The Taxman Killeth

by Mitchell, Mary Ann

  Amy prickled.

  “What about him?”

  “Is he gone?”

  “Yeah. He left the office right after the partners told him to vacate.”

  “Good, because I don’t like the idea of your hanging around the guy.”

  “Why? You do think he’s involved, don’t you? I have his address, but you’d better hurry and talk to him, because he and Teddy are loading boxes with—”

  “I thought you said he wasn’t in the office anymore.”

  “He isn’t.”

  “You went to his home after I told you to stay out of this.”

  “They as much as admitted they had something going on. Teddy’s afraid the partners are going to ax him next.”

  “Damn it, Amy, stop making yourself so visible. I don’t want to have to worry about what might happen to you. Amy, listen, I’m out on the street and scrounging around for information. Bits and pieces may be starting to fall into place, but I’ll never be able to string it all together if you’re a distraction. Please, go to work, do your job, as you did before you knew me.”

  “How can I, when I’m terrified of what might become of you?”

  “I need all my brain power to work this one out. I can’t be wondering what trouble you’re getting into.”

  “Okay. Okay. But will you at least take Stu’s address?”

  Todd did, reluctantly. Somehow his instincts were telling him it was a useless detour. He got her to grudgingly promise not to go near Stu, or to question Teddy. He hoped she didn’t come up with another suspect to harass.

  Chapter 16

  The Male Mata Hari

  Amy lay back in her bed and reviewed the cast of characters. Stu and Teddy were prime suspects. Pickens might know something but was certainly not the ringleader type. More likely he had been used to set Todd up. She remembered how Pickens had asked to work with Teddy. Pickens was low on the list but not crossed-off. Most of the other people in the office hadn’t even had contact with Todd, except for Trudy, and she was too ditzy to be involved in such a complicated crime. Outside the office there was Jennie, Todd’s sister. Amy totally wiped her name from her list of potential perpetrators. Jennie’s husband, Michael, was a bad breed, but he had no connection with her office. Besides, his brain was probably the size of a pea. There was someone she was forgetting. She counted the people on her fingers. Her voice resounded in the darkened bedroom. Roger Davidson’s name sprang to her lips.

  The next morning Amy called in sick. Both Teddy and Pickens would probably be relieved not to have to walk giant circles around her.

  She spent a portion of the morning completing tasks that had been put off. Then she took a cable car to Roger Davidson’s office building. When she got off the elevator, she noticed the same piece of paper taped to the wall directing her to Davidson’s office. The paper was a bit wilted and extra tape had been added to keep it from completely curling up. The chalk mark on the door was smudged and almost unreadable, but she immediately recognized the place when she opened the door.

  Row on row of desks stood before her. Near where Roger sat was a vacated desk chair. She marched back and swept the rolling chair over to Roger Davidson’s desk. When he looked up at her, she thought his already pallid face had blanched a lighter shade.

  “I told you I know nothing.”

  Amy sat down and stared at him.

  “I shouldn’t even be speaking to you, Miss...”

  “Amy Simpson.”

  “Miss Simpson.” He pulled his eye glasses off and dropped them on top of a folder he had just closed. “Did he send you again?”

  “No. I’m worried about him.”

  “Don’t be. Stay away from him. Forget anything he may have told you.”

  “Mr. Davidson, I’m not giving up.” Amy heard a throat clear behind her. Evidently the owner of the chair was back from her break. The woman was middle-aged going on one hundred. She wore sensible shoes, baggy stockings, and a black loose-fitting dress. A pair of 1950’s style eyeglass frames hung around her neck. The only thing missing was a bun on top of her head. Instead her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, stretching the skin on the sides of her face. Amy couldn’t tell what color the woman’s eyes were, since they were shrouded by make-up-free lashes into a squint. A stain of lipstick barely covered the woman’s thin lips.

  Roger immediately suggested that he and Amy go to lunch. He reached into his bottom desk drawer and pulled out a brown paper bag, and Amy carefully rolled the chair back to the woman’s desk and heard a strident tsk as she and Roger departed.

  He wouldn’t speak until they reached a small park. There he dusted a bench with a pocket handkerchief and invited Amy to sit down.

  “I always bring extra for afternoon break,” he said, offering her a triangularly cut sandwich.

  “No, thank you.”

  “Are you sure? I can run out at three and pick up some fruit at the deli.”

  “No, really. I had a late breakfast; I’m not hungry yet.”

  Roger unwrapped the triangle. It looked like some sort of dried-out white meat trapped between two slices of dark whole-wheat bread. There didn’t seem to be any lettuce or mayonnaise. No frills.

  “The police are still looking for Todd.”

  He nodded, chewing the bite he had just taken.

  “I’d like to be able to tell him something the next time he calls.”

  Shocked, Roger looked directly into her face for the first time that day. “I don’t want to hear this, Miss...”

  “Amy.”

  “Shh! I’m forgetting your name as a favor to you. I think you’ve been tricked into helping the man. He’s always been attractive to women. It’s not hard for him to get them to fall for his lines and cooperate. He was useful like that.”

  Amy felt very small. Todd had admitted that he had initially asked her to dinner in order to have access to the firm’s files. But when she recalled his heavenly strokes, she refused to accept that she wasn’t any different from the rest.

  “He had a way of making women feel special,” Roger continued. “That’s how you feel, don’t you?”

  He was reading her mind or her expression. Amy looked down at the ground.

  “He was our male Mata Hari. And I have no doubt that he enjoyed the job. Joey used to wish Todd’s charisma would rub off on him. But Joey had his special purpose.”

  “And what was that?”

  “Guess it doesn’t matter if I tell you now. He was a specialist in low-life.”

  “I’ve been to some of the bars he frequented.”

  Amy sensed Roger move a hair’s breadth away from her. She looked up at his non-expressive face to respond.

  “I wanted to see if I could collect some information that might help Todd.”

  “Miss, ordinarily I wouldn’t bother talking to you. But given the fact that you’ll no doubt hound me if I don’t, plus the fact that you look like a nice person, I’ll warn you against having anything to do with Todd Coleman.”

  “Why? Someone has to help him out of this situation. You refuse, after sending him into this mess.”

  “Me? I didn’t send him anywhere.”

  “Okay. Todd told me that it was some contact that only Joey knew.”

  “Initially I felt sorry for Todd and I asked around. There was no job. Todd made the whole thing up.”

  “That can’t be. Obviously it was too much of a secret to share with you.”

  “I may not look the part, but I’m fairly high-up and trusted. They would have told me, and they would have used me as the contact. Joey and Todd both got their directions from me. No one else.”

  “This is a cover-up, isn’t it? The plan didn’t succeed, so now you’re abandoning him. He told me you would.”

  “Coleman told you that because he knows there was no assignment. Don’t let him make a fool of you. I’m surprised he’s still in town.”

  “Todd wants to find Joey’s killer.”

  “He is the killer.” Amy was
about to deny that statement when Roger interrupted her. “It took me a long time to come to that conclusion. I had liked him. Knew him and Joey were close. I often thought they were too close to be working together. Maybe something went sour between them. There’s a hint of some illegal dealings. We found out Joey was deeply in debt and was ready to do whatever he could to save himself, including cheating his partner.”

  “They had a small export business.”

  “It was what they were importing that caught some officials’ eyes.”

  “Illegal aliens?”

  “Drugs.”

  “You’re wrong!” Amy’s voice was raised and crackling with emotion.

  “Quiet. I’m doing you a favor.”

  “No! You’re lying!”

  “His brother-in-law was a heavy hitter on the drug scene a few years ago.”

  “And he stopped dealing when Todd threatened to report him to the authorities.”

  “Is that what Todd told you?”

  “No, his sister told me the story. She said that her husband hasn’t dealt in drugs ever since.”

  “Doesn’t he? Listen, don’t accept any calls from Coleman. Don’t meet him anyplace.” Amy shook her head. “Or one day I might remember your name.” Roger bit into his sandwich. He laid the rest of the portion on the plastic wrap and reached into his bag to take out a small bottle of spring water. Amy silently watched. “I’d rather not. Remember your name. I like the way you look. Joey was right, Todd got all the lucky breaks.” He twisted off the cap from the plastic bottle and took a sizable swig of the water.

  Amy was frightened. She worried that she had put Todd in danger. Could they have already tapped her phone line? Then she realized that Todd had always called from a public telephone. She’d make it a point to keep all conversations short in the future, perhaps set up a secret rendezvous where they could share information.

  “What are you people doing to find Joey’s murderer?”

  “That’s the San Francisco Police Department’s job, not ours.”

  “He was one of your agents.”

  “I told you they were into drugs. It had nothing to do with their work for us.” After finishing one of the sandwiches, Roger pulled out a bruised apple and was about to take a bite but hesitated. Instead he put the apple back in the bag. “I’ve got to get back to work. Listen, I’d like it if you’d forget you ever heard about or met me. I’ll reciprocate the favor.” When Amy didn’t answer Roger shook his head. “Damned if I can understand why some woman would want to tie up with Todd Coleman.” He got up and walked to a trash basket, where he dropped his plastic wrap and plastic water bottle. Then he went off down the street and back to work.

  Amy was left worrying her bottom lip. They’ve abandoned him. Todd had known they would. He had also put her in contact with his sister. Had even asked that she stay in touch with the sister, perhaps to act as an unwitting go-between in their sordid schemes, she thought. She was beginning to have doubts. Why had he selected her? And why her law firm? Confused, Amy headed for home.

  A block away from her house Amy saw a familiar dark shape panhandling in the street. She didn’t know whether to run in the opposite direction or hug him. The latter would have looked inappropriate in this neighborhood. Amy kept walking.

  “Hey, Miss, spare some change?”

  She reached inside her purse and pulled out a quarter. She was about to drop it into his outstretched palm when he muttered an address and time to her.

  “Thank you.”

  Amy nodded and continued on to her apartment, where she quickly wrote down the address before she could forget. She fretted over whether or not she should meet him. Roger Davidson might be right. He might be giving her good advice, advice her mother would have given her, most probably. Amy decided to keep her appointment with Todd.

  The address belonged to an old Victorian house at the end of a dead-end street. The front yard was neatly mowed, and wisteria grew along the balustrade of the porch. The house was painted a baby pink with white trim, and most of the windows still had the original wavy glass. There were no lights on inside the house, although twilight was settling all around. There was a note attached to the free-standing mailbox, reminding the post person that mail was being held at the post office.

  Oh, my God, she thought, he’s broken in to a stranger’s house. Amy couldn’t believe how careless the residents of the house had been to advertise their departure.

  The dog next door barked, forcing Amy to decide whether to go up to the door or return home. She hurried down the cracked cement path and climbed the unpainted wooden stairs. The knocker was oddly shaped. It seemed to have the body of a dragon and the head of a eagle. Whoever owned the house must be a bit strange, she thought as she raised her hand to touch the dragon’s long tail. However, the door opened a crack before she touched the iron knocker. Then the door opened wide enough to allow her to enter. The interior was full of evening shadows, but there was no sign of Todd. Once she was beyond the door, she felt a body move behind her to close and lock the door.

  “Todd?” she asked, afraid to turn around in case it wasn’t him.

  He spun her around to face him and kissed her full on the mouth. There was a pleasant, soapy smell, and his tongue tasted of sweet chocolate. He dropped his head to nuzzle in the curve of her neck and to nip at her earlobe.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Like it?” he asked huskily.

  She wasn’t sure whether he meant what he was doing or the house. But she knew what had to be clarified first.

  “Did you break in here?”

  Todd pulled away, a shocked look on his face.

  “Me? No,” he hissed.

  “You’ve been known to...”

  “Yes, I have the ability to break into this place, but I didn’t have to. I had the key.”

  “You stole the key?”

  “Why must you always think I’ve done something wrong?”

  “But this couldn’t be your place, or you wouldn’t have dared to come near here.”

  “It’s a friend’s.”

  “The friend is letting you hide out here. That’s wonderful. It’s so much better than that awful neighborhood I found you in.”

  “Hmmmm.”

  “Your friend left the note for the mailman to keep others away?”

  Todd had moved down the hall. He beckoned her to follow. They entered a large wood-paneled room. A chandelier with real candles hung down from the center of the ceiling. The room looked as though it had once been someone’s library, but now it contained knickknacks on the rows of shelves. A few leather-bound books were scattered across a cocktail table, which rested on a richly colored Persian rug. Todd sat down on a couch that had an off-white slipcover. Two matching chairs were placed across from the couch.

  “Come sit down,” he said, tossing several throw pillows up against the opposite arm of the couch.

  Unsettled by Roger Davidson’s warning, she almost opted for one of the chairs but stopped herself, knowing that would make him suspicious. Instead she sat down next to him and grabbed one of the pillows to fondle.

  “What’s the matter, Amy, has something happened?”

  “No, Todd. I feel awkward in this place. It seems so...”

  “Overdone. Kay does everything that way.”

  “Who’s Kay?”

  “She’s a friend of mine and the owner of this house.”

  Amy’s muscles tightened. Todd noticed.

  “An old friend. We met about ten years ago during one of my investigations and have remained friends ever since.”

  “Is that typical?”

  Todd laughed. “You’ll splinter your teeth if you don’t relax that jaw.” Todd rubbed the back of his fingers against the softness of her skin. He had missed the feel of her. He wanted to kick the rest of those damn throw pillows off the couch and make love to her, but he kept his emotions under control. “Kay and I had a brief fling way back when. We liked each other too muc
h to continue the affair.”

  “What?”

  “I’m getting myself in deeper, aren’t I? What I meant is that there was no way the relationship would have turned into anything permanent, but we didn’t want our friendship to sour, so we...”

  “Stopped making love.”

  How was he going to be able to explain the difference between Kay and Amy without making a commitment for which he wasn’t ready?

  “It has nothing to do with our...”

  “Fling.”

  “I don’t think of us like that.” Todd saw that Amy’s cheeks were flushed a deep rouge. Her green eyes had turned a shade darker. “Amy, I care about you, more than I ever felt for Kay.”

  “Or any of the other women you ran across in the line of duty?”

  “What the hell are you talking about? I go to all the trouble to set this meeting up. I even risked calling your office. When I was told you weren’t there and couldn’t get you at home I stood on that street corner waiting for you to return to your place.”

  “Make any money?”

  “Damn, what’s the matter with you? You’ve been whining about wanting to see me. I thought you would be thrilled.”

  “To meet you in an ex-girlfriend’s house? How did you manage to manipulate her into giving you the key, anyway?”

  “I’ve had the key for years. And she’s a photographer who always goes away to Europe this time of year.”

  “So you did break in!”

  “I told you I had the key.”

  “A technicality. She doesn’t know a murderer is hiding out in her house.”

  Todd slapped the cushions with the palms of his hands and rose. “Get the hell out.”

  Words knotted in her throat. Amy stood up and dropped the pillow back down on the couch. Her hand reached out for him, but he moved away to the far corner of the room. Before she crossed the room’s threshold, he called her back.

  “Wait! I’m not going to have my sister suffer because of you.” Todd moved to the cocktail table, opened the thickest of the leather bound books, pulled out a fat white envelope and carried it to where she stood. “Give this to Jennie.”

  Robotically she took the envelope.