Twelve to Murder (A Mac Faraday Mystery) (17 page)

David said, “But when Kate died, Lenny Frost made a big deal—”

“Lenny Frost knows his way around the media machine very well,” Boris interjected.

“Lenny’s feelings for Kate went from hot to cold depending on what role he was playing,” Derrick said. “She always thought he was a sleazy, manipulative, spoiled brat. Sometimes, I’d think he was trying to steal her from me. Other times, he told me that he hated her guts. To this day, I don’t know which way he went with her.”

“Where were things when she died?” Mac asked. “Were they hot or cold?”

Derrick lifted his eyes to look at Mac. “Kate and I had a fight. It was one of those dumb things.” He rubbed his eyes and let out a gasp. “I just remembered this. Our fight was over Lenny. She wanted me to stay away from him. He had said something to her or—I don’t know. I told her that she couldn’t tell me what to do. One thing led to another. We had a big fight.” Once again, a sob came to his voice. Tears came to his eyes. “And that was how it was the last time I saw Kate.”

They sat in silence.

“I’m sorry,” David said in a soft voice.

“So am I.” Wiping the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand, Derrick stood up and retrieved a tissue from a box on an end table to blow his nose.

Boris told Mac and David, “If you’ve spent any time with Lenny Frost, you can see that sometimes he has a problem staying in touch with reality.”

“How did Carson Drake fit into all this at the time of the kidnapping?” Mac asked.

“Lenny and I were lying to Drake about my mother representing him,” Derrick explained. “Eventually, he figured it out and ordered Lenny to pay him for all of the drugs he had given us. Lenny didn’t, so Carson kidnapped him.” He looked at each one of them. “That’s the truth. My parents had nothing to do with any of it.”

Deep in thought, Mac rubbed his fingers across his lips. “Tell me about the kidnapping.”

Derrick returned to his seat on the sofa. “I told—”

“I believe you that your folks weren’t involved,” Mac interjected. “But…a big hurdle in clearing them is the fact that it was
you
—,” he pointed across the table at him, “—who the kidnapper insisted deliver the ransom in your mother’s Mercedes. The bag was outfitted with a tracking device. Somehow, the bags got switched and the tracking device put into a decoy bag. It only could have happened while it was in your possession. Now, your parents are dead and a whole family is dead—the Drakes. Carson Drake’s wife was murdered a year after the kidnapping. His two children were killed avenging his reputation. It’s time for you to come clean with everything you know.”

Derrick stared at Mac in silence. When he was unable to look at him anymore, he looked up at the police chief, and then to his lawyer.

“Your parents are dead, Derrick,” Boris said. “If there’s something that you haven’t told us about that kidnapping, you need to tell us now.”

“Carson Drake did it,” Derrick said in a firm voice. “Yes, I switched the bags, because Carson Drake ordered me to or he was going to kill Lenny.”

“When did you switch the bags?” David asked him.

“Before the drop,” Derrick said with a sigh that sounded like relief at finally getting the truth out. “Lenny called me on my cell phone.”

Recalling that the kidnapping happened in 1998, Mac asked, “Cell phone? This was—”

With a wave of his hand, Derrick explained, “This happened long before the police were tracking and monitoring cell phones and that sort of stuff. Lenny and I had cell phones back when all the other kids had pagers.”

“So, Carson Drake called you on your cell…” Mac said.

“No, Lenny did,” Derrick said.

“Lenny?” Mac replied with a furrowed brow.

“Because Carson Drake made him call me,” Derrick said.

“When was this?”

“After he was kidnapped, after Carson had called the studio demanding the ransom and gave them the instructions for the drop—that I was to deliver it in my mom’s Mercedes.”

“But at that time,” Mac recalled from what he had read of the case, “they did not know Carson Drake was the kidnapper. They didn’t know that until after Lenny was found and said it was him.”

“Exactly.”

David tried to lean forward in his seat, but the sharp pain in his ribs forced him to sit forward on the edge of his seat to ask, “When did this call come in to you on your cell phone?”

“The same day as the ransom call,” Derrick said. “Lenny sounded scared out of his mind. He said that Carson Drake had kidnapped him and that he was standing there with a gun to his head. He then told me what to do.”

“Which was?” Mac asked.

Boris cleared his throat to remind them of his presence. “You do realize that my client is not admitting to being a party to any of this—the kidnapping—”

“We’re not interested in arresting your client for anything unless he did something wrong,” David said. “Right now, we just want to figure out the truth before more people end up dead.”

“Go on,” Mac told Derrick. “Lenny calls you on your cell phone—am I correct in assuming that he was calling on his cell phone?”

Derrick nodded his head.

“Exactly what did Lenny say?” Mac asked.

“I told you,” Derrick sounded frustrated. “Carson Drake had a gun to his head and he was listening to every word Lenny said. The FBI was going to have me deliver the ransom. I was going to use a particular type of bag, a workout bag like the type that I used to carry my track clothes in. I was to get my track bag and stuff it full of newspapers and put it in my bathroom. There’s an access door in the back of the linen closet, behind the towels, for the plumber to get to the pipes. I was to stash my bag there. Then, when the FBI gave me the ransom to deliver, right before I left, while I had the bag, I was to suddenly say I had to go to the bathroom, run up to my room, and switch the bags—making sure I found the tracking device to put in my bag and then deliver my bag with the newspapers.”

Shrugging his shoulders, Derrick said, “Lenny asked if I got that. I said I did. He said to do it or Carson was going to kill him and it would be my fault.”

“What were you supposed to do with the real ransom?” Boris asked.

“Nothing,” Derrick said. “Oh, Lenny said that, too. He said to completely forget about the ransom and not to go near it. Carson had an inside guy—one of the FBI agents. So, if I told them about Lenny calling, the inside guy would know, tell Drake, and they would kill Lenny. So I told no one. I never went near the real ransom.”

“How did Carson Drake get the ransom then?” Boris asked.

“The inside guy,” Derrick said. “When the FBI realized they had been tricked, they interrogated me to death and searched the house. They said they never found it. But then, when Lenny called the police after Carson took off, he said he heard Carson tell someone on the phone that he had the ransom. So the inside guy must have gotten it. When Lenny got out of the hospital, we looked in the closet, behind the access door, and, sure enough, the money was gone. This FBI agent must have been on the take with the drug dealers Carson worked for.” Derrick looked across the room at Mac who was studying him closely. “It wasn’t my mother or father.”

“Did you share your bathroom with anyone?” Mac asked.

“No,” Derrick said. “It was my private bath that was attached to my bedroom. No one used it except me.”

“Did you ever talk to Zachery Harris, the writer who wrote that book?” Mac asked him.

“No,” Derrick said. “He asked for an interview, but I refused to ever talk about the kidnapping to anyone.”

“According to his book, he had an anonymous source who knew the inside details of the kidnapping.”

“Well, now that we know who his father was, it must have been Carson Drake,” Derrick said. “Maybe he finally tracked him down.”

Mac asked, “Do you think Carson Drake is alive?”

“Either he is, or the inside man who worked for the FBI has the money,” Derrick said. “The money disappeared. Someone took it, and it wasn’t me or my folks. I knew Carson Drake, so if he had come in to take that money from my bathroom, I would have known it.”

“So the only ones who had access to that bathroom to get the money was one of the federal agents working the case, or someone you knew and trusted,” David said.

“Exactly.”

A slow grin crossed Mac’s face when he sat back in his seat. “Someone above suspicion.”

Chapter Eighteen

After thanking Derrick for his time and offering their condolences once again, Mac and David stood to leave. Boris had opened the door for them to step out when Mac turned around so fast that he startled David, who was directly behind him.  Stepping around the police chief, Mac called over to where Derrick was staring in grief at the paperwork spread out before him. “How tall are you, Derrick?”

Both Boris and David looked questioningly from Mac to Derrick, who was equally perplexed by the unexpected question. “Huh?”

“How tall?” Mac repeated his question. “How tall are you?”

“Five feet, eleven inches,” Derrick said. “I’m considered average height. Just short of six feet. Why?”

“I noticed when we shook hands that you were a little shorter than I am,” Mac explained, “I’m six foot one.”

“Good for you,” Derrick said with a shrug.

“Yesterday,” Mac went on, “when I was in the pub with Lenny, I noticed that he was the tallest guy in the place. Of course, everyone who was in there was on the short side. I guess that’s part of Lenny’s star presence. He stands out not just because of his personality, but also because he’s so tall.”

“He tells the media that he’s six foot four,” Derrick said. “Really, he’s six two. He wears heels to seem taller.”

“Not the only lie Lenny told,” Boris grumbled. When David turned to him, he said, “Addicts are the best liars in the world.”

“That’s very true,” Derrick said.

On their way out the door, David asked Boris to speak to them alone in the hallway—out of Derrick’s earshot. “About the Stillmans’ wills…” the police chief broached the subject.

“What about them?” Boris asked. “Rather standard stuff. Derrick gets everything. They had no other children or relatives.”

Not wanting to give away details about the DEA investigation into the comedy club, David said, “A source told me that Derrick had been disinherited very recently, as in only weeks ago.”

Surprisingly, Boris nodded his head. “Janice did come to me to disinherit him and leave everything to Lenny.” Frowning, he swallowed. “It was the last time I saw them. Austin came in with her, and it ended up being a long and emotional meeting.”

“Was the will changed?” Mac asked him.

Boris nodded his head. “But not in the way Janice intended it to be when she walked into my office.” He folded his arms across his chest. “Our meeting turned into an intervention where Austin and I made Janice see how Lenny Frost had been playing her for years and how it had affected her relationship with her own son.”

“How is that?” Mac wanted to know.

“As you have probably guessed, I am not a Lenny Frost fan,” Boris said. “Neither was Austin. Janice was not your average talent agent. She represented child actors because she loved children and wanted someone on their side. Both of Lenny’s parents were second-rate actors who ended up being a couple of drunks and addicts. His mother died of Hepatitis B. When his father wrapped his car around a telephone pole, he was three times over the legal limit.”

“What does this have to do with the Stillmans’ wills?” David asked him to move on to the heart of the matter.

“Talent agents have the reputation of being manipulative of their clients,” Boris said. “That may have been how it started with Janice and Lenny, but it was not how it ended. Lenny turned the tables on her. After she ended their business relationship and moved her family back here—to get away from Hollywood and Lenny—he ended up following her and preying on her guilt. Everyone but her, including Derrick, could see it. When she came in to disinherit Derrick with some cock and bull story about him running a drug operation out of the club that she had set up for him, the first thing I thought about was Lenny, who—guess what—is working at the club as a headliner. Austin thought the same thing.”

“Then you think Lenny was behind the drug dealing and framing Derrick for it?” Mac asked.

“Not necessarily the ringleader, but if you take a look at Lenny’s history, you will see that trouble follows him around like a puppy,” Boris said. “At that meeting, we finally managed to get Janice to see it.” He turned to David. “So, to answer your question, yes, they changed their wills—to disinherit Lenny.”

“Does he get anything?” Mac asked.

“Janice had set up a trust fund for him three years ago. Again, out of guilt. Lenny has been getting a monthly allowance from it. Something to provide for him when he can’t get work, which is usually the case.”

“How much is in this trust fund?” David asked him.

“One million dollars, which is a lot of money for Lenny. He’s flat broke. The only money he has coming in is the salary from the Comedy Café and that allowance. He also gets the deed to the condo that he has been living in. Janice had bought it for him when he moved to the East Coast. Now that the Stillmans are dead, Derrick is going to sell the club, which means Lenny will be out of a job. With Janice gone, Lenny isn’t protected anymore.”

“Then Lenny had motive to want Janice alive,” David said.

“Unless he didn’t know that the Stillmans had changed their wills to disinherit him,” Mac said. “What was he going to get before they had made the changes?”

Boris replied, “The trust fund, condo, and either guaranteed employment as the headliner at the club until his death or a percentage of the profit from the club, plus a gift of one million dollars. I guarantee Derrick won’t keep Lenny on since he doesn’t have to.”

“The best friends are no more,” Mac said.

“That ended for good when Derrick grew up and got clean. Then he saw Lenny for who he really was. Janice’s perception was clouded by guilt.”

Mac glanced up and down the corridor and lowered his voice to ask, “Is there any possibility that Janice could have told Lenny about her plans to make him the beneficiary before that meeting?”

“No,” Boris said with certainty, “she was afraid of Derrick finding out.”

“Afraid?” David asked.

“Of devastating him to the point of a major relapse,” the lawyer explained.

“Let me get this straight,” Mac said. “Due to the changes in the Stillmans’ will, Lenny is out of a job, but he has ownership of the condo where he’s living—”

“At current market value,” Boris said, “it’s worth three quarters of a million dollars.”

“—and a trust fund worth one million dollars,” Mac concluded, “but he’s out of a gift of one million dollars, and what is possibly his last entertainment gig.”

“Unless he can get the new club owners to hire him,” Boris said. “I guarantee they won’t put up with his shenanigans. Most people aren’t as patient as Janice was with him.”

“What was that about?” David asked Mac once the elevator doors had closed.

With no one else in the car going down from the penthouse floor to the lobby, they had privacy and David could grill Mac about the strange line of questioning he had embarked on. “Why did you want to know how tall Derrick Stillman is?”

“Because he didn’t look that big to me,” Mac asked. “What do you think? Do you think he has to put his car seat all the way back?”

“You are now looking at Kate Coleman’s death?” David chuckled.
“Our
case is the Stillman murders. We got their killers. Sela Wallace and Zachery Harris in retaliation for their father deserting them.”

Crossing his arms, Mac leaned back against the wall of the elevator. “Are you satisfied with that conclusion?” With a cocked eyebrow, he waited for David’s reaction. “Out with it. Something isn’t sitting right in this case.”

“Why did Lenny pretend not to know Sela Wallace and take those hostages when he had an airtight alibi?” David muttered. “I don’t believe for one second that he forgot he had one. And who was he planning to put in that suitcase?”

The elevator doors opened. Holding the door open, Mac stood back and gestured for David to step out into the lobby ahead of him.

When Mac stepped out, he came face to face with Jeff Ingles, Spencer Inn’s manager. “Mac, do you have a minute?

“I could give you two,” Mac joked.

“This is not funny.” The always nervous hotel manager took out his handkerchief and wiped his sweaty brow. “About that reservation you made yesterday…”

Mac grinned. “What about it?”

“Did you have to pick
that
night?”

“That’s
the night I want.”

“But…” The whine in Jeff’s voice made him sound almost like an alto. “Why can’t you pick
another
night?”

“What’s the point of owning a hotel if I can’t use it when I want?”

“Do you have any idea what you’re doing?” Jeff turned to David for help. “Did he tell you what he’s doing to me?”

Answering with a shake of his head, David asked, “What’s Mac doing to you, Jeff?”

“He’s trying to kill me, that’s what.” Jeff’s voice was filled with despair when he explained, “I about had a stroke when I read your message yesterday.”

Amused by the manager’s drama, David asked, “Do you want me to arrest him for attempted murder?”

“Like that’s going to help,” Jeff said with sarcasm.

“As long as I don’t have an issue with the inn being closed to guests that night, why should you?” Mac asked.

“That’s the biggest night of the year in the hotel business. We already have reservations from guests who made them months ago—some years ago. I can’t go back and tell them—”

“But it’s my hotel,” Mac reminded him.

Jeff grabbed Mac by the arms. “Do you know what will happen if I tell all those guests that the inn is closed?”

Mac was surprised by the tight grip Jeff had on his arms. “What?”

“They’ll go someplace else,” Jeff said. “Another resort. Someplace else. Maybe even the Wisp. Do you know what that means?”

“What?”

“They’re going to go
someplace else!”
Jeff shrieked.

Sympathy flooded over Mac. “How about—”

“What am I going to do?” Jeff wrapped both arms around Mac into a hug and collapsed against him.

Not wanting the hotel’s manager to slump down to the floor, Mac held him up by his armpits. “Okay, I’m sure we can work something out.”

A glimmer of hope came to Jeff’s beady eyes. “What?” He looked up at Mac from where his head was resting on his chest.

“We don’t have to cancel reservations for those who already have them,” Mac said. “They can still come.”

Jeff let out a deep sigh of relief. A wide smile crossed his face. He stood up straight and tidied up his clothes to regain his composure.

“On that night, the night I want,” Mac continued, “they can enjoy the whole inn, dinner and open bar, as my guests. Everything will be on the house.”

The smile fell. Jeff’s face and body were instantly drenched in sweat. He was still fighting to find his voice when Mac ushered David toward the lounge.

Mac was gesturing for two beers when the police chief’s phone vibrated on his hip. While the bartender served up their drinks, David took the call.

“You should note this date on your calendar,” Special Agent Alex Fredericks opened his conversation with David.

“Why?”

“Because I’m about to tell you something that I don’t say too freely,” the agent said.

“Gee, thanks, Fredericks,” David said, “but I’m already committed to someone else.”

“Don’t be a smart-aleck,” Fredericks replied. “You were right.”

“Of course, I was.” David grinned.

“Our agent focused on Zoe Reese, Stillman’s assistant. Within hours, she made contact with the dealers we were looking for. We got a warrant to tap Reese’s phone, put a tail on her, and she led us right into a beehive. They’re planning a major score for this week and they said specifically that they want it done before Stillman returns from taking care of his parents because they know that he’ll be putting in a lot of time at the club and will be in the way. We have it on tape. Your man Stillman is in the clear.”

“Did your operative say anything that could indicate that the murders were to get Derrick out of the way?” David asked him.

“We thought that too, but no,” Fredericks said. “This big deal came up as a result of the murders. It was going to happen next week, but then they moved everything up because it became more convenient with Stillman gone. They adjusted their schedule as a result of the murders, not the other way around.”

“It’s great to hear that he’s in the clear,” David said.

“Thing is,” Fredericks added, “Zoe Reese isn’t working alone. She keeps referring to her partner and saying that she has to check with him. He’s the brains of the two. Could be the bartender or one of the comics who’s regularly on the bill. She’s using a burner phone to call him and she hasn’t referred to him by name yet.”

Fredericks finished the conversation by telling David that he would contact him if he got any information that could pertain to the Spencer Police murder investigation. After disconnecting the call, David climbed up onto the bar stool next to Mac and passed on the news.

“So the assistant is the one dealing the drugs, but she has a partner who’s pulling the strings from behind the scenes,” David concluded. “They haven’t identified him, but they know it’s not Derrick Stillman.”

“She’s doing the dirty work and taking the chances,” Mac said. “I wonder how loyal she’ll be when the feds nab her.” He answered his own question. “Depends on if the partnership is business or pleasure.”

“It’s amazing how quickly the honeymoon ends when threatened with twenty years of sharing a cell with a two-hundred-pound bruiser calling you ‘Cupcake.’” After taking a sip of his beer, David set down the glass and turned on his stool to face Mac. “Are you seriously thinking that these murders go all the way back to Kate Coleman’s death on that hilltop road in Hollywood?”

Mac shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not.” He took another sip of his beer.

“What are you thinking?”

“Carson Drake,” Mac said. “That’s who I’m thinking about. He’s been hanging over this whole case like Jacob Marley’s ghost in Dickens’
A Christmas Carol.
He’s not here, but he’s certainly the catalyst for everything going all the way back to Kate Coleman’s death.”

“More like the serpent in the Garden of Eden,” David said. “In exchange for promising to make him a star, he got Kate, Lenny, and Derrick hooked on drugs and the party scene. When she couldn’t deliver, Kate ended up dead. Lenny ended up kidnapped, terrorized, and in and out of rehab ever since. Derrick became addicted, but cleaned up his act only to lose both of his parents. This isn’t Charles Dickens, it’s a Greek tragedy.” Seeing Mac squinting into his beer glass, he put his elbows on top of the bar to lean in close. “You aren’t listening to me. What are you thinking?”

“What if?”

“What if what?” David asked.

“Something Boris said…I was thinking the same thing but…what if it was more than that?” Mac took his cell phone out of its case and ran his finger over a phone number he had recently put into his contact list.

At the same time, David’s phone vibrated. The caller ID read Bogie. He brought the phone to his ear and connected the call. “Yeah, Bogie…”

“How’s your ribs?”

“Not great,” David said while rubbing the brace around his midsection. “What’s happening there?”

“There’s a woman here to see you and Mac,” Bogie said. “She saw the news about Zachery Harris’ death and says she has information for the lead investigator in the Stillman murders. She drove all the way here from Delaware.”