The Perfect Alibi (Robin Lockwood #2)(70)

Carrie smiled. “Come on, Ivar. We know you were employed by Norcross Pharmaceuticals to follow Leonard Voss, who was suing the company.”

Gorski didn’t respond.

“Would you care to explain why you rented the car you used in Oregon under a phony name?” Anders asked.

“These questions are very aggressive. I think I should consult an attorney.”

“That’s your decision, but let me show you something first.” Carrie placed her laptop on Gorski’s desk and ran her fingers over the keyboard. Then she turned it so he could see the screen. “That’s you driving a block from the home of Rita and Leonard Voss. Does that help you remember why you were in Portland?”

Gorski smiled pleasantly. “I don’t want to be rude, but I must decline to answer any of your questions until I have consulted my attorney.”

“You do know that someone murdered Mr. and Mrs. Voss and burned down their house?”

Gorski kept smiling but said nothing.

“Take a good look at the date and time of this picture. It was shot from a traffic camera on the date that Mr. and Mrs. Voss were murdered and minutes after a neighbor saw flames coming from their house.”

Gorski looked at the screen, then back at Anders.

“We know you were hired by Norcross to follow Leonard Voss in connection with his lawsuit. We know that Norcross wanted to bury the suit to avoid adverse publicity about its product. We also know that Tyler Harrison, the attorney who represented Norcross, and Frank Nylander, Mr. Voss’s attorney, were both murdered.”

Gorski smiled. He looked perfectly relaxed. “I couldn’t have murdered Tyler Harrison,” he said. “I was in Oregon when he was killed.”

“Oh, so you know when Mr. Harrison was killed?”

Gorski stopped smiling. He realized he’d made a mistake.

Carrie waited a beat. Then she said, “You’re probably thinking that this picture isn’t enough to get a conviction, and you may be right. But it is enough to get an indictment, after which the Multnomah County district attorney will hold a press conference during which she will lay out everything she knows about the motive for the murder of Mr. and Mrs. Voss. That means that all your hard work to keep the public ignorant of the side effects of Norcross’s drug will be for naught. If you have an alibi for Harrison, I guess we’ll only be able to indict you for killing Mr. and Mrs. Voss. Either way, Norcross and you lose.”

Gorski shrugged. “Do what you have to do.”

“We will. But there is a way out for you. Even if you’re acquitted, the publicity will ruin your reputation.”

“You’ve taken up enough of my time,” Gorski said. “Please leave. If you want to contact me again, do it through my attorney.”

“No problem,” Anders said. “Once we’re gone, you can call Norcross and tell them what we have in store for them. But, if you do that, there’s something you should think about. If someone at Norcross did order you to kill Leonard Voss to keep him quiet, don’t you think they might hire someone to eliminate the only person who can incriminate the company? If you didn’t kill Harrison, someone else on Norcross’s payroll did.”

Carrie paused to let what she’d said sink in.

“We know Norcross is behind the murders of Leonard and Rita Voss. Tell us who gave you your orders, and we might be able to deal.”

“This is getting tedious, Detective.” Gorski smiled. “If you don’t leave, I’ll have to call the police.”

Anders laughed. “I’m glad to see you have a sense of humor. I wonder if your buddies at Norcross will be laughing when we tell them about our visit.”

Anders and Jacobs stood up.

“See you around,” Carrie said before she and Jacobs left.

“What do you think?” Jacobs asked when they were walking toward his car.

“I think that Ivar Gorski is one tough customer.”

“Do you think he’ll deal?”

“Honestly, no, but I intend to turn up the heat anyway.”





PART SIX



THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION





CHAPTER SIXTY


Private practice was often feast or famine. A few new cases had come in the door in the past few weeks, but none of them were very complex, so Robin had a lot of time on her hands. One afternoon she decided to organize the files in Doug Armstrong’s case so they could be put in storage.

Around six, Robin’s stomach began to growl and she decided to call it a day. She’d been going through the files Detective Jacobs had sent her from New York when he’d sent the questions he wanted Doug Armstrong to answer. She’d put the photographs of Tyler Harrison’s law office in a neat stack and started to put a rubber band around them when something in the photograph on the top of the pile caught her eye. The photo showed Harrison’s desk and the college and law school diplomas on the wall behind it.

Robin picked up the photo and studied it. Harrison had graduated from Columbia University, a prestigious Ivy League school, but he had continued his legal education at the Warren E. Burger School of Law at Sheffield University in Arkansas.

Robin frowned. Something about Sheffield University rang a bell, but she couldn’t remember where she’d heard about the school before. Robin conducted a web search and learned that Sheffield was a small Christian college in a rural area of Arkansas.