“Do you work for the IRS?” Ray asked, after cordially introducing himself as a professor of law and apologizing for the intrusion.

“Yes, I do.”

“Criminal Investigations?”

“Yep, that’s me. Fourteen years now.”

Ray described the letter, then read it verbatim.

“I didn’t write that,” Gage said.

“Then who did?” Ray snapped, and immediately wished he had not.

“How am I supposed to know? Can you fax it to me?”

Ray stared at his fax machine, and, thinking quickly, said, “Sure, but my machine is at the office. I can do it Monday.”

“Scan it and e-mail it,” Gage said.

“Uh, my scanner’s broke right now. I’ll just fax it to you Monday.”

“Okay, but somebody’s pulling your leg, pal. That’s not my letter.”

Ray was suddenly anxious to rid himself of the IRS, but Gage was now fully involved. “I’ll tell you something else,” he continued. “Impersonating an IRS agent is a federal offense, and we prosecute vigorously. Any idea who it is?”

“I have no idea.”

“Probably got my name from our online directory, worst thing we ever did. Freedom of Information and all that crap.”

“Probably so.”

“When was the estate opened?”

“Three days ago.”

“Three days ago! The return’s not due for a year.”

“I know.” :

“What’s in the estate?” -

“Nothing. An old house.”

“Just some crackpot. Fax it Monday and I’ll give you a call.”

“Thanks.”

Ray put the phone on the coffee table and asked himself why, exactly, had he called the IRS?

To verify the letter.

Gage would never get a copy of it. And in a month or so he would forget about it. And in a year he wouldn’t recall it if anyone mentioned it.

Perhaps not the smartest move so far.

FORREST HAD settled into the routine of Alcorn Village. He was allowed two calls a day and they were subject to being recorded, he explained. “They don’t want us calling our dealers.”

“Not funny,” Ray said. It was the sober Forrest, with the soft drawl and clear mind.

“Why are you in Virginia?” he asked.

“It’s my home.”

“Thought you were visiting some friends around here, old buddies from law school.”

“I’ll be back shortly. How’s the food?”

“Like a nursing home, Jell-O three times a day but always a different color. Really lousy stuff. For three hundred bucks plus a day it’s a rip-off.”

“Any cute girls?”

“One, but she’s fourteen, daughter of a judge, if you can believe that. Really some sad people. We have these group bitch meetings once a day where everyone lashes out at whoever got them started on drugs. We talk through our problems. We help one another. Hell, I know more than the counselors. This is my eighth detox, Bro, can you believe it?”

“Seems like more than that,” Ray said.

“Thanks for helping me. You know what’s sick?”

“What?”

“I’m happiest when I’m clean. I feel great, I feel smart, I can do anything. Then I hate myself when I’m on the streets doing all that stupid stuff like the other scumbags. I don’t know why I do it.”

“You sound great, Forrest.”

“I like this place, aside from the food.”

“Good, I’m proud of you.”

“Can you come see me?”

“Of course I will. Give me a couple of days.”

He checked in with Harry Rex, who was at the office, where he usually spent the weekends. With four wives under his belt, there were good reasons he wasn’t home much.

“Do you recall the Judge hearing a case on the coast, early last year?” Ray asked.

Harry Rex was eating something and smacking into the phone. “The coast?” He hated the coast, thought they were all a bunch of redneck mafia types.

“He was paid for a trial down there, January of last year.”

“He was sick last year,” Harry Rex said, then swallowed something liquid.

“His cancer was diagnosed last July.”

“I don’t remember any case on the coast,” he said, and bit into something else. “That surprises me.”

“Me too.”

“Why are you going through his files?”

“I’m just checking his payroll records against his trial files.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m the executor.”

“Forgive me. When are you coming back?”

“Couple of days.”

“Hey, I bumped into Claudia today, hadn’t seen her in months, and she gets to town early, parks a brand-new black Cadillac near the Coffee Shop so everybody can see it, then spends half the morning piddling around town. Whatta piece of work.”

Ray couldn’t help but smile at the thought of Claudia racing down to the car dealership with a pocket full of cash. The Judge would be proud.

Sleep came in short naps on the sofa. The walls cracked louder, the vents and ducts seemed more active. Things moved, then they didn’t. The night after the break-in, the entire apartment was poised for another one.

Chapter 27

Trying hard to be normal, Ray took a long jog on a favorite trail, along the downtown mall, down Main Street to the campus, up Observatory Hill and back, six miles in all. He had lunch with Carl Mirk at Bizou, a popular bistro three blocks from his apartment, and he drank coffee afterward at a sidewalk cafe. Fog had the Bonanza reserved for a 3 P.M. training session, but the mail came and everything normal went out the window.

The envelope was addressed to him by hand, nothing on the return, with a postmark in Charlottesville the day before. A stick of dynamite would not have looked more suspicious lying there on the table. Inside was a letter-size sheet of paper, trifolded, and when he spread it open all systems shut down. For a moment, he couldn’t think, breathe, feel, hear.

It was a color digital photo of the front of 14B at Chaney’s, printed off a computer on regular copier paper. No words, no warnings, no threats. None were needed.

When he could breathe again he also started sweating, and the numbness wore off enough for a sharp pain to knife through his stomach. He was dizzy so he closed his eyes, and when he opened them and looked at the picture again, it was shaking.

His first thought, the first he could remember, was that there was nothing in the apartment he could not do without. He could leave everything. But he filled a small bag anyway.

Three hours later he stopped for gas in Roanoke, and three hours after that he pulled into a busy truck stop just east of Knoxville. He sat in the parking lot for a long time, low in his TT roadster, watching the truckers come and go, watching the movements in and out of the crowded cafe. There was a table he wanted in the window, and when it was available he locked the Audi and went inside. From the table, he guarded his car, fifty feet away and stuffed with three million in cash.

Because of the aroma, he guessed that grease was the cafe’s specialty. He ordered a burger and on a napkin began scribbling his options.

The safest place for the money was in a bank, in a large lock box behind thick walls, cameras, etc. He could divide the money, scatter it among several banks in several towns between Charlottesville and Clanton, and leave a complicated trail. The money could be discreetly hauled in by briefcase. Once locked away, it would be safe forever.

The trail, though, would be extensive. Lease forms, proper ID, home address, phones, here meet our new vice president, in business with strangers, video cameras, lock box registers, and who knew what else because Ray had never hidden stuff in a bank before.

He had passed several self-storage places along the interstate. They were everywhere these days and for some reason wedged as close to the main roads as possible. Why not pick one at random, pull over, pay cash, and keep the paperwork to a minimum? He could hang around in Podunk town for a day or two, find some more fireproof boxes at a local supply house, secure his money, then sneak away. It was a brilliant idea because his tormentor would not expect it.