Flower Girl: A Burton Family Mystery

by David Marshall Hunt

  Chip's report continued: Verifying reliability of this is not a problem as these two are very arrogant and deem themselves bullet-proof. They select their victims for their weaknesses and their high profiles which tells me that publicity can ruin them; all part of the blackmail. No police have ever been involved. In fact there are no official records of the activities of these two con-artists.

  "So where did Chip get all these details?" I asked.

  Reddy replied, "Good question. A family member sent us this entire package via secure e-mail at michaela.com. Then Chip did a thorough background check on all parties, both targets, and the family requesting our services."

  Chip concluded his report with a note from the family saying that T2 is affiliated with Russo/Grey Oil and suggesting a sense of urgency and revenge:

  My family member has attempted suicide twice and is presently institutionalized. T1 is under contract to the Harmony Group Modeling agency of New York. The client says that T1 works for the same agency as my family member, their targeted victim. One more thing, I cannot support this, but I believe that these two have been the source of her drug addiction. She is only 27 years old with a very bleak future. Eliminating this threat may give her some hope.

  "Wait a minute,” I said. "They are connected to the Greys, that seems a bit too coincidental.” Reddy shrugged.

  Chip concluded his report by noting that by doing the assignments separately we did not risk an association as much. However, they were only separated for this week at their present Montana and New York locations, granting only short windows of opportunity.

  "Okay, so much for the details of the case. Other than the twofer aspect, it is a perfect fit," Dalisay said, "almost as if the clients know more about our process than we do."

  Now came our evaluation of the Twofer Case in terms of Reddy's Rule #1- never target someone who doesn't deserve it.

  "Dalisay and Shannon!" Reddy said out loud, scratching his ear as he is wont to do when making a decision he was vexed over making. "Accept or reject this case. It's your call.”

  As I watched Reddy scratch his ear, I thought to myself, Reddy has a tell. My slight hesitation gave Dalisay an opening, and she said, " Both targets meet Rule #1; however, I think Chip is suggesting that the case is too perfect, so I vote no deal.” I was startled by her eagerness to be involved in these cases; she seemed so indifferent to the sniper training up to this time, and being a professional healer, she wasn't about to shoot someone, whether they deserved it or not.

  "I agree with Chip and Dalisay,” I replied.

  I know how to take orders. I know that Reddy, the family patriarch, will make the final decision on this case; however, I couldn't resist saying with incredulity in my voice, "I don't believe this. You're actually going to take this case."

  Then Reddy threw a curve at us, as befits an ex-minor league baseball player. He replied coolly, "Dalisay is correct, Chip says the information is almost too perfect. He thinks it's a trap, a classic CIA set-up to grab Michaela and me." I hadn't even calculated Michaela into the equation.

  Dalisay asked, "Who's Michaela?" Reddy replied, "When we get back to Berkeley, I'll give you a tour of my basement lab at Shannon's and introduce you to Michaela."

  I noticed that he didn't call my place home.

  Later, on a cloudy moonless night, as pitch black as any I have seen, Reddy said, "It’s easy to get too wrapped up in Rule # 1: Don't target anyone who doesn't deserve it."

  I said, "I get it. That Twofer couple deserved it; however, what about risk and reward?"

  "Exactly!" Reddy said. "On the other hand, if we take this Montana case, at least I'll know where to find the client if things go wrong. And, while the CIA keeps an eye on me, I will be keeping an eye on them."

  When Reddy says things like that I really get worried, because it illustrates the real dangers and risks of this business. "So we should decline the Montana case. No one can keep an eye on the CIA," I said.

  "I agree," came the surprise reply, followed by a hearty laugh. "However, we’ll need to practice some serious six direction skills until we find out if it’s the CIA that is setting us up."

  As our summer of skills and case selection training at Skeleton Lake came to an end, Dalisay and I started to put together a list of Reddy's Rules, sort of an SOP Manual.

  "You had better hope Reddy never discovers that we have written down his rules," she whispered to me as Reddy headed for a walk around the lake with the dogs following him like he was the pied piper. ”My bet is that he has a pocketful of treats."

  Knowing how good Reddy is at investigating, we rethought our decision and burned the two copies of Reddy’s Rules in the cabin’s pot bellied stove. Then we laced up our running shoes and took off at a run to join Reddy and the Bear family.

  "Better safe than sorry," I said.

  "Hell, we know his rules backwards and forwards. We don't need to write them down, just react to them when needed, and try not to forget Michaela when analyzing future cases."

  At that moment I realized that like Reddy and I, she too had an eidetic memory. For me, all doubt that she is a Burton was erased.

  "It's as if Michaela's a member of the family," I managed to say with a straight face.

  Reddy and the Bear clan were running along the south trail headed east into the glow of the morning sun. When we caught up with them, Dalisay asked, "Can we call them Guiding Principles instead of Reddy's Rules?"

  I added, "GP's does sound more business-like."

  "Call them what you wish, but follow them, especially when selecting clients," Reddy replied.

  Later in our run, I asked Reddy, "How are we doing with the six directions?"

  "East and west are pretty good, North and south need more practice, and I do believe you are both sufficiently paranoid about things coming up from behind and out of the ground. However, I once had a habu snake drop from the limb of a tree on my head in Okinawa. On another occasion, a habu dropped on our dog and bit him, damn near killed him. Very toxic poison." From that day forward I found myself wondering if Reddy might drop a snake on me at any time.

  The first question Dalisay asked Reddy when the topic of clients next came up was, "Where do your Rules come from?" I was expecting him to say, from my life experiences.

  "Where do you suppose I got my rule Number 1? I train with Hamish at the same martial arts dojang every June when I return to Cheju-do. The Silla monk Won Gwang teaches the directives as spiritual guidance to all his students of the martial arts." Reddy grinned and we got back to our GP lessons.

  "Reddy's Rule Number 1 and the 5th directive are very similar," Dalisay said.

  I agreed. "Directive #5: Never take a life without a just cause. You’re right; it does have a ring of familiarity." However, Reddy taught us that rules are guidelines, not laws. They needed to be flexible and at times it was necessary to bend them.

  By summer’s end, I almost always rejected cases as too close to home, following Rule #4. I was beginning to wonder if there were sufficient clientele to meet Reddy's General Practices criteria and sustain our new family business. Twofers were way too risky. I thought back on the eleven kills I had estimated, based on Reddy's bank deposits total. At €300k a contract plus expenses, we neither wanted nor needed to do a volume business. But we still needed a mission statement.

  Reddy and I were in synch. Our mission was assassinations, namely, targets that met the criteria established in Reddy's Rules. Okay, call it contract killing. However, Dalisay had a different mission, assisting young women who were the victims of abuse.

  Later that night, after Dalisay headed into the cabin, Reddy and I sat on the dock dangling our feet in the cool lake water. "You're ready, Shannon, and we’ll talk assignment when the opportunity arises." I damn near hugged him. Call it pride, but I was both scared and overjoyed and happy to be headed home all at the same time.

  Back home in Berkeley I researched starting-up a family business. This led me to a lot of websites that pro
vided only general information on capitalization and finances, taxes, health insurance for employees, location-location-location, and of course some were focused on the security industry, others on sporting goods retailers and gun stores, nothing really close to Burton's Family Business.

  Then, I stumbled across an advertisement on the Internet for a seminar that caught my attention:

  Professor Marshall Hunt, author of 'Start-up: A Family Business' will be presenting a two day seminar Friday and Saturday (from 8am-4pm) [3-4 April 2013] at the Seattle Resort & Conference Center. The seminar is limited to 50 participants so be sure to register early. Call 1-800-222-2345 or click on the registration button on this page and complete the application. All major credit cards accepted. Fee $300.00. A bank of rooms has been reserved at The Skydome Hotel- contact them directly or make your own accommodation arrangements. Click here for details of the program.

  Reddy paid the fees and registered us all for the seminar.

  The professor, a grey-haired, bearded, bespectacled six footer, wearing jeans, a black t-shirt and a forest green corduroy jacket, asked the attendees an opening question: "What is the first ingredient one needs to start-up a family business?"

  A preppy looking twenty-eight year old wearing a carefully tailored dark blue blazer with a family crest and gold buttons, grey slacks and tasseled loafers, raised his hand and responded, "First you need a product or service that someone wants or needs."

  The Prof smiled and said, "That is a factor, but what else might be first?"

  Three or four more answers came from an eager audience. Then, Dalisay raised a hand and said, "A familia."

  Prof Hunt grinned and said, "I do believe we have something to work with. First, you need a familia of loyal employees, willing to live on a low income basis while you get started. Next, you need to assess what skills your family team has. Third, you need to determine what business, service or product, you intend to focus on and what are your market and your mission. Notice that this is not the first thing you do. Then, return to what skills need to be developed. Finally, you need financing. Most start-ups fail and fail quickly because they do not have sufficient funds to meet payroll, start-up expenses, inventory, etcetera, for at least eighteen months. Six months is not sufficient nor is a month to month approach.

  “Those are some of the basic tenants we’ll discuss during the seminar. I have invited several entrepreneurs to share their successes and failures with us as we progress. Let's begin."

  The final topic was presented by one of the entrepreneurs, Jill Cotton, who started an on-line consulting firm based on the slogan “Plans are for suckers." Professor Hunt had made the point that plans aren’t worth spit if you can’t implement them. Her story was about a disastrous case where unfinished business lingered for months, eating up revenues and time that should have been spent on growth and development. Everyone in her firm literally stopped whatever they were doing to close one unprofitable case. Cotton concluded, "Take care of unfinished business quickly and stop thinking like a start-up."

  When I checked the class roster in my program materials, the preppy young man turned out to be Courtney Blaine Grey, of Highland Park, Illinois, VP of the Grey Oil Corporation. I guessed he was Edvard Grey's cousin.

  After the seminar, people gathered in the foyer for snacks and beverages as they chatted in small noisy groups about family business. Courtney glided over to Dalisay, her twelve year old companion Penelope, and me with a big smile on his face.

  "What business are you considering, ladies?" he said, as he made direct eye contact with Penelope. It was not Dalisay nor I but Penelope that Courtney was hitting on. He perceived her to be a virgin. My knowledge of his cousin Edvard's propensity for droit du seigneur obviously biased my thoughts.

  Penelope was Critter's child slave, groomed to be his child bride. She attended the Hunt Seminar with us mostly because we wanted to keep an eye on her while Critter was still at large. She was one of the first of three girls to become a resident at Dalisay's Oakland Clinic for abused girls. Penelope had several talks with me when I was helping out at the clinic, counseling battered wives and children. We had known each other for some weeks now since she relocated from New Orleans. Reddy was the one who suggested she move into the dorm at the clinic.

  She still thought Critter was an okay guy, but she didn't really understand the Stockholm syndrome. After all, she had been raised by Critter since she was kidnapped at six and had only dim memories of a drunken, abusive stepfather and a heroin - addicted mother who mostly left her to watch TV and fend for herself before abandoning her in a flea infested motel south of San Jose.

  Reddy sent me stream video taken by Chip Moriga and attached to his investigative research notes on Courtney Blaine Grey. He was a slick greasy looking dude with crazy eyes. His left eye was green and the right one brown. The eyes were a genetic thing with many of the Grey family males since the time of their English ancestors according to Chip. Ruthless and ambitious, he was well down the Grey family tree but climbing.

  At the end of the seminar, Reddy drove us back to the airport to catch our return flight to Oakland. I was not surprised when Penelope leaned over the front seat, smiled and asked us, "What did you think of Courtney Grey?"

  I knew better than to tell a twelve year old girl to steer clear of the bastard. Matte once told me the story of Edvard Grey after a rape case became a matter of public record and got splashed all across the River Views news. Edvard had openly stated that it was his birthright to practice droit du seigneur. Using her best psychiatric terminology, she called him "one sick bastard.” Recalling that incident was what made me suspect that Courtney Grey, second cousin to Edvard, was hitting on Penelope because she was a virgin. I simply replied, "Not my type, too smarmy."

  Penelope asked, "Smarmy?"

  "Creepy, slick, greased back hair, fast talker, ladies man or should I say cradle robber."

  "Okay, I get the idea," Penelope said. "But, I am not a child; I'll be thirteen next month."

  We dropped Penelope off at the Oakland Clinic and Dalisay checked to ensure everything went okay during our absence. A fourth girl, age fourteen going on thirty judging by her make-up, her physique and clothes, had been admitted this morning. Dalisay talked with her for fifteen minutes; then, we drove home.

  When we got back to my place in Berkeley, the four things that stayed with us from the seminar were: first, was Courtney Grey going to be a problem?; second, redefining our mission; third, we needed to do an inventory of "familia" members' willingness and skills; fourth, I needed to determine if we had adequate capital and working funds for at least eighteen months. We had previously figured on a strategy based on ninety days of funds, and then our plan was to use the revenues to keep going. Professor Hunt's seminar firmly put the kibosh on that feeble plan.

  "Too bad we couldn't tell the Prof what our real business is."

  "You know girl, I think he knew we were hiding something," I replied.

  "He liked our charity angle, diversifying with the clinic and all," Dalisay said, adding, "I reckon that will be my main duty."

  Reddy pitched in, "I liked the old dude. He's had some interesting experiences and that makes him more legitimate than most t-shirt professors."

  "What's a t-shirt professor?" Penelope asked.

  Reddy replied, "A t-shirt professor has degrees and no real world experience."

  "I get it," Penelope responded. "They have been there and have the t-shirts to show for it, but they have never done that."

  "Exactly!" Reddy said.

  As we settled in, back home in Berkeley, Dalisay and I started a family skills inventory as per seminar guidelines.

  "As for our skills, I'm destined to be the bookkeeper and to keep an eye on finances and taxes," I said, thinking all the while of Reddy telling me I'm ready.

  "And, when Reddy thinks you are ready, or the case fits, you will be a sniper. I will put my skills to work at the clinic," Dalisay said.

  Eidetic m
emory does not mean psychic I thought.

  "That makes Reddy the CEO, Trainer, Tracker, Target Designator, and Primary Sniper."

  "So that makes my job title, Family Business Partner and Clinic Director," Dalisay said.

  I said, "How about for me, Partner, Director, and Knight in training. Wow! What a business card!" I played Paladin’s theme song on my smart phone for all to hear.

  "I like it. Can we all share your theme song?" Dalisay said when she stopped laughing.

  Reddy came up from the basement, brewed an espresso, and sat silently during all this jocularity. Angie, Dalisay, and I nonchalantly continued our conversation as though we knew he was there all along. Actually he has been absent for nearly two weeks. Then he said, "So, we’re in the business of assassinations!"

  "And we run a clinic and home for girls who need our help."

  Reddy paused, then added, "What say we call ours a business of child rescue and protection?"

  "That does have a more socially acceptable sound to it," I said. "Child rescue, aid to young women, and assassinations when justified?"

  "Okay, if we all agree that the assassinations part will remain secret or at least not publicized," Reddy said. Dalisay and I nodded in the affirmative. We are nothing if not respectful of our leader. The notion of filial piety ran through my memory.

  "Speaking of our business mission remaining a secret, what are we going to do about Courtney Blaine Grey?" I asked.

  "Why was a member of the Grey family at the seminar?" Reddy asked. "Maybe Courtney was checking up on us. The Greys are partners with the Parks in their Clinics in South Korea. However, I am certain they don’t know I’m investigating the Home for Girls in Cheju-do on behalf of Princess Zubaida."

  "Princess Zubaida?" Dalisay asked.

  "Oh yeah! As soon as I can, I’ll tell you about another case I am working on," Reddy replied.

  Back in Berkeley, after Professor Hunt's seminar, Dalisay became a regular running partner with Angie, the dogs, and me. Chip Moriga joined us a couple of mornings, and we all really liked him. He is one terrific runner and when it comes to encryption and decryption he's the best. Well maybe the second best. He’s also a gifted hacker.