Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries Boxed Set: Books 1-3 (The Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries)

by Heather Haven

  “Come on.” He carried the two plates to the dining room table. “Let’s eat this while it’s hot.” I crossed to the round glass top table, elegantly set with black place mats, napkins, sparkling crystal, and sterling silver. Flickering candles and fresh flowers finished off the decoration. I felt both honored and guilty that he had gone to so much trouble.

  “Get the salad, will you?” he asked. I went back to the kitchen and grabbed the bowl and tongs, as he continued, “Isn’t Estaban gorgeous? And such a nice man, Lee. I don’t mean to say all of this with you having a broken heart—”

  “Don’t be silly, Douglas,” I interrupted. “My heart isn’t really broken. I mean, maybe I’m over reacting,” Douglas gave me a look. I stuck my tongue out at him.

  “Besides, one thing doesn’t have anything to do with the other. If this is the man for you, I’m happy for you, truly.”

  “Are you, Sweetie? I knew you would be.”

  I doled out the salad, and we began to eat. “Tell me about your friend. What does he do for a living?” I asked with a mouthful of fluffy cheese, egg, and onions. Between his and Tio’s cooking, I was having a day worthy of James Beard.

  “He’s an art dealer here in Palo Alto, Miss Please-Eat-With-your-Mouth-Closed,” Douglas answered, with a wide grin.

  “Sorry.” I wiped my chin with my napkin. “It’s so good.”

  “Thanks.” Douglas smiled. “Estaban’s been in town for about a year. He and his cousin own the gallery on University and Emerson. You must have seen it, ‘Mesoamerican Galleries, purveyors of genuine and model art throughout the ages,’” he parroted from memory.

  “What’s ‘model art’?”

  “That means it’s a reproduction. He carries a lot of those. If they’re not marked, sometimes you can’t tell the difference between the real and the imitation unless you have a professional tell you.”

  My mind flitted to Carlos’ stolen statue.

  “Look here,” Douglas said, putting down his napkin, getting up and walking to the other side of the room. Thrown over the finial of a lamp, a small, carved stone dangled from a slender strip of leather. He unhooked it, saying, “This is a model right here. Estaban gave it to me last night.” He held it out to me as he came back across the room.

  “Why, it’s a cat!” I took it with delight. “It reminds me of Tugger.” I moved it around in my hand and examined it from all angles. “And you’re right. It looks old, very old.”

  “I know. It’s actually a copy of an Aztec leopard done from a mold. Estaban says he gets about fifty dollars apiece for them. He’s got them for sale at his gallery. Why don’t you take it, Lee?” Douglas offered impulsively. “It’s so you…and Tugger.”

  “Oh, no,” I started to protest, pushing it back on him.

  “Oh, yes,” Douglas said. “No arguments. For the nonce—that’s an Olde English phrase that means for the moment—Tugger is your main squeeze, so I want you to have it.” He put the leather cord around my neck and kissed me on the cheek.

  “Thank you, Douglas,” I said, touched by his generosity and his friendship.

  “Let’s finish our dinner, shall we?” he said and we did, chatting about this and that, like the old friends we were.

  I didn’t know it at the time but hanging around my neck was not an Aztec leopard but a sleeping tiger. And it had me by the tail.

  Chapter Six

  Bingo Bango

  Monday morning I arrived at Bingo Bango twenty-five minutes late because I missed the bus. The timetable said it wasn’t supposed to arrive for another five minutes, but apparently the bus hadn’t read the schedule.

  I was greeted at the door by Robby Weinblatt, who glared at me as if I had eaten his first-born. “You’re late, Maria Theresa,” he growled, addressing me by my masquerade name. I noticed he still had his knapsack slung over his arm. That probably meant he had only arrived moments ago, himself. Do as I say, not as I do, presumably.

  “I’m sorry, Señor Robby,” I said, rolling my r’s and using a halting Spanish accent. “The bus no come. I am mucho sorry, Señor Robby.”

  “Well, see that it doesn’t happen again, Maria Theresa,” he said, emphasizing my two names. He was his usual nasty self, but his eyes blinked nervously. “We wouldn’t want to have to replace you, would we?”

  My natural inclination was to smack him with my own knapsack, but I thought better of it. I lowered my head and said, “No, Señor Robby. It will no happen again.”

  I moved past him and on to my desk, the smallest of the lot, shoved in a corner and already piled high with everything needing to be copied, stapled, sorted, or delivered.

  Bingo Bango was located in a huge loft in one of those buildings off the Central Expressway in Mountain View, where the real estate per square foot doesn’t cost nearly what it does five miles north in Palo Alto. The loft was sectioned off into several dozen cubicles in the center of the space. Software engineers and computer techies sat and worked fifteen to eighteen hours a day, six or seven days a week, surviving on coffee, donuts and youth.

  Along the far wall of this enormous room sat the copy machine, as well as areas for the lunchroom and playroom, where the guys could work off some steam by playing pinball machines. I say “guys” because ninety-nine percent of the thirty-eight people working here were male. The remaining one percent was a loner who went by the name of Pat. Possessed of a low voice and crew cut, Pat dressed like a dockworker, but had just a hint of hips and possible bosoms. I chose not to investigate further, so the gender was still an enigma to me.

  The only places with any sort of privacy were the restrooms. The men’s room was in the hall near the staircase, and the ladies’ room was down one floor, sharing amenities with janitorial supplies. I never saw Pat use either facility. Bladder like a camel, I guess.

  The ladies’ room being on another floor made it difficult for me to do my sleuthing. Whenever I found anything that might be useful, I would have to cram it into one of my pockets and run downstairs to the bathroom, sharing my findings with a damp mop.

  Just when I thought it was going to be just another horrible day, I hit pay dirt. One of the things I’d noticed when I first started the job was that Weinblatt always carried a black knapsack and tended to drop it in various places around the office, depending on where he was using it. I went out and bought a similar one. Mine was a cheap knockoff from Walgreen’s, but they looked pretty much the same. I’d been waiting for any opportunity to get inside his sack, so to speak, and that day I kept my sights on him while pretending to sort the mail.

  Right after bawling me out, the nasty little twerp went to the copy machine. He looked around, unzipped the front pocket of his knapsack, took out a single 8 by 11 ½ piece of paper, copied it, folded the original plus the copy in quarters, and put both inside the sack. He then dropped the sack on the floor by the copier, and whistling, headed for the coffee machine on the other side of the room.

  I was up like a shot. Grabbing my own knapsack, I rushed to the copier. After a quick glance around, I switched my bag for his and headed to the janitor’s/ladies’ room. I locked the door and rooted around the innards of the sack until I found the paper he’d just copied. It was a memo and, boy, was it worth the chance I was taking.

  Apparently, Silo Junction, already on NASDAQ, had agreed to give Robby Weinblatt two percent of their shares if he continued to hand over the coding that had made Bingo Bango a front-runner. And, if he could bring down Bingo Bango in less than six months, he would receive a cool three-quarter of a million dollars on top of everything else. Other, smaller things were outlined in what read, essentially, like a contract. It was all right there in that stupid memo Señor Snot Face had left in his knapsack.

  I danced around with the mop for a minute or two, us having become friends over the past few weeks, and then called Lila on her private line with the glorious update. She answered on the first ring.

  “This is Lila.”

  “Lila,” I sing-songed into t
he phone, “the Leonard Fogel mystery is solved. I’ve got something in my hand that you’re going to love.”

  “Oh?”

  “And I’m about to scan and upload it. If it doesn’t burn up in the airwaves on the way over to you because it’s so hot, it should be at D.I. within minutes.”

  “From what little I know about airwaves, I would say that’s physically impossible,” she countered, almost spoiling my fun.

  “Well, wait until you read it,” I insisted, keeping my voice down. “The Office Manager, Robby Weinblatt, is the culprit, and I’m so glad ‘cause he’s such a mangy little twerp.”

  “Interesting. Why do you think he has mange?”

  “I don’t, Mom. It’s just an expression. I could leave this disgusting job right now, but it might look too suspicious, so I’ll wait until tomorrow morning. Then I’ll call in sick for the rest of my life. Yippee,” I whispered.

  “If you’re that sure, Liana, contact Leonard and have him come to the offices at nine this evening. You’re meeting with Carlos at six, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, that should give you enough time. Hopefully, you won’t run into traffic. We’ll go over everything with Leonard at that time and finish off the assignment.”

  “Will do,” I said and waited a moment, for what I don’t know. “Okay, Mom. Gotta go.”

  “Liana?”

  “Yes?”

  “Good job.”

  “Thanks, Boss,” I grinned into the phone.

  I checked again to make sure the door was locked and pulled the scanner from my pocket. It’s about the size of a business card holder, only slightly fatter, so it’s easy to tote. The plan was once I had scanned the doc, I would upload it into the iPhone. Living inside said phone is a program tweaked by our Richard. It does its magic and then sends D.I. the completed WYSIWYG—What You See Is What You Get or an exact image of the document. Bada bing, bada boom.

  Uh-huh. When I turned the scanner on, nothing happened. No little ping-ping sounds to indicate it had been turned on. No sharp red lines shot out on the page beneath it, delineating what area was going to be scanned. Nothing. Nada. I turned it on and off several times. I shook it. I cursed at it. Stifling the urge to throw it across the room, my eyes crossed studying all sides of it, as if I could possibly understand why it wasn’t working. After about five minutes of this insanity, I gave up. I hit the redial on the cellphone, my breath coming a little faster than I would have liked.

  “Lila,” I whispered, glancing at the bathroom door, “the stupid scanner isn’t working.”

  “Oh? That’s too bad.”

  “I’ll have to make a hard copy and bring it in person tonight.”

  “Very well.” Lila sounded unperturbed by this turn of events, while I sounded like I had just run the one hundred yard dash.

  “I’m hanging up now, but tell Richard I’m very pissed,” I said, as if this failure was his fault.

  “I will do no such thing,” Lila retorted. “And neither will you use such language at your brother.”

  “Okay, Mom, never mind,” I agreed, backing off instantly. “See you tonight,” I said, disconnecting. I refolded the memo and copy Weinblatt had made, putting them both in my pocket. Heading upstairs, I tried to come up with a plan for making an extra copy for myself, returning the original two sheets to Weinblatt’s knapsack and switching back his sack for mine, all without being noticed. Good luck to me.

  I could see Weinblatt having a conversation across the room with one of the techies and stuffing his face with a donut. Everyone else was occupied with a major project that had come in the night before. The time was now. I screwed my courage to the sticking post, wherever the hell that is, and returned to my desk.

  Grabbing my dirty coffee cup from Friday, a stack of papers that needed to be copied, and still clutching Weinblatt’s knapsack, I made a beeline for the copier. I figured no one would pay attention to the copy “girl,” as she went about her job, not even Weinblatt.

  I placed Weinblatt’s knapsack in front of my own on the floor, put the coffee cup on the edge of the machine, the stack of papers beside it and withdrew the original memo from my pocket. Unfolding it, I made a quick copy, retrieved said copy from the bin, and placed it under the stack of papers on the machine. I then took the original memo out of the copier, while deliberately knocking over the cup with the other hand. Remnants of cold coffee dotted the floor. Bending over to ostensibly pick up the mess, I unzipped Weinblatt’s knapsack, refolded and replaced the original and copy he’d made, rezipped the sack, and without straightening up, reached up and set the cup back on the copier, one-two-three.

  Still hunkered down, I took out a Kleenex from my pocket, swiped at the coffee on the floor, grabbed my knapsack, swung it onto my back, stood up, and picked up the stack of papers, preparing to copy them. Another one-two-three. No sooner had I accomplished that than Weinblatt came over and stood behind me, his mouth covered in powdered sugar.

  “What are you doing?” he snarled.

  I let out the breath trapped inside my body and answered sweetly, “I am to make two copies of these papers and then bring them back to Jerry and Zack. Do you want to see them?” I asked, taking the chance he didn’t. He didn’t.

  He glared at me and opened the lid to the copy machine, which revealed nothing. Somewhat satisfied, he closed it again. He looked at me with a scowl on his face, but it didn’t completely mask a case of good, old-fashioned bad nerves. Interesting.

  I smiled. “Can I help you with something else, Señor Robby?”

  “No, I just came back for this,” he said, snatching his knapsack from the floor. “Did you touch this?” He held up his sack.

  “Oh, no, Señor. I did not know it was there,” I said, in mock surprise.

  Suddenly he returned my smile, asking, “Why are you carrying yours? Going somewhere, Maria Theresa?”

  “No, Señor Robby. I was just to take some medicine, which is inside my bolsa, I mean, my knapsack.” I continued to smile. “I must learn to use the English words.”

  I opened my sack, took out a small bottle of aspirin and went to the nearby water fountain, while he watched. Sucking down a pill, I hurried back to the copier, smiled at him again until I thought my face would break, and put the stack of papers into the automatic feeder. He studied me for a second and left.

  After copying all the papers but the one I’d concealed at the bottom of the pile, I returned to my desk, stashing my hard won treasure inside my slacks. I sat down, allowed my heart rate to return to normal and mentally patted myself on the back.

  A few hours later, I grabbed my knapsack again but this time to go outside and have lunch under the trees. It was a gorgeous day, as it usually is this time of year, and I wanted to enjoy it and revel in my victory. Cellphone in hand, I took a chance and called John again once I was far from the madding crowd.

  This time he answered, “Hi.” I could tell he had read my number and knew it was me, yet his voice was expressionless.

  “John, at last! Didn’t you get my other messages?”

  There was a moment of silence and then he said, “Ah, yes, I did, Lee. I, ah, didn’t get a chance to call you back yet. Ah, how are you?”

  All these ‘ahs’ confused me, but I said, “I’m fine. How are you?”

  “Okay. Okay. Ah, we need to talk, Lee. Ah.” More silence.

  “Well, apparently we do. So talk, John.”

  “Ah, Lee, I think you’re wonderful. Really, I ah, do. You’re beautiful and smart and, ah…ah….” His voice trailed off.

  Oh, no, here it comes, the ‘you’re beautiful and smart’ speech. The kiss of death. Prepare yourself, sailor. Bad news coming onboard.

  “Go on,” I urged.

  “But Angela and, ah, Angela and, ah--”

  “Angela Ann?” I interrupted. “Who’s Angela Ann?”

  “Not Angela Ann. Just Angela,” he answered and a little testily, I might add.

  “Okay,” I said,
matching his testiness. “Who the hell is Just Angela?”

  “Listen, you know when I met you I had, ah, just ended a six-year relationship with someone.”

  “I do remember you mentioning that to me. Once. You said it was over.”

  Finding a spot under a shady tree in the parking lot, I plopped myself down. I had a feeling I should be sitting down for the rest of this conversation.

  “Ah, look there’s no easy way to say this, Lee,” he began. “When I met you, I thought Angela and I were through, but I was, ah, wrong.”

  “Ah, wrong?”

  “Three weeks ago we ran into each other again. We’ve…we’ve talked things out and we’re getting, ah, married.”

  “Ah, married?”

  Wow, I thought, there must be something in the water; everybody’s getting married. Wait a minute. He’s getting married to someone else and all the while, I thought he was my boyfriend? And he’s telling me this over the phone? Now, that’s being dumped, deluxe style. In retrospect, there are a thousand things I wished I’d said, but all I could think of to say was, “I see.”

  He took a shallow, anguished breath, and I could tell he was upset. I guess being the dumper isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. “I’m sorry, Lee,” he said. “I never meant to hurt you.”

  “I’m sure you didn’t,” I said, trying to rise above it all.

  Then he uttered the most damnable phrase in the English language, “I hope we can still be friends.”

  “Up yours, John,” I said, hanging up. I guess I don’t rise well.

  Sitting on the ground, I thought about having a good cry but couldn’t decide if it was because I was pissed off or heartbroken, so I elected to eat. Leaning back against the tree, I unzipped my knapsack, opened the small cooler, and ate the gorditas Tío had made for my lunch. I particularly liked Tio’s small seafood sandwiches with the chunks of crab, flavored with a lime cilantro sauce. Food brings me through every time.

  After lunch was over, I went back to the office to continue my job but couldn’t help counting the minutes. I phoned Leonard at his cubicle, even though he was only about six steps away from my desk, to plan a meeting with him. It wouldn’t do for me to be seen talking to him in person. I was way too lowly for that. I looked around to make sure no one was listening or watching me.