Chapter Twenty-Eight
“Can you please give me some room?” Mrs B asked, nudging Duck away from her feet. “I promise you I won’t float away.”
It had been a busy day and her patience was growing short with the dog. She’d already found contact information for as many of the names on Declan’s list as possible, and forwarded the information to Sam and Gary, cc’ing Charlie to ensure he was fully in the loop.
Her next task was to track down where the payment for Jules’ contract had come from.
She searched her emails and located the e-transfer. It had been sent from george_zu_slate@. She decided she might as well go straight to the source, so she copied and pasted the address into a new email and began to type.
Dear Mr Slate,
It has come to our attention that, due to a miscalculation on our part, you have made an over-payment for services provided by Declan Hunt Investigations with regard to your daughter’s security protection. We will be issuing a rebate on these excess charges.
Would you please provide me with a mailing address to which I can send the cheque? My apologies for not being able to e-transfer you the funds, but our accountant requires a paper trail that a cheque will provide.
Yours sincerely,
Joan Beckerman, Declan Hunt Investigations.
She pressed ‘send’. Almost immediately she received a bounce-back message— ‘Address not found. User unknown’. Mrs B checked her records to ensure this was the email address that had been used to initially contact them. It was. The account seemed to have been deactivated.
Mrs B normally would have gone to Charlie with the problem, but he wasn’t in and she felt sure that she could take care of this herself. She decided to follow another route. Mrs B picked up the phone, called Declan’s bank, and asked for her favourite account manager.
“Emily Rosen speaking. How may I help you?”
“Emily. It’s Joan Beckerman here. Look, I know this request is a little out of the ordinary, but I’m looking for some information about the person who made an e-payment for our services.”
“What sort of information?”
“I need to find out the physical address of the person who sent the transfer.”
“Ooo, Joan. That’s really a bit of a no-no around here. Can’t you just ask the person who sent the money?”
“I tried,” Mrs B said, “but the email they originally used is out of service, and they aren’t answering their phone.” Joan paused dramatically. “Listen, Emily—can I trust you with some sensitive information?”
“Of course you can, Joan. You know discretion is my middle name,” Emily whispered breathlessly.
Mrs B continued. “We’re facing a terrible situation, Emily. It’s a real life-and-death case, and the person I’m trying to find may be involved. The money transfer was on Monday afternoon. It was labelled as being from George Slate. Anything you can provide would be of use. I’d be ever so grateful.”
“Life and death, you say?”
“Absolutely.”
Emily was silent for a moment, then Mrs B heard the sound of clattering keys on the other end of the phone.
“Well,” Emily said, “I can’t give you an address. I’d lose my job for that. But I can tell you, since it’s a matter of life and death, that the account the money was transferred from is registered to a numbered company.”
“Can you give me the number?” Mrs B asked. “That would help the situation incredibly.”
Emily rattled off an eight-digit identifier registered in Alberta. “I hope you get the bad guys,” she said, her voice quivering.
“You’re a life-saver, Emily. Truly. Thank you so much.”
Mrs B disconnected. She had no sooner hung up the phone when the chirp of the door alarm indicated a visitor. Mrs B pulled a small vanity bag out of her purse and applied a fresh coat of lipstick. She had just finished tidying her hair up when the door opened.
Mrs B smiled broadly. “Harold. So nice of you to come over.”
Harold Vanstone made his way to her desk.
He reached for her hand, and gave it a kiss.
“I could tell you that I came over here to avoid having my office manager question me as to why I’m doing a property search when it’s clearly a clerk’s job, but that would be a lie. I came over because I like seeing you.”
“Likewise,” Mrs B said.
“Before I forget, I have some information on Charlie’s legal case.”
“Good news, I hope,” she said.
“The plaintiff’s lawyer has asked for a few more days. They are waffling. I can almost guarantee that they’ll fold. Obviously, they’ve realised that Harold Vanstone J.D. LL.B. is not a man to be toyed with.”
She put her hand on his shoulder. “Indeed.”
“Now, shall we get to work on your land title search?”
She nodded. “Thank you, Harold. You’ve always been so good to me. Here are the addresses.”
“Two of them?”
“The second one was a last-minute addition.”
Mrs B gave up her chair to the lawyer.
“Well, hello there,” Harold said to Duck, who had remained under the desk. Without coaxing, the dog left his spot and silently moved over to Mrs B. “I see we’re on better terms today,” he said. “No growls.”
The dog stayed where he was, watching from a distance.
Harold plugged in his credentials to the land titles search.
In no time at all, he had information on the first address, which was owned by a numbered company.
He rattled off the number. Mrs B frowned.
It was the same numbered company that the account manager at the bank had indicated had paid for Jules’ security.
Joan didn’t have to check—she had an excellent memory when it came to numbers.
The second property, the one that Charlie had been led to believe was Jules and her father’s residence, was eerily listed as being owned by the very same company.
“Harold,” she asked coyly, “are you able to identify the owners of that numbered company?”
He laughed. “For you, I could look up the shoe size of the Prime Minister, if that’s what you needed.”
She watched as his fingers flew across the keyboard, taking them to another government site. “What was that number?” he asked.
Mrs B rhymed it off by memory.
He looked up at her. “Is a corporate name sufficient?”
“I’ll take whatever you can give me.”
He leaned in toward the monitor. “Both properties are owned by a Monarch Holdings.”
Mrs B immediately recognised the name. She took a deep breath.
He frowned. “What we found out, Joan…it’s serious, isn’t it?”
She took his hands in hers. “Lives are at stake, Harold.”
“Do you want me to stay? I would if it would make you feel safer.”
“I appreciate it, but there’s no need to involve you in this. But when this is all over, we should do dinner…my treat—for everything you’ve done.”
Harold kissed her on the cheek. “I would be delighted. Until next time.”
He bowed, then skirted the dog and made his way out of the office.
Mrs B sat back down on her chair and composed herself. She’d wait until the others arrived for their meeting to tell them the bad news. If Declan was missing, Monarch had him.