by Mike Faricy
“You see the surveillance tape yet? They had him nailed before he even got started. Then this incident happens. Idiots, I would have had him in protective custody from the get go. Who the hell was his attorney? There had to be talk of a deal going down, threats on the girlfriend and the baby. A bust of that magnitude, five million and everyone is asleep at the switch. You gotta be kidding, Jesus.”
“You’re asking me, Aaron? His attorney was a public defender. Name Daphne Cochrane ring any bells?”
“Are you kidding, that woman? God, we look forward to a victory party whenever she’s involved. There’s part of your answer right there,” he said.
“Yeah, and rumor has it the other half of the answer is Tubby Gustafson.”
“Tubby. You’re kidding? Who did you hear that from? He usually isn’t that close to this type of action. God, I’d love to get my hands on that bastard.”
“Well, don’t hold your breath, the word I have is it was actually Tubby’s kid, Ben. Apparently he was pals with the Bergstrom kid.”
“Nice pal. From what I hear young Ben is supposed to be the heir apparent, but he’s not the old man. His reputation is the kid’s always stepping in it. Then Tubby has to come to the rescue and clean up the mess.”
“I’m guessing someone was afraid Daryl Bergstrom was going to give up Tubby’s kid in exchange for a deal and well,” I shrugged to suggest the obvious.
“And you know this how?”
“Daryl Bergstrom’s old man, Charlie. I met him, talked with him over lunch. It’s a comedy of errors, a mixed up kid making a number of bad choices. Someone panics and the next thing you know he’s dead. Anything you can tell me on your end?”
“About the murder? We’ve got it all on tape, repeat offender, about a ten-time loser. The Bergstrom kid’s throat was slit with a piece of glass if you can believe it. Some perennial loser named Duncan Nixon. Got a list of priors longer than your arm. It looks like he was locked up on some domestic charge within twenty-four hours of the Bergstrom kid getting arrested. I’m guessing he was in there just in case the option was needed and, apparently someone thought it was.”
“I saw Daryl Bergstrom at the Medical Examiners, he looked pretty beat up.”
“You were at the M.E.’s?”
“Just holding a hand, which didn’t seem to work any too well. The Bergstrom kid had a big bruise on the side of his face. No makeup on him so it was a pretty tough deal for the old man.”
“Yeah, the whole thing, the assault I mean, probably took all of ten seconds. Kid gets blind sided with a knockout punch walking out of the shower, carotid artery slashed before he was on the floor. Two uniformed deputies within twenty feet, and by the time they subdue that Nixon douche bag, the Bergstrom kid has bled out on the floor. No real surprise other than I wish someone, somewhere would have put two and two together and gotten that kid into protective custody. Christ, they had him wandering around in the general population, he was clueless.”
“Like I said, Daphne Cochrane. I’m told she just shrugged off any concern about Bergstrom’s protection. There was a death threat of some sort on his girlfriend and their baby, too. Apparently she blew it all off.”
Aaron gave a long exhale and shook his head. “Jesus. So who were you working for? The Bergstrom family?”
“Client privilege, buddy. Not that it really matters, now. I’m guessing I’m off the case before I even get a billable hour racked up.”
“Just watch yourself, Tubby gets wind of you getting involved in any way and there’s a real potential for problems.”
“I’ll just have to remember to shower alone from now on. I’d still like to see the tape, both of them actually, the arrest and the murder.”
“I can get you in, but does the term ‘air tight case’ have any connotations?”
“Yeah, I know. I’m just curious and want to see it for my own prurient interest.”
Chapter Ten
I was in a viewing room on the third floor of the police department. ‘Room’ was the operable word. The thing was about half the size of a standard broom closet. It housed a small desk, an overhead ten watt bulb, and an ancient computer running Windows XP as the operating system. Given the city’s current budget restraints, I was lucky there was even electricity in the room.
Aaron’s description of ‘air tight’ didn’t do the tapes justice. Along with the police tape of Daryl Bergstrom pulling the keys out from under the floor mat of the van, driving for twelve minutes, and parking on the upper floor of a parking ramp, there was the grainy tape from the undercover vehicle following him. The tape from the parking ramp security camera was a four-second delay series of images that piled on additional credibility to the charges, not that any was needed.
The actual tape of Daryl’s murder from the county jail a few days later was so short I had to replay it a half dozen times. Aaron showed me the evidence bag with the piece of glass used to slit the kid’s throat. My guess and the assumption of the police was it had been brought in by Duncan Nixon forty-eight hours earlier for that express purpose. That led to some obvious questions, for starters, why? What was in it for Nixon? It was pretty obvious he wasn’t going to get away with the murder. In fact, once he slit the kid’s throat, he stepped back, and calmly called the deputies over to watch. He’ll get life with a possible parole after maybe thirty years, but at age forty-six there’s a pretty good chance he’ll never make parole.
That brought me back to Daryl Bergstrom. Who, in their right mind takes a hundred bucks from someone to drive a van into a parking ramp, and apparently doesn’t ask any questions? Wouldn’t you maybe just glance under one of the tarps in the back of the thing out of normal curiosity? Was the kid that stupid or was there more to this?
“Your time’s up here, Haskell, I need this room,” Detective Norris Manning said as he pulled the door open in the viewing cubicle. It was one of life’s great mysteries. I’d thus far been unable to figure out what I’d ever done to him to get the attitude. I figured he was probably doing his level best to link me to Daryl Bergstrom’s murder before I even asked to review the tapes.
“I’ll be finished in just a minute. I want to rerun this detention tape once more and…”
“What part of ‘time’s up’ isn’t getting through your thick skull? I just told you I need this room now, official business.”
“Manning, you got four viewing rooms, the other three are empty. Why do you...”
“Because I like this one. Now shut that thing off and let me get back to department business.”
“Hey, what the hell is it with you, Manning?”
“Me?” He cracked the ever present piece of gum, bit it actually, probably imagining he was taking a bite out of me. “Let’s just say I like the taxpayers of this city to get the best value for their hard-fought dollars. That would seem to leave you out, unless of course we’re putting you behind bars. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got some viewing of my own to do.”
“Kids stealing candy?”
“Cute, real cute. Get moving.”
I ejected the DVD from the ancient computer.
“I’ll take that, no telling where it will end up otherwise,” Manning said and reached for the DVD.
I beat him to it, and placed it back in the plastic case before he had a chance to recover. “Not a problem, besides I’m the guy signed out on this and I wouldn’t want to disappoint your boss, the good lieutenant.”
“Move out.”
“As always a unique pleasure, Manning, enjoy your day,” I said and left.
On the way to my car I was thinking; on the one hand Duncan Nixon would be the guy to talk to, on the other, why bother? I didn’t have a horse in this race.
Chapter Eleven
The flop house over on the East side had faded gray aluminum siding and a substantial number of serious code violations, not the least of which appeared to be renting rooms without being classified as a rental property. From what I could determine, Destiny Meyers apparent
ly shared a room with Duncan Nixon, and probably just about anyone else who could meet her hourly rate. She gave a resigned sigh, took another long drag off her cigarette, and looked at the drink in her hand.
“I told you on the phone, he ain’t here,” she said then emitted a cloud of blue smoke that seemed to hang between the two of us. She rattled the ice cubes in her glass to accentuate the point of his absence, then stared at me dead pan while she took a healthy gulp.
She looked old beyond her thirty-something years. The lingering traces of a black eye, and the faded yellowish bruise on her cheek did nothing to help. She leaned against the doorway at the end of the hall, drained her drink then finished off with a satisfied gasp. It wasn’t quite ten-fifteen in the morning.
“That’s why I thought it might be a good idea to talk. I don’t think Mr. Nixon is going to be coming home anytime soon. I just have a couple of questions to ask you, background information is all.”
“Am I gonna need a lawyer? ‘Cuz I ain’t got that kind of cash. God, I told you guys everything I know. Why do you keep bothering me?”
“I promise it won’t take more than a couple minutes. Could I come in? Or, if you like we could just talk out here in the hallway.” The door to the next room was wide open. When I had walked past, the occupant had appeared to be either passed out or dead on the floor.
“God, I ‘spose, come on in. Just make it fast. I got shit to do. You want one?” she asked rattling her ice cubes again and maybe suddenly thinking more along business lines.
“Thanks, but I better say no.”
“You sure? Never know what could happen,” she said then held the door open with her foot just long enough for me to step in.
“No, I better take a pass, but thanks for the offer.”
“Fine, be that way.” She shrugged, then reached into a Styrofoam cooler sitting on the floor, and tossed an ice cube into her glass. She grabbed the half-empty fifth of Old Fitzgerald next to the hot plate on the dresser and filled her glass a healthy two-thirds full, then turned and tried to look seductive while she sipped. It wasn’t working.
“Look, Miss Meyers, I…”
“Call me Destiny, who knows we might become good friends.” She smiled, then pulled a folding metal chair back from the card table and sat down. She pushed the pizza delivery box onto the floor and casually tossed a pack of cigarettes in front of her.
“Okay, so I’ll tell you what I told the others. What’s your name again?”
“Dev Haskell.”
“Hmm-mmm, go figure. Anyway, I moved in here with Asshole a few months ago. You could say I was just sort of between things. Thought we might, you know maybe get together on a more permanent basis, only it turns out he was getting the better part of the deal. We were partying that night, he gets pissed off for some reason, and hits me. I told him I was gonna call the cops. He hits me again, I called the cops. You guys come, haul him to jail, where he belongs, I might add. Next thing I know, three or four days later, there’s about a hundred of you in here going through all my personal shit and everything, messing the place up. Hell, take a good look around, I haven’t even had time to clean up,” she said, then drained a good portion of her drink.
A quick glance confirmed what she said. Apparently she hadn’t had time to clean for quite a while, but I was guessing months rather than the few days in question. Trash bags were piled against the far wall beneath the faded beach towel hung haphazardly over the window. The clothes on the floor looked about four weeks’ deep. The double bed had just one grayed sheet crumpled at the foot of the bed and a sweat stained pillow at the head. Nothing resembling a fitted sheet, or even a pad, covered the mattress. Two bare bulbs hung from the light fixture in the center of the ceiling, one of the bulbs appeared to be burnt out.
“Business must be good,” I said.
“Whatever.”
“Did he ever mention the guy in jail, the kid he killed?”
“I’ll tell you the same thing I told the others, hell no. I never heard him mention that kid. What was his name again?”
“Bergstrom, Daryl Bergstrom.”
“Yeah, that’s the one, never heard of him before.”
“How about someone named Ben?”
She gave me a funny look, shook her head and sipped. “Never heard of no Ben.”
“How ‘bout a guy named Tubby?”
“Tubby? You mean like fatty? No, that ain’t ringing a bell.”
“What did Duncan do?”
“Do? God, nothing, bastard didn’t do a damn thing. Had my ass out there on the street, didn’t care if it was raining, snowing, hot or cold, just told me to get out there and get to work or he’d kick my ass.”
“He ever have any friends stop over?”
“For freebies? No, not for a long time, I didn’t like that, and put a stop to it.”
“How about people stopping over to see him?”
“Who’d want to?” She took another healthy sip. “He’d show up once in awhile with shit, I’m thinking it was always pretty hot, but I never asked no questions. You know, like where he got it and that. Had a flat screen once, but some guy showed up, partied with me for a night then he grabbed the flat screen on the way out the door. Told dumb shit Duncan he’d be back to collect, but I never seen him again. Old Duncan, it scared the crap outta him. He took off for pretty near a week that time. That was kinda nice, actually.”
She lit a cigarette and took a long drag then reached up to the dresser behind her for the bottle of Old Fitz and topped off her glass. “Sure you won’t have one? I’m kinda getting in the mood,” she said then raised her eyebrows implying this could be a good thing.
“I better not. And you never heard him mention Tubby Gustafson?”
“Gustafson? He did something for a Mr. Gustafson a few times, never heard him say Tubby. Who the hell would name their kid Tubby? Jesus, some chicks got their head so far up their ass. I mean, really.”
“What did he do for Mr. Gustafson?”
“Tell you the truth, I got no idea. Honest. I just know he didn’t try and pull any of his usual bullshit. I never, ever met the guy that I can remember. But he sure as hell had old Duncan scared shitless. Yeah, Duncan wasn’t gonna fool with Mr. Gustafson none, that’s for damn sure,” she said, and then gulped her glass down about halfway.
I began to feel an itching, bed bugs? Some weird skin disease? Just the general filth in this grimy little room? I wasn’t sure, but I knew I had to go, and soon.
“Thanks for your time, Destiny. Let me give you one of my cards. and if anything crosses your mind regarding Duncan and Mr. Gustafson, I’d appreciate it if you’d give me a call.”
“Will I get paid?”
“Maybe, it depends on what you’ve got.”
“Sure you won’t stay, I could show you what I got, it’ll be fun,” she said then flashed her eyes at me over the rim of her glass.
“Gee, sorry. I’m sure it would be, but I have to run. You think of anything please give me a call,” I said, and tossed a couple of my business cards on the table.
“I’ll maybe give you a rain check, you’re kinda cute,” she said. She staggered as she got to her feet, and steadied herself against the edge of the dresser. The bottle of Old Fitz rocked back and forth as I made a hasty retreat for the door.
I fled the scene, and debated about burning my clothes as I drove home.
Chapter Twelve
“All that proves is that idiot, Duncan Nixon had a semblance of a brain,” Louie said.
We were in the office. I was seated behind my binoculars, scanning the third floor of the building across the street. I’d just finished telling Louie about my Destiny Meyers moment.
“If he’s calling him Mr. instead of Tubby, apparently he’s not completely stupid. Hey, you seeing anything?”
“Naw, the girls must still be at work.” I put the binoculars on the window sill, and spun around in my chair to face Louie. His feet were up on the picnic table, with his eyes closed, h
is hands rested comfortably across his formidable girth.
“So what’s the link between Tubby and this Nixon loser?”
“Link? I think they work in the same industry. Nixon would seem to be a rather unsuccessful member of criminal society, and Tubby is sort of the local CEO of the criminal class. We’ll never know, but I’d be willing to bet Tubby told him to get arrested and get access to the Bergstrom kid. In the event Tubby felt threatened, Nixon could kill the kid and problem solved.”
“Yeah, maybe, except that doesn’t seem to make any sense. Tubby’s in the clear. Even if the Bergstrom kid fingers Tubby’s son, that’s not enough to make an arrest. Five million worth of drugs are in the possession of the police. Bergstroms’s nailed and currently lying in the morgue, unable to answer any questions. Nope, there’s something else going on.”
“Maybe it’s just Tubby’s general jerky attitude. Even if the kid was set up, at the end of the day he was still the one driving the van when everything went down.”
“No question about Tubby being a pain, but the rest still doesn’t add up,” Louie said then opened his eyes and looked around the office.
“Maybe I should talk to him,” I said.
“Tubby? Save yourself some time and just run out in the street into oncoming traffic.”
Chapter Thirteen
Rather than run out into the street, I was summoned to appear before Tubby Gustafson in his private dining room, not twenty-four hours later. I’d just arrived stylishly late at the office around noon, and climbed out of my Aztek. I was standing in the street, listening to the engine sputter, when a long, black sedan with Limo plates pulled along side and the rear door opened.
“Mr. Gustafson would like you to join him for lunch,” some guy said climbing out of the limo. He was tall enough to block out the sun, and looked like he’d have no problem chasing me down, if I was that stupid. He wore a silky purple jacket, and I could see brown leather shoulder straps holding the holster and pistol under his left arm. Under the circumstances, I was in no position to refuse the offer.
