The Russian & Aunt Sophia

by Rita Moreau

  “Injection marks were found between his toes. The coroner confirmed that the injection of the poison would bring death on quicker than drinking the poison in a cup of tea.”

  “What about the stomach contents,” I asked. “Anything else?”

  “Just vodka,” Ernie said and then added, “The poison could have been in the vodka, and the tea leaves doctored to make it look like it was in the tea Ivan drank that evening. Unfortunately, the coroner only knows the contents of the stomach. The rest is open to interpretation. MC, we need you to get into that safe,” Ernie said.

  I gulped and stuttered, “Wh-wh-what?”

  “Dominick has a cleaning service that comes in each and every week whether it needs it or not. You can be one of the housekeepers so you can get access to the house. All you need to do is find the safe and see if you can use your skills to open it. No one but the housekeepers have been in that house since Katrina left,” Ernie said.

  “I’m going with MC,” Velma now spoke.

  “No, you are not,” Rodeo said.

  Velma turned and looked at Rodeo, “This is a job for two people. You know that. She’s going to need a backup, not to mention help moving the refrigerator. I can keep watch while MC is tuning in the psychic radio waves. She needs to be focused on that and that alone.”

  After a lot of attempted rebuttal from Rodeo, Velma won the argument.

  “When are we cleaning house?” I asked Ernie.

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Louie is going to drive you home, MC. I’ll have several operatives standing watch nearby. Get a good night’s rest,” Ernie said.

  I sipped some fine Tennessee whiskey on the way home which would assure a good night’s sleep. I needed it as I thought about Katrina and what I saw or didn’t see.

  15

  Velma and I disguised ourselves as housekeepers the next day and went to Dominick’s house in Fort Lauderdale. It was scary how quickly it all took place. We were dressed for the part and had the cleaning equipment with us in the house. I was glad that Velma was keeping an eye out because as we were dropped off Ernie shared with us that Dominick was on his way to Fort Lauderdale.

  The house was located walking distance from the Atlantic Ocean. The inside was already spotless. We headed to the kitchen, and Velma and I had no problem moving the refrigerator and locating the safe.

  “I’ll be upfront,” Velma said. “Get working.”

  I stood in front of the safe and nothing was working. It might have helped to have the four other psychics from the bomb shelter room like yesterday.

  “Dang,” I said as I touched the wall safe and closed my eyes. I was hungry. Thanks to living with my aunts I had gotten used to three meals a day and snacks and with my aunts temporarily staying at the convent I was left to my cooking. This morning breakfast was a piece of toast and black coffee.

  I decided to look in the refrigerator. It was also empty and spotless and just made my stomach rumble. Then something hit me. I saw it clearly in my mind, and I immediately opened the freezer. There was an ice pack with a side sleeve. Inside was a sheet of paper with what looked like combinations for the safe. I pulled it out to look closer and saw a column of numbers. All of them had been crossed out except the last one at the bottom. Dominick, like all the rest of us, had to write down his passwords and safe combinations so he wouldn’t forget.

  Using the bottom number, I opened the safe and then put the paper back where I found it. Inside, the contents were pretty much as Katrina had described, except I could also see an old-fashioned, hardbound ledger. I pulled it out and opened it, and saw that it contained handwritten columns of dates, names, and dollar amounts. I snapped the ledger shut, closed the safe, and pushed the refrigerator back into its place.

  “Let’s go, Velma,” I said. Our instructions had been to take the housekeeping minivan sitting out front to a nearby strip mall where our team would be waiting. We left and drove down the street, and as we did, we saw what looked like an accident up ahead. A shiny, new, black Mercedes and an old beater had been involved in a fender-bender. “Ouch,” Velma said as we made our way around the two cars. Velma was driving and kept her eyes on the road, but I saw Dominick shouting at the driver of the vehicle that had sideswiped his Mercedes.

  As we went by, Dominick must have recognized the name of the cleaning company on the van and looked our way, and I quickly turned my head, looked straight ahead, and tried to hide my face with my hand. I chanced a peek once we had passed and saw Dominick staring at us before returning to yelling at the driver. Wait till he gets home. Not going to turn out to be a good day for Dominick.

  The burner Ernie had given me rang, and I answered. “Are you past the scene of the accident?” Ernie asked.

  “Yes,” I replied.

  “See you shortly.”

  Ernie had us flown back to Fish Camp and driven to the office. I went in and sat down as Velma locked the front door. Rodeo and Ernie were there waiting for us. No appointments were expected but we didn’t need any visitors either.

  We went into my old office. “Let’s take a look,” I said as I took the ledger out of a bag and set it on the desk. The ledger was entirely handwritten. As I flipped through it, I could see it was filled almost to the end and covered many years.

  “Now that we have the amounts, I need you to trace it through Dominick’s bank accounts,” Ernie said and handed me a laptop. Velma went to brew some of my favorite Cuban coffee.

  I was back on familiar ground, sitting in my old office, working on accounts and drinking Cuban coffee. By the end of the day, I had successfully traced the cash through a myriad of accounts that all led to offshore entities.

  “How did you get these accounts?” I asked Ernie.

  “Katrina supplied them. She had another flash drive. She said we will be able to easily trace the cash with the information on the flash. She does handle their books,” Ernie said as I thought about the flash I had of Katrina in a room with a dead body.

  16

  Ernie called to tell me that Dominick and Big Pete had been picked up by the FBI.

  “They’re being charged under what is known as the Magnitsky Act,” Ernie said.

  “The big Russian tax fraud case?” I asked.

  “It’s coming back,” he said.

  “Talk about death and taxes; it makes the IRS look almost reasonable. How did they tie Dominick and Big Pete to the Magnitsky Act?”

  “In addition to the money trails you uncovered, they found that money was moved through an elaborate series of transfers. Money laundering or what I would call money parking included the purchase of real estate with the funds. That’s where Big Pete came into the picture with his purchase of older condominiums for re-development,” Ernie explained. “It will probably be traced back to his brother Victor, and the bank in Russia at some point. But I doubt they’ll be able to reach him.”

  “Seems like the government would need to establish tainted money came through the offshore shell companies in the form of loans from Victor’s bank to invest in Big Pete’s real estate developments. Do they have enough to make it stick?” I asked.

  “Probably not,” Ernie said. “But, what they do have is the Russian arms dealer Dominick was dealing with, who the Feds are alleging was involved in that Russian tax scheme. Americans are prohibited from doing business with these individuals. He invested in the real estate developments Dominick had going on in Miami,” Ernie said. “The ledger you found in the safe and evidence provided by Katrina will nail Dominick.”

  “That was the cash and the man you saw in your psychic mind,” Ernie said.

  “So, in the end, it was bigger than Ivan’s murder,” I said to Ernie.

  “Ivan was just the tip of the iceberg. If he had lived, the FBI probably would have talked him into working with them to get the evidence to nail Big Pete and Dominick and his brother Victor.”

  “Not sure he could have done that without Katrina also agreeing to testify along with her father.”


  “If she had refused, she would also be indicted.” We both thought about that for a long minute.

  “So, what is going to happen to Katrina now?” I asked Ernie.

  “Conveniently, all the evidence points to others in the organization. Nothing is going to happen to her, at least for now. It’s back to business as usual for her. Katrina landed on her feet. She’s moved into the top slot of the legitimate side of the business now that Pete and Dominick are out of the way.”

  “I need to find out who murdered Ivan, so my Aunt Sophia can resume a normal life. She will have this hanging over her head, and I don’t trust Katrina,” I said.

  “Why do you say that MC?” Ernie asked.

  “The other night in the bomb shelter I saw more than a dead body. I saw Katrina standing over the dead body, and I could see a needle. Ernie, I think she killed her father. She was not going to the FBI. She wanted Dominick out of the way. He might have poisoned her father, but she finished it off with an injection. I am sure of it. I just need to get the proof.”

  17

  A few days later, Ernie called me and told me to be ready to go with him to Miami. He had a warrant to search Katrina’s apartment. It was in an apartment complex recently purchased by Dominick who had oddly enough paid a visit to Ernie while he was out on bail.

  Ernie and I entered the apartment where Ernie promptly found a vial of poison in the freezer of her refrigerator. Ernie had walked right to it as if he knew or someone had told him that he would find it there.

  The forensic team went to work. The poison was the same as what had killed Ivan, and Katrina’s fingerprints were the only ones on the bottle.

  She was arrested the next day by Hammerhead for the murder of her father. The judge would not grant bail, so she offered to speak to the FBI about her godfather Victor. She was picked up from the Boca Vista jail and whisked away by the Feds. Later Ernie called to tell me she was found dead. She had been poisoned, and her body thrown off a bridge.

  * * * *

  So today, I am back on the Mary Catherine along with Theo and our little friend, Izzy.

  “I promised Velma we would drop you off when we got close to Fish Camp,” I said to Izzy.

  “No worries,” I heard his little voice in my head. “I think you will be back there sooner than you think.”

  Dang!

  A NOTE TO THE READER

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for reading and I hope you would check out my other books. I would be most grateful if you would spread the word. In addition, I hope you would take a minute or two to post an honest review on Amazon.

  If you would like to chat, I would love to hear from you.

  Please email me at author@ritamoreau.com.

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  Until next time,

  Rita

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Rita Moreau lives in Florida with her husband, George, who brags to everyone that he is the author’s husband. Without his motivation and help there would be no author.

  I am very grateful to you the readers. Without you there would be no novels.

  Please read on for an excerpt from Feisty Nuns.

  AN EXCERPT FROM FEISTY NUNS

  1

  By way of introductions, my name is Mary Catherine Mahoney, MC for short. I was born and raised in Fish Camp, a small Florida town near State Road A1A, which stretches some 300 miles through oceanfront towns along the sometimes-blue Atlantic Ocean. State Road A1A extends from Amelia Island, just south of the Georgia state line, all the way to the southern tip of Key West. It’s about a seven-hour drive…if you pay attention to the speed limit.

  My friend and office manager, Velma, also grew up in Fish Camp, but not on the same block. She grew up in a black family, mostly female, large of body, but even larger of personality. They were church going, gospel singing women. Church was livelier for Velma than it was for me at St. Mary’s.

  My work, currently and for some time has been my life, and is dictated by my appointment book. Velma does her best to gauge the right amount of time to allot to my appointments. Unlike a doctor, I do not hold the power of life or death over my clients, so they are not always patient enough to sit in my office and wait. After all, most of my clients are filthy rich women who are used to people waiting on them. Many are also control freaks, which drives Velma and me batty during tax season.

  Today my one of my last appointments ran into overtime. The client was going through a big change of life: a divorce and her daughter and grandchildren moving back home. Not only was her personal life turned upside down, so was her financial life. In her case, she was finding out that they did not have the money she thought; in fact, they were almost broke. The family had lived high, and she had not thought anything of their lavish spending. After all, she was married to a doctor. The prospect of being divorced is never pretty, but she was also now faced with the dim prospect of having to get a job, and she had no marketable skills.

  Like so many others, she had dropped out of college to work while her husband finished medical school. She had spent her life as a full-time mother and a doctor’s wife.

  One day, after the children were grown and were starting lives of their own, her husband told her he wanted to do the same. She was looking for child support and alimony to get her through the transition. In that respect, I am like a doctor, my client’s financial doctor. These appointments take a little longer. If nothing else, at these times I’m a good listener.

  While I sat with my client, I heard my cell ding, and I looked down to see a text from Velma, who had only recently joined the twenty-first century, purchased a smartphone, and frequently used it to update me on the goings on in the front office. My next two appointments were now waiting for me in the tiny lobby of our office where Velma sits front and center. The text said that one had shown up early hoping to get squeezed in, and since she was already there she decided to sit and wait.

  My attention went back to my current client, and then I heard the ding again. Velma’s new text said the early bird was chatting on her cell and Velma was sure she was bent on calling everyone on her contact list. Geez!

  Being psychic was no help when it came to setting up or managing appointments. Since I was finished with my current client, I escorted her out, while Velma escorted the next appointment into my office, and I also looked around surprised to find an empty lobby.

  Velma returned to her command station and said,

  “I convinced the early bird to step out and grab a bite to eat. It’s the first time today I’ve had a minute to breathe,” she said as she pulled out a small fan, plugged it in, and pointed it directly at her face and large bosom.

  It was the middle of March, but the weather was unseasonably warm, even for Florida. It felt more like June than March. The snowbirds were happy, but not Velma, who was beginning to experience the joy of hot flashes.

  As I headed back into my office, I watched as she picked up her cell to check for new text messages, mostly from her twin teenage daughters. It was a reminder that after work, her next job started: mom to twin girls, chauffeur, cook, and caregiver to her mother, Bessie.

  The father of her girls, Rodeo, was out of town on a covert mission, and there was no communication. She had no idea where he was or even who he worked for, but after almost 18 years she had finally made peace with that part of Rodeo’s life. They were engaged and planning a wedding.

  My next appointment went smoothly, no major life changes. As I worked on that client’s return, I half listened to her small talk about the goings on in the life of a wealthy socialite. The various charities and social events she headed and the big trip she was taking next, a cruise around the world. I finished up her tax return, said my goodbyes, and escorted her out the front door of my office.

  I turned around to see Velma looking out the window for my next appointment, the one who had shown up ear
ly with the hopes of being squeezed in, but she was nowhere to be found.

  “She went out for a bite to eat about an hour ago and called me to say she was going to do some shopping. She should be back any minute now, which will make her late for her original appointment,” Velma said rolling her eyes.

  “Well, at least she is my last appointment for the day,” I said. Velma gave me that look that said she wasn’t my last appointment for the day.

  “Velma, you didn’t book me for another appointment, did you? At this rate, we’ll both be here until midnight, and we have appointments starting early tomorrow morning.”

  “I had no choice,” Velma said.

  “Velma, who did you book that you, of all people, could not say no to?”

  “Sister Hildegard. She just called and said they were coming over on the afternoon Greyhound bus. I’m surprised we don’t hear the clackity-clack of their black pumps coming down the sidewalk. They should be here soon. They said they had to talk to you right away, something about an audit.”

  “Sister Hildegard? An audit? Is the IRS auditing nuns now?”

  Velma then shrugged her shoulders as my next appointment, the early bird now late, came through the front door.

  We greeted her, and I escorted her back to my office along with several large Nordstrom shopping bags, which I knew were full of expensive boxes and tax receipts. Looking at their boxes actually helped me to keep up with the latest fashion trends since I was not a fashionista.

  I sat the client down, excused myself, and went back up front to Velma’s desk. Something bothered me about the Sister Hildegard thing. “I don’t believe this is happening again. See if you can get my Aunt Sophia on the phone. Try to find out what this is all about, so we at least have a heads up on those nuns.”