Macho Man Murder

by Leslie Langtry

  Dumpster! Hilly's modus operandi! Whenever she could, she always left her victims in a dumpster. It was her calling card. I needed to get in touch with her.

  I pulled over on a residential street and called Hilly. It went straight to voice mail again. Weirdly, she had a secondary message. You called again. Stop doing that. Or else the whole murder in your bedroom scenario becomes reality. Bye!

  I called Riley with the same results, except for the fact that his voice mail recording was normal. Flirty, but normal. Then I threw my cell onto the dash in frustration.

  Calm down, Merry. Think this through before you do something stupid. Again. A voice inside me said.

  Fine.

  I knew that Wally and Hilly had gone for ice cream after dinner. I also know that they'd left before I woke up. That's when I had the little reunion with Ivan and Ron. During that time, Wally had been murdered, but not by Ivan and Ron because I was with them. I was their alibi.

  And I was the one who benefitted from Wally's murder, a) because I would no longer need to kill Riley—although now, knowing he had access that I didn't have, that was up in the air at best—and b) because Rex was out of danger.

  With Ron and Ivan (unjustly) in the county jail, there was also no risk that they'd get revenge for Wally's murder.

  So who were my suspects? This was what I didn't want to think about. Because Hilly and Riley were the most likely to have murdered him. Hilly because she'd been the last one to see him alive and this was kind of her job. Riley because he got to live.

  And with Hilly claiming she'd witnessed the murder and naming Ron and Ivan—the two people who couldn't have done it—I'd say she was my number one suspect.

  What else did I know? That I had no idea what had happened. I had zero information on the scene of the crime. Well, I guess there's a first time for everything.

  I could see why Hilly blamed Ivan and Ron. Who'd care if a couple of terrorist guys got locked up for killing another terrorist guy? It checked off the boxes and cleared me. She probably thought it was a win-win.

  Could I lie and testify that I wasn't with Ivan and Ron when it happened? When had it happened exactly? And where? If it wasn't in town, and I'd looked everywhere, then it was out of town. And there's no way they could've killed him and gotten to me so quickly to throw the timeline off.

  Also, these guys were idiots. They'd never be able to plan something like this. Not in a million years. And why would they kill Wally? They were devoted to the little man. He'd raised them as his own since they were teenagers. Those two wouldn't kill him unless he left them strict orders to do so.

  It was no use. I liked Ron and Ivan. They'd kind of been big brothers to me. If by big brothers I meant two gorillas with the IQ of a gnat who looked at me as a little sister.

  Did I really want them to take the fall for a crime they didn't commit?

  Then there was Riley. He totally could've pulled this off. He had the most to lose, seeing how I was supposed to kill him and all that. And he knew I'd rather he died than Rex, so if it came down to it and I had to pull the trigger…

  Would I have actually gone through with it?

  But Hilly told the police she'd witnessed the killing. She named men who couldn't possibly have been there. In Hilly's mind, this would've been just another job. Wouldn't it? I really didn't know.

  She probably thought she was helping me. She probably had this in mind when they went for ice cream. She probably thought the whole thing was in the clear and she'd knocked out three baddies for the price of one.

  What she didn't count on was that I was about to smash her credibility to bits because I knew Ivan and Ron didn't do it.

  A tractor pulled onto the road in front of me. How long had I been driving aimlessly around town? It was like pacing, only with a car. Unlike walking back and forth, I'd been to every corner of Who's There. I was so distracted that it's a wonder I hadn't hit anyone.

  According to the clock on the dash, it was getting very late. I pulled over in a residential neighborhood and turned off the car.

  My cell buzzed, and I snatched it off the dash hopefully. It was Rex. Damn. A text, asking if I was okay. Double damn. He was so sweet. He knew there was something up with Wally and probably guessed that he wasn't my cousin. But he still worried about how I was handling all of this.

  I texted back that I was getting cookies at the Git and Go. It was a cop out because I mainly needed time to think before he questioned me. It was also a pain because he knew about the crime scene, the murder itself, and Hilly's statement. There was the slight possibility I could get that out of him.

  Did I go home and question him, hoping to dodge answering his questions? I was that good back in my prime. It wasn't a lie…more like a complete omission of the facts. Which is totally different, right?

  He texted back a heart emoji, and that was it. It was eleven p.m. Hilly was missing. Riley was avoiding me. Wally was dead. Ron and Ivan were in jail.

  What was I supposed to do now?

  There was only one thing I could think of.

  "Merry?" Soo Jin answered her door, dressed in a silk kimono. Her black, silky bob didn't have a strand out of place, and even without makeup, she looked like a goddess. I worried that her fiancé, Iowa state trooper Eddie Ruiz, was there.

  Why didn't I call Kelly, my best friend and co-leader? Because she didn't know where the crime scene was.

  "Come in!" She ushered me into her house.

  I hadn't been here since she'd moved from her condo. A small cat bounded across the floor, and I recognized Philby's other daughter immediately.

  "Moneypenny!" I picked up the purring cat and hugged her.

  "She's happy to see you!" Soo Jin closed the door behind me.

  I set the cat down, and she trotted away. "Is she weird?" I asked.

  Soo Jin laughed. "No. She's not like Philby or Martini. She's a perfectly normal cat. Sit down. I'll bring you some tea."

  Looking around, I felt guilty that I hadn't been by to see the new place. She was an amazing decorator. Everything was done in a Craftsman style, from the built-in fixtures right down to the Stickley furniture.

  "Wow!" I sat on the couch. "You did a great job!"

  She returned with a steaming teacup that looked like it was right out of the Qing Dynasty.

  "Thanks! I've always loved Frank Lloyd Wright." Soo Jin sat next to me and touched my arm. "How are you? I'm so sorry about your cousin."

  I set down my teacup and gave her a long look. Should I tell her the truth? It would help me in the long run because maybe she'd fill me in on the crime scene. Soo Jin had never been critical or judgy. I was going to take a chance.

  "He's not my cousin. Wally was a Chechen terrorist. I was undercover with his operation for a little over a year."

  She nodded as if she expected me to say this, and maybe she had.

  I continued. "He showed up on my doorstep, angry about my being a spy. He'd told me to kill Riley or he'd kill Rex. In a way, I'm glad he's gone."

  "You have had the most interesting life!" She smiled. "So that's why you wanted to know about the crime scene."

  "Will you give me the details?"

  Her eyebrows went up. "If I don't, are you going to break into the morgue again?"

  I waved her off. "I haven't done that that often." Only once or twice. I think. And the most recent time I was just trying to retrieve my taxidermic vulture who'd been laced with LSD. Nothing weird.

  "Okay," she said. "He was stabbed twice in the heart. Died instantly, I should think. Although I'll know more when I do the autopsy tomorrow."

  "Twice?" I said between sips of tea. "You'd think once would do it."

  She nodded. "It did seem like overkill. Almost like they wanted to make sure he was dead."

  The Chechen double tap. Was it inflicted to implicate Ron and Ivan?

  "Where was he killed?" I pressed.

  "That's the strange thing. It was out behind the Cornhole. They found him in the dumpster." />
  The Cornhole was a dangerous dive bar on the outskirts of town. Fights broke out on a regular basis, but as far as I knew there hadn't been a murder there. The fact that he was in a dumpster implicated Hilly because that was her thing. The fact that I'd taken Hilly there not long ago meant she knew where it was.

  It wasn't easy to find the Cornhole if you didn't know how to get there. That's why I hadn't stumbled upon the crime scene.

  "Who found him?" I asked.

  "Hilly called it in, I think. But she wasn't there when I arrived."

  Hilly. It kept coming back to her.

  "Why was Riley there?"

  She shrugged. "He said he was working a case. He also told me not to let you near the crime scene."

  The Bastard.

  I sat there soaking all of this in. I have no idea how long I sat there staring into space. But at some point Soo Jin handed me a glass of wine. That's when I started sighing and yawning. My goal was to wrangle a sleepover invite without actually asking her if I could spend the night. Maybe if I came across as pathetic and sleepy, she might just…

  "You should sleep here tonight," she offered.

  "Great idea!" The wineglass inspired me. "I'll tell Rex I'm spending the night because I've been drinking and I shouldn't drive."

  I hadn't drunk texted since college. No, wait. There was that one time in Budapest when I told the 80-year-old conductor of the Hungarian Brass Quintet that I thought he was cute. I ended up regretting it in the morning when a messenger delivered four dozen roses and two gallons of goulash. I felt guilty fleeing town and deleting his number, mostly because the goulash was excellent.

  The problem was drunk texting while sober. Allsh well… I texted. B home in morngign. Lov u! That should work.

  Soo Jin handed me the bottle. "My guest room is down the hall, first right."

  "Thanks," I said before gulping down the whole glass of wine.

  I watched as she padded down the hallway and went into what I assumed was her bedroom. Then I picked up the bottle and headed for the room she'd indicated. After another drink, I set the bottle on the nightstand and fell asleep, fully clothed.

  "Good morning!" Soo Jin said brightly from behind the door. "Breakfast is ready when you are!"

  As I listened to her footsteps heading down the hall, I started to get up. Moneypenny was snuggled up next to me. She stretched as I sat up, then licked my hand, purring madly. How was it that this cat was normal? My cats weren't normal. And they were related.

  I stood up and made my way to the private bathroom, where Soo Jin had laid out soap, towels, a toothbrush, and toothpaste. After a quick shower, I found fresh cotton pajamas and a fluffy robe.

  I could get used to this.

  She was waiting for me at the table with French toast, hot tea, and bacon. Without a word, I sat down and ate. Soo Jin didn't say anything. She just let me eat while she perused the paper. I noticed she was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt.

  "Is it Sunday?" I asked through a mouthful of bacon.

  She nodded as if that wasn't the world's stupidest question. Actually, the world's stupidest question is Can I fit that in my mouth? Most people don't know that. By the way, the answer should always be no.

  "Rex called," she said softly so as not to startle me. "Had to go into the office. He's worried about you but is okay with you staying here. Oh, and I washed your clothes. Let me put them in the dryer." And she was off.

  A twinge of guilt swished my breakfast around in my stomach. My husband didn't deserve this. He deserved the truth. But telling him the truth meant implicating Hilly and/or Riley. I couldn't bring myself to do that. Not yet at least.

  Soo Jin returned with a smile to hand me a fresh cup of tea. "Do you want to talk about it?"

  I shook my head and swallowed. "But thanks for helping me out. You're an amazing host."

  "Thanks! I love doing it. When I went to college, I had to choose between medical school or a degree in hospitality."

  "Seriously? Those two seem about as far apart as they can be."

  She nodded as if she heard this all the time. "I wanted to run a beachside resort in Tahiti or Fiji. But cutting up corpses won out."

  I think I would've made a different decision. But then again, maybe not. After all, I went straight into espionage after college. Maybe I was the strange one.

  "You know"—Soo Jin smiled—"I called the sheriff's department. Carnack is out of the office for the day. If you wanted to visit the suspects, now would be ideal."

  She knew me too well. Once breakfast was over and I was dressed, I drove to the sheriff's office.

  "Morning, Mrs. Ferguson," Deputy Ray Grimes said without looking up from what looked like a shapeshifter horror novel. I barely knew the man, but he obviously knew me.

  "Morning," I said. I tried to figure out what to say. He'd have no reason to admit me to the jail. In the end, I opted with saying what I wanted straight out. "I'd like to see the prisoners."

  "Okay." He hit something under the desk that buzzed, unlocking the door to the cells. Then he went back to his book.

  That was easy.

  "Asma! I mean, Merry!" Ron jumped up in his cell and raced for the bars.

  On the other side, Ivan did the same thing.

  "Is Wally really dead?" he asked.

  I nodded. "I'm so sorry."

  It was weird to say that when I really wasn't. But I did feel sympathy for these two. They'd known Wally all of their lives.

  "They say we killed him." Ron scowled.

  "But we did not kill him!" Ivan shouted, even though I was one foot away.

  I tried to put on a sympathetic smile. "Did you tell them I was your alibi?"

  The two men looked confused.

  "What is alibi?" Ron asked.

  "It's a person or group of people who can say you were with them at the time the crime was committed."

  Ivan's eyes grew wide. "You can do that here? Someone can cover you, and they believe them?"

  Things weren't that bad in their little corner of Chechnya, were they?

  Ron spoke up. "We did not tell them you were with us. We do not want to get you into trouble."

  That was sweet. And thoughtful. Especially from two men who liked to tear open beer cans with their teeth and wrestled an alligator named Larry every Christmas Eve.

  "It's okay, guys. They knew I was with you when they picked you up. Have they said anything to you about the charges?"

  "They said we could have right to attorney," Ron replied.

  "But we don't know anything about that," Ivan added. "Do you know about that?"

  I shook my head. "Don't say anything to them. I'm going to find you an attorney, okay?"

  Wait, I was? What brought that on?

  The men brightened at the thought of this. It was too late to turn back now. I had to go through with it.

  No one was more surprised than me when I said, "Just don't tell them I am getting one for you."

  "Right!" Ron nodded. "We are to say Asma is getting us attorney."

  "Her name is Merry now," Ivan corrected.

  Ron tried again. "Oh, right. We are to say Merry is getting us attorney."

  I shook my head. "No, just say you are getting an attorney. Leave me out."

  Ivan grinned. "We are to say Merry is not getting us an attorney."

  "But she really is," Ron added.

  Ivan corrected himself. "Right. And we are to say leave her out of this."

  "No," I said. "Tell them your attorney will be in touch. But don't tell anyone I'm getting you the attorney."

  Ron agreed. "Okay. Merry will be getting in touch with our attorney, but she is absolutely not getting us the attorney."

  I rubbed my eyes. "Guys! Just tell them your attorney will be coming soon. But don't say who is contacting them for you."

  "Wait!" Ivan held up one finger. "I know!" In a dreadful American accent, he said, "I want my phone call!"

  "Good point," I agreed. "Since you're obviously going to t
ell them I'm involved, call my number when you make your call. Give me the afternoon to find you a lawyer."

  "Okay," they agreed simultaneously.

  I turned to go but stopped. "Do you have any idea who killed Wally?"

  The men shook their heads.

  I sighed. "Right. I'll be on my way. Remember to give me a few hours to find an attorney, okay?"

  "Yes!" Ivan said as Ron nodded.

  The deputy buzzed me out without looking up from his novel. He seemed to be perspiring. I shuddered inwardly and left the building. I had just gotten into my van when I got a call on my cell. I didn't recognize the number.

  "Hello?" I asked.

  "Yes! Merry! This is Ron! I am calling you for our attorney, please."

  I didn't speak for at least thirty seconds.

  "The concept of time isn't one you're familiar with, is it?" I griped.

  "No! Very bad at time!" Ron said. I could literally hear him smiling on the other end.

  I tried again. "If anyone comes in to question you, say you are waiting for your lawyer, and don't tell them anything. Got it?"

  "Got it!" Ron then repeated what I'd just said to Ivan and, most likely Deputy Grimes, who probably wouldn't notice anything at this point.

  Great.

  I hung up and drove back to Soo Jin's house. She was waiting for me and let me in.

  "Do you know of a good defense lawyer?" I asked once inside.

  "Of course!" she answered before turning and heading down the hall.

  The woman was amazing. And I was pretty sure, after this was all over, that I'd need one for myself.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Jane Monaghan, attorney, met me at Oleo's for lunch. The pretty and petite blonde looked to be in her early fifties. She smiled warmly as she shook my hand, but I got the impression that she was sizing me up. I liked that because it meant she was paying attention. I also liked that she'd agreed to meet me on a Sunday at this restaurant. I sure didn't mind eating here again so soon.

  She pulled a legal pad from her bag and took the cap off her pen. "Before we begin, can I ask you a question?"

  "Sure," I said as the waitress handed me a double-chocolate shake and gave Jane a cup of coffee. I hesitated for a moment, wondering if I should also be drinking something serious. But the shake was extra chocolatey and had whipped cream on top, so I cut myself a little slack.