More Twisted: Collected Stories, Vol. II

“I guess… Sure. I just can’t imagine anybody’d go to the trouble to hurt me. “

Rhyme noticed Lon Sellitto trying to put a good front on. “Hey,” the rumpled detective said, “the odds’re a thousand to one against it. But, you know, why not be on the safe side?”

* * *

A burly man stood at the window of the little-used kitchen in his house in New Jersey. His back was to the view — not a bad one: skyline of Manhattan — and he was watching a small, flat-screen TV in the living room.

“I’m watching it right now, Captain.”

It had been some years since Carter had been a soldier — he was now a “security consultant,” which was as good a job description as any — but after all the military training he felt most comfortable addressing people by rank. He himself was simply Carter. To the people who hired him, to the people he worked with. Carter.

On the TV a commentator was mentioning that Ronald Larkin’s wife had survived the attack. She was described as a material witness.

“Hmm.” Carter grunted.

When Carter was overseas on his “security” assignments, he often relied on journalists for information. He was amazed at how much sensitive material they gave away, in exchange for what he told them — which was usually just a bunch of crap.

A second newscaster came on and the story turned into one about all the good done by the Larkin Foundation, how much money it gave away.

Carter had been involved with a lot of really rich people. Only a couple of sheiks in the Mideast had as much money as Ronald Larkin, he believed.

Oh, there was that French businessman…

But, like Larkin, he wasn’t rich anymore. He was dead.

“Larkin had come to town to meet with executives from other nonprofits about merging their organizations into a super-charity to consolidate their efforts in Africa, where famine and illness are rampant. And now let’s go to our correspondent in the Darfur region of Western Sudan, where…”

Yadda, yadda, yadda. Carter shut the set off, the remote a tiny thing in his massive hand.

Carter was then listening carefully to the captain, who was pretty troubled.

After a moment of silence, Carter said, “I’ll take care of it, Captain. I’ll make sure it gets done right.”

After he hung up, Carter walked into his bedroom and looked through the closet, where he found a business suit. He started to pull on the navy-blue trousers but then stopped. He replaced the suit in the closet and picked one that was a size 48. It was much easier to carry a gun inconspicuously when you wore a suit that was one size too large.

Ten minutes later he was in his forest-green Jeep Cherokee, heading toward Manhattan.

* * *

Robert Kelsey, a balding, fit businessman, was the operations director for the Larkin Foundation, which meant his job was to give away about three billion dollars a year.

“It’s not as easy as it sounds.”

Rhyme agreed, after the man explained: government regulations, tax laws, Washington politics, Third World politics and, perhaps the most daunting of all, fielding requests from the thousands of people and organizations who came to you, needing money for their heartbreaking causes — people you had to send away empty-handed.

The man was on the same couch as Kitty Larkin an hour before. He too had that distracted, disheveled air of someone wakened early with tragic news and was as yet unable to fully absorb it.

“We’ve got some evidence, a few leads,” Lon Sellitto said, “but we don’t have a clear motive yet. You have any ideas who’d want him dead? Mrs. Larkin didn’t have any thoughts on that.”

Lincoln Rhyme was rarely interested in a suspect’s motives — he considered them to be the weakest leg of a case. (Evidence was, of course, to him strongest.) Still, obvious motives can point you in the direction of good evidence that will get a conviction.

“Who’d want him dead?” Kelsey repeated with a grim smile. “For a man who gave away billions to kids who were starving or sick, you’d be amazed at how many enemies he had. But I’ll try to give you an idea. Our big drives for the past couple of years have been getting food and HIV drugs to Africa and funding for education in Asia and Latin America. The hardest place to work has been Africa. Darfur, Rwanda, the Congo, Somalia…. Ron refused to give money directly to the government. It’d just disappear into the pockets of the local officials. So what we do is buy the food here or in Europe and ship it to where it’s needed. Same with the medicine. Not that that cuts out corruption. The minute a ship docks, there’ll be somebody with a gun helping himself to your rice or wheat. The baby formula’s stolen and either sold or used to cut drugs. And the HIV medicine’s transferred into new bottles and sold across the borders to people with money to pay the going rate. The sick ones it was intended for get watered-down versions. Or sometimes just water.”

“That bad?” Sellitto asked. “Jesus.”

“Oh, yeah. We lose fifteen, twenty percent a year of our African donations to theft and hijacking. Tens of millions. And we’re luckier than most charities over there…. That’s why Ron was so unpopular. He insists that we control the distribution of the food and medicine over there. We cut deals with the best local organizations who’d get the job done. Sometimes those groups, like Liberian Relief, are allied with the opposition political parties. So, right there, that means he’s a threat to the government in power.

“Then there’re other regions where the government’s legit and he distributes through them. Which makes him a threat to the opposition party. Then there’re the warlords. And the fundamentalist Islamic groups who don’t want any Western aid at all. And the armies and militias who want people famished because they use hunger as a tool… Oh, it’s a nightmare.”

Kelsey gave a bitter laugh. “Then anti-U.S. countries around the world: the Arab bloc, Iran and Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia in the Far East…. The foundation’s private, of course, but over there they see us as an arm of Washington. And, in a way, we are. Oh, and that’s just overseas. Now, let’s talk about America.”

“Here?” Sachs asked. “He had enemies here?”

“Oh, yeah. You think the business of charity is filled with saints? Guess again. My background was corporate accounting, and I’ll tell you that the most ruthless corporate raiders are nothing compared to the CEO’s of a charity. Ron bought the food from a half-dozen suppliers here and in Europe. I can’t tell you how many tons of rotten rice and corn they tried to sell us. Ron reported a half-dozen of them to the FDA.

“Then some executives seem to think charity begins at home. One organization wanted to work with us and Ron found out that the head was getting a salary of five hundred thousand a year and flew around the country in a private jet that was paid for by the endowment.

“Ron dropped them cold, called up the Times and gave them the story. The CEO was fired the next day.”

Kelsey realized he was getting worked up. “Sorry. It’s hard to do good nowadays. And, now, with him gone? It’s going to be that much harder.”

“What about Larkin’s personal life?”

“His first wife died ten years ago,” Kelsey said. “He has a grown son who’s involved in energy joint ventures in China. They had a very good relationship. He’ll be devastated by this.”

“What about his new wife?”

“Oh, Kitty? She was good for him, and she loved him too. See, she’s got money of her own — her father had a textile business or something. Ron’d meet a lot of women who were just after one thing, you can imagine. It was hard for him. But she was genuine.”

“His brother?” Sellitto asked.

“Peter? What about…? Oh, you mean, could he have been involved in his death?” A laugh. “No, no, impossible. They were very close. He’s successful too. Has his own company. Not as rich as Ron, but I’m talking thirty billion instead of a hundred. He didn’t need any money. Besides, they had the same values, worked hard for the foundation. It was Ron’s full-time job, but Peter still put in twenty, thirty hours a week, on top of his full schedule as CEO of his own company.”

Sellitto then asked for a specific list of people who might have a grudge against Ron Larkin — from all of the categories Kelsey had mentioned. He wrote for some time.

Kelsey handed Sellitto the sheet and said he’d try to think of anyone else. The man, looking dazed, said good-bye and left.