“What are you doing here?” he shouted.
Good grief. How was I supposed to run a covert operation with a homicide detective hanging around my car?
“Get in,” I shouted back.
He circled the car and climbed into the passenger seat.
“You nearly gave me a heart attack,” I said, and rubbed the top of my head. “And maybe a concussion.”
“What are you doing here?” Nick demanded.
I wasn’t feeling particularly generous of spirit right now.
“What are you doing here?” I shot back.
He huffed. “You know better than to get involved in this.”
I gasped. How had Nick found out about my parents’ affair?
“How could I not get involved?” I demanded.
“Because it doesn’t concern you,” he said.
“Doesn’t concern me?” I repeated at the top of my lungs. “Have you lost your mind?”
Nick looked at me, paused for a few seconds then said, “We’re not talking about the same thing, are we?”
No way was I admitting to anything.
“You first,” I said.
Nick shifted in the seat and frowned, then nodded across the street and down the block.
“I was here questioning Eric Hunter,” he said.
“Eric?” I sat up straighter in the seat. “Eric lives here?”
I looked at the houses that lined the street. Massive two-story homes with crystal chandeliers visible through vestibule fanlights, paved circular driveways, lush landscaping with fountains and sculptures.
“My gosh,” I mumbled. “How much is Mid-America paying him?”
“A lot more than cops get paid,” Nick said.
“Maybe I should move into management,” I said.
“His wife has that shop downtown,” Nick pointed out.
“Yeah, but it’s only been open a short while. It can’t be earning this kind of money yet,” I said. “It has to be Eric’s bonuses. They must be huge. No way could he afford a place like this on a branch manager’s salary alone.”
A minute or two passed while we both stared at the houses.
“Why are you here questioning Eric?” I asked.
Nick shrugged. “Routine.”
I doubted that was true and wondered if Nick suspected Eric of Jerry’s murder, as I did.
“Have you found the suspect vehicle?” I asked. “Did it show up in the neighborhood? At a body shop?”
“No,” Nick said. “Whoever has the car is either hiding it, or drove it up to the desert and burned it.”
“Any other leads?” I asked.
Nick sighed. “Just a lot of people Donavan owed money to.”
From what I knew of Jerry, that list must be a long one.
“You still haven’t told me why you’re here,” Nick said.
If I’d felt closer to Nick I would have confided in him about my parents’ marital problem.
“Mid-America might have to foreclose,” I said, and nodded to the closest house. “I’m doing a property look-up.”
“In the dark?”
It was really hard to get a lie over on a homicide detective. Still, I wasn’t going to back down.
“It’s just preliminary right now,” I told him.
Nick grunted. I knew he didn’t believe me.
It seemed like a good time to change the subject.
“I talked to my brother,” I said. “He remembered Eric from high school. Said he had a psycho girlfriend. Do you remember her?”
Nick thought for a few seconds. “Doesn’t sound familiar.”
My brother and Eric, and maybe his girlfriend, were a year ahead of Nick, so I wasn’t surprised he didn’t remember her.
What happened to her? I wondered. Did she still think about him and wonder what-if?
“Want to get some dinner?” Nick asked.
Yes. Oh, yes. I wanted to go. I wanted to sit across the table from Nick and share a special evening with him. I wanted him to take me in his arms, hold me, make me feel safe and secure, and chase all my problems away.
I wanted him to tell me what had gone on with Katie Jo Miller back in high school so all those wonderful things could happen.
“No, thanks,” I said.
Nick nodded slowly. I wondered if he was having some of those same thoughts I’d just had. If so, he’d pushed them aside as I had done.
Or maybe he hadn’t.
Nick leaned closer and pressed his palm against my cheek. My heart fluttered. He kissed me on the lips. Nice. Really nice.
“I haven’t made-out in a car since high school,” I whispered.
Nick trailed kisses along my jaw. “Want to get in the back seat?”
“Yes—no. No,” I said, and eased away.
He sat back and gave me a half-grin.
“Stay out of trouble,” Nick said, and climbed out of my car.
I started the engine and pulled away. Nick stood on the sidewalk, watching. I stared into the rearview mirror until he disappeared from view.
He’d told me to stay out of trouble. I had no intention of doing that. In fact, I just might cause some trouble.
I intended to find out if Mick Dudley actually existed.
* * *
I accessed the photo on my cell phone that I’d taken of Mick Dudley’s loan application, and punched the address into my GPS. The route took me back toward Bonita, then south on the freeway for a twenty-minute drive to the town of Hayward. I exited and wound through the streets until my GPS announced that I’d arrived at my destination.
The neighborhood consisted of small, wood-frame houses built at least sixty years ago. Some of the owners had restored their homes back to their original beauty. Not this one, I saw as I stopped in front of what was supposed to be Mick Dudley’s house. The porch roof sagged, two windows were broken out, and the yard was waist high. Nobody had lived here for a very long time.
My GPS next took me to what was supposed to be the machine shop a couple of miles away where Mick Dudley worked. The gravel of the parking lot crunched beneath my tires as I pulled in. My headlights lit up the building and illuminated a “for rent” sign that hung crooked in one of the dust-covered windows.
An icky feeling swept over me.
Either Mick Dudley actually existed and had intentionally given false information to obtain a loan he never planned to repay, or Eric Hunter had fabricated the customer and pocketed the loan proceeds.
While cheating the system by making loans and keeping the money was grounds for termination at Mid-America, it wasn’t a criminal act—unless the company chose to bring charges, which wasn’t likely due to the publicity—so I couldn’t see how this related to Jerry’s murder.
But maybe I didn’t know everything yet.
I knew a place to check out.
I headed back to the freeway and drove north, then exited on State Street and made my way to Dayton Avenue, one of Santa Flores’ main arteries. This section of the city changed from block to block, with upscale furniture and home décor stores, doctor and dentist offices giving way to tattoo parlors, discount T-shirt shops, hot dog stands with picnic tables out front, and bars. It was hardly the kind of neighborhood I felt safe in after dark, but tonight I was willing to risk it.
Only a half-dozen cars were in the parking lot of the Buccaneer Bar when I pulled in. I found a space near the entrance under the lot’s only security light and went inside.
The place was dark, lighted mostly by neon beer signs. Booths lined the back wall, the bar stood on the right, and tables and chairs were scattered in between. Everything looked worn and scarred. Whatever had inspired the owner to name the place the Buccaneer was no longer in evidence.
Two of the booths were occupied, as were a couple of tables; three guys sat at the bar watching a basketball game on the only TV. I slid onto a stool at the opposite end of the bar. The bartender walked over and frowned.
“I paid you this month, Dana,” he said.
Francis Malloy was a big guy in his forties, with a shaved head and tattoos on both arms.
“I know,” I said, and smiled. “I keep an eye on your account.”
Francis had an account with Mid-America and had fallen behind on his payments a few months ago. I’d tried to work with him but he refused to return my calls—until I’d showed up here at the bar one night and confronted him.
I guess my courage in coming to a place like this had impressed Francis because he started making his payments pretty regularly after that. I’d stopped by the few times he’d fallen behind, and he’d always paid me out of the register.
That’s how I happened to run into Jerry Donavan here. He’d been a regular. We’d chatted every time I’d come to collect Francis’ payment.
“Beer?” Francis asked.
I was tempted but shook my head.
He frowned. “Don’t tell me you’re still on the clock.”
“Sort of,” I said. “Did you hear about Jerry Donavan?”
Francis blew out a heavy breath. “Bad deal, all way around.”
“Had he mentioned any problems lately?” I asked.
“Just the same old things. The ex-wives. The kids. Money. But, hell, everybody worries about that stuff.”
I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was a connection between Jerry and Eric that went well beyond Jerry’s contract with Mid-America to do appraisal reports. I pulled out my cell phone and swiped the screen until I came to the photo taken the night of Eric’s birthday celebration. It was a group shot, all of us leaning in and smiling while the waiter took our picture.
“How about this guy?” I asked, holding up my phone and pointing to Eric. “Has he been in, maybe?”
“That guy?” Francis chuckled. “He’s way too pretty for a place like this.”
So much for that idea.
I dropped my phone in my handbag and said, “Jerry had his share of problems, but who thought something like this could happen to him?”
“And just when he was turning things around,” Francis said. He picked up a cloth and started polishing shot glasses. “He had a new girlfriend, you know.”
“I didn’t know,” I said.
“Nice lady,” he said. “Works at that flower shop down the block. She had him on the straight and narrow. I hadn’t seen him in here in a couple of weeks.”
I remembered then that Marsha had commented how Jerry was finally getting his life together. Misty, who’d known him for only a few weeks, had called him a nice guy.
Could Jerry have really changed?
And could it have gotten him killed?
Chapter 8
When I arrived at the office the next morning I found a note from Manny on my desk. He’d been called to a meeting with the district manager in Riverside and would be back after lunch. While Manny didn’t keep a constant eye out to make sure I was working all day long, I was glad he wasn’t there this morning because I had some distasteful personal business to handle.
I put in a call to the title company Mid-America did business with and ordered a property profile, a report that provided all sorts of information about a particular address. It was a routine request, one of the things I often did when trying to locate a customer who had skipped or if I was helping Manny with a possible foreclosure.
Only this time it was personal. I wanted information on the woman whose house my dad had gone to last night.
I asked the clerk at the title company to rush it and he promised he would. I was keyed up, anxious to know who this woman was that had gotten involved with my dad and ruined my parents’ marriage.
The title company’s idea of a rush request might take hours. But instead of pulling up my collection route and calling my customers, I decided to take care of another pressing personal matter.
Whoever had programmed Mid-America’s computer system had built in the capability for any office to access the accounts in every other office. This came in handy when a customer wanted to make a payment in a different branch, which happened all the time.
I accessed the accounts in the Bonita branch and did a name search for Mick Dudley. The notion that Eric Hunter had made a loan to somebody who didn’t really exist kept nagging at me. I couldn’t stop thinking that it was somehow connected to Jerry’s murder.
Mick Dudley’s supposed account popped up on my computer screen. I did a double take. Yesterday afternoon, it had been past due. Now it showed a zero balance. The account had been paid in full this morning.
I sat back in my chair, staring at the screen.
Was this an incredible coincidence? I doubted it.
Eric knew I’d found the account yesterday; Gloria had told him about it. He’d probably gotten worried and paid it off to cover his tracks. I had a strong suspicion that if anyone looked for the actual paper file in the Bonita branch, it wouldn’t be found.
I wondered if Gloria knew what Eric was up to. She’d looked as if she could claw out my eyes when she’d seen me pull the file yesterday. Maybe she was in on it.
The thing about making a bogus loan was that you couldn’t make just one. If you were going to keep your misdeeds to yourself, undetected by other branch personnel or during routine visits from the district manager or the auditing team, payments had to be made on the account. This required another fraudulent loan. And it went on from there, like a pyramid scheme. Loan after loan, with some of the proceeds used to make payments on the existing loans, and the rest going into your own pocket.
No telling how many bogus loans Eric had made. Maybe this was the first but I doubted it—especially after seeing the magnificent home he and Lourdes lived in.
But still, I couldn’t see a connection to Jerry’s murder.
A message from the title company appeared in my inbox. I clicked on the icons, and the pages of the property profile I’d ordered glided out of the printer on the credenza behind Manny’s desk. I snatched them up and went back to my desk.
According to the profile, the house where my dad had been spending a great deal of time lately belonged to a woman named Lorna Pettigrew. She was the sole owner. She’d lived there for a little over a year. There were no liens or judgments recorded against the property and no mortgage, which meant that she’d either bought the house outright for cash, someone had purchased it for her, or somebody had died and left it to her.
I didn’t have all the info I needed to get a credit report on her but I gave it a try. Something popped, much to my surprise. I’d only seen this woman from a distance beneath the feeble porch light, but I’d guessed her age at around fifty. The credit bureau report indicated I was right. It also showed that she had three credit cards, all with low balances, and had a history of excellent credit dating back several decades.
Something about seeing all this information about her made my blood boil. Then I started to feel sick. I grabbed my handbag and a file folder from the stack on my desk, and headed for the door.
“Manny wants me to do a property lookup for him,” I called as I rushed past Inez’s desk.
She said something but I ignored her and dashed outside.
* * *
I hit the freeway and drove mindlessly. There wasn’t much traffic this time of day and the November weather was gorgeous, as always.
Life had a way of taking an ugly turn—no matter how good you thought your mojo was. Sometimes, maybe you had it coming. Other times, you were blindsided.
Honestly, this thing with my dad? I never saw it coming.
I transitioned onto another stretch of the freeway that ringed Santa Flores.
What would be really nice right now, what I’d truly appreciate, was someone I could confide in. Somebody who would listen. Spreading a burden around always made it easier to carry.
My best friend Jillian came to mind, but she was at work. She’d listen, if I called, but the problem was too big for a quick explanation over the phone.
Then Nick popped into my head. Nick? Oh, yes, Nick.
I felt mysel
f relax at the thought of telling him my problem, seeing the worried, understanding expression on his face, feeling his arms around me as he gave me a hug that would make it all better.
But how could I do that? I’d been adamant about not allowing him to get close. I couldn’t contact him now just because I had a problem and wanted him to do something that would make me feel better. That wouldn’t be right.
Maybe pushing him away wasn’t right either.
I changed lanes and aimed for the Dayton Avenue exit.
I wasn’t up to dealing with my feelings for Nick right now. This problem with my parents was all I could manage, and I could think of only one way to handle it.
There was no way I was going to tell my mom what I’d discovered—not until I’d talked to my dad first. I’d do that tonight. Maybe by then the sting of the whole thing might lessen.
Heading back to the office right now didn’t seem appealing; I had an errand that would put it off for a while longer.
I cruised down Dayton Avenue, past the Buccaneer Bar—already there were two cars in the parking lot—and kept watch for the flower shop Francis had mentioned last night, the one where Jerry Donavan’s new girlfriend worked. I spotted it and pulled into the lot.
The shop was crowded into a small plaza with a gift boutique, an ice cream parlor, and a used book store. Its windows displayed autumn-themed floral arrangements. Outside were brightly painted wooden carts filled with colorful flowers.
I parked and went inside, and wound my way through the green plants, vases, and gift items to the counter in the back. A gray-haired woman wearing a yellow apron was on the phone. She smiled, jotted something down and hung up.
“Hi,” I said. “I’m looking for someone who knew Jerry Donavan. I understand she works here.”
The woman’s smile fell, and she drew back a little. Her gaze took in the skirt, blouse and blazer I had on. I figured she pegged me for a bill collector, which I was, of course, and I knew she was reluctant to admit to anything.
“My name is Dana Mackenzie,” I explained. “I knew Jerry through my job at Mid-America. He did appraisals for us. I’d known Jerry for a long time and, well, I was there the morning it … happened.”
Fatal Luck Page 6