by Dan Taylor
“That sounds great and everything, but I made a promise to Tracy.”
He shakes his head. “Is that after you went and spoke to the Starship Enterprise himself, or before?”
“After. This is how it is: I texted her, letting her know I’m here and looking for her, and she text me back, saying she’d be back in two to three hours, and saying some crazy shit’s going down with an ex, and I was to keep watch, and to not trust anyone who came to door. No matter who it is.”
He’s looking around, thinking. Then he pulls out his phone, checks it, and puts it back in his pant pocket. “You’re lying.”
“It’s the truth. She also mentioned something about cloned cell phones and dudes posing as her brother. I want to trust you, but given the context, with Tracy saying that crazy shit, I’m sure you can understand why I can’t.”
“I don’t need you to trust me, shit for brains. None of this makes any sense. I don’t know what shit you’re pulling, but I’m coming in no matter what piss-poor excuse you come up with.” He says the next part as though he’s reading something off a report, or defending his actions in a tribunal. “How do I know you’re not one of Tracy’s crazy exes, and you’ve got her tied up in there?”
He’s looking for probable cause.
“You know she’s not in here, because the neighbor saw her leave. He told me that, at least.”
He sighs. “And he told me that shit too.” He pauses. “What’s your name, guy?”
My car’s in the driveway behind him. It’s a rental, and there’s a chance the rental car company hasn’t processed the registering of the car with the DMV as timely as the LAPD would like them to. It happens, so I say, “Harry. Harry Geoffries.”
“Well listen up, Harry Geoffries. I don’t believe a word you’ve said. I’d have to be an idiot to. I don’t care if the reason you can’t open the door is because you’re smoking marijuana in there, or anything dumb like that. I don’t sweat the small stuff, and what Tracy and one of her boyfriends get up to in their spare time is their business. All I want to do is look around, make sure Tracy’s not in there, and then I’ll be on my way. Three minutes. Five, tops. How does that sound?”
“It sounds like something one of Tracy’s crazy exes would say to lure me into letting them in, so they can do God knows what.”
He sighs. “You’re not going to open up, are you?”
“I think I’ve made that clear enough.” I think of something. “Tell you what, I’ll phone Tracy myself and ask her what her brother looks like. If she gives a description resembling you, then I’ll let you in. Or better still, maybe there’s something you can tell me that only Tracy would know, like something from your childhood, and I can relay it to Tracy and have her confirm you are who you say you are.”
“Like what, she’s got a mole on her right butt cheek?”
“I don’t know, some story that has details only Tracy would know.”
He thinks a second, shaking his head, smiling a little like he’d punch me if I were on the other side of the door, or vice versa. Then he says, “This one time, Tracy and I rode a unicorn to Mickey Mouse’s
Magic Castle and fought off a dragon. How’s that?”
“I’ll ask her to describe her brother.”
“You do that.”
I take out my cell phone, finish composing my text message to Georgina, send it, and then dial a number I’m only supposed to ring in extreme circumstances.
32.
“Hancock,” Detective Dukes says. “You’ve got twenty seconds to prove to me this is an emergency.”
Detective Dukes and I go way back. He’s saved my life on a number of occasions, though I’ve helped him get promoted to his current rank on the force by helping him catch a number of serial killers, one of which was a hit lady he had to spend three nights sleeping under my bed to catch. He calls us even, and I agree when I’m not in trouble and need his help.
I take a deep breath and say, “Although I can’t go into details, I’m in so much trouble I thought it a good idea to try to poison a cat tonight—twice.”
Detective Dukes is a hell of an investigator, so he says, “You tried to poison the same cat twice, or two separate cats?”
“The first one. Just like I said.”
“Do I want to know the details of the emergency?”
“I don’t have to tell you, because every local news outlet will be covering the story, as well as some national.”
He sighs. “I’ve told you that if it’s you who’s committed the crime, you’re on your own.”
“I haven’t killed anyone. You’ve got to believe me. It just looks like I have.”
He sighs again, the kind of deep sigh that has a guy counting how many days there are until he can start collecting his pension. “I’m hanging up, Hancock. I advise you to call your lawyer, and to start thinking about what size jumpsuit you’ll need in lockup.”
“My lawyer’s Georgina Steinberger.”
“Then get a new lawyer.”
“I have her on retainer.”
“Smart, Hancock” He sighs. “Tell me what it is you need.”
“It’s just a little bit of information.”
“Shoot.”
“Detective Lucy, you know him?”
Out of the blue, he hangs up.
I press the button to redial his number, and he answers straightaway. And says, “You broke rule number one, Hancock. I don’t snitch, even on the bad apples. Proceed carefully. Next time you don’t get a second chance.”
“I don’t want you to snitch. I just want to know a couple things. Silly things, like are there two detectives with the surname Lucy on the force?”
“Two detectives called Lucy? Sure. One works vice, the other drugs. There are also five Ramirezes, if you were wondering that.”
“Are they brothers?”
“Black guys?”
“No, brothers as in they share the same father and mother.”
“I’ll have to do some checking. Though I don’t think so.”
“Will you be able to do that now?”
“Wait a second.”
I hear Detective Dukes tapping away at a keyboard. I refrain from making some hacky joke about the LAPD having him working a desk job. A minute later, he says, “If the two Detective Lucys on the force are brothers, then I’m a hooker with a full set of teeth.”
“Are you saying they aren’t?”
“One’s a white guy; the other’s from some part of Asia.”
“Oriental?”
“That, or whatever the PC term is nowadays.”
“The white guy, what does he look like?”
I hear a few clicks, and then he says, “Let me see… There he is.” Detective Dukes gives me a cop description: in-depth, and finishing with “looks like he was born with a silver spade up his ass.”
I think a second, then say, “That doesn’t make any sense. The guy you described doesn’t look like either of my Detective Lucys.”
33.
“Nope, there aren’t any more,” Detective Dukes says, after carrying out my request for a double check.
“What’s the chance, say, of someone living close enough to his sister to visit her regularly in LA, but working for a different city?”
“I don’t get what you’re asking.”
“Do cops ever have a long commute, in your experience?”
“Nope. I don’t know anyone like that.”
“That’s what I thought. And you’re sure this second Detective Lucy, the white guy, doesn’t look either like a long bean sprout with a short-trimmed mustache or Michael J. Fox with a bad attitude?”
“Hancock, this guy’s a redhead, and he’s overweight.”
“That doesn’t match either of my guys.”
“Okay, Hancock. I gotta go. Whatever it is, good luck.”
“Thanks.”
I hang up and then go back over to the front door. I look through the peephole again, double-checking myself, and see who I s
aw before. I wasn’t mistaken. My guy isn’t a redhead, and doesn’t look like he was born with a silver spade up his ass. Whatever the hell that means.
Under my breath I say, “If you aren’t a cop, then who are you?”
34.
Watching his reaction carefully, I say to the guy posing as Detective Lucy outside, “I just got off the phone with Tracy, and she confirmed that you’re her brother.”
I don’t get much of a reaction. Surprise, maybe. “Great,” he says. Hell of a poker face if he’s the guy who killed Tracy. He says, “So, are you going to let me in?”
“I am. But it’s pointless. Tracy’s not here.”
“I just want to check, guy. Then I’ll be on my way.”
“Just a second.”
I go to the kitchen, look around, and then find something I can use. It isn’t ideal, but it should get the job done.
Then I go back to the front door, take a deep breath, and then unlock and open the door.
He smiles when he’s presented with me, though he doesn’t hold out his hand to shake. He looks around me inside Tracy’s duplex, and I step aside to let him in. As he goes past, I get a whiff of that 80s’ cologne, the one that smells like urinal cake.
He gets down on his knees, says, “Tracy’s real particular about people taking off their shoes. But you already know that, right?”
“Of course,” I reply, not knowing whether he’s referring to me having not taken off mine. I’m standing behind him, so he’d have to rubberneck to get a look. But he could’ve noticed before, when I initially opened the door.
“Wants to keep her carpets clean.”
When his shoes are off, he starts looking around, starting off in the living room. I’m behind him, looking for signs he knows the layout. He calls out, “Tracy, are you home?”
“She’s not here, Detective. Like I told you—”
“She’s out,” he says, turning around and fixing me with a skeptical look. If he is the killer, I wonder what game we’re playing, and if he has a gun.
He goes through to the kitchen, notices the bowl of stew on the floor. He gets on his haunches by it, lifts it up, looks at me and says, “This yours?”
I shrug. “I was preparing a meal for myself when you knocked.”
His eyes narrow, and he puts it down.
Then he gets up, walks past me, through the living room again, in the direction of the stairs.
I follow.
He looks up them, calls out Tracy’s name again, waits a second, then goes up, taking two steps at a time.
I quickly follow, and find him standing at the foot of the ladder leading up to the attic. He has his hands on his hips, looking up at the attic.
“Have you been up there, chief?”
“Tracy wanted me to get something for her.”
He turns around and looks at me, shaking his head. He’s also moving his hand up to the lapel of his jacket, slowly.
But he gets distracted when the cat comes sauntering out of Tracy’s bedroom, having squeezed through the ajar door.
He gets down on his haunches, stroking its neck. And what he says makes me reach into my pocket, take out Tracy’s meat tenderizer, and whack him over the head with it.
35.
Five minutes later, he’s sitting in one of Tracy’s dining room chairs, head slumped forward, his chin resting on his chest, and his hands tied behind his back and to the chair with the only thing I could find in a hurry: the belt to Tracy’s morning robe, which is pink.
Blood is running down his forehead from a one-inch gash just in front of his crown. I’ve checked that he’s breathing, but I’m still wondering if the blow I delivered, which was harder than I intended, has killed him. Failing that, given a brain injury that will eventually lead to his death or permanent brain damage. I’m also wondering whether I saw a second robe in Tracy’s wardrobe, and if there is, if it’s necessary to gag him with its belt.
I transported him downstairs, not because I think he’ll prefer the view from down here while he’s being interrogated, but because every room on the second floor is carpeted, and he could potentially rock the chair over and get free.
The only rooms that aren’t carpeted downstairs are the bathroom, where Tracy is still, and the kitchen, which has linoleum. I’m more than aware that if someone were to go into Tracy’s garden they’d have full view of my captive.
As I’m sitting on Tracy’s couch, waiting for him to regain consciousness, I’m holding two objects in my hand. The first is his badge, which if it’s fake, is a really high-quality fake. The second item is his gun. It’s a Glock 22, the type of pistol that the lion’s share of police officers carry.
What did he say before I knocked him unconscious? “Hey, there’s Tracy’s cat, Buster! How you doing, buddy?”
After he’d said that, I was more than convinced that he isn’t a police officer, and if he is, he isn’t Tracy’s brother and most definitely is the guy who killed her, as there isn’t a single sign Tracy owns a cat.
As I dragged him downstairs by his armpits, I figured he’d come back here to check Tracy was dead, or that he’d forgot to clean up a certain area of the crime scene, and was waiting for the opportune time to shoot me. He looked like he was about to before Buddy the cat distracted him.
But after I’d tied him up with Tracy’s morning robe belt, I got to thinking about the logic of all that.
If he is the guy who killed Tracy, then what the hell did he make of me being in Tracy’s duplex? He must’ve known I’d found the body, which makes the conversation we had at the door make little sense.
And how does the neighbor fit into all this, if this is the guy?
And the other Detective Lucy?
Shit. I just thought of something else: If this is the guy, and he’s not a cop, then what’s with the Chinese food?
I’m still looking at the Glock 22, turning it around in my hands, looking at both sides of it,
when I hear a groan from the kitchen.
36.
I put the pistol down on Tracy’s coffee table and go over to the guy. He’s not fully conscious, but stirring, like he’s waking up with a really bad hangover.
I don’t know what to do, so I do the only thing that seems to make a little sense: I fill up a glass with water, and splash it in his face.
His head jolts upright, and he looks at me with a look of distilled confusion on his face. Then there’s a look on his face like he remembers what he’s doing here and what he was doing before everything went black.
He says, “You… You… You…!”
“Hit you over the head?”
He frowns. “You did?”
“I kinda had to.” We look at each other a second, neither one knowing what to say.
“Why did you do that?”
“I don’t suppose you’re the one that killed Tracy?”
“Tracy’s dead?”
Surprise. Definite surprise.
“Come off it,” I say, though not assertively. “You knew that, and you did it.”
“Did what?”
“Killed Tracy.”
He starts to groan again, and I think it’s because of the throbbing pain in his head, until he starts to sob.
This is not the reaction I was expecting from a killer. I stand there awkwardly, not knowing what to do.
His sadness turns to rage on the flip of a coin and he shouts at me, “You son of a bitch! You killed her!” spit flying out his mouth and snot threatening to eject from his nose.
“I didn’t. I thought it was you.”
We frown at each other. Then I say, “If you’re not the killer, then why did you pretend she has a cat?”
He shakes his head. “What do you mean? We both just saw the cat upstairs.”
“We saw a cat. Tracy doesn’t own one. At least she didn’t.”
He seems to be in a state of shock, as he says, “So what you’re telling me is Tracy’s dead? As in not alive?”
“She is, and I’
m sixty, maybe seventy percent sure you’re the one who did it.”
He goes back to crying.
Needless to say, I’m more than a little confused, but I’m still convinced the guy sitting in front of me is the one who did it.
When he’s calmed down a little, I ask him, “If you’re not her killer, then why didn’t you know Tracy doesn’t have a cat?”
“Because she does have a cat, asshole!”
“There’s not a single sign Tracy owns a cat. Buddy’s the next-door neighbor’s or some shit.”
“Buddy?”
“The cat, which you called Buster, typically a dog’s name.”
“Oh, yeah? Would the next-door neighbor keep his cat food in Tracy’s cupboard below the sink?”
My heart sinks. I go over to it, open it, and there it is. Half to myself, I ask, “Why the hell would Tracy keep her cat food next to cleaning products?”
With sadness in his voice, he says, “Because Tracy was a shitty pet owner. But she was a pet owner.”
“Where’s her catty litter, or Kitty Litter?”
“She encouraged Buster to go toilet in the neighbor’s yard.”
“That’s disgusting.” I stand up. “I still don’t completely buy it. Tracy could’ve owned a cat previously, which died.”
“And have not thrown out the cat food?”
“She could’ve been keeping it for a rainy day.” I think a second. “I know how to settle this.”
I leave the guy where he is, and go upstairs to retrieve Buddy. I find her snoozing on Tracy’s bed. I’m in no mood for games, so there’s no coaxing or kiddy gloves. I grab that cat and wrestle her downstairs, she clawing me the whole way and making a noise like sizzling bacon.
When back in the kitchen, I look at her tag, which is attached to her collar. Then I say, “Aha! This cat’s name is Roger and Sons.”
He frowns. “They must be the guys who made it. Turn it around.”