Perkovic studied Karpinski for a few seconds more, then shook his head. Gregor was an idiot, a fearsome windup toy. Peter knew he would forget his promise, but Peter would remind Gregor when he was well enough to remember. Now he had to tell Nikolai about Charles Benedict.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Dana was surprised to see Stephanie Robb follow Frank Santoro into Vinny’s.
“I told Steph I hired you and what you learned in Kansas City,” Santoro said. “She’s pissed that I went behind her back but she agrees that it’s time for all of us to get on the same page.”
“And just so you know,” Robb added, “I still think Horace Blair killed his wife, but after what you found out about Benedict, I’m willing to listen.”
“I also told her about the chow here,” Santoro said as the waitress came over and everyone ordered burgers, fries, and beer.
“I’ve been giving this case a lot of thought,” Santoro said when the waitress left, “and I’m convinced that Charles Benedict killed Carrie Blair and is framing Horace for her murder. I don’t know why he killed Carrie, but let’s assume that he did. Can we account for the evidence against Horace in a way that implicates Benedict?
“Let’s start with the keys. Something about them bothered me when we conducted our experiment at Blair’s mansion. Do you remember what the keys looked like, Steph?”
Robb looked confused. “They looked like keys.”
“Right, but there was something odd about one of them. The two keys we found in the grave—the single key and the front-door key on Carrie’s key chain—looked old and abused. They were dull, they had scratches on them. The key we took from Blair that wouldn’t open the front door resembled the keys from the grave but looked much newer and less worn.”
“Why is that important?” Robb asked.
“Remember Ernest Brodsky?”
“Of course.”
“Remember how he earned his living?”
As soon as she made the connection Robb looked sick.
“Dana and I went over the surveillance tapes we got from the River View Mall. On Tuesday morning, a Porsche resembling Carrie Blair’s Porsche entered the mall’s parking lot. I couldn’t read the whole license plate but two of the letters match Carrie’s license and are in the right place on the plate.
“Around the time I saw the Porsche on the tape, a man entered Brodsky’s store and left carrying a small paper bag that was big enough to hold several keys. The man made a real effort to keep his face hidden. He was wearing a sweatshirt with a hood and he kept his head down. I went over Brodsky’s receipts for Tuesday. He sold two keys for cash right around the time the man in the hoodie went into his shop.
“Later that night, shortly after Brodsky closed his store, a Mercedes drove out of the mall. Brodsky’s car was found in the mall parking lot, so it’s a good guess that he was kidnapped from the mall. Benedict drives a Mercedes.
“Here’s the way I see it. Benedict kills Carrie and figures out a way to frame Blair for his wife’s murder that includes making it look like Blair dropped his front-door key in Carrie’s grave while he was burying her. He has Brodsky make a key that looks like Blair’s front-door key but isn’t. Then he kills Brodsky so he can’t be a witness. If I’m right, we also know how the gun, hairs, and blood got in the trunk of the Bentley. The second key Brodsky made was a copy of the Bentley key Carrie had on her key chain.”
“This is all guesswork, Frank,” Robb said.
Santoro smiled. “Not completely. As soon as I made the connection between this case and Brodsky’s murder, I called Wilda Parks at the crime lab and asked her if there was any way to tell if the key on Horace Blair’s key chain—the one that wouldn’t open the front door—had been made in Ernest Brodsky’s store.
“There’s a whole branch of forensics that involves tool-mark identification. Wilda explained that keys are made from blanks that don’t have any ‘cuts.’ ‘Cuts’ are the ridges on the key that interface with the components of a lock. If they are positioned correctly they cause the lock to lock or unlock. These cuts are made in a grinding machine. Different grinding machines will leave different tool marks on a key shaped by that machine.
“I checked with Stuart Lang at the River View Mall. Brodsky’s grinding machines are still in his store. Wilda called this morning. The tool marks on the key on Horace’s key chain—the newer-looking key—were made by Brodsky’s machine.”
“But what about the fingerprints, Frank?” Robb asked. “Horace Blair’s prints were on the key we found in the grave. Blair didn’t have a key to his front door on his key chain, so the key in the grave is probably his front-door key. How did Benedict get Blair’s key?”
“I don’t know,” Santoro said. “But Blair called Benedict as soon as we arrested him. That means they knew each other. I’m sure Blair could tell us if Benedict had an opportunity to get the key. Unfortunately, we can’t ask him because Benedict won’t let us talk to his client. But let’s forget about the key for now. There’s one more connection between Brodsky and this case. Why was Barry Lester in isolation, Steph?”
“He had a fight with one of Nikolai Orlansky’s goons.”
“Gregor Karpinski is a beast. Lester’s not. He’s a wimp. So why would Lester provoke Karpinski? I think it was a setup to get Lester into isolation so he could snitch on Blair. If you remember, Benedict really worked us over to get us to put Blair in isolation. Well, Benedict also represented Karpinski in an assault case.
“Now, here is the clincher for me. If Blair didn’t confess to Lester, then someone fed Lester the location of the grave and the contents of the prenup. Only two people talked to Lester while he was in jail. Dana interviewed one of those people, Lester’s girlfriend, Tiffany Starr. The next day, Starr was stabbed to death. I read the autopsy reports in Starr’s and Brodsky’s cases, then I talked to Nick Winters. In both cases, the knife wounds were almost identical: one shot to the heart.”
“Fuck,” Robb said.
“Yeah, Steph, I agree.”
“There’s something else that links Karpinski and Tiffany Starr,” Dana said. “I talked to Starr on the day she was killed. That night, Karpinski lured me to an industrial park and threatened to rape me if I kept asking questions about the Blair case.”
“Are you okay?” Robb asked with real concern.
Dana nodded.
“Karpinski isn’t so hot, though,” Santoro said. “Dana put him in the hospital.”
“How could you possibly do that?” Robb asked.
“I’ll tell you later,” Santoro said.
“I’m certain the fight between Lester and Karpinski was a setup,” Dana said, anxious to change the subject. “I’d bet everything I own that Blair never confessed to Lester. And if he didn’t, then the odds are that Tiffany Starr told Lester where to find the grave and what was in the prenup. If you need more proof, check Tiffany’s bank account. You’ll find a recent two-thousand-dollar deposit.”
“How do you know that?” Robb asked.
“I’d rather not say,” Dana answered.
“Damn,” Robb said. “I was so sure Blair offed her. Now I don’t know what to think.”
“I’m sure that Benedict has been leading us around by the nose, but I don’t have any idea how we can prove it,” Santoro said.
“If we could talk to Blair, he could tell us if Benedict had an opportunity to get his house key,” Dana said, her frustration evident.
“That’s something that’s not going to happen as long as Benedict is Blair’s attorney,” Santoro said.
By the time Dana got home she was exhausted. Jake was watching a basketball game. Dana pecked him on the cheek, headed straight for the bedroom, and fell instantly into such a deep sleep that she never noticed when Jake climbed into bed an hour later.
Sometime during the night Dana started dreaming. In her dream she was in a narrow shop with a low ceiling. There was almost no light, and the confined space was making her claustrophobic. Dana wanted
to get out of the shop, but the floor was covered with so many keys that she could barely move. She was starting to panic because each step made her sink deeper into the pile of keys, which sucked at her like quicksand. Dana struggled toward the door. She began flailing and she didn’t stop until she shot up in bed, damp with perspiration, her heart beating furiously.
Dana cast a quick glance at Jake to see if she’d awakened him but he was sleeping soundly. She went to the kitchen, filled a glass with water, and sat at the table. It was four in the morning and the sky was pitch-black. No moon, no starlight. She could sure use something to illuminate the problem Charles Benedict had posed for her, Dana thought. She was certain he had murdered Carrie Blair, but she hadn’t a clue as to how she could prove it.
If only they could ask Horace Blair if Benedict had an opportunity to get Horace’s front-door key. But no one could talk to Blair while Charles Benedict was representing him.
Then an idea occurred to Dana. She smiled. She thought about it some more and her smile widened. To the best of her knowledge, she and Charles Benedict had never met, and Benedict definitely did not know about the Ottoman Scepter. Dana looked at the clock on the kitchen stove. It was 4:45 on the East Coast and three hours earlier out west. Dana was fired up, but she knew that she would have to practice patience, because Marty Draper would be too upset to give her a crash course on Asian antiquities if she woke him out of a deep sleep at 1:45 in the morning.
Part III
The Revenge of the Ottoman Scepter
Chapter Forty-Eight
Santoro and Robb got out of the elevator and spotted the nurses’ station. A heavyset brunette was on the phone, reading from a medical chart, when they walked up. The detectives held up their identification and the woman held up her hand as she continued to talk.
“How can I help you?” the nurse asked as soon as she hung up the phone.
“We want to speak to a patient.”
“What’s the patient’s name?”
“Gregor Karpinski.”
The nurse had started to look at a white board with room numbers and patient names, but she stopped.
“Mr. Karpinski passed away last night.”
“He’s dead?” Santoro said.
The nurse nodded.
“How did he die?”
“I don’t know. I wasn’t on duty.”
“Is there someone we can speak to?”
“Dr. Raptis was here. Let me see if he’s available.”
Santoro and Robb walked far enough away from the nurse’s station so they could talk without being overheard.
“What do you think?” Robb asked.
“I don’t know. From what I heard, he was in pretty bad shape, stab wounds to the groin, head trauma.”
Before Robb could reply a young man in a white coat walked up to the nurses’ station. He was short and slender, and his long black hair looked as if it had been finger-combed. Santoro guessed he was in his late twenties. The nurse pointed to the detectives. The doctor’s glasses had slipped down his nose and he pushed them up as he walked over.
“Hi, I’m Dave Raptis. Nurse Arlen said you wanted to know about Gregor Karpinski.”
“He is—I guess ‘was’ is more appropriate—a witness in a case we’re investigating,” Santoro said. “We came up here hoping to talk to him, but the nurse told us he died last night.”
“That’s right. He passed away about three in the morning.”
“Was Mr. Karpinski your patient?” Robb asked.
“Dr. Samuels did the surgery. I’d looked in on him a few times since he was admitted.”
“Was his death a surprise?” Robb asked.
“Actually, it was.”
“Why is that?” Santoro asked.
“He died of cardiac arrest.”
“Why was that surprising? I thought he was in pretty bad shape.”
“Oh, he was, but the damage he suffered was to his genitals and head. There was nothing wrong with his heart.”
“Was there anything suspicious about the death? Anything that would make you suspect that he was murdered?”
“Murdered?”
“Mr. Karpinski was a witness in a murder case. His death could benefit some people. Can you think of anything that would help us figure out whether he died from natural or unnatural causes?”
The doctor looked concerned. “Gee, I don’t know. He had died by the time I got to his room. It never occurred to me that he might have been murdered, so I wasn’t looking for anything like that.”
The detectives talked with Dr. Raptis a little longer before they headed for the elevator. Santoro got his cell phone out and speed-dialed the medical examiner’s office while they waited for the car to come. After he spoke to Nick Winters, Santoro called Dana Cutler and told her that another avenue for proving that Charles Benedict had killed Carrie Blair had been closed.
Chapter Forty-Nine
At 10:30 a.m. The Scene was deserted except for a handful of alcoholics who were nursing drinks at the bar. Peter Perkovic found his boss going over the books in the back office. Orlansky looked up when Perkovic walked in. Perkovic looked upset.
“What happened?” Orlansky asked.
“Gregor is dead.”
“How did he die?”
“They’re saying cardiac arrest, but I saw his chart when I went to the hospital. There was nothing wrong with his heart.”
“So?”
“There are ways. An injection of potassium would be my choice.”
“There will be an autopsy?”
Perkovic nodded.
“Can you get the results?”
“Of course, but potassium poisoning is virtually undetectable.”
Orlansky stared into space and Perkovic waited patiently. Orlansky came back to Earth.
“Charlie?” he asked.
“A dead Gregor cannot talk to the police. And Charlie would know that it would upset you to learn that he told Gregor you had said it was okay to threaten this woman.”
“I agree. Talk to me as soon as you know the results of the autopsy.”
Chapter Fifty
One look at his waiting area and a potential client would know that hiring Bobby Schatz was going to be an expensive proposition. The magazines on the end tables focused on life in the Hamptons, Saint Croix, and Biarritz. Elegant sofas stood on either side of a Persian carpet that was laid across a polished hardwood floor, and the lawyer’s receptionist, who was so stunning that she could grace the cover of Vogue without makeup, was positioned behind a handcrafted mahogany desk.
The first and only time Dana had worked with Schatz, the capital’s preeminent criminal attorney had hired her to assist in the defense of an American-born terrorist who had tried to blow up the football stadium where the Washington Redskins play. The relationship had ended under strange and unpleasant circumstances.
“May I help you?” the receptionist asked in a friendly voice that betrayed none of the disdain she may have felt for a woman wearing jeans, shades, and a motorcycle jacket. Schatz had stopped representing biker gangs and other lowlifes long ago. Nowadays, the defendants he escorted to court were disgraced hedge-fund managers and nattily dressed political perverts.
“Tell Bobby that Dana Cutler wants a moment of his valuable time.”
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No, and I don’t need one. Just tell him who’s in the waiting room.”
The receptionist hesitated, but something about Dana made her reconsider. She pressed a button and conveyed the message.
“He’ll see you,” she told Dana. The woman started to get up but Dana motioned her to stay seated.
“Bobby and I are old friends. I know the way to his inner sanctum.”
Dana walked down a narrow hall, past offices staffed by the attorney’s associates, then stopped in the doorway of a large corner office decorated with expensive art and photographs of Bobby with the rich and famous. Sitting behind a desk the size of an aircraft carri
er was a thickset man with slicked-back dyed black hair who was dressed in an elegant gray pinstripe suit. A red polka-dot bow tie was secured under the collar of a white silk shirt, and a silk handkerchief poked out of the pocket beneath the jacket’s left lapel.
Schatz remembered his last meeting with Dana. “Do I need to call security?” he asked, only half kidding.
“No, Bobby. I’m not going to shoot you—at least not today.”
“That’s a relief.”
Dana sat in a high-backed armchair and took in the view of the Capitol dome.
“You’re still doing well,” she remarked.
Schatz shrugged. “I get by.”
“You’d do even better if Horace Blair was a client.”
“Once was enough, thank you,” Bobby answered.
“You two have a history?”
“Ten years ago, I had the displeasure of representing Horace when he was charged with drunk driving.”
“That’s right! Wasn’t that the trial where he met Carrie Blair?”
Schatz nodded.
“What was the problem?”
“My client. Carrie Blair was the prosecutor and she had one witness, the arresting officer. I made mincemeat of him during cross. If we’d rested without putting on any witnesses we would have won, but it was love at first sight for Horace and he insisted on testifying so he could make gooey eyes at Carrie.”
Schatz shook his head in disgust. “I did everything I could to talk him out of taking the stand, but he blew me off. Then he confessed during cross-examination, just to impress Carrie. I would have smacked my head against the counsel table but it would have been unseemly.”
“I thought defense attorneys were supposed to put the interest of their clients first,” Dana said with the hint of a smile.
Even ten years later, Schatz did not appear to see the humor in the situation.
“I don’t like to lose. Ever. In any event, I don’t see how I can represent Horace. Charlie Benedict is representing him.”
“That’s true, but he shouldn’t be Blair’s lawyer. You should.”
Sleight of Hand: A Novel of Suspense (Dana Cutler) Page 20
