Daryl George sat behind his desk sipping a cup of organic black coffee. Next to it was a thermos containing something green that smelled like seaweed and sadness. It made Serrano crave a cheeseburger.
Serrano and Tally sat down. George downed the rest of the coffee and folded his hands. He didn’t touch the green gunk. Serrano was thankful for that. Some of Lieutenant George’s health concoctions reeked like Satan’s armpits.
The lieutenant was in a good mood.
“Congrats, Detectives,” he said. “This was really fine work.”
“Thank you, sir,” Tally said.
“Sir,” Serrano said. “Wickersham refused a lawyer. Said he wants to plead guilty to all charges. Now, we’ve already heard from Chester Barnes. He’ll be representing Nicholas Drummond. My guess is Barnes will dig his claws into Wickersham, too, because if the kid sings, he incriminates both Nicholas and Caroline.”
“And Isabelle won’t have that,” Tally said. “She’ll spend every dime she has to poke holes in this case.”
“I’ve dealt with Barnes,” George said. “He’s a television hound. He’ll be on the news every night trashing our case. But he’s a mediocre trial attorney. Once this case gets past the court of public opinion, it’s all about how airtight the evidence is. So tell me, Detectives, how airtight is it?”
“Pretty airtight, sir,” Tally said. “We have Wickersham’s uncoerced confession. We have phone records for Wickersham and both Drummonds, the burner cell data and GPS coordinates from the phones Magursky used, plus surveillance footage from the electronics store where they were purchased. We have a subpoena for Magursky’s bank records, personal and business, and we expect to find $480,000 in transfers to Albatross LLC, which then paid off Wickersham. Plus we have the Albatross leasing documents from J&J Accounting, signed by Caroline Drummond.”
“And where is Ms. Drummond at this time?”
“We don’t know for certain,” Tally said. “J&J says she’s somewhere in Italy, but they can’t confirm. She’s not responding to calls, emails, or texts. She took a, quote, unquote, ‘sabbatical’ right before this exploded. We’ve contacted Interpol, but it’s possible she was able to procure fake identification before she came onto their radar.”
“You don’t think her sabbatical timing is a coincidence, am I right?” George said.
“Not a chance,” Serrano replied. “But the timing is strange. According to J&J, she left for the sabbatical a month before this investigation even started.”
“Is it possible it was a legitimate sabbatical, and she just decided to stay once everything blew up?” George said.
“Unlikely,” Tally replied. “Three weeks before Constance Wright’s death, Caroline called both Sam Wickersham and Louis Magursky. Phone records confirm she hadn’t had any contact with either Wickersham or Magursky in two years. Caroline Drummond’s ‘vacation’ came right on the heels of those calls.”
“But therein lies the major loose end,” Serrano said. “Right now we don’t have enough to pin Wright’s actual murder on any of these people. The fraud and conspiracy, yes. But that’s it right now.”
George sat back, trying to mask the disappointment on his face.
“You said Wickersham cracked,” George said. “And these people aren’t the Mafia. There’s no omertà. Once they know what kind of prison terms they’re looking at, they’ll be tripping over each other to cut a deal.”
“That may be so,” Serrano said, “but right now we haven’t charged anybody with homicide. Chester Barnes knows this. Which means he knows we don’t have enough on Drummond and likely not enough on Magursky or Wickersham. And even though she’s likely guilty of half a dozen various felonies, Caroline Drummond was out of the country when Constance Wright was killed.”
“These jokers all know that they’re on the hook for conspiracy to commit murder charges—or at the very least accessory after the fact,” George said. “If we haven’t charged them on those counts yet, Chester Barnes might convince them to keep their mouths shut to try and prevent murder charges. So it’s on you two to make this stick.”
“How so?” Serrano said.
“Wright’s killer came from the Drummond, Wickersham, or Magursky camps. Not to mention Christopher Robles trying to kill that Marin woman, and then his degenerate friends tried to finish the job. My take? Constance Wright got wind of the conspiracy to ruin her. That’s why she called Drummond and Wickersham, to let them know she was onto them and was going to go after the money. Which gives Wickersham and both Nicholas Drummond and his wife motive to shut her up.”
Tally nodded, but it was clear she wasn’t sold.
“Here’s one consideration,” George said. “The Marin woman. Strikes me as a little more than a coincidence that she’s been at the center of so many of these incidents. Maybe she’s involved. Maybe not. But something tells me it’s a little more than criminal rubbernecking.”
“I’ve considered that, sir,” Tally said. Serrano shot Tally a look.
“Chester Barnes will be talking to District Attorney Katz imminently, if he hasn’t already. If we can’t charge Drummond or one of the others with Wright’s death before Barnes cuts a deal, we’re going to eat shit from the media for letting the killer slide. I see a circus of dirtbags in our jail for ruining Constance Wright’s life and Rachel Marin circling like a vulture on roadkill. Constance Wright was a good woman. It’s our duty to make sure these scumbags pay the price for Constance; otherwise we’re going to get eaten alive by the media. Am I clear?”
Serrano and Tally both nodded.
“Now go get them,” he said. The detectives left.
“What do you think?” Serrano said once they were out of earshot of the lieutenant’s office.
“Part of me thinks he’s right. That if this group of assholes was willing to go so far as to bury Constance Wright that of course they’d go a step further. And if you work backward on the time frame, it matches up. Wright somehow gets wind of the conspiracy. Contacts her ex-husband and the patsy who helped set her up. They then send Caroline Drummond to Europe to get her away from everything, give her plausible deniability.”
Serrano nodded.
“But . . . ,” Tally said.
“But if Wright found out about the setup, why call Drummond and Wickersham before going to the cops? Why give them a chance to get to her?”
“She might not have had enough proof to come to us,” Tally said.
“So she calls them just to scare them? Let them know she’s onto them? Constance Wright was a smart woman. She knew how to play the game. She wouldn’t have contacted either of them unless she had evidence of something.”
“What if,” Tally said, “and this is a big if. What if Drummond was the father?”
“Of Wright’s unborn child? I don’t see it.”
“Hear me out,” Tally said. “There’s always a spark between exes. I know you and your ex went at it a few times after the divorce.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”