by Dan Taylor
13.
“Yep. Why’s that so weird? You said she’s not home yourself,” he says.
“Yeah, but…”
“But what?”
“Absolutely nothing.”
There are minefields to tread in continuing questioning this guy.
He says, “What’s so confusing? It’s you who told me she’s not there.” He pauses for a beat, and says, “Why are you asking these questions anyway? Are you a stalker? Because if you are, and even though I can’t stand Tracy, I wouldn’t feel right about snitching on her to some guy who could potentially chop her into tiny pieces and flush them down the toilet.”
“I’m not a stalker.”
“Then why the questions?”
“Concern.”
“Why would you be concerned if Tracy’s just out?”
“Because I noticed she hasn’t taken her asthma inhaler with her.”
He frowns. “Are you inside Tracy’s duplex?”
“Yep.”
“Aww, Jesus.” He’s agitated, rubbing the thinning hair on top of his head. “She’s given you a key, hasn’t she?” He shakes his head and stares off to the left of me as he says, “She went and gave one of her playthings a key. That’s the straw that’s broken the camel’s back. Next time I see that bitch…”
“Why would that be an issue?”
“I’m not telling you. You’re not my neighbor. Do I look like a jackass?”
He does, but I say, “No. Listen, I’ll leave you alone to watch Stargate, as long as you—”
“SG-1. The movie sucks, guy.”
“Okay, SG-1, if you just tell me if Tracy came back after leaving.”
“To get her inhaler?” Skeptical.
“Yeah.”
He thinks a second, his jowls wobbling from side to side as he shakes his head in frustration. “Not that I know of. I at least didn’t see her.”
“Then did you hear her door slam or close after she’d left?”
“Come to think of it, no.”
“And you would, right? Hear her door close?”
“Yeah, we live in the same cardboard-wall box. I’m sure she does it on purpose, to get me back for—you know—enjoying my motion pictures with dialog and a score I can actually hear.”
“Okay. Thanks for your time.”
“No problem, guy.” He has some sage advice for me before I leave: “If I were you, I’d have given Tracy a fake name. You wouldn’t be the first guy to come banging on her door, telling her your wife left you. But if you haven’t, I’d just as soon get out of Dodge. Tracy’s trouble. The kinda trouble a morning-after pill can’t fix.”
“Thanks for the advice.”
“No problem. And if you phone the cops about whatever it is this is, give me a heads-up. I need to hide my bongs and shit.”
“Will do.”
He closes the door, and I stand there for a second on his porch, trying to make sense of what he said.
14.
I’m back at Tracy’s, sitting next to my new buddy on the couch. She’s wandered up to the door a few times, meowing next to it as though she wants to go in, as though she knows Tracy’s dead in there.
There are three things Angry Nerd said that have got my mind working overtime. The first is about my being her type: a bored married guy. Could her killer be some guy just like me? Married to his sweetheart who’d do anything for him, maybe newly, a kid at home, but bumped into Tracy at a bar some night, ended up back here? Tracy pulls that Whitepages shit on him when he gets cold feet, tells him that there are four ladies with the same surname as his living in Los Angeles?
So far, it’s my best bet. And it isn’t far from the lead I was already working on.
But the second thing on my mind is his getting agitated when he thought, mistakenly, that Tracy had given me a key. I tried to get the reason why out of him, but he clammed up, told me I’m not a neighbor, and that he’s not a jackass.
I try to think about how I’d react if my neighbor gave some guy she barely knows a key to her home. I can’t think of a single reason why I’d get pissed, but then again, my neighbor and I don’t share a duplex. Maybe duplex owners share a special bond with each other beyond my understanding, like when I saw a kid crying because his ice cream fell out of the cone and I didn’t understand why he didn’t just wipe the snot away from his nose and go and buy another one on his mom’s dime.
Maybe that’s got something to do with it, or maybe Angry Nerd’s just paranoid from one too many nights in alone, smoking high-strength weed and binge watching sci-fi action series having fried his brain.
The third one’s the real pickle. Him having seen Tracy leave five minutes before I got there. First off, I took everything he said with a huge pinch of salt. I could smell that he was smoking the type of weed you regret smoking just after taking a hit. But still, I believe that part. Even though it doesn’t make a blind bit of sense. Maybe Tracy went outside, fleeing, maybe, before her killer got to her. It would explain why her door was left ajar, but doesn’t account for why she went back inside. It also doesn’t explain why he didn’t observe her going back in, and I get the impression from that guy—on account of him having waved to me twice as he spied me through his window—that he would’ve seen something more had it occurred. He also didn’t say that Tracy was running, or that she seemed in distress, and it would’ve been pertinent to the conversation, as I’d made it clear I was worried about what had happened to Tracy. Why she was missing from her home.
All I can do is put it to the back of my mind and carry on with the direction this investigation seems to be pulling me in: that some jilted lover poisoned her. A bored married guy like me, just psychotic enough to think covering up his extra-marital affair is worth taking someone’s life over.
Before Grace phoned, I was just about to look through Tracy’s phone. Her text messages. I get back to this now.
There are only conversations going back five weeks ago, so Tracy must’ve freed up some memory on her phone, deleted them. Still, accrued in only five weeks’ time, there are enough SMS conversations to keep me occupied for a whole week of analysis. What I’m saying is, if there’s a breadcrumb trail in these conversations leading to a killer, there’s a very slim chance I’ll stumble onto it. And that’s assuming that the person who killed her is a dude. Tracy could’ve ridden the Ferris wheel and the rollercoaster.
I skim through the conversations, keeping my eyes peeled for bored-married guy names. Bill, Pete, Giles, Frank, names like that. The most recent conversation she’s had with a dude is a guy named Vince. Promising. The conversation they had was about if he had time to come over and fix her shower. It was on the fritz; when she adjusted the temperature, it went from ice-cold to scorching hot at one minute turn of the temperature knob. He asked her for the make and model, and she told him how the hell would she know that, to which he replied, “Maybe it’s in the manual you should have stored away, or maybe you can google it.” The conversation goes on and on, petty stuff, he saying there’s most likely nothing he can do about the shower being so temperamental, and she telling him he’s a no-good plumber, and an even shittier ex-boyfriend.
When I’ve read as much as I can stand, I turn to the cat and ask her, “What do you reckon, buddy? Do you think this guy Vince could’ve done it?”
The cat stares into space, its eyelids half-mast, as it concentrates on just sitting on its ass.
“That’s what I think too.”
I skip through the conversations again, noting the names, and realize something. Not one of the contacts has the surname listed. I could do a Tracy, and Whitepage them, and they may or may not be listed, or they might be using a burner phone. Most likely not if our killer had the foresight to get his listing removed before he poisoned her. If Tracy was lying on the floor, having been shot, strangled to death, or succumbed to some other act of passion, then I’d think there’s a pretty good chance the guy was some numbskull who spoke to her on the same phone he called his wi
fe on—Jesus, I’m that numbskull. But this was planned. You have to get the poison, which isn’t like going to the pharmacy and buying aspirin, and you have to come up with a solid plan to get it inside her. It isn’t the act of someone dumb enough to leave a trail, which could mean hours spent looking through her phone could be wasted hours.
My head’s hurting, and I haven’t eaten since lunch. As much as I want to carry on, I need to get something to eat. I’m not exactly the bounciest ball at the toy store when I’ve eaten well and slept eight solid hours the night before, so right now, stomach grumbling and blood sugar low and a baby at home, I’m bordering on the intelligence of a jellyfish. I get up and go through to Tracy’s kitchen and look in her refrigerator. Looking into it’s like that scene you’ve seen at least five times in some movie. Tracy’s refrigerator is bare. There’s only an old tomato in the there, which looks like you couldn’t slice into it with a freshly sharpened chef’s knife and have all the seeds shoot out onto your shirt, and a tub of some cosmetic, as well as the aforementioned carton of milk.
Looks like I’ll have to order Chinese food. Sure, it’s risky, but tasty, too.
I start searching around in drawers for a takeout menu from which I can order, and I find something in the drawer to the right of the sink that nearly makes me run out to my car, drive away from here, never to return.
15.
In the drawer is a collection of car keys. Not a small collection Tracy might’ve amassed from owning a few cars over the years, but a big-ass collection. Like a whole bunch of guys came to Tracy’s duplex and never left. A whole bunch of bored married guys.
Jaguars, BMWs—the kinda cars that have polo-sweater-wearing rich guy written all over them.
I panic, and a minute later I have my phone to my ear, waiting for my lawyer Georgina Steinberger to pick up, having not remembered dialing her number or pressing the SEND CALL button.
She picks up, and says, “Hancock, I’m at dinner.”
“Georgina, I’m in trouble.”
She sighs.
Georgina’s a fifty-something New Yorker who eats fast and talks faster. She’s great at what she does, but she also talks to me like she’ll beat me up one day while simultaneously sexually assaulting me and do a great job of convincing the police I deserved it, which is precisely the reason why I’ve got her on retainer.
“You’re supposed to make this call before you get into trouble,” she says. “And before I’ve ordered.”
“Should I hang up? Is this a bad time?”
“Just tell me what it is.”
“I’m not quite sure yet.”
“Is there a dead hooker in your home?”
“Why would I be not sure about being in trouble if there were?”
“So it’s more complicated than that?”
“I think so.”
“Hancock, you seem to be confusing me with your dentist. I don’t like pulling teeth.”
“Someone’s dead.”
“Did you do it?”
“No. God no.”
“Good. Then I’ll remain at the table with my husband, if you don’t mind?”
“As long as I’m not on speaker, and as long as you don’t mention my name again and mention something about a dead hooker.”
“Don’t sass me, Hancock. You’re not a McDonald’s drive-thru. Just give me a second. And that was a trick question, to keep you sharp for the witness stand you’ll end up on one day. I’m going to use my other phone for this conversation.”
“Are you at a busy—” I start to say, but she’s hung up.
At a busy restaurant I was going to ask.
Whenever I speak to Georgina, I have flashbacks of high school, that desperation you feel when trying to think what to say next to stay out of detention.
Five seconds later my phone starts ringing, and immediately after I’ve answered Georgina says, “I am at a busy restaurant, but now I’m in the bathroom, and this is a burner phone. Before we continue, I want you to know I could be disbarred for even having a conversation with a client on this phone.”
“Is that a good thing?”
“For you it is, and for me it means my retainer just doubled.”
“That’s a good thing for me?”
“Talk fast, Hancock, and be succinct. You’ve got this habit of repeating back to people what they said to you in question form, like you’re an inquisitive but confused parrot. I put up with it for two reasons: One) your retainer is now the highest of anyone on my client list and the second highest before this incident, and two) I can imagine us ending up in bed someday, smoking cigarettes as we recharge for round two.”
“There’s not even a remote chance of that happening.”
“Succinct, Hancock. That means get to the point in as few words as possible.”
I tell her the whole story, making sure I cut out any unnecessary prepositions, and finishing with what I’ve just learned. The car keys.
She says, “And you want my legal advice?”
“That, and what you think.”
“I think you’re a moron but with a good heart and a great ass.”
“Not about me, about this situation.”
“My unofficial legal advice is don’t phone the police.”
“I already haven’t done that.”
“Just making sure. My next bit of legal advice is don’t order Chinese food. No matter how hungry you are. Bite the bullet and starve or make a packet of instant noodles. The less people caught up in this mess the better.”
“Roger that.”
“Tell me more about this neighbor. I like him.”
“Will this conversation help me out of this situation?”
“Probably not.”
I sigh. “I don’t know what else to tell you. He freaked when he found I had a key to Tracy’s duplex. Did I mention that?”
“You neglected to tell me that.”
“Then I’m telling you now.”
“You have a key? Are you being completely honest with me, Hancock?”
“I don’t have a key, but he thinks I do.”
“How did you manage to convince him of that?”
“He came to that conclusion all by himself.”
“You didn’t say, ‘I have a key to her home,’ or words to that effect?”
“Why would I say that if I don’t?”
“We ever go to trial, Hancock, don’t even entertain the idea even for a second that you should take the witness stand, even if I tell you it’s a good idea. In fact, especially if I recommend it.”
“Can we get back on track?”
“Carry on, maybe by telling me how you think he came to that conclusion.”
“He thinks I have a key because I’m at her duplex and he thinks Tracy isn’t there.”
“That’s right. He saw her leave, but she’s in the bathroom, right? Dead?” There’s a pause. “Do me a favor and go and check she’s still there. The moment you walked into my office, I had you pegged as the kind of high school student who took acid during recess.”
“Good idea.”
I go over to the bathroom and open the door. The cat spots the opportunity and runs through the gap, Indiana Jones style, and I curse a few times.
Georgina says, “I knew it.”
“Not that. The cat’s inside the bathroom.”
“That’s the cat you mentioned, right? The one you tried to poison for no reason.”
“It wasn’t for no reason. And yeah. Hold on a second.”
The cat’s standing on Tracy’s slumped over back, just chilling. I shoo her away, chasing her out of the bathroom like a shepherd dog, and then close the door behind her.
Then I say, “Tracy’s still there.”
“I’m getting a bad feeling about this, Hancock, at least for you. If it makes you feel any better, it looks like your retainer’s going to come to good use.”
“That’s supposed to make me feel better?”
“We’ve spoken long enough, Hancock.
My husband Frank bores easy, and I like to eat my entre warm, how the chef intended it, so we’re going to have to wrap this up.”
“Can I at least get some actionable legal advice before you hang up?”
“Sure, don’t phone the police.”
“You already mentioned that.”
“Did I mention the one about the Chinese food being a bad idea?”
“Yep.”
“My official stance, as your attorney, is that your hanging around there because of some harebrained idea you’d find the killer is the dumbest thing you could’ve done, and that’s without taking into consideration you’re probably house sitting the next door neighbor’s cat and thinking about ordering Chinese food.”
“Great advice.”
“My last bit of advice, and you should follow this to the letter, is to remove any trace you’ve been there, and leave. When the police knock on your door, don’t say a word to them about what you know or don’t know, deny any allegations with one-word answers, and ask them to phone me on my official line, assuming it’s at a reasonable time.”
“If I can’t do any of those things, which I can’t, what would your advice be?”
“Think of a reason why the neighbor freaked about your having a key, and think of a reason why a dead chick would have a collection of car keys.”
“Okay, Georgina. Nice chat.”
“One last thing, Hancock. When you’re a single guy, give me a call on this phone, and make sure you’re drunk and don’t have to get up early the next morning.”
“Not gonna happen, Georgina, but I’ll take it as a compliment, unlike my wife.”
“And say hi to her, and wish her luck from me, will you?”
I hang up.
Despite that conversation being almost completely pointless, I feel better for having had it.
I go back over to the open drawer with the keys in it, and then get to thinking why Tracy would have them in there.
The obvious reason is I’m at the end of a long string of guys she’s pulled this shit on. She lures them back to her duplex, after making sure they’re A) married, probably with kids, B) wealthy, C) bored, and D) low-hanging fruit, even for a guy. Once they’ve slept together, she—what?—tells her brother she’s romantically involved with them, and he, either in on it or not, goes to visit them. They freak, and after work they drive to Tracy’s as they listen to Roy Orbison as they think about their kid calling some other guy dad and how much Fruit Loops cost in the eyes of a divorce lawyer.
