A Fistful of Rain (18 page)

CHAPTER 25

It was stupid, but it was the only disguise I could think of, so I wore a ball cap and sunglasses when I went to the bank. I’d bought both of them at a Walgreen’s down the block from my branch, and maybe it was the cut, or maybe I just didn’t matter that much anymore, but no one seemed to recognize me when I made the purchase.

There was a small group waiting in the teller lines when I got to the bank, the last of the lunch crowd, and I stayed out of their way, trying to be inconspicuous, and it totally backfired and people stared. Maybe sunglasses and a ball cap would do it at the movies, but in a bank, it just made me stick out a little more. I got a withdrawal slip from the stand and filled it out precisely, and waited until the line died down before attaching myself to the end. That didn’t work, either, because another three people came in right after I’d done it, and assembled behind me. They were all women, professionally dressed, and none of them looked much older than I.

Four people in front of me, and the line had just shortened to three, when I heard one of the women say, “You know who she looks like? She looks like the girl from Tailhook.”

“That’s not her. She’s too short to be her.”

“Not Van, not that one, the
other
one, the one whose brother just got killed.”

“That’s not Mim.”

“I don’t know, it looks like Mim.”

“It could be.”

“No it couldn’t, she doesn’t live in town, she lives out in Lake Oswego.”

“That’s Van, Van lives in Oswego. She has that big house they showed on television that time.”

The line had shortened to one, and I really wanted the women behind me to shut up.

“Did you hear about the photos? There was this bit on the news about these photos.”

“Oh, God, I know! My boyfriend showed them to me, can you imagine letting someone do that to you?”

“You could ask her, you could ask if that’s her.”

“I wouldn’t want to be rude.”

There was a teller open, and I moved to his station. He was middle-aged, balding, and he smiled at me when he took my withdrawal slip, then looked at it and laughed and handed it back to me.

“I think you need to fill out a new one,” he said with a very amused smile.

I checked it, shook my head, slid it back. “No, it’s correct.”

“I think you wanted those zeros after the decimal point, not before.”

“No, it’s correct.”

He stopped being amused. “Young lady, you’re not very funny.”

“I’m not trying to be funny. I need it in cash, please.”

The teller took the slip once more, went over it again, then frowned at me with suspicion. He asked me to wait a moment, then began tapping on the terminal to the left of his cash drawer. He scowled at the figures on his screen, and I figured he was just making certain that the money was there. Then his posture changed, and he leaned forward on the shelf, gesturing for me to come closer.

“I’m terribly sorry, Miss Bracca,” the teller said. “I’ll get the manager.”

I started to protest, but he was already out of the station and heading down the row of fellow tellers. I told myself not to worry, that he probably needed the manager’s permission to access that much cash. I was a little surprised he hadn’t already asked to see some identification.

Along the line of tellers, one of the women was finishing her transaction. I caught her staring at me, and when I caught her, she blushed and turned away hastily.

My teller came back, flanked by an older woman. The woman wore glasses, and had red hair, and it was obviously dyed.

“Miss Bracca,” the woman said. “I’m Catherine Lumley, why don’t you come with me?”

“Fine,” I said, and got out of line. Catherine waited for me at the end of the counter, and she pulled the short door back, allowing me through. With her free hand, she pointed to her office, past the vault door, and I headed inside. She followed close behind me.

The office was carpeted, and then had an Oriental rug on it, to add to the plush. There were four filing cabinets and a big desk and three leather chairs. The cabinets and the desk were some dark wood, like the rosewood used in fretboards, and all of the handles for all of the drawers were brass and shiny. I could almost feel the money.

“Please have a seat,” Catherine Lumley said. “Would you like something to drink? Coffee? Water or anything?”

I took one of the chairs facing the desk, and she surprised me by staying on my side and taking one of the seats beside me.

“I’m fine,” I said. Even knowing the balance in my account, I was starting to feel like an imposter.

“You should have come to me right away. As a valued client, if you ever have any trouble with any of our personal bankers, you should never hesitate to speak to the manager.”

I looked at her blankly. Then I took off my sunglasses and repeated the look.

“If you’d like, I can call Mr. Rodriguez in here.” She added it in the same apologetic tone that the teller had used.

“You mean the teller? No, I mean, he was fine, everything’s fine.”

“He should have recognized you, of course. But I can call Mr. Rodriguez right now.”

“Okay,” I said. “I give up. Who is Mr. Rodriguez?”

Lumley chuckled, then stopped when she realized I wasn’t kidding. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I thought you knew. He’s your banker.”

“I don’t have a banker. I have a bank, this bank. This is the bank I’ve been using since high school.”

“Yes, and we do appreciate your continued patronage, Miss Bracca. But in cases of accounts in excess of one million dollars, we always provide our clients with personal banking facilities. Alexander Rodriguez has been handling your account since February.”

“Doing what?”

“Ideally, whatever you require.”

“I see,” I said. “Well, I require withdrawing a million dollars in cash, if that’s all right.”

She hesitated, and I was afraid she was going to ask what I needed it for, and I realized with a little feeling of panic that I didn’t have a good lie ready. “I hope this doesn’t mean you’re closing the account?” she asked.

“No, not at all.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“So . . . it won’t be a problem?”

“No.” She smiled at me, then got up and went around to her side of the desk, to her computer. She clacked keys for a couple of seconds, and the smile remained, even seemed to grow a fraction. “Will hundreds do? Or smaller bills?”

The Parka Man hadn’t specified. “I think hundreds will be fine.”

Lumley straightened, beaming at me. “Then I’ll have Mr. Rodriguez call you Monday, as soon as the cash is together.”

“Monday?”

“Yes, it’ll take until then for us to get that much cash.”

Someone living in my belly inflated a balloon, painted the word “panic” on it, then let it go to ride the currents up to my head.

“I need it sooner,” I told Lumley.

Lumley began to look concerned again. “I’m afraid there’s no way we can do that.”

“Who can? There must be someone who can, right? I have the money, I have more than enough money.”

“Your combined balance currently stands at four million, six hundred and eighty-seven thousand, nine hundred and eleven dollars,” Lumley said. “That’s not the problem, Miss Bracca. We’re a bank, not the Federal Reserve. We simply don’t have that much currency here, in fact, we never do unless we know there will be a need for it.”

“Can I open an account at another bank?” I asked, trying to keep the balloon from going higher. “Do a wire transfer?”

“You misunderstand me, I’m afraid. It’s not
us,
it’s the amount. Any bank in the region will have the same problem. What you’re asking to withdraw is a very large amount of currency.”

It was Tuesday afternoon. If I believed Lumley, and I didn’t have a reason not to, then it wouldn’t matter where I went. I suddenly realized I’d have the same problem no matter who I banked with. Which meant that come Friday noon, I wouldn’t have the money, and I didn’t believe Parka Man would give me a reprieve. Clearly, he’d anticipated this problem, but not how long it would take; that was why he had given me the time. If four days later I still didn’t have the money, he wasn’t going to be happy, and his unhappiness would probably manifest itself by inflicting a lot of pain, and probably death, on Tommy.

The beating had looked so painful, the damage so much, and sitting in Catherine Lumley’s office, I saw Tommy again in my mind’s eye. All the times I’d wished him to suffer, and now that he was suffering, I felt sick.

Lumley was waiting for me.

“How much can you get me by Friday?” I asked.

“I’d say five hundred, perhaps six hundred thousand dollars.”

“Which?”

“Six hundred thousand,” Lumley said. “Yes, I should think that wouldn’t be a problem.”

“Then I’d like you to do that, please.”

“We’d be happy to. I’ll have Mr. Rodriguez call you as soon as your cash is ready.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“No,” said Lumley. “Thank
you
for banking with Four Rivers.”

Graham’s apartment was in the Pearl, and that’s where I headed next. During the last few months I’d been with the tour, he’d made a habit of traveling with cash, upward of fifty thousand dollars at a time on some legs. He’d kept it in his briefcase, used it to pay for incidentals and emergencies and shopping sprees, but mostly it was for travel. Cash was the best way to get around the paparazzi and their penchant for digging through credit card receipts.

There was no way he was carting four hundred grand around in his briefcase, but he’d know where I could get it.

I took Burnside across the river, back into downtown, then up toward Powell’s. The Heineken Brewery used to be on Burnside, this huge old brick building that had stood since the bad old days, when Portland was renowned by sailors the world over as “the worst port in the world.” But Heineken sold the property a couple years ago, and some developers bought it and promptly tore the whole thing down. Now there were expensive condos and yuppie health food stores.

Graham’s apartment was in an earlier iteration of the process, a twenty-odd-story collection of new apartments with an Art Deco feel. He’d bought it after
Scandal,
when it had become clear that Tailhook was staying together, and that he was part of the package. Prior to that, he’d lived exclusively in L.A., and he still kept a home there. He’d bought in the Pearl because it was considered the trendiest damn section of town, full to the popping with young urban professionals, all of them beautiful, all of them eager, and most of them looking for a date. Click had his place just a little farther north from Graham’s.

I parked the Jeep and hopped out, and there was a security guy at the desk in the lobby, and he wanted to know who I was visiting. I told him I was Miriam Bracca to see Graham Havers, and the guard got all flustered and begged my pardon and told me he hadn’t recognized me.

“It’s okay,” I said.

“Mr. Havers has some company there already, I don’t think it’ll be a problem if you head on up without me calling first,” the security guy said.

“If it is, I’ll tell him I snuck past you.”

Security Guy grinned like we’d just become the best buds in the world. “Cool. And if anyone asks, I’ll say I’ve never seen you.”

I laughed and he grinned even bigger, and then I got in the elevator and went up to eighteen. There was no one in the car and no one in the hall, and I rang the bell beside Graham’s door, and waited. There was no music coming from inside, which was strange, because normally when Graham was home, he was playing something, usually a new band, usually someone none of us had ever heard before.

Graham answered the door, looking like he’d had some rest and wasn’t planning on any company coming by. He was in purple Adidas workout pants and a white V-necked silk shirt, and he was barefoot.

“Mimserama!”

“Hey, can I come in?”

He threw a glance over his shoulder, into the main room, then reached a hand for my shoulder, to guide me inside. The gesture popped a sudden memory of the Parka Man’s gloves on my arms and face, and I stepped back without thinking. Graham looked confused, but before he could voice it I went past him.

“Guy downstairs said you had company,” I said. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, it’s not a problem. You’ve met them, I think.” Graham edged around me, leading down the hall and gesturing into the main room, where his lifestyle was plain for any and all to see. He had a wide-screen Philips monitor mounted on the wall, between two arched windows that looked out into downtown, and two huge Klipsch speakers at the far corners of the room. The stereo setup was NAD and multicomponent, each piece seated gently in a chrome cabinet. The space was open, with low furniture, all modular, all vaguely Danish.

Detective Marcus had been standing at one of the three CD racks, examining the titles. Hoffman was on the couch. Both now directed their attention to me.

Graham continued past, saying, “You guys know Mim, of course, talked to her already. They just dropped by for a few questions.”

He told the last to me, adding a little shrug, as if to say that it all seemed silly to him.

“Miss Bracca,” Marcus said. “Pleasant surprise.”

“You and me both.”

Hoffman didn’t say anything.

“I can come back,” I told Graham.

“No, we’re pretty much finished here,” Marcus said, before Graham could answer. “We’ll be going now. Thanks for your help, Mr. Havers.”

“Hey, anything to assist, you know how that is.”

“You’d be surprised what a minority you’re in.”

Graham made a comment about being grateful for the police in general, then headed back down the hall, to get the door. Marcus followed, wishing me a good day, and Hoffman came last, but she stopped as she was passing me.

“Rough night?” she asked.

It took me a second to realize she was talking about the cut on my head. I tried to fumble out my prepared lie, but I didn’t need it, because she’d already continued on her way. I watched her and Marcus shake Graham’s hand, and then they left, and he shut the door after them.

“No idea what the hell
that
was about,” he told me cheerfully when he came back. “Just dropped by, wanted to know if I had any idea about anything about your brother or those pictures. Wanted a list of possible enemies, shit like that. I told them every unsigned guitarist. Then they asked for disgruntled employees. I told them I’d try to get them something, but the way Van is, that list would be fifty pages long.”