Jack’s a guy; he must have a bat or something around here...maybe even a butter knife that’s fallen into the folds of the couch…please God, anything!
I dig under the cushions of the couch, trying to stay as quiet as possible, until my hand brushes something hard and metallic. Pulling at the weighty object gingerly, I realize that it’s a gun. Got to love Parella; most people have candy wrappers...
I position myself behind the sofa with the barrel of the gun pointing towards the door of the storage room. And though I have no clue how to use it and whether it’s even loaded, I figure I’ve watched enough cop shows to give it a whirl. Not that I’ve got all that many choices here.
A tall, shadowy figure enters the storeroom carrying a large container of what I assume is gasoline from the pungent smell, and begins to sprinkle it around. Generously.
Crap. I guess it’s now or never.
“Freeze!” I yell into the dead, silent air.
The figure doesn’t freeze… In fact he lunges in the direction of my voice as I close my eyes and fire…
106
Huddled on the curb as I munch the donut Deputy Buckmaster the arresting officer gave me, I’m overwhelmed with the grim realization that I came uncomfortably close to dying tonight. That knowledge, coupled with the unforgiving concrete under my butt, makes me feel really cold, even though I have two police issue blankets wrapped around me like a makeshift parka.
Buckmaster, a portly man who sweats bullets and is constantly mopping his brow even in the brisk autumn air, waddles towards me and fills me in on procedure and that I’ll have to accompany him down to the station for an official statement. Nodding, I grab another donut from the stash that he’s graciously left as what I assume are the spoils of my victory. They’re not Dunkin’ Donuts but oh, well, a girl can’t have everything.
Parella bounds onto the scene with a furrowed brow. As he spots me on the stoop swaddled in blankets and donuts, relief washes over his face. He plops down next to me and doesn’t speak for a long beat, a thickness in the air between us.
“I hear you’re quite a shot,” he says, penetrating the void.
I shrug nonchalantly. “Just got him in the leg. A flesh wound. I guess I got lucky that the bullet even hit him...and heck, I guess I’m lucky I had any bullets at all, or a gun to fire them with. Leave it to you, Parella. Some people have loose change and candy wrappers in their couch, you’ve got a semi-automatic.”
He smirks proudly. “A Glock, actually.”
“You know, maybe this gun thing isn’t such a bad idea. It was him by the way, Jeanine’s husband. Good old Bartholomew from the club. I guess that fake fidelity was really getting to him; apparently he didn’t want his current affair revealed until he’d safely embezzled all the money from their joint accounts and left the country with his new bride to be.”
“And if it weren’t for us meddling kids he would’ve gotten away with it too!” Jack chimes a la Scooby Doo as I give him a playful jab.
“He was afraid Jeanine would start spying again, with the aid of your trusty gadgets.”
“You’re much better looking than Thelma though.”
“Thanks, Scoob.”
“P.S. the Latin translation for Frater Diligo is brotherly love, which is apparently the motto of The Brother’s Lucerne.”
The perpetrator can still be faintly heard in the distance, ranting in the back of the police car about his invasion of privacy as it pulls slowly away. Buckmaster gives me a quick nod and motions towards an empty squad car.
“I’ve got to head to the station to give my official statement.”
Parella wipes a few crumbs off my face.“Thanks for saving my store…again.”
“Thanks for saving me from the fate of being ‘woman shot in gang-related carjacking’ news at ten.”
“I guess we’re even,” he says, a sadness penetrating his gaze.
I can’t believe this is probably the last time I’ll see this annoying Neanderthal. I get an unexpected pang deep inside my heart.
“So, that’s it then...I guess I better get on with it and deal with my life... Or lack of life, I should say. I’ve got to get a job… Hey, maybe I’ll look into that chicken suit position outside of the pub.” We share a laugh as I put my hand out to shake. “Nice knowin’ ya, Parella.”
He looks at my outstretched hand and shakes his head. Grabbing me tight, he leans in and whispers, “Nice knowin’ you too, doll face.”
A rush of warmth flows thru my body and as his strong arms release me from the embrace, I can still feel the heat of his skin. He avoids my eyes as I turn and make my way toward Deputy Buckmaster’s patrol car. I shout over my shoulder as I walk away, “You can have the last donut.”
Jack takes a powdered and has a dainty bite then makes a disgusted face and throws it back inside the box. The short distance to the car seems endless and my legs want to give way; something feels very wrong about walking away from this man. Suddenly I hear someone running behind me.
“Liza! Wait!” Parella jogs toward me with a huge smile and powdered sugar smudged lips.
“Parella, I can’t do another sappy goodbye. Seriously. I don’t have it in me. “
“Shut up and listen. You need a job, right?”
“Uhh... Yeah…”
“We make a great team, right?”
I study his face. “And??”
Jack looks me straight in the eye with that goofy grin again. “We could start a detective agency.”
“What?!”
“Yeah. Out of the back room of the shop. We could start out small...you know?”
He’s standing close, his face open and child like. And though I could come up with a dozen reasons why it will never work, his enthusiasm is infectious and I suddenly have a wave of realization wash over me. This is it. The it I was searching for!
“Yeah! I can see it! And we can catch all the creepy, cheating cheaters out there!”
Jack tilts his head, his eyes earnest. “Yeah, sure. That and other stuff too.”
I snort. “Yeah, but let’s face it, the cheaters will bring in the most business.”
“Not all men cheat, you cynic.”
“Look who’s the romantic now.”
“You know this means you have to go back to school and get your PI license.”
“I never was very good in a class room environment. Always marched to the beat of my own drummer.”
“I’m not surprised”. Jack smirks. “Don’t worry I’ll tutor you. And don’t even think for a second this means I’m gonna sleep with you. Okay? This is strictly business.”
“Don’t flatter yourself, Parella...And you’re not my boss. We’re partners, like 50/50, or it’s a no go.”
“You drive a hard bargain, but you’ve got yourself a deal, doll.” He holds out his pinky.
I can’t help but laugh as I intertwine my pinky with his. “Deal, Parella.”
107
ONE WEEK LATER
A woman in her mid thirties, Kleenex in hand, stands outside of the shop sniffling and glancing at our freshly painted sign hanging just below the “Eye Spy” one that reads: “Crimes of the Heart Detective Agency.” I have a sneaking suspicion I know precisely why she’s here.
She enters tentatively and looks around. I can see her through the one-way window we installed into the storage room wall, now that it’s home base for us sleuths. The room is decorated sparsely, with a table and three chairs, a coffeemaker, and the small plaid hide-a-bed tucked into a corner. But we painted it a bright lemon yellow, which just makes me happy.
I love watching people inside the shop through the glass. I feel like a voyeur, plus I like lying on the pullout waving my feet in the air pretending to exercise. Today has been spent reading my introduction to investigating workbook though, which has been about exciting as watching paint dry. And although I promised Jack I wouldn’t leave this room till I got thru the first quiz, I better go in for backup on this one; Parella looks like a fish out of
water.
He stands behind the counter, hands in his hip pockets, asking tentatively, “Can I help you?” The woman immediately bursts into tears. As I enter from the back room, holding a box of donuts, I notice Jack give her a gentle pat on the shoulder.
“You’ve come to the right place,” he says comfortingly.
I approach the sobbing woman and hold out the box of Dunkin’ Donuts. Assorted. “Here, try one of these,” I say with a faint grin.
I guess it’s official. Today is the first day of the rest of my life.
Preview of Book Two of the Liza Radley Housewife Detective Chronicles:
Dog Eat Dog
1
I’m Liza Radley, an ex-housewife turned private eye whose first unofficial case was investigating my cheating husband Bernie, the balding podiatrist. Not the way I would’ve chosen as an introduction to the profession, but here I am running Crimes of the Heart Detective Agency out of a storage room with Jack Parella, an ex-cop who got a ball shot off in the line of duty. He’s my sometime partner and sometime almost lover but so far everything’s stayed PG rated. I’d like to keep it that way. I think.
This morning started like any other with Jack bringing me down a cup of java from his loft apartment above Eye Spy, the spy shop he owns that’s attached to our detective agency by a cramped hallway. That is until a guy named Lenny barged in waving a bunch of hundred dollar bills in the air, frantic that his miniature Australian shepherd had been dognapped by his future ex-wife. We don’t normally take dognapping cases…usually our “dogs” are the human kind. Usually male and usually humping barely legal secretaries and leaving their “scent” all over town. But that was an awfully big wad of cash Lenny was waving, plus he argued that Jameson was his only family now so we made an exception. And that’s how I find myself in this predicament four hours later, caught between a growling and possibly rabid Doberman Pincher and Parella; with about 5 ft of open earth between us.
“Liza, Jump doll. I think you can make it.” Jack says holding one hand out to me as he teeters towards the top of the five-foot high chain-link fence.
“You think? Not real comforting, Parella.”
“Well it’s either that or becoming lunch for killer over there.”
As if on cue the mangy dog growls and bares his teeth, which gives me an itsy bitsy panic attack. See I get these inconvenient episodes sometimes where the world takes on a teeter-totter sort of quality. Great. Like I needed another obstacle just now. I brace myself and take a running start towards the fence and leap into the air. Ok, leap may be pushing it. It’s a jump. A jump that barely lands me past the ditch and about a foot off the ground with Fido’s teeth sunk deep into my pants leg, his incisors grazing my calf. I scramble my way up a few notches of the chain link with the unrelenting animal still clamped down. My purse dangles from my shoulder and, as I look down, I remember that the divorce papers are still floating around in there without my John Hancock. Oh dear God please don’t let me die still married to Bernie.
The Doberman pulls at my favorite jeans and I hear a loud rip as the bottom seam tears away. Crap. Now I need to go shopping once I get out of this mess. Fido smells opportunity and jumps to grab my now exposed calf, which I’m sure looks meatier than usual from my Dunkin Donut binge today, and as I watch the mutt propel himself thru the air I hear Jack shout something which I can’t quite make out because of the deafening thump in my ears. My sweaty hands slowly slip from the galvanized metal and in the midst of the building panic attack I kick in Fido’s general direction with all my might. The kick lands smack dab on his nose and I hear a crunching sound that makes me cringe. Fido whimpers in agony and teeters away and under a nearby shade tree.
“Nice work, Doll Face.” Parella declares as I climb towards his out stretched hand. I reach the top then jump from the fence and land feet first on the newly sprouted spring grass.
“What the heck is going on in there?” I say motioning to the stucco estate guarded by Fido and several surveillance cameras.
“Whatever it is, they don’t want us to know about it.
The trail that led us to this area just outside of Boston had been one left by Vivian Malone, Lenny’s soon to be ex wife, after her hair salon appointment. Her white Mercedes pulled up and sat outside as she chain-smoked Virginia Slims ultra lights and threw the red lipstick tainted butts out the window to an ever-growing pile. Several times she approached the front gate and buzzed the intercom only to be denied access. We figured it was our only lead on Jameson so we decided our best bet was to enter the property unannounced after Vivian’s hasty rubber burning departure. We were quickly greeted by Fido and discovered the fatal flaw in our plan. The funny thing was though; in the faint distance we could hear what sounded like several hundred dogs barking. But no other mutts came out for backup.
“Something’s definitely fishy about this place. I’ll text Buckmaster and see if he’s got anything on this address,” I say, plucking my cell from my purse. Buckmaster was the arresting officer on the arsonist case that brought Parella and I together. He’s a portly man of few words but somewhere between me shooting the perp in the thigh, Buckmaster sharing his stash of custard filleds, and the ride to the station for my official statement, a bond was formed and he offered his help on any of our future cases. I flip open my phone and text Buckmaster the address and details once Jack & I have safely sought cover from prying eyes behind an overgrown oleander bush. “ I feel guilty about hurting that dog.”
Jack gives me a pat on the shoulder, “ It was eat or be eaten, Toots.”
As I watch him saunter towards my Karmann Ghia me thinks I’ll never get used to Parella’s weird way of talking, stuck in a time warp and carrying on like a character from the movie Casablanca. And I know I’ll never get used to the way he fills out a pair of jeans. Yum. But I’m not going there again. I’m officially off men. And the one time Jack and I played tonsil hockey I lived to regret it and pinky sweared that I would never let it happen again. We slide into the car and pull away from the curb still hidden from view by the unruly foliage.
“So now what?”
“I say now we find out a little more on Vivian Pinky Malone.”
Mrs. Malone is quite a departure from the average suburbanite in Massachusetts. She looks more like she hails from the Bronx. With her bleach blonde locks teased within an inch of their life and long blood red nails, she sticks out like a sore thumb in the land of Ralph Lauren Twinsets. “And how do you suggest we do that?”
“Obviously, ask the jilted husband. Radley, you’re slippin’.”
“ Duh. But I was thinking info more along the lines of things hubby dearest might not want us to find out. About him or Pinky, or whatever it is they do that deals in thick wads of cash.”
“ You’re thinkin’ on your feet, Doll.”
“ What does that even mean, you odd duck? Now let’s go grab a pastrami and figure out our plan of attack. I need to refuel.” Ok, so I’m supposed to be on a diet. I’ll skip the bread. I mean-sheesh-a girl’s gotta eat. Right?
2
We pull up to the curb near Sam La Grassa’s and plop some change into the meter. The line is long, as usual, and I grab a seat near the window as Jack orders our sandwiches. Mine sans bread. He saunters over waving a paper ticket stamped with the number 43. The red LED light behind the counter reads 34, so we’ve definitely got some time to kill. Luckily I get a reply text from Buckmaster. Looks like the house belongs to an old boxing champion.
“The house belongs to an Xavier Martinez. Ring a bell? Wasn’t that the guy who bought a gold plated bathtub for his ex-wife? Maybe I’m getting him confused with someone else.”
Parella’s face lights up. “ Different guy. Martinez was a middleweight. Took the prize in 2005 but kinda went nuts after that. Last I heard he lost all his money and was doped up on prescription drugs.”
“How’s he afford that mansion?”
“Not a clue. Maybe he’s got dirty fingers these days.”
> I shrug, racking my brain for a clue. “Didn’t Lenny say Jameson was taken in the middle of the night and that he never heard any barking?”
“That means whoever was the dognapper either knew the dog well enough to not incite a bark or they were a professional.”
“Professional dognappers?” I snort and cock my brow.
“Ok, maybe it’s a stretch. I’d say Pinky’s still our prime suspect. If we get a hold of her credit card bills maybe we can figure out where she’s staying. We got lucky with the hairstylist tip from Lenny but I don’t think she’ll be going back there any time real soon.”
Parella obviously knows nothing about women like Pinky.
They call number forty-three and I race to the counter to grab the gigantic mounds of salted cured meat and a squeeze jar of spicy mustard. I set the brimming plate in front of Jack and confiscate his kosher dill. Jack never eats it anyway.
What? Pickles don’t have calories…right?
3
Pinky and Lenny’s neighborhood is like the east coast version of Beverly Hills. If palm trees could survive sub-zero temperatures they would be lining the streets of the South borough District. The estranged couple’s address is 13 Windemere Drive and is a monstrosity of a house done in a Mediterranean style with an open breezeway that connects the separate wings.
We park near the curb and I leave the convertible top down, because frankly I think anybody who can afford a place in this neighborhood will have no interest in stealing my more than weathered 1967 Kelly green Karmann Ghia.
Eye Spy Page 23
