“Yes, I’m a police officer. You must be Aunt Gert,” he said, escorting the elderly woman down the hall.
She peered over at Esther. “Baby girl telling tales on me, has she?” she flicked her hand in dismissal. “Pay her no nevermind. These folk today going around calling older women cougars. Well, I’m an old mountain lion, baby. But since you already taken, we just gon’ be good friends. How about that?”
Lawton tightened Aunt Gert’s hand on his arm. “You try to get rid of me after this.”
Hickman harrumphed several times. “Gert, you hogging the man to yourself? Let him breathe.” He stretched his hand out for a handshake. “Welcome, son. Come on out of this hallway and sit. Women won’t even let a man get in the house good.”
Esther shook her head and walked behind Lawton and Aunt Gert. Aunt Gert put her hand back and Esther took it as they all walked through the wide entrance into the family room.
Everyone started talking at once, and Esther winked at Lawton as he smiled at the wonderful clamor of welcoming noise.
Later, as Esther and Lawton sat in her kitchen having coffee, they reviewed their progress.
“Looks like so far we’re batting all home runs,” Lawton mused. “My friends like you. Your family loves me. And if you don’t do me right, Aunt Gert may be the one who’ll help me heal my broken heart.”
“Don’t play. When I was younger, I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. She scandalized the family by having a nude painting of herself hanging in her bedroom. But she made sure her long silky hair covered all the appropriate places,” Esther tittered, somewhat embarrassed now.
“Get outta here,” Lawton said in disbelief.
“Yep. Daddy would say she needed Jesus, and Aunt Gert would just shake her head and say she already knew Him. We really do pray for her, but she was hurt by church folk antics and she won’t join what she calls ‘organized religion.’”
“What do you mean, ‘church folk’? We both go to church.”
“Club folk, work folk, neighborhood folk, church folk. People doing business as usual. The only difference is the place. I’m a Christian in love with my church and my God. Church folk be killing people softly.”
“That’s real talk. Together, you and I will keep Aunt Gert lifted. It was fun. I’m sorry your sister and brother-in-law couldn’t make it. Mom’s next. Mama is kind of protective, but you’ll hold your own.” On the sly, he snuck a glance to catch her reaction.
Esther swallowed. “I ain’t scared of your mama.”
“Just checking. I better get going.” He paused searching her face. They hadn’t discussed the elephant in the room. “You know you’ve done a great job cooperating with all the authorities and keeping the fraud investigation quiet. Although the church is involved you haven’t shared anything with anyone outside of your boss and the investigating team. That had to be hard. All day we’ve ignored what a big day tomorrow is. Are you ready for this?”
Small beads of sweat popped across her forehead. “I’m nervous. The plan for me to set up John is an important part of getting the whole house of cards to fall. But I’ve never tried to set someone up before. You’ll be with me, right?”
Lawton came around the table and pulled Esther out of her chair. He planted a small kiss on her cheek. “There’s not a chance that I will let anything happen to you. I’ll be close by the entire time.” Enveloped in his arms, she relaxed.
She blinked, her smile tremulous. “It’s been a lovely evening, Lawton. Thank you for being patient with my crazy family.”
“Aunt Gert might steal me,” he joked, his eyes glued to her lips. “Being a saved man, and you being a saved woman means I need to leave before repentance is needed. No more kisses tonight; they’re becoming a little too addictive,” he explained, keeping a small distance between them.
Esther pushed Lawton out the door in a lighthearted way. “Yeah, keep your distance, you’re irresistible.” She could hear his chuckle as he stepped off the porch.
She needed some quiet time. In spite of Lawton’s reassurances, tomorrow could be a rough day. The sweat pouring from her pores guaranteed it.
Chapter Thirty-four
Arms stretched up as instructed, Esther and Simone were fitted with listening devices. Simone’s flirtatious tittering and cutesy wiggle captivated the handsome fraud unit officer’s attention. Undeterred from his duty, his eyes twinkled as he taped the small microphone under Simone’s sweater. Esther rolled her eyes at the spectacle, her nose scrunched at Lawton in disapproval.
To soothe Esther’s frayed nerves, Lawton spoke in a soft, confident voice. “It’s going to be all right. Everyone here is a professional. We have gone over this enough to be confident that you will do fine. Remember—no heroics—all you have to do is get him to admit the truth.”
The fair-skinned officer in charge had curly, auburn hair, and his ocean-blue eyes were compassionate and sincere. In a gravelly voice, abused by years of unfiltered smoking, he assured Esther, “Miss Wiley, we wouldn’t put you in any danger. If we can bait and catch the employees involved, the bigger fish will fry. The best-case scenario is they’ll turn on each other for a plea bargain. And when they do, they become the property of the City of Detroit.”
Esther frowned. She had butterflies in her stomach, and she was fighting rock icy fear. She could taste her dread. It was metallic and brought memories of the well water at her overnight Girl Scout camp. Last week with an S on her chest, Superwoman was going to bring down the bad guys and save the day. Today, she didn’t want to bring home the bacon or fry it. She wanted to be in her flannel pajamas with the cover over her head awaiting a phone call that it was all over. She wanted to be able to do like Esther of biblical times and ask everyone involved to fast and pray. But her promise to keep everything a secret stopped her from reaching out to her church. Her one light in darkness was Lawton’s ability to pray. He was a man who knew his Word and knew it was his weapon. He had become her idea prayer partner. However, this morning was a new clear day, and she was only human.
Last night she tossed and turned, tormented by thoughts that John would turn violent. The plan sounded easy when law enforcement pitched it to her executive director, Mr. Woodson. As her boss, he was responsible for what went on in the agency. When the fraud unit cleared him of involvement in any of the nefarious activities, they went to him with the illegal and unethical operation that had been going on right under his nose. After getting over the shock and threatening to fire Esther for not telling him first, Mr. Woodson became gung ho to get in on the act and pursue all parties with righteous vengeance. Hence, her current dilemma. Microphone in place, her body mimicked the Harlem shake.
Irritated, Mr. Woodson clapped his hands at Esther and her out of control shaking. “Enough, Ms. Wiley, calm down. If you’re not going to do it for this agency, do it for your church that you’re always running to. They’re in just about the same boat we’re in. Doing this helps everybody.”
“Do not clap your hands at her,” Lawton chastised. “She’s not a pet poodle.”
Esther grinned in spite of herself. He was becoming her knight in shining armor, even in the small things. “Let’s just do this.”
Simone hugged her, “I’ll call John to your office. If I can get him to talk first, you won’t have to.”
Mr. Blue Eyes—nicknamed by Simone—shook his head in the negative. “You will do as we asked—nothing more. You don’t want to tip him off. Just act natural.”
Simone tossed her weave over her shoulder and sashayed out the door, mumbling.
Mr. Blue Eyes called after her, “I can hear all that.”
Simone retorted, “And I know this.”
Lawton touched Esther’s shoulder. “We’ll be close by. You only have to say the code sentence, ‘I’m not having a good day’ and we’ll be here.”
Distracted, Esther nodded. She sat behind her desk, fidgeting and waited. Twenty minutes passed. Finally her buzzer sounded.
Esther wipe
d sweat-drenched hands down her black pants. “Yes, Simone?”
“John’s here to see you.”
Esther inhaled and exhaled deeply. “Send him in.”
John’s entrance was forceful and intimidating to even an unobservant eye. “You asked, or should I say, demanded, to see me?”
Looming over her desk, he appeared to be larger than life. Esther could feel a tension headache grip her. “Yes, I did.” She cleared her throat and motioned to an open folder. “Tell me, when you were handling the bids, did you find any irregularities in the vendors’ paperwork?”
John leaned forward without looking at the papers. “No, and that’s why I wanted to keep doing it.” He then smacked the papers on her desk. “You don’t know what you’re looking at.”
Esther stood, her hands braced on the desk. “Let’s not start this conversation with insults.” Anger chased away her previous fear. “I understand the paperwork. I understood it so well that in my review something seemed off. It led me to compare last year’s bids to my most recent public bids. The incoming bids look totally different.” She again motioned for him to review the paperwork in the file.
John backed away from Esther’s desk. “I’m not sure what you are alluding to.”
Esther pressed her advantage. “You say I don’t understand. I say, I understand better than you think. Where’s the confusion?”
John’s face turned red, his chest rose, and then deflated in rapid succession. “Lady . . .” he gritted out between clenched teeth, “if you have something to say, speak your mind.”
Esther maneuvered and made sure the desk was between them. She picked up and held out the folder of bids. “Why are you so defensive, John? I asked if you could tell the difference between the bids you accepted and the ones coming in now.”
John snatched the folder and flipped it open. His eyes scurried over the pages, and he then threw the folder on the desk. In the blink of an eye, he was around the desk in her face. “You don’t want to play with me.” His saliva splayed her face. “You would be wise to back off.”
Esther’s desk phone buzzed. She hit the intercom function. “Yes, Simone?”
Simone’s voice cracked as she asked, “Do you want me to hold your calls, Ms. Esther? You have the State on line one.”
Esther was not going to fold now. She refused to do this again, and John hadn’t admitted one thing. “Yes, Simone. Thanks for checking before you interrupted, but John and I will finish in here before I take any calls. Let anyone who needs to know that I’ll get back to them.”
John was livid. “Don’t answer the phone again. You wanted to play bad, well bad is here.”
Esther slid backward. “I’m not following you.”
John gripped her arm. “Oh, you follow too well. Who knew you could take your eyes off your church long enough to see what was really going on here. It doesn’t matter. I no longer need this little job. I quit.” He released her and turned to walk out the door.
Esther saw the whole plan falling apart. She had failed. In panic, she grasped at straws. “Yeah, you run, John. And hope your puppet master doesn’t get mad that you made a move on your own.”
John whipped around and rushed back to her. “Who you calling a puppet? I make my own decisions.”
Esther goaded him further. “You know when I hired you, I thought twice because you didn’t have a degree. Sometimes when you’re not smart, you can easily be manipulated. Is that what happened, John? Did they trick you?”
John snatched both Esther’s arms in a tight grip and shook her as he spoke, each sentence punctuated by a hard back-and-forth jerk of Esther’s body. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Nobody pulls my strings. I brought this plan to them. And I included your precious church and it’s neighborhoods in the bundle.”
Esther struggled to get free, but his grip was ironclad and she was dizzy and nauseated from his manhandling. His tirade escalated. “How to fake the bid process was all me. For the last year and a half, all we’ve done is make money.” Abruptly, he pushed her away from him, and she fell limp against her desk. “You’ve never given me the credit I deserve,” he taunted. “As a result, I’m more than ready to make it on my own. You can’t prove a thing. You signed off on every job I put in front of you. Maybe you’re the stupid one. You can keep this job and shove it up your—”
The door burst open and Lawton, accompanied by the Detroit Police and Federal Fraud unit, streamed through. Lawton headed directly to Esther while everyone else surrounded John. He quickly checked her for injuries. Seeing her drawn face and how she held her head and neck, he spun in anger toward John.
Touching her neck with one hand and pulling Lawton back with the other, Esther motioned for Lawton to hold off. She pushed through the men surrounding John, standing nose to nose, tears of fury gushing down her cheeks. “You know what? I gave you a chance when others felt you were too young and too arrogant to be a manager. But you couldn’t find it in your flawed character to be grateful. You ignorant, backward thief! You once said to me you were a paper chaser. Well, here’s some wisdom for you: Christians in the Kingdom don’t chase paper, paper chases us. Get a clue.” Esther saw she had returned the favor when errant saliva flew into his face. She then growled, “And don’t you ever put your nasty hands on me again.”
Lawton’s eyes widened at the fact that his hunch was right. John had touched her. He lurched forward, but abruptly pulled back and nodded to the men to give John his Miranda rights so they could take him away. Officer Blue Eyes touched the tip of his hat and nodded in respect as he acknowledged Lawton’s restraint and maturity.
Shocked, John turned aggressive when they snapped the handcuffs on. “Esther, you better watch your back. This isn’t over.”
Before Lawton could react, Simone raced up to John and with savage strength, punched him. Officer Blue Eyes grabbed her around her waist and swung her away. “Hey, cut that out.” His voice was filled with mirth at the dynamo he held in his arms. “How can I take you to dinner from jail?”
John kicked out as he struggled with the police. Simone ground her teeth, angered at his threats to Esther. “Shut up, fool. Ain’t nobody scared of you. Where you headed, you need to be concentrating on not dropping the soap. Don’t nobody use me, trick. I’m straight-up Gratiot Avenue. You shoulda asked somebody. Tell my cousin Gator, cell block H, I said holla.”
Mr. Woodson moved Simone away from the door as they dragged John through it. Simone yanked her arm away from him and scowled as she went through the door and back to her desk.
Esther pumped her fist in the air in victory. “Yes!” she roared, and then grabbed Lawton into a tight hug. She could breathe now. “We have enough, right, Lawton? The paperwork and his admittance to being the mastermind?” Esther hugged him once more with all her pent-up emotions.
“I like, hug me tighter,” Lawton said, squeezing her back. “In a matter of hours that chump will roll over on his accomplices. And Love Zion’s properties should be safe from those crooks. I almost came in here a couple of times. We had Simone call in here, but you held it down. Girl, you’re something else. And when you broke down for the brother the scripture, money cometh—now that was classic.”
Esther couldn’t hide her relief. “Yeah, it was close a couple of times. Then I got angry. It helped me forget my fear and tune into his crimes. This has been a successful day. Right before you showed up, I had a seven o’clock phone conference with the people Richard e-mailed me. They all plan to vote down closing our program residences. They even suggested I put Love Zion’s residential plan in writing for other struggling impoverished neighborhoods.”
“When God has a plan, man can’t destroy it,” Lawton added as he rubbed the stress out of her shoulders. “I have to sit in on the debriefing and do some paperwork at the office before this is all wrapped up. Are we on for a late dinner tonight?”
Esther looked disappointed. “Oh, sweetie, I can’t. I have to go talk to my pastor about all of this.”
Lawton frowned. “The Briggs guy?” He stepped away from her and began to gather his equipment to leave.
Esther made quote marks in the air while she spoke. “His name is Pastor Stokes, not that Briggs guy.” She rolled her eyes as he continued to move around the room. “I wouldn’t disrespect your man of God. Please don’t disrespect mine.”
She was glad when that statement made Lawton stop and turn around. She now had his full attention. “I’ve noticed whenever his name is mentioned, you get irritated. Honey, he’s my pastor. That’s all. Now, I can see you tomorrow night. How about I cook?”
“That sounds fine, baby.” He appeared embarrassed that she had picked up on his insecurities involving Briggs.
“See you then,” Esther smiled.
As Lawton left, Mr. Woodson entered the room. He strode over to Esther’s desk in a jovial mood. “Good job, Ms. Wiley. I’m impressed. At first, I thought you were blowing it. I almost ran in here. But your fella said to wait, let you play it out. You did well. This will please the board; our catching and fixing this. Shows we stay on top of things. I’m not half-finished punishing John and anyone else we find out was involved. Prosecution alone is not good enough. I want their retirement, vacation pay—shoot, and I want the company T-shirt back. Then we’ll sue for the rest of the missing funds. Legal is already on this. By the way, Simone is safe, thanks to you. You’ll need to watch her, though, because she’ll only get this one pass.”
Esther murmured her appreciation for Mr. Woodson’s comments and agreed to keep an eye on Simone. However, as he left, her focus was on his remarks concerning Lawton. His having faith in her abilities meant everything. He was turning out to be her unexpected blessing.
The Devil Made Me Do It Page 21
