The Easter Egg Murder (11 page)

27

Saturday Morning, April 14, 2000

Harrie poured herself another cup of coffee and sat down with the newspaper. She wished she felt as bright and perky as the morning sun pouring in her kitchen window.

Another night of wild dreams had left her groggy. The news of Nick’s strange request was on her mind as she had gone to sleep. Another interesting tidbit from Steve was that Nick died with quite a bit of money, leaving bequests for several scholarships and charities.

S
hortly before they were married, Nick had told her about his grandfather disinheriting him. The old man had set up criteria Nick had to fulfill to get back in the will. One of the requirements was to use his law degree and actually practice law. Another was to marry a Greek girl. Harrie had laughed when Nick said they must prove to his grandfather that she was Greek. She was in fact half Greek, her father being born to Greek immigrants. But they changed their name to Drake when they became American citizens, and short of obtaining copies of her grandparents’ naturalization papers, she didn’t see how she would prove to anyone she was even half Greek. She told Nick all this, but he seemed undeterred.

She decided his grandfather must have had a change of heart, or Nick changed enough to convince the old man. How else did he end up leaving a small fortune behind?

Then she remembered the shady dealings he’d been involved in. Maybe the money he had left was tainted.

She also thought about the connection between Nick and Senator Lawrence. No matter what DJ Scott said, that simply didn’t make sense.

When the telephone rang, she thought it was Steve or Ginger and answered with, “Hey, what’s up?”

There was a brief silence before a deep voice responded. “Harrie, is that you?”

She sucked in her breath. “DJ! How did you get my number?”

He
sounded businesslike. “It was with the information about Nick Constantine. I’ve been trying to interview you, remember?”

“Oh, I’m not likely to forget. But it wasn’t me who ended the session yesterday afternoon.”

“I apologize for that, but your information was startling. As you can imagine, it changes our inquiry rather dramatically.”

“I might agree with you if I knew exactly what your inquiry had been in the first place. Are you ready to share that with me yet?”

He laughed briefly. “You are a persistent woman, aren’t you?”

“
I am. But you didn’t call me for small talk, did you?”

“No, I didn’t. Could we meet this morning to finish our
conversation? I’m handing over the investigation to one of our other agents.”

Harrie felt a wave of disappointment she would never have expected. “Oh, is the investigation concluded?”

“No. I requested that my ASAC assign the matter to another agent, and he agreed. I need to complete all the paperwork this weekend so that I can hand over my reports to the other investigator on Monday.”

“What
’s an a-sack?”

“
Actually, it’s A-S-A-C. It stands for Assistant Special Agent in Charge. So, how about it? Can we meet for breakfast or something?”

Harrie looked down at the old,
baggy T-shirt she had slept in.
Great! How quickly can I turn from a bag lady into a sparkling young woman?

“Uh, sure. I have a couple of errands, but I co
uld meet you in an hour.”

“Great,” he said. “
How about the IHOP on Paseo del Norte at nine thirty?”

Immediately after
agreeing to the meeting, she regretted it. It was a detour she didn’t need. She wanted to call Ginger and find out what she could do to help the O’Learys. They were like a second set of parents to her. She decided to make the breakfast quick, be out by ten-thirty.

Exactly for
ty-eight minutes later, she was threading through the Saturday morning traffic. If there were awards for such things, Harrie would surely receive one for getting herself put together in record time. She glanced in the visor mirror as she waited at the traffic light at Wyoming and Montgomery. Yep, everything was in place, including her head. Apparently miracles were possible after all.

28

She pulled into the parking lot at IHOP and immediately spotted three black SUVs. She wondered why it is that once a particular type of car is in your mind, you see them everywhere.

As she locked her door, she
sensed someone behind her. She whirled to see DJ and jumped. “You must like sneaking up on people. They teach you that at the Academy?”

He
raised his arms in mock surrender. Instead of the usual business suit, he was in jeans and a tee shirt with a casual jacket. He filled everything out nicely. “Hey, I come in peace,” he said. “I just walked over here from my car.” He pointed to a little red sports car.

“Where’s your big SUV?”

“That’s a bureau car. I don’t drive it when I’m on my own time.”

The waitress brought coffee, and Harrie noticed with a twinge that DJ added a generous splash of cream to his.

“Can I ask my questions before our order arrives? It would be nice to get this out of the way so we could enjoy breakfast.”

“By all means,” she said.

“Can you could tell me anything about any friends of Nick you might have met.”

“This probably sounds strange, but I don’t think he had any friends, other than Steve, of course.”

“You’re talking about Steve Vaughn, Ginger’s husband?”

“Yes. Steve and Nick graduated in the same class at Harvard Law. Then they worked at the same law firm for a short time. Perhaps Steve could tell you about other friends he might have had.”

Harrie tried to read what DJ wrote, but she wasn’t good at reading upside down. As if he could read her mind and without looking up, he said, “I’m just making some notes for the next agent”

“Why are you giving the case to someone else? Why not finish what you started?”

“Sometimes, several agents work a case and are assigned different people or groups of people to interview. Then they write up their reports, and they all go into the case file for that particular investigation. In situations like that, with multiple agents involved, the ASAC will pull all the information together to present to the U.S. Attorney. So it’s not like I’m turning over a case assigned specifically to me. I was just working on one small piece of the puzzle. Believe me. I have plenty of other cases that need my attention.”

“But it sounded like you wanted to be taken off this case for some reason. Forgive me for sounding nosey, but why do you want to be replaced?”

“Let me ask you a few more questions, and then I promise I’ll answer yours. Fair enough?”

Harrie smiled. “Okay, that’s fair. Ask away.”

DJ’s questions were: Did Nick do a lot of traveling during their marriage? Yes, he did. Did he seem unusually secretive about where he was going? Yes, he did seem reluctant to give her much information about where he would be. Did he spend large sums of money that he couldn’t explain away? Yes, he had a gambling problem.

DJ nodded.
“We know about Nick’s gambling problem. But there may have been another explanation. We have reason to believe he may have been involved in money-laundering activities in Nevada.”

Harrie shook her head. “
It just keeps getting better and better, doesn’t it? Are you also going to tell me now that he wasn’t a womanizing jerk?”

DJ smiled. “Well, I wouldn’t want to take away all your fond
memories of your ex-husband. He might have been a womanizing jerk, but we don’t have evidence of that.”

“So, this is the investigation you people are doing? You’re looking at money laundering in Nevada?”

“That’s only one small aspect of it. It also includes public corruption, illegal real estate transactions, smuggling, and violations of the Mann Act.”

“The Mann Act?”

“That’s the legislation that made it illegal to transport women or girls across state lines for purposes of prostitution. It’s also sometimes called the ‘White Slave Traffic Act’.”

“And you think Nick was involved in that?”

“We’ve been trying to determine if he worked with some men who we do know were involved. His death makes that more difficult.”

After their order
arrived, they ate quietly until Harrie put her fork down and said, “Okay, I have to know. What made the FBI interested in Nick? I mean, what brought him to their attention in the first place?”

“How good are you at keeping your mouth shut?”

“Who would I tell? As I said, Nick had no friends. All his family is gone now. Who else would care?”

“Well, for starters, how about your friend Ginger and her husband? They both knew Nick. Steve and Nick were friends. You’re very close to them. Wouldn’t you think it natural to share what we’ve talked about with them?”

Harrie chewed that over. “You have a point. It never occurred to me not to tell Ginger and Steve Especially considering what we found out yesterday.”

DJ nodded. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” He stopped, as though he had just registered the rest of her comment. “Wait a minute. What did you find out yesterday?”

“Quite frankly, I don’t think it’s true anyway. It’s really the most unlikely thing you could imagine. According to Steve, Nick was worth several million dollars.”

“Okay,
I need to talk with Steve. How about you invite him to your place, and we can all talk there?” He picked up the check and started for the cashier. “I’ll follow you,” he said.

Whe
n they reached his car, she grabbed his arm. “What’s going on that I should know about?”

DJ
studied the ground before he spoke. “You asked me back there what brought Nick to the attention of the FBI. Well, I’m going to tell you, but you have to promise me to not say anything to anybody. Agreed?”

She nodded and let go of him. The warmth of the bright morning sun couldn’t keep the chill away.

“Nick came to our attention from an informant.”

“Do you know this informant or does it work like that?”

His smile was one of resignation instead of humor. “Yes, I know this informant quite well. It’s someone who knew the people Nick worked for and knew there were bad things going on. And I’m afraid that person, as well as you and your friends, might be in danger.”

29

When she was eight, Harrie had a pet hamster named Gigi who spent most of her waking hours running inside a wheel. Harrie was now beginning to feel like Gigi.

She
had been living peacefully and uneventfully. Now she was being followed (maybe), her ex husband had been murdered (certainly), and another man she knew less well had been attacked (definitely). And to top it off, an irritatingly attractive FBI agent was following her home in his car because she was in extreme danger (according to him).

Everything seemed t
o come back to Senator Lawrence and his book about a murder that happened long before she was born. But that didn’t explain a thing about why Nick had been killed or why she and Ginger would be in jeopardy by association. Before, she had been content to drift along, editing the book and learning a bit of history about people long dead. No more. This was getting personal, and nobody had any answers.

She pulled into the
garage of her townhouse. DJ drove past her house and parked down the street. He waited until there were no other cars on the street before exiting his car and walking quickly into her garage. She hit the button on the wall, closing them safely inside.

“Why all the intrigue?”

“Just normal precaution,” he replied.

“Sit down, and I’ll make a fresh pot of coffee.
What should I say to Steve to get him here?”

“Does he ever help you out with repairs and stuff? Maybe you could tell him you need a light bulb changed or something.”

Harrie rolled her eyes. “Oh, pul-leeze! Where do you get your information about women? Romance novels?”

“Hey, no offense intended. I figured you must need help sometimes with things around the house. Or do you also specialize in home repairs?”

“I do most things on my own. For the rest I call my faithful handyman.”

“A handyman? How do you know this guy? We need to think about who has access to you, and be sure they are who they say they are.”

“Relax,” Harrie said. “He’s about seventy and I’ve known him since I was twelve years old.” She got out two mugs and opened the refrigerator. “I noticed you use cream. Unfortunately, I don’t have any. I take mine black, and I haven’t kept cream in the house since
—” she stopped. “Um, what I mean is, would plain milk be okay?”

“Milk is fine. It’s better for me anyway. I love cream in my coffee, but I don’t keep it in my own refrigerator. Too much fat, and it spoils before it’s all gone. I only use it when I’m at a restaurant because it’s available. Bad habit.”

Harrie poured some milk into her rarely used creamer.

“
I have to tell you this is all so overwhelming and confusing. Yesterday, you said Nick was working for Senator Lawrence. Are you absolutely sure about that? What would he have been doing for him? Surely Senator Lawrence isn’t involved in white slavery!”

“
Nick’s working for Senator Lawrence hasn’t been verified. But I can tell you this. The people we are investigating are a very nasty bunch. Nick knew some of them, that much is sure. We don’t know if he was involved in their activities. The fact that he was murdered is a strong indication he was. Beyond that, I can’t say any more.”

“Are you aware of the book Senator Lawrence is writing?”

“Sure. I read the newspapers, too. As of last Sunday, everyone knows he’s writing about the murder of Chipper Finn.”

“Does that have anything to do with the stuff you think Nick was involved in?”

“Good question. Our investigation covers a lot of territory. These people are part of a group who’ve been around New Mexico for a long time. It’s possible there’s some connection. The Senator knows a lot of politicians and people in high places.  Apparently, his book will speak about some of them. Most of those people from fifty years ago are dead, but there could still be some around who have good reasons for not wanting certain information to come to light. There is no statute of limitation on murder.”

She shuddered.
“I know the FBI was involved in the Chipper Finn case. There must be something in your files about it. The senator wrote about that in the book. Couldn’t you look it up, and see if any of the same people are part of this mysterious group you speak about?”

“
The FBI wasn’t involved in the murder case. Chipper Finn’s murder wasn’t a federal crime. What the Bureau investigated was the violation of Manny Salinas’ civil rights.”

“Are you telling me you can’t get your hands on information relating to that murder
because it wasn’t a federal crime? I thought the FBI had access to a huge data base of information about crimes all over the country.”

“I didn’t say I couldn’t get information. I’m just trying to explain it wasn’t our case
. Technically, we have no reason to investigate it.”

“Why do I sense you’re sidestepping this issue for some reason? Do you think there’s more to it?”

“Look,” DJ shifted uncomfortably in his chair, “could we just call Steve and get him over here. We could play Twenty Questions all day, but it wouldn’t get us anywhere. Let’s just stick to the things I do know.”

“Okay.”
As Harrie went to the phone, the doorbell rang.

DJ put his hand on her arm, stopping her. “Don’t answer that until you verify who it is,” he whispered.

She nodded and started toward the entryway. DJ followed closely and stood to the side of the door. She put her eye to the peephole and started laughing.

Standing there, looking at her with concern, were Steve and Ginger. “Where have you been? We’ve been calling all morning and you didn’t answer, not even your cell phone.” Ginger stopped abruptly as DJ stepped into sight.

“Come in,” he said. “I’ve been wanting to speak to you.”