Since Last Time

by Danes, Ellie

  We quickly found out that she lived in an area of town that she should never have been able to afford on her own. As Dalton pulled up to the gated community guard house, he asked the guard about her, but he said she kept to herself and had few visitors.

  I thought Dalton was going to show his hand there for a second, but I was sure that whatever we were going to need answered was going to happen shortly.

  We pulled up in front of her townhome. Very swanky. We all got out but stayed by the car while Eric went up to the door and rang the bell and then knocked. Rhonda opened the door in a robe.

  “Eric? What are you doing here?” She saw all of us over by the car. “What’s going on?”

  “Rhonda, I went over to the county clerk’s tax office this week. I’m sure you heard about the issue at the bar this week.”

  She shrugged in her robe. “So? What’s that have to do with me?”

  I could feel Dalton tense next to me. I put a hand on his arm and he relaxed.

  “Eric’s got this,” I whispered.

  “Since you were supposed to run the money over there and it appears it never made it.”

  “Who said I was supposed to?”

  “Pops and me. I saw him give you the check and you bring back the receipt. You know that’s fraud, don’t you, Rhonda?” Eric asked.

  A voice came from the back of the house. “Don’t tell him anything, Rhonda.”

  Rhonda stood up to her full height and behind her appeared George Harris in a pair of whitie tighties. That wasn’t something I’d be able to scrub from my mind anytime soon.

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  He pushed around her. “You can’t prove anything, Eric. It’s your word against hers, and she has influential people who want to see her do well.”

  She pouted her lips. “Oh, George.”

  “Quiet, Rhonda,” he replied harshly.

  She kept the pout.

  “Now, I have a business appointment in a few minutes and if you don’t leave this property, I will have to call the cops. And that will be the second time you’ll be in jail this week, Eric.”

  He caught sight of Dalton by my side. “I really don’t see why my wife was ever interested in either of you two,” he said, nodding to Dalton.

  Dalton leaned down to me. “Seriously. He must think pretty highly of himself with a young twenty-something on his arm.”

  I giggled, and Dalton nudged me with his hip.

  Eric leaned in closer. George and Rhonda must have seen something in his eyes because they both stepped back. “If I have my way, you’ll both be in jail by the end of the week.”

  Eric turned to walk away and then turned back to Rhonda. “By the way, Rhonda. No need to come into work. You’re fired.”

  On the way back home, all four of us came up with ideas as to what was going on.

  “Rhonda stole the money, but why?” Kris asked.

  “It couldn’t have been for rent because we are talking about thousands and though that townhouse is nice, I’m sure the bill is being paid by George,” Dalton responded.

  “How did she get involved with George in the first place?” I asked.

  Eric piped up from the back. “Shortly after she started working for me, George seemed to be coming in more often and spending time at the bar. I didn’t think anything of it because I knew he was married to Courtney, and I felt really sorry for him. Figured he needed someone to talk to. Guess it went far beyond that.”

  “True,” I answered, “And that also explains why Courtney is stuck in a marriage she can’t get out of. But why not separate and get another home to live in? It would be a lot easier than seeing a young woman shoved in your face every time you go down to the bar.”

  “Do you think she knows?” Kris asked.

  “Damn right she knows. Hence her trying to play for Eric and Dalton.” I stopped for a second. “No, that doesn’t make sense. Courtney knew how both of them felt about her. I still think she was digging for information on the will. Probably about the ownership of the bar, since we had just found out and Henry keeps everything locked down like a vault in his office.”

  “Anything from Pops and Dalton’s letters?”

  “Family stuff mostly.”

  Dalton coughed. “My letters to Pops were mostly about dreams about the bar. Where I saw it going. There were several letters from him to me about different types of craft beers.”

  “Really. I got him interested in starting to serve them. I didn’t know you had a hand in it.”

  “Pops was really old fashioned. But as the old regime was getting older, he had to figure out something to bring in the millennial crowd. He told me marketing had gone really well.”

  Dalton beamed over to me, and I blushed at the compliment.

  Kris halted the whole dream scenario we had going on. “Time out, everyone. That’s great and all, but if we can’t stop what is happening with the bar, we are going to lose it and all the dreams outside of working for Dalton himself… not to say that’s a bad thing, Dalton.”

  “No offense taken, Kris,” he replied.

  “However,” she continued, “all plans will be null and void.”

  “Agreed. But how…” I started to reply but Dalton’s phone rang, and he took it on speaker.

  “Henry?”

  “Afternoon, Dalton. Is everyone with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Come on by the office. I have something interesting here for you.”

  About fifteen minutes later, we found ourselves at Henry’s office. As a group, we were escorted by the birdlike Betty to the same conference room where all the drama had ensued just a couple of weeks earlier. A lot had come to light and much more had blown away, leaving us stronger as people and as couples.

  Henri immediately saw the easier relationship between all of us. “Nice to see some good come of a good spring cleaning.”

  Betty tittered over in the corner. She really did sound like a bird.

  Dalton spoke for all of us. “Henry, let us know. Did you find something out?”

  “I did,” he responded. “Do you know what a Ponzi scheme is?”

  Kris shook her head. “Not really. I thought it had to do with investments of some sort like Madoff in New York.”

  “Not legitimate investments. I went looking through recent lawsuits that had been filed over the last couple of years. It appears that George has been a very naughty boy.” Henry sat down on one of the seats to give his old bones a rest. “It appeared he may have married Courtney, believing that she had the money for his debauched lifestyle. She figured the same thing, so it looks like they both got the short end of the stick.”

  “No, I think that’s Rhonda,” I said.

  Kris laughed.

  “I’m sorry. He showed up at the door in a pair of white underwear. Didn’t leave a whole lot to the imagination.”

  Henry cleared his throat. “To answer your question, Kris, a Ponzi scheme is when someone says they have something of value, get people to invest in it, pay the original people with money from the secondary people and basically they lose out. The person running the scheme will say the investment folded or something, leaving them with the money and their investors fleeced.”

  Eric pitched in, “What does that have to do with our bar?”

  “That’s where it becomes pretty tricky. According to the many people I wined and dined over the last week, and you will get my bill for that, Dalton, by the way, the way it worked in your case is that Courtney would woo the investors and get them to meet up with George. He would tell them about a getting in early on this great deal. That lasted a good four years. I guess his lifestyle started to make things harder for the people he was getting money from.

  “Two years ago, from what I can gather, he started to go broke. He came up with a new scheme that he began pitching that a prominent local business was going broke. One of the investors got antsy and sued him, saying he thought he was being scammed. The lawsuit was pulled after I beli
eve George’s father bailed him out.

  “I believe he began another scheme using the property The Boar and Brew is built on. From what I heard, it was a historic piece of land in the downtown area that he had already gotten townhome deals on. The real clincher is that I can find no mention of any townhome deals, so I think that it is just another way to get the investors’ money.”

  “So, he used Rhonda to sabotage from the inside and used his connections to show that he had inside information about what going on with the bar,” Dalton surmised. “That’s just so wrong. All the stress that probably put on Pops. He wouldn’t have seen it either, since it was being done so underhandedly, and he never thought like that. He always hired college students, so he could help them out.”

  I could see the rage in both Dalton and Eric. I could feel the heat creeping up into my own face. “So those two little… shitheads… thought of this scheme to ruin our family so they could have a lifestyle of what? Black tie balls and Botox.” My voice screeched a little bit on the end of my little outburst.

  I have never been so angry in my life. This anger bubbled down below in my gut and made me rather sick. My father had gotten ill, and they went in like a shark for blood, ruining a good man’s peace of mind and likely his health. Pops probably felt helpless that there wasn’t anything he could do to make it right and didn’t know how.

  “Kris?” I looked over into her sad eyes. “What does my dad say in the letters to Dalton?”

  “When he started not feeling well, he wrote to him about not being able to help or find a way to make it work anymore. He had always been so good about the bar for almost fifty years and now he couldn’t see his way out of it. He asked Dalton for help in exchange for an ownership in the bar and that he should have it paid back shortly.”

  “You know this whole thing made him sicker and made his last days worse,” Eric said.

  Dalton asked Henry, “What can we do to make sure that they spend a lot of time behind bars?”

  “Getting them to the bar to talk about selling it to them might help them to get greedy and say more.”

  “Do you think that we can get the police involved and work it as a sting?”

  Henry smiled and for the first time since I had known him, I shivered. He looked like a vengeful shark going in for the kill. “It would be my pleasure, Dalton.”

  “Well, let’s just stop sitting here spinning our wheels. I want that bitch behind bars,” I said.

  As one family unit, we headed down to the bar. Eric called George and Courtney and said that we wanted to talk with them tomorrow at the bar about possibly selling it to them to at least get a little bit of income instead of losing it.

  When Eric got off the phone, I turned to Dalton. “He must know you have the money to pay the tax bill.”

  “Maybe. He might think that I won’t have time to liquidate my assets and pay it in full, causing us to lose it. I also don’t want to pay it until George has been arrested because though we can see the main players, it doesn’t mean that there aren’t other people involved.”

  I went and stayed at the hotel with Kris while the boys talked with the police to see what they could do to make this happen.

  Kris walked into the penthouse. “Holy Christ, Taylor! This place is gorgeous. I would never want to leave it!”

  I smiled sardonically at her. “Kris, it’s a hotel.” Pulling her over the sofa, I asked her the most important question on my mind at that time. “So, Eric and you?”

  Kris’ dark Hispanic skin brightened up at his name. “He’s a work in progress, but we are having dinner after this is all over.”

  “Dinner, not coffee.”

  “No, I’m all in. It’s dinner, and I expect dessert.”

  “I bet you do,” I replied.

  “Oh, shut the front door,” she responded.

  The boys came back later in the afternoon. They showed me their wires.

  Eric grinned like a little boy. “I feel like I’m on one of those cop shows.” He looked over at Dalton. “Now, don’t tell me you don’t feel a little wowed right now?”

  Dalton glanced up from tucking his shirt back into his jeans after showing me how it was all set up. “Okay, maybe a little. Any idea when they are coming by?”

  Eric nodded as he tucked his own shirt in. “Told him after we closed tonight.” He looked up and grinned at me. “Told George to also bring Rhonda so she could pick up her check.”

  “Think Courtney knows about Rhonda?” I asked.

  Kris snorted. “Doubt it. Rhonda would be below her status. This could be fun. Where are Taylor and I going to be?”

  “The police will be set up out in the back alley. I would suggest that you go back there with them to keep you safe,” Eric said, looking sheepishly at Kris.

  “Looking out for me?” she asked.

  “Maybe.” He smiled back at her.

  “I like that.”

  She turned on her heels and walked back to the kitchen with Eric turning his head to follow her out of the room with hungry eyes. He didn’t see me look at him, so I looked at Dalton, who had seen the same things. We smiled at each other.

  Eric and Dalton headed out to the bar while Kris and I chilled at the hotel until it was almost time for the big show. We took Kris’ bike around to the alley and knocked on the van’s door parked around back.

  Tommy Brice let us in.

  “Tommy, what are you doing here?”

  “Here to make the arrests once our detectives hear what they need. Just knowing they did this on purpose to your dad makes me sick.”

  “It’s nice to hear you say that.”

  A detective came over to us. “Ladies, if you will have a seat back here, we can get you all set up.”

  I sat where they pointed, and Kris sat down next to me. We grabbed each other’s hands and held tight.

  Never in my life had I wanted anything so bad as to make sure Courtney and George got what they deserved. Courtney had been a thorn in my side for the last nine years. It was time for the Prices to have a little payback.

  Chapter Twenty

  Dalton

  Eric and I cleaned the bar glasses while we waited for Courtney and company to arrive. The idea that these people had systematically hurt the people I cared for since I left hurt and hurt deep. I wanted my little slice of revenge pie.

  I heard a buzz in my earphone. “They’re coming.”

  Courtney arrived first. She was dressed to kill in a barely-there dress and high black stiletto heels. Rhonda came through the front door next, followed closely after by George.

  “Are you freaking joking, George?” Courtney walked over to him. I guess she didn’t know about Rhonda. “This little tramp is the one you’ve been hooking up with? She’s not even in the same zip code.”

  “Why do you care? I’m sure someone will keep you warm tonight. I think we have barely slept in the same bed for years.”

  I raised my hands. “Listen, could care less about your marital problems. We’re here to talk to you about the sale of our business.”

  George looked slightly hesitant, but his greedy little tongue flicked away at his lips. “You didn’t seem too interested yesterday when you were at the townhouse.”

  “At the townhouse. You set her up at our townhouse?” Courtney shrieked.

  “My townhouse and yes.”

  I looked over all of them bickering at each other.

  Eric caught my eye and just shook his head. “Can we get talking about this? I want to close up and get going. How about some drinks?”

  Eric pulled down a bottle of Crown Royal and started filling up the shot glasses.

  “The good stuff. Night’s looking better already,” Rhonda said as she shot her drink.

  Courtney sipped on hers, and George slammed his, little drops dripping down the side of his mouth. Eric and I shot ours as well but having a stronger tolerance for drink and full stomachs, I figured we could hold our own. But we needed to get them talking and fast because I su
re as hell did not want to be here all night.

  “Another?” I asked as I poured it in everyone’s glass again. And once more, they drank it down. This continued for a few more shots, but Eric and I hadn’t drunk since the first ones, just held them in our hands.

  “Don’t know what you want to do with the place, but just so you know, things come up missing all the time. Kegs, food, liquor. We need to get a little bit of money for our inheritance, since it is going to take so long to get through probate.”

  Rhonda wobbled a bit on her feet as she tried to cozy up to George. He was having none of it. He was trying to play big man on campus and didn’t want a drunk hanging on his arm.

  “That was me,” Rhonda slurred.

  “Shush,” George told her.

  “What? You told me you were going to buy the bar for me if I just took some things. It was just a few things I knew you wouldn’t miss.” She glanced in Eric’s direction beseechingly. “You guys had so much. I didn’t think you would miss anything.”

  I could see Courtney out of the corner of my eye. If steam could actually come out of someone’s ears, it would be doing it right now out of hers.

  “You are really dumb, aren’t you, Rhonda? Just the latest in a line of lovers he’s had since we’ve been married. He doesn’t want this dump. He just needs to show it to the investors and talk about the plans to build townhomes here.”

  I leaned over the bar. “I hadn’t heard of any townhomes going up.” I poured another round and down the hatch they went.

  “That’s because there isn’t one, you idiot.” She turned on me. “Just another way to get money from the investors and get Paul to pay for Peter.” She laughed noisily at her joke. She then pointed tremulously at George. “He barely even has a pot to piss in himself.”

  George turned to Courtney. “We would have had more if we didn’t have to keep bailing your parents out of their debt.”

  She waved him off.

  George leaned across the bar to Eric and me. He waved us in closer. I really wanted to smash my fist into his face, but that wouldn’t help us in the least. I poured him another round. He seemed to hesitate and then drank it down.