by John Lutz
When the food came they ate their salads slowly and deliberately while he told Lacy about his conversations with Hammersmith and Bostwick.
He was pleased when she skipped trying to argue that Millman’s death was an accident. Instead she said, “Tully would be the prime suspect, if Mermaid Pools stood to make half a million. Unless ...” She stopped buttering a roll. “Did Millman have any heirs?”
“Maybe. I heard about a sister who was supposed to come in for the funeral, but she didn’t show.”
“Maybe Millman cut her out of his will.”
“If he had a will.”
“It’s still early for one to be a matter of public record, but I can check on it.”
Nudger was a little surprised by how easy it had been to steer her into agreeing to help. “Then you’re interested in pursuing this with me?”
“Sure. If you’re buying dinner.”
“I’m buying,” Nudger said.
She cocked her head terrier-fashion and smiled at him. There was lettuce on one of her front teeth. “You still clicking with that whazzername ... Claudine?”
“Claudia,” Nudger said. He knew Lacy hadn’t really forgotten Claudia’s name. “We’re still clicking.”
“That’s a shame.”
“Depends on the point of view.”
“It’s my point of view. Since I’m me, my point of view is always mine.”
Nudger slid his half-eaten salad away and stared across the table at her. “Why are you doing this, Lacy?”
“I want your hot love, Nudger. You’re a very sexy man despite the bald spot and the developing potbelly.”
Nudger made a mental note to check on his bald spot. “I’m not talking about that,” he said.
“We don’t have to. I’m even willing to overlook the doughnut scent.”
“Or that,” he said.
Lacy looked puzzled. “About what, then?”
“Working with me on the Almer case, Millman’s death.”
She took a big bite of roll. “Money,” she said after a few chews.
“We already got our money.”
“You said Millman’s life was insured for a million dollars with National Triad, right?”
Nudger nodded.
“If we were to uncover evidence that Millman was murdered, it would void the double-indemnity clause and cut the million-dollar settlement in half. What percentage of that saved half-million do you think National Triad would pay for the information?”
Nudger hadn’t considered that approach. To save half a million dollars, an insurance company would pay ... well, he didn’t know, but it would be plenty.
“I’d guess maybe even half,” Lacy said, while he was still thinking about it.
“There’s one problem,” he told her. “We can’t conceal evidence of a murder, so National Triad would know we’d have to turn the information over to the police. They’d just wait for that to happen, and for murder charges to be brought. That way they wouldn’t have to pay us, or pay out any of the policy settlement.”
“But we don’t tell them we already have the evidence,” Lacy said, looking at him as if he’d gone insane. “You better let me deal with National Triad, Nudger.”
“I don’t want to be involved in extortion, Lacy.”
“You won’t be. I know how to approach them in the right way.”
Nudger tilted back his head and finished his beer. He placed his glass down hard on the table. “Getting involved with you is ...”
“What?”
“Dangerous.”
“You asked for me, so you got me. Now I feel the same sense of obligation you do, only my motive’s a little different. There’s nothing immoral about the desire to make a profit. You might not like it, but it’s the same as your scruples. We’re both working toward the same result.”
Scruples again! “Greed and scruples aren’t the same thing,” Nudger told her.
“I scrupulously take every opportunity to make money,” she said with a grin. “But if it will help you sleep, you can return your half of the money to National Triad.”
Nudger decided to put off that decision. He motioned the waitress over for the check.
“Where do we go from here?” Lacy asked.
Nudger wasn’t sure. “Got any suggestions?”
“My place. Bedroom.”
“Forget that, Lacy!”
“Okay, here’s another suggestion.” She reached into her purse and pulled out a handful of papers. “From the Almer file,” she explained. “Millman’s address is written down in here someplace. Let’s go pay him a visit.”
“He’s dead,” Nudger reminded her.
“Well, he doesn’t have to be home.”
“Dangerous ...” Nudger said again, looking at her and shaking his head, knowing he was going with her to Millman’s, because if he didn’t, she’d go alone.
She smiled while he paid for her dinner.
Chapter Sixteen
Millman had lived in the Beau Moderne Apartments, a complex of white brick two-story buildings not far from South County Shopping Mall. The architecture was vaguely Gallic, with mansard roofs, blue wooden trim and shutters, and beside each building entrance gold inlaid tile forming a fleur-de-lis. Nudger figured it worked kind of like in restaurants: all that French made the rent higher than it should have been.
Nudger and Lacy parked their cars on the street and made their way along a curving walk, past a clubhouse and fenced-in swimming pool, toward Millman’s building. The pool hadn’t yet opened for the summer, so there was no one around. Through a clubhouse window, Nudger caught a glimpse of some men playing billiards. The night was pleasant, and two buildings away, a cluster of people sat in the gathering dark, drinking and talking on one of the patios. One of the women kept laughing at something a man was saying. She had a high, musical laugh. They must have been barbecuing, because Nudger could smell the tangy scent of seared meat and sauce. It made him a little nauseated, so soon after supper.
“You don’t have to walk slow,” Lacy said. “I can keep up.”
Her cane had a rubber tip and made no sound on the sidewalk. Nudger had forgotten she was using it.
“I’m walking my usual speed,” he said.
Nudger was pleased to find that Millman’s address belonged to a town house with a separate entrance. He and Lacy wouldn’t have to try to figure out the lock and get the door open while standing in a hall or foyer, hoping they wouldn’t be interrupted by a neighbor coming or going.
They stood in front of the door. Millman’s was an end unit, and there was shrubbery nearby, so Nudger was pretty sure nobody could see them.
“Did you bring your lock picks?” Lacy asked.
“I don’t have any lock picks. If I owned some, I wouldn’t know how to use them. What about you?”
“I usually just kick doors open.”
“Well, we can’t do that here. It calls for something more subtle.”
“Why? It’ll look like a break-in, but nobody’ll know who was here. You kick it in, Nudger. I would, but my legs ...”
“It would make too much noise,” Nudger said.
The only visible lock was set in the doorknob. A cool spring breeze kicked up and ruffled his hair as he got his expired, honed Visa card from his wallet and attempted to slip what looked like the usual cheap apartment hardware that builders were using these days.
But the door was tight. Even the thinly honed plastic card wouldn’t slide between it and the doorjamb to depress the latch lock.
“Let’s try this,” Lacy said. She drew from her purse a long screwdriver with a red plastic handle.
“How is it you just happen to have that with you?” Nudger asked.
“I always carry it. The end is sharpened. It’s as good as a stiletto but its not legally a concealed weapon like a knife or gun. And it has other uses.”
She forced the sharpened end of the screwdriver blade into the thin space at the door’s edge, then leaned hard against it. Wh
en it didn’t penetrate, she beat on it with the heel of her hand. No result.
“You try it,” she said.
Nudger used all his strength to cram the end of the screwdriver into the crack near the latch, but he could force it in only a fraction of an inch.
“Here, watch out!” Lacy said in frustration.
Before Nudger could stop her, she used the crook of her cane to hammer the screwdriver deeper. It made a lot of noise, and he was terrified someone was going to look out a window or open a door and see them. He couldn’t hear the people talking and laughing on the patio anymore.
“Your turn again,” Lacy said, stepping back and leaning on her cane.
Quickly he leaned his weight against the screwdriver, forcing it sideways.
The door popped open.
“That was nosier than if I’d kicked it,” he said.
“That’s what I told you in the beginning.”
“Hello! Is anyone down there?” A woman’s voice, from the dark balcony above.
Nudger’s heart stopped, started, leaped into his throat and expanded.
“Hi! I’m Brad’s sister,” Lacy called up without hesitation.
“Oh,” the woman said after a pause. “I’m sorry about poor Mr. Millman ...”
“Thank you. We all are.” Lacy opened the door all the way and limped inside.
Nudger followed, almost tripping over her cane and knocking them both down as she groped for a light switch.
There was no overhead fixture, but large lamps on tables at either end of a long green sofa came on.
They were in a living room furnished modern, with stainless steel and black leather sling chairs, thick glass wall shelves that held golfing trophies and a few books and knickknacks, and an angular coffee table with a gray marble top. On the wall behind the sofa was a large abstract painting made up of formless black, red, and gray objects that here and there overlapped. What appeared to be startled, bloodshot eyes stared out from the spaces between the unidentifiable objects. Nudger didn’t know art, but he knew what he didn’t like.
Lacy closed the door behind her and grinned. “Let’s root around and see what we can find,” she said with mischievous enthusiasm.
“Put things back the way you found them,” Nudger cautioned her.
“Sure, sure.”
Nudger wondered if tonight was real, if he was actually doing this with Lacy Tumulty. He hadn’t seen her for a while and had forgotten how she could be, he decided. That explained his lack of judgment. Now here he was involved in breaking and entering in the apartment of a dead man. Was this smart? Was it even sane?
“You going to help me search?” Lacy asked, pausing as she rummaged through a drawer in one of the tables by the sofa.
Nudger got busy. The sooner to get out of there.
In Millman’s bedroom was a folding screen behind which was a desk with a computer and printer on it. Nudger went to find Lacy.
She was in the kitchen, looking to see if Millman had hidden anything in the refrigerator.
“You said you’ve been using a computer,” he said. “C’mon into the bedroom and see if you can learn anything from Millman’s.”
“Wow!” she said, as soon as she entered the bedroom. “Look at that round bed!” She leaned over and pressed on the mattress with her palm. “A water bed,” she observed, as the padded surface undulated. She glanced up at the ceiling. “No mirror,” she said. She winked at Nudger. “My offer still stands.”
“Business!” Nudger said. He was reasonably sure she was serious. “We’re here on business.”
Within five minutes she had the computer’s monitor glowing and was into the programs on the hard disk. Her fingers were quick and decisive on the keyboard. She seems to know what she’s doing, cyberphobic Nudger thought enviously. He moved around her and began searching the desk drawers.
In a bottom drawer he found half a dozen diskettes and laid them on the desk.
“Good,” Lacy said, glancing down at them. “We’ll take them with us and I’ll use my computer to see what’s on them.” And back she went to cyberspace.
In the desk’s top drawer Nudger found a small black vinyl book full of phone numbers. He leafed through it slowly. Most of the numbers looked like those of business associates. One number, under H, was scrawled in blue ink after the crude drawing of a small heart.
“Who exactly are you?” a woman’s voice asked.
Nudger spun around and saw a tall, redheaded woman standing in the bedroom doorway. Her simple yellow dress clung to a full, muscular figure. She had tiny green eyes and would have been attractive but for her lantern jaw. She looked as if she could bite cold steel in half with that jaw. She looked as if she wanted to bite Nudger.
He began stammering, trying to find words that he might string together to make a plausible lie. He was sure by her voice that this wasn’t the woman who’d called down to them from the balcony.
“Who exactly are you?” Lacy asked with calm indignation, turning away from the computer.
“I’m Irma Millman,” the woman said. “Brad’s sister.”
Chapter Seventeen
Recovering from his shock, Nudger knew this wasn’t the sort of situation Lacy usually handled with proper tact. A courtroom loomed in his future. Before she could say anything more, Nudger said, “We’re involved in investigating your brother’s death, Miss Millman.”
The redheaded woman looked at him dubiously with her narrow green eyes. “You’re police?”
“We’re private,” Nudger said. He introduced himself, then said, “This is my associate, Lacy Tumulty.” He shot Lacy a threatening glance so she’d be quiet. To his horror, she seemed amused.
“Who hired you?” Irma Millman asked.
“A man named Loren Almer, the father of Betty Almer, your brother’s late fiancée.” Nudger didn’t mention that his client was dead.
No reaction. Apparently Irma didn’t know about Almer’s death, which struck Nudger as odd. But he was relieved.
“Does Almer think Betty’s and Brad’s deaths are somehow related?” she asked.
“He hired us to find out,” Nudger said, bending truth and time, but speaking more or less accurately. “They, uh, were expecting you for the funeral,” he added.
“I came down with a case of food poisoning and missed my flight from Omaha.” Irma stepped all the way into the room and walked over to where Lacy was seated at the computer. She moved ponderously, as if she were twice as heavy as she appeared. Nudger guessed that she was very tired. “I take it this is part of your investigation,” she said, nodding toward the glowing computer monitor.
“Yes. It’s routine, in the era of the computer,” Lacy said. “Sometimes a victim’s hard drive contains names and addresses, maybe E-mail that can be retrieved that might tell us something.”
“Victim?” Irma asked, not too weary to seize on the operative word. “You do mean accident victim?”
“Well, yes and no,” Lacy said.
“Hold on here. You think Brad was murdered?”
“We’re merely touching bases to make sure he wasn’t,” Nudger said.
“And has the computer told you anything?”
“Not yet,” Lacy said. She was enjoying verbally fencing with Irma Millman now, manipulating the woman. “We have to know what to ask it.”
Irma’s gaze flicked to the half-dozen disks Nudger had laid on the desk.
“I’m sorry you missed your brother’s funeral,” Nudger said, “but I’m glad you showed up here tonight. Do you happen to know the name of Brad’s attorney?”
She shook her head no. “To tell you the truth, Brad and I grew apart some time ago. For the past ten years, we haven’t had much contact with each other beyond exchanging Christmas cards.” Irma looked uncomfortable. “He had some kind of falling out with our parents. I never knew what it was really about, and Brad never told me. But I was forced to choose sides, and I chose Mom and Dad’s. Brad never forgave me, even when we were the on
ly ones left.”
“Then there are no other relatives?”
“That’s right. I’m twelve years older than Brad. He was born when Mom and Dad were in their forties. Dad’s been dead six years, and Mom passed away four years ago. There’s no one now other than Brad and ... other than me.” She looked suddenly forlorn, as if struck by the reality of her solitary role in life.
She bent gracefully and removed her shoes, then seemed to luxuriate in the feel of the carpet on her toes and the soles of her stockinged feet. Her toenails were enameled bright pink beneath the nylon.
After a deep breath, she sighed long and loud. “I’ve had a rough day getting here. If you wouldn’t mind giving me a chance to rest for a while, before I look around here and see what needs to be done ...”
Nudger saw Lacy’s right hand move toward the stack of computer disks, then hesitate and draw back. Irma was watching her. The muscles along Irma’s nutcracker jaw flexed, unflexed, flexed, unflexed. Lacy switched off the computer and stood up.
“Have you talked with Warren Tully yet?” Nudger asked.
Irma looked puzzled. “No. Who is he?”
“He was Brad’s business partner. He might know about any financial or personal matters concerning your brother.”
“Thanks. I will talk to him. Brad’s company built swimming pools, is that right?”
“Yes. It’s Mermaid Pools. Their number’s in the yellow pages.”
Irma stood staring at them, obviously waiting for them to leave.
“What did you think of your prospective sister-in-law?” Lacy asked.
Irma blinked at her. “Betty Almer? I never met her. I doubt if she and Brad were going to invite me to the wedding. He obviously wanted to cut all ties with the past, and she probably knew that.”
Nudger edged toward the door, and to his relief Lacy followed with her cane. Irma glanced at the cane but said nothing. She paused and then trailed them through the living room to the outside door. Nudger could hear her breathing behind them, as if she were out of breath or might have an asthmatic condition.
As he stood aside to let Lacy leave first, he saw that the lock itself looked okay, and there were only a few deep nicks in the doorjamb to indicate there had been a forced entry. The odds were good that Irma wouldn’t notice. He was glad now that he hadn’t followed Lacy’s advice and kicked open the door, leaving a splintered door frame and probably a broken latch or lock.