of an affair?”
“God no,” Paul said. “Jack Tucker was insanely in love with his wife. I’d feel safe saying that man loved everything about his life. His wife, kids, work, friends…”
“That’s why this makes no sense,” James said. “I mean this in the most respectful way possible, but from an outsider’s perspective, Jack was a pretty standard guy. Boring, almost.”
“Any idea if he might have any connections to the victim of a murder that occurred eight years ago?” Kate asked. “A guy named Frank Nobilini who also lived in Ashton and was killed in New York.”
“Frank Nobilini?” Duncan Ertz said, shaking his head.
“Yeah,” James said. “Worked for that big-ass ad agency that does all the sneaker jobs. His wife was Jennifer…your wife probably knows her. Nice lady. Into community beautification projects and is very active with the PTA and things like that.”
Ertz shrugged. Apparently, he was the newbie of the group and knew none of this.
“You think Jack’s murder is linked to Nobilini’s?” Paul asked.
“It’s far too early to know that just yet,” Kate said. “But given the nature of the murder, we have to look at it from that viewpoint.”
“Do any of you happen to know the names of anyone Jack worked with?” DeMarco asked.
“There’s only two people over him,” Paul said. “One of them is a guy named Luca. He lives in Switzerland and comes over three or four times a year. The other is a local guy named Daiju Hiroto. I’m pretty sure he’s the supervisor over the Adler and Johnson NYC offices.”
“According to Jack,” Duncan said, “Daiju is the kind of guy that practically lives at work.”
“Was it common for Jack to have to work weekends?” Kate asked.
“Here and there,” James said. “He’d done it a lot lately, actually. They’re in the middle of some huge job to help bail out a nuclear decommissioning company. Last time I spoke with Jack, he said if they straightened it all out in time, there could be a lot of money involved in it.”
“I’d bet good money you’ll find almost the entire crew working today,” Paul said. “They might be able to tell you some things we don’t know about.”
DeMarco slid one of her business cards over to James Cortez and then picked a cherry Danish from the plate in front of them. “Please give us a call if you think of anything else over the course of the next few days.”
“And maybe keep the idea of the case from eight years ago to yourself,” Kate said. “The last thing we need is for the people living in Ashton to get into a frenzy.”
Paul nodded, sensing that she was speaking directly to him.
“Thanks, gentlemen,” Kate said.
She took one more long sip of her coffee and left the men to their quiet breakfast. She glanced out at the sound where a sailboat was slowly coasting out into the water, as if tugging in the start of the weekend behind it.
“I’ll get the address to Jack Tucker’s office at Adler and Johnson,” DeMarco said, pulling out her phone. And even in that, her tone was distant and cold.
She and I are going to have to hash this out before it gets out of hand, Kate thought. Sure, she’s a hard-ass but if I have to put her in her place, I won’t hesitate to do so.
The offices of Adler and Johnson were located in one of the more glamorous-looking high rises in Manhattan. It was located on the first and second floors of a building that also contained a law firm, a mobile applications developer, and a small literary agency. As it turned out, Paul Wickers had been correct; most of the team Jack Tucker had worked with was in the office. The workspace smelled of strong coffee and though there was a great deal of busyness among the eight people working, there was a somber mood as well.
Daiju Hiroto met with them right away, escorting them into his large office. He looked like a man torn—perhaps between his need to get this massive project finished on time and the humane reaction to the death of a co-worker and friend.
“I learned the news this morning,” Hiroto said from behind his large desk. “I had been at work since six this morning and one of our workers—Katie Mayer—came in with the news. There were fifteen of us here at the time and I gave them all the option of taking the weekend off. Six people thought it best to leave to pay their respects.”
“If you did not have this team to oversee, would you have done the same?” Kate asked.
“No. It is a selfish answer, but this job has to be done. We have two weeks to finish everything and we are a bit behind. And more than fifty people’s jobs are at risk if we don’t pull it off.”
“Of your team, who do you think would have known Jack the best?” Kate asked.
“Probably me. Jack and I worked very closely together on several large jobs over the last ten years or so. We’ve traveled all over the world together and pulled late nights and meetings that the rest of the team didn’t even know about.”
“But you said someone else knew about his death first?” DeMarco asked.
“Yes, Katie. She lives in Ashton and is fairly good friends with Jack’s wife.”
Kate wanted to say something about how it seemed a little offensive that Hiroto was not calling it a day so that he, as well as the others who had dutifully stayed behind, could grieve. But she knew the demons that sometimes drove men who were possessed by their work and knew that it was not her place to make such a judgment.
“In all of your time with Jack, did you ever know him to keep secrets?” DeMarco asked.
“Not that I can think of. And if he did, I apparently wasn’t someone he wished to divulge them to. But between the three of us, I find it very hard to believe that Jack had a secret life. He was on the straight and narrow, you know? A good guy. Polished around the edges.”
“So you can’t think of any reason someone might have wanted to kill him?” Kate asked.
“No. The idea is insane.” He paused here and looked out through the glass walls of his office and to the rest of his team. “And it was here in the city?” he asked.
“It was. Did you not call him when you realized he had not come in?”
“Oh, I did. Several times. When he didn’t answer by noon or so, I let it go. Jack was always very sharp, very smart. If he needed a few hours just to get away—which he did from time to time—I let him have it.”
“Mr. Hiroto, would you mind if we spoke to some of the others out there?” Kate asked, nodding toward the other side of the glass walls.
“By all means. Help yourself.”
“And could you get the contact information of those that decided to leave?” DeMarco asked.
“Certainly.”
Kate and DeMarco ventured out into the workspace of cubicles, large desks, and rich coffee. But even before they had spoken to a single person, Kate got a pretty good feeling that they
