Flesh Wounds

by Stephen Greenleaf

  “Gentlemen.” Molson’s laconic opening contrasted with the bursts of activity by the tech staff at his back.

  “What’s going on?” I asked in all innocence.

  “The fact that you’re here suggests you already know.”

  “Richter’s secret lab.”

  “Right.”

  “What are you going to do with the electronics?” Jeff asked with a surly grunt.

  “Leave it here for now. Impound it as soon as we find someone who can show us how to run it.” Molson’s smile was slow as the clouds drifting eastward overhead. “If you’re thinking about sneaking in and accessing some files, don’t—the place will be under guard.”

  Jeff started to say something sarcastic but I grasped his arm to stop him. “Did you find anything on Nina Evans in there?” I asked Molson.

  “No comment.”

  “What was it? Hard-core?”

  “From what I saw, it was every kind of core you can think of.”

  “Are you talking still photographs or video?”

  “Still.”

  “You didn’t look at the files in the computer?”

  “I told you we have to find someone who can run it.”

  “Any idea who was behind the porn setup?”

  Something in Molson’s eyes struck sparks. “Richter. Who else?”

  “I thought someone might have been backing him.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  I smiled. “Just a hunch.”

  “We don’t put a lot of stock in hunches, Tanner. Particularly not California hunches.”

  I shrugged. “If I were you I’d look for evidence that this lab was tied into a blackmail scheme. And I’d consider the possibility that the beneficiary of the scam was someone other than Gary Richter.”

  “Would you happen to have a name for that someone?”

  I shook my head. “Not at the moment.”

  “Well, I’ve got a name,” Jeff spat angrily, his lust for vengeance overriding his common sense.

  Molson didn’t bat an eye. “I’d be happy to hear it.”

  “Victor Krakov,” Jeff said. “I assume you know who he is.”

  Molson’s grin displayed teeth as long and narrow as his torso. “We have a chat with Mr. Krakov once in a while.”

  “Well, next time maybe you’ll do more than chat—maybe you can lock him up.”

  Molson’s brow lifted. “For what?”

  Jeff’s words were bilious and belligerent. “Contributing to delinquency, pimping and pandering, blackmail, extortion, assault, battery, buggery, burglary, barratry—”

  Molson smiled his undertaker’s smile. “If you’ve got evidence of any of those things, we’d be happy to have it. And while we’re talking it over, we’ll show you the stack of letters we’ve gotten about your column, the ones that claim it’s obscene and suggest you ought to be executed.”

  Jeff shook his head and stomped off toward the car.

  I looked at Molson. “There’s going to be some smutty stuff in those machines.”

  “Expect so.”

  “It’d be a civic contribution if it got lost.”

  “Probably.”

  “I don’t suppose that decision is yours to make.”

  “And I wouldn’t anyway, as long as it might be evidence in a homicide.”

  “What if I come up with the guy who killed him? What if you had plenty of evidence without introducing what’s in those computers?”

  “I don’t get your point.”

  “Accidents have been known to happen. Even in evidence lockers.”

  He smiled. “Especially in evidence lockers.”

  “What if it was a quid pro quo? I give you what I get on the Richter killing; you give Jeff Evans access to Richter’s computers for twenty minutes.”

  He was silent long enough for me to sweat. “I’d think about it,” he said finally.

  “That’s all I can ask.”

  “That’s more than you can ask,” he said.

  CHAPTER 25

  Chris is right—it isn’t a cabin, it is a dozen cabins, attached to each other like freight cars, winding in and out of a grove of conifers. The windows in the center sections mimic the sheen of the adjacent lake. The rough wood of the siding and shingles complement the boughs and branches that sway in the breeze above them. It is a horizontal castle, a fortress as comfortable with its surroundings as a Kentucky log cabin is with a stand of oak and hickory.

  As they pull into the circular drive and stop beneath the roughhewn portico, she is more cowed than she expected to be. Anything can go on in there, she feels, without reason or restraint or sanction. For a moment, she fights for breath. Only when she recalls the roots of her mission does her sense of purpose reclaim her.

  Chris regards her timidly. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  She opts to be blasé. “Sure as shootin’.”

  “If anything happens, I won’t be around to protect you.”

  “Nothing will happen that I don’t want to happen.”

  “I’m sorry you’re so naive,” he says with as much anger as he can muster. “And I’m sorry I’m too impotent to stop you.” He is gripping the wheel with neon knuckles as she gets out of the car and goes to the door and rings the bell. At her back, the Porsche spins away in a cloud of exhaust and bark dust and frustration.

  The door is opened by a small black-haired man of Latin ethnicity and paramilitary bearing. “You are Ms. Evans?” he asks with more hostility than deference.

  She nods.

  “Please come this way.”

  She follows him across the tile corridor and down a narrow hall and stops before a door with the logo of Lattiware carved in its grainy wood. When she is at his side, her escort knocks. Another man—bigger and more brutish—steps from the room into the corridor and trains an electric wand at her privates and her purse. When it points at her purse, it beeps.

  The burly man extends his hand. “I need to look.”

  She speaks loudly enough to be heard by the person she assumes to be seated beyond the hand-carved door. “He won’t like it if you do.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it will spoil the surprise.”

  “What surprise?”

  “A toy I brought with me. An accessory, you might say.”

  “Accessory to what?”

  She smiles. “To anything Mr. Lattimore might have in mind.”

  He isn’t swayed. “I still need to look.”

  “If you do, I’ll junk it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it won’t be exciting anymore; it’ll just be one more thing Mr. Lattimore has under control.” She strikes a pose. “What you need to understand is that with me he gets astonishment.”

  A noise at his back makes the sentry reenter the room. Moments later he reappears. “He says it’s okay. Even though it isn’t,” he adds as a final bleat of competence. Nonetheless, he steps aside.

  Lattimore is sitting by the fire, in a chair that enfolds him like a clamshell. There are computers to his left and right and large black panels recessed into the cedar walls like the ones she has seen at DigiArt. The decor is men’s club rustic—pine and oak and cowhide; bone and stone and planking. It is expensive but unimaginative, like the condo he designed for her, like the lab he designed for Gary.

  He gets to his feet as she approaches. He is quite short, she is surprised to see, a trifle overweight, more than a trifle balding. A boyish crewcut makes him seem both guileless and malleable, but she knows he is far from either.

  “Miss Evans.” He clasps his hands behind his back and inclines at his pudgy waist. “We meet at last.”

  “So it seems, Mr. Lattimore.”

  “Call me Jensen.”

  “Call me Nina.”

  “Wonderful. Please sit down. It’s always a pleasure to meet a professional as accomplished as yourself.”

  “Likewise,” she says.

  “I’ve enjoyed your work tremendous
ly,” he continues as he takes a seat and crosses his stubby legs. “It’s the best of its kind I’ve seen.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment—I imagine you’ve seen a lot.”

  His chest swells like a robin’s. “I have seen approximately ten thousand naked women over the past twenty years.” He reddens at his boast, then controls it. “Not all of them live, of course. Most were featured in various forms of media.” His expression intensifies, as if he is about to make a point. “You have the third-best body I have ever seen.”

  She tries not to laugh at the adolescent calculus. “Only third? Who are the first two?”

  “First is a woman named Jill who appeared in Swank in 1982. Second is a woman who calls herself Sally Slide. She appeared in a stag film called Sally and the Spaceman some years back.”

  “Sorry. Didn’t catch it.” She crosses her legs and attracts the expected attention. “I thought you were interested in art, Mr. Lattimore.”

  “I am, of course, but we’re talking natural endowments, not finished product.”

  “Hardware, not software.”

  His grin is gleeful. “Precisely.”

  “Well, I’m pleased that you like my mainframe.” She recrosses her legs and gives him a second glimpse. “What are you planning to do with it?”

  Although her entendre is double, he assumes she refers to commerce, which no doubt explains his affluence. “We will be offering two varieties of software—one to DigiArt subscribers; the other to our special clients. The latter works will be put up for on-line auction in a manner to be determined, but one that is fair to all concerned.”

  “Who are these special clients you’re talking about?”

  “You’d be surprised,” he says with pride, then quells an urge to boast. “They are people of proven interest in the arts, but I’m afraid I can’t be more specific.”

  “Why not?”

  “Some people think nakedness is by definition pornographic.”

  “Some wives, you mean.”

  “Wives can be a problem.” He glances at the monitor to his left; it seems to be printing E-mail. He reads a message, nods, then looks at her with boyish candor. “Why did you request this meeting, Miss Evans?”

  “I wanted to meet the boss.” She displays an equal enthusiasm. “And to see what you’ve done with me.”

  “In the computer, you mean.”

  She nods.

  “Why?”

  “I’m interested in my fate as an artist.”

  “You regard yourself as an artist?”

  “Of course. Don’t you?”

  “Oh yes. Definitely. You achieve effects that I’ve never seen anyone duplicate. After Christopher does his thing with Optical Effects and Elastic Reality, the results are spectacular. I believe you will become a legend among a select group of connoisseurs.”

  “Show me,” she says firmly.

  He hesitates, then nods. “Come with me. And by the way, what’s this surprise you have in store for me?” He is as excited as a kid at Christmas.

  “That comes later,” she says, and gives him a teasing poke in the vicinity of his genitalia.

  When I got back to the car, Jeff was nowhere in sight; I assumed he was on a bus heading back to the warehouse, plotting further vengeance on the man who had turned his girlfriend into a walking wasteland. I was plotting some vengeance myself, but my target was someone other than the person Jeff Evans had named as the culprit. To get the job done, I was going to need help.

  I found a phone and called Fiona. When I asked if I could see her, she seemed agreeable but apathetic. I’d hoped Fiona might be an antidote to my unrequited urge toward Peggy, but obviously it wasn’t going to happen, for reasons best left unprobed. I suppose it didn’t matter, except in the reaches of the heart where rejection always leaves a blister.

  She suggested I pick her up at the gym and give her a ride home after her workout. I said that would be fine. Which gave me two hours to kill. I used one on the telephone and the other on lunch.

  My first call was to the corporate headquarters of DigiArt. When I asked to speak to Mr. Lattimore, I was told he wasn’t on the premises. When I said I had a proposition to present to him, I was told to put it in writing and submit it to his attorney. I broke the connection and dialed another number.

  “This is Marsh Tanner,” I said after her hearty voice bounded down the line. “Remember? From Fresno. We talked about switching some of my talent with some of Victor’s talent.”

  “I remember,” Lila responded with caution. “Did you ever catch up with Victor?”

  “I did, as a matter of fact. He’s an interesting gentleman. But a bit … conservative for what I have in mind.”

  “Victor? Conservative? You must have got the wrong man.”

  “It was Victor, all right. I’m sure he’s good with the bar scene, but I’m moving beyond that now, taking advantage of some new technologies. Why go to a smoky bar when you can bring a gorgeous woman into your home and have her do whatever you want her to do right before your eyes. And I do mean whatever.”

  Lila paused. “I guess I don’t get it.”

  “You don’t have to at this point. But if this thing takes off the way I think it will, I’m going to need a coordinator of the Northwest Region by the end of the year. You could fill that slot for me, Lila. I can tell you know your way around show business.”

  “Thank you.”

  “But first things first. What I need you to do right now is get me together with Jensen Lattimore.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he’s got the two things I need in a partner—money and vision. Between the two of us, we can revolutionize the skin trade.”

  Her tone turned dubious. “I don’t think Victor would want me taking part in this. Sounds like he could end up on the short end of this thing.”

  “The beauty of it is, it won’t matter. Not to you. You’ll be a key member of my management team.”

  Her loyalty was gilt-edged. “I don’t know. Victor’s been good to me.”

  “I know he has, but Victor’s not going to be hurt. There’ll always be plenty of mouth breathers who like to whoop and holler and see real girls bumping and grinding with sweat dripping off their boobies. We’ll leave the goat ropers for Victor. Lattimore and I will be going after the high-end users.”

  “Like his special clients, you mean?”

  “Exactly. Do you happen to know a man named Ted Evans, by the way?”

  “Sure. From way back.”

  “Is he one of the special clients?”

  “Used to be, but I don’t think he is anymore. Why?”

  “I’m thinking of bringing him in on this, too. To make sure it’s structured right on the corporate side. To make sure key people like yourself will be compensated appropriately—with bonuses and stock options.”

  “Stock options?” she trilled. “For me?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “What exactly is it you want me to do?”

  “Set me up a meet with Lattimore tonight. All I need is an hour of his time.”

  “To do what, exactly?”

  “Explain my proposition.”

  “What if he doesn’t want to hear it?”

  “You’ll have to convince him, Lila. Tell him I’m bringing a sample of a revolutionary approach to nudity.”

  I was so sure she would buy it, I was already planning my pitch to Fiona. But instead of buying, she turned thumbs down.

  “It sounds real interesting, Mr. Tanner, but I think I better stick with Victor. He paid my maternity bills, you know? And he bought Marie a stuffed monkey and now it’s her favorite toy. I don’t like to go behind his back; I hope you won’t ask me to again.”

  Lila hung up the phone with a bang; integrity tends to pop up where you least expect it. My next call was in the nature of corroboration, to buy myself some peace of mind.

  I passed through several layers of resistance before I reached the right person. “My name is Tanner,”
I began when I got her. “I’m Chief Operating Officer of Eclectic Arts Incorporated of Palo Alto,” I lied. “We’re a subsidiary of Paramount Communications,” I lied again. “I’m calling about electronic reproduction rights in the permanent collection of the museum. I’m told you’re the person who handles that.”

  “That’s true,” she said. “What is it you wish to know about the rights?”

  “I assume I’m not the first to make such an inquiry.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “I imagine Microsoft has beaten me to it.”

  “No comment.”

  “Presumably the rights you’ve already granted have not been exclusive.”

  “Of course not—we’re a nonprofit entity.”

  “Good. For my part, let me assure you that we’re both willing and able to pay what a license to a collection such as the one at the Seattle Art Museum would warrant.”

  “That’s nice to hear.”

  “I do, however, need to get some idea of how many pieces of this pie have already been cut.”

  “Come again?”

  “I need to know how many other systems will be offering the same base. Perhaps you can tell me how many licensees you’ve already struck deals with.”

  “Two.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t believe I can say.”

  “I understand. Believe me. There is one company, however, that we seem to be bumping heads with in this area, and for our discussions to go forward I need to know if they’re a player.”

  “I’m not sure I can—”

  “There are personal animosities involved between the respective CEOs, and, well, I’m sure you understand. I’d hate to waste both of our times if this deal was out of the question from the get go.”

  “I certainly understand professional animosity,” she said, with enough steel in her voice to let me wonder at the acidic content of office politics in the world of fine art.

  “The company I’m referring to is DigiArt,” I said easily.

  “We have no deal with them.”

  “How about Lattiware?”

  “No.”