Ace High

by Dean Wesley Smith

  “No,” Pickett whispered to Melita, just barely loud enough for Sarge to hear as well. “Not just the columns. For millions of dollars and numbers of deaths. We think those letters sent to you were a code and there are some very angry people who don’t want some secrets in that code revealed, even after all these years.”

  “Oh, shit,” Melita whispered.

  “That pretty much describes how we feel,” Pickett whispered.

  The sounds of steps on the staircase coming down from upstairs cut through the silence.

  Mike said ten minutes.

  Only three had passed.

  This was not looking good.

  Not looking good at all.

  35

  December 10th, 2016

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  * * *

  Pickett crouched beside Melita.

  How the hell had it come to this? What did those men coming in actually know? And how had they been following them with Mike’s men watching things.

  Or had they actually been following Melita?

  Either way they were in a very bad spot, trapped in a basement room, and unless they could hold on until Mike and his men got here, this would turn very ugly very quickly.

  The invader’s footsteps on the stairs were clear and not really trying to be silent.

  Then from almost directly above the storage room there was a loud thud. Pickett had a hunch that was a body hitting the floor. She just hoped it wasn’t Mike’s man.

  “Find out what that was,” a man’s voice said from outside the storage room.

  Pickett couldn’t believe what she had just heard. That was Bob Steven Winston’s voice.

  She glanced up over the table and Sarge just nodded from where he was crouched behind the door against a brick fireplace. He clearly had recognized the voice as well.

  The doorknob rattled as someone tried it.

  “Stay silent and low to the ground no matter what happens,” Pickett whispered to Melita.

  She nodded and curled down into a ball on the tile floor.

  “Darling Black,” Bob Steven said, “if you and those two detectives are in there, your only chance of living is to open this door.”

  Silence.

  “Break it down,” Bob Steven’s voice said from the other side of the door. “I’m getting tired of all this screwing around.”

  Pickett rose up and saw that Sarge had moved slightly away from the brick wall to get an angle on the door.

  She had her gun trained on the door as well.

  He glanced at her and then nodded. He put three fingers in the air, then two, then one.

  Pickett and Sarge both opened fire at the door and the wall on both sides of the door.

  The intense sound of the gunfire was like a hammer smashing into them in the small file room. She had fired her gun a number of times in closed spaces and it was always a shock at how loud it was.

  They both quickly fired six times, spacing their shots at waist high and along the wall and door.

  Then Sarge ducked back to the brick and Pickett back behind the wooden table.

  “Son of a bitch!” Bob Steven said. “Light the place up.”

  At that moment the firing started and the files above the table were shaking as shots plowed into them.

  Bullets hit the table with loud thuds, but the table held.

  Dust and splinters were flying everywhere.

  Pickett used her body to cover Melita’s.

  Then, suddenly the gunfire ended as three quick pops stopped it cold.

  Pickett figured help had arrived.

  But neither she nor Sarge or Melita moved. Pickett wasn’t sure she even wanted to take a deep breath.

  Then Mike’s voice said, “Clear. You all right in there?”

  “I am,” Sarge said, moving over through the swirling dust to help Pickett up.

  “I am,” Pickett said.

  Then both she and Sarge helped Melita up.

  She seemed fine and uninjured. Just completely in shock. Pickett didn’t blame her in the slightest. That wasn’t something Pickett had ever wanted to live through.

  “I bet that’s not the kind of research for one of your mystery novels you were ever hoping to get,” Sarge said to the shaking and wide-eyed writer.

  “No,” Melita managed to say, shaking her head as Pickett held her up and Sarge went to unlock the door. “Not in my worst nightmares.”

  “Oh, trust me,” Pickett said. “What you are about to see on the other side of that door will be the real nightmare.”

  And she was right. Five men’s bodies were sprawled in pools of blood in the once-nice family room. One of Mike’s men stood on the stairs with his gun slung over his shoulder.

  Mike stood among the bodies, close to the door.

  Sarge shook Mike’s hand and said simply, “Thank you.”

  Pickett and Melita moved toward the door. Pickett wasn’t sure if Melita’s legs would hold her, but then Mike stepped forward and put his arm under Melita’s.

  “Thanks, Mike,” Melita said. “Seems I owe you once again.”

  Pickett glanced at the white, dust-covered face of Melita, then at Mike, who just smiled.

  Clearly Mike had done her a favor at some point in the past. It was going to be interesting to see what that was.

  “Always my pleasure,” Mike said, taking Melita from Pickett and helping her through the bodies and to the stairs.

  Outside the sirens were getting closer.

  Pickett moved over to Sarge and just hugged him.

  Damn he felt wonderful.

  And it felt even better that he hugged her back.

  Then together, they both stepped over the very dead body of Bob Steven Winston and headed up the stairs.

  About halfway up Sarge said, “Cavanaugh is going to love the paperwork on this one.”

  All Pickett could do was laugh.

  Part VII

  Follow The Money

  36

  December 14th, 2016

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  * * *

  Sarge was happy that after four days since the shootings, things had finally calmed down enough to be able to walk to breakfast again.

  And both he and Pickett had helped each other through the nightmares of reliving that fight in that closed room.

  It had taken them all the rest of the day and all the next day being interviewed to finally be done with the major investigation part of the fight. Of course, the department had their guns for the investigation, but they both had other guns, so neither of them had worried about that.

  And since they were retired and it had clearly been a case of self-defense, the chief hadn’t even asked them to sit aside. Part of that had to do with them not officially being on the force as well. Insurance wasn’t an issue it seemed.

  Poor Cavanaugh had found himself in a paperwork nightmare, as Sarge had known he would be. He had three assistants on it and it was still burying the poor guy.

  Will and Robin’s people had once again swooped in to help Mike and his people, but they didn’t really need it. The house had secret security cameras and pretty much everything had been recorded, including the fight in the basement. That had helped a great deal.

  It was two days ago that Robin had gotten permission to get the box of Darling Black letters. She had spent the last two days having them digitized and then running all sorts of comparisons with the columns, the letters, and the paperwork from the storage unit.

  Melita and her husband had gone back to Portland and Mike was pretty convinced the men had been after the letters, not her. Neither Mike nor Melita would tell them how they knew each other. And after asking once, Sarge didn’t press. So much about what Mike did was behind the scenes. Better to not know.

  At breakfast today Robin was going to tell them what she had found in the study of the letters, if anything.

  But there were still so many questions. Where was Heather Winston? Who was the dead girl in the hotel room? And what was so impor
tant in that storage unit and those files that so far eight people had died, not counting the girl in the room and maybe the parents. Two at the storage unit, six in the house.

  For Sarge, they still had a long way to go to get this case solved.

  The December day was cold, but not biting. He liked the walk to the Nugget breakfast more in the winter than in the summer. The air had a cleaner smell to it, fresher.

  He and Pickett had just turned onto Fremont Street when something occurred to him.

  “Cabin in Big Bear,” he said.

  Pickett glanced up at him, a puzzled look on her face.

  “We need to check to see if the cabin at Big Bear that the parents had been at when they supposedly died was still in the family. Or maybe under another name.”

  He had a hunch that if it was, they would find Heather there.

  Pickett nodded. “That just might be possible.”

  Before they even had a chance to sit down, Sarge told Robin his idea and she got on the phone to Will and his people.

  Sarge and Pickett turned to get breakfast since the smell of ham and waffles this morning seemed even more wonderful than normal.

  Pickett and Sarge were waiting for their omelets in the buffet area when Robin came over to them. “Cabin changed names three times over the years, but always from one corporation to another, owned by the same name. D. Black.”

  “Not the Melita Darling Black?” Pickett asked, clearly as shocked at Sarge felt at the very idea.

  “Nope,” Robin said.

  “Thank heavens,” Sarge said.

  “Checked that completely and it has nothing to do with Melita or any of her family. Got a hunch it is Heather, but all sales were done with cash, so nothing but the tax records are traceable.”

  “She’s there,” Sarge said, nodding. “It would make sense.”

  “But is she still alive?” Pickett asked.

  Sarge had no idea the answer to that question, because it was clear that Bob Steven Winston had some pretty powerful backers. And since he failed, more than likely his wife, who had clearly been behind a lot of this, had failed as well.

  Sarge heard himself think that, then realized how Bob Steven Winston and his men had gotten on Melita’s track. Heather had known who she was all along and where she had lived.

  “I’m betting,” Sarge said, “that Heather is there and still calling the shots.”

  “Mike?” Pickett asked.

  “Mike and Cavanaugh,” Robin said. “Cavanaugh and a couple of men need to go with Mike to check that out. We don’t want Mike’s men out on a limb without official backup again in this case.”

  Sarge agreed. “I’ll call Cavanaugh.”

  “I’ll call Mike,” Robin said.

  “And we’re not going?” Pickett asked.

  Sarge laughed. “One gunfight for two retired cops is enough for one week, don’t you think?”

  Pickett smiled. “I am in total agreement.”

  Sarge laughed at the complete relief showing on Pickett’s face.

  Twenty minutes later the three of them were eating breakfast while Mike and his men and Cavanaugh and two other detectives were headed to the cabin at Big Bear. Mike said their hope was to take her alive.

  Sarge normally wanted to be on the front line, but after the fight four days ago, he just wanted her arrested if she was there.

  And besides, they still didn’t know why all this was happening. And who that poor girl who got baked to death in that room was.

  They had other work to do.

  37

  December 14th, 2016

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  * * *

  Pickett was very relieved that Sarge didn’t think they needed to be there to arrest Heather Winston, if she was at the cabin. Pickett didn’t think they needed to do it either, but if he had wanted to go, she would have been at his side.

  So now they had to sit and wait. And try to figure out the rest of this mess.

  After all three of them had mostly finished their first round of breakfast and were sipping their coffees, Pickett turned to Robin. “What did the computers dig up?”

  “We know the car buying cover was nothing more than that,” Robin said. “A cover.”

  Pickett and Sarge both nodded.

  “We also know that Heather was the one who licked those envelopes. Except for Melita’s prints, the only other ones were Heather’s, the same as the ones in the storage unit. In fact, the envelopes and printer match envelopes and the printer from the storage unit.”

  “So Heather was Darling Black’s source,” Pickett said, nodding. She had figured as much, but good to have evidence now prove it.

  “Any idea why?” Sarge asked.

  “The information in the Darling Black columns came directly from the letters,” Robin said, “with very little changes at all. Melita didn’t change much, not even the writing, especially toward the end as she clearly got more interested in getting ready for college. And the columns after Melita left for college were written completely by Heather.”

  “So in a way Heather really was Darling Black, filtered once,” Sarge said. “Cinda was right about that.”

  Robin nodded, then went on. “Best the computers can figure when putting the information from the files with the letters is that the code indicates a time and a fairly exact place.”

  “For what reason?” Pickett asked.

  “That is the big question,” Robin said. “We ran all the times and places against all known crimes or other events. Nothing.”

  Sarge just shook his head, clearly discouraged.

  Pickett felt the same way.

  “Let me see if I can get this straight,” Pickett said, doing her best to grasp all the real information they had so far. “Heather gives a young columnist information to feed into her column.”

  “Yes,” Robin said simply.

  “The column must have been used to publicly pinpoint something at a time and place,” Pickett said.

  Robin nodded.

  “Heather got paid large sums of money for the information she was putting through the column,” Pickett said. “So we are missing the front of this puzzle and the back of this puzzle.”

  “How’s that?” Sarge asked.

  “We don’t know where or how Heather got whatever information she was passing on,” Pickett said. “And we don’t know what was done with the information on the other side to make it worth so much money and so many lives twenty-five years later.”

  Sarge and Robin both nodded.

  “We have the center, you are right,” Robin said.

  “So what kind of places were pinpointed by the articles?” Sarge asked.

  “Addresses that were vacant lots at the time, parking garages, a few old casino parking lots, and so on,” Robin said. “The times were from the middle of the morning to late evening.”

  Suddenly Pickett had an idea. This was all about money, but far larger sums of money than the forty million that had been in that safe at one point.

  Pickett looked at Sarge and smiled, then at Robin. “This all started fairly quickly after she and her fake family moved to town. Right?”

  Robin and Sarge both nodded.

  “So we didn’t ask a few questions we needed to know,” Pickett said. “First off, did anyone else from Heather’s former town move here ahead of Heather’s fake family?”

  “Tough to find, but possible,” Robin said. “What are you thinking?”

  “Drops,” Pickett said. “This town constantly has vast sums of money in transit. And without some of the modern technology we have now, back in 1990 it was much harder to track all that money.”

  Sarge nodded. “Had my share of armored car robberies back when I was starting off. Someone almost always ended up dead.”

  Robin and Pickett both nodded.

  “If an exact location is known through a code in the paper to both an inside person and a pickup person, a drop from a money car would have a lot less likelihood of being tracked
.”

  Sarge suddenly sat back in his chair. “If Heather’s notes were right and she had over forty million in that safe when she pulled the plug, how much money are we talking about overall?”

  “More than I want to think about,” Pickett said. She turned to Robin. “Any total of how many dates and places there were in those notes?”

  “Over the length of the column there were over a thousand,” Robin said.

  “Heather had the fake cars she was selling making her from three grand to six grand,” Pickett said.

  “That’s forty million easy,” Sarge said. “Just for Heather’s cut, which more than likely was small.”

  “Wow,” Pickett said as Robin picked up her phone.

  38

  December 14th, 2016

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  * * *

  Sarge let his coffee soothe him as he and Pickett waited for Robin and her computer people to dig out even more information.

  And wait for word from Mike and Cavanaugh. They wouldn’t arrive up there for another forty minutes. Sarge might have to have a couple of pieces of the wonderful bread pudding by then.

  And maybe some bacon and a waffle first.

  He had a hunch Pickett was right, that the times and places were drops, more than likely of bags of money from casinos.

  And if that was the case, this was a skim operation of large proportions, more than likely connected to a larger skim operation. Otherwise, even back in 1990 it would have been caught easily.

  So for this to work, this had a lot of inside help and some powerful people involved. No wonder people were dying now. Chances were some of those powerful people were still around.

  Robin was about to hang up, but Sarge had an idea and stopped her.