FIVE WILL GET YOU TWENTY (Food Truck Mysteries Book 9) (3 page)

He leaned down to kiss me gently. “My pleasure.”

“Did you know they were that serious? Moving in together is a huge step.” I wondered how Danvers would handle a relationship with his rules and schedule. It wouldn’t be easy. I’d known him to work all night when there was a big case that landed on his desk. He was always trying to get ahead and didn’t mind long hours to get that.

“Yeah, I did. I tried to warn Sabine, but of course, she didn’t listen.” Land looked frustrated with his sister, wanting to spare her some of the heartaches that go with relationships. I knew that as much as he tried, there would always be trouble when two people came together.

Land had warned me on several occasions not to trust Danvers at all, which seemed peculiar, since they were friends of a sort, but Land had been proved right on more than one occasion. Danvers could be friendly, but he was ruthless when it came to advancing his own career. The idea that Danvers wanted to look at the cash in the register was the type of thing that Land warned me about. He seemed to want to bust me for various offenses at times.

He gave me another kiss and told me that I had to leave or help. I took the hint and headed back to my food truck. Sabine was nearly done cleaning the prep area.

I sat down and counted the cash twice. I prepped the bag for deposit.

“Detective Danvers called for you. He wants to see you at Taco Inferno as soon as you can make it.” Sabine said the man’s name with enough venom that it made me a tad nervous. She wasn’t the type to forgive or forget. Detecting crimes might be a bit more difficult after this.

“What? When?” I asked. I looked at my phone. It was a little before two, and I’d hoped to close the truck and go home but that didn’t look like it would happen.

Sabine shrugged. “Maybe a half hour ago? I wasn’t watching the time. It wasn’t long after you went to visit my brother.” Her use of “my brother” made me worry a little as well. Normally, she was more than happy to give Land to me, but today the words seemed proprietary.

“Can you—?” I started.

“I’ll put the truck back and deposit the cash. No problems. Just don’t make me go over there with that egotistical gasbag.”

I assumed she was talking about Danvers, and I told her that would be great. I handed her the deposit bag and the keys to the truck. I’d have to get those back tonight or wait for her to arrive the next morning to get in. I texted Land to ask if he could pick them up later. That would give me a good excuse to see him again this evening.

Walking as fast as I could without mowing people down, I arrived at Taco Inferno in about 10 minutes. I was nearly out of breath by the time I arrived. I had imagined Carter in handcuffs or the food truck being towed off to the forensics lab. However, nothing like that had happened at all.

Danvers and Carter were chatting amiably in the truck. The lunch crowd had thinned out, and Carter distributed free coffee to patrons who asked for it. For the first two weeks, we were giving away the last urn of coffee each day to promote sales at the new food truck.

Given the line of people waiting to pick up a cup of coffee, I would call the promotion a success. Since we would have dumped the coffee out anyway, the only cost was the expense of creamer, sugar packets, cups and stir sticks.

“What’s up?” I asked as I stepped up into the truck. “You called and wanted to see me?”

Danvers nodded and handed me four more $20 bills. “All fake,” he said with a certain air of resignation. At least, he wasn’t sorely pissed off like Sabine. I wondered if he would resolve this issue by proposing, or if he’d just drop her.

I explained the steps that we were taking to ensure that this was a very short-term problem. Carter looked at me strangely when I said that I’d be working with him for a few days in the new truck.

“I just don’t want to put too much on you,” I said. “It’s a lot to ask to cook, serve and detect.”

He nodded. “I had a system for today. I can’t identify them and ask them questions, but I know which customers passed bad bills.”

I looked at the bills again. In the corner of each one, there were ink marks, just letters that made no sense to me. The first one read “TDQT.”

I held it out to Carter. “What is this supposed to mean?” I asked. “Are you using code of some sort?”

“Sort of. I wanted a way to remember who had given me the currency without writing a story about them on it. So I wrote a few initials so that I could keep track of what came from whom.”

“So what the hell does it mean?” Danvers said. His annoyance radiated from his tone. “This isn’t a Nancy Drew novel. It’s an open police investigation.”

Carter flushed a little. “This one was tall dude, cutie. He was a little flirty, and I remember him well. He was 6 foot 1, about 175 pounds, nice arms, brown hair and brown eyes. I could probably do a police sketch if you needed.”

Danvers eyes widened. He looked like he wanted to say something, but he stopped himself and settled for a compliment instead. “That’s a pretty good description you just gave. Have you seen him before?”

Carter shook his head. “No, but this is only my second day at this location. He could be a regular with time, which is why I’m a little worried about giving out all the details on customers. They could all be the backbone of the business here.”

I was impressed. I might still worry about him being on time in the mornings, but at least he was thinking ahead to a long-term business plan of keeping the customers happy.

“And this one?” Danvers said, holding out a second bill. He was holding the bill by the corner which meant he had hopes of finding some fingerprints.

The inscription on the side of the bill said “LP.” I had no idea where this one could go.

“Little person,” Carter said without changing expression. “She could barely reach the counter. I had to lean down to get the twenty from her. I marked it on there in code, so she wouldn’t think I was being rude.”

Danvers rolled his eyes. “Well, at least we should be able to find her more easily. What about the other two?”

Carter took the bills and stared at them a moment. I guessed after marking most of the bills all day, he’d forgotten the code for some. However, finally he handed the GMS bill to Danvers. “This lady reminded me of my grandma Smith. I hope it’s not her. I would feel too bad about busting a grandmother.”

“And the other?” Danvers asked, pointing to the bill in Carter’s hand.

“I don’t remember this guy as well, but he was in a gray suit and blue tie, business type. Not much to look at though, which is why I just wrote about what he had on.”

They decided that Carter would go down to the police station off Government Square after his shift to work with the sketch artist. With that, Carter got back to work. Danvers left without speaking a word to me, and I caught a cab to the secured lot.

“You know this has to be a conspiracy of some sort,” Land said after he’d dropped off the keys to me that night. Apparently, Sabine thought that it was less intrusive to return the keys through her brother rather than get up at 4a.m. I could easily see her point, but it worried me a bit that her enthusiasm for work had markedly worn off given her situation with the police detective.

“But why? How did this happen all of a sudden?” I said, trying not to trot out my favorite conspiracy theory. Land was not all that fond of my idea that Ryan Pohler was behind the scheme.

“Who knows? No one just announces that they’re going to start passing fake money. They had to have had the plates, special paper and a large set-up, and then they started passing bills.” Land looked through the refrigerator as he talked, trying to find something to eat. He would have to be a better detective than me for that to happen. The refrigerator was almost bare.

“But just as the new truck opens and only in that location,” I said for the second time in this conversation. Danvers had polled his peers, but no other cases of counterfeiting were ongoing in Capital City. That meant that our truck was being exclusively targeted to pass the money. I found this more than a little hard to take as coincidence. It felt like personal malice.

On the bright side, the highlighters had arrived and arrangements were being made so that I could work at Taco Inferno for a few days to try to learn more about the situation with the counterfeit bills. While Land wasn’t thrilled with the set-up, Sabine was going to take over the truck for two or three days by herself until I got to the bottom of this. I had more faith in her than Land did, which was a fairly low bar to hurdle.

Land gave me a long goodnight kiss, since I still had to get up at four to be at Dogs on the Roll before my shift at the other truck. It was going to be a long day, and Land’s affection made me feel better about it.

***

The next day started early, and I was at the truck first before Sabine arrived. She showed up around 5:30, which was earlier than Carter had usually shown up. However, today she didn’t look like herself. She had dark bags under her eyes and a sullen expression. I figured that this had something to do with Detective Danvers, but I didn’t want to meddle. Honestly, I
did
want to meddle, but given that she was running the truck for me, I chose not to. I couldn’t interfere and then ask for help.

The shift went quickly, and it was nine before I knew it. Sabine actually told me the time, and then ushered me out of the truck. “Things will be fine. You’re needed there,” she added as she handed me my purse. “I’ll talk to you after the lunch rush.”

I nodded, looked around one last time, as if I were taking an extended trip and walked down the street to the new food truck.

Carter was there, working on the day’s menu when I arrived. I wasn’t sure if he just hadn’t answered the phone yesterday or if he was there now simply because I had made it clear that I’d be here at nine.

I got into the truck and began my morning duties for the second time that day. It seemed odd to be repeating the same rituals, but at the same time, it felt comforting. I ran the highlighter over every twenty in the register, but they all turned up good.

By the time that I opened the window for the morning crowd, Carter was hard at work on the taco fixings. I hadn’t asked him for the day’s menu since I was nervous, but I figured he had it under control.

The first hour of the shift went well. I casually wiped the highlighter across the bills and the ink came up amber in each case. It took a little longer to inspect the bills, and in one case, I had to explain to the man that a counterfeit operation was in Capital City and certain protocols had to be followed. It sounded very official, almost like a police TV show.

Shortly before lunch, a good-looking man came up to the window and ordered. Carter immediately started chatting him up and winking in my general direction. I knew that this man had to be the QT that Carter had identified from yesterday. He ordered and handed me the bill.

When the man saw me run a highlighter across the bill, he turned and sprinted down the street. I looked after him, but I had no way of catching up with him. I stared helplessly as he disappeared into the intersection. The bill turned dark across the strip that had been highlighted. This was another fake twenty.

“He definitely knew something was up. Did you see the way he sprinted? He must do a lot of cardio,” Carter said. I wasn’t sure if he was giving an analysis of the man or his body. Carter was right. He was a very good-looking man, dark hair and eyes.

I wondered if he would tell the others who were passing bills here, so that we wouldn’t have any more incidents at the truck. In one sense, that scenario would be great, since the problem for us would be solved, but I had a bad feeling that some other issue would pop up involving the food truck. This was more of a situation where we would need to find the root causes.

However, the conspirators either didn’t communicate or were brazen. Just after noon, a diminutive woman approached the counter. I took her order, and she handed me a twenty. I wanted to check it for authenticity, but I didn’t want to alarm her. So I pretended to drop the money on the floor and swiped it while I was out of sight. I wouldn’t have been able to do that with a taller person, but the angle was such that she couldn’t see my actions.

The bill turned dark where I swiped across it. I palmed the bill and made change for her. Carter gave me an odd glance, but I smiled at him and gave the woman her food.

I kept an eye on her as she ate not far from the truck. I kept handling the orders and returning change until she started to walk off. I motioned to Carter as I shucked my apron and headed for the door.

I knew that this woman would not be sprinting off into the distance before I could reach her. She hadn’t even noticed me leave the truck. I took my time. Land had instructed me on the finer points of tailing someone earlier in our relationship, and now I tried to recall all of the things that he’d mentioned. I tried to look casual and stay back far enough that I wouldn’t be seen. She seemed purposeful on her walk and didn’t look behind her. So I wasn’t overly concerned about being spotted.

Within a few minutes, she arrived at a café. It wasn’t far from the location of Taco Inferno, so it seemed like a bold move to be so close to the scene of the crime. She would be a recognizable figure who was dining close to the place she’d passed the bad money. She was very sure that she weren’t suspected of passing bad twenties yet. That meant the counterfeiters had not recognized Detective Danvers yesterday at the truck, so perhaps no one was watching the truck for longer periods of time, only when they chose to pass the money. That was definitely not the way that I would have handled such an operation.

I had to wonder why she was now at a café, when only twenty minutes ago she had scarfed down a couple of tacos. It seemed peculiar at best—equal parts of arrogance and stupidity. She was obviously meeting someone, since she looked at her watch from time to time.

Within five minutes, Ryan Pohler entered the café and sat down. I was speechless. She handed over the remaining bills from the change I’d given to her and ordered a drink. They sat there talking for quite some time—long enough for me to get some photos of the two of them chatting.

I took my time leaving, not because I was hungry, but I didn’t want to be seen by the conspirators. I had just gotten proof of what was going on, and I didn’t want it covered up by the pair of them. As soon as I was out of eyesight of the café, I took off at a trot. I didn’t want to run, because of the number of people on the streets, but I wanted to head back to Carter as soon as I could.

Carter was waiting for me when I returned. “I was beginning to think that you’d been attacked or something,” he said, opening the door of the truck for me. “I was a bit worried.”

I nodded. “Thanks, but they didn’t even see me follow her.”

“They?” he asked. “Did you see the cute guy too?”

“No, no sign of him, but there wouldn’t be. He hadn’t completed the transaction when he was recognized, so there was no reason to report in and give Pohler the change.”

We discussed the situation a little more, but I decided that my best course of action was to take the photos to Detective Danvers and let him get the information out of them. I said my goodbyes to Carter and headed back to the original food truck. I texted the photos to Danvers on the way. I had originally thought of taking my new phone directly to his office, but I was concerned that he would want to confiscate my phone for evidence. I didn’t want that to happen, so a text seemed a better way to go.

I swear that he must have been on his phone already, because he was waiting in line at the food truck within five minutes of my arrival. He was polite about waiting his turn to talk to me, but I doubted that little else would be well-mannered.

“Where did you get this?” he asked, holding up his phone and showing me the photos, as if I didn’t know what he was talking about.

“I took them. I followed the woman from yesterday when she returned today with another twenty.” I handed him the wadded up twenty from my pocket. “She went to a café and met Ryan Pohler there.” I stayed to the facts and left out any glee at being one step ahead of him.

“Let me see your phone,” he said, holding out a hand.

I handed it to him, cursing under my breath. I didn’t want to lose the phone at this point. I didn’t have a landline or any other way to communicate without it. I held my breath as he flipped through the pictures. I found that to be rather unnecessary since only the two most recent ones applied to this situation, but he went through most of the feed. I didn’t have anything to hide in the photos, but it was annoying to say the least.

Finally he handed it back to me. “Okay, I’ll have a talk with Mr. Pohler about this. Apparently he has some explaining to do. At the very least, he’ll need to provide me with the name of the woman eating with him.”

I nodded. I was glad that I had my phone back. The incident reminded me that I should back-up my phone as soon as I could. “Have fun with that,” I said.

During the entire conversation, Sabine had watched us through half-closed eyes, but Danvers had ignored her until the last moments. “Sabine, nice to see you,” he said as he turned and walked away.

In response, Sabine threw a pan into the sink with far more force that necessary. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I didn’t like it. They seemed to be at some kind of impasse, and I wanted to help them if I could. Perhaps if I continued to look into this mess with Ryan Pohler, it would bring them together more often and allow them to work things out.

While I tried to convince myself that I was being altruistic, I also knew that I wanted to know why Pohler was trying to sabotage my business. There were plenty of other food trucks in Capital City. He had a major business operation that he was jeopardizing for $100 a day in food and change. It hardly seemed worth the trouble. Was he that consumed with competiveness or hate? Or did he just believe that he would never be caught with these violations of law?

All I did know is that Pohler had to have access to a variety of materials and connections to do something like this. Counterfeiting wasn’t the pastime of a small-time operator. Counterfeiting was likely to be a federal crime, which was a big deal—with big penalties. I made a note to google the consequences for passing bad money.

I let my mind wander. I had to think that his operations had something to hide since he’d taken such drastic measures to keep us away from territory that he perceived to be his. He had an operation that could conceive and execute a plot to distribute counterfeit cash to my truck. Yet at the same time, the plan was so sloppy and easily solved that I had to wonder about his expertise in this arena.

If I were about to distribute counterfeit cash, I would have used people who didn’t meet me in the daytime, and did not go to the same places every day until they were known by sight. Passing the bills took a certain amount of anonymity, and of the two people I’d met, neither of them was particularly skilled at the game. The first had been obvious in flirting with Carter, and the second was obvious by appearance. Why didn’t they use bland white men in business suits? I couldn’t swing a pack of hot dog buns without hitting ten of them.