by Allan Topol
With a lump in his throat, Cady began reading:
Late on Thursday evening, Harvey Gladstone, a retired realtor, died when his car crashed off the road in the mountains west of Napa Valley and burst into flames. It is unclear what caused Gladstone to veer off the road. Conditions were wet and hazardous. The police are still investigating.
Gladstone is survived by his wife of forty-one years, Louise, a son, Jonathan, and a grandson, Carl, in Los Angeles. For many years he operated Gladstone Realty, one of the major realty firms in Napa Valley, from its founding in 1960 until his retirement in 1988. Gladstone was also a past president of the Kiwanis and the Elks.
"Oh, shit, it can't be!" Cady blurted out. He thought about what Taylor had told him last night. Maybe she was right. Maybe somebody had used him. They had made the investigation easy enough, guiding him to all the right places.
You dummy! Gladstone's dead because of you.
He tried to review in his mind the points Taylor had made last evening, which he hadn't taken seriously. If what she was saying was true, then her own life was now on the line. Whoever had killed Boyd and Gladstone was after her next.
Oh, God, I let her leave here on her own last night. Cady cursed himself. She could've been followed. He tore the article about Gladstone from the newspaper and shoved it into his pocket. Then he ran outside the house and climbed into his dark blue Jeep Cherokee. Dirt and pebbles sputtered as he tore down the driveway.
* * *
Chuck Harley, the owner of the Mendocino Inn, was a tennis partner of Cady's.
"Hey, I'm looking for—"
Harley interrupted him. "She's in the dining room having breakfast."
"How'd you know who I wanted?"
"Well, last night when I checked her in, I asked, 'What brings you to Mendocino?" She said, "That asshole C. J. Cady.' That gave me a clue."
"Is she okay?"
"Unless she ate a double portion of the cook's corned-beef hash." Harley laughed at his joke.
In the dining room Taylor was the only guest. Confused and uncertain about what to do next, she had decided to take a long walk after breakfast on the beach. That was always good for thinking. She'd find a way out of this mess. In the meantime she sipped coffee and picked at a blueberry muffin while glancing at the San Francisco Chronicle. She had the cup in her hand when she saw Gladstone's picture and article. "Oh, no," she cried, and the cup fell out of her hand onto the table, then rolled to the wooden floor, spilling the coffee along the way. "It can't be."
From the entrance to the dining room, Cady watched the cup fall, saw the expression of terror on her face, and knew that she'd seen the Gladstone article. He rapidly approached.
"Oh, Taylor. I'm so sorry," he said grimly. "I was used. I should have been smart enough to know what was going on."
Cady glanced around. Harley had left them alone in the dining room, but they couldn't stay here. He needed to get her out of sight. "Let's go back to my place."
* * *
"C'mon, we'll go over your story again," Cady told her as they walked through the front door of his house.
Feeling buoyed by his support and concern, Taylor swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and went through all the different steps.
When she was finished, Cady said, "I have to try to get to Dorfman at the FBI."
She shook her head solemnly. "You can't do that."
"Why not?"
"We don't know who we can trust. If we accept what Alex said in the letter, then Sato has an influential American working for him. Perhaps more than one. Dorfman could be part of it. As the FBI director, he has to be spending time with McDermott and Webster. They might both be involved."
"You really think—"
"I don't know what to think. Two people have died. I don't want us to become numbers three and four. If you know Dorfman well enough to tell me it's a reasonable chance to take, I'll trust your instinct. But I don't think you do."
"Yeah, you've got a point," he said thoughtfully. "If you follow that reasoning, then we'll have to operate on our own for now."
She thought back over what she had told him. "When the senator came out of the grand jury room, he said that you had a phony document from a Napa, California, tax office that made his Mill Valley sale seem like a fifty-million-dollar transaction instead of ten."
Cady was aware of the weakness in the computer printout he had gotten from Karen without the backup being available. "Yeah," he said sheepishly.
"What exactly did you have?"
As Cady told her about his meeting with Karen and what she had given him, Taylor looked at him incredulously. "C'mon, C.J., that woman was conning you. They wouldn't have destroyed the backup on a ten-year-old transaction."
"What makes you so sure?"
"I worked for the California government. That's how I met Boyd. Unlike industry, they didn't have efficient document-disposal policies. At least when I was there."
Cady was defensive. "That was a long time ago, and you never worked in that office."
"Agreed. Who can we call to find out?"
Cady paced around the room, thinking. "When I spent a year with my old law firm in San Francisco, I was friends with a corporate partner, Al White. A good guy. He'd give me the info without asking any questions."
Taylor watched Cady's face as he made the call and asked White about document disposal. The chagrined expression on his face told her the answer before he hung up.
"I screwed up," he said simply.
She put a hand on his shoulder. "I wouldn't put it that way. I'd say you were tricked by some people who will stop at nothing to get what they want. It's time for us to pay a visit to Karen. She's in this up to her eyeballs."
"Exactly what I was thinking. We have to make a couple of stops first."
"What do you have in mind?"
"Now that I've bought into your story, I don't want us to be victims three and four."
Cady opened the top drawer of a bureau in the living room. He reached under a navy blue cardigan and took out a .38 revolver and a box of bullets.
"Do you know how to use that thing?" Taylor asked.
"Chuck Harley taught me to shoot a couple of years ago to scare off animals. I've never killed anything in my life."
* * *
Cady parked the Jeep in front of a large office building on California Street, deep in the heart of the gloomy canyons of San Francisco's financial district.
"Now do you want to tell me what we're doing here?" Taylor asked impatiently as he cut the engine.
"Remaking you."
"Remaking me?" Unconsciously she raised her hand to pat her hair.
"Yeah, I don't want any of Sato's henchmen nailing you before we get our case together, and I don't want you rotting away in a Mississippi jail. So right now you can say goodbye to Taylor Ferrari for a while."
"I don't understand."
He liked that he'd taken her by surprise. "Didn't you like to play dress-up when you were a little girl?"
"I never had a chance. All I had were brothers. They needed me for football or baseball. Now, would you mind telling me what you're planning to do with me?"
"There's an office in that building," he said, pointing, "with the name Epsilon Industries on the door. That's where the Justice Department operates its West Coast witness-protection program. They provide new identities to people who testify in Mafia cases and the like. Before we left Mendocino I called Tom Miller, a friend of mine who's the head of the FBI office in Sacramento. He promised to make all the arrangements. They should be waiting for you."
She flashed him a flirtatious smile. "Will I get a choice about what to be? I always wanted to be one of those tall, slim, blond, leggy models, the type you see in Vogue magazine."
"Personally, I prefer your current Sophia Loren natural look."
She stroked his arm as she prepared to open her door. "Cady, you're really not such an uptight SOB."
* * *
Taylor got part of her wish.
Five minutes after they entered the offices of Epsilon Industries, Ken Linderman, head of the DOJ's West Coast witness-protection program, fitted her with a blond wig. Linderman and Cady were both standing behind her, staring at her in the mirror, when Cady said, "Well, you always wanted to be a blonde. You should be happy."
She screwed up her face and shook it from side to side. "Ugh, I meant a classy blonde. This wig makes me look like a bimbo. Talk about cheesecake."
"Don't pay any attention to her, Ken," said Cady. "She's never happy. She had a miserable childhood that she hasn't gotten over."
Linderman was ignoring both of them. He fitted her with tortoiseshell glasses.
"They're plain glass," he said. "They won't affect your vision."
Then he had a photographer take a series of pictures of her.
"Smile, Taylor," Cady said. "We're not doing a root canal. Blondes are supposed to have more fun."
Thirty minutes later Linderman handed her a California driver's license, a passport, and three credit cards, all in the name of Caroline Corbin. She stared for a moment at the license and the Santa Monica address.
"You live on Wilshire Boulevard, close to the beach," said Linderman.
"I used to live in that area once. It's a perfect address for a bimbo."
Humorless, Linderman stared at her dourly.
"What about the credit cards?" she asked. "Are these valid? I've got to buy some clothes. I left Washington in a hurry."
Linderman looked at Cady. "Tom Miller told me to set these up for the max. There's a twenty-thousand-dollar limit on each card."
Cady scratched his head uneasily. To Taylor he said, "I authorized all of this without approval from any of the top people in DOJ. Since you're a rich partner in a prestigious Washington law firm, I'll trust you to repay Uncle Sam for any charges on the credit cards when this is over. Otherwise, it comes out of my meager government salary."
"Or your trust fund," Taylor said lightly, having read Cady's bio.
"Does that mean you'll be responsible for the charges?" Linderman asked her, wanting to get this point cleared up.
"More likely I'll put twenty thousand dollars on each of the cards and drop you both a postcard from Rio."
Cady couldn't help laughing. "I'll sign for it," he said. "She's hopeless."
When Cady had signed all of the forms and they were getting ready to leave, Linderman said, "I hope you two have a good time, whatever you're planning to do."
Taylor had no sooner gotten back in the Jeep than she took off the wig and glasses and stuffed them into her purse.
"Hey, wait a minute," said Cady. "I didn't go to all this trouble for nothing."
"The wig's hot, and it itches." Taylor untied her black hair, let it hang down, and ran a comb through it. "Also, one of the things in life I was always grateful for was that I had good eyes and didn't need glasses."
His lighthearted mood of before was gone. "I guess you don't like staying alive."
"I'll put them back on if it looks like there's any danger."
"That's real smart. You know that sooner or later they're going to try to kill you. I doubt if they'll give you much warning."
He started the engine and pulled away from the curb.
"Where are we going now, boss?" Taylor asked, trying to restore the camaraderie they'd had upstairs.
"Napa."
"Can we stop at Neiman Marcus on the way? I'm getting a little tired of wearing this one suit."
He checked his watch. "You've got an hour. We have to get there before Karen closes up for the day. So don't turn into one of those women shoppers on me."
He smiled, and she punched him playfully in the ribs. "That was a disgusting sexist comment. Men can shop as well as women. Or did your mother just call Brooks Brothers and have the family chauffeur pick up your clothes?"
"Methinks you have a tongue as sharp as a—"
"Serpent's tooth? You got that right."
* * *
"Where's Karen?" Cady said to the woman with flaming red hair behind the counter at the Napa tax office. The name tag on her black cotton blouse read, Samantha.
She shrugged. "That seems to be the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question."
Cady was nonplussed. "What do you mean?"
"It's the damnedest thing. Apparently they hired her last week. Then a couple of days ago she didn't show up for work. Now nobody can reach her."
Cady and Taylor exchanged looks. They were thinking the same thing. Either Karen had gotten scared when the senator died and took off for the hills, or whoever put Karen into this office wanted her out before Cady or anyone else came to dig further about Mill Valley.
"So who are you?" Cady asked.
"I should ask you the same question."
Cady showed her his DOJ identification. That was good enough for Samantha, and she said, "Actually, I work at the motor vehicles office. Somebody from government services called and told me to come over here to cover the office as a temp until they get a replacement for Karen."
Taylor broke in. "Who was here before Karen?"
Samantha shrugged. "I have no idea."
"Do you know where the backup documents are for the records in the computer?"
"I haven't a clue. Like I said, they just asked me to come over and cover the office."
Cady sighed. "Thanks for nothing."
She shrugged. "Hey, it's not my fault."
As they walked outside, he muttered, almost to himself, "We'll never find Karen now."
Taylor pointed to Ed's Diner across the street. "Let's head over there."
Cady shook his head. "I'm not hungry," he said, dejected. "If you want something, though, I'll go with you."
"Oh, I want something, but it's not food. Come on. It's my turn for a surprise."
They took a seat at the counter. Cady ordered a diet Coke, and she was served a cup of coffee brewed hours ago that looked and tasted like mud. There were only two other patrons in a booth in the corner. Ed, tall and thin, in his late sixties, Taylor guessed, was behind the counter in his stained white apron surreptitiously studying them.
"Have this place a long time?" Taylor asked.
"About thirty years. I guess that's a long time. You two from back east?"
"Washington."
He shook his head. "Too bad what happened to Senator Boyd. Out here we still love him no matter what he did."
Taylor bristled. The implication was that the senator had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. But that wasn't surprising. People thought most politicians were crooks. "Actually, I worked with the senator a bit," Taylor said. "He was one of my favorite people."
Ed nodded. He liked that. "What are you guys doing out here?"
Cady was watching her, wondering how she was going to handle this. She went on smoothly, "We're working on a lawsuit. Wanted to get some info from the tax office, but there's nobody over there now who can help us."
He raised his eyebrows. "Really? Trish is usually pretty helpful."
"Well, she's not here anymore."
"Hmph, I didn't know that. She ran that office for nearly fifteen years. Must have just happened." He thought about what they had said. "Actually, I was thinking that it's been a while since I've seen her. Lots of days she brings her own lunch, but she usually gets over here once a week. Always has BLT on whole-wheat toast. 'Hold the mayo,' she says, as if I wouldn't remember. I like her even though I feel sorry for her. She's one of those decent women who married a real bastard. We all cheered when she filed for divorce a couple of years ago."
Ed was rattling on. It was obvious that he liked to talk to his customers. That must go with the territory.
"Being a single mother with a teenage boy isn't easy these days," he added. "If you know what I mean." They both laughed. "But it beats having that piece of shit around the house. He was her second husband, too. Why's it always happen to the nice ones?"
"Does she live in Napa?" Taylor asked.
"Up in Rutherford. B
ehind the Chevron."
"You wouldn't happen to have a phone number, would you? Maybe she can help us."
Taylor held her breath while Ed pulled back and studied his visitors. They seemed honest and decent, and she had worked with the senator. "I don't have a number," he said, "but her name's Patricia Bailey. She's in the book."
* * *
"I should make the call," Taylor said when they were back in Cady's Jeep.
"Why, because you're a woman?"
"That and the fact that I worked for the senator. Ed told us people here loved Boyd."
"Be my guest." He handed her his cell phone. "Also, you should use my phone in case anyone is getting access to calls being made on your cell."
"Good point."
Taylor got the phone number from information and dialed. A teenage boy answered.
"Can I speak to Trish?" Taylor asked.
"This is Kevin," he said. "My mom's not here." He sounded polite, not surly, like lots of children who answered calls for their parents.
"Do you know when she'll be home?"
"Actually, she's off on an overnight," he said, and laughed, which gave Taylor the idea that Trish had gone with a man. The teenager apparently found this role reversal amusing. "She'll be back in the morning."
Then the boy caught himself. This woman sounded nice, but he was giving away a lot of information to a stranger. "Can I ask who's calling?"
"I'm a friend of Senator Boyd's," Taylor replied.
"My mom went to high school with him," Kevin said.
Taylor had lived in Washington so long she had forgotten what small towns were like. Everybody knew everybody.
"Any chance I can reach her by phone now?"
"No way," Kevin said. "I don't know where she is." He giggled. "She said, 'Don't call me on my cell unless it's an emergency.'"
Taylor didn't push. Tomorrow morning would be soon enough. They were making progress.
Cady started up the engine. "I'm impressed how you handled Ed and Trish's kid. You're good with—"
She completed his sentence. "Ordinary people. Real people, you mean?"
"Yeah. Like that."
She smiled. "I didn't have the advantage of a prep-school education."
He frowned. "Hey."