5 Bargain Hunting

by Rhonda Pollero

  “Hi,” Izzy greeted me.

  “Excited about tonight?” I asked as I leaned back in my chair.

  “Totally. Will you still come over and do my hair and makeup?”

  “Of course,” I said even though I’d forgotten all about that promise. “What time again?”

  “Five.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “Finley?”

  “Yes?”

  “Thanks again for running interference with my dad. He had coffee with Cole’s dad this morning and then he called me and said everything was okay.” She sounded relieved and eager all at once.

  No sooner had I hung up the phone than Tony appeared at my door. “Bucking for employee of the month?”

  I laughed. “Just doing what you said. I had some estate stuff for Vain . . . Mr. Dane and I thought it would be a good idea to contact the other officers from Liam’s old unit.”

  “Why?” he asked as he sat down.

  I told him Liam’s theory about them all being targets. “Isn’t it prudent for us to warn them?”

  Tony stroked his chin. “I suppose so. Write the letters and I’ll sign them.”

  As he got up and went to the door he turned and said, “Thank you for all your help with Izzy. I know she appreciates it and so do I.”

  “I’m happy to help.”

  “Happy enough to have dinner with me tonight?”

  I froze. If he’d asked me that question a month ago, I would have said yes without any hesitation. I thought of Liam. Then I thought of Ashley. “I’d love to.”

  As soon as he left my office, I wanted to run after him and take it back. No matter how frustrated I was over the whole Liam/Ashley thing, having dinner with Tony felt wrong. Having it feel wrong felt even worse. It meant that yet again, I had fallen for the wrong guy. Hadn’t Patrick’s cheating taught me anything? And in some ways this was worse than Patrick. Patrick did everything behind my back. Liam was doing it to my face and telling me not to sweat it. What self-respecting woman doesn’t sweat the other woman?

  Time to turn over a new leaf. If Liam could have Ashley, I could have Tony. Only deep down, in a place I didn’t want to go, I knew which one I really wanted.

  Well. I could wallow in self-pity or do something constructive. I typed carefully worded letters to the guys from Liam’s unit warning them of the potential danger they might be facing. After Tony signed them, I then went to Vain Dane’s office and knocked on the doorjamb. He looked up and his hazel eyes registered shock.

  “Finley?”

  I handed him the three letters all neatly paper clipped to their corresponding envelopes. “I know this will cause a potential problem on the Lawson estate so I thought it would be best to get a jump on it.”

  He was wearing a dress shirt and a tie even though it was a weekend. I wondered if he slept in a tie. Tight ass. He signed the letters and returned them to me.

  I returned to my office to collect my things. My cell was ringing when I arrived. “Hello?”

  “You used your house as collateral?” Jane barked into the phone.

  “Liam isn’t going to jump bail,” I said. “Where’s your compassion?”

  “Right now it’s looking at your monthly bills. Finley, you’re spending way too much money.”

  “Anyone ever tell you you’re a buzz killer?”

  “Several times, actually. But the house, Finley? Really?”

  “It seems to me that Liam was there for you when you woke up with a dead guy next to you.”

  Jane grunted. “I know.”

  “Thanks for being at the arraignment yesterday.”

  “You’re welcome. Finley, please, please stop shopping. And stop using your house like it’s a bottomless pit of money. If you don’t, you won’t be able to swing the monthly payments.”

  “I got it.” Now probably wasn’t the best time to tell her I’d just spent fifteen hundred dollars on a watch part.

  “I’ve got to go,” Jane said. “I’m taking a run on the beach, want to join me?”

  I smiled. “Like that’s going to happen.”

  With the estate letters, I had seven pieces of outgoing mail. I put them in Margaret’s in-box so she’d have to put postage on them Monday morning. Then I thought about it and retrieved the four letters to the deputies.

  I keyed their addresses in my GPS and opted to go to Wellington first. It was south and west of Palm Beach. It took me about thirty-five minutes before I found myself at the gate of a lovely golf course community. I scrolled down until I found Diego’s name, then pressed the button. I heard a childlike hello, then the gates swung open and I drove through. Following the rather stern voice of the GPS I found the Ferrer house.

  It wasn’t what I expected. It was pretty big, two stories, with archways and pillars. The front yard was littered with kids’ toys and bikes. I parked on the street and walked on the path to the front door.

  A small child—four or five maybe—opened the door and stared up at me. On her heels was Diego. I recognized him from his license picture. He placed an arm protectively over his daughter and asked, “May I help you?”

  I put on my best smile and said, “I’m from Dane, Lieberman, and Caprelli.”

  His expression darkened. “I have nothing to say to you.”

  He reached for the door but I grabbed the edge. “I don’t want to talk, I just need to drop this off to you.”

  “If it’s a subpoena you can toss it on the floor.”

  “It’s nothing like that,” I said in a rush. “Mr. Caprelli is concerned about your well-being.” I chose my words carefully because the child was still standing there. “He just wanted to make you aware of some developments in the Lopez case.”

  “Alicia, go find Mommy,” he told the child. She turned and ran down the hall.

  Diego stepped out onto the porch. He was a mass of coiled muscle and pretty damned scary. Maybe hand delivery wasn’t such a good idea after all.

  “Give it to me,” he said as he grabbed it out of my hand. He tore into it, scanned it, then tossed it at me. “Tell your boss I’ve been sufficiently warned. Tell your client to rot in hell.”

  With that I got a door slammed in my face. I was actually shaking. People have gotten annoyed with me in the past but that guy was a big slice of angry.

  Hopefully he was the worst of the lot. But no. I got a similar reception from everyone but Armando Calderone, and the only reason he didn’t ream me out was because he wasn’t home. I tucked the letter between the screen and the door and was secretly glad to be finished with the task. I walked back to my car slowly, enjoying the view of the ocean from the seventh floor.

  It wasn’t until I was behind the wheel that I noticed a curtain flutter in Armando’s apartment. Either one of the others had called him or there was some other reason he didn’t want to speak to me. I could go back up and pound like a lunatic, but time was getting away from me, thanks in no small part to the four stops I’d made for coffee as I zigzagged across the county. I was already halfway to Martin County, so I went up to Tony’s community, arriving fifteen minutes early. Izzy was thrilled to see me. She was even more thrilled to give me the message that her father would be picking me up at seven for dinner.

  “How cool is it that you’re having dinner with my dad?” she asked as she sat at her vanity after plugging in her curling iron.

  “It’s just dinner, Izzy.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Hold still so I don’t burn you,” I told her.

  Izzy had a lot of hair, so it took me a while to make the soft S waves she wanted. With her perfect olive skin, foundation wasn’t necessary. I did her makeup, and as I was finishing, Tony came home.

  “Don’t come in!” Izzy yelled as we worked the zipper up her back. “I want you to be surprised.”

  She looked lovely in the beige and black lace dress and I could see on Tony’s face that he thought so as well. They were in the hallway together and I felt every inch the third wheel. “I’ve got to
run,” I said.

  “Don’t you want to see Cole?” Izzy asked.

  I shook my head. “That’s a father-daughter moment.”

  “Don’t worry,” she said with a flick of her wrist. “He’ll take like a gazillion pictures.”

  “I’ll look forward to seeing them.”

  I was torn between the Versus one-shoulder dress and the Versus ruched-front jersey dress. The one shoulder showed off my tan but the jersey dress clung in all the right places. The problem was, I didn’t want to look all that sexy. At the end of the day, I was still having dinner with my boss, so I didn’t want to send out the wrong vibe. I went with the ruched front and the much-coveted pair of Jimmy Choo shoes my sister had given me as a maid-of-honor gift. I was just putting my lipstick in a tiny silver shell clutch when I heard the door open.

  I walked out into the living room; Liam stopped and his jaw literally dropped. “Wow.”

  I’d flat-ironed my hair, so I had swing factor going on. “What’s that?” I asked, pointing to the brown paper bag in his hand.

  “Dinner. I brought you moo shu.”

  “Sorry,” I said in the most chipper tone possible. “I have a date tonight. And it isn’t with Izzy.”

  “I figured that out from the dress. Who is it?”

  As if on cue, the doorbell rang. I made a mental note to call the alarm company and let them know they had somehow killed the motion sensors when they responded to the window smashing.

  I brushed by Liam and opened the door. Tony looked dreamy in his black suit, gray shirt, and monochromatic tie. He smiled broadly. “You look great.” He looked past me. “Hey, Liam. How are you?”

  “Fine,” he answered in a clipped tone.

  “Would you like something to drink, Tony?” I asked.

  “No, we have seven-thirty reservations at the Breakers.”

  “Then let me get my wrap.” I waltzed past a very pissy Liam and grabbed my pashmina off the back of the sofa.

  “I’d invite you along,” Tony said to Liam, “but the reservation is only for two.”

  “How nice.”

  Tony placed his hand at the small of my back. “Help yourself to anything you want,” I called over my shoulder.

  “I’ll get right on that,” he grumbled as I closed the door.

  It wasn’t until Tony pulled out of the driveway that he said, “I think that went well, don’t you?”

  “I thought Liam was going to hit you. Or maybe me.”

  Tony laughed. “That was the point.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I have a confession to make.”

  “We’re going to Burger King?”

  “No. When Liam told me he was staying at your place, I thought it would be a good time to give him a little shove.”

  I turned and looked at his profile, illuminated by the lights on the dash. “You’ve lost me.”

  “I didn’t have an emergency the weekend of your sister’s wedding.”

  “Then why didn’t you go?”

  “Because I knew Liam wanted to. I just didn’t know he’d blow it.”

  “It was one dance,” I said, just as I’d argued with my mother.

  “We’re not on the same page here. Look, Finley. Liam and Ashley had a nasty breakup.”

  “Coulda fooled me.”

  “They did. He’s been a little gun shy since then. Well, until you.”

  “I think you’re reading the signals wrong,” I told him. “You’re on the wrong page now.”

  “No,” Tony insisted. “I’m on the right page. Liam will sit in your house all night wondering what we’re doing.”

  “We’re having dinner.”

  “I know that and you know that, but Liam doesn’t.”

  “So you did this just to make Liam jealous? I’m playing the role of the pawn now?”

  “Not a pawn. I thought seeing us together might get him off the fence.”

  “What makes you think he’s on the fence?”

  “I know Liam.”

  “Well, your daughter is going to be pissed. She thinks we’re about to start something.”

  “I had a talk with Izzy. When I told her what I was doing, she thought I was terribly romantic. Apparently that appeals to her fourteen-year-old brain.”

  “You could have told me.”

  “It was more fun this way.”

  “Not for Liam,” I told him.

  “We’ll eat. We’ll walk along the seawall. You’ll smudge your lipstick and we’ll let Liam’s imagination do the rest.”

  “He’s going to be mad.”

  Tony smiled. “That’s what I’m banking on.”

  When in doubt, lie.

  fifteen

  I came home to find Liam laid out on my sofa watching football. He barely glanced up when I walked in and tossed my pashmina on the chair. “Have a nice dinner?” he asked in a casual tone.

  So much for Tony’s grand plan. “Lovely, thanks for asking.” I went to the countertop and checked my cell for messages. I hadn’t taken it with me because the cute silver shell bag was only big enough to hold a lipstick and a credit card. It wasn’t a problem. Tony was a wonderful conversationalist.

  Liam got up and headed toward the hallway. “See you in the morning,” he said.

  “You’re going to bed?” I asked. It was barely eleven.

  “Long day. ’Night.”

  “Good night,” I said as I slipped off my shoes.

  I went back to my room and pulled on some soft cotton drawstring pants and double cami tops. I was more than a little annoyed by Liam’s lack of reaction. His silence spoke volumes. Obviously I was in a one-sided lust-a-thon.

  Barefoot, I went back into the living room where he’d rained paper and files all over the place. I wasn’t the least bit tired, so I started reading the various pages. At the bottom of one box I found a copy of the grand jury transcript. Liam had dog-eared several pages.

  Most of them were sections of testimony where each officer except Stan Cain testified that they’d seen Liam pull a gun from his ankle holster. Then each one detailed their duties and responsibilities after the shooting. Diego Ferrer had stayed with the cache of drugs. Miguel Vasquez stood sentry over the guns, and Armando Calderone secured the cash. Liam and José had followed the ambulance with Fernàndo Peña to the hospital. Carlos Santiago didn’t seem to have a responsibility beyond hanging with ASA Alberto Garza, who’d shown up at the scene because of a police-involved shooting. Stan Cain was responsible for overseeing the arrests of the five Latin Bandits they had in custody.

  Other than the fact that I believed Liam could not shoot an unarmed kid, the grand jury should have been a slam dunk. But it wasn’t. No matter how hard he tried, Garza couldn’t get his witnesses to testify clearly. The worst example was Armando Calderone when he was questioned by Garza:

  Q: Garza: Approximately how much cash did you recover from the residence?

  A: Calderone: Around three hundred thousand.

  Q: Garza: Would you take a look at the evidence sheet, please?

  A: Calderone: Oh, sorry, I got confused between the guns, the drugs, and the cash. We confiscated fifty thousand in cash.

  Q: Garza: Did you participate in counting the cash?

  A: Calderone: Yes, myself and Deputy Santiago did the on-site count. Then we drove the money, the drugs, and the weapons back to the station house. A second verification count was done by the crime scene unit as well as the property clerk, Deputy Kronck.

  Q: Garza: What was the rest of your unit doing while you were handling the evidence?

  A: Calderone: I’d have to review my notes.

  I may not be Gloria Allred, but I knew assistant state’s attorneys prepped their witnesses. Calderone had come off like a buffoon who couldn’t keep his numbers straight, and the only one who didn’t fumble the ball was Stan Cain. No wonder Liam didn’t get indicted. The witnesses sucked.

  Or maybe Garza just did him a favor and didn’t prep the witnesses. Liam said he was a nice
guy. Which was good to know because the officers I’d seen today weren’t exactly there to serve and protect. At least not me.

  I went surfing through the files on the Latin Bandits. Jimmy Santos had been a member since the ripe age of thirteen. According to his rap sheet he’d been arrested more times than he’d had birthdays, and by the time of the raid, he was the prime suspect in at least three murders. The other Latin Bandits arrested that night were all low-level gofers. They just had the bad luck of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Not that they were angels, but none of them had violent crimes on their sheets.

  My cell phone rang and I leapt off the sofa to get it before it disturbed Liam. Not that I would have been crushed if he was disturbed. I was disturbed that he wasn’t disturbed. No, I was just being an ass. Why I thought that high school move would work is beyond me.

  “Did you get my text?” It was Izzy.

  “No.” Which was weird since I’d checked my phone as soon as I’d walked in the door. “How was the dance?”

  “Cole was great. He can dance, too.”

  “Good. I’m glad you had a good time.”

  “Well?” she squealed.

  “Well what?”

  “Did Liam go all nuts and stuff? Dad wouldn’t tell me and you didn’t answer my text.”

  “Hang on,” I said, then I scrolled over to my text messages and there it was, big as life. Did you fool Liam with the fake date? That smarmy bastard. He knew it was a sham! “Izzy, I’m glad things went well. But it’s almost one, you should be asleep.”

  “Hang on, Dad wants to talk to you.”

  “Finley?”

  “Hi. Thanks again for dinner.”

  “Did it work?”

  “It kinda backfired. Nothing I can’t handle. What do you need?”

  “My forensic pathologist is only available tomorrow. Can you meet him at the morgue at eight?”

  I rolled my eyes and my shoulders slumped. “Sure. If you’ll call Justin Haller at the Palm Beach Post. I sorta told him you’d call.”