Down and Dirty (Mercy Watts Mysteries Book 9)

by A W Hartoin

  “What happened?” Dad asked dully.

  “It’s really nothing. I just triaged at a shooting scene and now Nazir is pestering me.”

  “Can you help the investigation?”

  Yes.

  “Nope. I’m helping Big Steve on something.” I bent over and looked once more in the cabinet. “Dad, where is the Kahlua? Are you out?”

  “It’s in the coffee cabinet. I ran out of room…before it happened.” Before Mom’s attack, he meant. Everything for Dad was now before and after.

  “Which one’s the coffee cabinet?” I knew, but I wanted to give him something to do besides looking ready to collapse.

  Dad walked in and started looking. I don’t think he remembered and that’s when I got really worried. Dad’s mind was tight. He might forget birthdays, but he didn’t forget stuff. Stuff was evidence in my old man’s mind and that was catalogued forever and the same went for dialog. He was forever waiting for someone to trip up and say the wrong thing. That I got off with a “nope” was worrying.

  “I have this,” said Dad, holding a stout bottle of coffee liquor. “Pop Pop brought it, thinking Mom would like it, but she can’t drink. It makes her head hurt.” Dad teared up and I could’ve kicked myself. Hard.

  “Mercy!” called out Aunt Miriam, stomping into the kitchen. I shook my head, but she said, “He won’t answer. I tried a dozen times. You might be right.”

  Dad came to me with the bottle. “Who won’t answer?”

  “Nobody,” I said quickly.

  Dad went past me and turned on Mom’s espresso maker. “They must be important if you’ve called them twelve times,” he said to Aunt Miriam.

  Aunt Miriam’s eyes went squinty and I shook my head so hard I got dizzy.

  “Morty,” she said.

  “Is a really fun guy,” I said. “We had coffee with him and he’s really great.”

  I took her by the arm and tried to steer her out of the room. “I think Mom’s calling you.”

  “She’s gone into the bath.”

  Dad plunked the liquor on the table and dashed for the hall. “She can’t take a bath by herself.” Aunt Miriam stepped into his path and he nearly bowled her over. He acted like Chuck’s poodle, Pick, when you got between him and his bowl. Aunt Miriam grabbed him, pushed him back and gave him a slap that echoed around the kitchen and made me yelp.

  “Tommy Watts, stop that this instant,” she said.

  Dad stood there in shock with a little hand print on his cheek and his mouth hanging open. “You slapped me.”

  “And I’ll slap you again, if you don’t behave.”

  “Carolina is—”

  “A stroke survivor that has beat every odd. I think she can handle a bath.”

  “You don’t understand.” Dad tried to dodge her and Aunt Miriam raised her cane.

  “You’re afraid she’ll have another stroke and drown.”

  Dad started breathing hard and I took him to the nearest chair and forced him to sit. “She’s stable, Dad. It won’t happen again.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I’m as sure as I can be.”

  “That’s not enough,” he said.

  Aunt Miriam pulled up a chair and butted her little knees against his bony shins. “It has to be. Do you imagine you can go on like this?”

  “I have to help her. I never helped her.”

  “C.S. Lewis said, ‘You can’t go back and make a new start, but you can start right now and make a brand-new ending.’”

  “Lewis didn’t say that,” said Dad after a minute.

  Aunt Miriam eyed him. “Who did?”

  “James R. Sherman.”

  She slapped her hands down on his knees. “Good. Now I know you’re still in there. Now we have work to do and you are the only one that can help.”

  “Mercy, can—”

  “She will be doing what she does and you will be talking Morty out of whatever fix he’s in.”

  “I can’t do anything.”

  She squeezed his knees. “He’s your people, your family. You do for family. That is how it is.”

  “I can’t think,” he said. “My mind is so tired.”

  “Mercy,” said Aunt Miriam. “Coffee.”

  I made Dad some black coffee and put in a dram of St. George NOLA coffee liqueur. Aunt Miriam sipped hers out of a shot glass and I put mine in a latte. So good and with hints of chocolate, too.

  “Mercy, tell Tommy what you’re up to with this case,” said Aunt Miriam.

  I hesitated. Dad was known to take over anything and everything, whether he knew what to do or not. Aunt Miriam gave me the stink eye so I decided to chance it. I told him everything from the beginning and Tommy Watts yawned. Once he understood that I wasn’t in danger, he yawned.

  “Can you call Uncle Morty?” I asked. “There’s something up with him.”

  “Of course.” He wasn’t interested in the case, but he did manage to care that his friend had lost his marbles in front of Aunt Miriam.

  “Here,” said Aunt Miriam, holding out her phone.

  He refused it. “No. I’ll call him from the office. He won’t answer if he thinks it’s you.”

  Dad got up slowly and it might’ve been my imagination, but he did look a little more alert. “Miriam, what does Sister Francis think of you being MIA from church today?”

  Aunt Miriam went stiff. “She doesn’t know.”

  “That doesn’t sound like Francis. She’s always in the know.” Dad left the kitchen and we trailed after him. Me because I was afraid he’d go bother Mom instead of calling and Aunt Miriam because she was trying to convince him that helping me was essential.

  Dad climbed the stairs slowly, going over the spot where Scott Frame died with a slight pause to look at it. “Well, I’m sure you know Sister Francis better than I do. I’ve always thought her to be an understanding person.”

  Aunt Miriam checked her watch. “This will take a while with Morty, won’t it?”

  “You know how he is,” said Dad. “Difficult on the best of days.”

  “Maybe I’ll just pop over and see how services are going.”

  “Good idea.” Dad went out of sight and I waited.

  Don’t mess it up.

  “Do you need a ride?” I asked.

  “I’ll call an Uber,” she said. “You better not ruin my good work.”

  “Huh?”

  “I got your father interested. It’s the only thing he’s been interested in besides those morbid actuarial tables.”

  “I won’t,” I said.

  “And don’t do anything without me. I’m helping you and I intend to see it through,” she said, marching to the front door.

  “No problem. This could take a while.”

  She left and I sagged against the bannister. It was a miracle. No. It was Tommy Watts. I jogged up the stairs and found Dad in his office that was half disaster area and half neat as a pin. Claire’s half or temporarily Dana’s half was neat. Dad sat at his battered old cop desk, trying to find his phone under stacks of paper and books about stroke, rape, and PTSD.

  Together we found the phone. Super dead under a pile of printouts from the American Stroke Association. It took me another ten minutes to find the cord and plug it in.

  “Hey, Dad, do you know Tracy Payne?”

  “Contempo Casual? Yeah, I know her.”

  “How sleazy is she?” I asked.

  “She’s alright. Why?”

  “Uncle Morty says she’d do anything for money.”

  Dad smiled and I caught sight of a dimple for a second. “That describes a lot of people.”

  “She’s been indicted.”

  “Has she? I’m not surprised.” He tapped the side of his nose. “Tracy had a little issue.”

  “How has she had an issue?”

  His phone made its Hello, I’m working noise and Dad put his code in. I was happy he knew it. “Wow. I’ve got a lot of emails.”

  “How many?”

  Da
d avoided my eyes. “Well, not that many.”

  “How many Dad?”

  “6000.”

  “That’s a few,” I said.

  “And 675.”

  “When’s the last time you checked your email?”

  Dad sat back in his cushy leather chair. “It’s been a while. Before it happened.”

  “You’ve got some work to do.”

  “I don’t really care.”

  I moved a pile of books off a chair and sat down. “Well, can you care about Morty for a while ‘cause I need that.”

  “Of course. I’ll always take care of my people.”

  I wanted to point out that he hadn’t been taking care of crap for two months, but it wasn’t the right time. He called Uncle Morty and after a tense moment they were talking like the two old friends they were. Mostly calling each other names and goading each other. Then Dad got down to business. He wheedled and prodded Uncle Morty into getting what I needed. I gathered from the cursing that he wasn’t happy about it and from Dad’s expression, I don’t think he knew what was going on.

  After fifteen minutes, he came up with Martin Doyle’s address and phone number. He worked for the Parks Department in some capacity and had recently gotten engaged. The only interesting thing about him was that he was computer savvy. He built computers as a hobby and his degree was Computer Science. Morty thought he might have the skill to write that code or know the right people who did.

  Then after a promise of a generous bonus, Uncle Morty gave us Contempo Casual’s address, the Majestic Motel and Motor Lodge. The name was familiar and gave me a skin crawling feeling, but I couldn’t put my finger on why. Tracy wasn’t doing well and I couldn’t have expected her to be at the Marriott.

  Dad moved on to the International Bank of the Midwest and that’s where it went sideways.

  “Donuts?” asked Dad, raising an eyebrow at me.

  I shrugged. “I told you he’s been weird.”

  “Morty, I’m asking you about the bank. Can you—” Dad looked at me in astonishment. “He hung up.”

  “Happens to me all the time,” I said.

  “Does it?”

  “He’s crabby on a good day.”

  “I heard Nikki’s voice and he started talking about Aaron’s donuts. Since when does Aaron make donuts?”

  “He bought the bike shop and is turning it into a bakery.”

  “I hope he’s working on a good glazed raised,” said Dad. “He’s got a cop clientele.”

  “He made a cornmeal donut filled with franks and beans,” I said.

  Dad just looked at me. I think it didn’t compute and I completely understood that.

  “I’m serious,” I said.

  “I don’t think that’s a donut.”

  “That’s what I said. So can you get Uncle Morty back and see about that account?”

  Instead, Dad got up—much faster than before—and went to the secretarial side to rifle through his files. “I had a case last year.”

  “For Elite?” I asked.

  “No. For Midwest or someone who worked there. Let me think. It was a quick one. Denny handled it.” When he said “Denny”, we both stopped breathing for a second. Dad said it like Denny was alive and I watched him remember. He turned away from the file and went to the window.

  “Um…I can look,” I said. “Can you give me a hint?”

  “I have to replace him,” said Dad.

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  I went to him and hugged him tight, feeling all the bones in his back. Dad was always bony, but this was frighteningly thin. “I’m going to bring you one of Aaron’s Frankenbeannuts. They’re pretty good.”

  “I haven’t wanted to eat at all.”

  There wasn’t anything to say to that. I knew exactly how he felt. I did the same thing after Richard Costilla and nobody could say anything to change it.

  “I’m going to feed you anyway or Aaron is. It’ll be a nice change from him feeding me.”

  “He loves to feed you.”

  “Crab,” I said.

  “And chocolate.”

  Something dinged on Dad’s desk and Mom’s voice squawked from it. “Tommy? Are you okay?”

  Dad had put in a wireless intercom system under the guise of communication, but it was really so Mom couldn’t escape his constant health checks.

  He went and found the little white box and pushed the button. “I’m fine, Carolina.”

  “Do you need something, Mom?” I asked.

  “Oh, Mercy. Thank goodness you’re here. Is everything…fine?” she asked.

  Dad looked at me puzzled and I said, “Yeah, we’re just talking about Denny.”

  “Oh. Okay. I was worried. Would you mind bringing me a cup of Tension Tamer?”

  Dad said he’d work on finding that file. It was coming back to him. The CFO’s house was being vandalized every time the family went on vacation and the vandals knew how to avoid the cameras. Denny had discovered it was a vengeful neighbor who lost a property line dispute. Dad thought it was a good connection for me to get into the bank and the account.

  I went to get Mom her tea and delivered it to her in the bathroom. She was in the six-foot-long claw-foot tub, piled up with bubbles and reading A Gentleman in Moscow. I placed the cup on the shelf that balanced over the tub.

  “How’s the book?” I asked.

  Mom set it down and bobbed her tea bag up and down. “I don’t know. It manages to be boring and interesting at the same time. I didn’t know that was possible.”

  “Weird.”

  “Very. What are you up to that you’ve kept your father out of my hair nearly an hour?”

  I told her that it was Aunt Miriam’s idea to give Dad work to think about. Mom wasn’t sure it was a good idea. He was still so upset about Denny, but she didn’t protest.

  “Have you ever heard of the Majestic Motel and Motor Lodge?” I asked.

  “You are not going there,” she said. “No. Absolutely not.”

  “So not good for a couple’s weekend then?”

  “If you’re a crack dealer and a hooker then yes. Why do you ask?”

  “Someone Morty calls Contempo Casual lives there while awaiting trial,” I said.

  Mom sighed and settled back into her tub. “So that’s what Tracy has come to. Only men call her Contempo Casual, by the way. They can be so judgmental about women’s fashion while being completely clueless about their own.”

  Dad knocked on the door. “Can I come in? Or are you going to call me clueless again.”

  “I wasn’t talking about you,” said Mom. “But if the shoe fits, come in.”

  Dad came in and sat on the toilet. “Bad news. He’s dead.”

  “The client?” I asked.

  “Yep.” Dad still looked exhausted, but there was a spark. “He killed himself on Tuesday.”

  “Oh my God,” said Mom. “That’s terrible. Why?”

  “I got very little from the news, but there was a note.”

  “What did it say?”

  Dad flipped through his little notebook. “The report was vague. An apology, presumably for killing himself.”

  “That’s hardly worth writing,” said Mom. “If he was really sorry, he wouldn’t have done it.”

  “Tuesday,” I said and my parents looked at me. “He killed himself on Tuesday?”

  “Yes,” said Dad, looking down. “Ten o’clock in the morning. Shot himself on the ninth hole.”

  “Where?” said Mom.

  “St. Louis Legacy Country Club.”

  “Is that the one that invited you to join?”

  Dad chuckled. “Not a chance.”

  “Why not? We can afford it now and you are…you,” said Mom.

  Dad went over to perch on the edge of her tub, taking her hand. “We’re not rich enough or I suspect white enough for that club.”

  “Those kind of clubs still exist?” I asked.

  “Yes, but they do an excellent
job pretending that they don’t,” said Dad, accepting a sip from Mom’s cup.

  “So Tuesday at ten,” I said. “I have to talk to somebody at that bank.”

  “Or Calabasas could wake up and tell you everything you need to know,” said Dad.

  “He’ll wake up, but I don’t know how coherent he’ll be.”

  “Why is Tuesday important?” asked Mom.

  “That’s when Catherine got the account from the bank,” I said. “It could be a coincidence.”

  Dad stood up faster than he had in two months. “Or not.”

  “Tommy,” said Mom, “I don’t know if you’re up to this.”

  “I have a feeling,” said Dad, his blue eyes twinkling. He pointed at Mom’s phone. “Call Tenne and get her over here. I’m going to be busy.”

  “I don’t need a babysitter.”

  “But I need you to have one,” he said.

  “Alright. Alright. But you can’t drive,” said Mom.

  “You’re the one restricted from driving.”

  “And you’ve passed out from lack of food.”

  Dad grumbled, but he agreed to eat before driving. If Morty wouldn’t answer the phone, Dad would go over there and beat on the door until he did. I was to check out Martin Doyle and Tracy.

  Mom nearly jumped out of the tub when Dad mentioned me interviewing Tracy. “Mercy is not going to that motel,” she said.

  “Why not? I’ve sent her to worse.”

  “What?”

  “I mean, Mercy’s tough. She can handle it.”

  “Thanks, Dad.” I didn’t really want to go there. From Mom’s description, I’d feel dirtier than the ditch water made me, but a vote of confidence from Dad was enough to get me moving.

  “No,” said Mom. “If you look up scuzzy in the dictionary it says ‘see the Majestic Motel.’”

  “It’s not that bad,” said Dad.

  “Tommy! They found a dead hooker there three days ago.”

  “I assume she’s not there anymore.”

  “Thomas Watts. I will get out of this tub and beat you to death,” said Mom.

  Dad opened the bathroom door and shooed me out. “It’s daylight, Carolina.”

  “They deal crack in the lobby.”