An Unforeseen Turn of Events

Chapter Thirty-Five

If there's someone I can always rely on, it's Mr. Don Chin. Buddy thought as he lit a cigar. His feet were atop his desk. He was now able to make the last few months' payments on his condo in Tribeca. Buddy's wife was happy and he felt more relaxed.

Yep! Ryan Monti's indiscretion years back helped get me back in the black!

His phone rang.

"Don Chin's on the other line, Mr. Catalano," Shana told him in a low voice.

Buddy knew she was hoping Ryan Monti would call again.

"I'll take it, Shana. Thanks."

"I found out quite a bit," Don informed him. "The name of the woman is now Christine Goldberg."

(Christine Goldberg! My God, is it a new world or what?) Buddy thought as he chuckled to himself.

Aloud he said. "Go on."

"She's a recruiter for the Marie Cooper. Modeling Agency in Boston, but looking at her, she looks like a top model herself."

"Yeah, Ryan has good taste," Buddy said as he puffed on his cigar.

"She's married to a man named Daniel Goldberg, who just began working for a marketing start-up company. He worked for close to twenty years at Smith Marketing, but since the company folded, he's gone through three jobs. Struggling."

This interested Buddy enough to take his feet off his desk. He put his cigar in the ashtray. So maybe this Christine Goldberg is hard up for money and is shaking Ryan. Figures he forgot they slept together.

Buddy wondered how that was supposed to make sense but Chin interrupted his thoughts.

"They have twins, a boy and a girl. They're seventeen, almost eighteen. Christine's husband adopted them when they married.

"College-age," Buddy said and thought, God, they must need money now!

"The only other thing I found out was the husband Daniel's been taking a lot of days off work. I don't know why yet."

"Ohhhhh! You did good, Don! Keep digging. I know you'll get to the bottom of this."

When Buddy hung up, he puffed on his cigar and put his feet up again. They were getting somewhere. As he thought about this, the cigar smoke he puffed out formed into dollar signs in his mind.

He sighed. "It's always money," he said aloud, dispensing the cigar's ashes in the ashtray. The priest at his church came to mind. His wife insisted on attending. Whenever Father John received a big donation, he would shake that parishioner's hand longer and more warmly than the others, telling them he would gladly help them out if they needed anything. Buddy used to get those handshakes until he began experiencing financial problems.

He shook his head as he stamped out his cigar in the ashtray and picked up the phone to call Ryan. "It always comes down to money."

***

Money was also on Ryan's mind as he plowed through his study of the character he was set to portray. Shutting out all distractions, he concentrated hard on the video demonstrating the person's speech and mannerisms he needed to replicate. But after two hours of observation, his heartbeat more rapidly thinking about his mounting bills to Buddy's detective agency. Would the bank or his accountant question these payments? What if the press got ahold of this information? How long could he keep funneling private payments to Buddy? He could've paid him in cash, but it was much easier this way. Ryan trusted his accountant implicitly, but he also knew anyone could be bought off. Needless to say, he couldn't get much work done.