Free The Renegades by T. Jefferson Parker

watched their money closely.”
    “Why two savings accounts? Why two checking accounts?”
    “That’s not uncommon, Deputy Hood. Autonomy. Independence. The accounts were held jointly, so either one could get balances, make transfers, write checks.”
    “Did any of those accounts apply to an investment property, or a business?”
    “No. They are personal accounts.”
    Hood asked for the balance on the home mortgage and Grimm clicked away on the keyboard. It took a while. When he said three hundred thousand dollars, Hood was intrigued.
    “Mrs. Laws told me they bought their place for nine hundred thousand dollars,” he said. “So they came up with six hundred thousand dollars down.”
    Grimm tapped again, found the loan history, and nodded. “Six hundred and fifteen thousand.”
    “On a combined income of under a hundred grand a year.”
    “Yes.”
    “Did they close an account to get that money?”
    “Not one of ours.”
    “Sell a property?”
    He tapped and tapped more. He apologized for the slow computer. He stared at the screen.
    “Yes. Mrs. Laws sold a town home in Studio City. She realized two hundred thousand dollars from the sale, it says here on the loan apps.”
    “Leaving four hundred fifteen thousand to go for the down.”
    “Correct.”
    “Did Terry sell a property also?”
    “No. He was renting.”
    Grimm frowned at the screen as if it were misleading him. “There’s a photocopy of the down payment check. It’s drawn on the Pearblossom Credit Union, and signed by Terry Laws. Maybe there was an inheritance involved, or some other instrument.”
    “Is there a copy of Terry’s ten-forty with the loan application?”
    “Yes. I’m sorry I can’t show it to you or divulge any information from it. Federal, you know.”
    “If I were to see it, would it explain to me where he got four hundred and fifteen thousand dollars?”
    “If you were to see it, it would explain nothing of the kind. But you will not see it here in my office.”
    “Thank you,” said Hood.
     
     
    THE PEARBLOSSOM CREDIT UNION was new, small and neat. The vice president was a slender brunette named Carla Vise. Framed pictures of a cat faced out from her desk. Through her office window Hood could see a vacant lot filled with twisted Joshua trees and Spanish dagger. Hundreds of plastic shopping bags flapped and pressed against the windward side of a chain-link fence. The day was cool and bright.
     
    Carla offered Hood jelly beans from a plastic bowl and he took a few to be polite. She eyed him over a pair of reading glasses as he asked her what she knew about Mr. Laws’s down payment on his home. She told Hood that Terry Laws was one of her favorite customers, and that she couldn’t believe that he had been murdered, right here in Lancaster. She excused herself, then came back a moment later with a thick green file folder. She dabbed an eye with a wadded pink tissue.
    “Yes, he wrote the down payment check on his personal account here,” said Carla. She opened the folder and started fanning through the pages. “High Country Escrow.”
    “Do you know where he got the six hundred and fifteen thousand dollars?”
    She was already nodding. “Two hundred thousand dollars is what they made when they sold Laurel’s place in Studio City. And the balance came from Mr. Laws’s trust.”
    Hood’s nerves stirred. “This is the first I’ve heard about a trust.”
    “Oh really? Build a Dream? He started it in the summer of 2007, a charitable trust. It raises money for Southern California children living below the poverty line. Terry raised a lot of that money from the Sheriff’s Department—rank-and-file donations. You law enforcement people are generous. I think it’s because you see so much poverty and crime. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of it.”
    “So you handle this trust?”
    “We have the trust account. I opened it for him. And Mr. Laws transferred four hundred thousand dollars from his charitable trust to