The Victims Game
Part Seven - the Cop
By Scott J. Welles
scottjwelles@yahoo.com

DISCLAIMERS:  Hi. We've got some legal stuff to wade through before we can jump into things. Mostly the usual prerequisite jazz: ER and all related characters are the property of Warner Bros., ConstantC Productions, and Amblin Entertainment Television, a bunch of really swell, understanding guys who won't sue me if I mention that the aforementioned characters and institutions are being used without their permission, but only for entertainment purposes, and that no form of profit is being made on this work. For the benefit of the content-conscious amongst you, I'll assure you that there's nothing here that you couldn't see on the show, anyway. Except maybe some language, I'm not sure yet. Depends what kind of day I'm having as I write. Beyond that, I make no promises about what's in store. Could be silly, could be scary, could be sexy, could be sad. I'm not telling. Come on, live dangerously...

I was driving aimlessly through the night, letting my thoughts drift. To the best of my knowledge, I had never screwed up this badly before. I am sometimes dishonest and sometimes dumb, but seldom both at once.

This time, though, the consequences were not to me, but to people who had done nothing to deserve them. Just the opposite, in fact. One of them, a woman named Jeannie Boulet, had once told me that nobody gets what they deserve. Sometimes I think she's right.

There were only three possibilities that I could see. One, Carol Hathaway was guilty of the things being suggested about her, but neither Mark Greene nor Kerry Weaver knew about it. Unlikely. Two, she was guilty, and they knew it and had lied to me to protect their colleague. A little more likely, but not much. Three, she was innocent, the whole thing was bogus, and someone was trying to frame her. I wanted to believe it was this third possibility, but was that based on solid reasons, or simply wishful thinking? I couldn't be sure...

Assume for a moment that someone's framing her, just because we have to start somewhere. That premise raised three very interesting questions. Who, How, and Why?

Why was the easiest to answer. Twenty million bucks is a whole lot of motive. If you steal that much money, though, you need a fall guy. Gal. Whatever. Someone who takes the heat while you slip off to Tahiti or someplace.

How was a little tougher. I didn't know much about forgery, but I supposed it was possible to take the signed forms that I had collected, and scan them into a computer. Maybe then you could morph the signatures onto a new document, one like the statement that the Standards & Practices Commission guys had shown to County's administration. Of course, then you'd need to make the rest of it look legit. I wouldn't know how to tell an official legal document from an old back issue of Captain Marvel comics, but if it passed muster at a major metropolitan hospital, it must have been pretty convincing.

With that in mind, the answer to Who became clear. I could only think of one person who had possession of the signatures as well as the legal knowledge to fake a statement like that.

"Walter Montgomery, you son of a bitch," I muttered, pulling up to my hotel.

Inside my room, I located Montgomery's card and wasted a few minutes trying to call him at his office. All I got was his answering machine, surprise surprise. You don't rip off twenty mil and then hang around waiting for someone to call you.

If I were to go back and talk to those patients again, I was sure that some of them would be happy to come talk to County's administration and vouch for Hathaway. That would clear her of the charges of drug dealing, but it wouldn't change the fact that records had been changed and the money was missing. She was still the likeliest suspect in those matters. I could tell them my forgery theory, but I didn't like the odds of their believing me. Authorities tend to believe the easiest explanations in situations like this, and I had no proof. Much as Mark and Kerry and I might dislike it, the case against Carol Hathaway was tight.

Except for one thing. Who was the woman who had impersonated Millicent Carter? That's the only detail that really stood out. Okay, so that's where to start, I decided.

I unpacked and loaded my .38 revolver and holstered it, then looked up another number in the phone book and dialed. When a grumpy voice answered, I said, "It's Fox. I need to talk to you, and I think I should do it in person. Where can we meet?"

"Jeez, I don't believe you. You know what time it is?" He coughed up something phlegmy, then said, "What makes you think I want to talk to you?"

"Because the alternative is for me to call your old buddies on the force, and tell them you're an accessory to larceny. You want to deal with that, or you want to talk this out like professionals?"

If he could have given me the Evil Eye over the phone, I bet he would've. But he gave me his address instead. Or maybe in addition, I couldn't tell.

Eight minutes later, Steve Wasserstein opened the door to his apartment, just a crack. He had a beer in his left hand, and a gun in his right. Both were Colt .45, so maybe it was a theme. When he saw that it was me, and that I was alone, he put the gun back in a drawer near the doorway and let me in. He kept the beer. "Now what's this accessory crap?" he asked without so much as a hello.

I told him about what had happened while I looked around the apartment. It appeared to double as the offices of Atlas Securities, and it was cheaply furnished in both respects. The walls held citations and merits from the police department, with photos of Wasserstein with various official types. Probably mayors and police commissioners and the like, but I wouldn't recognize any of them. They seemed incongruous in a dump like this. I lived better when I was a college student.

One shelf held a number of framed photographs, with a couple of women whom I guessed to be ex-wives. There were four kids of various ages, two with each woman, and I was willing to bet that most of Wasserstein's income went to alimony and child support. Maybe a good chunk of his police pension, too. I felt a little more sympathy for him, then.

To my surprise, Wasserstein didn't bluster or argue while I talked. He listened quietly, sitting in an overstuffed armchair that was starting to rip. When I was finished, he said, "So you think Montgomery's behind all this?"

I nodded. "Or at least he's involved in it." He hadn't offered me a seat, but I perched on the arm of a worn sofa, anyway.

He shook his head. "That guy works for a family like the Carters, he's gonna make more than enough money. Why throw away that kinda career and go on the run just for twenty mil?"

"I don't know. Maybe he didn't want to work for a living anymore, maybe he always harbored a grudge against the Carters, maybe he just couldn't resist the thrill of the Big Con. You're right, the motive's weak, but he's the best theory I've got right now."

"And you think I had something to do with it, too?"

"Not really," I said, "I just said that to get your attention. You don't like me much, I know, but if you were in on it, you'd have known I was going to be at the party. I saw the surprise on your face when I showed up, and you don't strike me as a good enough actor to fake it."

"So what're you doin' here, then?" Something in his demeanor made me suspect that the beer in his hand wasn't the first of the evening. Or the second.

I leaned forward a little. "I want to find out who the woman was, if she wasn't Millicent Carter. She's the missing piece of the puzzle."

"And you think I'm gonna know?"

"No, but there were only four people who saw her in that room. I'm one. Walter Montgomery's another, and I doubt he'd admit it even if we could find him. The other two are a couple of your guys. At least, they were wearing Atlas Security uniforms at the time."

You could see I had his attention now. He was turning it over in his head. "I never heard about any meeting like the one you're describing from any of my guys," he said, carefully.

"Maybe they were fakes, too, then. One was black, with a broken nose, the other was white, with a blond buzz-cut. Sound like anyone you know?"

They did. I could tell. He knew immediately who I was talking about, and he didn't like it one bit. I had seen anger on Wasserstein's face before - it was about all I had seen there - but this time, it was directed inwards.

"They are your guys, aren't they?" I prompted him.

Maybe I should have held my peace, because the anger focused on me. "Even if they were, what makes you think I'm gonna tell you, Fox? I don't owe you anything. Hell, you were lucky I didn't press charges against you last time..."

"Come on, most of that was trumped-up and you know it."

"I still could'a got you on the concealed carrying charge."

I opened my jacket to show the holstered .38 and said, "You want to bust me now? Go ahead, call your old cop buddies, if it'll make you feel better." Calling his bluff.

He looked tempted for a minute, then shrugged it off.

I closed my jacket and stood, as if to leave. "Ahh, you're right. No reason for you to help," I said, offhandedly. "Why should you care if a bunch of doctors and nurses lose their jobs-"

"Don't give me that!" Wasserstein snapped, suddenly livid. This anger seemed deeper, more honest than anything I had seen from him before. "Half the cops I know have gotten treatment from the ER's in this city! Not all of 'em made it, but it wasn't for lack of trying! Hell, Weaver saved my ass once, back when she was working at Mount Sinai!"

I sat down again.

"I volunteered to work her kidnapping that time, just 'cause of that," he went on, seeming to calm a little. "Trying to give somethin' back, you know?"

"Yeah, I know." Maybe it was because I caught him at home, but there was a side of Steve Wasserstein I hadn't perceived before. Maybe he was an okay guy, under it all. A lot of people will surprise you, that way.

He was taking several deep, slow breaths through his nose, producing a slight whistle, and I wondered if it was some kind of yoga or something along those lines. "I got this, uh, anger-management therapy they got me doing," he said after a bit, "Too late to keep the wives from leaving me, but...look, Fox, I know what you prob'ly think of me, and you got reason. I wasn't cut out to be a detective lieutenant, not really. Didn't know how to handle things at that level. Those chest pains I told you 'bout? Saw a doctor like you said, and it turned out I had some kind of blood pressure thing."

I said, "Is that why you retired?"

A nod. "Too stressful to keep working on the force. Don't kid yourself, I was a hell of a beat cop, once upon a time, but I ain't as young as I used to be."

"Who among us is? Steve, I don't want to do anything but get Weaver and Hathaway and the rest of the County people off the hook. I wouldn't care about Montgomery or the money, but I need to find them to prove Hathaway's innocent. Can you help me with that, or not?"

He looked at me for a while, measuring me up. "I couldn't say so at the time," he ventured, "but you did good with Weaver and the Bledsoes, last time. And you could'a taken credit for it in spite of me, but you let me have it..."

It hadn't been my first choice at the time, but I didn't think I'd make points with Wasserstein by saying so now.

"On the other hand, you gotta understand. All my guys are ex-law-enforcement, like me. We take care of our own, until we got reason not to."

"You know the two guys I mean, don't you?"

He chewed on the thought a little more. "Let me make some calls," he said at last, "I want to get their side of things. Just because they were there doesn't mean they're dirty..."

"I'm not saying they were," I assured him, "I just want some witnesses who saw her, and I want to talk to them, see if they know where she came from, where she went, like that."

"Okay. I learn anything, I'll have them call you. Where you staying?"

I told him, and stood to leave. I didn't like waiting, but I could tell it was as far as I could push him.

Before I left, though, I swallowed my pride and stuck out my hand. "Thanks," I said.

He looked at me for a moment, then shook my hand, and I left.

I drove back to my hotel, feeling...well, not quite better, per se, but a little more stable and centered. It helped to feel like I had a direction to go in. Like I was doing something about the problem other than fretting over it.

When I pulled into the hotel parking lot and got out of my car, I thought I spotted Kerry Weaver's dark Plymouth in the lot. At least, it looked like hers, but it was hard to tell at night. I hadn't gotten a look at her license plate, so I couldn't be sure this one matched, but...

I stood in front of the car and tried to look for memorable details on it that might tell me whether it was hers or not. Kerry Weaver wasn't the sort to go in for vanity plates or bumper stickers or big fuzzy dice hanging from the rearview mirror or any other memorable features that would jump out at you. It could have been her Plymouth, or it could have been someone else's car altogether. I couldn't tell.

It was probably just wishful thinking on my part. I couldn't imagine Kerry would want to talk to me right now. Or maybe ever again.

My musings were interrupted by footsteps to my right. I turned, and saw Broken Nose, the black Atlas Securities guy from the Carter mansion, coming towards me.

"Hey, Fox," he said, in a friendly voice. There was a smile on his face, but it didn't reach his eyes, and the tone seemed stagy and fake. He was still walking towards me, and there was a dark object in his right hand, about the size and shape of a television remote control.

I pulled the .38 from its holster, fast, and then a little impulse made me turn and glance behind me. Sure enough, his partner was nearly on top of me. Buzz Cut. Sneaking up while Broken Nose distracts my attention. Classic misdirection strategy.

Buzz Cut grabbed for my gun, and I kicked him in the knee, stomping on it as hard as I could. He yelled and went down, and I turned to smash Broken Nose in the face with the butt of my gun, but he had already closed the distance and pressed the remote-shaped thing against my chest.

There was a buzzing noise, and a row of Christmas tree lights suddenly seemed to have been installed along the length of my spine, and it felt as though tiny eggbeaters were spinning beneath every inch of my skin. This decidedly unpleasant situation lasted for maybe a second and felt like maybe half an hour, and then it was gone and so was all my motor control, and I was face-down, sucking pavement.

The really sad part is that I've kissed worse things on a Saturday night.

"I don't know how to thank you guys!"
--- Fozzie Bear, 'The Muppet Movie'
"I don't know WHY to thank you guys..."
--- Kermit the Frog, Ibid