Cold Open, A Sam North Mystery (15 page)

Chapter Thirty-Seven

It was close to two, and we were on our way down the thruway and back to the city. I had five hours to be in Daniels’s office with confirmation and proof that Buck McConnell and IT&E routinely bribed foreign government officials to win contracts.

I had it.

Hunter had said so, I had it recorded, and I was feeling pretty good.

“Remember when these were tapes?” I asked, waving the little memory card that held the interview with Billy Hunter.

“You sound like my grandfather when I was ten. I remember when …”

“You saying I’m old?”

“No, I’m saying you sound like my grandfather. You losing your hearing now, too?”

It was hard not to be giddy. I was the proud owner of an interview with Billy Hunter, in which he had admitted to making more than a dozen bribes to various government officials—everywhere from Nigeria to Brazil—for IT&E.

He went on record saying that on two specific occasions he was told to pay whatever he had to pay per orders of the “man in charge.” He had been fired by IT&E six months ago, and once he was warmed up, he had no qualms about trashing McConnell and the company.

“So Billy says he was senior VP for bribes,” Freddie said.

“Appears that way.”

“You go on with his story and now you’re really all over McConnell.”

“I am.”

“What’s McConnell going to do next?”

“That’s what I’m hoping to find out. I got a damn good story here. Let’s see how he pushes back,” I said.

“You think there’s enough there to derail a presidential bid?” he asked.

“Maybe. Depends on where it goes after I break it.”

“He’ll probably blame it on an underling,” he said. “That’s what all these assholes do. CEOs, they know how to survive shit.”

“It is always the peons who pay for this stuff,” I said.

The thruway traffic was light; we were far enough north of the city that even with only two lanes in both directions we were still cruising along.

“There is something that bugs me,” I said.

“Feel free to keep it to yourself.”

“This whole thing with Herman.”

“The blackmailer,” Freddie said.

“We don’t know if that was him. If it was, and he got nailed, why would he try it again with Jack?”

“Exceedingly dumb?”

“I don’t think so. Hunter copped to everything, so Herman’s pictures were legit.”

“You call him to tell him you found Hunter?”

“Tried before. No one picked up. Just rang and rang.”

“Maybe he went out for some fresh air, turned over a new leaf.”

“I don’t know …” I said.

We were quiet for a moment before Freddie spoke up.

“I know where you’re heading with this, and I don’t like it,” he said.

“Come on. It will just take a moment. We’re already on this side of the Hudson.”

“Got me visiting shut-ins now,” Freddie said. “My social life is really suffering, hanging around with you.”

“Maybe you can come inside this time,” I said. “You know, meet Herm and see the place.”

“No, thank you,” he said.

“You’ll like Herman, I just know it.”

A short time later we cruised down Sherman Lane and parked in front of the Bindagi residence.

The street was quiet. People at work or inside to beat the heat. We walked up the front steps, I rang the doorbell, and we stood there in silence waiting for some sign of life. There was none.

“No one’s home,” Freddie said. “Let’s go.”

“This happened the other night. Herm’s a little slow to the door. He’ll probably peer out in a second.”

“Place gives me the creeps,” he said.

I tried the bell, then knocked, and still nothing. We had been standing there for probably five minutes now.

“Okay, I’m a little concerned,” I said.

“I’m a lot concerned,” Freddie said, looking down the street.

I pressed my face to the window where Herman had peered out of the other night but couldn’t see a thing inside.

“Let’s go around back, see what we find,” I said.

“Don’t want to be finding a pit bull,” Freddie said.

“C’mon, you’re supposed to be a big tough Rican from the Bronx.”

“And you’re supposed to be a semi-competent TV reporter,” he said.

We walked around the side of the house on a narrow, beat-up concrete pathway between Herman’s house and his neighbor’s. Around back there was a door with a few glass panes in the top half, and there were windows on either side of the door.

I tried the door, and it was locked. I peered in through a pane of glass.

“Anything?” Freddie asked.

“Nope. Kitchen is clean. No sign of the Rottweiler.”

“There’s a dog?”

“There was. Was kept in the kitchen, but he’s not in there now, I think.”

I stepped back from the door and looked at the window to the immediate left.

“Oh, no, no,” Freddie said.

“C’mon, it’s not like it’s breaking and entering,” I said.

“You mind telling me how it’s not?”

“I know Herman,” I said. “I’m a concerned friend. We stopped by and didn’t see him and, given his state of mind the other night, I grew concerned.”

“And decided to break into his house?” he said.

“Yes, to check on him. I’m a do-gooder—what can I say?”

Freddie was shaking his head. “Don’t like it. Not at all.”

The window was about five feet off the ground. It was going to be pain in the butt to get in through there.

“You know, let’s bag the whole window thing,” I said.

“Thank God.”

“I don’t want to rip my pants or shirt.”

“Don’t blame you. Let’s go,” he said.

I looked around, spotted a baseball-size rock, and picked it up.

“Got a better idea,” I said.

Before Freddie could say a word, I smashed the small glass pane in the door just above the knob. There was a quick burst of breaking glass.

I turned to see Freddie standing there shaking his head.

“That was easy,” I said.

“Sometimes you seem to get stupider by the minute.”

I used a stick to clear away the jagged glass, reached my arm in, and boom, we were stepping into the kitchen a few seconds later.

The place was quiet and clean and eerie.

“Herman,” I called, standing in the middle of the room. I looked around for the Rot, but there was no trace of him.

“We’re not going to go looking around the house, are we?” Freddie asked.

“How about you take the upstairs and I look down here?”

“Anything to get us out of here faster,” he said, and he set off down the hall to the front of the house and the stairway.

I wandered through the downstairs to the little living room where Herman had been sitting in his recliner the other night. The chair was still there, but all the snack wrappers and soda cans and garbage were gone. It was like the place had been professionally cleaned.

I returned to the kitchen and checked the little office off of it, and that was the same. All of the scattered files were gone. The piles of papers were cleaned up. It was like the house had been empty for months.

“No sign of anyone or anything up there,” Freddie said, coming back to the kitchen.

“Even the smell of the dog is gone.” I said.

“There’s no sign that anyone even lived here,” he said.

“That’s what worries me.”

Chapter Thirty-Eight

The car door slammed shut as soon as we hit the stairs down to the street. I turned and saw a man walking quickly along the sidewalk toward us.

Up the street in the other direction another door slammed shut as a man got out of an SUV. They were making their way on the sidewalk coming from opposite directions, walking briskly and with purpose.

We both noticed them at the same time.

“Maybe they’re real estate agents,” I said. “Here to look at Herm’s house.”

“Crap, and my piece is in the Jeep,” Freddie said.

“You’ve been carrying a gun? You never said you were carrying a gun. This is a no-gun operation,” I said.

Freddie nodded toward the guy closing in from our left. “Tell him that.”

I turned to get a look at the guy. In his hand was a small black handgun. The other guy was closing in as well, and I assumed he was armed, too.

There was only one way out, and that was back up the steps to Herman’s house. They had us cut off on both sides of the sidewalk; the Jeep was directly in front of us but wedged in between two cars. It would take some maneuvering to get out of the spot.

“Back door?” I asked.

“Sounds good,” Freddie said.

The men were fifty yards away on either side now.

“Let’s turn and run on three,” I said.

“Three,” he said, and we took off.

We took the steps two at a time and I could hear the sound of shoes on pavement behind us as we hit the little pathway alongside the house. We were at the back door again, reached in, opened it, and raced into the house.

“I’ll take upstairs,” Freddie said. “I’ll make some noise to pull one up. You’re on your own with the other guy.”

“Not a problem,” I said.

We ran down the hall, and I ducked into the living room; Freddie bolted up the stairs. I heard the back door smash open in the kitchen, then I heard Freddie stomping around above me.

I could hear each guy trying to play boss. It was another smooth-running operation.

“They’re upstairs.”

“How the hell you know they’re both up there? Could be a trick.”

“Then you go up, and I’ll look down here.”

“Why the fuck I have to go up?”

I half expected them to raid the fridge and discuss this further when Freddie made a huge commotion right above me.

“Holy shit, they might be going out the window.”

“I’m going up.”

I stood with my back to the wall right next to the opening to the hallway as one guy stormed past me and raced up the stairs. Freddie hit him as he got to the top, and he yelled, “Awwwwwww.”

The guy in the kitchen yelled, “Hey, Pete … you okay?”

I heard him bolt from the kitchen and race down the hall. I was going to have to move fast. I had boxed a bit as a kid and had studied karate throughout my thirties, but it had been a long time since I had thrown a punch. Morning-feature reporters usually aren’t mixing it up all that much in pursuit of the next fluffy story.

Upstairs there were the sounds of a struggle and then a tremendous thrashing. It sounded like bodies were flying into walls and furniture.

My guy was coming hard down the hallway, and it sounded like a bull was loose in the house. I balled up my fist karate style and reminded myself to lead with the knuckles. I jumped out and hoped to hell my timing was good. The guy was wide and fat and moving too fast for his size. His eyes bugged out in surprise, and I saw his right arm start to rise; I assumed a gun was attached to the end of it.

I twisted to my right to load my punch then snapped it off. My knuckles sailed into his nose, and pain shot through my hand as his body stopped cold. His feet went sailing out from under him, and he was horizontal in midair for a split second. He landed with a thud, and his head snapped back and cracked against the floor. I stood over him, my fist cocked and ready to follow up, but he was down. His eyes looked past me, straight up to the ceiling.

I kicked the gun from his hand as I heard someone race down the stairs. I spun around ready to strike again.

It was Freddie.

“What happened to him?” he asked, looking at the load on the floor.

“Slipped and hit his head,” I said. “Your guy?”

“Same,” Freddie said, grabbing the gun.

Upstairs there was a commotion, Freddie’s guy was getting up.

We ran from the house and leaped into the Cherokee. Freddie jockeyed the car out of the spot, and we pulled out just as the guy from upstairs came flying out the front door, his gun drawn.

“Go,” I yelled.

There was a flash from the gun, and I heard a pop. I ducked but there was no sound of a bullet hitting anything.

“Thank God he’s a lousy shot,” I said.

We were speeding down the street, and I heard the slow pinging of something inside the Jeep.

“What the hell is that,” I said. “You out of gas or something?”

Freddie glanced at the dashboard, then adjusted the rearview mirror and looked into the backseat.

“A door’s not shut all the way,” he said.

“Oh, crap,” I said, spinning around and looking in the backseat.

“Sons of bitches broke in. Probably looking for the camera,” Freddie said.

The camera was still on the backseat, but the little door to the compartment where the memory card goes was broken off.

“Oh, no,” I said. “They went for the memory card.”

“Please tell me you took it out,” he said.

“I did,” I said. I patted down my shirt pocket, but it wasn’t there. “I just don’t know where the hell it is.”

“It fall out in Herm’s house?” Freddie asked.

“Don’t know.”

“When was the last time you saw it?” he asked.

“I think, I think,” I said, trying to remember.

“Stop thinking. That’s the damn problem,” Freddie said.

“Last time I remembered seeing it was when I called Daniels. When we left New Paltz,” I said. “It was in my hand.”

The console. I had put it on the console between the seats. I looked down and saw everything that had been on the console—the papers and pens, the change and the other odds and ends that seem to fill up those things—was scattered on the floor at my feet.

“Look at this mess,” I said. “What a bunch of animals.”

“Anything spill on the floor?” Freddie asked.

“I got bigger things to worry about, like my career.”

“Like I said, anything spill on the floor?” he asked.

I leaned over and grabbed the bits and pieces and scrambled to sort through it all. There was no sign of the card.

I slumped back in the seat and exhaled.

“Gone?” Freddie asked.

“Long gone. My exclusive with Billy Hunter.”

It was just after three in the afternoon. I had four hours to meet the deadline Daniels set to prove Billy Hunter was bribing people for McConnell and IT&E. And the interview where he admits everything was gone.

“They got it,” I said.