by David Stever
The first order of business was to arrange a meeting with Dee Dee, so I tapped out a text message asking whether she could join me for lunch at noon, her choice of a location. She responded within a minute and suggested Max’s, a downtown watering hole. It was a perfect place to meet. Dim lighting and a decent bar made it popular with city office workers. I had been there many times; it was on my beat when I worked Vice. I hoped we could tuck away in a back corner.
Katie and Mike were restocking beer at the bar when it began again, their voices loud enough to draw me from the booth.
“Were her kids home?” Katie poked.
He faced her as he set a case of beer on the bar. “No. I told you, she is not ready to tell her children about me. They are going through enough as it is with the divorce and all.”
“Once again, that is my entire point. She will never tell them.” Katie opened the case and loaded bottles into the cooler beneath the bar. “She wants you as her boy toy. A friend with benefits. Nothing more. Mike, all I’m saying is, I don’t want you to get hurt when she moves on.”
“Moves on? Why would she move on?”
I parked myself on a stool. No way did I want to miss this.
“All your dates are in her house when the kids are gone.”
“So?”
“You don’t think that is unusual?” she asked.
“Not under the circumstances. She’s in the middle of a divorce. She can’t be seen with another man until the divorce is final.”
“Aren’t they separated?”
“Yes, but she doesn’t want to give the impression there was another man involved.”
“Didn’t they separate, like, a year ago?”
“Yes.”
“And everyone knows her husband hooked up with another woman?”
“Yeah, his secretary.”
“Then what is stopping the two of you from going out on a date?”
Mike set another case of beer on the bar. He folded his meaty arms on top of the box and leaned his large body against it. He paused. Then: “You think she has someone else, don’t you?” he said, in a melancholy voice not typical of his gruff persona.
Katie stopped loading bottles, turned, and faced him. I was glad she picked up on his change in demeanor. “All I am saying is, I think it is weird you never go out. You only see her when it’s convenient for her. Who knows if she has another ‘friend’? Once she got separated, maybe she decided to play the field.”
He shook his head. “She’s not the type.”
“I know you like her, but I love you, and I don’t want your heart broken.”
“She is not like that, you’ll see—”
A knock on the front window stopped the conversation. We all turned. Paul Ellison peered in through the glass, his hands cupped around his face.
Mike looked at me. “Twice in one day?”
“All before noon. This ought to be interesting.” I unlocked the door and let Paul in.
“I didn’t know what time you opened,” said the detective. “Thought I’d take a chance.”
Mike reached out and shook his hand. “We open at eleven, but we’re always open for you, Paul. Have a seat.”
Ellison climbed on a stool and checked the time on his watch. “Eleven. I’ll remember from now on.” He wore the same rumpled brown suit and wrinkled white dress shirt he wore this morning and the day before. He did not wear a tie, and as I thought about it, I don’t ever remember him wearing a tie.
“I can’t believe yesterday was the first time I was in here,” he said. “I got home last night and thought McNally’s is the place for me to hang out. Old Mike and Johnny. Why didn’t I think of this before?”
“Hey, you have your routine. Regular spots where they all know you. Why end a good thing?” Mike said, as he served him a shot of Jack Daniels and a beer chaser.
“Some of those places are getting a bit crowded. Too many people seeing me at all the wrong hours.”
“We understand.” I moved over and took the seat next to him. “Last thing you need is some rookie shocked to see you knock back a few during the day.”
“Amen to that, Delarosa.”
Mike poured two more shots and the three of us raised our glasses in a toast to old-fashioned police work—and to making it to retirement without being killed first.
Paul slid his glass to Mike for a refill and then looked at Katie. “What about you?” He patted the stool beside him. “I’m buying.”
She smiled. “Thanks, but I’m on duty.”
“Aren’t we all, sweetheart.”
“Some other time?”
“Sure. You’ll be seeing a lot of me from now on.”
She nodded and hurried off to the kitchen. Mostly, I’m sure, to remove herself from Paul’s line of fire. He sat for another thirty minutes, drinking and reminiscing about the good old days as a cop in Port City, before getting up to leave.
“That’s it for me, boys. Yes, my new home away from home.” He threw a five-dollar bill on the bar, turned, and walked out.
It was amazing: he downed at least four shots in the short time he was there, and it had no effect on him. His organs must be so alcohol-logged that a few more drinks would not make a difference.
Mike held up the five.
“Professional courtesy,” I said.
“The last thing Paul Ellison needs is another place to drink. He’s keeping an eye on you and the case.”
“Of course he is. Today was his way of making sure I keep my end of the deal. He smells a big score in Shelton. Hell, if he wraps up Stan in a murder, he goes out on a major high-profile arrest and retires like a king.”
“Can’t say I blame him.”
“Me either. But I can’t have him working against me. He and I need to be drinking from the same bottle.”
Mike raised a shot glass. “Amen to that, Delarosa.”
16
Paul Ellison’s unexpected visit delayed me by thirty minutes for my lunch with Dee Dee. I sent her a text to ask if we could push it until 12:30. She agreed with an immediate return text. I wanted Katie to conduct surveillance, so I asked Mike whether I could steal her away from the bar for a bit.
“Nothing I can’t handle. I do need her tonight, though.”
“We’ll be back mid-afternoon.”
I had on jeans and a T-shirt which I didn’t think appropriate for Max’s, so I hurried to my condo and changed into khakis, a dress shirt, and a blazer. I grabbed my camera bag and met Katie at our garage in the alley behind the restaurant. We took my BMW and I had her drive. I thought the car would blend in better downtown at this hour than my old, vomit-brown Buick LeSabre, my go-to surveillance car.
When I first met with Stan, he gave me the phone number that Kenzie gave him. But when Kenzie was murdered, thoughts of calling the number vanished until today. I took a throw-away phone from the glove compartment and dialed.
“That’s the number from Stan?” Katie asked.
I put the phone on speaker. “Don’t expect anyone to answer.” And nobody did. It only rang. “You can bet it’s a burner.”
“If it is, whoever has it might call back. They won’t recognize your burner number. They might think Stan is calling.”
“True. I like the way you think. So, we keep this phone with us in case.” I pointed to a cross street on our left. “Turn here.”
Max’s was in the center of the block and the odds of finding a place to park that would give Katie an angle to take pictures were nil. We circled the block three times with no luck. It was now 12:25. She doubled-parked and I was about to get out and walk, when a delivery van pulled away from the curb across from the restaurant.
“There.” We grabbed the spot and I hopped out, leaving her instructions to photograph anything and everything. Even a shot of her license plate would at least give us an address. All we had to work with was what Stan had told us. Dee Dee was still a mystery, and we needed to figure how to fit her into the puzzle.
The pl
ace was long and narrow, with a bar on the right and a dining room off to the left. People were two-deep at the bar. And here I thought we had our share of noon-time drinkers at McNally’s. I snaked my way through the crowd to the rear of the place and grabbed a high-top table being vacated by two young women. I took the seat that gave me a view of the door.
A waitress came by and threw down a coaster.
“Bourbon with a little ice. Plus, a friend is joining me.”
“Sure.”
She hurried off and I scanned around the room. So far, no Dee Dee. I sent Katie a text:
“They have valet parking. Take pics of all cars.”
She replied with a “thumbs-up” emoji. I took a sip of the whiskey and kept an eye on the door. Even though Dee Dee took me by surprise in the alley, and now had my suspicions on high, I did not press her for any information in our first meeting in my condo. She came to me asking for protection, so I wanted to gain her trust. My plan for this meeting was to dig deeper, but also make her feel confident that I could protect her while we figure out who eliminated Kenzie—and who orchestrated the blackmail scheme.
Fifteen minutes passed. No Dee Dee. No call or text.
I called Katie. “Anything?”
“No. But I don’t know what she looks like. I take it she’s late?”
“Yes, and I have one of those feelings.”
“How long do we wait?”
“Until one, unless I hear from her.”
“Copy that, boss.”
I put the phone on the table and scanned the bar. All young professionals, most in business attire, but nobody resembling Dee Dee.
Five more minutes passed when the waitress came over and set another bourbon in front of me. “From the woman at the bar.”
“Who?”
“Umm, she had on a tan ball cap. At the far end, close to the door. She asked what you were drinking. Guess you have an admirer.”
I looked up and down the bar. I did not spot a woman with a tan cap, but a woman with long, black hair caught my eye as she was leaving. Her hair swished behind her as she went through the door. I threw down a twenty and called Katie while squeezing my way through the crowd.
“A tall woman with long, black hair—”
“I got her, I got her. Valet had a green Jaguar in front and she drove off.”
I made it outside, but she had disappeared. I grabbed one of the valet guys. “A woman with long, black hair just got into a Jag. You know her?” I slipped him a ten.
He glanced at the money as he shook his head. “I wish.”
“Ever see her before?”
“Nope. Why, you get rejected?”
“More like I got played.”
17
“The waitress brought me a drink saying a woman at the bar sent it. A woman with a tan ball cap. I couldn’t find anyone with a tan cap but did see a tall woman with black hair go out. That is when I called you.”
“Definitely her. The woman from Entertainment Ventures yesterday. Green Jag and all. I took a lot of pictures.”
Katie was still behind the wheel of my BMW, headed back to McNally’s. I scrolled through the photos on the camera. “I agree, and it brings up many questions.” I stopped on a picture of the valet kid holding the door open for the woman as she got into the Jaguar.
“Which means Dee Dee told her you were meeting there.”
“Sure does. And sending me a drink was nothing more than a message—she knows who I am, and that she had eyes on me.”
“A warning to stay off the case?” Katie asked.
“Yep. The question is, who is she?”
###
Katie and I no sooner walked into McNally’s when my cell beeped with a message from Dee Dee:
“Very sorry about lunch. Something came up. A work thing.
Can I make it up to you? Buy you dinner tonight? Please?”
I handed her the phone and she read the text aloud as we explained to Mike what went down at Max’s. “You’re going to meet her, right? I’m going, too. Surveillance,” she said.
“Yes, I am going, but you are staying here. First, Mike needs you, and second, we don’t have a clue as to what is happening.” I poured myself a bourbon and downed a healthy swallow. “If she is the same woman from yesterday, we can make the assumption that she is Dee Dee’s boss with the escort service.”
“We called her Pocahontas. She has long, black hair,” added Katie.
“Wait,” Mike said. “You said she wore a baseball cap?”
“The waitress told me a woman wearing a tan ball cap bought me a drink, and when it arrived, she knew I would immediately search the bar, so I figure she took it off so I wouldn’t miss the hair as she left. She wanted me to see her.”
Katie crossed her arms in front of her in a defiant stance. “Therefore, I need to go tonight. Surveillance and back up.”
“No.”
“Johnny, you can’t go alone. I can stick a tracker on her car, take some pics.”
“Too risky. I don’t want Dee Dee or our mystery woman to know you exist.”
“She probably saw me in the alley the other night, anyhow. And maybe Stan told her about me.”
A rush of thoughts instantly shot through my mind. What if Dee Dee was not here the other night to ask me for protection, but on some recon mission? Did our mystery woman send her? And how did Dee Dee learn it was Kenzie who was murdered before the police investigated?
“I don’t care. Stay out of sight. Not another word.”
“It is server, by the way,” she said.
“What?”
“You called the server a waitress. It’s sexist.”
I shot her a side eye glance that said, “not now,” and poured another two fingers of bourbon in my glass. She huffed and went back to work. I retreated to the rear of the bar and leaned against the kitchen door. The non-meeting at Max’s played over and over in my head. What did I miss?
Mike lumbered back. “Known you too long, partner. Something’s got you twisted.”
“The woman today. Sure as hell didn’t catch her come in, which means she was in place before I got there.”
“C’mon, Detective. This is an easy one.” This was the Mike who became one of the best detectives to ever work the streets for the PCPD. He had an uncanny ability to imagine aspects to a case that other detectives could not. Inventing scenarios, even if far-fetched and unrealistic, would open his thinking and lead to new questions. He nailed this one immediately. “The woman, Pocahontas or whatever, she had help. Someone already inside who pointed you out. She buys the drink, then makes it easy for you to spot her as she leaves. Was the place crowded?”
“Packed.”
“Works to her advantage. I say the first girl, Dee Dee, was there in disguise.”
He ducked his large body through the door and into the kitchen. A moment later, he came out carrying a bucket of ice. “That’s it, brother. Find out who this chick is. Key to the case, if you ask me.”
Three young guys came in and took stools at the bar. They ordered drafts and asked Mike to put a European soccer game on the television. In behind them was a couple who wanted a table. Katie sat them and took their order. I stayed at the kitchen door and studied each person. Everyone appeared suspicious.
Who else worked for the tall, slim woman with the long, black hair?
18
The Shelton case file was spread out on my kitchen table. I grabbed a beer from the fridge and then sent a text to Dee Dee telling her to meet me at eight at Joey Mac’s. She replied within a minute with a “yes” and a “thank you!” I gulped down half the beer, then called Stan.
He answered on the first ring in his best pitch-man voice. “Johnny, my good man, what can I do for you on this fine day?”
“You can meet me in one hour.”
“Hold on a sec.” He muffled the phone, but I heard voices and then a door closing. “Okay, I’m in my office. You have news on the girl? Was she my blackmailer? Johnny, I want thi
s behind me. Haven’t slept since all this happened.”
“Can we talk in person?”
“Umm, yeah, sure, I can clear my schedule.”
“There is a bar on the corner of Eighteenth and Chelsea. Joey Mac’s. Park in the alley behind the building and use the back door.”
“All sounds very cloak-and- dagger.”
“Stan, one hour.”
I hung up. I did not need to add the furtive element to the call, but I wanted him to heed the urgency. Two elements of this case did not jive for me. First, Stan’s version of his relationship with Dee Dee—he believed she was more than an escort—was distinctly different from her take on their affair. If I was to keep his name out of the papers, I had to press him as much as possible. He hired me to find out who tried to blackmail him and so far, we had a dead escort and a determined detective who was quickly assembling pieces of the puzzle, and once he had it put together, it would make Stan front-page headlines.
Second, the woman who played me at Max’s had me curious as hell. She identified me and made a show of proving it. Why? To tell me to back off? Or did she throw down a gauntlet to goad me to react?
The plan for the afternoon was now clear: to make Stan come clean about Dee Dee, and get the name of the tall slim woman with the long, black hair.
###
Traffic was light for mid-afternoon in the city and I pulled into the alley behind Joey Mac’s thirty minutes ahead of Stan. The bar was in a residential neighborhood on the edge of Port City’s Little Italy district.
The bald, gregarious Joe Maccarone almost dropped a glass when he spotted me coming through the rear entrance. He took the cigar from his mouth and held out his arms. “I’ll be damned. The one and only Johnny Delarosa. And it’s not even my birthday.”
We hugged, and he had a boilermaker in front of me before I could sit on a stool. Joey Mac had fifteen years on the job when a gangbanger put two bullets in his lower back. He was beyond lucky—both shots barely missed his spine, but did enough damage to keep him from ever working the streets again. Three surgeries later, the PCPD offered him a choice: spend his last five years until retirement behind a desk or go out on disability. Joey on desk duty was unthinkable, so he made the exit with a permanent limp and within a year had managed to buy himself a business. It kept him busy; he got to hang out with his cop buddies and regale them with all his stories.