The Claudia Hershey Mysteries - Box Set: Three Claudia Hershey Mysteries

by Laura Belgrave

  “Cute kids, Emory.”

  “Yeah.” Carella smiled fondly. “Janice—my wife—she’s going to bring them Saturday to the mother-daughter tournament here. You oughta bring your daughter.”

  Claudia smiled. “Robin’s thirteen. She wouldn’t be caught dead doing anything with kids younger than her.”

  “That’s no problem,” said Carella. “They have two groups. One for eight to twelve; one for thirteen to sixteen. You oughta bring her. She’d have a ball.”

  It was hard to imagine Robin having a ball doing anything with her mother, Claudia thought. The girl wasn’t mouthing off since her confrontation with Claudia. She simply wasn’t saying much at all, and what little she did offer was punctuated by exaggerated sighs.

  Claudia turned back to face the counter. “I don’t know. She’s—”

  “Hey!” The chief’s voice boomed in Claudia’s ear. “This a private party or can anyone with a badge take up space?” Suggs sat heavily on the stool beside Claudia. He twisted a napkin from the dispenser and wiped his brow. “I was on the horn when you two sneaked out, but Officer Randall was good enough to tell me you all were headed here, and that you were buying, Hershey.”

  “Well, I—”

  “Good!” said Suggs. He beckoned to Maura Taylor, the young woman working the grill. “Hey, hon, put on two more dogs, huh? And put ’em on Lieutenant Hershey’s bill.”

  “Actually,” said Suggs, “I followed you over here because I hear tell somethin’s breakin’. That right, Hershey?”

  Surprised at Suggs’ good humor, Claudia briefed him quickly on Donna Overton’s financial statements, letting Carella detail the numbers.

  “Whew. That looks to be somethin’, all right,” said Suggs. He mopped his brow with another napkin. “Goddamn,” he muttered. “Either I gotta lose some weight or I gotta move somewhere where the temperatures don’t go past sixty.” He looked at Claudia. “Where else this thing headin’?”

  “I’ve got to take another look at Tom Markos,” she said. “Moody talked to him this morning, but didn’t get anything more than I did originally. But I think he’s holding back something. Maybe it somehow ties in with the deposits Overton was making.”

  “Worth a look-see,” Suggs said.

  Claudia shrugged. “We’re also still adding names to our list, names of people who visited Overton on a regular visit. It’s a slow process. Anyway, I’ve talked to a few of them, but need to get out to more. Moody and Peters are going to work the list with me.”

  “Yeah, and the sooner the better,” said Suggs. “I took half a dozen calls between yesterday afternoon and today. Psychics givin’ us tips. And I gotta tell ya—I ain’t too impressed. There’s nothin’ consistent in what they say.”

  “Peters says he caught a couple of calls like that, too,” said Carella.

  “Hershey,” said Suggs, “you gotta start talkin’ to the press, too. That business outside the station yesterday, well, I don’t have to tell you how agitated that made the Channel 3 guy.”

  “Morley’s a dunce,” Claudia said. She frowned, recalling the episode from the evening before. “He’s fishing.”

  “I know. It’s that whole business about it bein’ a dead psychic—”

  “Medium,” said Carella. “Psychics just get hunches. Mediums, they talk to the, uh, spirit world. They—”

  “Yeah, well, whatever,” said Suggs. “Point is, the guy’s leanin’ on us. And we got a call from The Miami Herald, too. You saw the first story they printed. Didn’t have much. But I think this guy’s gonna drive on over here in person pretty soon if we don’t shut him up with somethin’ fast.”

  “All right,” said Claudia. “I’ll call him when we get back. I’ll give him something, but it can’t be much.” She shook her head and took a swallow of Diet Pepsi. “The last thing we need is to let the killer know what we know about him. Not that we know much yet.”

  Their chili dogs arrived and they let talk slide while they ate. Claudia felt buoyed by what Carella had learned. They didn’t know the killer. But they knew a little, maybe, about why someone would want Donna Overton dead. Money was a popular component of a lot of murders.

  “You know, Hershey, whilst we’re busy chasing down the scum that whacked Overton a lot of other things are startin’ to slide.” Suggs took a swipe at his chin.

  Unbelievable! “Well, for God’s sake, murder takes a priority,” said Claudia. “The rest has to go on the back burner.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah, don’t get your underwear in an uproar. Believe it or not, I’m not raggin’ on you. And I’m not gonna pull anybody off the murder.” Suggs snorted. “Give me some credit. But there’s one thing I want you to have a look-see at anyway—”

  Suggs held up a hand when Claudia began to protest. “Just hear me out. What we have is a kid, girl ’bout fifteen, maybe sixteen, who overdosed this past weekend on some heavy-duty drug. I’m not sure what, but I understand she was mainlining. Now maybe that’s everyday stuff in Miami, but other than poppin’ kids for an occasional joint, the heavy shit just don’t happen in Indian Run. Or at least this is the first I’ve heard of a kid goin’ over the edge. Anyway, the kid spent a couple days in the hospital but she’s back home now. I want you to talk to her.”

  “I can think of three or four officers who could probably handle—”

  “No. I want you, Hershey. Number one, you’re the bona fide detective here. I wanna know where in hell the kid got her hands on the stuff. Someone’s routin’ that crap through my community. Number two, you got a daughter close to that age. And like you, the kid’s got only her mom, so my thinkin’ is you’ll probably connect with the kid better’n anyone else—”

  “Don’t assume that,” said Claudia.

  “Number three, I want you to do it, so do it.”

  Carella studiously cleaned his glasses.

  Suggs squinted at Claudia. “I mean, you did handle drug cases up there in Cleveland, too, didn’t you? You didn’t have your nose in a homicide every minute of every day.”

  Claudia glowered at Suggs. Oh, yes. She’d handled drug cases. Too many. Drugs were just another form of murder. “They weren’t my specialty,” she told the chief reluctantly, “but yes, I handled them.”

  “Good.” Suggs downed the last of an iced tea. “Ah, that cooled me off some.” He pushed his weight off the stool. “Just give it a whirl, all right? Talk to the girl. Give it fifteen, twenty minutes. That’s all. If you don’t get nothin’, we’ll come back to it later.”

  “All right,” said Claudia with a sigh. She felt the first bit of fatigue settling in around her shoulders. “You have the particulars with you?”

  “On my desk. I’ll give ’em to you when we get back. Oh. And leave the girl here a nice tip, huh? Cops got a bad rep for not payin’ their own way.”

  As they were leaving, Claudia took a look at the bowlers. She watched a man pick up a 7-10 split. The guy with him gave him a thumb’s up.

  Well, hell. Why not? Claudia took another five minutes to sign herself and Robin up for Saturday’s mother-daughter tournament.

  Chapter 9

  High heels were out. So was anything slinky or lacy, not that Claudia owned anything like that to begin with. Her style leaned toward non-style, which meant her closet held precious little beyond the jackets she favored, slacks, unadorned blouses, and a couple of sturdy sweaters.

  Once, Claudia had overheard herself described by Robin to a friend. It was about three months after their move from Cleveland. Her daughter was lying on the floor, legs stretched up to the couch, and she was twisting knots into the telephone cord. The knots drove Claudia wild.

  “She’s no fashion plate,” Robin had complained. “She always wears the same things, and her wrists show when they hang out of her jackets. She looks like a stork.”

  Claudia would’ve paid to hear what the friend said to that because a moment later Robin laughed delightedly. “Yeah. She’s got a rep for being tough on the streets. I think she
flosses her teeth with razor blades.”

  Kids could wound.

  After poking around the closet for five minutes, Claudia finally settled on conservative gray slacks, a white blouse, and a rust-colored jacket trimmed in navy. She would have preferred the black jacket, but it still lay rumpled in the back seat of her car where she’d tossed it after the wet lake ride with Tom Markos. Probably smelled of mildew by now.

  Well, for better or worse, this was it. Claudia squared off with a mirror and inspected herself. Jeeze. She looked like she was dressed for work, but never mind. At least her wrists didn’t show and anyway, she was too far along in life to make herself over for anyone.

  Of course, this whole business of going out on a date was ridiculous to begin with. For one thing, Claudia was out of the loop. For another, she was five days into a murder investigation. If she was going to devote her energy to anything but that, she should devote it to her daughter.

  Claudia pulled a brush through her hair, wincing at a tangle. She glared at herself in the mirror, then conceded a tiny smudge of lipstick.

  A date, for heaven’s sake. Where was her head?

  * * *

  Scoggin’s restaurant handled absurdly large crowds on weekends, partly because the menu was reasonably inexpensive and the food not bad, but mostly because other than the bowling alley, a few greasy spoons, and the Denny’s on the edge of town, Indian Run didn’t have much in the way of eateries. But it was Wednesday night and when Claudia pulled into the parking lot there was only a handful of cars, for which she was grateful. Her plan was to get in and get out fast. Dinner and done. She didn’t know how she’d been sucked in by that silly cartoon.

  Dennis Heath stood at the entrance to Scoggin’s. He showed Claudia a wide smile and said by way of greeting, “You walk fast. I don’t get through the drive-in window of McDonald’s that quickly.”

  Claudia smiled and shrugged self-consciously, aware that she felt self-conscious. “I practiced strolling once, but it made me feel like I was on drugs.” She shrugged again. “Just doesn’t come naturally to me, I guess.”

  The door was double wide and built of sturdy mahogany. Dennis eased it open and waited for Claudia to go ahead of him. He didn’t try to hold her elbow or put a hand at the middle of her back. She liked that about him.

  They sat at a round table by a window that looked out onto a modest garden with a winding walkway. A cluster of queen palms and a few cypress trees with gnarled roots were backlit by spotlights. Someone had planted hibiscus and other hardy plants that stood up to the cold. Here and there, a few concrete benches beckoned.

  “I always ask for this seat,” said Dennis. “When I look out there I’m reminded of one of those little plastic globes with a village inside. You know, the sort of thing you can turn upside down and shake snow onto.”

  Personally, Claudia didn’t see it. But maybe she’d been in Florida longer than Dennis. She asked him.

  “I’ve been here five months,” he said. “I came down here originally to settle my aunt’s affairs—she died and left a house just outside Feather Ridge—but once I took a look around I decided to stay. I figured I could work here just as easily as Chicago and without those freezing winds and ice.”

  “What is it that you do?” Claudia asked politely. The conversation was going to be one of those ‘let’s get to know each other’ deals.

  “I sell eggs.”

  She almost believed him, but then he laughed and said, “No, actually, I draw for a living. Freelance, mostly.”

  “I should’ve guessed,” said Claudia, chuckling. “Your cartoon was terrific. Me, I couldn’t color in the lines when I was a kid and I can’t draw a straight line now.”

  A waiter in shiny black pants, a white shirt, and black bow tie appeared to take their drink orders. After some debate, Claudia asked for a glass of burgundy. Dennis ordered a Scotch, neat. They settled back into conversation.

  Dennis did more than draw. Using a variety of art mediums, he freelanced for a greeting card company—everything from schlocky sentimentals to studio cards—occasionally did magazine and book covers, and now and then managed a cartoon sale to The New Yorker. But his belated passion, he explained, was breaking into comic books.

  “There’s a pretty good lock on the market and the competition is unbelievable,” Dennis explained, “but if I can develop a new character—something that’ll appeal to the young teen set—I might be able to get a bite for myself. I’m toying with some sketches now.”

  “Maybe you’d like to talk to my daughter sometime,” said Claudia. “Robin’s thirteen. She’s a walking encyclopedia on what’s in and what’s out.”

  “Sounds like an invitation,” said Dennis.

  “Could be,” Claudia replied. Where was this coming from?

  The waiter set their drinks on the table and took their food orders. Before Claudia could think of what she was saying, she told Dennis that she’d love to see his work. And then she told him about opening his package in the office, which seemed to lead directly into an exchange of histories.

  Just like that, she mused. She had waltzed herself right into the standard dating game gambits. Worse, she couldn’t seem to shut up. Their meals came—blackened grouper for him, prime rib for her—and she hardly noticed. She gorged on conversation as if it were a delicacy she might never have again.

  He’d been married for four years, this Dennis Heath, freelance artist with just the slightest paunch and hair that went every which way. No kids, no regrets, no real needs beyond a beer in the refrigerator and a comic book character that would spin the world on its axis.

  How wonderfully uncomplicated. How refreshingly everyday. Listening to him, telling him about herself, Claudia didn’t feel like a cop and she didn’t feel like a mother. She certainly didn’t feel like someone who flossed with razor blades. Murder was just a fuzzy concept, and she was grateful that he never brought it up.

  After dinner, Dennis ordered fresh drinks. Claudia planned to protest, but she didn’t. Nor did she protest when he touched her hand and suggested a stroll in the garden.

  “You forget, Mr. Heath, that I don’t stroll,” said Claudia as they walked to the garden door.

  “Could be a problem,” said Dennis. He laced his fingers through hers. “I walk with the speed of mollusk.”

  The early November air was cool and the concrete benches like ice, but after a few rounds of the garden Claudia and Dennis sat. They grinned at each other stupidly.

  “This feels like high school,” said Claudia.

  “If it were, well, I guess I’d just about be getting to the part where I put my arm around the girl. Like this.”

  Claudia felt Dennis’ arm close around her shoulder. “That’s about how I remember it,” she said softly. “And I think it’s my cue to do this.” She snuggled against him, liking his warmth.

  A minute passed, maybe more. Insects did their night dances, sending out a spiral of sound. A breeze rustled the tree leaves.

  “You wear braces?” Dennis asked.

  Claudia chuckled. “Not for a very long time. Do you?”

  “No.”

  “Should I be relieved?”

  “Yes, absolutely. No danger of getting stuck together. Mom and Dad’ll never have to know.”

  They kissed, a little like high school. And then they kissed a little like grown-ups.

  Only later, when Claudia was driving home, did it occur to her that they sat there necking in front of the garden window where anyone could see.

  Chapter 10

  Periwinkles in rainbow colors graced the short winding path to the home of Mary and Benjamin Curtell. The flowers provided the only colorful note to an otherwise increasingly gray day. The morning had abruptly turned to chill, teased by gusty winds that bore in from the north.

  Claudia shuddered a little and paused outside her car to button her jacket. She hadn’t grown accustomed to the weather swings that tickled Florida in the winter.

  A woman fiddlin
g with the flowers looked up as Claudia approached. She smiled quizzically and stood, brushing her hands together to shake off some of the soil.

  “Hi,” she said. “Can I help you?”

  Claudia automatically took measure of the woman: short and slight, shoulder-length raven hair with a dramatic silver tangle at her forehead, dark eyes under thick brows, delicate features, and skin so white and clear that it looked porcelain. The juxtaposition between light and dark, heavy and delicate was startling. Claudia put the woman’s age at thirty, idly wondering whether the woman’s moods mirrored the contrasts in her appearance.

  With a perfunctory smile, Claudia introduced herself. The woman in turn gave her name as Marty Eckelstrom.

  “I’m investigating the murder of Donna Overton,” said Claudia. “I was told that Mary Curtell was friendly with her. This is her residence, isn’t it?”

  “It is, but I’m afraid she’s out just now. She and her husband are grocery shopping.” Marty glanced at an oversized watch on her wrist. “They should be home any minute if you’d like to wait.”

  “All right.”

  “Come on in,” said Marty. “I’ll throw on a pot of coffee. No offense, but you look like you could stand some.” Marty smiled sheepishly. “Sorry. I have a bad habit of saying the first thing that pops into my brain. A family trait.”

  Without comment, Claudia followed the woman to the door. It was two doors down from Donna Overton’s and was similarly small and unpretentious. “Are you Mrs. Curtell’s daughter?” she asked.

  “No. She’s my aunt, my mother’s sister. My home is in California, but I’m staying here for the winter, working on my Ph.D.”

  “Oh yeah? What in?”

  “Cultural anthropology.”

  Once in the kitchen, Marty gestured for Claudia to pull up a chair at the table.

  “Doesn’t seem a likely place for academic pursuits,” Claudia observed. She watched Marty wash her hands, then wrestle a coffee filter free from a new box. “The only place of higher learning here is the Indian Run Junior College and frankly, I think the public library in town is bigger than what the college offers.”