Death's Door (32 page)

Who was the first president to have a running-water bathtub?

M
ADISON WAS WORKING
through a set of trivia questions on America’s presidents. Millard Fillmore had the dubious distinction of being in the White House when the first running-water bathtub was installed. Now who would know that? Even she did not have that obscure fact in her brain. Good. She was making a deliberate effort to stop thinking in trivia and spouting it in conversation. Her life was moving to a new level.

Paul was now a factor, but it wasn’t just him. She’d changed. Madison wanted…more. Mostly she wanted out, away from Total Trivia and Aiden and Chloe.

Her cell phone rang, and she glanced at caller ID, hoping it was Paul. Pamela Nolan was calling.
Oh my gosh!
She’d forgotten her friend from MIT. She had called yesterday when Rob had been in her office.

“Pamela, I’m so sorry. A lot has been happening. I forgot to return your call.”

“It’s okay. Life happens.” Pamela’s voice had its usual upbeat tone, and Madison could just imagine her talking on the phone and hooking a strand of long, glistening red hair over one ear as she spoke. Pamela looked like a china doll and spoke with a slight Texas accent. Guys often mistook her for a bimbo, but she was one of the smartest people Madison had ever encoun
tered. She’d gotten into grad school everywhere she’d applied and had chosen Stanford.

“You know, Madison, after I received your message asking about Chloe Barnett, I made some inquiries. There are a few things you might need to know.”

“Did you find out about her graduate thesis?”

“I did—it was on Internet gambling. It was part of a larger project being done out of the psychology department. Just to keep it simple, there may very well be an addicting element to online gambling. Apparently, people start out doing it for short periods of time, then find themselves ignoring everything else to gamble.”

“Winning produces a chemical reaction in your brain,” added Madison. “Gambling is a recognized addiction, with a twelve-step program and the rehab that goes along with it.”

“True, but Chloe’s theory was younger children could become trained as gamblers by adding a gambling element to various online games.”

“That’s sick,” Madison heard herself say. But she wasn’t surprised. There had always been something diabolical about Chloe. Hearing this, Madison was positive Chloe had been the one to approach Luis Estevez.

“Want to hear something even sicker?” Pamela asked, then went on without waiting for a reply. “Remember I told you that she was asked to leave Stanford? It was all very hush-hush.”

Madison’s sixth sense told her she wouldn’t like what was coming next. “Were you able to find out what she’d done?”

“Yes. I’ve been here long enough to have contacts. It was a big cover-up. She was sleeping with a professor. His project involved saving Monterey Bay. Are you familiar with it?”

“Yes. It’s a protected marine area off Northern California. The Monterey Bay Aquarium is world-famous.”

“Exactly. It’s the subject of one of those green earth-conscious movements that started in California. Professor Hinson set up a Web site with underwater cameras and his students
posted info on their research. Part of the site took in donations. You could donate money or stuff like towels for birds that got into oil and mackerel for the injured seals.”

“There are quite a few sites like that around. Did Stanford sponsor it?”

“Not officially. They knew about it, but it was Professor Hinson’s project. A number of wealthy alums donated heavily. The site was up and running for over a year when one of the grad students working on the project thought donations were less than expected.”

“Chloe. How did she do it?”

“Actually, it was pretty ingenious. The online contributions were mostly with credit cards. She electronically diverted many transactions to her own account. To do it, she had to have the financial info off the Web site. You know, personal info like passwords and mothers’ maiden names. While she was sleeping with good old Hinson, she was tapping into info on his computer. People didn’t complain because their statements confirmed that they’d donated. They didn’t have any way of knowing the money had been diverted.”

Suddenly, Madison realized the truth. Chloe had taken her money. “Pamela, you’re not going to believe this.” She explained about the identity theft, the loss of her savings and the devastation of her credit status.

“Oh God. I’m glad I called you,” Pamela cried. “I’ll bet she did it.”

“I made it easy for her,” Madison confessed. “I hadn’t changed my password after the divorce.”

“That’s a mistake, but most people don’t change their passwords and use the same one for everything.”

“What I don’t understand is how she got away with it. Weren’t charges filed?”

Pamela’s laugh was brittle. “No. The university didn’t want its reputation tarnished. Wealthy alums give staggering amounts
of money to the school. Professor Hinson put his life’s savings into the fund to make up the loss. Chloe was asked to leave, but that’s it.”

“That is so unfair. They cut her loose to do it again.”

“I’m really sorry,” Pamela responded, and Madison could imagine the concerned look on her old friend’s face. “What can I do to help? I’ve got a little money—”

“Thanks. I couldn’t take your money. Besides, I’m okay. I’m with a friend. I just want to get Chloe, to prove she did it. Any ideas?”

“Let me just add that Chloe had a gambling problem. There wasn’t any money to be recovered from her. That’s why Hinson gave up his savings.”

“So, my money is long gone.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“I don’t want her to get away with it.” Madison thought for a moment. “There must be a paper trail.”

“There must be, even if it’s electronic. Her bank records, most likely.”

Madison slapped the table with the palm of her hand. Aspen jumped up from where he’d been sleeping at her feet. “That’s it. I’ll get her records and see if the sums match what’s missing from my accounts.”

“You’ll need a court order, I think.”

“I might have her password, if what you say is right and people don’t often change their passwords. I’m going to log on to her bank account myself.”

“You go, girl. If that doesn’t work, contact the local FBI office. They have a whole identity-theft unit.”

“Pamela, I’m thinking Chloe applied for a job here just so she could move into online gambling. When I interviewed her, I realized she was overqualified for the position, but I hired her anyway. She saw we were an easy target, then Aiden fell for her and she’s in the driver’s seat now. What a waste. With her
education, looks and trust fund, Chloe could have built something on her own.”

“Wait a minute. What trust fund?”

“Her parents are wealthy San Franciscans. Her grandmother left her a trust fund. Maybe she gambled through it.”

“I think she reinvented herself,” Pamela said. “According to the records on file at the university, Chloe Barnett went to Berkeley on a scholarship, but still needed a student loan. She had a loan for grad school. Her parents are high school science teachers in Fresno.”

“Really?” The implications of these lies sent a wave of excitement through Madison. “I’ll bet she invented the trust fund to explain having money from gambling or ID theft.” Madison bet Aiden fell for it. Served him right.

Madison thanked Pamela and promised to let her know what happened. She almost called Paul with the news but decided first to see if she could access Chloe’s bank account. She remembered the woman banked with Florida National because Chloe had written a check for a group wedding gift for a programmer.

She went onto the Web site and typed eolhc1chloe. When Chloe had first begun working for them, Madison had seen her type in her password. Her name spelled backward, the number one, her name again. Every programmer had a special password. They weren’t too secretive about them because programming trivia didn’t require it.

No luck. Florida National didn’t recognize the password.

“Come on, Aspen. Let’s go for a walk.” She snapped the leash on the retriever and he happily trotted along beside her. It was bright outside, a clear, sunny day without the usual shroud of humidity that was typical when summer neared. It was a day when it felt good to be alive.

She also felt as if some enormous weight had been lifted from her. Finding out about Chloe was part of it, but realizing how much she cared about Paul meant more. Her life was
moving in a new direction. A career change was definitely in order.

Aspen relieved himself, lifting one leg on a gardenia bush. She spotted the deposit he’d left last night and retrieved it. The turd made her think of Chloe.

A bell gonged in Madison’s head.

“Here, Aspen. Here, boy.” She tossed the deposit into the trash, sprinted toward the bungalow, fumbled with the lock and finally opened the door. Aspen was right at her heels.

“Please, God. Let me be right. Turn the tide here. Let me get out from under one thing at least.”

She logged on to Luis Estevez’s bank’s Web site and typed in Chloe’s password. She was betting Chloe had opened an account at Allied Miami as a result of her alliance with the smarmy Cuban. Bingo! Numbers and transaction info filled the screen. She fumbled through the papers in her tote for the information sheets on the missing money from her account. The bank had given her the date and time of each transaction. If she could match it to deposits into Chloe’s account, she could prove what had happened.

It was astonishingly simple to match up the withdrawals and subsequent deposits. Chloe had zapped the money out of Madison’s accounts directly into her own. Even the cash taken from Madison’s credit cards appeared on the screen.

“How stupid.” If Chloe had been truly clever, she would have routed the money to another account, combined the money, then transferred it into her own account. That would have made identifying the transactions more difficult. Chloe wasn’t stupid, Madison realized, just arrogant. She hadn’t taken the extra steps because she never believed she would be caught.

Pamela was right about the money going to pay off gambling debts. There was very little in the account now. Electronic payments had been made to several online gambling companies.

“Print out three or four copies. Get one to Paul, another to
his father, and put one in a safe place.” Madison was so excited that she was talking to the dog. She reached down and stroked his head. “Wait a minute. I don’t have a printer.”

She had her laptop but not a printer. If she didn’t print out the info immediately it might somehow be deleted. There was at least one printer in the main house. She’d seen it in Wyatt’s home office, but she doubted the staff would let her in there. It required a laser fingerprint for entry. Surely, someone on the staff had another computer with a printer.

She grabbed her laptop, locked the door and headed for the main house. Walking fast, she hit speed dial for Paul’s cell. It kicked over to voice mail. “Call me. I found the ID thief.”

She knocked at the back door and Marcella, the chef, answered. There was no printer in the kitchen or elsewhere in the house. Mr. Wyatt was in his office. They should call him on the house system and ask.

Marcella dialed, then handed Madison the telephone. “I’m sorry to bother you. I know you must be busy—”

“No bother,” Wyatt assured her.

“I need to print out something. It’ll only take me a few minutes.”

“Come down to my office. I’m just going over a few test results. You can use the printer without disturbing me.”

The house seemed mammoth; it took forever to get to Wyatt’s home office. He was standing in the doorway when she arrived. She maintained a friendly smile but her heart was beating in double time.

He showed her to the printer. It took her a minute to plug in her laptop and it seemed like an hour, but finally the printer kicked out four copies of Chloe’s statement. She reconsidered, then went back and printed out the last six months’ records, all that was still available online.

Her cell phone rang. It was Paul. “You need me?” He sounded harried or as if he had someone with him.

“I have info on the ID theft. I’m going to have Lance drive me into the fraud unit—”

“Don’t do that. I’m not far. I’ll take you.” She noticed he didn’t ask any questions. He was a stickler for not discussing important things over a cell phone.

“Okay.” She hung up.

Wyatt was studying her intently. “Sounds like you have your problem solved.”

She didn’t see any reason not to tell him. “Don’t say anything to anyone. I don’t want this person to get away with it.” He nodded solemnly, and she continued. “It’s my ex’s new wife.”

“Why would she do that to you?”

“She has a history of it, and I made it easy by not changing my password after my divorce.”

“That’s too bad.” He shook his head. “Do you think this will straighten it out?”

“I hope so, but it may not be that easy. The least I can do is alert the authorities and hope they can stop her before she does this to someone else.”

“Will you be back in time for dinner? I have a proposition for you. I can see now’s not the time.”

“Maybe,” Madison hedged. She’d hoped to have a dinner alone with Paul. She’d spent the last two with Wyatt.

“Let me walk you back to the guesthouse. I’ll tell you what I have in mind and you can think about it.”

“Great,” she said, although she doubted she could concentrate on anything besides nailing Chloe right now.

“You know I’m setting up a foundation to fund promising medical research. There’s a lot to be done. One of the most important things will be finding a director.” He held open the door to the terrace. It was the fastest way to the guesthouse. She’d gone in the kitchen door because she hadn’t expected him to be home.

She tucked the stack of papers under her arm and walked quickly toward the bungalow. “There must be a lot of well-qualified people who would love the job.”

“I don’t want some professional foundation person who’ll view this as just another business opportunity. I think you should come on board right now and train for the position.”