Dachshund Through the Snow

by David Rosenfelt

  “Tomorrow morning. Not sure if he will want to talk to you, considering the circumstances. But he might.”

  “Which circumstances are you talking about?”

  “You representing the guy accused of”—he hesitates—“killing Kristen,” he says uncomfortably. “We’re all following it pretty closely; we cared about her a lot. Hard to believe it has been so many years.”

  “You worked here then?”

  He smiles. “Oh, yes. Fifteen years; I was one of the first employees hired.”

  “Has the company grown a lot over the years?”

  He nods. “That’s for sure. We only had two floors back then; now we have six. And every time we expand they make me switch offices; by the time I’m unpacked they’re moving me again.”

  “Kristen McNeil worked here back then as well?” I ask that even though I know the answer.

  He nods. “She did. Got here after me, but didn’t stay very long. She left a week or so before she died.”

  “Why did she quit?”

  “I’m not sure; she never told me. I came in one day and found out she was gone. I was planning to talk to her about it, but never got the chance. I don’t think anyone knew; it was a mystery. But something must have happened.”

  “What did she do here?”

  “Just assistant stuff, nothing technical. She didn’t work for me, so we didn’t interact that much. I think Arthur gave her the job as a favor to Kyle. But she was a hard worker, and a good kid.”

  “Arthur Wainwright? Kyle’s father?”

  Another smile. “Also known as the Big Cheese.”

  “What does the company do, exactly?”

  “We make hardware of various kinds. Our main product is routers. Are you familiar with this stuff?”

  “Absolutely. I can even tell you what a router is. It’s a device that routs things.”

  He laughs. “You’re obviously accomplished in the field. All internet communications go through routers; it directs the data … tells it where to go. Even internally; if I send an email to someone in the next office, it goes out into the internet world and then comes back. And routers handle all that.”

  “Who do you sell them to?”

  “We have corporate clients, but a lot of our router production has been subcontracted to us by the huge players in the field. We’re a small fish, though a profitable one.”

  “Is Arthur Wainwright a tech guy, or just a big-cheese guy?”

  “He used to be at the top in the tech area, back when he started this company. But there are new developments every day, things change by the nanosecond, and one has to keep up with it. After a while Arthur chose to delegate to worker bees like me.”

  Back to the matter at hand. “Do you know what Kristen was worried about in the weeks before she died?”

  He shakes his head. “No, but apparently she had good reason to worry. I just wish she had come to me, to any of us. We were a family; we still are.”

  “Will you ask Kyle to call me?” I hand him my card.

  “I’ll do that. Like I said, he might, but he might not.”

  “I would think he’d want to find out the truth about what happened.”

  “I’m sure he would. But you and Kyle might have different truths.”

  “Andy, come in here. Right away.”

  I’m in the den going over discovery documents and planning my next investigative steps. Laurie is up in bed; I thought she was reading, but based on her words, I’m hoping that she’s yearning.

  In any event, I’ve made it a lifelong habit to always obey when a beautiful woman calls me to bed, though for a lifelong habit it has happened remarkably few times.

  As I reach the bedroom, I can hear that the television is on and Laurie is watching the news. The possibility of yearning being the reason for her calling me has just dropped off precipitously. But I live in hope.

  “Look at this.” She points to the television screen, thoroughly dashing that hope.

  Two photographs are on the screen, one of which I recognize immediately. Under the two photos are the names George Taillon and Fred Siroka. I’ve got a hunch that they are not the subject of a piece about Nobel Prize winners.

  The bodies of the two men have been found in shrubbery in Pennington Park. They were believed to have been shot to death within the past twenty-four hours; it’s likely the bodies would have been discovered sooner had it not rained today. Rain cuts down on park attendance rather dramatically.

  “The plot thickens,” Laurie says.

  “The chance that their getting shot has nothing to do with us is absolute zero,” I say, as Laurie nods her agreement. “And it’s safe to say we can stop looking for George Taillon.”

  “There are a lot of layers to this.”

  “What do you mean?

  “Taillon paid Siroka to watch you, and it blew up in his face. A third party, we assume higher up on the chain of command, got rid of them. That’s three levels, and we don’t know if we reached the top yet. But if we further assume that none of the players were acting out of the goodness of their hearts, there must be serious money involved.”

  “All because an arrest was made in a fourteen-year-old murder,” I say.

  “It’s what happened as a result of the arrest. Let’s say that there is someone out there who is the real killer. As long as no one was charged with the crime, and as long as the police assumed whoever left the DNA was the killer, then the real guilty person was safe.

  “But once Noah was arrested, then the case was once again subjected to intense scrutiny. People, more specifically us, have a reason to look into the circumstances of the murder. We are trying to find the real killer, something the real killer seems not to be pleased about.”

  I nod. “Real killers do look at things like that negatively.”

  “They do. Which is why Marcus once again has to play the role of lawyer protector. You are playing the role of lawyer in need of protection.”

  I shake my head. “No, not this time. At least not now. Trying to put me out of commission would put an even more intense focus on our case, which is why they won’t do it. We need Marcus investigating, not protecting. Maybe that will change and we can revisit it.”

  “I disagree.”

  “I know, but this is my call. It’s my name above the door.”

  “Your name is not above any door.”

  “Not a literal door. A virtual door. I can see it plain as day. It says ANDY CARPENTER, KING OF THE CASTLE.”

  She finally agrees, at least for now. I call Sam Willis and ask him to find out whatever he can about Taillon and Siroka.

  “What are you looking for?” he asks.

  “I won’t know until you find it, so cast a wide net. I especially want to know if they’ve gotten their hands on any money recently, and where it came from.”

  “I’m on it.”

  “Wait a minute. Before you get off, tell me about NetLink Systems.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “What do they do? I know they make routers, and I know that all internet communications go through routers.”

  “Right. If not for routers, your computer would be a blank screen when you went online.”

  “And they sell these routers to who?”

  “I don’t know about them specifically, but I can take a good guess. They’re a relatively small company for the field, so I would imagine that they have contracts to make them for bigger companies, and I’m sure they also have people and companies that buy from them directly.”

  “What else do they make?”

  “A whole bunch of stuff you’ve never heard of. Switches, hubs, WAPs, security cameras…”

  “I’ve heard of security cameras.”

  “Congratulations. Can I go now?”

  I let him off and call Pete Stanton on his cell phone. He answers with his customary warmth: “What the hell do you want?”

  “Are you at Pennington Park?” I ask, assuming that the head of Homicide
would be at a double-murder scene.

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “I’m coming down there.”

  “What do you think this is, Disneyland? It’s a murder scene.” Then, “Why would you come down here?”

  “I have information for you about the two dead guys. And you’re going to give me information in return.”

  Pete knows me well enough to understand that I am serious about this. “Can it wait until tomorrow? I have a lot going on here and the chief just showed up.”

  “I’ll be in your office at ten A.M.”

  “That will give me something to look forward to.”

  I hang up and tell Laurie where things stand. Then I say, “You know, when you called me in here and told me to hurry up, I thought you might have been yearning for me.”

  “That’s what you thought?”

  I nod. “Yup. I didn’t realize it was about two dead bodies.”

  “The irony is that I did initially call you because I was yearning. The dead bodies on the television were a coincidence; I only found out about them because you took so long getting here.”

  “I don’t believe in coincidences.”

  “Would you be willing to make an exception just this once?”

  I pretend to think about it for a few seconds. “Might as well.”

  Pete pushes our meeting back to 2:00 P.M.

  I have no doubt that he’s busy; a double murder is a big deal in cop-land. That he’s seeing me at all today means he takes seriously that I have something important to say, as well as that he wants to continue to get free beer and burgers at Charlie’s. Not necessarily in that order.

  So I’m sitting in his office, alone, waiting for him to come back from a staff meeting. It’s not until two fifteen when he walks in. “This better be good,” he says. “And it better not be about the Kristen McNeil murder.”

  “No, you’ve already arrested the wrong guy in that case. I’m going to try and help you get the right guy in the double murder.”

  He sits behind his desk. “I can use all the help I can get.”

  “I’m going to want some information in return.”

  He frowns his disgust. “That’s a first. What have you got?”

  “I know how Siroka and Taillon were connected, and I’ve got a good guess why they were killed.”

  Just then a sergeant comes to the door. “The chief wants you in his office.”

  “Tell him I’m on something important and that I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  “You think I’m important?” I pretend to dab my eyes. “Have you got a tissue?”

  “It was my subtle way of saying you have ten minutes. So move this along.”

  “Siroka had been following me; I got lucky and Marcus noticed it. Marcus interceded in typical Marcus fashion, and they got together with Laurie and chatted. I guess Siroka just considered Marcus sort of a kindred spirit, because he opened up to him. He said that Taillon had hired him to follow me, and that it had something to do with the Kristen McNeil murder.”

  “Interesting,” Pete says.

  “Have you got a pen? I want to write that down. The things you hear when you don’t have a damn tape recorder.”

  He ignores that. “So why were they killed?”

  “Because whoever hired Taillon found out that we knew about him and Siroka. Taillon may have even reported that to his bosses, since he’d have to admit that the surveillance was over. Those bosses obviously didn’t trust Taillon not to reveal their identities. They didn’t want me digging any further.”

  “Why do you think Siroka was following you?”

  “Do you have hearing issues? I already told you he said it related to my case. That is supported by the fact that I took over Noah Traynor’s defense just before Siroka started tailing me.”

  “Or maybe somebody just doesn’t like you. I could give you a list.”

  “My turn,” I say. “Had you found a connection between Siroka and Taillon?”

  “They had worked together a few times; Taillon hired him for small jobs.”

  “Tell me about Taillon.” I look at my watch. “You’ve got six minutes.”

  “He was part of a new breed that’s filling the gap with the decline of mob families. He was sort of an independent contractor; gets hired on a case-by-case basis. Very good at his job. Tough guy, but clearly ran into somebody tougher.”

  “He worked alone?”

  “That’s difficult to answer. He had a loose arrangement with another guy with a similar résumé, but they were not partners.”

  “What do you mean by ‘a loose arrangement’?”

  Pete shrugs. “They’d back up each other when one couldn’t handle something. Like if your dentist is out of town, you call with an emergency and he has a backup. But in this case they’d also step in to help each other when the situation required two people.”

  “What’s the guy’s name?”

  “Mitch Holzer.”

  “Have you talked to him?”

  “Yeah … nothing. Guys like that open up to the police all the time.”

  “You think he knows anything?”

  “Hard to say. Following you is not exactly a job that requires an army, so I’m not sure why Taillon would have had to bring him in. But you never know.”

  I don’t say anything, so Pete says, “If you’re thinking of dealing with Holzer, think again. He is a dangerous guy, and I would say that the chance he will like you is absolute zero.”

  I hold up both of my hands. “You want to know what dangerous is? These hands are registered with the bar association.”

  “Are we done here?”

  “Two more questions. When you searched Taillon’s house, did you find any money? And what about a cell phone?”

  Pete looks at me strangely. “Twenty grand in cash. No cell phone, either on the body or in his house.” Then he stands. “Time’s up … thanks for coming in. It’s been a real treat.”

  When I get home, our house is considerably more crowded than I remembered it.

  That’s because Ricky is having a rare, Laurie-endorsed, triple sleepover. Ricky’s best friend, Will Rubenstein, is here, which is fairly common. Ricky spends a lot of time at Will’s house as well, and Laurie and I are friends with Will’s parents.

  Also here is Danny Traynor, who at first glance seems to be fitting in quite well. The three of them are playing video games, which is why each of them holds a joystick and they do not so much as look up when I arrive.

  The sleepover is a triple because Danny has brought along Murphy, his dachshund. Murphy and Tara are playing tug rope with a dog toy, while Sebastian sleeps on his bed. The three of them show about as much interest in me as the boys do.

  So I walk through to the kitchen without any reaction from anyone, human or canine. When I get there, Laurie is on the phone, so she doesn’t exactly greet me with open arms either.

  I wait until she gets off the call, then I say, “If a lawyer comes home and no one pays any attention, does he make a sound?”

  “Are we feeling unappreciated?”

  “Unnoticed.”

  She shakes her head. “What a tragedy. How did it go with Pete?”

  I recount the conversation, and when I get to the part about Mitch Holzer, Laurie says, “I assume you’re going to want to talk to him?”

  “Might as well; I have to talk to somebody, and nobody around here seems interested.”

  “Let me have Marcus do some homework on the guy to find out what we might be dealing with. But there is someone else for you to talk to first.”

  “Who?”

  “That phone call I was on was from Kyle Wainwright. He’s expecting you at his office at ten o’clock tomorrow morning.”

  “Good. Hopefully he’ll confess.”

  She smiles. “I doubt it. You think he’s a viable possibility?”

  “Probably not. But I’ll have a better feel for it after I talk to him. It’s always possible that he lost control and killed his girlfrien
d for cheating on him. But now, with someone hiring guys like Taillon and Siroka, this doesn’t feel like that kind of situation.”

  She nods. “I was thinking the same thing.”

  “The key will be figuring out why Kristen was killed. Any chance we have rests on that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, if the killing was random, if some violent asshole happened upon her and strangled her, we’re dead in the water. We’ll never find that person, and therefore we can’t possibly convince a jury.”

  “But…”

  “But if she wasn’t killed because of bad luck, or where she was, then we have a shot. If she was killed because she was a threat to someone, because of what she knew, then at least we have hope.”

  Just then Ricky comes into the room. He’s breathing heavily, so the video games must have been put aside and some physical playing, maybe wrestling, is going on.

  “Hey, Dad, Danny says you’re going to bring his father home. Can you do that?”

  “We’re trying, Rick. We’re trying.”

  “I told him you’d do it, no problem.”

  Thanks a lot.

  Sam calls and tells me that he has tracked down the cell phone numbers for both Siroka and Taillon. That their phones are missing is not as significant to our investigation as it might seem. Everything done on a phone, and nowadays pretty much everything done in life, is recorded somewhere, by someone.

  In the case of a phone, a record of all calls is stored for posterity on phone company computers. This is also true of the phone GPS records, meaning the phone company always knows where a phone is or was, even retroactively.

  “I’ll get right on it,” Sam says. “Now that I have them.”

  By getting right on it, Sam means that he will hack into the phone company computers and retrieve all the information he needs. Technically, that’s illegal. Nontechnically, it’s also illegal. I’ve long ago come to terms with that, and it wasn’t much of a struggle.

  In my view, the absolute best thing about sleepovers are the meals. Laurie would never embarrass Ricky by serving something healthy, like salmon or, God forbid, vegetables.

  So I go out and get three pizzas, ensuring enough for everyone to have a satisfying dinner, as well as leaving cold pizza for me in the morning.