by Nora Kane
“Is that the witness?”
“Yeah, she said something that made me think he was running some extortion game on her.”
“What’d she say?”
“‘I already paid your friend.’”
“That does sound like extortion. Is ‘your friend’ Mattis?”
“She didn’t say specifically, but that was my impression. She won’t be happy getting dragged into this.”
“Since when do we take that into consideration?” Radcliff asked.
“I’m just saying. You know, Mattis did say he worried about something. He canceled our initial meeting saying, ‘New things have come to light’. He claimed to have a lot more on Armstrong.”
“You say claimed, like you had doubts.”
“He was a hustler from way back. Mrs. Armstrong hired him after her husband disappeared to look for him.”
“He was a P.I.?”
“Unlicensed.”
“Any idea what he had on Rose Nelson?”
“Nothing specific. She was a stripper with a thing for outlaw types back in the day. I’m guessing her current husband doesn’t know much about her past, and she’d like to keep it that way.”
“I guess we’re going to ruin that,” Radcliff said. “Don’t wait up. It’s going to be a long night.”
“I won’t.”
“If you get bored, I reached out to Detectives Stanford and Worth. Stanford said he was too busy to be bothered with what he called ‘internet nonsense,’ but Worth said he’d be glad to talk to you. I think he wants to go Hollywood too, plus he’s retired, so I don’t think he’s too busy these days. I can text you his number if you want to give him a call.”
“Sounds good.”
Chapter 7
“Detective Worth? Detective Radcliff said I could give you a call.”
“Just Mr. Worth these days, or really, just Bob. Is this Margot?”
“It is.”
“You were on the job back in the day. I think we met.”
“It’s highly likely.”
Worth laughed. “It makes sense I’d remember you, but you wouldn’t remember me. I’m the very definition of average. I hear you’re working on some kind of show?”
“I’m a private detective, and I’m doing some consulting for the show.”
“Nice, what did you want to talk to me about, and am I going to be on the show?”
“If it’s up to me? Of course. I was hoping to get some information before you made your appearance, if you don’t mind.”
“I guess that depends on the information but feel free to ask.”
“Do you remember working the Steven Armstrong disappearance?”
“The one where some freak mailed his wife his eyeball?”
“That’s the one.”
“There’s not much to say about that one. We never got anywhere. Have you seen the reports?”
“Yeah.”
“There’s not much to tell that’s not in there.”
“Actually I’m curious as to why it ended up in homicide in the first place since there was never a body.”
Worth laughed. “You’re right. Normally, if someone came to me with an eyeball someone mailed them, I’d tell them to come back when they mail you a heart, but we were working on another eyeball-involved case. We thought if we found out what happened to Armstrong, it might lead to learning who did the other one.”
“There was nothing in the report about that.”
“We never found anything to tie them together.”
“Did someone else get an eyeball in the mail?”
“No, or at least, not that we know of. Since we never got a positive I.D. on the body, I suppose someone could have mailed his eyes. He certainly didn’t have them when we found him. Someone dug them both out of his skull.”
“A John Doe?”
“Yeah, a dog found him in a field. It looked like someone was getting ready to bury him—had a hole about six feet long and two feet deep next to the body—when they got interrupted.”
“The dog?”
“Unlikely. The thought was whoever left him there was planning to come back and finish the job. Rigor had him dead at least three days when we found him. Cause of death was a slit throat; somebody cut him from ear to ear.”
“And someone took out his eyes?”
“Yep, both of them. Couldn’t find either one anywhere. Coroner seemed to think the eyes were removed while the victim was still living. Tips of his fingers were missing too but that looked post-mortem.”
“Getting rid of the fingerprints?”
“Yeah, I’d say so. It worked. We couldn’t get a usable print. Other than the eyes, fingers, and second smile, the only other trauma was bruising on the wrists.”
“Handcuffs?”
“That was our guess. Someone bound him up, took out his eyeballs, and then cut his throat. They were taking him out to be buried in an unmarked grave, which would have never been found if they’d finished the job. Not that it mattered. We never found out who the victim was, let alone who might have killed him.”
“You figure Steven Armstrong suffered the same fate?”
“I can’t say for sure but yeah, it makes sense. The only thing anybody ever found was the eye. As it turned out, all we got taking on the Armstrong case was two unsolved cases on our resume.”
“You ever hear a guy they called ‘The Boog’?”
“Short for boogieman?”
“Yeah.”
“Sure, but nothing I heard was very credible. Are people still talking about him?”
“Yeah.”
“He’d have to be pushing eighty if he was real.”
“Yeah?”
“It was an old story when I was a young detective and that was a long time ago. You don’t think this is The Boog, do you?”
“Probably not. The name came up in something else I was working on. That one had a guy's wife getting sent an eyeball too.”
“No shit?”
“I wish I was making it up.”
“Sorry, I can’t help you. I don’t suppose I can still get on the show?”
“I don’t see why not, as the person putting on the show told me the goal isn’t to solve the crime but to be entertaining. I think you qualify. I’ll tell her you want to do it.”
“Cool. Thanks, Margot.”
“Anytime.”
Margot was driving home when Cassie called.
“What’s up?”
“Can I ask a favor?”
“Yeah.”
“I might be paranoid, but I don’t think I can stay at my place by myself. I get that Mattis was probably killed for something other than what we’re doing, but it feels like it was because of us, and I can’t help thinking I might be next. I swear someone is creeping around. I feel like I’m being watched.”
Margot would have told a lot of people they were being paranoid, but she knew what Cassie had been through. Unlike most people, she’d had killers come looking for her, so Margot instead asked her, “You want me to stay with you?”
“I know it sounds strange, but yes?”
“How about you come to Radcliff’s place? He’s got a spare bedroom.”
“Okay, can you pick me up?”
Again, Margot was tempted to tell her to calm down, but she decided if anyone deserved the right to be occasionally paranoid, it was Cassie so she said, “Sure, I’ll be right over. Send me your address.”
Margot got in her Prius and plugged the address into her GPS. Cassie lived in a townhouse not very far away.
She pulled into Cassie's driveway. There was a car parked across the street that Margot might not have given a second look if Cassie hadn’t thought she was being watched. She could see shadows moving in the front seat. Someone was in the car, just sitting in the dark. While there were certainly multiple explanations for someone sitting in their car, Margot decided she wanted to hear this person’s reason for being there.
Margot opened her purse and put her hand
on the S&W short-barreled .40 she carried and started toward the car.
The engine fired up and they drove off without bothering to turn on the lights until they were a block away, where Margot couldn’t see the license plate. It seemed Cassie might not be paranoid after all.
Chapter 8
“I noticed we have a house guest,” Radcliff said as he emerged from the bathroom dressed and ready to go to work. Since Margot didn’t start her job until later in the morning, she was still in bed.
“Yeah, she was a little freaked out about Mattis. She’s thinking she might be next.”
“I kind of doubt that.”
“Me too, except someone was watching her place last night.”
“Really?”
“Sure seemed that way. A guy in a car sitting in the dark across the street who sped off when I approached.”
“Plate number?”
“They didn’t turn on the lights until they were out of range.”
“You know you and her are trouble magnets. Maybe working together was a horrible idea.”
“Maybe. How did it go with Rose?”
“Weird.”
“Yeah? Weird how?”
“Well, she clammed up. Claimed you and Cassie must have misunderstood and then refused to say another word on the matter.”
“That’s not that weird. She ran with a rough crowd before she got in with the country club set. She’d know how to keep her mouth shut. I’m betting this wasn’t the first time she’s had to talk to the police.”
“I suppose you have a point. She wasn’t really the weird part, though, it was her husband.”
“Him? How so?”
“Total lack of surprise about his wife’s past. I figured this might get ugly, but he was cool with it. He said she’d always been upfront with him, about everything. She’d told him about your visit in detail. If Mattis was trying to extort Rose, it wouldn’t be by threatening to tell Mr. Nelson about her shady past. Not only did he know, but he also said he kind of likes having a wife who’s ‘lived a little.’”
“So, Mattis had something else on her?”
“Could be. Someone killed him over something. Chances are, it wasn’t Rose. It didn’t take long looking into Mattis to find out he rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. It sounds like blackmail was his primary business and business was good.”
“I guess that judge shouldn’t have made him give up unlicensed P.I. work.”
“Could be or maybe he’s been doing the other all along. Like I said, we were still at the crime scene and people were going out of their way to come up and bad mouth him. ”
“Not a lot of respect for the dead?”
“I guess a dead scumbag is still a scumbag. Maybe he changed over the years, but he seemed like the last guy someone would hire to look for a missing person.”
Margot got up and went to the other room and grabbed the file on Armstrong and her laptop.
“What are you doing?” Radcliff asked.
“I’m going to get a current address on Mrs. Armstrong. I think she and I need to talk.”
“Well, have fun.”
“You too.”
Margot figured out where Mrs. Armstrong was living and then got dressed to head over there. According to what she learned, Armstrong didn’t have to go to her job at a grocery store until this afternoon so maybe she could catch her at home before she started her shift.
Cassie was dressed and ready to go sitting at the kitchen table.
“I’m starting to think this show is a bad idea,” Cassie said.
“I’m probably the wrong person to ask. It always seemed like a bad idea to me.”
“Do you think Shaw will be mad?”
“Only for having to pay me, and we’ll work something out. I’m heading out to talk to Mrs. Armstrong. Do you feel safe staying here?”
“If we’re not doing the show, why are you going out to talk to Mrs. Armstrong?”
“Did I tell you about Hayes?”
“You don’t tell me about anything. In fact, you still owe me an interview.”
“Doesn’t being a consultant on your show count?”
“No.”
“Okay, we’ll work that in some time.”
“Thank you. What about Hayes that makes you want to keep working on a show I don’t think I want to do anymore?”
“You know about Diaz?”
“The eye thing?”
“Yeah, he claimed to have a lead on Hayes. That’s why I was there to get the eyeball.”
“Oh, who’s Hayes then?”
“He jumped bail. Headed out to Colorado where some psycho killed the people he was staying with and tried to kill both him and me.”
“Glad to see the psycho failed.”
“Hayes stumbled on something that made him run, and it’s possible that something is a contract killer they call ‘The Boog.’”
“I heard about him, it sounded too far-fetched to put on my show.”
“Yeah, except someone sent that guy to kill Hayes.”
“Okay, what does this have to do with Armstrong?”
“I’m following through.”
“Okay, in that case, I’m coming with you.”
“Why?”
“Why not?”
“I can think of a bunch of reasons, but if you stay out of my way, I guess you can tag along.”
Chapter 9
“My name is Margot Harris. I’m a private investigator—”
“—I didn’t know he was married and I have nothing to say,” Mrs. Armstrong told her. She was about the same age as Rose Nelson but hadn’t aged nearly as well or moved up the economic ladder as high. Her house was a lot smaller and there was no pool in the backyard.
“I’m not here about that.”
“Chuck's wife didn’t hire you?”
“Nope. I’m here to ask about your husband.”
“What the heck did Vince do now?”
“Not Vince, Steven. You know, the guy whose last name you kept?”
She smiled. “Yeah, I guess he still is my husband. Is this about his social security? Because he hasn’t been declared dead. He’s still legally my husband.”