The Malfeasance Occasional

by Various Authors

  “Jess.” Bobby’s voice was flat. His mouth moved again but nothing came out.

  “I was so worried about you, Bobby! I’d started to think you were dead.” She stepped towards him and his hand went up, leveling the gun at her chest.

  “Get out!” he snapped.

  “Bobby?” she said, stepping closer.

  “I don’t want to shoot you, Jess, but if that’s what I have to do to get rid of you, I will. You’re like some kind of sea monster that clings to its prey until it dies.”

  “But we’re having a baby together,” Jess whispered. “I love you and you love me.”

  “See, that’s the thing. I’m tired of playing house,” Bobby said. “It was never really my thing. But having a kid? Definitely not my thing. Remember me telling you to get rid of it?”

  “That was just nerves talking. You’ll love the baby when you meet him—or her. I know it.”

  “That’s your insane fantasy talking, Jess. I’m walking out of here and going to Mexico, and you are sure as hell not coming along for the ride.”

  “But … I love you. You can’t leave me.” Without thinking about it, she raised the gun. Bobby hadn’t seen it because the billowing sleeve of her coat hid it.

  “Put that down, Jess.”

  “Take me with you.”

  “Don’t make me shoot you,” he said. “I don’t want to, but if it’s the only way I can get rid of you, I will.”

  “You can’t abandon me,” Jess whispered. “I won’t let you walk out of here without me.”

  Bobby turned the gun on her, but she got the first shot off.

  There was an explosion of red on his white shirt, with streaks of blood blooming like the petals of a carnation. He fired a fraction of a second after Bernardo grabbed his arm, grounding the shot in the floor in front of Jess’s boot. Bernardo pulled him to the ground and the gun out of his hand. Bobby touched the wound and stared at his hand.

  “All I wanted was to get away,” he murmured. “Just … away.”

  His eyelids fluttered and her slumped to the ground.

  “Did I … did I kill him?” Jess asked.

  “No, Jessamine. It’s okay. Gimme the gun.”

  Without thinking, she handed it over to Bernardo. “He never wanted the baby. I tried to pretend that everything would be all right but…” She trailed off, staring at Bobby.

  Bernardo pulled out his cell phone, dialed, and told someone to come over to take care of a deadbeat, that he needed a doctor for his leg, and he needed a driver to take his girlfriend back to his house. Girlfriend? “Don’t worry. He’s already off on a dirt nap,” he added before he hung up.

  “Is Bobby dead?” Jess asked him. From where she stood, Bobby didn’t seem to be breathing. “I couldn’t live with myself if I…”

  “He’s fine,” said Bernardo. “This is gonna blow over, okay? Trust me.”

  The guilt crushing her chest started to lift. “Okay.” If Bernardo said Bobby was fine, who was she to doubt him? She knelt down on the floor next to him. He was clearly in a lot of pain, but he asked, “You okay? You didn’t get hurt, did you?”

  “I’m fine.” There was something oddly touching about his concern. Bernardo looked different to her now. Not ugly, but tough. Not fat, but solid. It was as if he were shifting before her eyes, taking on a different shape.

  “My friend will be here in a few minutes, and he’s gonna help me clean all this up. Just leave everything to me, will you?”

  “Okay.” She rested her head on his shoulder. It felt natural, somehow, as if she’d finally found the place she was supposed to be.

  HILARY DAVIDSON won the 2011 Anthony Award for Best First Novel for The Damage Done, which launched the Lily Moore series. That book also earned a Crimespree Award and was a finalist for the Arthur Ellis and Macavity awards. The sequels, 2012’s The Next One to Fall and 2013’s Evil in All Its Disguises, took her intrepid crime-solving travel journalist to Peru and Mexico. Her fourth novel (and first standalone book), Blood Always Tells, will be published by Tor/Forge on April 15, 2014. Before turning to a life of crime-writing, Hilary was a travel journalist who authored 18 nonfiction books. Her short fiction has won her a Spinetingler Award and an Ellery Queen Reader’s Choice Award, and it’s made her a finalist for a Derringer. Her stories appear in publications including Thuglit, Beat to a Pulp, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, and other dark places. Toronto born, Hilary has lived in New York City with her husband, Dan, since October 2001.

  My Brother’s Keeper

  by Charles Drees

  I sat at my desk, sipping my morning coffee, and scanned the paper. The headline blared: “Sputnik Falls to Earth.” Then my office door opened, and the woman who strolled in made me forget all about outer space. I tossed the paper on my desk.

  “Can I help you?”

  She ignored me the way you ignore a potted plant and glanced around my cramped office. She didn’t seem impressed. No surprise; the place was a dump.

  She, on the other hand, made a good first impression. Waves of silky, black hair framed a face that belonged in the pages of a fashion magazine. She didn’t look a day over thirty, but I was never good at guessing women’s ages and never guessed out loud. Her cashmere topcoat and pearl necklace screamed money.

  All of which made me wonder what she was doing here. Rich dames never crossed my door. When they needed a private eye, they hired one who worked for a big law firm downtown. So either she was lost or the big boys didn’t want her business. If it was the latter, the smart thing to do would be to send her packing.

  She settled in the chair in front of my desk, and crossed her legs. The rustle of her nylons made my skin twitch like I’d passed through a swarm of bees. She peeled fawn-colored gloves from her hands and laid them in her lap.

  “Are you discreet, Mr. Hunter?”

  Okay, so she wasn’t lost. “Discreet’s my middle name.”

  She arched an eyebrow. “How droll. Your dazzling wit must pay for your lavish décor.”

  My cheeks burned. “I know how to keep my mouth shut.”

  She nodded, then opened her purse and pulled out a silver cigarette case. She tugged out a cigarette and tapped the filter on the lid. She stared at me, waiting. I grabbed the book of matches off my desk and climbed out of my swivel chair. She watched me limp around the desk.

  “Something wrong with your leg?”

  I struck the match. “A souvenir from Korea.”

  She placed the cigarette between her full, red lips and cupped my hand until the flame scorched the tobacco, never taking her eyes off mine. She blew out the match and settled back in her chair. “I hope that won’t be a problem.”

  I handed her the ashtray from my desk and hobbled back to my chair. “How about we start over? What’s your name?”

  She puffed on her cigarette; plumes of smoke jetted from her nostrils. “Nora Danby.”

  Alarm bells pealed inside my head. No wonder I thought she belonged in a fashion magazine. The society pages regularly posted pictures of her and her husband, Grant Danby, making the rounds. They were the closest thing our little burg on the California coast had to royalty.

  Danby was the son of Howard Danby, timber baron turned real estate developer. Grant was a two-term state senator, and rumor had it that Daddy was grooming him to run for the U.S. Senate in 1960. After that, who knew? What wasn’t a rumor was you didn’t cross the old man. No wonder the other PIs had steered clear.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “Do you know who I am?”

  “Grant Danby’s wife.”

  She inhaled some smoke. “Then you can understand my need for discretion.”

  “Sure, but you still haven’t told me why.”

  She stubbed her cigarette out in the ashtray. Her lipstick left a ruby-colored stain on the filter—like blood on pale flesh. “Around Thanksgiving, my husband started spending more time in Sacramento,” she said. “Christmas and New Year were awful.” She stared out my window.
“He preferred being there with his new mistress to being home with me.”

  “He’s a fool.” The words popped out of my mouth before I could stop them.

  She offered me a sad smile. “That’s kind of you, but it seems I’m the fool. He’s made it clear he no longer loves me.”

  “Let me guess. You need pictures of him and his mistress for the divorce.”

  She shook her head. “It wouldn’t matter. Grant refuses to divorce me. It would damage him politically.” Her eyes glistened. “He promised to destroy me if I filed. He threatened to have people testify that I’m a drunk, an unfit mother. He said he’d make sure I never saw our children again.”

  I pulled a box of tissues from my bottom desk drawer and passed them to her. She plucked one from the box and dabbed her eyes. “I’m sorry.”

  “No need to apologize. Your husband sounds like a jerk. Surely you have friends who can vouch for you.”

  “They’ve stopped calling—or make excuses when I call them. I’m sure Grant has pressured them to stay away.” She dabbed her eyes again. “That’s how I got into this mess. I was lonely and just wanted someone to talk to.”

  “You had an affair,” I said, more statement than question.

  She avoided my eyes. “Yes. It was stupid and reckless, but I was desperate. My husband no longer loved me, and I just wanted someone who wanted me. Paul seemed like he did.”

  “Paul who?”

  “Taylor,” she said. “Paul Taylor. He’s why I’m here.”

  “Is he blackmailing you?”

  Her laugh sounded bitter. “I wish I knew.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  She placed the ashtray on my desk and started pacing. “Paul stole a diamond necklace Grant had given me. It belonged to his grandmother. Life magazine is coming next Tuesday to do a story on Grant. They’re taking photos, and Grant told me to wear it.”

  I shook a cigarette out of the pack on my desk and lit it. A column of smoke spiraled toward the ceiling. “How’d Taylor get his hands on it?”

  She wandered over to the window. “Last Monday, I planned to take it to the jeweler’s to have the clasp tightened. Grant left for Sacramento, so I called Paul. We met at the Bellmore.” She turned and met my gaze. “I wore it while we made love. Afterward, I put it back in its case and took a shower. When I opened it at the jeweler’s, the necklace was missing.”

  Images of a naked Nora Danby filled my head, and my mouth turned bone-ash dry. “Did you call Taylor?”

  She nodded. “As soon I got home, but there was no answer. Now, his number’s been disconnected. I need you to find him and bring back my necklace.”

  “Look, Mrs. Danby, I’ve got to be honest with you. If Taylor tries to blackmail you, you’d be better off talking to the police.”

  She shook her head. “No police. I don’t want Grant to find out. And what if this isn’t about blackmail?”

  “It is,” I said. “Trust me. But even if I’m wrong, the disconnected number means he’s skipped town. Looking for him would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.”

  “Please,” she begged. “I’ve talked to three other detectives. No one will help. You’re my only hope.” She pulled a photograph from her purse and handed it to me. In it, two young girls, their arms circling Nora’s waist, looked at the photographer. Smiles lit up their faces. Grant Danby stood to the side, looking bored.

  “I’ll pay you five thousand dollars,” Nora said. “I don’t want to lose my children.”

  It’d be nice to think I reconsidered because of her kids, but I had five thousand more compelling reasons. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

  She let out her breath. “Thank you.” She pulled a thick envelope from her purse. “There’s three thousand in here. You’ll get the rest when you bring me the necklace.”

  I stuck the envelope in my desk drawer without counting it. “Do you have any leads on Taylor? A favorite bar or restaurant? Where he buys his clothes?”

  She reached into her purse. “Here’s a photo of Paul. It’s from one of those booths where you get four for a quarter. You can’t see his face very well. He told me to destroy the pictures so Grant wouldn’t find them. I burned all of them except this one.”

  She handed me the small black-and-white photo. It showed her beaming at the camera. Her smile reminded me of her daughters. The left side of Taylor’s head peeked out from behind her. She was right: you couldn’t see much of his face. The part I saw showed a young man in his late-twenties, with dark hair and a slightly cleft-chin.

  What you couldn’t see was the small, crescent-shaped scar beneath his right eye, a souvenir from a childhood tussle with a neighborhood bully.

  How did I know?

  Because the person Nora Danby knew as Paul Taylor, I knew as Michael Hunter, my younger brother.

  * * *

  Michael hated me.

  He had his reasons. He was four years younger, so he’d lived in my shadow growing up. In school, I was a good student, a member of the debate team, and an All-State shortstop. Michael struggled to make Cs. He tried to escape my shadow, but he was always David Hunter’s little brother.

  The shrinks had a term for it: sibling rivalry.

  It got worse after I returned from the war. The paper called me a hero, and I had the medals to prove it. Mom and Dad threw a welcome-home party for me. Michael stayed away. As time passed, we had fewer and fewer reasons to stay in touch.

  Then, boom, Mom died from an aneurysm. Dad passed away six months later. The official cause was a heart attack, but a broken heart was more accurate. At least Michael attended both funerals.

  Before the war, I’d wanted to be a cop; my wounds changed my plans. The police department didn’t have any openings for gimp-legged, ex-GIs, so I used my share of our inheritance to go into business for myself. I wasn’t getting rich, but I was making ends meet.

  Michael chose a different path. Allergic to work, he spent his time hanging out with grifters and running cons. He burned through his inheritance in less than a year and hit me up for some cash. I turned him down. We hadn’t spoken in years.

  But out of some deep-seated family loyalty, I’d kept tabs on him. After Nora Danby left, I got in my car and went looking for him. Now that I knew what needle to look for, I knew the general vicinity of the haystack. Like most people, my brother was a creature of habit. He liked to sleep in and then eat a late breakfast at a diner on Madison. I checked my watch. If he was still in town, that’s where he’d be.

  I stopped by the bank and deposited my advance before heading to the diner. Traffic was light, and I swung into the diner’s parking lot before ten. Steam clouded the front windows. Inside, savory aromas engulfed me, and my stomach growled. I spied him sitting in a corner booth, wolfing down some eggs while reading the paper. He’d filled out a little since the last time I’d seen him, but he still had his matinee-idol looks. He didn’t glance up until I slid onto the bench across from him. His eyes narrowed, and he laid the paper on the table.

  “Well, well, if it isn’t the war hero. You lost?”

  I pulled the menu from its metal holder. “I heard the food’s good.”

  Michael sucked a morsel from between his teeth. “Too bad I can’t say the same about the clientele.”

  The waitress arrived, stifling my reply. She filled my coffee mug, and I ordered blueberry pancakes with a side of bacon. Michael watched her walk away, then looked at me.

  “What do you want?”

  “Who says I want anything? Maybe I just want to say hi to my little brother.”

  “Okay, hi. Now say goodbye.”

  “Aren’t you a little out of your league this time?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  I stared into his eyes. “Nora Danby.”

  He paused a second too long. “Who’s she?”

  I pulled the photo Nora had given me from my coat pocket and laid it face up on the table. Michael stared at it for several seconds, then shook his head
and sighed.

  “I told her to get rid of that.”

  “It’s not your best picture.”

  He looked up. “How is she?”

  I tucked the photo back inside my pocket. “Scared, desperate. She liked you.”

  Michael started to reply, then stopped and waited while the waitress deposited my food. After she left, he nodded at my plate. “Eat up. I’m not going anywhere.”

  I dug in. The pancakes were light and fluffy; the bacon, crisp. While I ate, Michael lit a cigarette and stared out the window. Something bothered me, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I didn’t push it. If it was important, it would surface. I finished and shoved my plate aside.

  “I’m surprised you’re still in town.”

  Michael blew a smoke ring and watched it dissolve. “Danby told me to stick around until he got in touch.”

  “What? You’re working for Grant Danby?”

  Michael glanced around the diner. “Keep it down, willya?”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “What do you care?”

  I gripped the edge of the table to keep from smacking him. “You’re my brother. Believe it or not, I don’t want anything to happen to you. Now, talk to me. What the hell’s going on?”

  Michael touched the scar below his right eye. “A few months ago, I was in Sacramento working a scam. I got friendly with a gal. Turned out she was Danby’s mistress. He found out and sent a couple of his boys to pick me up. I thought I was a goner, but instead he made me an offer: seduce his wife or he’d break my legs.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  Michael flicked cigarette ash into the ashtray. “Nope. He said he needed something to hold over her head. I took the deal; I like my legs the way they are.” His face turned red. “Sorry, I—”

  “Forget it. Tell me about the necklace.”

  Michael shrugged. “Not much to tell. Last Monday, I got a phone call from Danby telling me to make sure I met with Nora … Mrs. Danby. He said she’d have a necklace with her. He told me to take it and wait for further instructions.”