Changing Tides

by Veronica Mixon

  “Chet Rincon, Scot Bishop, Bubba Snively.” She crossed her arms, ran her hands over her forearms. “Amanda Hennessy might risk hiding him.” Her eyes blazed, and her face, no longer pale, flushed with righteous fury. “Susie Clemons was proud as punch to inform me you handled the details of Amanda’s abortion.”

  My neck went hot, and embarrassment rolled off me like beads of sweat. “Beth.” Sadness, shame, and my plea for forgiveness settled inside the one syllable. I forced myself to look her in the eye.

  Her pain made me so sad and tired, I wanted to slide off my seat and go to sleep on the floor. “I made a few calls and secured an opening in a private clinic. I’m sorry if you feel I betrayed your trust.” I stopped short of attempting to justify my reasons. “I did what I thought was best at the time.”

  “Yes. I’m sure you did.” Her deadpanned response did nothing to assuage my guilt, which I’m sure was her intent.

  I took the list back to my desk and searched for anything to keep busy. I threw away my empty water bottle, collected my tea cup, and washed it in the bar sink.

  Beth walked over and rested a hip against the counter. “I’m pregnant.”

  I stopped breathing.

  Beth wouldn’t look at me and stared at the floor like a chastised child.

  I blew a long somber breath. God, could this situation get worse? She was three feet away. I wanted to hug her, soothe, and offer my congratulations on the baby. It was the right thing to do, but I just couldn’t. All I saw was Calvin behind bars, Beth, and now an innocent child, living with a lifetime of scandal.

  I stepped up and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “It’s wonderful news. I’m happy for you.”

  She reached for a napkin and wiped her cheeks. “I didn’t know about the baby when I accepted the job.” She moved away. Wandered around the room, trailed a finger over the back of a wingback. “I’d decided to stay and work on my marriage for the sake of our child. But this morning when Erica said Cal ran drugs, I finished packing and stuck with my plan. I stopped here, hoped you might tell me different. But you agree with Erica.” A tear leaked, then another, like a slow drip from a faucet that hadn’t been properly turned off. “I won’t raise a child under a cloud of suspicion. Savannah’s a small town. A father in jail would be devastating for his kid.”

  A hot tingling shame slid over my skin. This was the first time I’d considered how Cal’s arrest would affect anything beyond me and our company’s reputation. I moved to her side, put a consoling hand over hers and allowed the idea of Cal’s arrest to lie between us.

  “I have to get to Colorado.” Her voice gained control. She squeezed my hand. “You have to help me.”

  Cedar’s burner phone rang and saved me from responding. I answered, gave him a quick overview, and he asked to speak to Beth.

  I only heard Beth’s side of the conversation, but it appeared Cedar was in full witness preparation mode. Any response over four words was halted for clarification. By the time Beth hung up, she’d given details on the last six months of her life. “He said I could leave, but he warned if someone’s following me the Feds will know every move I make.”

  I was fairly sure, until Nathan Parsi had Cal in custody, neither Beth nor I would be free of the Feds. The unfairness of us being swept into Parsi’s net of suspects pricked a few holes in my moral compass. “We could go to Erica and lay out the reasons you’re moving.”

  Beth returned to the sofa and laid the back of her head on the cushion. “Is that what you think is best?” She looked ready to accept whatever I deemed appropriate.

  “Erica might be more understanding if you told her about the baby. You don’t look pregnant, and knowing Erica she’d ask for proof, but a pregnancy test would suffice.” I considered the idea, tossed it around. “It’d be a risk for her to trust you’re playing straight and not running to Calvin. And blind faith isn’t one of Erica’s virtues, but it might be worth the chance. Even if she believes you, it’s still probable she’ll assign surveillance until they find Calvin. “

  “If the DEA follows me to Colorado and my bosses find out, I’ll be fired.” She leaned forward. Came close to sticking her head between her knees.

  “Are you okay?ˮ I hurried over, sat beside her, and rubbed her back.

  “I’m all right.” She took a shaky breath.

  She didn’t look all right, but she was pregnant. Maybe her gray color was from nausea.

  I made a decision, rose, and grabbed a throwaway phone out of my bag. “Okay. I think I know how we can slip you out of town.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  I reached across my office sofa and gripped Beth’s hand. I tried giving her a we-got-this smile, but the walls of my chest seemed to have an internal tourniquet, and inhaling a breath next to impossible. “You want a cup of green tea? I have one that supposedly calms your nerves.”

  “No, thanks.” Her free hand moved over her stomach. “I’m not feeling well.”

  I gave her knee one last pat and went through it all again. I explained renting a car in either of our names would leave a trail the Feds could follow. But Pea, my sorority sister from Duke, owned a car dealership. She could sell a vehicle as a typical transaction. Holding the paperwork could easily be passed off as business as usual.

  I explained why the thirty grand she’d found in the suitcase should be left in the safe until we straightened out Cal’s mess. That up until now she’d done nothing wrong, but crossing state lines with drug money could be questionable. Her glassy eyes were unreadable, but she handed over the cash.

  The irony of me, a rule-following-by-the-book girl assisting Beth in her quest to disappear, and then tomorrow expecting Marshal Parsi to believe I had nothing to do with Cal’s disappearance or the company’s shady business practices, wasn’t lost on me or the migraine lying in wait.

  Beth picked up her water. She raised it ten inches before liquid sloshed over the side. She set the glass back on the table. I suspected neither of us would pull this plan off without the benefit of liquid courage. I went to the bar, opened the wine cooler, chose a bottle of my favorite Chablis, and poured two glasses. After handing her a glass, I took a long-needed sip.

  She kept her wine at arm’s length. “I’m pregnant.”

  “You need something to steady your nerves. One glass of wine won’t hurt the baby.” She studied the glass with the intensity of a jeweler seeing the Hope diamond for the first time.

  I nudged her hand toward her mouth. “It’ll be okay.”

  She took a cautious sip, then another.

  I couldn’t imagine why she accepted me as a medical authority. She was the nurse—I was a financial banker, and a Lamaze dropout who believed withholding drugs during childbirth should be on Homeland Security’s list of tortures.

  One of my four burner phones buzzed. I checked the number and verified the area code before answering.

  “This ducking under the radar business is expensive.” Peanut said, then rattled off two new phone numbers. “I’ve booked the rental. A gray Nissan Rogue will be parked in the alley behind a shop called the Twisty Sisters within the hour.”

  “I really appreciate this,” I said.

  “Tell me again why we’re breaking the law to help your lying-no-good cousin?”

  “We’re not doing this for Cal,” I said. “We’re helping Beth. And we’re not breaking the law.”

  “Yeah? Then why’d I just spend over a hundred dollars on drop phones?”

  “Drop phones?”

  “I watch Hunted,” she deadpanned. “I know the lingo.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about. “Using disposable phones is just a precaution. I think the Feds may have my home and office phones tapped.”

  “Katie-bug.” Pea’s voice reeked misgiving. “Your Jesus complex has got to go. You’re not on the earth to save the world. Your deadbeat cousin and his wife aren’t your responsibility.”

  Peanut and I had been roommates and best friends in college, but cau
ght up in our careers and family we’d drifted apart after marriage. We’d renewed our friendship over Facebook and our devastating divorces. “Beth and Calvin are family.”

  Peanut sighed. “And blood trumps all.”

  “Cedar’s going to help me sort everything out tomorrow. By this time next week, my life will be back to boring.”

  “Uh-huh. Well, just so you know this little foray is costing you a week in St. Moritz.” I thought I sensed a smile, but I could be wrong. “I expect to have daily in-room appointments with a hunky masseur.”

  Yeah, she was smiling. God, I missed her. “You got it.” I was fairly sure my next request was going to push the bounds of our sorority sisterhood. I rubbed a sweaty palm over my thigh. “One more thing. Do you happen to have ten thousand in cash lying around?”

  ****

  Beth and I chatted our way out of the office and down the sidewalk. Well, I chatted and kept a close eye on the white Chevy. All Beth managed was the occasional half-smile when prompted. Other than ordering a green tea instead of coffee at Starbucks, we followed the plan. We sipped and window-shopped the two blocks south to the Twisty Sisters Boutique. I opened the door, did a quick glance around, and didn’t see the Chevy. I pushed Beth through the door and a middle-aged clerk pounced.

  “Can I show you ladies anything?”

  I drew in air, stared into her expectant eyes, and little bubbles of hysteria in my throat popped. “We’re just looking.”

  I kept a firm hand on Beth’s shoulder and guided her to a dress rack against the back wall. Beth’s face was a little pale, and her mouth a little more firmed than usual, but otherwise she appeared almost normal. I held up a blue sundress the color of Owen’s eyes and the clerk oohed and aahed. I nudged Beth’s side, and right on cue she threw her hand over her mouth.

  “Oh, gosh.” I scanned the store, pretending to look for the restroom. “She’s pregnant.” I zeroed in on the back door. “Needs fresh air.” I dragged Beth five steps, held my breath, and pushed down the lever, thanked God the alarm didn’t sound, and pulled Beth into the alley.

  “Do you want a glass of water?” The sales clerk stood in the open doorway.

  I rubbed Beth’s back. “My car’s parked around the corner. I think she just needs to go home.”

  The clerk glanced from my face to the blue dress across my arm. I thrust the dress in her direction. “Can you hold this for me? I’ll come back later.”

  “Sure. What’s the name?”

  “Kate Landers.” I clamped my mouth. Probably shouldn’t have used my real name.

  The woman took the dress, gave Beth a pitying half-smile, and walked back inside.

  I spotted the Nissan Rogue parked two spaces down and opened the back passenger door. Fished keys from under the floor mat and handed them to Beth. “Give me your cell phone.”

  “Why?”

  “Mobile phones have GPS tracking. You can’t take it with you.” I pulled a Wal-Mart phone from my purse. “If you need to make a call, use this one. I’ve already put my number in the contacts. Don’t call any of my regular numbers, and don’t call anyone else you know on this phone.” I mimicked Ben’s instructions on the proper use of a burner.

  We hugged goodbye and she held on for an extra second before slipping behind the wheel. I tried to imagine what it would to be like to be pregnant and muster the will to move across the country with an ailing mother. My opinion of Beth had changed dramatically today.

  I waited until her taillights disappeared and then quickly disassembled her phone. I threw the receiver in a container of ice sitting inside a delivery truck, and the battery in a dumpster behind Leopold’s Ice Cream Shop. I slowly strolled back to the office.

  An empty red van claimed the Explorer’s old parking spot. The white Chevy circled the square and passed me. The driver administered an impressive neck stretch, hit the brakes, and turned around in her seat. It took great restraint not to wave.

  I stopped by the receptionist desk on the way to my office. “Where’s Sandy?”

  Jennifer, my assistant, tilted her head left then right until she nursed a muffled pop. “Sandy’s at her third doctor’s appointment this week.” Jennifer smiled slow and humorless. She tapped her pen on the desk. “Sandy needs a job that doesn’t require being present eight hours a day.” If an eye roll could be conveyed in a person’s voice, Jennifer had the tone nailed.

  I saw where this conversation was headed and switched subjects. “Anyone come in while I was gone?”

  “No.” She turned back to her computer screen. “Everyone’s left for the day, and I’m heading out. Will you be in tomorrow?”

  “I’ll be in around eight, but I have an eleven o’clock at Cedar Haynes’s office, and then I’m leaving for Florida.” Right after I spill my guts to Marshal Nathan Parsi.

  My stomach grumbled. I remembered skipping lunch and my scrambled eggs were long gone. I went back to my office and called the Thai restaurant down the street.

  While I waited for my food delivery, I sent another snotty text to Ben.

  —Earth to Ben. Call.—

  Then I compared Samantha’s printed monthly reports to the ones I’d saved earlier and found no glaring discrepancies. Twenty minutes later, I sat at Joseph’s desk, opened a container of lemon grass chicken, and stuffed a piece in my mouth. I stacked all the warehouse files together and thumbed through a multi-sectioned that rivaled the size of War and Peace. I fanned through the first half of the file and found not one paper in date order. Twenty years of records haphazardly stuffed inside. I pushed the chicken container to the corner of the desk and turned back to the beginning.

  I flipped each page in the file, searching for a current lease on the warehouse. Instead, I found invoices, cancelled checks, and brochures for loading docks and security systems. Entire sections of the brochures were underlined and the words transcribed on attached invoices; a wonderful example of creative accounting.

  I emptied drawers, pillaged file cabinets, and netted no leases. I sat back in my chair and dunked a soggy spring roll into hot mustard.

  The bookshelves in Joseph’s office held stacks of three-inch binders with thirty years of year-end statements and brochures. Joseph was big on large construction company full-color brochures. I began clearing the shelves, stacking reference and accounting books in one pile, family photos and plaques from the Chamber of Commerce in another. I stared at eight empty shelves and the burn that pooled like a bucket of gasoline in my stomach ignited.

  My mind raced with all I had to accomplish before meeting with Cedar, but my body sagged and was definitely on a different schedule. I needed caffeine. I turned on Joseph’s computer while my coffee brewed. Opened his document folder and stared at a blank screen. I tried scrolling, hit control keys, opened his email, and found no history. Not one email. I opened an accounting program and searched for files and reports he’d saved. Nothing.

  Joseph’s computer had been wiped clean.

  I opened the utility program, verified the hard drive hadn’t crashed, and looked up the date of the clean out. Friday—four days ago. My eyes rested on a family photograph sitting on the corner of Joseph’s desk. The last time I’d seen my property manager he’d mentioned his wife wanted to visit their daughter Jessica, or maybe Jessica planned to meet them somewhere. I couldn’t remember the details. Either way, four days ago, Joseph wasn’t in his office. Joseph wasn’t even in Savannah. My mind went numb.

  I needed a new plan. Maybe someone hacked the system, but why just clean Joseph’s computer? I couldn’t come up with a legitimate reason Joseph would have wiped his computer of all data. But there was one really good illegitimate reason. He was on the run.

  I filed the books and papers back where they belonged. Stuffed a citizen of the year award between a book on the merits of investing in REITs and a picture of Joseph, his son, and a man I didn’t know back on the shelf. I stood on my tiptoes and shoved the last book back in place and hit something hard. Using the book in my ha
nd, I fished out a four-inch thick white binder he’d kept stored behind a set of accounting books. I opened the notebook and a small thin black book fell to the floor.

  I picked up the book: Journey, a James Michener anomaly and one of the few weighing less than ten pounds. I thumbed through the pages, noted a few words scribbled in the margin. None of them had meaning, I wrote them down anyway. A photograph slipped to the floor. A picture of Joseph with his arm around a woman in a wedding dress. She was smiling at another man whom I assumed because of his tuxedo was the groom.

  The notebook neatly categorized Joseph’s personal bills by month. No extra paper here. There was a section marked hospital. Bills for his wife’s three bouts of ovarian cancer were neatly filed, each invoice in date order.

  A phone buzzed. I glanced at the three burner phones I’d lined across the top of the credenza.

  A text from Beth appeared on the screen of the third phone.

  —1 hr from AL line. Tired. Stop 4 night.—

  I texted back.

  —Remember—Tk out phone battery.—

  What happened after Joseph left town that made him or a hacker delete every file on his computer? If he was on the run, why wait to delete incriminating computer files and leave so many compromising hard copies in the files?

  His computer records might be toast, but Joseph was a pack rat. If I used twenty years of property records he’d left behind, county websites, and Samantha’s accounting reports, I could re-create most of the missing computer records. I opened the first bulging file, separated the pages in date order, and discarded the duplicate copies. Joseph was definitely a tree hater.

  At ten minutes to ten, I put the last file back in the drawer and forwarded a copy of my spreadsheet to Ben’s secret email account. I had no doubt the mainstay of our family business was laundering money. I tried to register the emotions bombarding my system, but they were all over the place. Surprise. Dread. Distrust. Sprinkled with a heavy dose of fear.

  I went back to my office, poured the last bit of Chablis into a glass, and drank every drop.