Partnerships Can Kill: The Third Charlie Parker Mystery (11 page)

Vicky relaxed considerably once we reached
the restaurant. We were shown to a table near the windows filled
with an up-close view of Sandia Peak. The booth had seats of hunter
green, with a thick brass rail separating us from the next booth. A
young waiter bustled about, pouring water and taking our drink
orders. I searched for a topic of conversation.

“I really like your house, Vicky,” I said,
browsing the menu and deciding on the baby back ribs.

“Thanks,” she beamed. “I did enjoy doing it.”
She ran her hand across Ron’s lap and I got the idea she wasn’t
referring to her living room.

“Uh, you know, Vicky, I’ve been thinking
about getting a new conference table for the office. What do you
think, Ron? That generic work table is pretty tacky.”

“Sure,” he agreed, “whatever you think.”

“Maybe something antique? You probably have
suppliers for that kind of thin, huh Vicky?”

“Well, uh . . . yeah sure,” she agreed
slowly. “I guess I could find you something.” She gazed back and
Ron and I’d swear she actually batted her eyes.

The food arrived then, great piles of smoky
meats on platters the size of hubcaps. It was more than I’d eat at
three meals, but I planned to give it a darn good try.

“Maybe later in the week,” I said.

“Huh?”

“The conference table? We could go shopping
later this week.”

“Uh, right. Yeah.” Her long fingers pulled a
slice of bread apart and fed bits of it to Ron. I thought he would
actually suck her fingers right there in the restaurant. I had a
vivid reminder of the scene in the Ruiz kitchen.

"Were you and David Ruiz close, Vicky?" The
bitch in me waited until she and Ron were about a half inch away
from a lip-lock to ask the question.

Ron almost spluttered, but Vicky turned to
me, cool as ice.

"Not especially," she said. "Our parents have
been friends for years, but David and I didn't have much in
common."

"I wondered. I saw you at their house after
the funeral."

She looked puzzled. "I didn't go to the
funeral," she said. "My parents were there, of course. I think my
sister might have been, too. I'm not sure."

What an actress. I let it drop, but I
wondered what the hell she was up to.

Chapter 13

The rabbit in the pin-striped vest. I awoke
at two a.m. with one of those flashes of insight that comes from
nowhere. The Padilla's granddaughter had carried that rabbit. Just
like one of the stuffed toys in the photo on Vicky's bookshelf. An
unusual rabbit. What was going on with that girl, and what was her
connection with the Ruiz family?

After forty-five minutes of pondering the
question, and finding no answers, I gave up on sleep and went into
the kitchen. I zapped a cup of milk in the microwave and stirred in
two squirts of chocolate syrup. Rusty followed me into the living
room, trying to establish eye contact, in hopes that some of the
chocolate would accidentally spill into his bowl.

I picked up my novel, but couldn't get back
into the story. Eventually, my eyelids started drooping and I took
advantage of the moment to crawl back into bed. I had a nightmare
about Ron and Vicky getting married. She wore a skin tight white
dress that hit her about an inch below the buns, and we had to
serve the cake off our old worktable because she had refused to
find an antique one for me. It was a relief when the alarm went off
at seven.

Usually a hot shower will wash away the
ridiculous last vestiges of a dream like that, but this morning it
didn't work. Perhaps because I couldn't entirely dismiss the idea
as incredible. Perhaps because I still had so many questions about
Vicky. Perhaps because, no matter how much the creep picked on me
as a kid, I love the hell out of that shithead brother of mine.

I could feel tears mingling with the hot
shower spray. I let them come. It isn't very nineties to talk this
way, but sometimes a good cry really does make it all better. I
stood there until the water started to run cool.

A few of Gram’s blueberry muffins were still
in the refrigerator, and I allowed myself two. After that, I went
to my closet and chose my favorite pair of pale green linen slacks
and matching summer sweater. The set was a present to myself once
after the breakup of a love affair. Comfort food and now comfort
clothes. Rusty cocked his head to the side, definite questions in
his eyes, as he watched me spritz on a shot of Giorgio. I'm sure he
wondered if I were ill.

I arrived at the office before anyone else,
and bopped around doing all sorts of wifely chores, making the
coffee, opening the blinds, running a dust cloth over the
furniture. By the time Sally arrived, I was really hitting my
stride.

"Wow, you're all dressed up." She stopped in
mid-step to stare. "What's the occasion?"

"Sally, just because I occasionally choose
not to wear my usual jeans and t-shirt, it doesn't mean there's any
occasion
. I just like this outfit."

"Yeah, and you always wear it when
something's wrong."

And I thought I'd been so cool about it.

"C'mon, what is it?" she persisted.

With anyone else, I would have commanded them
immediately to butt out, but Sally knew me too well.

"It's
her
."

"I thought so," she said. "I noticed his car
isn't here yet. Is that where he is?"

"I don't know, and I don't think I want to. I
had dinner with them last night, and dropped them both off at his
place. What happened after that I'd really rather not
envision."

I told Sally about the dream, and we both had
a good laugh. Somehow telling it to someone else in the cold light
of day brought out the ludicrous side of it. I was glad I had told
her.

"I'll be in my office working on payroll," I
told her.

"Goody, my favorite day of the week. I'll
hold all your calls."

It took hardly any time at all to enter the
figures into the computer. With just three of us, it's probably
overkill to even use computerized payroll. But, it sure makes
figuring the taxes easy. The checks ran in no time, and I pulled
them off the printer. I put Ron's on his desk—no sign of him yet.
The file folder on the Ruiz case was laying on his desk, and I
picked it up. I carried it back to my own office after going
downstairs to hand Sally her paycheck.

Sitting at my desk, I flipped idly through
the pages and photos in the file. I was running out of threads to
chase in this case. The police had ruled suicide, and so far I
hadn't found anything substantive to prove otherwise. And, if it
wasn't suicide, it was murder, and I sure didn't have a clue as to
who could have done that.

Somehow, some little thing must be escaping
me. I had the feeling that once I found the little thing, the whole
mystery might just unravel at once, like chain stitching. David's
death, the IRS audit, the gun purchase, the missing financial
statements, the grief-stricken relatives—all links in the
chain.

One by one I flipped through the papers in
the file. The Xerox copies of the police photos were fairly good,
but I had the feeling I wasn't getting certain details. One picture
showed David slumped across the center console of the car.
Something black, presumably blood, covered the passenger seat.
There were other dark spots within the interior of the car, but in
black and white I couldn't tell what they were. Seeing the original
color photos might help.

I put a call in for Ron's friend in Homicide,
Kent Taylor. He came to the phone after about a minute.

"Yeah, Charlie." Kent isn't too big on small
talk. He's at that awkward career stage with the police force—too
old to have those rookie stars in his eyes and too young to retire.
He puts in his time, does a good job, and stays alive to go home at
night. Safe and steady.

"Hi, Kent. How ya doing?"

"Fine." Get to the pint, his tone said

"Now that the department has closed its files
on the David Ruiz case, would there be a problem with me having a
look at the photos and the car? I know you let Ron have copies of
the photos already. I'd just like to see the originals."

"Sure, Charlie. But the car, I'm not sure
what's happened to it. It could be at the evidence yard."

"Where's that?"

He mentioned the name of a towing service
that had been in business for ages. "They have the contract with
the department," he told me.

"Would they let me take a look at it?"

"Not without a search warrant," he said.

Hmm. This was getting awfully complicated. I
just wanted a quick peek to test my theory.

"Or, I
could
take you over there," he
volunteered.

"Would you? Oh, Kent, that would be
great."

"Don't get your hope up just yet. It may have
been released."

"You mean it might not still be there?"

"Well, even with a bullet hole in it, it does
belong to somebody. We might have turned it over."

"Could you check, Kent? I'll come right down
to look at the photos. In the meantime, if the car's still there,
don't let it get away."

He agreed, but didn't seem overly concerned
about it. It took me ten minutes to get to the main police station
downtown, another ten to find a parking space. By the time I
located Taylor, he'd pulled the file and phoned around until he
ascertained that the car was indeed still at the evidence lot. When
he saw how jittery I was, he laughed.

"Don't worry, kid. They won't let it go until
we get there."

I prickled at the way he called me kid. He'd
picked it up from Ron, no doubt. At least, thank goodness, he
didn't resort to honey, babe, sweetie, or anything else
sugar-coated. I don't take that kind of talk very well. Besides, I
couldn't afford to piss him off by saying anything at this point. I
still needed this favor. I caught him staring at my clothes.

"Kinda dressed up, aren't you?" he
commented.

"Just because you've never seen me in
anything but jeans doesn't mean I don't own decent clothes."

He handed over the file and an evidence bag
containing the gun without another word. Looking at pictures of
dead people is bad enough when they are strangers. Although I'd
only met David once, after meeting his family and hearing all about
him, I felt I knew him. This all had to be mentally disconnected
before I could open the file. Emotions aside, I had to look for
clues, hard clues.

In full color, this was much harder to do. I
forced myself not to look at David, only at the surrounding
area.

"What's this?" I asked Kent, pointing to one
of the photos. It was a black dot on the inside of the car door,
passenger side, about a half inch below the window.

"That's where the bullet ended up," he
said.

Oh. I continued to go through the photos,
giving each one my full attention. Near the bottom of the stack,
was one taken from several feet away. It showed the car sitting in
the parking lot, looking just like any other car in any other lot.
This must have been how it looked to passers by, except that it was
daylight in the photo. Something about the driver's side window
caught my eye. There was a distinct reflection of sunlight off
it.

"Kent, were all the windows of the car rolled
up when the officers got there?"

He stood so he could look over my shoulder.
"Sure looks that way," he said.

"Seems like it would have been really hot
sitting in a parked car with all the windows up. The temperature
was around ninety all last week."

Taylor shrugged. "So, the guy put himself out
of his misery."

I shot him a look.

"Sorry, that was a rotten thing to say." He
even had the good grace to look a little embarrassed. "What are you
getting at, Charlie?"

"Oh, I don't know. He left his apartment
quickly, there were food wrappers on the counter. I just had the
feeling he went to meet someone. If you're waiting to meet someone,
you don't do it with the windows up in ninety degree heat."

"How do you know about the food wrappers?" he
asked, his eyes narrowing slightly.

Uh oh. "Uh, Sharon gave me a key to his
place." It wasn't really a lie. I had found the key, and she had
said I could try it. "Let's go take a look at that car," I said a
little too quickly.

Kent apparently wasn't in the mood to dig for
answers, because he didn't say anything more. I took the file with
me as the two of us walked outside. I decided to follow Kent in my
own car so he wouldn't have to bring me back.

The Porsche was parked in an end slot, with
nothing else next to it. It was like even the police didn't want
the doors dinged on a car like that. From the outside, there was no
sign of violent death about the car. It was shiny red, a gorgeous
creature.

"What will happen to the car?" I asked.

"Well, I guess if it was paid for it belongs
to Ruiz's estate. If not, then some finance company has a beautiful
car with a couple of minor flaws."

The finance company wouldn't come out very
good on this one. David had paid almost nothing toward the
principle of the loan, so by the time they replaced the
blood-soaked front seat and the door panel with the bullet hole,
they'd have more in it than it was worth. Unless the company prez
decided to keep it for his own, they'd probably end up moving it
out through a wholesaler at a hell of a discount.

Kent opened the driver's side door for me.
Immediately, I was assailed by the horrible stench of death. My
stomach lurched, and I motioned him to close it again. I had to
take a couple of breaths of fresh air to clear my lungs. I decided
I could do my investigating through the glass.

Seeing the car for real didn't tell me a
whole lot more than the photos had. I tried to commit the details
to memory before Kent began to get too impatient. I left the lot
not knowing much more than when I got there.