by H. T. Night
Mr. Owusu didn’t respond. I looked at Chad and he looked at me.
I said, “You knew her, didn’t you, Mr. Owusu?”
“I know her family, yes. I’m not necessarily close to her, but her grandfather and I go way back.”
“To North Africa?” asked Chad.
“The Italian Civil War in 1944. I was only sixteen years old then.”
“Oh, I thought you said you were from North Africa,” I said.
“I was born and raised in North Africa, but my family migrated to Italy in the late thirties. Italy became my home. In 1980, I left Italy behind, took a boat to the United States and made my way to Los Angeles where I opened my shop. I was fifty-seven years old at the time and I had the American dream in my eyes and all that.”
“That’s quite a life, Mr. Owusu,” I said.
Chad reached out and shook the man’s hand. “We do appreciate you sharing your story with us and answering our questions. If we have any other questions, we’ll be in touch.”
Mr. Owusu walked us to the front door and waved as we walked to our car. Once we entered, Chad started up the vehicle and pulled away from the curb.
“Thoughts?” he said. “Besides the bad breath.”
“Yours or his?” I snickered.
“My breath smells immaculate. I’ve been sucking on Altoids all morning.”
“Your breath does smell strangely refreshing.”
“Look, Moon. Do you like the guy? Do you believe him? Your thoughts.”
“I like the guy, but I think he’s lying to us.”
“Yeah, I’m not sure how or why, but I do believe the old guy isn’t being entirely truthful,” Chad said. “I’m going to contact LAPD and see if they can give us the footage from the night of the crime.”
“Or give us anything, for that matter.” Chad seemed discouraged.
“Yeah, good point. I think it is time for us to pay Lori Hines a visit.”
When we pulled up in front of Lori Hines’ home, I noticed the dried grass had a broken-down vehicle parked diagonally across the lawn. The porch had an old, weathered, ripped couch on it, and the railing on the porch was cracked and dangling from the other side.
Chad stepped up and knocked on the door. And knocked again.
No answer, and no movement inside.
Damn.
Chad motioned toward an elderly man across the street, and we made our way to him.
The street was lined with small homes all packed close together, many sporting iron-spiked fences. The area was one of Fullerton’s most poverty-stricken in the entire city. We stopped on the sidewalk in front of the man’s home.
“Hi, sir,” Chad said, pulling out his badge and flashing it to the man. “I’m Agent Chad Helling and this is my partner, Agent Samantha Moon. We’re with the Department of Housing and Urban Development and we’d like to ask you a few questions.”
The man was maybe forty-five years old and wore jeans and a T-shirt, and held the water hose loosely. He shrugged and said, “Sure, what can I do for you?”
“We’re assessing the neighborhood,” I said, “and we wanted to know if you’ve seen anything out of the ordinary lately?”
He shook his head and pursed his lips. “Out of the ordinary, how?”
Chad said, “Anything of concern.”
He thought about it, shrugged.
“Well, the neighborhood is quiet.” He hesitated. “For the most part.”
“For the most part?” I said.
“Well, there’s some activity across the street, where the two of you just came from, in fact. People in and out all hours of the night. A few loud fights between the lady there and a guy who used to live there.”
I said, “How many other people would you say visit in any given week?”
“I have no idea, agents. I mind my own business and I appreciate it that they mind theirs.”
“I understand,” I said. “Here’s my card. Please call if you can remember anything else.”
He took it and we left.
We weren’t ten minutes in the car when I received a text message:
‘There is one thing I recall. There’s talk in the neighborhood that the people across the street sell firearms. Not sure how true any of it is, but most of us would like to see her leave the neighborhood. Please, keep this between us. I don’t want trouble.’
I hadn’t received too many text messages before this. Truthfully, I found them an odd way to communicate. Why not just call me? Anyway, I read the message to my partner, who whistled. “So, what do you think is going on, Moonie?”
I glanced at his side profile and back in front of us again. “We already know that there is some form of housing fraud going on with Lori Hines. We just don’t know how deep it goes.”
“Or what they’re doing in that house. Selling firearms?”
“No doubt, stolen firearms,” I added.
“This is all just too close to be a coincidence.”
“We need a search warrant,” I said.
“But first, we need to prove probable cause.”
“Yeah,” I said. “There’s that.”
Chapter Five
It was the next morning.
Tammy had been dropped off at my sister’s, and a Starbucks venti mocha was presently steaming in the cup holder next to me. Life was good. Barney was still playing on a CD that I’d listened to ten thousand times, give or take a thousand. Okay, maybe life wasn’t so good.
My phone rang. Chad Helling. I answered the call.
“Moon Pie,” I said, about as seriously as I could.
He chuckled. “Meet me at the Fullerton Police Department. I have another case we need to look into. It may be connected to the Hines case. I’ll brief you when we get there.”
“Changing routes. See you there in five.” I loved it when a case became juicier and juicier and this was turning out to be the case. Hey, I worked for HUD, so the memorable cases were few and far between. You could only kick a poor family out on the street so many times in the name of housing fraud and say it was for the greater good. HUD needed to police itself and we did a great job of ensuring the right people found homes, but sometimes, I hungered for a multilayered case like this one.
When I pulled up into the parking lot of the Fullerton Police Department, Chad met me at my vehicle’s door. As I stepped out, he handed me a manila folder. “Take a look at the new case.”
“New case? I thought Fortunato didn’t want us to take on any more cases.”
“Just open the file.”
I did, and read the case name at the top. “Darlene Michaels.” I shrugged. “Doesn’t ring any bells.”
Chad took the folder and pulled out a picture, a mug shot of a woman with brown hair, brown eyes and a scowl I’d recognize anywhere. Of course, I knew her then as Darlene Robertson, back when we had worked on her fraud case last year.
“Did Darlene marry?” I asked.
Chad nodded. “A guy named Andre Michaels, a single father of three kids. He and Darlene married just a few months ago.”
“And we weren’t invited to the wedding?”
“I don’t think we’re her favorite people, Sam. But get this. A week ago, she filed a restraining order against her hubby for domestic violence. Apparently, he pulled a gun on her.”
“Trouble in paradise. Was the gun was stolen from Frank Owusu in Los Angeles?”
“Close, but no. In her restraining order, she claims the gun has been in her family for more than a hundred years. She filed an insurance claim on the gun.”
“Okay, now that’s interesting,” I said and locked my vehicle. It was Chad’s turn to drive.
We got in Chad’s car and headed over to the Michaels’ residence.
***
We were in Andre Michaels’ HUD-sponsored house, and he wasn’t happy about it.
The thing about my job, love it or hate it, was that I tended to deal with people who had fallen on hard times. The thing about falling on hard times was that it could either bri
ng out the best in some people—those who fight and claw for more—or the worst. And judging by his hostile glare, I was thinking Andre might fall into the latter category.
“What can I do for you?” he said, which sounded civil enough—except if you happened to read his body language, which looked like a cross between wanting to run, and wanting to throw down. He was a big guy, muscular, tattooed. Andre had a way of rubbing his knuckles that made it seem like he was getting them ready, the way a pitcher might rub a brand-new baseball.
My partner and I sat next to each other on a worn, seventies-looking couch. Andre sat on a chair he’d brought in from the kitchen. Van Halen played from somewhere in the house. I knew Andre worked the night shift at a paper factory. I also knew that he had a short criminal record, which included threatening his most-recent wife and allegedly stealing an antique gun. It was early afternoon, and, judging by the crease lines and mussed hair, the man had just awakened. The kids were all in school.
I flipped open a manila folder, his case file. A quick scan revealed the man had three kids, whom he had been raising with his second wife, Darlene. Well, until the gun incident.
I said, “I’m sorry to bring this up, Mr. Michaels, but we need clarification on your file. According to our records, your first wife died while giving birth to your third child at Saint Joseph’s Hospital six years ago on May 22nd. But when we ran this information through the hospital database, there was never a woman named Faith Michaels who died on that day at Saint Joseph’s.”
I waited and watched the myriad of emotions on the man’s face. I sensed him wanting to get mad, but I also sensed that we had hit a nerve with bringing up his previous wife. I hadn’t meant to hit a nerve. I just aimed to get to the truth, and if this upset him, so be it. It was part of my job.
He rubbed his knuckles, over and over, his arms flexing, his tattoos dancing. There were pictures of his kids on the wall, which gave me some hope for them. Maybe he was a good dad to them, maybe not. The existence of the pictures suggested he gave a crap, which was better than nothing.
He took in some air, held it. His face was reddening. “My wife died during childbirth.”
“And we believe you,” Helling said. “But she didn’t die in Saint Joseph’s Hospital, did she? Where did she die, Mr. Michaels?”
“Obviously, there’s some type of mistake,” he said. “She died at Saint Joseph’s.”
I sat forward. I never liked to get scammed, and I felt like I was getting scammed now. Chad placed a hand on my shoulder and eased me back. A real good-cop, bad-cop routine, except I was actually pissed, and Chad was actually the level-headed one.
He said, “That’s not the only discrepancy we have on our application, Mr. Michaels. We need you to clarify a few more things. Your application states that you’re single, but we show that you are remarried to a woman named Darlene Michaels, formerly Darlene Robertson.”
“That bitch was never a wife. She lived off me. Eating my food and taking what she could.”
“She was living with you while she rented out her house, is that correct?” pressed Chad.
“House? She didn’t have a house. The woman was homeless when we started dating.”
“Mr. Michaels, are you aware that regulations clearly state that when there is a significant change in your household, you need to notify HUD, so that we can reassess your benefits?”
“Musta slipped my mind. You know, with my wife dying and leaving me all the kids.”
Chad studied him a moment, then said, “Was Darlene working while she lived here with you?”
“Oldest profession in the books,” he said.
“What do you mean?” asked Chad.
Except I knew what he meant. I said, “Are you saying your second wife was a prostitute, Mr. Michaels?”
“No, she was a whore. A prostitute sounds far more legitimate than she ever was. She was also a thief and a liar, and I’m glad she’s gone.”
I jotted down some notes in the file. Andre Michaels was in his late thirties, according to his file with HUD. He had three children, all under the age of twelve. He received assistance from the welfare system. If the children’s mother was still alive and working, then she’d be required to pay child support and that would change his income and thus, change his benefits.
I said, “Darlene Michaels, your second wife, filed a restraining order against you about two months ago. She claims you threatened her with a gun that you stole from her. The gun, as stated in the report, was a family heirloom.”
“Yeah, and I bet she filed an insurance claim on it, right?”
I didn’t answer, nor did Chad. We weren’t here to answer his questions, nor give up information that wasn’t his business, unless we deemed it to be. I said nothing, waited for him to keep talking.
He did. “Check her renter’s insurance policy. She has an endorsement added that covers her precious stolen antique gun. And for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why the damn woman had renter’s insurance when she didn’t even have a home. How did she pull that one off? Actually, I can tell you how. She’s damn good at what she does.”
“And what does she do, Mr. Michaels?”
“She steals and lies and cheats the system.”
Chad said, “Did you steal the weapon, Mr. Michaels?”
“Hell, no. But Darlene Robertson—”
“You mean Michaels,” I interrupted.
He blinked, shrugged. “No, I mean Robertson. I... I won’t acknowledge that bitch even has my last name.” He narrowed his eyes at us. “As I was saying, she’s a professional thief. The kind that makes a solid living by ripping off other people.”
Andre suddenly stood and walked over to a cabinet near the kitchen. Both Chad and I stood.
“What are you doing, sir?” asked Chad.
“Relax. I’m going to get you some proof. You do want proof, right, agents?” He gave us both a disgusted look and reached into a drawer, pulling out a small pouch. “She left it behind. I thought it might come in handy.”
Helling pulled out gloves from his pocket and slid them on. He took the pouch, unzipped it and pulled out several licenses, passports and social security cards with different names.
“What’s this?” asked Chad, although we both damn well knew what it was.
“Oh, didn’t I tell you? She’s into identity theft, too.”
“I’m taking this as evidence,” said Chad.
“All yours, Agent Helling,” he said, returning to his chair.
Chad placed the items back in the pouch and stood over Andre. “Do you know what happened to the weapon she claims you pulled on her?”
“She probably sold it, took the money and then reported it was stolen and filed a claim to get paid again. I’m not saying that’s what happened, but that’s the kind of mind that this woman has. She would steal from her own kids if given half the chance.”
I leaned into Chad and angled my eyes toward the hallway to silently tell him I was going to have a look around. Then I said, “May I use your restroom, Andre?”
“Go right ahead. Down the hall, to your left. Messy as hell. But then again, I wasn’t expecting guests.”
He might have emphasized the word ‘guests’ a little more nastily than he had to.
I set off to the bathroom.
Once inside Mr. Michaels’ bathroom, I pulled out a white glove from my pocket and opened his medicine cabinet. Fifteen bottles of current prescription medication. I read each label. All belonged to him except one for his wife, Darlene Michaels. Man, that guy had a lot of health issues. Even criminals had their burdens to bear.
I glanced in each of the rooms on my way back to the living room. Once back with the men, I excused myself and stepped out into the backyard to do a visual inspection. To the left of the patio, past the toys littered across the parched lawn, three slats of wood were torn through, hanging and broken with splintered lumber around a large hole.
I kneeled down and scanned the wood, ran my hand ac
ross the broken area and shook my head. Aside from a little water damage from the sprinklers, the wood was split from a hard impact.
I took a walk around the yard and moved to the side gate.
Chad’s footsteps came up behind me. “What do we have here?”
“A car backed into the fence. A red car, according to the paint here on the wood. Here are the tire marks.”
“And this is of interest, why?”
“Why was a car in a backyard?” I asked.
Chad smirked and shook his head at me. “I want to know how you handle being in that mind of yours. I bet you’ve already devised the reason behind this hole in the fence, haven’t you?”
“My guess? Darlene took the money she’s getting from her tenants and bought herself a pretty expensive vehicle. Andre, not wanting to draw attention to himself, told her she had to keep it in the backyard. As you can see, the side gate is wide enough for her to drive the car back here.”
“Why not keep it in the garage?”
“Because, like half of all Americans, he’s a pack rat and rather than pay for storage, he uses his garage to house all the things he collects.”
Chad put out his hand to shake mine. “How much should we bet that you’re wrong?”
“You’re going to bet against me? You feel daring today, don’t you? Or stupid.”
“I think I need to push your mind past the usual concoctions you come up with. Teach you to think outside the box.”
I glared at my arrogant partner. “I’d rather think without a box. How about that?” I started for the house.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
“To check out the garage. You coming?”
Within a few strides, my partner had caught up with me and we asked Mr. Michaels to let us see inside the garage. He hesitated and mumbled under his breath about agents and their nosy nature and so forth, but after he had that discussion with himself, he grabbed the key and took us out front.
“I don’t know what you’re looking for, agents, but last I checked, I can keep my garage any way I want it.”
“True. Let’s just say it’s part of the inspection.”
When Andre lifted the garage door, three boxes fell forward at our feet and opened up. Magazines fell out and slid a couple inches onto the driveway. A small walking path between the boxes piled high and wide enabled someone to get to the back of the garage.
