“This is a laugh,” Dana said, pointing to the letterhead: VALLEY MEDICAL AMBULANCE COMPANY, and under that, ACCOUNTING DEPARTEMENT. “Julia is the accounting department.”
We continued to stare at the invoices, as if the words were one half of an equation, about to rearrange themselves into the other half, making the whole understandable, giving us a reason why Phil had the copies in the first place, and then thought it necessary to hide them.
The suite of Evanescence songs ended, emphasizing the silence that settled over us, the excitement of finding “something” overshadowed by “so what?” The last words I heard as the music came to a halt were bring me to life.
“Not bad,” I told Dana as a commercial for a tranquilizer replaced the music. “Not Tony Bennett, but not bad.”
In the short-lived thrill at finding the invoices, I’d forgotten about the briefcase, which I now noticed standing in front of the oven.
“It was in the same place,” Elaine said, in tune with my gaze. “Still empty. I thought we should take it with us this time.”
I nodded agreement. I was sure Matt would want to take it to Russell, though by now there’d be a sufficient number of overlapping fingerprints to make it useless, I guessed.
“Wait a minute,” Dana said, waving an invoice in our direction. Elaine and I put down our mugs and gave Dana our full attention. “There’s no Schnur Convalescent Home in Alameda County.”
“You mean you’ve never heard of it?” Elaine asked.
“I mean there isn’t one. I know them all. Hospitals, senior centers, convalescent homes, trauma centers, you name it. I have to know them all.” Dana picked up the sheet and held it closer to her face, studying it. “Here’s another one. A bill for a pickup at a Mattson Assisted Living Center. That doesn’t exist, either.” Dana ran her fingers down the page. “Okay, okay, okay,” she said, apparently giving approval to some of the listings. A little more than halfway down the page, she tapped her finger and shook her head. “Absolutely no Jacobs Home in Alameda County. I don’t believe this. There must be at least six care centers listed on this page alone that don’t exist.”
“Maybe some of them are new?” I asked. “Or really small facilities, so you might not have made a pickup?”
Dana placed the invoice on the island counter so we could see it. She stepped back and folded her arms across her chest. “Then how come I’m listed as the driver?”
With a highlighter from Phil’s kitchen-drawer collection, Dana marked the nonexistent facilities Julia had billed, all with post office boxes as addresses. We examined the pages, shuffling them among us, one or two at a time.
Dana gave us a quick rundown of the acronyms for sites such as convalescent homes, assisted living centers, and the trauma center, and the patient codes that included dates and insurance IDs.
It was obvious that Julia was running some kind of scam, laundering money through services she never rendered.
“These billed amounts are all different,” I said.
“The basic cost of transport is three hundred dollars, then on top of that there’s fees if we need equipment or supplies.” Dana ticked off the list. “Like oxygen, cannulas, bandages, dressings. That’s all extra.” She looked down the list. “Say there’s about six or seven fake trips a week here. She could be hiding, like, ten thousand dollars a month.”
“Somehow Phil uncovered this swindle,” Elaine said.
Or was part of it, I didn’t say.
“This is a new one on me,” Dana said. “I’ve heard some worse things, though, like beating old people so they’ll need the ER and more money comes in from their insurance. Then the ER and the home split the reimbursement.”
“What?” Elaine seemed stunned, as I was. It made taking extra pens and pads of paper from the lab supply room seem not worth noting.
“I wonder how Phil discovered this,” Elaine said, still on her Phil-is-one-of-the-good-guys tack.
“Dad met Julia once or twice, but he doesn’t know her well, and I’m sure his only connection to her is through me,” Dana said.
“And Robin,” Elaine said. This time the lovely bird came out as a growl. When we looked doubtful, she elaborated. “Robin used to work for Julia at Valley Med. Robin had a badge in her closet from the company Phil works with. The briefcase was in Robin’s house, then Phil’s.”
A little loose and haphazard, but I could almost follow Elaine’s thinking, although she’d skirted two murders.
“What if Dad’s in danger?” Dana’s voice cracked as she uttered what we were all thinking. “There’s a lot of money involved in this, if it’s ongoing. Dad might be—”