To say I was distracted at work the next day would be an understatement. Luckily, so many years slinging coffee to the masses had left me very equipped to deal with the daily dealings of your average American café with all the thought God gave a gnat. That meant the other 99.99 percent of my mental faculties were busy going over everything that could possibly go wrong during this evening's espionage. And there was a lot that could go wrong, ranging from losing the case to maybe even getting arrested.
My plan needed to go off without hitch...but life was chaotic and unpredictable sometimes, so I needed to be prepared for the worst.
Jackson had decided to hit up Snappers for lunch, for the quote 'bomb ass wings', and thus Pasha and I were handling the lunch rush by ourselves. I was mildly annoyed that he'd decided to take a late lunch, I admit. It wasn't technically wrong, but it meant he'd be back just in time to work only thirty minutes and then clock out.
That shit really irked me.
Anyway, as I was handing a customer his cappuccino with two percent milk, the bell above the front door jingled in a way I recognized as someone snatching it open with a certain amount of angry force. I looked up in time to see Malik pushing his way to the front of the line.
He slammed his open palms down on the countertop in front of my register and roared as loud as a lion, "Where is my necklace?"
The casual chatter inside died as everyone turned to watch. "Excuse me sir. You'll have to wait in line like everyone else."
He straightened his back and touched a hand to his hunter green tie as if to adjust it. "I'm not fucking around. I want my shit!"
"Pasha, can you handle this crowd for a few minutes?"
She looked between us with her mouth slightly slack. "Uh...yeah."
I carefully walked Malik to my office; my body as calm on the outside as it was a fluttering mess of fear on the inside. It's not that I was afraid, I didn't believe he would hurt me in front of all these people. It was the amount of balls it took him to come to me like this. Before he had always appeared calm and collected no matter what was happening. But now...
When we got to the back, I gestured him in and followed but left the door wide open.
"Where is my necklace?" He said this time with that air of coolness firmly back in place.
"Your necklace? Why should you have it when your mother wanted your sister to have it?"
He frowned deeply; his face became a mask of contempt. "What business is it of yours either way?"
"Why do you care about an ugly necklace when you conveniently got most of her assets?"
"I deserve that money!"
"Deserve it how? Because you're smarter than your siblings? More successful? The oldest? Educate me, what's the arbitrary reason?"
"I earned it!"
"How?"
"You think those early years were easy? You think my mother became a millionaire with a husband and two kids without help?" He stomped his foot down like a naughty child. "I was the one watching my siblings while my parents worked!"
"You think you deserve everything for babysitting?"
"I raised those kids."
"Okay. And? Lots of older siblings help out."
"Help out?" A snooty little scoff escaped his lips. "Mom and dad were shit parents. The other three confuse our parents paying for everything they ever wanted as competency, but I remember what it was like to be poor."
"And what was it like? Did you have to help Destiny with her homework? Wash the dishes? Play with her? The inhumanity. My God, how did you survive?"
"I did all that and cook breakfast and dinner, walk her to and from school, schedule her doctor appointments, supervise her play dates, clean the whole fucking house, mow the lawn, and sometimes help pay bills when they were short! The only adult who cared was Aunt Margie."
Sheesh. That sounds like what Manny had to do after his father died and his mother suffered a brief depression. It almost made me feel sorry for him. I didn't believe in making older siblings basically raise younger siblings, but the man was still a murderer and it was time someone called him out.
"So, you killed her? That was the solution? Mom put too much on you too young, so you take revenge?"
He blinked once and stepped back as if I'd struck him. "How fucking dare you!"
"How dare you! Standing around acting like some kind of saint."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about you, in the house the night she died! You slipped in and killed the person you hated most."
He got quiet. "I didn't hate her."
"Could've fooled me."
"Who told you I was there?"
"No one had to tell me anything. You're just that predictable."
"You think I care about the opinion of some crazy, irrelevant bitch?" His face about turned purple in his anger as he yelled, "I'll tell you one more goddamn time, give me my necklace!"
"Hey!" Jackson stepped into the office with his hands gripped around a Styrofoam container of piping hot chicken wings. "You can get up out of here with all that bullshit."
Malik looked over Jackson with a calculated glare. He was a little taller, yes, but his slim almost skeletal form couldn't beat Jackson's shear muscle.
So, instead he turned back to me. "I'll pay you twice as much as Alexis to drop the case."
A little desperate, I think. "I can't be bought."
"Anyone can be bought." He said with his lip set in a sullen scowl. "You have three days to give me my necklace."
Malik turned and slid his boyish frame past Jackson without looking at him.
When I was sure he was gone I released the breath I'd been holding. "Thanks."
"The hell was that?"
"A possible murderer just stopping by to say hi."
"You ai'ight?"
I felt my head bob in the affirmative. "Yeah. But I'd feel better with some of those wings."
He grinned. "I don't like you that much."
I, for sure, had no plans to hand the necklace over to Malik, but now I was less certain I wanted to give it to Alexis either. The necklace I reckoned wasn't the problem but a symptom of the bigger issue: an ordinary family torn apart by greed. Yeah, I can call out Malik for doing anything in pursuit of money but what about Destiny or Gabe or even Alexis. Let's not pretend she hired me because the ugly shit had sentimental value. It's worth millions!
But one thing was for sure, if Malik had felt the need to come here and intimidate me then I was closer to the truth than ever. There was only a small component left to the whole ordeal, and whatever it was, I needed to figure it out in the next thee days.
*********************************
The early morning was cool and dry, but I barely felt the chill as I walked down the street. I'd gotten about three hours of sleep and pumped enough coffee into me to power a small village of early risers. I'd brought nothing with me but the lone key to unlock my car, a mini flashlight, my phone on silence, and Este's passport.
The mile trek was pushing my tolerance a little, but it was necessary. I couldn't risk a neighbor seeing my strange car outside Dupont Manor and calling the cops, so I'd left it parked in the lot of the closest strip mall. Hopefully enough people in the neighborhood were asleep at one AM that the strange woman walking down the street would escape notice too. At least I'd changed my mind about the head to toe black. Seeing a ninja walking down the street would probably raise more alarm than the shirt, pants, and sneakers I had opted for. The most important part was getting in and out with as little notice as possible after all.
Dupont Manor seemed all the more ominous in the black of night. The only light to guide me was the streetlamps overhead and a porch light on the house shining like a beacon in the night.
Este had instructed me to walk around the side of the house and wait for her to unlock the back door. I did as I was told, my feet heavy with anxiety as my sneakers scuffed over pavement and gravel and grass and finally up the steps of the slick wooden porch in the back garden. Thank God they don't have dogs.
Near the glass sliding door I paused to catch my breath and looked around. There was nothing to see in the dark but a single soft light illuminating a corner of the room inside.
Do I knock? No, what if someone hears? I waited in a swirl of uncertainty as the cicadas, crickets, and sheep-frogs hummed in the darkness. From the inside, a blur of quick movement caught my eye. I strained my eyes and stepped back just in time to see Este's form materialize on the other side of the glass. She was dressed down in her pajamas; her hair was covered beneath some kind of dark cloth—a scarf or bandana.
She reached her hand out to turn the lock on the door, then slid it open with a sly hand. She stood to the side and silently signaled me in with a waving of fingers. I stepped through the threshold and waited as she slid the door back closed.
"Is anyone up," I whispered.
The shapeless form that was her head shook. "Destiny is asleep. Alexis is out with her girlfriend. Gabe...is unconscious, but he wakes up sometimes."
"Okay."
"One hour." She insisted.
"Not two?"
"No." That sucks but it's better than nothing.
I turned and took a few steps into the darkness, relying on my memory to guide me. After reaching the hall I realized my footsteps were echoing. I turned to Este. "You should let me work."
"I can't watch?'
I couldn't risk her following me around. "If I get caught with you beside me, they'll know you helped me."
"Okay." The threat of trouble scared her into agreement. "I'll wait down here."
I left Este in the living room and started my hike up the stairs. Once I breached the top floor without incidence, I pulled the small flashlight from one of my pockets and shined the small light down the first corridor. It was empty, thank God, and I continued my journey toward the large wooden door at the end of the hall.
I hustled down it; weary that I could be caught at any moment. The sound of my sneakers squeaking against the floor could have been as loud as a jet engine for all I knew—but that was irrational. It was a small sound and from in their room's they likely couldn't hear past the thickness of well-crafted walls.
But still every step made my heart beat louder.
When I made it to Diana's room I slid inside and closed the door with surgical gentleness. I was too afraid to turn on the lights so instead I shined the flashlight around the room and let that small beam of light guide me.
The space next to the empty bed was occupied by some kind of large machine; maybe a heart monitor, maybe not. Next to that was a makeshift crash cart that had been wiped clean with some kind of sterile product that made the room smell like a hospital. I went over and opened the drawers of the crash cart. Inside were various tubey things, needles, syringes, a defibrillator and some scary looking equipment that was probably for intubation. Another drawer had the drugs. I picked up pouches and bottles and read each carefully. Epinephrine, lidocaine, sodium bicarbonate, dopamine, vasopressin, adenosine, dextrose, naloxone, nitroglycerin...I don't know what most of that even is. I was about to call it quits when an inch high, half empty vial caught my eye. I picked it up and shined the flashlight at the label. Morphine.
So at least one thing Corrine said was true. And from the looks of this vial she hadn't even been giving her the whole dose at once. So maybe morphine wasn't the murder weapon. I checked the other vials for tampering. If they possessed the ability to kill a person it didn't matter, none of them were even open. Then how did she die?
I caught myself staring at the unused syringes; remembering the one I'd had tested that had come up negative. Or did it? The woman's words rang in my ear: 'nothing but air.'
...Air...
I checked my watch and realized I'd already blown twelve of my sixty minutes. There would be no time to search more of the bedroom. I sighed but put everything back where it was and moved on. At the door I strained for sounds of movement; footsteps, talking, breathing—whatever. I couldn't hear anything beyond the door and even if I could the sound of my cowardly heart trying to beat its way free of my chest was loud enough to drown out almost anything.
Before the night was over, I'd probably take ten years off my life in stress alone. If I didn't get caught, that is.
My next location was Diana's grand second story office. Este had mentioned someone had gone through the office the night of Diana's murder. Could be a coincidence, but it could be related. I walked in the office as easily as I had the bedroom. The halls were dark and empty. All trace of the Dupont's reduced to mere hints of presence.
The office itself looked the same as it had the day of the will reading, with the exception of the chairs moved back to the conference table and the espresso machine hidden under some kind of plastic cover.
I wasted no time and bee-lined for a metal file cabinet just beyond the computer desk. Inside was carefully filed, well, files that seemed completely innocent on the surface. I checked the next cabinet but skimming over the files produced nothing of note. No back-alley deals, no evidence, no nothing.
Undeterred, I moved on to the computer desk near the center of the room. I doubt I would have the time to boot up the computer and go through any of the files on there. And that was assuming there was no password. I turned my attention instead to the shallow drawers on the desk. Opening them was a disappointment. There was nothing inside either of them but standard office supplies; pens, post-its, staples—but no clues. And I only had fifteen minutes left before Este would expect me to be walking down those steps and out the door.
I could cry! I'm tired. I'm overworked. I'm stressed. I made some pretty risky choices to pull this off and it was for nothing. There was nothing!
In my existential flailing my knee flew up and slammed into the bottom of the open drawer. I bit my lips and danced the pain away before remembering myself. I held my breath and stared at the door. Had someone heard?
When no sound penetrated the silence for about two minutes I released the air in my lungs and stared back down at the open drawer. The force of my knee had seemed to dislodge the bottom of the drawer. It wouldn't close like that. I finagled with it for what seemed like forever until the base popped up into my fingers. There underneath a false bottom was another hidden compartment.
What is it with this woman and her secret compartments? Did she really distrust her family so deeply all her important documents had to be stashed away in secret? How does one go about getting a secret compartment installed anyway? Are there loose floorboard and false bottom desk drawer contractors? How much would that cost? Is there a secret compartments economy?
I pulled out a stuffed thick manila envelope and pulled the stack of papers out into the desk. There wasn't anything unusual about it—just some legal documents and a small pile of checks, so why the need for the trickery? I grabbed my flashlight and began thumbing through the stack.
The documents were written in a bunch of legalese that meant little to me. I understood well enough that it had to do with some sort of cases where smaller companies sued Dupont but beyond that I didn't know. The strange thing was the stack of carbon copy checks left with it.
I thought maybe they were settlement payments but none of the checks seemed to have any relation to the cases. The recipient on each one appeared to be charitable organizations, but nothing to do with litigations. Maybe some further research was necessary, but I didn't have the time to do it here.
I hit the desk lamp, lined up the first page, and snapped a couple quick photos with my phone. I did that for every piece of paper I found in the false bottom drawer, including the checks. When I was done I put them back in the drawer, closed it, and booked it downstairs just as my hour was up.
Este looked at me expectantly, her eyes shining with hope in the light of the single hall lamp. I reached into my back pocket and produced her passport.
"Bless you." She gripped it in her hands and smiled with relief.
I felt like hot buttered shit.
By the time I made it home I had about three hours before I needed to get ready for work and my bed was calling to me in the most seductive voice but I knew if I went to bed now I'd lie awake thinking about what it all meant. And thus, I spent those three hours on the laptop trying to figure it all out instead.
I started by researching the court cases that Diana had found worthy enough to file away in the false bottom drawer. All of them were standard litigation for a corporation of Dupont's magnitude. Breach of contract. Employee discrimination suit. Intellectual property rights. Mostly typical.
The checks, all signed by Diana personally, were all names that harkened to local charity organizations, but I figured it was worth a shot to google them too. Some of the older copies had faded with time so I started with the most current: a check for twenty-five thousand to something called Humane Florida.
Google told me it was a locally run charity that helped feed the poor. Why would that be important? I'm sure they donate to charity all the time. I spent some time looking into them, but they seemed on the up and up. That was until I saw the name George Whitney as one of the company's CEOs. That rung a bell.
I flipped back through the legal documents and found one whose dates correlated closely with the check.
It was from July two years ago. Dupont was being sued for patent infringement. The plaintiff claimed Dupont stole his formula for some kind of hair cream. The presiding judge was... ...
Wait a minute...I read through deeper details of the case and found the evidence damning. In fact, the jury had agreed with me and ruled for the plaintiff until Judge George Whitney had reexamined and then ruled for Dupont.
And then not even five months later the charity he ran got 25k...
I did a similar run on some of the other checks. They were for charities that were either run by or associated with a judge or judge's family member. And all those judges had presided over a case where Dupont Cosmetics was the defendant. But that would mean...that's crazy. But then Malik's words rang in my ear:
'Anyone can be bought.'
Wisdom says there are no coincidences. Not the trial or the donation or the documents or the checks.
My eyes scanned the paper for the name of the lawyer who had defended Dupont, but I already knew.
Robert Davis.
I know what happened...
All I needed to do now was prove it. And that wasn't an easy task. If I was going to bring the murderer to justice, I would need a confession.
And a little back-up.