My Bad Grandad

by A W Hartoin

  “I know. What’d you want?” he grumbled, but it wasn’t genuine. I could tell when I really pissed him off and I hadn’t.

  “Are you at a party?” I asked, thinking I had to be wrong. Uncle Morty didn’t go to Mom’s parties and he practically worshipped her.

  “Somebody’s getting engaged to somebody and I’m here. Goddammit.”

  That had to sink in. An engagement party and he went. “Are you one of the somebodies?” I had every faith that Mrs. Papadakis could get Nikki engaged to Uncle Morty. Why she would want to was a mystery. He wasn’t husband material. He was barely uncle material.

  “Hell, no, I ain’t engaged. You get hit in the head?”

  “So Mom told you what happened?”

  “Of course, she told me and I told your dad,” he growled.

  “Why didn’t she tell him?”

  “‘Cause he’d yell that she didn’t go to Sturgis herself.”

  “Did he?”

  “Hell, yeah.”

  I leaned on the hall handrail. “Grandad would’ve still gotten slashed.”

  “You go on thinking that, Typhoid Mary.”

  “Hey, that’s not fair. I don’t go around spreading disease.”

  “Where you go, shit happens,” he said, thoroughly enjoying himself.

  “Things happen where I’m not. Look at the news,” I said and gave a finger wave to a passing cleaning lady.

  “I guarantee that if Carolina had gone, Ace would’ve had the most boring time of his life, but she didn’t, you did, and he’s in the hospital.”

  “That’s not my fault.” I heard him scratching the bristly overgrown hairs on his chin, thinking. That was never good for me. “You know we should send you over to a certain political camp.”

  “What are you going on about?”

  “There’s a politician that could use a little you in the neighborhood.”

  “Now I know you’re crazy. I don’t kill people,” I said.

  “Not directly. I say we put you in the room and let nature take its course. There’s a safe out there just waiting to be dropped.”

  “Whatever. Can we be realistic?”

  “I’m always realistic. Who’s paying, you or Ace?”

  “There’s a difference?”

  “He gets the veteran’s discount.”

  “Then Grandad’s paying.”

  He guffawed. “You’re a crap liar. You know my rates. What do you want?”

  I asked for everything he could find on Grandad’s war, his friends, etc…

  “Got it.”

  “How is that possible?”

  With Uncle Morty, anything was possible. He was a best-selling fantasy writer. Sometimes, he wrote under other names in other genres, usually non-fiction. He thought Grandad might be an interesting story, Silver Star and the whole hero angle. Grandad wouldn’t cooperate and Morty got nosy, using his hacking skills to root around Grandad’s war record.

  “I’ll send you what I got, but it ain’t that much,” he said.

  “Something happened back then.”

  “A hell of a lot of things happened.”

  I groaned. “Anything weird? Anything they were mixed up in?”

  “Well…there was some brouhaha about personal effects of dead soldiers being stolen before they were shipped back to the states.”

  “Oh yeah. Who in the world did that?”

  “Never caught anyone and Ace is a real hero. I didn’t find anything that would make him a target.”

  “That’s fine, because he wasn’t the target.” I explained what happened with the stabbing and that got his wheels turning.

  “I’ll send you everything I got on the friends, too. I was looking into a Band of Brothers type deal. They were all remarkable, but not interested in being interviewed any more than Ace.”

  “Why? Don’t people like that kind of thing? You’ve got connections. It could be big.”

  “Hold on. They’re breaking out the damn ouzo.” It got quiet on Uncle Morty’s end. “Holy shit, these people can drink.”

  “They’re your kind of folks,” I said with a laugh.

  “I like the schnapps.”

  “Especially when it comes out of Dad’s cabinet.”

  “Yeah, yeah. You wanna hear this or not?” he grumped.

  “Hit me.”

  Not much of a hit. Our guys each served multiple tours and won multiple medals. Grandad’s crash happened at the end of his first tour. He and Big Mike had severe burns and were sent back to the States, where Grandad, freshly divorced from Dr. Watts, met and married my grandmother, Janine, almost immediately. He went back to Vietnam and my father was born while he was gone. Hal, Robert, and Barney’s dad, Calvin, were part of Big Mike’s platoon. That’s how Grandad met them. I asked about Steve of Steve and Jeanette, but there were several Steves in the record. He could’ve been a pilot, part of Big Mike’s platoon or from somewhere else entirely. I had to get the last name.

  Our guys were all based out of the same camp, but weren’t always in the same operations. There were battles and narrow escapes. Uncle Morty mentioned several friends that died, pilots and ground troops. I didn’t recognize the names or the battles. I wasn’t exactly a war buff.

  “What about Big Mike? Wasn’t he captured?” I asked.

  “Don’t get your panties in a twist,” said Uncle Morty. “I’m getting to that.”

  “Well, get to it. They’re gonna wonder where I am.”

  Big Mike’s platoon was involved in some operation that went wrong. He and several others from the platoon were caught behind enemy lines and captured. The record was spotty on the subject and no blame was laid on anyone. That was during his third tour, which would’ve been grandad’s second. Big Mike was a POW for seven months before he escaped. Uncle Morty could hardly stand it. He wanted to tell Big Mike’s story so bad, but he wouldn’t talk about his experience, not one word. I thought it was understandable. He was the sole survivor and in rough shape when he escaped. According to his records, he had malaria, amoebic dysentery, and a badly-healed femur fracture as well as severe eye infections that could’ve resulted in blindness. Uncle Morty said the records noted that he was probably a week or two from death. How he escaped was left a mystery. The record simply said he escaped on foot, end of story. There had to be more to it. Did guys just walk out of the equivalent of a death camp? I doubted it.

  “Maybe this has to do with his escape,” I said. “Somebody might have a problem with it, however it happened.”

  Uncle Morty began typing. “Nobody stabbed Big Mike.”

  “Good point. They knew he’d switched rooms with Hal and they went after Hal.”

  “That don’t mean shit. Raptor was with Mike so, they’d have had to kill her, too. She wasn’t impaired and no easy mark.”

  I went back to the Necessities Room for a cup of coffee. “Yeah, but they could’ve hit Mike today. He was there.”

  “So they hit Robert? Maybe he was more vulnerable, like Hal was,” he said. “We can’t assume anything.”

  “So they could be after the whole group. That’s a scary thought.” I sipped my coffee and peeked around the door to make sure a search party hadn’t been sent out. “Were there any operations that they were all involved in?”

  “They were all in the general area when Ace crashed.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Calvin was injured during the attack when Big Mike was captured. There’s no mention of Hal or Robert that I saw, but they were in the same platoon so it’s safe to assume they were there.”

  “Grandad wasn’t?”

  “I don’t know. He was definitely in country though. I’ll send you some names. You can call some of the guys and see if they’ll talk to you,” said Uncle Morty.

  “I’ve got a better idea,” I said. “Hey, can you get me into a website called the Gold Star Brigade?”

  “I can do anything. Who’re they?”

  I explained about the group at the bar giving our guys the
stink eye. He said he’d get into the site and give me the password. For a price, naturally.

  “Thanks. Can you check and see if Hal was getting threats via email?” I asked.

  “Yeah, yeah. Ah, shit. I gotta go. She’s giving me the look.”

  “Nikki has a look just for you?”

  “Shut the hell up.”

  “Shutting up and thanks for the info,” I said.

  “Don’t thank me. Pay me.”

  “You’re a swell guy.”

  “Damn straight.” Uncle Morty hung up and Aaron’s phone immediately rang. It was Chuck, saying that he thought he should come up. I had another circular conversation about how I didn’t need him, but he still thought I did. Big Mike ambled in, trying to look like he wasn’t suspicious and failing miserably.

  I held up the phone. “Would you mind telling my boyfriend that I don’t need his help? I can sit in a hospital without his unfailing support.”

  Big Mike surprised me by taking the phone. It’s a good thing Chuck was actually on the line and chatty. They were old friends in fifteen seconds and thankfully decided that I didn’t need a back-up quite yet.

  “Good man,” said Big Mike, hanging up and giving me the phone.

  “I like him, but he goes a little bit overboard sometimes.”

  “Ace says he’s generous.”

  “I currently own four coffee makers and three appliances that I don’t even know what they do,” I said.

  He laughed and guided me out of the Necessities Room and back to the waiting room. My better idea would have to wait.

  Chapter Sixteen

  GRANDAD WANTED ME to spend the night on the convertible chair in his room, but I had things to do. I suspect he knew that and was trying to keep me with him so I couldn’t do them. He said we could play Hearts like we did when I was little. This wasn’t a tempting offer. My memories of playing Hearts included my cousins, Weepy, Snot, and Spoiled Rotten. Our games inevitably ended with Weepy crying—imagine that—Snot winning, and Spoiled Rotten throwing her cards, enraged that Snot won. Pass on the Hearts.

  I couldn’t say what I was really up to, so I said I had to get the BMW from The Stone House though it took me out of my way considerably. Big Mike agreed to take me and Aaron insisted on following on the Flea. I was going to sneak out and call an Uber, but Big Mike had taken to shadowing me pretty hard.

  No Panty Wednesday was winding down at nine that night, although more raucous and with fewer panties than before. The crowd was a quarter of what it’d been and still not anything like what I’d imagined when we first drove up that afternoon. No panties, but no debauchery either. All in good fun. I’d seen worse on Bourbon Street during Spring Break.

  The sun barely peeked over the rolling hills and The Stone House was cast in a rosy glow. It was beautiful, but it reminded me of the blood that had been spilled earlier. Apparently, the party spot was a daytime-only event because there were few lights and only some old-fashioned lanterns hanging from poles.

  Most of the remaining crowd headed out into the parking lot, where a odd bluish glow lit up the evening. A cruiser and a crime scene unit were parked next to the spot where Robert fell. They had two portable light units pointed at the ground, but there was no activity. A couple of guys rolled up cords and tore down the crime scene tape surrounding the area.

  Big Mike drove past the spot to Grandad’s bike, like that was going to stop me from going back to talk to them. I hopped off the back of his bike and said, “Be right back.”

  “Wait,” he said. “Where are you going?”

  “To talk to Bennett and Trevino.”

  “Don’t bug them, Mercy. They’ve got a job to do.”

  I cinched up my scrub pants and took off my borrowed helmet. “So do I. You all expected me to look into Hal’s murder, so I will.”

  “Hal, not Robert,” he said. “Have you got the keys for the BMW? Let’s go. We have to change and get back to the hospital.”

  I handed him the helmet. “Go ahead. I’m not stopping you. See you later.”

  “But Hal has nothing to do with Robert’s stabbing.” He patted the handlebar of the BMW. “Come on. Let’s go.”

  “You are so full of it. You know, I wasn’t going to work on Hal’s case because you were being such a pain, but now my grandad’s in the hospital. It’s on and you’re pissing me off.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.” Big Mike gripped his handlebars hard and the muscles under his ropey scars and tattoos bunched up.

  “Oh, right. This has nothing to do with Vietnam or you or anybody we saw last night.”

  “That’s right,” he said stoutly.

  I rolled my eyes. “You are such a bad liar. I’m going to figure this out because I don’t get it. You all love each other, but Hal gets murdered and you don’t give a crap about that.”

  He stood up and dismounted, stalking up to me. I guess I was supposed to be intimidated. Big Mike could eat me for lunch and most men, for that matter, but I didn’t budge. I’d like to say I was tough, but I was really momentarily paralyzed with fear. I snapped out of it with a burst of anger. “Go ahead. Hit me!”

  Big Mike towered over me with a finger the size of a bratwurst stuck in my face. It was his turn to freeze. Even in the dim light I could see the hurt pass over his rough features.

  Trevino ran over with his hand on his holster. “What’s going on over here?”

  “Big Mike is trying to intimidate me,” I said.

  He dropped his hand and took a step back. “You think I would hurt you, Ace’s granddaughter? Is that what you think?”

  “I think you wanted to intimidate me and that’s nearly as bad.” I didn’t mention that I peed a little.

  “I wasn’t trying to intimidate you. I want you to understand that the cops can do this.”

  Trevino looked at me. His face was in shadow, but I could feel his amusement. “How much do you weigh?” he asked.

  “Two eighty.”

  “End of discussion.”

  “I wasn’t trying to do anything. Mercy is my friend’s granddaughter and she’s not investigating anything,” said Big Mike, purposefully speaking in a soft, soothing voice.

  Whatever, dude. I’m so not done.

  “Earlier, you all wanted me to investigate Hal’s murder and now you don’t? Why’s that?”

  “Robert was stabbed. It’s too dangerous for a beautiful young woman like you,” he said, all proud like he had a good point.

  “So if I was ugly, it’d be okay?” I asked.

  “Of course not.”

  “So beauty has nothing to do with skill.”

  “No, but—”

  “But what?”

  Big Mike took a deep breath and tried another tact. “Ace said you’re not supposed to investigate the stabbing. He doesn’t want you anywhere near this.”

  “A murder’s okay, but attempted murder, not so much?”

  “Your grandfather said no.”

  “I say yes.” My hands went to my hips. “How’re you going to stop me?”

  “Ace orders you not to do it.”

  Trevino and I started laughing. He put a hand on Big Mike’s shoulder. “My friend, you should look up her history. Miss Watts doesn’t follow orders…or common sense, for that matter.”

  “Hey!” I exclaimed.

  “You jumped off a bridge, making yourself a target for a terrorist with an Uzi. I rest my case.”

  “It was a Skorpion and I was saving Angela Riley.”

  “And you have no common sense.”

  “Some people think that was heroic,” I said, my nose in the air.

  “And some people think it was stupid,” said Trevino. “Sir, I have some questions for you.”

  Big Mike started. “What?”

  “Some evidence was uncovered and we’d like you to take a look at it.”

  He swallowed hard. “Am I a suspect?”

  “Everyone is a suspect, except Janet, Mercy, and Raquel. We have multiple witnesses pl
acing them under a table when the stabbing occurred and arriving at the scene when Robert was on the ground.”

  “I wouldn’t stab Robert or Ace,” said Big Mike, his voice oddly shaky.

  Trevino paused for a second. Big Mike’s breathing sped up. The glare of the portable lights shone on his face, highlighting the red that crept up his neck. I didn’t seriously think Big Mike was a suspect and by Trevino’s tone, I didn’t think he did either.

  “Come on over here,” said Trevino. “It won’t take long.”

  Trevino headed for the lit area. I went to follow, but Big Mike didn’t. He was doing controlled breathing. In through the nose and out through the mouth. If I had to guess, I’d say he was trying to stave off a panic attack. He was a POW. Maybe Trevino saying he was a suspect triggered memories of the prison and interrogations.

  “Mike,” I said, “you stay here. I’ll check it out first.”

  He nodded and I dashed over to head off Trevino, who was coming back to insist. “I think we’re on to something with your friend. What’s he doing? I need to get his reaction.”

  “You’ll get it, just give him a minute,” I said.

  “We don’t have a minute. He’s vulnerable now.”

  I grabbed Trevino’s arm. “You don’t really think Mike stabbed Robert, do you? He couldn’t have killed Hal. Raquel was with Mike all night. He was out hard.”

  “I don’t think he did it. But same as you, I think he has an idea who did and I’m going to get it out of him.”

  “He was a POW,” I said. “I think he’s having a panic attack.”

  Trevino pivoted to me. “He’s panicking because I’m going to question him?”

  “Because he was once questioned by people a lot worst than you. Can we leave it for a minute? Show me what you’ve got. He’s not going to run.”

  Trevino pondered that for a second, looking at Big Mike bent over his bike, bracing himself on the seat. “I can do that. But he has to see this.”

  “No problem. What is it?” I asked.

  We walked to the crime scene. Heavy foot traffic had trampled the grass and the mud—which could’ve had prints—was a slushy mess. The blood was gone completely, washed away in the storm. “If you want to show me that you have no evidence, I’m with you.”