Interesting, Isn't It?
Previously: Amanda drops a bomb about Tally’s sequins.
Need to catch up on The Spring? Visit the chapter index here:
05:12 PM - Wednesday, November 5, 2014
US Park Police Office, Ft Winfield Scott, The Presidio
“Who took the photo of Alexa and Jen like that?” Mark asked.
“Dash Reilly.” Steph answered simply. “AND, it looks like it got forwarded too, but I can’t see where it went.”
“I’ll get Raj on that one.” Mark answered. “He probably sent it to Seb, I’m guessing. From what we know about Seb, this might just be the kind of picture he’d like: his non-girlfriend and ex-girlfriend in close contact?”
“Yeah, he’s the type for that. Just a little high school soft-core.” Jeannie agreed with a head tilt. She sighed loudly. “Why does this thing with Tally bother me? I just don’t get it.”
Mark’s stared at her. “Keep following that. It’s telling you something — let it bother you.” Jeannie stretched her face, making her eyes large in response. “You too, Steph — everyone, you’re all listening to your instincts and it’s good. We have more to do, but we’ve made some progress today.” Owen leaned back a little and took this in with a slight smile.
“Yeah, you guys should go —” Jeannie said to Owen and Steph. “I’m pretty sure I’m not approved to give you guys overtime, so you should head out. Pick up here in the morning though, okay?” Both Steph and Owen folded their computers and moved to pack up. Jeannie stood and walked them to the back door. “I’m really grateful you two are here, you know.” She said, holding open the door. The twilight was deep purple outside, with a biting chill.
“We know.” Owen retorted, pausing on the stairs, giving her a grin.
“Okay, good. But I’m going to work you harder tomorrow.” Steph stuck her tongue out quickly and then smiled.
Jeannie made her way back to the main conference room where Mark was chatting with Raj, Fergus padding his way behind her.
“Jeannie — Dash Reilly didn’t send that photo to Seb, he sent it to Tally.” Mark gave her a little look of triumph.
“Wait - what? Why? Why would Tally have any interest in Alexa having a shot…” Jeannie faded having the pieces fall into place.
“What’s happening?” Paco joined them and Mark explained about the photo again. His face bent a little bit as he processed the information, Raj looking up at both of them in their stunned silence.
“Yup, Dash sent it right to Tally’s phone the moment the picture was taken.” Raj informed. “Interesting isn’t it?”
“Okay…” Jeannie slid into a chair at the table. “Jen pours a shot down Alexa’s throat — we don’t know if it’s the special spiked Tito’s or not — but either way, she gives her a shot up close, Dash Reilly snaps a photo of the act and sends it to Tally.” She glanced from Raj to Mark to Paco. “It could be everything or it could be nothing at all…just like everything else in this case.”
“Yeah. It’s true, he could have sent it to Tally just as a “look at this party popping off” kind of thing,” Paco said, moving closer, “but maybe there was something to it…but why? What connects Tally and Dash? Neither one of them mentioned the other — are they dating on the sly?”
“Okay, well, remember the weird post that came out this morning on Pr3pSF?” Raj asked, “the whole thing about a guy and a girl walking and talking late night at Tahoe? — talking about Alexa? Why couldn’t that be Dash and Tally?”
“But if they’re a thing, why aren’t the public about it?” Mark asked.
“Because Tally’s Miss Fancy Pants —” Jeannie countered, “Dash Reilly probably isn’t on a level she wants to consider seriously. I mean, she’s proud to be going to the Cotillion with Charlie Dagonet — Charlie and Dash are two different breeds. I don’t know, though.” She shook her head slightly. “Why wouldn’t they tell us if they were into each other? Why were we thinking Dash was hot for Alexa? Did I make that up?”
“No, that came from the notion that Seb and Dash “shared” girls — like with Jen.”
“But we haven’t heard that Jen’s hooked up with Dash, it’s only been implied.”
Everyone was silent for a long moment.
“Okay — “ Raj began slowly, re-reading the post on Pr3pSF “if it isn’t Dash and Tally at Tahoe — who else would it be? We know Seb was wasted as usual, and he was with Jen. We also know no one else knew what happened in that room except for the people in that room: so on the guy side it’s either Seb — he’s out — Dash or Tripp Hartman. And we know Tripp isn’t the make out with a girl on the beach type, so…my money is on Dash.”
“And we know MJ and Zizi were together, along with Carolina and Charlie. Angela Parisi?” Jeannie offered. Mark looked at her askance.
“Do you really think a guy like Dash would spend his time on her?”
“Okay, you have a point. She’s too sweet and has an overbearing brother…I doubt it.”
The back door banged with someone knocking, making everyone jump slightly. Fergus gave a craggy bark and took off toward the door, Paco spun around and disappeared down the hallway to answer it. They heard him chatting with someone in a low voice.
“Hey guys? You should come out here — and close the door.” Paco called out. Mark, Raj and Jeannie darted to the doorway to see Chris Rossi behind Paco, carrying two pizza boxes with a small brown bag on top, Fergus wagging his tail wildly.
“Oh — there they are.” Chris said, giving a smile to Jeannie. “I stopped by Pizza Orgasmica and got an Orgasmica and a Pepperoni-Mushroom, but Jeannie will probably want that one all to herself.” Chris grinned. “I got extra peppers too.”
Shutting the door to the conference room to keep the evidence boards hidden, they decamped into the main office area, with everyone started pulling chairs together around a small work table in the middle. Chris looked around at the office and noted the photo of President Obama at Crissy Field above Paco’s desk. He pointed at it and looked at Jeannie with a smile.
“I know.” Jeannie said quietly, smiling back.
“Oh yeah, her old boss.” Paco said. “Still makes me wonder what she’s doing here with us.”
“Stop it.”
“Did you meet him?” Paco asked Chris.
“I did. It was our second date, right?” Chris looked at Jeannie while Mark brought in plates from the kitchen. Jeannie gave Chris a slight smile. “We’d had our first date around New Year’s in New York, and then I was told “I simply won’t have any time to see you until after the inauguration” which, I’m not gonna lie, was tough to bear, but I tried to be okay with it and not blow it by being annoying.”
“You were still annoying, but I found it very charming.”
“And you ignored me. But, then about two weeks after the inauguration I got a voicemail: “Hi it’s Jeannie. Can you be in DC tomorrow night? If you can, you need to be at the White House by 5, I’ll need your social security number for a background check, and wear a good suit — you’ll be meeting the president.” That was it.”
“You met the President on your second date? That’s wild. No pressure.” Paco laughed.
“Yeah, it was a trip. It was some sort of staff/campaign party, right?”
“Yes. And you were on time, and you had a good suit. I was very proud.” Paco saw Jeannie blush.
“And I got a photo with Obama, and then I had to sit on it and not show anyone for months because no one knew we were dating yet. It was a whole thing.”
“Yeah. It was.” Jeannie agreed, pulling a piece of Pepperoni and Sausage to her plate. “But it was better that way — our parents are close, so telling them out of the gate would have been constant pressure and I wanted none of that. We didn’t tell them for months. It was nice, actually.”
“It was.” Chris agreed quietly, giving her a long look.
“But enough about us.” Jeannie said. “I’m assuming you’re here not just to impress my colleagues with the best pizza in San Francisco.”
“I am. I have some intel for all of you.” Chris finished a bite of pizza and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “I dug into Jim Hartman a bit, and it’s all weird, I’m not gonna lie. Either the guy is incredibly smart or he’s incredibly shady — maybe both.”
“What do you mean?” Mark asked, pulling apart his crust.
“Well, like I said, there’s not a lot out there because he runs a private company, there’s no 10-K or anything like that, but the family money is interesting. All of the houses are under shell corporations. Actually, there’s one shell corporation for the San Francisco house, and another one for the Tahoe house. And, the Tahoe house’s shell corporation is incorporated in Reno, so even though the house is in California, it’s owned by a corporation based in Nevada, so the tax is basically nothing.”
“On a property that’s what — worth $15-20 million?” Mark asked. “Is that even legal?”
“I’m not sure, this isn’t really my specialty, but clearly he’s getting some kind of advice about how to hide or disguise assets. The Nevada and San Francisco shell corps are all subsidiaries of a larger corporation incorporated in Delaware, and while I couldn’t find much on it, it does have holdings in a Free Trade Zone warehouse in Delaware, which I thought was interesting.”
“What does that mean?” Paco asked
“They’re tax-free warehouses where rich people hide their shit.” Raj quipped, taking a bite of pizza.
“What kind of shit do the Hartmans have to hide though?”
“Who knows?” Chris answered, crumbling his napkin. “It could be art, Lamborghinis, Cuban cigars, rare Single Malt Scotches…you name it. People use these warehouses to hold their stuff and they don’t pay tax on them unless they take them out of the warehouse.”
“Interesting.” Jeannie said, thinking. “They don’t seem like the type to be needing that level of money-management to me, but what do I know.”
“Why do you say that?” Mark asked.
“I don’t know. The Hartmans aren’t the ritzy San Francisco socialite types, like some of the other families we’re dealing with. They do the ballet and opera and that, but I feel like I see them more at like, Catholic Charities events, which isn’t a bad thing at all, just a different set of people.”
“Not as rich?”
“Rich enough, I guess. That house in Tahoe sounds pretty major, but they don’t strike me as the kind of people who have sports cars and art hidden away someplace.”
“Not the baller-shot caller type?” Raj asked.
Jeannie sighed. “Well, they aren’t getting profiled in Architectural Digest or Vanity Fair, like some people around here. I don’t know. Honestly, the way today has gone, I don’t know anything about anything.”
“Well, there’s more.” Chris offered, glancing around. “I did a cursory credit check and their debt is way out of whack. Credit cards are near the limit which I thought was odd. Maybe it’s nothing, but I’d think they’d be the kind of people to pay off their cards every month. But their rating has gone down in the last year.”
“That could be anything, but it’s definitely odd.” Mark added. “It doesn’t answer where the money’s gone to, but shows it’s a wide-spread problem for the Hartmans.”
Jeannie walked Chris out the back door and down to his car.
“Thank you for that, you know. I appreciate it.”
“I didn’t really give you guys anything.”
“That’s why you brought pizza.” Jeannie smiled at up at him. Chris smiled and cupped her face, leaning in for a long kiss.
“Why don’t you come over tonight? I’ll make you a cocktail.” Chris whispered, tickling her ear.
“Okay.” Jeannie put her hands around his waist, holding his lean torso. “I have to bring Fergus home and check on Dad, but after that?”
“That sounds good. We can hang out…have a little date.”
“A date — wow, we haven’t had a date in a while.”
“I know. I’m trying to rectify that situation.” Chris kissed her again.