Checkered Thief (A Laurel London Mystery Book 3) (8 page)

“It’s a shame about you and Derek.” Sharon tsked from the front seat.

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

It wasn’t the first time people in town have rooted for my friendship with Derek to become more than just a friendship. Like Trixie, everyone thought that since we grew up in the orphanage, we should get married and live happily ever after.

Guess what? Screw happily ever after. It left a bad taste in my mouth thinking about it.

“Trixie swears you have an undying love for Derek and I could see it when you two saved me.” Sharon’s words didn’t sit well in my gut. Or maybe I was just hungry.

“Listen, Derek and I are just friends.” I gripped the wheel and took a sharp left on Main Street, gunning the gas toward the orphanage house. “He is happy with Brittany and I’m happy with . . .”

“Honey, don’t say Jax.” Sharon shook her head. “Rita Brown told me about your little tiff in The Cracked Egg and something about him finding you facedown drunk at Lucky Strikes.” She leaned over and sniffed me. “Oh dear.” She put her hand to her head. “You aren’t still drunk are you? I should’ve asked before I got in the car with you.”

“Too damn late.” I turned into the driveway and pulled up to the front of the house, putting it in PARK.  “You’ve been riding with me for forty minutes there and forty minutes back. And I’m going in here to get another swig before I go kick Rita Brown’s ass.”

“You will do no such thing.” She flung the door open and moved faster than I had ever seen her. She bolted up the steps after me and rushed through the screen door.

“Trixie!” I screamed down the hall as I darted toward the kitchen. “Where’s the bottle?”

“Are you nuts?” Trixie sat at the kitchen table bench, Henrietta in her lap happily sleeping.

“She is nuts, Trixie.” Sharon gasped for air. Her fingers grasped around opposite sides of the pie plate. “She is drunk.”

“She is not.” Trixie’s smile met her eyes. They glistened in amusement. “I gave her the cure.” She referred to the mixture she’d given me this morning.

“It’s five o’clock somewhere.” I slurred my words and looked up at the clock and realized I couldn’t play around anymore. It was after lunch and I hadn’t made it to my first stop.

“See!” Sharon stuck the pie on the counter and pointed. “She’s drunk!”

“Nah.” I flung a loose wrist in the air.

Trixie laughed and put Henrietta on the floor before she got up. She opened the cabinet door and took out a couple of plates and a knife from the drawer. “Did you see my prize?”

“I did.” I kissed her on the forehead. “I’ve got to go.”

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“I’ve got some business to take care of.” I waved her off, trying to knock her off my trail. She seemed awfully curious about my whereabouts and it wasn’t normal for her to do. “You two enjoy your prize pie and watch some SyFy.” I grabbed her tinfoil hat off the counter and stuck it on top of her head. “It’s getting crazy out there.”

She didn’t say another word when I walked out. Before I left, I headed into the office and closed the door behind me. Trixie and Ben Bassman, the lawyer from my mobster grandfather, were the only two people who knew I had blood money.

I couldn’t think of anyone else I would rather spend it on than Derek. I would give the money to Bethany to pay off her debt and get Brittany so Derek could have his happily ever after.

I had only kept a few hundred thousand at the house for me and Trixie. Trixie was fixing up the house and we did it a little at a time so people in town wouldn’t find out I had the money. We still kept my identity a secret because there were still family members of those my grandfather had offed out there and I didn’t want to be put in a body bag for a family I didn’t know.

Many times I had almost told Derek about the money, but I didn’t and now I’m glad I didn’t.

“What are you doing?” Trixie asked from the door.

I hadn’t heard her coming because I’d been too busy unscrewing the non-working old radiator—the perfect disguise—where Trixie and I had hidden the money in the wall. 

“I. . .” I jumped up. “I am worried.”

Think, think, think
. My brain had to come up with a good lie for her to believe me.

“Laurel, I’m not using our money to gamble.” She looked over her shoulder out into the hallway. I could only assume she didn’t want Sharon to hear us. “I have been using my pension The Gorilla,” (my grandfather’s mob name), “had set up for me. And I’m only doing the penny slots. You know that.”

“You promise?” I asked. Thank God, she came up with my excuse to look at the money.

“Yes.” She dipped her head. “I’ve got to go before Sharon comes looking. Right now she’s petting Henrietta.”

“Fine.” I gave her a motherly look. “I don’t want you having a gambling problem since this casino has come to town.”

“And I don’t want you to have a drinking problem since Brittany has come to town.” She grinned ear to ear knowing she just stung me.

“Touché.” I laughed, sticking the screws back in the radiator. I wasn’t going to be able to get some money for Bethany right now, but I would find her and tell her I had it to use and she could pay me back later.

It was noon and traffic was starting to pick up going back into town. Casino visitors apparently didn’t get up early after a long night of gambling.

Going at a snail’s pace let me glance down Fifth Street, in hopes I’d see Bethany walking out of Shear Illusions, but no such luck. But I did turn right into the Windmill Hotel parking lot. By now Louie had to be finished with his Krispy Kreme doughnut rounds.

The hotel lot was packed with out-of-town license plates on all the cars. Brittany’s yellow Jeep wasn’t in the parking lot. I know Louie said she had car trouble, or rather, Bethany had car trouble in the middle of the night, which contributed to the fight between her and Derek. Derek could’ve easily taken her car to his shop and given her one of his beater cars he used to pick car parts from.

Bang, bang, bang.
  I beat the bulletproof window that was between the hotel customers and Louie. He was on the stool, his shoulders slumped, his eyes closed, drool dripping from his open mouth.

“Shit, Laurel!” He fell off, landing on his feet like a cat. “You scared the shit out of me.”

“Doesn’t look like it.” I glanced down at his pants expecting to see a stain. “Hey, why do you have this bulletproof glass?”

Not that it was a valid reason why I was there, but it was something I just wanted to know.

“I’m glad I did.” He nodded toward the parking lot. “You can’t imagine what types of people a casino drags in. All kinds of people. And some look sketchy.”

“Really?” I hadn’t thought about it, but I wondered if Brittany’s hostage takers were here. Come to think of it, there wasn’t anything local but the Windmill. Long shot but it was worth looking in to.

“Yeah. Like the guy in number one.” He pointed to the first door that started off the row of doors at the ranch hotel. “He is really weird. Asking all sorts of questions about the town and people who might work at the casino.”

“Really?” I snarled my nose in a playful no crap kind of way, only my curiosity was way up.

“Yeah. And he keeps weird hours.” Louie got closer to the window where the round speaker was, he drew his lips in thoughtfully and whispered, “He carries a briefcase and has changed cars twice in one week. He doesn’t even want cleaning service. Can you imagine what it must look like in there? No cleaning for a week.”

“He’s been here a week?” This guy was definitely someone I needed to look into. He could’ve been planning Brittany’s kidnapping all week, collecting evidence and then doing the deed. “Did you answer his questions about the town?”

Forget about the uncleanliness going on behind the door in room one, I wanted to know what it appeared to be hiding.

“Of course not. Well, not many,” he corrected himself rather quickly.

“Say, this morning you said that you needed some help cleaning rooms.” I wanted to say to him that if he didn’t waste so much time sleeping on the stool, he might get the rooms cleaned and lose some weight, but this was my in. “I’m not busy right now with Drive Me,” I didn’t mention how Jax didn’t need me for paperwork detail for his private eye practice, “I thought I’d offer my services to clean a few rooms to keep me busy and all.”

“How much would you charge me?” He perked up in interest and quickly drew back once I straightened up. “I mean, I can only offer about twenty-five bucks a room.”

“Sure.” I shrugged knowing I was giving him a deal, but it wasn’t the money I needed. It was inside of that room of that guy asking all the questions.

“Really?” Louie even stood up. The stool tipped over, but he was so excited, he already had a bucket of stuff in hand and was heading out of the little door to the outside world. “This is the best news all day.” He held the bucket out in front of him.

“Right now?” I asked.

“No time like the present.” The bucket swung back and forth between us. “That guy in three just left so you can start there.”

“Perfect!” My voice escalated, sounding a little too over-joyous. “I mean,” I cleared my throat. “No time like now.”

“Let me get you a key to get started.” He shoved the bucket in my chest and I took it, looking down into it.

A stench I was familiar with crept into my nose, giving me an instant gag reflex. The bucket was filled with moldy bristle brushes and the bucket even had specks of mold in the bottom.

“Here you go.” Louie had an untied hanger in his hands. A key dangled from a piece of string tied around it.

“This is the key?” I rolled my eyes. “Louie, you need to get with the times. You need those slide key card thingies you see in movies.”

“If business keeps up like it has been, I’ll be able to do that and more.” He rubbed his hands together.

“And you need new cleaning supplies. They have mold on them.” I held the bucket away from my body. The smell reminded me of cleaning the orphanage. “You can run over to the Dollar Store and grab some new bottles.”

The yellow color of the toilet bowl cleaner was light as though there was water added to the bottle.

“I’ll run over real quick and grab some if you can keep an eye on the office while I’m gone.” He grabbed his keys from the office.

“Sure.” I smiled knowing I’d get all the information I needed from the guy in room number one. “I’d be happy to.”

“Here are the keys in case you need to get in there.” He handed me another set of keys on a coat hanger, one of them labeled
office
, before he jumped into his car.

There wouldn’t be a whole lot of time since nothing in Walnut Grove was more than just a couple of minutes from each other. I had to call in the big dog.

“Gia, I need your help.” I didn’t bother giving her time to chit-chat with me about how my day had been since I left the café and Jax had turned on me in front of everyone. “I need you to either call Louie or run to the Dollar Store and stall him. I have some investigation work to do.”

“What?” Gia chomped on the other end of the phone. “You are what?”

“I’ll explain later. But it’s for Jax and me.” I knew if I tugged at her heartstrings she’d give.

“Are you getting a romantic room together for you two?” I could practically see the smile and smell the smoke from the wheels turning in her head.

“You got it,” I lied, feeling a tiny bit guilty that I lied to my best friend. A code you just didn’t break unless in dire need. And this was dire need. “I’ll call you later!”

There was an audible groan from her but I didn’t wait to hear the complaint. I knew the café was probably busy, but I also knew the afternoon staff was there to help out. Besides, what were best friends for? At least I hoped she saw it that way if she found out I wasn’t completely truthful with her.

My first order of business was to get into the office and look at the computer for anything on room number one, only there wasn’t a computer in there. Louie was so far behind the times. The keys proved it and the old rotary phone was just the icing. Behind his messy desk was a large filing cabinet as rusty as the tines on the scrub brush. There was a little relief to see each drawer was labeled with a shared room number.

I opened the top one with
room one and two
written in black sharpie. Louie definitely didn’t know how to keep up with the bookkeeping. My guess would be that Sally had done all of it before she died and he hadn’t hired anyone to help him. It was a shame because I was going to have to waste time trying to figure out who was in room one.

There were two files in the drawer. One for room one and one for room two.

I opened up both files to see what he had in them. There were credit card receipts and signed room contracts from what looked to be past customers.

“Date. Date.” I scanned over the credit card receipts in room one file since it seemed to be the local way to see who was renting the room, but didn’t see anything dated within the last week. Louie did say the guy had been around for a week and asking all sorts of questions. I put the file back in the drawer and slammed it shut, almost giving up. Almost.

Until my eyes slid over the desk. There was a receipt pad with carbon copies. Quickly I grabbed it and started thumbing through. I should’ve known a real criminal wouldn’t use a credit card so it could be traced. I bet the kidnapper in room one used cash.

“Trent T. Lyle.” I tapped the yellow copy that had “merchant” stamped on the bottom.

Louie had written the date, room one, and Trent T. Lyle’s address.

“Las Vegas.” I smiled. “Where else are there major casinos?” I grabbed my phone out of my back pocket and took a picture. There wasn’t time for me to write anything down; I had to get out of there before Louie got back and into room one before Trent got back. I flipped to the next page and saw Brittany Hawthorne’s name on the receipt along with room two written by Louie on the bottom. I took a picture of that because it also looked like she was renting by the week and paying for it by cash.

I ran my finger down the screwed in hooks on the wall and found the hanger with
room one
written in sharpie marker on the actual key. I grabbed it and room two’s key before grabbing the bucket of moldy cleaning supplies, then locked the office door behind me and headed over to room one. I slipped the room two key in my pocket.