Dead Broke (Lana Denae Mystery Series Book 1) (12 page)

“Are you threatening me?” Borland demanded, moving a step forward.

“Only with arrest, sir,” Damien said. “Which I’m sure none of us want.”

Both of the detectives had remained calm, speaking quietly but authoritatively. Their purpose was to diffuse the situation and not escalate it to something more. They certainly didn’t want a scene. No one needed to know of their presence at the apartment.

But Paul Borland was having none of it. “You can’t arrest me! This is my building!” he shouted.

His voice growing measurably louder, Jamie said, “If you prefer, we can start poking around, see what we can dig up. There must be some reason you keep insisting we give you a warning before showing up. I wonder what you’re trying to hide?”

The raucous man went suddenly quiet. He made no move to leave but the detectives could tell he was thinking, contemplating Jamie’s words. Not willing to give in just yet, he abruptly switched tactics. “The Portland Police are going to owe me for this. You have been in and out of here for nearly a month and I haven’t seen a dime of compensation. You can’t just use this apartment rent free.”

“That’s not really our call. You’ll have to take it up with our Captain, or someone at the city,” Damien said.

“I will,” Borland retorted. Then, not wishing to push the issue further, afraid they would make good on their promise to start snooping around the place, he began to back away, grumbling all the while. “I’m not obligated to provide the police a place to stay or to do their job.” He paused only long enough to take a breath. “I’m paying taxes on a precinct that, apparently, isn’t being used.” Getting no response from the detectives, Borland mumbled something about the injustices and financial hardship this investigation was causing, and finally walked away. As he disappeared down the stairs, he was still grumbling to himself.

Closing the door to drown out the man’s fuming rant, Jamie looked at Damien and both shook their heads. “Is everyone in this building crazy?”

“Hope not,” Damien said. “
We’re
here, after all.”

“Doesn’t sound promising for us then, does it?”

The two spent most of the evening in idle conversation, watching TV—just passing time. Shortly before ten o’clock, getting a case of the hungries, Jamie got up and started noisily going through the cabinets.

“What are you doing?” Damien asked with an appalled look.

“I’m hungry.”

“Well, so am I but you can’t be eating a dead woman’s food. That just ain’t right.”

“She ain’t going to be needing it,” Jamie said, still scrounging through the cupboards.

“No.” Damien scampered to his feet. “I can’t let you do that. That’s like grave robbing.”

“Not exactly,” Jamie said. “I ain’t digging up anything.”

Damien shook his head, dismayed at the idea. “At the very least, it’s sacrilegious.”

“Well, how are we supposed to get something to eat, then? We can’t leave.”

“You ever heard of pizza? Or Chinese takeout? They
do
deliver, you know.”

“And what do we say, we’re here at the Rose City Apartments, number 607, the dead woman’s place?”

Damien sighed. “Why do you have to make everything so hard?” Reaching for his phone, he called to order a pizza and something to drink. Giving Nellie’s address, he hung up. “Now when I see the delivery guy pull up outside, I’ll go out and meet him in the hall.”

Jamie didn’t answer but sat with a slight smirk on his face. An obviously disturbed Damien didn’t seem to notice.

An hour later, well fed and becoming tired, they decided it might be best to get some sleep.

“Think one of us needs to stay awake?” Damien asked.

“No,” Jamie answered. “Anyone tries anything, the commotion
The Nellie
creates is bound to wake us.”

With a laugh, his partner agreed.

 Staying in the living room, Damien switched off the light. Claiming the couch, he laid back, closing his eyes.

Already comfortable in the recliner, Jamie was content to remain right where he was. Sitting there in the dark silence, he startled chuckling to himself.

“What’s so funny?”

“You.”

“Why am I funny?” Damien asked with a yawn.

“You really thought I’d eat a dead woman’s food? That’s just creepy. But thanks for the pizza.”

Damien rose up half way off the couch. “You went through that entire charade just so I’d spring for the pizza?”

“Mm-hm,” Jamie answered.

“Cheapskate.”

“If that’s the worst you ever call me, I’ll be happy.”

They continued the back and forth, taking small jabs at each other, neither noticing when they finally fell asleep.

Hours later, they were startled by a loud and forceful pounding on the door. Instantly awake, Damien noticed the sunlight streaming in the window. It was morning.

“Think that’s the manager again?” Jamie asked in a low voice.

“Wouldn’t surprise me, but I don’t think so,” Damien answered. “Different sounding knock.”

They both remained where they were, neither particularly inspired to answer the door. Then, the knock came again; followed by a female voice,  “Open up guys.”

“Lana,” they said together, jumping up.

Damien went to open the door. “Come in,” he invited.

“Thanks,” Lana said, stepping through the doorway. Inside the apartment, her eyes took in the greasy pizza box and empty soda pop cans. She gave them a raised eyebrow look. “Have a little party last night?”

“Pizza party,” Jamie said, nodding.

“In a dead woman’s house?”

Jamie gave her a shrug. “The living still get hungry.”

“S’pose they do.”

Damien spoke up, then. “You didn’t come by here at the ungodly hour of,” he paused looking to find the clock.

“It’s eight o’clock,” Lana told him. “Hardly early.”

Eight o’clock!
Blinking in surprise, Damien finished. “You didn’t come by just to talk about food.”

“You’re right,” she nodded. “I came to make sure you two were up. I’m on my way to Cascade Global. Mr. Holloway called this morning to say that our suspect did access their computers, specifically, Kurt Stabler’s account. It happened last night about two a.m.”

“So, he must have seen your TV special, huh?”

“Guess so.”

“We saw it too,” Jamie said. “Nice job but you could have just held a press conference like everyone else.”

“Could have but this was a more controlled setting, with only one person asking questions,” Lana explained. “And a press conference is much too formal. Plus, they play it only once and then show just the highlights. The killer may still have seen it but I thought we had a better chance of that this way.”

“Still, a little consideration on your part would be appreciated.”

“Consideration? For what? Why?” Lana was clearly confused.

“Why? Because you just made the whole Bureau look bad if anyone else ever has to do one of those.”

Lana laughed. “Is that your way of giving me a compliment?”

Jamie shrugged. “Take it any way you want.”

“I’m only interested in how the killer took it,” Lana said. “That’s the only opinion that matters.”

“True.”

“So was Holloway’s guy able to trace the hacker?” Damien asked.

Lana shook her head, “Unfortunately, no. The hacker seems to have covered his tracks again. But Ray might be able to find out anyway. Says he has a few tricks up his sleeve that Holloway’s guys may not know. He’s on his way over there now. Which is where I’m supposed to be headed too. Just wanted to make sure you guys were up.”

As she was on her way out the door, they told her of Paul Borland’s visit the night before. Lana was only mildly surprised. “The guy is a strange one,” she said.

“We decided the building must have something to do with it,” Jamie told her. “Everyone here eventually starts acting peculiar.”

Lana smiled bleakly. “In that case, I’m leaving,” she said, closing the door.

Chapter Thirteen

Ray Chaffe was already immersed in the task of decoding the tracking software by the time Lana showed up at Cascade Global. She knew better than to bother him and instead went to find Mr. Holloway.

Busy in his office, the man didn’t notice Lana until she spoke. Immediately turning away from his desk, he stood to greet her.

“Don’t stop working because of me, I just came in to let you know that Ray is here.”

Holloway nodded. “Yes, I saw him come in a few minutes ago and set him up in the outer office. I hope he has better luck than Davie did.”

“I’m sure he will,” Lana said. Then quickly added, “Not to disparage Davie of course, it’s just that cyber crimes are Ray’s specialty.”

“Mine too, these days,” Holloway said.

“Oh?” Lana said with a raised eyebrow.

“Setting up fraudulent investment accounts is not exactly legal,” Holloway explained. “Pretty sure the Securities and Exchange Board would not approve.”

“That was done as part of an investigation,” Lana argued.

“Doesn’t matter,” Holloway said. “They only recognize federal investigations, and you must notify them beforehand. They have to sign off on any fake accounts.”

“What fake account?” Lana said. “I happen to know a Mr. Kurt Stabler. In fact, he looks just like the picture on his account profile. I’d even be willing to bet he’s invested quite heavily in the AI-GLIS Fund at the moment.” She shrugged. “Seems legit to me.”

“Appreciate the support but that’s not likely to fly with the Feds.”

“Well, let’s hope Ray finds something quick then.”

The two had been walking as they talked. Reaching the outer office, they stopped.

Ray finally noticed them and said, “I may have some good news in a few minutes.” Then, looking to Holloway’s IT guy, he asked, “Is it working?”

Davie didn’t take his eyes off the screen. “So far. Shouldn’t be too long now.”

Nodding, Ray turned back to Lana. “I’ll spare you the technical details but we’re trying something a little unorthodox—hopefully it will work.”

“So, you were able to track him then?” Lana asked, a hopeful pitch to her voice.

“Not yet. But I was able to isolate...” he paused mid-sentence. “Nevermind, I said I’d skip all the technical talk. The condensed version is, I think I’ve successfully created a backwards projection, which theoretically could identify his ISP and eventually, his computer ID.”

Lana pursed her lips in thought. “You said you’ll know in a few minutes?”

“Should,” Ray nodded. “Might take a while longer to get all the information. A few hours, maybe—or sooner, now that Davie is helping.”

Glancing down at her watch, Lana said, “We have six hours before our three o’clock meeting. Let’s hope that’s enough time. I’d like to know which direction the meeting will take—hopefully it will pertain to apprehending our suspect at his home and not addressing trying to catch him in the act of murder.”

“I’ll let you know the minute I find something,” Ray promised.

Heading back to the precinct, Lana noticed she was a little on edge; the way she felt when a case was about to reach its turning point. She just wished she knew which way it was going to turn—for the better, or for the worse.

Spending the rest of the morning studying a map of downtown Portland, she assigned positions to the plainclothes officers who would be helping if they needed to go through with the plan to put Kurt out as bait. The officers would be stationed at various strategic locations on and around the Steel Bridge. She had no doubt her men could subdue the suspect. The only question was if they could do it before he attempted to kill Kurt Stabler. In order to assure that, there needed to be enough guys close by to make sure the suspect had no chance to get that close. But they needed to stay out of sight.

Lana sighed. Careful as she was with the planning, this was all speculation, based on the assumption the suspect would act in a manner consistent to his history, and assuming the man would go after Kurt Stabler. But what if he didn’t? What if he used a different method of attack? Would he choose to wait, and possibly go after Kurt at a later date? And, if they never found the suspect, did that mean Kurt would be in danger indefinitely? Had she made a huge mistake? Had her plan put Kurt perpetually in the killer’s sights?

She took a deep breath, trying to stop her worried mind from running away with itself. The effort did little to calm her nerves. Grimly, she knew there were no answers to the deluge of questions—yet, which only added to her anxiety. This was another man’s life she was gambling with.

Leaving the precinct, Lana went for lunch downtown, hoping to clear her head. At fifteen after one, she returned and was pleasantly surprised to find Ray seated in her office. A smiling Ray.

“Good news?” she asked hopefully.

Ray nodded, handing her a single sheet of paper. At the top was a name, Eric Schmidt, and below that an email address as well as a physical address. These were followed by an extensive profile and a long list of other information.

“This is our guy?”

“Affirmative,” Ray said. “He tried to disguise his identity in several ways; the computer and Internet were registered to different names, not his own. He used a lot of names, in fact.”

“So how are you sure he is the right guy?”

Ray smiled proudly, almost gloating, as he detailed his “daring” escapades through cyber space. “I had an idea to search recent transactions, banks, credit cards, and other online activity: PayPal, Etsy, Ebay, and of course the big one, Amazon. Then, I cross-referenced that info against the names of our victims. And got several matches.”

“I assume you were somehow able to narrow it down?”

Nodding, Ray said, “Turns out he has used the identity of all six ‘jumpers,’ setting up a virtual smorgasbord of credit. Those, combined with the investment payouts, have him set for life. It’s well over a million dollars.”

“And how does that help us?”

Ray was smirking a little now. “He made a mistake. A critical one. Everything traced back to a single computer. All these accounts, with multiple names; every one of them was set up from the same computer. That wouldn’t be unusual if the computer were in a library or some business. But when the computer is located in a single residency apartment...”