Oath of Office (12 page)

“I can’t believe you’re a friend of Dr. Meacham’s and he’s never taken you there,” Jennings added.

“I work a lot,” Lou replied.

“Well, since Terry died, I eat there three or four times a week,” Jennings said, gazing wistfully out the window. “Guess you could blame Millie’s for some of my issues with Dr. Meacham. I never was quite this heavy, but without my Terry around, well, I just lost the will to cook. Plus my friends all eat there, too, so I have their company. I usually order the corn bread chicken pot pie or beef stew, or if I’m in a real adventurous mood, the creamy Cajun chicken pasta.”

Uncertain precisely why, Lou sensed his interest perk. “So, Dr. Meacham knew you ate there and tried to lecture you about making healthier choices?” he asked.

Jennings made a face that suggested Lou had missed her point. “Dr. Meacham and his wife probably ate there almost as much as I did,” she said. “Only it seemed like he was a stickler for the lighter fare, like the glazed chicken breast with brown rice or else something like turkey stew. I checked to see if I could catch him eating the macaroni and four cheeses, or the lobster Newburg. But I really never did.”

“I can’t believe Millie’s is news to me,” Lou said.

“Is that the sort of thing you were looking to know, Dr. Welcome?”

“At this point, anything you can share with me is helpful.”

Chief Stone clearly sensed that Lou’s fishing expedition had gone as far as it could. He hoisted himself off the couch with a grunt, then stretched a stiff leg. “Bobbi, you’ve been incredibly generous with your time,” he said. “I realize this has been a traumatic experience for you. If you do happen to think of anything along the lines of what Dr. Welcome was asking about, you know how to reach me.”

Lou stood as well and handed the woman his business card. “Do you mind if I write my cell phone number down there?” he asked, realizing that the vindictive Filstrup had possibly already had his extension shut off.

“I hope I’ve been of some help, Dr. Welcome,” Jennings said. “If there is some way to explain this unexplainable evil, I’d do anything I could to assist you.”

“You’ve been most gracious, Mrs. Jennings.”

Lou had turned to follow Stone out when his cell phone sounded. The caller ID on the display screen read simply
DADDY-O
, and the ringtone was the Beatles’ “Hard Day’s Night.” Lou clicked the green Talk button.

“Hey, Pops,” he said. “I’m just leaving a meeting. Can I call you right back?”

“I’m starving,” Dennis said, ignoring Lou’s question. “What are you doing?”

His father had the voice of a four-pack-a-day smoker, despite his never having taken a puff of a cigarette. Dennis Welcome lived in Virginia, about a twenty-minute drive from Kings Ridge, and considered Lou’s home in D.C. close enough to permit drop-of-the-hat meet-ups. And as he was again between jobs, and handled being alone about as well as a lemming, the spirit lately moved him to try at least a couple times each week.

“You know what, Dad, I’m pretty hungry myself,” Lou said as he followed Stone down the walk to the cruiser.

“Great. Meet me at the Wave Rider in thirty.”

Lou knew his father was already salivating to be treated to his beloved Wave Rider Bacon Burger, but he had another idea. “Actually, Dad, I’m thinking we should try someplace different this time.”

Dennis Welcome snorted into the phone. “Yeah?” he asked. “What are you thinking?”

“Have you ever heard of a place called Millie’s?”

CHAPTER 16

EVERYBODY EATS AT MILLIE’S

The block lettering above the main entrance was set beneath a ten-foot enamel rainbow.

Judging by the number of cars in the parking lot as the noon hour approached, Lou believed the claim had some muscle behind it. Waiting in the busy lobby for his father, he used the time to scan the photographic history of the place, which had gone from a classic railroad car diner through a number of incarnations and reincarnations. According to the text accompanying the photos, Millie’s had opened for business thirty-five years before, with a five-thousand-dollar bank loan, ten soon-to-be maxed-out credit cards, and one very determined owner-cum-cook named Millie Neuland.

The original railroad car endured, and now, glorified by an imaginative designer, held sway at the epicenter of a vast dining room, surrounded by a dozen private salons. Given that Lou had lived in the region most of his life, he was impressed that his path and the restaurant’s had never crossed. Impressed, but not that surprised. Renee was totally into foods of various ethnicities, and in his life before her, he ate far less than he could have, worked far more hours than he should have, and spent what money he managed to hang on to in dark parts of the city that featured no rainbows.

In the years since its grand opening, Millie Neuland bought up much of the surrounding acreage, paved a parking area the size of a fairground, and at one point, added a quasi motel on the far side of the lot to house the cooks and waitstaff.

EVERYBODY EATS AT MILLIE’S.

Or works there.

After a lifetime of dealing with his father, Lou became aware of his presence almost before he had entered the building. Dennis Welcome was an expansive, barrel-chested charmer, with a salt-and-pepper crew cut and a deeply etched face that seemed perpetually tanned. His wardrobe consisted of one or two pairs of jeans, heavy, virtually indestructible work boots, and perhaps a hundred flannel shirts of various colors and plaids. This day, he had chosen a forest green.

Dennis was devoted to his two sons and granddaughter only slightly more than to his red Chevy pickup, the 200,000 miles on its odometer, and the
LOCAL UNION 589
sticker fixed to the center of its rear window.

Barring the year or so following the cancer death of his wife, he was the most inexorably upbeat person Lou had ever known, except when it came to holding on to his money. Whether it was water bottling, real estate, new toys, or a chain of barber shops, he was as capable of losing investments as he was at making people believe in them.

Mindless of the milling crowd, Dennis embraced his older son with a frontal Heimlich maneuver that would have dislodged a T-bone from the throat of a grizzly bear.

“Food here any good?” he asked, ignoring the menu Lou had handed him.

“They have everything here, Dad.”

“Burgers?”

“If you’d look at the menu, you’d see there’s a whole page devoted to burgers.”

“It’s like the size of the phone book. Besides, why do I need a menu when I have a doctor here to look at it for me? What about just a plain old cheeseburger? They have any of those? You know I don’t like any of that fancy crap on my cheeseburgers.”

“They have cheeseburgers, Dad. Bacon cheeseburgers, too.”

“Probably comes with an avocado on it.”

“Come on,” Lou said, taking his father’s tattooed, solidly muscled arm. “Let’s go sit down.”

The lunch crowd continued filing in around them to be quickly tended to by a team of pretty, chipper hostesses. There were plenty of available booth seats around the wall encompassing the main dining room, and a number of empty tables as well. But Dennis, as Lou knew he would, made a beeline for the counter seating, insisting as always that he liked being up high, and that the swivel action of the stools benefited his arthritic hip.

The counter, like the rest of the massive dining area, was well worn—possibly by design, Lou reflected, or possibly because of the difficulty in catering to “everybody” while keeping the place buff. Varnish was worn away in some spots, and the brass fixtures were short a good polishing. Still, the overall effect was an inviting charm and warmth. As if to underscore the motto of the place, the walls and wooden pilasters featured autographed photos of celebrities and politicians, usually paired with a perpetually beaming Millie—the quintessential grandmother. Lou recognized two former Virginia governors, several players from the Redskins, Nationals, and Wizards, as well as a rapper whom Emily adored but Renee despised.

As they made their way to the counter, Lou caught snippets of conversation from the expanding sea of patrons. Nearly everything he heard dealt with the Meacham murders.

Lou and Dennis grabbed adjacent stools, sandwiching themselves between two much older gentleman, each of whom appeared to be dining alone. The wall facing them opened on the kitchen, where perhaps a dozen white-uniformed cooks and chefs of various kinds were picking up steam for the lunchtime rush ahead. Flames, fueled by dripping grease, danced in the background, creating sizzling steaks that Lou could smell. The culinary ballet was impressive, and for a time, father and son watched, mesmerized. The stainless steel counters just opposite the grill were lined with cutting boards, large mixing bowls, and trays of vegetables. Movement … sound … aroma …

Cue the cash registers.

It was good to see Dennis immersed in something other than the wall-mounted TVs at his beloved Wave Runner.

The narrow passage between the counter and the kitchen was patrolled by a tall, gaunt waitress with crow’s-feet eyes and tousled red hair the same height as her head. Her name tag read
IRIS.
Nothing about her personality explained why she was working with the public. Not surprisingly, Dennis ordered a cheeseburger, fries, and a Coke.

“We don’t have Coke,” Iris said.

“Okay, Pepsi, then.”

“No Pepsi. We only serve Millie Cola.”

“Millie Cola? Lou, what is this place?”

“A place that only serves Millie Cola,” he said. “Why don’t you give it a try?”

“Okay, one Millie Cola and one glass of ice water on the side,” Dennis said.

Iris scowled and wrote on her pad. “And how would you like your cheeseburger?”

“With cheese,” Dennis said.

Another scowl.

Lou went for the Cobb salad and an iced tea.

“So … how ya you doing?” Dennis asked once their cadaverous server had moved on.

“You mean about John Meacham?” Lou asked, as usual having no problems reading the man.

“Your brother called. He said he suspected you might have had something to do with Meacham through your work. Apparently, the papers said he was an alcoholic and had been involved with a group like yours in D.C.”

“Graham could have called and just asked me. I’m in his speed dial.”

“Have they mentioned your name?”

“Not yet.”

“But you did.”

“I did what?”

“Have something to do with the guy, like Graham said.”

“I did, yes.”

“And are you in trouble?”

“Speak softer, Dad.”

“Are you in any trouble? Graham said you might be.”

If Graham, a successful money manager, worked as hard at keeping Dennis away from recurrent fiscal ruin as he did pointing out the mistakes Lou was forever making in his life, there might have been significantly less red ink in the family.

“I’ll give him a call later on so maybe he’ll stop speculating,” Lou said.

He wondered if the younger Welcome had reasoned out that Lou’s job might be on the line as well … or worse.

“Your brother’s smart,” Dennis understated. “He figures things out.”

“Tell me about it.”

“So?”

“So, I don’t know. I’m still trying to piece it all together.”

Lou could sense the old man to his right straining to listen in. He turned his back a few more inches and lowered his voice even further. If he had known Dennis was going to be in a chatty mood, he would have insisted on a booth. He should have been able to predict it. The violence surrounding the Meacham case was the sort of thing that utterly fascinated his father—and most other people, for that matter.

“He fall off the wagon?” Dennis asked.

“Nope. That much I’m sure of.”

“Drugs?”

“You know I consider drugs and alcohol flip sides of the same coin.”

“In that case, it doesn’t make any sense.”

“I agree with you there, Pop.”

“No warning?”

“Not that I can find.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Dennis reiterated. “Usually a guy goes ballistic and kills a bunch of people, then folks start coming out of the woodwork to say how they knew he was unstable, a loner, distant, that sort of thing.”

“So far none of that,” Lou said.

“Or else, if it’s a serial killer, they all say how he was just the nicest guy in the world, and always had a cheerful word for everyone, and that they can’t figure out how two dozen bodies got buried in his backyard without anyone suspecting a thing.”

Their drinks arrived. Dennis sipped his apprehensively.

“I don’t generally like any excuses for Coke,” he said, “but this one’s pretty good.”

“I’m glad they could please you. You should let the waitress know.”

“I don’t think she likes me.”

“Nonsense. Your charm is winning her over. I can tell.”

“So, why are you out here?”

“Actually, I drove out to talk with the chief of police. He set me up to meet with one of the witnesses.”

“That was nice of him.”

“I suppose. Dad, there’s something really strange going on around Kings Ridge.”

Careful to keep his voice out of range of the old man to his right, Lou told his father what he had shared with Gilbert Stone. When he was finished, Dennis fixed him with the same sort of curious stare he typically reserved for people with excessive body piercing.

“That
is
odd,” he said. “One or two weirdos might be a coincidence. Five or six is a trend—unless, of course, you’re overreading things.”

“Always possible.”

Lunch arrived, and after one bite, Dennis Welcome appeared to have become a convert to the church of Millie Neuland.

“Call me delicious,” he said to the reedlike waitress, brandishing his cheeseburger with two hands.

She favored him with an enigmatic smile that might have announced she no longer considered him a form of pond scum.

“Fresh food makes all the difference,” she said.

“Yeah? Just how fresh are we talking about here?”

“Fresh as in everything we serve is local. Produce. Meat. We even bake our own bread.”