“Rental car, red alert,” my paranoid-cop voice barked. “Doesn’t belong here. No tourist season.”
I kept my steps light, skirted the perimeter of the car and saw the driver’s seat reclined back and a balding, middle-aged man asleep behind the steering wheel.
The denial fairy exhaled a giant sigh of relief. “See? It’s just a shoe salesman taking a nap. Isn’t he just the cutie-wootiest?”
The paranoid cop froze. “Take out your gun,” he whispered. “What’s that on the back seat?”
I passed within three feet of the vehicle, turned and approached the car from the rear passenger side, skirting the range of the driver’s-side rearview mirror. I crept closer and saw a camera with a thick, long-range lens sitting on the back seat, within easy reach of the driver. But it was the lens that held my attention.
From five feet away the familiar print was visible even if the words were not. I’d used that same lens in Garden Beach while doing surveillance at night on the “Needle Nose” Robanski case. It was a Night Watch; night-vision lens. Birdwatchers and tourists don’t have those sorts of lenses, they wouldn’t need them, couldn’t afford them and couldn’t easily obtain them without a law-enforcement background.
I saw a flicker of facial movement, withdrew my gun and circled to the driver’s side of the car. I reached out, rapped sharply on the back window and held the Glock level with the man’s chest.
His eyes flew open, alert, wary and guarded. He jerked upright and tried, almost convincingly, to portray a startled tourist. His hands rose in the air.
“I don’t have any money,” he cried.
I smiled. “Shut the fuck up and get out of the car,” I yelled.
“But you’ll shoot me,” he answered.
“I’ll shoot you anyway if you don’t get out. Now do as I say.”
His clothes were rumpled. The detritus of fast-food meals littered the floor on the passenger side. When the man opened his door, the distinct, acrid odor of stale cigarette smoke filled the air between us.
He stepped out onto the gravel lot, hands high in the air, and faced me, his expression carefully arranged to look petrified, but his eyes were looking for an opportunity.
“Throw your gun,” I said. “Slowly.”
“I don’t have a gun,” he protested.
“You want to do this easy or hard?” I asked. “I know who you are. I know why you’re here. So let’s just cut the bullshit and get on with it.”
The man sighed, reached slowly into his coat and pulled out a small Smith & Wesson .38. I signaled with the Glock and the man dropped the gun and slid it away from his body with one rubber-soled shoe.
“Empty your pockets and turn them inside out so I can see them,” I instructed.
A billfold hit the ground, followed by a slimmer leather twin of the wallet. A digital-camera disc, a few dollars and some spare change, a handheld recorder and a set of earphones came next.
“Kick the badge holder over,” I said.
He kicked the wallet.
“Nice try, Einstein, now the other one.”
Reluctantly he nudged the leather holder toward me. When I stooped to retrieve it, my new friend got stupid. He jumped sideways, lunged forward and attempted to throw me to the ground.
Instead, he found himself flying over my back and landing with a thud on the hard ground behind me. I spun, stuck the business end of my gun to his neck and said, “If you try another stupid move like that, I’ll shoot you and tell the police I was being robbed.”
I stayed on the ground beside him, one knee crushing his shoulder, and opened his identification.
“Larry Hodges, private investigator, license number 3316.”
“Pleased to meet you Larry. Who hired you?”
Larry’s lips were sealed. He looked like a fat kid trapped by the playground bully, his beady eyes blinking in the bright morning sunlight as he fought to remain silent.
“Larry, Larry, Larry,” I said, shaking my head softly. “What am I gonna do with you? Don’t you have any sense of brotherhood? I’m a P.I., just like you. So how’s about coming up with a little collegial reciprocity?”
Nope. Nothing doing. He lay on the ground, glaring at me.
“No professional courtesy, huh, Lar?”
I looked around, hoping the street was as deserted as it seemed, and looked back at Larry.
“You work for Joey Smack?”
No answer.
“Okay, buddy. You don’t want to play nice, I’ll have to take you home and call your mommy.”
I stood up, motioned to Larry, and when he didn’t move, decided a little reminder of just who held the power was in order. I fired the Glock. The bullet landed six inches away from his head, chipping gravel and spraying small rock fragments into Larry’s astonished, and now terrified, face.
“Hey!” he yelled, coming up off the ground. “What are you, nuts?”
I smiled. “Maybe. Start walking.”
I slid my coat sleeve down to partially hide the gun and stepped up behind my quarry. We set off slowly, with Larry dabbing at his gravel cuts while we trudged toward home.
“I can have you arrested for this,” he muttered. “You’ll lose your license.”
“Don’t have one yet, Lar,” I answered. “I got nothing to lose.”
“I’ll charge you with aggravated assault and kidnapping.”
I smiled. “I’ll charge you with indecent exposure and attempted assault. I guess it’ll be my word against yours. A former cop up against a P.I. You know, cops don’t always see eye to eye with your type,” I said. “What do you think?”
Larry sighed and kept walking. When we reached the beach house, Nina opened the door just as Jake’s truck turned onto the street.
“Oh, goodie,” I said cheerfully. “You’re in time for team building!”
Nina held open the door, smiling uncertainly at our guest. Behind me, I heard Jake’s door slam and the crunch of his boots on the gravel.
“Been fishing?” he asked, his voice hot in my ear.
“Trolling. Found him under the metaphorical bridge, in a rental car at the end of the street, with a night-vision camera in the back seat of his car.”
Spike joined us all in the living room and heard the last few words.
“I’ve got my laptop with me,” she said. “If it’s a digital camera and he’s got the cable in the car, I can download the pictures.”
“You can’t do that,” Larry protested.
“Ah,” Jake said, “I think thou dost protest too much. Go get the camera, girls.”
Nina and Spike vanished, but Aunt Lucy stood just where she was, frozen in the kitchen doorway, a puzzled frown on her face.
“Hey,” she said, “you look familiar. Don’t I know you?”
Larry froze, looking like a deer caught in Aunt Lucy’s headlights. “No, ma’am,” he said, swallowing. “I don’t believe so.”
She advanced a few feet into the living room and studied his face carefully.
“Yes, I’m certain of it. Now let me think.”
Aunt Lucy closed her eyes for a long moment, and when they popped open, I knew she’d remembered.
“You were that guy the census bureau sent two months ago. You remember, don’t you? You said they’d skipped my house and you were there to ask a few questions.”
Her face changed, a look of sadness passing across her features as she seemed to recall the details of Larry’s visit.
“You wanted to know when Benny died and how. You asked if I lived alone. You asked all about Stella and Nina.”
She looked at me, puzzled. “He’s not a census taker is he?”
I shook my head no. Aunt Lucy’s eyes darkened.
“Then who are you?” she demanded. “And why were you asking all those questions?”
Larry the P.I. looked miserable. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Valocchi, really I am, but I can’t reveal who hired me or why.” He appealed to her. “But he doesn’t mean you any harm, ma’am, really
he doesn’t. He’s just watching out for you.”
Aunt Lucy’s face paled. “Then you go back and tell him I don’t want anybody hiding in the bushes, watching out for me. I’ve got family to do that!”
“Yes, ma’am,” Larry said, gulping. “Does that mean I can go now?”
“No,” Jake and I answered.
Larry sighed and seemed resigned to whatever lay ahead. When Spike and Nina returned, they were carrying a black nylon bag bulging with equipment.
“I believe we hit the mother lode,” Spike exclaimed.
“Yeah,” Nina said, “his laptop was in the trunk, along with all this other crap Spike thought we needed.”
Spike smiled. “Thought we might listen to his tapes, read his reports. You know, read the secret life of a private investigator.”
Larry shook his head slowly and closed his eyes.
Spike took the bag into the kitchen, in clear view of us all, and began laying black cylinders and boxes on the table. When she’d emptied the contents of Larry’s black bag, she plugged in the computer, turned it on and sighed.
“Password encrypted, Larry?”
He pursed his lips and looked away.
“That’s okay, honey,” Spike cooed. “I can handle it.” She turned to Nina and said, “Baby, would you bring down my floppy case?”
Nina nodded, an excited grin on her face. “Oh, I love it when she does this!” She practically ran up the stairs to their room, returned a moment later with a fawn-colored leather case, and fifteen minutes later she was producing file after file of information and pictures.
“Clever,” she said, looking up at Larry. “You give them numbers and not names. Very smart.”
Larry shrugged.
Spike worked for a while longer before calling me over to see what she’d uncovered. Photographs of Aunt Lucy’s house, of all of us, of Aunt Lucy in the grocery store, at the television studio and in her garden, popped up in a slide show study of my aunt’s recent past. Written reports detailing her normal daily routine, down to her grocery-store preferences and shoe size, were filed in chronological order. Nothing indicated her work for the government, nor was there any mention of her concealed lab. There were no pictures of the inside of her house. It was an investigation into an ordinary woman’s life, beginning one month after my uncle’s death.
Aunt Lucy walked over to stand beside Spike’s free shoulder, leaning in to read the details of her movements and activities. As she read, her face grew even more ashen and I could see that her hands shook.
When she’d finished, she looked at Larry and I saw tears glittering in her eyes.
“Who would do such a thing as this?” she whispered. “What kind of person are you to do this thing to a harmless old woman, eh?”
She walked over to him, leaned down and peered into his face. She spoke softly in Italian, but I had no doubt that she was cursing him. She straightened, regarding him with an almost regal disdain and spit on his shoes.
“Release him,” she ordered Jake. “Give him his things and let him go.”
“Do you want me to erase the files?” Spike asked.
Jake nodded before Aunt Lucy could speak, and Spike turned back to Larry’s laptop.
Aunt Lucy spun on her heel and began walking away. Larry followed her departure with his eyes.
“He was worried about you,” he said softly. “He wanted to know you were all right after your husband’s death. He wanted me to watch out for you.”
Aunt Lucy raised her hand dismissively and kept on walking down the hall.
“If you feel so badly about all this,” Nina said, “why won’t you tell us who he is?”
Larry looked at her, his gaze strong and unwavering. “Because I don’t know who he is,” he said. “He’s always paid me in cash and I’ve never seen him face-to-face.”
Jake looked at me, as if to say, “See? It happens all the time.”
Well, not to us, I thought. Never again. From now on, we’d know who we worked for, or we wouldn’t take their case. Put that in your mission statement, I added silently.
“Stella?” Spike called softly. “Could you come here a sec?”
Her face was carefully neutral, and to an outsider like Larry, her tone was apparently casual, as well. But I knew Spike now and heard the tension creep into her voice.
I crossed into the kitchen, rounded the table to Spike’s side and looked down at the computer screen.
It was a picture of the beach house taken probably from Larry’s vantage point at the end of the street.
“Watch what happens when I zoom in closer,” Spike whispered. “Look at that car on the right side of the screen.”
I watched as Spike hit a button and brought the right side of Larry’s picture into closer focus. Joey Smack sat in a dark sedan talking to a woman with short, black hair. Even with sunglasses it was easy to identify Tonya May’s profile. Now what the hell did this mean?
The date and time were stamped in the lower right-hand corner. Yesterday morning. Joey Smack and Tonya May had been sitting outside our house yesterday morning. Did Sheila Martin know this? Was this why the CIA had been so interested in calling us off the case? What was Joey Smack doing with Tonya May?
I walked into the living room without a word, took the gun from Jake’s hand and motioned him toward the kitchen.
Spike showed him the picture. He looked up, met my eye and nodded.
“Erase it?” Spike asked.
“Everything,” Jake murmured.
With a few quick keystrokes, Spike cleared Larry’s hard drive. She then packed up his case, handed it to Jake and watched as he turned it over to Larry.
“A word to the wise,” Jake said.
Larry shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. I quit. I didn’t mean to cause that old lady any harm.”
He seemed to have aged in the short time he’d been with us and I found myself feeling sorry for him more than angry. But just who was looking out for Aunt Lucy? Would he send another replacement? And if he did, what would we do then?
“I’m gonna tell the guy what happened here,” Larry said. “I don’t think he had any idea this would ever get back to her, let alone frighten her.” Larry looked at us with basset-hound eyes. “I think the guy loves her,” he said. “I really think he does.”
I raised an eyebrow and reached to open the front door.
“Then tell him I said he’s a coward. If he really loves my aunt, he’ll come apologize and face her like a man.”
Larry nodded and walked out the door. As we watched, he slowly trudged back to his car, slung his equipment bag into the trunk, climbed behind the wheel and drove away.
“Okay,” I said, turning back to the others. “That takes care of that. Now, what do we do about Joey Smack?”
Chapter 17
Nina’s lower lip stuck out in what Uncle Benny would’ve described as a “bee runway.”
“Better suck that pout back in, little girl,” he used to say, “or some bee’s gonna come along and take it for a landing strip.”
But Uncle Benny was gone and we were all stuck with Nina who didn’t want to hear about insects or Joey Smack, not when she was trying to raise our collective consciousness.
“I thought we were over that case,” she said. “I thought we weren’t going to go off half-cocked anymore. This is supposed to be my time.”
I bit my lower lip in an attempt not to say what I was thinking, which would’ve gone something like, “Nina, you airhead, Joey Smack wants to kill us. What more of a motivational statement do you need? We have a mission—stay alive and unharmed!”
Of course, wiser heads prevailed. I thought like a rational, sane person. How could I develop a plan to deal with Spagnazi while simultaneously making Nina a happy camper? I snuck a glance at Jake, saw him giving me a dark “fix this mess” scowl, and rolled my eyes.
“Okay, Nina,” I said. “Let’s use this Joey Smack crisis as an example. How do we, as a team, develop a unified stance
to both address the preeminent threat while not compromising our corporate identity?”
Nina gave me a blank look.
“I think she’s saying, how do we stay safe, get Joey Smack off our back and still improve our karma?” Spike translated.
“Exactly,” Jake added, finally on board with the plan.
Nina closed her eyes, took a deep cleansing breath and seemed to be meditating on our collective problem.
Jake’s cell phone rang and Nina cracked one irritated eye.
“Get it and get rid of whoever it is!” I hissed.
He turned away, flipped open the phone and said, “Hello?”
My God, even his voice turned me to mush; two deep and sexy syllables and I was ready to fly up the stairs to bed.
“Well, I don’t know,” he said softly. “I’m kind of in the middle of something.”
Nina opened both eyes and was unabashedly eavesdropping along with Spike and myself.
“Well, I know that, honey, but…”
Honey?
“Well, sure but…” Jake sighed, took three steps farther away from us and attempted to finish his conversation without us hearing him. Too bad for him. We heard every single word.
“Babe, that was two years ago. You can’t hold that over my head now.” Silence, then, “I know. I know. No, she’s not like that.”
Who wasn’t like that? Me? I felt a slow, burning steam rise from within my body. In another minute I was going to blow my top.
And then we all heard Jake say, “Of course, if it’s really that important, I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes. What’s the room number?”
He hung up, turned around and saw all three of us staring him down.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I have something I need to take care of. I shouldn’t be gone more than an hour or so.”
I looked at the kitchen clock. It was almost eleven-thirty. We had work to do. We had to make sure Joey Smack was no longer a threat. How could he just walk out on us?
When Jake turned and walked out the door, I followed him.
“What are you doing?”
He stopped, his shoulders stiffening slightly, bracing for what we both knew was coming.
Stella, Get Your Man Page 25
