Private Eye Four-Pack, page 71
“It’s okay with me. In my line of work you get used to waiting. Plus, it’s your money we’re pissing away here. I’ll wait until closing time if you want to screw around like this.”
She hesitated for an instant and then sat down. Streeter could tell he’d riled her. She had a way of letting you know she wasn’t pleased with a quick, pinched-up smile. The waitress came and Story ordered a club soda. Then she turned back to the bounty hunter and gave him an intense stare. “So, how are we doing with our little search?”
“We?” He hesitated before continuing. “Nothing on the bank-vault idea. I’ve checked a bunch of them and come up with zip.” He paused again. “Why didn’t you tell me Doug wasn’t alone when he died?”
So that was it, she thought. Poor little boy must feel excluded. The waitress brought the club soda, which gave Story a chance to think. She took a long sip and carefully put her glass down, deliberately wiping the corners of her mouth with a linen napkin.
“Shannon doesn’t have anything for us,” she said as she settled back in the black cast-iron patio chair.
“That’s really not the point.” Streeter didn’t like her lack of reaction. “If I’m going to do this job, you’ll have to tell me everything that relates to the man. You had to know something like that was important, or at least it might be important. This hunt’s going to be difficult enough. I don’t have time to screw around. And how can you possibly know she doesn’t have anything for us?”
“I spoke to her family and…” She shrugged, holding her palms out innocently.
“So what? You think they’re going to come out and tell you. ‘Hey, we found, oh, about seventy-five thousand bucks on top of Shannon’s refrigerator. It must be yours. After all, she was screwing your fiancé. Here, take it.’ Is that what you think?”
“If you’ll let me finish. I also went through her apartment.”
“How the hell did you manage that?” He leaned forward.
“Look, I may have been somewhat less than totally candid with you the other day. I knew about his affair with Shannon. All about it, including where she lived. Streeter, this hasn’t been a picnic for me.” Her voice softened and a trace of genuine pain spread over her eyes. It softened them nicely, he thought. “Telling you all about Doug’s problems and the troubles he and I were having was very difficult for me. The drugs, the women, the lying. I just got tired of going into all the gory details.” Then her voice stiffened slightly. “At any rate, I went over to Shannon’s shortly after the accident and talked the weekend manager into letting me in. I told him I was her sister and he bought it. I went over every inch of the place and there was nothing.”
Streeter didn’t say anything for a moment and they sat in silence. Finally, he spoke. “You’ve got this annoying little habit of being ‘somewhat less than totally candid.’ Just keep it up and we’ll be somewhat less than totally successful finding Doug’s money. You’re quite an operator there, Ms. Moffatt. Your fiancé isn’t even cold in the ground yet and you’re going through his mistress’s apartment looking for his money. Sounds like an adult sitcom.”
“Hell, our life together was a sitcom. Doug probably had several ‘hobbies’ like Shannon Mays. Let me tell you a little about us. I tried to make it work but he never really let me close. In public he could be very aloof and uncaring. And in private, well, let’s just say Doug made love like he did everything else. Quickly. To get done with it, and with as little hassle as possible. Half the time he was either so drunk or in such a big hurry, it was almost comical. We must have looked like the Special Olympics of sex, for God’s sake. He’d put in a little showmanship along the way, but never with any real feeling. I endured a lot from him. If he left anything, I’m entitled to it and I’m going after it. It’s my inheritance we’re talking about. Maybe I should have told you about Shannon. I didn’t and I apologize. But now let’s get on with it.”
Streeter shrugged. “You really don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to, but if you keep holding back it’ll just slow things up. I wasted a lot of my time, not to mention your money, finding out something you could have told me about last week. I got paid up front, so, if you want me to keep flushing it away, keep doing that.”
They both sat in silence again until Streeter spoke. “Did you know that Tom Cooper is looking into this, too?”
Story blushed for a second. “I, uh…No, I didn’t. Into what? How do you know?”
“I assume he’s looking into Doug’s affairs, if you’ll pardon the pun. When I went to Shannon’s apartment building, the day manager told me about it. It wasn’t Cooper but some girl from his office. Ronnie or Donnie or something like that. She was there last week asking if Shannon had left any of her stuff.”
“That jerk. That mother…I think I know who you’re talking about. I met his secretary with him at Doug’s funeral. She had some butch name like that. Kind of cheap-looking, and I got the impression Cooper and her had a thing together.” She took a sip of her club soda. “He called me yesterday and we set up a meeting for next Wednesday. He wants to discuss a bill that Doug supposedly owed him. Can you believe the gonads on that schmuck? He’s going to try and bully me into paying for what Doug already paid. I probably deserve a refund!”
“You have any invoices, receipts? Documentation?”
“No, but Doug told me he paid a bundle to Cooper right after his arrest and he was worried that Cooper wasn’t doing much to earn it. I’m sure Doug didn’t owe him anything. By the way, did you ever find out if I might be liable for his debts?”
“I talked to a lawyer friend of mine. He told me that, unless you two were calling yourselves husband and wife, telling everyone you were married, then Cooper probably doesn’t have much of a chance. But he can still make the claim, and it could cost you a bundle to defend yourself.”
“I’ve been thinking about that. When you start in with the lawyers, it always costs.” She sat silent. “Will your friend work for me on this?”
“He said he would. His name is William McLean. He was the DA in Arapahoe County for a whole lot of years. Every lawyer in town knows him and knows how good he is.”
Story nodded. She stared at her club soda, running her finger around the lip of the glass. The patio seemed almost dead except for some rustling in the trees that formed a green awning over part of it. At a nearby table, three androgynous Generation X’ers sat mumbling to each other, apparently lost in deep conversation. They all had the standard ponytails, baseball caps worn backward, pierced faces, and vacant, vaguely obtuse expressions. Story glanced at them for a moment. They seemed indistinguishable from one another. A warm breeze swept the whole area, causing the leaves to rustle much louder. Pronounced yet soothing, like soft, muffled chimes. She looked up, her face set like Charles Barkley’s when he was charging the basket.
“Maybe I can cut Cooper off before he gets started,” she said. “How’s this for an idea? We’ll draw up a demand letter saying that Doug told me he paid, hell, I don’t know, thirty thousand dollars or something major like that for a retainer. We’ll say he told me that only a small part of the money was earned by Cooper when the case was dismissed. I’ll ask him for a breakdown of how the money was spent and demand about half of it back. We’ll put it on McLean’s letterhead. If his rep is as good as you say, Cooper might just fold up like a cheap telescope when he reads it.”
Streeter considered the plan. “That’ll sure give him something to think about. It couldn’t hurt to put him on the defensive.”
“Precisely. I’ll run it all by McLean to make sure we don’t cross the line. Nothing illegal. I just want to cut this guy off at the knees so hard and so clean that he’ll go away for good. Plus, if he’s tracking down Doug’s money, this might get him off that trail. My hunch is he doesn’t have the stomach for a fight.”
Streeter thought about what Carey told him about Cooper’s trial in Adams County, but he said nothing.
“It’s important to show this joker that I’m no pushover,” she concluded.
“That might do it, but don’t underestimate Cooper. Is this how you run your business?”
“Advertising is like being at war half the time. You have to strike hard and fast. First impressions, appearances, they can mean everything. These guys I pitch to wouldn’t take me seriously for a minute if I couldn’t show right up front that I mean business. Don’t tell me that in your line of work you never shovel a little crap or take a few shortcuts to fake someone out.”
“True. I remember my first job for Frank. I found a bail jumper—a confidence man, of all things—up in Salt Lake City, staying at his sister’s house. Frank wanted me to have him come back here on his own money so we could save the airfare cost. I sure as hell couldn’t call him up and ask him politely to come home. So I decided to play on his greed. I sent him a cheap clock radio, like he’s won a contest back here in Denver. I also sent with it a registered letter saying he’s won the grand prize—a Town Car, I think it was; even put a Lincoln brochure in with the mailing. But the real clincher is, I sent him a one-way ticket to Denver. Told him he had to claim his prize in person. A lot cheaper than paying all that extra airfare for me and him. Course, I was taking a chance the guy didn’t just keep the radio and cash out the plane ticket. Luckily, he was as greedy as I thought. Not to mention as stupid. I went out to the old Stapleton International the night his flight’s due in, and sure enough the slob got off the plane looking every bit like he was expecting Vanna White to meet him. You should have seen his expression when I put the cuffs on him.”
“You’re kidding. That’s fantastic. I knew there was something about you I liked.”
“Coming from you, I’m not so sure that’s a compliment.”
Her smile stayed in place. “I suppose it’s that kind of cleverness that got you on Jeopardy?”
The question surprised him. “How’d you find out about that?”
“When I gave your name to my secretary, she said she remembered seeing you on the show a couple of years ago. Memories of the big, bad bounty hunter from Denver stuck with her. She said you won the night she watched. You were pretty sharp with the facts, she told me. How’d you get interested in that?”
He shrugged. “It’s all in the family. My parents and I used to toss trivia around while we ate dinner.” Streeter didn’t want to tell her the whole saga, but his parents—both pretty smart—liked to show off. They used their knowledge to outdo each other. Some families called it arguing, but his mother referred to it as a “lively exchange of ideas.” “Trivia’s a hard habit to break, I guess.”
By now it was dark, and she asked him to walk her to her car. “I parked across the street, behind that office building. I know I’m not supposed to, but it’s so hard to find an open spot around here. I’ll show you my baby, too.”
“Your baby?”
“Corky. He’s my wheaten terrier. He’s a good little dog but he’s so cute, all white and fluffy, that I spoil him rotten.”
They paid for their drinks and left. As they crossed the street they heard a faint jingling from down the block. Story seemed confused.
“That’s Corky’s bell collar. How’d he get out of the car?”
The sound grew louder as it came quickly toward them. Corky was about a half-block away when they spotted him in the streetlights. There was a bright-red streak along his side, and when Story saw that she screamed. “Corky!”
The dog didn’t seem to be hurt as he ran toward his mistress. When he got to her, she and Streeter could see that someone had sprayed red paint on his back and down his right side. The dog was oblivious to the paint and clearly delighted to see Story. As she bent down to check him out, he jumped up and licked her face like it was smeared with lamb chops.
“Who did this to you, Corky?” Then she looked up at Streeter. “My car!”
They quickly walked around behind the two-story brick building to where she had parked. Corky had made out much better than the Audi did. Someone had slashed all four tires and sprayed red paint on the left side of the steel-gray sedan. The driver’s door was jimmied open and they could see in the glow of the inside overhead light that someone had sprayed the dashboard with more of the paint.
“Oh my God,” Story yelled when she saw the damage. “What the hell’s going on, Streeter?”
He walked up to the car and noticed a crumpled piece of paper lying on the front seat. “Someone left a calling card.” He picked up the paper and read it. The two simple words “back off” were scrawled in blue ink on the stiff white paper. He turned and showed it to Story. “Very subtle. It looks like someone wants you to stop doing something.”
She took the paper between two fingers like Corky had just gone to the bathroom on it. “Who? What do they mean?”
Streeter again thought about his friend Detective Carey’s warning on Cooper. “Maybe Doug’s lawyer is sending you a message. Is there anything else you’re doing that someone might want you to stop?”
“This is crazy.” She dropped the note and walked slowly around the car, carrying her dog, who wiggled with excitement without knowing why. “They could have killed Corky. Is Cooper really that nuts?”
“Who knows? It’s unlikely that he would pull something like this right after he sets up that meeting for Wednesday, but who the hell knows? Is there anyone else who might know about Doug and what we’re doing?”
“It’s hard to say.” She was regaining her composure. “Doug knew so many people. So many nut cases. He probably dealt drugs with a lot of weirdos. Could be one of them found out about what we’re up to.”
“Well, it was either Cooper or someone else.”
She stopped and looked right at him for the first time since they got to the car. “Now, that was profound, Streeter.”
They inspected the damage for a minute and then she turned to him again. “Is there anything we can do before I call the police to make out a report?”
“Let’s knock on a few doors across the alley and ask if anyone saw anything.”
They talked to several neighbors. People in the first two houses noticed nothing, but at the third backyard from the entrance to the alley, they saw a man go into the back door. Streeter hurried up and knocked. A balding man maybe ten years younger than the bounty hunter answered. He was wearing just a pair of shorts and sandals and carried a half-empty quart bottle of Budweiser. Presumably, no one with such a swollen white stomach would leave his yard without a shirt.
“Excuse me,” Streeter said. “My friend’s car got vandalized sometime over the last hour and a half. It was parked in the lot of that office building.” He nodded toward the end of the alley. “You didn’t happen to see anything over there, did you?”
The man frowned in wild confusion as he listened, but when he answered he sounded basically lucid. “I thought I saw someone coming out of there about twenty minutes ago. I didn’t get much of a look, but he left his car sitting still idling in the alley while he got out for a while and headed to the parking lot. Then he got in his car again and backed out and drove off. I couldn’t see much of anything from my backyard and I didn’t know what he was up to but I’ll tell you this, he looked really pissed off. Major pissed off. I got a decent look at his license plate and I caught the three letters and the first number. B-J-J-3 something or other.”
“That’ll help. Thanks a lot.” He walked back to Story and told her. They tried a few more neighbors, but no one else saw anything, so they went back to the car.
“I’ll call the police,” she told him when they got together again.
“Now, that’s profound,” Streeter said.
As they waited for the police, Streeter realized there was something familiar about the partial plate number, but he couldn’t quite place it.
NINE
Soyko was all of eleven years old when his stepfather started kicking the hell out of him regularly. The old man, a bitter ex-professional middleweight, called each beating a “boxing lesson.” They lived next to their junkyard on Chicago’s near North Side, a couple of grimy miles from the city’s Loop. Soyko, who seldom used his first name of Leo because he hated it, absorbed the beatings until he was big enough to fight back.
And finally, one day shortly after his seventeenth birthday, in the back lot of the junkyard, he put an end to it. Business at the yard had been going south lately, and the old man was in a particularly toxic mood. It was cold out, midwestern bitter-damp, with the sky so low you could scrape it with a pool cue, when the old man wanted to administer another lesson.
The fight was as short and violent as it was one-sided. Soyko got in the first punch and never really gave the old man a chance. He delivered the final blows with a ball-peen hammer. The coroner’s report later said that the old man suffered massive internal bleeding and had seven cracked ribs, a splintered vertebra, four broken fingers, and several smashed facial bones. The kid even managed to break both bones in the elder Soyko’s left forearm. When it was over, Leo went back into the house, grabbed a few clothes, and left Chicago forever. Incredibly, the old man hung on for five days and then died without coming out of a deep coma. In the years that followed, Soyko often wondered if he’d actually meant to kill his stepfather. But he never wondered about his reaction to it. He was glad it happened.
“We’ll divide this up,” Soyko instructed Jacky in their search for Doug’s money. “I’ll take the strip joints and you check out the pool halls. The bars, places like that. I’ll see if he had any girlfriends and you just try and get a handle on anyone at all who knew the guy.”
He didn’t want to let Jacky get too near women. Soyko was bad enough in that department, but Jacky was pretty much out of control. Neither man appeared to really like women, and they never had girlfriends. But Jacky seemed to genuinely hate the gender. Women knew it, too. The only ones he was ever with sexually were hookers, and even then he had to pay a premium for his bent desires. Not that Soyko was much better. His idea of romance consisted of a drunken, doggy-style roll on the couch with some dim-witted trailer-park bimbo. He’d usually keep his shirt and socks on, and he never spent the night. But at least he could talk to a woman without scaring the hell out of her.
