Cash Call, A Stan Turner Mystery Vol 5

by William Manchee

  Chapter 38

  Revelation

   A few days later Monte called and said he'd gone to Mt. Pleasant to talk to Melanie, but she wasn't there. When he asked her sister, Emma Sue Landon, where Melanie had gone she had been evasive and uncooperative, so he decided to stake out her place in case Melanie showed up or Emma Sue tried to make contact with her.

   I didn't know why I felt compelled to find Melanie and confront her. My gut told me it could only lead to trouble. But I had to know the truth. It was a pretty drive through east Texas to Mt. Pleasant. The freeway was lined with tall pine trees that reminded me of Oregon where I had spent many summers as a child. It was after dark when I arrived at the location Monte had said he would be, but his car wasn't there.

   Not knowing what to do I cut my engine and decided to wait a while. After thirty minutes I was beginning to regret that I had made the long journey to Mt. Pleasant. I obviously didn't have the patience to be a private investigator. Then I heard a car coming up behind me. I turned around and saw it was a sheriff's car. My heart sank. He must think I'm a thief casing out Emma Sue's house. Shit, now what am I going to do?

   The deputy got out of his car. I didn't know if I should sit tight or get out to meet him. If I got out he might think I was being aggressive. I'd read many stories of innocent citizens being gunned down simply because a police officer got spooked. I elected to sit tight and just roll down my window. The deputy strolled up and leaned down to look me in the eye. I took a deep breath.

   "You Stan Turner?" he asked.

   "Yeah," I replied surprised that he knew my name.

   "Your buddy, Monte, told me I'd find you here."

   I exhaled. "Oh--"

   "He's waiting for you at the Sheriff's Office."

   "Really? How come?"

   "He said you hired him to find a woman--Melanie Dixon."

   "Right."

   "Well, he found her."

   "Oh. Where?"

   "In the morgue."

   "What!"

   "Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but she was found dead day before yesterday."

   "Oh, my God. How did she die?"

   "Someone ran her off the road, slit her throat, and then torched her car. It was pretty gruesome."

   "Jesus! Any idea who it was?"

   "Your friend said you could probably tell me."

   I nodded. "Well not exactly, but odds are it was the same gang of thugs that beat her up last week in Dallas."

   "Why now? Why didn't they kill her then?"

   I told him about the diamonds and what had happened at Valley View Bank.

   He shook his head when I was finished. "We didn't find any diamonds."

   "No. I imagine whoever killed her took them. They carved her up and torched the car to set an example."

   The deputy got back into his car and I followed him to the sheriff's office. Monte was waiting out front of the station with Emma Sue. She didn't look good. Her eyes were red and her face was pale. I got out of my car and walked up to them. Monte introduced us.

   "I'm sorry to hear about your sister?" I said.

   She sighed. "It's not your fault. It's that bastard Marvin Schwartz who's to blame. I told Melanie he was no good, but she wouldn't listen to me."

   "What do you know about Marvin Schwartz?" I asked.

   "He got her into the smuggling business–told her it was easy money and he'd been doing it for years--promised her she wouldn't get caught."

   "Well. He was right. They didn't get caught smuggling. Did she tell you what did happen?"

   "Yes. Usually a courier would bring her a shipment of diamonds to her office at Federal University in Rio. As part of her job she would often travel to Trujillo, Peru to visit the digs there. This is where she'd hand off the shipment to Schwartz. Then he'd take it to Dallas where he'd deliver it to the buyer."

   "So what happened this last time?" I asked.

   "Well, Melanie delivered the shipment to Schwartz but shortly after arriving in Dallas, and before he made the delivery to the buyer, he got into a car wreck and was taken to the hospital. Unfortunately he was injured pretty badly so they had to do surgery. It wasn't until he woke up the next day that he realized he'd missed his delivery."

   "Oh, shit. What did he do?"

   "Nothing. He didn’t know the buyer’s identity and had no way of contacting him. In the meantime the buyer assumed Schwartz had stolen the diamonds and sent some men to find him. Schwartz laid low for awhile but finally realized even if he returned the diamonds they'd still kill him. That's when he came up with a plan to steal them."

   "Really? How was that supposed to work?" I asked.

   "Since Dallas was his official US residence he maintained a post office box here. When he checked his mail he saw he'd been sued over his car wreck. He didn’t care about the lawsuit as he didn’t plan to hang around Dallas long enough for it to be a problem, but it did give him an idea as to how to hide the diamonds. He’d hire an attorney on the pretense of defending the lawsuit and deposit the diamonds with the attorney. He’d retrieve the diamonds later when things had cooled down. Of course, the attorney couldn't know about the diamonds so he stashed them in some of the pottery he'd brought back from Peru. But you know all about that.

  I nodded.

   "With a half dozen thugs after him, Schwartz thought it best to leave town and disappear. This is when he decided to enlist Melanie to recover the diamonds from you."

   It was all making sense now. I'd been an unwitting accomplice in Marvin's little scheme to steal two million dollars worth of diamonds.

   "Unfortunately for Marvin the disappointed buyer finally caught up with him and killed him," Emma Sue continued. "When Melanie found out Marvin had been murdered. She had to come up with a plan--a way to get the diamonds without anyone realizing she had them. She knew Marvin had left the pottery as security for the payment of your bill, so all she had to do was contact you, pay the bill and you'd release the pottery to her. But she had to make sure the owner of the diamonds thought you had them. That's why she pretended to put them in your safety deposit box and told the thugs that caught up with her in the hospital that you had them."

  "I see. Then she pretends to be outraged that Marvin would put her at great risk by tricking her into transporting stolen diamonds. It was a brilliant plan and I fell for it hook, line and sinker. Getting the buyer to think I had the diamonds and was trying to sell them, while she was making her getaway was pure genius."

   "Well, not exactly genius since Melanie ended up dead," Monte noted.

   "Ah. But is she really dead?"

   I looked at Emma Sue. She looked away.

   "Huh?" Monte said.

   "Let me guess," I said. "The body was burnt beyond recognition and the medical examiner couldn’t find any of Melanie’s dental records to positively identify the body, right?"

   "That's what the deputy said," Monte replied.

   "But the corpse was found in Melanie's car so it would appear to be her. And Emma Sue saw her drive off in the car so what other conclusion could any rational human being come up with?"

   "Right."

  Monte looked at Emma Sue. She smiled faintly. "You've got a vivid imagination, Mr. Turner."

   "Do I? . . . The thing that puzzles me, though, is who Melanie kill to stand in for her when the car burned?"

   Emma Sue didn't respond.

   

  39

  A Perfect Snow

   Growing up in Southern California, I never woke up to a white landscape. It didn't happen often in Texas either, but once or twice a year we got lucky. It was such a day in early March when I woke up and saw the lawn and trees covered with snow. Some kids were already up making a snowman across the cul de sac. It was a perfect snow because the temperature was hovering just above freezing, so there was no accumulation of snow on the roads.

  It had only been a few weeks since the Cochran trial and we h
ad already picked up a new murder case. I let Paula take the lead on this one as I needed a rest. Jodie was relieved when we hired a secretary for Paula. His name was Stewart. He was a big, muscular guy who used to be her personal trainer. Paula called him Stew and seemed to enjoy bossing him around all day. I thought the arrangement was hysterical and enjoyed kidding her about him.

   When I got to the office, there was a message from Jodie that her driveway was iced in so she wouldn't be coming to work. She lived in McKinney and apparently the storm had been worse up there. Paula showed up thirty minutes later and she too had a message from Stewart with a similar excuse as to why he wouldn't be in.

  "Boy, any excuse to stay home, huh?" Paula said.

   "Oh, well. It should be a quiet day. We should get a lot of work done."

   "You want some coffee?" she said.

   "Sure, if you're making it."

   "I am. I'll bring it to your office in a minute."

   "Okay."

   Several minutes later Paula strolled into my office with two cups of coffee. She came around behind me and set mine down on my desk in front of me and then started drinking hers directly behind me.

   She sighed. "Isn't it wonderful. We’re finally together. We've just won our first big trial."

   I swung my chair around and looked up at her. "Yes, this is working out quite nicely."

   She put her coffee down and gave me a tender smile. Then she swung me back around and started massaging my back. I closed my eyes as my muscles started to relax. Then I felt her arms wrap around me and her lips caress my cheek. I opened my eyes and turned toward her. She kissed me hard and fell into my lap. I pushed her gently away.

   "What are you doing? You told Rebekah this was strictly a business relationship."

   She shrugged. "So, I lied. What did you expect? Did you think I'd admit to your wife I was out to seduce you?"

   I shook my head and said, "Rob was right?"

   She frowned, "What?"

   "Nothing."

   She smiled again and then leaned over and gave me another kiss. It felt good, very good. I had a strong urge to give in to her and enjoy whatever she had planned for me, but as we kissed again I got a glimpse of a picture on my credenza of Rebekah and the kids getting ready to go swimming at the community pool. Guilt overcame me. I pushed Paula away. "Stop it! This isn't going to work."

   Paula stood up. "What do you mean? I found us a nice condo down the street. Whenever we feel like it we can take a break and go make love."

   I stood up and said firmly, "No. We've got a good thing going here with the new partnership. If we're lovers, the first time we have a lover's spat or Rebekah figures out what's going on, the firm will be in jeopardy. . . . Come on, Paula. You're a big-time criminal attorney now. Do you want to screw that up?"

   She took a deep breath and gave me an exasperated look. "You must know I've wanted you since the first day I met you in law school."

   "Really?" I said genuinely surprised.

   "Yes, but you were too wrapped up in your family and politics to notice."

   "I'm sorry. I had no idea," I said and turned away. "I'd probably only disappointed you anyway."

   She laughed. "How do you figure?"

   I turned back and smiled."You've got a thing for the big, burly brutes."

   She grinned. "Go to Hell, Turner," she said and sauntered out of my office shaking her head. When she was gone I fell back into my chair and let out a huge sigh of relief. I knew that probably wasn't the last time she'd try to lure me to her new condo, but I hoped and prayed if it happened again I'd have the strength to resist her one more time. It was a dangerous way to live but I had gotten used to living on the edge.