The Bloody Notebook

This case could really raise her profile, Alexis mused as she headed across Lake Washington towards Seattle. Publicity for a private investigator was sort of an oxymoron. But Alexis needed publicity if she was going to start making more money from investigations than she did from taking care of plants.

The thousand dollar retainer didn’t hurt either, and the possibility of getting paid $20,000 was an incredibly unexpected event for her.

Beyond that, Alexis was personally invested in this case. Her client, Seema, was her friend, and the victim was Seema’s older brother, Sanjay, who she had met in passing and been quite impressed with. Sanjay, the epitome of cool and the most sought after PI in three counties.

With choppy water on her left and calm water on her right zooming past her as she rode across the floating bridge, Alexis shook her head. It seemed impossible that Sanjay would be murdered. He was too smart, too careful to be caught off-guard. What the hell happened?

Alexis felt the familiar pull in her brain, a controlled swirl of facts and circumstances urging her to find out more and more about her case, tending to take over her waking hours — and some of her sleeping ones, too. The pull toward answers, and the pull toward danger.

Focus on the answers, Alexis reminded herself.

Answer: Sanjay’s death was not a suicide as suggested by the police. Sanjay did not kill himself. Although Seema had enumerated passionately the psychological reasons her brother would never have killed himself, and Alexis agreed, that’s not why Alexis felt so certain of it. She drew conclusions from concrete evidence. In this case, the concrete evidence started with Sanjay’s blood-spattered notebook.

When the police closed the case as a suicide, they had released Sanjay’s personal effects to the family, and Seema had passed them on to Alexis. In addition to the notebook, there were some coins, keys, a space pen, and a bright blue cocktail napkin with THE printed on it.

Sanjay’s black notebook was classic, just like Sanjay. Sanjay, who dressed crisply in pinstripe shirts, black jeans, and an elegant leather jacket. Sanjay, who kept his curly black hair neat and tidy, but always had one or two rogue curls over his eyes. His notebook, one of those lined, pocket-sized, softcover journals, held a curve — Sanjay had always carried it in his back pocket, next to his wallet.

The supposed suicide note was scrawled across two pages, but every other page in the notebook, full of his case and surveillance notes, held meticulously dated notes, in handwriting so perfect it almost seemed typeset. Each page had a handwritten page number in the corner.

Nobody as careful and precise as Sanjay would have possibly used a designated work notebook for a suicide note, much less a sloppy one.

Answer: Not only wasn’t it a suicide, it wasn’t a robbery gone bad. Yes, there was $20,000 in cash unaccounted for. But robbers don’t stage fake suicides.

Sanjay had been hired by the CEO of Raretech Services to figure out who was embezzling from the company, hundreds of thousands of dollars so far. Sanjay had told Seema that he had been paid $20,000 in cash, and that money was now missing. If Alexis could solve the case and find that payment, it was hers.

Answer: The suicide note itself was a hint, albeit an unintentional one, from the killer: “I’m sorry I fabricated evidence.” It was a clumsy ploy to inject doubt into the case that Sanjay was working on.

Yes, Alexis already had some answers. But the biggest question was yet to be answered.

Sanjay’s notes didn’t clearly indicate who he had fingered for the crime, even though Alexis and Seema were sure he had solved it. All Alexis had to do was figure out who the embezzler was using Sanjay’s incredibly neatly written and detailed notes. And that would give her the murderer.

Alexis parked her bike at the Olympic Sculpture Park. Swinging her leg off her spotless black Honda, she winced. Her Jo Kata workout always kicked her butt. She took the long way, past the pavilion and down the ramp, to her favorite spot in the two o’clock shadow of Alexander Calder’s Eagle. With the black notebook in one hand and her phone in the other for on-the-fly research, she turned to Sanjay’s case notes.

10/25 — Met with Dylan Taylor, CEO of Raretech, software services company with offices in Seattle, Tel Aviv, Bangalore. Raretech is growing so fast that the accounting team struggles to keep up. In last 2 years, hundreds of thousands of dollars have gone missing. Taylor suspects embezzlement by someone in accounting or sales, suggests starting with sales team in Seattle. Trips planned to Israel and India in November to check in.

Paid $20,000 cash, in advance. T wanted payment off the books so as not to tip off anybody in accounting.

While the entire sales team was doing well financially, and some lived quite conspicuously, it looked like Sanjay had already narrowed it down to a few salespeople.

10/29 — Zoë Ernst — Primary car is top-of-the-line Tesla, one of four she owns. Pays for four parking in Seattle One Tower, where she owns a top-floor condo. Largest client: Tango Pharmaceuticals, HQ in Chicago. Zoë visits frequently.

Surveillance notes: Goes out almost every evening with friends. Most common dinner choices: sushi, Thai.

10/30 — Jalen Moore — Lives in 19,000 sq.ft. Medina mansion with husband Oscar Grimaldi, tech executive. Largest client: Caliber Aerospace.

Surveillance notes: Works late most evenings; usually picks up dinner on way home. Visits Caliber like clockwork, 8:55 a.m. every Tuesday.

11/2 — Tom Martin — Least of the big spenders, lives in a modest condo close to office. Drives 5-year-old Subaru in impeccable condition. Second car, classic Jaguar E-type, stored in friend Bruce’s garage. Largest client: TNS Financial.

Surveillance notes: Walks to work most days, stopping at stockbroker North Star for coffee and a look at market indicators. Usually has lunch at desk; rest of sales team goes out.

11/4 — Mike Chang — Has longest commute (Bainbridge Island). Newest member of sales team and only renter. Lives in brand-new apartment complex with a bit of shoreline and great view. Largest client: Xper (gig economy company).

Surveillance notes: Goes to gym every morning at seven, seven days a week. You can set your watch by his schedule, probably essential when commuting by ferry. Usually bikes to and from ferry. Weekend bird watcher.

11/5 — Felix Martinez — Lives with wife Sierra Wilson in 3,000 sq.ft. floating home on Lake Union. Also owns vacation estate in Fort Hood. Largest client: State of Washington.

Surveillance notes: Travels to Olympia several days a week. Outside of work, Martinez typically home with family.

11/7 — Charlie Inola — Best sales record of the year. Dresses in latest styles from high end designers (usually red) and Louboutin heels; car is matching bright red Alfa Romeo 4C Spider. Largest client: Fashion Jump!, the 1,000-store chain headquartered in Bellevue.

Surveillance notes: Inola’s Spider is not inconspicuous! Likes to be flashy in every way. Doesn’t buy clothes at Fashion Jump!, but visits stores regularly to scope them out.

Alexis scrutinized the suspects, using social media, the web, and government databases.

Zoë Ernst certainly lived large, but she’d been a top notch salesperson for years. She bought her penthouse condo before she joined Raretech.

A little bit of web searching revealed that Moore’s husband had sold a substantial amount of his company’s stock recently, but it was a small percent of his total holdings. This gave Moore little motive for embezzlement.

At first glance, Tom Martin’s Jaguar seemed valuable. His photos on social media revealed that it was well loved but wasn’t in running condition. His condo was small, in an older building.

Chang had started just about the time that the embezzling started. He’s young and has more expensive tastes than his salary allows him to afford.

Martinez and Wilson are Diamond Circle donors to the United Way; honorary campaign chairs this year. Give back to community a huge percentage of what they earn. It seemed very unlikely to Alexis that Martinez was embezzling.

Flashy as it was, Inola’s Spider was an expensive car, not an astronomically expensive one, a recent purchase to mark a stellar year. Though she clearly loved her shoe collection, her clothing was part of her brand as a salesperson. She seemed to spend everything she brought in, yet there was no evidence of spending beyond her income.

Clearly, Martin and Chang were the top suspects, but how could she narrow it down?

Alexis strode back up toward the pavilion, hoping that a walk would get her brain in gear. She paused at a sign announcing a new exhibit at SAM. Alexis read SAM as “Seattle Art Museum” in her head, as many locals do. Aha! She suddenly realized what Sanjay had told her. And who the murderer was.

A quick check of photos on North Star’s social media accounts confirmed what Alexis thought: the blue cocktail napkin was a signature of their coffee bar, echoing the blue in their logo. When she looked closely, she could see that THE wasn’t printed on it; instead, it was Sanjay’s perfect writing. TNS Financial was the parent company of North Star, with TNS standing for The North Star — Sanjay had written the word “THE” when he figured it out.

When confronted, Tom lashed out. It wasn’t his fault! What could they expect when the rest of the sales team threw their constant success in his face? He had just taken what he considered his due. Tom’s daily visits to North Star had allowed him to easily collect blank paperwork that he used to siphon off some of the money that TNS was paying Raretech. By using actual paper invoices and statements, Tom took advantage of the rapid growth of Raretech’s business and lack of accounting prowess to avoid detection — until Sanjay had figured it out.

When Tom realized that Sanjay was onto him, he tried to bribe him. When that didn’t work, things took a violent turn. Tom had hastily tried to make it look like a suicide.

Alexis felt good about solving the case so quickly, yet her friend Seema had still lost her brother. And there was still a loose thread: where was the money that Tom had embezzled? Or, for that matter, Sanjay’s $20,000 in cash? All Alexis had to do was find it to get her unexpected reward. With the organized information in Sanjay’s notebook, surely the clues are there to be found, easy as ABC.

Think you’ve figured out where all the money is? Read the epilogue at www.almanaq.com/story/the-bloody-notebook-epilogue (spoilers)

Need a hint? Visit www.almanaq.com/story/the-bloody-notebook-hint