The Body of David Hayes Read Online Free PDF Page B

sure I get this right.”
    “Yes.”
    Foreman pulled out a notebook. “Contacted you how?”
    She ran down the events, bending facts slightly to make it sound as if Hayes had contacted her due to her position in the bank.
    “And the location of this face-to-face. How was that known to you?”
    She paused too long trying to think something up. Foreman filled the gap.
    “In case you forgot, Liz, I was the investigator on the original wire fraud. That put me in a… let’s call it a unique position, that allowed me to collect
all sorts
of information about this case, some of it relevant at the time, some not.”
    The room dropped about twenty degrees. She realized now that calling Foreman had been a terrible mistake. “I’m sure that’s true.”
    “Do we understand each other?”
    “Yes, we do.” The ice gave way and she clung to the ragged edges, half in, half out. Lou would have to be told.
    “I can’t see any reason to drag Lou through any of this,” Foreman said like a mind reader.
    “Well, we differ there. But that’s between Lou and me.”
    “Let me clarify one point in particular, and I want you to think carefully before you answer this, because I’m going to consider it as a statement to law enforcement, just so we understand each other.”
    “If I can help in any way, then I want to. That’s partly why I called you.”
    “Some people, Liz, they call us first because they think that helps remove them from suspicion. Not that you’d ever resort to such a tactic. I’m just saying, who called who doesn’t matter much.”
    “And the point you want to clarify?”
    “You were or were not involved
in any way
with the initial wire fraud?”
    “Was not.”
    “There is no way this is ever coming back onto you? There is nothing out there that’s going to blindside me, or anyone else associated with this investigation?
Discounting personal relationships
that you may or may not have had with employees of the bank. I’m not interested in that unless it carries weight with my investigation. And you’re telling me it does not?”
    “That’s correct.” The edges broke free and she bobbed up to her neck, the weight of her clothing pulling her down.
    “Okay. Good. Then tell me about the meeting. Location, time, circumstances, duration, topics discussed, any items exchanged. You want to edit out the personal stuff, that’s just fine.”
    “There was no personal stuff.” She regained some internal strength, defiant in her defense.
    “I’m just saying… what you tell me here, Liz, is going down in my notes. You understand? My notes can be subpoenaed, probably
will
be subpoenaed, so a person wants to think that through.”
    “I haven’t thought any of this through. David said he needed my help. He said he was afraid for his mother.” She’d told him all this already. “Then the money. I told him I couldn’t do that.”
    “Next time you’ll agree.”
    “I most certainly will not.”
    “You played it right, believe it or not. Convincing. But next time you’ll agree to pay in exchange for him leaving you alone—which he won’t. We’ll make the drop, not you, and that’ll be the end of it.”
    “It won’t be the end of it. You just said so yourself.”
    “Your role in it, I’m talking about. It’s complicated, Liz. We want that money. We want whoever that money belonged to. More than anything, we want to know how he did it—how he hid that money for so long.” Foreman’s eyes were unrelenting and cold. “This merger,” he continued. “MTK buying out WestCorp. That’s significant. Hayes switched lawyers within a week of that announcement. Did you know that?”
    “How would I possibly know that?”
    “His new team pressed hard for parole, and they got it. Attorney-client privilege… we’ll never know who hired those new attorneys, but someone wanted Hayes sprung for a reason, and that reason is the merger.”
    “But we announced the merger nine months ago.”
    “And they’ve