Sam Kincaid 01 - The Commission

further need of them. She also collected her birth certificate, passport, and other personal papers from a safety-deposit box she had previously rented. That done, she walked to a small savings and loan institution a couple of blocks from the Wells Fargo office. There she withdrew $225,000 from a money market account held in the name of a deceased female inmate who died in prison from complications resulting from HIV infection. The carefully laundered money was more than sufficient to jump-start a new life somewhere else.
    Stimson drove to a nearby shopping mall, parked in the terraced garage, and went shopping. She needed to get ready to travel, and that required a change of appearance. She purchased sunglasses, a hat, and some new clothes. She then stopped at a Great Clips hair design shop where the stylist cut her shoulder-length hair short and bleached her black hair blond.
    Stimson still had almost four hours before she had to be in Park City. She loaded the purchases in the back of her Ford Explorer, then stole the license plates off the unoccupied vehicle parked next to her. She figured it would be safer to drive with stolen plates than to risk using her own. When she finished her business with Kincaid and his family, she planned to drive straight through to Las Vegas. From there, getting lost in Mexico sounded just right.

Chapter Forty-four
    An agitated Bill Allred could hardly concentrate during the weekly Board of Pardons business meeting. The agenda typically included policy-and-procedure changes, personnel issues, and budget items. Twice he had been asked questions by other Board members, and twice the questions had to be repeated. While nobody said anything, it was clear to everyone that Allred’s mind was elsewhere. At one point, the acting chairman declared a 15-minute recess, hoping Allred would return focused on the business at hand. Instead, he came back more distracted than before.
    They had followed him from home to the board office—two cars, each making it so obvious that he would have needed a seeing-eye dog not to notice. He recognized Terry Burnham from Sam Kincaid’s staff, but he’d never seen the other guy. They were sitting in the Board of Pardons parking lot making no attempt to disguise their presence.
    This had started to become embarrassing. It would only be a matter of time before a Board employee noticed them and started asking questions. Because of the nature of their work, Board staff were always on security alert. What would he do then?
    He’d been instructed to lie low and go about his business in as normal a manner as possible. He could take the direct approach—walk right up and challenge them. But what if they arrested him on the spot? No. That was a bad plan. He could feign illness and go home. That’s what he would do. He needed to get the surveillance team away from Board headquarters.
    By the time he arrived home, Allred was in a state of near panic. He felt as though he might upchuck the pancake, sausage, and egg breakfast he’d consumed earlier in the morning. He felt isolated. He needed to talk with someone who could calm him down. What if his phone was bugged? They might be listening to all his calls.
    For the first time, the reality of the situation forced him to do something he’d never before imagined. He opened the Salt Lake Valley phone directory to the section entitled “Attorneys.” He worked his way through the lengthy list of criminal defense lawyers until he found the name he was looking for—Franklin Meadows. He reached for the telephone.
    ***
    I reached my office at the prison late in the morning. There were a couple of new developments. Burnham had called and left a message that he and Turner had followed a nervous-looking Allred to his office, and then back to his home. Assuming he stayed put, Kate and I would know exactly where to find him later in the day when it was time to reel him in for questioning.
    Patti informed me that Steve Schumway had dropped by the office earlier in the morning looking for me. He hung around long enough to make a pest of himself by asking Patti and several of my investigators for information about the status of the investigation. The inquiry was made under the guise of concern for his employees. Fortunately, after connecting Allred and the prison employees through Allred’s telephone records, Terry and I called each member of the SIB at home and warned them not to discuss the investigation with anyone,