Follow the Dotted Line by Nancy Hersage Page B

sat in a group stupor pondering the implications.
    “It could all be totally innocent,” Andy suggested, half-heartedly. “The neighbors say Mark and Tilda moved last week.”
    “People move all the time,” the executive pointed out. “When people have that much money and decide to leave the area, they ordinarily have the funds transferred to another bank. Who gets a certified check and then walks out the door with her husband’s entire life savings?”
    It was an excellent question, Andy agreed. “You think Tilda’s up to something?”
    “Have you met her?” Sandra asked.
    “No,” said Andy.
    “Had any communication with her?”
    Andy wasn’t sure how to phrase this. “She sent my children a gift box.”
    “Oh, really? Eye of newt?”
    Andy snorted with laughter. “Pretty much.” It was another punch on her validation ticket; Tilda made other people’s skin crawl, too.
    “Well, I don’t know exactly who Tilda Trivette is or what she’s up to,” the diminutive banker concluded, “but whatever you’re worried about—I’d keep worrying.”

Chapter 11
    Cheaper than Polyester
    Andy was a bogey golfer who drove 220 yards and insisted on playing from the men’s tees because it made most of the guys she played with uncomfortable. Except Ted, who was almost never uncomfortable with anything or anybody. Ted Leery and Andy played together once or twice a week at one of the four municipal courses in the San Fernando Valley. Ted had a nine-stroke handicap and had spent his career directing commercials and a few not-quite memorable TV series. He was pushing 60, handsome, uncomplicated, and happily married; a perfect golfing partner, who made small talk better than anyone she’d ever met and let anything that floated through his head come out his mouth.
    “So what did Mitch think about your trip to Texas?” Ted asked.
    They were playing at Hansen Dam Municipal, a sprawling course situated on the flood plain of a large concrete barricade that had been built by the Army Corps of Engineers in the 1940s. The green fees were cheap and the course was flat enough for Andy and Ted to walk 18 holes without huffing and puffing.
    “The reviews were not good,” she answered, as they ambled off the eighth tee. “All four of my kids seem more annoyed than anything else. First, they think their dad has died. Then they find out his remains were sketchy, if not all together counterfeit. And now, well, he may not actually be dead. And, whether he is or not, his wife seems to have absconded with his money.”
    “Maybe she hasn’t absconded at all. Maybe they’re together, making a break for it.”
    “A break from what?” Andy asked.
    “Beats me,” Ted said, as Andy set up for her fairway shot. He stood quietly for a moment, just long enough for her to swing the club. “Well done,” he noted, watching the line drive careen forward. “So how much do you really know about this woman?”
    “Almost nothing,” she told him.
    One of the two young Korean men in their foursome hit next. Early-thirties, the pair could have been mistaken for businessmen who just stepped off the plane from Seoul—until they opened their mouths. The Valley Girl accents screamed second generation Angelinos. Andy wondered why they were out on the course in the middle of a weekday.
    “Did you ask these guys what they do for a living?” she said to Ted.
    “Gamblers.”
    “What?”
    “Online blackjack,” Ted whispered, as the second man now took his shot. “Their mothers think they work as investment brokers. Anyway, they make enough to spend their days golfing. One of them said they’re entered in a tournament that begins at five, so they’re leaving the course at the turn.”
    Andy nodded. That meant she and Ted would have the back nine to themselves. They didn’t return to the subject of Andy’s trip until they’d stopped at the clubhouse for a dog and soda and then teed off on the tenth hole.
    “Got a next step?” Ted resumed,