What's Left is Right: Book two of The Detective Bill Ross Crime Series (15 page)

“Mr. Rodriguez had no knowledge that the illicit drugs and weapons were in his home. As Mr. Pepe Vivar is his nephew, Mr. Rodriquez has allowed him to rent rooms in his house and has also provided him with a job as his driver. Mr. Vivar has had trouble getting his life together since coming to the U.S. from Honduras and has had several run-ins with law enforcement, but he is family all the same. Mr. Rodriguez felt an obligation to try to help in any way he could, and unfortunately it would appear that he has strayed from the straight and narrow yet again.

“I request a hearing with the judge as soon as possible, at which time I will request that all charges against Mr. Rodriguez be dropped.”

“Good try, Julien. Your position is that your client is the salt of the earth. I understand; let’s see if the judge agrees. I will work on getting the hearing set up and get back to you ASAP,” responded the assistant DA.

~

They were all back in the conference room after the events of the morning.

“Latisha Williams is chomping at the bit to get the story of the arrest into tomorrow’s edition of the
Statesman
,” said Marie.

“She can do that but she still needs to stick to her agreement with us. This is just the beginning, the first step in getting to the truth. She cannot divulge any of the other suspicions we have. She can simply report on the arrests made and that Pepe Vivar has been charged with the murder—that he was arrested in a dawn raid on the home where he lived in Venture Point,” said Tommy.

“I think it’s likely that Rodriguez will walk,” said Bobby Brown.

“Julien is a smart SOB and he will make Jimmy Rodriguez look like a saint for trying to help his brother’s kid. Vivar is truly screwed; they will let him go down for this and, in doing so, make sure that there is no connection to the person who ordered the hit. My guess is that Julien will even help us with a motive, saying that new information has come to his attention about a previous altercation between his client and Mike Muguara. He will try to get the death penalty off the table. That’s unlikely, but in my opinion that’s what he will try to do, because that’s what I would do,” continued the assistant DA.

“So let’s assume that it unfolds in this way. We can play along. Jimmy Rodriguez gets to walk and he thinks he’s dodged a bullet. He will relax and we can use this to our advantage,” said Bill.

“We need to start building a case to go after Jimmy Rodriguez and the way to do that is to work on Pepe Vivar. We need to have Pepe understand that he is being set up to take the fall on this and that his attorney is constructing an argument to protect Rodriguez. If we can begin to drive a wedge between him and Jimmy and assure him that we think that he is just the fall guy, we might be able to get him to talk. We might need to offer to take the death penalty off the table. Is that something that your boss the DA would go along with, Bobby?”

“Not sure, Bill. Let me get back to you on that. I do think that your approach is the right one, however, so let’s start to drip water on Pepe Vivar and in the meantime I will talk to the DA.”

Every year in Austin there are violent swings in temperature as fall gives way to the onset of winter. One day it might be 80 degrees and humid and the next day 50 degrees and windy. Trees that a few days earlier were covered in fall colors were now laid bare by the buffeting winds.

Bill sat in the heavy traffic on FM360 in the late evening as he made his way home, the normal rush-hour congestion made even worse than normal by shoppers heading to the mall to hand over their hard-earned cash for overpriced gifts for Christmas. They would stand in line so their kids could tell Santa what they wanted for Christmas, and have their photograph taken with an overweight guy in a red suite who smelled and a couple of weeks earlier had been out of work and living under a bridge.

Elaine was hard at work changing the décor of their home when Bill walked in. Every year Elaine would decorate with orange and black for Halloween, then transition to red, yellow and gold for Thanksgiving, and finally to the crimson red and white for Christmas. This was her annual ritual each year, hauling each batch of decorations down from the loft, only to return them back to storage a couple of weeks later as one holiday transitioned into the next.

It was a tradition in the Ross home that at Christmas time, when the tree was to be set up and decorated, the family worked as a team, each in turn choosing just the right colored ball or garland to place on the tree while Nat King Cole and Bing Crosby sang “Deck the Halls” or “White Christmas” in the background.

So it was to be that night. Tommy was on his way over with Claire, and Elaine had baked her famous Scottish shortbread, ready for their arrival. Claire would have hot chocolate, Elaine a glass of sherry, Tommy a Coke as he was driving back home, and Bill his Glenmorangie as they ate the shortbread, sang along with Nat and Bing and got the Christmas season kicked off in the traditional manner.

“One wrong move and we could blow this thing,” said Bill as he and Tommy sat in his office after the tree decorating had been completed.

“You’re right, Dad, and we’re going to have to think two and three steps ahead.”

“If it was Garrison McMullen who ordered the hit, which I suspect it was, he will be nervous about the arrests and will be calling the shots with Julien Boudreaux. His biggest risk will be if Pepe Vivar starts to talk, and he will know that. They could just take Pepe out—have someone get to him while he’s in the holding cell. We need to ensure that Bobby Brown is sensitive to this possibility and that he gets the DA to go along with our plan to take the death penalty off the table. If we get Pepe to talk, then we will have to protect him.

“We also need to expect that Garrison McMullen might call in markers from those he has helped along the way. We know he is a shaker and mover in the Republican Party and that his son is the governor-elect. The governor’s office might put some undue pressure on the DA or on the chief. If McMullen is smart, which I’m sure he is, he will not want to show his hand completely. For example, if he gets the governor involved on his side, he will show his hand and he will know that he has shown us that he is the guy pulling the strings. It will have to be subtle, but we should expect it and be ready for it,” said Bill.

~

The following morning, they were in the office early. Marie was at her desk reading the editorial in the Statesman written by Latisha Williams. She had done what was asked of her and limited the editorial to the arrest in the slaying of Mike Muguara. She had done a really good job on the backdrop to support the piece, describing Mike Muguara as a war hero whose life had been extinguished by a two-bit hoodlum.

“Marie, can you take the assignment to try to track down Antonella Aguilar, the retired housekeeper from the McMullen Ranch? We need to find out what she knows,” said Tommy.

“Will do, Boss.”

“Dad, let’s you and I go over to the holding cells and see if we can get Pepe to talk without his attorney being there.”

~

Pepe was in his cell, head in his hands, when they arrived.

“Sleep well last night?” asked Tommy.

Pepe barely raised his head, but as he did so he let out a low-pitched growl and bared his teeth just like the caged animal he was. However, also like every animal when cornered, he was looking for a way out, an escape route, to be able to live to fight another day. Bill and Tommy began to sow a seed of hope. They hoped Pepe would recognize that it was his only real chance for survival.

“You’re being thrown to the wolves, Pepe. Your boyfriend Jimmy is going to ensure that he comes out of this squeaky clean, and to do that he needs to give you up. The drugs, the money and the guns all belong to you and you killed Mike Muguara on your own. He had nothing to do with it. While you’re sitting there with your head in your hands, why don’t you stick your head through your legs and kiss your ass goodbye. You’re dead, Pepe, you just don’t know it yet.”

“Go fuck yourself!” yelled Pepe. “Jimmy would never do that to me.”

As they left the cell with these words ringing in their ears, Tommy and Bill knew that Pepe Vivar was trying hard to convince himself that this was true. They also knew that he wasn’t succeeding.

~

Marie Mason had arrived at the Round Rock address, the last known location for Antonella Aguilar. She talked with neighbors but no one had any idea where Antonella had gone after she moved out of the small three-bedroom home she had owned for the past ten years. Some of the neighbors expressed surprise at the speed of her departure; one day she was there and the next day she was gone. The house was then put on the market and a moving company came and took all of her stuff away. The house sold fast as it was listed at a price well below fair market value.

The neighbors gave Marie the name of the Realtor who sold the property and she headed off to find her office.

“I’m looking for Dawn Summers,” said Marie as she walked into the Keller Williams agency on East Main Street in Round Rock.

Dawn Summers looked like a poster child for the real estate industry. She was tall and slim with long blond hair. Her makeup was perfect. She moved like a top class model on the runway, gliding rather than walking across the floor.

“Dawn Summers,” said the Realtor, extending her hand to Marie, holding it in place for just a microsecond to ensure that Marie saw the diamond and sapphire ring and matching tennis bracelet. “How might I help you today?”

“I’m Detective Marie Mason of the Travis County Police Department. Is there somewhere we can talk privately? I need to get some details on a home you sold recently.”

“Travis County Police Department,” said Dawn with some trepidation. “I hope there wasn’t a dead body buried in the garden,” joked the Realtor.

Marie was not impressed by the joke.

“A place where we could talk,
please
!”

Dawn led Marie to the conference room at the rear of the office. They passed by the scoreboard on the wall. Every Realtor company has a scoreboard in full view with the sales for each agent displayed. Being number one on that board was what they lived for. The money was great, but being the top dog on that board was what really gave them their jollies. It was no surprise to Marie that Dawn Summers was number one on the board. She also saw the notation on the board for the sale of Antonella Aguilar’s property on Brushy Creek.

“You were the listing agent for the Aguilar property on Brushy Creek, is that correct?” said Marie.

“Oh yes, three-bedroom, two-bath, 2200 square feet. Real nice little property. Got a sixteen-day close on that one, then the title company screwed around with the disbursement of funds.”

“What was the reason for the sale?”

“Not sure, something about wanting to be closer to her son in Florida.”

Marie found that confusing, but didn’t share her thoughts with the Realtor.

Antonella Aguilar didn’t have a son!

“Do you know her son’s name and also do you have a copy of the closing documents? I’d like the information on the bank account used to receive the proceeds of the sale.”

“Not sure that I am allowed to give you that information,” said the Realtor, now feeling that she was out of her depth. She was in shark-infested waters and needed to get help.

“I think you need to talk with the owner of our agency. His name is Bill Mitchell; let me go get him, if you don’t mind.”

A few minutes later, she was back with Bill Mitchell. Marie explained what she needed and why she needed it, and the owner of the agency understood and instructed Dawn to provide the information from the file.

“Okay, I have it here. The son’s name is Gavin and the bank account is with the First Bank of Sarasota, Sarasota, Florida.”

“Do you have a forwarding address?” asked Marie.

“Yes, it’s a PO Box 2722, Martin Luther King Way in Sarasota.”

Later, in her car in the parking lot of the Realtor agency, Marie concluded that someone wanted Antonella Aguilar out of the way. She had no son, but her fictitious son had the same first name as the boy she raised when his mother was banished from the McMullen Ranch. Had Antonella run, or was she pushed? Was Gavin McMullen also wrapped up in all of this?

“He wants to see you, Tommy.”

It was the deputy from the holding cell on the phone. “Pepe Vivar wants to see you.”

Marie was still out at Round Rock, so Tommy and Bill went to the holding cell to meet with Pepe Vivar.

“What can I do for you, Pepe?” said Tommy as he entered the cell. It looked like Pepe Vivar hadn’t moved since the last time they saw him. He was still sitting at the back of his cell with his head in his hands.

“I was just doing as I was told,” said Pepe, shaking his head in despair.

“And what were you told?”

“If I tell you, I don’t want the needle and I’ll also need protection as Jimmy will arrange to get me killed. He’s done it before with others who have opened their big mouths.”

“The problem with that, Pepe, is that I’m not going to go stick my neck out for you unless I know what it is you have to tell me. You’re just going to have to trust me that I will do what I can for you. That’s better than what you’ve got right now, which is nothing.”

Pepe waited for a moment but soon realized that he had little option but to spill the beans.

“Jimmy asked me first to tell him to back off. He said that this guy Raul Hernandez was trying to muscle in on our business and bring in his own cheap illegal labor. He was also going to give the illegals that work for us more money and try to tempt them away to work for him. It was going to really screw up what it had taken us years to build, and if he got too close and found out about our drug business, then the shit would really hit the fan.”

“Jimmy asked me to follow Hernandez and find out where he lived. I saw him come out of his hotel and head over to the gym on Lamar a couple of times a week, and I got in his face one night and told him that if he didn’t back down he was a dead man.”

“He wouldn’t stop, and we saw him talking with a group of electricians who appeared to be agreeing with what he said. That’s when Jimmy said that we would have to make him disappear. We could make it look like he was an illegal, and if we could do that the cops wouldn’t spend too much time looking for the killers.”

“We sat in the limo in the parking lot at the gym, Jimmy and I, and some of the illegals who worked for us, in a couple of our trucks and a beat-up old Taurus. I hit him from behind and we bundled him into the trunk of the Taurus. I took the remote from him for the BMW and looked to see what I could find in the car. There were a couple of handguns in the trunk and a nice leather jacket in the back. So I took them.”

“We drove out to Whispering Hollow where the others we had paid to help get the job done had cleared the area of a couple of homeless guys and made sure that the coast was clear when we arrived.”

“When we got there we hauled him out of the truck and I tied a rope around his wrists and secured it to one of the pickups. I took his wallet and money clip out of his back pocket; I just saw it when I was fastening the rope so I took it, and then I gave the signal for him to be dragged.”

“When it was over I took the baseball bat to him and Jimmy cut off his hands. We cleaned up the drag site, threw the hands in the back of the truck and dumped them in the lake later.”

“The cross had been set up and Jimmy poured gas on it and set it alight. He then took out the sign from the back of the limo, which he had written earlier, and nailed it to a tree. That was it, we were out of there and we drove home.”

Pepe had coughed the lot.

“Well, the thing is, Pepe, it’s your word against his. I doubt that your compadres who helped are going to suddenly get a conscience and tell us what happened. Nope, it’s a
he said - he said
thing, Pepe. I need more than what you’ve just given me.”

Pepe paused, staring at the ceiling for a moment. It was as if he was trying to decide to jump off the cliff or not. If he played his final card, there was no going back. As it stood right now the cops could say that they found out what had happened in the course of their investigation. They could construct it to hide the fact that Pepe had grassed. But if he played his final card then it would come out in the trial that he was the one who had given them the evidence. He decided he had no option but to get them to play along with his scheme to hide the fact that he had grassed.

“Okay, I’ll give you the evidence you need to prove that it was Jimmy who asked me to do this. Now you’re going to have to trust
me
. Before I tell you where the evidence is, I want it in writing from the DA that I won’t get the needle and that I’ll get protection. I don’t want to involve that slime ball Julien Boudreaux, so no talking with him. You get me a letter and I give you the evidence - deal?”

“Okay, Pepe, I’ll see what I can do.” Bill and Tommy left the cells to go brief the Chief and Bobby Brown.

~

Marie returned to the office after her trip to Round Rock. It was just after two in the afternoon and she looked up the telephone information for the post office on Martin Luther King Way in Sarasota. She found it and made the call.

“Can I speak with the person in charge of your PO box rental facilities?”

“Hello, Angelina Rocha here, I’m in charge of the PO box rental. Do you wish to rent a box?”

“No, Angelina, this is Detective Marie Mason of the Travis County Police Department in Austin, Texas, I need some information on a current renter.”

“I can’t give you that information over the phone, Detective, but if you send me an email with the box number, outlining why you need the information, then I can get you the information immediately.”

An hour later Marie had what she needed. The box had been rented by a Shirley Simpson of 17 Longmeadow Circle, Sarasota, a very expensive neighborhood on the outskirts of the city.

Shirley Simpson, why do I know that name?
thought Marie. It came to her in a flash. Shirley Simpson was Gavin McMullen’s campaign manager for his election bid for the Texas governor race. What the hell was going on here?

Tommy’s cell phone rang as he and Bill were headed back to the office from their meeting with Bobby Brown. It was Marie. “Where are you guys? I’ve uncovered some interesting information about Antonella Aguilar. Are you coming back to the office soon?”

~

They met in the conference room at Hudson Bend 20 minutes later and Marie brought them up to speed on what she had found.

“Gavin McMullen is in the middle of this. He is risking his entire political future; why would he do that? Did Gavin McMullen give the order for the hit because Mike was getting too close to uncovering his involvement? Mike had met with Antonella, and if she told Gavin about it and the fact that Mike was digging around in the family business, perhaps Gavin lost it and had him taken out,” said Tommy.

“The pieces don’t fit,” said Bill.

“Gavin’s name has never come up. Mike never mentioned seeing him during his surveillance activities. Mike simply said that Antonella raised Gavin, so Gavin must have a strong bond with her. Are we suggesting that he has killed Antonella in addition to ordering the hit on Mike? If he was concerned about Mike digging dirt up on the family, it’s likely that Antonella knows more about where the skeletons are buried than anyone. Why involve his campaign manager to set up a PO box for communication with the Round Rock Realtor regarding the sale of her home? No, Gavin is not a bad guy in this, I’d bet my life on it, but he is involved in some way. The real issue is, why is he involved? That’s what we need to find out.”

“Marie, can you get hold of Shirley Simpson tomorrow and try to get to the bottom of this? We need to talk with Antonella Aguilar. Bill and I need to get back with Pepe Vivar; the DA has given us a green light to take the death penalty off the table provided that he can give us solid evidence that Jimmy Rodriquez orchestrated Mike’s killing.”

~

The following morning Bill and Tommy were back in the holding cell with Pepe Vivar.

“I have your letter from the DA, Pepe, but read it carefully. If what you give us as evidence of Jimmy Rodriguez’s involvement is useless, then all bets are off. If, on the other hand, if it’s golden and we get a conviction, then the DA will go to bat for you with the judge and not seek the death penalty.”

Pepe spilled the beans.

“Okay, here’s the deal. You need to search the limo. Below the driver’s side seat, tucked up inside the lining, is a metal clip. The clip holds a micro-recorder. Most of the time when Jimmy talked with me about dirty work he wanted me to do, we did it in the limo. He’s paranoid that his house is bugged and he thinks the limo is secure. We drive out into the middle of nowhere, miles away from any cell towers, and have our little talks.

“For my own protection I’ve been taping our conversations. If it’s still there, it will have the conversation recorded when he told me to make the hit on Raul Hernandez and how he wanted it set up. When you find it, I want you to contact Julien Boudreaux and tell him that your continued investigation, including the search of the limo, has turned up additional evidence and that you want to bring him up to speed. At that time, you can say that unknown third parties have been bugging the limo and that might convince him that it wasn’t me who recorded the conversations and snitched on him. Agreed?”

“Sounds like a plan, Pepe. No idea if Jimmy will buy it, and he may still come after you. We’ll do our best to protect you, but
you
got yourself into this.”

~

They left the holding cell and called the chief to get a search done of the limo. That night they had the recorder and they all sat in the conference room and listened to Jimmy Rodriguez set up the hit.

Jimmy Rodriguez speaks
- So he won’t listen to reason! We’re gonna have to make this motherfucker disappear, Pepe. I want it done in the next week. I’m tired of this shit. If he starts bringing in his own people, like the fucking Guatemalans or, worse still, the Salvadorians, then there will be a war in the street.

We can pick him up and take him down by the lake at Whispering Hollow, kill him there and then just fade into the sunset. Everyone is used to seeing our trucks running around at night in the ‘hood, it will be no big deal. Where’s the best place to hit him, Pepe?

Pepe Vivar
- He goes to the gym on Lamar a couple of times a week. We can whack him there in the parking lot and put him in the trunk of a car and bring him out here. How do we kill him, Boss? Just put a bullet in him and throw him in the lake?

Jimmy Rodriguez
- No, we need to send a message! We lynch him, string him up or something, no let’s just tie him to a fucking truck and drag his ass! We also need to make sure he can’t be identified, so we need to cut off his fingers and take his teeth out. Can you get a team together, Pepe, not too many, say ten, and give them a hundred bucks each and tell them that we need to get rid of a guy trying to bring in South American shitheads to steal their jobs. Tell me when it’s set up.”

“Now let’s do a couple of lines and get outta here!”

That was the end of the tape. They had the smoking gun. Bobby Brown picked up his cell phone and called Julien Boudreaux.

~

“Julien, Bobby Brown here, can you be at the Sheriff’s office tomorrow morning? We need to meet with you and your client Jimmy Rodriguez. There’s been some new developments.”

“I was just about to call you, Bobby. My client has been held now for 36 hours and I want a hearing with the judge as we discussed. Are we on his schedule and if so, when?” replied Julien, trying to take control of the conversation.

“I’ve spoken to the judge, Julien, we’re getting it on his schedule. Just be there tomorrow at nine!”

Bobby hung up the phone.