Chapter 2

 

“She said she would have to come back to the bank and find me. She doesn’t have a phone or a car. She sold her vehicle four months ago and barely got enough for a few months’ living expenses. I don’t know how she’s surviving.”

“My god, the poor woman.” Over the phone, it sounded as if Penelope Fitzpatrick had come to a dead stop. She’d told Sandy she was watering the potted plants on her deck, but Sandy could sense Pen’s one-hundred-percent attention.

“I’d like to get the group together and tell everyone what I learned. Maybe there’s a way we can help Mary.”

“By all means,” Pen agreed.

Within thirty minutes, Sandy had received text message replies from Gracie Nelson and Amber Zeckis; a meeting was set for seven o’clock at Sandy’s home. The four women had followed the trail of a missing diamond necklace last April—maybe they could track the money Clint Holbrook had taken and find a measure of justice for his struggling ex-wife.

Sandy left the bank a few minutes early, picked up take-out Chinese for her dinner and went home to tidy up. Her two black cats, Heckle and Jeckle, greeted her at the door with plaintive meows to suggest they were starving. She knew better. She put food out for them, then dug into her carton of moo goo gai pan with her favorite pair of chopsticks, purchased on a banking trip to China a couple of years earlier. She walked through her living room, deciding once she’d picked up some stray magazines and taken her morning coffee cup to the kitchen it looked good enough for an impromptu meeting with friends. She changed from her business suit to cotton slacks and a loose top, wishing she could drop the spare twenty-five pounds that never seemed to leave her hips these days. The joy of menopause.

Pen Fitzpatrick was the first to arrive. Stately, in her seventies, with a Lauren Bacall aura that never seemed to wilt in the summer heat. It was Pen’s stolen necklace the group of friends had searched out, dubbing themselves the Heist Ladies as they trailed a gang of jewel thieves last spring. Pen immediately asked about Mary, inquiring whether Sandy had come up with some ways in which the group could help.

“We had a long talk over lunch today,” Sandy said. “Let me relay the information to everyone and we’ll see what we come up with.”

Pen nodded, dropped her small Versace bag onto a chair and knelt to scratch one of the cats behind the ears.

The doorbell rang a moment later. Gracie and Amber had arrived at the same time. Sandy admitted them, offered iced tea and everyone settled in, both cats immediately curling up on Amber’s lap. She smiled and shifted her iPad to the small side table by her chair.

“A few months ago, we all jumped on board to help a friend, and I think we had some fun in the process.”

Gracie groaned in a playful way, turning it into a smile.

“Well, aside from Gracie’s one injury on the job.” Sandy took a deep breath. “One of my customers, who’s also a friend, is in a pinch. Ex-husband, younger woman … Mary and Clint had a fairly successful kitchen-and-bath business they both worked in, taking jobs with some of the major builders, and money wasn’t a problem. Three years ago, Mary had to quit to take care of her ailing parents, and she trusted her husband to handle business as usual. With everything else on her plate, she admits she didn’t know their true financial picture.

“By the time Clint left her for a younger woman, apparently he’d obtained second and third mortgages on their house and either spent or moved money from the bank accounts. Mary has no idea where it went. During the divorce proceedings, he didn’t put up a fuss about giving her the house, even said he would continue to make the payments. Well, that promise was easily broken and she lost the house to foreclosure. It wasn’t as if this couple lived beyond their means—it was a lovely home in a nice neighborhood.”

Gracie spoke up: “So what’s his explanation? He just quit making house payments and doesn’t say why?”

“Apparently, that’s pretty much the way it went. Mary had a few thousand in a savings account, but the bulk of their cash had disappeared. Her parents only passed away this summer and she hasn’t had a chance to get work yet. She cleared the last two hundred dollars from her checking account today, and I really fear for how she’ll manage to eat.”

“Does she have any ideas about what she’ll do next?” Penelope asked.

Sandy shook her head. “She’s clearly not taking care of herself—she’s put every scrap of her energy into her parents’ care. I’ll do some more checking but, seriously, she looks like a street person. Mary Holbrook was never that way. She used to be slim and athletic, well-groomed. Never flaunted money but never lacked it either. She didn’t come right out and say so, but I have the impression she’s living in a shelter. She’s devastated.”

Amber, Gracie and Penelope exchanged glances and each gave a small nod.

“Well, then,” said Amber. “It looks like the Heist Ladies have another job. Last time it was diamonds, this time it’s cash. And this time we know who the crook is.”

Pen raised her iced tea glass. “All of you helped me when it meant recovering a family heirloom. Absolutely—we must help Mary take back her life and her dignity! Those are far more important.”

The others raised glasses as well. “All right, then. To the Heist Ladies!”