Prior Bad Acts

30

“SO LET’S HAVE the update, people.”

Lieutenant Dawes stood at the head of the table in the conference room. The war room, they called it when they were working a case like this. One entire wall was covered side to side with whiteboard. Leads, questions, details were written on it in Dry Erase marker, easily wiped away for the next terrible case.

“I’ve been looking for any record of Stan Dempsey owning property other than his house,” Elwood said. “Nothing. But I did discover there are forty-one land-owning Dempseys in the metro area. One of them might be a relative. I’ve got people making those calls right now.”

“Did we locate his ex?” Liska asked.

“In a cemetery,” the lieutenant said. “She passed away last year. Brain tumor.

“And I’ve heard nothing from the daughter,” Dawes went on. “I reached out to the Portland PD to ask them to locate her if they can.”

“Did anyone warn Kenny Scott about Stan?” Kovac asked. “As Dahl’s defense attorney, he’s a prime target.”

“I called him,” Dawes said. “Got his machine. I’ve dispatched a radio car to go over there and sit on his house until he shows up. Hopefully, he got out of town for the weekend.”

“He might want to think of making that a permanent move,” Tippen said. “If his address goes public, he’s going to have angry villagers with their pitchforks and torches on his front lawn.”

“He’s court appointed,” Dawes said. “He didn’t choose to represent Karl Dahl.”

“No,” Tippen conceded, “but he chose to represent him with zeal.”

“Minnesotans hate zeal,” Elwood said. “Zeal is right up there on the list of suspicious emotional behaviors like joy and despair.”

“Always err on the side of blandness,” Tippen advised.

Dawes turned to Kovac. “Sam, what have you got?”

“A headache,” he said. “I don’t like the husband’s alibi witnesses. One is too slick; the other is a hooker. Moore checked into the Marquette around three yesterday. Moore and the hooker were in the lobby bar from six, six-fifteen on. In between time he was banging the hooker, not beating his wife’s head in. The slick one, Edmund Ivors, joined them around seven.”

“Edmund Ivors?” Tippen repeated. “I know that name from somewhere.”

“He’s some kind of multiplex movie mogul,” Kovac said. “The most interesting part is that they were joined briefly by a third guy. Neither Moore nor Ivors mentioned a third man when I questioned them. The bartender described the guy as thirtyish, blond, dark jeans, black jacket, black T-shirt. Was there for maybe ten minutes.”

“Long enough to say, ‘Hey, I tried to kill your wife. I got run off. I want my money,’” said Dawes.

“That’s what it looks like to me. We’ll need paperwork to get the hotel to hand over the surveillance video.”

“Did the bartender see them make an exchange of some kind?”

Kovac shook his head. “She was busy. She saw the guy talking with them; then she didn’t see him. Dickhead Moore, Slick, and the Bird woman then went off to dinner and Christ knows what else. The bartender said Ivors struck her as the kind of slimebag who likes to watch.”

Liska crinkled her nose. “Eeewww!”

“What’s Moore ’s motive?” Elwood asked. “Besides that he’s an asshole.”

“Money,” Kovac said. “She divorces him, he gets half. He has her killed, he gets it all.”

“Is she divorcing him?” Liska asked, watching him with particular scrutiny.

“The handwriting is on the wall,” Kovac said, avoiding her eyes. He wouldn’t betray Carey’s trust. No one needed to know the famous final scene was still hours away, least of all Liska. “That clown’s been living off her for a while now, I’d say. He hasn’t made a film in years. He’s out running with the dogs while she’s in the hospital with a concussion. You can cut the tension between them with a knife.”

“She’s got money?” Dawes asked.

“Family money,” Tippen said. “The Greers of old were in the lumber business. Huge fortunes were amassed on the backs of immigrant lumberjacks. Alec Greer’s father branched out to mining taconite when that was still lucrative, and got out while the getting was good. Judge Greer is well off. Unless he leaves it all to charity, his daughter should inherit a bundle.”

Dawes raised her eyebrows. “Thank you, Mr. History Channel.”

“I’m a Renaissance man,” Tippen said. “A bon vivant. A raconteur.”

“You’re full of crap,” Liska said, tossing a ballpoint pen at him.

Tippen fired back a chocolate-covered coffee bean. Liska squealed as it hit her in the forehead.

Dawes assumed the role of mother. “Tippen, do I have to take those away from you before you put someone’s eye out?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Is Judge Moore’s father healthy?” she asked Kovac.

“No. On his way out. Carey is his only child-”

Liska burned a look into him and mouthedCarey?

“If she’s out of the picture, then the old man’s money would pass to his only grandchild, her daughter, Lucy. Lucy’s five years old. Moore would have control of whatever she inherited.”

“This is all a neat theory,” Dawes said. “What do you have to back it up?”

“My years of experience and wisdom,” Kovac said. “Get me a warrant and I’ll prove it. A search warrant for the house and a warrant for Dickhead’s financials.”

“And what are you going to use to get a warrant, Detective?” Dawes asked. “Your good looks?”

“And charming personality.”

Dawes rolled her eyes. “What have you got, Nikki?”

“Nothing much. I haven’t been able to confirm Bobby Haas’s alibi or to break it. One strange thing: When I was talking to him today, he told me that Marlene Haas was his stepmother, and his real mother died of cancer. But when I spoke to the caseworker from social services, she told me the kid’s adopted, that his birth mother committed suicide, and Wayne Haas’s first wife died from a broken neck when she fell down the basement stairs with a basket of laundry.”

“So nobody had cancer?” Elwood said.

Liska shook her head. “No. That’s a pretty weird thing to lie about, wouldn’t you say?”

“How old is this kid?” Tippen asked.

“Seventeen.”

“And he’s had that much violent tragedy in his life?” Dawes asked. “Maybe he just wanted to eliminate one of them. How would a kid feel, having all of that in his background? The only thing my fifteen-year-old son wants is to be exactly like everybody else his age.

“This boy probably feels like people think he’s some kind of a freak. At least saying his mother died of cancer is something other kids have a frame of reference for.”

Liska looked at Kovac. He knew her well enough to see all the subtle signs that something about this kid was bothering her.

He shrugged. “You can’t arrest the kid for saying his mother died of cancer when she didn’t. And if you can’t get a witness to put him at the parking ramp, you can’t pin the assault on him.

“I’m putting my money on the future ex.”

“I’m sure you are,” Liska said.

Kovac lowered his eyebrows.

“I’m taking Dempsey,” Tippen said. “He’s openly crazy. He’s made threats. What’s beating a woman with a club to a guy who might be willing to torture someone with an electric carving knife?”

“No wagering in my presence, please,” Dawes announced. “Let’s all get back to it. We’ve got to make something happen.”

“Any word on Karl Dahl?” Kovac asked as he rose from his seat.

She shook her head. “The man has vanished. The dogs never got on a scent. No one credible has seen him. We’re getting the usual tips from psychics and religious fanatics and people who just call because they’re lonely and they want someone to talk to. And lots of dead ends. I’ve got uniforms running all over town, chasing down bald-headed men.”

“He’s the kind of guy who lives off the radar,” Tippen said. “A shadow figure on society’s fringes.”

“I thought that was you,” Liska said, standing up.

Tippen gave her a mean look. “You’re very short and perky.”

“Fuck you.”

As they all moved toward the door, Dawes nodded for Kovac to hang behind.

“You have that strong a feeling about Judge Moore’s husband?”

“You’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg of my hatred for this jerk.”

“I’ll make sure we get the security video from the hotel bar ASAP. Maybe we can get a line on this mystery man. We can at least compare the video to the one from the parking ramp. See if it could be the same guy.”

“If I could get Moore ’s financials, maybe I could find evidence of payoffs for the hit.”

“I don’t see a judge giving us a warrant based on what we have, Sam. Do you think Judge Moore would swear out a complaint on him?”

“For what? If being a lousy husband was against the law, I’d be doing twenty-five to life,” Kovac said. “Besides, I don’t think she would do it. She has her daughter to consider. And her reputation. I don’t see her filing a complaint on some half-baked accusation just to get the Dickhead in our box so we can break him.”

Dawes sighed. “Do you have any excuse to bring him in for questioning?”

Kovac thought of the file folder he’d locked in the trunk of his car. He’d only glimpsed through it, but he knew there was plenty of evidence of Moore ’s infidelity. But if he brought David Moore in for that, then he tipped Carey’s hand.

Maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing.

“I could ask him to come in for a noncustodial interview,” he said.

“Will he cooperate?”

“No,” he conceded. “He won’t cooperate. The first thing he’ll do is squeal for a lawyer, and then we’re fucked.”

He looked away and sighed. “I don’t know what to say, Boss. I’d throw the jerk into a snake pit if I could, but if we bring him in on what I’ve got, that just gives him time to circle the wagons, tip off the doer.”

Dawes nodded. “All right. We can put a tail on him.”

“You can get the overtime for that?”

“Already blessed from on high. The brass wants this doer’s head on a silver platter.”

“I mean to make that happen,” Kovac said. “I’ll even stick an apple in his mouth for the ceremony.”