The Love-Haight Case Files (9 page)

Because of Evey, Dagger had done some work for Thomas Brock, finding the young lawyer almost a little too green and too much of a boy scout for his liking. Still, Thomas paid on time.

Saul had died of a heart attack and left Evey out in that proverbial cold, and now Thomas was dead. Poor Evey, she didn’t have a lot of luck with employers. At least she’d managed to outlive them.

Dagger had talked to Thomas’s ghost before making his rounds in the alley, wanting to hear the recounting of what happened. Not as helpful as Dagger had liked, but then he realized how quickly Thomas’s demise had come. Sadie’s information had been far more useful. And he realized Sadie had been right: Thomas should have known better than to have opened his door to the fey and the hooded man.

O O O

Following Sadie’s leads, Dagger found the biker bar hellhole about an hour after leaving the alley. Looking like the set of a rap music video, the place was wedged between an auto repair business that he thought might double as a chop shop and a tattoo parlor that displayed dragons and motorcycles in the window.

Dagger strolled in. He knew it would be dark in here, and it didn’t disappoint. The place reeked of spilled beer and sweat, the two dozen occupants an equal mix of candidates for Weight Watchers and models for
Iron Man Magazine
. All of them had tattoos, probably regulars of the place next door, it was just a matter of reading them to find a target. Three steps into the place he locked eyes with someone, the ink marking him a member of the Northern Structure. When Sadie had described one of the tattoos, Dagger realized Thomas Brock had pissed off someone either very powerful or very vile.

The ganger agreed to talk to Dagger alone in the men’s room.

Dagger had been critical of Thomas Brock for his lapse in judgment letting the fey and his handler into his office but he realized his own judgment wasn’t always perfect either.

The largest of the three thugs grabbed Dagger’s head and slammed it against the bathroom sink. The other two had been holding his arms, no easy feat. The men’s room was small and dirty, smelling of soap, beer, and piss; and Dagger should have known better than to agree to talk to the ganger back here “out of earshot of my buddies.”

Dagger usually smelled a setup, but he’d gotten so little sleep and was in a hurry, and those two factors had played against him. The thugs were strong, and though he could’ve easily taken any of them without breaking a sweat, together the three were getting the best of him. The tall one slammed his head a second time, and Dagger thought he saw stars. He struggled to rip himself free, but instead was pushed down to the filthy tile floor, his face near a patch of dried vomit, eyes watering from pong that was thick and choking at this level. Keen senses were inconvenient sometimes.

They rolled him over onto his back, and the tall one started kicking his side, the other two grabbing a tighter hold. For an instant Dagger’s mind took him back to Angola, where he’d run afoul of a terrorist cell in a bar, the thrum of artillery landing nearby covering the sounds of the slugfest—that fight had been in a men’s room too. Here it was the racket that tried to pass itself off as music blaring from a jukebox on the other side of the men’s room wall. In Angola he’d ended up in ICU for a handful of days. He should have died in that godawful place, but he was tough and healed quickly.

And he wasn’t about to die now, not in this hellhole. The two holding him tried to pin his legs too, but they weren’t quite big enough for that. Their mistake had been taking Dagger off his feet. He kicked at them now, like a wild animal filled with a frenetic, desperate energy, dislodging one while at the same time the tall guy kept kicking him. The dislodged thug tripped, and Dagger wiggled one arm free, brought it up and around, hand opening and fingers reaching. He found the right arm of the thug that still held him and dug his fingers deep into the flesh. The man wore one of those muscle shirts, big swath of skin exposed; it was an easy target for Dagger. The man howled in surprise and rage.

Dagger had just bought himself a heartbeat, and in it he managed to propel himself up from the tile and into the tall one, lashing out, getting behind him, and pinning his arms, swinging him around to be a shield against the other two who were recovering and coming at him again. The song on the jukebox ended and another equally atrocious one began, just as the tall one caught a knife in the gut that had been meant for Dagger.

Dagger pushed his now-dying meat shield at the thug who still gripped the knife handle, driving both men against a stall door and into the stall. Dagger kicked at the other guy, high and hard with the heel of his boot, and catching him in the groin. The man let out a reflexive wail and dropped to his knees, cupping himself. Dagger had another heartbeat to his advantage.

In the stall he pushed the dying thug hard into the other, ramming them both against the toilet again and again, until the meat shield was dead weight. Dagger released the shield and brought both hands up into one fist and drove them down on the neck of the woozy one against the toilet. He recognized the snap of a collarbone and in the dim yellow bathroom light saw the pupils of the thug’s eyes dilate and float back.

One dead—not of his doing, one unconscious—of his doing, Dagger turned his attention to the remaining thug who was holding his balls.

“Get up.”

The man groaned and struggled to his feet, and Dagger shoved him against the door to keep anyone else from coming in and joining the party.

“Say something interesting,” Dagger threatened. “Unless you want me to turn your brains into Jell-O pudding, you better say something real interesting.”

Sweat was thick on the thug’s forehead. He had a tattoo on his neck, and though Sadie hadn’t clearly seen the one on the guy driving the Buick, Dagger saw this one and recognized it, the mark of a Latin prison gang, the Northern Structure. The slang had fit, too, that Thomas’s ghost had regurgitated for him:

“You’re in the hat, lawyer man.”
You’re on the hit list.

“Your case is gonna be closed,
chapete.”
Idiot
.

Prison slang used by gang members.

Dagger knew from a previous case he could find ex-cons at this biker bar, including Latin gang members.

“Talk fast. And talk
a toda madre.”
Dagger threw some of the slang back at the ganger. “I’ll give you some hard candy, asshole. You’ll be the one growing daisies.”

Chapter 1.12

Zaxil stood in front of Evelyn’s desk. He nodded a hello to Detective Angela Reese.

The detective smiled politely and turned to work with Gretchen, who was going through some of Thomas’s files.

“This is no good, Evey. All fruit is not ripe.” Zaxil shifted his weight back and forth from his heels to the balls of his feet and stuck his hands in his pockets. “I’m not offering you any rent money back. I can’t. I just—”

“I don’t expect you to.” Evelyn knew about Pete on the roof and about the wealthy condo developer trying to grab this building. Thomas had filled her in on the case and she was going to help him with it after their work with Holder was done. “Maybe you can find another tenant, Zaxil, and—”

“Doubt that. Doubt I can fast enough anyway. And I’ve promised Pete that he gets approval on any tenant. You gotta be able to do something, Evey. You know law. Tom said you know as much about law as any lawyer with the paper hanging on the wall.”

“Look, I know Thomas was digging into bankruptcy protection and looking at historic preservation.”

“So you’ll keep digging, too, right? You’ll find me a way to save this place.” He’d not asked the last as a question.

“Yeah, Zaxil, I’ll dig. I don’t have to be a lawyer to dig.”

“All right then. All right. All right. Just figure it out before March.” He spun and headed out, holding at the door. “And take care of yourself, all right? Watch yourself. Pete tells me that rusted Buick cruised by here early this morning. Same one that’d been cruising by the night before, you know, when Tom was killed. Pete’s real upset he wasn’t paying attention to the people on the street that night; he might’ve seen the murderer. Pete’s a birdwatcher, said he was watching some Clapper Rails on the roof across the street. A big deal, he said, to see them this far in. Said they’re a marsh bird.” Zaxil scratched at his head. “Never asked him how he knows that. Anyway, said they flew when the sirens started. Pete’s real sorry he didn’t see the guy that gacked Thomas.” He left, the bell on the door jangling.

She shivered. All of this was so desperately unfair … herself without a job, Zaxil in danger of losing this building, Pete in danger of losing his life. She raged at Thomas for being murdered and at whoever caused it. So young, she had so much to look forward to, so much finally going right for her. She didn’t need this complication, and didn’t deserve it.

She’d survive it, though. Evelyn always survived whatever this world chose to dump on her. She’d tell Dagger about the Buick coming by again.

“That’s it for this stack,” Gretchen said. “Damn cold in here. We should crank the heat.”

Evelyn knew Thomas hovered nearby … well, Thomas or Val or both, as there was the telltale chill in the air. But neither showed themselves, even though Evelyn wanted Thomas to talk to Detective Reese. Evelyn returned to sorting through files with Gretchen.

“Me and Gretchen are part-time,” Evelyn explained to the detective.

“She’s telling you that crap piles up.” Gretchen was blunt about it. She’d cancelled her wine country bus trip to help. “These files…” She pointed to a stack on a tilting file cabinet. “I was gonna get to them next week.”

Evelyn knew that lawyers were notorious for having sloppy files. Big, huge piles, stuff sitting around to be dealt with. It used to take Thomas forever to go through the paperwork.

“Whoever did this last night, they left the … piles of … crap …” Evelyn settled on, “pretty much alone. And it really doesn’t look like anything is missing out of the file cabinets, just tossed around. Maybe like they were searching for something but couldn’t find it.” She was thankful the blood was at the back of the room, around the conference table. If Thomas had been killed near the files, she wouldn’t be sorting through paper.

Gretchen gave an evil grin. “Couldn’t find it ’cause they didn’t understand my filing system.”

Or lack thereof,
Evelyn thought. “Or maybe they just wanted to make a mess.”

“I vote on the mess angle. It has that feel to it.” Detective Reese appeared thoughtful. “So just the backup hard drive is missing, a few jump drives, and the memory board out of the computer. All the digital files.”

“And about that Buick Zaxil mentioned,” Evelyn said.

“We’re looking for it,” the detective returned.

Evelyn had walked Detective Reese around the issue of clients and the records, and the police correctly hadn’t tried to appropriate any of the files. Attorney-client privilege extended beyond the death of the attorney. It took a court order to get past that. Still, Evelyn conceded a little in an effort to help find the man who’d brought the dark fey into the office; she told the detective the titles of Thomas’s active cases. The detective could look up whatever was public about them in court records and follow leads that way.

Evelyn took a few minutes to call Vaughan’s office. She told his clerk Holder’s case was being passed onto to a designated attorney and requested the matter be moved back a week.

“Gotta do something about that blood back by the conference table, Evey,” Gretchen said. “It smells awful. Like a morgue in here.”

“I have someone coming in about seven.” Evelyn had set up the appointment with a company that specialized in crime scene cleanup, and seven was the quickest they said they could get here. It should take two hours max for a single slaying, the proprietor had told her.

“I liked this job,” Gretchen grumbled. “I really did.” She put her bony hands on her hips and stared at Evelyn. “Can’t you keep this place open? Got half a dozen active cases here. You should finish them. Thomas could finish them.”

“Undead can have jobs, Gretchen, but ghosts are not recognized legally because they have no physical presence. And as for me—” Evelyn had explained this to Gretchen an hour ago. “I don’t have my license to practice law.”

“You and me,” Gretchen continued, “we know more about the law than Thomas did …
does
. You know that, and he knew …
knows
 … that.”

“Doesn’t work that way.” Evelyn was going to miss the office too. Maybe a part of her had thought she’d be able to stay here after her degree and license, that Thomas and she could find enough business to keep two full-time attorneys busy. “Crystal Gaye is coming over tonight to get the files.”

“Who?”

“Crystal Gaye. She’s an attorney friend of Thomas’s. They went to Stanford together. Thomas has her listed as the attorney designated to pick up his caseload.” Evelyn had found that paperwork first thing. Attorneys were supposed to designate with the state supreme court which of their fellows their cases passed to if they died or became unable to continue their practice. It would be up to the clients if they wanted to stay with said new attorney—Crystal Gaye, in Thomas’s case.

“I know how it all works,” Gretchen grumbled. “But it shouldn’t work that way. Me and you, we could handle those cases. I liked this job. I really did.”

O O O

“Crystal’s good,” Thomas told Evelyn after Gretchen and Detective Reese left. He looked like the fog that on some mornings climbed the pilings of the Golden Gate Bridge. “She’s with a three-man firm downtown, and they can spread the cases out so it won’t overload them. Specialize in malpractice, wrongful death, and the like.”

“You’re a victim of wrongful death.”

They’d stood there for several moments, or rather Evelyn stood while Thomas floated, listening to the sounds of traffic, and to music that spilled out the open doors of the bars across the street—one blues, the other rock, a miasma of racket in disagreeing keys.

“I don’t want to give up the cases, you know,” Thomas finally said.

“I put a lot of hours on the Holder case. I think there are some things I could file to keep me on the Holder case. But it would be a lot of work—that and school, and I’m so close to finishing. I don’t want to jeopardize anything with the bar coming up.”