Habit (28 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN / MONDAY, 3:30PM

The phone rang. It was Alexander Heilshorn.

“Okay. I’ll help you.”

“That’s good. Because I think I found the man who killed your daughter.”

Brendan waited for the reaction. It was not what he expected. “You’re thinking of Reginald Forrester.”

“That’s right. Jesus, you knew?”

“I know who he is, yes. He taught at Cornell for ten years before being persuaded to leave. For his extracurricular activities and for misconduct.”

“What are you saying?”

“My P.I. looked into him long ago, the first time Rebecca went missing and I wanted to get her back. Forrester was an alcoholic, and a never-was writer. He published some poetry and prose at various times, with minimal success. After 2001, his writing described a loss of God, and people’s unwillingness to face and consider the real cause of their own destruction. He assembled it all into an ambitious manifesto. A horrible mass of darkness and dread reflecting his changed view of the world. It scared his students, the faculty, and administration. He was even put on a modern-day black list. Read
The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America,
by David Horowitz.” Heilshorn took a breath. “He performed very well academically, even after he became a drunk. Just like you, Detective Healy, he was high-functioning. Until he wasn’t.”

“And what happened?”

“He disappeared. My P.I. lost him completely. But then he resurfaced. He became involved with XList.”

“The escort service.”

“In its current incarnation, yes. XList probably doesn’t even exist now, not on paper, not on the web, not anywhere. Not with this very investigation ongoing. Not for the moment, anyway. It is a chimera, Detective – XList, Silk Road, Sheep Marketplace – they can be taken down, but then they spring up somewhere else. My sources have linked Forrester’s name with
Titan
, which protects the interests of the black markets.”

Brendan had never heard of Titan. “I sent an email to XList, to see about ordering one of their videos.”

There was silence on the other end.

“Hello?”

Heilshorn’s voice sounded strained. “You
wrote
to them?”

“Yes. I was trying to ferret out some more information about the videos your daughter was in; who the producers were, other actors, that sort of thing.”

“And you got a response?”

“I did. Why?”

“Detective . . . I’m sorry.”

“For what? Mr. Heilshorn?”

“You’re in a lot of danger.”

Brendan looked around his house. Colinas and Bostrom had been gone for about an hour. He was going to meet with Colinas later, and Bostrom’s shift was ending at four. The Sheriff was likely to assign another detail to watch his back, Watts or Lawless maybe, but until they showed up, Brendan was on his own.

“Why? Why am I in danger? Mr. Heilshorn, you said you would help me with this. So, help me. Tell me where I can find Reginald Forrester. Is he Leah’s father?”

“You can’t find him.”

“What do you mean I can’t?”

“He’s not . . . He won’t let you.”

“What? Mr. Heilshorn, he’s just an English teacher, not a superhero. I can find him.”

“He’s a . . . different sort of man.”

“I get that. Has relationships with his students. Writes Marxist manifestos. Runs a branch of an escort service. How have you . . . why have you kept this from me? From the police? Alexander? This is just nuts.”

“I’ve already told you,” said the older man, sounding weary.

“To protect the innocent, I understand. The other women who are like your daughter was. And their children. But how does finding Reginald Forrester endanger them? You know, I hear this all the time. The woman too afraid to turn in her abusive husband. The people afraid to blow the whistle on the corrupt company they work for. It’s paranoia, for the most part, let me tell you. If Reginald gets arrested, what – XList, or Titan, or whoever is behind them – they just turn around and behead a couple dozen women and their illegitimate children? No. I’ll tell you what will happen. I’ll get Reginald, I’ll bring him in. He’ll either do life in prison without the possibility of parole, or he’ll cooperate with the prosecutors and deliver names of the people who organize the Company, who coerce these girls out of college, or pluck them off the streets, or wherever, and get them turning tricks for senators, and get them into making these videos. We’ll get the names of the recruiters, the investors, the johns, all of it. And a task force will take it down.”

Brendan realized he was sweating. The pain pills he had swallowed and hour ago were just starting to kick in, and the shooting pain in his hip was beginning to abate. But he was gritting his teeth, and gripping one of his crutches so hard his knuckles were white. He realized he was slipping into that anger-mode which frequently landed him in trouble, and he thought he even tasted blood again. He was surprised Heilshorn was still on the line when the man spoke.

“I’m very sorry you see things this way, Detective. But I understand it. It’s what makes you the man you are, this faith in the system.”

“It’s not just faith in the system.”

“You’re awfully sure of yourself for a man who just spent nearly a week in his own filth and misery,” said Heilshorn with a flash of his own anger.

Brendan sighed. He took a breath and rubbed his face. He realized he couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten. When he was hungry he could get rambunctious.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I need your help. Look, tell me how you can help me and be assured that no one will get hurt.”

“I can’t.”

“But you said you would help. That’s why you called.”

There was a long pause. Brendan was opening his mouth to ask if Heilshorn was still there when the man spoke at last.

“I do want to help. You have to know, despite everything, part of me wants to believe you. That after your critical move, the cavalry will ride in and this will all be over. I want to have faith in you, too, Mr. Healy. And I want justice for my daughter, and for my son. That’s why I’m going to tell you this, and I’m going to hope to God that I’m making the right decision.”

Brendan waited. He could feel the pulse of the artery in his neck. He saw a flash of Rebecca’s face, her dead eyes staring at him in the mirror.

Heilshorn sounded weary, “Rebecca was working out a deal with Forrester. She was going to continue . . . working for him. But there was to be an exchange. This is what she told me.”

Again Heilshorn paused. Brendan fought the urge to implore the man to continue. He tried to remain patient.

“You’re right; if Reginald goes, it does not necessarily mean a beheading of all the others, as you put it. But, he has a child with him.”

“Oh Jesus,” Brendan said under his breath.

He thought of the master bedroom being fixed up in the house. He thought of the question Rebecca had asked Marcus Burnell about hooking up a diaper sprayer. He thought of Rebecca returning to the business, and somehow Eddie Stemp, her ex-husband, finding out, and not knowing the details. So Stemp had tried to get her to quit by offering her that passage in
The Screwtape Letters.

“She’s just a child,” said Heilshorn in a voice so small Brendan could barely hear. “And Forrester is a monster. Make no mistake. If he gets even the slightest hint that the police are narrowing in, if the cavalry does in fact ride up to save the day, he’ll kill that baby, and he’ll run.”

The silence in the house was like a weight. Brendan had never felt so alone as he sat at his table and looked out into the grey afternoon.

“The fact that you wrote in to the Company – they’ll know it was you – has likely alerted them. Forrester tried to take care of you already. But you’re still alive. You . . . that must mean something.”

Brendan tried to breathe, but it felt like his clothes were constricting him. What did it mean, that he was still alive? Did Heilshorn mean in the sense of fate, or the divine? Or did he mean that Forrester had been toying with him, letting him live for some other unknown reason? He loosened his collar, and at last he spoke.

“I’ll go alone. Tell me where I can find Forrester.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT / MONDAY, 6:06 PM

Brendan stood in the kitchen of his rented house. The lights were off – he hadn’t bothered to turn anything on as the sun dropped and the dark encroached. He stood next to the front door, where the streetlight filtered in, and checked his weapon. He opened the cylinder, examined the chambers for any debris or obstructions, and then loaded in fresh .38 caliber rounds. He snapped the cylinder home and replaced the firearm in the shoulder holster under his arm.

He left the house unlocked and stepped outside. The evening was cool but the low clouds kept things humid. Brendan wore a light windbreaker over a sweater and jeans. He zipped up his coat and walked slowly towards the Camry. He had left his crutches behind.

His hip was a dull ache, but he was surefooted on the driveway. He got into the Camry and called Colinas. His eyes flicked to the rear view mirror. He kept expecting a deputy detail to show up, but so far, none had.

“This is nuts,” he said to himself.

He realized that his hands were shaking. He took a moment to calm himself, and then he dialed Colinas. As the line rang, he realized that everything he had planned to say had suddenly left his mind. Colinas didn’t answer. Instead, his voicemail picked up.

Brendan searched for the words. “Colinas. Healy. I . . . I ah, I got a tip on Forrester. I’m proceeding alone. That’s the only way I . . . This is just the way it’s gotta be, I guess. My GPS is on. If you don’t hear from me in two hours . . .”

He didn’t know. Heilshorn’s words haunted him. The idea, no matter how far-fetched it may sound, that women and children could be harmed if the police got too close, was chilling. If something happened to him and a whole group of cops were dispatched, what then? What would be the point? Going it alone was only going to work if he succeeded. If he failed, and more police responded, it could be catastrophic. There was nothing to tell Colinas.

This was all based on Heilshorn’s statements, though. Brendan searched his intuition and tried to determine whether or not the man could be trusted. He was obviously emotionally impacted by the loss of his children, and people in such situations often behaved irrationally. On the other hand, he had knowledge of things that supported his claims to have been investigating the situation on his own for a significant period of time. Heilshorn seemed to know his enemy in this case, and Brendan’s gut told him that the old doctor wasn’t trying to be misleading.

While he sat thinking about this, the voicemail clicked over with an automated voice: “If you’re satisfied with your message, press one. If you’d like to rerecord your message, press two.”

Albany was a two hour drive. Heilshorn had given Brendan a specific location, and Brendan knew that it was one turn off 90 onto Western Ave. The whole thing would take two hours ten minutes, tops. He could call back when he got to Albany, in which case anyone coming for him would be far enough behind that Forrester might not get wind of anything. At the same time, his gut feeling told him he needed some sort of back-up.

Brendan pressed two.

“Colinas. It’s Healy. I got a tip on Forrester. But it’s got to be kept totally off the radar. I’m headed to Albany. Call me back and I can tell you more.”

He hung up.

A second later, a peculiar sense filled him like a cold liquid. Maybe calling Colinas had set it off – he didn’t know. But suddenly Brendan saw a complex scenario form in his mind’s eye, connecting it all together, each player bound in an intricate web.

Rebecca Heilshorn in trouble. Kim “Eddie” Stemp informs on her to her father, Alexander. Mr. Heilshorn then contacts the local Sheriff. He explains the sensitivity of the situation and asks the Sheriff to look into it with the utmost discretion. Was that plausible? Did Taber already know?

Brendan even imagined Argon being involved. He’d displayed knowledge about XList. So Taber called his old pal Argon for advice. For some reason, the Sheriff felt like the killer was about to strike. Why? How? Some inside information. The P.I. maybe. Or, Brendan suspected, even Delaney. Delaney had been acting, from the beginning, like he had some kind of inside information, behaving in a laissez-faire way unbecoming of a lead investigator. But Taber needed someone with no prior knowledge. A fresh player, untainted. So Argon served up the broken man – Brendan Healy. And then the killer strikes, and Brendan hunts the murderer of Rebecca Heilshorn.

But then, just as it had all formed so quickly in his mind, this conspiracy theory evaporated like dew. The web disappeared.

His heart was thumping in his chest. He keyed the ignition and then backed out of the driveway.

* * *

Interstate 90 was clogged with traffic by the time he neared Albany an hour and a half later. It was after seven, but apparently there were still plenty of commuters on the way home. Then, at seven-fifteen, they all seemed to magically disappear, and he had the road almost to himself. In fifteen more minutes, he was making the exit onto Western Ave. Within another minute and Brendan was turning into the University of Albany campus.

He followed Heilshorn’s verbal instructions, and drove around the campus to the other side. There sat the building under construction; Albany’s new School of Business.

He had asked Heilshorn why in the hell Forrester would be holed up in a building being built for a state university. Heilshorn told him he would understand when he saw the signs out in front.

Brendan swung the Camry down an access road a few moments later. A giant crane sat next to the incomplete three-story building. Next to the crane was a sign declaring the building contractor. Brendan’s breath caught in his throat. The company that had been awarded the thirty-five million dollar contract to erect the school’s new building was called “Titan Construction Management, LLC.” The emblem beneath the name was a heraldic lion with a long, snaking tongue.

It’s like they are boasting about who they are, Brendan thought.

But who would ever link a general contracting business to a porn business? Still, it was audacious. Brendan imagined that the organizers behind the escort service had to have a front to funnel their money and clean it for the IRS. He had previously thought that the erotic videos would have taken care of that. The IRS didn’t judge the morality of one business or another, it just wanted accurate bookkeeping. So maybe the escort service was taking in so much money that even porn video sales through the roof weren’t enough to be convincing. Brendan had believed that the situation with the escort service had been significant, but now he was sure that it was even bigger than he’d first suspected.

He remembered what Heilshorn had said.
My sources have linked Forrester’s name with Titan, which protects the interests of black markets.
One of Titan’s jobs could have been to launder the money made by XList.

And the fact that they were flaunting it, right here, in the middle of a state university, in plain public view, that was just incredible.

This company that serviced government officials with prostitutes was a chameleon, with a dozen different identities that continually shifted. XList was just a face, a mask.
XList probably doesn’t even exist now, not on paper, not on the web, not anywhere. Not with this very investigation ongoing.

He also thought of Heilshorn saying that Brendan must still be alive for a reason. Brendan didn’t believe in a god that manipulated the world, and he didn’t think Alexander Heilshorn did either. While he had reached the limit of his scientific patience and adopted a faith in a higher power, he was still sure that people were the manipulators, not God Almighty.

If he was alive, it was because he had survived.

And if anything, God was passive-aggressive.

Brendan smiled. At the same time, he killed his headlights as he drifted past the construction sign, towards the hulking crane and the dark, unfinished building looming ahead. The crucifix Argon had given him hung around his neck.

* * *

He parked near some other vehicles which looked like typical construction-worker trucks and cars. A tool bin was in the back of one pick-up truck, which was next to a beat-up looking Honda Accord. Another truck sat in the distance, out of the throw of lamplight. He wondered if there were workers inside, now. He scanned the four-story building and found that there were no discernibly lit rooms, only a glow in most windows from what were likely the hall lights. It was slightly brighter in some windows than others, but they were definitely not individually lit rooms.

Then a thought struck him: Forrester was working for the company. This was his day job. By night he robbed prostitutes of their babies, in order to keep them in the game or to keep their mouths shut about the congressmen and senators they serviced. By day he wore a tool belt and swung a hammer, listening to CCR on a battered radio.

And somewhere in there was he keeping a child? How exactly would that work out? A man like Forrester wasn’t capable of keeping a small child healthy and cared for, let alone concealed, especially if he was working a day job and moonlighting as an enforcer for a black market organization. There had to be an accomplice. He had to be working with somebody.

Brendan glanced at his phone. There had been two missed calls. One was from a half an hour before, the other thirty-one minutes ago. He realized that, in his nervousness and haste, he hadn’t activated the ringer on his phone. He usually kept it on silent – nothing was more disturbing to an interview with a witness or in the middle of a forensic investigation than a ringing phone.

Both calls were from Colinas.

Still sitting in his car and looking up at the building, he listened to his voice messages.

“Healy? Where the hell are you? Boy, you know how to ruin a surprise. We’ve been at your house for ten minutes now, dude. Oh, I see I got a call from you. Alright, let me check it.”

Brendan scowled in the dark. Ruin a surprise? What in the hell was Colinas talking about? He said “we’ve been at your house.” Who was “we?” Why were they . . . ?

And then Brendan realized. Today was his birthday. He was thirty-five. It had been his goal to quit smoking by today, he also remembered.

He hadn’t had a cigarette in more than forty-eight hours.

He closed his eyes and breathed through his nose. He couldn’t help but smile and shake his head. The next message wiped the humor from his face.

“Healy, are you fucking nuts? Listen, I’m here with Taber and Bostrom and Lawless, man. We came by to give you a fucking box of donuts, dude. I . . . you’ve put me in a tough spot, here, Healy. You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Call me back. I don’t know what I’m going to tell these guys.”

Colinas had hung up.

Brendan pulled the phone away from his ear. He suddenly felt cold and nauseous. Every instinct that had told him he ought to be here, was now gone. He looked at the flat, characterless Business School building and felt a shudder. Colinas was right. He was fucking nuts. He needed to back out of the parking lot right now, turn around, and get the hell out of there. This was a job for a SWAT team. At least, it was a job to be commanded by men with far more field experience than he had.

The Camry was still running. He reached the shifter and was preparing to put it in reverse when one of the lights in the building winked on.

Brendan froze. He leaned forward and peered through the windshield. At the far end of the building, on the third floor, a light had indeed come on in one of the rooms.