Partnerships Can Kill: The Third Charlie Parker Mystery (5 page)

"What do you think? Want to take it for a
test drive?"

I had to make a conscious effort not to
drool.

"I better not, not this time." I reminded
myself that I had a job to do. This is purely research, I repeated
internally. You cannot afford this car. You must get back to work.
My inner voice kept working at me, but it had to do some imaginary
tugging at the back of my collar to get me out of the Porsche and
back to my own set of wheels.

Chapter 6

Still daydreaming twenty-five minutes later,
I walked into Sharon's restaurant. She was making a gallant effort
at conducting business as usual, but I could tell it was a strain.
The waiters stood around like they weren't sure what to do
next.

"We had a good sized lunch crowd today,"
Sharon told me, as she showed me to David's office. "Morbid
curiosity, I think. There was a long story and a picture of David
in this morning's
Journal
."

David's office consisted of a small room near
the back alley door, which had been constructed by setting up some
hasty partitions of two-by-fours and nailing drywall over them. The
door had a lock, but even I could have easily gotten past it.
Inside, an old metal desk took up most of the space. Behind it,
some one-by-twelve boards laid across metal brackets formed a set
of shelves, which were laden to the point of sagging. There were
stacks of computer printouts, file folders, and miscellaneous
papers, along with books on restaurant management and computer
operation manuals. Unframed snapshots of David, each with a
different woman on his arm, were propped against the books. The
women all had dark eyes and lots of hair, like he'd gone through
the roster of a modeling school to find his dates.

A personal computer sat to one side of the
desk. The remaining space was cluttered with calculator, stapler,
and a shallow dish of paper clips just waiting to be tipped over. A
mug, half full of oily looking coffee, sat perilously near the
computer keyboard. On the side of the mug was a picture of a
haggard looking office worker receiving a pink slip, and the saying
"Go Ahead, Make My Day."

Scattered across the top of several layers of
file folders, and ripped-open envelopes were a handful of phone
messages, the kind written on pink forms.

"I take it these came in before Saturday," I
commented to Sharon.

Her brows pulled together in the center as
she looked them over.

"Heavens, yes," she said. "Look at the dates
on some of them. Looks like they've been here for weeks."

"I wonder if that means David never returned
the calls."

"I really couldn't say, but as you can see,
he was a real pack-rat. It's very possible that he returned the
calls, but kept the messages anyway." She looked at me and
shrugged. "I just don't know."

"Has anyone else been in here since
Friday?"

"No. I half expected the police to stop by,
but they haven't."

"Do you mind if I spend a little time in
here? I won't take anything with me unless I check it out with you
first."

"Go right ahead, Charlie. Do whatever you
need to. I just want answers." She picked up the coffee mug, and
took it with her.

I began by sorting the phone messages. Some
of them were almost two months old. A couple had notes scribbled in
the margins in straight masculine looking writing. I assumed David
had returned those, and had made the notes. Three of the messages
were from a Mr. Tom McDonald with the IRS. None of those had notes
in David's writing.

I pulled out the small spiral notebook I
always keep in my purse, and copied the names, phone numbers, and
all notes from the phone messages. If the police discarded the
suicide theory, and opened this as a murder investigation, they
would certainly search this office. I didn't want to face
obstruction of justice charges by removing anything that could
potentially be important. But, that didn't mean I wasn't ready to
glean any and all information I could.

Systematically, I went through each of the
drawers, which turned out to be about as organized as the desktop.
The further I dug, the more I began to wonder about David's
competence as the financial wizard of the business. Accountants are
people, and as in every other walk of life, they are all different.
But, one thing I've noticed almost universally (at least among the
ones I know) is that their records are organized. Without
organization, without being able to put one's hands on any certain
piece of paper at any time, an accountant would be hopelessly lost.
David's desk looked pretty hopeless.

I had to resist the temptation to straighten
the files and move things around. After all, I was here to find
clues, if any existed, to prove that David had not committed
suicide, not to revamp his office procedures. On the surface
anyway, there was nothing to indicate that David hadn't left here
on Friday night with every intention of being back at this desk
Monday morning.

I switched on the PC, wondering if the files
there might yield some new clues. Checking the root directory, I
saw that the most recent entries to his accounting program had been
made just after the first of the month, more than two weeks ago.
His word processor, though, had been updated just last Friday. I
changed to that directory, and opened the program. Its
sub-directory showed that two files had been worked on that day. I
pulled up the first one. It was a letter to one of their food
suppliers regarding a past due bill. David was asking the supplier
to extend credit an extra month past their usual terms. The second
document was a similar letter to the bank. Sounded like David was
having to do some sweet-talking to shuffle money where it was
needed.

I riffled again through the papers covering
the top of the desk. Quite a few of them were bills, some with past
due notices. None had yet reached the Final stage, and for the most
part, the messages were courteous but firm. It was obvious David
was getting some pressure, but enough to drive him to suicide? I
wouldn't think so.

Nothing else on the computer looked urgent or
even especially timely, so I switched it off. I pulled open the
center lap drawer on the desk. Its contents were almost in worse
shape than the rest of the little office. He had one of those
little divided trays that is supposed to provide a place for
everything, but the drawer was so jammed that the tray couldn't
even rest flat on the bottom. Papers, pens, clips, little notepads,
and a variety of junk, including a wadded up hamburger wrapper, all
came at me as I pulled at the drawer. This was unbearable.

I began to pull handfuls of stuff out,
attempting to locate the bottom of the mess. Finally, I had it down
to one layer. The heaviest objects had settled to the bottom, among
them a keyring. I picked it up. There were only four keys on it.
Three were obviously for doors -- his home, his office, and
something else. I could ask Sharon. The fourth was a safe deposit
box key.

Setting the keyring aside, I replaced the
papers I had pulled out, one at a time. I glanced over each one as
I went, in case one would prove to be a suicide note. Nothing
there. The drawer closed a little easier than it had opened. I
picked up the keys, and tried them one at a time, until I
ascertained that one fit the door to the office, and another fit
the restaurant's back door to the alley. Presumably, the front door
would be keyed the same. That left one more door key, which was
most likely his home, and the safe deposit key.

I felt like I'd checked what I could here.
Without delving into the books, or searching each of his files page
by page, I couldn't find anything that I thought would drive a man
to kill himself.

Sharon was at the cash register, closing out
the sales for the day. She brightened a bit when she saw me.

"We did better than I expected today," she
said. "How about you? Find anything?"

"No, not really," I said. I showed her the
keyring. "Was this a spare set of keys David kept?"

She looked at them. "I guess so. His regular
keyring had a little plastic thing attached that said 'I heart NM'.
You know the kind. His little sister had given it to him." She took
the keys from me, and flipped through them. "These two are for the
restaurant," she said, confirming what I'd already tested. "I don't
know about the others."

"His house, maybe?"

"Probably. He lived in those apartments on
Academy Road -- I can't think of the name, but they're just up the
street from the Food City grocery store."

"Mind if I take those?" I asked.

She handed the keys back. "Like I said, I
just want to find out the truth."

Back on the road, I contemplated what I was
doing. I wasn't sure how the police would feel about me snooping
around in David's apartment. But, if I didn't remove anything...
Besides that, I justified, they had probably already searched the
place themselves. If there was a suicide note, I felt sure the
police or David's family would have recovered it by now. If not,
then what harm would I be doing?

Chapter 7

The Jeep headed back across town for the
second time this afternoon. A hot pale blue sky reflected heat
waves off the freeway. Bright chrome shining off other cars struck
my eyes. The traffic became a clog at the Big I, where Interstate
40 bisects Interstate 25. I slowed to twenty-five miles an hour,
thinking about the weekend I'd just spent in the cool deserted
mountains. Slowly, the pace picked up a little. I worked my way
over to the right, watching for the San Mateo exit.

I found the apartment complex Sharon had
mentioned. The place consisted of five or six frame stucco
buildings styled and colored to look like adobe. According to the
mailboxes, D. Ruiz was in apartment A48. It took me a few minutes
of wandering around to figure out the numbering system and locate
the right one.

The key slid into the well-worn lock with
hardly a whisper. I used a scarf over my hand to turn the knob,
just in case the police would come by later for fingerprints. The
apartment looked like David had just stepped out to do a quick
errand. The drapes were drawn; a lamp in the living room still
burned. A TV schedule was open on the coffee table to Saturday's
date, with the remote control lying on top of it. The furniture all
looked new, and expensive. David's taste ran to the modern—leather,
chrome, and glass. His stereo system was the latest, with enough
controls and buttons to operate a space shuttle. Nothing in the
room looked more than six months old.

A sack from Burger King lay on its side on
the breakfast bar, a hamburger wrapper spread flat beside it. The
remains of the hamburger, a sprinkling of sesame seeds and a few
shreds of dried up lettuce, were scattered about the paper surface.
A puddle of ketchup, dried now to the color of blood, held one
corner of the paper down, and three shriveled french fries lay in
their cardboard container. A Coors can, which proved to be about
two-thirds empty, stood nearby. The wooden bar chair in front of
the food remains was swiveled toward the living room, like David
had just gotten up to go to the bathroom and would be right
back.

It was an eerie feeling, walking into the
just-vacated place. It wouldn't have surprised me a bit if David
had emerged that minute from the bedroom. I found myself tip-toeing
around. The apartment was relatively neat, compared to David's
office. There was a dirty coffee mug in the kitchen sink, and the
refrigerator revealed three cold cans of Coors and a cardboard box
from Pizza Hut. David's grocery bill must have been very
reasonable.

In the bathroom, the light was still on. A
shirt tail trailed out from under the clothes hamper lid, and his
towel had been stuffed over the towel bar in a wad. The medicine
cabinet held an assortment of shaving paraphernalia and dental care
products. A pack of twenty-four condoms was open. There were only
two left. I didn't see any drugs, prescription or the other kind.
Nothing out of the ordinary.

The bedroom was dim with the drapes closed. I
hit the wall switch, which turned on a bedside lamp. The bed was
unmade, a pair of dress shoes sat on the floor, and a suit jacket
lay draped over a chair. A small desk stood in the corner,
obviously not as heavily used as his desk at the restaurant. In the
top drawer I found a coupon book for car payments. Glancing into it
made me glad I hadn't purchased that Porsche earlier. He had also
racked up a sizeable bill at one of the priciest mens clothing
stores in town.

I hadn't seen a trace of a suicide note, and
I was beginning to feel nervous about being here. For all I knew,
the police or David's family members could come traipsing in just
any time now. In fact, it surprised me that I was apparently the
first on the scene. Still using my scarf, I made sure I left
everything as I'd found it, then slipped out the front door.

It was getting close to five o'clock, and the
traffic was picking up. I wasn't eager to get into the mess on the
freeway, but I didn't have much choice. I pulled into a convenience
store, and bought a copy of the evening paper before heading south.
By the time I got back to the office, everyone else was long gone,
and Rusty looked anxious. I reassured him that I had intended all
along to come back for him.

I checked the answering machine and my desk.
No messages either place. I dialed Ron's number, but there was no
answer. Rusty and I headed for home. He got a scoop of dry food,
and I had a can of chicken noodle soup for dinner. I felt let down
that day one of my investigating hadn't netted much for Sharon. I
thought about calling her at home, but didn't know what I'd say, so
I didn't. Rusty and I both were ready for the sack by nine.

At six a.m. my eyes were suddenly wide open.
The penalty, I guess, for going to bed so early. I got up, made
coffee, and read last night's paper while chewing on a bowl of
granola and dried fruit. In the obituaries, I noticed that David's
funeral would be this morning at ten.