By the middle of the next day, Ms. Gould had emailed me the first batch of employees working in the research division Trevor oversaw, even giving me her opinions on some of them. I did my own impartial investigation on them for the next several hours, which became several hours more when a new batch was sent. My first instinct told me to check if anyone had directly benefited from Trevor’s death, namely, if anyone of these employees had inherited his position and higher pay, but the woman who replaced Trevor two months after his death was actually hired from a company based in Boston. I wondered if this had come as a surprise to the research staff, but the new boss was at least not unqualified from what I saw, and the two months between the death and the hire indicated there was a lengthy interview process, something I would later try and verify with Ms. Gould. By the time Thursday morning rolled in, I had painted as good a picture as I could of Trevor’s work associates. Just about everything was ordinary when I looked into their work and online accounts. They were educated people with various hobbies and were paid better than the average Joe. Not to say that I didn’t suspect several didn’t have a vice or two that might make them prone to a violent act. I was sure no less than two of the scientists gambled regularly on betting sites, someone else was at least having an online affair, and yet another was an alcoholic, but none of these seemed to encroach on Trevor’s life.
What did pique my curiosity was not so much the scientists themselves, but a few of their family members. Two of the researchers had a relative or two in the military. I thought it plausible that if one of these academics wanted to murder someone, then it was probable they would seek out help, especially if that help came in the form of an arcanist warrior they trusted. An arcanist could even better explain how Trevor’s death looked so much like a suicide, as someone with the ability to warp the elements could use the power to stage Trevor’s body in any number of ways, and a soldier could handle any gun they came across. I imagined the detectives must have hypothesized this as well, but with no evidence to lead them to anyone in particular, they probably had to turn away from this avenue of thinking. Of course, I didn’t need proof to keep me from taking a stab in the dark. So, deciding to run with this idea, I started checking what the detectives had on these two researchers.
It turned out that they did interview most of the employees known to be close to Trevor, mostly by covering all their bases and getting their alibis. Both of the researchers had left work between five and six, giving either one the time they needed to get to Trevor before his wife. From there, the scientist who had left later, a Nickolas Irvin, told the investigators that he went to pick up his daughter from soccer practice and then went home to work on his yard. The second researcher, Gale Mendez, had left just after five and said she had gone straight home. I assumed that the detectives checked up on these excuses, but I couldn’t find exactly what they found. I had hit a digital dead end. There was nothing more on the investigator’s records or anything online that would give me an indication of whether one of them was lying or not. Having little other choice, I started searching online to see what I could gather on the military side of their families. I quickly found that Nickolas had a younger brother who was now a veteran of the army and who now worked as a civil engineer here in Chicago. Inspecting his online timeline for that last week in June showed Nickolas’ brother to be a fairly active user of his public accounts. He even posted a picture of himself and his drab looking wife sweating like pigs after a jog. If the time of taking the pic coincided with the posting of it, then the jog happened about an hour before Mrs. Malik came home. I didn’t think it impossible that this could have been part of a conspiracy, but I choose to move on to easier info getting.
Gale had a larger pool of military personnel to choose from. Her father-in-law was a veteran and two of her three children had followed in their grandfather’s footsteps. I didn’t think an old in-law was much of a trusted ally, so I paid more attention to her children. A little out of character for most in this generation, there wasn’t an overwhelming amount of public communication to sort through for her oldest child, getting most of what I was seeing through the accounts of her siblings. Nonetheless, I was able to ascertain that she was no longer an active member of the military and was now living and working in Indianapolis as an IT Specialist for a delivery business. The middle child was still residing in Chicago and was a middle school math teacher. Finally, going by his blog postings, the youngest was currently going to the University of Notre Dame after arriving from his last deployment in east Africa. Scanning his blog also revealed that he had returned from this deployment in early June. As I was treating nothing as coincidence, the fact that I found nothing in his otherwise lively accounts to indicate where he was or what he was doing on the evening of Trevor’s death tickled my intuition further. Eric Mendez was this young man’s name, and he kept popping up in my head as I continued looking for more details involving the two researchers as Thursday evening arrived.
By the time I was preparing to sleep for a few hours, I was resolved to make Gale Mendez my top suspect and began thinking up a plan to try and assemble relevant information from her. A scheme I had implemented on another case came to mind a couple of hours before most other people went off to work. Figuring it would work well enough for this case, I started preparing the first phase of my strategy on my computer with the hopes that Ms. Gould would be compliant. About an hour after she would have started work, I called Ms. Gould.
“Hello, Mr. Vickson. Something more I can do for you?”
“Yes, but for the highest chance for success, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you what will be a seedy favor. It will involve a bit of deception and you helping me to plant spyware on an employee’s computer. If it’s not something you can do, then I won’t compel you to do so.”
“Oh, I see. Then you suspect someone here is involved?”
“It’s my best lead. The virus should help me see if there’s any incriminating evidence on their computer, but more than that, I want to see how they respond to a message I want you to send.”
She uttered a long sigh. “I’ll help, Mr. Vickson, if you really think it’s our best bet. So what should I do?”
“I’m going to send you a link that contains the spyware. Don’t open it or it will attach to your computer. Just change the link’s wording to anything you want, preferably something having to do with work, and insert this link to an email that you’ll send to Gale Mendez.”
“Gale Mendez? Gods, is she your prime suspect?”
“For the moment. What do you think of her?”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that I know her all that well, but I do know she was close to Trevor. In fact, I would say that she corresponded with him the most out of all his work associates, and I’ve certainly seen her at get-togethers when the Maliks hosted them. What makes you think she did it?”
“I don’t yet think she did it, my investigation only points that she had the best opportunity to do so out of everyone I’ve seen. Do you know when she usually leaves work?”
“I can look up when she clocks out of her lab. Give me a moment…”
A minute later and she had to put me on hold to take another call. After five minutes more of waiting, her voice returned to my ears.
“Okay, sorry about that. Um, let’s see, Mrs. Mendez left at 5:57 yesterday, 6:03 the day before that… Yes, most of her times are around that range.”
“Really? Her alibi on the police reports has her stating she left just after five on the twenty-sixth. Can you check what her clock out times were on the week of his death?”
“Certainly. Give me a second… Oh, yes, she clocked out at 5:01 that day, and the rest of the week has that range as well. The week before is when she starts leaving earlier than usual.”
“And when does she return to leaving at a later hour?”
“By the end of the first week of July. It then pretty much stays the same for the following weeks. Actually, for months. This is strange. Why the
sudden discrepancy on those three weeks?”
“Something I hope to find out. Do you think Mrs. Mendez or anyone else was upset when they hired the new head researcher? Did everyone expect that Trevor would be replaced by someone in-house?”
“I don’t really recall if anyone expected an internal promotion, but I do know people were quite happy Mrs. Malik was able to hire such a highly esteemed expert in her field. It was a sign our little company was becoming a destination for respected professionals.”
“I see. I guess a possible motive is still out of reach. Anyway, have you received my email yet?”
“Oh, yes I have. I see the link. What next?”
“I want you to send the reworded link in an email to Mrs. Mendez that forces her to click on it. The link will then allow me to see her files and give me real time updates to what she does and sends. The link will not seem to do anything, so she’ll likely ask you to send it again. Just be sure to have a real link ready so you won’t draw any possible suspicion from her. After that’s done, I want you to send another email at some point later in the day. If she is guilty of anything, it will be this email that will probably reveal it.”
“What do I put in this second email?”
“Have you ever confided in each other about Trevor’s death?”
“I can’t say that we’ve confided in each other specifically, nothing beyond the standard consoling that comes during those first few days back at work.”
“So you’ve never told her about your suspicions?”
“I can’t say that I’ve said anything about suspecting murder to her. That talk was mostly reserved for Ryan.”
“All right, I want you to send her an email telling her some of your misgivings on Trevor’s death. Even mention that you’re thinking about hiring a P.I. to investigate something strange and that you want advice from a fellow friend of Trevor’s.”
“I suppose I can do that. But what if she asks what this ‘strange thing’ is?”
“That’s the part that might get her to slip up at some point if she is involved. Tell her that Ryan looked into Trevor’s personal computer and found a scrambled hard drive. Don’t reference his work computers, however. She can’t know that you might suspect anyone at work.”
“Got it,” she said, a hint of boldness making her voice as steady as I had ever heard it.
“At minimum, we should be able to either clear her name or gain more substantial proof. Thank you for your assistance, Ms. Gould.”
It was about an hour later when I received access to Mrs. Mendez’s computer. My screen showed me exactly what was on hers. I could also take control of her computer at my leisure, but I refrained from doing so right then, given that she could see my manipulation if she was on it and just have an IT guy purge the virus from the hacked machine. What was an additional obstacle to an eager scouring of her files was knowing that I wouldn’t understand five percent of what was on them. I was really banking on the conversation trap. The snare was sprung a little after lunch. The digital conversation went as thus:
Alice: Gale, I’ve been thinking a lot about Trevor lately. It all still doesn’t seem right to me.
Gale: I know what you mean, hon. I still think about him every single day.
Alice: Of course. I know how close the two of you were. You were each basically best friends as soon as he hired you all those years ago. But something in particular has forced me to look at everything again, and a little differently.
Gale: How so?
Alice: Well, just a couple of days ago, Ryan went back to the old place and started rummaging through his father’s things. Don’t tell me what made him do it, but he told me that he looked at the hard drive of his father’s personal computer and found it scrambled. Now, I told him that he was no computer genius and that could mean anything, but he swears to me that that it could only be done on purpose. Now it’s gotten me thinking that maybe there is more to Trevor’s death than meets the eye. I mean, no one believes he could have really killed himself for no reason, right?
Gale: Oh, Alice, of course no one can believe it, and perhaps the computer thing is a bit strange, but it could still mean almost anything. And don’t you think the police would have examined his hard drive and discovered this? Honey, the police found nothing that could suggest what you’re thinking.
Alice: But think about it, even if the police discovered the scrambled hard drive, it would still lead them nowhere. It could have been their biggest clue, but since they found nothing else, they had to drop it. Ryan and I are really thinking about it, Gale. A private investigator could maybe follow this lead deeper than the police normally can.
Gale: Oh, honey, a private investigator! They’re like psychics! You pay them and they tell you what you want to hear. Listen, I know it’s difficult to accept, even I don’t really think I have yet, but to waste your money on someone like that… Hon, just be careful. I don’t want anyone getting your hopes up needlessly, and on something as painful as this.
Alice: I know you’re looking out for me, and I do appreciate it, I really do, but I think it will at least ease my mind to have a P.I. look into this. Besides, I’m sure Ryan will help me pay for a reputable investigator.
Gale: I can’t stop you if you really think it will help, especially if Ryan agrees, but promise me you’ll think this through.
Alice: I will.
Ms. Gould called me a few minutes later, saying, “Did you catch the conversation, Mr. Vickson?”
“I did.”
“Do you think it’s strange she was against me hiring you?”
“Not really. P.I.s are indeed seen as little more than psychics by many, but I didn’t expect this particular conversation to reveal anything. If she is somehow guilty, then we just planted a seed of anxiety that will dictate her future actions. She might not do anything if she really believes she can’t be caught, but I doubt that. In fact, if there’s anything to this, I suspect Ryan will be getting a message from her soon.”
“Oh, I get it. Should we tell Ryan?”
“I’ll leave him a message right now.”
So that’s what I did. In the meantime, not expecting to get much more until Mrs. Mendez left work, I took the time to catch up on sleep and another job. It was at 6:30 that evening when I received a call from the doctor confirming that Gale had just called him, telling him about Alice’s desire for hiring a P.I. and, while she didn’t outright say it, she gave him the impression that she was advising against hiring one.
“Just like you predicted,” said the doctor.
“It was an easy guess. Whether she’s actually concerned for Alice or worried about herself, there was a good chance she was going to contact you.”
“So what do you guess she’ll do next?”
“Probably nothing more, but I’m going to have Alice tell Gale on Monday that she is committed to commissioning a P.I. That should get any uncaught criminal sweating a bit.”
“So it sounds like you’ll be working beyond our paid time scale.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll work pro bono for next week. If nothing becomes clearer by then, it’ll stay pro bono, if the fog does lift a bit-”
“Then it won’t. Fair enough. Tell me, would you take the chance of a week of unpaid work if you didn’t have a strong hunch something was going on?”
“It’s only a regular hunch, not a strong one.”
By the end of the weekend, using the email from her work computer, I had successfully infected Mrs. Mendez’s home computer and her personal pad with my spyware. As expected, I couldn’t make heads or tails of any work related files I saw, and it wasn’t until the end of the Monday workday did something more interesting pop up on her pad. She began looking up what private investigators could legally do, bringing a slim grin to my face. I suppose she was worried about us psychics. Still, all I had were circumstantial signals. What was a nagging clue were those three weeks Gale had left early. It seemed to me she had been spent that time leaving earli
er than normal so that it wouldn’t stand out to anyone if they were questioned about any odd behavior. Would this include her own family? Did she have potential support from more than one family member? Or was it only her youngest? It struck me as too risky to involve multiple people in a murder, even from one’s own family, but the possibility was there. What answers would I get from them about her early arrival times? It was time to take my investigation to the next stage. I would have to handle it delicately if I didn’t want to put them too much on the defensive, and thus permanently place me at a dead end, but I was at a point where I could no longer avoid some active prodding.
I contemplated for a long while about how and when to exactly approach Gale and her family. I realized I had to act quickly. I wanted Gale to be staggered when I contacted her only a day or two after learning a P.I. was to be hired for the case, making her doubt any hidden security at not being caught after the first investigation. My second goal was more practical. I needed to catch her in some kind of lie. The only other person who could corroborate Gale’s story was her husband, who worked as a math professor at the University of Chicago. I felt he was the key in catching this lie. So, on Tuesday morning, I was determined to start my questioning with him. I had wanted to catch him at work, so that he couldn’t speak to his wife as we talked, but when I called his office, I discovered that he was teaching night classes, creating a minor hiccup in my plan. However, I also learned that he had taught morning and afternoon courses over the summer. I wasn’t sure whether that meant anything, but it gave me a mildly clearer picture. I retried Mr. Mendez’s office at 7:30 in the evening.
“Hello?” said a deep voice.
“Hello. Is this Mr. Mendez?”
“Yes. And who is this?”
In the most professional tone I could muster, I said, “My name is Bryan Vickson, I’m a private investigator hired by the Medtech Corporation to clear up some anomalies they discovered in some of their records, which could be related to a series of thefts that have been taking place for the past year.”
Generations (The Nimbus Collection Book 3) Page 4
