Blind Vigil

by Matt Coyle

  “Yes. Thank you.”

  “Your ear’s bleeding, dude.” The man.

  I reached up and touched my ear and felt warm liquid on my fingers. The edge of my ear had been scraped when I landed on it.

  I heard the buzz of a zipper.

  “Here.” The woman. “A Kleenex for your ear. I don’t have any Band-Aids.”

  A tissue pressed into my hand. I folded it a couple times and pressed it against the scrape.

  “Thank you.”

  “Can we help you find someone?” The woman. A sigh from the man. He needn’t worry.

  “No thanks.”

  I turned to face where I thought Muldoon’s was. The sound of footsteps on the staircase to my right confirmed that I’d made the correct guess.

  Now what?

  Could I really be of any help to Moira in the field? Would it be better for both of us if I stayed home in my middle-class mortgaged prison, staring at halos of chandelier light and waiting for Moira’s phone call so I could give her my opinion? How long could she afford to pay me for my thoughts and how long could I live with getting paid for them?

  No good answers, but the wrong questions for tonight. Moira needed me on this case. And there might be someone following her.

  Muldoon’s was straight ahead. I tapped the cane in an arc in front of me until it made contact with the outside of the building. A left turn, a few more tapped steps, and I found the metal threshold to the front door.

  The sound of jazz from the bar pulsed through the closed door. I put the bloody tissue in my pocket and entered the restaurant. Stimuli overload assaulted my working senses. The music, customers’ conversations battling to get above it, smells of cooking meat and vegetables wafting back from the grill area mixing with perfume and cologne of people in the hallway.

  I stood in the doorway and tried to separate and categorize each sound and scent to get a sense of what I couldn’t see. Too much static to get a clear vision.

  “Excuse me?” Irritated male voice from behind. Forties or fifties. I realized I was blocking the entrance to the narrow hall. “Can we get by?”

  “Sorry.” I turned sideways.

  “It’s okay. I didn’t …” Voice calm now. Slight vibration of two sets of footsteps passed by me.

  Everybody’s disposition toward me changed when they saw I was blind. All perceived trespasses forgiven. I hadn’t been on the receiving end of grace much in my life. Had been on the giving end even less. I hadn’t yet gotten used to it and at that moment regretted it. Because to receive grace I had to be seen as blind. Seen. Noticed. A fatal flaw in a covert op. Yet here I was, stumbling in the dark, seen by everyone.

  I waited a couple beats after the people passed, then worked my cane down the hallway, bumping the tip against someone’s foot sitting on a sofa. Apologies. Grace.

  “Can I help you?” A young woman’s voice I didn’t recognize in front of me to the left. I’d made it to the hostess station.

  “Is Turk working tonight?”

  “Yes. He just took some customers to their seats. He’ll be back in a minute. Would you like to have a seat and wait for him?”

  White cane and sunglasses sitting in the hallway. Flashing neon sign. If Shay Sommers was in the restaurant or leaving, she’d notice me. And remember me if she saw me again. A coincidence for someone going about their normal life.

  “I’ll wait outside, thanks. Could you tell Turk that Rick is waiting for him?”

  “Sure.” The hostess. “Rick.” She said my name like she was reminding herself.

  I wanded myself outside into the courtyard, which had a ceramic tiled planter box that housed an elm tree. I found the back end of the structure, sat down on its eighteen-inch tiled rim, and folded up my service cane.

  The muffled thrum of jazz music from the bar inside Muldoon’s competed with the street sounds of night in downtown La Jolla. Up the stairs on Restaurant Row, cars passed by and parked in front by valets, conversations and laughter on the sidewalk. All easier to separate than the cacophony rebounding inside the closed space of the restaurant.

  Discordant noise assaulted me on my right. Someone opened the door to Muldoon’s. The noise faded as the door closed.

  “What are you doing out here?” Turk. Footstep, thunk, drag. Repeated a couple times. I stood up.

  “Waiting for you.”

  “I know. But … hey, your ear’s bleeding and your sunglasses are scratched up.” Concern.

  Shit. Even more of a neon sign. I grabbed the Kleenex out of my pocket and pressed it against my ear. Pain shot through my shoulder with the movement.

  “I had a little mishap. I’m fine.”

  “You want a Band-Aid out of the first aid kit?”

  “I’m good. Thanks.” I put the Kleenex back in my pocket.

  “What’s going on? Where’s Moira?”

  “Did Shay stop in after she got off work?”

  “No. She texted me that she was going straight home.” Urgent. “Why?”

  I’d made a private investigator 101 rookie mistake. Worried the client needlessly by involving him before adequate information was available. Now Turk was concerned and I didn’t have information to calm his nerves or even confirm his worries.

  I didn’t know anything. Only that Moira had spotted Shay leaving Eddie V’s and she’d headed in the direction of Muldoon’s and La Valencia. And that she hadn’t returned my phone call.

  “I was with Moira staking out Eddie V’s. Shay left work and Moira followed her on foot. I’m sure she followed her to her car and that Shay is now on her way home.”

  “But why are you here?” Emphasis on “you.”

  I didn’t like to lie to clients. Especially ones who were friends. But sometimes it was better to fudge the truth until you knew all the facts. I wasn’t going to further panic Turk and tell him about the Invisible Man and my concern for Moira. Especially when the Invisible Man might not even exist.

  “I got bored sitting in the car so I ventured out.”

  “But you asked me if Moira was here. If you don’t know where she is, why don’t you call her and find out.”

  “Radio silence on surveillance.” I tried to sound believable.

  “Yet, you’re clomping around out on the street. Shay knows I have a friend who’s blind and used to be a private detective. If she saw you, she might wonder what you’re doing here.”

  “Seeing an old friend.”

  “You’re lying about something, Rick.” Now angry. “What’s going on?”

  “I told you.” I should have stayed in the damn car.

  “Why would Moira be following Shay down here? Shay parks her car over on Cave Street in the other direction.” Then it hit him. “She left work and came this way, didn’t she? You thought she was coming by here like she usually does. Shit. She went to La Valencia again.”

  “We don’t know that.” I was ninety percent certain she did.

  “Have Moira call me tonight when you find her. Or when she finds you.”

  Step, thunk, drag until the rush of sound from Turk opening the door to his restaurant.

  Shit. Turk was mad and Moira would be, too, when I told her about my encounter with him.

  But I could take having Moira mad at me over not having her at all.

  CHAPTER NINE

  I CALLED MOIRA again. No answer. Texted her. Nothing. I tapped my way to the staircase and used the handrail to ascend it. Fourteen steps. Once I made it to the top, I realized I’d made a critical error when I left the car. I hadn’t counted the steps from the car to the staircase. I could start walking but I wouldn’t be able to find the car.

  I’d acted on impulse and ignored necessary details, a bad habit from my before life. Details mattered. Now more than ever. The number of steps from one place to another mattered.

  Everything mattered.

  I asked my phone the time. 9:19 p.m. Only fifteen or so minutes since Moira left me in the car and followed Shay Sommers. It felt like an hour. Every fift
een minutes was our agreed-upon time for her to check in so she wasn’t even late yet. But I’d called and texted her and gotten no response. I couldn’t go back to the car and wait for her to return. I couldn’t go down to La Valencia and try to find her. A walking road flare.

  All I could do was wait and do nothing. Like I should have done in the car.

  I walked ahead and found the covered brick walkway next to the garage in front of the supplement company. The business was closed at night and set back forty or fifty feet from the sidewalk, if my memory was correct. I took a couple steps down the walkway, turned to face the sidewalk, folded up my aluminum cane, and shoved it back into my inside coat pocket. The neon sign that was me would be less visable than when I was on the sidewalk.

  I pushed my sunglasses down on my nose. A circle of light appeared in my upper vision. Another streetlight on the sidewalk? Must have been. I edged a few more feet down the walkway until the upper half of the halo disappeared. There was still a half-moon of gauzy light on the bottom. Slight shifts of darkness in the void passed in front of the dull arc of light. Sounds and smells. Conversations. Laughter. Faint scents of perfumes and colognes. Low murmurs of car engines on the street. And rapid thumps of the valets jogging to retrieve customers’ cars parked blocks away.

  No return scent of the Invisible Man. And no Moira. I asked my phone the time. Nine-thirty-seven. She’d now been gone over a half hour and hadn’t checked in. I called her again. Voicemail. I grew more anxious as each new minute passed. Moira was a smart, seasoned private investigator, who despite her diminutive size, knew how to handle herself. Common sense told me that nothing could have happened to her during the quarter-mile walk from her car to La Valencia on the pedestrian-populated street. Even with an invisible man present who might not even exist.

  Maybe things had gotten interesting and Moira had forgotten about checking in or just ignored me. Still, my anxiety persisted. But the more I examined it, a different reason for its cause made more and more sense to me. Smelling the same scent from a man I’d smelled earlier today could give anyone pause, but the real reason I felt anxious was because without Moira by my side I felt isolated. Exposed. Vulnerable. For the last three months my home had been my cocoon, my sanctuary, my fortress. With Leah and Midnight by my side.

  The truth was, despite the hours I’d spent strengthening my body and my remaining viable senses, I wasn’t ready to take on the world alone. Not the world I used to inhabit. It was dangerous and the truth about people was often hidden even from those who could see.

  A half hour into my blind vigil, I heard the rapid pulse of running feet pass in front of me. Lighter and closer together than the loping strides I’d heard from the parking valets the last thirty minutes. My antennae went up and I listened for chasing footsteps, but none came. Good. No one was being chased. Not that I could do much about it if they were.

  My phone rang ten or fifteen seconds later.

  “Where the hell are you?” Moira. Angry.

  “On Prospect. Where are you? You were supposed to check in.”

  “Where on Prospect? I’m in the car. I’ll pick you up.”

  “I’m in front of the vitamin place.”

  “What? Where the hell is that?”

  “Thirty yards north of the entrance to Muldoon’s where that little garage structure is.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  I walked out onto the sidewalk and stopped next to the curb. Footsteps behind me.

  Sensory recognition jolted through my body. The scent. Dove for Men mixed with human musk.

  The Invisible Man.

  CHAPTER TEN

  I WHIPPED MY head north toward the scent, but it dissipated on an ocean breeze. He’d walked right behind me. Moving in the same direction Moira had on her run back to her car. He was following her, but he wasn’t running.

  Tires compressed to a stop in front of me.

  “Straight ahead.” Moira muted, like she was yelling at me from her driver’s seat through the open passenger window. “Get in.”

  I stepped down into the street and my cane found her car. I opened the door and slid into the passenger seat. The car started moving before I closed the door.

  “Did you see that man walking away from me?” His scent was gone, but his aura still haunted me.

  “What man?” I felt her head turn toward me.

  “The same man behind us on the sidewalk today. I think he’s following you.” I took a deep breath to settle myself, realizing what I said next would be hard to believe. “I smelled him again tonight. Twice.”

  “You mean the man I couldn’t find when you asked me to look for him?” Disbelief.

  “I didn’t imagine him, dammit!” The anger from feeling isolated and useless over the last hour minutes bubbled out of me. “It’s the guy. He passed by the car after you got out of it. Then he walked behind me while I was waiting for you on the curb just now.”

  “Good.”

  “What?” Was she making fun of me?

  “Shay met a man at La Valencia tonight. The two of them were waiting for the valet when I ran to my car. They’re still there.” The car slowed. “Whoa. They weren’t waiting for a valet. They were waiting for the man’s driver. He’s driving a Mercedes Benz Maybach.”

  “Check your rearview mirror for headlights. Is anyone following you?”

  “There are all sorts of headlights behind me, but none of them are following us. We’re on Restaurant Row.”

  “Have you had any unsatisfied clients in the last few months? Someone angry with you? Did Rachel Donnelly’s family hold you responsible for what happened?”

  “Thanks for bringing that up.” Hurt. “I don’t have any angry clients. No one is following either one of us.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. There’s nothing you could have done to save Rachel Donnelly.” I’d let my mouth run before my brain could catch up. Not for the first time. Still, that didn’t change the reality of the Invisible Man. “But there was a man following you. The same one I sensed earlier today. Don’t just blow it off.”

  “I appreciate your concern, but I think your imagination has gotten the better of you.” Pedantic, like she was speaking to a child. I liked her angry much better. “I know your sense of smell is incredible. You show it off every time I go to your house, but you’re not a bloodhound. You can’t identify someone solely by their scent. You use deduction as much as smell when you recognize me. Very few people come to your house. So, when I come by, you smell a familiar, but not necessarily distinct, scent and deduce that it’s me.”

  “You’re wrong.” But she’d planted a seed of doubt in my belief of my newfound capabilities.

  I could pretend that I could differentiate someone’s unique odor but I really didn’t have any proof. The man I smelled today could have been different from the one who walked by my car window and he could have been different from the man who walked behind me a minute ago.

  But my gut told me all three encounters were the same man and he’d followed Moira to and from La Valencia tonight.

  “What happened to your sunglasses and why is your ear bleeding?” Moira’s voice rose.

  “Nothing.” I took out the tissue the woman I knocked over gave me and dabbed my ear.

  “Doesn’t look like nothing.”

  “Not a big deal. I bumped into something.” The truth was too painful. “Why didn’t you text me updates or return my calls?”

  “I turned off my phone—Wait. There they go. Down Prospect.” The car accelerated then went down a slight incline. “Write down this plate number.”

  She called out the license plate number, and I dictated it into my phone.

  A right turn down a sharper incline. A few seconds later, a left turn.

  “Coast Boulevard?” I asked.

  “Yep. Along the ocean.”

  “What happened when Shay got to La Valencia?”

  “She took the elevator up to the tenth floor and was let into t
he Sky Suite.” The car jostled over a pothole.

  “Who did she meet there?”

  “I can’t be sure. If I’d continued down the hall, it would have been obvious that I was following her. But when she returned to the lobby forty-five minutes later, she was with the man who got into the Maybach.”

  “What does he look like?” But I doubted she’d describe someone I knew or knew of. I grew up in the tract home section of La Jolla and worked on Prospect Street for many years. But the world inside La Valencia Hotel was one I’d never ventured into. It was way out of my reach. The same zip code as the house I grew up in, but millions of dollars away.

  “Early forties. Five-ten. Brown and brown. Decent shape, but not a gym rat. Navy blue tailored Italian suit.” Her voice went up at the end of “suit” like she was going to add something, but she stopped talking.

  “But what? You were going to say something else.”

  “He’s wearing Italian, but it looks more like Canali than Brioni.”

  “Speak English.”

  “His suit is expensive, but not elite expensive. Not in the league of someone who pays $1,000 a night for a hotel suite and is driven around in a Maybach.”

  “I never knew you were so up on fashion and what constitutes upper elite,” I said.

  “I’ve lived in La Jolla a long time. Granted, in my late husband’s family house that was paid off decades before I set foot in it. But some things rub off on you if you pay attention.”

  The first thing I ever learned about Moira was that she paid attention. All the time.

  “Maybe he’s slumming in his casual Italian suit instead of his showoff clothes.”

  “Maybe so.” She didn’t sound convinced.

  “What are you going to tell Turk about what you saw tonight?”

  “I’m not going to tell him anything. He’ll get a report when I know exactly what’s going on. There’s nothing to tell, yet.”

  “You’d better think of something.” I told her about my meeting with Turk.

  “Why the hell did you go into Muldoon’s? You could have blown the whole surveillance and now you’ve freaked out the client.”