wanting children. But maybe staying childless was best in the long run. My future’s still uncertain. What kind of father could I be from prison?”
“CJ, exactly what went on tonight?” Tracy and a skeptical Wanda had removed CJ to Wanda’s car—walking along the road this time, since nobody at the gatehouse cared who departed. Now that Edward Statler was in jail, CJ no longer had a place to live. Especially since, apparently, CJ had helped put him there. Tracy, grateful that he, too, hadn’t been hauled away in a cop car, had volunteered to let him sleep on her couch tonight.
After all, a similar arrangement was working so well for Marsh and Sylvia.
“I admire your self-control,” he said. “I’ve been here nearly half an hour.”
Tracy had showered as soon as they walked in, hot and sweaty, and feet and legs slimy from the walk along the seawall. That was when she’d realized the cut on her foot really needed attention. All of that had delayed their conversation, but there was more to it.
“I figured you must feel pretty beat-up by everything that happened,” she said.
He looked up from her foot. “You’re a nicer person than you believe.”
“So?”
He gently patted her foot with a towel until it was dry. “Edward invited me to Florida for a reason. He needed somebody to do work that he thought I’d be uniquely qualified for. Plus he figured I had nowhere else to go and would be so grateful, I’d bury any ethics I had left.”
“Let me guess. The work wasn’t legal.”
“Edward’s been running major scams all over Florida for years, and a lot of people are involved.”
“Maribel?”
He smiled. “Why? Do you have a personal interest in seeing her put away?”
She wondered if CJ had picked who to turn in, based on some code known only to him. She would probably never know, and besides, Maribel didn’t matter. “Go on.”
“Edward was pretty good, so it wasn’t apparent, not with the mess all the banks are already in.”
“Let me guess again.” She pretended to think. “He bought houses, using shills and crooked appraisers, then he got banks to loan him—or rather, the shill—the entire price of the house plus the additional that the appraiser claimed it was worth. Then when the papers were all signed and sealed, and the money was delivered, the shill disappeared, Edward and the appraiser pocketed the extra money, and Edward was that much richer.”
CJ looked genuinely surprised. “How did you figure that out?”
She winked. “My secret.”
“Well, you got part of it. What’s the other part?”
She thought about the papers Wanda had seen. “Fake loan applications?”
“Not fake, but close. Doctored. They were applications from real people filled out as a ‘service’ by Edward’s employees. The applicants didn’t make nearly as much money as the applications claimed. Based on the falsified figures, they were then given adjustable mortgages. Of course they defaulted when they couldn’t make the rising payments, and lost their homes. After foreclosure, Edward snapped the houses back up at a percentage of what they were worth, then moved to the next and final phase, which you’ve so wisely recounted to me.”
“What a scumbag.”
“Not my choice of terms, but close enough.”
“But what was your part in all of this?”
“Not very complicated. Right away I realized what was going on, and I knew I couldn’t have anything to do with it. First, it wasn’t good karma. Second, it wasn’t even vaguely legal. Third, I’m already in enough trouble. So even though Edward was generous, I went to the authorities with evidence about what he’d been doing. He was already under investigation, and what you know is the tip of the iceberg. They asked me to get more information, and I did.”
Tracy was still trying to convince herself she had heard the word karma come out of CJ’s mouth. Plus her foot was still in his lap, and for some reason she was reluctant to ask him to hurry so she could resume ownership.
“And earned some brownie points while you were at it,” she said.
“And earned some brownie points, yes. But really, I don’t know if that will matter in the long run. I helped here, but nobody’s going to call this a wash with what’s going on in California.”
“But you did it anyway.”
“I’d like to leave Florida under my own power, not escorted by marshals.”
She had expected something so different. A repeat performance of their Southern California drama. A fresh chance to despise him. Instead, CJ was now something of a hero.
CJ