Family Ties (John Taylor Book 5)

by Travis Starnes

  He also tried Sharp’s home number, which no one picked up.

  Looking at the clock, he realized he’d have to deal with Sharp later. The meeting Caldwell had set up with the Wissler family was coming up, and he needed to get a move on. People like this were always happy to leave someone of Taylor’s status waiting, but they wouldn’t stand to be kept waiting for themselves.

  While Taylor was always happy to tweak the nose of the high and mighty, he needed something from them, so it was best to play by their rules.

  Taylor had expected the address to lead to a swanky mansion. Instead, he was taken to an office building in the center of Berlin. There were guards in the lobby who took his name and eventually directed him up to the top floor. The offices were swanky, of course, but they were still just offices. He cooled his heels a while longer, waiting in a glass-walled conference room of some type with nicer chairs than anything in Taylor’s house.

  After thirty minutes, a middle-aged man in a suit that screamed money walked in, followed by three others in nice, but much less fancy attire. When all three were seated, it was one of the flunkies and not the well-dressed man who spoke first.

  “Mr. Taylor, I’m Dominik Arneth, one of the Trust's lawyers. Before we can begin, we’d like to set down a few ground rules. We will not be answering any questions of a personal nature about any of the family members or trust employees, nor will we get into any details about assets or business interests the Trust currently or has previously held. Any information we do provide will be considered just informational, and we will not confirm anything that’s said here in this meeting.”

  “Or put another way,” Taylor said, “you plan on answering as few questions as possible.”

  “I want to make something very clear here, Mr. Taylor,” the well dressed man said. “You have no legal standing in this country to request a meeting on any topic, let alone something as... concerning as Frieda Wissler’s untimely death. The only reason we’ve agreed to talk to you is as a favor to Senator Caldwell and some interested parties who want to keep Mrs. Caldwell happy. Without her, you’d have no access at all. As it is, that access is naturally minimal. We, of course, understand if you find this too restricting and decide you no longer want this interview.”

  “Its fine, I get where I stand. So am I talking to him or you?”

  “Me, Mr. Taylor,” the well-dressed man said. “Mr. Arneth and his associates are just here to make sure everything stays on the, up, and up, I believe you Americans say.”

  “Fine. As you said, I’m looking into the murder of Frieda Wissler and, by extension, her husbands' death as well.”

  “I understood Frederick’s death was ruled natural causes,” Albrecht said.

  “That was the ruling. However, Frieda thought there was more to it than that. Her sudden murder seems to suggest she might have been on to something.”

  “The police have connected her murder to his passing?”

  “Officially, not yet, but some indications are pointing that way.”

  Taylor knew that was obfuscation at best. They had nothing but Taylor’s gut at the moment to suggest the two events were connected.

  “I see. Mr. Taylor, I will say both personally and as a spokesman for the family trust, we are aghast at Frieda’s senseless murder. As we’ve told the police, we are committed to helping find her justice. What I can tell you, however, is it is doubtful that the two events are connected. I’m not sure if you are aware, but Frederick had started suffering from the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. As I understand it, his sudden death was not out of character for someone suffering from that disease.”

  “You are correct, but the suddenness of his departure did seem unusual to Frieda.”

  “I’m aware of her concerns. You are, however, under some misinterpretations of the events. We did not suddenly let Frederick go. Not only was he a member of the family, but he’d worked here at the Trust for decades, and we were dedicated to taking care of him. His dementia started several years ago, although we didn’t know it was an actual illness at the time. Frederick was getting fairly old but was resistant to retiring at a more standard age. We did not have the heart to let him go, even as his work began to slip and errors started getting made. Instead, we moved him to lesser positions in the Trust, trying to minimize the damage he could do. We only forced his retirement once it became clear his condition had become completely unmanageable. Even then, the couple was well provided for, including the paying off of the mortgage on their apartment and allotting them a generous monthly allowance. There was nothing sudden about Frederick’s separation from the Trust.”

  “Then why did Frieda feel the need to bring in an outside investigator, if she was so well taken care of by the family?”

  “She was grief-stricken. She’s lost her husband of more than fifty years and was looking for answers in a situation where there were none. I feel for her, I really do, but that’s all it was. I am aware she brought in someone to look into Frederick’s death, and I’m also aware that this person found nothing to suggest his death was anything untoward.”

  “So then why do you think Frieda was murdered?”

  “That’s a question we are relying on the police to answer. The most likely answer, to me, was someone thought Frieda was the victim of the crime that plagues our city. While Frieda and Frederick were not wealthy, they maintained the tapestries of wealth thanks to the family trust. It seems that lifestyle and the fact that Frieda was an elderly woman living by herself made her an easy target for someone who believed that lifestyle meant she had something worth taking. The idea that she was killed for some other reason seems farfetched. To believe she was killed to hide something about her husband’s death, you’d first have to show that she found something to suggest his death was anything out of the ordinary, which hasn’t happened.”

  “What happens to the couple's possessions and holdings now?”

  “Frieda and Frederick had no children. Their estate will be sold, and the proceeds of it will be used to fund several public endowments as they requested in their wills. As you see, they left nothing to anyone making it unlikely they were killed for financial reasons beyond simple robbery. Unless you believe a charity had them murdered to get access to their modest but not extravagant bequeathments?”

  “I’m just suggesting the timing is more than a little coincidental.”

  “To what, Mr. Taylor? If there is no evidence that Frederick’s death was anything other than what’s stated, then what is the coincidence of her death.”

  Taylor could see he was getting nowhere. What’s worse, he was right, so far Taylor had found nothing to back up his belief that there was more to this beyond Whitaker’s actions after her aunt was murdered. If this was nothing, then Whitaker would have stayed and talked to the police. She was too by the book to do anything else, and there was no chance she was actually involved in Frieda’s death. The only thing that left was there being more to Frieda’s death than just random violence, which would mean there was more to Frederick’s death than natural causes.

  None of that was based on anything other than his knowing Whitaker, which wasn’t something he could offer up to anyone else. He was just spinning his wheels here. Either the family trust wasn’t connected to their death, or they were, and Taylor had nothing to prove they did or provoke some kind of response. Which meant he was wasting his time.

  “Well, I appreciate your time,” Taylor said, standing up.

  “We’re happy to help a friend of Senator Caldwell. We appreciate you taking the time to look into Frieda and Frederick’s deaths, and I’m sorry I couldn’t be any further help.”

  Of course, Taylor knew that was a lie. They’d be happy to put this behind them and get on with making money. They were most definitely not happy to offer further help. Even with another call from Caldwell, Taylor was pretty sure he wouldn’t get another interview with them. Although considering how unhelpful this one had been, that probably wasn’t going to be an
issue.

  Taylor was escorted out, hailing a cab back to his hotel so he could think.

  In the years since leaving the army, Taylor had been involved in a lot of cases, and none of them more frustrating. Usually, if there was enough for him to get involved, there was something for him to look into, which, if he was persistent enough, always led to the next clue.

  This was the first time where he started a case where he doubted himself. If it wasn’t for Whitaker’s involvement, he’d have given up already. Every piece of evidence so far told him he was wrong, and there was nothing to see here. The only three things that didn’t add up were Whitaker and the gunmen.

  True, the attack at the storage facility could have just been a random crime and not connected. It seemed a fairly extreme coincidence, but those did happen sometimes. Also true, Whitaker could have not found anything either and his belief in her could be misplaced. The only thing Taylor knew for sure was he couldn’t give up until he found her, and they cleared her name.

  Of course, that was easier said than done.

  Taylor arrived back at his hotel and tried the numbers for Grace Sharp again. There was no answer at the office, so the secretary must have either gone home very early or taken a really late lunch. Although when you’re working for a consultant who wasn’t around, there probably wasn’t a lot to do. It occurred to Taylor that Sharp could be working out of some kind of office sharing location where all the tenants pooled their resources for a Secretary. He’d considered doing something like that when he was working for himself tracking people but never got around to it.

  Since the home number also went unanswered, his only option now was to go by the addresses he had for her office and home and hope he could figure something out. He was just about to leave to do just that when his cell phone rang.

  “Did you find a lead?” Taylor asked, recognizing the cell number Graf had called him from before.

  “Maybe. I’m sorry, but it’s not good news. Some of our officers responded to a report of gunshots and an explosion just over an hour ago. Multiple bodies were found on the scene, including one that roughly matches Agent Whitaker’s description, although there’s enough ... damage that it’s hard to be sure. There was no identification on any of the bodies. I need you to meet me at the medical examiner’s office to see if the woman is Agent Whitaker.”

  Taylor’s blood ran cold as he heard the news. While there was a chance it wasn’t her, the fact that Graf thought it might be was enough to send a wave of terror through him. He was out the door, thoughts of tracking down Grace Sharp gone as he rushed to the medical examiner’s office.

  Chapter 7

  The trip back to the medical examiners' office seemed to take a lot longer than it had just that morning. Taylor spent the entire time in the back of the cab alternately, fearing Whitaker was gone and denying it could be her.

  When he arrived at the offices, he wanted to just push past the receptionist at the front and rush back to find Graf, but the security guard upfront would have probably stopped him. Dealing with that would have been enough of a headache that he opted to just sit and wait while she called back. After a few interminably long minutes, the doors to the back of the offices opened, and Graf came through.

  “I just want to prepare you it isn’t going to be pretty. They’ve covered her face, since the damage makes it impossible to identify her, but the rest of the body is pretty bad.”

  “I’ve seen bodies before,” Taylor said. “I’ll be fine.”

  “Okay, I just wanted to prepare you.”

  Graf lead him through the winding halls into a medical suite that smelled strongly of disinfectants. In the center of the room was a metal table with a body on top of it. Graf hadn’t been joking about the damage to the body.

  As he’d said, the face was covered with a sheet. The woman was still wearing the remains of a light tan suit, and no autopsy had been conducted yet. There were some burns, but most of the damage was cuts and abrasions all along the body. Several missing fingers and the rest were damaged enough that prints were probably not an option. Taylor could see bits of metal sticking out of some of the cuts, which suggested a lot of the damage had been caused by shrapnel.

  Taylor looked at the body hard. The suit wasn’t something he recognized that Whitaker wore, but it wasn’t that far off either and she could have bought it after they split. Even with the damage, it was clear the woman had been athletic, and the body seemed to roughly match Whitakers.

  Something caught Taylor's eye, and he turned to the medical examiner who was standing off to one side.

  “Can we lift up her leg and pull the pant leg up a bit, I think I see something on her right ankle?”

  The ME came over and carefully rolled up the pants leg, clearly trying to not damage the skin before his autopsy. As soon as he exposed the skin on the ankle, exposing an area that had managed to go undamaged, Taylor saw what had caught his attention.

  He felt a rush of relief paired with frustration as soon as he saw the small tattoo on the woman's ankle.

  “That isn’t Whitaker. I’m pretty sure it’s a woman named Grace Sharp, who currently consults for your government.”

  “Who? How do you know?”

  “I just got a file on her earlier today. She’s roughly the same build as Whitaker with the same hair, but one of her distinguishing marks is a small butterfly tattoo on the back of her right ankle. Of course, that probably isn’t enough to identify the body, but she was helping Whitaker on her investigation before Frieda Wissler’s murder.”

  “Can you send me her file?”

  “I have to check with Joe Solomon, but I don’t think it will be a problem. It was limited, more informational than anything else. Since she contracted with you guys, you probably have more on her than I do.”

  “So now we have two deaths connected to agent Whitaker.”

  “Hold on a second. There’s nothing to suggest Whitaker had anything to do with causing her death. Hell, considering we were jumped at the storage locker, doesn’t it seem likely that this may be the same people who were behind that?”

  “No. We finally got the information back on them. They were common criminals with long records for robbery and armed assault.”

  “They could have been hired by someone to wait at that particular storage locker for whoever came back to retrieve the files. Hell, they didn’t try to rob us. They just started shooting as soon as they were close enough.”

  “First, you’ve looked at the files, there was nothing there. Also, there have been a whole series of break-ins and several strong-arm robberies in that area. I know it seems like a coincidence, but those sometimes happen. The only evidence we have anywhere is the connection of your Agent Whitaker to two homicides.”

  “What about the other bodies, you said there was a shootout?”

  “Yes, there were two other men, but both had prints on file and are known to us. Again, common criminals.”

  “You have to admit that isn’t right. So first you have just random guys trying to kill us, I guess to rob us, and now more people you’re saying are street criminals involved with the death of someone connected to this. I just don’t buy it.”

  “I get you’re having trouble with this. More, I agree with you; this doesn’t add up for me either, not yet. I’m not saying I’m ready to place the blame of either murder at Agent Whitaker’s feet, just that we really need to talk to her and see if she can help us make sense of all this. I need to go to Mrs. Sharp’s home and see if there’s anything there that explains how she ended up in an unrented apartment in a gunfight. It’s against procedure, but why don’t you come with me and see if for yourself. That way, you can see what happened and if your friend was involved.”

  “Is there any chance we can see the place where the shootout happened too?” Taylor asked.

  Graf stopped and considered for a few minutes, clearly weighing having someone outside of his agency at a crime scene.

  “We can do that,” h
e said after a moment. “We’ll stop at her apartment first since its closer, and I’ll check to make sure my techs have finished with the scene. If they have, then we can go.”

  Knowing how the Bureau worked, he knew they’d throw a conniption if someone like him went to one of their crime scenes. Considering the Germans he’d known in the past and his dealings with them so far during this investigation, they were if anything more officious. He appreciated Graf bending the rules for him. However, he couldn’t help the sneaking suspicion that Graf also wanted Taylor there to spot anything that might be connected to Whitaker. He knew it’s what he would have done in Graf’s place.

  The pair drove to Sharp’s apartment in silence after Graf called to double-check the address Taylor had for her. While they drove, Taylor considered how screwed he was. If they didn’t turn up anything at Sharp’s place, then Taylor was out of leads. He had no doubt that Sharp’s death was tied into Frieda’s death, Whitaker’s investigation, and the guys at the storage facility.