Bad Business

by Robert B. Parker

  "A challenge," I said.

  "Better go easy at the bar," Hawk said.

  I was wearing a light raincoat and a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball cap. I got out of my car into the rain and walked to the hotel with my collar turned up and my cap pulled down and my hands in my pockets. Inside, the lobby was a warren of barrels and plastic sheeting, which was having limited success in keeping the lobby dry. The rug squished with each step I took. Happily the Castle Bar was dry. I sat on a barstool and looked across the lobby at the entrance to a function room where a large sign said MATTERS OF THE HEART in red letters.

  I ordered a beer, and ate some peanuts. I saw three women in summer dresses go into the function room. I ate some peanuts. A tall blond woman with an aggressive chest and tight white pants stalked into the function room. Two stunning Asian women, who might have been Vietnamese, entered in cropped pants and striped jersey tops. Cecile went in. Hawk came into the bar and sat on a stool beside me. I ate some peanuts. Hawk ordered a gin and tonic. We sat and watched the women drift in.

  "I'm beginning to see why you might not have been invited," I said.

  "You seen a man yet?"

  "No."

  A t eight o'clock on the button, Darrin O'Mara appeared momentarily in the doorway. I put my hand up to my forehead and rubbed it gently as if I were tired. My forearm shielded my face. Darrin closed the double doors. Hawk sipped his drink. I nursed my beer. From the ballroom I could hear the faint sound of music playing.

  "They dancing with each other?" Hawk said. I shrugged and ate some peanuts.

  40

  The steady summer rain was coming hard and pleasant into my windshield as I drove Hawk and Cecile home from Balmoral Castle. Cecile sat up front with me. Hawk was in the backseat.

  "There were no men, except Darrin," Cecile said, "and some thin guy with long hair. Darrin made a little speech."

  "About?"

  "Same crap," Cecile said. "True love cannot be compelled, but must be freely granted, and thus can only be available outside the obligations of marriage."

  "Then what?" I said. "Enough with the love talk off with the clothes?"

  "No. Each of us stood and introduced herself and walked the length of the room and back, and the man with long hair filmed us with a video camera."

  "Did Mr. Long Hair have on big glasses, like Buddy Holly?"

  "He had on big glasses," Cecile said. "Who's Buddy Holly."

  "Friend of the Big Bopper," I said. "What happens to the video."

  "It will go to some men, who will choose one of the lucky girls, or maybe more than one," Cecile said. "This was a casting call."

  "So O'Mara will field the requests," I said, "and arrange for the women to go see the men who requested them?"

  "Nobody exactly said that, but all of us assumed it."

  "See," Hawk said. "The course of true love can run smooth."

  "Just requires a little organization," I said.

  "Neither of you has thought of the real horror of this situation."

  "Which is?"

  "What if no one requests me."

  "Blame racism," Hawk said.

  "Yes," Cecile said. "Thank God I've got that to fall back on."

  "What about the poor rejected white women?" I said. "You black people get all the breaks."

  "Being white is tough," Cecile said.

  "How is this for you?" I said.

  "So far it's kind of exciting."

  "There seem to be overtones of a slave auction," I said.

  "I know," Cecile said. "And I keep thinking it ought to freak me out. But it doesn't. I guess because it's not really about race. It's much more about gender. The women are items. That's the part that would bother me if something was going to."

  "Are you willing to stick with this a little longer?"

  "How much longer?"

  "Just until you hear from O'Mara," I said. "I'd like to hear what he proposes."

  "I can do that," Cecile said. "As long as I don't actually have to show up at some motel room someplace."

  "You won't. If there's a motel to be showed up at, me and Licorice Stick can do the showing up."

  "Won't that be a disappointment," Cecile said.

  "Not for Licorice Stick," Hawk said.

  41

  I sat in my office, with my feet up, and the window open behind me, while I read the paper. Then I called Healy at 1010 Commonwealth.

  "I been thinking," I said.

  "Well isn't that special," Healy said.

  "When Gavin wanted me to go away he offered me a security job in Kinergy's Tulsa office."

  "I've seen you work," Healy said. "I was you I'da grabbed it."

  "We have two private eyes who were tailing principals at Kinergy," I said. "And now they've disappeared."

  Healy was silent for a moment. Then he said, "I'll get back to you."

  Then I went down and got my car and drove up to Gloucester.

  I found Mark Silver in a smallish house on the top of a hill on the east side of Lobster Cove overlooking Annisquam on the other side of the cove, and Ipswich Bay beyond it. We sat on his small deck looking at the water. Tomato plants grew in tubs on the deck. He offered me some iced tea. I took it.

  "So why you want to know about Marlene?" Silver said.

  He had a short haircut and a smooth tan and even features and teeth that seemed too white to be natural.

  "You like her?" I said. Mark was careful.

  "What's not to like?" he said.

  "Well, she's self-absorbed and self-important and insecure and autocratic and dependent . . ." I said.

  He grinned.

  "Okay," he said. "Okay. You know the beauteous Marlene."

  "So do you like her?"

  "No, of course not."

  "She likes you."

  "God knows what Marlene likes," Mark said. "She certainly has tried to get me to jump on her bones."

  "And?" I said.

  "I'm gay," Mark said.

  "She know that?"

  "Sure. I'm so far out of the closet I couldn't find my way back to it."

  "And she was still after you?"

  "Marlene was of the one-good-fuck-from-me-will-cure-him school," Mark said.

  "Oh," I said, "that school."

  "What's this got to do with her husband's murder?" Mark said.

  "I don't know," I said. "I just keep talking to people, see if anything pops up."

  "Good luck," Mark said.

  I sipped some iced tea. There was a mint leaf in it.

  "But you still trained her, even though she was annoying."

  "I go house to house," Mark said. "I charge a lot. I'm used to bored upper-class women who think they can fuck me straight."

  "Gee," I said. "Maybe I should get gayer."

  "Honey," Mark said, "you're straighter than God."

  I shrugged.

  "But more accessible," I said. "How'd she get on with her husband?"

  "He wasn't around much. She didn't talk about him much. When she did she talked mostly about him making money."

  "You think they, I don't want to be corny here, ah, loved each other?"

  "I think she thought he was a good provider," Mark said.

  "You think she was faithful?"

  "Wow, you are straight. All I know is she kept trying to straighten me out."

  "She ever speak of an organization called Matters of the Heart?"

  "No."

  "She ever mention anyone named Darrin O'Mara?"

  "No,"

  "What did she talk about when you were training," I said.

  "How smart she was, how good-looking she was, how many men lusted after her but were intimidated, how much money she had."

  "I detect a pattern," I said. Mark grinned.

  "She after you?" he said.

  "Yes."

  "Don't mean to pry, but was she successful?"

  "You are prying, and no."

  "I think she was glad I was gay," Mark said. "Then she could fail to sedu
ce me without feeling like a loser."

  "You know her late husband?" I said.

  "Never met him. I was always there during the day. He never was."

  "She ever talk about Bernie Eisen?"

  "Nope.

  "Ellen Eisen?"

  "Nope."

  "Anyone named Gavin? Or Cooper?"

  "Like I said, Marlene only talked about Marlene and how fabulous she was."

  "It doesn't seem much fun being Marlene," I said.

  "Fun? God no. She's like half the women I train. They don't really care about being in shape. They just want a friend." We talked for a while longer while I finished my tea. I learned nothing.

  "Crushed mint in the tea?" I said.

  "Yes. I grow it myself."

  "Good," I said.

  He smiled at me.

  "A lot of things are," he said.

  "Marlene?"

  "Marlene's not one of them," he said.

  42

  I t was maybe the first really great day of summer. Cloudless, bright, temperature about eighty. No humidity. I got to my office early, started the coffee, opened all three windows in my office bay, swiveled my chair, and put my feet up on the windowsill. There was just enough breeze to move the air pleasantly. The coffeemaker made a soothing noise until it finished. I got up and poured a cup and went back to the window. I felt like singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game."

  I heard the door open behind me and as I started to swivel back, I heard Adele McCallister say, "My God, Spenser, I don't know what to do."

  I was around now, and had my feet on the floor.

  "You could close the door," I said.

  "Oh, of course."

  She went back and closed it and came to my desk and stood. "Gavin's dead," she said.

  "Yes," I said, "I know."

  "I heard it was suicide."

  I nodded.

  "Was it?"

  "Probably not," I said.

  "Oh, God. Oh my God."

  I gestured toward my client chair. "Sit down," I said.

  "No. God, I ... You have to help me."

  "I will," I said.

  "I told him. I told Gavin and now he's dead."

  "You think the two facts are related?" I said.

  "Of course, if its not a suicide, of course they are. Somebody killed him and if they killed him they will kill me."

  "No," I said. "They won't."

  "You have to protect me."

  "I will," I said.

  She went past me to the open windows and looked down at the street.

  "Do you have a gun?" she said.

  "Several."

  "Oh my God, where am I going to go," Adele said. "I never had anything to do with anything like this before. For crissake I'm a Stanford MBA."

  She walked away from the windows and went to my door and looked at it and turned and walked back to my desk and looked at it and at the file cabinet and the big picture of Susan that stood on top of it and turned back and passed me and looked out the window again.

  "You're going to be all right," I said. "Sit, we'll talk."

  "I can't. I . . ."

  Her face reddened. She began to cry. Not a big full-out boohoo cry, but a sort of hiccup-y cry. Some tears, but not a downpour. I stood and put one arm around her shoulders and stayed with her, looking out at my corner, which was Berkeley Street where it meets Boylston. She whimpered a little more, then turned in against me and put her face against my chest and let herself do a full cry. While I waited for her to finish, I watched the foot traffic below. The girls from the insurance companies always looked especially good in their summer wardrobes. After a while she quieted and I took her by the shoulders and turned her and sat her in a client chair in front of my desk. Then I went around my desk and sat in my swivel. For dramatic effect I took a .357 Magnum from my desk drawer and placed it on the desk.

  "Is that loaded?" she said.

  Her eyes were red and her face had that puffy aftercrying look.

  "Yes. Not much point to an unloaded gun."

  She nodded.

  "Can you help me?" she said.

  "Of course," I said. "Even better if I know what's going on."

  "Don't you see," she said. "I told Gavin and he must have investigated and they killed him."

  "Who?"

  "I'm not sure who they are," she said.

  "Tell me what you told Gavin," I said.

  "We are running out of cash," Adele said.

  "Who?"

  "Kinergy. We don't have enough cash to get through the summer."

  "Why?" I said.

  "I don't know yet," she said. "I just discovered it by accident."

  "What does it mean not to have enough cash to get through the summer?" I said.

  "We can't service our debt. For Christ sake we won't be able to meet our payroll."

  "That's just like me being out of cash," I said.

  "Same thing, on a grander scale. If Wall Street gets this the stock will tank."

  "You have stock?"

  "Tons."

  "Other executives?"

  "Tons. It was part of our compensation package. And the lower-level employees. Their pensions are mostly invested in Kinergy stock. They'll be broke."

  "Why'd you tell Gavin?"

  "I didn't know who to tell. Coop is mostly in Washington. He may not know. If he does know, he may not want me to know. Trent and Bernie ran things. If it's as bad as I think, Bernie won't want me to know."

  "You fear reprisal," I said, "for reporting an economic fact?"

  "Oh, God, yes. You don't know. How would you. You don't know what Kinergy is like. Have you ever worked in a big company?"

  "U.S. Army," I said. "Middlesex County DA."

  "No, no. I mean big business."

  "I know what you mean," I said. "I was being frivolous."

  "Oh."

  "So you told Gavin what you had discovered. What did he say?"

  "He said I was almost certainly mistaken, and I insisted I was not, and he said that I should keep my mouth shut about it and talk to no one until he'd had a chance to look into it. He said he'd get back to me."

  "Why Gavin?" I said.

  "Because I thought he was honest. I mean he's weird and you know, anal, all buttoned down and zipped up, but he is loyal to Coop, and I think he had integrity."

  "And did you tell anyone else?"

  "No."

  "Did he get back to you?"

  "I don't know. The next thing I heard was he was dead."

  "And you don't know how much he looked into it, if at all?"

  "No."

  "But you feel his death is related?"

  "Yes. Don't you? I mean I tell him something dreadful, and the next thing I know he's dead."

  "Breakfast doesn't cause lunch," I said.

  "What the hell does that mean?"

  "The fact that one thing precedes another doesn't mean one thing causes another."

  "Oh," she said. "I know all that. But do I want to risk getting killed for some fucking formal logic rule?"

  "No," I said. "You don't."

  43

  I called an accountant I knew and we talked for a few minutes. When I hung up, I took Adele directly from my office and moved her into my place on the first block of Marlborough Street just up from the Public Gardens.

  "I wish I could have gone home first and picked up some things."

  "Safer this way," I said.

  "Could anyone have followed us?" she said when we went in to the building.

  "No."

  "You're sure?"

  "Yes."

  I was on the second floor. We took the stairs.

  "How do you know we weren't followed?" Adele said.

  "I have superpowers," I said. "Later maybe I'll leap a tall building for you, at a single bound."

  She smiled faintly. My wit was probably too sophisticated for her. I unlocked my apartment door and we went in.

  "Do you live with that woman?"

  "S
usan? No I don't."

  "Wow, you seemed so..."

  "We are," I said.

  "Oh." She looked around. "You live here alone?"

  "I have visitation rights with a dog," I said. "She stays here sometimes."

  She looked around some more.

  "My God," she said. "It's immaculate."

  "I'll be damned."

  "I just ... I'm sorry ... I just assumed men living alone were pigs."

  "Clean pigs," I said.

  "Do you cook for yourself?"

  "Myself and houseguests," I said. "You want coffee?"

  "That would be nice," she said.

  She sat on a stool at my kitchen counter, while I fired up Mr. Coffee.

  "I'm going to need things," she said.

  "Make a list," I said, "with sizes. Susan and I will get them for you."

  "Susan?"

  "I assume some of what you want may be intimate and I blush easily," I said.

  She smiled a little less faintly. She was beginning to get her feet under her. My doorbell rang. She jumped six inches and spilled coffee on the counter.

  "Omigodjesus," she said.

  "It's okay," I said. "I'm expecting someone."

  I went and spoke into the intercom and buzzed the door open and in a minute there was a knock on my door. I checked the peephole and opened the door and Vinnie Morris came in. Vinnie was a medium-sized guy with movements so quick and exact that I always thought of a very good watch when I saw him. His dark hair was barbered short. He was newly shaved, and wearing a dark summer suit with a white shirt and tie. He was carrying a long canvas gym bag.

  "Vinnie Morris," I said. "Adele McCallister."

  "How do you do," Vinnie said.

  A dele said, "Hello."

  "Vinnie's going to stay with you," I said.

  "Here?"

  "Yes."

  "I ... why?"

  "To protect you," I said.

  V innie put the bag down on my couch and unzipped it and took out a short double-barreled shotgun and two boxes of shells. Adele stared at him as if she'd seen a cobra. Vinnie put the shells on the coffee table and leaned the shotgun against the couch at the near end. Then he took an iPod and some earphones out and put them on the coffee table.

  "Is he ... ? Can he really protect me? He's not, no offense, Mr. Morris, but he's not big like you."

  V innie was paying no attention to us. He walked to the door he'd just entered and opened it and looked out into the corridor for a time. Then he closed it, locked it, fastened the swing bolt, and peered for a moment through the peephole.