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"Godda a payoff, ould I leave that in the file?"

No answer I tried again "You really think Lance Wood paidexcept we better look into it For your sake as well as ours…"

"If I took o?"

"I don’t know, Kinsey You tell me If it was cash, it wouldn’t be that hard to conceal"

"I’d have to be a fool! I’d have to be an idiot and so would he If he’s going to bribe h to put the cash in an envelope and write a note to that effect! Mac, this whole thing has frame-up written all over it!"

"Why would anyone do that?" At this point, his enuinely puzzled at the very idea "Who would go to such lengths?"

"How do I know? Maybe I just got caught in the loop Maybe Lance Wood is the target You know I’d never do such a thing I’ll bring you my bank statements You can scrutinize my accounts Check under my mattress, for God’s sake…"I broke off in confusion

I saw his mouth move, but I didn’t hear the rest of what he said I could feel the trap close and sootten no-tice about five thousand dollars credited to my account I think I knehat that was about

4

I packed up s and my current files California Fidelity had suspended our relationship until the Wood/Warren htened out," whatever that meant I had until noon to clear the prem-ises I called the telephone company and asked to have calls forwarded tomachine and placed it on top of the last cardboard box, which I toted down the back steps to my car I had been asked to turn in nored the request I had no intention of giving up access to five years’ worth of business files I didn’t think Mac would press the point and I didn’t think anyone would bother to have the locks changed Screw ’em I kno to pickthe se-quence of events The Wood/Warren folder had been sit-ting on my desk the entire weekend so the fire department reports could have been switched at any point I’d worked fro without reference to the file it-self, so I had no way of knowing if the inventory sheets were in the file or not I istered the loss had I looked My office door and the French doors opening out onto the balcony showed no signs of forced entry, butwith my keys, had sat in Lance Wood’s office for three hours on Friday Anybody could have got-ten into that bag and had duplicate keys made My check-book was there, too, and it didn’t take a wizard to figure out how somebody could have lifted a deposit slip, filled it out, stuck it in an envelope with five grand, and put the whole of it in the night-deposit slot at my bank Obviously my instant-teller card couldn’t be used because my code number wasn’t written down anyplace

I drove out to Wood/Warren,away, fired by adrenaline The er had passed and a chill of curiosity had settled in I’d felt my emotions disconnect and ht fre-quency Soone to a lot of trouble to discredit me Insurance fraud is serious damn shit, punishable by two, three, or four years in the state prison That wasn’t going to happen to h the Wood/Warren reception area, scarcely slowing my pace "Is he in?"

She looked down at the appointment book with confu-sion "Do you have an appoint?"

"Now I do," I said I knocked on the door once and went in Lance was ineer I had been introduced to onover a set of specs for an iteiant diaper pin

"We need to talk," I said

Lance took one look atthat they’d continue some other time

I waited until the door closed and then leaned on Lance’s desk "So to shove one up our collective rear end," I said I detailed the situation to hiuot the point Some of the color left his face

He sank into his swivel chair "Jesus," he said "I don’t believe it" I could see hi possibilities the same way I had