Anthony Carrick Hardboiled Murder Mysteries: Box Set (Books 1 - 3)

by Jason Blacker

  "It's past five thirty," said Jackson, announcing it like he was public radio. "Should we try tomorrow?"

  Dykes turned and craned his head to look into the backseat where I was.

  "Did you get all three search warrants."

  Jackson was also turned around looking at me. He grinned his shiny gold tooth.

  "Sure did. Kerri's still got a soft spot for Silent Red," he said.

  I nodded.

  "Works for me then. I could do some thinking in the bottom end of a bottle," I said.

  "If that's what you'd like," said Dykes, getting my drift but not offering up anything to the contrary.

  They drove me back to the hotel. We agreed on an eight thirty start in the morning. That gave me plenty of time for some thinking and some drinking. I walked straight to the bar and ordered a whisky. Irish whiskey. The only part I regretted was not being able to enjoy a smoke with it in the bar. Me and my vices, well, we'd have to be commiserating separately.

  THIRTEEN

  Salisbury Hill & Dale

  THE night before, I'd done a lot of thinking at the bottom of a whiskey glass. But Dykes oration about salvation had been nagging at me like a rusty nail at the bottom of my shoe. I hadn't done half the drinking I'd been planning on, and the last whiskey of the night I'd adulterated with soda water.

  On top of that I'd picked up some other nasty habits like drinking a glass of water before bed. Funnily, this morning I felt incredibly sprightly. I'd been up a little before seven, had a shower and shave and a hearty breakfast of steak and eggs. It was now a little before eight thirty and I was standing outside the main entrance of the hotel waiting for Crockett and Tubs, far enough away so a man could enjoy a smoke in peace without the hairy eyeballs of bingo grannies and soccer moms.

  There was a younger guy having a cigarette. He felt chatty. I didn't. But I was feeling sprightly like I said. That put me in good spirits. He wore baggy jeans that were almost falling down to his ankles. His baseball cap was on backwards, the brim straight as a razor. I couldn't see which team it supported, but I coulda guessed. And I would have been wrong. He had on black skater shoes and a black T-shirt. The T-shirt had something in red on it. Might have been a word, might have been bad art. I didn't care to find out. He looked like one of those popular pop stars. He didn't look at me when he spoke. He only looked at me when I wasn't looking at him. He was short. Maybe five seven on IMDB. Likely five six in real life.

  "You here for the game?" he asked me. He sucked on his cigarette like it was blocked at the other end. His veins along his neck popped out like ropes. He squinted at me with one eye as the smoke tried to lick his face.

  "In a manner of speaking," I said. I looked at him.

  "Yeah, I'm here for the game. Gonna be killa. The Big O's are gonna win. For sure. I've put cash money on it."

  I grinned to myself. I hadn't asked him anything and I didn't realize there were different sorts of cash other than the money kind. He sucked on his cigarette again and quickly blew the smoke back out. He couldn't have been older than twenty. But when you get to my age it's sometimes hard to tell.

  "I'm Nick by the way," he said.

  I didn't say anything. I was looking at all the different sorts of people coming and going from the hotel. I could see him looking at me from the corner of his eyes.

  "What's your name?" he asked.

  I wasn't trying to be a dick. I just wasn't in the mood for chatting. But he seemed sincere.

  "Mike Hammer," I said.

  He nodded his head up and down like it was something he already knew.

  "For reals? That's a pretty cool name," he said.

  I nodded.

  "Yup, for reals," I said, trying on the lingo for size.

  "Never heard a name like that before," he said. "You could be a wrestler with a name like that."

  You've never heard a name like that, because you've never read any good books, kid. That's what I wanted to say. Instead I said, "never wrestled."

  "You heard about that murder out at the park," he said, seemingly liking the sound of his own voice. "Somebody whacked the pitcher for the Cubs. Can you believe that? I thought I was gonna win before, but this makes it a slam dunk. You know what I heard?"

  The kid never stopped to give me an in. I don't think he cared for my opinion.

  "I heard that it was the Mafia. That pitcher. James Ensor, he owed them a ton of money. They whacked him because he wouldn't pay up. Sounds legit to me. They do that you know. The Mafia. They won't just break your kneecaps, no way, man, now they'll just kill ya. And it don't take much neither. I heard about a guy they whacked because he stole a pack of smokes from this Mafia's guy's son. That's how serious they are, man. You don't want to fuck with them. The Mafia, people think they're no longer around. It's not true. They just got smarter. I wouldn't mess with them. No way, man. They're totally legit bad asses."

  He took a moment to take another drag on his cigarette like it was still a straw that had something stuck at the other end.

  "Thanks for the tip," I said. Inside I was laughing the hardest I'd laughed since coming to Chicago.

  "No worries, man. I can tell with a name like that. Mark Hammer?"

  "Mike Hammer," I said.

  "Yeah, Mike Hammer. Cool name by the way. With a name like that I bet you don't get many guys messing with you. Still, I'd be sure to stay away from the Mafia. They're bad news. My girlfriend said she heard that they even control some of the cops around here. That's why crime is so bad here. I'm from Baltimore, and I can tell you that Baltimore is a way cooler place than Chicago. And I don't mean cold. No way, man, we just have better government. No Mafia there. But still, I wouldn't bet against them coming to Baltimore. It's a popping place. They'd do good business there. But we have good cops. At least most of them. Though this one time my buddy got pulled over for jaywalking and the cops took him down, man. They gave it to him pretty hard. I told him he shoulda sued the city for cop brutality. He got a scuffed cheek and he bit his lip when they took him down. It was brutal. Some cops, man, they're assholes, just on huge ego trips."

  I could see the unmarked police car drive into the main entrance. Thank God for small mercies. Nick's verbal diarrhea was pushing my blood pressure through the roof. I couldn't tell if he was bored or just lonely. I went to put my cigarette out in the trash can with a sand filled cigarette dispenser on the top.

  "I gotta get going, Nick. Good talking to you," I said.

  "Oh yeah, no sweat man. Geez, is that your ride. Fuck, you're a cop. Listen," he said. "I didn't mean anything by that. You know, most cops are good. But sometimes you get a bad apple, right? I'm not saying you're a bad apple, shit, man, I even like the Mafia okay. They've never given me any grief..."

  I walked up to the car as they pulled right up to the curb. I got into the back and closed the door. I didn't look back. For all I could tell Nick was still verbally vomiting verbosity all over the place.

  "Thank you, Jesus," I said.

  "You making friends I see," Dykes.

  "Jesus, you have no idea. Nick there just couldn't stop talking ever since I gave him the time of day."

  "Probably just lonely," said Jackson.

  "Get this," I said. "He asked me my name. I said Mike Hammer. Figures it'll make a great wrestler name. What the fuck?"

  Jackson laughed and slapped his knee.

  "Damn, I like that. No shit. He had no clue who Mike Hammer was?"

  I shook my head.

  "Not a friggin' idea."

  I could see Dykes look at me from the rearview mirror.

  "Still, would be a good wrestler name," he said.

  "Sure would be, but if you're going to make up wrestler names you've got to take your favorite James Bond movie and then add to that the name of the street you grew up on," said Jackson.

  He got no takers from the rest of us.

  "Okay," he said. "I'll go first. My favorite Bond movie is Moonraker. I grew up on Fifth Street. So my wrestler name is Moonra
ker Fifth. But you can play with it right, so I'd probably go with Moonraker the Fifth."

  Jackson was having fun all by himself, so it seemed. He turned around and looked at me.

  "What about you."

  I was feeling sprightly like I'd said, so I decided to play along.

  "Skyfall Lightning," I said, just pulling out the first James Bond movie I remembered and coming up with a word that sounded good with it.

  "Really? Man, that's an awesome wrestler name," said Jackson. "You really grew up on Lightning Street?"

  I shook my head.

  "Nah, it was Lightning Lane," I said, lying through my teeth.

  Jackson nodded, impressed with the yarn I'd just spun. He turned towards Dykes.

  "Okay, Dykes," he said. "Your turn."

  Dykes didn't say anything for a minute.

  "Well?" asked Jackson.

  "I'm thinking," said Dykes.

  We continued driving for a few moments. I spent the time looking out the window.

  "Dr. No Frost," said Dykes.

  "I dig it," said Jackson. "Moonraker the Fifth, Dr. No Frost and Skyfall Lightning. Those are some winning wrestler names."

  "I still like Mike Hammer the best," I said.

  "Was that Frost Street you grew up on or something else?" asked Jackson.

  "Frost Place," said Dykes.

  Jackson nodded and we rode in silence for a while. The sky was patchy with smears of gray and just the slightest hints of blue. Looked like it could rain but it wasn't.

  "We're headed to that lawyer first?" I asked. "Salisbury?"

  Jackson nodded, and then he turned round to look at me.

  "You gonna love this one," he said.

  He pulled the warrant from his inside jacket pocket and looked at it again.

  "Salisbury, Hill and Dale," he said.

  "You're shitting me," I said.

  Jackson shook his head.

  "I wouldn't pull your leg about something this serious."

  He was grinning his white and gold toothy grin.

  "Unbelievable," I said. "You can't make up this shit."

  "I know, right?"

  We drove in silence for a while further. It didn't take long to get to the office building. One of those generic modern looking office towers with the blue glass all up the sides. The kind of place that might have looked impressive twenty years ago, now they're everywhere. If you saw one in a picture you'd have no idea which city it was from.

  Dykes pulled up front and parked the car. We all got out and walked into the lobby. We didn't need to look at the addresses, we knew where we were going. Twenty-fifth floor. Salisbury, Hill & Dale was at 2508. They likely took up two or more floors was my guess.

  We got to the reception desk and Dykes talked to the receptionist. She was hired for her looks. I could tell that right off the bat. She was a young twenty-something baby doll with long curly blonde hair that crashed onto her shoulders like every teenage boys wet dream. She was clueless. And that was to our benefit.

  "I'm Detective Dykes, that's Detective Jackson CPD Homicide." He flashed her his badge. "Can you tell me where Frederic Salisbury is?"

  "Um, he's in a meeting if you'd just like to take a seat," she said as if she hadn't heard a word we said.

  "I'll find him," I said as I walked past the three of them. She went to pick up the phone, fumbling a bit. "Tell him Peter Gabriel sent us."

  She looked at me with a slack mouth part open looking for flies. She didn't get it. But it gave her something to think about. Dykes and Jackson joined me. I entered the main hallway and reckoned that he'd be in one of the corners. I had to guess as to left or right. I noticed he was a righty when he came down to the station so I went right. Bingo, at the end of the hall was his office.

  His name was on the wall just to the right of the door. Real walls enclosed his office and the door was a solid wooden one. We walked in like it was our own. It was a huge office that seemed almost the size of my apartment back in Santa Monica. A large wooden table sat back away from the door with a plush and comfy cushioned black leather chair behind it. There was a fancy rug on the floor, between the desk and the small conference table where Salisbury sat with two other men. I assumed them to be Hill and Dale.

  Even with two large tables in this office, it was several strides for us to reach them from the office's door. Salisbury had on the same round glasses. He was just as well dressed as before and his hair just as dyed. He wore a bad looking suit. It was well tailored and no doubt expensive but it looked like something that was more at home in the seventies than the tens. Might it have been called salmon? I don't know my colors that well, I'm not a fashion designer, but it looked like Pepto-Bismol had puked up on cream.

  He stood up and his eyebrows arched. He was visibly upset. I got that.

  "What is the meaning of this? I'm in a very important meeting."

  "Not as important as meeting with us," I said. I looked at the other two. "Hill and Dale?" I said, grinning from ear to ear.

  "I'm David Hill," said the shorter and fatter of the two. He was also older than Hill and Salisbury.

  "Then you must be Dale," I said, looking at the slimmer but still fat middle aged man in a dark blue suit. He nodded.

  "Gareth Dale," he said. "What is this intrusion about?"

  "It's about Salisbury's client, Celia Ensor," I said.

  I stepped aside and let Jackson come on in for the home run. He offered the warrant to Salisbury. Salisbury took it.

  "This is a warrant for any records you have related to Celia Ensor," he said.

  "This is highly improper," he said. "I'll have this cancelled in ten minutes."

  "Ten minutes is about all the time we need to make a mess of this place," said Dykes.

  "You wouldn't dare," said Salisbury, looking worried.

  Hill and Dale left the office, most likely to call on a favor from another judge. I wasn't sure a warrant like this was legal for privileged information, but Jackson had convinced someone to issue it and that was good enough for me.

  "Salisbury, Hill and Dale," I said, trying to deflect the conversation. "You couldn't have gone with "Dale, Salisbury and Hill?"

  I looked at Salisbury with a straight face. He looked back at me unamused, the warrant still in his hand.

  "It sounded better," he said. "In any event Solsbury Hill is spelled very differently. So you aren't being all that clever."

  "Sounds the same," I said, "and it gave me a very good chuckle."

  "Me too," said Jackson. "So are we going to exchange witticisms or are you going to help us."

  "Why should I make your jobs easier?" asked Salisbury.

  "Because if you're not inclined to," said Dykes,"we're going to start rummaging through the offices here and your files. Who knows what other secrets we might come up against."

  Salisbury looked at the paper in his hand. Such power with words. He didn't say anything for a moment.

  "Fine," he said. "What do you want to know?"

  He sat down at the table and we joined him.

  "We want to hear about Celia," said Dykes. "You can start telling us about any will or prenups."

  Salisbury sighed like the last gasp of a balloon.

  "I was James Ensor's attorney first. I've become hers since his death as you can imagine, because of the documents that James had me sign. Well, and I suppose the documents she witnessed."

  "That's what we'd like to hear about," said Dykes.

  "Do you really want to open up this can of worms?" he asked.

  "The egg has already been scrambled," said Dykes, swapping metaphors with Salisbury.

  Salisbury nodded and pushed his glasses up his nose. Dykes popped a Lifesaver in his mouth. It was likely the first roll of the day. Only a couple seemed to be missing. He didn't offer us any.

  "I specialize in sports contract law. At our firm we like to offer full service law and we have on hand other lawyers specializing in family law, entertainment law, as well as criminal law. We
tend to over deliver for our clients and it keeps them happy."

  "And you rich," I said.

  Salisbury looked at me. He didn't say anything, but I heard every word behind his mouth.

  "Carrying on," he said, "I first got Mr. Ensor about five years ago when his contract was up for renewal. He wasn't happy with his previous legal representative. I made him very happy."

  "And how happy was that?" I asked.

  "What are you insinuating, Mr. Carrick?" asked Salisbury, remembering my name which was very good of him.

  "How much did he get?"

  "You know that already."

  "I mean specifically."

  "I don't know specifically. I'd have to look at my records. He gets twenty-five million a year for five years. There was a three million dollar signing bonus the first year. Our firm takes ten percent of all income as well as deducting business expenses. Not to mention the endorsements Mr. Ensor has received which have been worth several million in most years."

  "So, it'd be fair to say he got more than thirty million a year in his pocket?"

  Salisbury nodded. I bit my tongue. This was a racket if I'd ever heard of one. Legal or not.

  "And before you, what had he received?" I asked.

  "Three million a year."

  I nodded my head.

  "So we make our clients very happy. That's why they're happy to give us such a large percentage of their income. We always increase salaries."

  "What about this year's negotiations?" asked Jackson. "We heard they weren't going too well."

  Salisbury nodded.

  "They're going to be tougher. Mr. Ensor wasn't playing as well as he had in previous years."

  "Were you signed on to negotiate his upcoming contract?" asked Jackson.

  "We were negotiating that," said Salisbury.

  "So your whale was swimming away from you probably," I said.

  "I believe he was negotiating with us on good terms," said Salisbury.

  "But you're not sure he was going to sign with you for another term," I said. I could see the worry and doubt etched all over his face.