School of Fish (Fish Out of Water #6) - Amy Lane Page 0,28
said thoughtfully, “when a corporation is planning a takeover, a number of things have to be in place. One company’s stock has to be cheap enough to buy, the other company has to have enough liquid cash to purchase it, and all the trustees on both boards have to be in a place where this looks like the smartest option. You both understand?”
Ellery met Jade’s eyes, and they both nodded.
“Good. There’s a lot of moving parts. But a lot of movies—many of them heist movies—have been made about tweaking each of those moving parts to make sure the outcome is orchestrated rather than random, right?”
“Right,” Ellery said. “Distract the president of one company while the other company is buying stock. Cause a disaster in one company so the stock sales plummet. Trade information before it’s due out to do the same thing. Acquisitions and mergers are pretty cutthroat, from what I understand.”
Galen nodded. “Exactly. Now, I can’t tell you what the corporations are here. Maybe drugs, but drugs are commonplace, and….” He grimaced as though looking for the right words.
“Most drug dealers aren’t that smart,” Ellery said, thinking about the ones they’d dealt with at the beginning of the summer. “And if they are that smart, they’re trying to commit fewer crimes instead of more of them, to keep attention off their activities.”
“Exactly,” Galen agreed. “So I can’t tell you who is taking over what. But think about this. This Ziggy Ivanov had to set up Mr. Townsend and get the attention of the world’s dumbest policemen to come arrest him. There had to be a reason for that. What were they distracting the policemen from? Then the next night, they framed the Dobrevk kid for the murder of a witness to the original crime. Ziggy is the guy moving from crime scene to crime scene, but he’s motivated by something. He doesn’t strike me as a mastermind. The guy who went after the files in the public defender’s office is probably higher up the food chain. He failed, so Ziggy is called in as a Hail Mary. Ziggy is a low-level corporate fixer, but one who wants to move up. That’s why he’s so very busy. He’s ambitious. Is the guy who tried to get the file at the PD’s office under guard?”
Ellery nodded. “Sean’s partner is there—at a different hospital from Sean.”
Galen nodded. “That is fortuitous,” he said. “I wouldn’t be surprised to find that more than one attempt is made on our coma patient’s life.”
Ellery nodded. “Loose ends. The Dobrevk file is about tying up loose ends.”
“Exactly,” Galen said. He gave a brief smile. “Corporations and criminals. People are forever surprised at how similar they can be.”
“Not you, though,” Ellery noted.
Galen’s smile went feline. “Indeed.”
“I’ll go text Sean’s partner, Christie,” Ellery said. “I think Arizona and I need to have a conversation anyway.”
“Your friend at the DA’s office?”
God, the man was sharp. “Everyone’s got one,” Ellery said, and Galen’s laughter warmed him as he turned to leave.
He paused at the doorway. “So I think if we take you to the jail, then Henry can—”
Galen waved a bored hand. “John’s coming to pick me up in an hour.” He smiled charmingly at Jade. “If you like, my dear, we can give you a ride too. It’s not the kind of day one wants to be mucking about in traffic.”
Jade looked at him with naked gratitude. “Ellery, can we keep him?”
Ellery laughed. Galen had shown up on his doorstep looking for some help for Henry, who was the brother of a friend. He’d taken one look at the office—which had still been under construction at the time—and decided he’d like to practice there.
“I can’t imagine making him leave,” Ellery said. “He’s very useful.”
Galen inclined his head modestly, and Ellery headed for his office. He’d thought he and Jackson were going to have a nice easy day today, but it seemed every time Jackson stepped onto the scene, the world had saved its hardest cases for him.
Big Fish, Little Fish
JACKSON WASN’T bad as a passenger. Fact was, Galen’s Town Car was pretty luxe, and Jackson got to spend time staring out the window and churning the world over in his head.
For about fifteen seconds before Henry started talking.
“You know,” he said conversationally, heading for Richards Boulevard, “seven weeks, and there was no drama—”
“You lie,” Jackson said, rolling his eyes. “I seem to remember your boyfriend stuck in a closet while you took down an armed drug dealer.”