The Garden of Betrayal - Lee Vance [59]
“How often did he borrow the car?” I asked, reverting to Reggie’s list of questions.
“Once or twice a week. He had a key.”
“And always to drive out to Long Island?”
“As far as I know.”
“Carlos was with a prostitute when he died. Did that surprise you?”
He grimaced.
“Men are men. But yes, it surprised me. Carlos was a romantic. He always had an infatuation for some girl. There’s nothing romantic about a prostitute.”
My cell phone chimed softly, indicating an urgent text message.
“Excuse me a second,” I said, taking it from my pocket and checking the display. The message was from Amy: Walter wants to see you in his office as soon as possible. I swore softly, wondering what the hell he was doing at work the day after his son’s death. Twenty minutes, I texted back.
“You have a problem?” Gallegos asked.
“It’s nothing,” I said, berating myself for having broken his flow. I needed to get as much as I could from him while he was still inclined to talk. “The bribe you mentioned. Did Carlos tell you anything more about it?”
“A little. He and his colleagues had been offered an opportunity to buy shares in an oil company. The oil company owned drilling rights that were worth more than the market realized. The idea was that everyone could buy the shares inexpensively and then make a big profit when the news came out.”
“In return for what?”
“Carlos didn’t say.”
“You know the name of the company?”
“No. Nothing more than I’ve told you.”
There couldn’t have been that many oil companies whose stock prices had popped seven years ago because of hidden reserves. It was a lead, although I wasn’t sure to what. I was about to thank him and say good-bye when I recalled Reggie’s final question.
“Tell me,” I said. “What exactly do you think happened that night at the motel?”
Gallegos lowered his head. When he looked up again, the tears I thought I’d spotted earlier were flowing.
“I think a brave man died for being honest.”
We said our good-byes, and Gallegos disappeared into the men’s room to pull himself together. I was paying the cashier when I glanced into the mirror behind the lunch counter and caught the eye of a man at the counter who was sitting with his back to me. He was wearing a baseball cap pulled low, but I could see a wide, shiny scar stretching from his mouth to his ear, as if he’d been badly burned at some point. I turned away quickly, feeling bad about having stared.
18
Activity on the trading floor was muted, everyone hunched over their screens or whispering on telephones. I rehearsed awkward condolences in my head as I walked toward Walter’s office. His curtains were drawn—I’d never noticed that he had curtains, much less seen them closed. I could feel eyes watching me as I knocked on the door.
“Come,” Walter called.
I entered, the words I’d prepared stopping on my tongue. There were two men in the room with Walter—one fortyish, sitting in front of his desk, and the other twenty years older, off to the left, with his back to the curtained glass wall. They could have been before and after models for a temperance brochure—the younger fit and fresh-faced, and the older beefy and with a broken-veined nose. Identical flat stares and a rumpled sameness to their suits made me suspect that they were members of Reggie’s fraternity.
“Lieutenant Wayland and Deputy Chief Ellison of the NYPD,” Walter intoned quietly, confirming my guess. The chief was the dissolute-looking one. “They have a few questions for you.” He pointed to a vacant chair between the policemen. “Sit, please.”
Neither cop extended a hand. I sat, my attention shifting back to Walter. He was as carefully dressed and groomed as ever, but the near-tangible intensity he always radiated had evaporated, his gaze directed into the mid-distance over my shoulder. For the first time, I noticed that he was getting old.
“I can’t tell you how sorry I am,” I said. “Alex was a good friend. Claire