Reed Ferguson Mystery Box Set 5

by Renee Pawlish

  “I’ll try,” she said as she sauntered across the lawn toward me.

  “I’m a friend of Bernie’s.” I gestured back at his house. “He’s been gone and he asked me to check on things.”

  “Oh, that’s nice of you.”

  Whew! What if she caught my lie because Shepherd had asked her to check on his house?

  “Is he enjoying his vacation?” she asked. “I’d love to go to Tahiti.”

  How about that, I thought, but I was really not surprised. Shepherd had been in Tahiti, just like Hinton. It’d be a smart bet the two of them went to the island together. The question was, why? And even though Shepherd was supposed to be in Tahiti, was he back in Denver instead because Hinton had been killed?

  “He’s having a good time,” I said. “Anyway, since I saw you out here, I thought I’d check with you to see if everything’s been okay at his house.”

  She shaded her eyes and stared at Shepherd’s house. “Over there? Yes, as far as I know.”

  “You haven’t seen anyone suspicious around?”

  Her hand went to her mouth. “No, why? Should I be worried? This has always been a safe neighborhood.”

  “No, just asking.”

  She gave me a little more scrutiny. “I’m sorry, what did you say your name was?”

  I’d registered on her suspicion meter.

  “Marlowe,” I said quickly. “Thanks for your time.”

  I waved at her and drove away before she could ask anything else. I pulled back onto North Ranch Road, and as I headed back to Denver, I tried to make sense of things. Had Shepherd really seen someone around his actual house? On the other hand, Hinton’s neighbor thought he’d seen someone around Hinton’s house. Was that person the same person who had eventually murdered him? Was someone after both of them? If so, why?

  My phone’s ringing interrupted my musings. It was Cal.

  “What’d you find out about Shepherd?” I asked.

  “Not a whole lot. He’s divorced and behind on his alimony payments – did you know they call it ‘maintenance’ now?”

  “I did,” I said. “What else did you find out?”

  “His wife’s name is Pam, he’s got a large mortgage on his house, car payments on a Mercedes and an SUV, lots of credit card debt – he likes to buy expensive wines – and a membership to Cherry Hills Country Club.”

  “Which isn’t cheap,” I said.

  “No, it isn’t. But that’s about it. No trouble with the law or anything like that. And Marshall Vanderkamp, Denise Hinton or Glenn LeBlanc never flew to Tahiti.”

  “Okay, so none of them murdered Hinton, unless they figured out how to get false IDs. Although, any one of them could be involved in the murder some way.”

  “Right.”

  “Thanks for the help.”

  “Anytime. Did you turn up anything interesting?”

  “Not yet,” I said slowly. “Just a lot of questions.”

  “Well, I’ll leave you to it.”

  I stared out the windshield and thought about what Cal had said. Shepherd had told the truth, at least about one thing. He hadn’t been paying his ex-wife in a while. So was she after him because of that? I now needed to track her down and talk to her. I pulled to the side of the road so I could google her address.

  Bernie’s ex – Pam Shepherd – lived in Aurora, on the other side of town. It was a long way to drive, and what if she wasn’t home? I preferred talking to people in person so I could watch how they responded to my questions, but I could see if she’d be available to talk to me. I checked a White Pages listing but couldn’t find a number for her. Maybe she had an unlisted number, or only used a cell phone and the directory didn’t have it. I put my phone back in my pocket and resigned myself to the drive.

  I got back on the road, but my mind was still a jumble of bits and pieces of information. And one big question remained: Where was Bernie Shepherd?

  Chapter Twenty

  Rush-hour traffic was building, and the dark clouds that I’d seen at Bernie Shepherd’s house moved east with me. Soon it started to rain. It took me over an hour to cross town, and by the time I got to Aurora, I felt as if I’d been running around all day. Then I realized I had been. On top of that, I was suddenly feeling some aches in muscles I didn’t usually use. It must’ve been tackling that kid in the alley. I glanced ruefully at my skinned palms while I waited at a light at South Parker Road and Peoria Street. What a day.

  The light changed and I made my way into a neighborhood off East Cornell that was dominated by modest townhomes with tidy yards and separate garages. All the buildings were painted the same dull gray with white trim – I’m sure because a Homeowners’ Association dictated against other colors – but it left the neighborhood without any character. As I pulled up to Pam Shepherd’s unit, I noticed that she’d painted the trim around her front door a bright yellow.

  A small bit of defiance against convention? was my first thought. Then I wondered about her living in an area that was clearly less affluent than Denise Hinton’s neighborhood. Had Pam not received as much in her divorce as Denise had in hers? Or did Pam not want the expense of a nicer place?

  The rain was coming down harder now. I grabbed a compact umbrella from the backseat, hopped out and opened it. Then I rushed up the walk to the covered porch. I rang the bell and waited, but no one answered. I glanced at my watch. 4:15. Maybe she wasn’t home from work yet. I turned around and frowned. I hated to wait, but I also didn’t want to drive over here again if I didn’t have to.

  I ran back to the 4-Runner, closed the umbrella, and jumped inside. My head and shoulders were wet, and a chill ran up my back. I wiped rain off my face and then dug out my cell phone again. I kept an eye on Pam’s front door while I googled her name.

  The first thing I saw was a number of LinkedIn profiles for that name, so I clicked on the site and started scrolling through the list. I finally found a Pam Shepherd who lived in Denver, so I checked that one. This Pam Shepherd worked as an office manager at a law office in Cherry Creek, a posh area of town, and she’d been there for a few years. She hadn’t included a picture, and I continued to poke around the web, but didn’t find one of her. I also didn’t find anything else of note about her, so I took a break and searched on the best of film noir. One site listed The Maltese Falcon as the best film noir. As much as I love Bogie, I wasn’t sure I’d agree. But then, how do you rank a “best of”? With so many great movies, it was hard to do. The dark clouds finally drifted east but a light rain continued. Even with that, the sun came out again, and I saw a beautiful rainbow.

  An hour later, a plump woman holding an umbrella in one hand and a large purse in the other hurried around the side of the building and onto the porch. She glanced up at the sky, then carefully shook off her umbrella and set it by the door. As she dug into her purse, I jumped out of the 4-Runner and dashed up the walk.

  “Excuse me, are you Pam Shepherd?” I called out.

  She turned around and warily eyed me, her keys in her hand. “Yes.”

  After Glenn LeBlanc had caught me using an alias, and since Pam worked at a law office, I decided to play it safe. “My name’s Reed Ferguson. I’m a private investigator.” I pulled out my license and showed it to her.

  She scrutinized it carefully, and then handed it back to me. “Is there something wrong?” She spoke in a high, soft voice, but with no concern or edge in her tone, just curiosity.

  “I’d like to ask you a few questions about your ex-husband, if you have a minute.”

  She hesitated. “I’ve been divorced from him for a long time, and I don’t have any contact with him anymore, so I don’t think I can help you.”

  “Please,” I said, not wanting to beg. “It’s important.”

  She waited so long I thought she’d refuse, but then she said, “Just a few minutes, okay? It’s chilly with the rain.” She was in a peach-colored skirt and sleeveless white blouse, and I could see goose bumps on her arms. “Hold on.”

&nbs
p; She unlocked the door, but rather than ask me in, she grabbed a sweater from inside and wrapped it around herself. I didn’t blame her for not asking me inside. She was playing it safe, and that was smart. She turned around and contemplated me as she smoothed her wavy brown hair, as if making sure she was presentable for our conversation.

  She focused soft blue eyes on me. “So what does a private investigator want with Bernie?”

  “He hired me,” I said. “He thinks someone is trying to kill him.”

  “What for?”

  “That’s confidential.”

  She nodded slowly. “Did he get himself into some kind of trouble?” Then she held up a hand. “Never mind. You probably can’t tell me.”

  I answered with a shrug. “Tell me about your ex. What was he like?”

  “He could be pretty intense at times and very driven to succeed. But he was a nice guy.”

  “Why’d you divorce, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  She gazed past me, a faraway look in her eyes. “We grew apart, I guess. Over the years he was more focused on his work, or golf, and I had other things taking up my time. One day I woke up and realized I didn’t really know him anymore, and he felt the same way. So I moved out.”

  “To here?” I gestured at her door.

  “No.” She smiled wryly. “I moved in with a friend, and once Bernie and I settled, I bought an expensive townhouse in Lone Tree.”

  “Nice area.” Lone Tree was south of Denver, full of McMansions on large lots.

  “It is, but it got to be more than I could handle.”

  “Did Bernie pay you maintenance?” I knew what he’d said; now to see if she confirmed it.

  “Yes, although he wasn’t very regular about his payments, and that’s why the townhome I had in Lone Tree became too much, along with a car payment on a Beemer, and other things I was blowing money on. I had to find a job, and let me tell you, it wasn’t easy because I hadn’t worked in years. Then I sold the car and the place in Lone Tree and bought here. And you know,” she flashed another smile, “I’m happier without all the stress of that huge mortgage and other bills.”

  “That’s not what I would’ve expected you to say.”

  “Why?”

  I hesitated. “Bernie said you were angry with him because he wasn’t paying you maintenance anymore.”

  She laughed, but it held no bitterness. “I was, at first. But I reached a point – with a little therapy – where I let go of the past. I got tired of fighting with him, and reporting him to court, all the while stressing about my bills. And I’d been looking to Bernie to keep me going, but I realized I was capable of taking care of myself. I’ve had to adjust to a new lifestyle, but it’s been good for me. Now I don’t care anymore if he pays me or not.”

  If she was angry at her ex, she wasn’t showing it. Had Shepherd been wrong when he said she might want to kill him?

  “That sounds like a healthy place to be in,” I said.

  “I think so.”

  “I’ve got another problem. Your ex has gone missing. Do you know of any place he might go, a place where he’d feel safe?”

  “Why don’t you talk to Pete about him? You’ve heard of Pete Hinton? He worked with Bernie, and he and Bernie were buds.”

  “Pete Hinton is dead.”

  Her jaw slowly dropped. “What happened?”

  “He was killed in Tahiti.”

  She fell against the side of the building. “I didn’t hear.” She paused, and then said, “What happened?”

  I explained what little I knew, but left out that I’d actually been there, since I still couldn’t explain that coincidence.

  “Wow,” she said. “What a shame.”

  “Did you like Pete?”

  “He was an okay guy, kind of intense, like Bernie. Pete was brilliant, not just a great doctor, he seemed to know everything about everything. He was a computer and math whiz in college, but got bored with it, so he decided to go into medicine. And I don’t think that was a challenge for him, either.” She shook her head in awe. “Have you ever met anyone like that?”

  “Just one,” I said, thinking about Cal.

  “Well, they have my admiration. I’m not that smart.”

  “Me, neither.”

  She glanced away. “That is a shame about him.” Then she focused on me. “But to answer your question, if Bernie’s not with Pete, I don’t know where he’d be.”

  I nodded and took out a business card. “If you happen to hear from Bernie, or if you think of anything that might help me find him, would you call me?”

  “Of course.”

  I thanked her for her time and then went back to the 4-Runner. It had stopped raining, but it was definitely cool. I shivered, not because of the chill, but because I had an ominous feeling that something bad was going to happen.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It had been a long day, full of surprises, but lacking in answers, so I decided to call it quits for now. I’d go home, see my wife, and regroup. I called Willie to tell her I’d be there soon, then started the 4-Runner and got back onto Peoria and fought rush-hour traffic. On the way back to my condo in the Uptown neighborhood, just east of downtown, I went over my conversation with Pam Shepherd and attempted to get everything straight in my mind.

  So the real ex-wife of Bernie Shepherd held no ill will toward him, at least on the surface. She seemed very nice about her ex-husband, but was she hiding her true feelings? Did she secretly want to kill Shepherd, as he’d suggested when I talked to him?

  And what about Denise Hinton, the woman who I’d thought was Bernie’s ex, when I thought he was Pete Hinton. She held a grudge against the real Pete, her ex, who just happened to be a murder victim. So who had killed him, and who wanted to kill Bernie Shepherd? Were these two situations connected? I was certain that Shepherd could clear up both questions, if only I could find him.

  I finally arrived home, and I dragged myself wearily up the stairs to my unit. When I went inside, Willie was in the kitchen, fixing meatloaf. I hadn’t asked her to, and it was a sweet surprise.

  “I was going to suggest we go out to eat, but you sounded tired,” she said as she mixed bread crumbs into the ground beef. “So I figured I’d whip up some comfort food.”

  I came over and gave her a kiss. “You’re the best. And I will treat you to dinner when this case is finished.”

  “I’m holding you to it.”

  “Can I help with anything?”

  “No,” she smiled. “I’ve got this. Tell me about your day.”

  I grabbed a Fat Tire from the fridge, sat down, and took a long pull on it. “I need something to break my way, but so far, nothing has.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “I lost my client today.”

  “He fired you?”

  “No. I can’t find him.”

  “How do you lose a client?”

  She sounded too much like Spillman right at that moment.

  “I’m not sure,” I said.

  “Didn’t you get his contact info?” Willie threw me a puzzled look. “Explain, please.”

  So I did, and concluded with, “He might be dead.”

  “How would you know that?”

  I shrugged. “If that’s the case, and his body is found and identified, Spillman said she’d let me know. In the meantime, I need to see if I can track him down.”

  “How’re you going to do that?”

  I didn’t say anything for a moment. “I don’t know.”

  She looked at me sympathetically as she pressed the meat concoction into a loaf pan. “I wish I could help.”

  “I do, too.”

  She put the meatloaf in the oven and turned to me. “How about a little TV while that bakes, and then a movie?”

  “That sounds good.”

  We watched the news, had dinner, and spent the rest of the evening watching sitcoms and then Sunset Boulevard, a favorite movie of mine. I let the case details simmer in the back of my mind, bu
t didn’t have any earth-shattering revelations.

  And then something finally did break my way.

  It happened with a phone call the next day. It was one o’clock and Willie was at work. I was sitting in my office, staring at Bogie on The Big Sleep poster. I’d already been back to the Twelfth Street Hotel and the Corner Store to see if Bernie Shepherd had showed up or if anyone had seen him – no one had – and I’d checked at his house as well, in case he decided to go back home. But I hadn’t seen him there either, and I wasn’t sure where else to look.

  Then Bogie started talking, and not the one on the poster. I answered my phone.

  “Is this Reed Ferguson?”

  “Yes?” I couldn’t quite place the voice.

  “This is John Mills.”

  It took me a second. “Oh, Pete Hinton’s neighbor.”

  “Yes. You asked me to call you if I saw anything suspicious at Pete’s house.”

  I sat up straight. “Did you see something?”

  “As a matter of fact, I did. Last night, when I went to bed. I thought I saw a light coming from one of the windows. Pete does have some lamps on timers, but they should’ve been shut off by the time I looked. I went over to check, but the house was dark.”

  “Did you see anyone?”

  “No, I didn’t. I went by again today, but it was quiet. I had some appointments, or I would’ve called you earlier.”

  Had Hinton’s killer come back to look for something? I wondered.

  “Thanks for letting me know,” I said. “I think I’ll stop by and take a look.”

  “Do you want me to come over?” he asked eagerly.

  “No, I should be fine. But if you see a black 4-Runner around, you’ll know it’s me.”

  “Okay.” He sounded disappointed. Probably didn’t have anything else to do, but I didn’t need him hanging around. “I’ll let you know if I see anybody else.”

  “That would be great.”

  I ended the call, grabbed my Glock from the closet and put on my ankle holster. Then I raced out the door. As I came down the stairs and around to the front of the building, I ran into Ace.