The Master Plan (2009) (21 page)

Marianne came in carrying a few phone messages. "Nothing urgent," she said. "And now that you're back I'm
going out to lunch. Do you want me to transfer the phones
to the answering service?"

"Please," Dana replied. "Have you heard from Casey or
Bob?"

"No. How did the hearing go?"

"As expected, but Kimball got the judge to set bail and
Del put up their bonds"

"That was nice of him"

"He's a nice man. I'm going to do some computer research so close my door when you leave"

"Okay. I'll see you an hour or so"

Dana told Marianne to have a nice lunch and then scooted
herself closer to the computer keyboard on her desk. She accessed the Internet, brought up the Chicago Sun-Times Web
site, and logged into her account.

Dana searched the archives using the keywords "Anthony Hunter" and found 106 references. She began scanning the lead-ins to the articles and opened the one that
said HOSTAGE TAKEN IN BANK ROBBERY. When the article
appeared on the screen, Dana printed it out.

The next article Dana printed was the one that reported
the discovery of the body of the female hostage in an alley
several blocks from the bank where she'd been abducted.
The woman's name was Sarah Turner and she was twentytwo years old.

SUSPECTS ARRESTED IN ROBBERY/MURDER reported how
two brothers, John and Anthony Hunter, had been arrested
at the home of John's girlfriend, Mary Lou Bandini. No address was given for Bandini. The article went on to say the
arrest had resulted from an anonymous tip. The suspects had appeared in a lineup and the bank teller and other employees had positively identified the Hunter brothers as the
bank robbers.

The articles in the archives traced the history of the trial,
conviction, and sentencing, and Dana printed out all the articles that she needed and put them in chronological order.

By the time Marianne came back from lunch, Dana had
made another copy of all the articles and placed them in
another file. She handed the file to Marianne and asked her
to label it and put it in a safe place.

"What do you want me to label it?" her secretary asked.

"Hunter Crime File," Dana responded.

"I read the story Sam ran about Tony Hunter's brother
being murdered last night. It's so bizarre. I didn't mention
it this morning because I didn't want to get Casey upset."

"I don't think Casey can be any more upset than she already is," Dana told her. "Maybe finding out how and why
this happened will help her."

"What can I do to help?" Marianne asked.

Dana handed Marianne a slip of paper with the name
Mary Lou Bandini written on it. "See if you can run a trace
on this name. I want to know where she is now. She'd be in
her late thirties or early forties"

Globe Investigations subscribed to several databases that
could be used to get information on individuals, and Marianne was a whiz at doing research. She flipped her hand
through her red tresses and sat down at her desk.

Dana went back to her office and called a friend of hers
at the county recorder's office in Cook County, Illinois.

"Hi, Dana," Billy said when he picked up the phone.

Dana and Billy had gone to college together and Billy had married Dana's best friend, Trudy. Dana had been the
maid of honor at their wedding.

"How's Trudy and the baby?" Dana asked.

"Both getting fat and sassy," Billy joked. "How are you
and the brute getting along these days?"

Dana laughed. "The same as always."

"Bring him to dinner next weekend. We haven't seen you
guys in a while."

"We can't come next weekend," Dana said. "Bruno's
mother is coming here for a visit."

"Is that good or bad?"

"I'm not sure," Dana said honestly. "Listen, pal, I need a
favor."

"Don't you always when you call me at work"

Dana laughed again. "Yes"

"What do you need?"

"I'm investigating two brothers named Hunter who committed a robbery and murder twenty-three years ago. They
lived in Chicago, so I'm hoping they were born there in
Cook County and you can get me some information off their
birth certificates."

"Do you have birth dates?"

"I have the years, but not the months or days"

"Okay, give me what you got."

Dana read off the ages of Anthony and John Hunter at the
time they committed the robbery and murdered the hostage.
She told Billy she needed the names of their parents and
needed to know if the parents had any other children. She
also needed to know if there were death certificates on file
for the parents.

"I'll try to get back to you in the morning," Billy said.
"Hunter's a pretty common name so it may take longer."

Dana thanked him and hung up. Although the information she was seeking on the Hunter family was public record,
there were new restrictions on obtaining that information
because of the problems with identity theft that had become rampant in the last few years. Getting the information
through Billy saved Dana a lot of time and red tape.

With her investigation on the Hunter murders begun,
Dana decided to go through the mail Marianne had stacked
on her desk. Monday's mail always included the letters that
had come in on Saturday, but thankfully there were only a
few new cases that needed to be assigned.

There were also two letters in the mail from readers who
had been cheated by Flannery's garage thanking Globe Investigations for looking into the matter and exposing Floyd's
unethical business practices.

Dana placed the letters aside for Bob and Casey to read
as they had done the work on the case. She buzzed Marianne and asked if she already made copies of these letters
for the file they had on Flannery.

"Yes, I did. In fact I made two copies, one for the file that
went to our attorneys and another for the duplicate file I
have here"

"I don't know why I asked," Dana said. "You're always a
step ahead of me"

Marianne laughed. "Most of the time I'm running to catch
up with you. By the way, I heard that Flannery showed up at
Casey's apartment on Saturday and now he's back in jail."

"Right. Apparently our lawyers got a restraining order against him that he violated by showing up at Casey's. Bruno
said he'll be in jail until the assault case goes to trial."

"Will we all have to testify?" Marianne asked.

"Of course. You're the one he actually assaulted."

"I still can't get over how Bob floored the guy. Bob may
look like a big fluffy marshmallow but he's really a tough
guy." The conversation, like many Dana and Marianne had
when they were in the office alone, was taking place over
the intercom. That way they could keep working while
they talked. "Oh, hold on, Dana. I'm getting some results
from my search on Mary Lou Bandini."

"I'll be right out," Dana said. She had sorted through all the
mail and picked up two of the reader requests she thought
Marianne could research and answer, and carried them out to
the reception area.

The printer connected to Marianne's computer was cranking out the information that appeared on the screen.

Dana waited for it to finish and grabbed the paper out of
the printer. "Mary Lou Bandini is in prison for embezzlement," Dana said reading the print out. "This is too crazy."

"She's serving her second year of a five-year sentence."

"Call the prison and find out when visiting hours are and
what I have to do to get permission to see her," Dana said.
"Also, see if you can get transcripts from the Hunters' trial.
That may give me more information than the newspaper
articles."

"Greg is going back to Chicago tomorrow. I can ask him
to go to the courthouse and get copies of the transcripts.
It'll be faster than waiting for them to send them to us"

"I don't want to inconvenience him, but if he's willing to
do it, I'll pay for his gas and food"

"I'll call him now and ask him," Marianne offered.

"Thanks. I'm going to go up to the newsroom and see
Sam. I want to share some of this information with him"

Dana only spent about ten minutes with her editor. The
newsroom was especially hectic that day and Sam was harried. However, Sam approved of Dana's activities and promised the paper would back her efforts.

The afternoon had passed quickly and it was close to four
when Dana returned from her quick meeting with Sam. Bob
and Casey showed up a few minutes later.

"We solved all four cases," Bob said proudly. "For some
reason, people were very friendly and cooperative today."

"Great," Dana said. "Get your reports done and I'll look
at them before I leave tonight."

"Don't you want me to tell you the details?" Bob asked.
"Some of them are quite amusing"

"Don't believe him, Dana," Casey said. "All four were
elderly people who have been scammed by unethical companies or individuals. It was all quite sad"

"You didn't think the guy that tried to buy a potbellied
stove and got a potbellied pig instead was hilarious?"

"No. He was just dumb, and I felt sorry for the pig"

Casey suddenly looked like she might burst into tears.
Dana stepped between her two investigators. "Bob, do you
think you can handle the paperwork on your own? I need to
discuss some things with Casey."

Both Casey and Bob had state-of-the-art laptop computers in which to input their stories. The laptops enabled them
to type up their reports and if needed e-mail them straight
to the newsroom for inclusion in the next edition of the
Globe. Casey always carried her computer with her. Bob always left his at home, giving him a good excuse to go there
to work.

"Don't mind at all," Bob replied cheerfully. "I'll get them
done tonight and e-mail copies to all of you. None of them
are front-page material, but I can condense all four into one
report to warn other consumers to beware."

"Perfect," Dana said.

Casey had already left the reception area to take a seat in
Dana's office. Marianne had just gotten a return call from
Greg.

"Greg says he'll be glad to do it," Marianne said. "He'll
bring them straight here when he comes back tomorrow."

"Wonderful. He is a great guy."

"I know it," Marianne said.

"And she owes her happiness to Bob's matchmaking service," Bob told them.

Dana and Marianne both rolled their eyes at him. Bob
laughed and left the office with the day's files under his arm.

Dana joined Casey inside her private office and closed
the door so they could speak privately. Casey was sitting in
one of the chairs in front of Dana's desk staring at the gray
skies through the window behind the desk. Her face looked
as dark as the clouds that threatened to dump more snow on
Crescent Hills.

"How are you doing?" Dana asked, leaning on the front
of the desk to talk to Casey.

"I was pretty good all day," Casey said. "Keeping busy
helps. Then, I got a call from the medical examiner's office
telling me they were ready to release Tony's body to me"

"I' m sorry."

"I guess I could take him to Chicago and bury him with his brother," Casey said softly. "Only I don't know if there's
any insurance or money for a funeral."

"I'm checking to see if there are any other relatives."

"I guess there could be. Everything Tony told me was a
lie, including the part about not having any family. Of
course, who am I to talk; I was lying like a rug too."

"You can't change the past, Casey. All you can do is move
forward"

"I take it you're going to investigate Tony's murder?"

"Bruno is doing that. I'm going to work on John's murder.
I don't know any of the homicide people in Chicago, and
they're so overworked, they may not care if I gather some information in their case"

"Have you learned anything so far?"

"Actually, I have" Dana paused and walked behind her
desk. She picked up the file folder with the articles she had
printed out from the Sun-Times archives and handed it to
Casey.

Casey looked at it without comment for a few minutes
and then handed it back to Dana. "What they did was so
awful. I can't believe it."

"Remember that they were young. Tony was only sixteen."

Casey nodded. "That doesn't excuse the fact that they
murdered an innocent woman."

"No, it doesn't," Dana agreed. "But now we have to figure out why someone came along all these years later and
murdered both of them. We need to find out more about the
bank robbery victim and if she has any relatives that may
have been seeking revenge"

"That works for John's murder," Casey said, "but it doesn't
work for Tony. He's been out of prison for two years now."

"The newspaper articles say that the brothers got over a
quarter of a million dollars in the robbery. The money was
never recovered and that could be the motive behind the
murders"

"Oh my God," Casey said slowly. The lost look left her
face as a sudden thought sparked her enthusiasm.

"What is it?"

"I think I know where the money is, or what's left of
it.