by Diane Kelly
Brett asked about my work, whether there’d been any progress on my cases. I told him how Eddie and I had narrowly missed capturing Beau at the campsite after Madam Magnolia had suggested we look for him there. I also told Brett about Beauregard’s latest escape, how Nick had almost been run down in the street.
“Nick’s working the case with you?” Brett asked.
“Unofficially,” I said.
Brett and Nick had met before and taken an instant dislike to each other. Admittedly, their problems stemmed from me, from the fact that I was close to each of them, though in entirely different ways. I supposed it was some type of innate, primal male thing. It wouldn’t have surprised me if they’d both started beating their chests and grunting.
“Unofficially,” Brett repeated. “So you’re saying he volunteered to help you out.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s damn convenient.”
Fortunately, Brett let the subject drop there. I was glad. I didn’t want to discuss this over the phone and apparently neither did he. Besides, if he kept pushing it, I’d have to point out his hypocrisy. Trish had volunteered to help on Brett’s Habitat for Humanity projects and he’d gladly accepted her assistance. Heck, I’d once come upon him taking Trish for a ride in his wheelbarrow, her Texas-sized breasts jostling as he rolled her across the uneven turf. The mere thought resurrected the mental image and the sound of her girlish giggle and had me feeling angry and upset all over again.
After a few more minutes of idle chatter, much of it again about the country club’s gourmet menu, we bade each other good night and ended the call. It wasn’t until I was brushing my teeth a half hour later that I realized neither one of us had told the other that we missed them.
* * *
Since my parents had taken over my bedroom, I started the night out sleeping on the futon in my guest room with Alicia. When she threw her leg over me for the third time, no doubt mistaking me for Daniel in her sleeping state, I rolled off the futon and opted for sleeping on the couch downstairs rather than fending off her unconscious lesbian advances all night.
A tongue on my face and whispering voices woke me at the butt crack of dawn.
The tongue belonged to Nick’s dog, Nutty, an ancient golden retriever mix with white fur on his snout and cloudy cataracts in his eyes. The whispering voices belonged to Nick and my dad, who were in my foyer packing for an early-morning fishing trip, what would be the new boat’s maiden voyage.
I sat up on the couch, rubbing my eyes.
“Sorry we woke you, hon,” Dad said.
I noticed it was still pitch-black outside.
“What time is it?”
Nick glanced at his watch. “Five fifteen.”
“Ugh.” How anyone found pleasure in getting up at this hour and fighting off mosquitoes while trying to track down elusive fish was beyond me. I pulled myself off the couch. “I hope neither of you catch anything.”
Nick slid a grin my way. “You sure are grouchy in the morning.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “I take back what I said about the fish. I hope you get eaten by an alligator instead.”
The dog and the men left. I returned to sleepy land. They came back at noon with five good-sized fish. By then we women were up and dressed.
“My,” said my mother as they brought their catch into the kitchen. “You two had a successful morning.”
Mom looked down at the fish and didn’t see Dad and Nick exchange glances.
My mother grabbed a large pan, turned the oven on to preheat, and turned her attention back to the fish. She picked up one of the fillets and immediately dropped it back to the counter with a thunk. Putting a hand on her hip, she pointed a finger at my father and gave him the evil eye. “Harlan Holloway, this fish is frozen solid.” She poked the fish with her pointer finger and took a closer look. “It’s halibut to boot. This fish comes from the ocean. In Alaska. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Nick came to Dad’s rescue, pulling up a photo on his cell phone. “It was either halibut from the grocery store or this.” I scurried over to take a look. The photo showed my father holding up a four-inch baby bass. “That was all we managed to land today.”
Mom shook her head. “That’s downright pitiful. I hope you let that poor little thing go?”
Nick nodded. “Gave him a kiss and sent him back on his way.”
Oh, to be that bass.
Mom picked up the fillets and plunked them in the pan. “I have half a mind to let you men starve to death.”
My father made a face behind my mother’s back and spoke to Nick in a stage whisper. “Now you see where Tara gets it.” Dad shot me a wink to let me know he was only teasing.
The five of us enjoyed the fish along with a salad and rolls and glasses of peach sangria on my back patio. The meal was nice, relaxing, comfortable. Nutty made the rounds among us, begging for scraps and getting more than his share. Hard to resist an old, sweet dog, especially when he sits patiently at your feet, happily waiting for anything you’re willing to give.
My parents and Nick left mid-afternoon, my father having wrangled a commitment for another fishing trip out of Nick.
“You might not be dating Nick yet,” Alicia said once the door closed behind them. “But I think he and your father are going steady.”
* * *
Monday morning, Eddie and I stood in a courtroom before Magistrate Judge Alice Trumbull, trying to convince her to let us run a triangulation on Richard Beauregard’s cell phone so that we could track him down. Our arguments fell on deaf ears. Trumbull denied our request, telling us that Beauregard seemed to be on the run now and unless and until we could show that he was continuing to cause harm, we need not return.
Dang.
We kept a close eye on our surroundings as we walked back to the IRS office. We had to stay on high alert. If I hadn’t noticed the explosives behind the tire of the car the other day, neither of us would still be alive. It was horrifying to think about. If I’d been blown to pieces at least my mother wouldn’t have had to worry about what outfit to bury me in. Heck, they probably could have buried me in a Tupperware container.
Eddie stopped in front of a small coffee shop and pretended to read the menu posted on the window. “Stay cool,” he whispered, “but we may have a tail.”
I pretended to read the menu, too, but saw a dark-haired, olive-skinned man approaching in my peripheral vision. He wore dress pants and a white shirt, typical clothing for a worker downtown, but the running shoes on his feet seemed odd, as if he expected to have to make a quick getaway on foot.
He was about fifty feet from us and heading slowly our way in an odd gait, both hands in the pockets of his dress pants. I shuddered to think what else might be in those pockets. A gun? A knife? And why was he walking funny? Could he be a suicide bomber with explosives strapped to his leg?
My heart began pumping in overdrive. Both Eddie and I had worn our Kevlar vests this morning, but they only protected our torsos. Our heads and legs were still exposed.
The man came closer, only a dozen feet from us now. When he pulled his hand from his pocket, the sun glinted off the metal object in his hand. Eddie and I had our guns trained on him in an instant.
“Put it down!” Eddie yelled.
The man shrieked and dropped the object in his hand, which turned out to be nothing more than a silver money clip. He turned and ran down the sidewalk, his hands in the air, screaming at the top of his lungs.
“On second thought,” Eddie said, shoving his gun back into his holster, “maybe the guy was coming to get some coffee.”
We retrieved the money clip, called the local police department, and in minutes had turned the clip over to a cop on his way to take a statement from the man, who’d called in an attempted robbery. The cop phoned us back a few minutes later. “He had surgery on a hammertoe. That’s why he’s wearing sneakers and walking funny.”
Oops. Our bad.
chapter twenty-seven
When Eddie and I arrived back at the office, a ruckus in the break room caught our attention. We stepped inside to see what all the commotion was about.
Josh stood in the center of a cluster of male agents. I could only get a partial glimpse of him.
“Did it hurt?” one of them asked.
“How hard was it to get in?” asked another.
“Dude, I think you caught an infection.”
Ew! They weren’t talking about Josh losing his virginity, were they?
I elbowed my way into the inner circle. Nope, they weren’t talking about Josh’s virginity; they were talking about his nose. It bore a shiny gold hoop that emerged from a severely inflamed spot on the side of his left nostril, which had swollen nearly closed.
Urk.
The piercing didn’t fit Josh at all. He now looked like the Gerber Baby crossed with Pink or Lenny Kravitz. But while Pink and Lenny had the personalities to pull off a nose piercing, Josh simply looked goofy, like a wannabe hipster, like he was trying too hard to be someone he wasn’t.
Nick wandered in.
I jerked my head toward Josh and spoke under my breath. “Check out Lord of the Nose Ring.”
Nick took a quick glimpse and whispered his reply. “He looks like a fish with a stuck hook.”
Yep, Josh looked ridiculous. Still, though the piercing didn’t fit Josh, it was nonetheless a bold romantic gesture, his attempt to venture into Kira’s world, to show her how committed he was to making their relationship work. Surely she’d be flattered—once the infection cleared up, that is. Until then she’d probably just be disgusted.
Lu stepped into the kitchen to refill her empty coffee mug. As she poured, she glanced my way. “My date with Fred was a bust.”
“Sorry to hear it. Not your type?”
She took a sip of her steaming brew. “Too horny. We went to dinner and when I came back from the ladies’ room I caught him popping three Viagra.”
Three? The guy was lucky he didn’t go blind. “What did you do?”
“I told him I was not that kind of girl and if that’s all he was looking for he could take me right home.”
“How did he react to that?”
“He took me right home.”
Sheesh. “Harry had potential. Maybe you should give him a nod.”
“Good idea.”
After completing a few routine tasks at the office, I dragged Josh to the minor emergency clinic to pay a visit to Ajay. The hole in Josh’s nose had begun to seep and the skin had grown more red and swollen. Josh appeared flushed and was sweating, too, as if he was running a temperature.
The things we do for love, huh?
Ajay took one look at the piercing, cringed, and prescribed an antibiotic cream. He also gave Josh a shot of penicillin and suggested he take a couple of ibuprofen for the pain and fever.
I dropped Josh back at the federal building and headed out to visit three more MSBs near the end of my list, keeping a careful eye on the traffic around me in case I was being followed.
Nothing suspicious cropped up at the first location I visited, which was a gold and silver exchange. Every large transaction was properly documented. I knew I shouldn’t feel disappointed the staff had actually complied with the laws, but I had grown increasingly frustrated over the days as visit after visit proved futile.
I wanted to find the person who had helped the terrorists move their money.
And I wanted to find him now.
My second stop was Cohen & Sons, a combination kosher deli, catering service, and convenience store tucked in a narrow space between a martial-arts studio and a discount dentist office in a working-class neighborhood. The place sold kreplach and candy bars, pastrami and Pepto-Bismol, matzo ball soup and Powerball tickets.
Given that it was now lunchtime, the place was hopping and I had to stand in line with a dozen people from nearby businesses who were picking up lunch for themselves and their coworkers. I inched forward along the refrigerated glass case, peeking inside at the offerings. The case featured a variety of meats and side dishes, including potato salad, coleslaw, macaroni salad, and carrot salad with raisins. I’d never liked carrot salad with raisins. Raisins belonged in oatmeal cookies along with brown sugar and vanilla, not paired up with a vegetable, pretending to be some type of treat. It was unnatural.
Behind the case worked Avram Cohen and his two sons, all three wearing stained white aprons over their clothes and yarmulkes over their dark-brown hair. The men moved quickly and efficiently, the two sons preparing the food while their father rang up the purchases and made change.
By the time I reached the front of the line, the delicious smells had taken their toll and my stomach was growling. I decided to nosh on a knish while I performed my review.
“Spinach or potato?” Avram asked.
I engaged in a brief mental debate. They both looked good, but I had another stop to make later today and didn’t want to risk getting spinach stuck in my teeth. “Let’s go with the potato.”
He called my order out to his sons, rang up my purchase, and took the cash I offered him. When I identified myself and told him the purpose of my visit, he glanced down the long line of people waiting behind me and gave me a sour look. “Your timing stinks.”
“Sorry.” But really, is there ever a good time to be visited by an IRS agent?
Avram called to one of his sons in Yiddish and gestured for him to take over the cash register. Then Avram removed his apron, hung it on a wall hook, and led me quickly to a small office at the back of the shop.
While I watched over his shoulder, he quickly logged onto the computer and showed me how to access their money-order sales records. He looked up at me before vacating the chair. “Got it?”
“Got it.”
I slid into the seat as he left the office.
While the men finished taking care of the lunch crowd out front, I nibbled my knish and reviewed the entries. Though there were quite a few sales of money orders, all were in relatively nominal amounts, the highest being in the five-hundred-dollar range. Most of the purchases were likely by people with bad credit who couldn’t qualify for a credit card or checking account and needed the money orders to pay their bills.
Though none of the sales were in amounts large enough to be immediately suspicious, given the high volume, especially just after payday on the first and fifteenth of each month, I supposed it was possible that the terrorists could have purchased multiple money orders to send overseas.
I peeked out of the office, relieved to see the lunch crowd had since dwindled and the men were now primarily cleaning up. I called to Avram and he returned to the office.
“Do you recognize any of these men?” I asked him.
He slung his cleaning rag over his shoulder, took the photographs from my hand, and looked over each one. “No. I don’t recognize them.”
“Can we check with your sons?”
Avram called them back one at a time. Neither of his sons recognized the terrorists, either.
“What is this about?” Avram asked.
“These three men have been arrested here in Dallas. They were involved in acts of terrorism in and around Syria,” I said. “We also have evidence that they sent significant sums of money overseas to fund terrorist groups. I’m trying to find the person or persons who helped them move their money.”
“These men are Muslim, yes?”
“Yes.”
“You thought that a Jewish man would help Muslim terrorists?” His expression said he thought I was too stupid to live.
“We’ve got to consider all angles,” I said. “We can’t leave any stone unturned.” Even stupid stones.
I thanked him for his time, complimented him on the nice knish, and left.
My final stop for the day was a business called JS Shipping that, despite its name, actually provided a variety of services, including shipping, copying, and lamination services, as well as passport photos. Th
e place sold traveler’s checks and money orders, too. JS Shipping was owned and operated by a Pakistani emigrant named Jameel Sakhani, who had dark hair, a thick mustache, and a face I suspected had never cracked a smile.
The place was a bit too warm and smelled of ink and cardboard. As a courtesy, I waited until the customers cleared out before approaching the counter. Sakhani seemed very put off when I identified myself and requested to take a look at his records.
“This is an intrusion. You are disrupting my business. Why do you need to see my files? You must give me a reason.” He stepped out from behind the counter and came close as if trying to intimidate me.
He didn’t know me very well, did he? I looked up at him and took a step even closer. Two could play the intimidation game.
“Well?” he snapped, crossing his arms over his chest. “What is your reason?”
I didn’t owe this man an explanation. His registration as an MSB gave the government the right to inspect his records at any time to ensure compliance. If he’d asked me nicely, I would’ve simply said it was a routine check. But since he hadn’t played nice, neither would I.
“Why don’t you want me to see your records?” I cocked my head. “Are you hiding something?”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “It is people like you who give the government a bad name.”
And it was people like him who made me want to put a bullet in his foot. “You started it,” I said. Real mature, huh?
We stared each other down for several moments. He blinked first. Ha!
“You can either show me your records voluntarily,” I said, “or I can close this place down, seize your files and computers, and take them back to my office for review.” I punctuated my words with a nonchalant shrug.
When the man realized I wasn’t backing down, he finally relented. He led me to a small office off to the side, where the store’s computer was located. He pointed to the desk. “You can sit there.”
