“I’ll be right over,” he said and hung up.
Now that I’d told the truth, I thought I should be rewarded for the gesture. Instead, I was getting a visit from Jax Danvers who had, during another visit, kissed me and later told me that it was all a mistake. This didn’t seem like much of an incentive for me. I compared Sam’s kiss to Danvers’ kiss. The lip lock with the detective was more what I was missing in my life. Sam’s kiss had been more about getting it right—technique—where Danvers’ had shown me passion, which is probably why I still dwelled on it instead of letting the matter go.
He was knocking at my door in 15 minutes. I let him in, and he plopped down on my sofa. He reeked of cigarette smoke with a hint of beer on him. Since I knew that he didn’t smoke, he must have come from a bar. I was slightly resentful that he was out having laughs with his friends while I was doing police work. But I gave myself some solace that he might be drowning his sorrows from a lack of leads in this case.
He picked up the small stack of photos and began flipping through them, far too fast for me to talk about any of them. He threw them back down on the table. “Not much to go on here,” he said with a very snide tone.
I shrugged. “I could have made up some spies for you, but you wouldn’t have appreciated that either.”
He grunted. “So what you got here?”
I took up the photos as if I were giving a presentation. With each one I gave the information about how I knew them and their likelihood of being involved. Mrs. Moroney was an older woman, probably in her early 60s, who came to our truck three to four days a week for coffee at 6:45 a.m. sharp. I had always assumed that she worked in one of the nearby office buildings. She had taken her lunch at Holding Out for a Gyro on two occasions and had talked to Janelle each time. Considering that I knew her name and all about her family, that wasn’t a surprise. She had even told me about the fare at Holding Out for a Gyro and gave it a three-star review.
The second person of interest was Jonathan Latimer, a young businessman who thought he was a gift to all single women. I knew this, because he had come every day for the first two weeks I’d worked at the food truck, trying to get my phone number. I’d refused him all ten times, and he gave up after that. I wasn’t the least bit surprised that he was likely giving Janelle the same treatment. While I would have dearly loved to pin the crime on him, I knew his motivations, and none of them were espionage.
The third person was Henry, an older man who lived downtown. He’d lived in the suburbs his entire adult life with his wife, and when she died, he sold the family home and moved into a loft downtown. He didn’t want to be reminded of her presence every time he sat down to watch TV or eat dinner. So he made a radical change, hoping it would make it easier to live without her. He’d bought a basset hound—that loved to sniff around the trashcans on the square—so he wouldn’t be quite so lonely.
I knew all this, because he’d told me—in detail. I knew every moment of his life before the move and most of the moments afterward. He was lonely, and since he didn’t like to eat alone, he came to the truck at off times, order large amounts of food and talked. Mostly I listened and cooked. I didn’t mind, and I always felt that off-hours crowds made a place look more popular than it might’ve actually been. And truth be told, I liked the romantic edge to the story. Maybe I was a closet romantic.
The last person was Sam. I gave Danvers most of what I had on him. I told him about the realty firm and his father and such. Danvers kept giving me odd looks, as if he wanted to say something. I just ignored him as I finished my spiel.
“Does Sam come to your truck and tell you all his problems too?” Danvers asked. “You’re worse than a bartender.”
I shook my head. “I met him socially and then saw him with Janelle.” I left out the part where I wanted to follow up this lead, but Sam had vigorously ignored my attempts to discuss food trucks and Janelle.
“You went out with him. Lord, you had dinner with a major suspect in an espionage case. Where do you meet these jokers?”
I shrugged. “My mother set us up, to be honest about it. She thought that I wasn’t meeting enough nice men, and she’s right.”
Danvers just rolled his eyes. “Well, she didn’t find one here. He’s the only one who doesn’t have a very plausible reason to be at the Nolan food truck. He was there once, and that’s it. So we’ll be starting with him. I’ll make sure to tell him that you said hello.”
Danvers had angered me, and I decided, then and there, that I would not be telling him about the connection to Janelle I’d seen at the Nolan house. Let them get a search warrant and find that piece of evidence out for themselves.
“Please don’t. I don’t want him to know that I pointed the finger at him.” I was sincere in my tone, and it stopped Danvers in his tracks.
“You like this guy? Great,” he walked to the door. “You aren’t much for the police, but you’re fine with criminal masterminds. Don’t worry. I won’t share the fact that you gave us his name and the fact that he was talking to a known carrier of state secrets.”
It was true that I didn’t want Sam to know, but not for the reasons that Danvers thought. I wanted to keep this channel of communications open so that I might learn more about why Sam had been at Janelle’s truck. It was one of the few leads I had, and if he thought that I’d turned him into the police, I’d have to explain my part in solving other crimes. It would not bode well for finding out anything more from him if he really was involved in this.
However, my mind kept bouncing back to the comment about not being much for the police. Is that what Danvers thought—that I didn’t like policemen? Had he dumped me unceremoniously because he had thought I was going to give him the old heave-ho? I knew men like that. At the first sign of skittishness on the part of their date, they dumped the woman first, so they could maintain a record of “never being dumped,” as if that was a category in the Guinness Book of World Records.
Danvers didn’t wait for me to answer him, which was good because I was deep in my own thought processes. He walked out the door with a small head nod, and I sat down and looked at the photos again. He had been right about one thing. Sam was the only one of those people without a good reason to be downtown during the day. I wasn’t sure what that meant.
I waited about an hour to call Land to see if he’d recognized anyone that I’d missed. I had every reason to doubt that he’d add much to the conversation. He kept to himself during work hours, preparing and serving the hot dogs and side dishes. So he might recognize a few faces, but I doubted that he knew much about them personally. That didn’t mean that he didn’t attract business. There were a number of women, young and old, who came by to ogle him. Either he didn’t notice, or more likely, didn’t care.
His voicemail picked up, and I left a quick message telling him the people I’d seen and recognized from the photos. I didn’t ask him to call back, and he didn’t that night.
I showed up at the truck the next morning expecting Land to have been out doing more surveillance, but he texted me early to tell me that he’d picked up the food truck. I drove downtown and parked in my usual garage spot. Land was busy preparing condiments when I arrived, and he barely looked up.
Even so, I could see that he wasn’t tired. I was a bit confused as to why he hadn’t answered my call the evening before if he’d been home and resting.
But of course, being Land, he didn’t even mention that when he greeted me. “How are you today?” he asked instead.
That was almost a conversation for him, and so I decided to play along. “Not bad,” I answered, keeping an eye on him. “How are you doing?”
He just nodded instead of an answer, but it was clear that he was rested and feeling better than he had been before. I took his friendliness toward me as an indication that he appreciated the consideration I’d given him when he was so tired.
“I tried to call you last night,” I added, thinking I might get a response out of him.
“Yeah, I was out. What did you want?” He continued cutting up the condiments as he usually did.
“Danvers stopped by last night—” I started, but he cut me off.
“And how did that go?” He raised an eyebrow in my direction. Land had been clear on more than one occasion that I was not to trust Danvers. The thought that we spent any time outside of the food truck hours in each other’s company always elicited a response from him.
“I went over the photos and pointed out the people I had seen talking to Janelle. I don’t think it added up to much though. I couldn’t see any of those people passing secrets to anyone.” In the case of Henry, he didn’t even keep any secrets from me.
“Huh,” he responded. His lack of a decent response suggested that he knew something that I didn’t, and he wasn’t particularly willing to share it. So, either I would have to wheedle it out of him, or he would clam up before I could learn more.
“So what about you?” I continued. I wasn’t going to play games. If I wanted to know something, I would take the direct approach. “Did you recognize anyone in the photos?”
“Your boyfriend,” he smirked. “A couple of customers. That old guy who tells you his life story every few days, the one with the dog.” By boyfriend, he’d meant my fix-up date, and I recognized his description of Henry as well. If those were the only ones, then he had recognized fewer people than I had.
I still suspected something was up. “That’s it?”
His gaze met mine. “Those were the only photos that I recognized, and I reported them all to Danvers too, but he didn’t come by and discuss them with me. He just took my information over the phone.”
The constant needling regarding Danvers made me certain I was missing something. He was trying to keep my mind from figuring out what. I went back over the non-Danvers statements and realized something. “How did you know what Sam looked like?” I asked. Land had seen Sam from afar, but I certainly had never taken the time to show Land photos of him, since I truly didn’t expect it to go anywhere. Either Danvers had mentioned it, or Land had a memory of faces that was extraordinary.
I got a quick flash of a smile. “He showed up at Janelle’s one night while we were on surveillance. I recognized his face again, and mentioned it to Danvers, who told me about your connection to the man. That’s all.” He shrugged.
I was distracted by the thought of Sam going to Janelle’s apartment. Their connection had to be much closer if he was visiting her at home. I wondered what they had had to talk about. Had it been whatever had set him off when he saw her at the food truck? I knew that I’d have to find another way to learn his connection to Janelle. However, that seemed minor to whatever was making Land so cheerful. He’d found something big and was challenging me to find it out.
My mind raced. If it hadn’t been that, then why was Land being like this? He had shared the names of the people he had recognized. Could it be something with the people that he didn’t recognize? I wondered, but I would have no way of finding out without reviewing all of the photos again. I doubted that Land would be this slippery about a situation that was unlikely to happen. He was ducking something that I could figure out if I put enough thought into the matter.
If it hadn’t been someone whose photo he’d seen, then had it been someone whose photo he had not seen? Suddenly, I realized what Land had grasped. Carter had been at Janelle’s food truck at least twice that I knew of, and yet there was not a single photo of him in the stack I’d been shown. While it could have been that the police already knew who he was and why he was there, they could have easily IDed the others without our help. So had Carter somehow evaded the surveillance by the police, or was he in a special category that didn’t need to be photographed, like maybe the CIA?
“Carter,” I said, meeting his gaze again. “There weren’t any photos of Carter in the stack that Danvers gave to me last night.”
Land just nodded.
“Do you think they already know who he is from the food truck?” It seemed unlikely. Danvers might have seen Carter at the truck, since our newest worker only came in every other day. I doubted that Danvers would have been able to place Carter out of context in that way. It was the same way as when I ran into a high school friend on my college campus or the local mall.
“Nope,” said the man of many words as he put the condiments out for the customers. “At least I got a recipe out of him before he left.” I knew that Land had to be thinking that if Carter left, the plans for the second food truck would leave with him. “And no, I didn’t see him during the surveillance either. He didn’t come by Janelle’s home…while we were watching it anyway.”
“So you’re thinking that Janelle didn’t try to hire him for her truck?”
Land sighed. “Don’t ask me. Why don’t you call and see about the financials from her food truck? They should be about ready by now. It’s been a few days.”
He was right of course. It had been a few days since I’d spoken to Janelle’s parents, and her mother had promised me a copy of the financial documents prior to a possible offer on the truck. Those records would give me an idea of what the truck was making and if it would be a good idea for me to buy it.
I dialed the number, but of course with the day I was having, no one answered. I left a message and hung up.
Chapter 8
By the time we’d cleaned the truck at the end of the shift, Janelle’s mother had returned my call. We made plans to get together after I was finished at the bank, and I looked forward to getting done so that I could determine whether or not the purchase made sense. I was beginning to think that I’d caught some of Land’s enthusiasm for this expansion.
While I now ran a food truck, not long ago I’d been getting my degree in business. As a result, I’d analyzed more than a few spreadsheets in my time. My father, who had worked in accounting for a lifetime, was still the expert in the family, but unless I ran across something questionable, I would be able to learn the state of the business.
I dropped the deposit at the bank and headed back to the land of wealthy families. I was still dressed in my food truck clothes, but since their daughter had also operated a truck, I knew they were familiar with the attire.
Janelle’s mother opened the door this time. She looked me over once and sighed, which said all that she needed to express about her daughter’s profession and my own appearance. She was carrying a large manila envelope in one hand. She thrust it toward me as if it was garbage.
“I was assured by our accountant that these should satisfy you regarding the business.” She looked down at the papers for a second with an emotion that looked remorseful before she brought her head up and looked at me again.
I took the packet without a word. I turned my head slightly and saw the photo of Sam again. While I was slightly concerned that Mrs. Nolan could tell Sam about our encounter, I decided to risk it. “Is that Sam?” I said, doing a double take with my neck swivel.
The woman gave me a long, cold stare without speaking for a moment. The silence grew uncomfortable. “How do you know Sam?” she asked finally.
“His mother is a friend of my mother,” I replied somewhat honestly. “It’s such a small world, isn’t it? I guess you must know him well, if he’s in your family photos.” I beamed at her to show that I had no motivation to lie about this.
Again there was a long pause. “He was engaged at one point to my daughter, Janelle. I’m surprised she had never mentioned it to you.”
I took a deep breath. “No, she didn’t. I wasn’t aware she’d been engaged. We were more work friends. We mainly discussed food service, business tips, and those types of things.” I tried to center myself as I continued to spin this web. I didn’t want to trip myself up or stumble on my own tongue. I’d known little about Janelle outside of her pushiness and her food truck.
“Yes, they ended it a few months ago. I guess I should really take away that photo, but Janelle just looks so pretty and happy there that I leave it.” The words
had an effect on her, and I thought for a moment that she was going to cry. However, she managed to pull herself together, and she looked at me again.
Sam had discussed his romantic history in general terms during our outings. I called them that because I still refused to call them dates. Yet in his discussions he had never mentioned being serious with anyone, much less being engaged. Mrs. Nolan had not specified who had broken off the relationship, but I was guessing that it had been Janelle. Otherwise, the photo would have most definitely been stored. No woman wants to see photos of a man who dumped her before the wedding. Would that be a motive for Sam to kill Janelle? Had he been so upset or jealous that he’d killed her? He didn’t seem the type, but I believe you don’t know a person until you’ve seen them in love.
“These are copies, so you don’t have to bring them back, but obviously these are only for you or your business manager. I would prefer that you kept my daughter’s financial situation to yourself, especially until a sale goes through.” Her manner was back to the cold hard façade I’d seen before.
I nodded. “I don’t plan to give out copies. These are solely for use in determining whether or not we want to buy the business.” I was planning on giving copies to Land and my father. I had no desire to give this information to the police. I knew that if they wanted it, they could get a warrant and learn more about the business than what I could learn from Mrs. Nolan’s generosity.
She thanked me again and showed me to the door. I made a quick buzz by the local copy shop and had three extra sets made. I always made an extra set of documents, in case they were lost. I’d done a group project in college where we’d relied on a member to keep the financial worksheets. She’d lost them after our first meeting, and we had no way to recover all that information except to go back and ask the company for another set. The professor had not been pleased by the appearance of incompetence. After that, I kept doubles of most everything.
THE REAL GYRO (Food Truck Mysteries Book 4) Page 7