  “True. Alright, so how is Jackie?”

  “She’s apparently going to be okay,” Karen said. “Somebody tried to OD her on meth, but unless you got a weak heart or other health problems, that’s not all that easy to do. She’ll probably spend the rest of the day in the hospital, and I’m glad you put security on her. It’s entirely possible whoever tried to kill her will try again.”

  “That’s why I did it,” Sam said. “At some point, we are undoubtedly going to need her testimony. Now we just need to figure out who was playing John Morton in that meeting. Any suggestions?”

  “Actually,” Summer said, “I might have one.”

  Sam looked at her and cocked his head to the side. “Go ahead,” he said. “Who?”

  “Somebody I already declared beyond suspicion,” she said. “Annie’s brother, Tom Linden. Jade was telling me what Indie said about the voice comparison thing. Tom grew up in the same house as Annie, so there would be similarities in the way they talk, right?”

  “Yes, I’m sure there would. Think you can get us a recording of his voice, so Indie can check it out?”

  Summer smiled. “Give me fifteen minutes,” she said. She got up and walked out of the office, and Karen looked at Sam.

  “What did she mean, somebody she already declared beyond suspicion?”

  “She had a meeting with Linden last week, and came away convinced that he was innocent. I think there’s just been too many little things going crazy, lately, so she’s willing to revisit the possibility that he’s not.”

  *

  “Hi, Tom?” Summer asked. “Hi, it’s Candy, remember me?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Tom said. “How have you been?”

  “Oh, I’ve been doing okay,” she said. “Listen, I wanted to let you know that I got a call from my doctor, and it turns out I don’t have herpes after all. Apparently, it was just a nasty attack of hives, but it’s all cleared up now.”

  “Oh, really? Well, I guess that’s good. I’ve been meaning to call you, but I’ve been really, really busy lately. Maybe, maybe we can get together again sometime soon. I mean, if you want to.”

  Summer chuckled. “Look, boy,” she said, “I just told you it’s safe to get in my pants. Kind of sounds to me like I want to get together again, don’t you think?”

  Tom burst out laughing. “You are about the most unusual girl I have ever known,” he said. “Listen, I’m going to be tied up for the next week or so. How about I give you a call next weekend, if I can get free?”


  “You’d better,” she said. “You wouldn’t want me to think you didn’t like me, now, would you?”

  “No, no way,” Tom said. “I’ll call you as soon as I can, I promise.”

  Summer hung up the phone, then emailed the recording she had just made to Indie. As soon as it went through, she called Indie to let her know that it was there. Then she went back to Sam’s office and sat at the conference table once again.

  It was fifteen minutes later when Jenna announced that Indie was calling. Sam reached over and hit the button on the speakerphone.

  “Hey, babe,” he said. “You get the results?”

  “Sam,” Indie said, “Herman says there is a ninety-nine point seven percent probability that the distorted voice on the recording from Starbright’s computer is Tom Linden. I don’t think there’s any way he could get closer than that, especially with that voice distorted the way it is.”

  “That’s the break we’ve been looking for,” Sam said. “Thank you, sweetheart, until I can give you better thanks when I get home.”

  “Oh, I’m gonna be looking forward to that all day,” Indie said with a giggle. “Bye-bye, Sam.”

  “Karen, I think we need to pick Linden up for questioning. Do you mind?”

  “Hell, no, I don’t mind. You got an address for him?”

  Summer rattled it off from memory, and Karen punched it into her phone. When the app began to speak, she got up and headed out the door.

  “I really wish it hadn’t been him,” Summer said. “He actually seemed like a very nice guy, and I’m sure this is going to devastate his sister.”

  “I think it may be worse than that,” Jade said. “Annie seems to really adore her kid brother. This might be one of the worst things she ever goes through.”

  *

  Tom Linden put down the phone and leaned back in his desk chair. He hadn’t expected a call from “Candy,” because he’d been sure he had handled the situation properly the first time he dealt with her. Of course, he hadn’t realized then that she was actually an investigator with Windlass; it wasn’t until just a few hours earlier, when he’d seen her dealing with the front desk security guard, that he had figured that out. If he was being honest with himself, he felt rather stupid about that.

  Why would she call me now? Tom asked himself. Unless they’ve suddenly become suspicious of my involvement. Gotta handle this quickly.

  He picked up his phone again and dialed the number that was marked “Vancouver Rehab” in his contacts. He was careful to turn on the voice changing app, to distort his voice once again.

  “Yes?”

  “I have a problem,” Tom said. “These investigators, Windlass Security, I think they may be on to me. One of them just called me, posing as a girl who wants to go out with me.”

  “What a pity,” Reynard said. “These people seem to be interfering in everything I’m trying to do.”

  “Yeah, well, I need some help. We need to shut them down, like right away.”

  “Yes, I suppose we do. Of course, this will further increase my fees. We won’t know how much until everything is done, but I will do what is necessary. Just make sure you are prepared to pay when the time comes.”

  “No problem,” Tom said. “Just make it happen.” He cut off the call and got up from behind his desk. There was no way he was going to sit around and wait for someone to come and get him. He walked down the hall and told his sister that he needed to run an errand, then headed for his car in the parking lot.

  *

  Locate and observe the home of Sam Prichard, the investigator. Take no further action until ordered to do so. Keep your phone on. That was the order that had come through an hour earlier.

  Locating Prichard’s home had not been difficult, because he was still listed in the Yellow Pages as a private investigator. Nolan pointed his house out to Laura as they drove past it.

  “Now we have to watch,” Laura said. “How boring is that?”

  Nolan grinned at her. “It’s all part of the job, remember? This is what we do.”

  “No, this is what we end up doing,” Laura said. “Our job is actually killing people, not sitting around watching them have dinner.” She was squinting through a pair of binoculars that were trained on the big picture window at the front of the house. “I see the wife, just sitting there with a little girl. Boring, that’s what I said, boring.”

  “He only said to observe for now,” Nolan said. “Sounds like you’ll get your chance to kill them. Just be patient, I mean, what choice do you have?”

  She put the binoculars down and looked at him as they went past the house. “We could go in and kill them now,” she said. “That would definitely not be boring.”

  “Yeah, good luck with that,” Nolan said. “Remember what happened the last time somebody hit a target before they were told to? I have never seen somebody disemboweled alive before, and I don’t ever want to see it again. And I especially don’t want it to happen to me, so get yourself under control.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Laura grumbled. “I just hate when he says to observe.” She made a face. “Observe this, observe that,” she said, dripping with sarcasm. “It’s been months since I got to kill anybody. He knows it builds up in me, why won’t he let me put it to work more often?”

  “Because you get sloppy,” Nolan said. “You go off half cocked, and things end up nasty. Why do you think he makes us work in pairs? He’s teaching us to be the best at what we do, so the least we can do is show him some respect.”

  “Yeah,” Laura said, “because it’s the best way to stay alive.”

  Nolan chuckled as he pulled the car over to the curb. “There’s a lot of truth to that,” he said. “So, we just observe. Until he says otherwise.”

  Laura let out a sigh. “Yeah, fine,” she said. “I just hope he doesn’t wait too long. I’m starting to get antsy.”

  “You can get as antsy as you want,” Nolan said. “Just keep your pants on until we get orders.”

  “God,” Laura said, “you sound like a good little soldier. Wait for orders, wait for orders, that’s all I ever hear out of you.”

  “That’s because you’re always ready to go off on a wild tangent of your own. At some point, you need to decide what you want. Continue to flaunt the orders you’re given, and your name may end up on one of our lists.”

  Laura shook her head. “God, you’re such a pain in the ass. Maybe you should tell him that it’s just the wife and kids there. Maybe he’ll give us the go-ahead.”

  Nolan looked at her for a moment, then took out his phone. He called up the email app and sent the message, then put it back into his pocket.

  *

  In the diner, Reynard sat sipping his coffee. His phone was laying on the table in front of him, and he took another look at the message that came in when it vibrated.

  Prichard is gone to his office. Only wife and children there.

  “What are you up to, Sam Prichard?” Reynard mused to himself. He had been thinking about the call from that boy, the one who had started all of this. Of course, it was necessary to now get Prichard under control quickly, before he could ruin everything.

  He already knew that Prichard and his team were closing in on Hickam, but it might be best if he never got a chance to question the man. Hickam was soft, and while Reynard was confident that he, himself, could avoid arrest or capture, it would be a shame to have put in all this effort and see it fail.

  Eliminating Hickam, on the other hand, was not feasible. He was the one who had brought in Reynard to bring the boys’ plans to fruition. The final success of the operation depended on both of them being in place, and Reynard wasn’t going to remove either of them.

  Therefore, it was time to get some leverage in place to use on Prichard. He had thought this through carefully before coming to a decision, but that was one of the reasons he had been so successful. He never rushed a decision if there was time to think it through. He looked at his phone and sent a reply.<
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  Acquire Prichard’s wife and children and hold them. Do not harm them without further orders.

  His remaining team in Denver was not his best, but they would do. Or he would kill them.

  *

  According to Grace Prichard, who was a real estate broker, the thing to do when you had no appointments for the day always included sleeping in, tuning out the world, and enjoying the pure luxury of not caring what was happening anywhere other than the bed in which she was luxuriating.

  Occasionally, however, those hours of self-indulgent luxury were interrupted by a frantic knocking on her bedroom door. This turned out to be one of those days.

  “Go away, Kim,” Grace shouted. “It’s my day off! I like to sleep on my day off!”

  “Grace, you have to get up,” Kim yelled back. “Grace, it’s—it’s Beauregard! He says we have to go to Indiana, and we have to go now.”

  “We’ll go after I get up! Now, leave me alone for an hour or two!”

  “Grace, Indiana and the children are in danger! Beauregard says we’ve only got a few minutes to spare! Now, get your ass out of that bed!”

  Grace raised her head and pushed the sleep mask off her eyes. Kim hardly ever used language like that. “What? What’s going on?”

  “Just get up and get dressed, I’m calling Indiana.”

  The covers flew off and Grace was up and on her feet. Her fluffy nightgown hit the floor as she yanked open her closet.

  Outside her bedroom, Kim had her phone in her hand and was frantically searching for the speed dial icon for Indie. She actually passed it up once, then found it and went back to smack it with her thumb.

  “Hey, Mom,” Indie said.

  “Indiana, it’s Beauregard,” Kim said instantly. “Grace is getting up now, we’ll be on the way in a few minutes, but he says you and the kids are in danger right now!”

  Indie had been walking from her kitchen to her bedroom, and she didn’t even slow down. “What kind of danger?” She went into the bedroom and directly to her closet, punched in the four digit code on the safe on its top shelf, and withdrew the little thirty-two caliber pistol Harry Winslow had once given to Sam.