“I want to wait for the report from San Francisco,” Jim said seriously. “It’s coming in tomorrow. Let’s see what that says first.”
“Probably nothing earth-shattering,” Jack said.
“I want to go to the stores of the designers she wears too, and some jewelers. Tallie gave me some names, although she didn’t think we’d come up with anything. Everything she wears is a gift, given to her by designers and stores so she will get Tallie to wear their things.” He had been meaning to do it for weeks, but he’d been too busy. They had other cases to deal with, some of them more pressing than this. “After that, we’re through. I’m ready to make a recommendation. All we have right now is circumstantial evidence and our instincts. But it’s the best we can do. That and the fact that the victim lost close to a million dollars in cash in the past three years. That ought to do it.”
Jim was itching to make an arrest, and he knew that Tallie wanted that too. She had also been waiting for Jim to tell her that she could fire Brigitte, and it was getting more and more difficult to have her around. And Jim felt that she could do that now. They almost had enough, and it was probably all they would get. He had seen Brigitte’s bank accounts, obtained through the bank with a confidential agreement, which precluded them from telling her that they had released her accounts to the FBI, and she had made many large deposits in the last few years, always in cash. And the money had gone out as fast as it went in. There was no way to tell what she had done with it. But what he hoped was that, confronted with the accusation and an arrest, she would cave, confess, and agree to make a guilty plea. It would be the cleanest scenario for them all, and he was sure she wouldn’t want the embarrassment and expense of going to trial, although she looked as though she could afford it. She made a hefty salary, and there was a fair amount of money in her bank accounts.
Jim dropped Jack off at the FBI office and went home. Bobby was there, eating a pizza and watching TV with a couple of friends.
“No homework?” Jim asked, raising an eyebrow.
“All done.” Making sure the boys did their homework had been Jeannie’s department, but for five years now it had been his. Breakfast, dinner, homework, laundry, housekeeping, Little League, carpool, getting the boys to all their sports games, field trips, taking care of them when they were sick, going to doctors, back-to-school clothes and supplies, teachers’ conferences, decorating the house and tree at Christmas, Christmas cards, taking their black Lab to the vet. He was a one-man band, and there were times when he missed her so much it nearly killed him. Not for what she did, but for who she was. He had loved her since high school. He had loved her for twenty-seven years, and he still couldn’t believe she was gone. It still took his breath away sometimes.
The boys had their feet on the coffee table, watching TV, still in their sports clothes, and were laughing loudly. The pizza box had just fallen on the carpet facedown, and they had open Coke cans on the table that were about to spill, and often had before.
“Hey, you guys!” Jim reminded them. “Could we not destroy the house, please?”
“Sorry, Dad,” Bobby said with a penitent look, and then they began shoving each other and rough-housing on the couch. It was hopeless, but he loved having them around. He rolled his eyes and went upstairs to work on his computer. He was thinking about Brigitte Parker’s house when he did, with all its glamour and glory. It was so different from the house where he had seen Tallie Jones, which was so much warmer and more real. But there was no denying that Brigitte’s home was beautiful. And he knew how much she made. Tallie paid her a whopping salary every year, with perks, benefits, bonuses, and numerous gifts. And she had still slept with Tallie’s boyfriend. That had to hurt. No wonder Tallie had looked so ravaged the first time he met her, it had been the night after she saw Meg, and why she wanted to fire Brigitte now, whether or not she had been stealing money from her. The betrayal had been just too much to forgive. And Brigitte still thought she didn’t know. Tallie had played her part well. Brigitte was right. Tallie was a damn good actress as well as director.
Bobby’s friends went home at eleven o’clock, and he stopped in his father’s room when he came upstairs.
“Still working, Dad?”
“Yeah.” Jim swiveled in his desk chair with a smile to look at his youngest son. He dreaded his leaving for school in two years and was glad he was still at home.
“You work too hard, Dad,” Bobby said kindly, and came over to rub his shoulders. It was the only human contact Jim had now. The only hugs and touches he got now were from his sons. He had never been able to bring himself to date after Jeannie, and still didn’t want to. The guys in the FBI office had razzed him about it for a while and wanted to introduce him to their wives’ friends, but now they finally left him alone. They got it. He wasn’t ready, and maybe never would be. The memories he had of their years together were enough, and he had the boys. “Working on any interesting cases, Dad?” Bobby asked him as he flopped down on the bed.
“Some.” Jim never talked about them at home until they were resolved, but the boys always loved to ask, hoping to hear tales of blood, gore, and excitement, and the occasional shootout, although those were rare. Jim shied away from those cases. He always carried a gun, but very seldom had occasion to use it. He was better known now for his success with white-collar crime than with the more violent ones. He liked solving his cases, not just shooting his way through them, and he didn’t like the physically dangerous stuff since he had lost Jeannie. If something happened to him, there would be no one to take care of his kids.
“What are you working on right now?” Bobby asked him, staring at the ceiling as he lay on the California king-size bed that was too big for Jim now.
“A very interesting credit card fraud case that covers thirteen states, an industrial espionage ring, and two embezzlements, one of them for nearly a million dollars,” Jim said as he smiled at him. He was such a good boy, as was Josh, and he loved them both. He missed Josh a lot and talked to him as often as Josh was willing. He was enjoying college.
“Sounds boring,” Bobby said with a blasé look as he got up. “I guess you’re not going to shoot anyone this week.”
“I hope not,” Jim laughed, and went to get undressed as Bobby headed to his room to put on his pajamas. He was sure the boys had left a mess downstairs, but he could clean it up in the morning before he left for work. He always did. They had a woman come in to do the heavy cleaning once a week, and he and Bobby did the rest.
He went in to say goodnight to Bobby, who was watching TV from his bed, and then he went back to his own room. He reminded himself that he wanted to hit the stores on Rodeo Drive in the morning. Tallie had given him a long list of stores that sent Brigitte expensive gifts. That was an assignment that would really have disgusted his son, and he was thinking about it as he went to bed, and smiled nostalgically. Jeannie would have loved a morning on Rodeo Drive. Everything he did and thought about always led him back to her.
Chapter 13
JIM STARTED WITH the stores on Rodeo Drive, and walked from one end to the other. Gucci, Fendi, Prada, Jimmy Choo, Dolce and Gabbana, Roberto Cavalli, and there were several jewelry stores whose names Tallie had given him too: Cartier, Van Cleef, and Harry Winston. He was mildly embarrassed not to have checked the stores sooner, but he just hadn’t had time. His priority had been interviewing the suspects and reviewing the evidence gathered by the forensic accountants. If they went to trial, they needed proof “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
In each store he walked into, he asked for the general manager, and inquired about the free gifts given to Brigitte Parker, Tallie Jones’s assistant. Tallie had assured him that Brigitte got free merchandise everywhere, for some very high-end items, everything from jewelry to furs to luggage. Tallie said Brigitte always bragged to her about it, but Jim just wanted to check it out for himself. It was a phenomenon he wasn’t familiar with, to that degree, and he wanted to know how it worked.
And in e
ach case, he got the same answer. Some claimed that once a year they sent out a gift, like a scarf, a nightgown, or a sweater, a decorative glass, a pen, a crystal table object, in thanks to their best customers, usually at Christmas. In some cases they offered VIP discounts, for which Brigitte didn’t qualify. They all assured him that Brigitte was one of their best customers, and she paid for everything she bought, and only occasionally with a small courtesy discount. And they confirmed that the items she purchased were expensive. Several fur coats, in a rainbow of colors, including a fifty-thousand-dollar golden sable jacket at Dior, four-thousand-dollar handbags, a diamond necklace, and a vast number of sweaters, shoes, and dresses. But in every instance, they assured him that Brigitte paid for her purchases herself, and none of them had been gifts from the store, contrary to what she told Tallie. Once again, Brigitte had lied.
He asked if she paid by check, credit card, or cash, and their records showed that she always paid cash, except for the sable, which she had paid for by cashier’s check. Jim asked the manager then if it was possible that his sales force actually gave her the items as gifts without his knowledge. The manager of Prada laughed when Jim asked him. “Not if they intend to stay employed here. That would be theft, as far as we’re concerned. I’m sure Ms. Parker has had gifts from us at Christmas over the years, but that would be a key chain, a wallet, or a scarf. Nothing larger. We’re running a business here, not a charity drive. We make our share of charitable donations, but not to our clients.” Jim looked faintly embarrassed to have asked the question. But the picture of Brigitte’s shopping habits had become clear to him in two hours on Rodeo Drive. She spent a fortune, always in cash, and none of the expensive items that she wore were gifts, contrary to what she claimed and Tallie believed. She was one of the best customers at every store, some more than others, and she had never used a credit card in any store, just cash. Her employer’s cash, most likely.
The jewelers told him the same story, and from what he could tell, her expenditures on jewelry and clothes far exceeded her income, not to mention the expensive decorations and antiques he had seen in her house the day before. He could have kicked himself for not making this little exploration sooner. It was all the evidence they needed. She had even bought herself a diamond ring the year before for nearly a hundred thousand dollars. And unless her family was sending her money he knew nothing about, that hadn’t shown up in her bank accounts, Brigitte Parker was getting all this cash from somewhere. She had stopped taking it when Hunt left Tallie’s house, but at the rate she spent money, Brigitte wouldn’t be able to stop for long. And it was going to be easy to get her shopping records from all the stores Jim had just been to and several others. He had been to ten stores on Rodeo Drive and three jewelers, and he was beaming when he walked into his office.
“Do I want to know what happened to you on the way to work this morning?” Jack asked him as he walked into the room where Jim was sitting at his desk with a beatific expression. He had everything he needed for the assistant U.S. attorney he had spoken to initially to pursue the case and issue a warrant for her arrest.
“I got lucky.” Jim grinned at him.
“You look it.” Jack leered.
“I’ve been on Rodeo Drive all morning, and thank your stars you’re not married to Brigitte Parker. The woman spends a fortune.”
“I thought it was all courtesy gifts because of her employer.”
“Not a one. She must have spent more than a million in the last three years. We’re going to have to check Tallie Jones’s books again. She’s pulling out more than we think. And she pays for everything she buys in cold, hard U.S. currency, cash.” He was grinning from ear to ear, as Jack dropped a printout on his desk.
“This must be your lucky day then.” Jack’s smile matched Jim’s as he pointed to it. “That’s a present to you from the San Francisco bureau. They talked to her father, her stepmother, and her sister. The story about the stepmother is true-they hate each other. But other than that, nothing she told her boss is true. She has no trust fund. They have no money. Her father is retired and worked for the phone company. Her mother died when she was a kid, and the stepmother says she’s a pathological liar and always has been, even as a child. She has ripped them all off for money on various occasions. She slept with her sister’s husband, borrowed money from him, blackmailed him, threatening to expose their affair to her sister, and pretty well wiped out their savings. It sounded a little like her threats to Hunt. She never goes back to San Francisco, and if she does, she never calls them, and they don’t want her to. Barney in the SF office says the father is a nice old guy and cries when he talks about her, says he doesn’t know what’s wrong with her. She spent about a year in a psychiatric hospital after her mother died, and got picked up regularly for shoplifting as a kid. There was something about credit card fraud, on a small scale, but it was never prosecuted. None of them have seen her in about fifteen years and hope they never do again. Oh,” he remembered and then added, “and she was never a debutante, if anybody cares.”
“Hollyyyyy shit,” Jim said with an even bigger grin. “Bingo!” And then his face clouded over. “Do you think the family will warn her that we’re on to her?”
“According to the boys in SF, they never talk to her and don’t want to. Her sister says she hopes she goes to jail where she belongs. And with a little luck, and the help of the U.S. attorney’s office, we may just be able to make her dreams come true. I don’t think you need to worry about them tipping her off. It’s all yours, maestro. It’s all in the report,” he said, pointing to the papers on his desk.
“You’d better get out of here, or I’m going to kiss you!” Jim warned him, and Jack pretended to run to the door.
“Don’t you dare!” The two men were laughing as Jack left and went back to his own office. Jim read through the report carefully, and now he had everything he needed. The only question he knew the deputy U.S. attorney would ask him would be if it qualified for the FBI, or if they had to turn it over to the police, but Jim thought he had a good case for keeping it with them. They had discovered that she had used Tallie’s free air miles several times without her permission, which was a federal felony, and Victor had pointed out that she had made several improper transfers from Tallie’s bank online, which was federal wire fraud, so they were clean. Jim didn’t want to give up the case. He wanted to do Tallie Jones the favor of prosecuting this woman, and getting back whatever they could for her, the merchandise if nothing else, so Tallie could sell it. And maybe her house, furniture, art, and antiques. It looked as though she spent the cash she took very quickly. And now he wanted to investigate how she had paid for her house, since it was obvious she hadn’t inherited the money, as she said, nor paid for it with her trust fund, which she’d never had. Brigitte was a liar from beginning to end, and poor Tallie had trusted her and fallen for it hook, line, and sinker. He wondered how long Brigitte had been stealing from her, and suspected that she had for many, many years, possibly the entire time, ever since Tallie started making money, and really serious money from her work. The only thing that had hidden what Brigitte had done was the fact that Tallie made such huge amounts from her films, and that she trusted Brigitte so completely, she never checked her accounts, or Brigitte’s handling of her money. Her assistant had had free rein for all those years. It had been foolish of Tallie to trust her to that extent, but Brigitte had carefully cultivated their friendship, and developed Tallie’s total trust in her, and being trusting and believing in people you thought you knew well wasn’t a crime and didn’t deserve to be met by a criminal response and wholesale exploitation. Jim wanted to do everything he could to help.
He put the most recent printout in the folder and went to the U.S. attorney’s office across the street, to see one of the deputies he worked with most frequently. Henry Loo was at his desk when Jim walked into the room, and the two men smiled at each other. Jim liked him because Henry was tough, but also reasonable to work with. They had had a l
ot of successful cases together.
“You look like a happy camper,” Henry commented, pointing to the chair across his desk. “Whatcha got?”
“A nice one for you. All gift-wrapped and tied up in ribbons.” Jim knew that pursuing stolen cash was always more difficult to prove than credit cards or checks out of a victim’s account, or the perpetrator’s, but the stream of cash was so direct, the expenditures so far beyond her means, and the lies so perfectly executed that Jim had no doubts about his case. And by the time he finished explaining it to Henry, and handed him the file across his desk, Henry was pleased too. Jim said, “I’ve been working on this for two months,” which was pretty quick for them. And he realized now that it might have been less than that if he had gone to Rodeo Drive sooner. But now everything had fallen into place, particularly with the report from the San Francisco FBI office. And he also explained to Henry why it should stay with them and not go to the police, and Henry agreed. They were clear. “She tried blaming the victim’s ex-boyfriend at first, whom she slept with by the way. But the guy makes a fortune and seems to be honest in his financial dealings. So is the accountant, we checked him out too, although the poor guy is a wreck, with a younger wife who’s pumping him for money. But this is a good case. We’ve got what we need here. I’m sure we can convict.”
“Sounds like it,” the young deputy said, looking pleased. “Think she’ll plead?”
“Hard to say. Depends how tight we make the noose around her neck, and how smart her attorney is. I don’t think she’s going to love going to prison, but given the amounts, she has no choice there. They’re not going to let her off as a first-time offender, because it’s aggravated by repeated theft on a continuing basis, and you have a serious case of abuse of trust here,” which they both knew would increase her prison sentence. “The victim trusted her completely.”
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