The Chocolate Falcon Fraud (18 page)

When I pushed the alarm button, and all kinds of noise exploded, our intruder threw the door open. The van's parking place, of course, was wide because it was a handicapped slot. The man dressed as the character “Wilmer” left the door gaping open and walked rapidly away, headed into the crowded park.

I opened my door and stood up in it, waving my arms wildly and pointing at the guy in the fedora. He had the sense to look at me as if I were a lunatic and to keep walking. Naturally everybody in the area thought Aunt Nettie or I had hit an alarm accidentally. They stood around staring at us, but nobody
did
anything.

I suppose that—if I'd been thinking quickly—I would have turned off the alarm, screamed like mad, and followed Mr. Fedora down the street. Later Hogan said it was a good thing I didn't do that.

“An action that threatening might have forced him to use the gun,” he said. “The idea is to keep yourself out of danger.”

So Aunt Nettie and I were not hurt or kidnapped. And we thanked our lucky stars for that.

The worst part of the whole adventure was that during the excitement, the cook, whoever she was, disappeared from the yacht. I was so proud of Aunt Nettie for spotting her, and then the girl zapped herself into the ether.

After Hogan had checked on the crazy ladies in the van with the alarm blaring, she was gone, and of course, neither Noel Kayro nor Grossman admitted to seeing her go. They claimed to have no idea what had happened to her.

Bah! I would have been happy to shove them both overboard. Right off the luxury yacht and into the Warner River. At its deepest, muddiest point.

But they claimed they had run to the rail when they heard our alarm go off. And after that, Rae the cook was gone. Maybe she went overboard.

Aunt Nettie still feared the girl was being kept prisoner in the bilges, if yachts have bilges, but Hogan said Grossman let him look everywhere on the boat, and there was no sign of her.

Hogan had given Aunt Nettie and me his obligatory lectures on taking risks—“Yes, dear.” “I understand, Hogan.”—when we finally realized there were two passengers in Hogan's official car.

He had brought Tess back to Warner Pier, along with—ta-da!—Jeff.

Joe had arrived by then, and he and I greeted Jeff effusively, but I'm afraid my first thought on seeing him had actually been less welcoming.

I said it out loud as soon as I had Joe alone. “Oh, Joe! How are we going to keep that kid safe?”

“I already asked Hogan. He's going to have a guard on duty at our house. I talked to him and explained your theory of Jeff being the possible target of kidnappers.”

“I suppose he had already figured it out.”

“I think learning that Jeff's dad is actually an extremely wealthy man reinforced some ideas he already had. Maybe. Anyway, from now on Jeff's to have bodyguards.”

“I guess he'll have to. But that'll mean having three houseguests and only two guest rooms.”

“The bodyguards will not require a bedroom, Lee. Or even meals, if you don't want to provide them.”

“Don't be silly! I'm the granddaughter of Susanna McKinney and the niece by marriage of Nettie TenHuis Jones. I can't have people in the house and not
feed
them.”

Joe laughed. “I'll order pizza tonight.” Then he spoke in my ear. “And what makes you think Tess and Jeff will need two guest rooms?”

“I guess upstairs will be off-limits for you and me the next few days,” I said. “I don't want to know anything at all about what's going on up there. I still think of Jeff as about fourteen years old and Tess as twelve!”

I phoned Alicia Richardson with the joyful news that Jeff was out of the hospital. She still hadn't reached Jeff's parents, but she seemed to be calmed by speaking to him in person. At least she had quit threatening to get on a plane and fly up to take command.

So the whole crew was at our house for dinner. Aunt Nettie brought ice cream and chocolates, and Tess insisted on providing bags of salad. Joe picked up the pizza. All I had to do was set the table and remember where I'd stored the great big paper napkins.

We had a festive meal, though we had to keep reminding one another that Jeff was supposed to stay quiet. He said he felt fine, but he still didn't remember how he had gotten into our attic.

The bodyguard was the one I'd played gin with in the hospital waiting room. I finally thought to ask his name, and it was Duane. And his last name was McKinney! We called each other cousin from then on, though he admitted he had no relatives who lived outside Michigan, and all my McKinney kinfolks had moved to Texas from Kentucky before the Civil War.

“I'm sure we're shirttail relatives,” I said.

“Maybe so, though my dad always said all his relatives were hanged.”

“Definitely the same family,” Joe said. “Have another piece of pizza, Duane.”

Hogan provided one more surprise: Tess' car. The crime lab was through with it, and he had one of the patrolmen bring it out. He also quietly slipped her pistol to her. This time it was in a lockbox.

After dinner Hogan and Aunt Nettie went home. Duane and Joe walked around outside, making sure Duane had a clear idea of where vehicles, yard lights, and other paraphernalia were. Joe also made sure Duane had keys to the outside doors. Duane assured us he would sit up in the living room all night. And, yes, he was accustomed to sitting in the quiet. He'd be fine, he said.

Then we went to bed. Jeff and Tess upstairs—and I was still vowing to stay away from up there—and Joe and me downstairs. Thank goodness we'd added an upstairs bathroom.

As he went up, Jeff said he felt “a little shaky,” but he kissed me on the cheek and thanked us.

“Just think,” he said. “One of the main things I wanted to do on this trip was take you all to dinner to show you how much I appreciated your help four years ago. And here you are, taking care of me again.”

“No problem!”

“I know I've been a pain in the neck. I hope things are looking up. I'll have to see about my car tomorrow. I don't even know where it is.”

“No hurry,” I said. “The car is safe. Sleep late and take it easy.”

Then I got into my own bed and tried to figure what the heck was going on. Because something was, and it wasn't just a case of a misplaced statue.

I had brought my laptop with me, and by the time Joe got into his pajamas I was deep in a spreadsheet.

Joe looked over my shoulder, then lay down, stared at the ceiling, and spoke. “Okay. I assume you're not working on next year's budget for TenHuis Chocolade.”

“Nope. I'm figuring out how much money these crooks have spent handing out trouble over the past week.”

“It's more than a week. The Valk Web site began to work on Jeff a couple of months ago.”

“True.” I flopped onto my stomach and looked into Joe's ear. “So. You agree this was a kidnapping scheme?”

“Very possibly.”

“I think the scam over the supposedly valuable falcon statue was definitely a blind. Jeff tumbled on that right away.”

“What does your spreadsheet indicate as the bad guys' investment so far?”

“Motel rooms, gasoline, meals, possibly airline tickets. Plus the biggest potential item: rental of the yacht, though Grossman may actually own the yacht. And staff. They've had to pay out a major sum on this scheme. Even if the con job over the fake falcon were to work, I don't see how they could make much
money. But the real mystery is Captain Jacobs. He's really dead, Joe. Why did they have to kill him?”

“We'll never know until one of them tells us.” Joe sighed.

“I don't think he was part of it. I think they hired him from an agency, just like they said.”

“Yes, he must not have been one of the baddies. He probably figured out that something was wrong. Then he had to pay.”

I took Joe's hand. I knew how bad he felt about Jacobs' death. “And he must have wanted to tell you.”

“Maybe. At least, I don't see any other reason for his showing up on our front porch. But why me? We had barely met. Why not go to the police?”

“I don't know.” I squeezed Joe's hand, then leaned against the headboard and propped my boot up on a couple of pillows.

“So, I'll try to recap.” I cleared my throat importantly. “Several weeks ago someone who either knows Jeff or knows a lot about Jeff uses the Falcone Web site to introduce Jeff to the idea that he could make a lot of money by finding this unknown falcon.”

“Maybe Jeff had already talked about going to the Warner Pier Film Festival.”

“That might be it. Because Jeff may be inexperienced, but he's not an idiot, and he wouldn't have been chatting about his romantic problems with a stranger. And his love life is key to why he wanted money.”

“Agreed.”

“Anyway, the crooks—and I'm not sure who's a crook and who isn't, but I suspect Kayro—come to our area and find a remote property to rent. They also rent or borrow the yacht and have it sailed around from Buffalo.”

“Of course, they may not have planned to pay more than the deposit on yacht rental.”

“Oh, wow! I hadn't thought of that. Stiffing the yacht owner would save a lot of money. Anyway, they hire the yacht and a crew to bring it over here. But Jeff accidentally fools the crooks. He comes to Warner Pier on his own, without confiding in Kayro, and meets up with me.”

Joe turned over to face me, and we both nodded. “I feel certain Kayro had no idea Jeff had relatives in this area,” I said. “I'm guessing that from his surprise when I mentioned Jeff's name at the motel.”

“I think you're right.”

“To make things worse, Jeff finds the so-called Valk property on his own. And that could nearly have demolished the plan. They were probably preparing to spring the trap a day or so later and wham! Jeff shows up—I suspect—before they're ready for him.”

“And he must have shown up at a time when there was nobody there but that girl.”

“Right. Miss Oshawna Bridges, originally Miss Bridget O'Shaughnessy, as created by Dashiell Hammett. The plot required that Jeff be lured out there, and that they imprison him in that cabin.”

“An ideal location for holding a kidnapping victim.”

“But Oshawna can't overpower Jeff on her own, so they have to improvise. Oshawna gets hold of Wilmer or Kayro—I can't see Grossman in this role—and they start looking for Jeff. They force Jeff's car off the road, and he receives a head injury.”

“But Jeff once again gets away,” Joe said. “He's able to get to our house. He remembers where the key was hidden and gets inside.”

“That explains why he hid in the attic!” I said. “He wasn't thinking straight because of the concussion, but he knew someone was after him, so he hid in the attic. Ye gods! The kid has an amazing instinct for self-preservation! And thanks to Tess' plot to bug his car, and to his cell phone, we were able to find him before he dried up into a mummy. Then Hogan had the smarts to put him in the hospital under an alias. So the gang hasn't been able to get close to him since.”

I tapped Joe on the shoulder. “And that has foiled their kidnapping plan.”

“I don't see what else it could be. Since you finally mentioned that Jeff's dad is much wealthier than I had visualized.”

We both mulled that over for at least a full minute. Then I spoke again. “I feel as if I should take a quilt upstairs and sleep in front of Jeff's door.”

“Not a good idea, Lee! Two young adults who are in love and in adjoining bedrooms? Damn tactless, these stepmothers.”

“Damn worried! And in adjoining bedrooms, my foot!”

We were both quiet for another minute. “Sorry,” I said, “but I don't like having Jeff loose up here in Michigan. The bad guys could still be after him.”

“That's why Duane is sitting in the living room. And as soon as the doctors approve, Jeff and Tess are both on a plane for Dallas, okay?”

“Okay.” I sighed deeply and began to close out the laptop. “I know this is all just speculation. The real explanation may be entirely different.”

“Right,” Joe said. “The real question is, how is Hogan going to prove anything?”

We turned out the light.

If my life were a suspense novel—which it sometimes resembles—we would have awakened the next morning to find Jeff and Tess had both disappeared. But no, both were there and ready for bacon and eggs. Duane was fine, too. He was relieved by a fellow named Bob at eight a.m. Bob had already eaten, but accepted coffee.

The day seemed to be starting well. I breathed a sigh of relief.

I breathed that sigh too early, of course. It wasn't until two that afternoon that anyone was kidnapped.

Chocolate Chat

This recipe defines what fudge is for my family. I'm sure my grandmother did not originate the recipe, but it makes wonderful, smooth fudge without a whole lot of beating.

Some people like a crumblier fudge. They may prefer the Hershey's version earlier in the book.

Gran's Fudge

4½ cups sugar

1 large can evaporated milk

18 ounces chocolate chips

1 pint jar marshmallow cream

2 tablespoons butter or margarine

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

dash salt

2 cups pecans

Cook sugar and evaporated milk to soft ball stage. (Boil at least ten minutes, then drop a bit into cold water. When it's ready, the drop will form a soft ball when rolled between fingertips.) Add chocolate chips, marshmallow cream, butter, vanilla, salt, and pecans. Mix well. Pour into buttered dish. Let set for 24 hours before cutting.