Liar: Karma Inc. Case 3

by Gillian Zane

  “No offense taken, Carlie. But what more could you possibly do to her that would make the most impact?”

  “Her children,” I answered quietly.

  “Oh, you are more devious than I would have expected. What did you have in mind? Kill one off?”

  There was no suitable response to that. All I could do was gape at her.

  I hope she didn’t actually expect me to kill children. I would take a demotion for that one. Or I hoped I would

  She glanced at my face and her lips twitched like she was holding back a smile. “I guess that is a little too much. What were you thinking that involves her children?”

  “Temporary loss of custody, it might put her life in perspective.”

  “Too much. That involves legal system things, I detest legal stuff.” She fluttered her hand as if pained. “Lawyers.” She shuddered.

  “An illness scare? That tends to wake people up.” I threw out my next idea thinking that maybe if Lori Kay thought she was really sick it might scare her into reevaluating how she thinks about things. Near death experiences had a lasting effect on most people.

  “You’re putting too much thought into it. Get her fired. Get her husband to hate her. Be done. There's no reason to reform her, only give her what she deserves.”

  “You would think that putting too much thought into this is a good thing. It’s someone’s life.”

  “Humans are simple. They want to be respected and loved. If you take that away, they get all sad and contemplative. You still get your Come to Hades moment.” She laughed at her witty comment, but I couldn't muster even the hint of a smile.

  “I just thought…”

  “That is your problem,” she yawned rudely, covering her mouth in an exaggerated fashion. “Too much thinking for such a little human brain. Go. Close your case. I want it resolved ASAP.”

  7

  Devious

  “I started another Facebook account under a fake name so I could post about this place without getting in trouble.” The IT guy, I think his name was Ben, leaned against my cubicle and chatted with me as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

  “That’s interesting,” I said trying not to squirm under his gaze. He had the perfect view down my shirt without being too obvious about it and he was using it to his full advantage. Not even trying to hide where his eyes were focused. He had made it a point to update my new computer regularly, installing this or that during the day, always staying to chat.

  “I sent you a friend request, if you were wondering who that was.” He pointed to my phone on the desk. I made a point of grabbing it and opening up my social media account.

  “Dirk Diglet?”

  “Yeah, funny, right?” I didn't know what was funny about it but I nodded to keep from hurting his feelings.

  “Sure.” I accepted the friend request and scrolled through his timeline. It was mostly bitching about work and funny pictures of coworkers. I stopped on one; it was a picture of a pallet of CCTV equipment. I held it up to him with a questioning look.

  “Yeah, those are why I’m working all the overtime. Bank, baby." He rubbed his fingers together to emphasize the statement. "They got us installing all these cameras in the building. Everyone’s paranoid because of what Phillip did. The board doesn’t want to be surprised again. They’re top secret too…so we have to keep it on the DL, if you know what I mean?” He winked.

  “Lips. Sealed.” I made a motion across my mouth as if I was zipping them up. But he just posted them on his social media account which had...I glanced down...over three hundred friends.

  “You’re cool, Cassidy.”

  “So are you…” Shit, I didn’t know his name. “Dirk.” I smiled and winked back.

  “Maybe we could grab a drink after work?” His cheeks blushed red. There went that bravado. He had been doing such a good job at maintaining a cool persona that the blush was actually endearing.

  “Yeah. I could always use a drink.”

  “Uh. Great. Yeah.” He stood up and almost knocked over my hanging file folders on the wall of my cube.

  “I’m all curious about these cameras now, though.” I shifted giving him a better view of cleavage. I was a total slut. Fuck it. It got things done.

  He stumbled a bit and then grabbed onto the wall of the cube to balance himself, his eyes firmly on my tits once again. Men were so simple.

  “You worried?” he asked. It came out kind of strained.

  “Oh no, not me. I don’t do anything wrong. At least in the building,” I laughed and tried to look a bit naughty. I hoped I was getting it right. I wasn't very good at faking it.

  "Oh, you." His cheeks reddened again and I looked up sharply when his crotch, which was now at eye level, bulged. Must have worked. "What, then?" he asked, fishing for more naughty bits.

  “I've heard," I brought my voice down to a conspiratorial whisper and he leaned in to hear me, "There are some people that like to hook-up in the copy room."

  "No way!" He looked shocked.

  "Are you putting a camera in that area?" I winked. His blush deepened.

  “What? Really? No, we weren’t planning on putting one in there…”

  “That's a shame. I've heard some pretty raunchy rumors. From what I hear…that's a hot spot. Wouldn’t that be hilarious if you caught someone on camera, fucking?” I emphasized the last word and Dirk or Ben, whatever his name was, gulped.

  “No way…uh what...sure, yeah, that would be hilarious." The implications finally sunk in and his eyes focused on my face and not my tits, finally. “I could put one in there to make sure no one is stealing office supplies.”

  “I did take a few too many post-its,” I laughed.

  “Busted,” he grinned back. His cool firmly back in place.

  “If you were to put one in there, I would make sure no one knows about it, wouldn't want to ruin the surprise and all that.”

  “You’re devious, Cassidy.”

  “So I hear.”

  8

  Jack’s Burgers

  DRAKE: Meet me for lunch.

  ME: No.

  DRAKE: I have info.

  ME: I don’t care. I fired you.

  DRAKE: I’ll treat.

  ME: Don’t. Care.

  DRAKE: Cassidy, please.

  I stared at my phone and pushed it to the side. It beeped again.

  DRAKE: ??

  ME: Fine.

  DRAKE: Are you still at the same job? Or did you get fired?

  ME: You’re a terrible investigator.

  DRAKE: I’ll pick you up in front of your building at 11:45.

  I walked out the front doors at 11:50. Drake glanced at his watch when I stepped out onto the breezeway, emphasizing that I was late. Dick. He leaned against a black SUV, dressed in a dark suit with a lavender power tie that I thought was endearing. A man who wears a lavender tie can’t be all that bad, can he?

  I took a moment to appreciate the look of him. He screamed power and control. There was something about a good looking man in a suit that made my belly do flip-flops and my heart speed up. He knew I was checking him out and a slight grin turned up the corner of his mouth. Dangerous. I chided myself and shook off the mild attraction. He was a dick and he was a predator. I shouldn’t have agreed to this lunch.

  I glanced to my right and noticed we weren’t alone in the breezeway. Lauren sat at the ‘smokers’ bench’ along the far side of the open area glaring at the two of us. When she saw I had noticed her, she stood quickly, a bored look on her face to mask her initial contempt. She waved a quick little greeting, whether to me or Drake, I didn’t know, and crushed out her cigarette on the ground with her four-inch red pumps.

  “Thanks for meeting me,” Drake said in a low and pleasant tone, drawing my attention back to the man. He opened the passenger door and waited for me to slip in, and then he even closed the door for me like a proper gentleman. Again that lurch of my stomach from his suave behavior. But no matter how smooth he was, he was still an ass.
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  Drake got behind the wheel and glanced over. His gaze slid from top to bottom, from my heels and up my legs, which were on display because of the short skirt I was wearing, and then over my revealing top. They lingered a bit on my top, but then took in my amused look that quickly changed to panic when I saw the burning desire in his eyes. Drake liked what he saw and wasn't hiding it from me.

  I coughed and fidgeted in my seat. Ever the awkward teenager at heart.

  “I only have an hour and a half for lunch, so we have to make this quick,” I said to cover up my discomfort.

  “I have the perfect place,” he replied and pulled away from the curb. “Not far.”

  He was telling the truth about it not being that far. The place he brought me to was only a few blocks away from my building, a place I would have passed a thousand times without noticing. It was a tiny little building set between two larger ones. There was parking in the back and he found a spot easily. I looked at the sign and a niggling memory poked at me. I had been here before.

  I didn’t wait for him to open the door for me; I got out of the car and took in my surroundings. I had definitely been here before. The three squad cars in the parking lot told me this was a popular spot for police to eat lunch. I had probably been here while on duty.

  “They give cops a discount,” he said when he noticed my eyes on the black and whites.

  “Did Cassandra come here?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why are we here?”

  “The owner has been passing on a lot of information to me. I thought it would be a good place to come so we could chat.”

  “I still don’t know what you want from me, Drake.”

  “I want to solve this case, Ms. Hail.”

  “Back to Ms. Hail, are we?”

  “Cassidy.”

  “Thank you.” I opened the front door of the quaint little restaurant and fell back in time.

  “You should’ve seen her, Pete. You’re girl here…she did this dive, leap thing and took the perp out at the knees like she was playing tackle football.”

  “Shut it, Nixon.” I took a big bite out of my burger. Jake’s had one of the best damn bacon burgers in the city. I moaned when the flavors hit my tongue and all three guys looked at me. Pete wasn’t the only one who appreciated my happy girl noises over food. There was one thing in common about my fellow officers, they liked girls that ate.

  “It was fucking hilarious. She had this guy by the legs and I could have sworn she sank her teeth into his leg. He screamed like a little girl."

  “I didn’t bite him. He was nasty as fuck,” I said through a mouthful of food. Pete’s eyes were huge. He didn’t like hearing work stories, and he thought I cursed too much, especially with the boys. But my partner Harvey Nixon loved a good story, especially when it came to me, his little chick partner. Nixon also knew it bothered Pete and he liked fucking with him, he thought I could do better.

  “What was that move you did? You had him down and in cuffs in no time,” Breaux asked. He and his partner had been with us today when we took down the perp. We had all decided to catch lunch after the excitement and Jake's was the place to go. Breaux and his partner were regulars here with me and Nixon. Breaux's partner, Williams was such a regular here he had become quite attached to the hostess and was finally trying to get her number. It was a lost cause, she had a strict ‘no cops’ rule for dating, or so she had told me, and if my intuition was right, she also had a no men rule. Once she turned him down he would focus on someone else and stop obsessing.

  “They call it grab leg,” I said with a grin. Nixon laughed, Pete’s frown deepened.

  “Who was this guy?” Pete asked Nixon, not asking me, the one who took down the suspect. I frowned. I could see Pete was upset, but I was tired of his overprotectiveness. I was a cop. He knew I was a cop when we started dating.

  “Murder suspect. We pulled him over for an expired break tag, but when we ran the plates we saw he had jumped bail last week,” Nixon explained while shoving fries into his mouth, like we apprehended murder suspects all the time. It was my first and I was still on a high from it. Pete's frown turned into a scowl and from the look he shot me, I knew I would be hearing about this later. I sighed, looking down at my burger, which wasn't as appealing as it was before.

  “You’ve been here before?” Drake asked. As usual, he was freakishly able to read my moods.

  “I think so.”

  A big man hurried over to us, deftly avoiding other diners and chairs as he made his way to us. I knew him. Big George.

  "Drake," he greeted him with a big smile and clapped the investigator on the shoulder. Drake, out of character, grinned back. Big George was a likable guy. "Let me show you to a table."

  He led us to a table near the bar. I smiled at the friendly owner who looked at me as if he had seen a ghost. His eyes widened and his instant smile morphed into a frown.

  "George, this is Cassidy. Cassidy, meet Big George, the owner," Drake introduced us.

  “Pleasure,” I nodded.

  I slid into my chair and glanced at the bar and a feeling of queasiness rushed over me. Behind the mahogany expanse of bar was a large framed image of me. I was with Nixon, a burger and a pile of fries in front of us, both of us in uniform. There was a black ribbon across the image. The feeling in my fingers drained and I gulped over the lump in my throat.

  “She came here a lot.” Drake noticed where my attention was directed. His astuteness was getting to be too much.

  “Yeah,” I agreed.

  “Her boyfriend worked here, she got him the job.”

  “A waiter position," I confirmed. I remembered. He didn't want to do it, but he wasn't making ends meet in his final year at college.

  “He didn’t come into work the day after she disappeared.”

  “Did he do it?” I whispered.

  “George doesn’t think so.”

  “He loved her.” George sat across from us. “I can't wrap my head around him killing her."

  "He was overprotective. Maybe she did something that...” I trailed off.

  "I don't think so." George shook his head. "Look, let me get your order in and I'll come back and we can talk. What do y'all want?"

  “Bacon cheeseburger, no mayo, everything on it, extra pickles, and a sweet tea,” I said without having to look at the menu.

  “That’s exactly what Cassandra used to order.” George gave me a curious look again.

  “Oh.” It was all I could say. Both men were staring at me with puzzled expressions.

  “I’ll have the same,” Drake said and it broke the weird reverie. George nodded and stood.

  “Did you tell him about me?” I asked, wondering if Drake had mentioned I was interested in what happened.

  “No.”

  “Then why is he looking at me so funny.”

  “Probably because you look like her.”

  “No, I don’t.” I looked nothing like my former self. That was the point of this whole new persona from Karma Inc. If I was running around looking like my former self, I would make all kinds of people confused.

  “It’s subtle. The eyes, the shape of your jaw, but it's more how you carry yourself. I figured you were related and you’d tell me in time. But, then when I found out about her being adopted I figured it was a coincidence.”

  “Cassandra was not adopted,” I said with more force than I planned.

  “She was,” he argued as he studied me, trying to figure out why I was so upset.

  “She wasn’t. I know for a fact she wasn’t. She was born at Mercy General, her mother…” I trailed off. What was I about to say? The memory was at the tip of my tongue, poking at my consciousness like an annoying fly.

  “Her mother, what?” Drake asked, urging me to finish my statement.

  “Her mother was in labor for ten hours,” she told the story a lot. I remembered her telling the story.

  “You were the most beautiful newborn, Cassandra. It was love at first sight.” Sh
e’d say it in a whisper as if my baby years were all that felt real to the woman. As if those were the only years that mattered. And oftentimes that's how it felt. The years when I got older, when I could speak my mind, and things got messy, those didn't count. That's when she could ignore me. Especially after her relationship with my father crumbled and she retreated to the bottle. Those years didn't matter. Only the ones I couldn't remember, when I was a cute, cuddly baby.

  “You’re saying Cassandra didn’t know she was adopted?”

  “I’m saying, you’re wrong. She wasn’t adopted.”

  “Cassidy, maybe she didn’t tell you.”

  “No. I would have known if she knew. Her mom told stories about her birth…her dad. No, she wasn’t adopted. There were pictures…”

  “I found the paperwork, but it was hard to track down. Cassandra was only a few weeks old when they adopted her. It was a closed adoption, there was very little documentation. It could have been an internal family adoption, that happens a lot and not a lot of documentation is needed."

  "That doesn't make sense, they would have..." I argued, but Drake cut me off.

  "I noticed Cassandra's blood type was AB- which is a really rare type, her parents are listed as Os. That’s impossible. When I saw that, I dug deeper.”

  It was impossible. And I was AB-. Every time I gave blood they remarked that it was great I was giving blood, but it was kind of useless since only about 5% of the population could use it. I didn’t know what my parent’s blood type was. It never came up in conversation. But if they were in the O range, I wasn't their child.

  “Why would they have lied to her?” I whispered.

  “I don’t know. Sometimes it’s hard to tell a child and then so much time passes and they don’t want to admit they withheld the information.”

  “But, her mother, she had this very detailed labor story.” I sighed and sat back in my chair as soon as I said the words. Lies were always overly full of detail. I should have known better; my mother was a consummate liar. She had been lying about everything, her drinking, the drugs, and even my birth.