by Rick Pullen
“Nice place,” Beck said.
“Beachy. Not ostentatious,” Geneva replied. “It’s big, but it’s still comfortable. The senator has good taste.”
The old man stood outside, watching from his front porch, when Beck and Geneva finally walked back across his yard to retrieve their car.
“I’d sure like to rent it,” Beck said. “Do you know how we reach the property manager?”
“Like I told ya, I think it’s rented for the year,” the old man said. “Well, maybe next year.”
The man disappeared in his house and stepped back onto his front porch a moment later, handing Beck a scrap of paper.
“His name’s Casper Agee. Nice fella. Old as me. A bit scatterbrained. He sorta looks like that genius guy, Einstein. Hair out to here.” He held his hands far from his head. “He’s got an office over in George Town, not too far from the airport.”
“Thank you, mister . . . ?”
“Bridges,” the man said.
“I recognize the accent but can’t place it,” Beck said.
“Texas. San Antonio. You?”
“I’m Beck Rikki from Washington, DC.”
“Where all them damned politicians is from?”
“Guilty as charged.”
Beck shook the man’s hand, and they left.
Back in the car, Geneva rolled her eyes at him. “You’re quite the actor. I’m now your wife, and we want to rent a very expensive house. You’re rather clever.”
Beck grinned. He had his moments. “Stretching the truth to get at the truth isn’t all bad, although my editors would frown. They want everything on the up and up, but out in the real world, sometimes you need to use your wits to dig out the truth. A little sleight of hand does no harm. Besides, the hotel clerk already has us married. I thought I should acknowledge our Cayman nuptials.”
“And stopping at the neighbor’s?”
“I didn’t know if anyone would be watching and call the cops on a couple of trespassers. So l decided to give us a legitimate excuse for looking around. Instead of a suspicious neighbor, we have a cooperative one.”
She turned to him and caught his glance. “You know, you’re not as dumb as you look.”
“Deception comes with the job. I work in Washington, remember.”
“So who do you deceive next?”
“Follow my lead, lady. Just follow my lead.”
21
Beck called Casper Agee, trying to hear him over the blast of the small car’s overworked air conditioner. The air conditioner was cold. The rental agent’s response, lukewarm. He couldn’t meet until eleven thirty the following morning.
“That gives us the rest of the day to search land records,” Beck told Geneva.
“Sounds thrilling.” She smirked.
“Sarcasm? Really? About doing God’s work?”
“But land records?”
“Hey, it’s this land.” Beck nodded at the palms and lush green underbrush on the passing sand dunes as he kept two hands on the wheel. “In my business, we call it a paper trail. Just watch. It’s better than a movie. Promise.”
“I hope you brought the popcorn.”
They wound back across the island’s narrow sunburned roads to George Town and hunted down the Land Registry Office. Beck was familiar with US land records but unsure what he faced in this British colony. He found a stout, aging clerk who explained how the records were organized. They were similar enough. He shouldn’t have problems doing his research.
“Will tax stamps on the deeds give me the value of the property?” Beck asked the clerk.
“Not only the property value. Our records also contain tax stamps for leases,” she explained. The clerk handed Beck a map of the island and corresponding tax rates and then led him and Geneva to a large room with rows of floor to ceiling shelves of dusty deed books and rows of almost-new computers on a long oak table in the middle of the room. She left them on their own.
It was similar to a court clerk’s office back home, Beck thought. The newer deeds were now on a computer; the older ones in the oversize printed volumes. The computer would do. At most, he figured, he needed to look at land records going back a decade.
“What did that woman just say?” Geneva asked.
“It’s simple,” Beck replied. “We can determine real estate values as well as the values of property rental leases from land deeds on file right here.”
“So?”
“Just hang with me. This is where the fun begins.” “You were right a while back.” Geneva shook her head and snickered at him.
“About what?”
“You really are a nerd.”
Beck sighed loudly, making sure she caught his feigned annoyance. He immediately went to work. He sat at one of the computer terminals and clicked the keyboard. “Look here.” He pointed to the screen as Geneva peered over his shoulder. “Jersey Shore Ltd. purchased the house four years ago from a company called Sunrise Meridian.”
He noticed the page menu allowed him to search other government records, so he pulled up the buyer’s incorporation papers. “Right here. See. Bayard and his wife are sole owners of Jersey Shore.” Beck typed in more, and another document popped up on the screen. “Aha. Check this out. The seller, Sunrise Meridian, is a subsidiary of a company called XAX Ltd. in Venezuela. And isn’t this nice. They even provide a full list of all of Sunrise Meridian’s corporate officers. They’re all from Venezuela too. See, I told you this would be fun.”
Geneva sat in the chair beside him in front of an adjacent computer. “Okay, so Bayard sets up a family business to buy his house.”
“Patience. Being an investigative reporter takes time and perseverance. One fact at a time. Each piece of evidence leads to the next question.”
“Which is?”
Beck wondered how she could be so clueless. Was she just not paying attention or was she deliberately provoking him? “The question is who is this Venezuelan company and why did they use a subsidiary to sell Bayard the house? Are they connected to that Pentagon contract bid? If so, I think I just may have my story.”
He checked his cell and called Nancy at the office. “Is Woodard still in South America? Could he check some business records for me?” Bobby Woodard was a long-time foreign correspondent for the Post-Examiner.
“Shit,” Nancy said. “I was talking to the international desk this morning. Jim McKnight told me Woodard just finished covering an oil ministries meeting in Caracas and left yesterday.”
“You got contact info? I’ll see if he can get ahold of one of his stringers to dig out some details.” Beck hoped Bobby had a decent stringer correspondent in Caracas.
Beck gave her all of the XAX information he had and did his best to pronounce the Sunrise Meridian officers’ names, which were in Spanish. He finally gave up and spelled them individually. Oh, how he regretted not being more diligent in Professor Harding’s Spanish 101. Damn, had he only known how important being bilingual would be in the twenty-first century.
Nancy told him to call her back tomorrow and hung up. Beck explained the conversation to Geneva.
“So you think this Sunrise Meridian company is tied to my contract—our contract—if this XAX company has a Bayard connection,” Geneva said. “Precisely.”
“Well, then, we just have to wait for word from your office. We’re done for the day.”
“Hardly.” Beck shook his head in mocking frustration. “We need to see what else is hidden in these documents.”
Since his assistant seemed bored, it was time to put her to work. Beck showed Geneva how to thumb through ten years of land deed indexes. She worked the computer and quickly found Sunrise Meridian owned a dozen other properties on the island. He then explained how to trace the deeds back to a previous owner and follow that trail back for decades.
She dug in and picked up on the process quickly. After a few miscues learning the system, she got so interested in one property she traced its ownership back to the old deed books. She pul
led three of them from their berths on the wall and followed the paper trail until it ran out more than one hundred years ago. She carried each large book in front of her at her waist like a clothes basket filled with clean towels. They were so heavy, she stood on tiptoes to ease them onto the slanted coun-tertop where she could open and read them.
Beck watched her from behind as her sundress rode up the back of her tanned legs when she lifted the books. God, she was a beautiful distraction, he thought. He was glad to see her finally engage in his passion. Now if he could just curb his own so they wouldn’t end up in bed all afternoon.
“I hate to admit it, but this is kinda fun, like a treasure hunt,” she said a few moments later as she sat back in her chair in front of the computer. “A new discovery on every page. I can see how you might get hooked on doing this type of thing. It’s like tracing a family tree, only it’s a piece of land. Too bad a woman can’t use this method to research the dirt on her man’s history. This only proves helpful finding the dirt under his feet.”
“Ooooh. That sounds dangerous,” Beck said. “Not sure many guys would like their past deeds recorded.”
“Imagine all of the heartache we could avoid.” She was typing as she talked.
“If it helps at all, you’re not just looking through deeds, but deeds of trust.”
“Even better,” she said. “Of course then the question becomes academic. What woman ever trusted a man’s deeds?” She did not acknowledge her failed wisecrack, but kept her eyes concentrated on her screen and feverishly pounded her keyboard.
Beck turned to his own terminal and quickly found Sunrise Meridian had recently sold off four of its properties: a condo, the house on the ocean, some acreage, and a shopping center—all to Bayard’s Jersey Shore company. He printed copies of all of the transactions.
“Look at these,” he said, handing the pages to Geneva. “According to these deeds of trust, Bayard purchased eight million dollars worth of property in four years. Where in the world did he get that kind of money?”
“His combined mortgage payments for all of those properties would cost him more than his monthly salary,” Geneva said.
Now she was starting to tune in, Beck thought. “And his financial disclosure documents back in DC show his net worth at no more than two million dollars. Something doesn’t fit.”
Geneva was still looking over the paper copies. “And look at this. Look who the lender is.”
“Let me see that.” Beck grabbed the pages out of her hands. “I can’t believe it.” The answer was right in front of him, but he had been so blinded by Bayard’s name on all of the deeds of trust, he hadn’t read through the documents to find the most important name. “Son of a bitch. Not only did Sunrise Meridian sell Bayard the properties, it financed them as well. Good catch.”
“But what does that mean?” Geneva looked at him as if she were lost again.
“Maybe nothing and maybe everything. Find out if Bayard leases out all of these properties.”
Geneva keyed in the information and quickly found Sunrise Meridian was leasing back all of them.
“Bingo. Print it out,” said Beck. “I have a hunch if we do the math, we will get to the bottom of this scam very quickly.”
“What do you think you will find?” Geneva asked as they waited for all of the documents to print.
“What if Sunrise Meridian leases the properties back for the same amount of money—or more—as Bayard’s monthly mortgage payments to Sunrise?” Beck asked.
“Oh, I get it.”
“Exactly. They’re actually giving Bayard the real estate for free—for nothing—but he’s covered his ass by making it look like he’s buying it. It’s just a fancy, more complicated form of bribery instead of stuffing dollar bills in his pocket. But it’s still a bribe.”
“A very big bribe.”
“In exchange for some very big numbers in the Pentagon contract.” Beck did the math on his cell phone. “Look at this.” He showed Geneva the figures. “The rents paid to Bayard are higher than his mortgage payments to Sunrise Meridian.” Beck could feel the adrenaline running through his veins. “I can’t believe it. He’s really doing it.”
Geneva looked at him. He could tell she was puzzled. “Beck? What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I’m not sure what I expected, but I just really didn’t think he would actually do it. It’s just so big. So audacious. This guy’s got the biggest balls of any politician I’ve ever seen in my entire career. It’s so presumptuous. I’ve never seen a payoff this gigantic. The money we are talking about is crazy. It’s in the millions. And he thought he could actually get away with it.”
“Well, he has up until now,” Geneva said.
“Yes, but as you discovered, it’s all documented. Maybe you were wrong. Maybe you can dig into a man’s past.”
Beck was still trying to wrap his arms around what they had found. Right here in this sunshine-drenched island playground just outside the United States, an American politician has created an international operation to enrich himself while running for president. What exactly does that mean?
“We still don’t know who is behind all of this money,” Geneva said.
“Who is this XAX?”
“We need to wait to hear from Nancy. Maybe Bobby’s stringer will pick up some clues down in Venezuela.”
Geneva wrinkled her brow and gazed at Beck. “What?” he asked.
“I don’t know if this is important.” Geneva hesitated, uncertainty on her face. “I noticed all of the documents were filed by the same law firm, Roger Kindred and Associates. Does that mean anything?”
“What did you find?”
“Roger Kindred incorporated both the seller, Sunrise Meridian Ltd., and the buyer, Jersey Shore Ltd. His law firm also filed all of the deeds. It’s like he’s the only lawyer on this island.”
“That can’t be a coincidence,” Beck said. “That must be the local connection.” Beck felt like kicking himself. He hadn’t been paying close enough attention. Geneva was turning out to be a very able assistant as well as a beautiful distraction.
Without saying a word, he stood and walked over to the clerk and grabbed a dog-eared paper telephone book sitting atop her desk. She glanced up at him showing little interest. He found Kindred’s office number and punched it in his cell phone. While the phone was ringing, he handed the clerk his copies, and she tallied what he owed on a scratch pad. He held the phone to his ear as it continued to ring and managed to pay the clerk before someone finally answered.
Kindred’s secretary said he would be free at three o’clock the following day to discuss Mr. Rikki’s interest in buying real estate. He hung up and turned to find Geneva practically in his face.
“More playacting? Who are we this time?” she asked.
“Just a tourist interested in buying some real estate,” he said. “Be good to me, or I won’t let you attend my next performance.”
“But don’t I have a supporting role? After all, I am your leading lady.”
More than you know, thought Beck. “Good point. I guess your understudy isn’t available.”
“Humph.” Geneva displayed a facetious pout that slowly grew into a broad grin. “Are we done yet? I’d like to take you back to the hotel and do awful things to you. I’ll be your understudy—until I decide to get on top.”
If only, thought Beck. “Not yet. Let’s go to the beach.”
“Skinny-dipping?”
“Don’t tempt me.”
They headed out the door for their rental car. In the middle of the parking lot, Beck realized he was empty-handed. “Did you pick up the copies by any chance?”
“I thought you did.”
“Hell. Be right back.” He tossed her the car keys so she could get out of the heat. Beck then bounded up the stairs and pushed through the government building’s heavy door. He startled the clerk who was still seated at her desk and now on the phone. She quickly hung up in midsentence.
“Sorry. I
left my copies.” He looked to her in affirmation and gestured at the stack on the edge of her otherwise clear desk.
She looked at him with a forced smile, her eyes creased under her wire-rimmed glasses. He grabbed his copies, slapped the rolled-up pages on his wrist, and nodded a thank-you to her. Then he pivoted and walked out.
Funny, he thought, he was almost certain he heard her say the name Bayard over the phone.
22
Beck pressed hard on the gas pedal. He took the curves and straightaways in the small rental car like a grand prix driver, heading back in the direction of Bayard’s waterfront mansion. He was comfortable now driving on the left and decided to use it to his advantage, zigzagging along the south side of the island again.
Geneva grasped the handle above her door and pressed her right hand against the dashboard to steady herself. “Beck, really.”
“Sorry. I can’t wait for the next clue,” he said. “Mystery buff in me, I guess.” He slowed down.
Beck had copied the plat of the acreage Bayard purchased and brought it with them. Future building lots and roads were outlined, and he remembered a winding road that bisected the property. He found it on his island map, and in just twenty minutes, he was braking the rental car, searching for a wide enough space to pull over.
They stepped out of the Ford into the sizzling sunshine and humid air. A breeze gave a hint of relief. Beck slipped on his baseball cap and looked around. Geneva tugged on her wide-brimmed straw hat and tucked her hair up underneath.
He looked down at the plat. “Well, this is it,” he said. His arm swung out in the direction of the vacant land covered occasionally with tall brush and scrub pines climbing rugged sand dunes.
“This is what?”
Beck said nothing but continued to gaze across the acreage. “This is my Pulitzer Prize.” An air of triumph filled his voice.
“Your what?”
“This is the real bribe,” Beck said. “The house was nothing. This is worth millions today and tens of millions tomorrow. Bayard has set himself up for the good life. This is forty-seven acres of prime land just begging to be developed. Close to a hundred building lots here.”