Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Did you catch that?” Sam asked the captain.
“The highlights.”
“I’ve hated this case from the outset, and I hate it even more now.”
“I can’t believe we might’ve found the money and the Feds didn’t,” Malone said. “I kinda like that.”
“I figured you might. This department could use a big win like that, and it’s all thanks to Green. He’s a star.”
“Yes, he is. Cruz reported back from the hardware store—the same things Mandi said she bought.”
“I’m glad it matches up. That’s another box checked.”
“You believe her when she says it was the brother.”
“It fits our theory that the murder was heat of the moment, that the murderer grabbed the first thing they could reach, and it went down from there.”
“So the charge will be manslaughter?”
“That’s what I’m thinking. I don’t believe he went there that day intending to kill her.” Sam checked her watch. “I have enough time to talk to him before Gonzo’s meeting.”
“I’ll let you get to it.”
“You want to come in with me?”
He blinked, seeming surprised. “Oh, um, sure.”
“Are you? You still remember how, right?”
“Don’t be a smartass.”
“That’s like telling me not to breathe, Cap.”
“Don’t I know it.”
Sam led the way into interview two, where Ken McLeod Jr. was pacing like a nervous cat. If his sister were to be believed, he had good reason to be nervous. “Have you been advised of your rights regarding counsel?”
“I have. I waived my right to counsel.”
Sam turned on the recorder. “Interview with Kenneth McLeod Jr., Lieutenant Holland and Captain Malone present. Subject has waived his right to an attorney. Have a seat, Mr. McLeod.”
“I’d prefer to stand.”
“Have a seat, Mr. McLeod.”
He sat, hands on the table, posture wary and distrustful. “I don’t know why I’m here.”
“You don’t?”
“No.”
“Let me tell you something they taught us in Law Enforcement 101. Innocent people don’t run.”
“We weren’t running. We were going on vacation for Thanksgiving.”
“And when did you decide to take this vacation?”
“Yesterday.”
“Right after your mother was murdered. Odd timing.”
“She wasn’t in our lives. Her murder had no impact on us.”
“None at all? Your mother was whacked in the neck with a yard tool and bled out on the floor of her garage. That didn’t affect you at all?”
“Not the way you think it would. She hurt a lot of people with what she did, including my sister and me. It’s no wonder someone killed her.”
“Do you have any idea who might’ve killed her, Ken? And before you answer, I want you to think about your options here. If you know something and don’t share it, you can be charged with a felony count of impeding a homicide investigation.”
“I told you. I don’t know anything.”
Sam had to give him credit, he never blinked, fidgeted or anything that murderers usually did when confronted by cops after committing the ultimate crime. “Were you at your parents’ home on Sunday?”
“No.”
Again, he gave no indication he was lying.
“What if I had a witness who can put you there?”
“Your witness is lying. I haven’t been anywhere near my parents’ house in months. I’d be willing to take a polygraph, if necessary.”
Interesting, Sam thought. If he’s lying, he’s one hell of an accomplished liar. “Why did you and your sister decide to go to the Bahamas days after your mother’s murder?”
“I told you—because Mandi is on Thanksgiving break from school, and we both wanted out of here for the holiday, seeing as we no longer have a family to spend it with.”
Sam hated that the explanation made sense, but she couldn’t reconcile what Mandi had told her with the cool customer sitting before her.
“So you’re close with your sister, then?”
“We’ve had our differences over the years, but we’ve stuck together during this nightmare our mother brought down on us.”
“What kind of differences?”
“The usual sibling shit. Who got to use the car our parents made us share as teens, who took whose earbuds and didn’t return them. That kind of stuff. Things were a lot better between us after I left for college, and we weren’t living together anymore.”
Recalling her own sisters saying the same thing once upon a time, Sam stood. “We’ll be back.”
“I haven’t done anything. You can’t hold me here indefinitely.”
Sam let him have the last word and left the room with Captain Malone following her out.
“What’re you thinking?” Malone asked when they were in the hallway.
“That the sister is minimizing her own involvement and pointing the finger at her brother to save her own ass.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I want to talk to Mandi again.”
“I’ll watch from observation.”
Sam led the way back to interview one, where Dominguez was overseeing Mandi’s efforts to record her version of what’d happened.
Mandi popped up out of a slouch, her eyes wide with fright. She looked like someone who had something to hide. “Did you talk to Ken?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“He says he didn’t do it.”
“He’s lying!”
“See, the thing is, I don’t think he is.”
“He is! He did it!”
“Convince me.”
“I told you! He called me at one thirty on Sunday in a complete panic. I left my dorm to get the things he said he needed, and I was at my parents’ house by three and found him standing over my dead mother.”
“He says he hasn’t been to their house in months. Did he tell you why he went there that day?”
“To beg her to do the right thing and give back the money.”
“Does he know you made the Cayman deposits for your mom?”
She blinked and squirmed, and Sam could almost see smoke coming out of her ears as she tried to figure out how to reply to that. “No.”
“How did you explain your frequent trips there to him?”
“I told him I was taking a break from school. Like I said, this was long before we knew what my mother was doing. I had no clue she’d stolen the money I was depositing for her until the Feds charged her.”
“And then you knew exactly why she’d sent you to the islands and basically implicated you in her crime. The way I see it, Mandi, you had much more of a motive to end her than your brother did.”
“I didn’t do it.”
“So you say.”
A knock sounded on the door, and Sam got up to see who was interrupting her interrogation. The only time that happened was if someone had found something that would help.
Cameron Green gestured for her to come out of the room.
Sam closed the door behind her. “What’s up?”
“After we found Mandi’s ties to the Cayman Islands, I did some digging in some of the other more notorious tax shelters and found something interesting in Delaware.
The VMcL Corporation was formed more than two years ago, and I thought you might be interested in who’s on the four-person board of directors.
The company’s assets are listed at fifteen million. ”
Sam took the paper he handed to her and scanned it quickly. It listed Amanda McLeod as chair, Kenneth McLeod Jr. as vice chair, Kenneth McLeod Sr. as treasurer and Virginia McLeod as director-at-large. “Great work as usual, Green. This helps.”
“Are you liking the daughter for this?”
“I want to, but she insists it was the brother, who’s the coolest-under-pressure dude I’ve ever encountered if he murdered his mother.
I don’t know what to believe. We need a warrant to dump their phones and the father’s,” she said, adding Ken Sr. on a hunch.
“She insists the brother called her at one thirty in a freak-out, asking her to get stuff for him from the hardware store and then meet him at the parents’ house.
I need to know if that call happened and if you can put him in the area on Sunday. I’ll ask Malone to get the warrant.”
“Once we have it, I’ll get with Archie to track them,” Green said. “We can track the pings to isolate his location.”
“Do hers and the father’s, too. Let’s figure out who’s telling the truth here.”
“On it.”
Sam ducked her head into the observation room. “Cap? Can you come here, please?”
“What’s going on?” she heard Mandi ask Dominguez. “I didn’t do anything! You need to let me go!”
Captain Malone stepped out of the room and closed the door behind him.
“We’re going to track the cell phones to see who’s telling the truth. Can you take care of the warrants?”
“I will. Good call, no pun intended.”
She handed him the paper Green had provided. “In the meantime, Green has found a corporation in Delaware worth fifteen million, and guess who’s on the board of directors?”
Malone scanned the sheet. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
“Let’s go ask Ken Jr. if he knew he was vice chair of the board.”
They went back to interview two.
“Got another question for you, Ken. Have you ever heard of a corporation called VMcL?”
“No. Why?”
Sam placed the paper on the table in front of him. “I assumed you would’ve heard of it since you’re the vice chair of the board of directors.”
“What? No, I’m not.”
Sam pointed to the place where he was listed. “Yes, you are.”
He looked up at her, shock etched into every corner of his face. “I know nothing about this, Lieutenant. I swear to God.”
Sam believed him.
“I can’t believe she’d use me this way.” He shook his head. “Who implicates their own kid in a crime of this magnitude? Who does that, Lieutenant?” He seemed on the verge of tears. “She was my mother. Wasn’t she supposed to protect me?”
Sam had heard Nick ask the same heartbreaking questions about his own mother. “Yes, she was.”
“I don’t know what to do. I had no idea she’d done this, and now I suppose I can be held criminally liable for things I had nothing to do with.”
“This may be an opportunity to fix some of the wrong your mother did.”
“How so?”
“As a director of the company, I’d imagine you’d have the ability to determine where the money goes.”
He brightened visibly. “I would, wouldn’t I?”
“I think so.”
“I’ll do anything I can to make this right for the people she stole from.”
“Hold that thought.” Sam retrieved the paper about the company’s board of directors. “We’ll be back.”
Sam left interview two, and while Malone went to see to the warrants for the phones, Sam returned to interview one. “What’s the deal with the VMcL Corporation?”
Mandi’s brows furrowed. “I don’t know any company by that name.”
Sam put the printout on the table. “That’s strange, because you’re the chair of the company’s board of directors.” She pointed to the place where Mandi could see her name.
“I am? How’s that possible if I’ve never heard of the company?”
“I don’t know. You tell me.”
“I don’t know either! She never told me anything about this.”
“The company has fifteen million in assets.”
“Oh. Well… I didn’t know.”
“Now you do.”
“I’m not sure what you want me to say about it. I didn’t know she made me the chair of a company I’d never heard of. I didn’t know she was sending me to the Caymans to deposit stolen money. I didn’t kill her.”
“You were pretty oblivious all the way around, huh?”
“I was in college, Lieutenant. Did you go to college? Do you know what’s involved?”
“I went to college and grad school—with dyslexia—so yeah, I know what’s involved.”
“I didn’t have time to pay attention to what she was doing with her business.”
“But you had plenty of time to take trips to the Cayman Islands whenever she needed you to.”
“Those were vacations. Since when are vacations illegal?”
“They’re not, unless you’re on the payroll to stash money in tax-free havens.”
“I wasn’t. She didn’t give me a dime except for my tuition. My brother and I were always expected to work, and we did. They even made us share a car in high school so we wouldn’t be spoiled. None of our friends had to share a car with their siblings. We were the only ones.”
Poor baby, Sam wanted to say. How did you ever survive such hardship?
After hearing how Ginny had raised her kids, Sam needed more insight into who she had been as a person, how she’d ended up defrauding friends and family and what her relationships with her kids had been like.
She left Mandi and went to talk to Ken Jr. again. “Who was closest to your mother?”
“Her sister, Janet.”
“Did your mother steal from her?” Sam didn’t recall seeing anyone named Janet on the list of fraud victims.
“No, but probably because Janet is an artist and never had money to steal. She knows my mother better than anyone.”
“Write down her address and phone number.”