Maggie Lee | Book 28 | The Hitwoman Pays A Debt

by Lynn, JB

  Sighing, I hurried to my bedroom and put the bags inside.

  “Where have you been?” God demanded to know from his terrarium.

  “Shopping with Katie,” I reminded him. “You knew that.” While I spoke, I put Benny into his little enclosure.

  “Long day, long day, long day,” he said tiredly before curling into a ball and closing his little eyes.

  “But you were a big help.” I stroked his head with my finger and his whiskers wiggled with delight.

  “I have to go see Ian,” I whispered to the lizard. “Do you want to come with me?”

  “Of course,” he said. “Notice that the mammals all deserted me and ran out after him when they realized he was here.”

  “In their defense,” I told him, “they really don’t have a way of opening the terrarium and letting you out, short of knocking it over.”

  He twitched his tail in annoyance.

  “And that could damage your sensitive skin,” I teased him.

  He stuck his lizard tongue out at me. Despite that, I lowered my hand and let him climb up it so that he could scramble up my arm and perch on my shoulder. “Did they say what Ian wants?”

  “I wasn’t consulted,” he said huffily.

  I took a deep breath and squared my shoulders, and prepared myself to walk out to the barn.

  “You should probably bring an apple,” God suggested.

  Deciding that he was right, I made a quick detour into the kitchen to grab an apple out of the bowl on the counter.

  Susan watched my action and nodded approvingly. “Very good, Margaret. I’m glad to see you’re taking your health seriously.”

  I didn’t bother to tell her that the fruit wasn’t for me but for the pack animal.

  With God on my shoulder and an apple in my hand, I marched out to the barn. Matilda, Piss, and DeeDee were playing tag with Katie and Alicia. They all looked like they were having fun. Ian was leaning with his back against the barn wall, watching them, an amused smile on his face.

  “Hey, stranger,” I said, tossing the apple to Irma.

  “Twice in one day,” she brayed with delight.

  Ian pinned me with his gaze. “I want you to come to dinner.”

  I blinked, surprised by the invitation. “Okay, why?” I assumed it had something to do with my father. Most of the things that drew us together had to do with my father and whatever trouble he had gotten himself into at any given moment.

  “Kristen wants to get to know you better.”

  I gulped. Kristen, also known as Dr. Yes, was his girlfriend. She was also a medical examiner. And on top of that, Dr. Yes is the official doctor of Delveccio’s criminal enterprise.

  “You will come, won’t you?” Ian asked hopefully, noticing my hesitation.

  I swallowed hard. “Sure.”

  “Like this can’t lead to trouble,” God whispered in my ear.

  8

  “Is your hot brother on the market?” Armani asked as I walked back to the main house from the barn. She caught me off guard, and I gasped, startled.

  “You don’t have to look so appalled at the idea of me going after him,” she pouted.

  “I didn’t see you sitting there,” I explained. I climbed up the steps and sank into the chair beside her. “No, he’s not on the market. He’s involved with someone.”

  Armani chuckled. “You don’t have to be psychic to tell that you don’t like her.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know her,” I said defensively.

  That wasn’t really true. I’d met her when she’d come to take care of an injured Angel Delveccio in a seedy motel room with her silly little flowery bag, and the way she had knocked on his chest, like he wasn’t a real person, didn’t sit well with me. I guess for somebody who spends most of their time examining dead bodies, that was perfectly acceptable behavior, but I hadn’t liked it. And I didn’t trust her.

  Armani interrupted my thoughts by holding out her bag of Scrabble tiles and giving it a good shake.

  “Do I really have to?” I whined. It’s not like her tiles ever had any good news to share. At best, they usually contained a warning for me.

  “The last one instructed you to duck,” God reminded me.

  Sighing, I reached in and pulled out seven tiles. I put them on my leg in alphabetical order. E F G I N R S

  Armani and I stared at the combination of letters for a long moment.

  “Refs grin,” she translated.

  “That would take two Rs,” I pointed out.

  She shrugged. “Well, what do you see?”

  I stared at the letters for a long time. “Iron rings,” I told her proudly.

  “You can’t spell iron with an E,” she pointed out.

  “No,” I said. “But if you put it in this order.” I moved the letters around so that they said FE RINGS. “And you know that Fe stands for iron, iron rings makes sense.”

  She sat back in her chair and considered that thoughtfully. “Do you mean, like, shackles?”

  “Uh oh,” God muttered.

  I shook my head. “I certainly hope not.”

  “Maybe we should consider bringing shackles into The Corset,” Armani mused.

  “No,” I told her. “Don’t consider bringing shackles into The Corset.” Aunt Loretta’s lingerie shop had enough weird things there. It didn’t need medieval torture devices, too.

  Armani snapped the fingers of her good hand. “Surfing!” she crowed victoriously.

  “Surfing is spelled with a U,” I told her.

  “Maybe she means your indentured service to Ms. Whitehat,” God murmured.

  I grimaced, realizing that I was, in many ways, a servant of Ms. Whitehat.

  “That’s it, isn’t it?” Armani pumped her fist in victory.

  “It could be,” I replied carefully. I didn’t want to consider what that might mean. My cell phone buzzed, saving me from getting into a deeper conversation with her on the topic. Glancing at it, I saw a string of olive emojis. I smirked, realizing that only Patrick would send me that kind of message. “I have to go out,” I told Armani.

  She made a shooing motion at me. “Go, go. I have to convene with the spirits.”

  “What are you convening about?” I asked curiously as I got to my feet.

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “But they seem restless.”

  I nodded like that made sense. In all honesty, it made no less sense than most other things that go on in my life.

  “I won’t be gone too long,” I told her.

  “Will you be here for dinner?” she asked.

  I shrugged.

  “Susan won’t like that,” she warned. “She doesn’t like it when anybody misses dinner.”

  “And yet, we’re all adults, and are in control of our own schedules,” I told her sarcastically.

  She shrugged. “I don’t make the crazy woman’s rules.”

  Chuckling, I got into my car.

  “Where are we going?” God asked.

  “Patrick needs to talk.”

  “You mean, he needs to ask something of you. Maybe it’s him you’re indentured to.”

  I drove up the driveway and turned onto the road. Patrick was waiting in his vehicle just a few yards down. He waved for me to follow him. We parked in the lot of an empty breakfast-only restaurant, and he hopped into my car.

  “Hey, Mags.”

  “What’s up?”

  “I want to show you Brody,” he said. “Since I know where he is now.”

  Nodding, I let him direct me across town.

  “What is it that you’re worried that he’s up to?” I asked as I drove.

  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’m just worried that whatever it is could get me in a lot of trouble.”

  I glanced over at him. “With the police?”

  He shrugged. “There are a lot of people I could be in trouble with.”

  We rode the rest of the drive over to the local baseball field in silence.

  “He’s the thi
rd base coach,” Patrick said, slumping down in his seat so that he would be as unnoticeable as possible once we’d parked.

  I stared at the man in front of me, manning the third base line. He had a crew cut, a hawkish nose, and an intense demeanor. I would have nailed him as a cop even if Patrick hadn’t told me.

  “Do you want me to tail him from here?” I asked.

  “No,” Patrick said. “I just wanted you to see him.”

  “You could have given me his photograph for that,” I told him.

  “But I want you to see his car, also,” Patrick said. “Drive around to the other end of the lot.”

  At the other end of the lot, there was just one vehicle, parked by itself.

  “That’s what you want me to tail?” I asked, taking in the pickup truck painted with flames of fire.

  Patrick said, “Subtle, isn’t it?”

  “Again,” I said to him, “you could have just showed me a picture. It’s not like it blends in.”

  “But there was one more thing I wanted you to see,” Patrick said.

  I turned and squinted at him suspiciously. Something in his voice had put me on edge. “What?”

  “Be calm,” Patrick urged.

  My blood pressure shot up. “Don’t tell me to be calm,” I told him, as anxiety ratcheted up within me, making every one of my muscles tighten. “Just tell me.”

  Instead of telling me, he just pointed. I followed the line of sight that he was indicating and gasped.

  9

  I made it back for dinner, keeping Aunt Susan appeased, but I didn’t really pay attention to most of the conversation around the table. I was too busy worrying about the fact that Patrick had pointed out that Kristen, Ian’s girlfriend, had been at the baseball game.

  He hadn’t known what their relationship was, but he’d been right to tell me about it. I was definitely going to have to do some digging during my dinner with them the following night.

  “Margaret!” Aunt Susan said sharply, cutting into my thoughts just as I was slicing up a piece of pot roast for Katie.

  “Yeah?” I asked, glancing up at her.

  “We don’t use ‘yeah’ at the dinner table,” she huffed.

  “Sorry,” I muttered. “Did you want something, or were you just finding a new way to pick on me?”

  “Margaret!” she gasped, appalled at my attitude.

  Griswald, sitting beside her, put down his fork and knife and considered me carefully.

  I shook my head. “I’m sorry,” I said, putting Katie’s plate back in front of her. “My mind was somewhere else. What was it you wanted?”

  “Canapés or crudités?” Susan asked.

  “Excuse me?”

  “For Lawrence’s party,” she said huffily. “Weren’t you paying attention?”

  “Not in the slightest,” I admitted.

  Across the table from me, my sister Marlene tittered under her breath.

  “We’re trying to decide what to start Lawrence’s party with?” Susan explained, her voice strained with exasperation.

  “Fireworks?” I suggested. A hush fell over the table.

  Susan glared at me.

  “Or maybe a marching band?” Aunt Leslie suggested. I shot her a grateful look and she winked back at me.

  “Or a parade?” Griswald said, playing along with the game.

  “With an elephant?” Katie asked excitedly. “I want an elephant.”

  Aunt Susan seemed to grow angrier at each option that was offered. “Am I the only one taking this seriously?”

  “Yes,” Griswald, Leslie, and I said simultaneously.

  “Well, I…” Outraged, she jumped up from her seat and stalked out of the room.

  “Sorry,” I apologized to Griswald. After all, it was his big event that I hadn’t been taking seriously.

  He shrugged. “Don’t be. She’s acting like this party is going to be the event of the century.”

  “That’s because she didn’t get a wedding,” Aunt Loretta said.

  All eyes turned toward her. She was listlessly moving her fork around her plate, not actually picking anything up, just redecorating. Realizing everyone was staring at her, she glanced up and then sighed heavily. “You deprived her of a wedding, Lawrence.”

  “I did not,” Griswald countered quickly.

  “No dress, no cake, no dancing.” Loretta shook her head. “A woman waits her entire life to get married and you whisk her off for a quickie with the Justice of the Peace.”

  “That was her idea,” Griswald said defensively.

  Aunt Leslie began to giggle. She tried to hide it behind her napkin but we could all see she was losing it.

  “It’s not funny,” her twin rebuked sharply.

  “I’m sorry,” Leslie gasped at Loretta. “But the image of Susan having a quickie with the Justice of the Peace…” She dissolved into a fit of full-blown laughter.

  The rest of the adults smirked and struggled to control themselves. Even Griswald.

  “So is there going to be an elephant?” Katie piped up innocently.

  “Or a monkey,” her cousin Alicia suggested. “Monkeys are cute.”

  Katie gave me a knowing look. “Or gorillas.”

  I nodded, smiling weakly at her. I’d asked her to say hello to the gorillas at the zoo the last time she’d been there, and I still wasn’t sure whether or not she’d actually had a conversation with them.

  We finished the rest of dinner, joking and laughing. Aunt Susan never returned to the table.

  After I had helped Templeton clear the mess on the table, he said, “I’ve got this. You look tired.”

  I nodded. “I’ve got a busy day tomorrow.”

  “Then turn in,” he suggested. “Just close your door and shut the rest of the world out for a little while.”

  I gave him an impulsive hug. “Thank you.”

  “You deserve a break, Maggie,” he murmured back with a loving squeeze.

  I’d almost made it back to my room when Aunt Susan cornered me. “If you don’t want to come to the party, you don’t have to.”

  “Oh,” I said, rolling my eyes. “But I already bought a dress.”

  “I don’t know why you’re so hostile about the whole thing,” she muttered.

  “And I don’t know why you’re on my back about everything,” I snapped back.

  “Separate corners, ladies,” Griswald said, walking down the hallway and interrupting our sparring.

  “Good night,” I said, slipping into my room and closing the door firmly behind me. I would have flopped on my bed, but DeeDee, Piss, and Matilda were already covering the mattress. “Move over,” I told them all.

  With a lot of grunting and groaning, they managed to make enough space for me. “Mood bad Maggie?” DeeDee panted worriedly.

  “Yes,” I replied. I stared up at the ceiling, trying to get my temper under control.

  “What’s wrong, Sugar?” Piss purred, kneading my shoulder with her paws.

  “I’m worried about Ian,” I admitted.

  “But you’re going for dinner there tomorrow,” God reminded me.

  “And I’m going to need some help while I’m there,” I told them.

  “Help! Help! Help!” Benny squeaked from his box.

  “What do you need?” Piss asked.

  “I need to figure out what Kristen is up to,” I told them.

  “We’ll try,” God pledged.

  “And I need somebody to come with me to the funeral.”

  “Died who?” DeeDee whined, covering her snout with her paws.

  “Nobody we know,” I assured her. I glanced at the one-eyed cat beside me. “Do you think you’re up for it?”

  “Sure, Sugar,” Piss meowed. “Just tell me what you need me to do.”

  “I don’t know yet,” I admitted. “All I know is that we have to help Griswald.”

  10

  Templeton let out a low whistle when I walked into the kitchen the next morning dressed for the funeral. He ran his gaze
up and down the little black dress I’d borrowed and the green heels that Katie had insisted I buy, and gave me an enthusiastic thumbs up. “Not that I mind,” he said with an easy smile as he handed me a cup of coffee, “but don’t you think you’re a little overdressed for breakfast?”

  “I have to go out,” I told him.

  He wisely chose not to ask me where I was going in my out-of-character get up.

  Aunt Susan didn’t have the same wisdom. She burst into the kitchen, took one look at me, and said, “Tell me you have a job interview.”

  “I do,” I admitted. It really wasn’t a lie. Ms. Whitehat had set one up for me for the dentist she wanted me to scope out.

  “You’re overdressed,” she told me.

  “Well, isn’t that better than being underdressed?” I shot back.

  “Not this again,” Griswald said. “Leave Maggie alone, darling.”

  Susan opened her mouth as though she was going to protest, then snapped it shut and stamped out of the room.

  Chuckling, Templeton grabbed a piece of bread and said, “I’m going to go feed the crow.”

  While he was outside, Griswald said, “Look at your phone. I sent you something.”

  I looked at my phone and realized he’d sent me the photographs of three men. One labeled Stephens, tall and lanky with white hair, the second Martinson, short and intense, and the third, Cheever, sported a beer gut and a sullen attitude.

  “Who are they?” I asked, even though I was pretty sure they were his main suspects.

  “They’re all retired U.S. Marshals,” he said. “And they were all working the same case as Gabriel and I.”

  “You haven’t told me what that case was,” I reminded him, sipping my coffee.

  “A judge was killed by a bomb,” he said.

  “You don’t do well with bombs,” an alarmed God reminded me.

  Griswald squinted at my squeaking chest, shook his head, and looked away.

  “What kind of bomb?” I asked, since I didn’t know what else to say.

  “One that was left in his chambers,” Griswald explained. “And the only way someone could have done that is if they had access to the area. And that was my team, the judge, and his secretary, who was also killed in the blast.”