“Let’s ask the bartender,” Truman suggested.
“Never seen it before,” she said, glancing up from the lemons she was slicing.
“Are you sure?” Jackie pressed.
“I’ve got three keys for this bar,” she assured them. “None of them look like the one you got.”
By the time they got down to the grandstand area, people were streaming through the turnstiles.
“You know what?” Jackie said. “We forgot to show the key to Marion.”
“You’re right,” Truman said. They walked back over toward the cashier’s line. At least twenty people were in Marion’s line.
“She must be everybody’s lucky teller,” Truman said.
“Let’s come back later to talk to her,” Jackie suggested. “I want to look for that cop friend of yours.”
“My daughter’s,” he reminded her.
They found Bobby Roberts down by the bleachers. He stood with his back to the crowd, scanning the rows of benches for something or someone.
“Bobby?”
Roberts whirled around, smiled broadly when he saw who was standing there.
“Hey, Mr. Kicklighter. How you doing? You gonna win some loot tonight?”
“Haven’t even doped out my picks yet,” Truman said, suddenly realizing the truth of the statement.
Bobby leaned in closer, putting an arm around the older man’s shoulder. “Put a little something on the three-six-eight in the fourth,” he said. “I was talking to some people today, say it’s a sure thing.”
Truman pulled his change purse out and extracted two bills. “I’ll do just that,” he said. “Thanks for the tip.”
“Say, if you’re not betting, what are you doing here?”
Truman saw he was looking pointedly at Jackleen.
“Bobby, this is my friend Jackleen. She works in the restaurant at my hotel. She was with me and Mel last week.”
“Doing a little sleuthing, eh? Return to the scene of the crime?”
“Sort of,” Truman admitted. “We were wondering, do you know anything about a woman, a blond woman who could have been mixed up in this thing with Wade Hardeson and that computer disk?”
“A blonde? No. Why?”
“We went over to the tourist court where Rosie Figueroa lived today. A kid told us he saw Wade going into the cabin this afternoon. And while he was inside, this woman, she drives a Firebird, she comes up and she’s peeking in the windows, watching him.”
“That right? The kid see anything else?”
“Nothing important,” Jackleen said. “We were wondering something else too. Rosie’s car has been parked at that place all week. It hasn’t been disturbed. We were wondering how she got here.”
“Carl, one of the guys at the valet parking, saw her getting off a city bus about six-thirty, something like that.”
“Half an hour before post time,” Jackie said thoughtfully. “Plenty of time to hide something.”
“Whoa now, folks,” Bobby said sternly. “I understand you wanting to clear your friend’s name. But you can’t go around messing with evidence. You do that and you’ll hurt your friend more than help.”
“All right,” Jackie said. “I guess we sort of got carried away.”
“No problem,” Bobby said, relaxing. “Say, Mr. Kicklighter, did Cheryl tell you I looked her up? We had dinner the other night. Heck of a nice kid, that grandson of yours.”
“What?” Truman’s mind was somewhere else. “Oh, uh, no, I haven’t talked to her. That’s nice.”
Bobby’s eyes flicked toward something behind Truman.
“Whoa. Gotta go. There’s a couple of high school kids at that hot-dog stand over there, buying beer. Fake ID probably. Lemme go explain the law to them. See you folks later.”
Jackie’s face was glum. “Oh well. No sense hanging around here, right? You got any other ideas?”
“Yeah,” Truman said, holding up the two dollar bills he was still clutching. “I got an idea. Let’s go play that tip Bobby gave us. At Marion’s window. Then we go down to that loading area where they found the girl’s body; see if we see any locked doors down that way.”
“But that cop just said—”
“The hell with him,” Truman said, waving his hand dismissively. “That’s what’s wrong with this generation of yours. You never learned to question authority.”
Chapter TWENTY-FIVE
There was a new gate, chain metal six feet tall with a heavy-duty padlock blocking off the ramp-way to the area where they had found Mel, sitting beside Rosie’s body.
“This gate wasn’t here last week,” Jackleen said. She tried to put the key in, but it stuck, and she had to wrestle to pull it back out.
“Is there another way down there?” Truman wondered.
“Beats me. I know there was a fence around the area where the dogs were locked in their trucks, and that led out into the parking lot,” Jackleen said. “I guess we could go outside the track, walk around till we see it.”
“We’ll check it on the way out,” Truman said. “But I’ll bet the outside gate’ll be locked and double-locked now.”
“Let’s try to talk to Marion,” Jackleen suggested.
The redheaded woman smiled when she saw them. “You folks still here?” She was breaking up a roll of quarters, putting them in her cash drawer.
Jackie held up the key. “We found this and we’re thinking maybe she got killed for it. Does it look familiar to you?”
Marion took the key and looked at it.
“Hey,” a voice behind them said. “You people mind? It’s only a couple minutes to post time and I got bets to put down here.”
Marion handed the key back. “Looks like any other key,” she said. “I can’t talk. My supervisor’s standing over there, watching me.”
Reluctantly, Jackie and Truman moved away from the windows.
“Can we eat now?” Jackie asked. “We’ve been on the run all day. I’m really, really hungry.”
“Okay,” Truman said. “Let’s get a hot dog down there on the mainline, watch a couple of races. Then we can start looking again.”
Mr. K’s energy was a marvel to Jackie. Here he was, what, sixty-some years old, and he never seemed to tire out. Her own sorry behind was dragging and here it was barely nine o’clock.
“No. I want to sit down and eat. Get me a cold beer,” she said. She added quickly, “My treat.”
He started to refuse, but she insisted. “You drove,” she said.
“Just a sandwich then,” he said, relenting.
They found a table in the fourth-floor lounge, ordered club sandwiches and two beers, and sat back to watch the third race.
Jackleen produced a racing program from her purse and began studying it.
“Where’d that come from?” Truman demanded.
“I found it on the counter in the ladies’ room,” Jackleen said. “I guess somebody got fed up and went home early. Look. Somebody had all their bets planned out.”
“If they went home this early, they were losing,” Truman said. “I played the race that cop told me about and lost. I’ll watch, but I’m not playing any more tonight.” He crossed his arms over his chest to demonstrate his resolve.
Jackie dug down in her pocketbook and brought out a small zippered change purse. She counted out the crumpled ones and the quarters, nickels, and dimes. “Sixteen dollars,” she announced.
Their sandwiches arrived and Jackleen nibbled at hers while poring over the program, her pen poised on the race form.
Truman ate half his sandwich in five quick bites. He was hungrier than he’d realized.
Bored, he began looking around the room. For a lounge, it was well lit—so people could study their programs, he assumed.
The crowd was a mixed bag but ran heavily to casually dressed retirees like himself. Here and there were tables with younger couples and there were some college kids too, down for spring break. Sitting at the bar were the serious players, hunched over their prog
rams and drinks, a blue haze of cigarette smoke swirling above their heads.
“Okay,” Jackie said, slapping her hand on the tabletop. “Quinella box, seven-four-five. Here goes nothing.”
“You’re nuts,” Truman said. “Why don’t you take that money and flush it down the toilet instead?”
Jackie was up and moving toward the betting windows.
When she came back she fanned the betting slips in front of Truman’s face with a flourish. “Marion said it’s a long shot, but she likes it.” Then she held the tickets to her lips and kissed them lightly. “That’s for luck,” she said.
The bell rang and the mechanical rabbit took off with eight greyhounds in hot pursuit.
“Seven-four-five,” Jackie chanted, squeezing her eyes shut and crossing her fingers on both hands. “Come on, seven-four-five.”
A moment later Truman was standing up, shouting at the television screen. “Seven-four-five, seven-four-five! Yes!”
“I won?” Jackie was startled, looking around for confirmation. The numbers flashed on the tote board.
“I won,” she screamed. “Thirty-eight dollars!”
“Beginner’s luck,” Truman said. “Take the money and run.”
“No way,” Jackie said. She pointed to the program. For the sixth race someone had penciled in “trifecta key-8- over-1-4-7.”
“What’s that?” she asked, showing the notation to Truman.
“Three trifecta tickets betting the eight-one, eight-four, and eight-seven combinations,” Truman said. “Fool’s bet. Cost six bucks, too.”
“I can afford it,” she said, her eyes sparkling with excitement. She fairly danced back from the betting windows, ticket in hand.
“Marion says that Sunny Gal, the eight dog, is a long shot with twenty-two-to-one odds. I could win forty-six dollars if she comes in.”
“Or lose the six bucks,” Truman pointed out.
Jackie couldn’t watch the race. She covered her eyes with her hands and poked her thumbs in her ears to shut out the shouts from the others in the bar. “Come on, eight, come on, eight,” she chanted over and over.
She was still chanting when Truman reached over and shook her shoulder.
“It’s over,” he said. “That eight dog of yours was a bum. Hardly made it out of the box before he was over in the infield, sniffing the flowers.”
“Oh,” Jackie said glumly. “Oh well.”
“Sorry,” he said.
Truman was standing up now. “Come on,” he said, pulling her chair out. “You won one and lost one. You came out ahead. Let’s get out of here before you lose both our shirts. We’ve got work to do—remember?”
“You’re right.” She tore her losing tickets in half and put the bits in the ashtray on the table.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Cookie Jeffcote poured a capful of bubble bath into the tub. The stuff was forty-two dollars a bottle and usually she … The hell with it, she thought, emptying the whole bottle under the tap.
Bubbles frothed up and over the side of the tub. She giggled and stepped in, sinking into the hot, scented suds up to her chin. She raised the champagne glass and took a long, deep sip.
“To me,” she said aloud, raising her glass in a toast.
Tonight was the night. Butch would take care of Zorn and then she’d be in a position to deal with Jewell Newby. She’d been doing some calculations. Her share could be worth close to a million.
She thought briefly about Butch. Her bathwater was steaming hot, but she shivered at the memory of those grease-stained hands roaming over her body.
Butch could become a problem, she realized. But nothing she couldn’t handle.
She’d made him tell her his plan, fearful of another of his monumental screwups. But actually, the scheme should work.
She’d made vague promises to Ollie Zorn about “special consideration” in return for his cooperation.
He’d practically drooled all over the floor when she’d suggested meeting at her condo. Men, they were all the same, young or old, tall or midget, they all wanted the same thing.
Butch had an alibi all planned out: He and Curtis were to get themselves into a brawl at a bar out on Treasure Island, allow themselves to be tossed out, and go on to another bar.
Cookie, the only witness to the unfortunate incident, would say the killing happened at exactly the time Butch and Curtis were getting shitfaced down the beach at Shacky’s. There would be no neighbors to contradict her, because the condo on one side of her was empty—its Canadian owner still up in Ottawa—and old Mrs. Fuller, on the other side, was deaf as a post.
It was nine now. She sighed. Zorn would be here soon. She would order takeout from the Chinese place down the street when he got there. She had plenty of booze on hand. She wanted the little twerp good and drunk by the time Butch and Curtis arrived.
When the door buzzer rang, she sat upright in the tub, spilling some of the champagne. What the hell? She’d told Zorn it would be a late-night meeting.
The buzzer rang again and Fluffy, her Pekingese, went nuts, barking and yipping and throwing himself against the door. Cookie threw on a short satin robe and matching satin mules and hurried to the door. If Butch was early, the plan would be ruined.
She scooped Fluffy up into her arms and jerked the door open. “You idiot—”
Michael Streck stood on the other side of the door, his suit jacket hitched over his shoulder, a bottle of champagne in his hand. A slow, self-satisfied grin on his face.
“Hey now, doll,” he said, when she’d grabbed him and jerked him inside the condo and shut the door. “Thought I’d come by for a little visit.”
Fluffy growled and bared his teeth.
“Shush, sugar,” Cookie said, patting the dog’s bow-tied topknot. “This is mama’s friend Michael.” She took a deep breath. “Baby,” she cooed. “I didn’t mean to yell at you, but you know, I wasn’t expecting you. And these god-damned neighbors are all so nosy. Well, I’m always glad to see you, you know that, but you should have called, honey.”
Michael set the champagne bottle on the table in the foyer. He pulled her to him, untied the robe sash, stood back, and took in the view; her skin still pink from the bath, bubbles clinging to the curves and folds.
“Why so jumpy?” he drawled. “Let’s celebrate.”
She set the dog down gently on the floor. Michael’s hands were all over her now and despite the voice in the back of her head that screamed “Caution, caution,” Cookie found herself responding in kind.
“What are we celebrating?” she asked.
Michael reached into the inside breast pocket of his jacket and pulled out a fat packet of bills.
“The big score,” he said, chuckling. “Remember that thing I mentioned, the thing Nunz wanted me to get for him and the boys? The guy delivered tonight, and I tried it out. Works like a charm.”
He peeled off ten hundred-dollar bills and tucked them in the pocket of her robe. She shrugged out of it, laid it on the arm of the loveseat, and led him by the hand to the sofa.
He sat there, amused, while she walked, naked, to the French doors and pulled the curtains shut. Then she went to the wall switches and flicked the lights off, one by one. He was being so sweet and generous, she couldn’t chase him off.
When she joined him on the sofa, he was struggling out of his shirt.
“Let me,” she said, nuzzling and unbuttoning at the same time.
“I almost forgot,” he said, taking a tiny tinfoil-wrapped package from his shirt pocket. “Another present—to get you in the mood.”
She was already in the mood. But she drew a line of powder on the glass-topped coffee table and snorted it all.
They made love on the living room sofa, with Fluffy barking like hell every time Cookie screamed or moaned.
“Just a minute,” Michael said. He got up, picked up the snarling Pekingese, and groped his way in the dark to the French doors, then opened them and threw the dog out onto the terrace.
/> “Hey,” Cookie said, struggling upright. “You’ll hurt him.” She glanced at the glowing clock on the VCR player. It was almost ten. Jesus. She had to get herself straightened up. If Zorn walked in now, the whole deal would be ruined.
She stood up and put on her robe. “You gotta go, babe. I’m supposed to have a business meeting. Somebody from the Fountain of Youth is supposed to come over in a little while.”
Michael picked up the slacks he’d tossed on the floor. Another tinfoil packet fell out. “Oops,” he said, holding it up so she could see it. “I forgot about dessert. Relax, Cookie, it’s early yet.”
Ollie looked out the window of the bus and back at the luminous dial of his wristwatch. Ten after ten! He fumed silently. He’d been on the damned bus for nearly two hours. And before that he’d spent another hour on the wrong bus, gone all the way out to the Veterans Administration Hospital in Gulfport before discovering his mistake.
He’d had to go all the way back downtown to Williams Park to catch another bus. And after all that he’d forgotten to get a transfer, so he had to pay full fare again. Full senior citizen fare, but still.
Now his stomach was growling. The newsstand had been busy today, so busy he’d only had time for a package of cheese crackers and a chocolate soda for lunch. He hoped Cookie Jeffcote was a good cook.
He glanced out the window. Rows of high-rise hotels and condominiums lined both sides of the street, but he couldn’t make out any street numbers because the buildings were set so far back from the road. He stood up and walked unsteadily down the aisle of the bus to the driver.
“I’m looking for the San Souci condominiums,” he said politely. “Fifteen thousand Gulf Boulevard. How far away are we?”
“Far away?” The woman laughed. “Mister, we passed that ten minutes ago. Big pink building on the right.”
“Passed it?” Ollie said shrilly. “We passed my stop?”
“What am I, a mind reader?” she asked. “You want off here?”
Kathy Hogan Trocheck - Truman Kicklighter 01 - Lickety-Split Page 16
