Blood and Roses (Holly Jennings Thriller) (7 page)

“Interesting, then,” Amar replied. “Looks like this Mr. Christiansen did have some stake in horse racing.”

“It does,” Chad replied.

“We will be speaking with him again,” Holly said. “Then we can get back with you and see what we have.”

“Good. Thank you,” Amar said. “And I believe we will need to visit Edwin Hodges as well.”

“We will, but I’m not done checking Gershon out either,” Holly replied. “Trust me, he’s lying about something—perhaps about not knowing what Tieg wanted to discuss with him. We need to push him harder next time. I want to check his story out further.”

“Why do you think that he’s being deceitful?” Amar asked.

Holly glanced back and saw that Gershon was watching them walk away. “Trust me, he’s hiding a secret. And also trust me, boys, we have stumbled onto a tangled mess. Woman’s intuition.”

10

The drive back to San Diego late that afternoon took a bit more time than the drive up. Holly hoped they would get to where they wanted to go before five and that they would find Scott Christiansen at his offices. She was hoping for an element of surprise. They were going to be pushing it. They had interviewed Mr. Christiansen at his place of business, Equine Health Systems, days after the jockeys had been discovered. Upon learning that there was an equestrian-focused company in such close proximity to where the jockeys had been murdered, Holly knew it was a good idea to question Christiansen and his employees. Everyone had checked out.

“Now why do you think Christiansen didn’t mention when we interviewed him that he had dealings in the racehorse world? He indicated to us at the time that his primary source of sales came from within the western world, didn’t he? Like cow horses and stuff,” Chad said.

Holly nodded. “It’s certainly strange, and now Tieg is dead. Guess we’re going to find out.” While they continued down the Golden State Freeway, Holly looked up on her iPhone information regarding Edwin Hodges and Marvin Tieg’s documentary. The documentary angle could lead nowhere, or it could lead somewhere. Hopefully, that somewhere would point them to a killer. When dealing with big personalities like Hodges and Tieg, public scrutiny would be high. This case was big and likely to get even
bigger. Holly wasn’t intimidated by a big case—she would work until they found justice for the victims.

She also looked into anything she could find concerning connections between Tieg and Christiansen. Scott Christiansen had created some kind of wrap that went on the leg of a horse in order to absorb energy. He claimed the wrap would help keep a horse sound and could prevent injury, as well as aid in recovery from existing injury. From all that Holly had learned from the initial interviews at Equine Health Systems and what she read subsequently, the wrap appeared to be a reasonably successful venture, and independent studies at top universities had also been conducted to prove Christiansen’s claims. That was all fine and dandy, but it was not what was interesting to Holly at this point.

What interested her were the mentions of Scott Christiansen that popped up on a few equestrian blogs specific to horse racing. Apparently he had pissed a few people off. This was news to her.

“So these guys in the racing industry appear to be pretty traditional when it comes to how they deal with horses,” Holly said.

“What do you mean?” Chad asked.

“Well, you have Christiansen, who has created a wrap that he likens to putting good running shoes on your horse, which seems smart, but the guys in the racing world are saying that the way the wraps are designed, they would slow a horse down.”

“And that would be the last thing those guys would want.”

“Exactly. But Christiansen was out to get them to buy and invest in the product. I can’t figure out how he was connected to Tieg yet, but I will. I’ve also been able to find where Christiansen filed a lawsuit against Tieg just last month, around the time the jockeys were murdered. I don’t know the details, but maybe Mr. Christiansen can fill us in.”

“Maybe he can,” Chad replied.

They turned into the industrial complex just after four thirty and located the Equine Health Systems building. Heading to the parking stalls in front of Equine Health Systems, they passed the building where the jockeys had been discovered. The detectives had never been able to find any kind of link between the dive shop and the jockeys. The shop had moved to a new location only a week prior to the deaths. Everyone who worked for Ocean Experience came out clean and so had everyone at Equine Health Systems, including Scott Christiansen. Holly and Chad had come to the conclusion that the killer had seen opportunity in an empty warehouse. How the murderer knew about it being vacant had plagued them. The proximity to Christiansen’s place of business just seemed to be pure coincidence. They weren’t so sure now.

Holly and Chad had toyed with the idea that the killer’s choice of warehouse had been random, although they both knew there was hardly any randomness where killers were concerned. Most sophisticated kills, which these indeed were, were conducted by highly methodical, well-organized, and intelligent individuals.

Now there was a possible link.

The Equine Health Systems building was quite a bit larger than the former dive shop’s.

“Not sure what to think,” Chad said.

“Don’t think anything yet. Let’s see what we can find out. Life is strange, my friend.”

“True.” Chad shrugged.

“Come on. Let’s see what we got.”

A receptionist sat behind the front desk. She looked to be readying to leave. “Hi. Is Mr. Christiansen in?” Holly asked the attractive blonde.

“I believe he’s gone for the day.”

Holly flashed her badge. “I believe you should check. Let him know that Detectives Euwing and Jennings are here. He should remember us.”

The woman’s eyes widened as she picked up the phone and punched in a few numbers. “Hi, Lisa, is Mr. Christiansen still here? Okay. Um…there are some police officers here to see him. Okay.” She hung up the phone. “Someone will be here in a moment to take you to his office.”

A minute later another attractive blonde appeared. Holly saw Chad take note.

The woman led them through the open door to Christiansen’s office. Scott Christiansen stood up. He was of average height and build, with nice blue eyes and light brown hair. He looked to be in his fifties. He wore a button-down shirt and a pair of jeans. Holly spotted the cowboy boots and large silver belt buckle as he came around his desk to shake their hands. She’d also noticed the cowboy hat on the corner of his desk when they’d been by before. The guy was a bit of a cowboy, or at least fancied himself one.

He smiled and looked a bit quizzically at them. “Detectives? How are you? What brings you by here today? I thought we’d already gone over what happened last month.”

“We thought so, too, but there has been an interesting turn of events and we think maybe you left out some information when we interviewed you previously. We’re here to ask you a few questions about Marvin Tieg.”

Christiansen’s smile faded.

“Mr. Tieg was found murdered this morning. Would you know anything about that?”

The man sat back down in his leather chair behind the large oak desk, his face now ashen. “What?” He shook his head vehemently. “No. No! Of course not.”

Holly nodded. “What can you tell us about Mr. Tieg and your business dealings with him? And why didn’t you tell us about them previously?”

Christiansen first picked his phone up and dialed. “Lisa, do you still have that bourbon I brought back from Lexington? Good. Can you make me a drink?” He hung up and looked at the detectives. “When the jockeys were killed last month, I was already on my way out from trying to do business with Tieg. You didn’t ask me if I did business with Tieg at the time.”

“No, but we did ask if you had any affiliations with anyone in the sport.”

“And I told you that we sell some product to people on the track, but very little. Very little.”

“The thing is, you were doing business with Marvin Tieg, and he is highly affiliated with the track.”

Christiansen sighed. “Fine. Here’s the deal. My business dealings with Tieg turned ugly when the man decided to rip me off. As if he needed to do such a thing. And I also realized I was dealing with someone with no ethics where either business or the animals was concerned. My wife has incredible instincts, and she warned me not to do business with him. She was afraid that if I worked with him it could ruin who we are on principle. She didn’t want to be associated with Tieg, and she didn’t want our company associated with him. She didn’t trust him. So I lied to her and told her I wasn’t trying to work any deals with him. I thought if she was wrong, which I should know better, then we would make a lot of money in a business venture with Tieg. The money would likely outweigh her personal feelings. I never told her. When you guys showed up after those poor kids were killed and were asking all sorts of questions, I was afraid word would get out and back to her if I let on that I had any business with anyone on the track,
especially Tieg. My marriage has been a bit shaky lately. I never thought those jockey killings would be related to Tieg. I would have never expected this. With Tieg.”

Holly looked at Chad. She was usually really good at spotting a con job from a hundred miles away, but as crazy and convoluted as this guy’s story sounded, something about it rang true.

“What about Tieg’s ethics had your wife, and later you, so concerned?” Chad asked.

Christiansen shook his head. “Look, I’m a horseman. I love the animals and I have spent years trying to come up with a product that works in keeping them sound, meaning their legs stay fit—no lameness issues. Horses are all bone and tendon from the shoulder on down. You can imagine what carrying that kind of body on those thin legs can do to them. Many of them wind up with a lot of leg issues resulting in lameness. It’s been my goal to prevent that in as many horses as possible. I have that product now, and it does quite well, but the horses that can really benefit are the ones who are racing. These are thousand-pound animals that at three years old and younger, before they have even fully matured, are pounding down tracks at forty-plus miles an hour. These horses need protection. I have been at the tracks talking to trainers, owners, grooms, anyone who will listen. And Tieg actually listened. I thought it was great. Here’s a guy with clout and money. Get his horses into the product and we’re off. Right? The guy was even going to talk about it in the big documentary he was doing to coincide with the Infinity Invitational. And, it was all good, until Tieg saw the potential to take this product,
that I have created,
and have it made under his name.”

“So, he was getting into the equestrian health care market?” Holly asked. There was a lot here to tear apart. But she would take it one step at a time.

“It would seem so.” Christiansen picked up a magazine on his desk and tossed it across to her. It was an equestrian magazine specific to racehorses and a page was marked with a sticky note. Christiansen nodded at her. “Take a look. Money was no object to Tieg, and it scared me to think he could run me out of business by plunking down his cash and using his name.”

Holly opened up the magazine, and he was right. There was a full-page, glossy ad for a product that looked just like the one Christiansen had created, but bearing the Tieg logo. “Do you have a patent on your product?”

“Sure I do. But do you know how many knockoffs are out there, and cheap ones? I try to beat them in the marketplace, but this really ticked me off. I filed a lawsuit against Tieg last month. I realize now that I should have told you all of this initially. I was trying to save my ass at home.”

Holly and Chad didn’t let on that they already knew about the lawsuit, and Holly didn’t voice it, but she did think that he might need to be saving his ass in more places than just home, if he still wasn’t being completely forthright. “Tell us what angered you so much about Tieg’s copy.”

Christiansen shrugged. “I think that’s self-explanatory. The guy made a deal with me, said he’d endorse the product, put it on his animals, talk it up on a documentary scheduled for primetime TV, all of that, and then he turns around and stabs me in the back.”

“Where were you last night?” Chad asked.

“I worked late. I was here, and then I went home. I had dinner around eight with my wife and daughter.”

“What time did you leave the office then?”

“About seven thirty.”

“Was anyone else here?” Chad asked.

“No. I set the alarm. I’m sure you can somehow validate that, as only two managers and I have access to the security system, and we each have our own code.”

“Can you give us the name for the security company and the code?” Holly asked.

Silence ensued momentarily. Tension settled in among each of them. Finally, Christiansen said, “You guys think I could have killed Tieg?” His eyes widened. He shook his head.

“This is our job, Mr. Christiansen. We aren’t accusing you of anything. We are simply investigating and to do so we have to ask questions and check out stories,” Holly responded.

“Understood. It’s a little surreal, though.” Christiansen grabbed a notebook off his desk and wrote down the information.

“You mentioned that Tieg didn’t have ethics when it came to the horses. What exactly do you mean by that?” Chad asked.

“You know, I believed him when we started talking and planning to do business together. I believed that he wouldn’t harm the horses. His trainer, Rafael Torres—former trainer, that is—was implicated in using dermorphin in Cayman’s Cult and likely other horses that Tieg had with him. I now have to wonder if Tieg really wasn’t aware, or if he was involved at a whole other level than his trainer administering the drug. Torres was never officially sanctioned or anything. At the time, the drug was hard to detect, and nothing could be proved. But just recently a lab in Denver developed some new procedures for detection. Torres is out of the limelight on this now, but there are some trainers and folks likely going down because of this drug—it’s also being termed frog juice.”