Mr. Monk Is Open for Business (3 page)

CHAPTER FOUR

Mr. Monk and the Kindred Spirit

I
have to admit I was stoked. We hadn’t even opened and already we had a client. The right kind of client, too: an influential lawyer with a puzzling case. On our drive out to the jail, I played around with catchphrases. “M and T. Your solution for all things mysterious.” Hmm, maybe not. I didn’t want it sounding trivial, like we were going to find your lost car keys or figure out why your cat stopped eating the Meow Mix.

The murder had not taken place in San Francisco, but in a commuter town to the south. Our client was residing in the San Mateo County jail, a white, two-story industrial-looking complex right off the Bayshore Freeway. I must have driven past it a hundred times and just assumed it was a warehouse. Inside, it was like any other detention center, especially the interview rooms, which are the same the world over—square spaces with a bolted-down table and nonbolted chairs, metal doors, one-way mirrors, plus microphones and cameras. For a consultation with a lawyer, the microphones would be off.

Henry Pickler was waiting for us. He was slight and pale and in his thirties. In my opinion, he was not the type to be caught dragging a murdered drug dealer through a field. If I hadn’t known better, I might have thought he was part of
the jail’s cleaning staff. That was mainly because he was cleaning the room.

When Monk, Daniela, and I walked in, he had already borrowed a handkerchief from his guard and was wiping down the steel table. “You never know who was here last,” Henry explained, and scrubbed harder to make up for the lack of any disinfectant. I knew exactly what Monk was going to say.

“This man is innocent,” he said in my ear, then brought out his own handkerchief and a little spray bottle of Formula 410, with a custom-made label. I’m not sure if he’s actually added anything to the ingredients of Formula 409, or if he just feels better having it in a bottle with an even number. I never get a straight answer, except that it’s better this way.

Monk has worked with OCD suspects in the past, and he always starts out believing in their innocence. What it often means isn’t innocence, just that they’re better at cleaning up after.

Daniela and I stood by as Monk and Henry finished polishing the table and arranging the four chairs. As soon as they let us sit, Daniela made the introductions. Neither man volunteered to shake hands.

“I got to know Henry through his wife,” Daniela explained. “Becky worked for me. Well, three days a week. She was my house cleaner.”

“Married to a house cleaner,” Monk said. “Sweet deal.”

“Not as romantic as it sounds,” sniffed Henry. “She wasn’t very good.”

Monk’s face fell. “I’m sorry. So many people call themselves professionals when they don’t remotely have the skills.”

“I wouldn’t let the woman near a vacuum, not in my house.”

“Excuse me,” I said. “You talk about your wife in the past tense. Did she walk out on you, Henry?”

“How did you know? Are you spying on me?”

“I’m a good guesser.”

“She did,” Henry admitted with a sigh. “And for no reason. I was just trying to show her the correct way to floss. Becky didn’t always floss. She lied to her dentist about it. One minute I’m giving her a flossing tutorial, the next she has a bag packed and is walking out the door. After five years of marriage.”

She lasted five years? I thought.

“This woman is going to get gum disease, mark my word,” Monk predicted. “Was she still living with you when the incident happened? The incident in the vacant lot?”

“No. Becky left me eight months ago.”

“The dead man was connected to drug trafficking,” Monk said. We’d both read the report. “Does your wife have any drug connections? Untidy people often have drug connections. That’s been my experience.”

Henry chuckled. “Becky was raised in a Dutch farming community in Iowa. She wouldn’t know a drug dealer if she tripped over one.”

“Tripped over one?” I asked. That was an interesting choice of phrase. “How about you, Henry? Would you know a drug dealer if you tripped over one?”

Henry turned to face the wall. “I’m not answering any questions.”

“So what were you doing in a vacant lot at two a.m. with a corpse and a shovel?” I asked.

“That lot is part of my property. I can be out there whenever I want.”

“And why were you there at two a.m.?”

“Two twelve to be exact. I mean, no comment.”

I softened my tone, drew my chair a little closer, and tried to sound reasonable. “I’m sure it’s not your fault, whatever happened. Did you get involved with drugs somehow? Do you owe them money? If they were threatening you, it could be called self-defense.”

“No comment.”

Daniela rolled her eyes. “See what I’ve been dealing with. Henry, dear, if you don’t explain what happened, you could be convicted of murder. Whatever you’re hiding, it can’t be worse than murder.”

I could go on and re-create the next few minutes of this one-sided conversation, but it wouldn’t be helpful. This was all there was to learn from Henry Pickler. He himself called the meeting short, preferring, I guess, the company of his domestically abusive cellmate (accused) to that of his lawyer and the two private investigators who were trying their best to help.

We watched a guard lead him out. Then Daniela asked the other guard if we could use the room for another few minutes. “As long as we have a clean table,” she asked, “and the microphones are still turned off.” We were told we had fifteen minutes, the rest of our allotted time, until they needed the room.

“I need to know this.” Monk paused, waiting until the guard left and the door closed behind him. “Why did you employ a terrible house cleaner?”

“Henry’s wife? She wasn’t terrible. She was hardworking and reliable, and she didn’t steal.”

“I could say the same for Natalie. But I wouldn’t let her clean.”

“Okay, guys,” I interrupted. “Let’s stay focused. Henry must be protecting someone.”

“I thought of that,” said Daniela. “But he’s pretty much a loner. He works from home as a Web site designer. His one phone call after his arrest was to me, the only lawyer he remotely knew. According to the jail records, no one else has come to visit. Henry is an only child. His parents died a decade or so ago and left him a sizable inheritance, which is frankly the only reason I’m continuing to represent him and bill his hours.”

“So, he’s willing to pay for a top-notch lawyer,” said Monk. “And yet he won’t explain what happened. Where’s the logic in that? Spending money for help and then refusing it?”

“That’s why you’re here,” Daniela said. “The inexplicable. Isn’t that your specialty?”

“Did we really say that?” Monk asked.

“You did. It’s in the brochure you gave me on the ship.”

“Did we mean it? I’m not sure we meant it.”

“We meant it,” I assured Daniela. “How about Henry’s wife? I know they’re separated. But could he be protecting her?”

Daniela shook her head. “Becky hasn’t been back. We’ve traded e-mails a few times and I follow her on Facebook. She’s living in the Seattle area. Don’t tell Henry, but I think she’s seeing someone.”

Monk grunted at the news and shifted his shoulders. I
could see him mentally changing gears. “Okay, what about the victim?”

Daniela reached down into her yellow leather Gucci handbag and pulled out a manila file folder. “Esteban Rivera. A legal immigrant from Guatemala, twenty-six. From his DEA sheet, we know he was a small-time street pusher—crack, weed, meth—working North Beach for the Mexican cartel.”

It was fascinating to hear Daniela Grace using a little street lingo. She had the look and manners of an upscale real estate broker showing off a Nob Hill condo. I had to remind myself that this matron was a top-notch defense attorney.

“North Beach?” Monk said, making a face. “That’s Lucarelli territory. What are the Mexicans doing selling drugs in North Beach?”

“Trying to get a foothold,” said Daniela. “If this murder had occurred on an inner-city street corner, it would be a textbook turf hit; the Lucarellis sending a message with a nine-millimeter shell delivered at close range. There was a similar example last year. Also the Lucarellis. Suspected to be the Lucarellis, I should say. They were investigated. No one was arrested.”

“Had the body been moved?” I asked. “Maybe he’d been killed elsewhere and dumped in the lot.”

“The M.E. says it hadn’t been moved, except by my client. The body was also newly killed. Less than half an hour before Henry was caught.”

“The Lucarelli mob wouldn’t move the body,” Monk said. “They’d shoot him on his street corner and leave the body there as a message.”

“We’re acquaintances of Salvatore Lucarelli,” I mentioned, in an effort at full disclosure.

“More than acquaintances,” said Daniela. “I’ve done my homework, people. You cleared him of a murder charge.”

Monk twitched his shoulders. “On that occasion Lucarelli was innocent—even though he happens to be a killer and a mobster. None of that is my fault.”

“Well, you can start from that angle. Talk to Lucarelli. If you find out who really killed Rivera, we won’t have to get anything out of our uncooperative client.” Daniela handed me the file folder. “The forensic report’s in there, along with the M.E. report and the officers’ statements.”

I transferred the folder into its new home—not a Gucci handbag but a PBS tote. “I’ll send over the paperwork.”

“Your standard rates are fine. It’s the client’s money. The more I charge the stubborn little man, the better I’ll feel. Oh, one more thing.” In a reflex move, she eyed one of the cameras in the corner of the room. “You already know this, but I just want to make it clear. No offense.”

I was intrigued. “What?”

“Working for a lawyer is different from working for the police.”

“What did I tell you?” Monk muttered under his breath. “Another reason.”

“Your job is not to broadcast Henry’s secret, whatever it is, or get him convicted of some other crime. It’s to serve his best interests. Right now that involves finding out what he’s hiding and why. That may or may not involve the police.”

“Another reason not to be in business,” muttered Monk a little louder.

“You’re not saying we should let a crime go unreported?” I asked.

“Not exactly,” said Daniela. “But any information you garner as my agent, paid for by our client, is private. It’s to be used to further our client’s case. That’s not just my policy. It’s the law.”

A few minutes later, Monk and I were in the jail’s parking lot, getting into my old but clean Subaru. “If you want to dissolve this PI thing, I’m okay with that,” said Monk. “No harm, no foul.”

“We are not dissolving the business.”

“So it’s fine to work for an unethical lawyer?”

“Daniela is very ethical. And law-abiding. She came to us, needing to find an alibi for an uncooperative client. What she does with that information is her call, not ours.”

“We’re no longer on the side of the angels, Natalie.”

“When angels hire us, then we’ll be on their side.”

“I’m serious. We could be helping Pickler get away with murder.”

“What murder? You just said he was innocent.”

“That was based on personal hygiene, which is not infallible.”

“Look, if this goes to trial, Daniela will have to turn over all of our hard evidence, whatever we find, to the DA’s office. That’s also the law.”

“I’m not comfortable with this.”

“You’re not comfortable with anything. Do you want to hear my theory?” I asked.

“Not really.”

“I think our client is Walter White.”

“He’s Henry Pickler. Don’t you even listen?”

“No, I mean from
Breaking Bad
. And before you ask, that’s a TV show. It’s about this very smart, obsessive chemistry teacher who is dying from cancer. He becomes a meth cook and gets involved with the Mexican drug cartel. Before long, Walter White is shaving his head and killing people, but no one suspects for the longest time because he’s such a quiet, peaceful guy.”

“There are three things wrong with your theory, Natalie.”

“I know. Henry isn’t a chemistry teacher, doesn’t have cancer, and didn’t shave his head. But doesn’t this account for the fact that he won’t tell us anything? He really did kill Rivera over drugs but can’t tell us why because that would endanger his whole drug operation.”

“Do they really make TV shows about teachers turning into meth cooks?”

“Yes, Adrian. It was very popular.”

“Hmm.” He cocked his head and shrugged. “Well, as long as they didn’t show the bad guys cooking meth. Because then people would learn how to make it and that would be wrong.”

“Of course,” I lied. “TV executives are decent, moral people. They would never show things like that.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Mr. Monk Goes to the Barber

M
y partner has gone through nine barbers since I’ve known him. Three of them he fired, complete with pink slips and exit interviews that carefully detailed the reasons for their termination. Of the six he liked and went back to twice a week for trims, one retired at the age of thirty-two; two moved out of state; one had a nervous breakdown; one took out a restraining order; and one vanished so thoroughly even Monk couldn’t find him. I personally think the man enrolled in some witness protection program set up for service people who’ve worked for Monk.

He has since taken to being his own barber, snipping exactly one hundred hairs a day as part of his morning routine. If you want to know how he remembers which hairs he’s cut and which ones he hasn’t, he divides them into sections and numbers them. I’ve seen the diagram.

All of this is to say that we rarely step into a barbershop. The one exception is Albert’s in North Beach, nestled on a side street between Telegraph Hill and the Financial District. It’s a homey Italian establishment run by Albert himself, a half-blind haircutter with shaky hands and a twitch. But you have to walk through Albert’s in order to get to the social
club in the back. That’s where you can almost always find Salvatore Lucarelli, godfather of the crime family bearing his name.

Salvatore was there that afternoon when Monk borrowed a broom by the front door and swept his way through a layer of fallen hair to get to the back room. Usually this place is off-limits to law enforcement. But the mob makes an exception for Monk.

The back door was closed, and I made sure to knock and wait. It’s never good to go around opening doors in a Mafia establishment, just in case there’s something you don’t want to see. One of the don’s nephews came and ushered us in.

“My friends,” Salvatore said in a raspy voice, looking up from his desk. He swung off his reading glasses and moved aside a ledger. It wasn’t necessary. I didn’t want to get anywhere near that ledger. “Always a pleasure to see Adrian Monk and his pretty little assistant.”

You know how it is when something hits you the wrong way—even a simple phrase. “I am not his pretty little assistant,” said I. “Not anymore.”

“Nonsense,” said Sal. “I think you’re very pretty. Aging well. You should learn how to take a compliment, Natalie.”

“Pretty is not a compliment,” I argued. “It’s a way of belittling me and I don’t appreciate it.”

“Hey, I don’t belittle women, lady. I put ’em on a pedestal.”

“Mr. Lucarelli,” Monk said, holding up his hands. “She didn’t mean anything. Honest.” The alleged mobster was one of the few people Monk called mister.

Today seemed to be a relatively slow day. A few associates hovered around the air hockey table, which had replaced the
pool table when the boss had decided his guys needed a little more cardio. Fat Tony switched off the table and strolled over to join his uncle at the rolltop desk. By the time we got there, he had rolled it all the way closed.

“I assume this is not a social call,” said Fat Tony. As usual, he was munching a carrot, just about the only piece of food I’ve seen him eat since he’d gone vegan about ten years ago. At one point they say he weighed more than three hundred pounds. Now he was well under two hundred, almost skinny. The only thing Fat Tony hadn’t been able to shed was the nickname. The same was also the case with Vinny the Schnozz, a mobster with a deviated septum who had undergone an operation back in the nineties and now had a nose smaller than Zac Efron’s. The mob likes its traditions.

“Adrian and Natalie are our friends,” Sal reminded his nephew. “They’ve kept me out of jail more times than my best lawyer.”

“That’s because you weren’t guilty,” said Monk. “But the law of averages is working against you.”

Sal chuckled. “Never heard of that law.” He leaned back and laced his fingers across his belly. “Let me guess what this is about. That Rivera fellow working for the Menendez cartel. The cops have been here twice, even though they got a suspect in custody who don’t deny a thing. I’m thinking we should all leave well enough alone, don’t you?”

“Afraid not,” said Monk. He looked a lot more confident than I felt. “We represent that suspect, Henry Pickler. He’s a clean, upstanding citizen who, based on his hygiene alone, couldn’t be a killer. Probably not.”

“Represent him?” asked Sal. “What does that mean?”

“Let me explain.” I cleared my throat and stood a little taller. Then I explained—how I was now a licensed private investigator and how we were actively seeking cases from the public. I was even brazen enough to walk around the air hockey table and hand out business cards. All of the associates took a card, which seemed to provide them with amusement.

“Natalie Teeger, CPI,” said Fat Tony. Everyone there knew the initials: Certified Professional Investigator. “That’s rich.”

I had prepared myself for reactions like this, but you’re never really prepared. “Is it rich because I’m a female private eye or because I’m Monk’s boss?”

“Both,” said Fat Tony. “Plus you’re sweet Natalie who drives him around and hands out wipes. That makes it three ways funny, like a humor trifecta.” The others chuckled along, including Uncle Sal.

I had only a second to decide how to push back. I went with cool and hard. “Glad you’re amused. But I didn’t come here to tell jokes. I came to ask questions.”

“Ask away,” said Sal himself. His tone was as condescending as his nephew’s. “By the way, how’s your beautiful daughter? Julie, right?”

“Julie is fine,” I said, refusing to be intimidated—or at least refusing to show it. “We know you have an ongoing dispute with the Menendez drug cartel.”

“Whoa, lady. You don’t know no such thing,” said Sal. “And out of respect for our friend Adrian, I’m not going to have anyone frisked for a wire.”

“Thank you,” said Monk. “I owe you.” He so hates being frisked.

“I will save the lovely Natalie time by saying the Lucarellis have Mexican relations who we don’t always see eye to eye with and who can get a little unruly at times. You know how it is with families.”

It was my turn. “We also know one of your employees was killed in Daly City last week, shot in the head, just the way Esteban Rivera was shot in the head two days ago.”

Salvatore stretched his hands across his belly and cracked his knuckles. “I’m a retired cement contractor, Miss Teeger. I don’t have employees. As for this Mr. Rivera . . . His body, according to what the police tell me, was found in Millbrae, well south of the city. Is that a hotbed of activity for this Menendez cartel you speak of?”

“No, it’s not,” I had to admit.

“But it is near the home of your client, Mr. Pickler, who was found with the man’s body and a shovel if I’m not mistaken.”

“You’re not . . . mistaken, that is. But the last place Mr. Rivera was seen alive was here in North Beach, your territory. He was standing on the corner of Bay and Mason, like he did on most nights. A witness saw him approaching a dark sedan and lean in the front passenger window. A few seconds later Rivera got into the backseat.”

“Did this witness get a license number or recognize anyone?” asked Salvatore.

“No,” I had to admit again.

“Did the witness say Rivera got in against his will?”

“No.”

Salvatore grunted. “Adrian, my friend, will you please explain to your little boss how the rules of evidence work?”

In a perfect world, Monk would have my back in a situation like this. Seeing me surrounded by a pride of smirking gangsters, he’d be able to forget his phobias and his aversion to the mob, and be supportive. In a perfect world, he would have stepped up and found a way to put these guys in their place. What happened next might not have been perfect, but it was darn near close.

“I think my boss is right.” He said it in a loud, clear voice.

“Ooh,” Fat Tony said. “So she is your boss.”

“Yes,” said Monk. “Technically. Tell me, Tony. Why did you get a new gun?”

“What?” Fat Tony’s hand reached toward his shoulder holster, easily visible under his blue Windbreaker.

Monk pointed from across the room. “That pancake holster is made for a nine-millimeter Beretta. I know because that’s what you usually carry. That holster doesn’t quite fit your new gun, which, if I’m not mistaken, is a Smith and Wesson Chief’s Special. They make them a little shorter than the Berettas. It’s starting to annoy you, the loose fit. I can tell by the way you’ve been moving your left arm.”

Fat Tony eyed the offending holster, then zipped his Windbreaker halfway up. He dropped both arms to his side. “The way I’m moving my left?”

“You hug it a little closer to your side than the other arm. It’s been bothering me since we walked in. In a while, you’ll get bothered enough yourself to go buy a holster that fits. After all, you’ve only had the gun for a day or so.”

Salvatore grunted. “Tony, is this true?”

“The gun’s new, yeah. But I got a permit. I got a whole slew of permits.”

Monk continued. “My guess is your nine-millimeter Beretta’s at the bottom of the bay where no one will ever be able to do ballistics and connect it to Esteban Rivera’s murder, which happened to be committed with just such a nine millimeter. I’m sure my boss saw the same thing. Didn’t you, boss?” Mob or no mob, how I wish I’d had a microphone on me at that moment.

“Uh, yes,” I replied.

“So, yes, I could explain the rules of evidence to Natalie. But I think she understands them pretty well.”

“Tony, Tony,” said his uncle, shaking his head. “Your Beretta? That was a Christmas present.”

For the next ten seconds, you could have heard a pin drop. Not a snicker, not a snort. That was probably why we all noticed the sirens at the same moment.

They were far away but coming closer. Fast. The two-tone wail of police sirens. Not an ambulance. The room grew even tenser as the vehicles turned onto a nearby street, probably Filbert. A few hands eased their way toward shoulder holsters, including the ill-fitting one under Fat Tony’s arm. Glances flew back and forth, looking for some sort of signal from the man in charge. The tension eased a little as the sirens continued wailing down Filbert, then, one by one, cut out. Whatever it was, it was nearby and bad. But it wasn’t us.

We were still all glued in place when the door from the barbershop flew open. Old Albert stood in the frame. “There’s something happening. I think over on Stockton. Something big.”

Fat Tony grabbed the remote from the lip of the air
hockey table and clicked on the TV hanging from a wall mount in the corner. He began to change channels, surfing to find some breaking news. It didn’t take long. Every local station was interrupting its regular programming.

“We’re trying to get the details now in this recently developing story,” said a young, nervous-looking reporter across the street from a downtown warehouse. You could see him still adjusting his microphone and earpiece. The echo of a gunshot made him jump and sent him edging closer to the local ABC mobile unit. “According to what we’ve been able to learn, a lone shooter has entered an office building in downtown San Francisco and begun firing. At least three people are believed to have been killed so far.”

Godfather Sal sighed and threw up his hands. “What’s this world coming to, huh? It’s enough to make you despair for humanity.”

Fat Tony agreed. “A regular breakdown of society. Why aren’t you guys there?” he asked, pointing to the screen. “I thought you two worked every big police case. Captain Stumblebum should be giving you a call any second.”

“Stottlemeyer,” Monk corrected him without getting the joke. “And this isn’t our kind of case.”

“Are you sure?” said Tony. “It’s a better use of your time than harassing a bunch of citizens for no reason.”

“I’m sure,” Monk confirmed. “I don’t do SWAT teams or shootouts. Not my thing, and the captain knows it. I can’t imagine a set of circumstances that would turn a workplace shooting like this into the kind of case that could use my skills. . . .”

It was just then, exactly on cue, like the punch line in a bad sitcom, that my phone rang. Monk stopped. Everyone stopped as I pulled it out and checked the display.

“Captain Stumblebum?” Fat Tony guessed. “That him?”

“Um . . . Maybe.” I swiped the screen and held it to my ear. “Hello. Captain?”