Ryne Pearson - Capitol Punishment

“You’re getting as cynical as me,” Frankie observed with a devious grin. “I’d better get you back to Anne for some attitude adjustment.”

Art lowered his head, smiling broadly. “My plans exactly.”

“How’m I doing?” Darren Griggs asked, no tears at all having come this session.

“Darren, I’m not the one to judge that,” Anne answered. It was never the response a patient wanted. Things would have been easier, they invariably believed, if the doctor could just listen to them, bless them as well, and send them on their way. But it didn’t work like that.

“Yeah. I know.” Darren smiled meekly, mildly ashamed of himself for the attempt at praise seeking. “I am feeling better.”

“Good. That’s what counts.”

“Felicia is doing better, too,” Darren said proudly.

“Have you convinced her to come with you?”

“Well, actually, we were talking about that last night. I don’t think she’s ready to, you know, come out yet.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“But, Felicia thought it would be good to have you over for dinner.”

“I’m supposed to be making dinner for you,” Anne reminded him with a chuckle.

“I know, but it would be good for her. And…”

Anne knew what Darren wanted to say. “Moises.”

“I’m hoping he’ll come home soon. It would be good for him to see you, too.”

“Maybe,” Anne said. “But if he’s being as rebellious as you say, he may be doing more you don’t know about.”

“I’ve thought the same thing. I’m worried. He’s a good boy, Dr. Preston, but he’s hurt by this.”

“I understand that. But he may need a dose of authority other than yours to prevent him from getting involved in behavior that’s self-destructive. I’m not an authority figure, Darren. But I know someone who is.”

The man in her life, Darren recalled. An FBI agent. “He’s welcome to come.”

“Good. When?”

“Is Monday all right?”

“For me, sure. I’ll have to check with Art,” she added. “But, I have a way with him.”

Darren knew what she meant, having been on the receiving end of a woman’s persuasive abilities for twenty years. “We’ll see you both Monday.”

“You remember him, then?” Hal Lightman said hopefully as the bank teller nodded at the picture of Nikolai Kostin.

“Yes, vaguely.” The young lady, her manager standing next to her for support, looked away from the enlarged driver’s license photo. “I can’t remember much else about him.”

“The register shows that you handled the last cashier’s check that this gentleman came in for,” Omar Espinosa said, trying to jog her memory. “A little more than three weeks ago. Try and think.”

“It was in the morning, Sherry,” the manager said, putting a reassuring hand on her teller’s shoulder.

The teller’s head began to shake slowly as she looked apologetically to the agents. “I’m sorry. All I can remember is the face.”

“Anything about the money?” Lightman asked. “He brought in twelve hundred in cash. Did he say anything about where he got it? A job, maybe? Anything?”

“I’m sorry,” she responded.

Lightman let out a breath. “That’s all right. You did your best.”

“We may need to talk to some of your people at a later time,” Espinosa told the bank manager.

“Anytime.”

The two agents left the Palmdale branch of Suncoast Security Bank, stopping just outside the glass front of the financial institution.

“It was a long shot anyway,” Espinosa said. “What’s she going to remember after three weeks? She sees hundreds of people a day.”

“I know,” Lightman agreed, leaning on the side of the Chevy and scanning the area around the bank. It was a typical strip mall, probably built in the early eighties by the looks of it. Earlier than the big building boom. That was apparent from the absence of any southwestern styling and earth tone stucco on the facade. Just a grouping of stores stretching from both sides of the bank, all the way to the side streets.

Espinosa, too, was surveying the area, which was suffering a mild case of blight. Things weren’t very new compared to other areas of the high desert city. “Why did Kostin come all the way over here to get his checks? There are closer banks to his place.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Lightman answered, the why hitting him with more force as he considered it again. “Maybe he came to this bank as an afterthought.”

Espinosa saw his fellow agent looking to the row of stores more closely now. “He may have been coming here for something else.”

“Right,” Lightman said. “This bank may have just been in a convenient place.”

“Let’s check it out. You start at that end,” Espinosa suggested, pointing to the east end of the strip mall. “I’ll take this side.”

Hal Lightman studied the numerous storefronts as he walked toward his end of the strip mall. A dentist. A doughnut shop. A sandwich place. Some offices. It was quite a hodgepodge, he thought. Of course there were also the all-too-common FOR LEASE signs, the product of so many strikes that the Golden State had against it.

Defense cutbacks. Earthquakes. It had all hit California. Except for locusts, Lightman thought, hoping he hadn’t somehow suggested the plague to some higher power with his errant musing. Enough of the negative, he told himself as he entered a pool supply company at the end of the row.

Strike one, he knew, leaving the business after just a few minutes. No one had recognized the picture of Kostin. The same result from the next two businesses, a dentist’s office and a doughnut shop. The next in line was a small office, obviously closed for the day. Lightman moved on, the smell of something wonderful hitting his nose before entering the restaurant.

“Good morning,” a pleasant-looking older man said, greeting the agent. “We are serving lunch. Just one?”

“No, thank you.” Lightman showed the somewhat startled restaurateur his shield. “We’re checking with merchants in the area. Have you ever seen this man?”

The restaurateur bent forward, bringing his eyes close to the picture. His head came back up, nodding, a concerned look on his face. “Yes. Nick.”

Yes! “He’s been in here before?”

“Many times,” the man answered, seeming surprised at the question. “His office is next door.”

“His office ?”

“Yes.” The man gestured in the direction from which Lightman had come. “Is he in trouble?”

“Right next door?” Lightman asked, trying not to seem excited.

“Yes. But he has not been there in a while. Is he all right?”

“I’ll be back, sir. We’re going to need to get a statement from you.” Lightman walked back the way he had come, stopping at the darkened office of Birch and Associates, or so the gold stencil on the glass front door said. He cupped both hands around his eyes and pressed close to the glass, examining the interior of the small office. There wasn’t much to see. A desk, with no phone on it or anywhere in sight. A chair. One chair, actually. Some in/out boxes, all empty. Pictures on the wall, though they looked like they could have come with the place.

A front . It wasn’t hard to come to that conclusion, and Lightman had already solidified the conjecture as he raced back to the Chevy, motioning to Espinosa. He had the cell in hand, the desired speed-dial button already pressed, as his fellow agent came up. But the first words about the discovery were spoken to a very pleased senior agent quite a distance to the south.

“Seymour,” John Barrish said, his time on hold longer than anytime he could recall. The relationship had changed, apparently. Was the Jew still his defender? It didn’t really matter. He needed only one final thing from the legal zealot.