by Lauren Carr
The doors flew open and the morgue attendants came in with a gurney and body bag. Special Agent Delaney gestured at them. “Over here. This one goes first.”
Mac whirled around to watch Delaney direct them in bagging the body and getting him out. Before the ME can do his one scene examination? But— When he saw Delaney cast a warning look in his direction, Mac turned back to the coffee counter.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” With his handkerchief, Alan Richardson wiped down his bushy mustache. “There was no one else here.”
“Are you sure about that?” David asked with a straight face. “Three dead men. They certainly didn’t drop dead from natural causes. Someone had to have done something to make that happen.”
Catching David’s eye, Mac put on a straight face as well. To let Richardson know they were waiting outside would be to blow the undercover agents’ covers.
“Unless you mean the owner and her creepy daughter,” the lawyer responded.
“What’s so creepy about her daughter?” Mac asked.
Richardson shot him a glance. “She doesn’t talk. You say hello to her and she looks like she’s going to jump out of her skin.”
“Maybe she looks scared because she is scared,” Mac said. “You’re not exactly Mr. Rogers.”
The lawyer turned to the police chief while cocking his head in Mac’s direction. “Who is this guy?”
“Mac Faraday is a homicide detective,” David said. “He works on contract with the Spencer police department on special cases.”
Mac caught a wink from David in his direction. The police chief had lied as smoothly as if they had sorted it out before Tommy Cruze had dropped dead.
“Tell us what happened,” David ordered Alan Richardson.
The lawyer wiped the beads of sweat from his bald head. “My client, Tommy Cruze, and I came here for a breakfast meeting with a couple of associates.”
“What type of associates?” Mac stepped aside to allow the morgue attendants to wheel out the gurney with the enforcer in the sealed body bag.
Alan Richardson paused to watch the gurney leaving. His face grew pale. His flabby jowls quivered.
“Mr. Richardson?” David prodded him. “What happened here? Who were those men with the automatic weapons outside?”
“Were they after your client?” Mac asked. “Maybe settling an old score? Or was it a new one?”
“Tommy Cruze is—was—a legitimate businessman,” Alan insisted.
“Yeah. Right,” Mac responded.
“He was framed for the murder that he went to jail for,” Richardson said. “The fed that led the investigation was crooked—and now he’s sitting in Cruze’s cell. The judge saw it for what it was and overturned the conviction.”
“And how much did you pay that judge to flip the conviction?” Special Agent Delaney had come over to ask.
“Don’t answer that, darling.” A tall, leggy redhead in a white business suit filled the doorway leading in from the reception area.
Mac wasn’t into buxom bombshells who looked like they belonged in the centerfold of a magazine. He preferred his women petite and sleek—the type he could pick up in his arms—like Archie. But, as he looked at the redhead, he thought that if he were into bombshells—here was one. He could see by the drop of Delaney’s jaw that this woman was his type.
When the redhead stepped in, she gazed down at the floor in the direction of the dead bodies. Delaney reached out his arm to block further entrance. “You can’t come in, ma’am. This is a crime scene.”
“She’s allowed,” Richardson said. “Ariel is my attorney. We’re business partners.” He grasped her arm to pull her around. “She’s also my wife.”
Her eyes still on Tommy Cruze’s motionless body, she said, “Richardson can’t answer any questions without my being present.”
“Mrs. Richardson,” Mac said, “since you and your husband are partners, then I guess that means you worked for Tommy Cruze, too?”
“She never met Cruze.” Alan stepped between them to block his view of her. “I met Ariel after Tommy went to prison. She’s had no connection with him or his business in any way, shape, or form.”
“While you were in with him up to your eyebrows,” Special Agent Delaney said.
“Doesn’t matter now, does it?” Alan replied. “You got what you wanted. Cruze is dead.”
While Alan ranted on at the federal agent and David, Mac watched Ariel staring at Cruze’s body on the floor. Feeling his eyes on her, she lifted her eyes to meet his. Fear filled them before she turned away.
Alan continued, “I wouldn’t be surprised if those hit men outside wearing FBI jackets really did belong to you.”
“If it wasn’t for your agents being either crooked or incompetent,” Ariel interjected, “that animal would still be locked up. But you couldn’t put Cruze away and keep him there, so someone had to do the job for you.”
“Like your husband?” David asked.
Pointing a long dagger of a fingernail in his direction, Ariel turned to the police chief. “You better watch who you go throwing accusations at.”
“I had nothing to do with Cruze’s extracurricular activities,” her husband said.
“You’re full of it, Richardson,” Delaney said. “Cruze is dead. You aren’t on his payroll anymore. So you can cut the crap and tell us who offed him. Or were you the target? Maybe Ray Bonito decided he was tired of being number two, especially after ten years of running the operation, and decided to eliminate the top man—and his lawyer—to clear the field.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Ariel replied. “Bonito is a certified psychopath. Not only that, but he was none too happy when Cruze’s conviction was overturned. When you make an insane man unhappy, you have a gourmet recipe for a blood bath.”
“Ray Bonito is crazy,” her husband said. “I haven’t seen him in over a year and a half. He’s become paranoid, which happens to many men who get into bed with organized crime figures. After years of looking over your shoulder to see who’s waiting to stab you in the back—literally— you can’t help but become paranoid and cut yourself off from everyone.” He added, “The only ones he’ll have face-to-face meetings with are his most trusted men.”
“And that doesn’t include you?” Mac asked.
“You want to know how paranoid Ray Bonito is?” Richardson asked. “I’ll tell you. Tommy Cruze couldn’t even get in to see him. Ever since he got out, Tommy’s been trying to have a face to face with Bonito—and Bonito works for Cruze, not the other way around.”
Special Agent Delaney asked, “Are you saying Cruze was still running things while he was in jail?”
“Working remotely is all the rage nowadays,” the mob lawyer said with a chuckle.
“Bonito set up this hit,” Ariel said in a harsh voice while casting a glance at Tommy Cruze’s body once more. “Ray Bonito is the one you should be questioning.”
“What’s Bonito’s favorite MO?” Mac gestured at the two dead bodies being examined by the county medical examiner. “Firing squad or poison?”
Richardson shook his head. “Poison? That’s much too tame for Ray Bonito.” Looking around, he pointed at the two men twisted in death poses on the floor. “I haven’t a clue about who did this. The only thing I can think of is the lady who runs the place. After all, everything we ate and drank came from her.”
Examining the array of overturned coffee mugs, smashed creamers, and sugar packets scattered all over the floor where they had fallen when the table was overturned, Mac asked, “Was there anyone else here when you came in?”
“Besides that woman and her weird daughter—”
Richardson backed up when David abruptly stepped up to him. “That ‘weird daughter’ is a child. You don’t know anything about her—the way she
lives, where she comes from. So when you talk about that little girl, you do it with respect. Do you understand me?”
Ariel jumped to her husband’s defense. “Do you know who you’re talking to?”
Pulling her back from where she was chastising the police chief, Richardson nodded his head. Beads of sweat poured down the sides of his face to soak the collar of his shirt.
Mac pointed at a table for two against the window looking out onto the deck. The napkins had been used, but the table was clear of any food or drinks. “Was someone sitting here?”
“When we came in,” Richardson said. “A couple. But then, right after we sat down, they got into a fight and left.”
“Fight over what?” Mac asked.
“I have no idea.” Richardson shook his head. “Suddenly out of the blue, the wife had a meltdown and stormed out with her wuss husband chasing after her.”
Mac recalled hearing the wife, Nora, on the audio saying that she wished he could be a man for once. Now Richardson referred to the husband as a “wuss.” “Did you or Cruze or any of his people or associates say anything to them?”
Richardson shook his head. “None of us knew them or ever saw either of them before.” He cocked his head at Mac. “Are you thinking that maybe they planted the poison that killed Cruze?”
“Tommy Cruze made a fortune out of making enemies,” Delaney told him. “There’s no telling what score that couple may have been settling.”
“We didn’t decide we were even coming here until this morning,” Richardson said. “Those two were here when we came in. If they came to kill Cruze, then how did they know we were going to be here, and how did they do it?”
“Good question,” Mac said while watching David answer his radio.
The police chief’s eyes widened and his mouth dropped before he turned away and stepped into the reception area away from them. “Are you kidding me?”
Alan pointed a finger at the federal agent while saying, “I’m telling you…it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out what happened and who did it. It was that couple who was here and then left. They must have worked for Bonito.”
Seeing David whirl around while pressing his radio to his ear, Mac excused himself to join him. The thought of Archie falling victim to the crime spree that had invaded Spencer gripped his heart. He tugged on David’s sleeve to get his attention. “What’s going on?”
“They have a DB at a bed and breakfast on Lakeshore Drive.”
“Possible homicide?”
“Maybe accidental,” David said. “Thing is, I can’t leave this.” He gestured at the two dead bodies on the floor in the middle of the café.
“Finnegan took the café owner and her daughter to Spencer Manor,” Mac said, “and Bogie went with them.”
“He’s the only other one on the force with experience in possible homicides.” David cocked his head at him and narrowed his eyes. “What are you not telling me?”
“Those assassins outside may very well not have been coming after Cruze.”
David cursed.
His radio crackled. “Chief,” the operator called out. “Who do you want me to send? Fletcher?”
Mac tapped David on the shoulder. Once he had his attention, he tapped his fingers against his own chest. “I can go. You just told Richardson that I’m on contract with the Spenser police. I’ve investigated hundreds of murders, and I’m still certified by the state as an investigator. I can handle one little DB at a B and B.”
David looked Mac up and down and noticed that he was still in his running sweats. After a heavy sigh, he told him, “Okay. But you can’t go like that. Take my cruiser, swing by the station, and take a quick shower. I have an extra set of clothes in my locker. They’ll fit you. I’ll have Tonya give you a badge and service weapon.”
Chapter Eleven
“Gnarly, there you are.” Archie came out onto the front porch to greet Bogie’s cruiser when it rolled through the Spencer Manor entrance. Once again, she was dressed in her soft gray suit for an outing at the Spencer Inn after dropping Gnarly off at the Doggie Hut. When she saw the German shepherd, covered in blood, jump out through the cruiser’s open window, she shrieked. “What happened to you?”
“He took down a hit man,” Bogie told her before opening the rear door to let his other passengers out. “You don’t want to see how the other guy looks.”
“Mac—” she gasped.
“Mac’s fine,” Bogie said. “But there’s a mess at the Dockside Café. Tommy Cruze is dead.”
Archie sighed with relief.
“That’s the good news,” Bogie said. “The bad news is that since Gnarly took out one of the dead hit men, he’s now covered with evidence. The feds are going to be coming out here to process him. That means you have to cancel his appointment with Misty.”
“Do you know how hard it is to get an appointment with Misty?” Archie’s hands were on her hips. “I’m supposed to leave him like this…”
Hanging his head like a guilty child, Gnarly sat before her.
“Would it make you feel better if I went back to the Dockside and killed Tommy Cruze a second time?” Bogie offered.
“It’s not me I’m concerned about. It’s Gnarly.” She pointed to the dog, who had lain down. With a long, mournful whine, he rested his head on her pumps. “Look at him. He’s devastated. He loves Misty. You should see him when he leaves the Doggie Hut after one of her deep body massages. She makes him feel so handsome.” She stomped one of her feet. “Oh, I hate Tommy Cruze for doing this to Gnarly. If he was still alive I’d go shoot him myself.”
“I’d hate to be Cruze right now.” The deputy chief went into the house.
After digesting that bad news, Archie noticed Randi Finnegan and two new faces.
“More refugees from the mob,” Randi said. “This is Leah Juliano and her daughter, Sari.” She went on to explain that they had been placed in the area two years earlier after being put in the program.
“Well, hello, Sari.” Archie knelt down by the little girl who had squirmed out of her mother’s arms and was showing Gnarly her stuffed dog. “You’re a beautiful little girl. How old are you?”
Sari’s eyes met Archie’s for only a moment before she turned her attention back to Gnarly.
“Sari doesn’t talk,” Leah said.
“That’s too bad.” Archie rose to her feet. “Why not?”
“She just stopped talking one day.” Leah looked up and around at the stone and cedar mansion. “Is this your house?”
“I live here,” Archie said. “It’s complicated.”
“Sleeping with the big man for money, huh?” Leah laughed. “That’s not complicated. It’s the way of the world.”
Giving up on trying to like the woman Randi had brought to Spencer Manor, Archie asked, “What would be the odds of a witness hiding from the mob having a mob hit go down in her establishment? Who would have thought?”
“I never saw any of those people before in my life,” Leah said forcibly.
“I wasn’t saying—” Archie said by way of an apology.
“Come, Sari.” The café owner pulled her daughter by the arm up to her feet. “We need to wash your hands. That dog is filthy.” Without invitation, Leah dragged her daughter inside the house.
With an apology in her eyes, Randi nodded at Archie. “I think it’s the culture clash. Leah can be—”
“Rude.” Archie added, “It’s not culture. It’s lack of manners.”
“She’ll be relocated within two days,” Randi said. “With so many mob figures in the area now, I’m afraid of taking her to the Spencer Inn or any public place.”
“She and her daughter can stay,” Archie said.
“Thank you, Archie,” Randy said. “I knew I could count on you. You’re such a class ac
t.”
“I’m not doing it for her,” Archie said. “It’s for her daughter.” She whirled around on her heels and went inside to call Misty to beg for another chance for Gnarly.
In the upscale resort town of Spencer, Maryland, where many of the town’s residents were listed in Who’s Who, the small police station resembled a sports club. Located along the shore of Deep Creek Lake, the log building that was home to the police department sported a dock with a dozen jet skis and four speed boats. Its fleet of police cruisers was top of the line SUVs painted black with gold lettering on the side that read “SPENCER POLICE”. For patrolling the deep woods and mountain trails, they had eight ATVs. Like the cruisers, all of the vehicles were black with gold trim.
David was on the mark when he surmised his clothes would fit his older half-brother. After a quick shower in the police chief’s private bathroom on the top floor at the station, Mac slipped into a pair of dress slacks, a button-down shirt, and a blue sports jacket that he had found in David’s locker. Mac chuckled when he discovered that David’s shoes, however, were one size too small. That meant he had to wear his worn running shoes.
Tonya, the desk sergeant, smiled up at him when he came downstairs. “My, my. If you had blond hair, I would have thought you were the chief.”
Knowing that she was unaware of the familial relationship he shared with David, Mac only grinned.
Tonya had lived on the lake her whole life. Many suspected that the long hours she put in at the station were an excuse to not go home, to where two of her three grown children had returned with their offspring after a short time spent in the outside world.
“Gnarly’s not riding shotgun with you on this case?” Tonya was a huge fan of every dog. Sometimes, Mac felt like she was simply going through the paces while making small talk until they arrived upon the topic of Gnarly and his latest escapades. She had three dogs of her own that she doted on more than her kids. The dogs were more self-sufficient.