Chapter 12
One more stop, and Con could finally go home for the day. All of this was so new to him, these production companies and tax loopholes, fancy desks, and woke fairy tales, that he’d pretty much forgotten about Matthew Nelson Neil.
Even seeing Dwight Dozier’s name in the magazine featuring Thomas Ellsberg hadn’t triggered thoughts of The Sandman.
But as soon as he started his car, Con heard the man’s voice coming out of the speakers.
“Fuck.”
He shut off his phone but just listening to Matthew Nelson Neil for a handful of seconds had riled him up again.
He wanted nothing less than to listen to a story about the California Gold Rush narrated by a serial killer, but not listening almost seemed as if he was granting The Sandman more power over him.
I’m going to listen to it again tonight , he thought with conviction. Listen and not fall asleep this time.
Con headed back across the city toward Imperial Productions. The man he was looking for was Edward Samuelson, the chief editor of all three pirated films. This was only after he was informed that the final name on the list, producer Charles Calloway, was out of town for the next two weeks.
Martin Yeo was on the top floor of the building, the penthouse, if you will, but Edward Samuelson was relegated to the basement.
No, not the basement.
The sewers .
That’s what Con considered the area he was navigating now. Open ceilings with hundreds of cables roped through beams, pitted concrete walls.
Rooms with aftermarket doors.
If he’d fallen asleep and woken up here, Con would never have guessed that he was in the same building that he’d been in earlier that day.
In fact, he might have thought he’d woken up on the set of a Saw movie, the first of which he’d actually watched with Beth when it had first come out years ago.
Had that been the last movie they’d watched together? Impossible. But he couldn’t remember anything more recent.
Con interacted briefly with three mole rats, told them he was here to see Edward, and they all sent him in completely opposite directions.
Eventually, however, Con found Edward Samuelson. The man was in a room that was unbelievably even hotter than outside the building. A room stacked with computers the size of fridges, all hooked together by a rat’s nest of cables and illuminated with blinking green lights.
Old-school Bill Gates would have felt right at home.
“Edward Samuelson?” Con said as he approached the man seated in a wide gaming chair.
Edward spun around. Unlike Martin and Thomas and Adon, there were no pictures of the man on IMDb. There was a profile but no actual photo.
Still, Con knew that this was the man he was looking for. Faded gray Street Fighter T-shirt, small eyes, freckles across the bridge of his nose.
The only thing he was missing was Cheetos dust on his fingers.
“Who are you?”
Con showed his badge and introduced himself.
Edward just grunted, unimpressed.
“I’m here because Martin Yeo is concerned that your upcoming new release will be pirated like the films last summer.”
Edward chuckled, which made his substantial gut quiver.
“Right,” he said with an eye roll. “Marty should be more concerned with creating better movies than pirated films.”
“You know, you’re like the third person who has said that to me today,” Con remarked.
Edward shrugged as if to say, Well, there ya go.
“You’re not proud of the movies?”
“I do what I can with what I’m given,” Edward said. “And I know what you’re thinking; before you ask it, no, I didn’t pirate my own films.”
“Never said you did. But Martin was so concerned that he called in the FBI.”
Another eye roll, one that had a different meaning this time: Don’t you have something better to do with your time?
Trust me, I wish I did.
“And you think it’s me, right?” Edward said. “Because I’m down here in the basement and he’s up there in his fancy suite?”
“I—”
“Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. Because I’m not boojie, I must be the one behind the leaks.”
“No, I’m just speaking to everyone who had access to the films. You, Adon Guerrero, Thomas Ellsberg. Charles Calloway.” Con paused. “Martin Yeo. I’m just doing my due diligence.”
“Uh-huh.”
“No, I’m serious.” Con wasn’t sure why he was becoming so defensive. “I’m just going through the list of names.”
“Well,” the man said petulantly, crossing his arms over his chest. “I had nothing to do with it. I take pride in my work, FBI man. Real pride. I can only do what I can with the material I’m given, but I turn out the best product I possibly can. And I don’t pirate films. Goes against everything I stand for.”
Con glanced around the room. The door had been closed when he’d arrived, but it wasn’t locked. Based on the size and number of computers, Con assumed that this a likely place to keep the master copies of the films.
“Who has access to this room?”
Edward’s face reddened just a tinge.
“I do—it’s where I do the final edits. But some of the other editors who handle the rough cuts also come in here.”
When Con looked around a second time, he did so deliberately.
“The door was unlocked and—”
“Don’t even say it.”
“It’s just that—”
“I trust my team. And if you’re thinking that maybe when I was taking a piss or heating up a Hot Pocket someone snuck in, well, you’d be wrong.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because I don’t take a piss and I don’t eat Hot Pockets.”
Con immediately clued into what Edward was really saying.
“You’re the first to arrive and the last to leave, right?”
The man smiled wryly, his thin lips curling into a pencil-thin grin.
“You got it.”
“But when you’re not here, like—”
“You know how much time I have from when filming wraps to when it’s released? And I’m talking about festival and pre-screening release dates, not when any regular Joe can see it in the theaters?”
Con shrugged.
“I have no idea.”
“Weeks—at most . Usually, ten days. They wrap, my editors rough cut, and then I do the final edits. Most of the movies have a shit ton of CGI, which you probably know, and this takes long hours to get right. Long hours. And a lot of computing power.” Edward gestured to the computers about the room with an air of pride. “I don’t leave here until it’s done. If I do, which is rare, then I lock up. And I have the only key. Mr. FBI, I don’t know who is pirating these movies, and I know you’re just doing your job, but the leak doesn’t come from here.”
Con smiled.
“Just had to ask.”
“ Uh-huh . I have a deadline coming up, so unless you have more questions…”
“ Shadowstrike ?”
Edward seemed surprised that Con knew the name and, quite frankly, he was a bit shocked he remembered it, as well.
“That’s right.”
“Well, good luck.”
Con took one final look around and then left. It took fifteen minutes to find his way out, with three new mole rats again giving him mixed directions.
Unlike when he’d left Thomas Ellsberg’s office, he felt his core immediately cool upon feeling the California sun on his skin.
It was past five now and Con checked out for the day, mentally and physically. He drove home and the closer he got the more he started to think of Matthew Nelson Neil.
About the audiobook.
Earlier, he’d promised himself he’d listen to it again.
Now, Con wasn’t sure he was up to it.
He was so lost in thought, wavering back and forth, that he didn’t even notice that there was a car already parked in his driveway.
As usual, when his mind turned to The Sandman, his sister Valerie wasn’t far behind.
They’d fought the day that she’d gone missing. Valerie was a hothead, always had been, and this was far from their first fight.
But this argument had been particularly brutal.
And the subject was a sensitive one for Con.
It had revolved around their mother. Gerry Striker had dementia and it was getting worse. Until recently, the woman’s symptoms had been mild, forgetting what she went to the store to buy and returning home empty-handed, that sort of thing. Unable to find her car keys even though they were in the dish by the front door where she always kept them.
But over the past two months, Gerry had become increasingly confused. She’d called Con twice, asking for Donnie.
Donnie was her husband, and Con and Valerie’s father. He’d also died in a car accident decades ago.
Valerie lived with Gerry, whereas Con had just moved in with his then-fiancée Beth. His sister was fed up, tired, and scared.
She wanted to put Gerry in a home. Said that she’d be more comfortable there. That it would be better for all of them.
Con was having none of it, telling his sister that she was being paid to look after her mother and living rent-free in their family home.
“You don’t know what it’s like! It’s impossible!”
“Val, you need to suck it up. She’s our mother for Christ’s sake! We’re not putting her in a goddamn home!”
“She’s not our mother anymore! I don’t know who she is!”
The blow-up had escalated from there and ended with Valerie storming out.
That was the last time he’d seen his sister in person.
Two months later, Gerry’s dementia was so bad that she was unable to look after herself and Con had no choice but to set her up in a long-term care facility where she remained to this day.
Con was walking toward the fridge to grab himself a beer when he stopped.
Beth was standing in the kitchen, a glass of red wine in her hand.
He was startled by her presence. She looked the same as she always did, attractive, fit. Well-dressed.
Only her face was different. Beth Striker would never be referred to as a happy-go-lucky person, no one who lived with Con could be, but she appeared particularly dour today.
“Beth? Are you okay? Is something wrong?” Con asked, fearing the worst. “Is it your dad?”
Beth’s father had been diagnosed with colon cancer six months ago. It was in remission, but the specialists had informed them that there was a high probability of recurrence.
Beth didn’t answer.
She just looked at her glass of wine and took a deep breath.
“I’m moving out, Constantine. I’m—I’m leaving you.”