Dark Carnival Murders (4 page)

"Okay, you two get your
act together and I’ll give you directions to the site." We were
finished for now and everyone left the room except Lacey and
me.

"I’m sorry, I wasn’t
trying to give you a hard time about money," she said.

"Lacey you’ve worked for
me for over a year and you’ve always kept everyone in line and put
up with all the bull the guys threw at you, so you deserve a raise
and you’ll get one. So beginning Monday start yourself at double
what you are making now, we have enough business to keep up. Does
that work for you?"

She looked shocked at the
offer and gave me a hug. "Thank you so much. Jessie is now getting
to the age where she needs things that she didn’t need before. This
will help with everything."

"Okay, get going and give
Mac a good-bye kiss; he’s running off to join the
carnival."

She laughed and we went
out to the lobby. Mac turned and said, "I’ll run Lacey and Jessie
home and come back with the camper." They left and Buck was on his
cell phone explaining to Maria what he was going to be doing. He
gave me a thumbs up and hung up.

An hour later Buck and Mac
had the camper looking like two macho men were living out of it. We
put in plenty of beer cans and tossed clothes around to give it a
homey look. They were dressed in bluejeans and cutoff t-shirts with
their muscles bulging, looking all the part. I gave them the
directions to the carnival and who to see.

"Act like you’re just
needing a job for extra money and that you can travel. You both
know how to bullshit, but if you get caught don’t kill anyone
unless it’s absolutely necessary."

They got in the truck and
drove off. Angelo, Penny and I stood with Earl and Paula watching
them go.

"Think this is going to
work?" Earl asked.

"I’m hoping on it. Buck
and Mac both look like bikers and rowdies, they shouldn’t have any
problems. Now if you and I went in for a job, they’d carry us out
on a rail," I said smiling at him. "All we can do now is wait. I
need to call the Walkers and let them to know they have to wait
too. It’s going to be a rough night for them." I went back to my
office to call.

~~*~~

Mac drove into the
carnival parking and up near the tent. It was late but the crowd
was still at a busy level. Buck and Mac got out and wandered around
the place to get familiar with the rides again, it had been a long
time for both to have been away from that kind of work.

They spotted the huge
trailer that held the office and went up the stairs to the door.
Buck knocked and heard someone yell to come in, they entered. There
was a small counter with a rather rough looking woman behind the
grill that separated the entrance from the rest of the
truck.

"Can I help you mugs?" the
woman growled.

"We’re looking for work,"
Buck growled back. The woman smiled, Buck had that effect on women,
even the ugly ones.

"What kind of work?" she
said nicer now.

"Carnie work, we’ve both
got experience running the rides." Buck was trying to sound like a
low life.

"What makes you think we
need help?" she fired back.

"Carnivals always need
help. You gain people, you lose people from quitters to those going
to jail. We just figured maybe you had a couple holes to
fill."

"Maybe we do, what are
your backgrounds, criminal I mean?"

Buck grinned, he had a
troubled youth and could prove it, "I’ve had a few run-ins with the
law, back in Detroit, nothing near murder, mostly petty crimes,
drunk driving, a few high speed chases. Never killed anyone I would
admit to."

The woman looked to Mac,
he smiled and said, "I was a choir boy in Kansas, maybe a few small
infractions bending the law but I’m clean."

"No major warrants out for
either of you? I will check, so don’t bullshit me."

Buck said, giving her his
famous walrus smile, "We be good boys now, ma’am."

She sat staring at them,
then said, "You’ll have to talk to Mr. Dark, the owner, but I’ll
put in a good word. We need two big guys like you, now days we can
only seem to get scrawny druggies and burnouts. Hang on and I’ll
call him" She picked up a two way radio and called for the man. He
came back to her and she told him that there were two men looking
for work. "I think you need to take a look," she said with a
smile.

Buck and Mac stood in the
small lobby of the office and waited. Then the door flew open and
in walked the strange man in the top hat. Buck could see what Jim
had told him about how the man looked evil.

He strutted around Buck
and Mac sizing them up like cattle. "I’m impressed, do you have any
background in carnie work?"

Buck went over his resume
of the Bob-Lo island work then Mac explained what his
qualifications were. Dark just paced.

"Either of you into any
criminal activities, anything that you wouldn’t do if asked, if you
know what I mean."

"If you mean would we be
above doing something shady? Anything short of murder wouldn’t
bother us. If you know what I mean."

"Where are you from?" Dark
asked Buck.

"Detroit, all around, I
moved a lot."

Dark smiled and asked,
"Did you know Piper Davis?"

Amazingly, Buck did,
"Greasy little creep, into theft and kiddie porn, rode with the
Vigilantes bike club. That Piper Davis?"

Dark smiled and told the
woman, "Martha, get these men on the payroll. You two can start on
the round-up. Can you handle that?"

"We’ll have people stuck
to the walls," Buck said with his grin.

"Just don’t kill anyone...
yet," Dark said with a smirk and went out of the
trailer.

Buck smiled as the woman
pulled the paperwork for them to fill out. They had to lie as to
their addresses, luckily Buck still carried his Michigan driver’s
license and showed it to her. Mac just said Buck was driving their
truck and he had his license taken away. She accepted that, Buck
was sure she didn’t really care.

They finished up and the
woman called on the two way for some person named Skeeter to come
to the office. About ten minutes later a man entered, he was
introduced as Skeeter Lynn. He was about half the size of Buck and
looked like he hadn’t bathed in a few weeks.

"Yeah, Martha what’s up?"
he spoke with a toothless grin.

“
Dark said to get these
mugs started on the round-up. Watch them for a while to make sure
everything is good.”

“
You got it sexy woman,”
he said with a cough. He led Buck and Mac to the midway and over to
a corner where the massive ride sat. Its job was to spin fast,
forcing people against the walls as it lifted them off the ground.
It was centrifugal force that held the victims to the
wall.

Skeeter set them up with
the ride and watched for a bit. Luckily the round-up was a standard
ride so Buck and Mac both had experience with it.

Skeeter smiled and said,
“Yeah you know what you’re doing. Have fun.” He walked away as Buck
pulled his cell phone to call Jim.

*

Chapter 5

I was in my office and
picked up the desk phone and dialed the Walkers. The husband came
on and asked right off if we found them.

"Mr. Walker, please be
patient, we have two men now inside the carnival and they should be
able to find out what happened, you just have to wait now. I’ll
keep you informed as soon as we have something. This is our first
priority and I’m going to be bringing the police in shortly. We are
doing our best."

He was silent, then, "I
guess we will just have to depend on you, thank you and we’ll be
here." He hung up but I could tell he was upset, I didn’t blame
him, now I really had to find the boys. I went back out to the
lobby and was standing behind the couch when my cell phone
buzzed.

I grabbed it from my
pocket and read the caller ID, it was Buck. "Can you talk?" I
asked.

I could hear a loud amount
of noise and he yelled into the phone, "Yeah, we got the job, this
Dark guy looks evil as you said. We just started, will fill you in
later," he said and hung up.

I looked to the expectant
group sitting in the lobby, "They’re in." Everyone gave a sigh of
relief and Earl said, "Now it’s up to them."

"Yeah, but I’m going to
call Lynn to let her know what we’re up to and to be ready." It was
just after five in the afternoon, I didn’t know if Lynn was in the
city or still on her honeymoon, I hated to interrupt if they were,
but I called. She came on after three rings.

"Now what do you want?"
she laughed.

"I wanted to see if your
honeymoon is still going on or are you back to work?"

"Hell, we just got into
the airport in LA and were just heading out to find our car. I hope
you don’t have a major crime to report?"

"No, just missing boys,
two, ages ten and eight and we’re suspicious of a carnival that
rolled into town this week. Long story, I’ll fill you in when you
hit town, call me."

"Okay, we have a long ride
back to Vegas so it will be later tonight or tomorrow, if it’s not
a priority."

"As of right now we have
the situation sort of under control but will let you know more
later. Enjoy your ride," I said and hung up.

"I hate waiting," I said
and sat next to Penny on the couch. "Lynn and Deacon have a couple
hours before they are settled back home. Buck and Mac probably
won’t find much on their first night, but I hope they do some
snooping. We may as well go home; I’m worn out from running around
in the heat today."

"And you missed your nap,"
Penny added.

I looked at my watch and
said, "We could still snuggle when we get home."

"Forget it, you can’t
snuggle without fooling around," she snickered.

"Fine, let’s just go home
then."

Earl and Paula got up and
said they were going to get something to eat and left. I asked
Angelo how he enjoyed the day at the carnival.

"I liked it, well not the
missing kids, but the whole thing was good. If you need any of my
contacts in the family to help finding the boys just let me
know."

I thought about bringing
in Angelo’s whole family and have them attack the carnival and put
Dark in cement boots. Of course, Lynn would have a fit, so I may
need what the mob could find out for me without murdering anyone.
Penny gathered her things and the three of us went to the
van.

We arrived home and I took
Willy out from the kitchen to do his business, as Angelo went to
his guesthouse. Penny was nuking a couple pasties and I settled on
the couch. We ate our meal and then watched TV with our beer and
chips.

Around eight, there was a
loud knocking on our front door. I wondered why the alarms hadn’t
gone off then realized that I hadn’t set them. I peeked through the
little hole in the door and saw a big nose. Then I saw teeth, they
were attached to Deacon. The goof ball was smiling in the peep
hole, I opened the door and let them in.

"Should we be honored that
you came right here from your honeymoon?" I asked.

"Don’t flatter yourself,
we went home and changed, then came here. Now what is this big case
you have?" Lynn asked.

"Well, it may not have
anything to do with you; it’s a missing person case."

She shrugged, "I can
handle it; we all share now since they’ve been cutting back on
departments. Is it missing or a kidnapping?"

"Not sure, but the boys
have been missing for a day now. If they might have just wandered
off, but they should be back by now."

"Talk to me Sherlock," she
said as she and Deacon sat.

I explained the whole day
from the early morning tent departure to Buck and Mac getting a
job.

"Carnie Buck, I love that.
I need to go take pictures tomorrow," Lynn laughed.

"I’m sure he’d appreciate
that. Now can you do anything?"

"Nope, not until we have
probable cause or some evidence that the boys went there in the
first place. No judge would sign a search warrant on conjecture.
Now if Buck and Mac can find something that would allow us to go in
and search. Of course, we could go in and ask nicely if we can
look, and maybe they’ll give us permission to look see, but I doubt
it. From past experience, carnivals aren’t too cooperative with us.
In the morning I’ll do a background check on this Jacob Dark, maybe
he’ll come up dirty and we can harass him."

"I thought about having
Angelo bring in his family but I knew you’d never approve
that."

"Damn skippy, I don’t want
to see any wiseguys near this. Or just don’t let me see them." She
grinned and asked, "We’ve been here for twenty minutes and still
haven’t been offered a celebratory wedding drink, are you getting
cheap as well as senile?"

"Are you able to drink
being pregnant?" Penny asked.