Mike Faricy - Devlin Haskell 07 - Ting-A-Ling

by Mike Faricy

  “Excuse me, do you work here?” She was an attractive brunette, with a chest fighting to escape the confines of her dress. I had to concentrate to focus on her face.

  “No, sorry, I’m actually waiting to meet someone. She’s running a little late.” I didn’t see any point in mentioning the close to an hour part.

  “Are you Dev?”

  I think I blinked or half jumped. “Danielle?”

  She nodded and held out her hand. “Danielle Roxbury, nice to meet you.” The extended hand gave me the opportunity to glance down her dress. Yeah, they were really trying to jump out and get some air.

  “Sorry I’m so late, my car wouldn’t start. I think it’s that stupid battery again and I…excuse me, Dev, up here. Hello.”

  “What? Oh sorry, I have a hearing impairment. Service related.” I took a sip of my beer and let that seep in.

  She looked like she wasn’t buying it and had probably heard something along that line a few thousand times. She studied me a long moment before she spoke. “Actually, I’m really running late. I’m on my way to somewhere else, another get together, you know the Holidays. I had to taxi down here. God, I feel like I’ve been running late all day.”

  “Look, we’re not going to be able to talk, let alone hear one another in this place. I could give you a ride and we can talk on the way. It’ll save you a taxi fare.”

  She seemed to consider my offer for a moment, then nodded. “Okay, I guess.” She sounded less than enthusiastic.

  Some fat guy with a red face and an empty martini glass began to ooze onto my bar stool before I was even off the thing. We made our way through the crowd and were almost out the door when she stopped.

  “Hold on, I just want to make a call and let them know I’m on the way,” she said. Her cell was already up against her ear. “Hey, Karen. Yeah, I know, stupid battery again. Anyway, a guy is giving me a lift.” She looked at me and nodded. “I’ll be there in fifteen. Dev Haskell. Yeah, I know. Can’t wait, see you shortly. Okay, yeah, bye.”

  I wasn’t sure there had even been someone on the other end of the line, but I couldn’t blame her for playing it safe. “I’m parked just around the corner. You want to wait here and I’ll pick you up? It’s pretty cold.”

  “Oh that’s sweet,” she said and looked surprised.

  I didn’t waste any time walking to my car. It was damn cold and I hoped the heat would begin to kick in by the time I drove around the block. There was a parking ticket frozen onto the windshield of my Lincoln Continental. Merry Christmas from the city of St. Paul and the parking Gestapo. I fired up the engine, tossed the box holding Eddie’s files into the back seat, then made a half hearted attempt to scrape the frost off the inside of the windshield. I had the heater set on defrost and blowing cold air full blast. It didn’t seem to be helping. I thought of running the wipers until I remembered I was out of washer fluid. By the time I drove around the block I think it had actually gotten colder in the car.

  I pulled into the circular entry and stopped opposite the door. A valet with a questioning look on his face bounced out the door. I lowered the passenger window. “Just picking up.”

  “Good luck, man.” He gave my car a quick once-over, chuckled and bounced back inside.

  I think he said something to Danielle standing there with her hands in her coat pocket because she gave a sort of disgusted grimace when she looked out the window. She took her time then seemed to grit her teeth and stepped out into the cold, taking quick, tiny steps toward my car. I had to reach over and open the passenger door because the handle was broken on that side. The door was frozen closed and I had to pound on it a few times before it creaked open.

  “Hop in.”

  “You sure?” she said then cautiously climbed in. She stayed as close to the passenger door as possible. She thrust her hands deeper into her pockets, then pulled her coat around her like it was a hazmat suit and she might contract some incurable disease from the interior of my car. Her chin was buried about four inches beneath the collar. Just her eyes peeked out.

  “Heat’s just about to kick in,” I lied. “Where to?”

  “Up the hill to Summit Ave., about two blocks this side of Dale. Do you know how to get there?”

  “Yeah,” I said, pulling onto the street. “I live up there.”

  “You live on Summit?” she asked, sounding incredulous. It was the toniest street in St. Paul and she didn’t bother to hide her surprise.

  “No, but close by, just a couple of blocks away.”

  “Oh,” she said, then followed up with, “Brrr-rrrr.”

  I drove down West Seventh to Grand Ave and turned right. Fortunately, we didn’t have to wait at the stop light.

  “Oh, God, how old is this thing? Is your heat on?”

  “It’s a classic and I think the heat’s getting ready to start. So, you said you needed some investigative work done?”

  “Mmm-mmm, God. It’s so cold.” Her shoulders looked to be up around the top of her ears and her voice came out muffled from somewhere deep within her heavy coat.

  “Would you care to expand on that?”

  “God, I’m freezing to death. Are you sure the heat is on? I can’t feel my toes.”

  “Almost. What did you want me to look into?”

  “Oh, God, I can’t stop shivering.”

  “We’ll be at your party in about three minutes. I think you’ll survive.” I felt the vague hint of warm air beginning to bounce off the windshield. As we approached Ramsey Hill the light turned yellow and I stepped on the gas. It turned red about the time I reached the intersection, then sailed through. The hill was extremely steep, so I gave the accelerator another push about halfway up the hill. The Lincoln sputtered, then coughed a couple of times before it sprang back to life.

  “Oh, God, no, please,” Danielle whined to herself from somewhere deep down in her coat.

  “We were discussing your investigation.”

  “Huh? I was thinking of having you check out a guy who owes me a lot of money.”

  “The guy who left you stranded the other night?”

  She grunted a noncommittal response.

  “Why does he owe you money? I mean, did he just take it, drain your bank account, use your credit cards?”

  “No, nothing like that. Matter a fact he’s a banker, or at least he was. He’s a lawyer too now that I think about it. I lent him some money for his business.”

  “Which is?”

  “His business? He’s into all sorts of rubs and barbecue sauces and things. He went commercial last spring. He has an industrial kitchen, somewhere. He’s developed packaging, that sort of thing. He’s moving the stuff into stores, the farmer’s market, some trade shows.”

  “Is it any good?”

  “I don’t know. To tell you the truth I never tasted it. I’m a vegan.”

  “A vegan who invested in barbecue sauce…interesting.”

  “That’s it, up there on the left. The brick house with the white trim and dark shutters. See, where all the candles are. Oh, God, brrr-rrrr.”

  The place was a large, three-story, brick colonial with a double front door centered on a long porch with lots of pillars. There were maybe a dozen large, round ice globes on either side of the front sidewalk with candles burning inside that illuminated the way. It looked pretty upscale and although I’d been past the house a million times I’d never been inside.

  “Let me just turn around here so you don’t have to cross the street. It’s slippery and you’re in heels.”

  “That would be nice,” she said, sounding unconvinced.

  “I’ll walk you to the door,” I said thinking I could at least scam some free drinks and who knew where that might lead.

  “No thanks,” she replied in a tone that suggested no further discussio
n.

  “Look, Danielle, I might be interested in the investigation. Why don’t you call me and we can chat some more.” Then I made the u-turn and pulled ahead so she could exit the Lincoln, step out onto the candle lit sidewalk and another world.

  “Here’s my card,” I said and handed it to her.

  She kept her hands buried in her pockets and her shoulders raised close to the top of her head. I held my card out there for a very long moment before she reluctantly snatched it and thrust her hand back into her coat pocket.

  “Give me a call if I can help,” I said.

  “Yeah, look, thanks for the ride. I’d ask you in, but well, you probably wouldn’t know anyone. Better get that heater looked at,” she said then shouldered the door open. She quickly got out, turned and ran as fast as she could in heels toward the front door.

  Nothing like a first impression. I leaned over and pulled the door closed then headed down to The Spot for my own brand of Christmas cheer.

  Chapter Five

  It was the following Tuesday. I had blanked out my ‘meeting’ with Danielle about sixty seconds after she fled the scene. I just remember the heat suddenly came on in the Lincoln before she’d even made it up to that ritzy front porch and I took that as an omen.

  I’d been sitting in my desk chair looking out the window at a cold, gray, empty street for the better part of the morning. Occasionally someone would hurry into The Spot, but with the temperature hovering right around arctic for the past few weeks people were so bundled up I couldn’t recognize anyone. At this rate it would be months before there were any women on the street worth leering at.

  My cell interrupted any otherwise unproductive day.

  “Haskell Investigations.”

  “Dev?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s Danielle,” she said, sounding like I should be excited to hear her voice.

  “Hi, Danielle.” I tried to hide my disappointment.

  “I’m calling to discuss your employ,” she said, then proceeded to rattle off a laundry list of names, addresses, phone numbers and suspicions. Basically, it boiled down to Danielle lending a guy named Renee Paris, fifty-grand about a year ago. She wanted it back and he suddenly didn’t seem interested in talking to her. Aside from the fact that his name sounded like something out of a 1960’s movie, I didn’t think she had a leg to stand on.

  I actually knew the guy, or rather, I knew of him. Usually when someone talks about what a rat a particular person is there’s a good chance a listener might just chime in with, ‘Yeah, but he’s got a sick kid, the business is going bad or there’s been a death in the family,’ in an effort to explain away pain-in-the-ass behavior.

  No one ever countered in that manner when the name Renee Paris popped up. They usually listened to the tale of abusive chicanery and then countered with, ‘You think that’s bad, you should hear what that bastard did to us.’

  Renee Paris is what’s politely referred to as a developer. I’m sure there are some very good people who fall into that category. In the case of Renee Paris, he’s also a jerk, a cheat, a liar, short of stature and a self-absorbed asshole with a long history of dubious business and real estate undertakings.

  If the cops ever found him sitting behind the wheel of his car with a bullet between the eyes, they’d have to rent the Xcel Center just to hold all the suspects.

  That said, it still seemed no matter how bad his reputation, he was always able to find the next person to fleece. I figured Danielle was just the latest victim in a long line of victims.

  Well, and of course, there was one more thing about Renee Paris. I had a childhood acquaintance, Jimmy White, not a pal anymore, but only because I hadn’t seen him since we were in high school. Jimmy died a few years back. He’d apparently gotten involved with Renee Paris in some sweetheart sort of real estate deal.

  After Jimmy filed for bankruptcy, lost his business, lost his home, and then his reputation, he felt he had nothing else left to lose and so, he took his life. I didn’t know a lot of the facts and I’m sure it was more complicated than one jerk pushing Jimmy over the edge, but I wasn’t a fan of Renee Paris right out of the starting gate.

  “And Danielle, I’m guessing you don’t have any sort of signed agreement, letter of intent, stock options, anything like that. Correct?” I asked.

  “Well, yes, I guess technically that’s correct. But, he knew I wanted to be paid back. I told him as much when I gave him the money and he promised me he was good for it.”

  “The fifty-grand. Was that in the form of a cashiers check?”

  “Actually, he said that cash would work better.”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “He said he’d pay me back just as soon as he could.”

  “But cash?”

  “He said it would be better for tax purposes, you know, not having to report it and all. I don’t know much about that sort of thing and well, Renee does. He knows all that technical tax sort of stuff.”

  “You got anything in writing, maybe a phone message or a text that attests to the fact you loaned him money?”

  “Not really. Renee thought it would be more personal, you know, if we looked one another in the eye and shook hands. ‘My word is my bond,’ he always said.”

  “How’s that working?”

  “Not all that well, I guess.”

  “I’m not exactly sure how I’ll be able to help. Frankly, Danielle, it sounds like you may be better served hiring some junkyard dog attorney who could go after him in a court of law. About all I could do in an investigation would be to tell you where he’s having dinner and maybe who he’s with.”

  “From what I know of him, if he actually had an inkling that I hired a private investigator and he was being followed, I think that might go a long way in getting him to respond to my requests. He can get kind of paranoid.”

  “Paranoid? Like he could go crazy? I don’t want to push him into doing something violent.” I didn’t add ‘toward me’.

  We spoke for another minute or two. She passed on Paris’ address and phone number to me. None of our conversation seemed to point to a very successful undertaking, then again it was two-fifty a day plus expenses.

  “Okay, Danielle, terms are four days in advance to put me on retainer. Plus expenses, I verify all expenses with receipts. I don’t mark up expenses, I just past the cost along to you. And just so I understand, you want to know where he goes and who he’s with. I’ll report that to you what, daily, weekly?”

  “Daily would be good.”

  “Okay, I’ll begin just as soon as you get that retainer to me.”

  “Give me your office address and I’ll have it to you within the hour.”

  She did get it to me, although it was more like three hours, and in cash, ten crisp hundred dollar bills. I wrote out a receipt for her, but she just waved it off saying, “I trust you, Dev.”

  I tossed her receipt in my desk drawer.

  Chapter Six

  The first thing I did was call my contact down at the DMV.

  “Department of Motor Vehicles, how may I direct your call, please?”

  “Donna, extension four-one-three.”

  “One moment, please.”

  “DMV, this is Donna.”

  “Hi, Donna, Dev Haskell.”

  There wasn’t so much a long pause as it was just dead silence. I finally blinked. “Donna? Hello?”

  “What do you want?” she whispered, then sighed as if to suggest she couldn’t believe her bad luck.

  “Just need a little information on someone.”

  “I’ve told you before, you can’t continue to do this. I’ve just been moved up a civil service grade level and your call is putting all of that at risk.”

  “Guess you should have thought abou
t that before you started luring underage interns into your bed. Not so sure the state HR department will look too kindly on that sort of activity, or your husband for that matter. I don’t know, what do you think?”

  “I’m not discussing this any further.” Her whisper ended with a hiss.

  “Good, because I need any information you have on someone named Renee Paris.”

  “The developer? Is he the one who stuck the city with that empty department store?”

  “Among other things. I’m guessing he’s aged middle to late forties. Violations, date of birth, prior addressees, anything you can find.” I spelled out his name and gave her the address Danielle had given me. “There can’t be too many guys in your files with that name.”

  “This sort of thing is going to take some time. Don’t call me.”

  “You’ve got my number?”

  “Unfortunately,” she said and hung up.

  I didn’t hear from Donna until the following morning. Maybe not so amazingly I was busy doing the same thing, basically nothing. I was sitting in my office chair staring out the window at a cold, gray, empty street. I’d counted two people scurrying into The Spot in the past hour and a half.

  “Haskell Investigations.”

  “I’ve got that information for you. You’re going to need a pen and some paper.”

  “Who is this?” I joked, then spun the office chair around. The only thing that had moved on my desk in the last few days was my coffee mug. I picked up the pen I’d pocketed at the liquor store. There was a blank yellow legal pad on the desk and I sort of brushed my hand across it to remove some of the dust and doughnut crumbs.

  “Do you want this information or not?”

  “Yes, Donna, sorry, just closing the file I was working on. Okay, let me have it.” There was another one of her long pauses, but I could sense her mind working. I’m sure she was envisioning a variety of ways she would like to ‘let me have it’.