John Lescroart - A Plague of Secrets

This stopped Glass dead. He squinted through his glasses, across at her. “Marijuana customers? You’re sure of that?”

“Absolutely. He’s on the list.”

“The list?”

“I’m sorry. Haven’t I told you yet about the list?” She gave him that news, the incriminating computer records. “Anyway, in short it looks like there’s a ton of connections between all these people, and we’d like an excuse to shake their trees and find out if we can what those connections are. The blackmail, for example. What was that about? Was it serious enough that Maya might have killed to keep it quiet? Or, on the other hand-”

“No”-Glass raised his palm to her-“hold up a minute. Let’s go back to what might really make a difference. You’ve told me that Maya says she didn’t know this weed was sold out of her shop, right? How credible is that to you? Especially if her brother was one of the customers.” He waited, a smile beginning to play at the corners of his mouth. “That’s what I thought. And beyond that, if the mayor-I’m kind of new in town, but Harlen’s her protégé if I’m not mistaken-I mean, she’d know as well, or might know. How much was Maya paying Vogler again?”

“Ninety thousand,” Schiff said.

“Well, that’s enough, or almost enough, to live on, right? Do you think it’s actually possible that he didn’t kick back some percentage of this drug money to Maya, who had, after all, set him up in business?”

Schiff kept nodding. “You’re saying Vogler-”

“I’m saying it sounds to me like he was her partner on the dope side as well. Which would explain his cavalier attitude toward her as much as blackmail, wouldn’t it? He can treat her any way he wants and she can’t fire him, can she? Since he’s her supplier. They’re in it together hip deep.”

Glass was making sense, although neither she nor Bracco had yet considered the possibility that this whole thing might, in fact, be about the weed. Schiff’s hope, and the reason she’d come to visit Jerry Glass today, was that he could start some kind of a U.S. prosecution on the marijuana issues that would make the principal witnesses nervous enough about the possible dope charges against them that in exchange for lenient treatment on that score, they would perhaps be inclined to trade information they might have about the murder.

But now Jerry’s take took it to a different level, contemplating that Maya herself might have been the prime mover, and armed with political connections and possibly even police protection, she would have been all but invulnerable to suspicion, much less prosecution.

And then-instead of this imagined blackmail about what she’d maybe or maybe not done in her past-the murder had simply been the usual dope deal gone bad. Maya had killed her employee because of any number of common reasons-he wanted a bigger cut, he was selling to his own customers and leaving her out, he was either getting sloppy or hard to control.

Now Jerry Glass settled back into his chair, his hands clasped on the desk in front of him, a faraway glint in his eyes over a tight-lipped smile. “I know how we can get these people to talk,” he said.

Back in his office once again, Glitsky sat slumped, his elbows on the armrests of his chair, his hands joined in front of his mouth. He was back in at work because what else was he going to do? Zachary was coming out of the coma, although they were going to operate on him again to close up his skull tomorrow. Rationally, he knew that there was reason for hope, and yet all he could feel was a deep self-loathing. Regardless of what Treya or Hardy or anyone else said, he knew that all of this was his fault.

Through his lack of attention he’d allowed his son to be hit by a car-there was still a reasonable chance that his boy could die. Even if he didn’t die, he might never be completely right in the head again. And they might not know the extent of those injuries, if any, for years.

He’d left the lights off at the door, so again the high windows provided the only illumination, and not much of it at that.

He clearly wasn’t welcoming guests.

Nevertheless, somebody knocked and he straightened up and intoned, “Come in.”

Bracco poked his head in. “Sir? Lights?”

“Sure.”

Glitsky covered his face with one hand against the sudden brightness, then lowered the hand and faced both of his inspectors with a flat eye. “Come on in. Have a seat.”

Bracco was on his way over to a chair, but Schiff saw him and noticed something and stopped in the doorway. “Are you okay, Lieutenant?”

He turned to look at her and surprised himself when he said, “My son’s in the hospital. He got hit by a car. He came out of a coma this morning, but he’s got another operation tomorrow. I’m sorry I’ve been out. What can I do for you two?”

Both of the inspectors broke into condolences and questions, and he responded and answered dutifully without really hearing many of the individual words. They were just noise against the constant thrum of the guilt in his head.

And then finally he became vaguely aware that they were talking about something else, something to do with their case, and after a couple of minutes of that-mostly more white noise-he held up a hand. “Whoa up,” he said to Schiff, who appeared to be acting as spokesperson. “Can you repeat that last part? Are you talking about Jerry Glass? Federal Jerry Glass?”

“Yes, sir, but that’s what makes this so good, at least potentially. He says the dope is enough, especially in the quantity we found at Vogler’s place, to trigger a forfeiture.”

“Forfeiture?”

Schiff nodded with enthusiasm. “Confiscating their property.”

Glitsky said, “I know what forfeiture is, Debra. But whose property?”

“Maybe Vogler’s, if for example we can prove that he used any part of the profits from the drug sales to pay off his house. But also Maya Townshend’s, and even better, maybe her husband Joel’s.”

“Townshend Real Estate?” Glitsky asked.

Bracco finally spoke. “It could be huge, Abe. Millions and millions.”

“They were in the drug business? I thought she didn’t know anything about that.”

“Well, that’s her story,” Schiff said. “But Darrel and I don’t really believe it. And Jerry Glass doesn’t believe it. And he thinks he can get a federal grand jury motivated to prove it.”

“Well, all that’s well and good, but how’s it relate to the homicide you’re trying to bring to trial? We’re still doing homicide here, right? That hasn’t changed during my short absence?”

“Jerry thinks there’s much more going on, and that Vogler’s murder’s in the middle of it. He gets these people into a forfeiture situation on the civil side, then he gets to ask them anything on the criminal side in secret with the grand jury, they look into their assets, get connections we wouldn’t have a chance at.”

“Plus,” Bracco added, “the threat alone. It’s pretty powerful leverage. They tell us the truth or-”

Glitsky cut him off. “I get the concept,” he said, “but I can’t say I really like it.”

“What’s not to like?” Schiff asked.

“Well, for starters, if you don’t have any evidence, how do you decide that these people are your suspects? Or that one of them is. You leaning toward any one of them?”

“Maya doesn’t look bad for it, Lieutenant,” Schiff said. “She was down there, it was her gun. We know her relationship with Vogler was squirrelly at best.”

“So bring her downtown and sweat her.”

“Not so easy,” Schiff said. “She’s already lawyered up. Your friend Diz Hardy.”

“Wonderful.” Glitsky studied the ceiling for a moment. Then, “What about this list of Vogler’s customers? You don’t think it’s reasonable he was killed by one of them?”