Chapter 16
Sixteen
“ T here. Is that him?” Margot nodded toward the door at a man in a tired gray suit under a bland khaki trench coat. She and Max were seated in a small lounge area at Ranchero Mutual, waiting for Gallagher’s colleague to arrive. They’d already told a teller they were waiting on someone. The woman kept sending suspicious looks their way.
The wind that followed the man in fluttered the front of his coat, revealing the badge clipped to his hip.
“I’d say so.” Max stood. “That or the teller finally called the cops.”
Margot sighed as she stood up. That would not surprise her. Not with their luck.
“Dr. Gaultier? Mr. Carson?” The man walked closer with a curious frown.
“That’s us.” Max held out a hand. “Agent Dye?”
The man shook his hand. “Yes. Call me Jeremiah.” He extended his hand to Margot.
“Nice to meet you,” she said.
“Agent Gallagher gave me a quick rundown of this case. Have you opened the box here?”
Margot shared a look with Max, then shook her head.
“No,” Max said. “We wanted to, but we didn’t want to obscure any fingerprints on the key.”
“You’d have done that by picking it up.”
“Not if we wore gloves and were extra careful taking it out of the box.” Max pulled a fresh pair from his pocket. “We thought about fingerprinting it, but didn’t want to tamper with evidence.”
Dye raised an eyebrow, and Max’s mouth took on a sardonic tilt. “Anymore than we already have. We also figured the staff here might get suspicious if we pulled these babies out to turn our key in the lock.” He shook the gloves.
“You’d be right.” The man scratched at his temple and blew out a breath. “Okay. You have the key?”
Margot reached into her purse and pulled out the Ziploc bag containing it.
“Perfect.” He took the bag, looking toward a counter that ran along the wall to the right. “Let’s go see if I can lift any prints from it, then we’ll find the manager.”
He led them over to the counter and set the bag down. From one pocket of his trench, he withdrew a small black case and opened it, taking out a fluffy brush, a container of black powder, and several fingerprint cards.
It only took him a minute to dust both sides of the key. He found a thumbprint on one side.
“That’s a decent print.” Covering it with clear tape, he picked it up, looking at it. “I’ll run it when I get back to the office.” Putting his kit away, he brushed the powder off the counter and picked up the key. “Shall we?” He nodded toward the teller.
Max turned and motioned Dye to go ahead. As the agent walked past, Margot slipped her hand into Max’s, and they followed.
The same teller who’d been staring at them suspiciously while they waited looked even more wary as they approached.
Dye lifted his badge from his belt and showed it to her. “Hello. I’m Agent Dye with the FBI. I’d like to speak to your manager, please.”
Her eyes widened, then her gaze shot past him to Max and Margot. “Um, sure.” She turned her head, looking down the long desk at a woman in a black pencil skirt and a floral patterned black and white blouse, who’d just emerged from the back. In her late forties, the woman had her light brown hair pulled up into a loose French twist. Gold-framed glasses sat on the end of her nose as she stared down at a pile of papers in her hand.
“Tess.”
The woman looked up. Her brows pinched as she took in the teller’s wide-eyed look and the three people standing on the other side of the desk. A wariness crept into her eyes.
Margot didn’t blame her. It probably looked like she was getting robbed.
Dye held up his badge. “Are you the manager?”
She nodded and walked closer. “I am. How may I help you?”
“I’m Agent Dye, FBI. This is Dr. Gaultier and Mr. Carson. We need your assistance getting into a safe deposit box.”
“Do you have a warrant?”
“He doesn’t,” Margot said. “But I have a key. It’s a long story, but I’m hoping my name is on the list of people authorized to access the box.”
Tess set her papers down and moved to a computer. “May I see your ID, please?”
Digging out her passport, Margot handed it over.
“What’s the box number?”
“Two-eighty,” Max replied.
The woman’s bright pink nails clacked over the keyboard. “Good news.” She glanced up with a smile. “You are.”
“That’s great. We’d like to see the contents,” Agent Dye said.
“That’s up to Dr. Gaultier.” Tess nodded to Margot.
“It’s fine. They’re here to help.”
“Then let’s go get you access.” She pushed away from the counter, then went through a door set into the wall to her right and came out into the lobby. “Follow me.”
Beige carpet turned their footfalls to soft thumps as they went down a hallway. Tess paused outside of a room and opened the door, turning on the light. “You gentlemen can wait in here while I take Dr. Gaultier in to get the box.”
“I’m sorry. I need to keep eyes on it,” Agent Dye said. “It’s part of a homicide investigation.”
Tess’s eyes bugged. “Oh. Well, then, I suppose you can stand in the doorway. It’s a small space.”
“That’s fine. So long as I can see.”
“I’ll stay here.” Max moved into the room.
A spate of nerves traveled down Margot’s spine as they walked away. It wasn’t logical. He was only a few feet away. But she’d feel better with him by her side.
“All right, let’s see…” Tess entered the safe deposit box vault and walked along the wall of metal doors. Margot trailed behind while Agent Dye stayed in the doorway.
“Box 280 is… here.” Tess stopped and inserted her key into a lock.
Margot put on a set of gloves from her purse, then took the key from the bag and stepped up to slide it into the second lock. The door opened, and she let the manager take the box out. Margot pushed the door closed and removed the key, putting it back in the baggie. Whatever was in that box better mean something and not be some wild goose chase.
Back in the room where Max waited, Tess set the box on the table. “I’ll leave you to it. Do you need anything else at the moment?”
“No, I think we’re fine, thank you.” Agent Dye moved closer to the table.
“You’re welcome. Please come ask for me when you’re finished.”
“We will.” He gave her a short nod, and she left, closing the door.
“Let’s have a seat, shall we?” Agent Dye motioned to the chairs arranged around the table.
Max pulled one out for Margot, facing the agent. She sent a soft smile at him as she sat, then took his hand as he sank down next to her.
Dye took off his coat and draped it over the fourth chair, then smoothed his tie and sat. “Agent Gallagher asked me to loop him in when we opened this, so I’m going to call him, if that’s all right?”
Margot nodded.
“We’d prefer it,” Max said. “So we don’t have to go over things twice.”
The agent made the call. Gallagher picked up almost immediately.
“You’re on speaker, Mark,” Dye said.
“Good. Hello, Dr. Gaultier. Mr. Carson.”
They chimed in with hellos.
“Start from the beginning. You went down to Dallas to look in your safe deposit box and you found a key and a notebook added and two coins missing, right?”
“Yes,” Margot said.
“You’re sure that’s all that’s missing?”
“On the surface, yes,” Max said. “Margot called a friend who was able to access the list of items stored in the box. They went through it all and only the coins were gone. But the stop I mentioned?” He paused, giving the agent a moment to connect the dots.
“Yes?”
“We went to a jeweler’s on our way here with a couple of the pieces from Margot’s collection. Some of the stones have been replaced.”
There was a short pause while Gallagher processed that information. “Dr. Gaultier, did your husband know what was in the deposit box? The exact items, I mean?”
Margot bit the corner of her lip, thinking. “I mean, it’s possible. I kept the documents in our home safe. He had access to that. Why?”
“Because I’m trying to figure out if he had the reproductions made first and switched things out when he put the journal and the key in, or if he made more than one trip.”
“More than one,” Max interjected. “The ring the jeweler looked at had the center stone replaced, but the diamonds were real. Tad couldn’t have replaced that stone in the bank. A jeweler would need to do that. He’d have taken the ring, had the stone replaced, then brought it back.”
“But remember, he asked us if I could get the original appraisal report so he could compare them.” Margot held up a finger. “It’s possible that one had been tampered with long before I even took possession of it.”
Max tipped his head. “That’s true.”
“So, short answer, we still don’t know,” Gallagher said. “Okay. What about the journal? Mr. Carson, you said it looked like a betting journal?”
“Yes. My best guess is for horse races. Margot said it’s not Tad’s writing, though. We don’t know who it belongs to. There are no names anywhere.”
“All right. Make sure you turn that over to Agent Dye. Our racketeering division can take a look at it. Maybe they can figure out what it all means.”
Margot squeezed Max’s hand and kept her expression neutral. She was glad he’d photographed the whole thing. Asher would probably work faster. Plus, they’d actually get to know the results.
“We will,” Max said. “That and the key. We need to go back to the other bank after we’re done here to get the rest of the jewelry. Before we left the jeweler’s, we made arrangements to have the remainder looked at.”
“I’ll come with you.” Agent Dye’s head bobbed once.
“Sounds good. Open that box now. Let’s find out what the other Dr. Gaultier left behind,” Gallagher said.
Margot glanced at Max, the hand tucked into his getting slick with nerves. There could be just about anything in there.
He squeezed her fingers. “Do you want me to do it?”
She blew out a breath, ruffling her bangs. “No.”
Untangling their hands, she swiped them on her pants, then raised one and lifted the lid.
Her brow furrowed as she looked inside. “A map?”