Family Ties (John Taylor #5) - Chapter 5

Taylor spent several more hours poring over documents with no luck before shutting his computer down. He’d found some general background information, what he really needed wasn’t going to be found in searches. There were two possibilities he could see at the moment for getting more direct information, but both would require help to get.

He decided to call back to the States first. It was still morning back home, but the help he needed would have to be started soon before it got too late in Germany.

“Senator Caldwell’s phone,” Loren answered.

The volume of noise in the background suggested that the Senator was again at some kind of function. Considering how much the campaign season was heating up, that wasn’t a huge surprise.

“Loren, its Taylor. Can I speak with the Senator a moment? I’m calling from Germany.”

“I’m aware of where you are, Mr. Taylor. Hold one moment.”

The campaign must have been taking its toll on the Senators' aid. Dashel was normally obnoxiously polite, even when it was clear Taylor annoyed him, and rarely came back with snippy responses.

“John, how’s everything going over there? Have you found Loretta?”

“Not yet, Senator, but I do need a little help. I need to get in to talk to someone from the Wissler family about Frederick Wissler, Whitaker’s relative, but I’m not sure how to go about doing that. I’m guessing for people at their level I can’t just go round and ring the doorbell. I was hoping you could call them and get me the high society pass for a meeting.”

“There’s high society, and then there’s ‘old’ money. I don’t know anyone from the family personally, but I’ve dealt with their peers before, and they usually consider anyone from our side of the pond as nouveau riche. Still, I’m not without my charms. I’ll make some calls and see what I can do.”

“Thank you, Senator. I’m sorry for having to ask for so many favors lately.”

“Don’t worry about it, John. Just remember this the next time I need you to come speak at an event.”

Taylor groaned internally. Her tone suggested she was playing with him, although that didn’t mean she wasn’t serious either.

“You can count on me, Senator.”

“Okay, I’ll call you back after I work my magic. It will take some time, so I can’t promise it won’t be until very late there.”

“That’s fine, Senator. Call me as soon as you can.”

They said their goodbyes, and Taylor dialed the next person he needed to speak with.

“Mr. Taylor?” Graf said.

“Yes, Inspector. How’s the arm?”

“It’s fine. The bullet fragment just passed through some muscle. The doctors said that, in a month or so, I should fully recover.”

“Good, I’m glad to hear it. Any news on the files or the shooters?”

“The files are just a mix of records, old photos, things like that. We will keep going through them, but on first pass, there doesn’t look to be anything pointing towards your friend or the reason for Frau Wissler’s death. It is pretty clear someone has gone through these files, which means there’s a good chance that anything important was already removed.”

Taylor knew that Graf meant Whitaker when he said ‘someone.’ He also knew that their check through the files was focused on clues that would lead to her. Since they had already written off Frederick’s death as natural causes, Frieda’s suspicions as the delusions of an old woman, and decided her death was at the hands of Whitaker, they had no reason to look beyond that. Which also meant they could have, and probably had, missed something. That didn’t mean that Taylor would be able to figure out what that something was that they missed since any clues into Frederick’s death and Frieda’s request to Whitaker would all be guesses at this point. He still had to try, though.

“I know you’ve gone through them, but is there any way I can look through the files?”

“I don’t think so. Those files are evidence in a murder and now an assault on a police officer. We can’t have you messing up the chain of custody.”

“What if you had an officer stay with me while I looked at them at your station? That wouldn’t break custody, and I might find something that you missed. Whitaker had the address for this stashed away, and the files were still inside, so they had to contain something of use. Besides, if I’m wrong and you’re right and whatever was in the box was already removed, they wouldn’t help you at trial anyway.”

There was silence on the other end of the line for a long time. He could hear small noises on the other end, so he knew Graf was still there and thinking it through, so Taylor waited him out.

“I will let my department know you are coming and that you should be allowed to view the files under supervision only,” Graf said, emphasizing the last point. “None of those files are to leave, do you understand Mr. Taylor?”

“Perfectly. What about the gunmen. Any word on them?”

“We got back preliminary identification on them. They are local criminals known to work in that area. One was wanted in a recent armed robbery of tourists on the same street, in fact.”

“It seems a stretch that we go to that specific address and would be jumped right before we went inside by street criminals. I find it hard to believe it isn’t connected.”

“I admit the coincidence seems extreme, which is why I said our preliminary identification. We will continue looking into the men's’ background, but they are known to us. These men were common street criminals. They have no history of working as muscle for anything organized and have no association with anything that would suggest that. Everything in their history supports the conclusion that it was an unrelated attempted robbery, as farfetched as that seems. Still, I have men working through their known associates to track down their third friend as well as looking for a connection between them and this case.”

“So no foreign connection, then?” Taylor asked.

“No, like I said, common street criminals with no history of any kind of foreign contacts. Why?”

“No reason, I’m just having trouble believing this is unrelated.”

“I understand your misgivings, and as I said, I share them. We will continue to look into it.”

Taylor had heard the tone Graf used in the past enough to know that he wasn’t planning on looking into it seriously. He’d go through the motions and maybe assign it to someone else, but despite his protestation, Taylor knew Graf was done with that angle.

Taylor just couldn’t buy it. They might be just randomly hired armed muscle without any prior history, but there was no way that wasn’t planned. While Taylor knew coincidences happened, there were coincidences, and then there was this kind of thing. What he couldn’t do, at least not yet, was mention his suspicion of their being tied to the Russians. Graf was still keeping Taylor at arm's length, and if this was a specific retaliation by the Russians on Taylor, it was guaranteed to make Graf freeze Taylor out.

“Ok. Well, I guess let me know if anything on that changes. I also had an unrelated request.”

“Which is?”

“I’m tracking back through Whitaker’s actions before Wissler died. She made a stop at the medical examiner’s office to ask about Mr. Wissler’s death. I wanted to go and talk to the Medical Examiner and ask questions about that visit.”

“We’ve already interviewed the medical examiner.”

“I understand that, but I want to get a feeling for where her head was at and where she might be going. I know Whitaker, and I know how she conducts investigations. I might hear something in his answers that you missed. At this moment, it’s all we have to go on to find her unless you guys stumble across her by chance. You don’t have a lot of leads at the moment.”

There was a long pause again while Graf considered. Taylor had played this card a lot so far, and, while it did lead them to the storage locker, it hadn’t gotten them any closer to Whitaker. Taylor had to be careful how many times he tried this tactic because eventually, Graf would stop buying into it.

“Fine. I will make a call for you to go be allowed in to talk to them. They will be closing shortly, so you will need to wait until the morning.”

“That’s fine. I can still go and see the files today, right?”

“Yes. I will call the precinct now and get you access.”

“Thanks. I’ll call you if I find anything.”

Graf hung up, and Taylor left the hotel and went to catch a cab to Graf’s precinct, where an officer was waiting to lead him into an interrogation room where they had the boxes of files waiting for him. An officer sat in the room the entire time, half watching Taylor as he read through one document after another, presumably to keep Taylor from taking any of the documents or messing up some part of the evidence.

It turns out they didn’t need to worry. Taylor read for hours, long enough that the officer watching over him changed twice before he finished. He read through or at least skimmed, every document in the boxes, and nothing stood out to him. It was all financial documents from the Wissler family going back decades. There was a chance something in these boxes did shed light on Fredericks's death, but Taylor couldn’t see it. This was just the paperwork that builds over a person’s lifetime, important enough to keep but not important enough to ever look at a second time.

That, of course, begged the question of why this was important enough to put in a storage unit all by itself. Its possible someone, even Whitaker, switched out what was in the boxes before Taylor and Graf found them, but Taylor couldn’t see the reasoning behind it.

Taylor knew he was missing something, but he still couldn’t see it. He was coming at this case sideways, working from the middle out. It was frustrating. Over the last few years, Taylor had gotten pretty good at this thing and usually had a feel for where things were headed.

This time, he had nothing. Just a bunch of questions.

He caught a cab back to his hotel and planned on calling it a night. Graf had sent him an email letting him know he could go by the medical examiners' office the next day and, if the medical examiner wasn’t busy, he would talk to Taylor about Frederick’s autopsy and show him the files.

Taylor lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. It wasn’t really all that late, but there wasn’t a lot that Taylor could do until tomorrow. When Taylor finally fell asleep, his thoughts of Whitaker in danger out there somewhere plagued him.

Taylor was in the middle of a dream, back in the desert, except Whitaker was with him this time, tied up in one of the caves. Their torturers kept asking why Whitaker had killed her aunt. The bright glow of his cell phone threw shadows across the room, its harsh light making him squint. He was forced to rub his eyes several times before the screen came into focus enough to hit the answer button.

“Hello,” his voice croaked.

“John, I’m sorry if I woke you up,” Caldwell said. “I know it’s late over there.”

“Its fine Senator, I was up anyway.”

“You’re a terrible liar, John. I’m sure you’ll want to hear this anyways. I managed to speak with someone from the Wissler family just a little bit ago and they’ve agreed to meet with you tomorrow at eleven your time. You’ll be meeting with Albrecht Wissler. I’m not clear on his relation to Loretta’s relative, but my best guess is this is one of the lesser members of the family. They’ll also have one of the family attorneys present and they made it very clear that they are only doing this as a professional curtsy. While I’d never find fault with your methods, I’d advise that you... temper your normal approach.”

“By temper, I take it that I shouldn’t go barging in headfirst like normal.”

“Please don’t take it as a criticism, I just have the feeling that they’ll look for any reason to shut the interview down.”

“No offense was taken, Senator. Whitaker regularly pointed out the issues with my normal approach. Heck, if she were here, I’d let her take this meeting without me, or at least try and stay silent through all of it. I’ll be good.”

“I’m about to step into a fundraising dinner, but don’t hesitate to call if you need anything else. I’ve been praying for you and Loretta.”

“Thank you, Senator. That means a lot.”

She hung up, and Taylor set his phone back down, fully awake now. Now he had two leads to follow up on, although he wasn’t sure he could get anywhere with the family. The Senators' warning, coupled with the facts that he did know of Whitaker’s investigation, suggested to him that if Frederick's death was more than the natural causes, as the M.E. had ruled it, then the most likely suspects would be in the family itself.

From what he’d been able to find so far, the family business and family social functions were the only real professional or personal contact that Fredrick had. The problem was that was just a wild ass guess. There wasn’t anything even suggesting they’d have a reason to off Frederick, let alone that they’d done it. Since Frieda’s death was almost certainly tied up in her investigation into Frederick, that would mean they’d also have to have her killed.

If they were passing Taylor to a lawyer and a flunky, it seemed like a long shot that they’d actually give up anything that would help him along.

Taylor was once again awake, staring at the ceiling, struggling to fall asleep.

When morning finally came, Taylor was worn out. He’d taken hours to fall back asleep, and the dreams had returned. He’d managed to get over the worst of his nightmares years ago as he learned to cope with his PTSD, and it had been almost a year since his last nightmare. Even Whitaker’s leaving him hadn’t triggered their return. The one last night was particularly bad, with Whitaker as a supporting player, and had left him shaken.

He pushed the thoughts aside as best he could and tried to focus on what he needed to do. His first step was the Medical Examiner’s office. It was located in an ugly, squat cement building nestled in the middle of a block of businesses with a large roll-up door on one side. Except for the small sign next to the door, Taylor would have assumed this was some kind of warehouse.

A security guard sat at a desk right as he came in and found Taylor’s name on a list. Taylor waited for nearly half an hour before an older man with wild, grey hair came out wearing a stained doctor's coat.

“Herr Taylor?”

“Yes,” Taylor said, standing up.

“I am Doctor Petzold. Leftenant Graf called ahead and asked that I speak with you. If you’ll follow me, I’m very busy today, so let us make this quick.”

While his German accent was very thick, the man spoke with a very British inflection, making him sound almost like a caricature of old British WWII films Taylor remembered seeing as a kid. The doctor lead Taylor through a row of corridors, past examination bays, and offices, eventually ending up at a fairly nice although spartan office.

The doctor went around and sat behind the large desk and indicated that Taylor should take one of the seats opposite.

“I’m to understand you have questions about the death of Frederick Wissler?”

“Yes. I wanted to know more about how he died. His widow was concerned enough about his listed cause of death that she hired an outside investigator to look into it. I was hoping you could shed some light on why she thought that was necessary.”

“I cannot tell you what caused Frau Wissler to doubt our findings, beyond saying that I have seen unusual reactions from grieving family members before who are unwilling to accept their loved one has passed away. Admittedly, that type of disbelief is usually based on the loved one dying from an overdose or self-harm and not an old man dying from natural causes, but people react oddly to the death of loved ones.”

“So, there was nothing unusual in this case?”

“Beyond Frau Wissler’s insistence? No. I didn’t perform the initial autopsy, but I did look the case over thoroughly and discuss the case with Doctor Niehaus, who performed the initial examination. Nothing in the case stood out. Herr Wissler was in poor health, suffering from the effects of Alzheimer's along with high blood pressure and a fairly severe heart arrhythmia. His actual cause of death was Hemorrhagic stroke, which is when a blood vessel ruptures and leaks blood into the brain. While this type of stroke is a common concern for patients with high blood pressure, it is even more common for someone suffering from Alzheimer's. The disease often causes micro-bleeds into the brain as part of the ongoing deterioration. Doctor Niehaus recorded signs of these types of bleeds in Herr Wissler.”

“Do you always do autopsies for elderly patients?”

“Not always, but it also isn’t uncommon. Since no one was present for his passing and he wasn’t under active hospitalization, an autopsy was ordered. Had he passed in a managed care facility or hospital, then an autopsy would most likely not have been done. I want to understand, nothing in this case, beyond Frau Wissler’s accusations, is out of order. I’ve been a medical examiner for twenty years, and I can tell you that Herr Wissler’s death was completely ordinary. His cause of death was completely ordinary and the timing of his death in relation to his disease's progression was not unexpected. The only issue out of the ordinary was the length to which his widow was willing to go to feed into her denial.”

“What do you mean by extraordinary lengths? This can’t be the first time a family member disagreed with a listed cause of death and pressured you to change it or re-investigate.”

“No, it isn’t the first time, but normally those families limit the pressure to personal pleas or legal appeals. Frau Wissler didn’t stop there, as you know. At first, she tried calling and having her lawyers send requests, all of which were reviewed and answered according to our policies. The difference here was when she started having investigators look into our work, specifically the woman Leftenant Graf told me you were looking into. When we denied this woman access, as we should have considering she is a foreign national without authority to review official functions, she managed to pull strings to come in and question our work. Much like you did, in fact.”

As he talked, Petzold became more agitated until the last sentence was said with particular vehemence.

“I’m not questioning your work, Doctor. I’m trying to find that investigator who’s now gone missing. To trace her movements, I need to understand what she thought she was looking for. When I ask about the questions, they asked you, that’s all I’m trying to do. I’m not in any way doubting your work. When you said she pulled strings, what do you mean?”

“The day after she first showed up and was denied access to Herr Wissler’s files, I received a call from my bosses boss, who instructed me to allow this Agent Whitaker and a woman named Grace Sharp access to the files and answer any questions. When they showed up, it was clear that Sharp was the one with the connections. She wasn’t actually interested in the case and seemed to have come along to help Agent Whitaker if we made any protests.”

“Did your boss tell you who Mrs. Sharp was?”

“No, just that we were to give her access.”

“Can you show me the files they looked at?”

“Yes, but I don’t think you’ll find anything of note. Even after they looked over all of the files in the case and asked me questions about why I made this or that conclusion, Agent Whitaker seemed frustrated. Whatever she thought had happened to Herr Wissler, she didn’t seem to find it.”

“Can I see the files they looked at?”

“Yes, I have them here,” Petzold said, handing over a folder thick with sheets of paper.

Taylor looked through the pages, finding that the information here matched everything he’d seen in the police files, at least the parts he understood. There was a fair amount of medical jargon that went beyond Taylor’s area of expertise. What was apparent, however, was that there wasn’t anything here that would shed light on what Whitaker thought had actually happened. Just that she’d been looking for some kind of proof.

Thanking Doctor Petzold, Taylor left the office. While he didn’t find out what Whitaker was looking for directly, he did at least get one new piece of information. The name Grace Sharp seemed familiar to Taylor, although he wasn’t sure exactly where he’d heard it before.

It was, however, one more lead. Sharp had been with Whitaker at the medical examiner’s office the day before her aunt’s murder, which meant Sharp might have an idea where Whitaker might have gone. Now he just had to remember where he’d heard the woman’s name and track her down.