“You playin’ Momma Duck to your duckling?” one of the regulars asked, a little unkindly, when he came out from behind the bar with a tray.
“You lot are a tough crowd,” he said in response, depositing their drinks on the table in front of them, sliding each pint in front of the correct person with the ease of many years of practice. “If I wasn’t here, who’d help her out with the foofy drinks y’all try to order—Seth?”
That, as expected, got laughs from some of the regulars. Seth was a good man, and handy to have around, but he had no interest in the front room, and would be about as useful as Mistress Penny-Drops when it came to serving drinks.
And speaking of the long-tail, Teddy thought, where was she? Penny occasionally came by in the afternoons, but she was always there at night, particularly when he was working the night shift, but there hadn’t been ears or tails of her all day. Maybe she’d holed up somewhere, sleeping off a hard day of mousing or… whatever it was she did all day.
He wanted to take a nap, too. His normal schedule had him sleeping until noon, but he’d been up by 10 a.m., and even though he’d gotten a quick run in before meeting up with Ginny, his body had never quite gotten into gear.
Ginny had gone back to the office soon after her single martini, leaving him the printout of reports of everything that she’d found out, annotated with her comments. He knew that he should have been studying them; he’d even taken them with him when he had dinner pre-shift, bolting down a chicken club and a bottle of seltzer, but never actually opened the folder. He’d figured he’d have a better chance to look them over in the morning, when he was less distracted, but the fact that he was obviously avoiding it bothered him.
He was her partner, however he’d backed into it. He was supposed to have her back. And having her back meant staying current with the case.
The guilt was half expected, and entirely unwanted. He hadn’t planned on any of this—not the partners, not the responsibility, and sure as hell not the guilt—when he agreed to help her out on one job. One job, no more. He already had a full-time job, and he wasn’t that bored. But he had no idea how to get off now. He’d committed. He was, as Ginny herself had gleefully pointed out, hooked.
He didn’t have much time to think tonight, though; the tables were hopping. He spent most of the night collecting drink orders and delivering them, busing tables when needed to make sure there wasn’t too bad a buildup at the close. The one night they’d gotten behind on that, it had taken until nearly 3 a.m. to get all the glassware washed and sorted. You made that kind of mistake once, and the lesson took.
“Hey, Tonica, what’s tonight’s menu?” someone called out as he passed.
He stopped and noted that their table was covered in empties. “If you’re too drunk to read the chalkboard, Henry, you’re too drunk to be trusted to order anything. Do I need to take your keys?”
Henry, who “drove” a motorized wheelchair, gave Teddy two fingers, and then saluted him with it, while his companion deposited their empties on Tonica’s tray. “Flash us some leg, maybe we’ll leave you a tip,” the other man suggested.
“Down, boys,” he said, hoisting the tray, shaking his head and laughing. These guys were pussycats compared to some of the idiots he used to have to deal with, before he landed here. Even yesterday’s Grabby Hands was, all things considered, mild.
So what was it, that drove someone to misbehave? That was the question they needed to figure out.
Teddy scanned the bar again, gauging where he’d be needed, and what groups were reaching the end of their stay, when he caught a glimpse of familiar blond curls. She had come back in and settled at the far end of the bar in what had become her usual spot, where she could look out the front window and make sure that Georgie was all right.
It had been pissing down rain earlier tonight, so he hoped to hell that she’d left the dog at home.
Seeing her brought on another moment of guilt about the unread file, and then he shook it off. This was his job, keeping Mary’s running like a well-oiled or at least reasonably well-maintained machine. Playing researchtigator was his job, too, but at the same time it was… something else. He’d get to the file in the morning, and to hell with her if she said anything about it tonight, guilt be damned.
There was a burst of laughter from the group she was part of, and he identified Ginny’s friend Max, and a tall, lean black woman with a buzzed haircut and strongly muscled arms sitting on either side of her named… Lillian, he remembered finally. The three of them together looked like an upscale liquor ad, glossy and cheerful.
“Hey, Mallard,” he said, moving behind the bar and depositing the tray of empty glasses in the sink, sliding out of Stacy’s way with the ease of experience. “Couldn’t stay away, huh?”
“They came to see me off on my maiden voyage,” Stacy said, slapping his arm with the bar towel she’d slung over her shoulder, and then giving the bar a quick sweep, as though to emphasize her ownership of that bar, at least for tonight. “Because some people are civilized.”
From that, he was guessing that Jon, the other full-time bartender, hadn’t been happy about her taking on more bartending duties, and he’d been vocal about it that afternoon, never mind that he’d just worked a full shift himself. Tonica could see trouble coming, but Stacy shouldn’t be catching the flak from it. They needed three qualified bartenders, just to keep from burning out. Three, and another barmaid—or barboy. Teddy wasn’t going to squabble over gender so long as they were competent, and…
If Patrick was serious about whatever plans he had for Mary’s, maybe he could talk the owner into hiring more staff, too. You couldn’t expand without, well, expanding, right?
“Tonica!”
He realized that he’d been staring at the glassware for longer than they really deserved, utterly tuning out the conversation flowing around him. Christ, what the hell was wrong with him tonight? “Yeah, sorry,” he said to Stacy. “I need two pints of Epic, and a Floater. Want me to make it?”
“Nah, I got it,” she said, and went into motion, setting up the two beers and pulling a highball down for the mixed drink, each movement smooth and precise.
“You trained her well, Obi Wan,” Ginny said, watching him watch her.
“I did. But there was natural talent there, too. Also natural stupidity,” he said, raising his voice a little. He still hadn’t forgiven her for the flying tackle she’d made when they’d been threatened in the bar during the Jacobs job, no matter how impressed he had been, or how well she’d proven she could handle herself now. That idiot’d had a gun.
“Well, like calls to like, I suppose,” Ginny said with a smirk, and he sighed.
“I walked right into that door, didn’t I?”
“Yeah, you did.” She raised her cocktail glass at him and took a sip. “But she doesn’t make martinis as well as you do. Yet.”
“Hah!” Max said, making everyone turn to look at him. “I just got it!”
Lillian, clearly used to playing the straight man in the group, sighed. “Got what?”
“Ginny! And Tonica! Gin and Tonic! Aw, so cute!”
The groans were heartfelt, and Lillian rewarded Max with a wallop across the back of his shoulders that sounded like it hurt.
“I get top billing, you note,” Ginny said smugly.
“Drinks up,” Stacy called, cutting off whatever response Teddy might have made, and he nodded, building the tray and carrying it back to the table.
Neither of them had mentioned word one about the shelter, or the missing money, but he was pretty sure they were both thinking about it. He was pretty sure neither of them could stop, no matter his earlier thoughts.
“Next time she bats those eyes and plays on your ego,” he told himself as he delivered the order, “just say no.”
* * *
The humans weren’t working. Penny’s tail twitched back and forth irritably, watching them. Finally, she’d had enough: sliding through unwary legs, she left the buildi
ng. She trusted Georgie, she trusted their humans, but she needed to see for herself. Her own nose and whiskers would tell her what to do.
It was damp outside, the pavement unpleasant against the pads of her feet, but she would not let that deter her. Moving down the street, she kept to the shadows as much out of habit as caution: there weren’t many humans walking down here, and those who were didn’t notice her moving past their ankles. The rain had stopped, but the air and ground were both wet, and her fur was soon unpleasantly damp. She shook herself briskly and sneezed once, to get the moisture out of her head, and kept moving on to her destination.
Once there, though, she hesitated, staring at the building. There were two lights in the front, illuminating the empty parking lot, and another over the door, and a few dimmer ones around the edges of the building. Compared to the rest of the neighborhood, the building was well lit, and yet…
This was the place the other animals were talking about, the one the humans had gone to visit, the one Georgie had come from. She’d been able to find it easily enough, but now that she was here, her paws seemed stuck on the pavement. Her first impression was that it stank. In the damp night air she could smell antiseptic, and piss, sweat, and fear. But there were happier smells, too: of grooming and petting and playing, and if there were too many animals in too small a space, it was clean and warm inside. And Georgie had come from there. So it couldn’t be too bad.
Right?
Her tail, upright, twitched just slightly at the tip.
Bad enough that the animals there were unhappy. Were scared. Bad enough that their humans had come here to sniff around, and then talked in the low voices they used when they were serious. But they weren’t doing anything; they were in the Busy Place, talking not in the low voices of serious, important things, but the higher voices of not-serious.
As she stepped around the building, avoiding puddles and looking for a space in the fence she could slip through, something else caught Penny’s attention. A confusion of smells: fresh paint, and gasoline, and another scent, different. Harsher, thicker… dangerous.
Her whiskers twitched, and her tail involuntarily lowered and lashed back and forth, a whiplike movement. This was what the other animals had been talking about. This was why they were afraid.
Penny hadn’t survived on the streets by being stupid, or overly arrogant. She didn’t recognize this smell, couldn’t say where it came from or what left it, but that alone was cause for caution. Not everything was a threat, but the wise cat looked both ways and then looked again.
She stepped past that opening in the fence, and kept looking for another, farther away from the source of that smell.
Pssssst.
The growl came from farther down, almost at the end of the fence. A flat face with an upturned nose stuck out through the slats. Dog, but not unfriendly.
“You the noser?” the dog asked
“I am. One of them, anyway.” But Georgie wasn’t with her. Suddenly, she missed that larger bulk standing over her.
“C’mere.” And the nose withdrew, pulling the slat with it. That left enough room for a small-boned tabby cat to slip through.
On the other side, there were half a dozen dogs of various sizes, and Penny had to fight the urge to arch her back and hiss. None of the dogs seemed aggressive, huddling together at one end of the cement run. Unlike the rest of the building, the yard was well lit, with no shadows for a cat to hide in. A human was at the far end, spraying water around from a hose, keeping an eye on them but not really paying attention.
The dogs were restless, uneasy, their ears saying one thing and their tails another, and all the while their noses twitched, as though trying to smell something they didn’t want to find. When they saw her, there was a small start of surprise, like they were resisting the urge to give chase, and waited while she moved cautiously toward them, the bulldog trotting at her side.
“This is the noser,” the bulldog announced, as though he’d gone out and found her himself. Since she’d still be on the other side of the fence if he hadn’t stuck his nose in, Penny was willing to admit that he had, sort of.
That seemed to throw them into a mild frenzy. “Have you found out what it is yet? Do you know how to make it go away?”
Having only just then smelled what they were talking about, Penny had no answer for them. But she’d give up her whiskers rather than admit that. Instead she merely twitched one ear in a superior manner, and let them yammer around her, casting looks over their shoulders at the human every now and again as though looking for a signal. If she listened well enough, they’d tell her where she should look, and what for.
“All right, kids,” the human called, turning off the water and coiling up the hose. “Last call. Everyone inside, so I can get my ass home, too!”
The dogs turned, with varying degrees of speed and grace, and raced to the other side of the enclosure, leaving Penny with the bulldog and one old greyhound.
“We can’t do anything,” the greyhound said. “We go here, and we go into the kennel, but we can’t go There.”
“We daren’t go There,” the bulldog corrected. “We’d die. You be careful, noser.”
“Always careful,” Penny told them, and then touched noses briefly, before he trotted off to join the others being herded back into the building through a narrow door.
The human paused as the last tail went inside, and looked back over the courtyard as though thinking there was one animal left uncounted, but Penny had already disappeared by then.
Time to go hunting.
7
In the end, Teddy did open the file in the morning, but only in the sense that it was after 2 a.m. Normally, when he got home after a night shift, all he wanted to do was fall facedown into bed and sleep for about ten hours straight. He stared at his bed, and then at the folder in his hand, and sighed. Part of it was the desire to do right by their client, to find out who took the money, and keep them from losing the grant next year. And part of it…
Part of it was the desire to get the drop on Ginny, to find something that would solve the case before she did. They weren’t keeping score, not like on trivia night, but… they were still keeping score. A little. Maybe. And it would feel so good to find something that she had missed. Teddy wasn’t proud of that fact, but he wasn’t going to deny it, either.
“And there’s only one way to win.”
With a painful flashback to college, and the all-nighters he’d sworn he would never ever pull again, he sat down at the kitchen table in his apartment, the empty silence echoing around him, and set a mug of coffee and the folder down in front of him.
“Rock on, old man,” he said, and flipped the file open.
Two more cups of coffee and ninety minutes later, he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer, but he felt better about the case.
There wasn’t all that much information on either the players or the shelter itself beyond what Ginny had already told him, but seeing it in print gave his brain something to chew on, matching what he had already seen to what was on the page. After rereading the same paragraph twice and not being able to remember what it said, though, he gave in. Giving up sleep to get things done became counterproductive after a while, and those all-nighters were for younger idiots.
Putting the file aside, Teddy rinsed his mug out and left it in the sink, then headed for bed. Maybe, if he was lucky, his unconscious mind might be able to sort through possible connections and loose threads better than his sleep-deprived conscious brain.
Before he made it to the mattress, though, his attention was caught by a book shoved into the bookcase, not shelved neatly like the other titles but resting sideways on top of them. The bright-colored cover, against the more sober spines of textbooks and hardcover novels, was like a yowl for attention. He pulled it out and held it, thinking.
He had bought Investigation for Morons months ago, half as a joke, half as a way to keep Ginny from making a mistake that could get them both arrested. Instead
of giving it to her the way he’d originally planned, though, tied up in a bow like the most ironic present ever, he’d made the mistake of flipping it open randomly and starting to read.
An hour later, he had started dog-earing pages, and had highlighted at least three passages, and if he was going to give her a copy, he would have to buy another one, because this was his.
It wasn’t that he had any great desire to be an investigator. In fact, reading the book had taught him that he had no desire at all to be an official, licensed private eye. But he was also fascinated by it, the way you could uncover things, even without official channels or authorization, how far it was possible to snoop without actually crossing the line. Everyone was so worried about the government snooping, they forgot to worry about their neighbor.
“What do you say about this gig, huh?” he wondered, and flipped to the index to see if “theft, petty and grand” was listed.
Petty theft, he learned, was the taking of anything under a set sum, usually around five hundred dollars, while grand theft was anything worth more than that amount. Petty theft was a misdemeanor, while grand theft was a felony. That much he’d known, more or less. It also convinced him that they were once again poking their noses into things better left to the cops. But, short of getting her nose chopped off, Ginny wasn’t going to back down, and…
“And they’re not going to go to the cops, so saying they should be handling it is a nonstarter. Go to damned sleep, before you get stupid.”
* * *
The alarm on his phone went off at 8 a.m., jolting Teddy unpleasantly from his pillow, his heart racing.
“Hell. Right. Oh hell.” He reached over and managed to fumble the alarm off, falling back against the pillow. Normally on a Sunday, he’d sleep in a few more hours to recover before picking up the evening shift. No such luck today. Too much to do.
L.A. Kornetsky - Gin & Tonic 02 - Fixed Page 11