Sara Paretsky - V.I. Warshawski 08 (33 page)

He
was grinning like a fool when he climbed down from the can. “I knew the theory,
but it’s interesting to see it in practice. Now what do we do?”

“Move
to the mouth of the alley and wait to see if all hell breaks loose.”

We
sat for fifteen minutes in the dark shadows. Ken put an arm around me and
kissed me. I twisted his arm down to his side.

“What’s
that hard thing next to your breast? A gun? You ever use it?”

“Yep.
But I’d just break your arm for you if I thought you were getting out of hand.”

“Think
you could?” He made fighting sound like an exciting form of foreplay.

“I
know I could,” I said in a voice like chalk.

He
was quiet for a minute. “You don’t think I seriously like you, do you?”

“I
think you don’t know if you’re playing a game or if you like me. And either way
it doesn’t matter. I’m old enough to be your mama and I’m not Cher—I don’t need
perpetual youth to keep me from feeling my age.”

Maybe
I needed to keep breaking and entering to stay young at heart. I kept that
thought to myself, though, and let Ken beguile the rest of the wait by telling
me of his hope to join the Peace Corps in Eastern Europe, and Darraugh’s
conviction that if he didn’t get a job or go to graduate school straight out of
college no employer would take him seriously. I tried not to think about time
passing, or—worse—what Conrad would say if he knew what I was doing.

When
we’d waited long enough for an army to arrive, I went around to the front and
used my picklocks on the door. Ken kept watch, but the streets were empty in
the hour before dawn. The locks were solid but nothing special—Jasper relied
too much on his alarm system. Even having to fumble in the dark it only took
five minutes to get inside. I relocked them behind us and turned on the lights.

A
Few Bucks in Petty Cash

I
sent Ken to Tish’s computer. “I want to know what her files say about five
things: Century Bank, Gateway, Lamia, Home Free’s construction projects, and
JAD

Holdings.
The best place to start is the accounting files. I’m going to look in Jasper’s
private office.”

Ken
switched on Tish’s machine, but grumbled that it was no challenge to break into
a system like hers: all the files were neatly labeled and accessible.

“It
would be better if you’d let me use your picklocks: I’ve never actually broken
in through a door. I could show you how to look at the computer while I
practiced with the door.”

“We
don’t have time to screw around,” I snapped at him. “Even though it’s Saturday,
Tish or Jasper may come into the office.”

The
wood veneer on Jasper’s door covered a steel plate and a couple of
sophisticated locks. I squatted in the narrow space and set carefully to work
while Ken began studying files. Working with gloves on slows you down because
you lose some of the sensitivity in your fingertips, but I wanted to make sure
I left no prints behind. At the end of half an hour I managed to get both locks
undone.

Before
going inside I went to see what Ken was finding. He had Home Free’s payables on
the screen for March. I scanned it. They had paid payroll taxes, insurance for
Tish and Jasper and the premises in Chicago and Springfield, and had made
various payments to what I presumed were construction firms, since
Charpentier’s name figured several times in the list. Poor Tish got only thirty
thousand a year—not much for all the work she did. Jasper didn’t treat himself
much more royally: he earned fifty thousand. Their travel budget seemed large,
but Jasper said he went to Springfield a great deal.

Total
payables for the month came to a little more than a million dollars.

Since
their state filing last year had shown them with ten million in funds, that
seemed like a reasonable monthly payout. I asked Ken to print out last year’s
accounts and to keep hunting for the names I’d mentioned.

Inside
Jasper’s office I moved gingerly among the electronic equipment—I didn’t want
to trip off some ancillary alarm. I poked around the room hunting for a back
exit, just in case, and found it finally in the small bathroom that had been
carved out of the far corner. It seemed kind of funny to have a shower with a
bolted steel door for a back, but it was an efficient use of space.

I
glanced nervously at the clock built into the desk console: almost five now. I
went back to the front room for Ken and saw with annoyance that he’d shed his
gloves.

“You
fool! You can’t leave prints in here. You’re on file, you know. If we mess
something up or have to run for it they may be suspicious enough to print the
place!”

“I
can’t work with them. I thought you saw me take them off when I spliced the
phone line.”

“Put
them on or go home.”

He
looked at my face and decided against argument. When he’d pulled them from his
jeans pocket and put them on again I asked him to come into Jasper’s office
with me.

“I’m
getting nervous now that day has arrived. I want to switch on his street
monitor. I’m afraid if I hit a wrong switch I’ll trip some secondary alarm.”

Ken
inspected the controls on the left side of the desk, then knelt to look
underneath. “I can’t tell what all these are, but this one seems to be attached
to the wire that goes out to the camera on the front door.”

He
turned on the screen and hit a switch. The Korean restaurant across from Home
Free came into focus, followed by a picture of a car coming up the street.

I
thanked him and began looking through drawers, briefly scanning paper files.

A
rosewood cabinet underneath the desk had a lock built into it, and not a
trivial one. In the interests of time I was tempted to let it go, but was too
curious about what had to be secured inside a locked office. When I had it
undone I glanced nervously at the clock: it was five-thirty. I checked the
monitor. Someone was getting into a car in front of Home Free; more cars were
starting to pass the building. I was thankful for the thick shielding Jasper
had placed on the front windows.

I
pulled open the cabinet. My jaw dropped. The drawer was packed with neatly
wrapped packets of bills. The top layer showed hundreds except for a corner
sectioned off with cardboard that held twenties. I lifted a few packs. Hundred
dollar bills as far as the eye could see. I did some quick calculations, trying
to estimate the hoard. As near as I could reckon it would be close to five
million dollars. No wonder the building was so secure.

In
such large quantities the money didn’t look real. The only context I had for
that kind of cache was television news pictures of drug stashes. Was Jasper
dealing on the side? I remembered my words to Conrad earlier—drugs were trite.

What
else could generate that much cash—and why else would it be in cash? Maybe it
was counterfeit—maybe Jasper was funneling funny money into the system. That
would explain why he needed both an acquiescent bank and to put the lid on City
Hall.

“Hey,
Vic—come here a minute. I’ve found something that might interest you.”

Ken
called from the front room.

I
shot a quick look at the monitor as I stood up, and nearly froze. Jasper
Heccomb was climbing out of a car in front of the building.

“Ken!”
I screamed. “Come in here now!”

I ran
to the door. He was gaping at me, bewildered.

“Now!”
I hissed, “Jasper’s here. Move!”

As he
stared, immobilized, we could hear Jasper’s key scrabbling in the lock.

Running
to Tish’s desk, I grabbed Ken’s arm. Yanked him in my wake into the inner
office. Slammed Jasper’s door shut, turned the dead bolt, hustled Ken into the
bathroom with me. I took an extra second to shove that lock home. It was a
flimsy one, but probably didn’t open from the outside.

I
climbed into the shower. “Stand behind me while I move these bolts. There isn’t
room in here for two.”

The
hair was standing up on my head. Sweat poured down my neck. My fingers were
clumsy with fear but I finally slid the bolt free. I pushed the door open into
the alley just as Jasper started pounding on the bathroom door, demanding that
we come out with our arms above our heads.

As we
loped down the alley I heard a shot—Jasper breaking the door down.

“Come
with me. Don’t worry about your car—you can pick it up later.”

I
opened the Trans Am and was in with the motor running while he was still
fumbling with the door, looking worriedly at his own car. At last he climbed in
beside me. I roared down the street.

Lawrence
Avenue was coming alive in the thin gray morning. It was after six now—I’d
goggled at the money longer than I thought. The Korean and Arab merchants who
dotted the area were starting to arrive at restaurants and bakeries. Traffic
was still thin enough that I could keep an eye on the road behind me. I didn’t
think Jasper was after us. I wasn’t sure what he drove—when I saw him on the
monitor I’d been too shocked to pay much attention to the vehicle. A little
sports coupe, I thought, trying to remember the image. Maybe a Miata.

At
Burton I turned north, drove up to Foster, and made a giant U on the side
streets to the Kennedy. I thought we were clear. I took the expressway to
Belmont but parked several blocks from my apartment. If Jasper had alerted my
watchers I wanted to come at them on foot.

“Go
down to my building and see whether you can spot anyone—either hanging around
the entrance or sitting in a car. I’ll wait up here by the diner.”

How
had Jasper known we were there? Maybe one of those wires on his desk console
fed an alarm in the rosewood cabinet, something that went off in his house. He
wouldn’t want the cops, or the alarm company, to come in on that wad.

The
image of Deirdre floated to my mind, her brains and blood forming a sticky mass
on my desk top. Had she found the money in the course of her volunteer work and
taxed Jasper with it? Was he the man who was meeting her in my office that
Friday night?

Jasper
could easily guess I was behind this morning’s break-in—I’d been asking
questions with the subtlety of an elephant in musth. Maybe he assumed I knew
something was amiss at Home Free—he probably thought I was trying to goad him.
No wonder he had been so scornful when I asked if he could find a placement for
Ken.

I
felt the skin on the back of my head tingle and tighten, in the spot where
they’d hit Deirdre. Why was I still walking around? Why hadn’t my followers
taken advantage of any number of opportunities to assault me? Maybe they were
waiting to find out how much I knew. After this morning they wouldn’t wait much
longer.

As
soon as Ken returned with an all clear I took him into the diner, stopping at
the counter to snag orange juice from the cooler. I forced Ken to drink a glass.
His green-gray pallor eased slightly.

I
took him to a booth. Barbara, the waitress who usually looks after me, came
over with the coffeepot. She wanted to check out my date, teasing Ken until
someone at a neighboring table asked for her. For once he let sexual innuendos
roll past him without a response.

“Eggs
for me this morning, Barb—poached with hash browns,” I called after her.

“How
can you eat?” Ken muttered. “I feel like I might throw up. Do you think he’ll
check my fingerprints?”

“You
feel sick because you’ve been up all night and you’ve had too much excitement
on an empty stomach. Believe me, food is what you need.” I flagged Barbara and
got Ken to order something. “As for your prints—you probably rubbed them out
when you put the gloves on. Even so, he’s sitting on something so volatile I
doubt he would call the cops in. Unless he’s got exceptionally cool nerves.
What did you see down the street?”

“There’s
no one in front of your place, but your cop pal’s car is there. How did you
shake him off when you left last night?”

“He’d
gone out after a murderer. What had you seen in the files—you called to me just
before we ran away.”

“Oh,
that.” He swallowed coffee and rubbed his head, trying to make himself behave
with my own coolness. “I’d found a couple of interesting things. The first was
a contributors’ list. Someone had given a huge amount of money to Home Free
last year—a good quarter million dollars.”

“Do
you remember the name?”

He
squeezed his eyes shut, thinking, then gave an embarrassed smile. “Running away
chased it out of my head.”

“I’m
going to write out a list of names. You tell me if you recognize any of them.
Do you have a pen on you?”

He
fumbled in his pocket and came up with a grimy ballpoint. I took one of the
napkins and listed a dozen names, including Fabian, Gantner, and Blakely along
with nine others that I made up at random. Ken studied the list, squinting at
the fuzzy writing on the napkin.

“Gantner.
I’m pretty sure. I think Blakely was a donor—big, but not as huge as Gantner.
Bill Buckner sounds familiar too.”