The Guilty: (P.I. Jack Marconi No. 3)

by Vincent Zandri

  The bar was old even by Albany standards. Very old. Probably dating back to the late 1800s or more. But the Davids had managed to renovate the place into a modern drinking and eating establishment complete with fancy overhead lighting, a rich scarlet interior wall finish, and an ear-pleasing digital sound system. They also made sure to keep in the old by making the refurbished antique wood bar the place’s focal point. The ornate mahogany counter extended the entire length of the room, reaching all the way to the dining room.

  It was early still. Not even five o’clock when I hooked a quick right just as I entered through the front glass and wood door, and bellied up to the bar’s near corner. Marconi’s number one rule of private detecting. Never enter into a place you can’t easily get yourself out of. Planting myself this close to the door felt entirely like the right thing to do. Keeper, the cautious.

  There was a woman dressed in tight black Levis jeans and matching black T-shirt tending to the bar. She was standing all the way at the opposite end, where she was washing out wine glasses in the small sink and placing them stem first, vampire bat-style, on an overhead rack to dry. She’d heard me come in but wanted to finish what she was working on before she approached me.

  It wasn’t until she made it more than halfway that I noticed she was the same woman I’d seen yesterday evening lying passed out on Robert David Jr.’s couch. The tall blonde, with the killer body and the tattoo of a white-fanged snake coiled against the smooth skin on the right side of her neck. Now that she was standing only a few feet away from me I could see that the snake started down at her shoulder and extended upwards to her earlobe. Cute. I wondered if her boss and lover was hanging around anywhere. Maybe in the kitchen. I was banking on his presence.

  She tossed me a smile that was decidedly forced.

  “What can I get for you?” she said. Her voice was low, raspy. I pictured the way she looked in her white, lacy thong underwear. It made me blush.

  I ordered a bottle of beer. She retrieved it for me and set it onto a coaster that said, “Bass Ale.”

  “Glass?” she said.

  “Strictly cowboy for me,” I said. Then, “What made you go with the snake?”

  She shot me a quizzical look, as though I’d asked her what brand she uses for a conditioning rinse. It took a beat or two, but eventually what I asked clicked inside her pretty little brain.

  “Oh, the snake,” she said, bringing the tips of her fingers to the coiled blue, red, and brown snake tattoo. “I like snakes. I find them enchanting and mysterious.”

  “Looks like it’s about to bite your neck. You like neck bites?”

  Her faced turned a distinct shade of hot red.

  “I don’t even know you,” she said.

  I reached into my pocket, pulled out a card, and set it on the bar.

  “But your boyfriend knows me,” I said.

  I looked at her neck, wondering if Junior had tried to pierce her neck with his teeth. Tried to draw blood like a real vampire. It was impossible to tell from where I was sitting and from where she was standing behind the wood bar. She looked the card over and then looked me up and down.

  “You’re the one came to the house last night.”

  “That would be me. I’m looking into how and why Sarah Levy can’t even remember her birthday, much less what happened on February 18th, when her brains got scrambled on Junior’s property.”

  Her pretty face went stone stiff, the blood draining out of it.

  “What’s your name?” I pressed on.

  For a split second, I didn’t think she was going to tell me.

  “Daphne,” she said after a time.

  “Like on Scooby Doo? Really? Wow.”

  “What do you want from me?” she said.

  “I just want to ask you a couple of questions, Daphne. Before you get busy.”

  She stole a glance over her shoulder. Other than a high school age busboy who was busy setting up the back dining room tables for the dinner hour, the place was empty as a morgue.

  “Do I have to speak with you?”

  “No.”

  “Then maybe you should leave.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  She exhaled. It made the snake move.

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Are you Robert’s new girlfriend?”

  “Sort of.”

  “Meaning?”

  “We see each other when we feel like seeing each other.”

  “So if this were Facebook, your relationship status would qualify as, ‘It’s complicated.’”

  “You go with that, Mr. Detective.”

  “You aware that Sarah Levy thinks Robert is still in love with her? That he’s still going to marry her?”

  “At this point, she probably still believes in the Easter Bunny, Mr. Marconi.”

  “True. Very true. And how very sensitive of you to say so. How long have you been doing drugs with Robert?”

  She took a step back.

  “This conversation ends now. Enjoy your beer and leave.”

  “But I’m just getting started,” I said. “Do you feel Robert is capable of hurting someone he loves out of an uncontrollable anger?”

  “Leave,” she said, her right hand in the air, waving at me to be gone.

  She disappeared into the back room and for a few moments, I thought I might never see her again. But then I heard a commotion, and someone else emerged from the back room altogether. It was Robert David Jr. Judging by the scowl on his face, the baseball bat in his hand, and the red horns protruding from the top of his skull, I could see that he was not happy.

  Thus far, things were going pretty much as planned.

  30

  OKAY, MAYBE JUNIOR DIDN’T have actual horns growing out of his skull, but he was threatening me with a baseball bat. He was wearing the same black jeans and matching black tee that his sig-“it’s complicated”-other was wearing. The tightness of his clothing accentuated his lean musculature when he stomped his way down the length of the bar to me, patting the palm of his free hand with the fat end of the cut-off baseball bat.

  I drank some beer.

  “You really gonna hit me with that thing, Junior?”

  I pictured that same bat slamming into the back of Sarah’s head.

  “I might,” he said, that scowl now bearing those sharpened and whitened vampire fangs. “I thought I told you to butt out of my business, Marconi.”

  “Your business is entirely my business, Junior,” I said, taking another drink of my beer, setting it down carefully onto the Bass Ale coaster. “I believe that sooner than later, it will be police business also. And then, take it from someone who knows, it will be maximum security prison business. That’s when your pretty little fantasy life will come to an end and you will become the skinny boyfriend of a big, black, buck male.”

  I wasn’t pressing Junior’s buttons. I was slamming them home with a framing hammer. And my methodology was working too. He proved it by doing something extraordinary. He raised up his right leg, stepped up onto the bar’s interior work counter and, twisting his body, jumped up onto the bar top so that he landed on the aforementioned skinny ass. Then he quickly swung his legs around, slid down onto the floor and stood before me, that shortened baseball bat still poised in his right hand.

  I looked into his eyes.

  The eyes were glassy, pupils contracted to maybe half their size. I knew what I was I looking at. I’d seen it in prison many times when inmates smuggled in speed or crystal meth. Something that would serve as a quick high and a cheap substitute for fine cocaine.

  “Wow,” I said. “A floor show and everything.”

  Out the corner of my eyes, I saw Daphne reappear. She had an unlit cigarette nervously poised between two fingers of her right hand.

  “Time for you to be long gone, Marconi,” he said, as he took a step toward me, raising up the bat as if he intended to strike me with it. “The cops have no evidence of nothing.”

  “That’s a do
uble negative, Junior,” I said, as I got up fast, grabbed hold of the bat, yanked it out of his hand. At the same time, I took hold of his arm, wrapped it fast around his back, pushing the wrist up toward his neck. I shoved the arm hard, and nearly brought his shoulder to the point of dislocation. But not quite.

  The pain was so intense he immediately dropped to his knees and yelped like a girl. I pressed the bat against the back of his skull and pushed his head down, chin against chest.

  “Robert don’t!” Daphne screamed, coming around the bar and making her way to us. “I’m calling the police.”

  Dropping the bat, I reached around and turned the deadbolt on the door. Then I reached into Robert’s back pocket and pulled out his wallet. I shook it upside down so that the credit cards and money spilled out of it onto the floor. I kept on shaking the leather wallet until a small clear plastic packet of white powder emerged. Tossing the wallet, I picked up the packet. Then I let go of Junior’s arm and, raising my right leg, pressed the flat sole of my boot against his backside and pushed. He went down hard onto his face.

  “By all means, Daph,” I said, “call the cops. I’ll be happy to show them what you two like to do in your spare time.”

  There were a couple of suited young men standing outside the door. They tried to open the door. But it wouldn’t budge.

  “Yo!” the first one called out as though we were in a Rocky movie. “You open or what?”

  All three of us ignored him.

  Junior raised himself up onto his knees and tried to work the pain out of his shoulder by shrugging it and spinning his arm around in slow circles.

  “No cops, Daph,” he insisted. He got back up onto his feet. Wobbly.

  The guy at the door tried it again, as though it would magically open this time.

  “Hang on!” Junior yelled through the picture window glass. Then, looked at me. “You touch me again, and I will kill you.”

  “I’m sure you will,” I said. “It will only add to your newfound reputation.”

  “Robert, shut up,” Daphne said. “You’re already in trouble.”

  I eyed the guys standing outside the door. One was short and round. His buddy behind him was tall and thin. Abbot and Costello. I shoved the packet of dope into my pants pocket, unlocked the door, and pushed it open.

  “It’s hot outside, boys,” I said. “Good time for a cold one.”

  I eyed Junior as I slid my way past the two customers and out onto the searing sidewalk. I could still feel the angry heat permeating off his lean body all the way to my parked 4Runner.

  31

  FIRST I SHOVED THE packet of dope into my pocket and then, knowing that Junior was busy at the bar, I hopped into the 4Runner and drove directly to his Marion Avenue home. The time was nearing six on yet another hot and sultry evening. Instead of parking in the driveway, I parked along the curb about three houses down from Junior’s. Since I didn’t have the luxury of breaking into his home under the cover of darkness, I had to rely on stealth. Which meant entering the place from the backyard.

  I got out of the 4Runner and walked along the street for a bit, until I came to the house that was located next door to Junior’s. It was a three-story brick house set on a heavily wooded lot. Hooking a right onto the property that bordered the two lots I entered into the wooded area where it hugged Junior’s privacy fence. I followed the fence line all the way back into the dark woods until it ended at a ninety-degree corner. Making my way around the corner I stepped onto Junior’s property and searched for a breach in the wood slat storm fence.

  What I found didn’t actually qualify as a breach, but I did find an area at the bottom of the fence that was half rotted away from constant exposure to the thick, damp woods. Using my boot like a battering ram, I kicked the wood in. It didn’t take much effort before I was able to make an opening that would easily allow my five-foot-nine, one-hundred-eighty-five pound body access. Lying myself down on the pine-needled floor, I crawled through the opening in the fence.

  Once through, I stood up and quickly made my way across the green grass and onto a smooth concrete and inlaid stone patio that surrounded the Olympic-sized, in-ground pool. The pool was filled with crystal clear, blue water. One of those space-age, robotic vacuums that didn’t require a human operator was busy cleaning the pool floor in random arcs and sweeps. Surrounding the pool were potted plants and black wrought iron furniture. A wood Tiki bar was stationed near the shallow end. It had three bar stools set out before it. Fancy.

  I made my way past a long iron table that was big enough to support a large dinner party and then came to a set of sliding glass doors. I knew that if the place contained hidden video surveillance as a part of a much larger security system, that I had already been snagged. Which meant at this point, it didn’t matter if I skillfully jimmied the glass doors open or simply tossed a chair through the glass.

  Vying for the neater, safer alternative, I pulled out my Swiss Army knife, opened the big blade. I fit the blade into the narrow space between the door frame and the door, and methodically moved it back and forth until the lock released. Sliding the door open, I let myself into Junior’s private world.

  32

  STANDING ONLY A COUPLE of feet inside the house, I listened for any kind of alarm.

  Nothing.

  No dog either.

  I pulled a pair of Latex gloves from my blazer pocket and slipped those on. Even if it might be proven later on that I broke into Junior’s house, it still wouldn’t do me or the police any good to have my prints contaminating a possible crime scene.

  I stood in the sitting room which contained a long sectional couch and some bookshelves. There was an LCD TV mounted on the wall and a big black coffee table. Some original artwork hung on the wall. I hooked a left and made my way through the same living room where Junior and Daphne had been sleeping one off the evening before. The place had been cleaned up since then, the mirror returned to its rightful place, the metal coffee table immaculate. Not a trace of any partying left over. If I had to guess, I would say the place had been cleaned by a pro. Probably an outfit for which Senior, no doubt, footed the bill.

  I took a look at the kitchen.

  It was large and full of stainless steel. Like the rest of the place, it was so clean it looked as if it hadn’t been used for cooking, much less eating, in recent days or weeks. But then, I could only assume Junior took his meals at the restaurant. That is if he ate at all. Maybe he simply survived on other people’s blood. The dining room was attached to the kitchen. Again, the same story. Clean. Immaculate. Sterile even.

  I walked back out to the vestibule and took the stairs up to the second floor. The master bedroom was located to the right. I went in and took a quick look around at the king-sized bed which was made up with a black satin comforter and matching black pillows. The walls were painted a dark blue. Covering much of them were bookshelves. The shelves were crammed with books. I took a quick look at the titles. Many of them were the same ones Val had mentioned to me the night before. Titles being gobbled up by the Facebooking, videogame playing, texting-while-driving, youth of the world. Dominion, Dead Until Dark, Club Dead . . . There were a few zombie titles added to the mix, Cure, Eating Miss Daisy, Faster Zombie Cat! Eat! Eat! . . . and also, as Val also suspected, a bunch of erotica titles: Wallbanger, In Flight, Rock in the Heart, and, of course, Fifty Shades of Grey. But not only were there at least a dozen copies of “Fifty Shades” on the shelf, there were dozens more of its sequels: Fifty Shades Darker, Fifty Shades Freed, an entire “Shades” trilogy, and more.

  I snapped a few quick pictures of the bookshelves.

  “I’ll be damned,” I whispered to myself. “Leave it to Val.”

  I shifted my eyes to other areas of the room. The drapes were long, thick and dark, and had they been closed, the room would have been devoid of any light whatsoever. Clearly Junior liked his darkness in order to sleep. More evidence of his fascination with the vampire life? Maybe.

  I opened
the drawer on the end piece set alongside the bed. A Kindle e-reader was stored inside it, some tissues, a tube of KY jelly, and not much else. Picking up the Kindle, I turned it on. The first book that popped up was Fifty Shades of Grey. As if Junior wasn’t getting enough of the same material from the paper versions. I glanced at the books collected in his digital library. They were identical to the ones that were stored on the walls beside me. Turning off the Kindle, I set it back in the drawer and closed it.

  There was no TV hanging on the wall. No sound system either. The room was intended pretty much for sleeping. I moved over to the dresser of drawers and opened the top one. It was filled with socks and underwear. Boxers, not briefs. Good choice. I felt around inside the drawer for anything that might not feel like fabric. Again, nothing.

  I noticed the bathroom set off to my right. I went inside it and stared at the shower and toilet. Clean as a divine whistle. I opened the glass shower door. There was a large bottle of shampoo and a matching bottle of conditioner set on the small metal shelf. I closed the door, shifted the couple of steps to the medicine cabinet and opened the door. The cabinet could have served as a mini pharmacy. There had to be two dozen bottles. Uppers and downers galore. I pulled the smartphone from the pocket inside my jacket and snapped a picture. Then I closed the door, exiting the bathroom.

  Out in the hall, I checked the other bedrooms.

  One of them was made up as a guest room, and the other had been made into an office. The room was finished off with cherry wood paneling. It looked like an office only a lawyer could love. Or perhaps a doctor who liked to audibly record his daily patient notes at home. There was a laptop computer sitting out on the desk and not much else. I opened it. It immediately booted up to a sign-in screen. I knew I would never be able to come up with the right password, so I didn’t even bother. Plus time was getting tight. I wasn’t sure how long I had before Miller would have the alarm system re-engaged and the cops would have no choice but to pay a call to check for a possible intruder. Unplugging the computer, I closed it back up, stuffed it under my arm, then took it with me out into the hall and down the stairs.