Irreconcilable Differences

I jumped in before she could take a breath. "Could those no-bills be pro bono work?"

"Frank? Pro bono work? You've got to be kidding. He bills his clients for an hour's work if he thinks about them over his morning coffee. No, it isn't pro bono work. More likely it's his bone working."

I had been sipping coffee while she talked, and it practically sprayed through my nose when she said that. Sherry was not one to make crude remarks.

"Okay, Sherry. Good work. What's the best way for me to get the stuff you've copied?"

"Come pick it up from me at the library. You'll want to bring a briefcase. Go into the study room and leave your briefcase open on the chair, then go get a book. It'll be in your briefcase when you get back. That's called a dead-drop, isn't it?" She was really getting into the spy stuff, but her tradecraft was actually pretty good.

"Sherry, you'd make one helluva detective," I said sincerely. "Watch for me at the library. I should be there within half an hour."

I pulled off the surveillance, drove to the library, and followed her instructions to the letter. Sure enough, when I returned to the study room, there was a package inside my now-closed briefcase. After a quick stop in the library restroom to get rid of the coffee, I headed back to the surveillance, hoping that Frank had not split. His car was still parked where it had been, so I did what any good detective does. I sat. While waiting, I glanced at the copy of Frank's Daytimer sheet for that day. It showed appointments all afternoon until 5 p.m. It looked like it was going to be a long, boring surveillance. In other words, typical.

However, at 2:03 p.m. Frank came out and got in his car. He didn't leave; he just sat there. Five minutes later, an attractive blonde woman came out and got in a white Subaru wagon. I recognized her as Frank's secretary, Lori Lee. Frank backed out of his parking spot and started to drive away. I started up and got into position to follow him, but something told me to wait. Sure enough, blondie in the Subaru pulled in behind Frank, and off they went. When Frank turned, she turned. About fifteen minutes later, both cars turned into the parking lot of the Stateline Motel, drove directly to the rear building, and parked. They got out, and Frank went to room 114. Interesting. He didn't register. He took the key out of his pocket and led the buxom and giggly Ms. Lee inside. I took up a position that would let me get clear photos when they came out, which they did about two hours later. I fired off as many photos as I could and dictated times and other information into my Pearlcorder.

They departed in their respective cars and went back to the office. It looked as if Frank would be conducting legal business for the rest of the day, so I took the film to a good friend to process and print. She's a professional photographer whom I pay well to discretely process my investigative photographs.

The photos were exceptionally sharp. While I was getting the photos processed, my cell phone rang. It was Sherry. She said that Frank was home and in for the night. Great! I didn't tell her about the afternoon's work, wanting to look at the Daytimer sheets first. I asked her if she could get a look at his worksheet for today and give me a call that night. She agreed to try.

That night at about 1:00 a.m., she called. The entry for Tuesday's appointments showed two and a half hour's work scheduled for a local company between 2:00 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. but there were no hours in the billing column. There were two letters, they looked like initials, after the company's name. Sherry's tip about the no-billed hours had proven to be right on the money. It looks like ol' Frank was not only sexually screwing blondie, he was also financially screwing a client. Tsk tsk. A dishonest attorney. Who'd a' thunk it!

[Wednesday, August 14 and Thursday, August 15]

I followed Frank on Wednesday, but as is the rule in most surveillances, nothing happened. It appeared that he was doing legitimate legal work, and that more-or-less corresponded with the Daytimer entries.

But on the following day, Thursday, at 2 p.m. Frank once again came out and got in his car. I waited for Lori Lee to emerge, but she was a no-show. Her car remained in the parking lot.

Panic time. I had waited about five minutes for her, and now Frank was in the wind. I thought about it and then remembered that Frank and his secretary had not registered at the Stateline Motel. Frank already had a key. I sped out to the Stateline and sure enough, there was Frank's car in the parking lot, right in front of room 114. Bingo!

I snapped photos of the other two cars in the parking lot and read their tags into my recorder. One was a California plate, the other was from Idaho, Kellogg County. Again at 4 p.m., the door to room 114 opened and Frank peeked out. Seeing no one, he came out alone rolling a cart with what looked like electronic equipment cases on it. He loaded the cases and cart in his car, jumped in, and left quickly. Wanting to see whom else Frank Wilson might also be "associating" with, I waited.

About ten minutes later, a young woman with short brown hair came out of the room. I fired off three photos of her before she got in her car, the one with the Idaho plates, and left. Apparently, ol' Frank isn't just popping his secretary, he's spreading his joy around. But what did the equipment cases contain?

I waited another half hour and when no one else came out of the room, I headed to the sheriff's office to get a friend of mine to run the tags for DMV information. Then I visited my cooperative photographer to get the film processed. While I was driving, Sherry called to tell me Frank had arrived home. I told her we needed to meet and discuss the surveillance results to date. She may have been able to tell from my voice that I had something interesting.

"I don't have to be at work until noon tomorrow," she said. "Where would be a good place to meet?"

"Well, I don't think we should be seen together in Fightin' Creek. Why don't we meet at the Buffalo Burger at exit 241 off I-90 in Falls City at ten o'clock tomorrow morning? That'll give me time to get Frank to work."

She agreed.

[Friday, August 16]

When Sherry arrived the next day, she seemed very energized. We made contact in the parking lot.

"I drove around for an hour or so to make sure no one followed me," she said rather proudly.

"Why? Do you think Frank is suspicious?"

"Not really, but it just seemed like the thing to do."

Though I thought she was probably getting into the spy-thing a little too much, it was hard to fault her for being cautious.

"Let's go inside and sit down so we can talk."

We took a booth near the restrooms so I could watch the parking lot.

I went over my surveillance notes with her and explained about Frank's two visits to the Stateline Motel. Then I handed her the photos and was about to give her the cars' registered owner information when she exclaimed, "Holy mackerel!"

Perceptive detective that I am, I deduced that she recognized someone in the photos.

"See someone you know?"

"Oh, yeah! You probably recognized his secretary, Lori, the one with the big boobs and blonde hair."

Well, yes, as a matter of fact, I rather enjoyed looking at Ms. Lee. Would that it have been possible to see even more...

She continued. "But you evidently didn't recognize the other one. Right?" Her tone of voice was also saying, "You should have."

I clearly heard the telltale scream of an incoming bombshell.

"The younger one lives two doors down from us."

Yep, that was a bombshell. I looked at the DMV records and noticed the woman's street address. It finally registered.

"Sherry, I'm sorry I didn't make the connection sooner. So, who's the woman in the picture?"

"Woman?" she sniffed. "Just barely. That's Sharon Donovan. She just graduated from high school last May. I think she just turned eighteen last month."

Scratch "bombshell." This was a thermonuclear explosion! Rather than being upset, Sherry began to smile. But it was a spooky, icy smile.

"I think Frank is headed for big trouble in more ways than one," she said edgily.

"All right. Now that we know Frank is carrying on with two women, let's see if we can correlate their meetings this week with anything in his past Daytimer sheets."

For the next hour, we examined the past year's planner sheets. By the end of our examination, we had uncovered a very regular and suspicious pattern of behavior. Between the hours of two and four nearly every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon for the past two or three months, Frank had "appointments" but unbilled hours. His normal notation process for legitimate clients was to use their first initial and last name and a file number, but for the suspect hours, he simply used two initials. Looking over the past year's sheets at those specific days and hours, we concluded that Frank had been meeting with at least six different people, presumably women. Since Lori Lee's initials, LL, and Sharon Donovan's initials, SD, were used consistently, we assumed that the other initials represented first and last names of other dalliances as well. But the real zinger was that SD started appearing in Frank's Daytimer about nine months ago. If accurate, that would have been roughly eight months before Ms. Donovan turned eighteen, the legal age of consent in Idaho.

I suggested to Sherry that we try and identify the other four people whose initials were in the Daytimer. Trying to save her some money, I suggested that we probably had enough information to nail Frank. Her answer was a surprise.

"No, I don't want you to stop now. In fact, let me ask you this. You said that Frank already had the key to the motel room. And you've seen him use that same room twice. Doesn't that suggest to you that he may have booked the room well in advance of his sessions?"

Supposedly professional private investigators really hate it when the client is thinking one step ahead of us.

"That's certainly possible. Let me check into it and get back to you."

"There's one other thing, Lee. Is there any way you can videotape Frank meeting with these women?"

"Sure. I can use a camcorder from the car just as easily as a 35 millimeter camera."

"No. You don't understand. I would like for you to tape them inside the room."

"Ah. Well, that is a violation of both state and federal law. Even if we did it, you couldn't use anything in court. In fact, you couldn't even tell anyone we had done it without risking having us end up in the clink."

"Oh, no, I understand that. I have no intention of showing the tapes to anyone except Frank, and then only if it's absolutely necessary. It's my bet that once he knows the tapes exist, he'll be more than happy to give me a very quiet divorce with a generous financial settlement. And if that doesn't do it, I'll let him know that I know and can prove that he was fucking a minor. He's not going to want to get anywhere near a contested divorce with the evidence we already have."

I began to hear music in my mind. It sounded much like the opening music from "Jaws."

"So your idea, Sherry, is to keep watching Frank and collect so much dirt that he will go quietly into the night and leave you financially secure."

"Yep. That's exactly what I want to do."

"Well, it will take some doing. The first thing I need to do is get a look at the room he uses and then the room on either side. Whichever adjacent room best fits our needs will have to be booked in advance for Tuesdays and Thursdays, the same as Frank seems to be doing. First I'll need to find out what kind of arrangement Frank has with the motel manager. I don't want the manager saying anything to Frank that might tip him off. Then I'll need to get the necessary equipment. That's no problem; I know where to get what I need. I'll let you know once that's done so we can go to the next step. But for the time being, I would suggest that I keep watching Frank but only on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. That will help keep your cost down, and it will also help identify any other girlfriends he might have. Do you agree?"

She nodded eagerly, then asked, "Is there anything else I can do to help."

I felt like saying that if she did any more, I would have to get her licensed as a PI and pay her instead of billing her. Instead, I thought for a while.

"We should try and identify the other four women whose initials are in the Daytimer. Does Frank have a Rolodex at home?"

"Not that I know of." She paused, then, "But he uses ACT! contact management software on his notebook computer. I've seen him looking at it when he's home. It's password protected, though, and I don't know the password."

"Well, if we can get a look at the database file for that program, we may be able to save a lot of time and even learn the names of any other women who he's contacted. How computer literate are you?"

She looked at me with an expression that said, "I've probably forgotten more about computers than you'll ever know, buster." But when she spoke, all she said was, "Enough to do whatever we need to do." Somehow, I had no doubt that she was absolutely positively right.

"Does his notebook computer have a CD or a disk drive?"

"Both."

"Okay. I'll come by the library today and give you a diskette. It won't have a label, so don't mix it with any other diskettes. If Frank goes out and leaves his computer behind, I want you to make sure the computer is off. Then slip the diskette in the drive and turn the computer on. You won't immediately see anything on the screen other than whatever normally comes up when the computer is turned on, but there is a program loading from the diskette. Once it's loaded, that will take about a minute, you'll see a little icon flash in the lower right corner of the screen. When the icon stops flashing and disappears, turn the computer off and take the diskette out. You will have loaded in a keystroke logging program. It will record every keystroke he makes and identify every program he opens in a small hidden and encrypted file. It will also date-time stamp each activity. That's not going to give us the database directly, but it is going to give us the password to the database. Once we have that, I'll have you copy his ACT! database. Are you with me so far?"

"Of course."

"To retrieve the information that the keystroke logger captures, you'll need to re-insert the diskette some time after the next time he logs onto ACT! With this diskette inserted, turn on the computer. Again, look for a small icon to appear in the lower right corner of the screen. It will be a different icon than the first one. When this second icon disappears, the information the logger grabbed has been transferred to the diskette. Any trace of our keystroke-logging program has also been securely deleted. Frank's data won't have been affected in any way. Once you get the diskette to me, I'll go over the keystrokes and give you Frank's password. Then you'll just have to find some way to copy his database. Got it?"

She merely nodded.

"All right. I'll drop the diskette off this afternoon at the library. I've got a book to turn in, so I'll put the diskette inside. Watch for me around 3:30. Catch me before I get to the book bin and take the book from me as if you are going to check it in. Now, is there anything else we need to cover?"

She thought for a moment, then shook her head. We got up to leave, but before I could walk away, she put her arms around me and gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. I was surprised, pleasantly, and looked at her. Her eyes were soft brown, and I felt more pangs of sexual attraction stirring as we parted. Damn! I hated involuntary celibacy.

I went back to the office, made a copy of my keystroke logging program on the diskette, and had lunch. I kept thinking about Sherry and puzzled over how I could be attracted to her, but the growing hardness in my pants left no doubt that I was indeed attracted. Her eyes...and their powerful message.

Promptly at 3:30 p.m. I walked through the library doors. I didn't immediately see Sherry, but she saw me and intercepted me as I was headed slowly for the book bin.

"Are you checking that in?" she asked rather loudly.

When I nodded, she said, "I'll be glad to take it from you."

I handed her the book and thanked her, then more quietly reminded her to call me on the cell phone if necessary. The whole exchange took fewer than ten seconds.

[Saturday, August 17]

The next day, Saturday, I had planned on doing some home repairs. About 11:00 a.m. my cell phone rang.

"Frank went golfing this morning. I've loaded the program in his computer."

I had a moment of fear, hoping Frank had not gone to sink another kind of hole in one.

"Are you sure he went golfing? Or should I take a drive by the motel?"

"No, a couple of his buddies picked him up. This is something he does pretty often, so don't worry. By the way, I'm calling from a pay phone, not from home." Then she started to laugh. "I loved the icon you told me about. Very appropriate considering what we're going to do to Frank." The icon is a middle finger extended upward.

"I thought you might enjoy that. Be sure to call me when I need to retrieve the diskette from you. Unless I hear otherwise, I'll start watching Frank again on Tuesday. Is that okay?"

"That's fine. Have a good weekend. And Lee, thank you very much for all you're doing. I really appreciate your work."

[Monday, August 19]

The following Monday I checked out the Stateline Motel and its manager. I was not surprised to learn that the motel still offers hourly rates and that it is still not rated in any automobile association hotel and motel guide. Probably just an administrative oversight. Sure. However, I was surprised to learn that I knew the manager from my days on the sheriff's office. The manager was a greasy, rat-faced little twirp named Robert Rowden. Of course, the deputies had all nicknamed him Robert the Rodent.

That Robert the Rodent was managing the Stateline Motel was actually very good news. He owed me a very large favor from when I had been on the sheriff's department. Robert had gotten into a bit of a scrape, though not of his doing. He was a convicted felon and riding in a pickup with one of our local yokels who always carries a gun. I had stopped the pickup and rousted both of them. The local boy had a concealed carry permit, but I could have violated Robert's parole for having been with the local gun-toter. Instead, I had sent the driver on his way and took Robert home. One sometimes cuts some slack in exchange for information or other assistance down the road.

I walked into the lobby (such as it is) of the Stateline Motel and there behind the counter, looking greasy as ever, was Robert the Rodent. He recognized me right away but was a bit wary. Ex-con's usually are wary.

"Well, if it isn't my favorite Kellogg County mountie."

Well, well. Clearly Robert the Rodent was not aware that I was no longer with the sheriff's office. And right then, I couldn't think of one good reason to tell him.

"Robert, how're ya doin'?"

Robert's eyes narrowed. The boy must be a mind reader. At least he can read something.

"What're you after?" Such dazzling repartee.

"Nice to see you, too, Robert. I need to ask you some questions, and I'd really appreciate truthful answers."

Blank stare. But then again, a blank stare was normal for Robert.

"Robert, do you have anyone who is regularly renting a room here?"

"Nah, all our guests are here today and gone tomorrow. We don't get many return customers."

"Now, see, Robert, you really need to think before you answer. Now think hard, Robert."

Robert's pained expression told me that he was either thinking hard or having a bowel movement. Hopefully it was the former. From the smell of the lobby, though, I wasn't sure.