Tax Cut (8 page)

“Didn’t you?”

“No.”

“Why the heck not?
You knew we were going to Philly and that we are looking into someone’s murder. Plus, there are parts of Philly that I certainly wouldn’t walk through without some sort of protection. Do you know if where we are going is in one of those parts?”

“Um, well…”

“Geez, Chelsey, I love you to death, but sometimes you make me wonder.”

“Well, I’m sorry
. I’m not as worldly as you are.”

I kept driving and found my way off the highway
on South Front Street. A few short turns later, we were in front of a four-story home with a rooftop deck.

“Huh,” Bonnie said, as if she was taking it all in.

“Pretty ritzy place for someone who is only twenty-five years old and had my job. I was expecting more of a sleazy apartment. This place is probably pretty expensive. But, what do I know? Maybe she quit her job because she got a much better one.”

I locked up the car and we headed toward the door.

“What are you going to say to her?” Bonnie asked.

Before I could answer, a gang of teenagers crossed the street, nearing us.

“Hey, mama, you want some a’ this?” one of them said, grabbing himself between the legs.

Bonnie angrily
turned around to him and said, “What did you say to me, you little turd?”

“Come on over here and get some, cougar
. I’ll take care of you real good.”

I slowly backed up toward the car.
The kids were only twelve or thirteen, but there were six of them, and I was feeling nervous. Six of them would surely overpower the two of us.

“Did you just call me a cougar, you little twerp?” Bonnie screamed.

“Bonnie, let’s just go, let’s go,” I whispered.

“C’m
on, old lady, I got something that’ll make you scream louder.”

Bonnie’s face turned purple.

“Did you just call me ‘old lady’?” Bonnie yelled as she reached in her purse and pulled out her gun, pointing it directly at the one who called her “old lady.”

“She’s got a gun,” they yelled. “Run!”

They took off running in separate directions, yelling profanities back at Bonnie. One of them picked up a large rock and threw it in Bonnie’s direction. It hit one of the windows on Joni’s house with a loud
thunk
, but luckily, the window didn’t shatter. Why anyone would pick up a rock and throw it at someone holding a gun was far beyond my comprehension. Bonnie squeezed the trigger, firing off a warning shot toward them. The kids kept running until they were out of sight.

“I can’t believe he threw a rock at someone holding a gun,” I said to Bonnie.

“Yeah, that one must have fallen out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down,” Bonnie said with a smirk.

I laughed
, breathing out a sigh of relief. I looked around and noticed that no one was watching. In my neighborhood, if a gun was fired, everyone would have been looking out of their windows to see what was going on. I guess this neighborhood was used to the sound of gunshots ringing out at all hours of the day.

I imagined that if Joni was home, she was awake now with the noise of the rock crashing into the window and the gun. We approached the door and knocked.
There was no answer.

“You can’t knock like that,” Bonnie said.

“Like what?” I asked.

“Like a little girl.
You need to grow some hair down there.”

“
Eww
.”

Bonnie starting banging on the door.

“Joni! Get your little caboose in gear and get down here and answer the door.”

“Go away,” a voice yelled from inside.
It was a young female voice. I had never met Joni, so I didn’t know if that was her or not.

“Joni, I didn’t drive two hours to come see you to have you be rude. Now, let us in.
We work at Coral Beach and we just want to ask a quick question.”

There was no response.

Bonnie walked over to the Volkswagen parked closest to Joni’s home. She took out her cell and started typing.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I’m texting Uncle Freddy.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because I want him to run this plate for me.”

Within a few minutes, Bonnie’s phone buzzed.
She looked at the screen, then marched back to the front door and yelled, “Joni. Listen up. I have a gun, and I’m going to shoot out the four tires of your car if you don’t come down here and talk to us.”

There was silence.

Bonnie marched over to the car, took her gun back out and pointed it toward the car tire.

“What the heck, Bonnie?
Someone’s going to call the cops.”

“Trust me,” Bonnie whispered to me.

“Say goodbye to Tire Number One,” Bonnie called out.

The front door cracked open with the chain lock still connected.

“How did you find me and what do you want?” the voice behind the door said.

“I just have a quick question.
Do you know what happened to Vinny Buttiglieri?” I asked.

“He’s dead
. Don’t you read the newspapers?” Joni said with a splash of anger and a pinch of sarcasm.

“I know.
Did one of the council people at Coral Beach kill him?”

The door slammed shut.

“Wait! Please!” I pleaded and pounded on the door.

“Now what?”
I asked Bonnie.

“I can shoot out her tires,” Bonnie said
, matter-of-factly.

“I
suppose I can understand why she doesn’t want to talk to a couple of lunatics with a gun outside of her place.”

The door reopened, and a short brunette with a gorgeous face and body hustled out of the door with a duffle bag.
She rushed over to her car.

“Joni?
Where are you going?” I asked.

“If you found me, they will too…assuming that you weren’t actually sent by them.”

“Sent? By who?”

“By all those monsters in Coral Beach,” Joni replied.

“Marc?” I asked

“No!” she said sternly as she opened the door and threw her duffle bag in the back of the car.
“Look, I don’t want any trouble. I need to get out of here before they find me.”

“Please. Please, tell me,” I begged.
“I’m afraid they are going to hurt me, but I don’t know who they are.” I faked a tear.

Joni opened up the front door to her car, put one leg in
, and said, “The mob.” She sat down, pulled her other leg into the car, revved the engine, and took off like a racecar driver.

“Well, that wasn’t very helpful,” Bonnie said.

“I guess it’s nice to know it’s not Marc. But I’m not sure if I believe her. That guy has a mean streak.”

“What does she mean, mob?”

“The only people I can think of are the developers, Gino Righetti and Cal Zamboni. I wondered if they had something to do with Vinny’s death. The newspapers did suspect mafia involvement. I don’t have any proof, though, and I’m not even sure it was one of them. And if it was, that doesn’t explain Vinny’s note.”

“Well, where do we go from here?”

“Home, I guess.”

We drove
back to Jersey. I dropped off Bonnie and thanked Jayce for watching Mandy. I drove home, contemplating what my next move would be.

Chapter
8

A caravan of construction vehicles crept slowly to a stop where
a townhouse project was being completed. Men jumped out of their trucks to assess whether the ground was properly prepared for the pour. The break in the weather was exactly what they needed to make sure the concrete set properly. A call was made to the driver of the cement mixer, telling him to come as planned.

Within a few hours, the foundations of the new townhomes were laid
. Unbeknownst to the workers, the bodies of the missing married couple were encased in the architecture of the newest buildings of Coral Beach. Possibly forever.

* * *

I was excited for work today, despite the fact it was Monday. Bonnie was starting her new job, although I worried that Dingo would be piggish and would make Bonnie’s life at work miserable. But then, I remembered that Bonnie knew how to charm the pants off of anyone. I knew she could handle herself, so I stopped worrying.

Bonnie spent the first part of the morning filling out
personnel forms. Then she went over to the tax office to learn the ropes. It was only ten a.m. and Bonnie was already pestering me on her first day of work.

“Hey, I need to learn how to do an agenda request for you,” she said.

“You worked for me for how long? And you don’t know how I like my agenda requests delivered?” I joked with her.

“Well, I know you are a total bitch when they are late,” she quipped.

“Hey! Nero was right—you’re not nice,” I said. “The least you could do is be nice to the person who found this job lead for you.”

“Oh, I’ll make it up to you.
The hospital where Jayce works has box seats to the Devils this season. I’ll take you to a game if he can get the tickets.”

“Well, if you insist. What’s this item?”

“Dingo said he knew it was past the deadline, so he called Marc and got permission to add a tax refund resolution to the agenda.”

I was happy that Dingo took the initiative to call
Marc himself. I did not wish to speak with Marc. I told Bonnie I would email her a template to use for agenda requests. Requests from the tax office primarily consisted of the tax refund resolutions that she had mentioned. When residents overpaid their taxes for one reason or another, a resolution had to go before the governing body to approve the refund. In order to make it easy for her, I typed out everything that she would need. She would only have to fill in the names, addresses, and amounts of the refunds owed, and she would be good to go.

“How is Dingo so far?” I asked her.

“Full of testosterone,” she said.

“Hang in there!”

“Oh, I will, and if he doesn’t stop staring at my chest, I’m going to wear one of those Madonna bustier tops with pointy ends and I’m going to very sexily lean over his desk, and poke him in the eye with one of my boobs.”

“
There’s that Bonnie that I know and love!” I said.

Just then, the phones started ringing off the hook.
Various livid people calling about the zoning change. Obviously, the post office did their due diligence and delivered the notices on time. I took names and phone numbers all morning, and listened sympathetically to the complaints. I emailed the first list of angry residents to the board of trustees before I left for lunch, then left the phones in Bonnie’s capable hands.

I headed back to the office after an hour had passed.
I got right back to work and saw Bonnie had emailed the tax refund resolution to me. I printed out copies to distribute at the meeting. I noticed I knew a few of the names on the list. Village president Marc Coglione, members of the board Winifred and John, and several more names that sounded familiar to me. Now I knew why Marc was okay with adding a late item to the agenda—it was an item that put money into his pocket. I went to a drawer to pull out my current list of volunteers to boards and committees to see if any of the other names were familiar to me because they were involved with the village, but I was interrupted by the sound of my ringing phone. It was a call from the senior center director, Patti Costello.

“Chelsey, you’d better get over here.
Babs Todaro is here and she is causing a scene. I don’t know what to do. She keeps asking for you. Maybe you can calm her down.”

“On my way
,” I said as I disconnected.

I ran over to the Senior Center and found Babs screaming at people and
whacking them in the legs with her cane. She was in a room full of seniors who were trying to eat lunch and Patti was trying to calm her down.

“Babs, it’s Chelsey
. What’s wrong?” I tried to ask her.

She pulled her cane back to smack me in the shin and I hopped backwards, out of the way.

“Do you know anyone from her family that you can call?” I asked Patti.

“I wish I did,” she replied.

Babs continued to walk around the room with her cane, causing a scene. She started to shout, “Food fight, food fight.” Then she reached over, took an apple off of someone’s plate, and pitched it clear across the room. It landed with a big
thunk
. Several seniors packed up their lunches and left the building.

Patti and I looked at each other in bewilderment.

“I think we should call the police,” I said. “I hate to cause a bigger scene, but I don’t think she’s going to listen to me.”

Patti left the room to call the police.
I tried to follow Babs around and minimize the damage. I pleaded with her.

“Babs, please, come into the lobby with me.
I have a surprise for you.”

She stared at me with a bizarre look on her face
for a full thirty seconds, then she charged at me. I jumped back, but she caught me with the cane in my leg. Babs wasn’t very strong at her ripe old age, so it didn’t really hurt.

“That’s enough, Babs
! You can’t go around hitting people with your cane! You are going to hurt someone!” I yelled at her.

She w
hacked me again.

I grabbed hold of the cane.
She pulled it as hard as she could, so I let go. I was afraid she was going to fall and break a hip. She swung the cane over her head and took a running start for me. I ran. She chased me around the entire room with her cane over her head.

“She’s trying to steal my cane, she’s trying to steal my cane,” she shouted.

I ran into the lobby to try to get her away from the other senior citizens. She chased me into the lobby and around the couches positioned near the entrance. The police finally arrived after two laps around the room.

“Patti, she’
s nuts; she’s going to hurt herself.”

Babs turned
, looked at Patti, then clunked her in the head with the cane. Two young police officers entered the building and started yelling at Babs.

“Hey, hey, hey,” one of them said.
“You can’t go around hitting people with your cane.”

Babs looked at him and w
hacked him in the knee with her cane.

The officer looked at her, and said loudly and sternly, “Ma’am, do not touch the blue again.”

She pulled the cane back and smacked him with it again. The two officers picked her up by her arms, took the cane away, and plopped her down on the couch. They told her to sit until her daughter arrived. Babs started to cry. Apparently, there had been a few other incidents with Babs, so the police had contact information for her family.

Bab
s’ daughter arrived and was completely embarrassed. She explained that Babs had been placed on some new medicine for her dementia and was not responding well to it. She took Babs home. The officers asked Patti if she wanted to press charges for assault, since they had witnessed Babs’ cane landing on Patti’s head. Patti declined. I wanted to get back to work, but I felt a horrible migraine coming on. It had to be from all the stress. I couldn’t help but say to myself,
What the heck did I get myself into by taking this job?
I went back to my office, found my purse, and popped a couple of pills for my headache. I told Bonnie I needed to take a short break to let the meds kick in.

I went outside and walked the block and a half to the beach.
Although it was warm for March, there was still a bit of a chill in the air, so I zipped up my coat. The sound of the waves hitting the sand had always had a soothing effect on me. I thought if I sat down at the bench atop the entrance, I could rest my eyes, inhale the salt air, listen to the beach sounds, and calm down enough to make the pounding in my head disappear.

I sat down on the bench and had enough time to take one deep, relaxing breath before I noticed it
: A somewhat large, black object lying in the sand, the waves lapping over a portion of it. It appeared to be heavy by the way the undertow wasn’t able to drag the object back out to sea. I squinted, in hopes my vision would clear enough to make out what the object was. Curiosity got the better of me. It wasn’t uncommon for a dolphin to wash up on the beach at the Jersey shore. I got up from my seat, and trudged down the short path through the dunes to get a better look.

Seagulls swooped down near the object, occasionally pecking at it.
Perhaps it wasn’t a dolphin. It seemed similar to a large garbage bag. Each footstep of mine sank in the sand. The pounding in my head was lessening. My migraine medicine was kicking in. I continued my walk, closer to the object. It was a calm and peaceful day. No one was on the beach this time of year. The sun was shining brightly, causing me to raise my hand above my eyes, trying to block out the glare for a better look.

I finally reached the large black object.
It was indeed a ginormous garbage bag. I moved around it to the other side, to see what was inside the open flap. I peered in, without touching it, then let out a blood-curling scream that could have been heard for a mile. I ran a few feet away, then lost my lunch on the beach. I couldn’t make out the decomposing face I saw, but it didn’t matter to me. I was too freaked out to think about who it could be. I reached in my pocket, took out my cell phone, and dialed the Coral Beach emergency line.

Within a minute, police and
EMS arrived on the scene. A little while later, the coroner. The police took my statement and said I could leave. I had, without a doubt, had my fill of Coral Beach for the day, so I called it quits and drove to my parents’ house, shaking, unable to get that dreaded image out of my head.