LIES OF THE PHOENIX (A Lieutenant Cassidy Mystery Book 1) (15 page)

N
ORA CASTLE HAD
been on the phone for an hour with Lieutenant Paul Kozlow of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Organized Crime Unit. Vladimir Zykov had been on their watch list for some time and the news of his death and a possible Chicago connection had opened a new focus of investigation for them.

She was happy to have the L.A.P.D.’s help, but Lieutenant Kozlow was worth his weight in gold. He had taken the case information and had run with it. His unit had been seeing an encroachment of organized crime into the international investment world and this was a lead that could break things open for them.

Kozlow had made contact with Lloyd Nash’s former Los Angeles employer, Markwall Investment Group. At first the investment firm closed ranks and refused police access to financial information citing privacy issue and stating that in-house accountants were more than qualified to identify any unauthorized access or theft. The firm promised to do their own in-house audit, but was confident that their routine accounting measures would have already turned up any suspicious activity. A few days after being contacted by the police, Markwall Investment Group reported back that their audit had shown no discrepancies.

Lieutenant Kozlow thanked them for their cooperation and then proceeded to obtain a court order from a sympathetic judge to allow a forensic accountant access to the Markwall Investment Group books. Kozlow had already found cell phone records linking Lloyd Nash to the Potestas crime organization known to be dabbling in high end financial crime. Nash’s mysterious disappearance from his life and job in L.A., his appearance in Chicago with a new identity, and his connection to the death of Vladimir Zykov, a noted L.A. crime figure, sealed the deal with the court and a search warrant was issued. The Markwall account books were now open to the L.A. police.

Nora listened attentively to everything Lieutenant Kozlow had to share. She updated him on the Chicago investigation and thanked him for his help.
The pieces of the puzzle are coming together,
she thought. She picked up her yellow note pad and headed to Lieutenant Cassidy’s office. As usual, his door was open and he was pouring over one of the stacks of paper on his desk

Cassidy looked up as Nora’s figure appeared in the doorway. “Come on in. Anything new to report?”

“Just talked to the L.A.P.D. Organized Crime Unit. They sent a forensic accountant over to look at the books at Jordan Lawrence’s old investment firm. They found some big discrepancies.”

“Let’s hear it.” Cassidy leaned back in his chair as if settling in for an interesting story.

“The forensic accountant said that there was a massive security breach in the firm’s computer system. It doesn’t show up in the current accounts, but in tracking unusual access pathways into the system through old archived accounts. That’s probably why the firm’s in-house audit didn’t pick up anything unusual. They were only looking at current account activity.

Some of the accesses were done from Lloyd Nash’s computer and some from other employees’ computers. The random accesses made it look like employees were just innocently looking up account histories. The time stamps for those other accesses, however, were mostly after hours or on weekends, not during normal business hours.

The forensic accountant said confidential data on almost all the big accounts had been accessed and compromised. That information would be worth millions on the black market. Electronic fund transfers could be made and no one would know until the account was drained of assets.”

“Our suspicions are proving correct,” Cassidy said.

“The forensic accountant is working with Markwall Investment Group to protect their accounts from any future unauthorized access, but that pilfered data presents a real threat to their present investments and clients. If the data is sold, it could send some big financial concerns into a tailspin that could crash the market. But Markwall can’t sell off the investments to protect assests either. There is such a large quantity of stock involved that dumping it into the market all at once would result in financial chaos and huge losses from which many of their investors would never recover.”

“Did the forensic account say whether there has been any unusual market activity to date?” Cassidy looked deep in thought.

“He said so far everything looks stable. It doesn’t look like Lawrence has sold the data as yet.”

Cassidy’s attention snapped back to Nora. “Good. We want to keep the data breach under wraps. Tell Lieutenant Kozlow there should be no publicity on this. Have him tell Markwall Investment to keep things quiet for now. We want Jordan Lawrence and the L.A. crime group to believe their scheme is still a secret.”

“I don’t think there will be any problem with Markwall Investment keeping quiet. They don’t want anyone to know there was a security breach. There is something else though—”

Cassidy gave a nod to Nora to continue.

“The forensic accountant said that he found a very interesting embezzlement scheme going on as well. It involved a tiny fee of a few pennies being added to every share of stock that was traded or sold at the firm. It was identified as a transactional service fee, but it was so small and obscure it never attracted anyone’s attention. The in-house accountants never picked up on it because it looked like a legitimate transaction fee on every share sold over the last couple of years. Who’s going to question a fee of a penny or two on a share of stock selling for a hundred dollars or more in transactions of millions of dollars? The service fee was siphoned off into another corporate account that looked legitimate to pay firm expenses, but then bogus invoice billings were used to empty that account. The forensic accountant said that given the huge volume of trading done by Markwall Investments, those pennies added up over the last two years to more than $450,000.”

“Lawrence arranged a nice financial cushion to tide himself over while he worked out a multi-million dollar deal for the stolen account data.” Cassidy was thinking out loud as he sorted through this new information in his head. “He had a falling out with his L.A. crime associates and now he is on the run from them. Zykov was sent to collect on the deal, but Lawrence outsmarted him. One thing for sure, with Zykov dead, the L.A. syndicate will be sending someone else to do the job.”

“Yes, he—”

Just then the department clerk, Mark, appeared at Lieutenant Cassidy’s door. “Excuse me Lieutenant, there is someone named Ben Taggert on the line for you, he said it’s urgent.”

“Thank you, Mark. Go ahead and put the call through.”

The phone on Cassidy’s desk buzzed and he picked it up. “This is Cassidy. Ben?” Cassidy’s expression turned dark as he listened intently to the caller. After a few moments he said, “Stay there, we’re on our way.” He looked at Nora. “Sarah Lawrence was attacked at her work. She’s at the hospital. We need to get over there.”

* * * * *

Sarah sat propped up on an Emergency Room cart with Ben at her side. The ER physician had just been in and reported that x-rays showed no broken facial bones, but two black eyes were already blooming across her face. Her nose was tender and swollen, but not broken. She ran her tongue around the inside of her mouth and could feel a gouge where her tooth had cut into the inside of her lip. She was glad that none of her teeth were broken. She had a small cut on the left side of her neck and one over her right brow, but the Emergency Room physician had said that the wounds did not require suturing.

Lieutenant Cassidy and Detective Castle stood at the foot of the ER cart. Cassidy had finished questioning Sarah. She had been unable to give a detailed description of her attacker aside from his clothes and general height, weight, and body build, but her description of the scarred hand and the ornate knife hilt were a start. Cassidy gave a nod to Nora and she immediately understood his meaning. She was starting to anticipate his thoughts.

She stepped into the hallway, pulled out her phone and called the precinct. “This is Detective Nora Castle, put me through to Homicide.”

Detective Jake Walski answered the call.

“Hi, Jake. Listen, I need you to contact Lieutenant Paul Kozlow at L.A.P.D.’s Organized Crime Unit. We have a new player in the Lawrence case and we need some help identifying him.” She gave Jake the meager physical description of Sarah’s assailant, along with the identifying hand scar and a description of the knife. “See if they can come up with anything and get back to me right away if they can I.D. our suspect. Thanks.”

She ended the call and returned to the bedside where Cassidy was updating Sarah and Ben on the investigation and the forensic accountant’s findings.

“We know that your husband has access to a large cache of embezzled money,” Cassidy said. “It is how he has been funding himself since he came to Chicago. Are you aware of any separate bank accounts that he maintained? A safety deposit box, or any place where he might hide cash?”

“Please don’t call him
my husband,
” she said defensively. She sat up and ran a hand through her tangled hair. “I checked our bank accounts and credit card balances and everything looked normal.” She was quiet for a moment, then with a note of determination in her voice she said, “I want to get back to my house. Maybe I can find something that will help.”

Ben had been standing quietly next to Sarah letting Cassidy do his job. Now he jump in. “No, wait a minute. You are not in any shape to go anywhere today. And you certainly aren’t going back to your house!”

“I have to agree with Ben,” Cassidy said. “Our forensic team has already gone through your house.”

“I don’t mean to disparage your team’s efforts, but my house contains my stuff and I’m the only one that knows what should or shouldn’t be there,” Sarah said. “If your team is done rummaging around over there, it is my turn now.”

Ben was alarmed by her persistence, “Sarah, this is a bad idea. Somebody could be watching the house.” He looked to Cassidy for support, but there was none.

Cassidy stared off into space thinking for a minute and then said, “Alright. You and Ben can go tomorrow. I will send a uniformed officer with you. A squad car parked out in front should be a deterrent to anyone. You can have an hour or so and then I want you out of there. Do you understand?” He looked directly at Sarah and she nodded her agreement.

“We have one advantage right now,” Cassidy explained. “Jordan probably thinks you are still in the dark about why he disappeared and that means he will think you are still loyal to him. He doesn’t know we uncovered his Lloyd Nash identity and the data theft at Markwall Investments, or his connection to L.A. organized crime. He may think we are suspicious about him, but he still thinks you are in his corner. We want him to keep thinking that. He probably doesn’t even know about the second break-in or what happened to you today.”

Sarah nodded again.

“Where are you staying tonight?” Cassidy asked.

“I am staying downtown at my company’s corporate apartment,” she said nervously. The adrenalin that had been driving her was starting to wane and her reserve was empty.

“No, you’re staying at my place.” Ben turned to Cassidy and said, “She’s staying with me where I can keep an eye on her. I’ve checked out that corporate apartment and it is not secure.”

Cassidy directed his attention to Sarah, “That’s not a bad idea, Sarah. Ben is a trained police officer. His radar for anything suspicious is going to be much better than yours. Your attacker knew where you worked. He had to have been watching you.”

The realization that she had been drawn into Jordan’s criminal plot was apparent to her now. He had put her life in danger. She wasn’t going to let him continue to control her life.

Cassidy could see the resistance in Sarah’s face. He needed to be more concrete so she understood the danger. “You can’t go back to your usual daily routines right now. You need to take some time off from work and be as invisible as possible until we catch these guys. We’re going to keep an eye on you as well, but prudence dictates that you take whatever precautions you can.”

Ben broke in again to lobby for his plan, “My new place is like a fortress—all entrances and hallways are monitored by closed circuit TV, there is a doorman and a security guard at the entrance, elevators are key operated and a second key has to be inserted to get to the top unit which is mine, all units have locked double entranceway doors, and each unit has an alarm system that triggers audio and video surveillance if there is a breach in the system.” He paused to take a breath, and then continued trying to get his full argument in before he was cut off. “There is also secure parking garage with an attendant and entrance to the building requires passing through the lobby and past the security guard and doorman.”

Cassidy held up his hand for Ben to stop. He could see that Sarah was being overloaded with too much information.

Ben waited for Sarah’s anticipated objections and began to mentally prepare an additional volley of points to bolster his position.

Instead she looked up and said, “Alright, I will stay at Ben’s.” She was drained and had no energy to argue. “I’d like to get out of here. Can we leave?”

Surprised by his easy victory, Ben said, “I’ll check with the nurse. Be right back.” He slipped out of the room leaving the two detectives with Sarah.

Cassidy directed his attention to Sarah. He could see that the events of the day had taken a toll on her both physically and emotionally. She was going to need some support until she could get over this trauma. Ben was ready and willing to do that and he had the skills to keep her safe.