Sara Paretsky - V.I. Warshawski 07 (50 page)

“Damn
right I do. What the hell are you doing in my office?”

“I
felt so bad about spoiling your shirt this morning that I just couldn’t sleep.
I thought if I could take it home and wash it for you, you might forgive me. Of
course, ironing isn’t my strong suit, but maybe Teri would do that.”

“Damn
you, Vic!” I heard a muffled voice in the background, and then Dick, softly,
saying, “No, it’s all right, sweetheart. Just a client who’s gotten herself in
over her head. Sorry to wake you up.”

“The lady
says you won’t pay her child support,” Miniver interjected on his line.

“I
won’t what?”

“Dick,
if you keep shouting like that, poor old Teri’s never going to get back to
sleep. You know, the back payments you owe me for little Eddie and Mitch. But I
looked in your Diamond Head file, and found that you had more cash than I ever
dreamed of. I haven’t been able to buy myself new shoes because every dime I
make goes to feeding your two little boys, but if you could spare something out
of Diamond Head, well, it would make a big difference.”

There
was a long silence, then Dick demanded to talk to the officer without my being
on the phone. Miniver, to make sure it stuck, had me bring Arlington onto the
line‘. Dick seemed to be asking if I had been searched, because Arlington said
all they’d found was a gun.

“He
wants to talk to you again.” Arlington jerked his head at me.

“You
don’t have any proof,” Dick said peremptorily when I was back on the line.

“Sweetheart,
you’re always underestimating me. I smuggled it out of the building before the
cops showed up. Believe me, I could be showing it to my newspaper friends by
this time tomorrow.”

He
was so quiet I could hear the Oak Brook birds begin to tweet behind him. “You
still there, Officer?” he said at last. “You can let her go. I don’t think I
want to press charges at this time.”

Miniver
and Arlington were so disappointed at not being able to arrest us that we
cleared the building as fast as possible. I didn’t want them to dream up some
secondary charge, like impersonating an electrician. The police followed us to
the Nova, and then tailed me closely until I had passed the La Salle exit on
Lake Shore Drive. They finally got off at Fullerton.

We
rode up to Belmont, where I turned into the harbor and cut the engine. The
eastern sky was already rosy with the coming dawn.

We
grinned at each other, then suddenly both began laughing. We laughed until our
ribs ached and the tears streamed down our cheeks.

“What
do we do now?” Mr. Contreras asked when he’d recovered from the fit.

“Sleep.
I can’t do anything else without a few hours in bed.”

“You
know, doll, I’m so… I don’t know what the word is. I don’t think I can sleep.”

“Wired,”
I supplied. “Yeah, but you’ll crash pretty soon and then you won’t be good for
anything. Besides, Peppy needs you. What I think…”

I
squinted at my watch. Five-fifteen. It was early to call anyone, but I didn’t
want to go back into our building alone right now. My own apartment should be
secure, but if Vinnie was tied into Chamfers at all, he could let a whole gang
into the building to waylay me. Or worse yet, my neighbor. I was damned if I
was going to cry for help to Conrad Rawlings. That meant I needed to turn to my
friends the Streeter Brothers. They ran a furniture-moving business, but did a
little security work on the side.

As it
turned out, I didn’t wake Tim Streeter. He and his brother Tom were already up,
getting ready for an early breakfast before starting a moving job. If I could
wait until six he’d be able to bring a crew of five over to my building on
their way to the move.

I was
ravenous. We whiled away the time at the all-night diner where we’d stopped
last night. Mr. Contreras, who hadn’t thought he was hungry, packed away three
fried eggs, hash browns, a side of ham, and four pieces of toast. I stopped
after two eggs and the hash browns. I hoped no one was going to jump us: a full
stomach isn’t the best preparation for battle.

Tim
and Tom Streeter showed up at ten after six, whistling lightly and joking with
their crew. The Streeter boys are both enormous, topping six-four and muscled
to move pianos down five nights of stairs. The three other men weren’t exactly
tiny either.

Leaving
two of the crew out front, the rest of us went around to the back. If someone
was hanging out on the stairs there, we’d be able to spot them before walking
into a trap. The sun was well up now; it was obvious that the area was clear.
We checked behind the garbage cans in the basement entry just to be sure, then
went up to my place. No one had penetrated my security system.

We
were cautious in moving through the front door into the main stairwell, but it
was clear too. I used my flash. Someone had been here last night: they’d left a
crumpled McDonald’s bag on the floor. And urinated on the stairs. For some
reason that enraged me more than the idea of people lying in wait for me.

“It’s
just punks, cookie,” Mr. Contreras reassured me. “You can’t let yourself get so
wound up over a bunch of punks. I’ll come up and clean it for you.”

“You
go take care of Peppy. I’ll worry about this.”

Tim
asked if I wanted someone to spend the day—they could manage the move with four
men if they had to. I rubbed my eyes, trying to think. Exhaustion was beginning
to encase my brain in concrete.

“I
don’t think so. We should be okay during the day. Can I check with you tonight?
Would you have someone if we need an extra body in a fight?”

Tim
agreed readily—business had been light lately. With the recession, fewer people
were buying new places and moving into them. We went downstairs together, to
make sure Mr. Contreras’s place was clear. I barely had the energy left at that
point to make it back up the three flights to my own apartment. I knew I should
scrub the stairwell, but couldn’t force the extra action on my body. I just
remembered to take off the shoulder holster and unhook my bra before collapsing
across the bed.

My
sleep was punctuated by dreams of the worst job I’d ever held, trying to sell
Time-Life books by phone in the early seventies, except in my dreams I was
being pursued by a relentless telemarketer. At one point I thought I’d actually
picked up the phone and yelled “I don’t want to buy anything now” into it. I
slammed it down only to have it start ringing again.

I sat
up in bed. It was one-thirty and my mouth felt like a cotton-ball factory. The
phone was ringing. I eyed it malevolently, but finally picked it up.

“Yes?”

“Is
this V. I. Warshawski? Why in hell did you hang up on me just now? I’ve been
trying to reach you all morning.”

“I’m
not on your payroll, Mr. Loring. I’m not worried about jumping high enough fast
enough to keep you happy.”

“Don’t
give me that crap, Warshawski. You yanked pretty hard on my chain Monday,
warned me Paragon’s affairs would be in the papers if I didn’t talk to you. You
can’t pull a stunt like that, then leave me hanging.”

I
made a sour face at the phone. “Okay. Let’s talk.”

“Not
over the phone. You can meet me in Lincolnwood in half an hour if you leave
now.”

“Yes,
but I’m not leaving the city today. You can be here in half an hour if you
leave now.”

He
hated it. All executives hate it when you don’t leap the first moment they bark
out an order. But I couldn’t stray from my base, even assuming my stiff body
would start moving. Between Vinnie and Dick something was going to happen soon.
I wanted to be here for it.

The
conversation ended with my giving Loring directions on how to find my
apartment. “And by the way, how did you get my home number? It’s not listed.”

“Oh,
that. I called some people to find out about you and they sicced me onto
Daraugh Graham at Continental Lakeside. He gave it to me.” The old executive
network strikes back.

I
staggered into the bathroom to scrub my teeth clean of lint. If I only had half
an hour, I needed a workout more than I did coffee. Since I still hadn’t
replaced my running shoes I put everything I had into my exercises, working a
lot more with my handweights than usual. It took a full forty minutes but my
brain felt looser, as if it might be willing to do a little work if called on.

I
showered and dressed. I dug through the mess on the floor of my hall closet and
unearthed an old pair of running shoes. They dated back five or six years and
were worn too thin for serious running, but they made getting around easier
than the loafers I’d been wearing.

Since
Loring still hadn’t shown, I made coffee and a snack. After fried eggs at six
this morning it was time to get back to a healthier regimen. I sauteed tofu
with spinach and mushrooms and took it into the living room with the Smith
& Wesson. I didn’t seriously expect Loring to attack me, but I didn’t want
to be really stupid at this point either. I tucked the gun under a stack of
papers on the couch and curled up cross-legged next to them.

I was
halfway through my tofu when Luke Edwards called to tell me the Trans Am was
ready. He gave me a lugubrious account of the patient’s near-death and her
survival, due solely to his heroic efforts.

“You
can come get it today, Warshawski. In fact, I wish you would—I need the Impala
back. I’ve got someone who wants to buy it.”

With
a guilty jolt I remembered leaving the Impala around the corner from Barney’s
on Forty-first Street. With all the truck traffic in and out of the warehouses
there, I sincerely hoped Luke’s baby was in one piece. I calculated times. If
Loring arrived soon I’d be able to leave by four, but I’d have to go south on
public transportation—otherwise I’d just have to fetch Rent-A-Wreck’s Nova back
later.

“I
don’t think I can make it before six, Luke.”

“I
got plenty to keep me busy here, Warshawski. I’ll be waiting for you.”

When
he’d hung up I looked at my watch again. It was close to three now—I guess
Loring had to prove he could keep me waiting, since I had made him come south.
Corporate egos are a much more disagreeable feature of my job than the
occasional thug.

I
called a friend of mine who was a senior counsel for the Department of Labor,
and was lucky enough to find him in his office.

“Jonathan:
V. I. Warshawski.”

It
had been some months since we’d last spoken. We had to go through the ritual of
discussing baseball—Jonathan, who’d grown up in Kansas City, had a regrettable
affection for the Royals—before I could ask what I needed to know. I sketched
it as a hypothetical scenario: a company wants to convert a union’s pension
fund to an annuity and pocket the cash. They get the duly elected officers of
the collective bargaining unit to sign on to the plan.

“Now,
suppose the officers sign on without putting it to a vote of the rank and file.
Would the courts see that as legal?”

Jonathan
thought a bit. “Tough one, Vic. There’ve been some related cases under ERISA,
and I think they hinge on how the local conducts its business. If the officers
make other financial decisions for the local without a vote, I think they’d
probably find that it was legal.”

ERISA
was a twelve-year-old law supposedly designed to protect pension and other
retirement programs. It had already generated more volumes of federal case law
than the Talmud.

“What
if the officers received, well, substantial cash for signing on to the plan?”

“A
bribe, in fact? I don’t know. If there was evidence of intent to defraud the
union… but if it was just to convert a pension to an annuity, it’s possible
ERISA would find it unethical but not illegal. Is it important enough that I
should check up on it?”

“It’s
pretty important, yes.”

He
promised to look into it by Friday. When we’d hung up I wondered what position
Dick was really in. He must have looked into the legal angle before getting
Eddie Mohr to sign over the pension fund. Surely he hadn’t been so blinded by
greed that he’d exposed himself to a federal prison sentence.

My
spinach was too cold now to be appetizing. I took the plate back to the
kitchen. Presumably the folks at Diamond Head killed Mitch Kruger because he
saw Eddie living well and wormed out of him how he’d got the money from the
company. And when Mitch came around trying to get them to ante up for him, they
conked him on the head and pushed him into the San. Did that mean they knew
what they’d done was illegal? Or just that they were afraid it might be? People
panic at the thought of exposure when they’ve done something shameful. And if
the bosses let their panic be felt by underlings whom they’ve hired strictly
for brute muscle, anything can happen. Still, Dick was walking a mighty fine
line here.

I
found myself holding the plate, staring abstractedly out the kitchen window,
when Loring finally rang the bell. Mr. Contreras was up and about: I could hear
his fierce interrogation of the visitor when I opened my front door.