Tipping the Valet

by K. K. Beck

  “So? There’s a million old drunks hanging around Dumpsters.”

  “Yeah, but there’s more,” said MacNab. “The lab says the condition of the gun is consistent with its having been in a Dumpster behind an Italian restaurant.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “Apparently it has traces of a substance they think might be,” he glanced down at the report, “Arborio rice.”

  “Arborio rice?”

  “They make risotto out of it.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  SUZZALLO LIBRARY ON THE University of Washington campus is a collegiate Gothic building built in the nineteen-twenties, and whenever he approached the entrance, Tyler always liked to look up at the statues that run along the top of the building, an eclectic collection that includes Moses and Dante, Louis Pasteur and Newton, Beethoven and Benjamin Franklin, Shakespeare and Adam Smith.

  He loved the vast cathedral-style reading room, too, with its vaulted ceilings, stained glass windows, and oak bookcases and tables. It was a quiet place to study. He tried to concentrate on his structural analysis textbook, but then he started to think about those cops at Alba and how they had kind of sneered at him and acted like he was some kind of criminal. All he was trying to do was his job. If he could just park the damn cars and have enough time to study it would be fine. But no, he had to end up getting shot at, and then be treated like a thug!

  Suddenly, he heard a strange sound above the tapping of computer keyboards. It was, he felt sure, a sob. Tyler turned to his side and saw that a young woman at the end of the table had buried her face in her hands. She looked like a million girls on campus in a gray hoodie and yoga pants, and she was clearly crying. Silently now, but he could tell by the way her shoulders moved that she was in tears.

  What had happened to her? What was she doing crying in the reading room?

  Then the girl seemed to pull herself together, straightened her spine, and pushed her hair back from her face. She blinked hard, and after wiping away a last tear, set a pair of severe black-rimmed glasses onto her face. He had the strange feeling that that he knew her but that he couldn’t place her.

  And then he realized that she was Flavia Torcelli, the stunning and snobby little hostess from Alba!

  Her face was turned away from him now, and he wondered if he had only imagined that it was Flavia Torcelli. What would she be doing here? Without any makeup and wearing a gray hoodie? And glasses. Her hair wasn’t in that big bubble thing on top of her head. It was just hanging straight down.

  Maybe he was crazy. Maybe it wasn’t Flavia Torcelli at all and he’d been so traumatized by the events at Alba that he was delusional. Now the mystery woman was collecting a bunch of books and papers and a laptop and an iPhone and was smashing them into a backpack.

  Tyler found himself doing the same thing, but very quietly. And when she scraped her chair away from the table and rose, he was startled to realize he had every intention of following this girl to see if he was indeed delusional.

  He lagged behind as she made her way out the west entrance into the light spring rain falling on the brick plaza known as Red Square. Through careful pacing and a longish stride, he managed to catch up with her just as she passed the building that housed the student cafeteria. He looked at her reflection in the window, and she looked at his. Now she turned around with her arms folded. She was glaring at him.

  Tyler felt himself blushing, but he figured he could walk up and say hi to her. Why not? He knew her from work. Although her fierce expression was less than welcoming. “Excuse me,” he began.

  “Are you following me?” she demanded, blinking behind her glasses. The voice confirmed it. It was indeed Flavia.

  “Well, I guess so,” he said. She looked so different! Smarter and not so mean. She appeared not to recognize him. That figured. Probably all the valets looked alike in their black pants and white polo shirts.

  He thrust his hands into his jacket pocket. “Um, I was in the library. I was sitting at your table.”

  “So?”

  Suddenly inspired, he yanked his iPhone ear buds out of his pocket. “After you left I saw these on the floor under the chair where you’d been sitting. I thought you might have dropped them.”

  Her face softened a little but she still looked wary. She swung her backpack off her shoulder, and began to dig around inside it. “Here,” she said, with a little bit of that imperiousness she sashayed around Alba with, and handed him a hairbrush. After that she handed him a pen, a notebook, and a paperback book, and continued rummaging.

  Suddenly she produced identical ear buds and held them up. “They’re not mine,” she announced. “The ones you have.”

  He stood there stupidly for a moment, until she began to snatch back her belongings impatiently.

  With those glasses she looked younger and sweeter and not so mean and snotty. Suddenly he blurted out, “You look so different with your glasses.”

  “Do you know me?” She was suddenly unsure of herself, and he decided that Flavia Torcelli in a confused and vulnerable state was kind of adorable.

  “From Alba,” he said. “I mean the restaurant, not the city.”

  “Oh.” Suddenly she gave him her big phony hostess smile. “We hope you enjoyed your meal.”

  “I’ve never actually eaten there,” he said.

  Now she looked un-phony and confused again. Tyler felt himself reeling a little at her multiple personalities and the rapidity with which she flashed between the two.

  Tyler assumed his own phony service persona, and said in an unctuous voice with a winning smile, “Welcome to Ristorante Alba. Buona sera.”

  She still looked confused.

  “Don’t forget to leave the keys in the ignition,” he continued, prompting her a little with beckoning hands.

  “Oh my God! You’re one of the valets!” She laughed nervously.

  “What’s so funny about that?” Tyler said.

  “I don’t know. What were you doing in the library?”

  “Studying,” said Tyler with dignity. “I’m an engineering stu-dent here. I work nights as a valet so I can pay off a big student loan I already got stuck with and finish my degree. College isn’t free, like in Europe. Anyway, what were you doing in the library?”

  “I go there to study. It’s hard to study at home. I’m a student here, too.”

  “You are? What are you studying?”

  “Marine biology.” She looked as if she’d said too much. “But of course there is also the family business.”

  “The restaurant?”

  “Of course.” Suddenly her eyes grew wider. “Oh my God! You’re the valet who was arrested!”

  “It was all a mistake,” said Tyler. “Look, I’m here now! I’m not in jail!”

  She seemed uninterested in his personal story. “So much criminality here!” Tyler was alarmed at the rapidity with which she began to melt down. Her voice was getting louder and there appeared to be the return of tears in her eyes.

  “I know. That shooting. Anyone would be traumatized.”

  “Ha! That shooting was nothing! Just part of it!” She looked at him with real terror, suddenly turned, and began to run away from him.

  “Flavia. Wait!” said Tyler.

  A large older woman walking a German shepherd was passing by, and she now stopped and scowled at Tyler. She clearly thought he was some creepy guy terrorizing women. He had thought of going after Flavia, and maybe suggesting she get some post-traumatic stress counseling or something. But it occurred to him this woman might sic her dog on him. Or worse yet, call the campus cops. That’s all he needed today—another brush with the law.

  He sighed and watched Flavia Torcelli bound away from him like a frightened gazelle. She moved so beautifully, he thought.

  ———

  SINCE Vic worked nights, avoiding his parents was pretty easy. The Gelashvilis were always in bed when he got home, and in the morning when they left for work, he was asleep down in the remod
eled basement of the sixties ranch house he’d grown up in.

  So when he put his key into the lock at about 2:30 A.M., he was shocked to hear classical music coming from the living room. Cello and violin, of course. He hoped to avoid them and just slink downstairs, but then the music lurched to a stop.

  “Victor!” said his father. “Is that you?”

  “No, it’s a burglar,” he said.

  “Victor, come here,” said his mother in a voice he’d never heard from her before. Mad and sad instead of just sad. He was so startled he went into the living room. Dad was standing by the fireplace, his violin dangling at his side. Mom was seated behind her cello.

  “We need to talk,” said his mother.

  “Right now?” said Vic innocently.

  His father said, “We’ve been down in your room.”

  “What!” They hadn’t been in his room in years.

  “We found a lot of strange things. We want to know what you’re up to. We’ve been waiting up for you.”

  “Can’t we do this later?” he said. He turned to go into the kitchen where the basement door was. To his horror, they followed him.

  “Dad looked at your laptop,” said his mother.

  Then she reached over and touched the bruise on his cheekbone. “Your lip, too. God, what happened?”

  “What?” he said. “My laptop?”

  “Come with me,” said his father, shoving him toward the basement door and down the steps, his mother trailing behind.

  “What is the matter with you!” Vic yelled at both of them. “What is this, the KGB?”

  “What about the KGB?” shouted his father. “The first thing I noticed is, your screensaver is a portrait of Josef Stalin! What are you thinking!”

  “Nobody messed with him,” said Vic.

  “He had oceans of blood on his hands,” said his father. “He wrecked a whole country. You idolize that monster! A crude, sadistic peasant of the worst kind! Haven’t we taught you anything?” Gennady Gelashvili was still shoving his son when they entered Vic’s bedroom, his wife, Anna, taking up the rear.

  “He was a Georgian,” said Vic. “And he was one of the most powerful men on earth.”

  “A Georgian? So what?”

  “But I’m a Georgian.”

  “Are you crazy? You are crazy! We have a Georgian name because of my grandfather, but you’ve never even been to Georgia! Neither have I! No one in our family has lived there for seventy-five years! What are you talking about! And look at this stuff on the walls!”

  Gennady gestured toward a large Scarface poster with Al Pacino as Tony Montana in a white tuxedo dangling a gun. Next to it was a poster for the film Eastern Promises, showing a pair of sinister tattooed hands. “Gangsters! You are in love with gangsters!”

  “Jesus, Dad,” said Vic, a little whinily. “It’s in our own family. I mean, didn’t you tell me your cousin Ivan in Vladivostok was part of the mafia?”

  “No! I told you I suspected he was involved in some black market business dealings back in the 1980s when everything was a little crazy. I don’t know what he’s up to! I haven’t seen him in twenty years.”

  “That’s not what cousin Gleb says,” said Vic.

  “Who is cousin Gleb?” demanded his father.

  “Uncle Ivan’s son,” said Vic triumphantly. “I met him on the Internet. I think our family is pretty well connected, if you know what I mean. Don’t deny it.”

  Gennady stared at his son. “Are you crazy?” he demanded once again.

  “Ever since you dropped out of community college—” began his mother.

  “It’s gone beyond that, Annushka,” Gennady snapped. He turned to his son. “What’s all this GPS stuff on your computer? What are you tracking? Who are you tracking!” He went over to the corner of the room and pointed at some cardboard boxes that the tracking devices he and Chip used had come in. “This is something criminal, isn’t it? Well, whatever you are involved in, it’s not paying you very well, because you still live at home.” He grabbed a big jar full of crumpled ones and fives from the dresser. “You’re living on these tips from parking cars!”

  “Not for long!” said Vic. “I’m about to move out.”

  “If you go back to school,” said his mother, “we can help you with tuition. But this time you’ll have to show us your grades. Not like before.”

  “You can’t live here if you are involved in some dodgy business,” said his father. “We came here to get away from all that. I gave up my position back home because all of a sudden the students were a bunch of mafia kids whose parents got them into university some dirty way. Now you’re acting like you think that’s glamorous! Scum! You want to be scum!”

  “Fine,” said Vic. “I’m leaving right now.” With as much dignity he could muster, he gathered up his laptop. “I’ll come get the rest of my stuff later.” Then he grabbed his tip jar, turned it upside down, stuffed the bills into his pocket, and left the room.

  “Where are you going at three in the morning?” shrieked his mother.

  He didn’t answer her and stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind him. He got into his Volkswagen Golf and drove straight to Acme Heated Storage off the freeway in another suburb, Woodinville.

  He had calmed down by the time he put the key in the door of their storage unit. Thank God they’d gone for the heated option. They’d had to spend the extra money because it was the only space with a big enough door. Now he could curl up here and spend the night in comfort.

  Once inside, Vic clicked on the flickering fluorescent lights and calmed down immediately. He walked among the whole collection, caressing the bodywork of all the cars he and Chip had gathered here. A Lamborghini, five Mercedes, a Ford F-40, a Maserati, a Jaguar, two Porsches, a Ferrari, and three Cadillacs.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I CALLED YOU ALL HERE TODAY because there’s a bunch of stuff going on that people aren’t telling me,” said Gus Iversen, sitting in his plaid recliner in front of the fireplace in his small Ballard home. The room was dominated by a large, old-fashioned boxy TV and a fireplace with a mantelpiece full of framed family photos. Above the mantel hung an oil painting of Grandpa’s old boat, the Ingrid Marie.

  In a smaller chair near Gus’s throne-like recliner, sat his lawyer, Veronica Kessler, with a legal notepad on her knees. At her feet sat her elderly black Lab, Muffin, whom she had brought along apparently because she and the animal were inseparable.

  “What do you mean, Dad?” said Ingrid Benson. “What kind of stuff aren’t we telling you?”

  “You’re not telling me stuff that I think might cost me money later down the line,” the old man said. “Legal bills. Rescuing you financially again. Plus I’m worried about Tyler, here.” He turned to Veronica. “What did you find out?”

  “Apparently, they could have held him because he was a felon in possession of a firearm,” said Veronica, scratching behind Muffin’s ears. “But they didn’t. Beats me why. I would have thought they’d want to soften him up and see if he has anything to do with that criminal activity at his workplace. But for some reason or other, they let him go. Maybe it’s straightforward.” Veronica sounded doubtful on this point, as if nothing ever actually was straightforward. “Maybe they believed his story about taking that gun away from some old guy by the Dumpster.”

  “So tell me about that felony, Tyler,” said Grandpa brusquely.

  “Okay, it was my twenty-first birthday and a bunch of my friends took me out to the Viking Valhalla in Ballard.”

  “Oh yeah, I remember that place,” said Gus. “What the heck happened?”

  “So there was this girl—and there was this other guy and he was coming on to her and she didn’t want him to.…” Tyler sighed deeply. He had already gone over this evening in his mind many times. “Anyway, we ended up outside and he started giving me these little pushes and—”

  Gus chuckled. “That’s how it always starts. Those little two-handed pushes.” He folded his hands into fis
ts and made little pushes in the air, cocking up his chin in a threatening manner. “One time up at the Elbow Room in Dutch Harbor there was this big part-Eskimo guy just come off the halibut fishery—”

  Ingrid Benson interrupted her father. “Tyler! You never told us a thing about this! Besides, we all celebrated your twenty-first birthday together! It was your spring break.”

  “That’s right!” said her husband. “We took you out to dinner. I had monkfish drizzled with a tarragon vinaigrette!”

  “That was the next night,” said Tyler. “My friends took me to the Viking Valhalla right after midnight—like the first minute I turned twenty-one. I went out to dinner with you the next night. God, it was horrible! I just managed to make bail in time to meet you guys at the restaurant. I didn’t even have time to take a shower!”

  Veronica Kessler jumped in. “So they got you on assault and malicious mischief. Which means you must have both attacked the guy and wrecked something on purpose.”

  “Yeah, I hit him,” said Tyler. “And I keyed his car.” Tyler remembered the satisfaction he had taken drawing a clean line through the cherry red finish of the passenger-side door of the guy’s Corvette.

  “I can’t believe you did that!” said Ingrid.

  “Well, I didn’t actually key it,” said Tyler. “Because I didn’t plan to drive that night. So I didn’t even have any actual keys.” He turned to his grandfather apologetically. “I used that Swiss Army knife you gave me for my twelfth birthday.”

  “Oh yeah,” said Gus. “I remember that.”

  Gus turned to Roger. “Why are the cops interested in you? What the hell were you doing at the crime scene?”

  “I was just trying to make contact with my old boss,” said Roger. “I thought maybe he might be interested in investing in—”

  “Not that stupid ‘make your own dinner and take it home and eat it’ business!” said Gus, flapping his blue-veined hand dismissively.

  Roger produced an irritated sigh and Grandpa said, “I know. You don’t like me bossing you around and asking you all this stuff, but as soon as Ingrid asked me for a loan, I got the right to boss you around and ask questions. And by the way, where’s Samantha? I told you I wanted to talk to all of you.”