“A million, maybe more? I mean, how much is normal?”
“One person’s normal is another person’s abnormal,” said Norris, chuckling. “But there are basic parameters. Now, there are different types of life insurance. You have whole life and universal. They’re more like savings plans that actually build up cash value and that you can borrow against and such. Now, universal life insurance policies have some more flexibility than a whole life policy, but I think what you’re talking about is good old-fashioned term life insurance. It only pays out upon death. They come with fixed premiums for a certain period of time. Ten, twenty, or thirty years is typical. Now, you got a young kid who’ll need support for many years, you’ll want a higher policy amount. Or if the insured is a high earner, then you’ll want more to continue to support a certain lifestyle in the event they die, that sort of thing. Key man policies are often issued to cover the life of important executives, and the beneficiary is the business. But that’s obviously not your sister’s situation.”
“What would the premiums run for someone like my sister?”
“Don’t hold me to it, but for someone her age and healthy, generally speaking, for a twenty-year policy for a million bucks, you’re looking at four hundred bucks a year in premium payments. For a thirty-year term, a little over six hundred bucks a year. That’s strictly actuarial tables talking. Odds are she’ll live another fifty years or so. Of course, after, for example, the thirty-year term is up, she can keep paying the next layer of premiums. But then your sister would be close to her mid-sixties, and the premiums would be a lot higher, so she might just let the policy lapse. That way, the insurance company has collected twenty or thirty years’ worth of premiums from the insured and not paid out a dime.”
“Nice business, if you can get it,” noted Jamison.
“Selling insurance is a for-profit business, after all,” Norris said, with a laugh tacked on.
Jamison glanced at Decker and then said to Norris, “Thanks, I’ll give these materials to my sister and she can follow up with you.”
“Sounds good.”
Norris rose.
However, Decker remained sitting and said, “We were referred to you by Linda Drews.”
Norris slowly sat back down. “Oh, right.” He shook his head sadly. “That was tough. Her son dying like that. Broke my heart.”
“Yeah. She said he had hurt his back at work and was on painkillers.”
“Right.”
“That didn’t affect his ability to get life insurance?” asked Decker.
Norris eyed him keenly. “I’d love to keep jawing, but the fact is I’ve got an appointment to get to.” He stood. “Jenny can show you out.”
As they left the office and headed to their truck Jamison said, “You really spooked him.”
Decker nodded. “I think he knows we’re FBI.”
“Is this some sort of insurance scam?” she asked.
“Could be.”
“The premiums he quoted are pretty low. I doubt most people would need help to pay them.”
“Maybe not,” he said.
“You’re obviously thinking about something,” she said, staring at him.
“I’m remembering something Fred Ross told me.”
“What’s that?”
“That nothing in Baronville is really illegal.”
Chapter 61
DECKER SAT UP in bed and listened to the rain pouring down outside.
Does it ever stop raining here?
He looked over at the small table under the window. He’d laid his clothes there. And on top of them was his badge.
He rose, walked over, and picked it up.
It wasn’t an FBI special agent badge, because he wasn’t one. But it was a federal badge and it did have the authority of the FBI behind it. And Decker had arresting authority as a member of an FBI task force.
Decker had carried a badge for over twenty years now. He’d had it the night he’d discovered that he no longer had a family.
He’d had it with him when Alex Jamison and then Melvin Mars came into his life.
He carried it now in Baronville, PA.
It had provided him comfort when he’d needed it. It had provided him a means to the only ends he had ever cared about.
The truth.
But that was not why he was now looking down at his badge.
He glanced out the window, and though he couldn’t see it, he knew exactly where the home of Dan Bond was located.
The old man should have been allowed to live out the remaining years of his life in peace. But someone had not allowed him to do that. And Decker was going to make that person pay.
Decker swiveled his head in the direction of the house where Alice Martin lived. And just a few doors down from that was Fred Ross and his sawed-off shotgun.
He cast his mind back to that first night, after he’d found the bodies. He and Jamison had driven down the street. There had been no cars parked on it.
However, Fred Ross’s van had been parked under his carport.
Ross said he’d been at the hospital. And Decker had confirmed that that was true. And he had been transported by ambulance, meaning his van would have been under the carport that night.
These thoughts were interrupted by a tap on his door.
“Yeah?”
Jamison said, “It’s me. Got a minute?”
Decker said, “Give me a sec.” He checked his watch. It was after midnight. He pulled on his pants. “Okay.”
Jamison, dressed in a robe, came in.
“What’s up?” he said.
“I got to thinking about our meeting with Norris and I decided to do some digging.”
“Digging on what?”
“Insurance premiums.”
“Okay.”
“I emailed a friend of mine who’s in the insurance business and asked her some questions. Specifically, I gave her Keith Drews’s information. The back injury, the fact that he was a prescription drug user, and also where he lived. I just got the reply back.”
He glanced at his watch again. “Your friend works late.”
“She works in Manhattan at one of the biggest insurance companies in the world, so she’s basically chained to her desk. Anyway, she said Baronville is smack in the middle of what the insurance industry has started to call Opioid Alley. Fifty or so years ago insurance companies had different insurance ratings for different communities, but that was outlawed. So even though they call places like Baronville part of Opioid Alley, that’s really unofficial because they really can’t charge more for a policy simply because of where you live. But insurers do file rates based on an entire state and the opioid crisis has grown to such an extent that it’s actually affecting longevity, and thus the premiums charged tend to be higher. Like Norris said, it’s a for-profit business. My friend said that even though Keith Drews was a young person, the fact that he lived here and had suffered a back injury and was consequently taking painkillers would raise a red flag for them. And the fact that most opioid abusers start with prescription painkillers would also be factored in. And a million-dollar policy for an unmarried and childless person with no job would have also raised questions. The bottom line, she told me, was that because of Drews’s circumstances, it’s highly doubtful a policy that large would have been approved. But even if an underwriter would okay such a policy, the premiums wouldn’t be a couple hundred bucks a year like Norris quoted me for my sister.”
“What would they be?”
“She could only give me a ballpark, but she said for a ten-year policy it would be about two thousand a year. For a thirty-year policy about four thousand. So how could Keith Drews have afforded that unless someone was making the payments for him, like you suggested?”
“But your friend said that she didn’t think the policy should have been issued in the first place, even though it was.”
“That’s right.”
“Which makes me wonder why an insurer would’ve taken that risk. And it’s not just Drews. As you know, Kemper told me a lot of life insurance policies have been cashed in here over the last few years.”