Turbo Twenty-Three

by Janet Evanovich

  “I like bananas,” Chewy said. “They’re high in potassium.”

  I shoved Lula into the car.

  “Sorry about the banana,” I said to Chewy.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “I like your friend. She gives a good head butt.”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I smiled and nodded, got behind the wheel, and drove off.

  “I swear I thought he had a gun,” Lula said.

  “He did. It just wasn’t in the same place as his banana.”

  “I guess Kwan didn’t feel like going to jail today.”

  “He’ll get back to me.”

  I dropped Lula off in front of the deli on the first block of Stark. No parking places, so I gave her my order and circled the block. I was stopped at a light when Ranger called.

  “You have a single surveillance camera in the lobby of your apartment building,” Ranger said. “At six thirty-five this morning the Jolly Bogart clown walked through the back door and got into the elevator. Three minutes later he got out of the elevator, crossed the lobby, and left the building.”

  “That’s really creepy.”

  “We need to have a conversation with Mr. Ducker,” Ranger said.

  “When do you want to do this?”

  “Now.”

  I looked in my rearview mirror. Ranger was behind me.

  “Let Lula take your car back to the office,” Ranger said.

  I double-parked in front of the deli and waited for Lula. She hustled out with two bags of food and two sodas.

  I got out of my car and held the door for her. “I need to go with Ranger. I’d appreciate it if you could get the car back to the office for me.”

  Lula looked back at Ranger and gave him a finger wave. “Are you gonna have a nooner with him?”

  “No. This is work related.”

  Lula gave me my bag of food and my soda. “Hard to believe anything you could do with that man would be work.”

  Ranger was in his black Porsche Cayenne, and he was wearing perfectly pressed Rangeman black fatigues. He smelled great, and he didn’t look tired. I suspected I looked like roadkill.

  He glanced at me and grinned. “Did you sleep in those clothes?”

  I buckled my seatbelt and narrowed my eyes at him. “Someone woke me up at four in the morning.”

  He looked at the bag. “Lunch?”

  “Ham and Swiss. Would you like half?”

  TWENTY-THREE

  RANGER PARKED IN front of Ducker’s apartment building, and we looked for the Kia. No Kia. We went to the door and rang the bell. No answer. Ranger knocked. Nothing. He took a slim pick from his pocket and opened the door.

  It was a completely unmemorable apartment. Beige carpet, beige couch, beige drapes on the windows. Television in the living room. A maple table and six chairs in the dining room. Probably the dining room table had never been used. Not ever. Shoes under the coffee table, and an open bag of chips and an empty soda can on top of it. Dirty dishes in the kitchen sink. Not a lot in the refrigerator. Bogart Kidz Kups in the freezer.

  I went room by room with Ranger. We looked in the medicine chest and the closet.

  “No man-sized freezer,” I said. “No Bogart locked in the bathroom.”

  Ranger went through Ducker’s dresser drawers. “And no gun.”

  We returned to the living room, and Ranger looked at the shoes under the coffee table.

  “No chocolate on the shoe,” Ranger said. “And it’s a size eleven. We measured the print on the floor in Bogart’s office. It was a size ten.”

  There was the sound of a key being inserted in the lock on the front door, and I looked at Ranger.

  “Our lucky day,” Ranger said. “We don’t have to go searching for Ducker.”

  Ducker opened the door, spotted Ranger and me, and went for the gun tucked into his jeans.

  “Don’t even think about it,” Ranger said.

  “You’re the security guy, right?” Ducker said. “What’s going on? And what’s with the minimum wager with you?”

  “Stephanie works with me,” Ranger said. “Where were you at one o’clock last night?”

  “I wasn’t anywhere,” Ducker said. “I was here. Like always.”

  “Someone broke into Bogart’s office last night and left threatening messages. He was wearing the Jolly Bogart clown suit.”

  “Big deal,” Ducker said. “Anyone can get that suit. They sell them at the party store at the mall. You can get the wig and everything. It’s real cheap too.”

  “Do you have any idea who broke in last night?” I asked him.

  “No, but I’d kiss him on the lips if I found out,” Ducker said. “Bogart is a real asshole.”

  “So what do you think?” I asked Ranger when we were back in the Cayenne.

  “This is why I’m in the security business and not investigation. I’m good at protecting people. I don’t enjoy this. Unfortunately I’ve failed to protect a new client and I feel compelled to find him.”

  “And I’m along why?”

  “I need some fun in my life.”

  “Jeez.”

  He grinned at me. “It’s more than that. I was the point person in my unit when I was in the military. I can sense danger the way a dog can sniff out a rabbit, but I’m not a detail man. You notice things that don’t show up on my radar.”

  “Do you think Ducker is a killer?”

  “If he is a killer it’s not because he’s gone postal from the Jolly jingle. I think there’s something more going on here.”

  “For instance?”

  “I don’t know. The crimes are all over the place. They start with industrial sabotage and progress to a bizarre murder, then a murder that’s premeditated but not especially creative, an explosion, and vandalism. It’s almost like they were all done by different people.”

  “Don’t forget my door. Someone doesn’t like me snooping around.”

  “Another threat like that and you might have to come live with me so I can protect you until the danger has passed.”

  “I expect there’s an ulterior motive involved.”

  “Yeah,” Ranger said. “There’s that.”

  I pulled Dottie Loosey’s file out of my bag.

  “I have a favor to ask. I could use some help bringing this woman in.”

  Ranger flipped through the file. “Has Connie placed her at this address?”

  “Yes.”

  • • •

  Dottie Loosey lived in a row house by the button factory. There were several blocks of the small two-story houses. They were originally built as housing for button company workers, but over the years they all went to private ownership. At least half were now rental properties. They had started out all the same, and were now all fiercely different.

  Dottie’s stood out for its neglect. In fact, it looked a lot like Dottie. There was nothing to pretty it up and soften the years. It was raw and weathered, with peeling paint and window trim down to bare wood.

  Ranger parked one house down, and we sat and watched Dottie’s place for a while. It was early afternoon. No one was moving around. No car or pedestrian traffic. This wasn’t a part of town sought after by young parents. The houses had no front yards, and minuscule backyards.

  Ranger read through the file again. “She has a history of drug and alcohol abuse, and violent behavior. She’s been in and out of jail for the past twenty years. Public drunkenness, possession, two armed robbery convictions. Her daughter posted her bond. The daughter has a Massachusetts address. It looks like Dottie lives alone.” He handed the paperwork back to me. “Let’s do it.”

  We went to the door and rang the bell. No answer. No sounds from inside the house. No television or radio. Ranger knocked. Nothing. He tried the door. Locked. He picked the lock, opened the door, and yelled “Bond enforcement.” No one responded.

  We cleared the house, working our way through, room by room, looking for Dottie. Her furniture would have been discarded by a sober person. Stained and to
rn couch in the living room, stained bare mattress on the floor in the bedroom, a faded quilt on the mattress, an empty whiskey bottle on the floor. No pillow. Cigarette butts overflowing a cracked dish.

  The smell wasn’t great.

  We ended in the kitchen. A couple food-encrusted dishes in the sink. Crumpled fast food bags everywhere. Empty refrigerator. A cracked and peeling Formica countertop littered with empty whiskey and beer bottles, a squeeze bottle of mustard, and a Bogart Kidz Kup.

  “Look at this,” I said to Ranger. “She can’t be all bad. She likes ice cream.”

  I picked the cup up and it rattled. I peeled the lid off and looked inside.

  “Not ice cream,” I said to Ranger.

  Ranger took the cup. “She’s got some pharmaceutical grade meth, a small amount of crack, and I’m not sure about the pink pills.”

  “This is a new Kidz Kup container. It’s never held ice cream. There’s no chocolate stain on the bottom, and it doesn’t have any markings from the machine that puts the lids on. I have firsthand experience with Kidz Kups lids.”

  Ranger put the lid back on and returned the Kidz Kup to the counter. “I haven’t heard anything on the street about Bogart Kidz Kups, but it’s hard to keep up with this stuff. It’s more likely that some unused containers were discarded and Dottie got hold of one. I’d like to think that’s the case, because the alternative is ugly.”

  “Packaging drugs in something designed for children?”

  “When you were working at the plant did you run across anyone who might have a business on the side?”

  “Butchy has a garage filled with microwaves, toaster ovens, and Nikes.”

  “Did you get into his house?”

  “No.”

  Forty minutes later Ranger and I walked around the outside of Butchy’s house, and Ranger let us in through the back door. The kitchen was as I remembered it, but the cardboard box was gone from the table. I couldn’t help wondering if it had been filled with Bogart Kidz Kups. Four six-packs of beer and six packages of hot dogs in his fridge. No rolls anywhere to be seen. No Kidz Kups in his freezer. I went to check out his over-the-counter cabinets and found they were filled with pint ice cream containers still stacked together and wrapped in plastic.

  “What do you make of this?” I asked Ranger.

  Ranger stood looking at them, hands on hips. “Let’s talk to Butchy.”

  “Now?”

  “As soon as I finish the walk-through. I want to see if he has a clown suit in his closet, and I want to check his shoe size.”

  • • •

  Ranger called his office from the road and asked to have someone keep an eye on Butchy until we got to the plant.

  “What about Bogart?” I asked Ranger. “Any word on him?”

  “I have Tank taking point on that one. So far there’s nothing. Bogart hasn’t been home. He hasn’t called in. His wife and daughter are supposedly at a family reunion at Disney World. They say they haven’t heard from him, but they only seem mildly worried.”

  “ ‘Supposedly’ at a family reunion?”

  “We’ve checked and there was a family reunion, but it was a one-day affair last week. The wife and daughter are still at Disney. If someone went missing in my family under suspicious circumstances I’d be home and I’d be frantic.”

  “Are the police involved yet?”

  “Yes. And the FBI. They’ve impounded his car.”

  “Who’s running the plant?”

  “Jeff Soon. He’s the vice president and in charge of plant operations. He has an office two doors down from Bogart. Word is that Bogart owns the company, but lately Soon’s been running it. If you remember there was an empty file on J. T. Soon in Zigler’s office, and a note on his desk to run a background check on Soon.”

  “Have you been working with Soon?”

  “No. My dealings have been with Bogart. Soon is a shadow in the hall.”

  When we arrived, Butchy had an eighteen-wheeler pulled up to the loading dock. Two men were helping him load it.

  “Hey,” Butchy said when he saw me. “Looks like they got you working security with the black shirts now.”

  I smiled and nodded. Friendly. “Is there someplace we can talk?”

  “I don’t have an office or anything, but we can go to my truck and I can get a smoke if that’s okay with you.”

  We followed him to his truck, and he got a joint out of a cooler on his front seat.

  “You want one?” Butchy asked. “I got plenty.”

  “That’s illegal,” Ranger said. “It’s a controlled substance.”

  “No way,” Butchy said. “It’s marijuana. And, besides, we’re on private property so it’s okay.”

  “It’s not legal on private property in New Jersey,” Ranger said.

  “Okay, but it’s medicinal. I’m even thinking about getting a service dog to help with my medicinal issues. I might get one of those little Chihuahuas. I hear they’re feisty.”

  “Ranger and I happened to be in your neighborhood, and when we walked past your house your garage door happened to open,” I said.

  “Shoot,” Butchy said. “That’s no good. It shouldn’t do that. I got a load of shit in that garage. Did it close again?”

  I cut my eyes to Ranger. Ranger looked like he was contemplating smashing Butchy’s head into his truck to see if any brains fell out.

  “About the stuff in your garage,” I said.

  “If you want a toaster oven I can’t sell it to you,” Butchy said. “It belongs to someone else. I’m just storing it.”

  “Tell me about this storing,” Ranger said.

  “It started small,” Butchy said. “Like, I started just keeping a couple boxes for one of my neighbors, and now I got three off-site storage units. I just keep the overflow in my garage these days. You got something you want stored?”

  “It looks to me like you might be storing hijacked property,” Ranger said.

  “I don’t ask questions,” Butchy said. “I just rent storage.”

  I saw a small smile twitch at the corners of Ranger’s mouth. “Have you ever stored anything for Larry Virgil?”

  “Sure. He was a good customer. It put a real dent in my business when he got run over.”

  “How about ice cream?”

  “I can’t store ice cream,” Butchy said. “I haven’t got a freezer unit.”

  “So where was Virgil going to store the ice cream that was in the Bogart truck he hijacked?” I asked Butchy.

  Butchy grinned and shook his head. “Larry Virgil was the dumbest guy I ever met. I guess he thought I was going to store it.”

  Ranger and I exchanged glances. If Butchy thought someone was dumb they had to be really dumb.

  “I’m home watching TV and I get a call from Virgil saying he’s got an eighteen-wheeler full of stuff he wants to store,” Butchy said. “So I meet him at one of my empty units, and he pulls in with a freezer truck. It turns out he was on Stark Street, and he came across the truck double-parked with the keys in the ignition. So he couldn’t resist taking the truck.”

  “Where on Stark Street?” Ranger asked.

  “I don’t know,” Butchy said. “Just Stark Street. Anyway, I look at the truck, and the condenser’s running, and I recognize the truck. I tell Virgil that I loaded the truck, and it’s full of ice cream, and I can’t store ice cream. He looks at me like I got corn growing out of my ears, so I have to explain to him that just because I got climate-controlled units don’t mean I can freeze shit. So we both went home after that. I guess Virgil was taking the truck to his garage until he could figure something out.”

  “Have you told any of this to the police?” Ranger asked.

  “Naw,” Butchy said. “They never asked me.”

  Ranger had the hint of a smile again. “Didn’t it occur to you that Zigler fell out of that truck?”

  “Sure, but I didn’t put him in there. So it’s not like I got something to contribute.”

  “What about t
he pint containers in your kitchen?” I asked Butchy.

  “What about them?”

  “Why do you have so many?”

  “Well, they’re free and they’re perfect. A bag of high-quality shit fits in them just right. And it’s all disguised. You put it in your freezer and it’s like money in the bank.”

  “Where do you get the containers?”

  “The storeroom, of course.”

  “That’s stealing.”

  “Everybody steals from the storeroom. It’s one of the perks of working for Bogart. He don’t give you free ice cream, but he lets you steal. It’s like a company policy.”

  “I’m curious,” Ranger said. “Do you steal during the day? Just walk out with whatever you want?”

  “If it’s small, but mostly you use the back door to the storeroom. We all try not to abuse the privilege and be too obvious. Only problem is there’s no light at the back door so you have to be careful where you’re walking if you forget your flashlight.”

  “Did you kill Zigler?” Ranger asked Butchy.

  “No, sir,” Butchy said. “I haven’t killed anybody lately.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  RANGER AND I walked back to the building and left Butchy to finish his joint.

  “Do you think he’s really that dumb?” I asked Ranger.

  “I think he’s conveniently dumb.”

  “I forgot to ask when we were at his house. What size were his shoes?”

  “Twelve.”

  We went to the front reception desk and asked to see Soon. After fifteen minutes we were told he would speak with us.

  His office was devoid of anything personal. A desk. A couple chairs. A bookcase. It was as if he didn’t intend to stay long. He was a slim little man wearing rimless glasses. His hair was shoe-polish black and thinning. I placed him in his fifties. Partially Asian.

  “Very nice to finally meet you,” he said to Ranger.

  Ranger nodded. “Mutual. And this is my associate, Miss Plum.”

  “Of course,” Soon said. “She’s already spent some time here at the plant. What would you like to discuss?”

  “Tomorrow we’ll have completed all installations and will be moving into a maintenance and monitoring mode. Since Mr. Bogart isn’t on-site I wanted to make sure you were comfortable with the new system.”