Dead In Red

by L. L. Bartlett

  “That surprises you?”

  He frowned, his gaze dipping back to the document. “I guess not. Besides his mother, I was his only other close relative. Not that we were ever really close. And what’s he left me, a pile of bills?”

  “Why didn’t he mention his mother in the will?”

  Tom sighed. “They didn’t exactly get along. That branch of the family has a lot of money and although he was an only child, Walt was definitely a black sheep. He could’ve gone into the family business, but he opted not to. You’ve heard of Ben Kaplan Jewelers, haven’t you?”

  “Whoa—only their commercials every five minutes on the radio and TV. They’ve got to be the biggest jewelry retailer in the city. So why’d Walt go into construction?”

  He shrugged. “He probably thought it would make him look . . . I dunno, more manly. He couldn’t have been any good at it. He hated to get dirty. I think he was relieved when he got to quit after his accident.”

  “Your aunt still own the business?”

  “Yeah, but Walt’s cousin Rachel runs it these days. She’s good at it, too. I wouldn’t doubt my aunt leaves the whole thing to her.”

  I tapped the document still in his hand. “You’re also listed as Walt’s executor. That means you’ve got to settle his estate. By law you’re supposed to get things started within ten days of a death.”

  “Man, I don’t have the time for that. And after what you’ve told me, I don’t want to know what Walt had in that apartment or storage unit.”

  “The apartment is already pretty clean, as you know.” He didn’t deny he’d already been through it, and I went on. “I found some pictures you wouldn’t want to see, but I’ll wait to dispose of them. Eventually the police might want them. In the meantime, you could call in an estate liquidator to get rid of everything else. If you leave the stuff at the storage place, eventually they’ll either sell or dump it, although as executor of Walt’s estate they might haul you into small claims court for back rent.” I handed him Walt’s keys. “You really should go through the storage unit, just in case there’s something of value.”

  Tom nodded. “Walt was a pain in the ass in life, and is proving to be an even bigger one in death.”

  “I know you said you didn’t want to know what else I’ve found out, but—”

  He exhaled a long breath. “It was one of his fancy women killed him, right?”

  “I think so.”

  “It’s gonna come out,” he groused, shaking his head. “It’s all gonna be made public and . . .” He didn’t finish the sentence. I wasn’t quite sure if he was angry at me or just the situation. His gaze met mine. “You know who?”

  “Maybe. But I don’t know as we’ll ever be able to prove it.”

  Tom was silent for a long moment, staring at the floor—or maybe he didn’t see it at all. Finally he looked up at me. “Back off, Jeff. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “You sound like my brother.”

  “I’m glad someone looks out for you. I should’ve looked out more for Walt. If I had—”

  “From what I’ve learned about Walt, he didn’t want a lot of people in his life. That he found something of value in his transient friendships with his ladies . . . well, maybe that’s all he needed.”

  Tom didn’t look convinced. He folded the will and stood, walked back to his office without looking back.

  I’d finished swabbing the floor and was about to dump the bucket of dirty water when Tom finally emerged. “I’m thinking about adding happy hour food on the weekends. What do you think?”

  “More important, what does the health department think?” I asked, accepting his change of subject.

  “Yeah, I’d have to look into that. There’s debate as to whether it encourages customers or just invites freeloaders. You have any experience with that?”

  We talked about my former bartending job, then we moved onto sports when the first customers came in. No more talk of Walt. Until I could prove who’d killed him, I decided to keep it that way.

  * * *

  The two o’clock doldrums had hit and there were only a couple of Tom’s cronies nursing beers in front of the tube when Brenda strode into The Whole Nine Yards. “Can I help you?” Tom asked, in his most surprised and subdued voice. It wasn’t often a woman walked into the bar. It was almost unheard of for a black woman to do so.

  “Sure,” Brenda said, sliding onto a barstool. “I’ll have a Coke.”

  “I’ll take care of the lady,” I told Tom. “She’s a friend of mine.”

  Tom raised an eyebrow, gave Brenda a nod, and headed back down the bar to chat with his friends. Their eyes had been on Brenda, too, but Tom distracted them.

  “Looks like I gave them something to talk about for the rest of the day,” Brenda said.

  I half-filled a glass with ice, and squirted the soda from the well trigger. “Here you are, ma’am.” Brenda reached for her purse, but I stopped her. “It’s on the house. What brings you to this part of town?”

  “I didn’t come to spy, if that’s what you think.” She took in the bar’s décor: artfully suspended hockey sticks, baseball bats and other sports equipment. “Not a bad little place. But it was actually that little candy store where you got the chocolates that drew me out here. They were just the best, and I kind of ran out.”

  “Kind of ran out?”

  “Okay, I pigged out on them and they’re gone and I craved some more. Is that a crime?”

  “No, I’m glad you liked them.”

  “Yes, well, I haven’t made it there yet. On my way, I thought I’d take a look at Cyn Lennox’s little café at the mill. You and Richard have spoken so much about it, and her. Not that I was going to go inside and actually check it out. I mean, the time we spent with her yesterday was just too awkward. But when I got there, there was a big hand-written closed sign on the door.”

  All my nerves went on red alert. “What?”

  Brenda lifted her glass. “I thought you’d be interested, since you and Richard were planning to play Starsky and Hutch tonight—not that you bear the least resemblance to Ben Stiller. And you can’t follow Cyn’s nephew around if he isn’t there.”

  “Did the sign say anything like, closed for repairs—or sickness, anything like that?”

  She shook her head and took a sip of her drink. “No emergency telephone number, no nothing.”

  My mind was racing. Cyn had been upset when she’d come to Richard’s house the afternoon before. She’d had an argument with Gene, and now her café was closed—just the vibe I’d gotten while talking to Dana Watkins.

  “What do you think it means?” Brenda asked.

  “Nothing good.”

  She nodded. “Where will you start now?”

  “With the telephone book.” I looked up. “Tom, a phone book?”

  “In my office.”

  A minute later, I’d retrieved the telephone book. I’d already checked for Gene with no results. This time I looked for Dana Watkins. More than a column of numbers were listed under Watkins, and as luck would have it, one of them simply said D. Watkins. I grabbed the wall phone and dialed. Unfortunately, D. Watkins stood for David Watkins, not Dana. I’d have to try them all, and there was always the chance her number was unlisted—or that she only had a cell phone.

  I slammed the phone back on the receiver.

  “No luck, huh?” Brenda asked.

  I shook my head.

  Brenda took another sip of her Coke, her gaze wandering to the still-open phone book. “I’m not doing anything this afternoon. If you want, I could call all those numbers and see if I can find your Dana. Would that help?”

  “Oh, Brenda, that would be worth a million bucks to me.”

  “On the contrary, it’s very selfish of me. Richard and I are not going to leave on this honeymoon if you’re still looking into that man’s murder. The quicker you nail the sucker, the easier we’ll all sleep.”

  I could’ve kissed her.

  She rose fro
m her seat. “But before I do that, I really have to go to that candy store. See you at home.” With a wave of her hand, she was out the door.

  Before I put the phone book away, I looked up Cyn Lennox. Nothing listed in Amherst—just like nothing for Eugene Higgins. Then again, why would there be? She’d returned to Buffalo after it had been printed. Directory assistance was no help either; the number was unlisted.

  I spent the next two hours doing any busy work I could think of while I pondered my next move. To find Gene, I’d have to find Cyn. I had a feeling she’d gone to ground, but I’d have to check out her house anyway. The actual mill wasn’t part of the café. If Ted Hanson was on the premises, he might have an idea of where Cyn had gone. But even if he did, he might not tell me.

  Tracking Cyn would be difficult, but not impossible. The problem was, according to Sophie’s timetable I was running out of time. Brenda and Richard’s plane tickets were for Friday. And then there was the vision of the bloody hands. Time may have already run out for someone. Cyn? Gene? Veronica?

  I caught up with Tom before I left, pulled him aside so the customers wouldn’t hear. “I might need some time off in the next couple of days. The stuff I’m looking into has taken a turn I hadn’t expected, and—”

  Tom raised a hand, cut me off. “We’ve already been over this; I don’t want to know about it.” He exhaled a ragged breath, exasperated. “It’s my fault. I should’ve never talked to you about Walt. I only thought . . . maybe, him being a nobody, the cops wouldn’t care about finding his killer. And then they made the arrest . . .”

  I remained silent, felt my fingernails dig into my palms as I waited for him to fire me.

  He nodded toward the door. “Go on. Just call if you’re not coming in.”

  I swallowed, my mouth dry. Cutting me this kind of slack would cost Tom; he’d either lose money if he had to open later, or he’d exhaust himself doing both our jobs.

  “Thanks.”

  # # #

  CHAPTER 19

  Brenda hadn’t yet found Dana Watkins, having another ten or twelve numbers left to call. But she had packed a picnic dinner for Richard and me to eat should we need to go on stakeout duty. “I’m going on my damn honeymoon, and nothing is going to stop me,” she’d said as she pushed us out the door with our life-sustaining supplies. Richard wasn’t as thrilled. The value some people place on their car’s leather upholstery is simply unnatural.

  We hadn’t even made it to Main Street when I’d investigated the large paper grocery sack and assured him Brenda had packed plenty of napkins, and a half-used tin of saddle soap—just in case.

  Our first stop was The Old Red Mill. A metallic purple motorcycle was parked in front. The bike in the ramp garage had definitely been black. Still . . .

  As Brenda described, a hand-written sign was tacked to the café’s front door. The lights were off; already the place looked abandoned.

  Richard and I circled the building, found a door on the far side and rang the buzzer until Ted appeared at the door. “You again,” he muttered in greeting, his expression sour.

  “I’m looking for Cyn Lennox.”

  “She isn’t here, and I doubt she’ll be back. She told me you were bad news.”

  “How am I responsible for her troubles?”

  Hanson dragged a hand through his graying hair. “Sorry. It’s just . . . since I found that guy dead on the hill, I had a feeling my life was going to change—that I’d be looking for a new tenant for the café.”

  “What was Cyn’s excuse for closing?” Richard asked.

  “She was so upset she was babbling when she called me last night. All I got was that she’d fired her nephew, and she had orders for restaurants that needed filling. I asked her about hiring someone else, but she said she couldn’t talk anymore and hung up. The sign was up when I got here this morning.”

  “Did Dana come in today?”

  Hanson shook his head. “I went in and had a look around the café. The office is a disaster. Cyn must’ve come in and cleared out what she could. Baking supplies and equipment were also missing.”

  “Did Cyn tell you why she fired Gene?”

  “No, she isn’t talking to me at all. I don’t understand it. She thought the world of him. What could he have done to make her so angry?”

  I had a suspicion. And I had another suspicion: that Ted and Cyn were—or had been—lovers.

  I offered Hanson my hand and we shook.

  The floodgates opened and I was bombarded with images and sensations. One in particular he enjoyed, though might never happen again: Cyn, on the back of his motorcycle, her arms wrapped around him.

  Ted took back his hand.

  “Thanks,” I managed.

  He nodded, went back inside and closed the door.

  We started back for the car. “Well?” Richard asked.

  “Cyn and Ted have been more than just landlord and tenant.”

  Richard raised an eyebrow, said nothing.

  “He’s worried about her—and probably with cause.”

  Richard’s cell phone rang. He answered it, handed it to me.

  “Get a pencil,” Brenda said, her voice sounding tinny on the little phone. “I’ve got Dana’s address. Wouldn’t you know it was the next to last name on the list?”

  I had a pen and jotted it down.

  It was a toss-up if we went north to Cyn’s house or south to locate Dana. I was pretty sure we wouldn’t find Cyn home, but I had to check it out. So north we went, battling the last of the commuter traffic.

  As anticipated, the drive was empty and no one answered when I knocked on the condo’s door.

  “She’s not home,” came a quavering voice. Sitting on a white plastic chair on the front porch of the next condo was an elderly woman in a green-plaid cotton housedress, with worn, what had once been pink, fluffy slippers on her feet.

  I descended the steps and joined the old woman. “Do you know when she’ll be back?”

  She shook her head, her tight white curls never moving. “Not soon. She had suitcases.”

  “Last night?”

  “About ten o’clock. She didn’t even turn on the porch light when she loaded the car. And when she drove away, her headlights were off. I thought to myself, ‘that is strange.’”

  “Yes, it is,” I agreed. “Has anyone else been around asking for her?”

  “Just a nice young man in a silver car.”

  “Kind of thin, short and balding?”

  “Yes. Reminded me of my husband Charles when we were first married, oh, sixty years ago now.”

  “When did the young man stop by?”

  “Oh, several times today. You just missed him about ten minutes ago.”

  Damn. But at least Gene didn’t know where Cyn was, either. That meant she was probably safe.

  “Thanks for your help,” I told the old woman and went back to Richard’s car.

  “So?” he asked as I slammed the door shut. I gave him a recap. “You want to hang around in case Gene comes back?”

  “There’s no guarantee he will. We’d better go see Dana. That is, if she’ll give me an audience.”

  Richard started the car.

  Dana Watkins lived in a typical, older middle-class housing tract in Cheektowaga. Rows of purple petunias bordered the sidewalk up to the front door of the neat little brick bungalow. Richard and I got out of the car and headed up the path. Dana’s car was parked in the driveway, and there were lights on inside the house, but no one answered our knock.

  Richard followed me around the side of the house to the back, where a central air conditioner hummed. I stretched to peer through a kitchen window. Dana was hard at work, kneading dough on a 1950s chrome-and-Formica table. I tapped on the window. She looked up, annoyed.

  “Can we talk?” I yelled, probably loud enough for her neighbors to hear.

  “Go away,” she mouthed. “I’m busy,” and went back to her kneading.

  I tapped on the window again. No reaction. I
kept tapping. Thirty seconds. One minute. Finally she stomped to the back door, yanked it open. “Will you stop bothering me!”

  “I need to talk to you. We’re pals, remember?”

  “You are not my pal.”

  “I was last Wednesday.”

  Impatience shadowed her eyes. “I have a lot of work to do. And you’re keeping me from it.”

  “Then tell me where to find Cyn or, better yet, Gene.”

  Anxiety tightened her lips into a thin line. She breathed through her nose, her breaths coming in short snorts. “I suppose if I asked you to leave you’d ignore me and just keep bugging me.”

  “A man has died and the police have arrested the wrong person for the crime. I’m working on behalf of the murdered man’s family to find out the truth.”

  She scowled. “Well, you might’ve put it that way earlier. Oh . . . come in.”

  I climbed the three concrete steps with Richard right behind me. The aroma of breads, cakes and cookies filled Dana’s kitchen, which was overrun with flour sacks, spices, and cans and jars of other ingredients. The oven timer counted down thirteen minutes and six seconds. The table and sideboard in the dining room beyond were stacked with boxes and racks of baked goods. Dana was already back to work at her kitchen table.

  And there was something else in the room. An aura I recognized and it didn’t belong to Dana.

  “You’re filling Cyn’s orders?” I asked.

  “It’s a great opportunity for me.”

  “Why did Cyn close the café?” Richard asked.

  Dana looked up, for the first time noticing Richard. “This is my brother. He’s also a friend of Cyn’s,” I said.

  She didn’t believe me. “Look, all I know is she said she was shutting down. I don’t know any more.”

  “This doesn’t look like a licensed kitchen,” Richard said conversationally.

  Dana’s head snapped up, her eyes blazing.

  “I’m a physician. I’ve got friends who work for the health department. I wonder what they’d say if they knew about your little operation.”