Chapter 25

Doreen opened her eyes and groaned. Her head was killing her. Her hands and feet were tied together.

"There you are," said a man, with a slightly familiar voice, but one she was still struggling to place.

With her eyes closed, she whispered, "What do you want?"

"I want an awful lot of properties, properties that we were supposed to make a lot of money on," the man said.

"What did you do to my animals?"

"They're all right here," he replied. "I figured they would at least keep you calm. Apparently you're some crazy animal lady now."

That statement had her opening her eyes again, but darkness was all around her. "So," Doreen began, "let me get this straight. I'm supposed to sign paperwork to give you all the properties, so you can turn around and make lots of money, and then you won't hurt me, right?"

"Gee, look at that. You figured it all out."

"Except, if you let me go, then, chances are, I'll tell the cops, and you'll get in trouble. So, no way you'll let me go, so why would I help you?"

After a moment of ugly silence, a shadow stepped into the light. "Can you see me?" he asked.

"No, I can't. It's dark here."

"Plus you've got on a blindfold," he muttered.

"Well then, how could I see you?" she snapped. "Good God, are you really the brains behind this?"

Another ugly silence followed, and then the man came closer and said, "That's enough out of you. I took enough of you with that kind of attitude before."

She opened her eyes and tried to wiggle away the blindfold, but suddenly it was ripped off, and she found herself staring at the man who had hit her. "Reggie?" she asked in disbelief.

"Yeah, it's me."

"Did you kill Mathew?"

"Sure I did, once I realized what was going on and that Robin had cheated him out of everything. He was so furious, and, if it hadn't been my money involved too, I would have been absolutely over the moon at what she'd done. However, then I heard how she'd gotten you to sign all these transfer forms and then filed them, which is a whole different story than just having the paperwork on hand. Mathew didn't find out until he went to deal with the property title issues and realized that Robin had legally changed the titles on all these properties."

Doreen groaned.

Reggie continued. "Everything is yours. Everything. Every single one of those properties that had nothing to do with you, that you would never have gotten, ever, are now in your name," he snapped. "All my money, all my pension, everything I've worked for all this time," he said, sounding almost hysterical, "went up in smoke because of that lawyer, that stupid female."

"Right, that stupid female lawyer who Mathew also screwed over," she added.

"Which has nothing to do with me."

"Or me," she declared, staring at him. "There's a reading of the will tomorrow. Why aren't you waiting for that?"

"Waiting for what?" he snapped. "Waiting to find out that Mathew didn't give me anything but a little bit of money? You think I haven't looked at that will time and time again, wondering what I would do about it?"

She stared at Reggie. "What's in the will?"

"Everything goes to you," he snapped. "Everything. I get like twenty thousand dollars. Do you know how far twenty thousand dollars will go?" He shook his head. "Nowhere, it will go nowhere."

Considering she was doing quite well with five thousand dollars, she wanted to pipe up and say something but figured he wouldn't take it well.

"I've learned to live on almost nothing," she muttered.

"Yeah, good for you," Reggie snapped. "I'm not interested in learning to live on almost nothing. He owes me."

With that, she had to agree. "I totally agree with you. That was a bad thing for him to do, but it's also Mathew we're talking about here. So you should know that anybody who screws others will probably screw you too."

He stared at her for a moment. "How is it you can still be so nice?"

"What do you mean?"

"You would have signed those papers if he'd asked, wouldn't you?"

"Of course," she said, with a shrug. "It wasn't my property."

"In that case, you can just sign them over to me." Then he slammed a stack of papers down in front of her.

Looking at the formidable pile, she frowned. "How many properties did he want me to sign over?"

"A lot, and not only were they not yours, but a lot of them weren't his either. They were all part of a custodian group, and he was the leader of it. We all trusted him because we'd done deals with him before. However, this time, his lawyer screwed him over. Once everybody got wind of that, his life got difficult in a hurry."

"Oh my God," she muttered. "Everybody got screwed in the deal?"

"Everybody."

"And how many times have you guys done things like this, where you screwed other people?"

Reggie shrugged. "That was the name of the game."

"So, it's the name of the game, as long as you're not the one getting screwed out of your life savings, is that it?"

He nodded. "Absolutely."

"Didn't you just say you made a lot of money on all these deals?"

"Sure, but we had more money coming."

"And that's why you're upset. Not because Mathew screwed you over but because he was fool enough to get screwed over himself."

"Yes, we trusted him. We thought he had it together and that she didn't have him by the balls, but, boy, were we wrong."

She just stared at him. There was something surreal, farcical, and satisfyingly comical about the whole situation. "How many people got screwed over?"

"Six investors. A couple of them are furious and are claiming losses because they were in a position where they have enough money that they can do so. Others don't have a clue what to do and aren't sure if they have any recourse. But me? I won't sit around and wait. I want those properties."

"But you don't want just what you are owed," she noted calmly. "You want all of them."

He gave her a nasty smile. "You see? Mathew thought you were too stupid to understand business, but he didn't get you at all, did he?"

"No, he sure didn't," she stated, eyeing Reggie carefully. "He assumed because I was quiet that I was stupid, but that's not true."

Reggie nodded. "I get that, and I told him that he was making a mistake getting rid of you because you would come back to haunt him."

"I'm not coming back to haunt him, but apparently Robin did."

At that, his face twisted in disgust. "Oh, that witch," he snapped. "She treated me like dirt. You might not have seen me half the time, but that one made sure not only to see me but to grind her heels into me. Mathew laughed and told me that I was way too sensitive and needed to get over myself."

Doreen didn't know exactly what to say to that, but she gave it a shot. "I'm sorry. Robin was apparently accustomed to a certain lifestyle. Yet she didn't come by it naturally, so she felt everybody owed her."

"Yeah, ya think?" Reggie said, with a headshake. "Why exactly is that?"

"Just the stuff that makes life very difficult for everybody," she said. "Let's find out what the will says."

"Did you not hear me? I know exactly what the will says, and it says it's all yours, except twenty thousand to me."

"The trouble is, these properties weren't even in the will, were they?"

He shook his head. "No, because they were all under corporations, trusts, and dummy accounts, and now that they've all been transferred, you basically money-laundered them."

"I didn't do anything," she snapped.

He laughed. "No, and, if anybody got a hold of them from here, it's free money."

She stared at him. "How could Mathew possibly get me mixed up in this?"

"It wasn't him. It was Robin, that lawyer. That constant scam of his, moving ownership around in a tax dodge, required him to have signed documents on hand all the time, but it bit him in the butt this time. He didn't even realize that Robin had done this. He thought he had all those papers from her, but one of the last things she did was file them. You should have heard him when he found out." Reggie chuckled. "I was inside the house at the time, and he just about destroyed the entire place."

Doreen nodded. "I can imagine," she said faintly.

"Yeah, it was pretty ugly," he said, "and you can bet I was deliberately absent when he started to call for me."

"I'm sure you were," she whispered.

He stared at her, rubbing a hand on his head, and asked, "Like my bald head?"

"Last time I knew, you had a full head of hair."

"Yeah, I did, but that's what living with Mathew these last few months has been like. The stress has been so terrible that I ended up bald really fast, but whatever. I don't really care about that, but I do care about the fact that I'm about to lose everything."

She looked at him shrewdly. "No, you're not about to lose everything. What you're not happy with is losing whatever you put into this, and what you want is to screw over everybody else and take it all for yourself."

He gave her a fat smile and nodded. "Exactly, and you're the one who will make it happen. You will."

"What if I don't?"

He smiled at her, then at her animals. "I killed Mathew and his PI. I should have finished off the Chinese guy, but I'll do that later. So I don't have a problem killing people. Do you think killing an animal will be a problem?"

She glared at him. "So, these innocent animals that have done absolutely nothing to you,… that's who you'll hurt?"

"Sure, why not?" At that, Mugs walked over, and, since he'd known Reggie for years, he rubbed up against him and snuffled. Reggie smiled, bent down, and scratched him. "Although I might keep this guy. He and I had a bond back then."

She stared down at Mugs, feeling a sense of despair. "It would be nice if you would keep him," she said softly. "I would hate to think you would kill him just because he's mine."

"I will if it makes you sign the paperwork. That can certainly be arranged."

"But, even if I sign it, who will you get to file all this stuff?"

"That's my problem, but don't you worry. I can get a lawyer to take care of this in a heartbeat."

She thought about it and then nodded. "You probably have a lawyer in the consortium, so you can share the profits with him."

"I'm not sharing the profits with anybody," he snapped. "My days of sharing and getting screwed are over."

"So, how do you stop the new lawyer from cheating you out of this?"

He hesitated and then shrugged. "I pay a flat fee, that's what. I'll get somebody who doesn't know me, who doesn't know anything about this mess. We file it, and it's all mine, and then I disappear to a nice Pacific island."

"I don't know if the Pacific islands are quite what they're cracked up to be," she shared cautiously. "Think about it. They have hurricanes and ugly weather, and, with the pandemic, there are all kinds of supply issues and related headaches."

"Stop all that talk and start signing." Then he tossed a pen at her.

She looked down at her hands, secured with zip ties. "I can't sign anything tied up like this and have it look like my signature," she stated. "I'm surprised Mathew didn't try to forge my signature and handle it that way."

"He did try, but, because everything had to be checked and double-checked, it didn't work, since he'd injured his hand."

"Yeah, but he could have hired someone. Surely he had access to someone skilled in forgery."

"He figured he would ask you first," Reggie said, with a shrug. "I told him that it wouldn't work, but he seemed to think it would."

"I would have signed them," she declared. "I've never been interested in taking what wasn't mine. All I've ever wanted was enough to live on."

"That's good for me, I guess," he said, rubbing his hands together. "Then you won't have any trouble giving it to me."

"Oh, but things have changed. The property is mine now. And since Mathew is dead and gone, and it won't save his butt, why would I help you, when you're the one who killed him?"

He stared at her. "How do you know I killed him?"

"Who else would?" she snapped. "Besides you just admitted it."

He stopped and glared at her, his hands on his hips. "So what if I did?" he finally said.

"Ah, now we're getting somewhere. And what about the private detective? Did you have to kill him too?"

He shrugged. "Yeah, he knew too much, and he would have put it all together."

"Do you really think that the others in the consortium won't figure it out when they do a title search down the road? Surely someone in that group has the brains to figure out that you've taken all these properties for yourself and ran?"

He stared at her. "Just the one guy is on my case. He's getting impatient, calling me all the time. However, I'll be long gone before he finds me and the others figure it out. They're so flummoxed that they won't do anything but wring their hands for a while. Meanwhile I'll be out of the country."

She stared at him. "Reggie, you know that's not true. You know that's not the way this will work."

"Sure it will," he stated almost desperately. "Otherwise I don't have enough money to retire. Don't you get that?"

"Yeah, I get that," she replied. "What I don't get is how you think this will ever work out in your favor. These men will come after you, and you won't even see it coming. Who knows? Maybe they'll do the same thing to you that you're trying to do to me and make you sign everything away."

He shook his head. "No, I won't do it."

"But don't you see? They'll find something you care about, and they'll force you."

"I don't have anybody," he snapped. "Working for Mathew made sure I didn't have anybody."

She stared at him. "No family?"

"No, and thank you for asking fifteen years after we met."

She winced. "You're quite right. Particularly by the end stage of our marriage, I didn't even know how to do anything but walk the hallways like a ghost."

"He used to call you that, you know? He told me how it was creepy the way you just whispered through life," he admitted.

"Sure, and, anytime I spoke up, I got beat down."

"I really did argue with him over that. He told me that it was good for you, but, when he kept making all those comments about you being a ghost, I realized how much of an effect it had on you."

"If I could have kicked him myself, I would have. I even wanted to when I found him dead because a part of me wanted to have killed him myself. I just can't believe you killed him down at the Chinese food place."

"He was the idiot who thought he could sit there and wait for you. Mathew thought he was so clever to find out about your movements, to know where you were and what you were up to," he said. "Why not just go to your house?"

"Because the neighbors were always watching for Mathew because he made such a stink the last time. Because the cops have alerts out to watch for him when he returns to town. Because the cops also have told him not to bother me at home."

At that, his eyebrows raised. "I didn't hear anything about that."

"Oh, he didn't tell you that? My friend was all over Mathew for creating such a disturbance and trying to assault me."

"I didn't know that, but it certainly explains a lot."

"It might explain a lot to you," she said, "but it doesn't explain a thing to me."

"Sure it does," he said, with a smile.

And then it dawned on her why he was being so smug. "Where is Goliath?"

"The cat? He's here somewhere. He didn't take kindly to being picked up." He glared at her. "Bloody cat, he scratched my hand." He pulled back his sleeve to show her his scratched-up arm.

She nodded. "Cats are like that."

"Which is why he'll be getting a bullet," he stated, glaring at her.

"Thaddeus?" she asked warily. He pointed, and there, sitting off to the side, was Thaddeus, just watching the proceedings.

"Thaddeus," she said in a soft tone. "Doreen loves Thaddeus."

He tilted his head and whispered back, "Thaddeus loves Doreen."

Reggie looked from one to other and nodded. "Oh, isn't that sweet," he muttered. "At least I know who I'll kill first."

She looked back at him. "So you think killing the bird will stop this?" And such a cynical tone filled her words that she was proud of herself.

He glared at her. "If you want the bird to live. They have a long lifespan, you know."

"I do know that," she stated, "if they get a chance, of course."

"Right," he agreed.

She looked around the room, her eyes slowly adjusting to the light. "Where are we?"

He shrugged. "Doesn't matter where we are."

"It does matter. It really matters."

"No, it doesn't," he countered. "You're someplace where nobody will find you."

"So, a warehouse? That's almost too cliché." He glared at her, then she looked at the side wall where there was a bit of paneling and frowned.

It looked familiar, but the light was bad enough that she couldn't quite see her surroundings. Then she cried out, "This is my basement."

"Yeah, it's a good basement too," he noted. "I almost missed this floor. Who would have thought there would be doors from the garage connected to this basement?"

"I know. It's a very strange layout for a house, but it's my house," she said in delight. "I'm really glad to be here."

"Well, it was convenient."

"Of course it is," she said, with a smile.

"Nobody is likely to come down here, at least not for a few days."

She nodded. "Of course not. Mugs will have to go to the bathroom." She looked around, and Mugs was already whining at the door, running back to her and to the door and back again.

Reggie glared.

She suggested, "If you open up the side door to the garage, he can run out to the backyard."

He contemplated it for the moment and nodded. "You're not going anywhere, so I'll leave you to think about the fate of the other two animals." Then he followed Doreen's instructions, and Mugs ran up the stairs to the double doors at the top. He opened them and let Mugs out the side door of the garage, then Reggie came back down.

"Presumably he'll come back when he's done."