Sleight of Hand (12 page)

I could argue the ‘gainful’ bit, but I just ate another piece of toast and watched him. I didn’t like where this seemed to be leading. Officially, I wasn’t in the army any more, despite the fact I was still under orders. They paid me a retainer which they had disguised as a veteran’s disability payment.

He licked his lips. “So even if I accepted the legality of your claim, I would adjudge your compensation payment redundant.”

“That’s the second time you’ve used that comment about legality. You want to tell me what that’s about?”

He seemed to be getting more confident as he went on.

“Your claims are commensurate with a sergeant grade E5 at a 25% rating with no dependents.”

I shrugged. I had never claimed anything, but that was the right grade and it was probably what was written in the agreement I had signed.

Krantz tried to hide his triumphant expression. “But there are no salary records for you after boot camp, no army records at all, in fact, until you started claiming. You never made private, Ms. Farrell, let alone sergeant. You were never in the army.”

He sat back, satisfied that he’d nailed me.

I finished my breakfast and took a swallow of coffee. It rattled him to see my lack of reaction, but he felt secure enough in his facts to take a sip of his own coffee.

“You don’t have the security clearance to see my records,” I said.

He laughed and brushed my comment away with a wave of his hand.

“Ridiculous. You’re claiming that you were special forces or something? Ms. Farrell, if you’d ever actually been in the army, you would know that the special forces don’t recruit women. And anyway, their salary records are still available to me.”

I suppressed a flare of anger. “Obviously, not all of them. Just tell me one thing, Krantz. Why would it be worth it?”

This was beyond ridiculous. The money was nothing, but it was upsetting out of all proportion with that. Exasperating.

Krantz leaned forward as if he were about to impart something profound to me.

“I’ve found out that you’re just a small part of a large conspiracy to defraud the taxpayers and divert veterans’ money from where it is needed.” He licked his lips, and his little rabbit eyes became earnest. “You’re probably not aware of it, and the amount may seem trivial to you personally, but I can tell you, I know that this fraud is worth many millions in total. My job at the moment is to find out how the fraud is perpetrated. I’m not really interested in your case, per se. I want to find out the person in the VA department who arranged it and how it works. I mean, how much of a cut do you take and how do you pass the rest back? Who to?”

He rocked back on his chair. “If you make full disclosure I could help. It might never even come to criminal charges.”

I just looked at him.

He tried once more. “You applied to join the army once. I’m thinking that showed some patriotism on your part and I applaud that, believe me, I do. Now, think of the damage this fraud is doing to this country. Please, find that patriotism again and help repair the problem.”

I jerked him across the table before he realized what was happening. His eyes bulged and he scrabbled futilely against my grip.

“Listen to me, Krantz. Maybe you have found some conspiracy with compensation payments. Maybe it is worth a lot and it needs fixing. But don’t you ever come around here telling me I’m part of it, and don’t you ever,
ever
dare suggest I’m unpatriotic.”

I threw him back into his chair and walked out. Every eye in the place was on me. It wasn’t the way I’d have wanted to say goodbye to Papa Dee’s, but at that moment, I didn’t care.

I walked slowly back to the office. Tullah’s van driver was there getting our things loaded. She sensed I wasn’t in a talking mood and just gave me the address of the new office to pass on to Jennifer.

I had to scrub this out of my mind. I needed to be thinking clearly at lunchtime. Jennifer wasn’t going to be happy with what I had to say.

Chapter 15

Jennifer arrived at the new office at noon. I heard her talking to Tullah and I walked out to greet her.

“Hi, Amber!” She turned on her pin-sharp Italian heels and gave me a big smile. She was wearing another beautiful dress, medium blue this time, simple and elegant, with a plain jacket.

I wasn’t quite sure whether to shake her hand or kiss her on the cheek. We had been very informal with each other, but there’s a certain distance you should keep from clients. I didn’t want to make any assumptions.

She solved the problem by kissing me on both cheeks, European style.

“Hi Jen,” I replied. “Thanks for coming over. What do you think of the new office?”

“I like it. Nice and bright. Easy for me to get to as well.”

“Thanks. It’s all thanks to Tullah. She found the place and did the deal.” Tullah smiled shyly.

I motioned to my office. “Let’s go sit down.”

“Oh, honey, I booked a table for lunch,” said Jennifer.

I must have looked hesitant, because she pressed on quickly.

“It’s at the Moulin. It’s a booth, so it’ll be private.” She paused. “I thought it would be easier if I run you out to Silver Hills from there afterwards.”

“Ah, okay.” I hadn’t dressed for lunch, I’d dressed for the office and visiting the site of the planned resort. Not really up to the Moulin, which was another of those restaurants I’d heard about but couldn’t afford. I ran a hand through my hair. “Give me a few moments and I’ll get some stuff.”

I went back to my office and took the Walther PPK and holster from the safe. It doesn’t have the stopping power of the HK, but it’s smaller and lighter and it fits better under a jacket. That’s the reason James Bond favors it. Then again, he wouldn’t have been caught dead in the sloppy jacket I put on.

I ran a comb through my hair, made sure it was neatly caught in its tie and looked in the mirror. At least the worst of the bruising was gone. Sigh. I grabbed my preliminary notes and investigation gear and rejoined Jennifer. Tullah gave me a big grin and a wave as we left.

I expected the chauffeur to be waiting for us outside and stopped for a second to look around, but Jennifer strode briskly to another car. My jaw unhinged itself. I went over and stroked it. It was all I could do not to lick the thing, it was so gorgeous.

“Are you getting in it or getting off on it?” asked Jennifer, laughing.

“Okay, okay, I’ll get in.” Her laughter was infectious. “This will definitely be the first time I’ve ever gotten in a pink car!”

It wasn’t just any car either, it was the top of the line Mercedes roadster. It was already a fun car with outrageous performance. And then Jennifer Kingslund bought one and painted it a deep and dusty pink. I slid down into the pale leather seat and wriggled with pleasure.

She gunned the engine and we joined the traffic with a little chirp from the fat tires. The roof folded away. I relaxed and enjoyed the ride. We were laughing and chatting, but she drove with precision.

Far too soon, we pulled up in front of the Moulin. Jennifer tossed the keys to the valet, grabbed my arm and marched us in.

Most of the top end, one-off restaurants in Denver are to be found downtown or around shopping areas. The Moulin had bucked the trend and gone outside the boundary of Interstate 70 to a lot with a view of Peaks Park and the Foothills Country Club.

They’d avoided making any architectural suggestion of it actually being a mill, and settled for a lovely open space format with split levels and booths on top looking out over some lawns and a garden, with the park beyond. The glossy warm ochre of the floor tiles caught the sunshine and made the place glow.

If the maître d’ thought I wasn’t dressed for it, he didn’t even blink. His eyes lit up at the sight of Jennifer and he came out and made a tremendous fuss over her. She was obviously a frequent diner here and she spoke fluently to him in French. While his back was turned for a moment, I caught a smile from her and a roll of the eyes.

“Stop that,” I whispered. “You absolutely love it.”

With more commotion than I’d ever had in all my years of visiting restaurants, we were eventually settled in our booth with spritzers and two orders for light meals on the way.

Jennifer took a long drink, looking out over the tended garden. Her face became serious.

“Okay,” she said. “Fun over for the moment. We need to go through how it’s looking.”

I nodded and retrieved my notes. I didn’t normally need them, but I’d had very little time for the wide range of things I had been looking at. The financials in particular, which I’d gone through last night in a desperate bid to clear my mind of the scene at Monroe Street.

“I’ll start with Troy?” I looked up and Jennifer nodded.

“Captain Morales appears to be aware that I’m retained by you. Is it okay to share information with him?”

“Of course, but thank you for asking.”

I tapped the notes. “Victor’s tracked down Troy’s friends from the cycling community. He missed a race he was signed up for, first time ever that they can recall. He hasn’t made any contact with his family back east. Captain Morales tells me that it was blood on the carpet. Troy’s keys were under the sofa.” I waited a beat. “I think we can be sure that he was abducted. The security cameras were turned off at the time and no one can remember seeing or hearing anything. That tells me it was planned and done professionally.”

Jennifer cleared her throat. “Was this done to get at me, or is there something in Troy’s background I don’t know about?”

I looked at the file in front of me, but didn’t open it. “Jen, there’s nothing Victor found in Troy’s life outside of work that would warrant anything like this. No gambling debts, no secret vices. The worst we can pull up is his father wanted him to go into the family business and there was a big bust-up.”

“And?” It struck me how like David she was. She knew I had something to say and was delaying saying it.

“His friends say he was infatuated with you.” I sipped the spritzer to wet my mouth. “They also believe that you used that to keep him when he got an unbelievable offer from the Jardines chain in California.”

Jennifer turned a furious gaze on me. “I’ve told you—”

I held a hand up to stop her, and she immediately backed down. “No. Sorry, Amber. You didn’t say what you believe. And it doesn’t matter what you believe, it’s what they believe.”

“I don’t think you are at all the type of person to use sex to keep a key employee from leaving,” I said. “And Troy never told anyone that. Quite the opposite. But the more Troy denied it, the more his friends believed it.”

Jennifer stared out at the gardens, still angry.

“So, as an outside party,” I went on, “I could easily identify the Golden Harvest as your signature restaurant in your home town. If I got the mistaken impression that you were also involved with Troy, abducting him would be an easy way to cause disruption and financial damage, at least for a time.”

The appetizers arrived, and we paused while they were laid in front of us. I ate and continued the briefing. God, I hadn’t gotten near the hard parts yet.

“Victor’s still working on Troy. But I’m afraid I have to say, every day that goes by means less hope.” I stopped and saw the shadow in her eyes as she took that on board.

Looking down, I flicked the notes. “On to other staff. I’ve looked at the rest of them who’ve left. I’ve only managed to talk to a few, but, with one exception, I think it’s a waste of my time and your money.”

“So why is the turnover rate going up?” she snapped.

“It
has
gone up. I’m not sure it’s
still
going up,” I replied. “I would lay the blame on your HR department, and your recent takeover of Frankell-Maines.”

“Blame stops on my desk, Amber. What’s your reason?”

“Mixing different cultures.” I was reaching here. It said private investigator on my business card, not business analyst. But as a sergeant previously responsible for getting boys and girls from different parts of the armed forces to play nicely, I had an appreciation for the flashpoints caused by even minor differences in the way things get done.

“On top of that,” I went on, “there are large salary differences between the parts of your company since the takeover. The former employees I talked to were well aware of what people doing the same jobs were getting in the PR division.”

Jennifer looked thoughtful and we were silent again as the wait staff cleared the first course. “The exception you mentioned?” she asked when they were gone.

“I want to talk to Geoff Hansen, who left the financial department. Just a gut feeling.”

She nodded, her cool blue eyes hooded. The main course came and we ate in silence for a while. The food was excellent, much more pleasurable than the next part of the conversation was likely to be.

“Finances,” said Jennifer simply and my stomach tensed. I had been given a lot of information, down to the intended target for her next takeover, Tucker Beacon, a company run by a local boy made good, Jack Tucker.

“All I have are the files you gave me, so maybe I’m missing something.” I took a deep breath. “You haven’t got the cash to build a resort, let alone take over Tucker’s company. You can barely keep the PR division afloat in today’s climate. You can’t get the kind of backing you’ll need from the banks without losing control.”

Jennifer threw back her head and laughed.

Diners looked up from their meals. Wait staff glanced and went back to work. The maître d’ beamed at us from his strangely ecclesiastical pulpit; happy eaters meant good business, and people noticing that Jennifer Kingslund ate at the Moulin was even better.

When she had the laughter under control, she leaned across and squeezed my hand. “I’m sorry, that was so rude. I’m repaid for my suspicious nature. I haven’t given you all the figures, and on what I gave you, your analysis is actually right, but there should have been no way you could have been able to come to that conclusion.”

She dived into her bag and pulled out a single page summary which was close to mine, except for a section under the title ‘war chest.’ I pulled mine out from my file and laid them side by side.