Board Stiff (Mattie Winston Mysteries) (8 page)

There’s a hint of admiration in Hurley’s voice when he mentions Vonda’s legs. I make a mental note about my own commitment to continue working out, and one of my thigh muscles twitches in protest at the thought. “So why don’t you think she did it?”

“Because she seems a little too eager to have us think she did. I suspect she has an ulterior motive. She wants a chance to get some free publicity to push her green platform.”

“Ah.” I see how that could work and give a grudging nod of respect to Vonda. She might be smarter than she looks. “Does that mean you aren’t going to go back there with a search warrant?”

“Oh, I’m going back there all right. And I plan to tear through every bit of that place—hers and his—if for no other reason than to piss her off. I don’t like that woman.”

Good. Legs aren’t everything
. “So where do we go from here?” To me it’s a loaded question that can apply to our case, our relationship, our lives, and our jobs. But Hurley jumps straight to the case.

“Are you hungry? I need to get a bite to eat, then we should head for your office to see what Izzy has come up with on the autopsy.”

“Food sounds good to me.” The nausea from earlier has dissipated for the moment and now all I feel is hungry. I’m hoping it was hunger that caused the nausea in the first place. “Where do you want to go?”

“Does Chinese sound okay?”

It does, and a few minutes later we are seated in a booth at the Peking Palace. I don’t bother to look at the menu. I have it and practically every other menu in town memorized. Hurley doesn’t look at it either; we just snag a passing waitress and give her our order.

As I sit in the afterglow of Hurley’s love comment on top of the gleeful anticipation of finally getting some food, the Fates decide to screw with me yet again. I see Hurley focus on something over my shoulder toward the main entrance, and his expression changes to something I can’t quite interpret. Then I hear a voice I’ve heard before, on the night that broke my heart.

“S
teve, you haven’t been answering your cell phone. What’s up with that?”

It’s Kate, Hurley’s wife from fifteen years ago, the one he said he thought he had divorced after only a few months of marriage. Standing beside her is the daughter the two of them apparently had. I wonder if Hurley had a DNA test done, though even without a test, it’s not hard to believe that Emily is his. She has the same tall build, dark complexion, jet black hair, and brilliant blue eyes Hurley has, whereas Kate is medium height, mousy complected, reed thin, and has brown hair and eyes. In fact, if one were to go on physical appearances alone, it’s easier to believe Emily is Hurley’s daughter than it is to believe she’s Kate’s.

My understanding of the situation two months ago when Kate and Emily first appeared on the scene was that Kate was broke and had nowhere else to go. She’d lost her job and her house, and she needed to mooch off Hurley for a while. The idea of a daughter certainly made that an easier sell, so, physical resemblances aside, I hope Hurley checks the veracity of Kate’s claim if he hasn’t already.

“I’ve been busy,” Hurley says, sounding annoyed. “I’m working a case.”

“Yes,” Kate says with a brittle smile and a sideways glance toward me. “I see how hard you’re working. If I hadn’t seen your car pull in here, who knows how long you could have been working here with your . . . your . . .” She pauses and cocks her head at me. “Just what is your relationship these days?”

“Actually, Mattie recently took back her old job so we’re working partners again.”

“Really?” Kate flashes that brittle smile again.

Emily, who is standing beside her mother looking embarrassed and extremely uncomfortable, glances around us to see who might be watching or listening in on our awkward exchange.

“What do you want, Kate?”

“Something urgent has come up and I need to go out of town for a few days. I want to leave Emily here with you, but I didn’t want to do so without asking first.”

Having Kate’s butt as far away from here as possible sounds good to me, so I’m a little annoyed when Hurley starts giving her the third degree.

“What’s so urgent that you need to leave now? Why is it going to take a few days? And why can’t you take Emily?” He seems to sense that his words might have come across harsher than he meant and he turns to Emily. “Not that you aren’t welcome to stay, Em. You are. You’re welcome in my home any time and for as long as you want. I just want to know what your mother is up to.”

His words hit me hard. I realize that any relationship I have with Hurley in the future will, out of necessity, also include Kate and Emily. I’m not sure I like the idea, at least the Kate part. Then I again remind myself that I can’t have that kind of relationship with Hurley, anyway, so it shouldn’t matter. It shouldn’t. So why does it? Damn.

“I found Brent,” Kate says.

Hurley, who looks puzzled, shakes his head and shrugs.

“Brent,” she repeats. “My brother?”

“I thought you said he was dead.”

“I said I thought he might be dead for all I knew because I hadn’t heard from or seen him for so long. The last time I did, he was heavy into drugs and hanging with a bad crowd.”

“Then why would you want to hook up with him?” Hurley asks. “That’s the last thing you and Emily need in your life right now.”

“Brent swears he’s clean and has been for the past year,” Kate says. “He went through a detox program and was staying at a halfway house in Cincinnati.”

Hurley frowns. “And you need to see him right away because . . .”

Kate looks around to see who might be listening and then she ticks me off by sliding onto Hurley’s seat and sidling up to him. Emily, who looks even more uncomfortable than before now that she’s standing there alone, starts to fidget. I feel sorry for her so I slide over on my side of the booth and pat the seat beside me. With a grateful smile, she settles in, sitting bolt upright, her hands folded demurely in her lap.

In a low voice Kate says, “Brent told me he owed some money to his dealers when he went into his court-ordered rehab and now that he’s out, they want it back. He doesn’t have it because he used the stuff he was supposed to sell. He says they’ll kill him if he can’t pay them back so he left the halfway house and he’s been in hiding.”

“Kate, you need to stay out of this,” Hurley says. “Let your brother fix his own problems.”

Kate pouts, and to my dismay, she looks adorably cute and vulnerable when she does it.

“He’s the only real family I have left other than Emily,” she whines. “My mother is still alive, but she’s so far gone mentally, the last time I visited her she thought I was the queen of Persia. As messed up as Brent may be, he is my brother and I can’t just abandon him. Given the situation, I don’t think it’s safe to take Emily with me.”

“Just what do you intend to do with Brent once you find him?” Hurley asks.

Kate gives him a funny little grin, implying an apology as yet unmade. “I was hoping you could help me with that. He needs a place to hide out for a little while. It won’t be for very long,” she adds hurriedly as Hurley opens his mouth, presumably to object.

“Are you crazy?” Hurley says. “Your brother has thugs who are out to get him and you want to bring him here to my house?”

Kate pouts again, smiling prettily, and I can sense Hurley weakening.

“The thugs are in Cincinnati,” Kate argues. “They’d have no reason to look for him here as long as he doesn’t leave a trail of any sort.”

Hurley sighs heavily and rolls his eyes. “Can’t he just come here? Why do you need to go and get him? That seems unnecessarily dangerous to me.”

“He doesn’t have any way to get here,” Kate says. “He has no car, nor does he have money for a bus or train. As it is, he’s relying on friends to loan him a couch to sleep on and to feed him. He had to quit his job because the dealers would have found him there easily. I could send him bus or train tickets, but I figure the less of a trail there is, the better.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Hurley says with a begrudging nod. “But it still sounds dangerous. Maybe I should go with you.”

Kate and Hurley on a road trip together? I don’t like the sound of that at all. “How can you leave now with the case we have going?”

“I can’t,” Hurley admits. “But we don’t have to go right now.”

“Yes, we do,” Kate says. “Brent says every day he stays in Cincinnati brings him closer to getting found. His dealers have a lot of connections and it’s only a matter of time.”

“How are you communicating with him?” I ask.

“I got one of those throwaway cells when Emily and I left Chicago and I gave the number to the nursing home where my mom is. I told them they couldn’t give the number out to anyone except my brother and I gave them a test question to ask any callers, a question only Brent would know the answer to. Brent was smart enough to contact the nursing home to see if they knew how to find me. From there it was pretty simple.”

“I’m scared for you, Mom,” Emily says to Kate. “I don’t think you should go. Steve is right. It’s too dangerous. We should find another way to get Uncle Brent here.”

“I’ll be okay,” Kate tells her. “Brent says the friends he’s staying with are friends of people he met in rehab so he had no prior connection to them. There’s no reason the drug dealers would find him there without a lot of searching and questioning. Even then they might never find him, but Brent doesn’t want to take that risk, or put the people he’s staying with in any jeopardy. Since I haven’t seen him in years, there’s no reason for anyone to be looking for me. I doubt half the people who know Brent even know he has a sister, so it should be pretty simple. Two days, three at the most. We’ll be back here in no time.”

“Why don’t you let me call someone in the Cincinnati police department to see if they can expedite things for you and keep Brent safe?”

Kate winces and gives him an apologetic look. “I’d rather not get the cops involved. Brent’s detox and stay at the halfway house are conditions of his probation, so technically he’s in violation. Plus the cops don’t know he was dealing. They busted him for using. If he tells the cops some kingpin dealer is after him for a debt, they might lock him up and hit him with new charges.”

“I doubt that,” Hurley says, his brow furrowed in thought. “But the probation thing is a problem. I’m a cop. I can’t have him staying at my place if he’s in violation of his probation.”

“Then I’ll take him to Madison and he can stay in a homeless shelter, or at the Y until I can afford my own place,” Kate argues.

The waitress arrives with our food and Hurley and I offer to share with Kate and Emily. Emily takes us up on it, but Kate says she isn’t hungry—an utterly foreign concept to me—and asks for a drink of water, instead.

“Thanks to you letting us stay at your place, I’ve got almost enough saved for a deposit on an apartment,” Kate says as she watches us eat. “I only need another month or two. And Brent can get a job, too.”

“Where are you working?” I ask, liking the direction this is going. I had assumed Kate and Emily were freeloading off Hurley all this time.

“I’m clerking at the Quik-E-Mart,” she says. “Night shift. It’s not great money, but it’s enough to get by on if we rent one of those cheap condos on the other side of town.”

I know the place she is referring to. It was some investor’s idea of affordable condo living that was built back in 2007. Right after that, the housing market crumpled and the poor saps who bought condos found themselves owning something worth half what they paid for it. A lot of people just walked away and took the hit on their credit. A few stayed. Others moved elsewhere, but petitioned the condo board to allow for rentals. It was approved and now the place is almost solely occupied by renters. It’s not a bad section of town, but the rent is so cheap that a lot of the people who live there aren’t your upper crust of society. A fair amount of drug activity goes on there and the cops visit for domestic violence complaints a lot.

I can’t imagine Hurley letting Kate and Emily live there, but Brent would be another story. It’s a viable option and Hurley seems to sense this.

“Okay,” he says with a resigned sigh. “Keep your cell phone with you at all times, and I want you to check in with me every twelve hours.” As Hurley runs through a few more safety precautions, Kate nods her agreement, looking relieved.

Emily, on the other hand, looks scared.

When Hurley is done with his speech, Kate reaches across the table and takes her daughter’s hand. “It will be okay, Em. Don’t worry.”

I’m not sure I agree with her, but I keep my thoughts to myself.

Kate departs a few minutes later, leaving Emily with us. When we are finished eating, Hurley asks Emily if she would prefer to go home or hang with him at the police station.

Much to my surprise, Emily turns to me. “I don’t suppose I could go with you to your office? I’d kind of like to see what you do.”

“I don’t think you’re ready for that,” Hurley says. “Some of the stuff Mattie deals with can be pretty gruesome. Besides, I don’t want you getting under foot.”

Emily’s shoulders sag and her disappointment is palpable. I sense something in her that I’ve seen in Erika, who also has a keen interest in anything bloody, gory, and having to do with death. I’m sure Dr. Maggie would have a field day with both of them.

“Actually, I don’t mind giving Emily a quick tour of the office and showing her some of the basics,” I say, hoping Hurley isn’t upset that I’m butting in. “She can hang in the library for a while. Arnie’s in today. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind bragging on what he does.”

“Who’s Arnie?” Emily asks. “Does he cut people open?”

“Not usually,” I tell her. “Although, he does assist the medical examiner from time to time if we are busy, or if the regular assistant, like me, isn’t available for some reason. Most of what Arnie does is process evidence and conduct lab tests. Oftentimes, it’s his results that end up solving the crime.”

“Will I be able to see an autopsy?” asks Emily.

“Probably not. But maybe we can set something up for a future date if it’s okay with your mom.” I see Hurley make a face at me. “What?” I ask with a shrug.

“I don’t think that’s an appropriate environment for a young girl.”

“How old are you, anyway?” I ask Emily.

“Fourteen. I’ll be fifteen this summer.”

“That’s older than Erika, and she’s handled the stuff in my office just fine.”

Hurley frowns and rubs his fingers across his brow. “I wish your mom had given me an owner’s manual, or some kind of guidelines before she left.”

“She’s always telling me I should explore new things. As long as it’s safe, she doesn’t care. She says she tried a lot of new things when she was younger.”

I can’t help but wonder if one of the new things she tried fifteen years ago was Hurley.

“One of Mom’s favorite sayings is how are you going to know if you like something unless you try it?”

Hurley smiles and shakes his head. “You are right about that. I remember her saying exactly that to me on several occasions.”

“See?” Emily says. “She would be all about letting me go to Mattie’s office. I’ve always loved science and that’s what this CSI stuff is all about. It’ll be educational.”

“Whoa,” I say. “I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about what to expect over there. It’s not like the
CSI
shows on TV. For one thing, we don’t have sexy lighting and a high-tech, glitzy, state-of-the-art facility. Nor do we have gorgeously handsome people working there who get back DNA results faster than you can say, well, DNA.”

This is a gross understatement. We have Izzy, who looks like an aging, short, balding teddy bear; Arnie, who oftentimes looks and behaves like an escapee from the nearest mental hospital; and Cass—not the other half of the Johnson Funeral Home twins, but rather our part-time receptionist-slash-secretary-slash-file clerk—who could look like anyone on any given day since she likes to dress up as characters in the thespian group she belongs to. In fact, I’m not sure I’d recognize the real Cass if I ran into her on the street.