Corridor Man Volumes 1, 2, 3,4 5

by Nick James

  “Yeah, it’s just good business and hopefully might get them to rethink any potential moves. Obviously it’s a stressful time for her family. I think, under the circumstances you probably dodged a bullet. I’d say she was going to join the acquisitions group once she returned from her little jaunt in Paris and she was probably going to file a lawsuit as well.”

  “My understanding is the family still intends to do that, and the last group I need to see today or any day, is that bunch of acquisition ingrates that deserted us.”

  “With all due respect, I think they were probably planning to leave sooner or later. The Saunders incident with Mr. Denton just gave them an excuse and some cover. Without her, Saunders, they’ve suddenly got a very steep hill. It would seem to me that every day you could delay the transfer of those files the firm position becomes just that much stronger.”

  “Angie Benedict is there, that’s where she landed.”

  There has to be a way to get back at that bitch, Bobby thought. “Yes, and I’m guessing she’ll be very good at what she does, but wouldn’t it make sense to ensure she didn’t do any damage on her way out the door?”

  “Damage?”

  “Did she take some files with her? Maybe files that have nothing to do with acquisitions, but belong to other clients. I could see how she might hold that as some sort of trump card or just be happy at the chaos something like that would cause.”

  Bennett seemed to suddenly be deep in thought. “God, do you think she’d do something like that?”

  “I think after the past week we’ve had, sir, anything is possible.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Assumption Church was filled to overflowing. Bobby arrived toward the end of the service and stood in the back of the church, thankful he’d been able to miss the eulogy. When communion was distributed he hurried up the aisle, getting in the line that led up past Emily Saunders sitting in the front row.

  He paused with his hands folded for a brief moment before stepping up to the priest. He was aware that Emily had seen him and was leaning over whispering something in her mother’s ear. He piously made the sign of the cross then folded his hands and walked toward the side aisle and back down to the rear of the church. Both Emily and her mother watched him intensely as he passed by.

  After the service there was a catered buffet in the church basement for family and friends. While people waited in line to fill a plate Bobby walked to the head of the line, took a cup of coffee and stood off to the side. Emily found him just a minute or two later.

  “Thank you for being here, Bobby. It’s nice to see you again.”

  “It’s the very least I could do, my condolences again, Emily. How are the feet?”

  “Much better, thanks to you last night. I’m not sure I would have made it without your special attention.”

  “Anytime,” he said and looked down to check her shoes, today a nondescript pair of black heels.

  “Not to worry, I went for comfort today. Can I talk you into joining us for lunch?”

  Bobby smiled, set his coffee cup down and glanced at the long line waiting to dish up food. “Thanks, I’d love to, but I really have to get back to work. I just wanted to tell you how nice it was to meet you last night. I only wish it had been under different circumstances.”

  “Don’t we all.”

  A woman Bobby recognized as Emily’s mother stepped up next to Emily. “Mrs. Saunders, my name is Bobby Custer, I worked with Elizabeth. Please accept my condolences, I’m so very sorry. She was a wonderful inspiration to us all.”

  She latched onto Bobby’s hand and looked him in the eye. “I want to thank you, for helping my daughter. She told us you were the only one who had the decency and the courage to step up and come to her aid. Thank you, Mr. Custer,” she said and squeezed his hand.

  Bobby nodded and said, “It’s wonderful to meet you, wasn’t that a wonderful eulogy.”

  Emily’s mother nodded and smiled, then said, “Oh look, the Graysons, will you please excuse me for a moment.” She stepped over to an elderly couple, the woman was clinging to a walker while her husband desperately attempted to hang on to two luncheon plates. It looked like he might be suffering from Parkinsons.

  Bobby glanced at Emily then stepped over and said, “May I carry those plates for you?”

  The old man gave a grateful look and said, “You sure as hell can, son.”

  “Earl, Dorothy, this is a friend of Emily and Lizzy’s, Mr. Custer.”

  “Please call me Bobby, why don’t we get you settled right here,” Bobby said placing their plates at a large round table.

  “Sit down, Dorothy you’re holding up the line,” Earl said.

  “What?”

  “This is our table,” he said and smiled.

  Bobby nodded, held the chair while Dorothy slowly angled herself in front of it. She suddenly dropped into position and he pushed her in. “Enjoy your meal,” he smiled and walked back over to Emily.

  “God, is there anything you can’t do?” she said. “You get my mom and Dorothy on your side and I’ll never hear the end of it.”

  “Better not tell them about your feet.”

  “Yeah, right. Not to worry I’ve been cautioned to be on my best behavior.”

  “Listen, it was nice to see you, thanks for giving me a moment. Emily, I’ve got to get back to work and it looks like you’ve got a lot of people who want to talk to you,” Bobby said then nodded toward the food line extending out the door and up the stairs.

  “Oh, groan.”

  “Duty calls,” he chuckled and began to step away.

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Emily said, then pulled his arm to draw him close and gave him a peck on the cheek.

  “Thank you.”

  “Hope to see more of you, Bobby.”

  He nodded then left before he said anything stupid.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Bobby pulled into the driveway at the Denton house and parked next to a black pickup truck sporting a Legalize Cannabis bumper sticker on the tailgate. The back of the truck was partially filled with what looked like construction debris, boards with nails, torn scraps of sheetrock, bits of plaster. He walked to the front door, rang the doorbell and waited for a long moment.

  The door was opened by what could have been an attractive woman were it not for the multiple piercings and the rust-colored Mohawk. She frowned and didn’t say anything.

  “Hi Addison,” Bobby smiled.

  A look of surprise spread across her face and then just as quickly disappeared. “Do I know you?”

  “Yeah, we’re Facebook pals,” he said. “I’m here to see your mom, actually. Is she available?”

  “No, she’s not seeing people today,” she said then cocked a hip and frowned.

  “Who is it, Addison?” Cori’s voice called from somewhere in the home.

  “Fuck,” she barked. Then said, “Just a minute” and closed the door. She opened the door a minute or two later and said, “I guess she’ll see you.” Then she just walked away.

  Bobby let himself in and looked around the foyer.

  “She’s in the kitchen, drinking wine, no surprise,” Addison called from halfway up the stairs to the second floor.

  Bobby made his way toward the back of the house. He found Cori sitting at the kitchen counter, a half empty bottle of white wine opened in front of her. She was just setting her glass down as he stepped into the kitchen.

  “Hi, Cori, thanks for seeing me,” he said, then couldn’t help but focus on her black-and-blue cheekbone.

  “Come to look at the damaged goods?” she said and took another sip of wine.

  “Well, I heard a little bit, I don’t really know much. Do you want to talk?”

  “I suppose they sent you here to tell me not to file an assault charge, is that it?”

  “What? No, nothing like that. In fact, no one from the firm even knows I’m here. I just wanted to check and make sure you were okay.”

  “I’ll live,” she
said and gave him a look that suggested she wasn’t about to believe whatever he was going to say.

  “What happened?”

  “What happened? Another one of his episodes is what happened. He’s hiding up in his lair all damn day and then comes down and goes off on a rant about my drinking. He was making absolutely no sense, one moment he’s storming back and forth across the room, the next he’s slurring his words and wants to ‘mate with me on the floor.’ That’s Noah’s term by the way. When he hit me, that was the last straw. I’d finally had enough and called the police. I told them in no uncertain terms I wanted him out of here.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Like I said, I’ll live. Virgil Allan arrived and talked the officers into taking him to the hospital instead of jail. At that point I didn’t really care where they took him just as long as it was out of my house,” she said and took a hearty sip.

  “My understanding is he’s in the mental health facility and…”

  “The loony bin. I don’t want him back here until they determine once and for all what in God’s name the problem is, and then fix it.” She drained her glass then reached for the bottle and poured another.

  “Anything I can do for you?”

  “What’s wrong? Aren’t you supposed to talk me out of being so cruel to the senior partner?

  “No, like I said I just came here to see how you were doing.”

  The kitchen door suddenly swung open and Addison walked in. She ignored Bobby and Cori, walked over to the refrigerator and then stood there holding the door open examining the contents.

  “God, there is shit-all to eat in this place.”

  Cori reached for her glass and drained half of it. “There’s some pulled pork in that dish, you could micro it and…”

  Addison flashed a quick smile in her mother’s direction that was meant to be anything but kind. “I’m a Paleo vegetarian, mother, if you’d care to remember.”

  Bobby wanted to hit her just on general principles.

  “Didn’t you order a pizza the other night, I seem to remember having to pay for it.”

  “That was different, I was working.”

  “Working?”

  “My exhibit. Hello, I’m thinking of doing a show, remember?”

  “Is this the same show you were thinking of doing last winter or is this something entirely different?”

  “Whatever,” Addison said then gave an exasperated sigh, slammed the refrigerator door and stormed out of the room.

  “Just amazing she doesn’t have all sorts of suitors vying for her attention,” Cori said and then drained her glass and reached for the wine bottle again. The wine remaining in the bottle filled her glass a little more than half full. She took a quick sip then got off her stool, walked across the kitchen, and opened the door of the glass-fronted refrigerator stocked with wine. She pulled out a dark green bottle, a twin to the empty on the counter, and handed it to Bobby.

  “Would you do the honors, please? Feel free to join me.”

  “I’d love to Cori, but I should be getting back to the office, long day still ahead of me,” he said then uncorked the bottle while she emptied her glass then held it out to be refilled.

  “Suit yourself,” she said then took a sip and said, “You know the way to the door.”

  “Nice to see you again, Cori let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

  She didn’t respond and Bobby thought she and her daughter were more alike than either one realized. He walked out to the foyer. Addison was sitting at the bottom of the stairs with an iPad on her lap.

  She looked up at him all smiles, “You said your name was Bobby Custer, right?”

  “Yeah, that’s right.”

  She smiled a broad smile then made an elaborate show of holding a key down with her index finger. “There, I just deleted you as a Facebook friend.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that Addison, and here I thought we were getting on so well.”

  Her smile quickly faded into a glare. “How very shallow.”

  “Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you. I take it you live here, with your parents, is that correct?”

  “I’m dedicated to my art, for your information,” she said and stood.

  “You certainly must be. Good luck on that exhibit or show or whatever you’re working on, keep me in mind, I’d just love to attend,” Bobby said then walked out the front door.

  He walked back to his car, pulled a small scrap of 2x4 from the rear of Addison’s pickup. The piece was no longer than six inches and had a long rusty nail sticking out of the top. Bobby gave a quick glance back toward the house then shoved the nail into the sidewall of Addison’s rear tire. The tire began to hiss when he withdrew the nail and he tossed the scrap of lumber back into the bed of the pickup.

  He drove down the driveway and glanced in his rearview mirror before turning onto the street. The rear bumper on the pickup was just beginning to lean at an angle as the tire continued to deflate.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  “Oh, Mr. Custer, thank goodness,” Marci said then waved a pink message slip in his direction. “This gentleman was here to see you, asked that you give him a call.”

  Bobby took the slip of paper. Marci had stapled a business card to it. The card read:

  DARYL WOODLEY

  Detective

  POLICE DEPARTMENT

  CITY OF SAINT PAUL

  HOMICIDE

  “Is everything all right, Mr. Custer?”

  Oh yeah, not a problem just a little incident trying to get his wife hooked on drugs so she’d have a relapse and it didn’t quite work out.

  “Oh, I’m sorry I missed him, I’m doing some volunteer work with underprivileged children and wanted to talk to him. I’ll have to give him a call, thanks Marci,” he said and hurried back to his office.

  He debated about calling Woodley, maybe putting if off until tomorrow then decided the least unpleasant of the bad options in front of him was to call the detective. Hopefully he could put him off from meeting and deny whatever charges Woodley wanted to make.

  He dialed Woodley’s number from his office phone and thought about the middle of the night call that woke him the day Brad Carey had been killed.

  Unfortunately Woodley answered on the third ring.

  “Daryl Woodley.”

  “Detective Woodley, this is Bobby Custer returning your call, sorry I missed you earlier.”

  “Yeah, same here. In court, were you?”

  “I would have loved to have been in court, to tell you the truth, but as you know I remain disbarred and unable to practice. Unfortunately, we had a member of the firm killed in a car accident, overseas in Paris, actually. Her funeral was today. A very talented individual, we’re all going to miss her.”

  “Read about it, hit and run, right?”

  “Yes, that’s my understanding. The world seems just a little less bright with her gone.”

  “Yeah,” Woodley said, sounding like he wasn’t buying. “Say, ran into a past acquaintance of yours the other day.”

  “Acquaintance? Of mine? Who was that?”

  “The name Brad Carey ring a bell?” he said and even though Bobby knew it was coming, just hearing the name sent shock waves racing up his spine before exploding in the back of his skull.

  “Brad Carey, God it’s been a long time, we both joined a club no one wants to be in, disbarred attorneys. Poor Brad, he never seemed to find himself. Well, how is he, I guess if he’s dealing with you it can’t be good. What’s he done this time?”

  Woodley paused just long enough to let Bobby know he’d caught the detective off-guard. “Apparently he was involved in a drug deal, we’re still trying to figure it out.”

  “Drugs? Huh, never knew him to go in for that sort of thing, of course I haven’t seen him for at least five years. Half a decade,” Bobby added for emphasis. “Nice enough guy, but there was always sort of a bit of a wild card to the personality. Drug deal you said?”

  “
That’s right.”

  “I suppose anything is possible, but drugs? That’s sure not the Brad Carey I knew.” A trickle of sweat slowly began to make its way down his back. “Has he got representation, a public defender?”

  “Say, I got some folks coming in right now, Mr. Custer. Why don’t you give me your cellphone number and I’ll give you a call back.”

  Bobby gave him his new number and waited.

  “Great,” Woodley said then paused a moment. “Thanks, listen I’ll call you back when I get a free moment.” Woodley’s voice betrayed nothing, but Bobby had the distinct impression he’d just compared his cellphone number to a list of outgoing calls from Brad’s phone.

  Bobby hung up, drummed his fingers on the desk and started reeling off just a few of the bad possibilities; Christine fingered him; Brad gave a deathbed confession; Bobby’s old phone number was on Brad’s cell; someone spotted Brad and Bobby together, the list went on and on.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  The phone interrupted Bobby’s negative thoughts.

  “Bobby Custer,” he answered.

  “Hello Robert, Jonathan Bannon, returning your call. How can I help, hope it’s not bail money,” he chuckled.

  “Thank you for returning my call, Jonathan. I wondered if we might get together, just the two of us. I’d like to learn a little about your business.”

  “My business, Bannon Dynamics, what’s this about?”

  You on the edge of a cliff and me about to push you off, you bastard. “I have some contacts that, broadly stated, might be interested in investing in a firm in your general area of expertise. I thought maybe you could help point me in the right direction, I really don’t know much about your industry.”

  “I think that might be possible, I may even have a nice tip or two for you. Can you give me some idea of what they’re bringing to the table?”

  “Well, they like their privacy and want to remain behind the scenes. They’re definitely not the meddling type and they have a pot of cash they’ll bring to the table. That’s the good news.”