Her comment was interrupted by loud quacking coming from the direction of the courtyard. It was as though several ducks had come out of the canal and were demanding attention. Maybe Maxi and Mini shared the fact that it was a good place to get treats, but for that to happen when they were generally sleeping late at night was very unusual.
“I’ll check to see what’s going on. Maybe Barrington got your message and came straight over. It’s probably him.” Kate walked over to the front door and opened it. The ducks went wild.
The door was still slightly ajar when two huge guys with Rojas tattoos on their thick necks and forearms burst into the living room. The larger of the two appeared to stand around six-foot-six and wore a black leather jacket over a form-fitting wife beater shirt and black jeans. His greasy black hair was combed straight back, and he sported a mustache. He held Kate’s back tight against his chest with one muscular arm wrapped around her neck as he pushed her forward. A nasty-looking knife rested at her throat. His sneer exposed a gold grill over yellowed teeth. He grunted a single word: “Move.”
The other shorter but meaner looking one held a gun aimed at Garrett. “Do what he says, puta, or I shoot your boyfriend and my friend uses his knife on you.”
Garrett obviously knew enough not to make a move that could endanger Kate. Meanwhile, Cameron heard the commotion, but wisely remained in the kitchen. She must have reasoned that if they didn’t see her, the intruders wouldn’t know there was a third person in the house. She backed into the walk-in pantry, pulled the door partially closed and took her cell phone out of her pocket. When she dialed Barrington’s cell number voicemail answered. She whispered into her phone, “It’s Cameron. We’re in danger. Come quick and bring backup.” Hopefully she hadn’t been heard.
Kate’s heart was beating so fast and loud it echoed in her ears. Her karate training compelled her to slow down her breathing, but it was clear her black belt would be of no use in this situation. She said in a flat voice, “What do you want? Money? If you’re looking for drugs, we don’t have any.”
With her back to the two thugs, she couldn’t see their tattoos which she would have recognized instantly after her last encounter with the Rojas Cartel.
The big guy released his grip and shoved her to the sofa where she collapsed next to Garrett. He gave her hand a squeeze as if to tell her they would get out of this.
It was almost more of a growl than a statement when the big guy said, “We have been watching you. We know you are looking for the wife of the piece of scum we threw in the canal.” He pointed to Garrett. “You, Mr. FBI man—yes, I know who you are. You are going to tell us what you know, or your girlfriend will not be so guapa when we are done with her. Claro? We have our ways to know what we want.”
Garrett didn’t answer immediately. Then he said in a level voice, “You are right about us looking for Shady’s wife. We have our own beef with her, but if you got him, what do you want with her?”
The smaller man said in nearly perfect English, “While we do not have to answer you, I will. Those sucio cabrónes —forgive me, I will translate. Those dirty bastards think they can steal our customers with their pills and doctors and pharmacies. The body of El Doctor was the first message to his amigos that we will protect what is ours. His espousa will be the next, so we must find her. We believe it is possible she had as much power with their foolish attempt to cut into our business as he did. She will know the names of all the others. When we are done, the others will realize you do not challenge the Rojas. With no leaders, we believe they will be finished.”
“I understand what you said but harming us won’t help. If we find her, she will be brought to justice and your message will be sent. You see, we know something you don’t. She has killed before, so she won’t be able to get out of that when she is arrested. The cops will make sure she pays. You have as much as told us you killed Shady, but we think you didn’t know you actually finished the job for her. We think she planned to kill him. Do we have a deal? Trade our safety for our silence about what you just told us. You leave us in peace, and we will take care of her. But, if the police do connect you to Shady’s murder without us telling them anything, we can’t help you on that.”
Both men looked a bit stunned. “That puta has killed before? I will tell you this because you may be right. When we found him he was unconscious on the floor. We thought he was dead, but he opened his eyes and tried to rise.” The tall one pointed to his sidekick. “Hernando beat him to send a warning to the others, then pointed a gun at his forehead to scare him. He tried to grab it and it went off, killing that cabron. It was not our plan to kill him, so we took his body while we figured out what to do and the news said he was kidnapped. But you think she meant to kill him, and we did it for her?”
Cameron came out of the kitchen. “That is exactly what we think. Look, you aren’t good guys. I know that because I’ve had experience with the Rojas before. I should not be warning you, but I know you have your own twisted code of honor. You could kill all of us, but I don’t think you will. We have surprised you. It is the truth that we don’t know where she is at this moment, but we will find her, and we know how. She will pay. That won’t happen if you harm us, and you don’t have the time to beat it out of us. The cops are on their way here, and I’m not bluffing. Leave Barbara Shady up to us and the cops. Go!”
The tension in the air was almost palpable. Silence. Hostile stares. The big guy moved toward Garrett and Kate sitting on the sofa. He bent right into their space while Cameron held her breath. Then he said, “We will take you at your word. FBI man, what we have heard from you and your amigos better be true or we will be back just for fun.”
Garrett stood, almost eye to eye with the thug. “You will read of it in the papers. Now get out of here.”
38
Barbara Shady stared at the flat screen TV while she picked at her room service dinner. She had not left the room since the day she checked in. One more day and she could leave all of this behind her. Marrying and killing old men for their money, changing her look and name after each of the marriages ended in the husband’s death had gotten more and more stressful. She finally had enough money stashed in secure places and it would soon be over. No more fearing that she would be caught. Freedom. She pressed the mute button on the TV but left it playing on the local news station.
She set up her small laptop and entered the URL for Crystal Cruises, then keyed in Serenity and the date of departure. The description and itinerary displayed within moments. Barbara stared at the small screen, picturing what would doubtless be a very classy escape from the search for her and knew she would never return to the United States. She let out her breath in slow puffs, a relaxing technique she used so often. Just one more day.
When she married the old geezer Shady years before, her plan was to follow her usual routine. He had seemed like a perfect mark for a short marriage and a healthy payday, this wealthy doctor who was part of Beverly Hills society. His practice included very recognizable names in politics, the wealthy social circles and the entertainment industry. It didn’t take long for her to realize that many of his patients really didn’t have problems that required an orthopedist. Instead, they had needs easily satisfied by a prescription pad and lots of money. Recognizing how much more he could be worth as the years passed when his issuance of illegal prescriptions increased thanks to her, his life was spared. At least until she was sure she could inherit enough combined with what she already had and was able to hide to live a luxurious life and never worry again.
39
Considering what had happened, all three of them were reasonably calm by the time Barrington arrived accompanied by two uniformed officers. Cameron invited them in and thanked them for coming.
Barrington looked around in confusion. “Where is the emergency? Your message sounded desperate and scared. We got here as soon as possible, but it appears nothing is wrong.”
He turned to Garrett. “What’s this all about, Danny?
I didn’t figure you for a false alarm kind of guy.”
“No false alarm. It’s a rather long and involved story and we are bringing you into it. Fortunately Cami was in the kitchen when two very scary members of the Rojas Cartel forced their way in here and threatened our lives. They were looking for Barbara Shady and somehow knew we were looking for her, too. Maybe they’d been watching us. Anyway, Cami heard the threats but stayed in the kitchen, so they had no idea anyone else was here. That’s why she was able to call you.”
“But they’re not here now?”
“No. Let’s say we persuaded them to leave. I promised them I wouldn’t talk about their ‘visit’ and what they told us if they would leave us unharmed, but I guess some promises are made to be broken. Although they as much as confessed to killing the good doctor, one of them claimed the gun went off when he tried to grab it. I think he was telling the truth. I’m pretty sure she’s the one who drugged him and thought he was dead. You might want to look into that. As far as I could tell, they figured the wife knew as much about his drug operation as he did and wanted to set her up as an example of what could happen when you mess with Rojas. Beating Shady up was to be the first warning, she was to be the second. Listen, this will take a while. Do you guys want some coffee or something to drink?”
Barrington shrugged and said he wouldn’t say no. The two officers agreed, so Cameron showed them into the dining room. “Why don’t you guys sit here while I put up a pot of coffee. As Danny said, this could take some time.
She came back a short time later with large steaming mugs of Columbian coffee, a bowl of sugar, packets of sweetener and a pitcher of half-and-half. She set them down on the table and went back into the kitchen.
When she returned, she carried a tray of pastries. “In this house, you can’t have coffee without something to go with it. I just happened to have these éclairs in the fridge. Dig in while we bring you up to date.”
Garrett began. “You may or may not know that Barbara Shady has had several different names and left a string of wealthy, dead husbands behind her in cities up and down the coast. The woman is what might be called a Black Widow. Shady was to be her victim as well, although he managed to survive much longer than his predecessors. His drug operation could have been the reason. A real cash cow.”
“No kidding. We still don’t have confirmation on how many of the retired doctors are involved, but I’m guessing it’s a nice thing to do in retirement—a lot more lucrative than a 401K or IRA.” Barrington smiled at his attempt at making a joke. “Since what you’re about to fill me in on sounds like it has to do with drugs, should I be calling in my DEA counterpart?”
Garrett said, “Nah. You can hold off for the time being. That lets you be the hero. After all, you’re one of my devoted fans.” He chuckled. “You helped us. Let’s just say I’m looking out for you.”
The two officers finished their coffee and éclairs, and Barrington told them since there was no emergency they could leave and he would take it from there. They thanked Cameron for her hospitality, said they were glad the threat had been handled, and took their leave.
Barrington indicated he really hadn’t wanted them to hear what might be coming next. They were patrol and he was investigative. Garrett understood.
They proceeded to bring Barrington up to date about everything they had uncovered, including her clever plan to embezzle from the HOA.
Cameron said, “We’ll call the Attorney General in the morning to bring him up-to-date about what must be done here tomorrow afternoon. That’s where you’ll come in. We’ve already been in conversations with him about the taking down of opioid rings around the country.”
Barrington couldn’t hide his surprise at the mention of their involvement with the AG. “Wait a minute. You’re just going to pick up the phone and call the California Attorney General? And, he’ll take your call?”
“You’ve got it partly right,” Cameron answered. “The part you got wrong is that it’s not the California Attorney General—we’ll be calling the United States Attorney General. You see, Nathan Hartman and I are dear friends. His wife Kim is the third member of our fraud-busting trio. We tried to tell you we are more than your ineffective, amateur sleuths.”
He shook his head and said, “Well, I sure underestimated you guys. I am honestly impressed and can’t wait to hear everything.”
She poured him another cup of coffee.
Then he listened in awe while the three of them took turns telling him what they knew so far.
Garrett took the lead. “As I alluded to before, we believe that Barbara was the one who injected Shady with the Oxy that was found in his system. This was probably the scenario. She knew she had to make an appearance at the HOA Board meeting to keep them calm—”
“Why would she need to keep them calm?”
Cameron said, “Oh, there were about three million reasons. You see after she disappeared, we discovered she was able to embezzle right around Three Million Dollars from our HOA Reserve Fund. As far as we can tell, her plan was to kill her husband that night with an overdose of Oxy which would make it appear that he was an addict. With him out of the way, she would simply disappear, and we would be no wiser until we discovered that millions were missing from the account. By the time we discovered the loss, she would have used one of her aliases and good luck finding her or the money. But maybe she didn’t give him a strong enough dose and thought he was dead, so she just went to the meeting like nothing was amiss to give us fake financial statements.”
Garrett interrupted. “That’s speculation, of course, but with everything that’s happened I think it makes sense.”
“Okay. Go on Cameron.”
“Well, she knew there could be no suspicion on our part about the missing money before she was gone, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out if she didn’t show up at the meeting or contact us we would have gotten nervous immediately. However, it would be no problem for her to show up, then make an excuse for his not being there and leave before anyone else. She figured Shady’s dead body would be found after she disappeared. But that, of course, isn’t what happened.”
Kate picked up the thread. “It seems she returned home, probably saw the blood on the living room rug with Shady nowhere in sight. Most women would have panicked, but not her. We figure she calmly staged it to look like a robbery and kidnapping giving the impression that both of them were in danger. However, we don’t think she ever imagined his corpse would turn up in the canal a few days later.”
“The Rojas goons claimed he was definitely unconscious on the living room floor when they got there,” Garrett added. “They only intended to scare him to teach him a lesson by beating him up and putting a gun to his forehead. They wanted to set him up as an example of what could happen when you cut into the territory of the Rojas Cartel. Once again, if you believe what they said, they had no intention of actually killing him, but he came to and tried to grab the gun. It went off and killed him. They panicked and grabbed his body, hid it, then dumped it in the Grand Canal near his home a few days later.”
40
A clear and believable picture was beginning to form for Barrington. It looked more and more like Barbara Shady managed to go into hiding somehow while the police searched for her and her husband in all the wrong places. Clever woman. “She had your three million stashed somewhere, so didn’t have to worry about money. Who knows where she could be?”
That’s when they told him that she had much more than the three million. They mentioned the aliases, bank accounts under various names that were fat with inheritances plus insurance payouts from killing previous very wealthy husbands. Then Kate mentioned the possibility that a clever woman like her could be stashing a good portion of it in cryptocurrency, which would make it much harder to trace if at all.
“Anyway, it’s true she could be anywhere by now. We uncovered quite a bit of her trail but haven’t found her yet. We know she simply and calmly walked over to the Marriott on A
dmiralty and checked in under an alias right after she cleared out, but she left without checking out the next morning. However, and here’s where it gets good, we do know where she will be tomorrow. We are pretty certain of that.” Garrett continued, “That’s why we brought you in now. This is how you get your big bust. Be aware, however, that some other states may be fighting to prosecute her for those other murders. However, you will get the headlines.”
Now Barrington looked skeptical. He wanted to know how they knew everything so far and what was yet to be revealed.
Kate said, “Well, my firm FraudBusters uncovered the information about the aliases and dead husbands, but as far as how we know where she will be tomorrow and at approximately what time, sorry, we protect our sources.”
There was no need to involve Maggie as their source of the Beverly Hills gossip, which would have also led to him knowing how they found out about what would lead to Barbara’s capture.
Barrington was on board after asking several more questions. They told him about her booking the around the world cruise, how much it cost, and their belief that she intended to disembark in one of the ports and either settle there to start a new life, or take another form of transportation to whatever new home base she’d chosen.
He listened intently while Garrett gave him the final pieces of necessary information. “The cruise is booked under the name Briana Hanley. She will definitely have a passport and credit cards in that name. We used that name to see if she’s been staying anywhere in the greater LA area awaiting the departure date, but we came up dry. She probably used yet another name and credit card—an alias that we’re not aware of.”
The stunned expression on Barrington’s face said everything. It reflected his amazement that a very old Colonel, an action adventure actor, an advertising executive and a woman who operated a firm called FraudBusters and, okay, a former FBI agent who did happen to be his favorite author—had actually uncovered all of this while the cops ran around in circles. It was beyond anything he could have imagined when he got the call for help.
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