Handcuffs in the Heather

by Dale Mayer

  And rather than making herself a sandwich, she sat to have another banana muffin. And then, with the second banana muffin and a cup of coffee, she sat out on the little deck, my very little deck, she reminded herself. It would now only be a temporary deck though.

  As soon as she finished her coffee, she would get a second quote. That would give her the information she needed. Just as she was about to finish her coffee and to head out, Nan called back again.

  “Jenny says, thank you. That’s exactly who she was thinking of. She said the woman gave Manny something. That’s one of the reasons why it struck her as odd.”

  “Do you know what it was she gave her?”

  Nan’s voice rose in triumph as she said, “Yes. This woman gave Manny money.”

  Chapter 31

  Wednesday Late Afternoon …

  There were a lot of reasons why a woman would have given Manny money. And there were many bad reasons why somebody would have done it too. But Doreen would focus on the good reasons. Maybe the woman wanted to be charitable. Maybe her husband hadn’t paid last time for his job with Manny and had sent his wife to clear his bill. Although that boggled her mind. But it didn’t mean it wasn’t possible. People did all kinds of strange things.

  And the truth of the matter was, that was just the way life was. Just when you thought you understood people, they went and did something strange. She couldn’t jump to conclusions. Even though Jenny had identified the woman as being Norbert’s wife, that wasn’t necessarily enough to go on. But it was another connection between the two cases. It was also enough to go talk to Peter again. She wished he had a cell phone. She was tempted to buy him a disposable one, so, while she investigated this case, they could talk. And then her phone rang again. She stared at the unknown number. When she answered, Peter’s father, Jeremiah, from the secondhand store, spoke.

  In an emotional voice, he said, “Thank you.”

  “For what?” she asked cautiously.

  “Peter’s here,” he said. “He’s pretty shaken up, but apparently you guys found Manny.”

  “Yes, that’s true, but it’s not the end of the search. We still don’t know anything about what happened to him.”

  “No,” he said, “we know that. But we’re grateful. Anything at this point is hugely helpful. I can’t believe Peter’s been off drugs and sober for six months.” The older man’s voice got tremulous.

  After that, they spoke for a few more moments, and then Doreen asked, “Is it possible to speak with your son for a minute?”

  “Sure, sure, sure,” he said. “Hey, Peter, Doreen wants to talk to you.”

  In the background, she could hear Peter ask, “Who’s Doreen?”

  “The bone lady with all the pets, looking into Manny’s case,” he said in exasperation. “Come on. The woman you just talked to.”

  The phone was handed over, and then Peter came on the line. His voice was a little shaky as he said, “Hello?”

  “Good afternoon, Peter. I hope you’re feeling better.”

  “Not too much,” he said, “but the shock’s eased a bit now. That’s always the worst, isn’t it?”

  “I think so, yes,” Doreen said gently. “I did hear from Manny’s mother. Of course, you know, she received the news about Manny’s death today too. She did say she saw her daughter once when she was with a bunch of church ladies. Apparently she was walking in the park, and Manny came over to talk to her and ended up saying something about not having to worry about him anymore because he was leaving soon. His mom did assume at the time he had found a way to move to another part of the country. But Manny’s mother also mentioned she saw somebody with him, and it took a while to figure out who it was. That woman gave Manny some money.”

  “Lots of people gave us money though,” Peter protested. “Think about it. We were always panhandling.”

  “In this case though,” Doreen said, “it was Lynette, Norbert’s wife.”

  Peter gasped. “Oh, I remember that,” he cried out. Then he stopped and asked, “Is it important?”

  “In stuff like this,” Doreen said, “it’s almost impossible to know what’s important and what’s not. But do you know why Norbert’s wife would have given Manny money?”

  “A lot of reasons, I suppose,” he said, “but the biggest one was she wanted Manny to disappear. She said he was a humiliation and called him all kinds of nasty names. She was a piece of work, that one. Talk about kicking somebody when they’re down. That was just the person she was.”

  “Did she give Manny much money?”

  “Yes, it was a lot,” he admitted. “And I think that was why Manny was thinking she could possibly leave this time.”

  “Was that a condition of receiving the money? Was the wife paying off Manny, telling her to stay away from her husband or some such thing?”

  “I don’t think she cared about the husband one bit. I think she was hoping Manny would just disappear and would stop being an embarrassment.” He sniggered. “Norbert used to talk to Manny all the time. He was really unhappily married and didn’t know why he married his wife in the first place. Plus, as soon as they were married, she stopped being a wife in many ways.”

  “So, maybe Norbert came to Manny as much for friendship as anything.”

  “I think so, yes, and maybe more,” he said. “He really was sweet on him. The weekly appointment could have been a way for him to help out Manny as well.”

  “True,” Doreen said. “I’m glad Manny had Norbert and you as friends right up to the end.”

  That was the wrong thing to say because Peter started blubbering again.

  “You don’t happen to remember how much money it was, do you?” Doreen asked, trying to pull Peter out of it. “Or if it happened more than once?”

  “It was just once,” he said. “We talked about it lots afterward because Manny was enthralled with the amount of money she’d been given. It was thousands of dollars. And it wasn’t long before Manny was broke again. But he’d given everybody he knew a shot of drugs to save them from having to do at least a couple tricks.”

  “Sounds like Manny’s actions came from heart,” Doreen said with a smile. “Too bad he couldn’t take that money and run with it though.”

  “I think he was planning on it. But he did tell Norbert, you know?”

  Doreen’s eyebrows shot up. “Manny told Norbert what his wife had done?”

  “Yes,” Peter said. “Norbert was really angry about it. When he left Manny, he told him that he’d fix it. But he did tell Manny to keep the money. He also gave him a lovely ring. Manny hawked it and bought a cheap replacement at the pawnshop. He wouldn’t wear it, but Manny couldn’t quite let it go. He’d been really touched.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Doreen said. She figured Manny had probably spent all the money from Lynette and from selling Norbert’s ring by the time Manny had hooked up with Norbert a week later too. “I just wonder if maybe the wife made arrangements to help Manny get out of town.”

  “If she did, she didn’t tell Manny about it,” Peter said. “Honestly, it would have been much better if she had made arrangements like that. You can’t give money to a junkie. It just disappears up the arm, like everything else.”

  “Still, it was something. Did Manny see her again? When he didn’t leave town right away, did Norbert’s wife come back and yell at Manny for not having followed through?”

  “I saw her myself once,” Peter said. “And she didn’t seem happy to see us there, but she didn’t have a screaming fit or anything. I think Manny just gave her the finger as she drove by.”

  “Which would have pissed her right off.”

  “Oh, yes, absolutely,” Peter said with a chuckle. “But you know what? You always get those highbrow people who think everybody else is beneath them.”

  Doreen knew all too well because she’d had to hang out with the highbrow people. Unfortunately she was afraid that, in the past, she may have come across as one of those highbrow people too. “If you th
ink of any other confrontations or anybody else who might have done something odd, like that matter with Lynette, you’ll let me know, won’t you?”

  “Nothing comes to mind,” Peter said. “That was just such an odd thing. I even forgot about it until you brought it up.”

  “Considering it all happened fairly close in time to when Manny went missing and when Norbert died …”

  “Do you think Lynette had anything to do with Manny’s death?” Peter asked, his voice suddenly dark.

  “Oh, I doubt it,” Doreen said hurriedly. “And remember. We can’t assume anything. We need hard evidence.” When she heard Mack’s words rolling off the tip of her tongue, she rolled her eyes. Then she said, “Don’t think or do anything rash.”

  “I’m too tired to do anything rash.”

  “I’m glad you went home to see your father,” she said.

  “Yeah,” Peter said gruffly. “Me too.”

  Doreen hung up and sat here, pondering the information for a few moments. She had her suspicions, but that was all they were. Suspicions. It was too easy to get the wrong person at this stage. She sent Mack an email, telling him about the money from Lynette and the wife telling Manny to get out of town. It wasn’t anything but another puzzle piece. It helped, but it didn’t do a lot when the rest of the puzzle pieces were still missing. All in all, she didn’t have any information that made a difference. And that was very distressing. She started in on searching for the license plate. What were the chances of finding one that ended with a Y? There had to be another way to do this.

  Frustrated twenty minutes later, Doreen picked up the phone and dialed Mack.

  When he answered, she asked, “Did you search for that truck?”

  His voice was mild when he said, “Good afternoon, Doreen. You know it’s almost dinnertime, right?”

  She gasped and said, “Really?”

  “Really,” he said. “So, no, I haven’t had a chance to check out that license plate. Why?”

  “Because I’m wondering if anybody had that number before.”

  “Remember? It’s not a number. It’s a letter, and there are probably lots of them. I did start a search, but I don’t remember if I checked to see if the results have come up. I’ve been a little busy.”

  “I get that,” she’s said, “but I think it’s important.”

  “I might be able to tap in from here. I’ll call you back.” He disappeared on the phone as soon as he said that.

  Doreen made herself a cup of tea and stared out moodily. This case was about to crack wide open, and she had a pretty damn good idea what was going on, but she just didn’t know how. She settled down again and looked up Lynette’s address. That was the one person who needed a good talking to. She was the one hiding secrets. Or maybe she didn’t give a damn. She certainly hadn’t waited before she remarried. So, who knew what was going on there?

  Doreen found the address, looked it up, and realized it was a ten-minute drive away. As she sat here, doing nothing anyway, she thought, What the heck? She stood and grabbed her keys.

  Then Mugs raced past her, and Thaddeus cried behind her, “Thaddeus come. Thaddeus come.” Even Goliath sauntered in to see what was happening.

  She stopped with a groan and said, “Really? Do we all have to go?”

  Chapter 32

  Wednesday Late Afternoon …

  Mugs barked several times, and Doreen laughed. “Okay,” she said. “Fine. It’s a road trip.”

  With all three animals in her car again, Doreen backed down the driveway and out of the cul-de-sac, heading toward Gordon Avenue. Finally she turned toward Dilworth Road and used it to cut across the mall area to Dilworth Mountain. In her mind, she understood where she was supposed to go, but some of the streets didn’t sound familiar. She took several corners and then finally came to the right street. And shortly afterward, she came to the house in question. It was a huge all-brick mansion and looked timeless. It sat there, just off to the corner, where it would maximize the view of the city below.

  Doreen nodded to herself, pulled up and around, parked, got out with the animals, and decided she’d take a casual walk past. She was walking on the other side when a Mercedes pulled into the driveway. Their big garage door opened, and the Mercedes pulled in beside a truck. This made Doreen stop in her tracks.

  “It pulled up beside a black truck,” she whispered to herself. She hurriedly pulled out her phone and called Mack.

  “I haven’t had a chance to get an answer yet,” he snapped at her.

  “New search,” she said, her voice steadily soft. “Look up Norbert’s wife’s new husband’s vehicles. She just parked her Mercedes in her garage beside a black truck.”

  Mack swore on the other end of the phone.

  She cut him off, saying, “Yes, I’m here. Yes, I’m looking. Yes, I have a damn good idea what happened, and you need to get me some proof.”

  Then she hung up on him and walked around the cul-de-sac a couple times before putting the animals back into her vehicle and sitting with them, wondering what she should do now. She needed the woman’s number. Using her cell phone, she tried to track it down but didn’t get anywhere. It was probably unlisted. She needed Mack to get that too. And that would just piss him off.

  Finally she decided to leave her car, taking Mugs and Goliath on their leashes and Thaddeus on her shoulder. She walked up to the front door and rang the doorbell. It was one of those elegant executive homes her ex would have loved. She’d lived in plenty of them herself too, but they didn’t appeal to her. They always had that modern contemporary look but were very cold feeling. When the door opened, a beautifully coiffed blonde stood in front of her with a bored look on her face.

  The woman reminded Doreen of her past. All the women she’d known back then had the same elegance and the same bored look.

  She asked, “Yes?”

  Doreen gave her a bright smile and with a blunt tone said, “I just wondered why you tried to pay Manny money to leave town.”

  The woman stared at her, and fear whispered through her eyes.

  Doreen nodded and added, “Exactly. Did you think it would all just go away?”

  The woman looked around hurriedly. “You better come in,” she said, as she pulled the door open.

  Doreen stepped inside with the animals in tow. A beautiful slate floor with some high-gloss finish made the entire room glow. But Doreen had seen much nicer. She was completely unimpressed if the woman was trying to intimidate her. Doreen had the wrong person in that regard. “So you haven’t answered my question.”

  “Why the hell should I?” the woman snapped, showing the ugliness that lived inside. “It’s got nothing to do with you.”

  “I get that you might not like that your first husband was banging Manny on a regular basis. Weekly, to be exact, but what difference did it make at that point if Manny was still around or not?”

  The woman stared at her in horror. “How could you possibly know all this?”

  “I also know,” Doreen said, “that Norbert was being charged with stealing from the bank.”

  “No, no, no.” The woman shook her head. “He wasn’t charged. That’s the thing. They were going to lay him off, but they weren’t going to charge him.”

  “So, what? You couldn’t handle it? You couldn’t handle the humiliation?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You couldn’t handle it, so you ran him down?”

  “I didn’t run him down,” she said. “How dare you accuse me!”

  “Why not? Manny disappears. Norbert dies in a hit-and-run, and a month later here you are, married and up another step on the social ladder.” Doreen waved her arm around at the house for emphasis.

  The woman’s face turned blotchy red with anger, and she stomped her foot on the floor. “You don’t know anything about it,” she said. “Do you have any idea what it’s like when your husband wants to spend time with a prostitute? Like, how absolutely disgusting is that?”

&nbs
p; “I think Manny was probably a very nice person,” Doreen said.

  “How could she/he be,” Lynette snapped. “It was an abomination.”

  “Right,” Doreen said, hating how this woman had reduced Manny to an it. “So you killed him.”

  The woman laughed. And the thing was, it was real laughter.

  Doreen’s heart sank, as she realized she’d been wrong.

  “I didn’t have anything to do with her. I tried to give her money, hoping she’d leave town and save me the humiliation that all my friends knew about. It was bad enough Norbert was being let go from the bank with a cloud of suspicion over him,” she said tiredly—her shiny good looks slipping into a brassiness, showing the tarnish over her years. “But to think he was doing whatever he was doing with that person, God!” She shook her head in disbelief.

  “And your marriage a month after Norbert died?” Doreen asked.

  “Oh, you should know,” the woman said snidely. “I understand your husband dumped you. So you went from having it all to having nothing. Well, I was done with having nothing—I wanted at all.”

  Doreen’s heart sank farther as she realized this woman already knew a lot of Doreen’s history and probably half the town did too. Doreen said, “You were married so fast. You were probably banging him while your husband was banging poor Manny.”

  “Poor Manny,” she snapped. “They’d known each other for forever. He kept trying to defend his lifestyle and saying he was just mixed up and needed support.” She shook her head. “It’s disgusting.”

  Doreen wasn’t of the same mind-set. “And your second husband, did he mind all that?”

  “Of course,” she said, “He wanted it all to go away himself.”

  “Of course he did,” Doreen said with a thin smile, not believing half of what Lynette said. “I guess, since Norbert died, life’s been good, right?”

  “Why shouldn’t it be?” the woman snapped. “I mean, I went through hell before my husband died. It was a relief when he was gone. And Manny too. You have no idea what it’s like to be the object of ridicule.”