Dead Midnight (28 page)
The railing of the stairway to the upper deck seemed more wobbly than it had before. I moved slowly, testing each board with the toe of my shoe before I put any weight on it. I wasn’t sure what I’d do once I got up there. I’d take care of that when the time came.
She called after eight and said she’d taken care of everything. I was to tell no one what happened, particularly you, Jody. She said that if I did, we’d both suffer the consequences. I didn’t have to ask what she meant by that.
Once upstairs, I moved through the mist to the door. No lights inside the bar or the kitchen beyond. The padlock on the door, like the one on the boathouse, was a good one, would take a long time to pick. Time I didn’t have.
A window similar to the ones downstairs flanked the door on either side. I spotted some loose shingles beside the left one, pried them off. Only tar paper behind them, old and brittle; I pulled it free. Most of the insulation between the stud and the window was gone; I removed what was left and went to work on the Sheetrock with my Swiss Army knife. In minutes I’d cut loose a big enough piece to stick my arm through and release the window’s latch. The rusted aluminum frame grated in protest as I eased it open.
I waited to see if the noise had alerted anyone. Apparently not. After a minute I climbed up and through to the room beyond. As I recalled, a stairway led down from here to the lower level. I felt my way along the bar to the fire-door.
Locked from the other side.
From below I now heard a voice, harsh and insistent, but I couldn’t make out the words. It went on and on without interruption.
You don’t know her. She’s a greedy, arrogant woman who thinks the rules don’t apply to her. She’ll probably try to intimidate you and find out how much you know. Don’t underestimate her.
I put my ear to the door, straining to hear. Now a second voice was raised in protest. Again I couldn’t make out the words, but they were laced with fear. The other person interrupted with a scornful laugh.
There had to be another way down there. Maybe through the kitchen—it served both floors. They must’ve been able to take food downstairs without carrying it through the bar area.
I took out my flashlight and moved slowly, trying not to make noise. Cobwebs brushed at my face and hands; I knocked them away. When I pushed one of the bat-wing shutters, it nearly fell off the wall. I eased it free, laid it on top of the commercial cookstove.
There was a door set into the wall beside the stove—another firedoor, perhaps. I tugged on its handle, was hit by a blast of icy air when it opened. Walk-in freezer. But why use costly energy running it when—
A chill that had nothing to do with the temperature took hold of me. I stepped inside, not letting the door shut all the way behind me. Shone my light around—
And moved slowly toward a stainless-steel table draped in a paint-stained canvas drop cloth under which was a conspicuous bulge. I raised the cloth, shone my flash down.
Short blond hair, sparkly with ice crystals. Waxen, sculpted features that it was impossible to believe had once been poised, self-confident, animated. Bloody gash and discoloration at the right temple.
So this was how she’d “taken care of everything.” Well, not quite. Tonight she planned to finish the task.
When I went inside l heard voices yelling on the second floor. I ran up the stairs to the bar and saw they were fighting physically. Screaming at each other, something about Jorge. Tessa was getting the worst of it, and I knew firsthand how much damage Dinah could inflict, so l got between them and tried to stop them. Dinah was clawing at me, and Tessa was hanging on, using me like a shield. I turned and shoved her away and she fell and hit her head on the bar. The sound was horrifying, and I knew she was dead. So, like the true coward l am, I ran out of there, away from this terrible thing I had done.
I replaced the drop cloth over Tessa Remington’s frozen face. In the kitchen I leaned against the wall, breathing hard. There it was, the evidence I needed. Call 911 and—
“No!” The shout rose from downstairs, a truncated, terrified sound.
I looked around for another door. None there. But across the kitchen was a dark, empty space. No, not empty—a wooden cage. Dumbwaiter, how they sent the food downstairs.
I exchanged my flashlight for my gun. Though it was a large industrial-size cage, it would be a tight fit. If it was even operable. I located the Down button, squeezed in there—sitting down, my back to the rear, head lowered, knees bent. Pain stabbed my back in protest. I ignored it, pressed the button.
The cage jerked and bounced. Began its descent, clanking and growling. I brought my feet up, ready to kick out, the .357 grasped firmly in both hands.
The cage stopped abruptly, dealing a jarring blow to my spine. I rammed my feet at the wooden panel in front of me. It yielded, and I heard a cry of pain as it connected with flesh and bone.
I struggled out of the cage, barely gaining my footing. Stumbled back against the wall beside it.
“Watch out!” Jody Houston’s voice called.
I saw the pool cue descending just in time to duck. It swished past my head. Dinah Vardon swung the cue again, and this time it connected with my shoulder. The gun slipped from my hands; I went to my knees reaching for it. Vardon whacked me across the ass.
I scooted forward on my elbows under the pool table. My fingers touched the .357; I grasped it, rolled over, and brought it up. Vardon stood over me, the cue poised.
“Drop it, Dinah!”
She backed off but didn’t lower the cue.
I edged out from under the table, got to my knees and then to my feet.
“Drop it!”
She flashed me a contemptuous look, let the cue fall to the floor. “Listen,” she said, “put the gun away and we’ll talk.”
“No way.” I motioned to Houston, who sat in a straight-backed chair, her legs bound with duct tape, her arms trussed behind her. “Cut her loose.”
Vardon ignored the order. “It doesn’t have to be this way, you know. I have money, a great deal of it. I’ll pay you—”
“I don’t want your money. Cut her loose.”
“You haven’t heard how much. I have twenty-two million dollars. More, when I sign Tessa’s name to the sale documents for
InSite
’s building and sell this property. Still more, if I can crack the codes on her offshore accounts.”
“You’ll have plenty of time to work on that in jail—if they let you have your computer.”
“I’m not worried about jail. Or you.”
“You should be.”
“I don’t think so. Last chance to take me up on my offer, McCone.”
“No, thanks.”
“Your loss.” She shrugged and smiled. “If you won’t take my money, I know an excellent attorney who will.”
Wednesday
It was dead midnight when the police arrived.
I’d had no difficulty preventing Dinah Vardon from leaving—in fact, I hadn’t had to try. Acting oblivious of the .357 trained on her, she’d sat herself down on the pool table, called her attorney, and insisted he meet her at the Hall of Justice, then proceeded to ignore Houston and me. Later on I reflected that she reminded me of a cat that has gotten its nose out of joint: it puts its back to you and stares haughtily into the distance, but from the flattening and swiveling of its ears you can tell it is listening to everything that goes on behind it.
And in the interim between my 911 call and the arrival of the first squad cars, there was plenty for Vardon to listen to. Jody confirmed what Eddie Nagasawa had told me, and much of what I’d theorized. She’d asked Eddie about the insurance policy Roger claimed to have left her after a call from Vardon suggesting they “get together to talk about Roger.” After Eddie showed her how to retrieve Roger’s files, it had taken her a while to piece them together and figure out that the so-called policy was actually on her own computer. Finally she accessed it and put it on disc, uncertain as to what to do with it.
If at all possible, she didn’t want to make Roger’s confession public; Remington’s death had been an accident, but knowledge of his part in it would tarnish his memory in the minds of those who had cared about him. She felt for Tessa Remington’s husband and friends, however, and knew they deserved to learn what had happened to her. And Vardon became insistent, calling repeatedly, the conversations taking a threatening turn. When she encountered me at Roger’s flat and realized the Nagasawas were opening an inquiry into his suicide, she decided to take the disc to his father, but Daniel’s seemingly skeptical reaction made her back off. Vardon called again the next day, and Jody set an appointment with her, but fled to Oregon instead, taking the Zip disc with her.
Most likely Vardon had known or found out about Jody’s cottage in Eagle Rock and gone there with the intent of killing her. But coincidentally she met up with J.D. I’d probably never know what went on during their final confrontation. And given the lack of evidence, there was an odds-even chance she would never be charged with the murder.
She’d covered up an accidental death. Figured out Tessa Remington’s passwords and looted the Econium Measures funds. Driven around in the dead woman’s expensive car for two months while Tessa’s corpse lay in cold storage because she—as she’d bragged to Jody—could get away with it and wanted to taste what it was like to be rich. Bribed Kat Donovan to leave the area, arriving at her house in the BMW wearing a yellow head scarf that, to a neighbor who admitted to bad eyesight, made her look like “a blonde in a fancy car.” Held Jody hostage and repeatedly threatened to kill her if she didn’t turn over the disc.
And if I hadn’t stopped her tonight, she would have disposed of Tessa’s body, along with her personal effects, by pushing her car into the sea south of the city off treacherous Devil’s Slide. Jody was certain that even if she’d surrendered the Zip disc she’d have been a passenger in that car.
Arrogance is its own undoing, of course. Vardon had incriminated herself because she couldn’t resist bragging to Jody. And she hadn’t realized the limitations of her knowledge of forensics; given the condition of Remington’s body, no coroner would have believed she and Jody had died at the same time in the same car wreck.
But those crimes were nothing compared to the enormity of J.D.’s murder. It pained me to think there might never be justice for him.
Adah Joslyn’s voice spoke behind me. “Damn, McCone, you know I hardly ever check my e-mail at home.”
I turned toward her. Even at this late hour she was dressed in an elegantly tailored suit, her curly hair perfectly styled. “I sent a message to your office as well. Doesn’t somebody monitor what comes in when you’re off duty?”
“My counterparts on the other shifts, yes. One of them read it.”
“So he couldn’t figure it out and get over here?”
“He’s a recent hire from the Detroit PD. Your note said you were headed to the Last Resort. How the hell was he supposed to know what that is?”
“You’ve got a point there.” I glanced at the door, where Vardon was being led out in handcuffs, then looked across the room, where a paramedic was examining Jody.
“She’s one tough woman,” I said. “She held Vardon off as long as humanly possible. And shouted when she heard me moving around upstairs.”
“If she’d’ve come to us in the first place, J.D. would still be alive. And you and I both know that even if Vardon’s charged with murder, some hotshot lawyer’s gonna get her off on lack of evidence.”
Something was nagging at me. I closed my eye, struggled to bring the memory to the surface.
“McCone? You all right?”
I pictured J.D. smiling at me when we met outside
In-Site
’s building last Thursday. Heard him say, “You’re still doing that.”
I asked Adah, “How fast can you get a search warrant for Vardon’s house?”
“Case like this, pretty quick.”
“Good. This is a long shot, but I’ll tell you what to look for.”
“Hey, McCone!”
“Uhhh?” I was in bed in the RKI apartment, bruised and battered, and once again hiding from the press. A Vicodin-induced dream involving seahorses swimming among wildflowers still had hold of me.
“You were right,” Adah’s voice said. “Vardon kept the jeans and tee she wore home from Oregon after she stole your travel bag.”
That made me sit up. “And?”
“The penny was in the inside pocket of the jeans, right where you said it’d be.”
Again Vardon had been done in by her arrogance. No one would search
her
house. No one would connect the clothing with J.D.’s murder.
“For once,” Adah added, “it’s a good thing you’re superstitious.”
“Yeah, it is.” I’d distinctly remembered finding a shiny new penny and tucking it into the inner pocket of those jeans the last time I’d worn them. It was for just such occasions that the phrase “lucky penny” was coined.
Friday
Eventually you let go of it.
Now you know there are as many reasons as there are suicides. Often more than one cause for that final self-destructive act. And none of those reasons has anything to do with the living—with you.
I let go as I stood on the Marin Headlands, remembering.
Joey. His life, and he didn’t care to share it with any of us. For some reason he’d failed to bond with his own family members, just as we’d failed to bond with him. No need to feel guilt or remorse; it happens. His death was presumably the way he’d wanted it—lonely and private.
J.D. His life, and he’d given so freely of himself to others. But there had also been a closed, secretive side to him, the side that made him an investigative reporter. Death was nothing he would have willingly sought, but on occasion he’d risked it for the sake of a good story. No need for guilt or remorse there, either. He’d died doing the thing he loved most, and in time that knowledge would ease my sadness.
Behind me I heard the voices of those who had gathered on the bluff above the Golden Gate to celebrate J.D.’s life. An Episcopalian minister who had never met him but understood how much a proper service would mean to his religious parents had officiated, coached on personal details by J.D.’s friends. Tables with food and drink had been set up and, while his mother and father remained in attendance, we reminisced somberly. But after the limo hired to return the Smiths to the city departed, the gathering took on a lighter tone. Voices were raised in humorous and frequently irreverent remembrances. Glasses were raised as favorite J.D. anecdotes were related.