Forget to Remember

Paul. I remember now. When I called your office to invite you to dinner I talked to Rose. After she checked with you and we confirmed the appointment, she didn’t hang up immediately. She asked me some questions. I thought she had a friendly concern for me, so I answered them. She asked me how my memory was. I said it was still a problem. I told her I’d been to England. I didn’t tell her I was sure of my identity, because I wanted Grandma to tell you.
    “Then she asked whether I was staying at the farm. I said I was staying at a motel. She asked for the name of it. I gave it to her. Then she asked for my room number, in case, she said, you had to get hold of me here. I gave her that. Michael knew my room number. He was lurking in the stairway just a couple of doors from my room. He expected me to come from the elevator instead of up the stairs. I’m sure his plan was to follow me into my room before the door closed and then kill me.”
    “Shit.” Paul stared at his coffee cup. “Rose couldn’t have done it. She couldn’t be in cahoots with Michael, could she?” He thought some more. “I’m going to talk to her in the morning.”
    “Michael also knew when I was coming here the first time. That’s when he called Grandma and threatened her. How would he have known if Rose hadn’t told him?”
    This was one time Carol was glad to have Paul escort her to her room. They went inside together and made sure Michael wasn’t hiding in the closet. He had her spooked, and she wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d somehow been able to come through the wall.
    When she was convinced Michael wasn’t there, Carol kicked Paul out and said she’d talk to him in the morning. She locked the dead bolt and set the chain and turned on the television set for company.
    ***
    It was late, but Paul had to find out the truth about Rose. If she tipped off Michael about Carol, she could be an accessory to attempted murder. A murder that would cheat him out of millions of dollars. That was too unfeeling. He really liked Carol; he wouldn’t want any harm to come to her even if she weren’t a valuable asset to him. He often thought about their night together and wished it could be repeated. She had the softest skin of any woman he’d ever known.
    He went back to his office and started rooting through Rose’s desk. Looking for—what? The smoking gun. She probably didn’t write anything down. He turned on her computer, but he wasn’t knowledgeable enough to find hidden information about Michael, such as an address or phone number. She probably had it stored in her cell phone, anyway, which of course she had with her. Damn modern technology.
    Not knowing what else to do, he took a quick look through the office file cabinets but didn’t turn up anything suspicious. The files contained a folder for each of his clients. None looked out of place. The Sakai folder was thick but didn’t have anything unusual in it, as far as he could tell. Rose was too smart for that, especially since he looked at it all the time. He had perused it that afternoon.
    He couldn’t open the middle drawer of Rose’s desk. It had its own lock. What did she keep in that drawer? She had the only key. They kept a small tool kit in the office for doing minor repairs. Paul retrieved a long screwdriver. He shoved the blade between the top of the drawer and the desk frame. This damaged the desk, but that couldn’t be helped. Using brute force, he pried the drawer open, breaking the flimsy lock.
    Inside the drawer were several pencils and pens and some other office supplies. There were also a few papers. Paul pulled out the papers and dumped them on the desktop. Among them was a checkbook. He knew she had a checking account at the bank close to the office. He picked it up. Rose was meticulous about keeping the office accounts. She probably kept her checkbook the same way.
    He opened the checkbook and looked at the ledger. All her deposits and withdrawals were neatly entered. Paul recognized the amount of her paycheck, entered regularly every two weeks. He thumbed through the pages of the ledger until he reached entries that had been made within the past few weeks. The running balance took a big jump on one page.
    Paul knew Rose didn’t have any outside sources of income. Her parents didn’t have any money to spare. Her only investment was a 401K plan Paul managed. He looked at the four-figure deposit that caused the increase in the balance. The notation