V is for Vengeance (Kinsey Millhone 22)

Cappi’s tone of voice took on an edge. “And you want me to do what, stand here with a clipboard, counting widgets and making sure everybody has a hall pass?”

“If you want to look at it like that, yes. Once a shipment’s inside the building, somebody has to reconcile the goods with the manifest—”

“What’s with the lingo? What the fuck is a ‘manifest’?”

“A list of goods. Same as an invoice, an itemized account of what’s been shipped to us and where it goes next. In the meantime, we hold everything here until it’s ready to be moved.”

“Why didn’t you say so in the first place? I can’t learn anything with you lecturing me. You yap, yap, yap, and what goes in one ear goes out the other. I can’t retain if I don’t see it written down. Like I learn with my eyes. I need facts and figures so I can understand how all the pieces fit. You know what I’m saying? The pipeline. Accounts payable and stuff like that.”

“I have bookkeepers for that end of the business. I need you here.”

“Yeah, but you haven’t really said where these shipments are coming from or where they go. I know it’s Allied Distributors, but I don’t have a clue what we distribute. Baby food? That don’t make sense.”

“Doesn’t have to make sense to you. It makes sense to me.”

“But where are all the records kept? Has to be written down someplace. You don’t carry this stuff in your head. Something happens to you, then what?”

“Why the sudden curiosity? Years we’ve been doing this and you never gave a shit.”

“Fuck you. Pop said it was time I learned. I’m here doing the best I can and you criticize me for not showing interest before?”

“It’s a legitimate question. Sorry if I seem skeptical, but what do you expect?”

“What kind of shit is that? You either trust me or you don’t.”

“I don’t.”

“You accusing me of something?”

“Why so defensive?”

“I’m not defensive. All I’m asking is how you run an operation this size without somebody writes it down.”

Dante dropped his gaze, working to control his temper. If Cappi was pressing for the information, he’d get information. Dante said, “Okay, fuck it. I’ll tell you how. You see that computer terminal over there?”

To the right, just inside the door that led into the warehouse proper, there was an unmanned desk with a computer keyboard and monitor, the CPU tucked into the kneehole space. Dante could see Cappi’s gaze shift to the darkened computer screen.

“What, that thing?”

“That ‘thing’ as you refer to it is a remote terminal with access from the house and the office downtown. In the wall behind, there are dedicated lines laid in. It may not look like much but that’s the brains of the business. It’s how we keep track. We got backup on backup. Password changes from week to week, and the hard drive is purged every Thursday at noon. Clean slate. The only dollar figures left look legitimate.”

“You wipe out everything? How can you do that?”

“To all appearances, yes. If files are subpoenaed, they got nothing on us.”

“I thought files stayed in the machine even when it looks like it’s erased.”

“Since when do you know shit about computers?”

“Hey, I hear stuff like everybody else. I thought the FBI had experts.”

“So do we.”

“What if there’s a goof?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Power outage, something like that. Computer freezes up before a purge is complete.”

“Then we’re screwed. Any other questions?”

Cappi said, “I’m cool.”

“Good. Now maybe we can move on to the problem at hand. This is the hole needs patching. I’d like to know who’s bleeding us, but more important, I want to put a stop to it.”

“Why me? What if I don’t want to stand out here in a coverall like some stupid-ass warehouse goon?”

Dante smiled, wishing he could punch his brother’s lights out. “You have an attitude problem, you know that?”

“This is chicken shit. Pop said bring me in. What you’re doing here is keeping me out.”

“This is in. Where you’re standing right now. You want more, you can earn it like I did.”

He left Cappi on the loading dock while he went up the metal stairs to the mezzanine level, where operations was housed in five offices behind a wall of waist-high windows. From there he could see much of the warehouse operation—guys on forklifts, speeding along the narrow corridors between two-story-high storage bays, guys engaged in private conversations, unaware that he was watching. His office here was crude, the basics, no refinement whatever. Dante didn’t have a view of the loading dock, but he’d mounted security cameras in strategic locations.