Part 7 The Third Wife #6
Now, Lenny Grossman, the superintendent at 59West, had apparently also been absent since Thanksgiving, November 26th.
So who was the ‘superintendent’ I’d met in Aristo King’s apartment on December 21st who looked exactly like Lenny Grossman?
Who had been the man dressed in white coveralls who’d unlocked the elevator doors for me to save Alexei in the elevator shaft . . .
Who I’d glimpsed on the blow-through level beneath the roof . . .
Who I’d seen entering the panic room on the 93rd floor, just before I’d been shoved into the sauna . . .
And who the night superintendent at 59West thought was sick . . .?
Could someone have impersonated Lenny Grossman for almost an entire month?
It actually made some sense.
Posing as the superintendent of the tower would’ve given the perpetrator(s) behind the events of December 21st unfettered access to every corner of the building and thus complete freedom to arrange all the deathtraps.
Hell, they would have had keys to every apartment on every floor, too, and thus could’ve moved around in plain sight as they prepared.
They also would’ve had access to Aristo King’s penthouse, making kidnapping him during the night very doable.
Looking at Lenny Grossman’s photo, I saw that he would’ve been pretty easy to mimic: glasses, moustache, paunch, white coveralls.
Indeed, the glasses and the moustache made it particularly straightforward.
I mean, how much attention do we really pay to the workers in our buildings?
I didn’t think the self-absorbed New Yorkers in the supertalls of Billionaires’ Row would pay much at all.
I doubted that Ajax and Cassandra King knew Lenny’s name, even though it’d been embroidered on his coveralls.
Add to this mix the strange company on the darknet that Roman Oberov had mentioned: Modern Alchemical Solutions. Apparently, it specialised in giving its customers unusual forms of vengeance, like setting up that rich boy for rape—
‘Yo, Sherlock Holmes,’ the super of Lenny’s building interrupted my thoughts. ‘We done here?’
‘Oh, yes, thank you,’ I said. ‘Thank you for your help.’
I walked back up to the street, came to Georgy’s car.
As I opened the passenger door, I paused again as I rechecked the photos of Lenny Grossman on his Facebook page.
I tried to recall the man I’d met at 59West.
This was almost certainly the same guy.
The glasses, the moustache, the stocky frame in the white coveralls . . .
I couldn’t be sure, but maybe his eyes were a little different.
Just as that thought came to me, with a chill I recalled the forbidden word Roman Oberov’s son had used.
Perevertyshe.
One who walks around in another’s skin.
I shook the thought away.
Don’t be ridiculous, Sam.
It was late when I got back to my motel in Sleepy Hollow.
I’d Ubered there while Georgy had driven home.
He needed to make more calls tomorrow to get us access to the Grandmaster’s body at the morgue. When he got back to his office, he was also going to email me the security footage from the garage, so I could examine it.
Alone in my motel room, I was still thinking hard.
Impersonations. Imposters . . .
Walking in another’s skin . . .
Modern Alchemical Solutions . . .
The darknet.
I called the Tech Detect.
It was after 11 p.m., but I had a feeling he’d be up.
He answered on the third ring.
‘Sam Speedman, hey.’
‘Got a question for you, Monty.’
‘Shoot.’
‘Ever heard of a company on the darknet called Modern Alchemical Solutions?’
There was a short silence on the other end of the line.
‘Yeah, maybe . . .’ Monty Woods said softly. ‘It’s not involved in all the Aristo King shit, is it?’
‘It might be. Why? What’s the problem?’
‘You hear stories on the darknet, dude,’ he said. ‘There are some crazy messed-up folks out there, offering crazy messed-up services. Modern Alchemical Solutions will fuck people up for you but in very pointed ways.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ve heard rumours. If your husband cheats on you, Modern Alchemical will cut off his dick and mail it to his mistress. If someone’s blackmailing you, Modern Alchemical will get kompromat on them and ruin their lives. There was a rich kid named Preston or something—’
‘Prescott.’
‘—that’s right, Prescott. Word is, they set him up for rape using his own fucking semen.’
‘It’s crime for hire?’ I said.
‘It’s not as straightforward as that. The guy behind it—no-one knows who he is—assesses your problem and then decides if he’ll work for you. Sometimes he says yes, other times he says no.
‘In one story I heard, Modern Alchemical Solutions got some cheating husband’s pubic hair from his bathroom floor and then went and placed it at the crime scene of a dead hooker. Like I said, they ruin people.’
‘Monty, can you look into Modern Alchemical Solutions for me? Poke around a little?’
Another silence.
‘I don’t know, Sam,’ the Tech Detect said.
‘You gotta remember, when you peer into the seamier corners of the darknet, you leave digital footprints, so the darknet is often watching you. And there are some folks there that you do not cross. Let me do some light searching. Some very light searching. I don’t want Modern Alchemical Solutions coming after me. ’
‘Thanks, Monty.’
I hung up and went to bed.