No Way to Die (17 page)

They each thought for a second, and then Jonas shook his head and said, “I haven’t seen any of those guys in over a month.”

“Me neither,” Stella said.

“Would you know if Holly’s seen them? We forgot to ask her,” Toni said.

“I don’t know,” Jonas said. “Not to my knowledge.”

Stella just shook her head no.

“Stella,” I said, “when we first sat down, you said you wanted to talk about things that were going on around ACS. What did you mean?”

“Well,” she started, “I mostly just wanted to tell what I knew about Thomas. About how he was a brilliant man and how happy he always was. I’m scared. I don’t believe he committed suicide, not for one instant. I saw him the night before he died. He was happy—excited, even. He seemed like a guy on the verge of coming up with something really big—which, of course, he was. He got in early every morning after his run, and he left pretty late in the evening—he probably put in twelve-hour days routinely.”

“Jonas?” Toni asked.

“Agree completely,” he said. “I never have believed Thomas was troubled enough to want to commit suicide.I don’t believe it even now. I’m like Stella. I can’t believe he would take his own life.”

I nodded. “I understand what you’re saying. In fact, I’ve heard these sentiments from a couple of people now.”

“Do you think that Thomas might have been having an affair with someone?” Toni asked.

“An affair? I can’t imagine it,” Jonas said. “I mean, the guy seemed like a totally devoted husband and father.”

“That’s right,” Stella agreed. “He seemed like a real family man to me.”

“If you’re not comfortable with this, then just say so,” Toni said. “But do you think there could have been anything between Thomas and Holly?”

They considered this for a few seconds, and then Stella said, “No. I don’t think so. I mean, they were together enough that something could’ve sparked. But, like we said, Thomas seemed like a devoted family man.”

“Put it this way,” Jonas added. “If there was anything going on between the two of them, they did a damn good job of disguising it from the rest of us. They never left any tracks.”

Stella nodded.

That wrapped it up for us, so we thanked both of them for coming to talk to us and asked them to call us up if they thought of anything else. They seemed relieved that at least someone was paying attention. I guess if I thought my boss had been murdered and I was the only one who seemed interested, I’d be relieved as well.

* * * *

An hour later, we were back at the office. Toni and I went into my office. She flopped into a chair and put her Doc Martens up on my desk the way she used to. This was good.

Richard was gone, but I called Kenny and Doc in and briefed them on what had happened at the meeting.

“So where’s that leave us?” Doc said.

“Well, the two math docs tend to support the version of the story that Katherine gave us,” I said.

“That’s right,” Toni added. “They specifically said that they didn’t see Thomas acting depressed or down in the dumps after the sale to MST fell through. Stella said he seemed excited—basically, the same thing Katherine said.”

“Unfortunately, though, if I’m Inez Johnson and this is brought to me, I say, no big deal. People misinterpret other people’s feelings all the time. When it comes to the question of whether or not Thomas was murdered, I’d have to say this proves nothing.”

“May not prove it,” Doc said, “but it’s starting to look like a smoking gun.”

I shrugged. “Maybe,” I said.

“How about what Dr. Valeria said?” Toni asked.

“Inconclusive,” I said. “Just because some smart person can conjure up a viable possibility as to how a crime
might
have been pulled off doesn’t mean that a crime actually occurred.”

“How about that British goon who was scoping out our office?” Doc said.

I pictured Mr. Baldie flipping me off as he drove past. I shook my head. “I don’t know what to make of that yet,” I said. “Except I can tell you for sure that just because we get into it with a couple of Brits in the parking lot doesn’t mean Inez Johnson is going to see that as them having anything to do with killing Thomas Rasmussen.”

Kenny looked flustered. “So what’s that mean?” he said. “We’ve got nothing?”

I shrugged. “Technically,” I said, “you’re right. We got butkus. Nothing. At least not yet.” I spun in my chair and looked out the window. A thought gnawed at me. “You know, despite all the odd, conflicting shit, though—one thing that escapes me is why MST would kill Thomas. I can’t see what they have to gain.”

Toni looked up at me. “They wanted Starfire,” she said.

“I know that. But they couldn’t get it because the Feds blocked it, not Thomas. Why kill Thomas?”

“Maybe he let slip that he didn’t want to sell to them,” Toni said. “Maybe he pissed them off.”

“I don’t know,” I said. I thought about it for a second. “We really need to talk to the guys at Madoc, don’t we?”

Doc looked at me. “Kinda like taking a walk into the lion’s den, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “Yeah, maybe.” I thought about it for a second and said, “Maybe we need to do this the old-fashioned way.”

“The detective way?” Kenny said.

“The army way,” Doc said.

“Right,” I agreed with both of them. “Kenny, I think it’s time to check some phone records. Let’s see whom Holly’s really been talking to. Home, office, cell—the whole package. Next, let’s start trying to find everything you can on Madoc Secured Technologies and Nicholas Madoc. If we’re going to approach them, probably best to find out everything we can. You probably won’t be able to get anything on their cell phones, but you might get something on their office phones.”

“I’m on it,” he said.

“Toni and I will keep talking to people. Doc, you’ll be with us.”

“Got it.”

* * * *

“Are you okay?” I asked Toni after everyone had left. “What happened in the Jeep this afternoon with the music?”

She still had her feet up on my desk, chewing on a pencil she’d picked up. She looked at me.

“Nothing. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I’m just a little—”

“Stop,” she said, cutting me off. “I’m fine. Move on.”

I looked at her. “If you say so.”

“I do. Actually,” she said, “I am a little worried.”

“About what?”

“About you,” she said. She put the pencil down.

I smiled. “That’s nice that you’re worried about me. Makes me feel—” Then I looked at her more intently. “Why are you worried about me?”

“If the Madoc guys are really bad—and based on this morning, it looks like they might be—then I’m a little concerned about that. It makes me worry about you.”

“I’m not worried about them,” I said.

“Exactly,” she said, swinging her feet to the floor. “You’re completely full of yourself, aren’t you? You and your puffed-up macho crap about how they need to watch out for us. Whoa!” She shook her hands in mock fear.

“Okay then,” I said. “Where’s this coming from? What do you suggest?”

“Well, for starters at least, you might have Doc beef up the security system here. You’ve been talking about doing it for two years.”

I smiled at her. “I get it,” I said. “Is this an official nag? You’re nagging me here, aren’t you?”

She shook her head disgustedly. “Logan, at times you can be an exasperating little child. I’m trying to be serious here. We have a serious threat, if you’d care to listen. But no, your response is to go charging out into the parking lot ready to beat the shit out of someone. Someone, I might add, who you have no idea who they are or who’s behind them.”

“Toni, there were
three
of us. There were
two
of them. Any
one
of us could have probably taken both of them. I don’t care who they are; I’m okay with those odds.”

“‘Charging into the parking lot’ was meant as a metaphor,” she said.

“A metaphor?” I asked. “A metaphor for what?”

“I’m just saying you should be a little cautious around these guys, you know?” she said. “I have a bad feeling, Danny. I don’t think you should just get all pissed off like you do and go charging off the face of the earth, ready to start swingin’. Believe it or not, there are badder guys in the jungle than you. These are big boys here. What if they decide they don’t want to play your game? That macho bullshit won’t do us any good if they just decide to blow your Jeep to smithereens one morning with you inside of it.”

I formed a mental image of what she’d just suggested—not a pleasant thought. I looked into her eyes for a second. I don’t usually see Toni concerned about things, but she was clearly uneasy now. This sobered up the situation for me in a hurry.

“Okay,” I said seriously. “Okay. I’ll have Doc get some quotes on beefing up our system around here. And for the time being, I won’t go charging off looking for dragons to slay.”

“And you’ll try and be careful?” she said.

“Yes, mom, I’ll try and be careful.” I smiled at her.

“Good,” she said. “Thank you.” She smiled at me—a smile I hadn’t seen before. It was a sincere, relieved, happy kind of smile that immediately started to melt me right there in my chair.

“You stop it,” I said.

“Stop what?”

“That smile. Stop smiling at me like that.”

“You’re strange, Logan.”

“I’D LIKE TO propose a toast,” I called out. I pushed my chair back and stood up. We were gathered in the Merchant’s Café in downtown Seattle on Thursday, March 8. It was the official four-year anniversary of Logan PI. As has become our custom, we held an anniversary dinner to celebrate. The staff at the restaurant had arranged a nice private table for our group of twenty-four associates, friends, and family members, but the restaurant was busy, and I had to speak up to be heard above the din.

“First,” I said, “let me thank you all for coming out tonight to celebrate our fourth anniversary.”

The people at the table applauded.

“In December 2007,” I said, “I was discharged from the U.S. Army. I was fortunate in that I had two things going for me:first, I had a lifelong vision of having my own private investigation agency. Although I broke the chain of lawyers in the Logan family, I was still interested in the law—just from a different angle.”

“There’s still time,” my dad called out, causing everyone to laugh. “We’ll get you set up for the LSAT next month.”

I laughed. “Not in the cards, Dad.”

“Besides, you have to be able to read,” Toni said, eliciting another round of laughter.

“True. But seriously, even though I didn’t want to be a lawyer, I was always interested in law enforcement. Becoming a police detective—or even better, a private investigator—this was what I always wanted.”

“The second thing I had going for me was a good friend who shared the same vision.” I turned to Toni who was seated next to me. “Ms. Antoinette Blair.”

“Hear! Hear!” Gus Symanski called out. Each year, we like to invite some of the people we’d worked with the past year who we felt were important to our success. We’d invited Dwayne Brown and Gus this year. Gus is a big fan of Toni’s.

Toni smiled and nodded at me, and then turned to Gus and blew him a kiss. Gus, ever the drama queen, slapped his face delightedly as if the kiss had landed.

I continued. “With Toni, I was lucky to find someone who had the same passion that I did for the work. She teases me—as you’ve seen—but I think we make a good team, and I’m grateful that she’s here.” I looked at her, and she smiled.

“Toni and I’d known Richard Taylor for six months or so—he was a guest lecturer at a course we attended when we were seniors at U-Dub.” I nodded toward Richard. “We got to talking with Richard and, as it happens, he wanted to retire from a fifty-year career in law enforcement. As a matter of fact, he so badly wanted to retire that he was willing to extend very generous terms for the purchase of his agency. In other words, he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. I made a deal with Richard and formally hired Toni the same day at the start of 2008.”

“Richard’s lease was up, so we needed to move straight away. Toni and I were able to locate an office on Westlake right on the water at Lake Union. The place was old and beat-up—I think they used to sell time-shares out of it. But they gave us a hell of a deal. With a lot of hard work and creativity, we transformed the space into what we know today as the world headquarters of the Logan Private Investigation agency.”

“He supervised,” Toni called out, nodding toward me. “I did the work.”More laughter.

I nodded my head in acknowledgment. “Those of you who know us well know that that's complete—” I paused, “—well, that’s probably true.” People laughed again. I paused again, and then said, “Anyway, when we had our grand opening there four years ago today, many of you were there to wish us well. We appreciated your help and your support then as we started the business. Today, as we’ve grown over these past four years into Seattle’s number one private investigation agency, we appreciate your help and support even more.”