“No, Juliet,” Michael said. “I wouldn’t do that. It’s real important that we find out what we’re dealing with here.”
Juliet didn’t want to cry anymore. Her eyes felt raw. “This is like a nightmare. I buried my husband today!”
“You’ll hear from those FBI agents in the next day or so,” Max said. “One of them told me he knows Bob.”
She tried to think. “Yes, that would be Darren Clement. Bob went to high school with him. They used to play golf, but I haven’t seen him in years. I don’t think Bob has, either.”
“Well, he’s on the case. He and his partner might even take the case over.”
“I’ll keep working on it myself,” Michael said.
Cathy nodded. “We’re on your team. We’ll get through this.”
Juliet wasn’t that confident. “What was my husband involved in?”
“I know one thing for sure,” Cathy said. “He loved you and the kids. Hang on to that.”
But that was shallow reassurance, and it didn’t ring true anymore. “I need to go home,” Juliet said. “To my own house. I need to look through Bob’s things.”
“All right,” Michael said. “We’ll go with you.”
J
uliet’s house seemed like a foreign place to her. The mess the intruders had left looked even more ominous at night. Shadows were bigger, more jagged, and seemed deadlier. Everything had changed. The lighting, the silence, the pall of death hanging over the rooms. Funny that this house had always brought her joy. How could things have flipped so quickly?
She went into Bob’s office, turned on the light. The contents of his bookshelves and drawers lay on the floor. She was grateful she’d had his laptop with her at Jay’s, so they hadn’t gotten that. She’d had Michael retrieve it from Jay’s and turn it over to Max.
“If there was anything important here,” Juliet said, “I think they would have taken it.”
“Yeah, but we should look anyway,” Michael said. “There might be something they didn’t recognize, but it might mean something to you. I think your best bet is to go through his drawers and whatever files are left. And if you notice something
missing, tell us about that too.” He set his own laptop on Bob’s desk and pulled his chair up to it. “I’ll go through his computer files.”
“How will you do that? I thought you gave his laptop to the police.”
“Yeah, I did. But first I copied his hard drive.”
Cathy high-fived him. “Nice.”
“I’ll work through his computer files and see what I can dig up about those airline tickets and trips out of town. Also, did you read through his e-mails?”
“No, not yet,” Juliet said.
“I’ll do that too. Do you have a file for your credit card statements? Did they get it?”
Juliet pointed to a drawer on the floor. “Well, that’s the drawer. I think he kept those kinds of files there. He’s a pretty organized person.” She caught herself speaking in the present tense, but didn’t have the heart to correct it. She lifted the drawer and slid it back into the desk. The files that had been in it were spilled across the floor. She stacked them on the table.
“Cathy and I could do a search of things in his closet,” Holly added. “Check his pockets?”
Juliet nodded. “His clothes are all over the floor.”
“I’ll feel right at home,” Holly said. “Okay, if there’s anything we need to see, just come get us.”
As Michael sat at the computer, Juliet put the rest of the drawers back into his desk—the desk she’d been so thrilled to find in an antique store. She had sent it out to be refinished before moving it into the office, and it had come back looking brand new and as opulent as Bob liked.
She stacked more of the messy files and papers on the desk and sorted through them. She studied a business card for a
security alarm company—it wasn’t the one they used for their home. She turned it over and found the name Sid Griffin in Bob’s handwriting. She set it on the desk to show Michael, then flipped through more papers, finding the usual items—envelopes, prescription pads. She looked through each item, hoping for a clue, something that would tell her why Bob had other bank accounts and why these killers had been after him and invaded their home. There had to be a solid explanation, something that would relieve her pain and restore her memory of Bob as a good man.
She found nothing significant. She knelt and gathered up more papers. A map of the Bahamas stopped her. “This must have been for his trip to Nassau.”
Michael rolled his chair to her, took the map, and unfolded it on the desk. Bob had jotted notes in the margin and circled an area on the map.
“I always wanted to go to the Bahamas,” Juliet said. “Why wouldn’t he have taken me?”
Michael shook his head. “I don’t know.”
She slid the business card to him. “I also found this. It’s not the security company that monitors our alarm system here.”
“ ‘Sid Griffin, Owner,’ ” Michael read. “I know him. We were rookie cops together. His company usually does commercial security systems. Heavy-duty stuff. So maybe they wired Bob’s office. Should be easy enough to find out.”
Holly came back into the study. “Juliet, I just found something that’s kind of interesting.”
Juliet looked up with dread. “What is it?”
“I decided to look through your suitcases and see if Bob left anything inside. The small one on his side of the closet had this wallet in it.”
“But his wallet with his license and credit cards was in his personal effects. I have it in the box the police gave me.”
“This is a different one,” Holly said. “And it has some credit cards in it. American Express and—”
“No,” Juliet said again. “We don’t have an American Express account. We only use my debit card, which is a Visa. I don’t like debt, so we agreed not to run up credit cards. He had another debit card for his office account, but that’s all.”
Holly brought her the wallet. Juliet took it and looked through it. “I didn’t know about any of these accounts.”
“One more thing.” Holly brandished a key on a small ring. “I found this key in his shaving kit. Did he keep an extra one there?”
Juliet took the key chain and looked at the key. “This isn’t our house key. It’s not even shaped the same. I don’t know what this key goes to.”
“Okay,” Holly said. “Just thought I’d ask.”
“Leave it here,” Michael said. “We need to make note of it.”
Feeling a twisting in her gut, Juliet turned back to the stacks of papers. The intruders had taken most of their financial papers. “Is there a way to access these accounts online?”
“Maybe.” Michael turned back to his computer. “His computer had a key chain app that captures his password so he doesn’t have to remember it every time. If he ever accessed it on his computer, it’ll probably be here.” His voice trailed off as he looked. “Score! He has passwords for American Express and Discover.”
Juliet stood behind him as he pulled up the American Express account and opened the last statement. An itemized list of charges filled the screen. He scrolled to May.
“Ten charges in a row from the Bahamas,” he said.
Juliet swallowed the knot in her throat. She studied the statement—restaurants, hotel, a rental car. All the week he was supposed to be in Denver.
She felt the blood draining from her face, and her head felt light.
Max had said the DEA suspected Bob was involved in the drug trade. Was it even possible?
She saw charges from a dress shop, a boutique, a hair salon. “What is all this? Why would he be buying stuff there? He didn’t bring anything home for me. I would remember.”
Cathy met Michael’s eyes, and suddenly it hit Juliet. Clearly, he’d kept his secret activities confined to these accounts so she wouldn’t see them. But who was buying things at those women’s shops? She let out a broken sigh. “I told you, Cathy. Another woman.”
“Honey,” Cathy said in a weak voice. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly good explanation.”
“Or maybe there’s not,” Juliet said. “Maybe these cards are related to those bank accounts. I don’t know what to think.”
Cathy sighed. “Are you sure you’re up to this? We could take you to Jay’s and you could sleep. You need rest. We could come back and do this ourselves.”
“No, I can’t rest,” she said. “I have to see this for myself. I have to know.”
Her hands trembled as she trudged on, searching for clues. They searched until it was almost morning, and she realized she needed to get home to be with the boys. They would want to know where she had been all night.
She went back to Jay’s, weary and shaken, sick over what her findings revealed about the man to whom she had committed her life.
H
olly took a four-hour nap, then dragged herself out of bed. There were a couple of conventions in town, and the taxi service needed all hands on deck. She needed the money, so she had no choice. She got a large cup of coffee from her favorite convenience store and drank it for breakfast. The baby didn’t take it well. Hyped on caffeine, her child kicked like a martial artist all morning.
When things finally slowed, she went to her favorite hole-in-the-wall diner, where a lot of her friends hung out for lunch. She went in and spoke to some of them, scattered at tables, then headed to the counter.
“Holly!” her friend Deena cried from behind the counter. “Where have you been? I’ve been trying to call you.”
Holly vaguely remembered seeing a missed call from Deena. She slipped onto a stool and dropped her purse on the one beside her. “Yeah, I’ve been busy.”
“Well, you look like death warmed over.”
“Tired. Haven’t slept much. Hit me with some coffee, will you?”
Deena poured her a cup. “I wanted to see if you were going to Nate’s party last night. It was fun but I left early because you weren’t there. Why didn’t you call me back?”
Holly took a long sip and felt the baby squirm again. Maybe she should have ordered decaf. “Had a death in the family. My brother-in-law was murdered.”
Deena’s mouth fell open, revealing her tongue ring. “You’re kidding.”
“Wish I was.”
“Wasn’t your sister-in-law murdered a few months ago?”
“Yeah. And my brother-in-law to be. Makes me glad I don’t have a significant other. It’s like a family curse or something.”
“Are they connected?”
“No. Just a lovely coincidence, apparently. But it’s weird, right?”
“Some coincidence.” Deena drew in a deep breath. “What happened?”
“He was shot at the U-Haul place. He’d helped me move that day.”
She gasped. “I heard about that. Dr. Cole?”
“Yeah, you know him?”
“He was my doctor. He was your brother-in-law?”
“Yep.”
“Wow.” She leaned over the counter. “I mean . . . Wow! Dr. Cole . . . he was my favorite person in the whole world.”
Holly narrowed her eyes. “Why did you go to him? You don’t have back problems.”
Deena winked. “
He
thought I did. Is anybody taking over his practice?”
“I don’t know yet.” Holly shook her head. “Wait. Are you
telling me you liked to go to him because he’d prescribe you drugs?”
Deena looked from side to side, then lowered her voice even more. “Just so I’d have some when I need them.”
Holly’s eyebrows shot up. “Like what?” She’d known for years that Deena took painkillers recreationally, but lately Holly had seen her popping them more and more. Holly rarely mentioned it. It was none of her business. But now . . . “So how did it work?” she asked.
“I provided him with nice, neat medical records, and he took me at my word about my medical history and refilled my scripts without too many questions.”
“Seriously? He didn’t order new tests?”
“No. That’s why so many of his patients loved him.”
Holly tried not to look shocked. “So . . . you know other people who did this, then?”
Deena’s boss walked by, and she snapped to attention. “So you want the usual?”
Holly tried to refocus. “Yeah, eating for two. And would you pour this out and give me decaf so my baby will stop tapdancing on my bladder?”
“Right. Hamburger and fries. No onions. Best prenatal meal a baby could hope for.”
“Lay off, will you? I eat healthy. I just need comfort food today.”
Laughing, Deena put the order in and turned back to Holly. Holly lowered her voice. “So . . . you knew other people who went to him with the same MO?”
“Sure. He was known to be . . . kind of easy. He saw a different person about every five minutes, so he didn’t take time to question us much. As long as we had paperwork, he took us at our word.”
“For anything you wanted?”
“No, just painkillers.”
“So . . . what did you get? Lortab? Oxycontin?”
“Yeah, and the new one. Opana.”
Holly had never heard of Opana. “What is that?”
“Oh, you gotta try it, girl.”
Holly had no idea that Deena’s drug use had gotten that bad. “No thanks. I need all my brain cells.”
Holly had been known to take pills when she was partying, but she had never gone far down that road. And she hadn’t done it at all since she’d found out she was pregnant. From where she sat now, it seemed a little . . . sad.
So Bob was a favorite among drug seekers, but it didn’t sound as if he had done anything illegal. At least, nothing anyone could pin him down for. But surely he would recognize fake records when he saw them.
She scarfed down her food, then hurried out and called Michael and Cathy on three-way to tell them what she’d learned.
“So what does this tell us?” Cathy asked.
“Not much,” Michael said. “Just that Bob wasn’t above all this. He relaxed his standards for more money.”
“Could this be why the DEA was watching him?” Holly asked.
“Maybe, but if so, they wouldn’t have gotten very far. Bob wasn’t stupid. He would make sure he was covered legally. Really, this only tells us about where he was morally.”
“Didn’t his lies and secret bank accounts already tell us that?”
“Yeah. I think we need to get into his office, see what we can find. And talk to his nurse and secretary.”
They agreed to meet at Jay’s and talk to Juliet.
Holly hoped her sister had the strength to keep digging.