Lost and Found (22 page)

“I know
,
Mom.” He didn’t linger
;
he hopped in the backseat of the idling car.
She
waved again as they drove away and hurried back in
to
the house. Richard
was loading
the breakfast dishes in the dishwasher. She touched his arm
and
then reached around him for her mug of lukewarm coffee.

“I called Sam. I’m meeting him in Sequim this morning at his new office
.
It’s
next to the state trooper detachment
,
so
if it doesn’t go well
,
I won’t have far to go when I’m arrested.”

Maggie instinctively rubbed his arm. “Sam won’t turn you in. You were railroaded by Dan.”

“No Maggie
,
it was of my own free will. I chose to help him for money. It may have been his idea to dump the truck in the lake and collect the insurance money. But I went along with it. He owed me the money
,
and it was only way he was going to pay me. I was in a real bind
when
all the loans came due.”

She didn’t say anything
. She was grateful he opened up to her last night about the stolen truck and why the
sheriff appeared
on
the
doorstep. Dan owed Richard a lot of money for his share of the building materials purchased for the final homes they were building on the Gardiner property.

“You know what I can’t figure out?” Richard closed the dishwasher. “How
does
he appear to be doing so well. He screams he’s always broke, but then somehow
,
he suddenly comes up with the money for other things. It’s a game with him. He hoards his money. Lives like a pauper
,
but then all of sudden
,
he has cash to throw around.”

“He’s growing dope again. So why hasn’t the
sheriff
caught him?”
She
dumped her cold coffee down the sink.

“Because he’s too smart. He shuts it down when he gets a whiff of trouble and moves it. Most likely to some low life friend in the area.” Some of the hardness in his face lifted, maybe because he finally shared his burden.

“I better go.” He hesitated until
she
stepped toward him,
and
then he slowly leaned in and kissed
her
, holding her close for a few seconds before leaving.

She flattened her hand on the counter and tapped her fingers when Richard slipped on his black leather jacket. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go with you?”

“No. Stay here
.
I’ll leave you the truck so you can pick-up Ryley. I don’t know how long I’ll be.” He went out to the barn
,
and a few moments later
,
came out with his Harley. He fired up the engine
and
pulled on his helmet.
She
lingered on the porch wearing just a navy sweatshirt and worn blue jeans. She leaned against the smooth porch railing.
He
didn’t wave, nor did he look back when
he
drove away. She couldn’t help but be amazed at the mountain he’d appeared to
have
overcome since last night after he’d finally shared the hook Dan held on him.
She’d been
speechless, but forced herself to listen without
judgment
even though she wanted to jump up and down and yell.

He hadn’t told Diane the full story about the truck, only enough for her to realize it was best left alone. Dan couldn’t sell the truck
,
so he was going to collect the
$30,000
insurance money on
it.
After they dumped the truck in Buckhorn Lake, Dan filed a report that
the
truck was stolen outside a Seattle hotel. If you thought about it, what were the chances of a search and rescue team accidently discovering a truck in that deep lake? And when the divers went down and matched the serial number to the stolen truck
,
one of the biggest questions was how the truck
got
all the way back here if it was stolen on the mainland. The problem now was, Dan signed the truck registration over to Richard
without
tell
ing
him, and passed him the registration the day before the
sheriff
arrived.
Ownership questions
now
dangled
in
the wind
,
and
that created a very big problem. With no insurance money paid,
under
the current investigation,
it
was now unlikely
to be
forthcoming. Because of Dan’s stupidity
,
Richard would be the registered owner, and Richard’s insurance would technically pay for the truck. The problem was Richard didn’t have insurance on the truck, and registration papers hadn’t been filed at the DMV. When the
sheriff
spoke with Dan,
he
concocted
a
story similar to the facts, but didn’t look good for Richard. He played the bad boy, confessing to the officers that they caught him. He owed Richard money, and Richard forced him to sign the truck over to him and
had taken
the truck from Dan. Then Richard demanded cash and forced Dan to file a report
saying
the truck was stolen, which he thought it was
since
Richard told him the truck was gone. He said he was just trying to help
Richard out
because
he didn’t have the vehicle insured yet. Richard was his business partner, but
Dan had no idea
what he did with the truck
.
After Richard took the truck, he’d not seen it again.

The
question in Maggie’s mind
was if
the
sheriff
believe
d
Dan
.
A brilliant liar. Confess to a smaller crime
, and it
was apparently enough to sway the officers to look harder into Richard’s financials. When Richard spoke to the officers
,
he told them he never had possession of the truck
.
He
did tell them Dan gave him the registration the day before the officers appeared to question him. He urged the
sheriff
to check with DMV
.
The
fact he didn’t register the vehicle in his name or insure it should tell them Dan was not disclosing all the facts. Richard
pointed out he wasn’t the one who filed the stolen vehicle report and then
said nothing further to the officers
.

This morning
,
Richard was going to
tell
all of this to Sam
to
get his help. At this point
,
it didn’t look as if Richard would see the money from Dan unless he took Dan to court. And Richard wanted to steer clear of court. Too many spotlights
would shine
directly on his own financials
.
Add
in Dan’s ability to spin a tale
and
think quickly on his feet
,
shifting a story to benefit
his
cause,
and it
was enough to make Richard take a step back and reevaluate.

She
could see Richard was scared. The heat Angie managed to stir up in Dan’s direction had shaken Richard
because
the
attention
was focused on Dan and all his properties, including the one he owned with Richard. He didn’t want any investigator looking too closely at the applications, let alone the approving officer who overlooked many of the details.

Sam was right
.
All
the innocent people buying these homes didn’t know if they pissed
Dan
off, he could
legally
evict them with little notice,
and
they would be required to move their home, which they’d discover was not as
simple
a task as when
he
sold
it
to them.
They’d
be forced to walk away, lose their home because it was on Dan
’s
and Richard
’
s property
. And
Dan and Richard would once again own the house. Richard was unsettled with the sloppy homework done by the property lawyers and the realtors who did not pick up on this minor detail. Nobody appeared to look at all the pitfalls anymore. A good lawyer could make a case for fraud if they put the time and effort into it. Why Richard had ever gone along with this scheme to begin with was problematic.
Unless
the polished version of
the
land deal
was looked at
. Two guys own a piece of land, have it rezoned as a mobile home park, apply to the community
zoning board
for approval for 25 manufactured homes with a twist, built on site to spec
,
and get
them
selves
an edge on the market.

For a moment
,
she
wondered if it
might
not be better to just walk away from everything and start over fresh
with
no
ties to Dan
.
But it would mean
no money, bankrupt
cy
. Say goodbye to
their
home where her children were born
,
raised, and where Lily died. As she breathed in the ache, the reality of the situation sunk in.
She
wondered for a moment
about the choices Richard made for them and
if she too would be able to sacrifice what they had left.

“Nice digs. Don’t you find it a little unnerving parked this close to the
sheriff
?” Richard lounged in one of the worn second hand office chairs in front of Sam’s desk in
his
dingy tiny office with outdated brown
paneling
and one small window.

Sam wore a five o’clock shadow, obviously
he had
no time to shave this morning.

“It has its perks.” Sam watched him meticulously
with
a
hardness
that
failed to loose
n
even a little.

He
couldn’t remember the last time someone made him squirm. “You’re not going to give me a break are you?”

Sam twirled a pen between his thumb and index finger. “You called me
,
remember
?
”

“I need to know something Sam, before I tell you anything. Will you use it against me?” Sam appeared to soften when he dumped his pen on the desk and leaned forward
,
resting his forearms on the pile of papers scattered across his desk. His eyes lightened with sympathy.

“Richard
,
I told you last night I’m trying to help you. I’m pretty sure you didn’t kill anyone and need my help to relocate a body. Or do you?”

“No
,
I didn’t kill anyone.”

Sam opened his hands
—
an invitation to start talking. “Well
,
fill me in.”

“You need to know first
,
what I did…I did to protect my family. When you’re in partnership with Dan
,
it’s
like making a pact with the
devil
. Try breaking that tie
;
it’s damn near impossible. He’s got me over a barrel
,
Sam. He’s slick, and I was so wound up in my grief, and Maggie…”
He
stopped and looked away.

“I know what you went through and why your head was out of the game. There’s no
judgment
from me. Talk, so we have a place to start.”

He
nodded. “Okay. Three months ago. The line of credit was pulled by the bank. I exceeded the limit too many times, and I was late with the payments. Dan stopped paying the subcontractors
and
suppliers
. He
stuck me with all the bills
,
which
over the last year
,
amounted to $350,000. I tried to not pay
for a bit
,
and
then to pay my half. Except no one could find Dan to make him pay his half. And since I’m the partner who’s here, legal action was threatened solely against me. They only needed to make one of us pay. Whatever I’m out, I need to take legal action against Dan. But you need to serve him, and he’s such a cagey bastard
,
he won’t give out his address. He has no land line, only a prepaid cell phone, no internet,
and
no permanent
residence, so find him first. He’s almost invisible. He knows how to live off the grid. He knew I’d be stuck. So I made the payments myself. I took out a second mortgage on my property. I’ve no equity left anywhere. The five houses that sold last year, I only got half the money. The lawyer handling the proceeds from the beginning set up two accounts to divide half of each sale. One half
is
placed in my account
,
the other in Dan’s. And because we shared our land lawyer
,
he couldn’t represent me and take action against Dan to get my money back. I had to get another lawyer, which went nowhere
because
we were unable to find Dan and serve him. Until three months ago,
and then
he shows up
crying
the blues
.
The lawyer I hired did a quick check on his bank accounts
.
He
has no cash floating around, and his equity in his rental property is minimal. My lawyer
’
s advice was to negotiate and work out a deal. That was after I couldn’t come up with another $50,000 for his retainer.”