Knot Ready for Murder

by Mary Marks

  When there still was no response, Fanya said, “She’s either gone, or someone’s in there with her. I can handle a physical situation better than you. I’ll stay here. You go get the manager to open the door.”

  She was right about handling any physical situation better than me. I took the elevator back to the main floor and hurried toward the reception desk. I ignored the protests of four people waiting in line and went directly to the desk clerk.

  “Sorry for interrupting, but this is an emergency. Something’s wrong with our friend. We know she went to her room a half hour ago, but now she’s not answering the door. We need someone with a key right now.”

  The young man raised his eyebrows. “Could it be she’s taking a shower and didn’t hear you?”

  “No. She went to her room to drop off some packages and then we were supposed to go out to lunch. Please, can you hurry?”

  “One moment.” He spoke briefly to someone on the phone and then turned to me. “Hotel security is on the way.” With an apologetic smile he turned back to the woman he’d been helping. “Sorry for the delay.”

  One minute later, a neatly dressed man with a military bearing and a receding hairline approached “You’re the lady who needs help?”

  I nodded, comforted by his size and the no-nonsense look on his face. “Fifth floor. Hurry.”

  Inside the elevator he reached in his trouser pocket and pulled out a fat key ring. A delicate garden of red hair grew on the tops of his fingers. He inserted a small brass key into the override slot and pushed the fifth-floor button. “Do you know what’s wrong with her?”

  Yes! She’s a self-centered, vain, sneaky, miserable witch. I shook my head. “No.”

  The car lifted nonstop to our destination. We turned right and rushed down the hall.

  Fanya stood in front of the door to room 512, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. When we were close enough, she said, “I thought I heard her moan.”

  The man in the brown suit slid a card with a bar code through the lock mechanism and the door clicked open. He gestured for us to move to the side. “You stay out here for now.”

  He slowly pushed the door open. “Hotel security, Ms. Smith. Checking to see if you’re okay.”

  She moaned again. He reached under his jacket toward an area adjacent to his left armpit; a place where a shoulder holster would be. “I’m coming in, Ms. Smith.” He disappeared into the room.

  Low voices mumbled inside, then he reappeared. “She’s in here.”

  We followed him into the dim hotel room. The brown-and-yellow color scheme continued from the hallway into the room with gold drapes, gold carpet, and a brown bedspread. Apparently, housekeeping cleaned her room while she went shopping, because the bed was freshly made with crisp white pillowcases and the air smelled faintly of Pine-Sol. Hadas lay on top of the bed with an ashen face, clutching her belly.

  Brown suit turned to us. “She says she fainted but refuses to see a doctor or go to the hospital. There’s no more I can do here, but I still need to write an incident report.” We gave him our names and phone numbers. He entered the information in his smartphone and handed us each a business card: James Murphy, Private Security Group.

  As he marched toward the door, he said over his shoulder, “Call me if you change your mind about the doctor.”

  Fanya sat on the bed next to Hadas. “Nu? What happened? Did you really faint?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “No, you’re not. You’re young and healthy.” Pu, pu, pu! “Something’s not right if you’re fainting.”

  Hadas ignored Fanya. She glanced at the business card and frowned. “I’m going to have to find a new place to hide, now the cops are involved.”

  What? No “Thank you for caring?” No “I’m sorry for dragging you into yet another personal crisis?”

  I stood with my fists on my hips and my lips in a straight line. “Well, I’m done chasing after you and your gypsy ways. You’re coming back to Encino, where we can keep an eye on you. Once we get home, you’re going to tell us everything, and I mean everything! Start packing because you’re checking out.”

  Hadas took one look at me and packed her suitcase without protest. Between the three of us, we managed to carry her luggage and all her purchases to the car in one trip.

  On the ride home, Hadas slumped in the front passenger seat. I briefly glanced to my right to check on her. “Are you sure you’re fine? Maybe we should stop off at an urgent care clinic and get someone to look at you.”

  “No!” Her protest was loud. “I already know why I fainted.”

  “Well, don’t keep us in suspense,” I said.

  Hadas raised a defiant chin. “I’m pregnant.”

  CHAPTER 31

  I tightened my grip on the steering wheel and fought an impulse to drive to the side of the freeway and stop. “How far along are you?”

  “Eight weeks.”

  “So you’re keeping the baby?”

  Hadas’s voice became soft and wistful. “After I miscarried all those years ago, I thought I’d never have another chance. I’m over forty. This is a miracle. Of course I’m keeping this baby.”

  “Whose baby is it?”

  “Mine!”

  “Okay.” I asked, although I had a fairly good idea of the answer, “Let me put it this way. Who’s the father?”

  “I think you know.”

  I looked away from the road long enough to see concern etch wrinkles on her forehead. “Yeah, I think I do.” Was it the man who was desperately pursuing her?

  Fanya spoke from the back seat. “Hadas, you need to be more careful now you’re pregnant. For one, you need to read the Psalms every day and stay away from funerals and cemeteries.”

  I glanced at Hadas again.

  An amused smile broke through her defenses. “I don’t believe in those old superstitions, Fanya.”

  “Wouldn’t you rather be safe than sorry? There are simple things you can do to ensure your baby’s health.”

  “Such as?”

  “Eat only kosher food, avoid stepping on discarded fingernail clippings, and keep a ruby on your body at all times.”

  Hadas barked a slight laugh. “I won’t even ask about the fingernails. But why wear a ruby?”

  “It’s a segulah, a protection against miscarriage.”

  “Maybe I need to carry several rubies,” Hadas murmured.

  I didn’t blame her for being scared. She’d lost her first child in a miscarriage.

  Back in Encino, we helped the mother-to-be carry her shopping bags and suitcase to the guest room. Was it my imagination, or was her face turning green? She suddenly clutched her waist with one hand, covered her mouth with the other, and ran into the bathroom.

  Fanya and I looked at each other. “Morning sickness.”

  We listened to sounds of retching coming from ten feet away. I almost wanted to sympathize with the unfortunate Hadas. But I kept thinking about her first pregnancy over thirty years ago when Crusher offered to marry her and save the Uhrman family’s reputation. During the brief time they lived together, did he witness her morning sickness? Did he comfort her?

  Fanya opened one of the dresser drawers she was using and retrieved a bundle of dried herbs tied tightly together with string. She flicked on a plastic lighter and touched it to the end of the bundle until it began to send out the pleasant aroma of sage on the curls of smoke. She walked around the room waving it in the air, reciting, “Keinehora, keinehora, keinehora.” Once she banished the evil eye from the guest room, she made a methodical circuit of every room in the house. She ended her exorcism by opening the front door to push out the demons with her last keinehora and wave of smoke.

  Hadas emerged from the bathroom and asked for water.

  I led her to the kitchen and sat her at the table while I drew a tall glass of tap water. “Drink all of this.” I plunked the glass on the table in front of her. “You need to stay hydrated.”

  “Thanks.” She held the gla
ss in slightly shaky hands and sipped.

  I unwrapped a stack of saltine crackers and arranged some on a plate for her. “Eat these when you begin to feel nauseated.” As an afterthought, I handed her a fresh lemon from the fruit bowl on the counter. “Sometimes smelling this will calm your stomach. Scratch the rind a little with your fingernail. The smell will be stronger.”

  Once I was sure she wasn’t going to puke again, I suggested we find a comfortable place in the living room to sit and talk. “It’s time to tell us everything. Don’t leave out any details.”

  Fanya put the teakettle to boil on the stove. “I’ll make some ginger tea. It’s good for the stomach.”

  Hadas took a deep breath, leaned back on the sofa, and gently clasped her hands over her belly. “I have to stay in hiding. At least until all of this blows over.”

  “All of what?”

  “My brother Ze’ev caused all this trouble. It’s a long story.”

  I looked at my watch. “It’s only four-thirty. Take your time.”

  She nibbled on the edge of a saltine. “My father built the Uhrman Company from scratch. We employed dozens of people. Shortly after I began to work there, I modernized the business.”

  “We were talking about Ze’ev. You said he was responsible for your current troubles.”

  “I’m getting there as fast as I can, Martha. But you need to know the history in order to fully understand the present. These are the details you said you wanted.”

  “You’re right. Go ahead.”

  “At first, my father intended to hand over the business to his only son, Ze’ev. You know how traditional their generation was. But every time Papa gave him something to do, Ze’ev managed to screw it up. The only thing he was good at was numbers, so Papa stuck him in the back office with the accounting.”

  “But you’re running the business now, right?”

  “Yeah, but only after Papa realized I’d do a better job than my brother. After Papa’s death two years ago, Ze’ev and I inherited Uhrman Company as equal partners, but with me as CEO.”

  “How did Ze’ev react? Was he upset to discover he wouldn’t be running the company?”

  “I thought he’d be angry, but I was wrong. He was happy to be in charge of the accounting.” She leaned her head against the back of the sofa and sighed. “I should have been more suspicious when our revenue began to dip each quarter. I thought some of our clients were late to pay.”

  “When did you learn the truth?”

  Fanya walked into the room and handed Hadas a cup of steaming ginger tea. “Drink this. It’ll help.”

  Hadas accepted the cup and took a sip. “A year ago. We started to operate in the red. I hired an outside accountant to do a secret audit. Sure enough, he discovered Ze’ev had withdrawn almost a million dollars since Papa’s death.”

  “Ze’ev a gonif?” Fanya called him a thief. “What a shock!”

  “Shock? Yes and no. My brother was an addict, Fanya. Gambling, alcohol, and women. When I confronted him, he didn’t deny he took the money.”

  “I’ll bet you were relieved,” Fanya said.

  Hadas swallowed more ginger tea. “I gave him three choices: One, replace the money he stole; two, face prosecution for fraud and embezzlement; or three, sign his half of the business over to me. He couldn’t replace the money and he didn’t want to go to jail. So, in the end, he had no real choice. He signed over his share of Uhrman Company, making me the sole owner. Two weeks later, he was killed in a hit-and-run. I thought that would be the end of an ugly episode, but I was wrong.”

  Hadas played with the handle of her cup and broke eye contact. “A week after the funeral, a handsome, well-dressed stranger appeared in my office.”

  “Alexander Koslov?” I asked.

  She looked at me again. “Right. Alexander said he loaned Ze’ev five hundred thousand dollars but Ze’ev never paid him back. As of six months ago, the added interest boosted the loan amount to over a million.”

  “Whoa. There are laws against usury, aren’t there?” Fanya’s eyes sparked with indignation.

  “Alexander wasn’t a banker. He didn’t play by those rules. He was a ruthless loan shark. He said I inherited my brother’s debt and he was there to collect.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” Fanya snorted. “No judge in the land would make you liable for your brother’s debts.”

  Hadas took another sip of tea. “Ordinarily, maybe not. But Alexander showed me a note signed by Ze’ev pledging his half of Uhrman Company as collateral for the loan. The date on Alexander’s note came before the date Ze’ev signed over his half of the business to me. Alexander said his claim would take precedence over mine.”

  “What a nightmare.” Fanya crossed her arms and huffed.

  “You’re telling me. I went to a lawyer who basically advised me to settle.”

  “By settle, you mean pay Alexander Koslov a million dollars?” I asked.

  Hadas nodded. “The next time I spoke to Alexander, he said I could buy Ze’ev’s note for two million dollars and all my problems would go away. But the longer I waited, the more the interest would pile on.”

  “Did you tell him Gei faifen afenyam?” Fanya used the Yiddish for “go jump in the lake.”

  “No. When I told him I would have to think about it, these were his exact words. ‘Bad things can happen to people who don’t pay their debts. Look what happened to your poor brother. ’ ”

  I could see how money pressures plagued Hadas and why she chose to run. I also guessed that going into hiding, especially in her delicate condition, provided an island of calm in the midst of all her dramas.

  “Alexander gave me a week to get the money. If I couldn’t pay him in one lump sum, I could pay over time. With interest, of course.”

  “Why didn’t you go to the police?” By now, Fanya fumed, nostrils flaring.

  “Are you kidding? I didn’t want to provoke Alexander. I just wanted him to go away. And then I got another shock when, three months after Ze’ev’s death, the police told me a ‘credible witness’ had come forward. They said the car deliberately accelerated and swerved toward Ze’ev. It was awful enough that my brother was killed in a road accident. But murdered? I certainly was not ready for murder.”

  “Any ideas on who the driver could’ve been?”

  Hadas wagged her head. “As far as I know, the police have made no progress in solving Ze’ev’s death.”

  “But Ze’ev’s death and Alexander’s threats all happened six months ago. Did you pay the two million he asked for?”

  Hadas scowled. “Who has that much cash lying around? Certainly not me. I was still trying to lift the company out of the red. Alexander offered to excuse the debt and eventually destroy Ze’ev’s note if I would bring him into the business as a silent partner. He said I could even take a percentage of his transactions. For my trouble.”

  “Money laundering?”

  She looked at the floor and nodded. “I’m not proud of it, but there was no choice. He would deposit large sums of cash into the business account and then I would send cash payments to his Koslov Associates account.”

  “That’s blackmail!” Fanya made a disgusted face.

  “So why are you running away now?” I asked. “What’s changed?”

  “Alexander pressured me to become his lover. He sent flowers every day. He brought me expensive jewelry—which I refused to accept. One day I said, ‘If you’re really serious about me, there is one thing you can give me which might change my mind.’ I didn’t think he’d agree, but the next day he handed me the note Ze’ ev signed, giving half of Uhrman Company as collateral. I immediately put the note into the shredder.”

  “Wow!” Fanya said. “No more blackmail.”

  Hadas raised her eyebrows at Fanya’s obvious conclusion. “Yeah. No more blackmail. For the first time in months, I relaxed, knowing Alexander had given me what I really wanted—the business free and clear.” She looked at her hands. “In a moment of weakness, I slept w
ith him. Once our affair started, he thought he owned me.”

  “So that’s how . . . ?” I pointed to her belly.

  Hadas sighed and gave her belly soft little pats. “I wasn’t about to hand over my life or my child’s life to him. I needed to act quickly. I made out a will, giving the business to Yossi. In case neither one of us survived, the business would go to Ettie. Then I told Alexander what I’d done.”

  “Wasn’t that risky?” Fanya blinked rapidly.

  “A calculated risk. I told him Koslov Associates would no longer receive money from the Uhrman Company.”

  “Messing with the Mob’s money is an extremely dangerous game. How’d he take it?” I asked.

  Hadas huffed. “How do you think? He threatened me. That’s when I told him my husband was a federal agent. And if he harmed either one of us, the whole federal government would come down on his head.”

  What an understatement. The feds take it very badly when one of their own is harmed.

  “I also let him know I’d been keeping a record of every illegal transaction he made and if anything happened to me, the information would be handed over to the FBI.”

  I underestimated Hadas. Under the helpless little woman act, she possessed nerves of steel. “You outsmarted him.”

  She smiled. “He was furious, for sure. He gave me an ultimatum: Destroy the will and hand over the incriminating record or something bad might happen.”

  “Is that what they were looking for when they broke into my house on Monday?”

  Hadas nodded. “I told Alexander the evidence against him was in a safe place. I also informed him I was pregnant. As long as he stayed away from me and the baby, his secrets were safe. But the moment he caused trouble, the evidence would find its way into the hands of the FBI.”

  “How did he react?”

  “Once he learned I was carrying his child, he became obsessed. He claimed he didn’t care about the money anymore. He wants us to raise this child. Together.”

  I finished her thought. “That means as long as you stay married to Yossi, you can use him as an excuse not to marry Alexander?”

  Hadas fixed me with a steady gaze. “Exactly.”