Deadly Interest (37 page)

“
So every one of these
people,” I held up Mrs. Vicks’ yellow sheets, “have the same
address and opened identical accounts?”

“
Yeah,” she said with a
wry look.

“
And we can safely assume
these people don’t know one another.”

Maya finished my thought. “Which means that
it looks like one person is controlling all the accounts.”

“
But why?” I asked. “Why
go to all the trouble? Wouldn’t the pattern become apparent the
minute the loans weren’t paid back?”

She shook her head, staring upward in
apparent disbelief.

“
What?” I
asked.

“
This is perfect,” she
said. “This is beautiful. I get it.” Sitting up and leaning forward
as though the words might come out more quickly if she were closer,
she explained. “I’m going to bet that not one of these people paid
back a single penny.”

“
I’m not
understanding.”

Maya shook her head. “The world is a strange
place and the world of banking is sometimes even stranger. Since
none of these people borrowed more than ten thousand dollars, our
loan department can choose to write the losses off rather than send
them to collections.”

“
Oh, come on,” I said,
disbelieving.

Her eyes were bright. “It’s true. We’re
having such success with this program that we’ve extended
six-figure credit to most of our client base. Six-figures,” she
emphasized. “These,” she indicated the list, “are small potatoes.
Very small. And, if I can guesstimate, even all put together, they
don’t make up more than three percent of our asset base. All of
these are within tolerances, and definitely within a loan officer’s
limit to write them off without approval from David. And, the
argument can be made that ten grand isn’t worth the trouble to go
after it.”

“
So what
happens?”

“
Whoever wrote these
checks, knew that the bank wouldn’t follow up, so Owen,” she raised
her eyebrow and pointed to his name on the paper before us, “came
up with hundreds of fake borrowers. Not one of them is large enough
to go after, but put together they total a real nice
haul.”

“
But, who are they?” I
asked.

Maya squinted, and I could tell she was
thinking aloud as she continued. “We can’t do anything without a
person’s social. As long as we have that and their name, we have
enough to run a credit check.” Her gaze on the ceiling, she spoke
slowly. “My guess is that elderly folks in high-priced retirement
homes . . .” she indicated a couple of the group home names that
lined the top of the lists, “have money. So, when we ran a credit
report on them, they came up as excellent prospects. Owen must have
seen them as an untapped resource—he borrows money in their names,
never pays it back, and when they go past due, he writes off their
small balances as a loss.”

“
And if anyone ever
questioned the accounts,” I said, “like the FDIC doing this audit,
Owen had you all set up to take the fall.” Maya let loose a sigh
that might have been a sob, and I bit my lip for a long moment,
before putting the final bit of information together. “And it might
have worked, except Mrs. Vicks’ apparently recognized one of the
account names.”

Maya nodded. She fingered the letter we’d
found from Ursula Siewicz, a resident of one of the nursing homes
heavy with Banner Bank customers. “I can’t believe this,” Maya
said. “I’d like to go confront Owen right this minute with this.
This is the thing that seals it.”

I read it again.

Dear
Evelyn
,

I was pleased to receive your lovely letter
yesterday. It is always wonderful to hear from old friends,
particularly when I feel so far away home. I was, however, puzzled
by your question about a bank account in Chicago. I made certain to
have all my accounts transferred to a local savings and loan when I
moved here five years ago. The thing that worries me was that the
social security number you wrote in your letter is definitely mine.
I’m sure I didn’t leave any accounts in Chicago. And even if I’d
forgotten one, I never banked downtown, I always kept my business
local, as you know. I’m very concerned about this. Unless Richard
opened an account before he died and forgot to tell me about it, I
can’t imagine how my social security number could have gotten into
a downtown bank’s records. But then again, with all the bank name
changes going on, I suppose anything is possible.

Would you be a dear and check into this for
me? If there’s any money in the account, you can have them mail me
a check, and then I’ll send you something for all your trouble. But
honestly, I think it’s really just some clerical mistake. My best
to you—When are you going to retire to enjoy the sun?

I tapped the cream color stationery. “Mrs.
Vicks must have recognized Ursula’s name and wondered why her old
friend was applying for such a significant line of credit. But how
would Mrs. Vicks have come across this information?”

Maya leaned back in the wooden chair and
crossed her arms and legs. “Evelyn Vicks worked for me, you know,”
she began. “But things have been slow in my department lately and
Owen’s assistant Nina has been so busy with this new program that
he asked if I’d mind if Evelyn would run credit reports in her
spare time. I said that’d be fine.”

“
Do we think Nina is in on
this?”

Maya scrunched up her face in thought. “I
can’t say for sure.” Shaking her head, she shrugged. “But I
wouldn’t rule it out.”

“
Mrs. Vicks obviously
recognized her friend Ursula’s name,” I said, picking up the
thread. Maya nodded. “But, what? She started to investigate?” I
tried out the scenario in my own mind. Maya understood my
question.

“
Yeah,” she said. “Why
wouldn’t she have asked Owen about it directly? It seems more her
personality to tell someone about her friend saying the application
was fake.”

We were both silent, staring without seeing,
at opposite corners of the room.

When our eyes met again, I could read that
she’d come to the same conclusion I had. Quietly, I said, “Maybe
she did tell someone.”

“
Oh, God,” she
said.

“
What?”

“
If I wouldn’t have let
her take on the extra work, Evelyn might still be alive.” Maya’s
dark eyes welled up and her mouth twisted as she looked
away.

“
You can’t think like
that,” I said. “And we’re talking about murder, here. Do you really
believe Owen is capable of killing another person?”

Her face clouded as she shook her head. “I
don’t know what to think anymore. I’ve always found him to be a
little weasel, but you’re right. I don’t see him as violent.”
Heaving a weight-of-the world sigh, she added, “But I never thought
he’d embezzle either.”

“
You couldn’t have known,”
I said, reaching across to place my hand on hers. She grabbed it,
and squeezed, hard, before meeting my eyes again.

“
Thank you for saying
that,” she said.

“
We might be jumping to
conclusions, you realize.” I stood up and began to pace, tapping my
lip with an index finger. “Mrs. Vicks was killed at home, and I
distinctly remember bunches of Banner Bank statements on her
kitchen table when I saw her that night, and I know they were still
there when I went back the night I was attacked.”

Maya shook her head, not understanding.

“
If Owen killed her,
wouldn’t it stand to reason that he would’ve taken all the Banner
Bank files with him when he left?” I asked.

She considered this. “Can you swear that
every single paper was there? That none of the files were
gone?”

“
No,” I admitted. “But
still, why leave any?”

“
Maybe somebody came
before he could take them all. Maybe that’s why he went back the
night of the wake. You were there yesterday, right? Were the bank
statements there, too?”

I didn’t know. Feeling stupid for not
thinking about that sooner, I knew I’d have to call Lulinski and
see what he knew. I said as much.

Maya had that look of concentration again.
“No matter what, we still need to be able to prove this is what’s
going on.”

“
So, we need to find out
if these accounts are past due?” I asked.

“
Exactly. I mean,” she
said, “what we need is a good long look at Owen’s
files.”

“
Can you do
that?”

Both elbows on the table, she leaned
forward, rubbing her temples. “That’s going to be tough. This ‘Line
of Affluence’ program is Owen’s baby. He keeps everything on his
side of the loan department. There’s no way I could spend much time
searching through them without somebody wondering what was up.”

“
If all this falls under
his jurisdiction, then how could he claim you approved any of the
applications?” I asked.

Her eyes were weary as she lifted one slim
shoulder, resigned. “It’d be my word against his, I guess, and
there are a couple of girls in that department who he’d easily be
able to influence.”

I thought about Nina Takami, and nodded.

Rubbing a thoughtful finger along her
temple, she closed her eyes for a long moment. “What I need to do
is to find out the status of these accounts. See if payments have
been made on any of them.” Opening her eyes again, she rubbed an
eyebrow. “And if we could pull up the original application for
Ursula Siewicz, we could compare handwriting.” She flashed a weary
grin. “I’d have to depend on your expertise for that.”

“
I don’t see how I’m going
to get a look at that anytime soon.”

“
Yeah,” Maya said, letting
the word drift. “Unless . . .”

“
Unless?”

“
We could go in tomorrow,
when nobody else is there.” Complicit eyes searched
mine.

“
On a Sunday?”

“
I have keys, and as an
officer of the bank, I have the alarm codes, too. This way nobody
sees what we’re up to, right? We could both go in, make copies of
everything we need and then we’d be all set.”

“
Don’t you guys have
security cameras?” My hands splayed out in front of me, I tried to
think. “And how will we explain about me being in the bank during
off hours?”

“
Cameras are set up only
in the bank lobby and in the vault areas. You and I won’t be going
anywhere but the loan office. And anyway, I’ll be there with you. I
have a right to go in anytime I need to.”

What Maya suggested sounded all perfectly
legal, safe, above-board. But it sure the heck didn’t feel that
way. I took a deep breath.

“
Okay,” I said. “I’m
in.”

Lulinski had called me Nancy Drew. I
remembered how cautious he’d been about Mrs. Vicks’ mail. He’d
probably tell me to back off until he got a warrant. But I didn’t
think we had enough here to get one. Not yet. A tight ball of
exhilaration bounced around between my jittery stomach and my eager
brain and I couldn’t wait to get in there and find the answers.

“
And no one will be there
on Sunday night?” I asked.

“
Nobody but
us.”

“
Good.”

Tomorrow, I thought. Tomorrow we’d have this
all wrapped up.

“
Oh,” I said.

“
What’s wrong?”

“
I’m taking my sister
downtown tomorrow.” Damn it all to hell.

“
Well, maybe she can just
meet you later, or something.”

I shook my head. “She’s handicapped.” I
hated using that expression when talking about Lucy, but it cut
through an otherwise drawn-out explanation. “Can we do this maybe
after four or five?”

“
Sure,” she said. “It’s
already late and I want to go to church tomorrow anyway.” Her gaze
swept over the table. “Lotta prayin’ to do.”

My cell phone buzzed, making me jump. I’d
forgotten about the message I’d left Lulinski until I saw his
number there. “Hi George,” I said, using his name for the first
time. I knew by the split-second delay in his response that I’d
probably taken him aback, but I didn’t think Maya knowing I had a
detective on the phone would preserve the open lines of
communication she and I had established.

“
Got your message,” he
said. “Everything okay? I’m nearby. I can be there in five
minutes.”

“
Just fine,” I said, “but
I don’t think we’ll be able to get together tonight.” Maya
continued to shake her head, staring down at the tabletop. I hoped
Lulinski trusted me enough to cut me some slack here and not show
up, badge in hand, at Maya’s door. “But I’d really like to talk
with you tomorrow about a couple of things. Do you think you’ll
have time?”

Too late I remembered my promise to Lucy.
How could I keep forgetting about her? If they ever awarded a
‘worst sister’ trophy, I was a shoo-in.

“
I’ll make time,” he said,
then asked again. “You’re sure everything’s okay?”

“
Yeah, absolutely. I’ll
talk with you tomorrow, then.”

We both hung up and Maya tried to smile.
“Boyfriend?”

“
No,” I said
automatically, then wondered what excuse I’d come up with if she
pressed me to know who “George” was.

“
I didn’t think so,” she
said, then shot me a quizzical look. “The scuttlebutt around the
bank is that you’re seeing David Dewars.”

I held up my hand, staving off that idea.
“We went out twice, but it was definitely more business than
pleasure,” I said.