Truth and Justice

by Fern Michaels

  “I don’t want any of you to get excited. One day she moved twice, and each move required a new identity. Right now she is in Kalorama in a very nice, very expensive house. She lives there under the name Nora Lewis. She moved there weeks after collecting Major Nolan’s benefits. I’ve been trailing her for two days. I can’t be certain she didn’t spot me, but she hasn’t relocated, so I think I lucked out.”

  “How do you know it’s Sara Windsor?” Annie asked.

  “Because she looks like the picture Avery handed out to the team. It was easy to spot her once the wig came off, the extra padding in her cheeks, stuff like that. She’s pretty good at disguises if I do say so myself. The person who thought he was married to her helped quite a bit with insight as to what he thought made her tick.”

  “When you say she’s pretty good at her disguises, what does that mean? How good is good?” Alexis sniffed. “Better than me?”

  “No one is as good as you, dear,” Myra said soothingly. “I’m sure Sara has nothing else to do with her time, so she works on her disguises. It’s probably her life’s work. She doesn’t appear to have recently held a job. At least we haven’t any indication she ever worked a day in her life. She’s a con artist, so maybe that’s considered a job in her world. What else do you have, Mr. Spenser?”

  “Duke and I have been on her for a while. Actually, it seems like forever. At first, I wasn’t sure it was her, but I stuck with it. Either she’s sick, or she gets her jollies going to doctors. She went to five or six different doctors every day for a week. Sometimes she had two appointments on the same day, and yes I have the names of the doctors and the addresses.”

  “What does that mean?” Maggie asked.

  Spenser shrugged. “I have no clue. No doctor or nurse was going to tell us anything, so we didn’t even bother to ask. She did go to a fertility clinic twice if that means anything. She’s on her phone a lot. Seems like more than most people.”

  As one, the Sisters pounced on Spenser and peppered him with questions. “Where? What’s its name? Did you go in to check it out?” Those were among the dozens of questions they threw at him.

  Yoko handed over a second cup of black coffee. Spenser drained it, smacked his lips, smiled, and kept talking.

  Chapter 15

  “ I’m kind of hungry, ladies. Do you have anything to eat here? I hate complaining, but I haven’t had anything to eat other than a protein bar since yesterday. Duke and I were afraid to let the woman out of our sight for fear we’d lose her. Cheese? Crackers? I’ll settle for anything, and a beer would go really good right now. Icy cold. Look, Duke’s on it, so my stopping long enough to eat isn’t going to change anything. It would be nice if you could pack up some food for me to take to Duke when I leave here, too.”

  “Of course we can give you food, you dear, sweet man, and for your partner also,” Myra said. “We’re not usually this inhospitable, but we’ve been slowly going crazy here trying to sort this all out for Bella. Then you show up with actual results, so we’re a little wired right now. I apologize on behalf of all of us. When Avery said you had answers to all our questions, we ran with it. Again, I apologize for all of us. One ham, turkey, and cheese with lettuce and mayo coming up. Pickles and chips on the side.”

  “And one icy-cold beer,” Kathryn said as she pulled a Corona off the door of the refrigerator and took off the cap before she handed it to Spenser.

  “Can you make two sandwiches for Duke? He’s a big eater.”

  “Absolutely,” Myra said, as she layered bread and cold cuts, while Yoko spread the mayo and layered the lettuce. Isabelle wrapped the two extra sandwiches in tinfoil and slipped them into a paper sack. At the last second, Nikki tossed in two Red Delicious apples.

  Spenser propped his legs on a spare chair, his eyes dreamy as he wolfed down his sandwich and swigged his beer. It was as if he were on vacation.

  The minute Spenser’s jaws stopped moving, Annie said, “Can we get to it now?”

  “Did you go inside the clinic?” Alexis asked.

  “Did you at least try to bribe the help to find out what was going on with Sara at the clinic?” In your face and ever blunt, she said, “You know the rules, Mr. Spenser. Money talks and bullshit walks. Well?”

  Spenser laughed out loud. “Ladies, this is not my first rodeo, nor is it Duke’s. Just ask Mr. Snowden here. We can hold our own, but to answer your question, we do indeed have the meat. We paid out some large bribes, but we got what you need. Otherwise, I would not be sitting here, and Duke would not be babysitting Sara with a million names.”

  “What was she doing at the clinic? Do you know?” Annie demanded.

  Spenser rolled his eyes. “Of course I know. She was claiming Major Nolan’s . . . uh . . . sperm donations. She showed absolutely no interest in Bella Ames’s eggs, which she had stored there earlier. When she left the clinic, she left with two of the major’s . . . uh . . . donations. There was a man with her dressed in medical garb and he had a medical cooler of some sort. It had a big red cross on it. Our contact, the one we bribed, did not know who the guy was. She surmised he was some kind of medical techie, and that they were taking the sperm to a doctor’s office.”

  “You followed them?” Myra asked.

  “Duke did. I stayed behind with the lab tech I was flirting with and bribing at the same time. The major’s donations were listed under the name Windsor Andrews. That’s Andrew with an s. That tells me that the major confided in Sara with a million names, and she’s known all along where the donations were. She has his power of attorney. That’s how she was able to walk out with the major’s . . . donations. My informant said there are eight donations total. Sara took two with her. That means there are six left to carry on the Nolan bloodline. So, unless your Bella has an updated POA, those donations belong to Sara with a million names. She can do whatever she wants with them.”

  “I got it! I got it! I know what she’s going to do! She is going to get artificially inseminated, that’s what she’s going to do!” Maggie said. “One way or another, she is going to get her piece of Major Nolan. The guy is dead, she can never hope to somehow maybe get him to fall in love with her. Next best thing, bear his child. Make sure Bella never gets her hands on those donations to taint the major’s bloodline. Andy Nolan belongs to Sara with a million names, and no one can do anything about it. She hasn’t, as far as I can tell, done anything wrong unless you want to string her up for breaking and entering to get copies of stuff from Bella’s apartment. But there’s no proof she did that, no witnesses to any of that. She pulled it off. I have to say, I’m in awe, and I did not think there was anything in this world that could shock or awe me. But this takes the proverbial cake in my opinion.”

  The women looked at one another, and as one said, “Oh my God!”

  “That was Duke’s and my sentiment, too, when we figured it out,” Spenser said. “If there’s nothing else, ladies, I need to get this food to Duke.” He picked up the messenger bag he’d dropped by his chair and handed it to Snowden.

  “Everything we got is in there. All the doctors’ names, addresses, receipts, notes, our thoughts. We took a lot of pictures of the inside, as well as the outside, of the house in Kalorama. Oh, there is one other thing, Avery. We got the name Paul Montrose from Sara’s husband or whatever he was to her, that guy Steven Conover. He said she was on the phone one day talking to her brother and he heard her mention that name. Conover said he thought Montrose was a member of the major’s team, as well as a personal friend. We didn’t have time to look into that because Sara kept us hopping. Montrose might know something. Check with the army. As far as I know, that name has never cropped up anywhere else.”

  The goodbyes were quick and curt. The Sisters started to chatter the moment the door closed behind Matt Spenser. Avery ignored the women as he started to sort through the papers he’d taken from Spenser’s messenger bag. He did mutter that neither he nor any other member of his team had come across the name Paul Montrose until Spen
ser just mentioned him. In other words, a new, clean lead to follow up on.

  “Someone call Bella and ask her if she knows who Paul Montrose is?” Annie said.

  Maggie said she would do it. She fired off a text and waited for a response.

  Maggie read her response. “ ‘Colonel Paul Montrose was Andy’s best friend. They were in the same unit. Andy said if they had the time to have a formal wedding, he would ask Paul to be his best man. I don’t know anything else about him other than he is not married and was due to get out of the army soon. Then he was going to go to work for some big firm in Silicon Valley, and they were going to pay him scads of money. Andy pretended to be jealous, but he wasn’t.’ So where does that leave us?” Maggie asked when she had finished reading Bella’s text.

  “We need to find Colonel Montrose,” Myra said.

  Annie leaned forward. “I don’t see that as being all that hard to do. We know now that he left the military and went to Silicon Valley to work. Maggie, use all your resources to find him. Isabelle, hack into whatever it is you hack into for the military and see what you can find out about him.”

  “And when we find him . . . ?” Kathryn demanded.

  “Then we call him or have Bella call him. We either go to where he is or ask him to come to us. That’s a no-brainer,” Maggie said. “Bella doesn’t know him; she never met him and only knows what Andy told her, which is not all that much. I think it would be good for Bella to meet and talk to one of Andy’s best friends. I really want to help that young woman because I feel so bad for her.”

  “We all want to help her, but you heard Alexis, we can’t just bulldog our way into the sister’s life and take her out when she didn’t break any laws. It’s okay to not like someone—”

  Yoko literally jumped off her chair and into the air to land on the kitchen table, a perfect ninja move as she put it. “People! Listen to me! What do you mean the sister did not break any laws, that it was all legal? All of you, look at me! Tell me!”

  The Sisters and even Avery Snowden all started to babble at once. Annie did a double take and let loose with a sharp whistle. Translation: Quiet down!

  “Thank you,” Yoko said. “The sister impersonated Bella and stole her eggs! Doesn’t that constitute breaking the law? She had them transported somewhere else. That guy Peabody is a witness to the transfer. So we do have a case against her. Nikki, Alexis, you’re lawyers, do we or don’t we have a case to go after her? It’s a simple yes or no question.”

  Nikki and Alexis responded in unison. “Yes!”

  Yoko hopped off the table. Annie patted her on the shoulder, and whispered, “Well done, darling girl. I was getting a little worried there for a minute.” Yoko laughed out loud. She loved it when Annie praised her.

  Snowden shuffled his papers, then stuffed them in his backpack. He looked around at the Sisters to see if he was still needed. Myra threw her hands in the air. “I guess you can leave, Avery. Things seem to be at a standstill until we hear back from Mr. Montrose. We need to remember California is three hours behind us. We will, of course, apprise you if we hear anything or need your expertise.”

  “Then I am outta here, ladies. I’ll check back in later. I’m going to swing by the house in Kalorama just to see it with my own eyes. I do not trust that woman. Duke and Matt are seasoned operatives and both were Navy Seals, but this woman . . . she’s something else. I could see her outwitting them. And as much as I hate to admit it, I think she could maybe bamboozle me in some way.” The old spy shook his head in disgust at his own words.

  The Sisters laughed. Nikki narrowed her eyes to slits and stared at the old spy. “Not to worry, Avery. Now that we have the skinny on her, she’s toast.”

  Snowden shivered as he waved goodbye and left the kitchen, wondering what kind of devious punishment the Sisters were going to dish out to Sara with a million aliases. He gave himself a mental shake and decided he really didn’t want to know. He shivered again in the damp October night as he recalled the look on Nikki’s face. For one brief second he almost felt sorry for Sara.

  Back inside the kitchen the Sisters sat around the table hashing and rehashing what they’d learned from Matt Spenser and Avery Snowden.

  Annie raised her hands and waved them about to gain everyone’s attention. “So in the end, this whole . . . super mess comes down to a case of unrequited love. Do I have that right, and do you all agree?”

  The Sisters’ heads bobbed up and down in unison. They all agreed that Annie was right and spot-on.

  “What do you suppose Sara would have done if her brother hadn’t died? This whole mess just fell into her lap in a manner of speaking. She never once sought out Bella other than to break into her apartment, and we aren’t even a hundred percent sure she did. Would she have just stood off in the distance watching the couple, or would she have tried to ruin the marriage in some way? Personally, knowing what I know about Sara now, I think she would have eventually harmed Bella,” Annie said.

  “I can see her trying to undermine Bella. I’m sure she did it with Andy’s other relationships, so why wouldn’t she do it with Bella? As far as she was concerned, Andy was hers. He belonged to her and her alone. She didn’t mind sharing him temporarily, but not for good. Marriage means children, family, the whole ball of wax. There would have been no room for Sara in that family. I only say that because I think Andy would have tried to include her, but she wouldn’t have wanted any part of that. Being the aunt to the children of the man you love was not in the cards for Sara Windsor. Like I said, Andy was hers. She wasn’t sharing,” Annie said.

  “I see it the same way,” Maggie agreed.

  “Me too. I could see Bella on an outing with Sara and Bella never coming back owing to some kind of cockamamie accident, arranged by Sara, of course,” Kathryn said. Yoko and Alexis nodded to show they agreed with Kathryn. Myra, Annie, and Nikki just shook their heads as they tried to comprehend the lengths Sara would go to try to win Andy’s love.

  “Stop the presses, everyone. I have a text coming in from . . . drum roll, please . . . Mr. Paul Montrose!” Maggie cried excitedly. “Boy, that was quick!”

  Everyone started to babble at once, drowning out what Maggie was trying to say. Annie shook the rafters with a whistle so shrill, Myra covered her ears. “You’re worse than a roomful of magpies. Calm down, be quiet, so Maggie can share Mr. Montrose’s text. The floor is yours, Maggie,” Annie said so softly that the girls had to strain to hear her words.

  Maggie cleared her throat and read the brief text. “ ‘I would be more than happy to hop on the red-eye tonight and appear on your doorstep first thing tomorrow morning. Just give me your address. There is nothing in the world I wouldn’t do for Andy’s widow and Andy’s friends. I’ll help in any way I can. I can stay as long as you need me.’ ”

  “Sounds like a sweet man,” Myra said. “First thing in the morning sounds really good to me. Will someone notify Avery and make sure he gets the message to his operatives who are surveilling Sara? We don’t want her taking off on us since she seems to be such a getaway expert. Matt and Duke might be tired and need to be relieved. Nights are long, and it’s easy to let your guard down at three in the morning.”

  “Done. Mr. Montrose said he is partial to pancakes and would see us for breakfast,” Maggie said.

  “Done. Avery said he’d pass the word to the boys,” Isabelle said. “He also said the shift changes at eleven, so they’re good for now.”

  “I just sent Bella a text explaining the current situation. I told her to be over here at eight tomorrow morning. Wouldn’t it be nice if . . . if Mr. Montrose and Bella hit it off? He’s single, or at least he was according to Bella,” Nikki said.

  “Ever the romantic, eh, Nikki,” Myra said softly.

  “Always and forever.” Nikki sighed. “It’s just that Bella is so young to have gone through all that’s happened to her. We’re going to dump another load of misery on her when we tell her about Sara. How much is one person expected to suck
up? She needs a break. So, yes, someone from her husband’s past that she can talk to about Andy will do her a world of good. At least I think and hope it works that way. If nothing else, they become friends. His coming here is a good thing for all of us. If that makes me a hopeless romantic, then so be it.”

  “It’s a good thing, dear. Don’t ever apologize,” Myra assured her.

  “I think our biggest problem is who is going to cook breakfast tomorrow morning?” Kathryn said. “I’m not seeing anyone volunteering,” she said, then giggled.

  “Okay, okay, I’ll do it,” Maggie grumbled.

  “Oh, you dear, sweet child, thank you, thank you,” Myra gushed. “Bacon?”

  “Don’t get carried away, Myra. I said I’d do the pancakes, I didn’t say anything about bacon. We need, like, three pounds for just our crew alone, and I bet that guy eats a whole pound himself,” Maggie said.

  Alexis raised her hand. “Since I’m the one who got us into this mess, I guess it’s the least I can do. I’ll do the bacon.”

  The Sisters clapped their hands in appreciation.

  “Well, then, I think on that note we can tidy up here and head upstairs to bed. A good night’s sleep will have us fresh and dewy-eyed when we meet Mr. Montrose for breakfast. I think if we agree to meet down here at eight, it will be good. I don’t expect Mr. Montrose to arrive until around eight thirty, possibly nine o’clock. Let’s say we call it a night, girls.”

  And that’s exactly what they did.

  Chapter 16