by Julia Derek
“Really? How many times has she filed lawsuits?”
“According to what I can see, nineteen times.”
“Nineteen times! Damn. Did she actually go to court for all of them?”
“It looks like she went for most. And that she won them, too. This girl likes to sue people.”
“Huh. That’s very interesting. I would never have guessed. She seemed kinda harmless when I had my initial session with her.”
“Well, now you know. Isn’t it interesting that she was killed only hours after her lawyer filed a lawsuit against The Adler Group?”
“I guess.” Then I got what he was getting at. No wonder he was so happy now. “Wait, you’re thinking Adler is really behind her murder? Come on!”
“Absolutely. It makes perfect sense. Even you must agree with that. Just think about it a little. How often is a murder this easy to solve? Two eye witnesses and the perp passes out half a block away from the victim, ready to be picked up by the authorities? It’s all much too convenient, baby.”
Ignoring Ian’s term of endearment, I bit the inside of my lip. Okay, yeah, it was a plausible theory, but I wasn’t so sure it was much more than that—a theory. I told Ian this. “Besides, I can’t imagine Adler would be so stupid they’d have her killed right after being served. That would give them motive.”
“They were never served.”
“How do you know that?”
“Her lawyer told me.”
“What? You spoke to her lawyer?”
“Yep. Just got off the phone with her.”
“How did you manage to convince her to give you that information? Isn’t that confidential?”
Ian chuckled softly. “Maybe, but by now you should’ve figured out that I would never let such a detail stop me from getting what I want.”
“You told her you were from the FBI, didn’t you?”
“Of course. It’s amazing how easily you get people to talk when you mention that. So, you see, Adler and company already knew what your client was up to and chose to eliminate her before she’d given them a motive. Isn’t that very interesting?”
As annoying as it was, I had to agree that it was.
Chapter 4
After I’d ended my conversation with Ian, I did a Goggle search on Eve Koch, not expecting much to come up. I was right—except for some links to her social media accounts, there were no hits on her. This girl was quite active on social media such as Facebook and Twitter, though, especially on Facebook where she seemed to be posting a few times a day. Her page was available to the public, so I read some of her many posts and comments.
Right as I was about to stop reading, thinking I was wasting my time, my gaze zeroed in on a post Eve had made about homeless people. It contained a cartoon of an alcoholic sitting at a street corner, holding his hand out and asking for money. The cartoon was so big and loud it was hard to miss. Under it, Eve had written, in glaring caps: SHOULD YOU GIVE THIS MAN MONEY? ANSWER: OF COURSE NOT. WHAT YOU SHOULD DO IS KICK HIM LIKE THE DOG HE IS. ONLY WAY TO TEACH HIM HOW TO BEHAVE!
What the… She couldn’t be serious.
I read some of the many comments below in which people either called Eve foul names or agreed with her statement. Eve herself had chimed in, all of her comments as nasty as her initial post.
Well, I guess she is serious, I thought, my stomach turning a little.
I found my phone and called Ian.
“Hey, you,” he answered on the third ring. “Miss me already…?” I could tell there must be an annoying smile on his lips.
“Um, not exactly. I need you to look something up for me.”
“What’s that?”
“It turns out Eve is not as sweet and innocent as she seemed to me. According to a post on her Facebook page, Eve detested homeless people. I want to talk to the two eye witnesses and see what they have to say about the assault. If she did something to the homeless person to set him off.”
“If she did, don’t you think it would’ve been noted in the police report? There’s no such statement by the witnesses.”
“Maybe they never told the cops. Maybe they came in the middle of Eve and the bum fighting and didn’t realize Eve had been the one attacking him, not the other way around. The cops might never have asked them about it. An ID was all that was needed to solve the case, so they might have ended the investigation the moment the witnesses gave a proper ID. Not all cops are thorough. Surely you’ve encountered sloppy agents at the Bureau. I want to make sure we’re not jumping to conclusion about this case.”
“Fine. Hold on a sec and I’ll find them for you.”
I sat in silence as Ian dug up the two names for me.
“Lisa Huang and Pete Hannity. I can give you their contact info as well.”
“Please do. Actually, if you can email me a copy of the entire police report, it would be great. I want to read it.”
“Sure. Anything else?”
“No, that’ll do. For now.”
After I had read the report, I knew exactly how to get in touch with Lisa and Pete as well as the names of the two detectives assigned to the case. I would find a way to talk to the witnesses as soon as possible. If what I suspected was correct, maybe Eve’s death wasn’t so questionable after all, certainly had nothing to do with her trying to sue Adler like Ian believed.
I really hoped I was correct.
***
I opted to try to connect with the male witness first, a Wall Street trader, thinking it would be easier to get him to talk to me than the female one. All I had to do was go to the bar he was at that particular night and approach him. I’d discovered his taste for after work drinks by simply waiting for him when he left the building where he worked. The third night I hung outside his office, I had arranged to have the entire evening free and made sure I looked ready to mingle. I kept my fingers crossed I hadn’t done so in vain and that he would go out after work today as well.
I was in luck—he and three of his buddies, all of them in their mid-twenties, headed to one of the busy bars in Downtown Manhattan’s Wall Street area.
Stocky Pete Hannity was either a true party animal or so traumatized by the bloody murder he’d witnessed that he needed to get himself shitfaced to cope with it. Whatever the reason, I was glad he was going to bars as it sure made my task easier. When he had gotten a few drinks in him, it shouldn’t be too hard to chat him up, get the truth out of him.
I waited until they had all disappeared inside the White Horse Tavern, yet another bar for them to visit. I was beginning to wonder if they had a list of bars in the financial district they were determined to go through. They obviously didn’t have a favorite hangout.
The Tavern was jam-packed with party-hungry men and women in corporate clothing, most of them on the younger side. I was on the verge of being drenched in a beer that a loud guy spilled as I passed him, but I jumped aside at the last minute.
I was halfway into the large bar before I finally spotted Pete and his buddies standing at the other end of the oval-shaped wooden bar in the middle of the rowdy space, for a moment fearing I had lost them. They were downing beers and shots, laughing and talking, slapping each other’s backs and the bar counter every now and then.
Pete was seated on a stool at the bar, his buddies surrounding him like a human fortress. It was as though they knew someone wanted to get to him tonight and wanted to make it as hard as possible.
Well, I knew just what to do to make them give me access to Pete—I’d offer to buy them a round of drinks. As eagerly as they were downing their drinks, I couldn’t imagine they’d ever refuse such an offer. Trying to flirt with any of them was a bad idea. Maybe the wrong guy would take a liking to me and then I’d be stuck with him for the rest of the night.
By the time I’d gotten all the way around to where the four guys were drinking it up, I was longing for a cold beer myself despite hating beer I had gotten so hot and sweaty from pushing and shoving against all the p
eople. I prayed my makeup and hair still looked okay; even if I wasn’t planning on using my looks to win these guys over, I wasn’t stupid. If I looked all disheveled, they would be less likely to help me out no matter how many drinks I bought them.
I hadn’t bothered to change my looks since these guys didn’t know who I was, and after tonight I would never see them again anyway.
I made my way up to the bar counter as close as I could without making it obvious I wanted something. Then I smiled big at one of Pete’s friends who stood right next to me, a thick-necked redhead with a crewcut and a face full of freckles.
“Hey!” I said. “You guys must’ve had a great day on the market.”
“Yeah, it was a good one!” the freckly dude said and raised his foaming beer at me.
“Probably not as good as mine,” I said and winked. “Which is why I’m gonna buy you and your buddies a round of drinks. To celebrate all the dough I made today. What are you guys drinking?”
Freckleface’s tiny eyes got big. “You wanna buy us a round of drinks?”
“Uh-huh. Told ya I wanted to celebrate and you guys look like you know how to do that.”
“O-kay!” The dude turned around and slapped two of his buddies. He jabbed a thumb at me. “The lady here wants to buy us a round of drinks to celebrate her success on the market today. What do you guys want?”
It took me some time to get their orders with all the hollering going on and lots of spittle on my face that I pretended not to notice. Finally I knew what everyone wanted and ordered beers from one of the busy bartenders, even one for me. I’d suck it up, literally speaking. Drinking wine would make me stick out and I needed to blend in.
As soon as we got the beer and had cheered my imaginary success, I zeroed in on Pete, whom I had managed to squeeze myself next to much quicker than I had hoped. Pete had square glasses and pasty white skin, his short brown hair combed sideways the way corporate professionals so often did. He had the kind of look that was easily swallowed up by the masses of professionals crowding the sidewalks at rush hour in Manhattan. Especially since he wore the typical light blue button-down shirt and dark slacks thousands of other young men wore every day. There was absolutely nothing distinctive about him. As bland as he was, it was a wonder I had spotted him in this packed bar.
Well, here I was. Now I just needed to get him to give me what I wanted.
I gave him my best seductive smile and raised my glass, praying he was straight and that I was his type. I needed to use all my weapons to make this happen.
“To Wall Street and making money!” I said. He clinked his glass dutifully to mine. As I took a closer look at him, I noted that his eyes were not as flat as I had first assumed but a little glassy. I couldn’t tell if that was because he was really upset or just drunk already. Possibly a mixture of both. The one thing that seemed clear, though, was that he wasn’t completely relaxed. He kept rubbing his neck with his free hand as if it wouldn’t stop bothering him.
After having a sip of my beer, I took another look at him. Yes, he was no way near as happy and carefree as his friends. Something was definitely eating at him. It had to be Eve’s murder. Even so, I couldn’t just start asking him about it. Not when his and Lisa’s identities were still a secret. I had to come up with another way to get him to talk about what had happened that afternoon. What had really happened. I was sure it was more than what he’d stated in the police report. That report had just screamed of lazy police work to me. I was so glad I had bothered to do a Google search on Eve and found her nasty Facebook post.
“You’re pretty,” he said suddenly and gave me a halfhearted smile.
Relieved to get a positive reaction out of him, I broke into a big smile, tilting my head coquettishly. “Thank you.”
“I like redheads. They’re feisty and fun.”
“Well, that’s me in a nutshell. I’m feisty all right.”
“I need feisty,” he said, which I didn’t doubt as down as he seemed to be. He had a large swig of beer. I had another sip of my own. It tasted like crap and my stomach turned slightly as I swallowed, but I kept smiling. “And fun,” he continued. “Especially today. I just lost three million bucks for my company in a bad trade. I hope I still have a job tomorrow.” He sighed heavily and for a moment I feared he might start crying.
Oh, so that was why he was so down.
“I’m so sorry you lost so much money,” I said, making a guilty face. “Now I feel terrible bragging about all the money I made.”
He had another swig of beer and brushed his hand downward as if I was being silly.
“Don’t worry about it. Some days are good, some bad in this business. That’s just the way it goes. If I’m out of a job tomorrow, I can always find another one.”
“What company do you work for?” I asked.
“The Boehner Company.”
I nodded like I knew exactly what The Boehner Company was when I had no idea. I needed to quickly switch the subject or he might figure out I was not who I pretended to be.
“I work for Goldman,” I said.
“Really? That’s a great company. Well, not that you don’t know that already.”
“Yeah, it sure is.” The only reason I knew something about Goldman other than that it was maybe the most prominent investment bank out there was because one of my friends back in L.A. worked for them. Fortunately, the little I knew about that firm—like how big they were on charities, for example—would serve my purposes perfectly tonight. I leaned closer to Pete. “What’s so great about Goldman is not only how well they treat their employees, but their involvement in the community. Did you know they donated several million dollars to help the homeless last year?”
Pete lit up a little, finally looking like there was some life in him. “Really? I knew they were generous, but not that generous. Well, let’s hope the money will actually do some good.”
“Why wouldn’t it?”
“I know so many companies and organizations that keep pouring money into the homeless problem, but it doesn’t seem to make a difference. They’re still out there and as crazy as ever. Like looney bin crazy.” He grimaced and moved his index finger in circles at his temple.
“Yeah, I know. Most of them are either drug addicts or mentally ill. Or both. It’s so sad. Someone’s got to do something to fix that. Like really fix it.”
“Definitely.”
“If not, things could get real dicey. I’ve been attacked by a few bums, but luckily nothing bad happened. Did you hear about that girl who was stabbed to death by a homeless guy in midtown the other day? It was all over the news a few days ago.”
“Hear about it? Hell, I was there.”
I had to concentrate not to smile big; this conversation was definitely going in the right direction.
I made myself look shocked. “You were there? What’s that supposed to mean?”
He sat up a little taller. “I was one of the two eye witnesses to the event.”
“No! You were? It must have been horrible. What happened?”
He threw a glance over his shoulder, then leaned closer to me. “This will sound bad, but that chick had it coming.”
I frowned. “How did she have it coming?”
“She kicked that guy’s cup out of his hand when he asked if she could help him out.”
I gasped, covering my mouth. “No!”
“Yes,” Pete said, nodding gravely. “Then she yelled at him that he was a big loser and needed to get a job. That it was because of people like him that the country was in debt to China. She kept reaming him out as he crawled around, trying to gather his money. Finally, I guess the dude couldn’t take it anymore ’cause he shot up and started to stab her. It all went so fast that I have no idea where he got that knife from. My… my, um, friend and I were in total shock.”
