“The worst part of all this is that I’m not going to be able to keep you on as my assistant.” The words hung over the table as Lauren’s force field rejected the notion. “I can pay you for one more month, but you really should spend that time lining up a new job.” This point hit home, eliciting another jagged sob from Lauren. Madeline gave her a weary smile as she held her hand, conveying the full scope of her own loss. Lauren sniffed and grasped her hand tightly.
“If there’s anything I can do…” Lauren offered. Though she had no right to feel sorry for herself, given what her employer was going through, she couldn’t help but see this as a complete upheaval of her once promising life. Even though Madeline was facing a divorce, she was going to be a rich divorcée, which was a lot better than being an unemployed poor person.
“If Steven wasn’t trying to cut me off without a cent, I’d keep you on. I’m going to find it very difficult to function without you,” Madeline confessed, earning a moody chirp from Lauren. “But I will put the word out, and I’m sure you’ll be snatched up right away. I know several people who’ve coveted you for themselves. Now’s their chance. I’ll make a few calls and you’ll probably have a bidding war going in no time.”
Her words worked liked a bouquet of hundred-dollar bills. Lauren tried to remain somber, for Madeline’s sake, but it was obviously sinking in that she had just earned $2,500 for doing nothing and would be able to hold out for an even better salary.
“Especially after the success of the ball…” Madeline added. Though she had been trying to put a good spin on the situation, thinking of that fateful night made her own spirits plummet.
“The ball was awesome!” Lauren gushed. “You were amazing. You looked so beautiful and you held it together perfectly after Steven stormed out on you.” Madeline looked up from her empty latte cup.
“What did you see? What do you remember of that night?” she asked, startling Lauren with her urgency.
“Uh…I…well, you did a great job with the auction—”
“But what about before that…after Steven left…how did I seem to you?”
“Uh, fine…I mean, I could tell at first you were upset, but once you started dancing again—”
“You saw me dancing?”
“Yeah…”
“Who was I dancing with?” Madeline’s grilling her put her on edge. “Lauren, do you remember me dancing with a guy with dark, slicked-back hair? He was about my height with my heels on…” Madeline looked as though she were trying to bore a hole through Lauren’s vapid expression.
“Yeah, yeah…I remember the guy…”
“What do we know about him? Was he on the guest list or was he a guest of someone else? Do you know where he was sitting?” Lauren shook her head, a vacant look on her face.
“I don’t know who he was…I just figured it was someone you knew. I mean, you were dancing with him a lot…” Madeline couldn’t hide her exasperation. She ran her hands through her hair as she took a deep breath. “Is there something wrong?” Lauren asked anxiously. An odd, quizzical look came over her features. Madeline could almost see the gears turning.
“It’s nothing like that,” she said, rushing to erase the notion she had a personal interest in the man. “He was acting strangely when I was dancing with him, and I heard some other women saying the same thing. You know how it is at these big, high-dollar events—you sometimes get crashers looking for easy pickings.”
“Oh…I see. You think he might have been a pick-pocket or a jewel thief…?” Madeline shrugged equivocally. “Oh, I didn’t know…”
“It’s okay. I just wondered if you happened to know how he got in, just in case we had reports of anything missing.”
“Right…”
“So, anyway…that’s the sad story about our breakup,” Madeline said, eager to finish their conversation. “And I hope you know how sad I am to have to let you go.”
“I know. You’re the best boss anyone could ever hope for,” Lauren said, laying it on thick.
“Well, I don’t know about that, but thanks. I’ll put the word out that you’re available.”
“Thank you.” They smiled forlornly at each other.
“I better get going,” Madeline said as she stood up. Without warning, Lauren threw her arms around her.
“Keep in touch, and good luck!” Lauren said, waving goodbye as she bounded out of the café.
Madeline was walking back to the car when Burt appeared beside her, making her jump.
“How did you know I was here?” she asked. There had been no parking on Coast Village Road and she had to park behind one of the business complexes, hidden from the street.
“GPS. It’s in the phone I gave you. I like being able to keep tabs on my clients. I never know when one might go missing.” This ominous admission startled her. “You’ve probably had your fill of caffeine,” Burt surmised. “Let’s find somewhere less public where we can talk.”
They met back at the Douglas Preserve. Madeline found Burt sitting on a bench just off the trail. She sat down beside him and took in the view while she waited for him to speak.
“Your discovery was a good one,” he said.
“What did you find out?” Burt looked at her askance. He could tell the suspense was getting to her.
“The room you were taken to was not registered to any hotel guests that night. And neither were the three others facing it.” Madeline was dumbstruck. “One of the four had guests who checked out Saturday morning. Another had guests checking in on Sunday. And that was all the activity in that group.
“How could that be? I’m positive that was the place. We looked everywhere else…” Burt shifted his body so that he was facing her, left arm propped up on the back of the bench in a pose of nonchalance.
“My guess is the perpetrators had inside help. It wouldn’t be impossible for them to break in, but they had to have known which rooms were going to be vacant that night.” Madeline felt her body sag, as if something essential to her being had just evaporated. “I think it’s time you took this to the police.”
The look on Madeline’s face made him quickly amend his opinion. “I’ll keep working on this, but we’re going to need access to surveillance videos and employee time cards and background checks and other things that the hotel is not going to grant a P.I. I’ll share with them everything I’ve uncovered pertinent to the assault, and I’ll work with them any way I can. But I also have hunches I want to pursue outside of their purview, at least for now.” Madeline was shaking her head as he spoke.
“I can’t go to the police. I can’t give them those photos. They’ll go to Steven and he’ll tell them a load of B.S. He is so convincing—Mr. Upstanding Citizen, friend to all the big wigs in town. No one will take my word over his.” Burt held up his hands to stop Madeline’s justifiably paranoid ramble.
“You can’t jump to conclusions. At this point, there’s no reason not to get the police involved. The longer you wait, the harder it’ll be to find evidence. Security tapes are often erased or taped over after a certain period of time.” Burt faced forward, looking down at the ground as he chose his words. “I think focusing on catching your husband has been a way to avoid dealing with the reality of what happened that night.” Madeline made no move, but Burt could feel the tension emanating from her body.
“You need the law to find out who did this to you, and you need to get counseling. I don’t mean this to sound harsh, but look how your husband has kept you off balance since that night. He hasn’t given you a single day without dropping a bomb on you. You’ve been so busy reacting to his systematic destruction of your life, you haven’t had a moment to grieve or take care of yourself.”
A tear trickled down Madeline’s cheek. She wiped it away before daring to look Burt in the eye. She knew if she opened her mouth, she’d lose it. Burt sa
t back, giving her time and space to absorb what he’d said.
“Will you come with me?” she asked. Burt nodded. Madeline let out a deep sigh. It surprised her that now the unthinkable had been faced, she actually felt calmer inside. Burt was right; she had been allowing Steven to whip her in private, convincing her she would be worse off if she didn’t suffer in silence. The more she thought it over, the more it made sense to hand the burden to the police.
Maybe nothing would come of their investigation; maybe Steven would flood the internet with the horrid photos. She couldn’t be sure he wouldn’t do that anyway. If he did, his precious reputation might suffer too as a result. Either way, she couldn’t control what he did with them, so it was better to strike where she had the best chance of exposing his role in her molestation.
“Do you think they’ll believe me?” Madeline asked, a new tide of trepidation washing over her.
“I think they’ll treat it as a legitimate complaint.” Madeline snorted at Burt’s delicate phrasing. “You’ve got the photos, your version of the events—the blackout and waking alone in the room—and we’ve got photos of your footprint in the flower bed and the sprinkler spray, which corroborates your story. It’s not a lot, but victims of rape often have less to go on than that.”
“Should I tell them I think Steven is behind it?”
“No. They’ll interview Steven about receiving the photos, but let’s keep our theories to ourselves for the time being. It’ll be much better for them to come to their own conclusions about him rather than us trying to lead them that direction.”
“Should I tell them Steven has filed for divorce?” Burt thought this over.
“That’s better coming from you than Steven. They might figure you’ve concocted this story to save your marriage if they found out through him.”
“Then they might think that anyway,” Madeline said, getting to her feet. She stood staring out at the ocean as she moved the chess pieces around in her head.
“When should we do it?” she asked at length.
“Tomorrow. There’s no reason to wait any longer. But take some time to think it all over. The more confident you are with the facts as you know them, the more convincing you’ll be.”
“What are the ‘hunches’ you want to pursue?” she asked, sitting back down beside him. Burt leaned back against the bench.
“I still feel money is the motivation behind Steven’s actions. If progeny were all he was after, he could’ve taken a mistress here in town, waited until she got pregnant, and then pulled this number on you. But as soon as this plan was in place, he went hunting big game. There’s no shortage of beautiful young women in this town, and I don’t think it’s any coincidence he’s gone to court a wealthy divorcée. I think he’s in deep financial trouble. I started looking into a certain area of his business dealings that have been goldmines for crooks in the past.”
“What area would that be?”
“Real estate loans.” Madeline mulled this over.
“I’d love for you to find some major dirt on Steven, but all his business dealings are in group partnerships. I don’t see how he could slip anything past his investors.”
“This type of thing has been done before, and with much larger firms than your husband’s. It has to do with loan payoffs and reconveying the deed, or more to the point, not reconveying the deed.”
“You lost me,” Madeline said.
“There was a pretty famous case years ago that had to do with a title company, whose owner—unbeknownst to his employees—was handling loan payoffs through escrow, but not recording those final payments. The people who thought they now owned their properties free and clear, found out some time down the road that the money was never given to the lien holders.”
“Seriously?”
“Twenty years in prison seriously.”
“But how was that possible?”
“The guy was very bright, but also a little naïve to think someone wouldn’t catch on sooner or later. All it takes in a scam like that is for one borrower to start a new refinance, then bingo, they find their property is as encumbered as it was before the payoff and all their money is gone.” Madeline scratched her head.
“I just don’t see how something like that would be possible in Steven’s partnership. There are too many people involved. Surely someone would notice…” Burt shook his head.
“Not necessarily. And again, this is just speculation on my part. But my instincts tell me Steven Ridley has to put on a pretty good show in order to attract new investors. The money’s got to look like it’s raining from heaven. Chances are he started postponing the actual repayment of certain loans by a week or two in order to make his balance sheet look more impressive. Once he figured out this delay went unnoticed, he got bolder. Next thing he knows, he’s habitually treating other people’s money like it’s his own. Before long, he’s got a lot of empty cupboards to replenish, and maybe he didn’t hook as many big investors as he needed to, or maybe he simply got greedy.”
“That sounds like a Ponzi scheme,” Madeline said.
“Yeah, just like one.” Madeline sat back against the bench, utterly flummoxed. She found it difficult to believe Steven could be that corrupt—squeaky clean, ultra-conservative Steven. But she quickly reminded herself of all the plotting that had gone into her frame-up. No doubt, there was a side to her spouse she had been completely blind to.
“So, when he comes up short, he has to get money from somewhere…” she said. Burt smiled, nodding his head.
“My guess is you are unaware that Steven had been trying to pull money out of your real estate holdings.”
“What do you mean, like a loan?”
“Yep.”
“How do you know that?”
“I saw several inquiries by banks on your credit report, all within the last five months.”
“Steven never mentioned that to me.”
“Why am I not surprised?”
“Okay, it sounds like you’ve got a reason for suspecting him of stealing. But how do you go about proving it?”
“First I searched for trust deeds held by Steven’s company. I was surprised how many came up. Now I have to sift through them to find out if any of these borrowers are under the false impression that their payoffs have been recorded.”
“How will you do that?”
“Pretexting. I’ll pose as a rep from a lending institution offering to lower the rate on their mortgage with RAM L.P. I’ll call each one of these property owners until I find any who’ve been duped.”
“And if you’re right…?”
“If I hit pay dirt, then Steven’s screwed.” A happy wheeze escaped Madeline as she saw how close they were to turning Steven’s plot upside down.
“I don’t want you to get too excited yet. It may take me a few days to find what I’m looking for, if I’m not totally off-base. And even if I’m right, there’s a significant downside where you’re concerned.”
“What, you mean I’ll have a jailbird for an ex-husband?” Madeline joked.
“I mean it might be a rather hollow victory for you, if you’ve been counting on breaking your prenup and cashing in on half of the Ridley assets.” Madeline’s expression became suitably sober. “If Steven goes to prison for misappropriating funds that he had a fiduciary responsibility to safeguard, your joint estate will be sued left, right and center. And any ill-gotten gains will probably be confiscated.”
“Oh,” Madeline sighed. “I win, but I also lose.” Burt nodded. “Well, isn’t that just the way my luck is running these days—I can’t seem to win for losing.” They were silent for a moment, both running alternate scenarios in their heads.
“If there was a way to get Steven for the rape, we could keep the embezzlement for later, after the prenup was voided. But so far we can’t
find a way to connect Steven to the photos or the man from the ball, who is starting to seem like a ghost, so there are no grounds for voiding the prenup,” Madeline concluded glumly.
“There might be another way around the prenup.”
“Which is what?”
“If I can find proof of Steven’s larceny, that could be used as leverage against him,” Burt said. He usually wasn’t one for Machiavellian scheming on his clients’ behalf, but this case was not his standard fare. He hated unfair fights and Steven Ridley was wiping the floor with an innocent woman, his own faithful wife of twelve years. Any man capable of his misdeeds deserved everything he had coming to him, with interest. And as long as Mrs. Ridley was his employer, he was going to make sure this misogynist didn’t skate free.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Madeline was so preoccupied by the time she returned to the hotel, she couldn’t have said with certainty what streets she had taken to get there. She was fumbling around in her tote for the room key when Steven’s voice made her jump.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded, hand to her heart.
“Nice car,” Steven said. The tone of his voice made her wish she had something very heavy to hit him with. Her instinct to bolt for safety kicked in a second too late; Steven blocked her as she tried to slip past him. He grabbed her by the arm as she pivoted away from him.
“Let go of me,” she said defiantly, keeping her voice steady and loud enough to be heard if anyone was in the vicinity. Steven held his hands up as he took a step back. “What are you doing here?” she repeated.
“We need to talk,” Steven said.
“Anything you want to say to me will have to go through our attorneys.”
“Madeline, I’ve had time to think things over.” Madeline’s heart stopped, then started pounding, making her feel faint. “I have a proposal for you, one I think you’ll be quite open to.” She let out an exasperated huff. For one crazy second she thought he was talking of reconciliation. She backed away, into the line of sight of the front desk.
Cynthia Hamilton - Madeline Dawkins 01 - Spouse Trap Page 16