“Do you have any idea what he’s doing?”
“No, sir. Shows up, stays an hour, then leaves. No idea why or who he is, but he never causes trouble and always seems pleasant enough.”
“What’s his name?” I asked.
“Sir?”
“When you buzz him up, what name does he give you?”
“I don’t buzz him up anymore. By this point I know he’s okay so I don’t bother.”
“But at the beginning,” I continued, “he must have given you a name. Do you remember it?”
Don thought for a moment, then he said, “Chester. I think it was Chester.”
“You sure?” I said.
“Not a hundred percent, but I think so.”
“What else can you tell me about him?” I said. Suddenly Don stood up straight and took several steps back from me. He straightened his hat, then stepped forward.
I turned around to see a Lincoln pulled up at the curb. Don was approaching the backseat door, which he opened, bending over slightly while holding his hat with his free hand. When the door was fully open, a man stepped out and nodded at Don.
He was about six feet tall, slightly stocky, a middleaged man who clearly took care of himself. His black hair was slicked back into a neat coif, and his skin was evenly tanned. His watch glimmered in the afternoon sun, and I didn’t need to look closer to know it was real, and had likely cost nearly as much as my education.
He strode up to the entrance, and I could tell from the slightly scared look in Don’s eyes that this was
Brett Kaiser.
“Mr. Kaiser,” I said, matching his pace. Not an easy feat. “My name is Henry Parker. I’m with the New York
Gazette. Can I ask you a few questions?”
Kaiser turned to glare at me, barely breaking stride. “I have nothing to say to you,” he sniffed.
“Can I ask you what you know about 718 Enterprises?
Do you know a man named Stephen Gaines?”
Kaiser stopped, turned to face me. His eyes were cobalt-blue, but there was an anger in them that went well beyond that of a businessman annoyed at a prying reporter.
“Listen here, you little prick,” he said. “I don’t know who the hell this Gaines fellow is, and I sure as hell am not going to talk to you about anything else. I-”
“So you know about 718 Enterprises.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“You denied knowing Stephen Gaines, but didn’t deny being aware of a company that was allegedly paying you for lease space in your office building. Why not deny that as well?”
“Like I said, I have nothing to say to you.”
“One question,” I said. “One question and I’ll leave.”
Kaiser held a moment. I could tell that this man hated being shackled by a “no comment,” didn’t believe he had to bow to anybody or pretend his nose was clean. He ran his business the way he chose, and he’d be damned if anybody else told him that he might have erred on the wrong side of the law.
“One question,” he said, “and then if I ever see you again I’ll have your job taken away faster than you can clean all this mud off of you.”
Cute line, I thought. It never ceased to amaze me that men like Kaiser could so calmly keep potentially devastating and illegal secrets, yet somehow I was the bad guy.
“Why?” I said. “Why take their money? Your practice seems to be thriving. Why take the risk?”
Kaiser opened his mouth, but just as I expected a lengthy response, a beautiful gem that would perhaps unravel the spool just a little more, his cell phone rang.
When Kaiser looked at it, I could have sworn his face went pale. He shoved it back into his pocket, looked at me and said, “Goodbye, Mr. Parker,” and walked inside the building and disappeared into the elevator.
I stood there, trembling, angry that I had felt so close to getting him. Don came up to me and said, “Sweet guy, ain’t he?”
“Yeah, he’s going on my Christmas list for sure.” I watched as the elevator light clicked, bringing Brett
Kaiser to the twentieth floor. I eyed the windows facing the street. No doubt Kaiser had a great view. Then the curtains were drawn closed, and I figured Brett Kaiser was looking for a little privacy.
“Thanks, Don. I appreciate the help. Keep up the good work, and thanks for being agreeable.”
Don laughed. “Gotta tell my wife that one. ‘Honey, a reporter told me I was agreeable.’ Not sure if that will win me points at the dinner table, but it’s a good conversation piece.”
“The least I could do,” I said. “Take it easy, Don.”
I walked to the corner, thinking about my next move.
I wasn’t going back quite empty-handed. Even in his non-answer, Brett Kaiser had confirmed that he was well aware of 718 Enterprises. I believed him when he said he didn’t know about Stephen Gaines. If my brother was involved in some sort of drug trade, his work on the street was twenty floors below Brett Kaiser’s penthouse.
I was about to call Jack when I felt my cell phone vibrate.
Assuming it was Jack calling me, I took it out, looked at the caller ID. I didn’t recognize the number, but it was from a 646 area code. It wasn’t Jack; he had a 917. Might have been somebody from Kaiser’s firm calling to threaten me, could have been a wrong number. Either way it seemed like a good time to screen my calls. I didn’t want to waste any time on a conversation that wasn’t vital to the investigation.
When the phone stopped vibrating, I waited for the little envelope to appear that signaled I had voice mail. I called it, plugged in my security code and listened.
And at the first word, my blood ran cold. I knew that voice. Hadn’t heard it in a long time, but there was no way
I’d ever forget it. I hadn’t spoken to her in almost a year, when I was dragged kicking and screaming from her office after she’d tried to ruin the life of the man I admired most.
It was Paulina Cole.
“Henry, this is Paulina. You know the last name, so I won’t keep you. We need to talk. Off the record. It’s important. You know damn well it’s important because you can bet I don’t like calling you any more than you like hearing this message. But we need to talk.”
She left her cell phone number and home phone number. Not her work number. I couldn’t believe her audacity in calling me, but the fact that she only left her private lines clearly meant something was up. Something she didn’t want her bosses at the Dispatch involved in.
And while I was making my mind up whether to call her back, Brett Kaiser’s apartment exploded in a massive orange fireball that shot flaming debris half a block and cascaded smoke down upon Park Avenue.
16
“Who was that?” Morgan asked.
Chester closed the phone, putting it gently back into his coat pocket. He looked at Morgan blankly and said,
“Just checking my voice mail.” He then offered a smile.
“I didn’t hear voice mail pick up,” Morgan added.
“You one of those dogs, hear high-frequency pitches and everything?” Chester asked.
The Town Car hit a bump, and Morgan gripped the armrest. “No.”
“Well, that’s too bad. Because when dogs hear something, they don’t ask questions. But if they start barking, that’s when their owner is bound to get upset. You get me, Morgan?”
“I get you.”
“Good,” Chester said. He looked out the window. They were heading toward the Queens-bound midtown tunnel.
Morgan could make out the East River, Roosevelt Island.
Morgan had never considered living outside of the city. If he was going to be a power broker, a master of the universe, he had to live within the castle walls. But now the powers that be were trying to evict him, trying to get him to leave the grounds he so desperately wanted t remain on. They’d taken his job, his livelihood, his dignity. It was up to him to figure out a way to stay.
So if Chester wanted to bullshit him about who he was calling, that was fine. Morgan didn’t need to know everything. As long as the paychecks cleared, that’s all that mattered.