Death, Taxes, and Cheap Sunglasses (A Tara Holloway Novel Book 8) (11 page)

“Is Dad around?” I asked.

My mother’s tone instantly changed from happy to concerned. “What’s wrong?”

“Can’t a girl ask to speak to her father without something being wrong?”

“She
can,
” my mother snapped. “But you
don’t.
Every time you want to speak to your father it means something’s up.”

True. I generally counted on my mother to share any of my news with my father. Not that my dad and I weren’t close. We were. It’s just that my mother’s role in the family was serving as the central information center and my father’s role was to pay for things, fix things, and teach us kids how to handle guns. It was thanks to his superb guidance that I’d learned to shoot as well as an army sniper.

“Last time you asked to speak to your father,” my mother continued, “you wanted to borrow his long-range rifle.”

“That’s not why I need to speak to him,” I replied. I had my own long-range rifle now. Dad had given it to me for Christmas, just like he’d given me my first Daisy BB gun when I was a little girl. Yep, some girls, including
moi,
are made of
gunpowder and lead.
“I need him to help me on a case. I’m pretty sure an animal rescue group I’m investigating is supplying animals to a canned hunting ranch.”

“That’s despicable.”

“Yep. It’s also illegal if they’re claiming to be a tax-exempt sanctuary.”

“Hold on a minute. I’ll have to go find him.” My mother set the phone down and a minute or so later returned to the line. “Here he is.”

“Thanks.”

Dad’s voice boomed over the airwaves. “Hello, there, Tara. Your mother says you want to speak with me?”

“I’ve got a favor to ask you.”

“Anything for daddy’s girl. Ask away.”

“I need you to come with me to a hunting ranch and shoot a lion.”

There was a moment of silence followed by a, “Say what, now?”

“You won’t actually shoot the lion,” I clarified. “But I need you to pretend you’re a trophy hunter wanting to bag a big cat.”

I explained about the Kuykendahls and the canned hunting outfit. “My gut tells me those cousins may be supplying animals for hunts.”

If I could prove it, I could charge Quent and Kevin with criminal tax evasion and put them out of business for good. As things stood right now, all I could do was revoke their organization’s tax-exempt status for failure to maintain adequate records and issue them a tax bill. I wanted to do more than that. I wanted to put those losers in jail. And I wanted to rescue Simba and his furry, four-legged bear buddies and as many of those deer and oryx as possible.

“I’d be glad to help any way I can,” my father said.

“Great,” I told him. “I’ll call Southern Safari and see if I can get it arranged.”

As soon as we ended our call, I pulled up the photograph I’d taken of Southern Safari’s sign on my phone and jotted down the phone number. I then placed a call to Southern Safari.

A man with a deep Texas accent answered. “Southern Safari, where your trophy is guaranteed. How can I he’p ya?”

I told him I wanted to arrange a hunt for my father as a gift for his birthday. “Any chance you’ve got a lion? He’s always wanted to bag a big cat.”

I knew they didn’t currently have one on site. I’d had Eddie call them yesterday afternoon. He’d claimed to be a personal assistant for an unnamed Hollywood celebrity and asked for a full list of their available game. The manager of Southern Safari had e-mailed Eddie a complete list. Though it contained a variety of deer, scimitar-horned oryx, Nubian ibex, Dama gazelle, Mouflon sheep, and wildebeest, there was no lion on the list.

“I don’t have a lion at the moment,” the man said, “but if you can give me a few days I believe I can make arrangements to get one.”

“What’s the fee?”

“It’ll depend on our cost, but my best guesstimate is that a lion’ll run you at least five grand.”

Holy crap!
Being a bloodthirsty jackass was expensive. I supposed I shouldn’t have been surprised. Canned hunting was a multimillion-dollar industry in Texas. Hence the state legislature turned a blind eye and failed to regulate it.

I arranged the hunt for a week from Saturday. Looked like Simba would be getting a stay of execution at least until then and, if I had anything to say about it, for the rest of his life afterward.

I turned my attention to the stack of files on my desk. Each of them was equally pressing and they had been assigned to me en masse, so there was no clear file to start on next. Beginning at the top, I pointed my index finger at each file in turn. “Eeny, meeny, miny, mo.” I pulled “mo” from the stack and opened the file.

This particular case was something new and different. Someone, or perhaps multiple someones, had been impersonating an IRS employee online and phishing for personal banking information via e-mails purporting to be from the agency. The e-mails were designed to resemble official IRS letters, and included the Treasury Department insignia at the top. While the letters contained a valid mailing address for the IRS service center in Austin, they failed to include a telephone number.

The con artist had clearly had some fun when drafting the e-mails. The names of the fictional IRS employees who’d allegedly written the e-mail correspondence included such clever monikers as B. Andit, T. Hief, and U. R. Aschmuck. The scammer had included falsified employee identification numbers, as well.

The someone or someones used a clever and conniving method. Had the culprit told potential victims that they owed money to the IRS, the taxpayers would have likely questioned why and perhaps enlisted the assistance of a tax professional. After all, people didn’t want to give a penny more to Uncle Sam than they had to. Instead, the perpetrator informed victims that a programming glitch in their tax software had caused a computation error and overstated their tax liability. As a result, they were due a $427.95 refund that the IRS would be happy to send by check in the mail in the next six weeks or, if the taxpayer wanted their funds quicker, via direct deposit to their bank account within three business days.

Again, while the amount was nothing to sneeze at, it wasn’t such a significant number as to set off warning bells. The thief seemed to realize that subtlety worked in his favor. Suspicions were also allayed by the fact that the letter purported to give the recipient the option of receiving a paper check. Of course anyone choosing that option would never receive the refund check.

The victims were asked to fill out a short form at the bottom of the letter. The form included spaces for their bank’s routing number, bank account number, and signature. The letter stated that the recipient’s social security number had not been included on the letter for security purposes, but requested that the taxpayer provide his or her social security number as verification that the person receiving the e-mail was the intended recipient. The letter said the number provided would be compared to the social security number on record with the IRS to authenticate the recipient’s identity. The letter then requested that the taxpayer either scan the completed document or take a photo of it, and that the file or image be sent to the IRS via a reply e-mail to an address intended to look like an official Treasury Department address.

Because the e-mails requested no money from them, many people failed to perceive the threat. The general public was much more susceptible to scams that merely asked for information rather than money. Unfortunately, a con artist armed with a name, address, bank account number, and signature could cause substantial damage. This particular con artist had made withdrawals at the victims’ banks, relieving the duped parties of more than $85,000.

The IRS had first become aware of the problem when a man named Roy Larabee barged into his local office in Farmer’s Branch and demanded a return of the $1,800 withdrawn from his checking account shortly after he’d provided his banking information via e-mail to an IRS staff member named S. Teal. After being informed that no such employee existed, that the IRS does not send such letters by e-mail, and that he’d been duped, the enraged man had removed his size-ten loafer and lobbed it at the counter clerk. Fortunately, IRS counter clerks are used to dealing with all manner of crazies and the clerk ducked in time to avoid injury. The loafer did knock over a full coffee cup, however, spilling its contents onto a printer, which spewed sparks and smoke and activated the building’s automatic sprinkler system before expiring.

Larabee was charged with assault on a government employee and destruction of government property. Since he had no prior record, his attorney had been able to plead the charges down to criminal mischief and an agreed punishment of twenty hours of community service. I phoned Larabee’s attorney to get permission to speak directly with his client.

After identifying myself, I said, “I need to speak with Mr. Larabee about the fraudulent e-mail he received. Could you tell me where I might reach him?”

“He’s completing his community service as we speak,” his attorney said. “He’s working with a cleanup crew from the city parks department at White Rock Lake.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“When you see him,” the lawyer replied, “tell him my bill is past due.”

“Will do.”

I rounded up my purse and briefcase and headed out to my G-ride, sliding my cheap red sunglasses onto my face. Twenty minutes later, I turned into the park and took a spot in the lot near the playground. It was a bright but unusually chilly day. Given that no children were scampering about, it looked like the area moms had decided to keep their tykes inside today, where they could keep warm.

The cleanup crew, in their bright orange safety vests, were concentrated along the bank of a narrow, boggy creek that emptied into the lake. Some of the men worked with pincer-type devices while others, presumably nonviolent offenders, used pointed metal sticks to spear the trash.

I made my way over and checked in with a man who, judging from the fact that he was reclining on the yellow plastic playground slide with his eyes closed, appeared to be in charge. His mouth hung open, emitting an odd gagging, snoring sound. Sleep apnea, I supposed.

I stepped up to him. “Hello, there.”

Startled, the man jerked awake, throwing out his arms in an instinctive defensive gesture. My instincts kicked in, too, causing me to turn my head reflexively to avoid his flailing arms. The momentum caused my cheap, lightweight sunglasses to fly off my face. They hit the metal support pole of the nearby swings with a
plink
and fell to the ground, the left lens popping out of the frames.
Great.

As the man sat up, I wiped dirt from the lens and tried to finagle it back into the frame. No luck. I tossed the lens in a trash can, slipped the damaged sunglasses into the breast pocket of my blazer, and handed the man my business card. “I’m with the IRS. I need to speak with Roy Larabee.”

The man used my business card to gesture at a short, portly man with a bowl haircut using his pincers to fish a used condom out of the brush. “That’s Roy right there.”

“Thanks.” I walked over, keeping an eye on the man lest he remove a shoe and lob it at me for an encore of his previous performance. “Mr. Larabee?”

The man looked up. When he spoke, his voice was equal parts anger and sad resignation. “That’s me. Who are you and what do you want?”

“I’m Special Agent Tara Holloway from the IRS.” I didn’t bother extending my hand for a shake since both of Larabee’s were occupied, one with the pincers, the other with a clear garbage bag. Also, since condom cooties were in the vicinity, I didn’t want to risk catching them.

Larabee glowered at me for a moment before dropping the condom in the bag and turning back to poke around in the debris. “You’ve established who you are. Still waiting to hear what you want.”

Jeez.
What a crankypants. Besides, he should know better than to ask a compound question. This was America, where the average attention span is 2.3 seconds.
Now where was I again?
Oh, yeah. “What do I want? I want to catch the guy that stole from you.”

He stopped poking around and looked up at me. “You for real?”

“Absolutely. You weren’t the only victim. There are dozens of others like you in the area.” The con artist had scammed over seventy-five innocent taxpayers.

Larabee issued a grunt. “Good to know I wasn’t the only one dumb enough to fall for that stupid e-mail trick.”

“You weren’t dumb,” I said, trying to assuage his self-loathing. This guy was a sad sack if ever I’d seen one. “You were just … na
ï
ve.” Na
ï
ve and short-tempered, which was why he was out here today rounding up trash.

He snagged a beer can with the pincers and turned to call to one of the other men. “Hey! You with the bin. Come over here.”

The man scurried over with a special bin for recyclables. Larabee dropped the can inside with a tinny thunk and the man scurried off again.

Though my case file had contained copies of the e-mails he and some of the other victims had received, it hadn’t given me a complete picture or a clear place to start my investigation. I hoped that by speaking with some of the victims and the bank tellers who’d handled the withdrawals, I’d have a well-defined plan of attack by the end of the day.

“I have a few questions for you,” I said.

He waved his pincers in the air. “Ask away.” He looked around the park and issued a sigh. “It’s not like I’m going anywhere.”

I pulled my notes and a pen from my briefcase, then set my briefcase on a bench nearby.

“Any idea where the thief might have obtained your e-mail and home addresses?” I asked.

“None,” he spat.

“Had you received any suspicious e-mails before you got the one purporting to be from the IRS?”

“Sure,” he said. “Same ones everybody else gets. The one where a friend supposedly had their wallet and passport stolen in a foreign country and needs me to wire them five grand. The ones that look like they’re from a delivery service, telling me they attempted a delivery but I wasn’t home and now they need me to click a link or open an attachment. Those ones about Asian women who want to do nasty things to my private parts or asking whether I want to meet a black woman with a big booty.”