Baby Brother Blues (Sammy Dick, PI Series: Book 1)

by Trudi Baldwin

  Finally, after I’d sawn my way rapidly through the melt-in-your-mouth steak and scooped out the mountains of potatoes crowned like whipped cream in the twice-baked potato skins, I was feeling truly stuffed, so I slowed down. My see-through spandex dress was getting a workout expanding in the tummy region. I hoped it wasn’t expanding in the butt or thigh region as well. I figured I’d just work out twice as long tomorrow with Montaigne to make up for my excesses tonight.

  Just then the violinist in the quartet switched instruments to a gleaming sax. Talented guy! The quartet launched into a sweet, fun rendition of Hello Dolly! with the piano player singing. “Well, hello Dolly. You’re lookin’ swell Dolly…”

  Sylvester caught my eyes again across the table, “Do you know how to Swing, Tina?”

  I didn’t know if he wanted me to engage in a threesome with him and Strumheinnie, or dance, and I might have been up for either, but when he rose from his chair and extended his hand, I figured he meant the dance type of Swing. I swiped my napkin quickly across the butter-glazed lower half of my face, to erase all evidence of the marvelous feast I’d just consumed, set the napkin on my chair and rose to take his hand. “Would love to!”

  Once again, we were the only couple on the floor. Apparently, Swing was a little beyond this crowd. I was not in the least surprised when Sylvester took subtle control of me. His command was firm but fluid, and he engaged me in a few basic swing steps, so we could mesh our bodies and rhythm. Then he put me through my paces like a trick pony. The man had the moves! He was an excellent leader, so I was able to follow. I love Hello Dolly! anyway. I crooned the words under my breath as he whirled me in and out and we did some fancy kicks in perfect harmony. Threw in a little Charleston. The sax was sweet. The singer was sexy. Sylvester maneuvered me into a three-spin turn. I executed it to perfection, spotting my head neatly toward the far corner of the room as I turned, so I wouldn’t get too dizzy. This time the crowd clapped in the middle of the dance for my three-spinner. Probably incited by the Kids’ Table, but who cares! What a blast!

  Finally the dance number came to a close as I wrapped my right arm around Sylvester’s neck, and my left arm extended out toward the crowd. He dipped me back almost to the floor in a grand finale finish. If my hair wasn’t so short it would have grazed the ground. I felt completely supported the whole time. I figured Sylvester probably managed businesses the same way. No wonder he had his hands in so many.

  The crowd cheered again. Smiling and breathless, Sylvester and I returned to our table. We’d jollied up the entire crowd. Well, except for Strumheinnie, who looked a little miffed, but softened when Sylvester gave her a kiss on the cheek as he sat down.

  I looked down at my place at the table and, lo and behold, someone had removed the dinner plates and delivered a dessert in my absence. Will wonders never cease? It was some kind of double-your-pleasure dessert, a mound of chocolate mousse rose like a puff ball on one side of the glass plate with a dark chocolate swan imbedded in the top. On the other side of the plate was a handsome slice of cheesecake. Plump cherries dribbled down the sides. I’d worked up an appetite during the dance, so I dug into these delights. Montaigne was really going to get a workout tomorrow. We’d have to work out for eight hours straight to undo the effects of these calories. Luckily I liked working out with the Mountain Man just as much as I liked chocolate mousse with a dark chocolate swan on top.

  Michael turned to me as another slow dance began and led me back out on the dance floor. He had on some irresistible cologne. I snuggled in closer and drank the scent deeply into my lungs. Sweet! Okay, time to get back to work. “I’m curious, Michael. Do you know if Sylvester carries life insurance policies on you and/or Mai?”

  “Of course, we all have life insurance policies on each other. Large ones. It’s just good business practice.”

  “According to who?”

  “According to Sylvester, and I believe him. He has guided the business down the right road in so many different ways that have resulted in increased profitability, that I barely question him now.”

  Where was I going with this line of questioning anyway? If I exposed Sylvester’s questionable life insurance policy practices, what would it buy me and Geo? Zilch. Well, worse than zilch. The loss of this incredibly lucrative gig! But for some reason I said, “So are you and Mai both in good health?”

  “Where are you going with these questions, Sammy? Er, Tina?”

  “Sorry, it’s just that you and Sylvester hired me to objectively explore every angle of your business, and a few anomalies showed up along this line.”

  “Our health is none of your business, and I don’t see what it has to do with the current profitability of Swann Diamonds, regardless.” Whoa, I was seeing some of the barely concealed anger and intensity again that I’d witnessed in our very first meeting. Interesting. This subject was a hot spot for some reason.

  Even though he was protesting vehemently about my line of inquiry I saw a flicker of doubt appear in his eyes. I made a mental note to try and probe the health records of Mai and Michael. It was becoming increasingly harder to do these days, but who knows what Geo, the whiz kid, could find out. The slow dance number began to die down, but before it was even finished, Michael led me over to our table and deposited me in my chair with a plunk.

  I saw Sylvester carefully observe this abrupt ending. I looked him back in the eye, somewhat challengingly, as if to say So what? He smiled knowingly and rose from his chair. “You appear to be available now for another slow dance,” he said with only a hint of sarcasm. “May I have the honor?”

  Glory, deep in conversation with Tomas did not seem to mind. Tomas had that effect on women. I rose from my chair and walked out with Sylvester to the dance floor.

  He enveloped me in his arms, but I pulled back a little so that I could establish my own power base. Besides, I wanted to be looking right at him, not over his shoulder, to observe his reactions when I talked to him. Never one to accede his own power base, though, he started talking first.

  “Looks like Michael doesn’t like to mix being questioned with dancing.”

  “Apparently not.” I tried not to sound put out. “How about you?”

  “Oh, I’m famous for my ability to multi-task,” he smiled. His self-assurance was equal parts attractive and intimidating. He twirled me slowly out and then back in like a fish on his line. “What would you like to know?”

  “I’d like to know if you specifically target companies to partner with where the CEOs have serious health issues?” Now, why was I asking that? What good would it do? None.

  Sylvester didn’t miss a beat, nor did his body stiffen. Instead he chuckled. “What makes you ask? Do you suspect that Michael or Mai are at death’s door and I’m about to inherit a fortune?”

  “We haven’t been able to uncover Michael and Mai’s health records yet, but…” I lost my courage at that point and couldn’t continue. This line of questioning was putting my paycheck at risk. Why did I even bring it up in the first place?

  “Why so quiet, my dear?” He snuggled me in closer. What little power base I might have attained was ebbing away with each little snuggle.

  I began to think out loud, “I guess I don’t see how this line of questioning ultimately helps the investigation you are paying Geo and me to conduct.”

  “Of course it does.”

  “It does?” I froze in my dance tracks, stepped back and stared at him in surprise.

  He coaxed me back into the little snuggle hold with a gentle motion. The hooded cobra lulling its prey. “Sammy,” he whispered seductively, close to my ear so that I could feel his breath along the lobe and in the inner ear, “always, and I mean always, know everything you can about the person you are doing business with.”

  I guess the ear tingling inspired me to plunge onward. “Okay, then, in your partnerships do you or do you not specifically target CEOs with health issues and then take out a life insurance policy on them?”

  “Yes.”


  This time I pushed right out of the stifling little snuggle hold and shoved him away to arm’s length, “Yes?! What do you mean, yes?”

  “I mean yes.” With that said, he threw back his head and laughed out loud. I’d never heard him laugh before. It was a glorious sound. Apparently, many others hadn’t heard him laugh either. People stared at us. Even Tomas and Glory stopped their intense conversation long enough to sit back and stare at us.

  Sylvester seemed not to notice or at least not to care. Instead, he leaned back in close by my ear that had almost stopped tingling and blew gently on it again. “Ah, Ms. Dick, you do give me pleasure. Allow me to explain.”

  Like an ember gently blown, my ear by this time was nearly erupting into flames. The sensation was spreading to my neck. I felt myself blushing and tried to hide my discomfort by concentrating on what he was saying.

  “I am always on the lookout for a good company. When I see one with promise, I run a series of tests and investigations before even considering it. One of the investigations I conduct is on the health of its owners. I do this for a number of reasons, most of them obvious.”

  I felt like a small child who’d been inadvertently dropped off in college Economics 101 instead of preschool. I was out-classed, big time, but that had never stopped me before. “So, Sylvester, let me get this clear, when you find an ailing CEO in charge of a thriving company, you just jump right in and slap a life insurance policy on him or her?”

  Sylvester tilted back his head and laughed again. Almost everyone was staring now. I was afraid Glory was going to run out on the dance floor, shove me aside and thrust her own ear in next to Sylvester’s laughing, crooning lips.

  “Exactly, my dear. That is one of my methodologies. Quite effective, actually. What you aren’t taking into consideration is that I do it all openly.”

  He reflected a bit. “Well, almost all openly. I don’t tell them in advance that I already know about the health issues. I find a way to meet the prospective business partners. Then I get to know them and their business. If there are health issues, I bide my time until they divulge those of their own accord. Then, often, after they learn about my business record and my willingness to invest generously in the future of their business, they invite me in to help them co-manage their company. As a matter of good business, I then take out a life insurance policy on the most critical members of the leadership team.”

  He paused a while, then mused, “I did decide to extricate myself from also being a member of the board of the life insurance company issuing the policies. Somehow that seemed a conflict of interest.”

  I wanted to burst out, “Well, duh!” But I refrained and said something almost as inciting. “And it’s just a happy coincidence that a considerable number of those business partners conveniently died shortly after you helped take over the reins of the company?”

  “I’d laugh out loud again at how incensed you are, Ms. Dick, but we’ve already been attracting way too much attention, so I won’t.” He was smiling broadly. “First of all, let me say that I’m thrilled that you and your partner uncovered all this. It speaks well for the future success of Dick Investigations and of my willingness to conduct business with you should I require it for a future investigation.”

  I started to beam and preen inwardly, then pulled myself up short. “You’re just skirting the issue, though, Sylvester. In reality, you’re just a monetary mercenary, and your targets of choice are people in dire straits.” Why was I saying such a thing to the man who was essentially my boss and right in the middle of a delicious compliment?

  Then the other side of me said, because I want to know who he is and how he operates. It’s a pertinent piece of the overall puzzle of what’s going on with Swann Diamonds.

  He whispered again. This time his voice was drenched in sarcasm. “Oh, I love that term monetary mercenary, Sammy; allow me to use it sometime.”

  Then he stopped moving altogether and stood deadly still. I was forced to stand there like a stone with him. His eyes gleamed coldly. I figured they were gleaming the way a knife glints in the moonlight just before it slices open your throat. He used my public name. This time he was the one who pushed me away almost roughly to arm’s length. “But be clear on this, Tina, those business deals helped people in ways you can’t even fathom. Husbands went to their graves knowing their wives and children and children’s children would be well taken care of. Do you know what that means to someone in their dying hour? Do you know how I bestow that kind of peace on people in their final minutes of life?” His voice dropped a notch and grew even more rough, “Because I know damn good and well how to run a business so it is profitable. It is my gift. So if my gift helps more people than you have ever even met in your entire, very short lifetime, who are you to cast judgment on me?”

  Holy fuck! I was sure he was going to march me back to my seat and plunk me in it then, but, once again, I’d underestimated the man. When he saw that I had heard him loud and clear, when he was certain that I’d received the message to back off, when he’d established once again, as he did with every human being he ever encountered, that he was the alpha male, the dominant leader of the pack and none of us should forget it, then he relaxed back into the dance. It was a long number and I too relaxed, and, gratefully for both of us, I finally shut up. Thinking, Thank goodness, I haven’t blown this job for Geo and me. At least, not yet, but the night is still young.

  When the dance was over, he led me graciously back to my chair, returned to his own and immediately wrested the attention of Glory off of Tomas and back on himself, the alpha male. And all was right with the world, even for Tomas.

  I turned to Michael. “I’m going to wander over and see how my friends are doing.” He nodded and I made my way through the tables in the relative darkness. The spotlights were on the dance floor, but the tables were bathed in semidarkness.

  As I approached the Kids’ Table, I could see Delilah looking out at the dance floor longingly, and the backs of Geo and Kathy whose heads were together in some kind of love-bird conversation. Oh, so sweet! I thought a little bitterly, but refrained from voicing my immaturity out loud. The seat next to Delilah was empty. Someone must be up dancing, so I slid in next to my old friend.

  “Hey, how come you aren’t out there dancing?” I asked all of them.

  “Perhaps the next slow dance,” Geo said tentatively. “Kathy, what do you think?”

  “Oh, Geo, I’d love to!” Kathy squealed, or at least I heard it as a squeal.

  Delilah lamented, “I so want to dance, but no one’s asked me.”

  “This crowd is a little old for us, Delilah, don’t you think? I mean, who else but old people have thousands of bucks to plop down for an evening’s worth of entertainment?”

  “That might be true, but I still want to dance.”

  Just then, a man who’d apparently been close behind me sidled up to Delilah and offered his hand to her. “May I have this dance?”

  I looked up and recognized him instantly. It was the man I called Soul Patch with the beady, black eyes. Someone else seemed to recognize him instantly too: Kathy. As she observed Soul Patch lean down and take Delilah’s hand, I watched Kathy shudder in recognition. Even in the half-light, I saw fear crawl up and seize her face. The blood drained out, leaving her skin even more lily-white than before. Kathy couldn’t take her eyes off the man. Whoa, what’s going on here? I thought the girl was brand new in town? How could she possibly recognize Soul Patch?

  Next, a terrible thing happened that would change everything from that moment forward. As Soul Patch casually glanced around the table at the dinner guests, his eyes suddenly focused with a start on our little Miss Kathy Keach. I watched Soul Patch jerk upward in surprise, then peer more closely across the table until, with absolute certainty, all of his attention concentrated on her, as if he was sighting a gun oh so carefully between the eyes of his intended prey. Kathy whirled around and mumbled something about the restroom to Geo. She fled the
scene so hurriedly that none of us knew what to do next.

  Soul Patch recovered first, acting as if this remarkable interchange had never occurred, and lifted Delilah’s hand upwards to lead her out to the dance floor. I wasn’t sure Delilah had witnessed any of the intense interactions, she was so intent upon dancing. But judging from Kathy’s face, the devil himself may have just led our innocent, unsuspecting Delilah out to dance.

  The moment Soul Patch strode out of earshot, Geo sprang into action. “Something about that man upset Kathy. I’ve got to find her.” With that, he threw his napkin on the table and sprinted off in the direction Kathy had fled.

  Well, whaddya know, I thought, I come to visit the Kids’ Table and it completely vacates within seconds of my arrival. Considering the way Kathy had reacted to Soul Patch, I didn’t know if it was wiser for me to stay and warn Delilah or to track down Geo and Kathy. Figuring not too much could happen to Delilah on a dance floor in a jam-packed room, I decided to chase after Geo and Kathy.

  I found Geo leaning in close to Kathy, just in front of the Ladies’ Room. She looked white and her eyes were rimmed in red. There was something else about her face that didn’t quite mesh with fear, too. Her eyes were narrowed and her lips set. Ah, anger! She was not only afraid, she was angry. As I got closer, I could hear her saying, “That’s him, Geo, I know it’s him. His name is Pierre, James St. Pierre. That’s the man who tried to kill me!”

  If her allegations were true, no wonder she was upset. I chimed in, “When he was introduced at our table, Sylvester called him Stephan. He’s somehow connected to Sylvester’s younger brother, Sonny. Sonny runs a major commercial construction company here in town, among other things.”

  “That fits. That fits!” Kathy nodded emphatically. “He’s involved in international real estate and title transaction deals, but, regardless of the business he claims to be in, I would never, never forget that face!”