Damage Control (15 page)

Damage Control Strategy
Days 10 through 16

(the second Saturday through the third Friday after the murder)

Chapter Thirty-eight

I get a warm glow when I think back on the next week. Over the weekend Rafe and I did the hospitality thing for Mama and Uncle D while they rested up from their cross-country jaunt. That meant Josie going to Mass for the second week in a row, because the last thing I needed was some Mama drama. On Monday we got them on a plane headed back to Baton Rouge, so that Uncle D could start calling ex-cons from a phone that didn't belong to us.

Tuesday's highlight was Seamus taking me to a studio in Arlington, Virginia, to record our little skit on how Spunky-Josie needs to pack heat. Turned out to be a lot harder than I'd expected. I had the script cold, and the bit we were shooting wasn't supposed to run more than forty-five seconds, but we needed rehearsal and revisions and then take after take until Seamus and the digital video guy were happy at the same time. Finally got it done, though.

The idea was to post the thing on YouTube—not right away, but the next week if D.C. was still dragging its feet on my concealed-carry permit application. Get enough hits from gun lovers and Seamus could go to the NRA with his big pitch. Couldn't help feeling a little excited about it, even with all the drudgery. YouTube isn't exactly the big time—even if you go viral, you're doing the same thing dancing cats do every day—but humpty-thousand people were going to see my name and face and hear my voice so, hey, why not be happy?

Wednesday I started to get a little traction with the America-back-into-space thing. Got calls from the Congressman
and
the potential donor, both pretty upbeat. I started scratching out some ideas for a commercial that could be slapped together in time for the next primary season. I'd have to run the thing by Seamus, once I had something to run, but I already had visions of a modest six-figure score.

On Thursday came the call from Uncle D. He had good news.

“You should expect a contact from one Daniel Klimchock by early next week, sugar. Not sure what his angle is, but this is favors from, like, three guys. So if he's not what you were hoping for, let me down gently, okay?”

“Got it, Uncle D. Can't thank you enough.”

“All right, sugar. Stay good, now.”

Then came Friday. Epic day. Glorious day. A day to press in my memory book, or whatever the digital equivalent is.

First thing Friday afternoon I called Glencora Robinson, the hardworking D.C. civil servant who had reluctantly filed my application for a concealed carry permit, and asked for a status report. Made the call from Seamus' land-line, with him on an extension. He had a handkerchief over his mouthpiece, and worked so hard at keeping quiet that his face turned ripe tomato red.

“Your application is pending, Ms. Kendall.”

“Well, it's been a week now and I've been coming to work blue-pencil scared every day, because of what happened and me being defenseless and everything. How much longer is it going to take?”

“I am very sorry about your fears, but I cannot give you an estimate for final action on your application.”

Seamus broke into a gape-mouthed grin and pumped his fist in the air like the Redskins had just scored a touchdown to put them nine points ahead of the point-spread with two minutes left in the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl.

“Is there someone else I could talk to, then?” I asked. “You know, to try to explain why this is so important?”

“You're welcome to call anyone you wish to ask for an appointment, but the civil service officers in this area are very busy with pressing affairs.”

Seamus silently mouthed “
pressing affairs”
as his face lit up like a leprechaun's on St. Patrick's Day. He flashed an enthusiastic thumb's-up at me.

“Okay, I guess. Whom would I call, then?”

“I am not able to identify the particular civil service officer who has responsibility for your application at this point in time. That is a matter of internal deliberation and therefore is not subject to public disclosure.”

I thought Seamus might wet his pants as he broke into his happy dance.

“Well, is there anything at all you can tell me, or am I supposed to just sit here and wait for this hoodlum to come back and take care of unfinished business?”

“I can only advise you to be patient as your application is considered in due course. You will be informed promptly upon final disposition. Please feel free to call at any time. We are here to serve the public.”

She hung up. I hung up. Seamus let out a whoop they could have heard on Farragut Square.

“Did you get all that?” he asked, almost panting with eagerness.

“Every word.” I gestured toward a computer screen with my telegraphic transcription of her answers underneath each of my scripted questions.

“‘Pressing affairs.' ‘Internal deliberation.' ‘Here to serve the public.' That couldn't have gone any better if I'd written her lines as well as yours.”

“Just out of curiosity, why didn't we record the whole call on tape? Then we could have laid an audio track on the clip with her actual voice.”

“That might have been illegal. Taping a call without both parties' consent is a felony in Maryland, and who knows whether D.C. has a law like that as well?”

“Oh.”

“Anyway, this will work just as well. Maybe even better.” Seamus used both hands to frame an imaginary shot, and then put the first two fingers of his right hand on the thumb and ran it along the bottom of the make-believe frame. “We'll have a shot of you talking on the phone, with an audio track of you reading your lines and someone else reading this woman's. We'll make the audio track sound kind of wind-tunnelly, as if it really were a tape recording. We'll run a super along the bottom of the picture with a transcription of what's being said. In little tiny type we'll put, ‘Actual conversation. Government employee's words read by paid performer from contemporaneous notes.' Have to take the time to do it right, so we'll spend Monday on the recordings and go live first thing Tuesday morning. Bet we get ten-thousand hits in the first eight hours.”

And that was just Friday's opening act. The feature attraction came that evening, a little after six, as Rafe and I were just getting into our cocktails. Rafe's lawyer called. Rafe put him on speaker.

“The forensic audit of your accounts is complete,” he said. “Bottom line: nada. Dry hole. Unless you spent the last twenty years accumulating ten gold bars that you've had stashed in a safe and you somehow got those to McAbbott, there is simply no way you could have paid him off.”

“So I'm no longer a target of the investigation?” Rafe asked.

“Not a target. You'll be a possible suspect until the cops actually convince themselves that someone else did it, but every lead they had on you has brought them to a dead end. They're not going to spend any more taxpayer dollars going after you unless they just stumble over something new on their way to lunch.”

“That's great news, Mike. Thanks for calling with it. Nice work.”

In an instant, Rafe looked happier than I'd seen him in weeks: unforced smile and a relaxation of his upper body, as if he'd just unbuttoned a vest that was two sizes too small. Gave me a thrill just to look at him. Not sexual. I was just so happy for
him
.

As Rafe punched the OFF button on our phone console, I noticed a red light blinking. We had apparently gotten a call while Rafe and his lawyer were talking. Lightheartedly, with some happy-go-lucky, what-the-Hell body language, Rafe pressed the button to play back the recorded message.

“My name is Danny Klimchock. Someone asked me to get in touch with Josephine Robideaux Kendall at this number.” He said my name haltingly, as if he were reading unfamiliar words from a scrap of paper or a PDA screen. “Bit of a problem. I'm heading overseas on Tuesday, connecting through Dulles with a seventy-five-minute layover. I'm supposed to land at Dulles at ten-twenty-five in the morning. If you can figure out a way to get through security, we can hook up then. Otherwise I'm out of pocket for a week. So, one way or the other give me a call at the number on your caller ID screen.”

The voice sounded dead ordinary. No particular regional accent, no rasp, no growl, no unusual cadence, no hint of threat or toughness—or cordiality, for that matter. Smooth enough, but without the upbeat, forced charm of a telemarketer. A CPA's voice, or a Department of Transportation careerist's. I wrote down the number he'd called from, including the area code: three-one-two—L.A.

Rafe raised his eyebrows at me.

“One of Uncle Darius' friends came up with a Klimchock contact?”

“Sort of. Friend three or four times removed.”

“Not exactly making it easy for you, is he?”

“Nope. But, as Uncle D sometimes says, food tastes better when you're hungry.”

Damage Control Strategy,
Day 20

(the third Tuesday after the murder)

Chapter Thirty-nine

The first ‘Like' for our video came thirty-seven seconds after go-live at nine a.m., Eastern. The first ‘Share' came six seconds later. You can't type as fast as you can point and click, so the comments didn't begin until 9:02. The first five pretty much captured the general tenor:

“You go, girl! Shoot first and never mind the questions!”

“Good luck, little lady!”

“America needs rational gun control! The blood of innocents is on your hands, you trigger-happy bitch!”

“Come to Texas! Y'all will have your permit before you're all the way off the plane!”

“.32? .32???? Shoot someone with a .32 and all you do is make him mad! Get yourself a .40 caliber S&W semi-auto, and use 165-grain ammo. NOT 180 GRAIN! And shoot for the guts!”

That last one brought me up a bit short. This troll knew I'd applied for a permit for a .32-caliber weapon. Not exactly a state secret, of course: my application was a public record, accessible online. But apparently one look at my spunky face on a computer screen had stimulated this guy in Whoknowswhere to Google his way into the database and get detailed information from that application. A little creepy, for my taste. A girl likes attention, sure, but there's attention and then there's stalker-level obsession. A cold chill ran up my spine—and not in a good way.
Seamus, what did you charm me into signing on to?

I picked all this stuff up on my way to Dulles, where I planned to meet Klimchock. Getting myself on the gate side of security? No problem. I'd be flying to Phoenix in September for the annual CCC Conference: CCC standing for “Calcatraveamus Cunes Caerulius,” which is pidgin Latin for “Let's Kick Blue Butt.” Bought a refundable ticket on a Delta flight leaving Dulles for Phoenix today. Printed out the boarding pass, sailed through security with nothing but a computer case for luggage, and here I was. After meeting with Klimchock I'd reverse course, trade in the unused ticket for one that would work in September, and not even have to pay a change fee.

By that time I had less than half an hour before Klimchock's ETA. A Starbucks cart at the west end of the gate area had me salivating. Unfortunately, Starbucks is on MVC's naughty list because it donates to Planned Parenthood, which is radioactive for a lot of our clients. Don't necessarily drink that particular Kool Aid myself, but the customer is always right—at least until I have that West Wing office. I figured that as sure as I decided to sneak a vente mocha, thinking no one would ever know, the CEO of one of our biggest donors would stroll off a jetway and catch me red-handed. So I trekked to the other end of the terminal where I found a pastry cart selling just regular, you know,
coffee
. Didn't taste all that bad, didn't cost four-seventy-five, and it got the job done.
Hmm
.

I'd just about finished it when Klimchock's plane pulled up to the gate. A little web research had told me roughly what he looked like but I came
this
close to missing him; turned out that web photo was a mite flattering. Not homely or anything, but most of his buzz-cut hair was gone, with just little gray tufts sprinkled here and there on his scalp. Bit of a stoop that you wouldn't expect in a guy in his late thirties; maybe several months in a Russian prison does that to you. Nondescript blue sport coat and khaki slacks with a dress shirt. No necktie. Smiling, but kind of a cockeyed smile that had a wariness behind it:
whatever you're about to say, I've heard it before
. He carried the kind of black attaché case that an employer might give you but that almost no one would buy for himself.

He spotted me about the same time I did him, but he pretended he hadn't. Flicked his eyes away real fast, the way men to do when a woman catches them staring at her cleavage. Probably didn't want to tip me that he'd looked me up. I acted like I hadn't noticed and approached him from his left with a peppy, “Mr. Klimchock?”

“You have to be Josie Kendall.” Shifting his attaché case to his left hand as he pivoted toward me, he extended his right hand. I guess widening his eyes was his idea of faking surprise.

“Sure am!” We shook. “Thank you
so
much for taking the time to meet with me.”

“Any friend of Jerzy's.” He
almost
winked, but not quite. “Where did you get that coffee?”

“Far end,” I said, gesturing east with my cup hand. “But there's a Starbucks cart on the other side, if you'd prefer that.”

“No thanks.” He shook his head firmly. “Joseph Stalin will get out of Hell before I pay five bucks for coffee. Besides, Starbucks donates to Planned Parenthood.”

HELL-o. Seriously?

I know plenty of wealthy conservative fundamentalists. Deeply religious and just as sincere as a little girl with her first kitten. They're already saved, the way they see it, and they can't be unsaved no matter what, but they'll put in Saturdays on Habitat for Humanity projects anyway because Jesus loves them and when they do that it makes Him happy. If it weren't for people like that, I might have to get an honest job. But I didn't know any who'd
made
their money quite the way I figured Klimchock had made his.

Hmmm.

Before long we had our legs under a mini-table, with a cup of coffee and a croissant in front of Klimchock. About then—
boing!
My feminine sonar pinged to confirm that I'd excited male desire. Klimchock closed his eyes before biting into the croissant. Not sure whether he was saying grace or asking for help to keep from lusting after me in his heart. Whatever, when he spoke he was all business.

“First I thought Jerzy had cheated me. Then I thought he'd conned me. I finally realized that he'd just conned himself. A million bucks actually did end up being half of all that was left out of one-point-two billion in cash flow that our venture had generated over not quite two years. Putin made money, the KGB made money, a boatload of Russian bureaucrats got rich—and Jerzy and I barely covered our costs, with a couple of nickels left over to help us remember the ride.”

“How do you mean ‘conned himself'?”

“It's Russia.” Eyes shining, Klimchock looked the way I suppose conquistadors did when they glimpsed El Dorado over the horizon. “There's just
so much
of
so many
things there: oil, natural gas, sturgeon eggs, small arms, big arms, really big arms, priceless art, diamonds from countries that aren't allowed to sell diamonds, opium from Afghanistan, tin and manganese and bauxite and uranium and metals you've never even heard of from countries under forty-seven different kinds of trade sanctions. And it's the Wild West! Wide open! Permanent boomtown! It seemed so easy at first. We figured that by my second quarter in-country we'd be clearing a million a month.
A month!
Clearing!
”

“And you're saying he didn't just sell you that story, he bought into it himself.”

“Totally. He and I joined a very big club. Germans, Eastern Europeans, Frenchmen, Armenians, Greeks, Turks, Americans—and plenty of Russians. You just
look
at the stuff and your eyes light up. You know the risks, you know the government is basically a gang of thieves, you know how other guys have gotten taken. But you think, ‘I'm special. I'm smart. I'm savvy. I'll be careful.' You try to hustle Russia—and you end up like most of the others. Better than a lot of the others in our case. I got out with a whole skin, and Jerzy didn't hurt anything except his feelings.”

“Jerzy had mentioned…higher numbers to me.”

“Yeah, that's Jerzy.” Big grin. “
Was
Jerzy. His memory came equipped with a telescope that enlarged everything he looked back on.”

“So him trying to shift federal solar-power grant money away from Sanford Dierdorf to a wind-power deal he had arranged—was that just Jerzy fantasizing?”

“Not necessarily. That sounds real enough. No federal agency is going to leave one penny in appropriated funds unspent. If Jerzy had forced them to take the money away from Dierdorf, they would have looked for another place to spend it fast, and if Jerzy was sitting right there he'd be a prime candidate for it. But if that's what he had in mind, he couldn't let any grass grow under his feet.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because Dierdorf's scam was approaching its sell-by date. As soon as a new administration comes in and gets its act together, the hustle is all over. Whoever Dierdorf's rabbi is at the federal agency goes over to K Street to be a lobbyist, a new group of senior political appointees takes over, the GS-12's who've been biting their tongues come out of hiding—and when that happens, stick a fork in Mr. Dierdorf 'cause he's done.”

“So even if Jerzy had gotten an audit started, the whole Dierdorf thing might have been history, even before the audit was finished?”

Klimchock thought about that, chewing meditatively on flaky bread as tiny crumbs drifted from his mouth to sprinkle his shirt.

“Have to go with yes on that one. Maybe Jerzy figured he could scare Dierdorf off just by getting something started; pull the cash switch before administrations changed; then make a quick buck for a year or so as the new kid on the block. Say two or three million. Nothing to sneeze at. Sounds like a long shot to me—but Jerzy was always an optimist.”

“Do you think Dierdorf would have killed Jerzy to keep that from happening?”

“Sure, in concept. Hard to make the cost-benefit work, though. A contract-kill is a big risk and a big expense, and Dierdorf would only be protecting another twelve, fifteen months' worth of grant money. Dierdorf can be dumber than a box of rocks, though, and I suppose he might have talked himself into it.”

“And then talked himself into having someone burglarize MVC's office?”

“I read about that.” Brushed crumbs from his shirt and gulped coffee. “Someone named, what, Reuter?”

“Bart Reuter, yeah. Who lawyered up right away with a D.C. attorney Dierdorf had used before.”

“Repeat business is the key to success.” Klimchock shook his head slightly and grinned. “My take on that one is, you might pin the hit or the heist on Mr. D, but you can't make him take the rap for both.”

“Not sure I follow.”

“
If
Dierdorf killed Jerzy, then there's no way he sends a mouth-breather to town for anything remotely connected to that murder. He may be dumb, but he ain't crazy. No-necks have a habit of getting caught, and when they get caught they have a habit of talking.”

“Well,” I muttered, “Reuter is one for two.”

“You sound a little frustrated.”

“I am.” I nodded. “Smart people tell me Jerzy was using me in some kind of bigger scheme, somehow, and maybe the using part hasn't stopped even though Jerzy is dead. No one can come up with a theory for Dierdorf that makes sense, though—and who else is there?”

“Well, there's me—but that kinda thing isn't my gig anymore. I had some time to think while I was behind bars in Russia. The main thing I thought was, ‘If I get out of this alive, I'm finding something steady with a 401k plan and no chance of ever eating black bread and borscht again.'”

He fished a business card out of his shirt pocket. Orange on white:

Klimchock Hydraulics And Thermodynamics
Applied Engineering and Product Applications
“We're in the Solutions Business”

“This is my latest line. Should have the website up by the end of the week. I'm an engineer. Engineers are boring, but they mostly die in bed.”

I took the card, thumbed it, briefly noted that the addresses and phone numbers below the headline stuff were Idaho, not L.A. An italic line across the bottom jumped out at me:
A Christian Based Company
.

“I hope this was helpful.” Klimchock said this with an air of finality as he glanced at his watch.

“It was. Real helpful. Thanks again.”

“Like I said, any friend of Jerzy's…”

This time he actually did wink. He gathered his things, sharing a friendly but superficial salesman's smile as he did. Right on the verge of sauntering away, he paused, hesitated, then offered a final comment.

“I just remembered something about a rent-a-thug named Bart Reuter. I heard he'd done some work for Dierdorf but hasn't had a Dierdorf gig since he blew a handoff from a bag-man in South Dakota over a year ago. Fracked it up, you might say. I'm having trouble seeing Dierdorf behind Reuter's escapade here.”

Well, Josie, this just isn't getting any clearer, is it?

***

I called Uncle Darius on my way back to my car, because I just
had
to talk to someone about Klimchock. Darius came across as skeptical.

“So a guy who thought a million-dollar payoff for two years' work was chump-change found Jesus in the gulag?”

“That's what he says. I mean, it's possible. Maybe he really did just add things up and decide to make a quiet, decent but modest living as an applications engineer working out of a small office in Idaho.”

“Right,” Uncle D said. “And maybe you could be sincerely born again and still talk about murdering someone in cost-benefit terms, as if you were deciding whether to buy a software upgrade.”

“Yeah,” I admitted, “that bothered me a bit. I could see using an applications engineering business as a front—but why fake the born-again stuff?”

“Well, darlin', all I can do is speculate. If you wanted me to speculate, I would say that ‘hydraulics' and ‘thermodynamics' covers a broad field with a large number of specific applications that involve United States Air Force procurement officers. And if you wanted instant entrée with a fair number of Air Force officers, especially out west, faking a born-again schtick wouldn't be a bad place to start.”