First Murder

by Fred Limberg

  “We just want to talk to him. He’s a little hard to find sometimes.” Tony shrugged, tried a wider smile.

  “Uh-huh. John Law knockin’ on the do’ Sunday mornin’ and he ain’t in trouble?”

  “We want to talk to him is all.”

  “Uh-huh.” The old woman started coughing.

  Tony fished a fold of bills out of his pocket and peeled off a twenty. Then he took one of his new cards out of another pocket.

  “I could use your help. Now if you see this guy, any time, day or night, you call this number on the bottom.” She reached for the bill. Tony held it back and gave her the card first. “See the number on the bottom?”

  “Not without my damn glasses.” She held it close to her tired watery eyes, squinting again. “Where it say cell?” Tony nodded and passed the twenty over.

  “That’s the number. You see this guy you call me. If it works out, I’ll have another twenty for you. Deal?”

  “Anytime?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Okay Ray.” She smiled a toothless smile and slammed the door.

  “I thought I was Ray.” Bankston was chuckling as they pulled out of the dingy parking lot.

  “Well, we look so much alike. I can see where people get us mixed up.” Tony laughed too. “So what now, boss?”

  “I think we should rest today. I don’t want to get into it with the Hewes’ woman if her husband’s around, and we can’t find Stuckey. That was a slick move with the old woman.”

  “There’s always a peeper. Even on patrol, whenever I’d pull up to a house, a crime scene or a domestic, whatever, I’d look around for the peeper.”

  “If she calls let me know. I’ve got a few questions for Mr. Stuckey, too.”

  Ray was driving, heading toward the east side of St. Paul to drop Tony at home. They rode in silence, each of them content with their own private thoughts.

  Ray was getting comfortable with his young partner and appreciated that he didn’t talk just to make noise—that he waited until he had worked through a question before he asked for help. He liked that he didn’t leap to conclusions, too. So often the new ones, the youngsters, would be so eager to make their mark they tried to make the evidence fit some preconceived notion instead of letting it guide them.

  Tony was simply enjoying the silence, watching familiar scenery slide past, letting go of the dozens of questions in his mind. He needed rest, he knew that. He also knew if he didn’t blank out the details of the murder for a while that things would begin to get confused. Maybe he’d go to the gym and work out. That helped sometimes, cleared some cobwebs. Maybe he’d call Sue Ellen later, see how life in the safe house was. He laughed to himself when he got the idea that what he should really do is check out a couple of the old Latin Kings haunts, find Garcia, and shoot him.

  As they turned onto Tony’s street Ray gave a low grunt and pointed toward a SUV idling at the curb in front of his house. They could see three heads in the vehicle even though the windows were tinted.

  “Someone’s waiting for you,” Ray said.

  Tony wondered if the Latin Kings had somehow gotten through the barricade around his identity. Ray stopped the car in the middle of the street a half block away. Tony was just reaching for the Glock under his left arm when a man exited the SUV from the driver’s door. The big man lit a cigarette. It was Marc Giordano. Tony remained tense but left the gun in its holster. Ray drove alongside the SUV.

  “What’s wrong?” Tony asked when he got out of the car. Marco smiled at him and he relaxed.

  “Oh, nothing,” Marco replied in a teasing sing song voice. He flicked the butt away. The rear door opened and Sue Ellen slid from the seat. Marco retrieved a clipboard and pen.

  “Sign,” he commanded, and thrust an official looking document in Tony’s hands. “And welcome to the team.”

  With his signature on the document Tony officially joined the protection detail for assistant district attorney S. E. McConnel as the SPPD’s liason officer.

  Tony was puzzled but pleased. This must have been the tricky thing Sue Ellen had mentioned the night before that she was working on. While Tony and Marco were discussing the protectee’s eventual return to the safe house Sue Ellen was talking with her Uncle Ray at the car window. Before Tony could say good bye to him Ray dropped the car into gear and took off, leaving his grinning niece standing in the road. Marco left too.

  “So how does this work?” Tony was smiling and untangling keys on his front stoop. “This protection thing.”

  Sue Ellen was standing back from the steps admiring the small tidy house. It was pale green-almost-gray stucco with white shutters and trim. There was a large bare tree in the yard and not a leaf in sight, the browning grass cut short, and the walkway trimmed. Tony kept his home neat.

  “Anyone comes after me you shoot ’em. Pretty simple.” Sue Ellen was wearing a khaki mid-calf length skirt with a denim blouse. A heavy sweater was draped over her shoulders, but the day was warm for October, last night’s rain a memory. Her bright red lipstick was perfectly applied and inviting.

  “Okay, next question. How did you get Marco and the Marshal’s Service to go along with this?” Tony finally got the door open and with a sweep of his arm invited her in.

  “I sighed—a lot.” She brushed against him as she entered the house. Her perfume smelled expensive and wonderful to Tony. “I mean a lot. I’d read part of a file and sigh real loud. In a few minutes I’d do it again. Finally Marco made a call and told me to get my butt ready, he was handing me off to you for the day.”

  Tony closed the front door and she slipped easily into his arms. It was a long time before either of them talked again.

  Sue Ellen spied the arch over the hallway that led to the bedrooms and took Tony by the hand. She paused to peer into a small bedroom he’d made into an office and into a sparkling tiled bathroom that had either been immaculately maintained in its original vintage or restored. At the end of the hall was the bedroom. It wasn’t a large room. Nothing about the house was on any grand scale. There weren’t any clothes littering the floor. Several pictures were arranged on the dresser, photos of a couple in different dress and times—children and parents growing up in each one. The quaint double bed was neatly made up.

  In a very short time there were clothes littering the floor and the quaint double bed was no longer made up. It had a delightful squeak to it, antique wood joints laughed and squealed as Sue Ellen and Tony tussled and tumbled while they made love; sometimes frantically desperate and urgent—sometimes slow, simply letting their breathing move them.

  The low lazy October sun was peeking in below nearly drawn shades before they rested. They weren’t done. They were just resting. Tony had the thought that they might not be done for years. He felt very protective.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked right after his stomach made a low growling noise.

  Sue Ellen laughed. “And here I thought I’d finally found the perfect man. Kind, sensitive, picks up his clothes, makes the bed. And after sex all he wants to do is eat.”

  “Is that a yes or no?” He was melded to the curve of her backside in the narrow bed; warm, happy, and spent. His stomach growled again. She wriggled against him.

  “Don’t tell me you can cook, too.”

  “I’ll do better than that missy. I’ll show you.” Tony slipped from the bed. Sue Ellen watched him search through the dresser and smiled wickedly at his trim backside and powerful legs. Then a soft cotton cloth covered her face when Tony tossed a pair of lounge pants at her. “Those will work.” He slipped into a faded pair of jeans, still grinning, and left her in the bed.

  She tracked him down finally, busy in the kitchen. A rosy looking Bloody Mary waited for her on a small breakfast table by the patio doors. Outside on the deck a massive stainless steel grill stood sentinel over planters and redwood stained Adirondack chairs. Then she spied two squat bowls.

  “You have a dog?”

  “Part time. I’ll introduce
you in a minute.”

  Tony busied himself at the stove and Sue Ellen tried her drink. It was tart and not too hot, nearly perfect. She’d have to teach him that she didn’t like olives. When she looked back outside the part time dog was staring in, tail wagging. She opened the door.

  “Meet Boof.”

  The dog eyed her warily but didn’t bark.

  “Hello Boof.” She held out her hand for him to sniff. “How do you get a part time dog?”

  “He belongs to Dot and Benny next door. The yards are kinda’ small here and mine’s all fenced too. We put a gate in for him so he’d have more room to run.”

  “He’s cute.” Boof apparently decided she smelled okay and gave her a lick. “What is he?”

  The dog was long and low to the ground. Boof had oversized floppy ears, sad wet eyes and tremendous paws. Sue Ellen thought he looked kind of like a Basset Hound but he was covered in black curly fur.

  “Good question— and not the first time it’s been asked.” Tony sipped his own drink. He was about to share the theories that had been posed over the years when his cell phone rang. “Damn it.” He looked at the screen. The caller ID number was unfamiliar.

  “Ray?” It was the old woman from the apartment house.

  “This is Ray.” Sue Ellen looked confused.

  “That boy here now. Come in jes’ a minute ago. To that girl’s place.”

  “He’s there now?”

  “Uh-huh. You said to call.” Tony rubbed his face with his free hand, thinking that the old crone sure has lousy timing. No, Stuckey has lousy timing. He was starting to hate Sean Stuckey.

  “How long ago did he get there?”

  “I tole you, jes’ now. Not five minute ago.” The old woman sounded a little pissed.

  “Okay. What’s your name? You never told me your name.”

  “It’s Connie.”

  “Connie, if you see him leave call me right away. Can you do that?”

  “You gonna’ gimme another twenty?”

  “Sure. Sure I will. Now you call me if he leaves.”

  “I will Ray. You kin count on me.” She clicked off.

  Tony, frowning now, turned off the stove and turned to Sue Ellen and Boof. Both of them were looking at him with raised eyebrows.

  “We have to go.”

  Sue Ellen sighed and gave the part time dog one more scratch. Tony dialed Ray’s number. He was afraid it was going to roll to voice mail it rang for so long, but Ray caught it in time.

  “Stuckey’s at the girl’s apartment,” Tony said evenly. He was surprised when Ray responded with a healthy “goddamnit!” “Meet me there in a half hour?”

  “It’ll take me closer to forty-five minutes, maybe an hour?”

  The Twin Cities aren’t that big and on a Sunday afternoon traffic would be light, Tony puzzled. “Where are you?”

  “I’m out in Mi…I’m a ways out.” Ray replied. Tony thought he sounded a little sheepish. Minnetonka? Lakisha Marland? No wonder the old guy thought it was worth a cussing, Tony chuckled to himself. You rascal.

  “What are you grinning about?” Sue Ellen was dressed, ready to go back to the safe house and not happy about it.

  “Misery loves company.”

  Chapter 26

  Ray made good time from the wilds of Minnetonka. He pulled in behind Tony just minutes after he had arrived. Tony was in his Ford pickup. Ray was in an unmarked Crown Victoria—unmarked but still with a siren and light, both of which Tony would bet had seen recent use.

  De Luca was wearing his jeans and a SPPD logo tee shirt under a weathered black leather jacket. He wore his pistol in a clip holster high on his right hip. He was ready to play the bad cop. Ray was wearing the same charcoal gray suit he’d had on that morning but his tie was gone. He had flipped his badge wallet open and tucked it in the breast pocket of his suit coat.

  “You cussed.” Tony grinned when he said it. Ray started with an angry look that melted into one that might have been amusement.

  “So did you.” Ray replied, and punched his young partner on the shoulder. “He still here?”

  “Connie didn’t call to say he left.”

  “That’s her name, huh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, Ray…I guess you owe her another twenty bucks. Let’s go see Mr. Stuckey.”

  They met Sean heading down the second floor stairwell. Tony was glad he didn’t have to spend time with Angie again, even if it would only have been long enough to escort Stuckey out of the building. They all clomped down the narrow stairs and out onto the sidewalk.

  “We have some questions,” Ray said evenly. He was Stuckey’s height, but seemed taller. He looked directly, unflinching, into the young man’s eyes.

  “What if I don’t have any fuckin’ answers?” For once Stuckey didn’t have his backpack over a shoulder. He was having trouble deciding what to do with his hands without the strap to hang onto.

  “Detective de Luca has his cuffs with him. I’ll arrest you right here and now if you give me any more lip, kid.” Ray didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t smile, or frown, or flinch, or even blink.

  “For what?” Stuckey’s voice rose. The end of his question squeaked.

  “Murder.”

  “Why are you coming down on me for all this? I didn’t do anything,” Stuckey whined.

  “You lied to us, Mr. Stuckey. That’s not a good thing to do in a murder investigation.”

  “I didn’t lie. I haven’t. Not once.” The look on his face didn’t match the conviction in his voice. A handful of orphaned leaves danced in a stray breeze in the entryway.

  “There are two ways this can go now, Mr. Stuckey. We’re going to have a talk. We can do it back over in St. Paul at headquarters or we can go have a cup of coffee at that diner I saw up the block.” Ray finally moved his head when he nodded toward the diner but his eyes never left Stuckey’s. “If we go to that diner I expect you to behave. If you start yelling and cussin’ us then it’s back to St. Paul and right damn now.”

  The three men were the only ones in the small diner besides one bored waitress and a cook that was clattering away in the back. They took a booth in the rear, past the short lunch counter. The frayed blue and white striped leatherette was slightly sticky and the linoleum on the tabletop showed skid-tracks, testament to the thousands of blue plate specials that had been slid across its tired surface. Ray and Tony sat on one side, facing Sean Stuckey. They were both watching him for the flinches and perspiration and darting eyes that would shout Liar as sure as the buzzing neon sign like the one in the front of the café shouted Open.

  “So what did I lie about?” Sean dumped two sugars in his coffee and stirred it for a long time.

  “You lied about meeting the women in LA, at least some of them.”

  “Scotty’s mom? I never met her out there. I met her once at their house, that’s all.”

  “April nineteenth. Late. You were in a bar trying to get Mrs. Fredrickson and a friend of hers to notice you. Trying to pick them up, maybe? Have a little fun with some hot moms?” Stuckey flinched when Ray used the term ‘hot moms’. It stung him. Ray meant for it to.

  “No.” Stuckey was staring at his coffee cup, shaking his head slowly, obviously deep in thought, trying to remember. “No. I don’t remember. I never met Scotty’s mom until that afternoon at the house.” He looked up at Ray, pleading with his eyes, searching. “I mean, if we’d met there wouldn’t she have recognized me? At the house? Wouldn’t she have said something?”

  “You looked different then.”

  “How do you know?”

  Tony fished a picture out of his jacket and held it up. “We know.”

  “Where did you…” the question died on Sean’s lips. It didn’t matter where they got the picture. It didn’t matter how.

  “You also lied about your career in the movie business.” Sean didn’t say anything. Tony was surprised at that. He’d been pretty vocal in his denials up until then. “We came across one of t
he earlier episodes.”

  “They’re all supposed to be gone. Erased. Bought up,” Stuckey said softly, so low they had to strain to hear him. “Holtzman, the old man, he spent close to a million to get his kids off the hook, to keep it quiet.”

  “The reality is that there are still some out there.”

  Stuckey nodded. Tony thought he saw a flicker of something behind the young man’s downcast eyes, something that looked like hatred and defiance. He wondered if Ray was seeing it too. It was like Stuckey was steeling himself for a fight—that he was preparing for battle.

  Stuckey must have noticed how closely Tony was watching him. The look of defiance seamlessly transformed into one of fear, of defeat. His eyes moistened and a surprising lone tear rolled down one cheek.

  “I was dying out there. I was broke and flunking out and doing every drug I could get my hands on. I was dying. Skip and Todd, that was the Holtzman kids, they cooked up this bullshit pay-per-view porn deal. They talked me into it.” Stuckey turned his head and looked out at the deserted dark street. A lone car disappeared in the distance.

  “Okay, it wasn’t too hard to get me to go along. They had the drugs and cash and, well, I’m not very picky sometimes. Especially when I’m trippin’. They bullied their old man’s crews out of gear and had a friend who knew the computer shit.”

  Tony looked at Ray as if to ask ‘are you buying this?’ Ray shrugged and let Stuckey continue.

  “At first it was a joke—all a big game. We’d get coked out of our fucking minds and find some old gal who liked young meat and they’d film it. They did that like three times. The video was really shitty and the women…” he shook his head. “It was just too weird, man. Then one night I dropped a tab of acid before the shoot. I had to. It was out of control. That night was the end of the amateurs. Bad scene. I don’t think that one ever got put in play.” Stuckey took a sip of cold coffee and grimaced.

  “After that they’d hire hookers and shit. Then they wanted to get in on the action. Skip. Todd. One of them. I can’t remember which one—he had a pretty big dick so we’re going to tag team this one old whore. That’s the night we got busted.”