She’d been his go to person when he needed something, and now all he had was this idiot that didn’t know shit. However, he was about the best looking idiot he’d ever met. But that wasn’t going to color his mood in killing him if he didn’t get his shit together.
“What do you mean, you can’t find Blake Daniels? I all but took you to his home to get him to pay what he owes me. I told you before you left, if he didn’t pay, you were to beat the shit out of him until he did.” He told him the house was empty. “Empty? Of him or everything?”
“There is nothing in the house but this here letter. It’s addressed to you. But there isn’t even a paper towel in the kitchen I could use to pick it up.” He didn’t bother asking him about why he’d need that to pick up an envelope. He’d already discovered the man was a germophobe. Not with everything, but enough to make Peter nuts with it. “I didn’t read it.”
He put the envelope on his desk and told the kid to go away. Not that Peter tried to remember his name, but if all else failed on that, kid worked every time. He knew that not only would Margie have known his name, but she would also have known everything there was to know about him.
As soon as the door closed behind the kid, Peter tore into the envelope. Dumping the contents on the desk, always fearful of someone sending him some poison—a trick he’d pulled a few times—Peter looked at the penny stuck to a piece of cardboard. No note. Nothing to explain what it was supposed to mean. Turning it over, he looked at the phone number on the back.
He had emergency phones for things like this. Hell, he even had some stock in one of the many companies that manufactured them. Pulling out one from his desk drawer, he was glad to see it had been charged up and was ready for him to use. Almost as soon as he finished putting in the phone number, a woman answered.
“Hello, dumbass.” He asked her who she was. “I don’t think I’ll give you that right now. But I did want to tell you why you’re calling me. There will be no more payments to you from either Blake Daniels or Lauren Mathews. That ship has sailed. Also, you’ll be thrilled to know that I’ve taken back all the money they’ve paid you and given it to them. We both know the video wasn’t real.”
“What the hell do you mean, you’ve taken the money back? You can’t do that.” He turned on his computer to see where she might have gotten the money from. The one account in the bank not far from where he lived had over seven thousand dollars in it. However, almost as soon as he clicked on it to see transactions, the account was at a zero balance. Terrified now, he looked at all his accounts, even the ones he had overseas. They all looked good, so he closed up the accounts and leaned back in his chair. “I see you think you got the better of me in emptying my bank account. There is insurance for those sorts of things, so I’m not worried.”
“Then you’d better have a look at your two accounts in the Cayman Islands again. I do believe they’re empty as of now too. Oh, and insurance doesn’t cover those accounts. Since you didn’t gain the money legally, you have no legal standing in having it put back.” Opening the accounts again, he saw they were indeed emptied. Not only were they empty, but she’d not even left a penny in the accounts to keep them open. “That’s why we sent you a penny, Hightower. So you could put it into your account to keep it open. However, I don’t know how that will work on your end. Again, it was obtained illegally.”
Her laugh hurt his head. It was as if it were pinging off the inside of his skull in a way that made him sick with it. Turning off his computer, rebooting it to see if he was just being played with, he found that the accounts were not closed. That if he had a question about it, there was a number for him to call.
“Why are you doing this to me? I don’t know you from Adam. Put my money back, and I’ll forget this ever happened. I’ll even stop hounding Blake and Lauren for the money. How’s that?” She just laughed again. “Look, bitch. Put that money back or so help me, I’m going to hunt you down and tear you a new ass.”
“I have it on good authority, Peter, that you’re going to prison. For a very long time.” He asked her on what charges. “Anything and everything in your little book of information. It was wonderful of you to have had someone I could speak to who kept track of things for you. You’d not believe how helpful people have been when we’ve gone to their back yards to look for the bodies.”
“Becky? That kid doesn’t know her ass from a hole in the ground. She stole that from me, thinking it was important. It’s not. Not the least bit.” It was, and he was sure she knew it. “Whatever you think you have, young lady, you don’t have shit. Just give it back to me, and we’ll call it even. Of course, after you put my money back. I will have it by the end of the day.”
“You go on thinking you can make me do anything.” She hummed a little bit, and he thought he knew the tune, but she spoke before he could get a good hold on it. “By the way, I want to thank you for all the money you’ve donated to several good causes. I won’t tell you which ones—I’m thinking you’ll try and get it back from them before they’ve had a chance to use it. However, it is going to help a great many families out this year.”
“Why are you doing this to me? I don’t know you. You obviously don’t know me, or you’d know better than to fuck with me.” She said she knew who he was and that he was powerless to touch her. “You think so, do you? I have the long arm of the law in my pocket. They’ll do what I tell them, or they’ll be in worse trouble than you are right now.”
“How do you suppose that is going to work? You have no idea who I am. You don’t know where I’m living. Nor what I am. And I’m a what, not a who.” Peter asked her what that was supposed to mean. “Well, for one thing, I can be in and out of places in a flash without you ever seeing me. Like, right now, I know you have twenty-three burner phones in your desk drawer. On the top of it is a picture of your late mother. She wasn’t a good person either, was she, when she found out you liked to dick little boys instead of a nice woman? Of course, you blamed it on her, but that never flew either, did it? Also, you have an engraved pen set there from someone named Margie. Was she—? I started to ask you if she was your lover, but that’s not right, is it? She and you, the different parts of each of you, would have turned you off.”
“You think you know so much. You fucking bitch. I’m going to find you if it’s the last thing I do.” She told him she hated that saying. “Why? I’m guessing you have a good reason for not wanting me to hunt you down? I don’t care.”
“No. It’s not that. You can hunt for me all you want, but you said you were going to find me if it was the last thing you did. Why would you continue looking for me if you’ve already found me? I mean, that would be just nuts for you to keep on looking after you’ve found me. Don’t you agree?” He had no idea what she was talking about. “Never mind. It must be too much over your head for you to understand even a little fun. Also, you’ll be glad to know your home is being taken for back taxes. I don’t know how you think you were so special that you didn’t have to file them, but you should be getting a knock at your door right about now.” The doorbell sounded, and he heard the kid say he had it. “That kid. He’s a nice kid, don’t you think? His name is Jimmy, by the way. He works for me too. That’s why he’s not doing what you want him to.”
“What do you mean, he works for you? He’s getting paid by me.” She said he’d better check on that. Jimmy had been there for nine days now, and no one had paid him shit. “I guess I won’t be able to either since you took all my money from me. What the hell do you want?”
“Mr. Hightower? My name is Agent Skinner. I’m here with the Internal Revenue Service. We need to have a long talk with you about the nonpayment of taxes and such. We’ve been notified that you have been cheating the United States government of some tax money.” He told him he didn’t know what he was talking about. “Well, then you’ll have proof of your reasons, I’m guessing. If you’d like to come with me—or not. It matters lit
tle to us at the IRS what you want to do. But we’re going to need all your records, as well as any receipts you have on things for this place and the other four we’ve found that you have your name on.”
“Again, I have no idea what you’re referring to. I have a girlfriend that has a couple of homes, but they’re not mine.” He hoped to Christ Margie had never found out about the shit that was in her name. She could easily own his ass. “This house is hers too, I think. We did that in the event something were to happen to me, she’d be set up. I’m a much older man than she is.”
So Margie is wealthy? The voice in his head had him looking around for her. He asked her where she was. Not out there where anyone can see me. I’m going to have to dig a little deeper into this. She should be getting compensated for fucking you.
“Do you hear that? There is a woman speaking to me. She called me earlier, and now she’s talking to me.” The man, Agent Skinner, said they were the only two in the room. “I know that, you moron. I can see we’re the only two in here. But she’s speaking to me right now. Telling me she’s going to be investigating why Margie’s name is on things and not mine. She’s going to cause me trouble. That woman already took all my money.”
“You have money, do you? Not according to your records, you don’t.” Agent Skinner sat down in the chair. “Why don’t you tell me what she’s saying to you, and we’ll work from there. How about that?”
It was then it occurred to him that he had better keep his mouth shut. It didn’t help him at all that whoever was speaking to him was taunting him. Telling him she’d found four houses so far, including the one he was living in. He tasted blood. He was trying so hard to keep his mouth shut. When he found her, he was going to shut her up in the most permanent way.
“Nothing?” He shook his head. “Oh well. I guess it was too good to be true about her helping a man out.” She egged him on, telling him to call the man a moron again. She was sure, she told him, that would go over very well. “Come on then. You tell us where you’ve got your receipts and such, and we’ll get this taken care of. Whoever this Margie is, she should have someone clean up in here. I think it smells like someone is going to jail.”
Skinner was laughing as he stood there waiting on him to get things gathered up. There wasn’t any way he was going to try and find things to take with him. Hell, he didn’t have the first clue as to where things were. Everything that he owned was in Margie’s name. Hopefully, that would count for something. However, not with the luck he was having right now. Things were going to shit, and he was going to be the plunger to make it go down easier for everyone involved.
I’m going to have to have a long talk with Margie. I’m betting she thinks she’s fucked. Well, isn’t it going to be just wonderful for her to find out that not only does she have a place to live, but enough money to have a nice life? Without you. He asked her if she’d go and get Margie out of jail. Nope. I think she’s a tad bit safer there than out with you. Oh boy, is this going to be great. You have yourself a nice time with the Feds, Peter. This will teach you to fuck with people’s minds.
Chapter 7
Joey watched the people coming and going into the jail. There had been some talk about someone being really sick. She found out just now that it wasn’t her sister. She didn’t know why, but it worried her on so many levels that Peter might well try and harm Margie for what she knew about him. At this point, Joey didn’t dismiss anything the man would do to get what he wanted.
“She’s looking better.” Joey turned when Meadow spoke to her as her sister was being brought through the door. Margie did look better. Not only was her hair pulled back from her face, but she looked years younger than she normally did. “Must be from having someone take her seriously.”
“I’m betting when she hears about Peter, she’s going to have a fit.” As soon as she was unchained, Margie hugged her. It was brief and not allowed, but it felt as if she’d put everything she had wanted to share with her in that simple touch. “You look wonderful.”
She said it before she could think about how Margie would take it. Instead of getting upset as she usually did, asking her if she had looked horrible before this, Margie thanked her. Sincerely too, it seemed to her. Then when she was allowed to, Joey reached out and put her hand over Margie’s.
“How are you doing?” Margie had to turn away for a moment, and Joey let her. The tears were right there where she could see them, and she wanted to hug her again. “I’ve been making sure you’re getting extra things. I hope they’re all right for you. I realized I knew very little about you after all these years.”
“I know no more about you than I could get from one of your people. I’m so sorry about that. I’ve been thinking about so much while in here. I have a lot of time.” Margie looked at Meadow. “You look nothing like I thought you would. I mean, I’ve imagined all sorts of ugliness when we first started talking. Then as you began to help me, I still didn’t get it right. Thank you so much, Meadow. I wouldn’t have survived without you there most of the time.”
“You deserve better than Peter. Hell, anyone deserves better than Peter.” Waiting for the outburst with Margie defending Peter, it startled Joey when it never came. Her sister had never let anyone bad mouth Peter since she was only a child. “Your sister is here to visit you. I only came by to give you this. I’ve spoken to Joey, and she can answer any questions you might have. If not, you both know how to reach me.”
The file was put on the table, and Meadow got up. Joey looked at her sister again. Wondering if they’d be all right alone made her nervous. But as soon as Margie smiled at her, things in her mind and heart settled down considerably.
“I didn’t think you’d come to see me. Not that I can blame you for not wanting to come here. Who wants to be in a jail on a nice cold day? I’m glad you did.” Margie pulled the file toward her, and Joey thought about how she really didn’t know Margie at all. “Where did you get this?”
The picture was a still of the video that Mom had, the one Peter had been blackmailing her with. After telling her sister what it was and who she thought the other two men were, Margie shook her head. Asking for and getting a box of tissues, she cried for a few minutes before she spoke to her again.
“This is me, not Mom. That’s not Blake either. Blake is much taller than this man. Is this what he’d been telling her he was going to release to ruin you?” Joey told her that was what she’d heard from both Mom and Blake. “Peter did this to her. And to you. I had no idea when he made me do this that was his intention. He told me he wanted to have this done so that when I moved on to greener pastures, he could look back on it and— You know, more and more every day I realize how he played me. Not just for things like this, but everything in my life has been one lie after the other. Did you know that he’s a homosexual? I didn’t. I thought he was just too old. Or he’d blame whatever kind of issues we were having on me. My unwillingness to conform, he said.”
“Conform to who? Him? I believe you’re much too strong willed to conform to anything you don’t want to.” Margie thanked her. “I don’t think that came out right. I meant it to make you realize how much smarter than him you are.”
“I’m beginning to see that too. And I didn’t take it the wrong way.” She looked at the file again. “I want, if it’s possible, to be friends at least. I’ve fucked up a lot. I know that now. I’ve never been a nice person. Not to you, not to Mom, or to anyone that wasn’t Peter. And all he did was run me into the earth by having me keep pushing and pushing you guys away. I don’t even understand why he cared so much if you were successful or not.”
“I don’t know either. It would be something he might only have in his head.” She pulled the file to her. “Meadow can get into his mind and found out some things that are going to benefit you. Everything he owns is in your name. Bank accounts. Homes. Stocks and bonds. She has moved all the overseas money to a couple of banks here in
the States for you to use.”
Putting her hand over hers, Margie looked at her sister. “You didn’t have to do any of this. You didn’t have to do a lot of things I know you’re doing for me. I get a good meal when I ask for it. Not that they’re bad here, but I’m eating better than I think I ever did. There are extra blankets when I need them. It’s the little things, I’ve discovered, that can make a night alone locked up so much easier to deal with. I would be here alone, without shit, except for your help. I’ve burnt so many bridges, Joey, that I’m—”
“Don’t. You’re my sister, Margie, and you always will be. I will tell you that there are times, even sitting here today, that I’m afraid of what you’re going to say to me. Do to me. But I’m working through them. I love you.” Margie told her she loved her very much. “When we get all this settled about Peter, you will come and stay with us, and we’ll have a wonderful time.”
“I’d like that. Very much, I think.” They went over each of the pages in the file. Margie was given permission to take notes and to be able to keep them. Also, Joey gave the primer to her with the coded book that Becky had gotten. “Meadow said you have something for me to sign about Rebecca. My confession.”
“Yes.” Handing her one of the papers at the bottom of the file, she watched her sister read over it. “We’re going to have a private service for her tomorrow. Nothing in the paper. I think with everything going on, it would be better for everyone if we were to just pretend like we knew nothing about her being killed.”
“You know who did it, right?” She nodded. “I thought I was doing the right thing with that. I’ve been warned not to say anything that can be recorded, but I wanted you to know I’m so very sorry I was involved.”
Pierce: McCray Bruin Bear Shifter Romance Page 10