The Nebraska Quotient (A Nebraska Mystery Book 1)

by William J. Reynolds

It was a tempting offer but, dragged out as I was, I knew a drink would about put me away. I declined it and took her up on the tea. As soon as she finished with the door she disappeared into a minuscule kitchen to finish her preparations.

  The apartment was small, smaller than mine even, but clean and well-decorated. The door at the top of the stairs opened into a cozy living room with a large picture window looking out into the oaks shading the house. The kitchen, such as it was, was to the left, at the beginning of a short hallway off of which, I assumed, was a bathroom. At the end of the hall was a door to, probably, the bedroom. Not too bad.

  I planted myself dead center on a flower-print sofa under the picture window, where I could take full advantage of a stiff breeze whipped up by a square electric fan propped in the window. It chilled me, but that felt good. I rubbed my eyes. The lids’ insides felt lined with sandpaper.

  Marcie emerged with two amber glasses filled to the top with ice and rapidly cooling tea. “Do you use sugar or lemon?”

  “Neither, thanks.” I half drained the glass, warm though the drink still was.

  She lowered the volume on a small stereo set propped on the top shelf of a boards-and-bricks bookcase, then put on a brass reading lamp. She settled herself on a rattan chair near the couch. “Can you tell me anything about Eddie?”

  “I can’t tell you where he’s gone to; I don’t even have a clue. I’ll give you that straight up.”

  “But then—”

  “What am I doing here, and at this time of night?” I took another slug of tea. The ice cubes were almost gone and the tea was respectably cold, good on the back of my throat. I was waiting for the caffeine to hit. “Marcie, did your brother mention, or give any indication, that he was in some kind of trouble before he vanished?”

  “Trouble? What do you mean, trouble? I told you, Eddie’s had a couple run-ins with the police, but nothing serious.” She fiddled with the gold chain circling her neck. The crucifix dangling from it glinted gently.

  “We’ll come back to that one. Right now, I’m not talking about trouble with the police. I mean, did Eddie ever say anything about problems he was having with—well, gangsters?”

  Her dark eyebrows fairly disappeared into her hairline. “Gangsters?” She sputtered a laugh. “In Omaha? You’ve got to be kidding!”

  “Actually, no. Look, Marcie, I’m going to be brutally up-front with you, mostly because I’m too tired to think of smooth ways of putting things. The word on the street is that Eddie got himself into one whole lot of trouble with a local gang boss, a particularly bad character they call Crazy Al, though not, I’m told, within his earshot. Ever hear of him?”

  “No,” she snapped belligerently. “Why should I have?”

  She shouldn’t have, except that I was certain, after Oberon’s little pep-talk, that the cryptic memo on Bell’s wall indicated a meeting with Crazy Al—crz al—on the seventh at 10:30 in a place Bell’s personal shorthand abbreviated geo bar. It was a meeting from which Bell had not yet returned, and seemed unlikely to.

  “Because the word on the street is also that Crazy Al had Eddie killed,” I said crudely. “Why this should be I don’t know. I’m hoping you do.”

  Incredulity had hardened into something very much like shock on Marcie’s face. I let her sort through her reactions a minute, maybe two. Finally the shock, if that’s what it was, melted into a kind of tight-lipped defiance. “I think you must be crazy,” she decided at last.

  “It’s been suggested before, but that’s really not the point. The point is that your brother has for some time now been involved in the taking and selling of pornographic pictures—the police know all about it, and I’m sort of surprised you don’t—which may be what put him at odds with the Mob. It’s an area they’ve been known to have an interest in, though not around this town before. I believe your brother was also very likely into something more serious than dirty pictures—blackmail, to be specific—and that may have easily led to his troubles with the mob. The problem is, all I can do now is speculate. Unless you have anything helpful to tell me.”

  Her face was flushed now, her delicate eyebrows drawn into a taut V over hot eyes that flashed spikes at me. If looks could kill, as they say.

  “I have something to tell you all right, mister private detective. You have lost your mind, that’s what I have to tell you. You waltz in here and start tossing around some bullshit about my brother being in some porno ring with gangsters. My own brother! Don’t you think I’d know about it?”

  “Apparently you don’t. Look, Marcie, I know this has got to be a shock. But I’m afraid it’s all true. Besides what the cops told me, I found pictures in your brother’s place, plus a list of shops he sells them to locally.”

  “And just how in hell did you get into Eddie’s apartment?”

  I was getting tired of the course of this conversation: too many detours. “Ah, for God’s sake, Marcie, get with the program. Just because your last name’s the same as Peter Pan’s little friend doesn’t mean you have to share her naïveté. Your brother hawked pictures of naked ladies and I broke into his apartment. Nobody’s a saint. Face facts.”

  “I think I’ll call the police instead.”

  I drank some tea. “It’s immaterial to me. But I’d think twice if I were you. I just left the cops, and I can say with some certainty that they’d love to get their hands on you. They know about the connection between Copel and your brother. They know Copel was investigating Eddie’s disappearance the night he ended up dead in my living room. They figure the one might have had something to do with the other. Now so far I’ve managed to keep your name out of things. You pick up that phone and you’re in it up to your eyeteeth. No turning back. Your decision.”

  She had half risen from the wicker chair. Now she sat again, heavily, furiously. “You bastard,” she spat venomously. “What the hell do you want from me?”

  “Respect and admiration, but I’ll settle for some straight talk. You say you didn’t know anything about Eddie’s photographic hobby?”

  “That’s what I say, and I still don’t believe it.” For emphasis she crossed her arms under her breasts, which made them swell distractingly under the ELO T-shirt.

  “Whatever you prefer. Did Copel and your brother have anything to do with each other before you hired Copel to look for Eddie?”

  The question seemed to surprise her. “No. Why?”

  “Because—and I have nothing to back this up, it’s just groping on my part—I wonder if Copel and your brother were into a little business prior to Eddie’s disappearance. A little blackmail business.” She started another protest rally but I cut her off. “Look, when Copel showed up at my place the other night, he was carrying some pictures, nude shots of a young woman whose name you’d probably recognize. I gallantly returned them to her and talked to her about them. She wouldn’t tell me anything I’d call useful, but I came away with the distinct impression she had been forced to pose. Why anyone would force her seems a little obvious, don’t you think? Well, I searched your brother’s room and came up with a mittful of pictures of the same style, if not the same woman, and so I began to wonder if this wasn’t putting a considerable strain on coincidence. What do you say?”

  Her tea had gone untouched. Now she picked it up but did nothing with it, as if she’d forgotten what you do with a glass of tea. She put her head against the back of the chair and looked at the ceiling. “I don’t know what to say. I still can’t believe Eddie is mixed up in anything that—that bad. I don’t know …” She stood and left the room, excusing herself. I put my own head back and closed my burning eyes. What a day. I was exhausted enough that the idea of giving Marcie Bell her money back and calling it all quits occurred, and appealed, to me. But I knew that wouldn’t work—I’d be a candidate for the looney bin inside of forty-eight hours if I didn’t take things to a point where they at least started to make sense
… .

  And then it was dark, and close. I suffered a moment’s disorientation before realizing I had fallen asleep on Marcie’s couch. The perfect guest. I tried to catch a stray moonbeam on my wristwatch: 11:30. I hadn’t been out too awfully long.

  I sat up and rubbed my neck, still foggy-headed and uncertain what to do. I had already violated etiquette to the point that I could probably just lay it to rest now and slink silently into the night. On the other hand, I felt I should at least thank my hostess for the loan of the couch.

  Being unsure of the lights’ location I left them out and negotiated my way to the short hallway without knocking anything over. At the door to the bedroom I paused. No light seeped under the door, no sound came through it. I tapped softly, almost silently. No reply. In I went.

  The room was heavenly cool. A window air conditioner hummed happily away on low. Above it, through the top half of the window, street light stumbled in and painted the room indigo. I could discern a tall chest of drawers, a smaller dresser with mirror, a night stand, a bed. On the night stand a clock radio played soft music at a volume so low as to be virtually inaudible over the quiet hum of the cooling unit. On the bed a body under a pale sheet stirred slightly.

  “Don’t let the heat in,” she slurred sleepily in a voice barely louder than the music.

  I stepped into the room and shut the door behind me. The room was small; that single movement put me at bedside. “I must’ve left my manners in my other pants,” I said by way of apology. “I usually don’t go around conking out in people’s living rooms.”

  “’S okay. I guess it’s been a long day for you.”

  “You too. I’m sorry about—well, about out there.”

  “I know. Me too. I just … I don’t know. I’m a big sister, I guess.”

  “Yeah. Well, listen, go back to sleep. I’ll let myself out and lock up. I didn’t mean to wake you, I just wanted you to know that if you want me to drop the case, I understand.” I moved toward the door.

  “Wait,” Marcie said. She rearranged her pillows and worked herself into a sitting position, back propped against pillows propped against headboard. She pulled the sheet to her neck. “I’m not asleep yet, really. I took something about half an hour ago and it’s made me fuzzy. But don’t go yet, I want to talk about this some more.”

  I went back over and sat on the edge of her bed. Heat from her leg, resting lightly against the small of my back, flowed through the sheet. I shivered.

  “I was thinking ’bout what you said … blackmail,” Marcie managed stupidly. “Maybe Copel,” she yawned mightily. “Sorry. I mean, maybe Copel took those pictures and planted the stuff in Eddie’s place.”

  It was an interesting angle. “Why?”

  Another yawn. She shook her head at the end of the yawn. “Lord, why doesn’t this stuff ever work when you want to sleep?” In the dark, I smiled. “I don’t know why,” she continued. “Maybe because he was in trouble—with these Mafia people, maybe. He stashed the stuff at Eddie’s, where no one’d look for it.” She stretched, working off the sleeping pill. Already her speech was clearer.

  “Well,” I said decisively, “that’s certainly something to think about.”

  “Then think about it, will you? Because I still don’t believe my brother has anything to do with this … this other stuff.”

  “You may be right.” But I doubted it, doubted it seriously, if only because what I had found at Bell’s place wasn’t hidden away, just stored away. Yes, Copel had had a key to Bell’s place and it was a natural spot to hide something if he was looking to hide it—from, say, the Mob. But it just didn’t feel right, even if I didn’t say so to Marcie. Instead I yawned, so hard my ears popped. “Anyhow, I’d better get going. It has been a long day.”

  “Not yet.” Suddenly she folded herself over and was in my arms, holding me tight, very tight and very warm. A little furnace. “Just hold me,” she whispered in the cool dark. “I’m scared, scared for Eddie, because of what might’ve happened to him and because I’ve never been scared for him before.” She held me even tighter, which I wouldn’t’ve thought possible. “He can’t really be dead, can he?”

  “Nobody knows, Marcie,” I said, trying to be consoling and yet honest. I didn’t like the way things were going, the way I was starting to feel. I put my arms around her to hold her as she had asked, and only then, when my hand slid up the long uninterrupted stretch of skin on her back, did I know she was naked.

  Her own hand was on the inside of my leg, moving slowly, caressingly, upward until it found the part of me that had already begun to respond. The caress grew insistent.

  “Marcie, I don’t—”

  And her lips were on mine, her tongue probing deeply. I tasted the mint of her toothpaste, smelled the musky, subliminal scent of her, thought of every good reason to call this to a halt, ignored each of them.

  I peeled the sheet from between us and cupped one smooth, full breast. My finger caught the chain looped around her neck and it pulled away. “Damn clasp,” she murmured dreamily, and plucked the necklace from her moist skin. She laid it on the night stand but I heard it slither serpentine over the edge to land silently in the carpet. She ignored it. I mauled her breasts. She caught her breath in my mouth and pushed against my hands. Her own hands worked off my coat and began on the buttons of my shirt. When it was gone I lowered her onto the bed, worked my lips against her mouth, my pelvis against hers.

  Her fingers slid down my back, scratching lightly, and downward. I fumbled with buckles and zipper, then shed the last of my clothing like a snake leaving behind its skin. Her nails clawed me as I threw the sheet from the bed. Her skin was gray in the blue light. She was slender, rather small for her full breasts. I stroked them again, feeling the hard tips against my palms. She shuddered and dug deeper into my backside with her nails. I kissed her, hard. She sucked my tongue into her mouth with surprising force. Presently, and with some difficulty, I extracted it. “Shall I give you something else to do that with?”

  In the darkness I felt her shake her head. “That’s not what I want.”

  “It isn’t?” I whispered innocently. “Then what?”

  Her fingers gripped tighter and pulled me against her, onto her. She ground her hips against me, at the same time using her tongue on my lips. “Now,” she insisted.

  “You.”

  She groaned and reached for me, guided me faultlessly into hot softness.

  “Now, you son of a bitch,” she breathed feverishly into my ear.

  Well, since she asked so nicely …

  By 1:15 I was on the street, wiping moisture from the back window of the red beast with my handkerchief. It had to be eighty degrees still. A corona of humidity encircled the street lamps. Upstairs, Marcie slept soundly away.

  I envied her that.

  Behind the wheel I sat momentarily and thought. Not, surprisingly, about Marcie and the wholly unexpected scene that had transpired upstairs. That deserved thinking about, to be sure—the handsome, hard-boiled, cynical P.I. bedding his beautiful, quiveringly available young client may be requisite in crime novels and TV series, but it was unique to my experience. Maybe if it hadn’t been I wouldn’t be looking to get out of the business.

  Which was neither here nor here. What my head worried now was the new angle on the case that Marcie had presented. In my gut I knew when she had said it it wasn’t right, but that seldom is enough for my head, which now reminded me that Adrian had failed to recognize Copel’s name—which, if he had been her blackmailer/photographer, I would have expected her to know. And OPD did have knowledge of Bell’s photographic endeavors, while no such charge had been made or proven against Copel. Also, it seemed to me not quite up Copel’s alley—too much work involved for too little money. Blackmail Copel would tackle, but not pornographing. More important, there was no reason to think, no evidence to suggest, Copel was the photographe
r, therefore no cause to treat Marcie’s speculation as anything but that.

  I shifted on the vinyl seat. My ass stung where she had dug in her nails when she came. I started the car, directed it away from the freeway and toward Center Street. At that time of night, with little traffic on the streets, the freeway would be no faster. Besides, I still had some thinking that needed to get done, and that’s easier at thirty-five miles an hour than at fifty-five.

  My equation was still a distance removed from producing a quotient. As I followed the darkened and deserted streets I tried to make a mental list of what I knew. It was a quick task: Copel was dead, Copel had pictures of Adrian Mallory, Adrian refused to discuss the pictures; Eddie Bell was missing, Bell took the pictures of Adrian, Copel was investigating Bell’s disappearance when he was killed.

  Pretty depressing, isn’t it? The rest of what I “knew” I didn’t know for fact—that Bell was dead, dead at the hands of an insane mobster who had killed Copel, too; that Bell and/or Copel blackmailed Adrian and/or her father, Senator Mallory, and/or were preparing to; that more pictures of Adrian were floating around somewhere. These were merely assumptions, maybe good ones, but assumptions nonetheless. You can’t build a case on them. And you surely can’t come to the truth through them.

  My journey was finished before my ruminations were. I detoured, taking Center to Saddle Creek, which merged with the Radial just south of my place; followed the Radial past home sweet home and to the point where it veered off onto Fontenelle Boulevard. I took Fontenelle north, through the park, then circled around, via Ames Avenue and Thirty-first Street, toward my neighborhood, reveling in the night and my solitude, letting warm darkness blanket me and muffle the sounds of my own brain.

  It was along Hamilton Street, in a crumbling block east of the Radial, perhaps two, three miles from my place, that I noticed the sign. It wasn’t old, but it had a rock-sized piece knocked out of the center of it, where a maroon-and-white Dr Pepper emblem had once been. Below the emblem, in a white rectangle, black letters spelled out the name of the establishment it fronted: George’s Car Barn.