One O'Clock Hustle: An Inspector Rebecca Mayfield Mystery (Rebecca Mayfield Mysteries Book 1)

by Pence, Joanne

It looked like suicide, but why, Rebecca wondered, would he have used a silencer? Why would he care if anyone heard his gun go off?

  She saw a number of handwritten notes on Sidwell's calendar, and a few sticky notes on his computer. The handwriting on the suicide note matched all the others.

  Rebecca looked up to see the waitress standing frozen in the doorway, her eyes enormous.

  “Did you see anyone come in here?” Rebecca asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Are you sure you didn't see Mr. Sidwell enter the club?”

  “I didn't,” she whispered.

  “Did you see any strangers in here?”

  Again, the waitress shook her head.

  Rebecca made the necessary phone calls to get the Medical Examiner and Crime Scene Investigation to the scene, and then interviewed the rest of the staff. All gave her the exact same answers as the waitress.

  o0o

  Rebecca spent the rest of the day and long into the night in Homicide, completing paperwork on Tommy's arrest, and answering questions, written and oral, about everything that had happened between her and Sidwell before he ran off, and then later, when she found him in his office.

  When she finally got to go home, she found her apartment empty except for Spike. She thought Richie might have been there to celebrate solving the murders. She thought she might have received at least a phone call.

  Instead, there was nothing.

  She went to bed and for the first time in a week, she should have slept well. For some reason, she didn't.

  o0o

  The next morning, she watched the medical examiner perform an autopsy on Sidwell's body.

  “The only finding at all strange is he did have a smashed knuckle on the pinky finger of his left hand. But that sort of thing could happen for any number of reasons. It isn't enough to affect my conclusion. I'm finding that this man committed suicide,” Evelyn Ramirez said as she finished up. She gazed at Rebecca. “I have the feeling that isn't what you wanted to hear.”

  “No, it's fine,” Rebecca said. “It's just that I've never heard of a suicide using a silencer. Most wouldn't care about the noise, and it makes the gun more awkward to handle.”

  Ramirez shrugged. “A guy has to be nuts to kill himself to begin with. A silencer is one of the least strange things I've seen a person use.”

  “I guess so,” Rebecca said, reminding herself that everything pointed towards suicide, including Sidwell's note, and no physical evidence contradicted that finding. She thanked the ME, who would soon submit a written report on the autopsy.

  Back at her desk, she matched withdrawals from Sidwell's bank account to deposits into Meaghan Bishop's account.

  She worked on the report about the two murders. It was going to be long and complicated, and would take some time to complete. She also, finally, finished up the report on the murder of the poor liquor store clerk from last Friday night. She found it hard to think that case had happened barely a week ago; it seemed more like an eternity had passed.

  Going home to her apartment that night, once again, only Spike greeted her, and damned if he didn't seem to be looking for Richie. She took him out to the yard and sat to watch him play.

  Kiki came down the backstairs to join her. “Hey, Becca! How you doin'?”

  “Okay.”

  Kiki sat on the bench at her side. “So, how's it going with Casanova?”

  Rebecca shook her head. “It isn't. It was never that way between us. The case is over. He's already gone his way, and I'm going mine.”

  “Oh well,” Kiki said with a heavy sigh, “don't worry about it. There's a lot more fish in the sea.”

  “Right,” Rebecca agreed. Kiki's cliché made her think of another one that she had heard this past week, “A leopard doesn't change its spots.” That pretty much summed up Richie.

  o0o

  The next day at work, she received a call that the police found an abandoned black Buick that not only had been reported stolen days earlier, but also matched the description of the car people saw in the vicinity at the time of Danny Pasternak's drive-by shooting.

  She went with the Crime Scene techs to check it out. Harrison Sidwell's fingerprints were found on the steering wheel and driver's door handle.

  Later, at her desk, she finally finished the report that presented her conclusions on the murders of Meaghan Bishop and Daniel Pasternak. All she had left to do was to sign it.

  Sidwell was clearly guilty. He admitted killing Meaghan Bishop and Danny Pasternak, yet the whole business of his suicide continued to nag at her. It allowed the case to end almost too neatly in one, big, all-the-i's-dotted-and-t's-crossed package.

  She couldn't stop her mind from replaying, over and over, Richie's words after he stopped Tommy from killing her. He said Shay had gone after Sidwell, and if anyone could find him, Shay could.

  She believed it.

  Sidwell had been was a clever man. He had been meticulous in so much that he had done, the scamming, gambling, even keeping a blackmailer in check for quite a few months, that it seemed odd for him to make such a bonehead error as to leave his fingerprints on the car he drove to kill Pasternak, and to abandon it on a street in the city where it was sure to be found.

  Maybe he hadn't abandoned it there. Maybe someone got him to tell where he'd hidden it and then moved it to a spot where the police were sure to find it.

  And why did Sidwell go back to his office after the shoot-out? Why not run?

  Unless—she shuddered—in all of this, he had no choice. If Shay had found him, she doubted Shay was big on options.

  Rebecca gave up. She had to stop fighting her report's findings. She had no definitive reason to hold off concluding the case. It was neat, no loose ends, and perhaps a tad too tidy, but if everyone was buying it, who was she among so many?

  Case solved. Score one for the team.

  Finally, she signed her report and dropped it on Lt. Eastwood's desk. Before leaving work, she called the burner phone number Richie had used.

  “This is Rebecca. I just wanted to let you know that all charges against you have been dropped. The case is over, all wrapped up, finished. You don't have to worry about it anymore.” She drew in her breath. “I hope everything is okay. I guess that's it. Good-bye.”

  She hung up. It seemed there should have been more to say.

  But why? What?

  She put on her jacket and left the office. She would stop at McDonald's on the way home. They were running a two dollar special on Quarter Pounders.

  Somewhere, Glickman was smiling.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “Big Caesar's? Are you kidding me? Did you know I just had a case there?” Rebecca said to her date as she settled into his green Honda Civic.

  Officer Tristan Davis had recently graduated from Officer Training School and had been assigned to the Taravel station. Rebecca met him when she gave police cadets a tour of the Bureau of Inspectors, and she couldn't help but notice the tall, sandy-haired, hazel-eyed officer. He was about thirty, and this was his first job since leaving the Marines. To her pleasant surprise, two weeks later, he phoned her at work and asked her out. Of course, she said yes. He was her kind of guy.

  “I thought you would enjoy seeing it as a customer instead of as a detective. I mean, you will enjoy it, won't you? Wasn't it some time ago that the murders happened?”

  “About a month,” she said. Actually, thirty-seven days had passed since she'd found Sidwell's body.

  “They're running some sort of reopening special, and I have tickets for the cover charge and two drinks each—which is my limit, anyway.” He smiled, apparently thrilled to be getting into the place without charge. Clearly, he was new to police work.

  His face fell when she said nothing. “If you don't want to go …”

  If she didn't, she realized he would be on the spot to figure out where to take her instead. Any place else she suggested in this city would be expensive, and it would be a shame to waste complimentary
tickets.

  He had warned her that she should dress up, that they were going someplace “really nice,” and she had done so. Her form-fitting shimmery emerald green dress was sleeveless and cut low in front and back, and she wore her hair with a side part, falling soft and sleek down past her shoulders.

  “It's fine,” she said with a smile. “I'm sure it'll seem quite different from the last time I was there.” Talk about an understatement, she thought.

  They parked in a lot around the corner from the club. That fee alone would cost Tristan quite a chunk of change.

  The inside of the club was freshly painted, but not much else had changed. She didn't recognize any of the help. Tristan turned over the tickets and they were shown to seats surprisingly near the band. As in the past, big-band songs were being played. She would have thought such music would only appeal to an older, if not old, clientele, but a large number of thirty-somethings were there, probably enjoying the chance to dress, dine, and dance elegantly.

  They ordered drinks, and as the band played “Embraceable You,” Tristan asked Rebecca to dance. He was a bit awkward and explained that really wasn't his style of dancing. He was more a Nine-Inch Nails kind of guy. She wanted to ask why, in that case, had he brought her here, but decided that might sound bitchy, and he was much too nice for that.

  Still, he was clearly glad when the music ended and they could sit. A tray of appetizers with shrimp, prawns, and lobster appeared at their table, compliments of the house.

  They talked about work. He was quite interested in her career and how she rose through the ranks. She found him to be a pleasant, handsome, clearly good-hearted fellow who wore his ambition on his sleeve. She reminded herself that she was most likely that way when she started out in police work. He seemed to be of the “it's not what you do, but who you know” school. The unkind thought crossed her mind that their date might soon be over if she told him that knowing her would be of no use whatsoever to his career.

  The more Tristan talked, the more she realized the only thing they had in common was work. Much as she had hoped otherwise, that hardly made for a scintillating date. She kept trying her best to smile.

  She was studying the appetizer tray and had just reached for a scallop, when a familiar voice said, “Welcome to my club.”

  Her fork poised in mid-air as she looked up. Her mouth dropped. Forget The Godfather, tonight he was pure James Bond, debonair in a black tuxedo jacket with a bowtie and even a small red boutonniere in the lapel. “Richie?”

  He grinned at her reaction. “Rebecca,” he said, giving a slight bow, and then reached across the table to shake hands with her date. “Tristan, so glad you could make it.”

  Tristan jumped to his feet. “Thank you for the tickets, Mr. Amalfi. Your club is beautiful!”

  “Are you being treated well?” he asked, facing Rebecca.

  “Yes, very much so,” Tristan answered. “The appetizers are delicious.”

  “Rebecca?” Richie asked.

  “Everything he said,” she answered.

  Richie studied her a moment. “You look beautiful tonight.”

  He had never said anything like that to her, and it took her aback. She reminded herself of how much he irked her at times, and that there was no reason she should feel tongue-tied or as if she had butterflies in her stomach just because he was all dressed up. Clothes, as they said, obviously made the man.

  She wasn't able to stop her frown. “Thank you.”

  “So,” Tristan, still standing, turned to Rebecca. “Mr. Amalfi suggested I not tell you that we were coming here tonight, that it would be more fun to surprise you after all you two had been through trying to find the guy who murdered someone here.”

  “Oh?” Rebecca didn't like the tone of that.

  Richie tugged at his ear lobe as he glanced at the nearby customers. “Yeah, well, let's keep it down. I don't like reminding people of all that, you know?”

  Tristan's eyebrows lifted. “Oh, sorry! I should have realized…”

  “Mr. Amalfi also doesn't like to be reminded of it”—Rebecca folded her arms and met his gaze—“since he was the prime suspect.”

  “Really?” Tristan asked.

  “Yes.” She never glanced Tristan's way. “I even arrested him.”

  Richie glared at her.

  She glared back.

  Tristan's eyes widened as they leaped from one to the other. “Oh.”

  “Sit,” Richie told him, his voice gruff. “I didn't mean to disturb you.” He gave a nod of good-bye and turned away.

  As Tristan dropped into his chair, the band began to play “Arrivederci Roma.”

  Richie glanced back at Rebecca, and saw that she was still watching him. He strolled back to her. “An old Italian love song, made for dancing.” He held out his hand, his head ever so slightly cocked. “Inspector?”

  She would have gladly refused, but his tone said he expected her to say “No,” and even his eyes had a glint of something mocking. She took the napkin off her lap, plopped it on the table and stood. “Sure.”

  Surprise flashed across his face, then vanished. He led her far from the table before he took her in his arms.

  The scent of his after shave brought back memories of when he was all but living at her house. Memories that were surprisingly good, and even bizarrely fun. Memories that she didn't want to have.

  They danced in silence a moment, then he asked, “How have you been, Rebecca?”

  “All is well. I suspect you got my message.”

  “About the case, yes,” he said. “I would have called back, but I didn't want to impose.”

  “There was no need to,” she said quickly.

  “Right.”

  After listening to a few more bars of the song, she said, “So, tell me, how did you get all this?”

  He looked around the room, all the people, the band, the food, and seemed both pleased and perhaps a little overwhelmed. Somehow, that reminded her of when he was a part of her life, not so cocky, not so self-assured. Damn, if she didn't miss that fellow. “Turns out my loan covered the down payment plus,” he said. “And you know this place makes money if run right.”

  “So now you're a nightclub owner,” she said with a smile. “Who would have thought it?”

  “Not you,” he said softly.

  “You should have called and told me about it.”

  “What, so I could listen to you hang up on me?”

  That hurt. “I might not have,” she said quietly.

  “Oh? I know you don't think much of me.”

  “That's not true,” she said, then thought about it. Thought of her suspicions about Sidwell's suicide, of the evidence that fell too neatly into place. “I mean…”

  “I know,” he said, then didn't speak for a long while as they slowly spun in time with the music to the far side of the dance floor. He danced very well, she thought. The music continued and became a medley of popular Italian songs. Dean Martin would have been proud.

  She felt herself relaxing a bit. She knew Richie read her far too well. She didn't trust him, didn't particularly like him, but for some reason, being with him, even dancing with him, felt right. She listened to the music.

  He caught her eye. “It seems someone asked Tristan to leave. I guess you're stuck with me the rest of the evening.”

  “What?” She looked across the floor, but her table was now empty. “He wouldn't have just gone off like that. What did they say to him?”

  Still holding her gaze, he raised his chin ever so slightly. “Maybe that there was something going on at the station and he was needed. Or maybe that the lady was otherwise occupied tonight.”

  She all but gasped. “That was arrogant!”

  “Were you having such a great time?” he asked.

  She hesitated, then admitted, “Not so much.”

  “Good! I thought you looked a little bored.”

  She smiled, but also shook her head. He was beyond arrogant. But then the smile vanished an
d she paled. “Wait a minute, did you tell him to ask me out?”

  He grinned. “Hell, no! It was the talk of the Taravel station, so I heard, that from the time he met you the kid was head-over-heels. Puppy love, I think they call it. I decided to give him a break and suggested a woman like you should be brought someplace with class, somewhere like this club.”

  “You're terrible.”

  “I know.”

  “He was a Marine!”

  “That I didn't know. You want me to call him back?”

  She didn't need to think about it, but answered simply and honestly, “No.”

  “Good,” he murmured.

  “Come Back to Sorrento” ended and “Al Di La” began.

  She had loved the song since she was a young teenager and went to a dance at the middle school gym. For some reason, instead of only fast songs, the older tune played—probably some teacher's favorite—and she danced it with the boy she was crazy about at the time. Unfortunately, she never danced with him again.

  “This is one of my favorite songs,” she said, a bit wistfully.

  He caught her gaze. “Mine, too. But the way they translate it is all wrong. It's hard to translate, but it means something like 'more than that,' 'even more,' 'beyond.' Something like that.”

  “You understand the words?”

  “Sure. He's telling her how much she means to him, his love, his feelings.” His voice turned low and soft as he continued. “The end is the best, when he says even more than infinite time, even more than life…al di la, ci sei tu per me…more than that, that's what you are for me.”

  Her breath caught even as she reminded herself that he was only translating words to the song. “That's very pretty,” she said trying, for some reason, not to look at him. “A lovely song.”

  “A song…yes, it is,” he said, then turned her round and round as they continued to dance.

  Despite herself, she felt her spirits lift, found herself relieved that he'd sent Tristan home, and unexpectedly glad to be with him again.

  She smiled, enjoying the feel of his arms around her, the sound of his voice, the touch of his hands. And as they danced, she stepped just a little bit closer.