“Please, Mom. Becky’s only gonna be there tonight then she has to go back to school.”
Megan sighed and got up from the table. “You’ll need gas. I suppose I’ll have to let you use my credit card.”
After Kevin and Taylor left, we spent the rest of the day catching up. Meg wanted to know why I hadn’t tried harder to keep my marriage together. She and Natalie had been good friends at one time, and they still kept in touch. I learned more about how Allison, my daughter, was getting by in a few hours than I had since the divorce. From there, we talked about our parents. She didn’t want to discuss what would happen to our mother once Father passed. She acted like as long as we didn’t broach the subject he would never die. Eventually, we got back to Mike and the coins. By that time, we all had too much to drink, and we called it a night.
Unlike Fred, who fell asleep at the foot of our hide-a-bed in Mike’s office, sleep eluded me. Mike’s computer was sitting on his desk at the end of the bed, staring at me with its Cyclops eyeball. I had thought CRT monitors were extinct. I wondered if his computer was a relic as well. “Could I be that lucky,” I said to Fred, who woke from his slumber at the mention of his name, then laid back down just as quickly.
I knew I’d never rest unless I checked out Mike’s computer, so I got up and went over to his desk. His computer was turned on its side with the monitor on top. It was running a version of Windows almost as old as the one-eyed monster it resembled. I simply booted it in Safe mode and logged into the Administrator account and changed his password. I was so engrossed in my hacking, I failed to notice Megan.
“I was getting a nightcap when I heard talking,” she said, standing outside the open door. I could feel the blood drain from my face. I felt like I’d been caught watching porn. “I thought you might have been talking to Kevin. I need to get my card back before he uses it for more than gas. Is he home?”
Fred was wide awake by now and thumping his tail on the bedcovers. Either he was happy to see Megan or thought the spread needed an old-fashioned cleaning. “Some watchdog you turned out to be,” I said to him. Then turning to my sister, I said, “No. I was talking to Fred. It beats talking to myself when I’m thinking out loud.”
Megan came into the room and took a seat next to my fierce guard-dog, so she could see the monitor clearly. She took one look at what I was doing then turned back to me with a look of shock. “You got into Mike’s account?”
“Piece of cake,” I answered while raising my head to adjust my reading glasses. “Good thing he wasn’t one for updating.”
Her initial shock morphed into admiration. It was the look I used to give my father when he would fix my bicycle. “Kevin and me tried for days to get into that computer.”
“It would have been a lot harder if he was current. These older versions of Windows are a hacker’s dream. His email is set up to insert the username and password from a cookie. I’m reading his mail now. Shall we see what he was up to?”
“Born2fish,” she said pointing to the last inbox entry. “I wonder who that is.”
“I can try a reverse email lookup, but don’t hold your breath.”
“You might as well be talking to the wall, Porky,” she said with a frown. “Skip the jargon and get on with it.”
“Sorry. Hey look at this message.” I opened the email from born2fish.
Megan read the message out loud. “I’ll have your money tomorrow. Meet me at my house after six.” She turned away from the monitor and shifted in her chair. “Do you think it’s about the coins?”
“Sounds like it. Check the date.”
“June third. The day before Mike was killed. I told you he was murdered for those coins.”
We spent another hour reading through emails, but didn’t find any more correspondence with born2fish. Megan went to bed shortly after. She had lost interest once I started reading files that only a hacker could understand.
Mike had made several web searches, trying to find the value of the coins. I couldn’t discover any searches with specific dates or mint marks, which left me clueless as to how much they were worth. I too had become bored after a few hours, and I was ready to turn in when I ran across a web page in one of his history files that had the URL of the local newspaper. I copied the link to a browser and waited for it to load. “Damn thing’s slower than you chasing a rabbit, Fred.” Once again, I woke my sentry from his dreams.
Chapter 5
I probably would have slept until noon if not for the smell of fresh brewed coffee. I woke more confused than usual. As I suspected, the link for the local paper was the article about the murdered coin dealer and his wife. Even Fred could see the connection. Mike must have printed it on his defective printer and sent it to me. I really needed coffee if I was ever going to solve that puzzle.
“Good afternoon, sleepy head,” Megan said when Fred and I joined her in the kitchen. She was sitting at a small table. The table rested in an eating nook with a large bay window. “What time did you go to bed? You look terrible.”
“Must have been around two this morning,” I answered while letting Fred out the door leading to her deck. Then I went to the counter and poured myself some coffee. “Wow what a view.” Her kitchen looked out on the lake through a twin of the nook’s. I was tempted to take my coffee out on the deck despite a warning from a thermometer nailed to a post. It read ninety-six with equal humidity. Thank God for air conditioning, I thought.
“So what do we do now? Do you think born2fish is the guy sneaking around in that Bass Tracker?” she asked. I returned to the table and took a seat where I could enjoy the view without going out to the sauna.
I started to turn toward her when I saw a Great Blue Heron land on the deck. Fred had already gone down the stairs and wasn’t around to scare it off. “My thought too,” I answered while watching the bird poop on her railing. “I got nowhere with tracking him down after you went to bed. Not unless you believe Mickey Mouse did it. Oh, and by the way, I found the clipping about the murdered couple. It looks like Mike must have been the one who sent it to me.”
“What? Why would Mike do that?”
“Exactly what I wanted to ask you.”
Meg got up from the table and headed toward the coffee pot. “Maybe I bragged about you too much. I once told him how you always guessed who did it when we used to watch Murder She Wrote when we were kids.” She took her coffee pot from its burner and pushed the off button. “Just enough for two more cups. You want a refill?”
I held up my empty cup, nodding yes. “Why would he want me to solve the murder of a couple of strangers? They are strangers? Aren’t they?”
“Far as I know,” she said, filling my cup. “He never mentioned them to me. But what is this about Mickey Mouse? Sometimes your comments don’t make any sense at all.”
“Nothing I did seemed to work, so I broke down and spent the money on a reverse lookup of born2fish’s email address. It’s registered to Mickey Mouse who lives at 123 Main Street, Disneyland, CA.”
Meg walked back to her kitchen counter with the empty pot. “There must be some way to find him,” she said, looking over her shoulder.
“Of course there is. All you need to do is subpoena the records of the ISP that born2fish sent the email from. Do you have any friends at the FBI?”
She turned toward me looking defeated. “So it’s a dead-end then?”
“Maybe, Meg, it’s time to bring in a professional who has connections.”
Megan turned away from me and placed her coffee pot back in its machine. She had her back to me when she answered, so I couldn’t tell for sure, but it sounded like she was crying. “I don’t have the money to hire a private detective. You’re all I’ve got, Jake. Please, don’t quit now.”
Fred was back at the sliding door wanting in. He must have gone for a swim to cool off; he was dripping wet. “I better go out there with him before he starts scratching at your screen.” His timing was perfect. I never knew how to respond to female emotions. �
��And don’t worry. We’ll find a way to prove Mike didn’t kill himself.”
“Oh, Porky. You’re the best brother in the world,” she said while wiping away a tear. I was out the door before she could ask me how I planned to turn into a male version of Jessica Fletcher.
Fred gave me plenty of time to think while I waited for him to dry off. Ironically, the drier he got the wetter I became. Because of the humidity, I was soaking with perspiration. Fred didn’t have that problem. Dogs don’t sweat, nor do they worry about how to prove an in-law didn’t kill himself.
Once Fred had dried off sufficiently enough to not ruin my sister’s imported hardwood floors, Megan was nowhere in sight, but I could hear her on the phone in Mike’s office. I gave her a wave as I passed, heading for the guest bathroom to take a shower. Fred went to the kitchen where she had put out a water bowl for him. She had had the sense to put it on a large throw rug.
Megan was back in the kitchen when I finished my shower. I could hear her talking to Fred, so I wrapped myself in a bath towel and went back to Mike’s office to change into some dry clothes. I spent the rest of the afternoon on the phone with my insurance company. Contrary to their television ads, getting them to help in a fast and friendly manner was simply BS. They finally agreed to pay twenty-five dollars a day for a rental until the adjuster could estimate the damage to my car.
Next, I searched Truman’s twenty page phone book for a car rental. There wasn’t any, so I tried the Sedalia book. A quick call to the first listing got me a car for only thirty-five dollars a day on a weekly basis. So much for insurance.
Megan and Fred were on the deck when I finished. Fred had his head in her lap getting an ear massage while Meg talked on her phone. She had it on speaker mode – evidently so her hands would be free to work on Fred. “Okay. I’ll see you later then,” she said, then reached over and pushed the off button.
“Was that Kevin?” I asked.
“No. Just an old girlfriend. Kevin never came home last night,” she answered without making eye contact. Her tone sounded worried.
“Is something wrong? Is he okay?”
She quit giving Fred his massage and looked up at me. “Yeah. He’s okay. He left me a text saying he spent the night at Taylor’s house.”
“My damn luck,” I said and sat down. “I was hoping you would give us a ride to Sedalia.”
She sort of tilted her head when she looked at me. Then she must have seen why I was upset. “Oh. You thought we’d have to take the Tempo. Kevin can be considerate you know. They came back to get Taylor’s truck and left my Jeep.”
Twenty minutes later, we were stuck in a traffic jam. At first she hesitated on taking Fred, but relented after he laid down in front of her and given her his sad puppy look. “I haven’t seen traffic like this since they redid I-25,” I said.
“It’s either an accident, or they must be blasting today. I’ll be so glad when they finish with the road work. It seems like it’s been going… What the hell!” She stopped in mid-sentence when we saw the roadblock up ahead and a sign that read ‘Drug Check’.
We were waved on when we approached the checkpoint. We must not have fit the profile of world class drug smugglers. Either that or my fierce guard dog scared them off when he started barking at the drug sniffing German Shepherd one of the cops had tethered to a leash.
It was past noon when we finally go to the rental lot. Having skipped breakfast, I was famished. I could see mine and Fred’s favorite fast-food restaurant across the street. I swear he knew that those golden arches meant lunch; he barked in their direction when I let him out of the Jeep. “Are you hungry, Meg? How about some lunch first? I can get the rental anytime. I’ll buy.”
“Can I have a rain check? I’m meeting an old friend, and we’re going over to Big Lots and then check out the clothes at Goody’s. You know - girl stuff.” She didn’t wait for me to answer and took off going east on Broadway.
“Now, I wonder why your Aunt lied to us, Freddie?” I asked. I didn’t need the eyesight of a canine to see Penny’s a block down the street in the other direction. McDonalds would have to wait. Fred wouldn’t pass as a seeing-eye dog, so I needed a vehicle before I bought us lunch.
The rental agent had no recollection of the thirty-five dollars a day he had quoted me. Maybe he had changed his mind because of Fred. But once I agreed to pay a non-refundable pet deposit and accept an ‘older’ car, his Alzheimer’s vanished, and Fred and I were headed for lunch in a car that would have made Kevin proud. But at least the air conditioner worked.
As it turned out, we didn’t need the air once we left the rental lot. A storm front had come in while we were negotiating with the rental agent, and the temperature had dropped considerably. I drove across the street to McDonald’s and parked under a giant-oak tree, then let Fred out to water it. That’s when I realized I needed to go as well. After putting Fred back into the car with all the windows down, I headed into McDonald’s and straight to the men’s room. I figured it was better than reliving myself at the oak tree, considering someone might object.
I was on my way back to the car with a bag of McDoubles when I passed by a large screen television and happened to catch the tail end of the newscast. I froze in place. The announcer was talking about the recent drug busts around Lake of the Ozarks. A film crew out of Kansas City was reporting on the drug check Meg and I had seen earlier. I sat down at the nearest table to watch.
“If you ask me,” said the old man next to me, “it’s the Mexicans.”
“What did they find?” I asked, regretting it almost before the words were out of my mouth. Experience dictated one should never get started in a conversation with old men unless one had nothing but time on his hands.
“Found a whole bunch of prescription drugs hidden in the door panels of a truck. I done seen this special on CNN where they are smuggling counterfeit drugs now because it’s more profitable than marijuana. You can’t even…”
He was interrupted by a woman who had lipstick on her teeth. “Raymond. Let the man eat in peace. I’m sure he don’t want to hear your right-wing views.” By the tone she used on him, I guessed the woman was his wife.
“I’m sorry,” I said to her and quickly got up to leave. “I must be in your seat.”
“I can’t leave him alone for five minutes while I go to the little girls’ room,” she said. “I hope he didn’t offend you with his views.”
“It was a pleasure talking to him, Mam,” I said and made my escape, but not before looking back at the old man. “You take care now, Raymond.”
Megan’s lie about meeting her girlfriend was still bothering me. I needed time to think, so I took the long way and drove around the lake. The road to Bagnel dam wasn’t bad; however, I had expected to see the lake, but it didn’t materialize until I got to the dam. It was a pretty drive, just the same, and it gave me time to reflect on my life and the events of the last week.
I was getting nowhere as an over-the-hill programmer back in Colorado, and the pittance I made writing and doing handyman work was getting me there fast; maybe, I needed a new career. My degree in math and computer science had been little help in a state with one of the highest percentages of college graduates. Maybe I would have a better chance where the competition wasn’t so fierce. I could always teach, couldn’t I? Then I thought of my nephew and his friends, before washing that thought from my mind. I’d rather drive a septic truck than babysit kids like that.
Then there was my love life – or lack of one - that reminded me of the nurse back at the hospital. Was it really possible to fall in love at first sight or had it been the anesthesia? She was beautiful. Her dark hair and violet eyes reminded me of Allison’s mother. I was a sucker for the Cleopatra look played by Elizabeth Taylor in the movie. But Amy already had her Julius Caesar. Although some people told me I wasn’t bad looking, I knew I was no Marc Anthony.
“How about that sexy waitress at the restaurant?” I asked Fred. “What was her name? Linda? Forget a
bout love. That one was more like lust at first sight.” Fred didn’t bother to answer. But now that he was awake, I had his undivided attention.
Once I passed the dam, I could finally see the water and was brought back to the present. This end of the lake was huge. And unlike sleepy Truman, it was quite crowded. There were large expensive houses and condos everywhere, and the boats weren’t the little fishing boats and pontoons of Truman – they were yachts. Just one of those monsters must have cost more than I’d make in a lifetime. “What did these people do to make that kind of money, Fred?”
There were outlet malls, every major fast-food restaurant on almost every corner, and several high-class restaurants that would cost me a week’s wages for a meal. There were shopping centers, banks, and even a couple small theme parks. But what was most impressive were the boat dealers. I never saw so many expensive boats in one place in my entire life. I drove through Osage Beach and Camdenton traffic jams, then headed west on Highway Seven, thinking my sister was one lucky gal to live at the other end of the lake. I would have traded this entire part of the lake for the solitude of her backwoods retreat.
If the road to Truman had been a roller coaster, this part of Highway Seven was a bob sled on steroids. When I pulled into her driveway some four hours after I had left her in Sedalia, my sister’s house was a welcome sight. I got there just in time to see her crying, and Kevin leaving in the back of a sheriff’s car. Almost as surprising, Taylor’s mother, my nurse from the hospital, was standing next to Megan. I could tell she had been crying too. She wasn’t surprised to see me, so I guessed someone had told her by now who I was.
Fred went straight to Megan and seemed to smile at her as he gently put a paw on her thigh. She reached down to pet him, but before I could ask what was going on, a black Mercedes SUV pulled up behind my rental. It was Amy’s husband, Hal.
“What’s so important that I had to leave the clinic before seeing Dr. Arnold?” His question was directed toward Amy. Fred’s smile turned into a growl. I guess he didn’t like the tone of Hal’s voice.
[To Die For 01] - A View to Die For (2012) Page 6
