Chapter 6

Following Shadow, Ed walked into the IRS office and stopped at the receptionist. She looked at Ed and then glanced down at the cat. Smiling at Ed, she asked, “Who are you here to see?”

“The person in charge,” replied Ed in a very casual manner.

Very calmly, she picked up the phone and called security. Looking at Ed with a smile, she said, “Let me let him know you are here.”

The sour tone of her voice let Ed know that she was lying to him. He reached in his back pocket as the woman said, “This is Jean. There’s a man here with a very large cat to see you.”

There was a moment of silence as her features took on an increasingly puzzled look. She looked up at Ed and saw the IRS identification. Trying not to allow her expression to look too stupid, she leaned forward and examined the badge. After reading the name, she answered, “Ed Biggers.”

After another moment of silence, she replied, “Black.”

Amused, Ed watched as she repeated, “Shadow, okay. Well, I see that he’s one of ours. Sorry to call.”

She hung up the phone and looked up at Ed apologetically. She said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were one of our agents. I thought that you were a disgruntled taxpayer.”

Smiling broadly, Ed replied, “No problem.”

She said, “Did you know there’s another man with a large cat around here?”

“Yes, I know. John Carter. He’s upstairs waiting for me,” answered Ed.

“So you know him?” asked the secretary.

“He’s my husband.”

The woman sat there staring at Ed as if he had just told her that he was from Mars. A door to the offices opened and their tax consultant, Frankie Paulovich, stepped through the door. Seeing Ed, he came over with his hand extended. In a very friendly tone of voice, he said, “Ed, what are you doing here?”

Holding up his identification, Ed replied, “I’m here to find my new office.”

Watching the exchange with wide eyes, the secretary got on the phone to call the boss and let him know that Ed was here. Frankie said, “I just finished preparing your quarterly return.”

As she listened to the conversation between Frankie and Ed, she realized who John Carter and Ed Biggers were. Half of the agents in the office consulted on their tax returns. It was rare to find someone that gave away ninety-five percent of their income to charity.

In response to a direct call from Deana Ahlberg that Ed Biggers was going to be working out of his new office. Gary Smales was very curious as to what to expect. He came out of the office area to meet Ed and didn’t realize that the cowboy with the cat was Ed until a gesture from the secretary tipped him off. Seeing his boss in the lobby, Frankie turned to him and said, “Mr. Smales, this is Ed Biggers.”

Extending a hand, Ed said, “Pleased to meet you Mr. Smales.”

Examining the man standing in front of him, Gary asked, “What are your plans?”

Ed said, “Well, I’m working on a joint case with the FBI. I’ll be needing access to a large number of tax returns over the next nine months.”

Gary asked, “What is the case?”

“You don’t have clearance for it,” replied Ed.

“What are you talking about? I’m your boss,” said Gary more than a little irritated at the implication that an underling would notwouldn’t share details about the case he was working.

Shrugging, Ed replied, “Sorry, but that isn’t exactly correct. I report directly to Deana Ahlberg and she knows the details of the case. According to the agreement I have with her, I’m supposed to be given access to any information that I may require through this office.”

Disturbed by Ed’s statements, Gary decided that it was time to validate them. He said, “Please stay here while I make a couple of calls.”

Frankie asked, “Can I show him around the office?”

As Gary left the lobby, he replied, “Sure. Show him the cubicle that we’ve set aside for him.”

As was the case in Billings, Montana, walking through the office was painful for Ed. Stopping at one of the cubicles, he grabbed a pencil and a folder that was particularly offensive to him. The agent in the cubicle took great offense at his actions, but Ed flipped open the folder without responding. As he flipped through the pages, he marked each line with an X that screamed lie to him. He handed the folder back and said, “I marked every line with an X that contains false information. The other folders on your desk may have errors, but they aren’t fraudulent.”

Going to the next cubicle, Ed went through three folders on the desk. In a matter of five minutes, he had marked the fraudulent lines in all three. He handed back the folders and went to the next cubicle. It took him almost an hour to get through all of the cubicles in the room. After the first three cubicles, he was being followed by a crowd of agents watching him work.

When he had finished, he stood rubbing his temples to get rid of the headache. Incredulous at what he had just seen, one of the agents asked, “You’re an accountant?”

“No, I’m a mineralogist,” replied Ed. He added, “It’s just that lies give me a splitting headache and I have to expose them, particularly criminal lies.”

Staring at a folder that had come from his desk, Frankie said, “I can’t believe it. This shows a clear pattern of fraud. I’m going to be able to nail this guy for a million at least.”

Ed said, “Nail the ones that knew they were lying, to the wall. Send them to prison, they are cheating this country. Don’t destroy the folks that made honest mistakes. If you can, give them the opportunity to settle at the owed amount.”

One of the agents said, “It doesn’t matter, they still broke the law.”

Shrugging, Ed said, “You can play that game. Of course, the other agents will probably collect more than you. They’ll get through more cases in less time and with less cost. They can go after the bigger fish while you’re screwing over somebody’s grandmother.”

Frankie smiled at Ed and shook his head. He had just performed the same calculation mentally and realized that Ed had made a good point. He said, “Let me show you your cubicle.”

Ed followed Frankie to a simple cubicle near the back. It was the furthest cubicle from a window, the coffee pot, and the entrance. In short, it was the new guy cubicle. Standing there looking at it, Ed didn’t like the cubicle at all. It would require him to walk past all of those other cubicles and the folders filled with lies. He would never be able to do that with any kind of regularity. Turning to Frankie, Ed said, “Take me to Gary’s office. I need to get upstairs. We are expecting a number of investigators to show up, shortly.”

Somewhat reluctantly, Frankie took Ed to the office of Gary Smales. It wasn’t a good idea to disturb Gary in his office unless it was to announce a major break in a big case. He knocked on the door and flinched when he heard the gruff, “Come in.”

Opening the door, Ed walked in and looked around the room. It was a very simple office piled high with folders. Shadow entered behind Ed and sat down next to Ed. Looking down at the cat, Ed said, “Did you have a chance to talk with Deana?”

“Yes,” replied Gary. Frowning, he said, “You were correct. You take the cases you want, work on them to your satisfaction, and then leave it to us to clean up after you. I’m not sure of the wisdom of that.”

Frankie piped up, “Uh, Gary. He just went through the office and identified the fraudulent lines in over fifteen big cases. He did that in just thirty minutes. I’ll be more than happy to follow behind and clean up his messes.”

Staring at Frankie with daggers in his eyes, Gary said, “We will see. I have my orders.”

Shadow slipped out of the room as Ed turned. At the door he paused and said, “I will be working up in the FBI offices. I’ll call down and let you know what files I need.”

Ed left as Gary stared at his back. This was not the way that Gary liked to work. He demanded total involvement in all of the big cases within his jurisdiction and watched over his agents with a critical eye. He had particular standards that he expected from them, despite the fact that they were government employees. Gary didn’t realize it, but his agents were going to close a record number of cases over the next month, and collect more than the office had ever brought in.

Rover and Ed went up the elevator to the FBI office. When he entered, Ann was waiting at the door for him. He looked at her and flipped open his IRS identification. Direct to the point, he said, “I’m working on a joint case with John. We will need an office large enough for two desks.”

Ann Moore, the head of the Phoenix FBI office, looked at Ed’s identification with a critical eye. She had known Ed for a long time, but this was the first time that he had ever shown her official federal identification. She asked, “When did you get that?”

“Just recently,” answered Ed. Looking around the lobby, he asked, “So have the others arrived yet?”

With the irritation in her voice giving a hint at her anger, she said, “Yes, they are in the conference room. What are you working on?”

“It’s a joint case between the FBI and IRS.”

That was exactly what John had told her, but she wanted more details. This was her office and she had a right to know what was going on in it. She asked, “So what is this case?”

“You’re not cleared for it,” replied Ed. Only two people at the present time knew exactly what was going to be the consequences of this case and those two were John and Ed. When they had enough of a plan, they would meet their bosses and explain what they were doing.

Ann glared at Ed as he walked off to the conference room. Shadow joined Rover outside the conference room, taking a position to guard the door. After a minute of staring at the door after it closed behind him, she stormed off to her office to call Mike Holden, the Director of the FBI. Those two men had crossed a very important line, and she wasn’t going to let them get away with it.

Inside the conference room, John was standing at the front of the room facing twenty curious Druids. Just the number of Druids in the room was amazing. The fact that they were working together signified the massiveness of the operation. Once he had the attention of everyone in the room, John said, “Sean was killed by a member of an organized crime family after giving them the warning that they were to leave us alone. I find it inexcusable to ignore our warning like this. Today, Ed and I are announcing Operation Druids’ Revenge.”

Looking around the room, John was relieved to see that everyone was nodding. Ed went up to the front of the room and said, “We are going to shut down organized crime in twenty cities. We can’t trust local law enforcement, the corruption is just too extensive. We need eyes and ears that we can trust.”

Again, everyone in the room was nodding their heads. Satisfied, John said, “We want you to each head to a major city and observe the criminal operations there. We aren’t looking for specific crimes, but major patterns of behavior. We want to know what days they collect money. We want to know when they meet to distribute the money. These guys are creatures of habit and we want to know their habits.”

This time, some of the men shook their heads. John pointed to one of them and asked, “What is the problem?”

“That’s going to take some time to accomplish. We won’t be able to move against them for quite a while.”

“Correct. Our goal is not to put a couple of guys in jail. That won’t send a message to them. Our goal is to totally shut them down for good.” John’s voice had taken on the resonance of a man on a mission.

The Druid asked, “You are really serious about this?”

Answering for John, Ed said, “You bet. We want to take out every aspect of the business from drugs to prostitution. We want to catch the money men that are financing their activities. When we are done, the only organized crime that we’ll hear about are two losers who get caught stealing candy from kids.”

A number of the Druids laughed. John asked, “What do you think?”

The Druids looked at each other for a moment. Jerry, the head of the servants of the God, said, “How do you expect to pull this off?”

Glancing over at Ed, John said, “I don’t know. I won’t know until we get the intelligence data from you guys.”

All of the Druids in the room nodded their heads. Jerry looked around the room and said, “We are all from different major cities in here. I suggest we go to our home turf. Since we are all in law enforcement, we can also look into local records for other things that might suggest trends.”

Nodding, John said, “Look at previous places where crimes have taken place and the sites where the arrests were made. These creeps will basically stay in the same area.”

There was a long moment of silence as people looked around the room. John looked from one Druid to the next, seeing that each one nodded in his direction. At that point, John said, “If there are no more questions, let’s get to work.”