“I might need him.”
“You might?”
“Yeah. I have some things I’m looking in to and I might have to hack into some email and some other stuff on a website down here.”
“Down where?”
“I’m in this little town near Puerto Vallarta, and somebody got killed.”
“Jesus, Lucy, are you in the middle of another one of your escapades? I still tell people about our adventures solving the death of Awful Angus down in Ochi.”
“Yep, I’m at it again. And once again it came out of nowhere.”
“You’re lucky that way. New material just falls in your lap. Ha! Well, anyway, here’s his number.” Lucy wrote it down. “I’ll call him after we get off the phone and tell him Lucy Ripken calls, do what she asks.”
“Muchas Gracias, Señorita Mickita.”
“My pleasure. And Lucy?”
“Yeah Mick.”
“Do me a favor and watch your ass.”
“Will do, Mick.”
“Let me know when you want to do the hit on the loft imposter. We only need one Mickey Wolfe in the world and that’s me.”
“Right on, Mick. See ya.” They both hung up.
“So someone hijacked your loft?” Terry said. “What a bummer.”
“You have no idea what a bummer, if that is what happened. My landlord is a hound from hell and it smells like he’s behind this,” Lucy said. “In any case, that’s all I got done today,” she said. “It was—upsetting.”
“I can imagine,” Leslie said. “Listen, tomorrow we’ll check out the real estate office. I’ll shoot with the mini-cam and see what shakes. After that, we’ll use your friend’s pal if we need to. Slope Tweed, huh? Sounds like an interesting specimen.” Leslie was seriously into it now, Lucy could tell. Smelling blood.
“All I can tell you guys is we have to get this done fast because I have got to get back to New York ASAP,” Lucy said. “I don’t know what’s up with the X Dames but I am not going to lose that place for any stinking TV show.”
“So let’s get on it,” said Terry. “Marcia, you go with Leslie to see that Townsend dolt in Dario’s office tomorrow. Tell him you want to invest your X Dames winnings in a Sayulita surf hut or something. Leslie’s your financial advisor or whatever.”
They left Lucy alone. After a room service dinner she began to get into a major fret about her loft again, trying to figure out how to take it back from afar. Nothing seemed feasible. Then the phone rang. She pounced on it.
“Lucy here.”
“Hey Luce, it’s me.” Harold.
“Damn am I glad to hear your voice,” she said. “Things have gotten really weird, Harry. Are you still in Fla? How’s it going down there? You strike it rich yet?”
“Whoa, Lucy, slow down. Things are OK. Moving. Remember my friend Prudence in Jamaica? Well, I called her and she hooked me up with these two cousins of hers who’ve been working as cane-cutters on some rich-ass exile Cuban’s plantation about two hours from here. So I tracked them down and when I told them I was a friend of cousin Prudence they got really friendly. They bailed on their cane-cutting gigs—God, that’s ugly, hard, shit-paying work—but anyways, they were very happy to help me start digging for twenty-five bucks an hour against ten per cent of my haul. I don’t believe they think we’re going to find bags of money, and the ground is pretty damp, but—”
“Harry, cut to the chase. Are you there?”
“We’re about 50 feet into it. I found a maintenance guy to get me plans to help me steer around some plumbing so that took a little extra time and payola. We can only work midnight to five am and I also had to invest some time in shoring things up because the ground’s so damp. All in all it’s taking a little longer than I thought. But another three days or so we’ll be there. Say a little prayer for me, Lucy. Now that I’m actually doing this it seems pretty preposterous I must admit.”
“But you don’t want to cut your losses and get back to New York, huh?”
“No way, Luce. I got a serious tunnel going here, and I’m way too close to my target at this point. Why? What’s up?”
“Someone’s in my loft since yesterday and I don’t know who.”
“What?”
Lucy told him the story. “So here I am in Sayulita and the mysterious stranger has moved into my place. I figure Lascovich is behind this but on the other hand I don’t know how he could find out about the X Dames gig, which this woman used to trick Jane and get in, so I’m also thinking it’s might be someone connected to somebody on the show because she knew all about it.”
“But you told Lascovich you were leaving, right? So he found out where you were going and—hey, how is that going? The show I mean.”
“Murder and mayhem on the high waves, what else?”
“What?”
She told him another story.
“Jesus, Luce, you are so good at stepping into it. So what are you going to do?”
“Oh, we have a plan, don’t worry. Things go right Teresa and I are going to turn this lurid scenario into the TV event of the next fall season. Surfing is a hot ticket right now, Harry. And murder always sells. So put ‘em together and what do you got? Bibble te bobble te boo. A Neilsen sweep. But it will probably take a few days to pull it off so I was hoping you might make it back to Manhattan before Lascovich gets back and see if you could get rid of this person in my loft.”
“And how was I supposed to accomplish that?”
“Harold, you are one wily character when you need to be.”
“I guess that’s a compliment but I still need a couple of days to unearth my million.”
“Still think it’s there, huh?”
“I sure as hell can’t walk away without knowing one way or the other. I’ll be back in New York, let me see, today’s Tuesday—Saturday afternoon I would guess.”
“I think Lascovich will be back in his office on Monday.”
“I’ll check it out Saturday night or Sunday, see what’s up. But damn. Lucy, it’s Manhattan real estate. People kill for that much space. You know the deal.” She didn’t respond. “I’ll do what I can.”
“Thanks, Harry.” She paused, and softened her voice. “And Harry?”
He knew that tone. “Yes, Lucy?” he said slowly, drawing it out, and she could picture him smiling his patented, come hither and strip, immediately if not sooner, smile.
“You know what I want to do to you next time I see you, Harry?”
“I have a pretty good idea, Luce,” he said. “And I’m sure you know that I eagerly await your ministrations. Or as the man once said, I could use a lemon-squeezer.”
“I only hope that it is in my own bed, in my loft, that we can make lemonade.”
“I’ll see what I can do, baby.”
Aaah, that was a nice closer, she thought, putting down the phone. A little bit of Harry, even from afar by phone, went a long way at a time like this.
CHAPTER EIGHT
A ROTTEN DEAL AND AN EMAIL TRAIL
At ten o’clock the next morning, accompanied by Leslie with her mini-cam hidden in her bag, the new X Dames surfing champion Marcia Hobgood wandered into the office of Sayulita Development Company and asked to speak with Ruben Dario. Dario had gone to Puerto Vallarta, according to snarky, self-important Violeta, sexy young high-heeled office manager, and so they met with Wally Townsend instead. Lucy knocked back a fresh carrot, celery, and ginger juice while waiting in El Juicy Internet Café across the street, watching. Lucy had sent an email to Slope Tweed at seven am, before her surfing lesson with Marcia commenced. She’d ridden six waist-high waves, done a couple of decent bottom turns, and even shuffled up and tried a little nose-riding. Now it was down to business.
Fifteen minutes after entering the office, the two women emerged with Townsend. He was around fifty, a heavy-set white guy with a permanent terra cotta tan, thinning slicked-back hair, and a taste for gaudy Hawaiian shirts. He’d been around all week, but seemed a marginal character, the reside
nt gringo knucklehead in the plot as it developed thus far. Now they were going to use him.
The three of them climbed into a red SUV and drove off. Lucy jumped onto her borrowed-from-the-hotel, fat-tired beach bicycle and followed them up the street, eating dust all the way. They went halfway around the plaza, turned right, and headed down a narrow side street jammed with parked cars. Three blocks later they stopped. Lucy caught up to them just as Townsend unlocked a gate and they stepped into a property hidden behind a high white wall.
They went in. She waited a minute, then approached the gate. It let into a lush, beautifully-landscaped yard, with myriad fruit trees, flowering shrubs, and small fountains. Flowing water and birds made sweet, soothing sounds, and butterflies fluttered amidst the flowers. A stone path led through the secret glade to a charming little one-storey white stucco house with a red tile roof and a small covered verandah: a tiny jewel of a dwelling, in perfect condition. The lushly-planted grounds extended around both sides of the building, and seemed to go on beyond it for quite a ways. Lucy had a quick look around the yard, then dodged out the gate as Townsend emerged from the house with Marcia and Leslie. Lucy jumped on her bike, waited, then followed them back down the road. They returned to the realty office and after a few moments the two women came out. They gathered at the internet café.
Leslie started. “I don’t think Townsend was in on it, since he seems so utterly amazed at his own good fortune that he can hardly contain himself.”
“In on what? What do you mean?” Lucy asked.
“That was Sandra Darwin’s house,” Marcia said grimly. “She had just recently bought it, in partnership with Dario and Townsend. And now they’re going to tear down that beautiful house and rip up all those trees and flowers and build a three-story 14-unit condominium project on the site. Townsend thought maybe I wanted to put my 25 grand in prize money as a ten per cent deposit on a pre-build price of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for a two-bedroom unit, possibly with a territorial view. He’s sure I’ll be able to double my money once they get the plans in place and start marketing the units. Even better I don’t take the money across the border I don’t pay taxes. Yadda yadda yadda. It was an offer I could refuse.”
Lucy considered things. “I guess the question is where did Sandra fit into this deal? I know she was concerned about her living situation, but how was she involved?” she said. “We need to find out who was the seller and what were the terms.”
“I asked Townsend already,” Marcia said. “Just playing curious, you know? He said the seller had requested that they not reveal his name.”
“Did he say why?”
“He said it was a matter of privacy.”
“Hmm,” said Lucy. “I think he’s full of shit. Well, listen girls, I’m going to ride back up there and sniff around a bit, OK? I’ll see you back at the suite later.” They headed off to the beach while Lucy jumped on her bike and rode up to the property.
She went past the house, turned at the next corner, bounced down a bumpy little alley, and turned again. She rolled a few yards down the street, to where she would be directly behind the house—and here she discovered another pretty little house of about the same vintage, only this one did not have a wall around it. Instead, in a somewhat scruffy yard chickens pecked at the dirt, a trio of fat brown goats ate weeds, a single cow stood still, lines of laundry fluttered in the faint breeze, and three small boys dashed about underfoot. A Mexican woman roughly Lucy’s age was taking shirts and underwear down from one of the clotheslines. Lucy approached. “Buenas Dias,” she said.
“Hola,” said the woman, and gave her a smile. “How are you?” she said in lightly- accented English.
“You speak English?” Lucy said, a little surprised.
“Yes. I have been studying it with my friend, but she is—” she stopped, and her face fell.
“Your friend? You mean—” Intuiting, Lucy looked past her, and past her house, to where her yard flowed, unfenced, into what was clearly the back yard of the house beyond. Sandra’s house.
“Si. Yes. Sandra. I teach her Spanish, she teach me English. We were—like sisters. Friends for many years.” She stopped again, obviously overcome.
“I’m sorry,” Lucy said. “I have only just met her and she was a very good person. I feel very sad for her family, and her friends. But I wonder—I am trying to find out something about what happened to her, and—do you know who was the owner of the house there, that she lived in?”
“The owner? Yes but of course. It is my father who owns that house and this, where I live with my family.”
“Your father. Is he here? Could I speak with him?”
“He is fishing, like he is every day. He will be back in—” she looked up at the sun. “One hour more, maybe two.”
“Does he speak English?”
“No but I will help you talk with him. And my husband who is with him also speaks English a little bit like me.”
“Your English is excellent,” Lucy said. “I only wish my Spanish was this good. I hate not being able to talk to people in the street.”
“Most of the Americans that come here do not wish to speak Spanish,” she said, and shrugged. “So we all learn English.”
“I seem to forget my Spanish as fast I learn it,” Lucy said. “But I keep trying.”
“No problem, Miss—”
“Lucy. Lucy Ripken.”
“And I am Mariela Pastor.” They shook hands.
“Muchas Gracias, Mariela. See you later.”
Lucy found Terry and Leslie sitting in a coffee shop on the plaza, fending off the chattery advances of a couple of shave-headed, ear-ringed, nipple-ringed, tongue-pierced, and heavily-tattooed aging Dutch hippie men. They shooed the Dutchmen away and Lucy gave them the latest news. They then gave her theirs: they were scheming to turn the thing into a two hour reality-based movie of the week, and Leslie thought she and Bobby might even get one of the broadcast networks to bite, if they could push the Outside Network into a second slot by guaranteeing them syndication rights if the series followed. The story was weird enough, she figured, in its evolution from reality-based womens’ sports competition to real life murder mystery. If that’s what it was. They sat for a minute, watching the tourists and locals wander by, mulling the decidedly strange, post-postmodern nature of what they were doing: investigating a crime while making a movie out of the investigation. Or was it a documentary at this point? A docudrama?
Then back into action. Lucy took Leslie and her mini-cam with her on the second trip to Mariela’s house, where she found her in the company of two men, a slender, well-built white-haired guy who looked to be pushing seventy, and a heavyset man of forty or so, with longish hair and a bandito’s mustache. They sat on the porch steps gutting fish at high speed, and throwing the innards to a pair of small black dogs, who caught and gulped them down as fast as the men could throw them. Unable to resist, Leslie turned on the camcorder and started shooting. The men stood, wiping their hands on blood-stained t-shirts and ragged cut-offs. Lucy and Mariela did the introductions, and Lucy then explained that they wanted to film the discussion. Leslie kept filming. The men—Mariela’s father was Jose Luis Caselin, and her husband was Pancho Pastor—wanted to know why. Lucy hesitated, and chose to be blunt. She explained, in English, that they were not sure that Sandra had died by accident and so they were looking into any reasons anyone would have to do her harm, and wanted to make a record of everything they discovered. Mariela quickly translated for her father, who said something back rapidly in Spanish. When he stopped, Mariela said, “You mean to say that you think someone caused her to die, yes? This is what my father asks.”
“Yes,” said Lucy. “That is what I think is possible.”
“Why do you think this?” Mariela asked, and then turned to her father and spoke briefly. Her father, Señor Jose Luis Caselin, had seemed a taciturn man to that point. But now, with a determined look on his face, he began speaking, and as he worked his way into his
argument he grew more animated and excited. Clearly he was getting something serious off his chest. It took him five minutes, a non-stop tirade. And then he fell silent and sat down, exhausted.
“He says many things, Lucy,” Mariela said. “But in the end it is only one thing. I will try to make this clear for you. My father believes that our town is being stolen by people who care nothing for the people who have lived here for many years, and for those who would like to live in the old ways. And he thinks that what has happened here to us is part of that bigger story, so he tells the story of the house where Sandra lived, that has been in our family for almost fifty years. My father and my uncle Leon helped their father, my grandfather, built these two houses, and Leon lived there in the house behind our house for most of his life. He never married so after he died five years ago, we rented it out. Sandra was our first and only tenant, and lived there these five years. We became friends because she was a very good gardener, you can see how beautiful are the trees and bushes and flowers. And she taught my son Jose to boogie board, and she taught us English. So we were friends. She was paying a small rent for some time, and then all the property around here became very valuable.” She hesitated, then went on. “I am telling you part of this story too, my father’s words and my own. We have three sons and so we never imagined that they would be able to go to the good schools and the university, but then, when all the land here in Sayulita became so rich we began thinking that our boys would leave here and make another life for themselves, instead of to be fishermen. But we wished for Sandra to stay here as long as she wanted, and so when she came to us with a proposal to buy the house and land we were happy to think about it. It turned out that she did not have the money to buy it, but she had found some partners who wished to finance it for her. They wanted to take the property and tear down the house and all the trees and make a big project, and a lot of money, but we did not wish to make Sandra leave, nor did we want a big project there, and we will not need this money for many years, because our boys are still young, so we made a deal with them that we would sell them the house and lot for a good price, but only with the condition that Sandra is able to stay there for as long as she wants up to ten years. We did not want to sell the place to any other person. This is what Sandra asked for, ten years, and so we did it. In ten years, we told them, we will need all the money, and you can do your project. They said that was good and in the meanwhile they paid us a down payment of fifty thousand dollars, which was very good as Pancho and my father could buy a new boat, and we have a nice car now, and next week a washer and dryer are coming from Puerto Vallarta so I will not be doing laundry this way any more, but the rest of the money—two hundred thousand dollars US—they were going to pay in ten years when Sandra could leave. And also the deal was that she had the right to buy the place at that price at that time, right of first refusal, they called it, if she wanted to stay longer. They seemed fine with this. I think they thought that Sandra would want to leave Sayulita by then, maybe she told them that, I do not know, but we knew that she wanted to stay here. And that she might even be able to buy it herself. So we took this chance, thinking that even if she left in ten years that we would be willing then to let them build their big project, because we can use the money to send the children to university. And maybe by then there will be so many noisy gringos in Sayulita that we will not care about living here.” Her eyes filled with tears. “But then she died in the surfing contest—”
X Dames: A Lucy Ripken Mystery (The Lucy Ripken Mysteries Book 3) Page 12