by Jessica Beck
“You don’t have to do manual labor, Suzanne,” Jake protested. “You’ve already put in a full day’s work at Donut Hearts,” he said as the men dug into the second set of sandwiches I’d made for them.
“I want to,” I said. “After you eat, why don’t you both go get some rest, and I’ll work around here on the cleanup a little more?”
“Suzanne, I can’t let you do that,” Jake said.
I stared at him fixedly and just smiled without saying a word.
After a full twenty seconds, he relented. “You know what? On second thought, that would be great. Thanks.”
I could see Phillip start to form a protest of his own, but Jake shook his head slightly, and my stepfather backed down immediately.
Once that was settled, I asked, “Where should I get started?”
“We haven’t even touched the loft or the basement,” Jake said. “If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather you didn’t go downstairs. I’m not sure about what we’re dealing with there.”
I didn’t have to have my arm twisted. The truth was that I had no desire to go down where wild things might be, and it wouldn’t have surprised me one bit if there had been whole communities of critters set up down there in the house’s long absence of residents. “The loft it is,” I said.
“If you open the window, you can chuck stuff out straight into the dumpster,” Jake suggested.
“How much is up there?” I asked, wondering what I’d just gotten myself into.
“It appears that whoever had this place was a bit of a hoarder,” Jake admitted, “but if you wear a mask and use some heavy gloves, you should be fine.” After another bite of his sandwich, he asked, “Are you sure you don’t want me to stick around? You probably shouldn’t be here by yourself.”
“She won’t be,” Momma said as she came in and joined us. She was wearing sturdy clothes, clearly ready to work, but she still managed to be stylish doing it, something I had not inherited from her.
I looked as though I’d outfitted myself at a yard sale.
“I’ve come to help as well.”
“Dot, I thought we agreed. You’re supplying the financing, and we’re supplying the brute force,” her husband said gently.
“Come now, Phillip, you don’t honestly think I’d agree to that, do you? I haven’t had a chance to work with my daughter for years. It will give us a chance to catch up.”
At least he knew better than to argue with Momma about it, and we didn’t hear a peep out of Jake. He too had learned the foolishness of going against my mother without having something dire at stake in the matter. After my husband finished his sandwich, he asked, “You didn’t happen to bring any dessert with you, did you, Suzanne?”
“Just a couple of fritters left over from the shop,” I said as I pulled out the last two things still in the massive bag I’d brought with me. “You don’t have to eat them if you don’t want to, though. They’re probably stale anyway.”
“I’ll take my chances,” he said as he eagerly reached for one of the wrapped fritters. Instead of eating it himself though, he offered it to his partner in renovation. “What do you say, Phillip?”
My stepfather glanced at my mother, who nodded her approval with a broad grin. “You’ve worked hard this morning. I’d say you’ve earned it.”
“I agree,” Phillip said with a grin as he eagerly pounced on the offering.
After they were finished eating dessert, the men took their leave, and Momma turned to me and smiled. “Thank you, Suzanne.”
“For what?”
“For letting them do this,” she replied. “It was important for both of them to feel useful again.”
“I know,” I said. “I’m surprised you’re digging into the dirty work too, though.”
“You shouldn’t be,” she said a little loftily. “You know as well as anyone that I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty.”
“I have a hunch that it’s going to be more than your hands, but I’m happy to have you here with me.”
She hugged me briefly. “As am I. Now, what should we tackle first?”
I pointed to the stairs. At least they looked sound enough. “I’ve been told that our services are needed to clean out the loft.”
“Then by all means, let’s get to it,” she said, pulling on a pair of heavy work gloves as she ascended the steps.
I had no choice but to follow. I wasn’t exactly looking forward to going through someone else’s trash and discards, but then again, at least I’d have my mother as company, and no matter what, she was a fun person to have by my side.
Chapter 2
“THIS IS REALLY QUITE a mess,” Momma said as she threw the single window at the top of the loft open. “I wonder when someone was last up here.”
“My guess is that it’s been years, based on the amount of sheer junk that’s here,” I said. The smells on the first floor of the cottage had been muted when I’d come in, but up in the loft, we were getting the full force of an overwhelming combination of unpleasant odors. “Did something die up here or what?”
“Suzanne, bite your tongue,” Momma said as she gingerly nudged with her foot the edge of a pile of old newspapers nearly three feet tall and almost eight feet long.
I didn’t know if it was because of my past experience finding bodies or just my overactive imagination, but I could easily see how a corpse could be buried beneath the overflowing newspapers. “You have to smell it too,” I said. “I wonder what the guys found downstairs this morning? I’m willing to bet it was nothing like this.”
“Well, there’s nothing we can do about it now except get to work removing it all,” Momma said as she looked at the piles of debris with obvious discomfort. “There’s no point in tarrying. Let’s dig in.”
“Why not?” I asked as I pulled my own gloves on. “What’s that?” I asked her a moment later as I felt something just under the newspapers.
“Suzanne, if you are trying to frighten me, I don’t appreciate it,” my mother said sternly.
“I’m not kidding around, Momma.” I reached deeper into the pile despite my better judgment telling me to run, not walk, downstairs and out of the house immediately. I pulled a few papers delicately aside to see what I could uncover without thrusting my entire hand into the pile.
An old can of processed meat had ripened over time and exposure and had exploded, filling the air with the ghastliest scent. “I may have found our problem,” I said as I disposed of it out the window.
“At least one of them, at any rate,” Momma said. “We’ve certainly tackled a big project, haven’t we?”
“Are you talking about the loft or the house in general?” I asked as I started gathering up more newspapers and shoving them out the window as quickly as I could. Some of them started to blow away the moment they made it through the opening, and I was about to go downstairs after them when I noticed something particularly odd happening outside.
It wasn’t just newspapers being caught by the wind and blowing around.
I also saw at least a dozen twenty-dollar bills wafting to the ground as well.
“It’s raining money out there,” I told my mother as I stood there, shaking my head in disbelief.
“Suzanne, you may as well stop, because you’re not going to convince me to look out the window, no matter what.”
I reached down into another pile of newspapers and found more money. As I held a few of the weathered but still nice twenty-dollar bills of the new design out to her, I asked, “How about this? Would you care to look at these?”
Momma was about to say something when she saw the money in my hand. “Where did you get that?” I could swear that her tone of voice was almost accusatory, as though I’d produced those bills myself just to get her attention.
“They were in that pile of newspapers,” I told her as I handed them to her.
“Are they real?” she asked me.
“They look legit to me, but what do I know? I’m just a donutmaker,” I sai
d as I pulled my gloves off and grabbed my cell phone. “I hate to do it, but I’m going to get Jake over here right now.”
“Phillip needs to hear about this as well,” Momma said as she pulled off her gloves and made her own call.
As we waited for their return, we kept digging into the newspaper piles, but the rest of our efforts were in vain. We found a great deal of old newsprint, but no more money.
“Where is it?” the men both asked as they bounded up the stairs together. “Is it the same as this lot?”
Evidently they’d recovered some of the money I’d accidentally tossed out the window earlier.
“It has to be,” I said as I handed Jake my batch while Momma gave her husband the rest of it.
“What do you think?” Phillip asked Jake with a frown after he examined a few bills in his hand.
“The same thing you do,” my husband said.
“It just doesn’t make any sense, does it?” Phillip asked him.
“Not yet,” Jake replied.
“Would you two Sherlocks care to share what you’re thinking with us mere mortals?” I asked them plaintively. “After all, we’re the ones who found the stash. Don’t worry, we’ll split the reward with you. Maybe not fifty-fifty, though,” I added with a grin.
Momma shook her head. “No, Suzanne, don’t even tease about that. The four of us are in this together. Whatever we get for finding this, we split it four ways.”
“I was just teasing,” I told Momma. “They know that.”
“It’s a moot point, anyway,” Jake said with a frown.
“It’s not counterfeit, is it?” I asked him. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought to hold them up to the light to check for the security strips and holograms, but then again, I hadn’t been expecting to stumble across a handful of fake money. The bills had looked real enough to me, but as I’d told Momma, it wasn’t exactly my specialty.
“They are good ones, there’s no doubt about that, but they are fake just the same,” Jake said. “Do you agree?”
“I do,” Phillip said.
“Whoever made them must have dyed them in tea and laid them out between the newspapers to age a little,” Jake said. “I’m guessing that whoever manufactured them didn’t know this house was going up for sale so quickly. The counterfeiters are going to be surprised when they come by and find that the locks have been changed and the loft has been cleaned out.”
“Do you have any contacts you can call at the Secret Service?” Phillip asked Jake.
“Why the Secret Service and not the Treasury Department, or even the state police?” Momma asked the two former law enforcement officers.
“Counterfeiting is under the purview of the Secret Service, and they’ve been under the Department of Homeland Security for quite a while,” Jake answered. “As a matter of fact, the Secret Service has been handling counterfeiting longer than they’ve been charged with protecting the president. Fortunately, I happen to know an agent I can call.”
It didn’t surprise me. My husband had been a member of the North Carolina State Police for so long that he’d developed relationships with all sorts of other law enforcement officers. “Is it anyone I know?” I asked him, since I’d met more than a few over the years since we’d been together.
“No, I met Agent Blaze long before we met,” he admitted.
“Is that really his name? Blaze? That’s so cool,” I said.
“Actually, he’s a she. Her name is Courtney Blaze, actually,” he said almost apologetically. “She’s very good at what she does.”
“I just bet she is,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm and level. There wasn’t any doubt in my mind that my husband loved me dearly, but I also knew that he was an attractive man who had been very good at his job, something that tended to get competent women around him interested.
“Suzanne, we had a professional relationship only,” Jake explained before he dialed her number.
“I don’t doubt it for a second,” I said, and almost as an afterthought, I kissed his cheek lightly. “Go on. Make that call.”
Jake nodded, and I noticed that as he dialed a number in his phone, Momma looked on with approval. I loved it when she witnessed me being a grownup about something. Even at my age, my mother’s blessing was very important to me.
Jake stepped to one side and lowered his voice as he had the conversation, and as he did, I started to bend down to look for more treasure we might have missed.
Phillip touched my shoulder lightly. “Suzanne, I wouldn’t do that if I were you. We need to let the authorities finish the investigation.”
“Momma and I have been sorting through these newspapers since we first found the bills,” I said.
“I know that, but I’ve had a few brushes with the Secret Service in the past myself, and it’s been my experience that they don’t like anyone anywhere near one of their cases.”
“Okay. I don’t really need a reason not to work, anyway,” I said with a grin to show that there were no hard feelings.
Momma approached me as Jake continued to speak on the phone with his contact. “Suzanne, you’re handling this all rather well. It’s good to see that you realize there’s nothing for you to be jealous about.”
“I know that better than you do,” I told her with a smile. “I trust my husband with all my heart.”
“This time it’s trust placed wisely,” Momma said, no doubt referring to the fact that my first husband, Max the Great Impersonator, had cheated on me while we’d been together.
“Who do you think is behind this?” I asked her softly, wanting badly to change the subject.
“It might be someone from Union Square or April Springs,” Momma replied.
“Not a stranger to the area?” I asked her, curious about her reasoning.
“No, I doubt a stranger would just leave counterfeit money lying around. Whoever did this was obviously familiar with this house.”
“Not enough to realize that it had been sold, though,” I said.
“That’s clearly true,” Momma said as Jake got off his call and dialed another number immediately.
“What did she say?” I asked him.
“One second,” he replied as he held up one finger in my direction. When the call went through, he said, “Chief, it’s Jake Bishop. We’ve got a situation out at the house we’re flipping. No, no dead bodies this time. Counterfeit money. I already called them. They are on their way, but they want some of your men here pronto to guard the place until they get here. No, I was told specifically to contact you directly. I know, but what can you do but comply with the request? We’re not going anywhere, but if I were you, I’d hurry on over here myself. See you soon.”
After Jake hung up, he said, “Sorry about that. Blaze is on her way, but she wants local law enforcement to guard the site until she gets here. She’s close to an hour away, and I told her I’d hang around until she got here. Is that okay with you?” he asked me.
“We’ll all stay, if that’s an option,” I said. “At least I will,” I added, realizing that I’d just spoken for Momma and Phillip without asking them. “You two can take off if you want to.”
“Are you kidding? I’m not going anywhere,” Phillip said eagerly.
“Nor am I,” Momma added.
“Then let’s go outside and wait for Chief Grant to show up,” Jake said.
“Is that really necessary?” I asked him.
“Trust me, you don’t want to be in the house when Blaze gets here,” Jake said knowingly.
I knew better than to question my husband’s judgment about something I didn’t know anything about. “Then let’s go outside. I wonder if we missed any other bills during our search?” I asked as I glanced at the pile of papers still there.
“If you did, you’d better believe that they’ll find them,” Jake assured me. “Let’s go, folks.”
We made it outside ten full minutes before the April Springs police chief showed up on the scene along with two of his deputies.
“The scene is secure,” Jake told him.
“Are you hanging around?” Stephen Grant asked, clearly a bit nervous about dealing with the Secret Service by himself.
“If you don’t mind,” Jake said, not mentioning that he had been requested to be there when his contact arrived.
“Are you kidding? I’d love it,” Chief Grant said.
“What’s up, neighbor?” Curtis asked as he joined us. It was pretty obvious that he’d noticed the police cruisers whizzing past his house on their way to us.
Jake took one look at him and shook his head. “This isn’t a good time, Curtis. You need to head back home.”
“Got it. Just checking up on you,” the man said with a nod, and then he vanished down the road to head home again.
Reinforcements came in less than half the time they’d promised.
Evidently the Secret Service was in a hurry to get started.
Chapter 3
“IT’S BEEN A LONG TIME, Bishop,” the beautiful redhead in a tailored black suit said as she approached my husband and offered her hand. It appeared that she’d really wanted to hug him instead, but I wasn’t sure if it was because of my presence or the agents under her on her heels, but she changed her mind at the last second. This woman was not only lovely, but she was also clearly self-assured. The two agents with her stood a few steps away with their hands folded behind their backs, and it was clear from the start that she was the agent in charge of this particular operation.
Jake smiled gently. “Hello, Blaze. Thanks for coming.”
“Happy to. After all, it’s part of the job,” she said, her smile quickly fading. “Now, tell me what happened here.”
“My wife and her mother were helping my father-in-law and me clean out this house we’re flipping when Suzanne found the first few bills.” He turned to me. “Suzanne, this is Courtney Blaze. Blaze, this is my wife and her mother, Dorothea. That’s her husband, Phillip.”
“Is that what you’re doing now, working construction?” she asked, clearly not approving of my husband’s new choice of careers.