Tahoe Dark (An Owen McKenna Mystery Thriller Book 14)

by Todd Borg

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Hades, Greek god of death, had a staff that was forked like a two-prong pitchfork. The prongs flared out. Just like this.”

  I found a locking pliers. We wrapped the end of the pole with a rag to protect it from damage and improve the pliers’ grip, and gradually cranked the pole out of the Jeep.

  As we worked, I gave Diamond the details on how I found the dead robbers.

  “Two robbers down,” Diamond said. “Two to go. Gotta hand it to you on the pine pitch, yellow cress, bug hunt.”

  After Diamond left with the spear, I called the bank and asked for Jean Hannerty.

  After a short wait, a woman said, “Hello, this is Jean.”

  “Hi, Jean, my name is Owen McKenna.”

  “I just got off the phone with a Sergeant Lanzen from the Washoe Sheriff’s Office. She told me you’d be calling.”

  “May I stop by in an hour or so and talk to you a bit about David Montrop’s withdrawal?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Thanks. See you soon.”

  An hour later, I walked into the bank in Incline Village and asked for Jean Hannerty. I was directed to a group of three desks. Two were empty. One was occupied by a woman who was speaking on the phone. The woman was a commanding presence, partly because she was large, but mostly because she radiated control and dominance. She held the phone with her left hand. Her right arm was outstretched, making big gestures like a maestro conducting a full orchestra. Hannerty’s hair tossed and shivered as her free arm went left and right, her finger pointing at the strings, then the horns, encouraging the basses, admonishing the timpani. She saw me coming and nodded at me. She hung up, made some notes on a pad and then stood and reached out her hand. “I’m guessing that you are Owen McKenna because Sergeant Lanzen said you are very tall.”

  “Good to meet you,” I said as we shook.

  “I know you want to ask about David Montrop, but I don’t see what I can add. His murder has been a shock to us here at the bank. He was a good customer.” She gestured as she spoke, her fingers out, palm up. Then her hand went over her heart as she said that it was a shock. Her gestures were so demonstrative that a deaf person could have understood her without the benefit of lip reading or sign language.

  “I was told that he made a withdrawal the morning he was killed. I’d like to ask about the bills that your bank gave him.”

  “You’re hoping that we have the serial numbers, but we don’t record them as a general rule.” Her right arm was conducting again. “Mr. Montrop generally had us write a cashier’s check for his band payments. This time he asked for cash, which, although unusual, was not the first time. Some of the bands he books don’t have a band checking account. They like cash because then they can divvy up the money to each member.”

  “Sergeant Lanzen said he withdrew twenty-five thousand. What denominations did you give him?”

  “I double-checked with Mary this morning – she was at the teller window the morning Montrop came in – and she and I both remember that he asked for half in twenties and half in hundreds. But we only had ten thousand in twenties, so we gave him the other fifteen thousand in hundreds. We note the denominations so we can go back and verify if needed.”

  “You said you don’t record the serial numbers as a general rule. That implies that you sometimes do?”

  “I meant that as a generic statement about most banks. A few banks have bill counters that also scan for serial numbers. But they’re expensive, and we’ve never felt the need. We’re just a little small-town bank.”

  Her small-town bank line sounded well-rehearsed as if she regularly tried to downplay the bank’s role in a town with enough Silicon Valley billionaires to be one of the richest towns of its size in the world.

  “When do you record serial numbers?” I asked.

  “Unless we have a special request, we only record our robbery packs.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Come, I’ll show you.” She brought me across the bank lobby and through a locked door that opened to the area behind the counter. There were two tellers working at one end of the counter. Hannerty walked to the other end. She typed a code onto the computer keyboard, put a key into a cash drawer, and pulled it open.

  “This is a robbery pack.” She pulled out two bundles of twenties. “Every teller’s cash drawer has them. If a robber comes in, we make sure that he goes out with this. The first bundle are bills where we’ve recorded the serial numbers. The second bundle is a dye pack.”

  “Which can explode and blow dye all over the money and the robber, right? How are yours triggered? A timer?”

  “At the door of the bank, there is a transmitter. If the dye pack is carried through the door, the transmitter starts the timer in the pack. Thirty seconds later, it blows. They’re very effective in catching robbers, as you no doubt know.”

  “And if any of the bills escape the dye, you have their serial numbers.”

  “Right.”

  Hannerty escorted me back to the front of the bank.

  I said, “The money you gave to David Montrop, were there any other descriptive aspects to it?”

  “What do you mean?” Hannerty asked.

  “New bills? Old bills? A mix?”

  “They were all old bills.”

  “Were they in rough shape or pretty smooth?”

  She thought about it. “In our bank, we use the standard currency strap, a bill count of one hundred for every denomination above the one dollar bill. The bundles we gave Montrop were pretty flat on the hundreds, so the bills weren’t too worn. But the twenties were more worn. Those bundles had more volume.”

  “From what you’re saying, if I found a stash of cash with twenties and hundreds, there’s no way I could identify whether or not it came from the money David Montrop withdrew from your bank.”

  Hannerty was nodding and gesturing before I finished my sentence. “Correct. Unless the bills are marked or recorded in some way, cash in the form of mixed bills is almost impossible to trace. But of course, that still gives you some useful information.”

  “What would that be?”

  “If you find money you’re wondering about and it contains bills other than twenties and hundreds, you know that those other bills didn’t come from the withdrawal that David Montrop made.”

  “One, fives, tens, and fifties,” I said. I reached out to shake her hand. “That is useful information. Thanks.” I said goodbye and left.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Mama Nature was showing off the beauty of high-altitude weather, so I decided to drive north and head to Reno by way of the Mt. Rose highway, and see just how hot the sun can be at 9000 feet when the air is only 48 degrees. Because Spot had been confined to the Jeep while I was in the bank, he was eager to stick his head out the window and inhale the cold wind blast as we cruised up the mountain.

  We crested the pass and followed the twisty road past the Mt. Rose ski area and down 4500 vertical feet. The pines gave way to sagebrush as we came to the broad, angled slope that drops down from the mountains on Reno’s west side to the urban center of the valley.

  Twenty minutes later, I walked through the front door of Reno Armored and into the arctic blast.

  This time, Rita, the receptionist, was wearing a quilted, goose down coat that was colored a deep purple. Probably, it took the color edge off her unpainted-yet-purple fingernails. She told me that Randy Bosworth was in. Whether the vibration in her voice was her vocal characteristics or shivering, I couldn’t tell. She buzzed Bosworth and said he would be out in a minute.

  The heavy door made a whoosh as Bosworth pushed through. He’d switched from his long sleeves of two days before to a short-sleeved shirt, the better to keep from baking to death in the event the cooling system couldn’t keep it below 50 degrees.

  “Hey, McKenna,” he said as he pumped my hand up and down about three times too many. He grinned at me. “When I didn’t hear from you yesterday, I wondered if y
ou were maybe taking one of those staycations, you know, where you stay at home to enjoy what the local area has to offer. Your job’s got to be one of the great ways to scam some bucks, right? You walk the beach and hike the woods, then bill for your time. No one can actually prove whether you were working or playing. And, of course, you can always claim that you were thinking, puzzling out a complicated case. But then I got a call from a cop who knows me. He said that the El Dorado County cops brought in two of the robbers’ bodies.” Bosworth made a little chuckle.

  My lack of sleep had made me impatient. I wanted to walk out, but I took a deep breath and counted to five.

  “I need to ask about the cash your men were bringing to the casino,” I said. “I’d like to know the denominations, the way it was bundled, and any other details you can remember.”

  “I guess that would save you more legwork, huh?” Bosworth said in a mocking tone. “I’m not going to give you details about the cash or anything else, because you’ll just detail it in your report as if you’d done yet more work, but it’s all just a Sherlock Holmes charade.” Bosworth was now sneering. “You might be able to fool Mr. Timmens, but you don’t fool me.”

  I pulled out my phone and dialed the number I’d entered in my contacts list. I put it on speaker as it rang.

  “Who’re you calling?” Bosworth said. “I’ve got work to do, and I can’t waste time while you continue this act.”

  A young male voice answered, “Reno Armored. How may I direct your call?” he said loud enough for both Bosworth and me to hear.

  Bosworth stared at my phone, frowning.

  “Owen McKenna calling for Mr. Timmens,” I said.

  “Hey, you can’t do that,” Bosworth said. He took a step toward me and raised his arm as if he might try to snatch my phone from my grip. “You try to spin some tale to my boss, I’ll kick your ass.”

  I lifted my phone high so that Bosworth couldn’t reach it without jumping, which, given his girth, he probably couldn’t do. “Hey, Owen McKenna!” an enthusiastic voice came out of the phone. “My God, I can’t believe what you’ve done! I got a call from the El Dorado Sheriff’s Office, and they told me about how you and your dog found the bodies of two of the robbers all because of some pine pitch you got off the tire of our truck! That is a fantastic bit of detection! I already called our casino client and gave them the news. Earlier they had told me that they were going to cancel our contract. But now that two out of four robbers have been found dead, they’re acting like we’re clearing the streets of scum. They said they’re going to have us take over their cash needs for their Vegas casino. Not only have you saved us, McKenna, we’re going to substantially increase our business because of you. Whatever your fee is, I’m going to double it!”

  “Thanks, Mr. Timmens. I appreciate the feedback. I’m actually here at your Sparks facility, and Randy Bosworth is stonewalling me. He said that I was taking a…” I turned toward Bosworth and spoke loudly enough that Timmens could hear over the phone. “What did you call it, Bosworth? You accused me of taking a staycation and passing it off as billable hours? What was the other thing? Oh, yeah. Something about me taking credit for what the cops did.” I turned to speak directly toward the phone. “Bosworth thinks I’m faking my work.” Behind Bosworth, I saw the receptionist’s eyes get very wide.

  “What?!” Timmens was shouting. “Bosworth, is this true? Are you screwing up again? Not only have you gotten this backward, you’ve slandered McKenna. If anyone else heard you, we’ll be in serious hot water! I want you in my office, Bosworth. One hour.”

  “Mr. Timmens, I was given false information by the police. I got the impression that McKenna didn’t do anything to find the bodies. I was just responding to what I’d been told.” Bosworth’s voice had risen an octave.

  “Bosworth, did the police specifically tell you that the El Dorado Sheriff’s Office found those bodies without any help? Did you call the El Dorado Sheriff’s Office and ask them about McKenna? Tell the truth, because you know I’m going to call them and ask.”

  “Well they didn’t exactly say that, but…”

  “One hour, Bosworth. In my office in one hour. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, sir,” Bosworth said, his voice low.

  “And Bosworth?”

  “Yes?”

  “Before you come over here, tell McKenna anything and everything he wants to know.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “McKenna?” Timmens said.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m going to make this up to you.”

  “No sweat,” I said, and hung up.

  Bosworth looked like a dog, hanging his head, looking defeated. But I could tell that he was already scheming about his revenge.

  “Details about the money?” I said for the second time.

  Bosworth took several heavy breaths. “The money was our standard assortment, ones, fives, tens, twenties, fifties, and hundreds. Everything bundled with currency straps, one hundred bills per denomination.”

  “How many bundles of each?”

  “I don’t know. It varies from casino to casino. We have their requested proportions in the vault along with the iPad where we keep notes on the cash disbursement app and a physical log sheet we keep for redundancy.” He looked at the clock. “I can’t get in there, now. It’s a timed vault, impossible to break into outside of predetermined times. That way no one can just pop in here and rob us. They have to know the times for each day and week, and that information is encrypted. We can only learn the times for a given day each morning at ten a.m. And it changes each day, so no one can make advance plans.”

  “If you don’t know the proportion for each denomination, give me your best estimate.”

  He thought about it. “I think that particular casino goes heavier than normal on hundreds and twenties.”

  I nodded. “What’s the condition of the money you deliver?”

  “Used, but not real worn. We have a policy of pulling the limp bills. It makes a big difference to the casino to get money with snap and stiffness.”

  “Your currency bundles,” I said. “Do they sit pretty flat?”

  “Yeah. Flat and thin.”

  He looked at the clock again. “I better go.” He waited for me to precede him out the door. It seemed like he was about to say something like a parting shot, but he thought better of it and stayed silent.

  I turned to leave. Bosworth looked at the time. “When Rita’s on her lunch break, she locks the door. So I’ll let you out.”

  He escorted me to the front door, pushed the release bar and opened it up. I figured he might try to hit me, so I kept my eye on him as I left.

  I walked out to my Jeep and left.

  As I drove out of the parking lot and turned down the street, I realized that I’d turned the wrong way. I had come from the other direction. The industrial area was confusing. Maybe I could get out a different way, but I’d be a lot less likely to get lost if I turned around. So I pulled into a different parking lot, made a U-turn, and headed back the way I’d originally come.

  Then I made one of those belated realizations. In the parking lot where I’d turned around, I’d passed a parked silver car. A man was sitting in the driver’s seat. A woman was standing outside the car at the open passenger window, leaning down talking to the driver. I hadn’t gotten a good look at them, but something about them seemed familiar. I hit my brakes and came to a stop, trying to visualize the people. As I pictured them, I realized that the woman looked like Rita the receptionist. That made sense, as Bosworth had said she was on her lunch break.

  But the driver of the silver car, the man, was also someone I thought I’d seen before. I couldn’t place his face in my memory. Sensing a vague recognition of a person in a place I’d never been was nothing unusual. But why, when I saw the Reno Armored receptionist near a car, would I recognize another person with her? That would be an unlikely coincidence.

  I turned around yet again to drive back and have a second
look. Then I remembered where I’d seen the male driver. It was the Korean gardener at David Montrop’s house in Incline Village. A man named Kang who couldn’t speak English.

  Now I was very curious. The gardener was connected to a man who’d been murdered up at the lake, and the receptionist was connected to a company that had a truck robbed at the lake.

  Obviously, Rita and Kang needed to explain how they knew each other and what, if anything, they knew about the crimes. And if she wasn’t speaking Korean, he must have been speaking English. Yet he’d presented himself to me and Washoe County Sergeant Lanzen as not speaking English. But I recalled that the house cleaner Evan Rosen thought he was faking his inability to speak English.

  I sped up toward the parking lot and made a hard turn into its entrance.

  The silver car was gone.

  I looked around. There were exits at both the front and back of the lot, multiple ways to escape. Maybe Rita had gone with him. Or maybe she’d simply walked somewhere.

  Thinking that Kang may have spotted me and wanted to get away fast, I picked the main road and drove in the opposite direction from where I’d come.

  It turned in leisurely S-curves, an attempt to make the industrial park more esthetic. I careened around them, looking into every lot and side alley. When I came to intersections, I looked for a silver car, but had no luck.

  After ten minutes of searching, I gave up, pulled over, and dialed Sergeant Lanzen. I got her voicemail.

  “Hey sergeant, Owen McKenna here. I thought I should tell you what I just saw. I came down to Sparks to talk to the manager of Reno Armored. As I was leaving, I saw the Reno Armored receptionist outside talking to a man in a car. I’m not certain, but I think the man was Mr. Kang, Montrop’s gardener who supposedly doesn’t speak English. I have no idea what it means. But it’s an unlikely coincidence. The car was a silver sedan, but I didn’t notice make, model, or license plate because the man’s identity didn’t come to me until I’d driven away. When I realized who it was, I went back, but they were gone. I made a search of the local roads and found nothing.”