The Love-Haight Case Files

by Jean Rabe, Donald J. Bingle

  The waitress disappeared and Evelyn reached into her backpack for the cell phone. Detective Reese first, then Thomas, she decided. Gretchen would be in the law office and so could pick up the phone. Finally, Dagger; she wanted to tell him about the mysterious revelation regarding Mei-li Arnold and get some pointers on investigating the woman.

  She watched the waitress bring a plate of shrimp and rice to a man at a nearby table. It made her mouth water. After all the running, she was famished. And running away from something? That usually wasn’t Evelyn’s style. She tended to confront things head-on. But three against one in the park? Evelyn was smarter than that.

  She found Detective Reese’s card and flipped open the phone. “Great. Great. Great.” The charge was gone. She looked around the dining room, no payphones; they were practically museum pieces nowadays. She’d ask to use the restaurant’s phone. She turned and gestured to get the waitress’s attention … just as the two hooded figures passed by the window, came in the door, and all hell broke loose.

  Everything happened at once.

  The figures—one male, one female, judging by their builds—reached into the front pockets of their hoodies and pulled out guns.

  Diners shrieked, some seeking cover under tables, some jumping up, their chairs tipping back, plates and teapots clattering and shattering. A table fell over and a portly man slid behind it. Evelyn’s waitress had been approaching, and she threw her hands up and screamed: “Umay! Call the police!”

  The figures shouted too, the first of their words lost in the pandemonium. One of the gunmen fired at the ceiling and the panicked diners quieted.

  “No one move and no one gets hurt!” the smaller figure ordered. Definitely a woman’s voice, but with a Latin accent. She pointed the gun at Evelyn. “We just want her.” She pulled the trigger, and Evelyn dove for the floor, a bullet whizzing by where her head had been a heartbeat before.

  They wanted her, all right … they wanted her dead! So much for her thinking inside was safe.

  Evelyn rolled and jumped to her feet as another bullet zinged by. The third shot caught her in the shoulder and spun her around. It felt like a red-hot ice pick had been plunged in, and she slammed her teeth together, stayed on her feet, and dashed for the door in the back that she suspected led to the kitchen. Behind her, the dining room erupted into even greater chaos.

  “Call the police!” Evelyn hollered as she burst into the kitchen. She heard six more shots fired behind her, and more screams. “Call 9-1-1. Please call—” Someone was already doing that, she realized, the eldest of the kitchen staff.

  “Shut up!” she heard from out in the dining room. Three more shots. “Get down, everyone! Or we’ll kill all of you!” It was the female thug barking orders.

  The kitchen was cramped. There was a large grill immediately to Evelyn’s right, pieces of chicken and beef on it that had been attended by an elderly Oriental man, the one on the cell phone. “Police,” he said. “Send police right now please.”

  A fry cooker next to the grill had something sizzling in baskets, and pots boiled on the stove. A long, aluminum-covered counter directly behind had chickens and slabs of beef and pork on it. One of the cooks, a young man with a hairnet over his beard, apparently had been chopping at racks of ribs with a cleaver. A waitress had been holding a tray with someone’s meal on it—but this was dropped in shock, and she fumbled for her phone, dropped it, and ran out the back door. A busboy followed, both fleeing into the alley. Evelyn registered blurs of white aprons, elbows, and heels. The dishwasher, a ghoul dressed in something like hospital scrubs, turned and stared slack-jawed.

  “Run!” Evelyn encouraged the three who remained in the kitchen. She grabbed at her shoulder, which was throbbing. It felt like she’d stuck her hand in warm pudding; that much blood had soaked into her sweatshirt. She’d never felt such pain before. It was making it difficult to think. “Run.” She started toward the alley door, hoping they’d follow. “Run! You have to—”

  “Police,” the elderly cook continued on his phone, standing defiantly at his grill. “Thai-One-On Café. Many guns are here.”

  Two more shots rang out in the dining room, there were more screams, though they sounded muffled now, and the door behind her flew open.

  “Mano toca!” The male gunman.

  “Run!” Evelyn screamed at the top of her lungs. “Just get—”

  “Para! Stop, Ms. Love, or I will kill them all!”

  Evelyn froze, back still to the man. Her knees locked and she felt dizzy. She heard her own ragged breath, the woman thug out in the dining room shouting: “Stay down!” followed by another gunshot, sizzling and popping from the grill and the stove, frightened voices from out in the alley, the elderly cook still talking to the 9-1-1 operator, and then a faint siren.

  Thank God, she thought. There must have been a close police car.

  “Alvar! We’re getting company!” the woman hollered from the dining room. “Just gack her and let’s get out the back. Car’s waiting. Rápido!”

  “No!” Evelyn forced herself to move. She whirled on the gunman, arms up and fists out, bringing her leg up too, guessing he was directly behind her, and being rewarded by landing a solid kick to his hip. At the same time he fired, and he would have hit her dead-center if she hadn’t been spinning. The bullet caught her just above the left wrist, another ice pick driven in.

  “Awesome.” Evelyn jabbed up with her knee as she moved close and catching him in the groin, but not hard enough to do any damage. He leveled the gun as she jumped back. Lord, the pain was intense! It was getting hard to think. There was little room to maneuver between all the big appliances.

  Before she could do anything else, the bearded cook rushed past her with his cleaver, chopping down on the thug’s gun hand. The gun and most of the thug’s fingers fell to the floor, and he tottered off balance as he screamed.

  Evelyn squeezed in and kicked the thug again, her heel striking his knee and bending it backward.

  “Police!” The elderly Oriental cook was still on the phone. “Much shooting. Much blood. Hurry now please. Someone will be dying!”

  “Damn straight someone’s gonna die. You bring guns into my kitchen!” The bearded cook with the cleaver brought it viciously down again, and missed. The thug—still hollering in pain—had pulled his injured hand in close and barreled forward as much as the space allowed, pushing Evelyn against the fryer and knocking his hood back. He was Latino, and had tattoos on his neck, a pierced nose with a sparkling stud, and a pierced eyebrow. She would never forget his rage-filled face.

  Evelyn felt the pop of hot grease spitting up against her back, inconsequential to the pain in her arm and shoulder. One good arm, she pivoted and stretched, snatching at the handle of a fryer basket. It was heavy, filled with egg rolls, but she managed to pull it out and swing it high like a club against the side of the man’s head. He’d been coming at her again, but the blow staggered him and left a crisscross angry red pattern on his face from the boiling oil.

  The bearded cook brought the cleaver down again, landing another blow to the man’s arm. “Can’t you quit?”

  “Mierda!” With his good hand, the thug grabbed at his burned face, one arm limp from the cleaver hit. “Perra pendeja! María, necesito ayuda aquí!”

  The basket still dripped hot oil; Evelyn hit him with it again.

  “You go, girl,” the bearded cook championed.

  The thug dropped to his knees and she slammed the basket on top of his head, losing her grip on it.

  “This ought to stop him.” The cook brought the cleaver down on the thug’s shoulder, the blade sinking in deep and cutting through bone. The thug pitched forward, and without pause the cook stomped on the bloody hand. The man wailed and clawed at the tile with his good hand, and then he stopped moving.

  “Think he’s dead?” the bearded cook asked.

  Evelyn worked to catch her breath and keep her balance. The kitchen was starting to spin.

  The si
rens grew louder.

  “Roscoe, what a mess you’ve made,” muttered the elderly cook as he squeezed past the ghoul on the other side of the kitchen.

  The ghoul was still staring transfixed.

  Turning his head to continue to talk on the cell phone to the 9-1-1 dispatcher, the elderly cook hurried toward the alley exit and waved at the bearded fellow. “Roscoe, you come with me! Roscoe!” He paused at the back door. “Roscoe … no!”

  The woman burst into the kitchen, firing and hitting the bearded cook square in the forehead. He fell, and she swung the gun on Evelyn.

  Evelyn couldn’t feel the pain anymore. Numb, and fueled entirely by adrenalin, she skittered back, good hand flailing and fingers brushing a fiery hot pot. She grabbed the handle, grimacing against the heat, and brought the pot around, a bullet whizzing off it and ricocheting somewhere. A second bullet was fired and connected with something. With all the strength she could summon, she slung the pot. Boiling water and pieces of shrimp splattered the woman.

  “Tramp!” the woman hollered. “You’re dead, you—”

  Evelyn was too dizzy to try anything else and felt herself knocked to the floor by the ghoul dishwasher, who had finally shaken off the shock. Her head hit hard against the linoleum and the lights hanging from the ceiling appeared to flicker.

  The ghoul took a half dozen rapid shots to the chest meant for Evelyn. The impact staggered the ghoul, but didn’t stop it. Already dead, Evelyn realized the bullets couldn’t harm the creature. The ghoul ambled forward, and the woman fired again and again, the gun finally either jamming or running out of bullets, Evelyn couldn’t tell from her vantage point. She struggled to her feet, slipping in the blood and grease, falling twice before pulling herself up by latching onto the front of the stove. She couldn’t move the fingers of one hand, couldn’t feel them.

  “Tramp!” the woman hollered again. The ghoul had her backed up to the only spot of wall that didn’t have shelves or an appliance against it.

  “Get out of here,” the ghoul told Evelyn. “In case there are more.” It had a halting, vaguely feminine voice. “I have this one.”

  Sirens keened, and then stopped. Shouts from the dining room intruded, the police arriving. Evelyn heard someone holler: “An ambulance. We need multiple ambulances.”

  “Back there,” someone else cut in. “They went into the kitchen.”

  “Call the coroner, too.”

  Two police officers came through the door, leading with guns, one reflexively firing on the ghoul.

  “Don’t,” Evelyn managed. “She saved me. It’s the other one. The one who’s breathing.”

  There were more sirens, more shouts from the dining room. The door to the alley banged open and the elderly cook returned, still holding onto his cell phone. “Thank you, operator, police have arrived. Goodbye now.”

  The cacophony continued to swirl around Evelyn. She couldn’t feel her feet. Mercifully, she passed out.

  Chapter 2.8

  Dagger McKenzie hated the smell of hospitals. His senses were keen and picked out a lemon polish that must have been used on the floor, along with the biting odor of antiseptics, urine, blood, and things worse than death.

  He smelled a lot of blood on Evelyn. He loomed over the side of her gurney. He was six feet five, with muscles that pushed at the seams of his leather jacket. Today he wore his jet hair pulled back in a short ponytail, so tight he thought it must look painful. He knew his long, thick sideburns hid the hard planes of his face, but he also knew nothing could mask the concern that flitted behind his eyes.

  “I told you to be careful, Evey. Can’t you ever listen? They could’ve been scraping you off that kitchen floor in pieces.” His scowl was deep, and he intended to scare her, but he softened the next. “You could’ve been killed. What good would you do your damn gargoyles then, huh, Evey?” He wrapped his fingers around the rail of the gurney’s metal sideboard and squeezed so hard his knuckles turned white.

  She looked small and pale; pupils different sizes, suggesting she’d picked up a concussion in addition to the bullets. An IV bag with clear liquid dripped down a tube and into her arm; he didn’t like the smell of it.

  “Was in a ’srestaurant, Dagger. In ’sbroad daylight.” Evelyn’s voice cracked and the words came slurred.

  “You’re in shock, they said. Got you doped up good, don’t they? Helluva way to avoid talking to the police.” He looked up at the wall clock. “But they’ll talk to you later.” He glanced down the hall in the other direction.

  A pair of officers, one holding a clipboard, talked to a man in scrubs, a doctor or a nurse.

  “They’re going to take you into surgery, Evey, the ER docs said you’re stable enough for it now. That’s serious, surgery. You lost a lot of blood, a lot. Got three slugs in you.”

  “Three? ’Sfunny. Only felt two.”

  “What were you thinking?”

  “Was ’sthinking about red curry chicken.”

  “Not funny. Evey—”

  “Dagger, ’slisten … Arnold’s wife. Follow the mmm—”

  “Follow the what? Evey?”

  But she was out.

  “Mr. McKenzie, we have to take her now.”

  The scrub nurse looked too young to Dagger, like she was only halfway through high school, not experienced enough to be entrusted with Evelyn.

  “Excuse me, sir.”

  He reluctantly released his grip. She pushed Evelyn’s gurney toward the operating room and looked over her shoulder.

  “You can wait down the hall, Mr. McKenzie. She’ll be in surgery a while.” She touched a panel on the wall, and the double doors to the surgery suite swung open, and he saw more women in scrubs, these older and making him feel a little better.

  Dagger watched until the doors closed and he lost sight of Evelyn. “Damn it all.” He picked up her backpack. He’d been called because paramedics found his name and number in her wallet. She’d listed him as a contact person in the event something untoward happened … like getting shot in a Thai restaurant across from Washington Park. Evelyn had a mother—somewhere. When she needed something—either money or a place to crash—she wandered into Evelyn’s life, wandering out again when the hint of something better came along. But Dagger had told the ER chief that Evelyn didn’t have any relatives. He thought Evelyn’s mother was worse than having no mother at all.

  He stopped at the policemen and waited until they’d finished talking with the man in scrubs.

  “This is connected to Thomas Brock’s murder,” Dagger told the older of the two, assuming he was the lead on the case based on his stripes. He pointed toward the surgery suite. “Evelyn Love getting shot is connected. I don’t know how.” Yet, he added to himself. “They work OT legal cases, stepped on some toes, ruffled the wrong feathers. There’s a detective looking into Brock’s murder.”

  Dagger’s eyes narrowed as he searched his memory. Evelyn had told him the name of the detective, but he hadn’t met her. Dagger remembered names better when they were put to faces, and he was not particularly fond of cops.

  “Crap. Angel. Angela. Reese. Detective Angela Reese.”

  The officer made notes on the clipboard.

  “Sir—”

  “McKenzie. That’s all I can tell you. That’s all I know.” But I’ll find out more, Dagger thought. Questioning the two gunmen wouldn’t be happening. The man was dead; the meat cleaver to the shoulder had sealed his fate. The woman was in ICU, the ghoul dishwasher had clawed her up pretty bad, and she was listed in critical condition. “Evelyn gets out of surgery … you make sure somebody’s on her door. They had the stones to send people at her in a restaurant. They could send ’em into a hospital. The gunmen were after her, the others in the restaurant were just collateral.”

  Police weren’t stupid—most of them anyway. They’d probably already planned to have someone on Evelyn’s room. But Dagger wanted to drive home the point. The one with the clipboard took a few more notes.

  “Mr. M
cKenzie—”

  “Later. I’m out of here.”

  O O O

  He’d brought his motorcycle because it was faster, allowing him to weave in and out of traffic. He sat astride it in the parking lot and put Evelyn’s backpack in front of him, opened it, and starting pawing through it. A couple of crushed beer cans. He shook his head—those weren’t from Evey, she’d brought gargoyle bait with her today, probably loosened some stony tongues with the pricey microbrew. A few stray cashews at the bottom, probably more gargoyle bait. Evey had spent some of her hard-earned money on today’s venture—microbrews and cashews. She’d been serious about getting the rocks to chat.

  Her wallet was in there. Thirteen dollars and some change. She needed to get her degree, pass the bar, and then find some place that would pay her what she was worth. Dagger knew she barely made enough to live on and had a sizeable law school loan.

  A map with lots of circles on it, a scribbly shorthand in the margins. He scanned it, seeing names and arrows, Norwegian grn granite, and realizing she’d actually managed to meet with a couple of gargoyles. Next to Luke likes 2 tlk, she’d written: Arn’s wife OT—he dnt no. Sin. Mei-li’s plans? Plans was double-underlined. She’d drawn an arrow from that to larger print: $$$?

  Not much to go on, but something. Dagger stroked his chin. Three choices.

  Do nothing—he wasn’t getting paid for this, and unlike attorneys, he didn’t do “pro bono” work. He was a private investigator and he charged for his time.

  Or he could pursue the Franklin Arnold angle. Dagger had already figured out that Arnold had—through a web of gang connections and favors owed him—ordered the successful hit on Thomas Brock. But Dagger hadn’t been able to prove it and questioned whether he or anyone else ever could. Maybe the answer was simply to get rid of Arnold.

  Or, he could follow Evey’s hint about Arnold’s wife.

  Curiosity lured him toward that last option. Arnold’s wife an OT, huh? And if he’d read her scribble correctly, Arnold was oblivious. Was Mei-li the wife’s name?

  “Interesting.”