The Millionaires - Brad Meltzer [63]
“I can handle it just fine. I know a secretary in Fraud who’s still pissed about a snotty comment at an office party with th—”
“Fudge!” Joey interrupted, turning a blind eye at the source. Sure, it made the lawyer in her cringe, but that’s what the cutout was there for. Someone else does the dirty work; she gets the final work product. As long as she doesn’t know where it comes from, she cuts out the liability. Besides, even if it is a legal fiction, it’s worked for the CIA for years.
“A hundred for the records. A grand for the ears,” Fudge said. “Anything else?”
“Phone company. Unlisted numbers and maybe a few taps on the line.”
“What state?”
Joey shook her head. “Where do you find these people?”
“Honey, go to any chatroom in the world and type the words: ‘Who hates their job? ’When you see a return e-mail address with AT&T.com on it, that’s who you write back,” Fudge said. “Think about that next time you’re a jackass to the copy boy.”
* * * *
“What’s this?” DeSanctis asked, flipping through a two-page document as he leaned on the trunk of his winter-worn Chevy.
“It’s a mail cover,” Gallo said, cupping his hands and breathing into them. “Bring it to their local post offices and they’ll…”
“… pull Oliver’s and Charlie’s mail and photocopy every return address,” DeSanctis interrupted. “I know how it works.”
“Good—then you also know who in the post office to hand it to. When you’re done, take the search warrant to Oliver’s. I’ve got one more stop to make.”
* * * *
“What’s this?” the Hispanic woman in the dark blue post office sweater asked.
“It’s a thank-you gift,” Joey said as she held out a hundred-dollar bill.
Standing between two rickety metal bookshelves stacked with rubber-banded piles of mail, the woman leaned out of her makeshift cubicle and scanned the wide-open back room. Like the distribution area in most post offices, it was a human antfarm of activity: In every direction, bags of mail were dumped, separated, and sorted. Convinced that no one was looking, she studied the hundred dollars in Joey’s hand. “You a cop?”
“Private,” Joey said, turning on just enough lawyer calm to put the woman at ease. She hated doing this herself, but like Fudge said, when it came to mail, the scale was too large. If you wanted to build a real profile—and you needed every return address—you had to go in and find the local carrier yourself. “Private and willing to pay,” she clarified.
“Drop it on the floor,” the woman said.
Joey hesitated, searching the corners of the room for cameras.
“Just drop it,” she repeated. “No harm done.”
Lowering her arm, Joey let go, and the bill sailed to the floor. When it hit, the woman took a tiny step forward and covered it with her foot. “Now what can I help you with?”
Joey pulled a sheet of paper from her purse. “Just a little photocopy work on some friends in Brooklyn.”
* * * *
“Whattya mean it’s gone?” Gallo growled into his cell phone as he pounded the elevator button for the fourth floor. There was a sharp lurch and the beat-up elevator slowly kicked into gear.
“Gone—as in, no longer here,” DeSanctis shot back. “The garbage’s been picked through, and the recycling bins are on the curb, completely cleaned out.”
“Maybe they already got picked up. What day’s recycling?”
“Tomorrow,” he said dryly. “I’m telling you, she’s been here. And if she figures out how we—”
“Don’t be a moron. Just because she stole Oliver’s garbage doesn’t mean she knows what’s going on.” The elevator doors opened and Gallo followed the alphabet around to Apartment 4D. “Besides, in the grand scheme of things, we’re about to get something a whole lot better than junk mail and some old newspapers…”
“What’re you talking about?”
Ringing the doorbell, Gallo didn’t answer.
“Who is it?” a soft female voice asked.
“United States Secret Service,” Gallo said, lifting his badge so it could be seen through the door’s eyehole.
There was a silent pause… then a fast thunking as a totem pole of locks unclicked. Slowly, the door creaked open, revealing a heavyset woman in a yellow cardigan. She pulled two pins from