Free No Accident by Dan Webb Page B

are separated, and I’m not going to speculate on his state of mind,” Sheila said. Then she added, “but I think the facts speak for themselves.”
    Sheila looked out over the sunlit room with a knitted brow. “I came to this room a year ago. The room was full of children, just like it is now. Some of those children aren’t here anymore.” Sheila stared at something beyond the wall in front of her. “I told the children then that we would build a new wing so that Children’s Oncology would be the leading center in the country for the research and treatment of cancers affecting children.” Sheila turned and looked straight into the camera. “I have a long memory, and I’m going to keep my promise.”
     

9
    So Jorge Ramirez and Beto Capablanca had worked together at Liberty Industries. Alex didn’t know exactly what scam Jorge Ramirez had been trying to pull, but he was certain that Jorge and Beto had not learned any lessons in prison. With Jorge dead, Alex wanted to speak to Beto, but Alex remembered that Beto was hard to find when he didn’t want to be found. Alex also knew that Chip Odom, his boss, wouldn’t be eager to devote resources to track Beto down solely on the basis of Alex’s hunch.
    Alex decided there was an easier way. He needed to speak with the auto insurer for Liberty Industries. If Alex could convince them that the gardening truck really caused the accident, or that Jorge Ramirez somehow caused it with a scam gone awry, they would have the right financial motivation to gather evidence to prove it. And if they did, Chip Odom would agree to a deeper investigation, and odds were that Rampart Insurance would avoid liability for the accident and Roberta Cummings would get a well needed financial benefit out of it.
    Alex called his company’s own claims department. Curiously, Liberty’s insurer had not yet contacted Rampart about being reimbursed for the destruction of Liberty’s van in the crash. Rampart’s claims department didn’t even know yet who Liberty’s insurer was. When would they know, Alex asked. Hard to say, they said.
    Hard to wait , Alex thought. He wouldn’t wait. He would call Liberty Industries and bluff them into telling him the name of their auto insurer. The call where Alex bluffed Liberty’s H.R. department had gone fine, so why not try the same thing with a different department? He didn’t know the name of the insurer, so he figured he would just say he was calling from “the insurance company.” For the bluff to work, he needed to call someone who wouldn’t ask too many questions, so he called Liberty and asked for the accounts receivable department, hoping to reach a gullible, low-level bookkeeper.
    The receptionist connected Alex to a woman with a hard-to-place foreign accent. She spoke loudly, but it didn’t make her accent any clearer.
    “Hi,” Alex said. “I’m calling from the insurance company to confirm the status of the insurance payment for the accident on December 23rd. You remember, the big one?”
    “Oh, I remember. Everybody remember s. You want to talk to the finance department?”
    No, Alex didn’t. Finance types were more inquisitive than accounting clerks, but he had no choice.
    “Yes. And tell them I’m from the insurance company.”
    Alex held his breath as he waited on hold. What was the worst that could happen if his ruse was discovered? Just that the person on the other end of the phone would note Alex’s phone number and track the call back to Rampart. Then Alex would be fired and very quickly go bankrupt. Which was distinctly worse than Alex’s current trajectory of slowly going bankrupt. Alex was wishing that he’d thought this plan through a little better when a male voice greeted him on the other end of the line.
    “Finance. Daugherty.”
    “Yes, I’m calling about the December 23rd accident?”
    “You with Peninsula Life?”
    Alex paused. That wasn’t a name he was expecting. Peninsula was a life insurer, not an