The Fregoli Delusion (21 page)

“Like Jarrett's wife?”

“She’s already explained our
relationship, Donaghue. I don't have anything to add to that.”

“Did you ask Mrs. Jarrett to
divorce her husband?”

“Of course not. Chrissy has her
life and I have mine. I'm completely satisfied with the way things are.” He
glared at Hank. “If you think jealousy was a motive for me to shoot her
husband, you're even more stupid than you look.”

Truly could see that Hank was
making an effort to remain patient.

“How's your business doing, Mr.
Crocker?” he asked. “These are tough economic times.”

“It's doing very well, thanks. It
would be doing even better if I could make this meeting in Chicago. We’re
negotiating to acquire a distribution chain that’ll be key to our growth in the
next decade. Are we done here?”

“When are you coming back to
Glendale?”

“Tonight.”

“Do you possess a firearm, Mr.
Crocker?”

“Yes, I do. I keep it locked in
the safe in my office at home.”

“What kind is it?”

“A Colt.”

“Do you mind if we take a look in
your car?”

“Of course I mind. Are you insane?
Don’t you understand you need a warrant for that kind of gross intrusion on a
person’s privacy? Are we done now?”

When Hank glanced at Truly, she
shrugged. Crocker hadn’t acknowledged her presence the entire time. He was the
kind of male who made her skin crawl: too successful, too good-looking, too
self-important. A complete solipsist. If she wanted to ask Crocker any
questions right now, Hank was giving her the opportunity, but she preferred to
have more background on him before trying. She liked to have a few angles of
approach in mind before tackling a difficult subject, and at the moment Crocker
was a blank wall to her. She shook her head.

Hank put away his notebook and
stood up.

“We appreciate your time. We'll be
in touch with you again later.”

“I sincerely hope not.” Crocker
threw himself out of the armchair and left the lounge without a backward
glance.

“I want a warrant for his personal
finances,” Hank said, “his phone records, the gun in his safe, and everything
else you can think of, including that damned case of scotch.”

“Yes sir,” Truly said, standing
up.

“Don't call me sir, Maureen.”

“Sorry.”

21

There was a button next to the
door that sounded a discreet chime within the suite when Horvath pressed it. He
waited, self-consciously brushing imaginary flecks from his lapels, until the
door opened. Melissa Grove leaned casually against the frame, looking him over.

“I’m Kincaid,” Horvath said.

She smiled and despite himself
Horvath felt his adrenaline spike. She was tall and very well-built. Her dark
brown hair cascaded across her shoulders, and the scarlet kimono wrap belted
around her narrow waist failed to conceal her disproportionately large bust. She
tapped one of her black mules on the carpet and gestured for him to come in,
closing the door behind him.

“Welcome,” she murmured, giving
him a light embrace. “You look fabulous, just as I hoped you would. As dreamy
as your voice on the phone.”

“Thanks.” Horvath held her for a
moment, conscious of her fragrance.

She stepped back, lightly gripping
him by the elbows for a moment. “I don’t normally accept Saturday afternoon
appointments on such short notice, but I think I’m going to be very glad I made
an exception in your case. Let’s sit down for a moment and get to know each
other a little better.”

“All right.” Horvath followed her
into a seating area, where he sat down on a beige leather couch while she
poured liquid from a ceramic pot into two small cups and handed him one.

“It’s green tea,” she said. “An
excellent source of anti-oxidants.”

Horvath looked at it dubiously.
“Nothing stronger? To maybe relax us a little?”

“Definitely not. Alcohol dims the
experience, John, and we must treat our bodies as temples at all times.”

“I get you,” Horvath said,
dropping his gaze to her chest.

“Easy, tiger. Plenty of time.”

Horvath took an envelope from his
inside jacket pocket and handed it to her. She accepted it, ran her thumbnail
over the bills inside, then got up and locked it away in a cabinet along the
far wall. “You didn’t exaggerate when you said your bonuses are generous. Why
don’t you tell me a little bit about yourself? That way I’ll have a better idea
what sort of experiences we can share next time you visit.”

“Personally, I’d like to know a
little more about you,” Horvath replied. “What sort of things you’ll do for
me.”

“My, my. Direct, aren’t you? I’ll
do whatever you like, John, as long as you always behave like a gentleman.”

“I might have unusual requests.”

“Whatever you want,” Melissa said.
“It’s your money.” She loosened the tie on her kimono suggestively.

Horvath nodded. “In that case,
could you go to the door and let my partner in? She’s waiting in the hall.”

Melissa leaned back, frowning. “I
take couples, John, but I require advance notice.”

“That’s okay.” Horvath stood up.
“I’ll let her in.”

“Really, I’m a little
disappointed, John. I’d rather have known in advance you were bringing someone
else.”

Horvath walked to the door and
opened it. Karen walked in, shaking her head. “Tsk tsk, Melissa. What would
your boyfriend say?”

Horvath showed Melissa his badge
and identification. “Now, where were we?”

Melissa glared up at him. “Oh,
really, this is just ridiculous. You’re a cop? This is entrapment, pure and simple.”

“Not at all,” Horvath replied easily.
“Entrapment is when you coerce somebody to do something they wouldn’t normally
do. This is obviously what you normally do, hon, and I didn’t have to talk you
into anything.”

“What’s the point? I’ve never been
arrested for anything before.”

“Yeah, well, that’s about to go
down the tubes,” Karen said.

“A misdemeanor.”

“Which carries a penalty of up to
a year in the slammer.”

“It’d never get that far.”

“Don’t be so sure,” Horvath said
sadly. “I have a confession to make. I’m not a virgin. I’ve done this before.
Bust hookers, I mean.”

“I’m not a hooker. I’m a
courtesan.”

“And a very fine one, at that. Why
don’t you ask us what we want?”

Melissa covered her face with her
hands for a moment. “What do you want?” she asked finally, her voice faint
through her long fingers.

“We want you to drop all this
bullshit about Richard Holland and tell us the truth. His alibi for Thursday
morning was bought and paid for, correct?”

Melissa lowered her hands and
wrung them in her lap. “I can’t say anything.”

“How much did he pay you?” Karen
asked. “Enough to make it worth your while to go to jail for him? Look,
darlin’, it’s not just the prostitution thing. When we nail Holland’s ass for
murder, you’ll go down with him. Accessory to murder, lying to police officers
in the course of an investigation, obstruction and hindering. You can kiss all
this goodbye, starting right now.”

Tears began to leak from beneath
the long black lashes.

“Oh, for crissakes,” Karen said,
feigning disgust.

“It’s in your best interest to
come clean,” Horvath said.

“I can’t.”

“Sure you can. Just tell us when
Holland called to set up his alibi, how much he paid for it, all the details.”

“I’m afraid.”

“You wanna be,” Karen snapped.

“No, you don’t understand.” She blinked
away her tears, looking up at Karen. “I’m afraid of
him
. He’s sadistic
and demands an awful lot of ego-stroking. I’m not sure what he’ll do when he
finds out I’ve gone back on our agreement.”

“What are you, his shrink or
something?”

“Almost.” She took a handkerchief
from the pocket of her kimono and dabbed at her streaked makeup. “I majored in
psychology and I recognize the type. He’s a classic narcissist.”

“
You
went to college?”
Karen asked skeptically.

“I have a graduate degree. I paid
my way through five years of school with this business.”

“And a whole lot more, from the
looks of it. This is a pretty fancy nest.”

“Holland told you to lie for him,
is that right?” Horvath prompted. “He paid for an alibi? He told you to tell us
he was here with you on Thursday morning when he really wasn’t?”

She nodded.

“How much did he pay?”

“Ten thousand dollars.”

Horvath glanced at Karen and saw
the triumph glittering in her blue eyes. He turned back to Melissa. “That’s it?
You lied to police officers in the course of a homicide investigation for ten
grand?”

“Up front. As a retainer. Another
twenty thousand if I was questioned by police and repeated his alibi, which I
was and I did. And another fifty thousand if I’m called to testify in court.”

“So you stood to make eighty grand
just to provide him with an alibi, and you’ve collected thirty so far?”

Melissa nodded again.

“You need to come with us,”
Horvath said. “We want a written statement. We can arrange for protection for
the next while, if necessary.”

“It will be. He has a mean streak
when he doesn’t get his way.”

“Get dressed. We’ll wait.”

She stood up, clutching the kimono
tightly around her.

“I’ll need the envelope back,”
Horvath added. When she hesitated, he gave her a crooked little smile. “It
belongs to the taxpayers, Melissa. Give them a break.”

She took the envelope from the
cabinet and handed it to him. “You know, I liked you better when you weren’t a
cop. We were getting along so well.”

He watched her walk across the
carpet to her bedroom, then turned and grinned at Karen.

“All the courtesans tell me that.”

22

“Nice dump,” CSI Jon Beverley
quipped as he passed Hank at the foot of the staircase and trotted up toward
the second floor of Perry Crocker’s home at 11145 Waterbury Place in Granger
Park.

“Any luck, Bev?” Hank called after
him.

“No other guns yet, Lieutenant.
But the evening's still young.”

Two other crime scene technicians
followed in Beverley's wake. As they clumped upstairs, equipment in hand, Truly
appeared at the top, looking down at Hank.

“We're ready to do the
housekeeper's suite, Lieutenant.”

Hank turned and lifted an eyebrow
at Jeannette Faucher, the Haitian-American woman who stood next to him, arms
folded defensively across her chest.

“You have no right to do this,”
she complained. “I'm an American citizen, just like you. How would you like me
to go into your home and do this to you?”

Hank looked at Perry Crocker's
lawyer, standing next to her. “Mr. Baggs. We'd rather that she open the door
herself, but we can open it ourselves if we have to.”

Baggs shifted uneasily. “Mrs.
Faucher, as I already explained, their warrant includes your suite in addition
to Mr. Crocker's home and vehicles. You asked for my help and I'm glad to give
it, but you need to be reasonable. They can only look for firearms or the
specific brand of camera stated in the warrant, that's all. It's much better if
you cooperate and allow them to conduct their search with as little fuss and
damage as possible. A show of goodwill goes a long way in situations like this.”

“I'll ask you again what Detective
Truly asked you before, Mrs. Faucher,” Hank said. “Do you own a firearm and, if
so, do you keep it in your suite?”

Faucher glared at Baggs.

“Please,” the lawyer said.

“All right, all right, all right.
Yes, Mr. Police Man, I got a gun. For protection, you know? This is a very
fancy house and Mr. Crocker, he's away all the time. Maybe somebody try to
break in to my room and I have to defend myself. Ever think of that, Mr. Police
Man?”

Hearing Truly coming down the
stairs behind him, Hank asked, “Where do you keep it, Mrs. Faucher?”

“In the little table next to my
bed. Where I can reach it in the middle of the night if someone breaks in and
tries to rape me, Mr. Police Man.”

“To the best of your knowledge,”
Truly said, “is it there right now?”

“Sure, it's there. It's always
there.”

“Would you show me, please?”

Faucher huffed angrily, glared at
Hank, and pushed past him to follow Truly upstairs. Her suite of three small
rooms, plus a bathroom, was located over Crocker's four-bay garage. It was
accessible through a locked door at the end of the hallway on the second floor.
While there was also an entrance from ground level on the far side of the
garage, Hank and Truly had agreed it would be preferable to enter her living
area from Crocker's side. A search of the suite had been included in the
warrant signed by Judge Brown only because it was contiguous to Crocker's
living area and because it was reasonable to assume that since Crocker
possessed a key, he could have entered the suite at any time to hide a murder
weapon, should one have been in his possession.

The lawyer had already opened
Crocker’s safe for them, and Bev had bagged a Colt .45, along with a box of
ammunition, but it was clearly not the murder weapon. Hank knew the tests would
prove that beyond a shadow of a doubt. They needed to find a gun that fired
.22LR ammunition if Crocker was going to remain a viable suspect.

A warrant served earlier on the residence
of Stephen Willis had been disappointing. Willis confirmed he’d returned home
on Thursday to find a case of scotch and a box of cigars sitting on his
doorstep. He’d called Crocker and joked about it, but had no other way of
confirming they’d actually been left there by Crocker himself since his home
security system, surprisingly, didn’t include doorstep video surveillance. He’d
removed the six bottles and discarded the case, which had been picked up by
city sanitation on Friday, so fingerprint evidence had now been recycled into
oblivion. They took the bottles anyway, one of which had already been opened by
Willis. He was not pleased, to say the very least.

Baggs's cell phone rang. He
answered it, turning away from Hank and wandering down the hall. “Yes, Perry.
Yes, they're still here. No, as I said, they’ve taken it to their compound to
do the search there. I’ve made arrangements for one of your other cars to be
there when you arrive. All right, I'll tell him.” He ended the call and came
back to Hank.

“That was Mr. Crocker, Lieutenant.
His departure was delayed, and he doesn't expect to be home for another hour. I
told him you've already taken his car from the airport. He was a little upset.
Hopefully it can be returned to him as soon as possible.”

“Depends on what we find.”

“Understood, Lieutenant. My client
wishes only to cooperate. He's completely confident that since he hasn't done
anything wrong, this will all be cleared up very quickly.”

“Sure.” Hank glanced at his watch.
Karen and Horvath would be executing a similar search warrant right now on
Richard Holland’s residence and car, as a result of having punctured his alibi
this afternoon.

He went upstairs, Baggs following
him, and walked down the hallway to Faucher's suite. He found Beverley in the
bedroom, holding up a revolver in a plastic evidence bag.

“A .357 Magnum S and W,
Lieutenant.” Beverley glanced at Baggs and Faucher, making an effort to hide
his disappointment.

“Keep looking,” Hank said.

“Roger that.”

“Now what the hell am I supposed
to do to protect myself, Mr. Police Man?” Faucher demanded.

Hank glanced at Baggs, whose cell
phone had chimed. The lawyer looked at the display, put the phone away, and
left the suite.

“No sign of a camera,” Truly said
when he returned to Faucher's tiny living room.

“Keep looking,” he told her.

“I said I don't got a camera,”
Faucher complained behind him. “Why would I want to spend my money on something
so foolish like that?”

“Keep looking,” Hank repeated and
went back downstairs.

A uniformed officer met him in the
hallway. “Media's outside,” he said. “The lawyer's gone out to talk to them.”

“Wonderful.” Hank looked through
the open front door. Rachel Pierk was interviewing Baggs in Crocker's driveway
beneath the spotlight at the corner of the big three-car garage. Hank slipped
out onto the verandah and went down the stairs. It was remarkable, he thought,
how journalists were able to get wind of search warrants almost as soon as they
were signed off by the judge. He wondered who Pierk's source was this time.

“Mr. Crocker is very pleased to be
able to cooperate with the police in this very important investigation,” Baggs
was saying as Hank crossed the lawn. “He’ll be more than happy to share any
information he might have that will assist them in their efforts to apprehend
the person who committed this heinous crime.”

“I understand they're searching
Mr. Crocker's home and vehicle for the gun used to murder H.J. Jarrett,” Pierk
said. “Does Perry Crocker admit to owning a gun, and have the police found it
in their search?”

“Mr. Crocker has exercised his
second amendment rights to defend himself within his home,” replied Baggs, “and
he has turned over to the police the firearm which he keeps locked away at all
times. As I understand it, the police are looking for an entirely different
kind of gun than the one Mr. Crocker owns, but as I say, he's more than happy
to assist their investigation in any way he can.”

At that moment Pierk spotted Hank standing
in the shadows, listening to them. She thanked Baggs quickly and moved forward.
The cameraman, the same one who'd accompanied her at the art gallery
fundraiser, followed behind, continuing to shoot.

“Lieutenant Donaghue, can you
comment on the discovery of a firearm in the home of Perry Crocker that may be
linked to the Jarrett murder investigation?”

“All statements must be obtained
from the office of the chief of police,” Hank said.

“Is that a no comment,
Lieutenant?”

“Not at all. I'm afraid I can't
help you, Ms. Pierk. All statements have to come from the chief's office. End
of story.”

Pierk turned to her cameraman and
drew a finger across her throat. He shut off his camera and lowered it,
glowering at Hank.

“Look, Lieutenant,” Pierk said,
lowering her voice, “I'm sorry about last night. I didn't mean to come off as the
aggressive news bitch. Blame it on adrenaline. Can't you help us out a little? Is
Crocker a suspect? Do you have something on him?”

“I'm sorry, Ms. Pierk. I can't
help you. Check with the chief's office. They'll have some sort of statement
for you shortly.”

“Can't you just—” She broke off as
the cameraman tapped her on the arm.

“They're executing another
warrant,” he said, looking up from his cell phone, where he'd just been reading
a text message. “One of the company veeps.”

“Let's go,” Pierk said. She
glanced at Hank. “’Bye!”

As he watched them jog down the
driveway to their van, Hank took out his own cell phone. It crossed his mind
that he should call Karen to give her a heads-up, but he resisted the impulse.
She was an experienced hand with the media, she knew the gag was on for this
one, and he didn't want her thinking he didn't trust her.

Instead, he punched in Ann
Martinez's number to let her know she needed to have a statement ready.

Apparently, he mused as the call
went through, it was the cameraman who had the good sources.