White Collar Blackmail: White Collar Crime Financial Suspense Thriller (27 page)

Chapter 53

The newspapers and talkback radio were evenly divided about Karen Deacon. Some were sympathetic, and some were downright nasty. Her kids had been the subject of some vicious teasing and when she picked up Brett from school he was sporting a black eye. Someone had called his mom a
ho
, and while he hadn’t known what it meant, he knew it wasn’t good. Sally fared worse when some of the girls said that her mom was a slut and had killed Devlin Cooper. Tom Deacon had recovered from his initial shock, and while he wasn’t happy, he had supported Karen and even asked her to move back in with him. His players were sympathetic, and some of them felt terrible about the way they had treated Devlin after the Pirates game. Karen knew that the first two weeks would be the worst, but the relief she felt from being free of the blackmailers was cleansing. It was too late now, but she and Devlin should’ve come out when the blackmailers first contacted him.

Chas Grinich was not surprised when forensics told him that all calls made to and from Elliot’s cell phone were private. Further examination revealed that calls were only ever made to and received from one number. The cell phone was a prepaid, and its present location was a mansion in the Hamptons. The majority of calls were made from a high-rise office building, an apartment in Manhattan, the house in the Hamptons and locations between those buildings while traveling. When Aaron Lord checked the ownership of the house, he found that it was owned by a corporation, owned by other corporations, a structure now all too familiar. It concealed the ownership of the property but indicated that the real owners were the same people who had blackmailed Todd Hansen and engaged in insider trading. Old fashioned surveillance of the property soon confirmed that disgraced former lawyer and now mega-wealthy investor, Dermott Becker, and his much younger wife were the occupants of the Hamptons mansion. By 11 A.M., Becker’s prepaid cell phone had either been destroyed or the battery had been removed because it could no longer be tracked. It made little difference as the link between Borchard, Elliot and Becker had been established.

Agents followed Becker to the Truman Building and watched him take a private elevator from the parking garage to the offices of ACME Investments Inc on the fiftieth floor. That night they attached a tiny camera to a concrete roof beam engulfed in shadows. Anyone using the private elevator would be caught on disk. Grinich was encouraged by the progress the agency was making.

When Todd entered the club the following morning, he was greeted by guffaws and smartass comments.

“Have a night out did ya, Todd?” Jed asked.

“Were you on the nest all night, Red?” Another thug laughed.

“Nothing like the taste of hot chocolate,” McEvoy chipped in.

Todd felt the color race to his face. Was Vanessa’s apartment bugged or were they just keeping close tabs on him? He was about to say something when Elliot said, “Knock it off, you bloody hyenas.”

As they walked up the stairs, Elliot showed Todd a red Samsung cell phone. “No wonder you couldn’t fix the other one. It died,” he said.

Todd silently breathed a sigh of relief. There was nothing in Elliot’s demeanor to suggest that he knew anything.

Brock Borchard knew that he was being watched. He didn’t see any agents, nor did he notice any cars following the limo but his gut instincts were on high alert. He knew that he couldn’t fly to New York undetected. It was nearly midnight when Ahmet dropped him at the Rialto Towers like he did almost every night. Borchard took the elevator to his penthouse on the 40
th
level, turned on all the lights and poured himself a Glen Fiddich. Twenty minutes later he pulled a Chicago Bears cap down over his forehead and left the penthouse without switching the lights off. He took the stairs to the parking garage two at a time before climbing behind the wheel of an unobtrusive, blue Toyota Camry with heavily tinted windows. Ten minutes later, he pulled up in a dark side street behind a silver Cadillac limo. As he got out, one of his warehouse employees jumped in the Camry and took off down the road. Farik was behind the wheel of the limo and Ahmet was next to him. Dirk was sitting in the back.

“Don’t speed or do anything to attract attention, Farik,” Borchard said. “Drive for six hours and then switch with Ahmet.”

“We should be in New York just after midday,” Vaughan said.

“That’s right. We’ll get settled into the hotel, and Farik and Ahmet can pick up the Camrys from the rental places. I don’t want anything drawing attention to us. We’ll start work the following day.”

“Have you got false licenses and cash with you?” Vaughan asked.

“We’re not stupid,” Ahmet scornfully replied.

Chas Grinich was fuming. His agents had lost Borchard and his gang. They appeared to have vanished. The agents had watched Borchard get dropped at his apartment building and had followed the black limo to Ahmet’s house where he’d driven into his garage. Since then there had been no sign of life at the house and the limo remained parked in the garage. Borchard was dangerous, and while he had never been convicted, Grinich knew that he had committed at least five murders and probably more.

Chapter 54

Vaughan drove the dark blue Camry down the alley and behind the club. There appeared to be no one else in it, but Borchard was lying across the back seat. Vaughan parked hard on the curb, opened the rear door, and Borchard slipped into the club.

Todd had his head down calculating the vig on the outstanding loans when he felt someone looking at him. He looked up, and a dark, swarthy, heavyset man in his mid-thirties was standing in the corridor just outside his office. There was something unsettling and intimidating about the man. McEvoy was standing directly behind the man with another swarthy looking character who wasn’t much bigger than McEvoy.

“What is this?” Todd asked.

The heavyset man ignored him and instead said to the other two, “I’ll see Elliot by myself. Wait downstairs.”

Dermott Becker had been angry when he called Elliot to say Borchard would be visiting via the entrance to the store. Becker had cursed and ranted about Borchard interfering in matters that didn’t concern him before relenting. Elliot sensed that Becker was wary of upsetting the Serbian. Without saying a word, Borchard sat down opposite Elliot and slowly put a cigarette in his mouth. He was a master of turning up the pressure even though Elliot appeared unfazed.

“Tell me about the accountant,” Borchard said, blowing a perfect smoke ring. “How much does he know about the drugs?”

“What’s this about?” Elliot asked.

“Someone leaked to the FBI. I suspect it was him.”

“It’s not. I have him tagged twenty-four hours a day. I know he hasn’t seen anyone from the government. You’re barking up the wrong tree.”

“Really? What about the girlfriend? Why couldn’t he be passin’ information on to her?”

“Because I’ve had her watched as well, that’s why.”

Losing patience, Borchard snarled. “Answer my question. What does he know about the drugs?”

“Virtually nothing,” Elliot replied. “We get rid of him every time we get a delivery. He would’ve seen some of the guys making sales, and he helped with some collections last week.”

“Get rid of him?”

“He’s never here. We send him out for lunch, coffee or whatever.”

“So he could be watchin’ from across the road?”

“Watching a white van drive down a alley. It could be delivering anything.”

“Didn’t you say he was smart?” Borchard sneered. “Tell me about the woman.”

“The woman?”

“Jesus! You were calling the Deacon woman. Where did you call her from? Here?”

Elliot paused. “Yeah, I Skyped her from here, but I always closed my door so he wouldn’t have heard anything.”

“You never lost your cool? You never shouted at her?”

Again Elliot paused but this time for longer.

“Don’t worry about answering,” Borchard said. “You already have. So he probably did hear some of your calls. I’m sure the Fibbies traced Dirk from her cell phone. Why do you think they didn’t trace you?”

“That’s easy. Skype’s virtually untraceable, and it’s heavily encrypted.”

“So the FBI can’t crack or trace it?”

“All they’d get is a jumble. It’s caller to caller secure.”

“Okay. Maybe I’m wrong. I doubt it, though. Have there been any other strange occurrences since he started working for you?”

“Strange? No, other than turning the club from losing a shitload to making a profit.” Elliot laughed.

“Nothing else?”

“Nothing.”

“My gut’s rarely wrong,” Borchard said, standing up. “Do you search him every day?”

“Of course,” Elliot lied.

“You need to keep a very close eye on him, because if you’re wrong, it’ll be you who’s in the gun. I’ll be in touch.”

Vaughan brought the Camry up to the store entrance and opened the rear door. His boss slid into the back seat and said, “Head for Manhattan, Dirk. I’ll tell you where to go when we get there.”

Thirty minutes later Vaughan drove into the parking garage below the Truman Building.

“Stay here,” Borchard said, getting out and striding toward the private elevator.

Dermott Becker was sitting in the boardroom by himself. He didn’t get up or shake Borchard’s hand and instead said, “You’re encroaching on my territory, Brock. I hope you’ve got a damn good reason.”

Borchard pulled out the chair nearest to Becker and eyeballed him. “I have. Listen to this.”

For the next fifteen minutes, Borchard related his suspicions and finished by saying, “The only reason the Fibbies haven’t questioned Elliot is because the kid’s a plant. They don’t want to rock the boat. I told you to get rid of him. If I hadn’t been paying my friends in the Chicago PD, I’d be staring at ten years hard time. Fuck that!”

Without saying anything, Becker reached for one of the phones on his desk.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m calling Jack to tell him to double the watch on the kid and his girlfriend,” Becker said, shuffling through some papers in front of him. “He’s got a new phone. So do I. I jotted down his number before. I’ve just got to find it.”

“Why the new phones?”

“Something happened to Jack’s. A power surge or something. I don’t exactly know. All he could get was squiggly lines on the screen, and it was beyond repair. As you know, we always changeover dedicated prepaid cell phones at the same time, so I had to get a new one too.”

Borchard’s eyes narrowed, and he reached out his hand as Becker punched in Elliot’s number. “Cell phones don’t crash these days,” he said. “My guys have all got cell phones, and I can’t ever remember one crashing. Put Jack on speaker mode. Something stinks.”

Before Becker could speak, Borchard said, “Jack, we want you to get your old cell phone back pronto. Dermott will give you the name of a telephony expert. I want you to take it to him and find out if it’s been tampered with.”

“It might’ve already gone out with the trash.”

“Nah,” Borchard said, “techies never toss stuff like that out. They always think they might be able to use the parts for something. Get Amon to go get it now. There’s no time to waste.”

“What’s this about?”

“It should be obvious, Jack. I just hope Brock is wrong,” Becker said. “I’ll phone you with a name within the hour.”

Chas Grinich was both relieved and worried when the cameras in the parking garage of the Truman Building picked up Brock Borchard entering the private elevator. What was Borchard doing in New York? What did he know? Did he know about Todd? He hadn’t traveled by plane and his gang hadn’t been sighted recently, which probably meant they were with him in New York. It was clear that they had known they were being watched and slipped out of Chicago.

Five minutes after Borchard left, Elliot barged into Todd’s office. “Stand up and put your hands above your head.”

“You’re joking,” Todd replied, not moving.

“No, I’m not. Now get the fuck up.”

Todd got up and slowly put his hands up while Elliot vigorously patted him down. “Unbutton your shirt!”

“What is this?” Todd asked nervously.

Elliot ignored him and started rifling through the papers on his desk. Eventually he said, “Nothing,” and left Todd’s office without another word.

Todd sat behind his desk taking deep breaths. They hadn’t searched him for weeks. He was taking Vanessa to the movies tonight and thoughts of canceling went through his mind. What had that evil, swarthy looking hoodlum told Elliot to make him so suspicious?

Chapter 55

Todd tried to keep calm, but he was nervous and kept glancing over his shoulder as he walked along the sidewalk with Vanessa. It was a cold, windy night; the streets were poorly lit, and it would be two blocks before they reached the restaurant district.

“What’s wrong?” Vanessa asked, pulling the collar of her coat up around her face.

Todd quickly related what had occurred. “They want me to work tomorrow morning,” he said. “That’s never happened before. Elliot wants to look at the outstanding debts.”

The wind howled along the street, and flickering streetlights gave off a pantomime of moving shadows.

“Stop looking behind,” Vanessa said, walking even faster to keep up with him. “If they were going to do anything, they’d have done it by now. I’m worried about you. I’m going to talk to Doug Lechte in the morning. I think you’ve done enough. It’s time to get out.”

“Doug’s working on a Saturday?”

“It’s a job for Max Lustig and Doug doesn’t want to disappoint him. Max said it was a pity you weren’t still with the firm because you would’ve been the best person to handle it.”

Todd hardly heard a word Vanessa said. He was still thinking about what she’d said about getting out. He felt better now that he could see the lights of the entertainment district. “They won’t let me. They’ll want more.”

“They had nothing before you told them about Karen Deacon and who knows what they’ll get off Elliot’s cell phone. You’ve done more than enough.”

“I’m visiting Arturo on Sunday, so I’ll talk to Grinich, but I already know what he’s going to say.”

Todd was as tight as a drum during the movie and when they came out he grabbed a taxi.

“That’s only two blocks.” The taxi driver growled. “How am I gonna make a buck out of that?”

“I want you to wait and then take me to Flushing.”

“Ah, that’s better.” The taxi driver grinned.

“You’re not staying?” Vanessa whispered, obviously disappointed.

“Sorry. I’d be useless and besides you’ll be safer without me.”

Todd tossed and turned most of the night. Elliot was a gangster, but the swarthy guy and his henchman were something else and positively scary. The usual smell of stale smoke and alcohol greeted Todd as he entered the bar. The thugs were around the pool tables, and McEvoy strode toward him shouting, “Stop right there, kid.”

What followed was a search that lasted more than two minutes.

“Early night last night,” McEvoy said. “Did you have a fight with the girlfriend or didn’t she want to put out? Give us your phone. What’s your password?”

McEvoy ran his eyes down the numbers called and received. “Don’t you and the girlfriend ever text?” he asked, as he returned Todd’s phone.

“No.”

“Oh, I nearly forgot. Jack called to say he can’t make it. He told me to tell you to go home.” McEvoy grinned.

As Todd walked along the street back to his apartment, he knew that Elliot had never wanted him to work. It had been a setup so that McEvoy could search him. He racked his brain trying to think what he’d done that had them so suspicious. His call to Vanessa went through to voicemail, and he said, “Sorry, I’m feeling sick. Can we skip tonight? I’ll come by after Castlebrough tomorrow.”

Todd was careful not to change his regular Sunday routine, and he left his apartment at precisely 12:30 P.M. His senses were on high alert as he made his way along Gable Street, and he paid close attention to the cars parked on the street. Two taxis passed him, but he kept on walking toward Mount Street where he knew Grinich would pick him up. Todd paid little heed to the dark blue Chevy parked in a no parking area. He was about fifty yards past it when he glanced around to see if anyone was behind him. There was a flash of movement in the Chevy and then there was nothing. He had never been followed on his visits to Castlebrough before, but now he was sure they were watching him. He stopped on the curb, slowly looked around, and hailed the first cab that he saw. Chas Grinich wouldn’t be picking up his usual fare today. Todd sat directly behind the driver so that he could look in his side mirror. The Chevy maintained a distance of about three hundred yards from the taxi and was only conspicuous when it changed lanes to pass.

Chas Grinich was surprised and then worried that Todd wasn’t walking along Mount Street at the appointed time. He drove slowly around the block and when there was no sign of him he became very concerned. Twenty-five minutes later he was relieved when his office called to let him know that Todd had arrived at Castlebrough at the usual time. Something had made him change his schedule, and Grinich pondered what he should do. He toyed with the idea of lining up on the cab rank in front of the jail, but there was no certainty that he would be at the front of the line when Todd was leaving. He had no idea what had occurred, but it hadn’t been serious enough to curtail Todd’s visit to Castlebrough. It was clear to Grinich that he should lie low for the time being.

Arturo never changed, and Todd wondered what was behind the veil. The room was set up, and the mobster was anxious to get his chess fix. After two games that he won easily, he stared menacingly at Todd and said, “You’re no competition. You’re playing like shit. I didn’t have to wait two weeks for this. Any asshole in here who can hold a chess piece would put up a better fight than you.”

“I’m sorry, Frank.”

“What’s wrong? Did you go out drinking last night? Are you hungover?”

“I wasn’t going to tell you, but I think they’re on to me,” Todd replied.

“Tell me everything,” Arturo demanded.

When Todd had finished Arturo smiled grimly and said, “So the Serbian has returned to New York.”

“You know him?”

“Know of him,” Arturo corrected.

“Is there anything you can do?”

“I warned you. They’re in my backyard, but killing for the sake of killing is bad for business. However, if they break the rules I’ll send them a message they won’t forget.”

“Break the rules?”

“You wouldn’t understand. Shuffle the cards. I hope your gin’s better than your chess.”

As Todd was leaving, Arturo said, “Do you still have that number I gave you?”

“Memorized,” Todd replied.

There was a line of taxis waiting at the front of the jail and Todd climbed in the back of the first one. There was a small shopping mall about two miles from Vanessa’s apartment, and he told the taxi driver to drop him at the entrance. Within two minutes of being on the highway, Todd looked in the driver’s side mirror, and there was the Chevy again.
Why are they watching me so closely? It has to have something to do with switching Elliot’s cell phone. What do they know? Are they following Vanessa too?

When the taxi pulled up at the mall, Todd gave the driver a fifty and took off. It was late in the afternoon, and there were few shoppers as Todd raced to the stairs to the parking garage. Without slowing, he ran through the garage and up the ramp to the street. There was no sign of the Chevy, as he worked his way down back streets to Vanessa’s apartment. When he reached her street, he poked his head around an alley. The Chevy wasn’t on the street. He sprinted the last two hundred yards, and when she opened the door, he was distressed and breathless. Before he could say anything she put her finger to her lips and said, “Hang on,” and plugged her iPhone into the docking station and Beyonce’s voice blasting out “Drunk In Love” echoed around the apartment.

Todd collapsed onto the sofa and in gasping breaths related what had happened with the Chevy.

“You look exhausted. You can’t go back to Bandits, and you can’t go back to your apartment. You’ll have to stay here.”

“You don’t understand. Grinich won’t agree and if he doesn’t, I’ll have to do the remainder of my sentence.”

“Isn’t that better than being killed?”

“That’s just it. I don’t think they know anything. If they knew about the phone switch, I’d already be dead. I don’t who that scary guy is but I think he’s the reason they’re taking so much more interest in me.”

“He might be Elliot’s boss?”

“No. Elliot didn’t defer to him like he does when he talks to Dermott.”

“Poor darling,” Vanessa said. “Why don’t you try and get some sleep? When you wake up, we’ll go and get something to eat.”