One O'Clock Hustle: An Inspector Rebecca Mayfield Mystery (Rebecca Mayfield Mysteries Book 1) (4 page)

“Do you have any bread for toast?” he asked.

With only a few yanks, tugs, and curses, she put on toast and coffee while he scrambled eggs and then cooked them with grated cheddar.

He nearly gagged when she poured Tabasco on her eggs, but other than that, they ate in relative peace. They had just finished when they heard a knock on the door.

Richie's eyes went wide then narrowed and he headed towards the shoulder bag with her Glock inside. She stood her ground, tugging on the handcuffs and refusing to let him get close to it.

He frowned, but walked with her to the door. “Get rid of whoever it is,” he ordered. As she opened the door just a little way, he stood behind it.

As she had expected, her landlord, Bradley Frick, had knocked. He stood before her with a big smile. Over the years, they had become good friends. He would come down the back stairs to her place, or she'd run up to his, and they often had long heart-to-hearts over coffee or wine, depending on the hour and if Rebecca was on-call or not.

“Rebecca, sweetie, I wanted to be sure you're okay.” He wore tight, nearly white jeans, a floral shirt and sandals without socks even though the temperature was chilly. His bleached blond hair spiked around his head, and he had no sideburns while his eyebrows remained dark. His teeth were perfectly capped. “I heard about a murder at a nightclub last night, and since you were on-call, I wondered what happened. The news is so bad in this town! Spike! Come give us a kiss!” He expected her to let him into the house as he bent towards the dog. Instead Rebecca moved her foot so Spike could run to Bradley.

He picked up the dog and cuddled him.

“The case is nearly solved already,” she said, feeling awkward about the way she blocked the door. She always invited Bradley in. “There's nothing to worry about, but could you do me a favor and keep Spike with you today? I know I'm going to be working crazy hours, and some people might come by to discuss the case and I don't want him underfoot.”

“They're coming
here?”
His eyes opened wide. “You mean like your detective friends and all? To talk about
murder?”

“Yes. In fact—ouch!”

He jumped nearly ten feet in the air. “What is it?”

“Nothing. Don't worry about it. Good-bye. And thanks, Bradley.”

She shut the door and kicked Richie. “That's for trying to break my thumb! What's the matter with you?”

He rubbed his shin. “Whatever it takes, Inspector. You were too chatty all of a sudden.”

“Believe me, you're safe from Bradley.”

Richie grinned. “That's a relief. I was so, so scared.”

“You're not funny, Amalfi!”

Another knock sounded on the door.

“Don't tell me the idiot's come back,” Richie said. “Get rid of him this time!”

Glaring at him, she pulled the door open.

And gasped.

One of the most beautiful men she had ever seen in her life stood in the doorway. About six-foot-three, with wavy blond hair, blue eyes and a deep tan, he had high, pronounced cheekbones and as aristocratic a nose as she could imagine. He wore a brown and gray tweed jacket, brown slacks, a white shirt, and a plaid wool neck scarf. “Inspector Mayfield?” he asked politely. Even his voice was magnificent.

She could only gape a moment, then her mouth shut as she wondered how he'd gotten through the locked door to the breezeway ... unless Bradley had let him in. If so, the landlord would be back soon demanding a proper introduction.

“Who—” she began when Richie pulled the door out of her hand and opened it wide.

“Shay, get in here.”

That's Shay?

“Where's Vito?” Richie asked.

“Right behind me. He's checking the place out.” Shay noticed the handcuffs. Eyes eerily like dry ice traveled over Rebecca from her barely brushed hair to her slept-in outfit. One eyebrow lifted. Who was this guy? she wondered.

Shay glanced back over his shoulder and nodded, then entered the apartment. Following him came the exact type man Rebecca expected to find hanging around Richie Amalfi—a stereotypical wise guy's bodyguard. Vito was sturdy and squat, firmly earthbound, with a cone-shaped head, a fleshy nose, and rolls of fat under his cheeks like melting scoops on an ice cream cone. He wore a heavy tan car coat with bulging pockets that made Rebecca wonder what he carried in them.

“'Ey, Richie,” Vito said, grinning and pointing at the handcuffs. “I heard you was suspected of shooting somebody, not getting hitched.”

“Funny. She's a homicide inspector.”

He eyed her. “Still, nice
braccioli
.” He smirked, then took a bite out of a half-eaten hero sandwich buried in his thick hand. “You here all night, huh? Leave it to you,
paisan
.”

“Man, you don't know how scary that thought is.” Richie didn't even smile, but just shook his head.

“If you two are talking about what I think you're talking about,” Rebecca said, one hand on her hip, “you're both asking for a fat lip.” Her eyes shot daggers at Richie.
Just what was so scary?

Vito's thick brows rose high. Richie hunched his shoulders, then said, “There's coffee. Help yourselves.”

“Everybody,
stop!
” Fuming, Rebecca spun towards Richie. “Who are these men? What are their full names?”

“Shay is a nickname,” Richie said. “He likes it more than his own name, Henry Tate. And this is Vito Grazioso. Gentlemen, meet Inspector Rebecca Mayfield.”

She eyed them. “Are you ex-cons?”

“What you been tellin' her, Richie?” Vito asked.

“They aren't,” Richie said. “They walk the straight and narrow. Just like me.”

“Sure, you do,” she said, then lifted her handcuffed wrist. “You expect me to believe that?”

Instead of answering, Richie said, “Rebecca, sit down at the table.”

She studied the men before her. Whoever these men were, whatever was going on, could prove very interesting. Richie surely knew a lot more about the dead woman than he had admitted to. To prove his innocence, he would have to tell Shay and Vito what he knew. She was all ears. This was exactly why she had decided to stick—literally—to Richie. Without a word, she sat, just as Richie asked her to.

Even he looked surprised.

Shay found a cup and saucer rather than a mug for his coffee, as well as a sugar bowl and teaspoon. He sat across from them at the small round table, and meticulously added two and a half spoons of sugar. When he stirred, he decorously extended his little finger. He wore no jewelry, as opposed to Vito who wore a pancake-sized watch and a gold pinky ring so thick and heavy it looked like the Mother Lode.

Rebecca couldn't wrap her head around these three very different men working together.

While Shay sipped coffee and Vito gobbled his sandwich, licked the mayonnaise off his fingers and wiped them on his sweatpants, Richie filled them in on what happened at Big Caesar's.

“
Fung gool
,” Vito swore.

“You're right, but watch your mouth,” Richie said, with a quick glance at Rebecca.

“
Fung gool?”
she repeated. “What's that? It doesn't sound Italian.”

Richie scowled at her. “Don't say it! It's San Francisco Italian. From Calabrese, Sicilian, who knows? But it's not something you should ever say, all right?”

She blinked in amazement at his reaction.

“Sorry, boss,” Vito muttered as he got up, poured coffee into a mug, and then slurped it loudly while returning to the table. “Anyway, you ain't never seen the killer before, right?”

“Not that I know. He wore a ski mask and he was a big mother—, uh, guy. But he knew his way around, so somebody helped him,” Richie replied. “Somebody we know—somebody who set me up, dammit to hell!”

“Who woulda known you was goin' to Big Caesar's last night?” Vito asked.

“Hey, it was Saturday night. Big race at Santa Anita today.” Richie twisted in his chair to glance towards Rebecca's TV, and grimaced. Not only wasn't it a plasma, it wasn't even an LCD, but was big and boxy. “They expected me. Besides, the woman I went with—the one who was killed—wanted to go.”

“That don't narrow the field none, do it?” Vito said morosely. “But was Danny there?”

Richie shrugged. “Nobody saw him, which was weird. He's always there Saturday night.” He faced Rebecca. “Did anyone see him?”

“You're talking about Danny Pasternak, the bookkeeper?” she asked, putting together the talk about horse races and the money man.

“Yeah. Sure.”

“No one saw him. And I was told he didn't work nights,” Rebecca said. The way the three looked at her, she knew she had been lied to in more ways than one. “So Danny's not a bookkeeper, he’s a book
ie
?”

Shay and Vito looked at Richie. He nodded. “Well, I guess, yeah, you could say that.”

Rebecca threw up the one hand not manacled to Richie. “Great. I'm going to talk to him today. I guess now, my questions will be a bit different than what I had planned as I try to find out why Meaghan Blakely, or whatever her name was, went into his office.”

“That wasn't her name?” Richie asked.

“I doubt it. No one with that name came close to fitting her age or description.”

“Shit,” Richie muttered.

Vito nodded.

Shay said nothing, but looked from one to the other without expression. She had seen eyes that cold only once before, on a known psychopath. What was with him? she wondered, and then, as if he were reading her mind, he gazed at her so intently he seemed like some alien creature intent on turning her into a pod person. The man gave her cold chills. She wondered how she ever found him handsome.

Richie glanced at his watch. “Look at the time.” He again eyed her small television. “I don't suppose it's hooked up to a satellite, right, Inspector?”

“Are you joking?”

“DirecTV. Dish. What's to joke about?” His voice became increasingly more desperate as she stared steadily at him. Then his shoulders slumped. “Christ, I don't understand people who don't watch TV properly.”

Vito shook his head sympathetically.

Shay abruptly changed the subject. “Why her?” he asked, his thumb pointed towards Rebecca. She realized he must have taken as much of a dislike to her as she had to him.

“She'll have access to stuff we don't,” Richie said. “Besides, she knows I didn't kill that woman. She'll work with us.”

“Is that so?” Rebecca asked, stunned by the man's arrogance.

“You know I didn't kill anybody,” he said.

“I know no such thing.” She lifted her handcuffed wrist. “Seems to me you're capable of it.”

“You two,” Richie said, pointing to Shay and Vito, “find out what you can from Harrison Sidwell and his bouncers. For sure, they know more than they let on to the cops. And I want to know who handed me the note to go see Danny.” He turned to Rebecca. “You got the note, right?”

“No one found a note, Amalfi,” she said coldly. “And none of the staff admitted to any contact with you other than bringing the drinks you ordered. None of them admitted to seeing Pasternak in the club last night. That part of your story has more holes than Swiss cheese.”

Richie shook his head. “If I didn't get the note, I never would have found Meaghan! I wouldn't have been blamed for offing her! Who is she? Why did anyone want her popped? Why hire some hit man to whack her? And where the hell was Danny last night?”

“Wait—
hit
man?” she asked. “Where did that come from?”

“One shot, through the heart. Quiet. Ski mask. Looks like a button with a contract to me.” Richie turned towards his friends for confirmation and both nodded as if no sensible person would have thought otherwise.

“Or a very lucky shot,” she tossed back at them.

“Right,” Richie said, not bothering to hide his contempt … again.

Richie turned back to his buddies. “Talk to Danny. If he's not home or at work, he could be holed up with his
goomar
. Carolina Fontana. He set her up in an apartment near North Beach. That's all I know.”

“
Goomar
?” Rebecca asked.

“His mistress, what else?” Richie said.

Rebecca had to admit it would probably have taken her a while to find anyone who'd reveal that Danny Pasternak, bookie, had a woman on the side.

“What you gonna do?” Vito asked Richie.

“I gotta get home, get some stuff.”

“How you gonna do that?”

Richie looked at Shay who reached into his jacket pocket and handed Richie a burner cell phone and a garage door opener. “They're both set to work,” Shay said.

“Good job,” Richie said, then turned towards Rebecca. “Ready?”

She all but spat out the words, “Not on your life!”

CHAPTER FOUR

Richie held Rebecca’s cell phone to her ear as she called Bill Sutter. She hated driving her black Ford Explorer one-handed, especially when she needed to turn a corner. “Sutter, it's me. How's the case coming?”

“We've got the murder weapon, no question about it. It's got Amalfi's fingerprints. We've put out an APB on him. Paavo's fiancée, Angie, is here kicking up a fuss that her cousin's innocent. Another cousin is a lawyer and is here to represent him, if and when he shows up. And everybody's wondering where you are.”

“I'm on the case, where else?” she said. “Who's the gun registered to?”

“It isn't.”

Why didn't that surprise her?

“When you coming in?” he asked.

“A couple of things came up last night that I want to check out, then I'll be there.”

“Really? What things?”

“I ... uh, it's complicated. Listen, did you reach Danny Pasternak yet?”

“Can't find him. His old lady said he didn't come home last night, but she isn't worried. Seems he spends a lot of nights away. She claims she doesn't know where. Sounds like he's got something on the side, if you know what I mean.”

“Okay, thanks. Talk to you later.” She nodded for Richie to hit the “End” button. He did.

“You've got a lawyer,” she said and told him briefly about the conversation.

He directed her to a narrow street near the top of Twin Peaks, an expensive neighborhood of mid-century modern and newer homes with garages on the ground floor and living areas above. “It's number eighty-one on the left. Gray. Big picture window,” Richie said as he tried to hide in the leg area under the glove compartment. She covered him with a blanket and plopped her handbag on top of it.

She knew she was breaking more rules than a leopard had spots, but for some reason, she—who was normally such a by-the-book person in everything—was unable to stop herself. She had thought long and hard about getting Richie into her SUV, and then removing the handcuff from her own wrist, putting it on his, and arresting him. She was armed, of course, and it would have been easy. He knew it, too. But he trusted her.

That was his problem not hers, she told herself. She had a job to do. Right now, she simply wanted to learn why he decided to go to his house and what he expected to find there. And then she would arrest him. She needed to play along just a little while longer.

She spotted the house he described up ahead.

An unmarked police car sat two doors before it. She stopped in the middle of the block, rolled down her window, and stuck her head and one free arm out.

“Mayfield, Homicide,” she called, showing her badge. “You guys can take a half-hour break. I'm going to check around inside. It'll take me a while.”

“You sure you don't want back-up?” one of the patrolmen asked.

“What did you say?” She let her voice grow loud and hostile. “You think I can't handle myself? Is that it? Why? Because I'm female, maybe? You think I'm not capable of doing my job? Let me remind you,
officer,
I'm in Homicide.”

“No, ma'am. I mean, yes, ma'am.” The guy didn't say another word, just gave a nod to his partner and the two sped off as Rebecca pulled into Richie's driveway.

“Good thinking,” Richie said, popping his head out from under the blanket. “But for a minute I thought you were going to give the kid a spanking.”

She threw the blanket back over his head.

He fought his way free, took the garage door opener out of his pocket and hit one of the buttons. The two-car garage door opened. A 700-series BMW sedan was parked on one side. She should have known Richie would own more than one car…unless he lived with someone. A girlfriend maybe?

But he had dated Meaghan Blakely.

Two-timing rat!

“Who does that car belong to?” she asked.

“It's mine. Sometimes a Porsche is too small.” He glanced at her. “Why?”

Rebecca ignored his question and drove into the garage. “I hope you realize that if those cops are watching, they're going to wonder where I got your garage opener.”

“Better they wonder that than see me waltz you up to my front door and open it with a key.”

She knew he was right, but for some reason that only increased her irritation. Why did he have that effect on her? He hit the remote again and the garage door lowered shut behind them. “Come this way,” she said, opening the door on the driver's side.

He stubbornly shook his head, then put his hands together and cracked his knuckles. At each pop, a ripple went down her back. God but he was annoying! “I already crawled over the car seats when we got into this piece of junk,” he said. “Now, it's your turn.”

“You can't believe how much I hate you.” She stepped out of the driver's door and tugged on the handcuffs. “At least my car doesn't have bucket seats with a gear shift and handbrake in the center. Be thankful and come on.”

He sat like an immovable object. “That's only because they didn't make bucket seats in nineteen-fifty! But you've still got this arm rest between the seats. So it's your turn.”

She did a slow burn, yet the inside of his house might turn up some evidence that would prove his guilt or innocence, and entering with him would make it easy to search. “Fine. Go!” She crawled over the seats and out the passenger door.

They walked up a flight of stairs, and then he unlocked the door between the garage and the house.

The sunny kitchen was bright with white cabinets and pale blue, gray, and white granite countertops. But the cabinet doors and drawers all hung open, and the room smelled of gas.

“What the…!” Richie ran across the room, Rebecca doing her best to help, as he flung open the window over the sink, then hurried to the gas cooktop and shut off the burners. They were unlit and caused gas to fill the house.

A whirring sound continued. The two stood absolutely still, then both turned towards the microwave. It was running.

“Get out of here!” Rebecca cried, tugging on Richie's arm to leave the kitchen. She could have been trying to pull a brick wall.

Her feet were nearly lifted out of her boots as he lunged towards the microwave and punched the button to open the door. Inside she saw a bowl with rice in it. It had started to blacken. The rice was a built-in timing device. Set the microwave to run for an hour or more, put the rice inside, and wait for it to dry out enough to catch fire. When it did, with the gas leak, the whole house would have gone up.

A shudder went through Richie that Rebecca could feel through the handcuffs.

Although most of his swear words were in Italian—including the infamous '
fung gool
'—she didn't need a translation.

Five minutes later, they would have been too late to save the house—and possibly have been killed.

“Let's get all the windows open,” she said, feeling a little squeamish. They stepped into the living room. The picture window gave a breathtaking view of San Francisco, looking eastward, towards the downtown and financial district skyscrapers. But Rebecca scarcely noticed as she and Richie went to the smaller side windows and opened them wide.

That done, she watched Richie's expression move from shock to sadness as he eyed the destruction to his home.

The furniture had been slashed, and its stuffing pulled out. The huge, wide-screen plasma television set lay smashed on the floor, its back pried off and tossed aside.

“My God,” she murmured. “How could they have done this with the police watching the house? Unless”—she faced him—“they did it before you escaped from Bill Sutter. Before you became a suspect.”

He didn't answer but walked down the hall. There was a small guest bedroom, a den, and a large master bedroom. They had all been ransacked the way the living room had been. In the bedroom, three TV sets had been aligned on stands facing the bed—a king. Now, all had been destroyed as if someone searched inside them. But for what? she wondered. Exactly what was Richie not telling her?

Richie no longer seemed sad, and no longer swore. He no longer said anything, but in a fierce, all-consuming fury marched through the house, alternately kicking some broken pieces and sadly glowering at others as he absorbed the destruction.

She wasn't sure if his silence or his cursing was worse.

He stopped suddenly and picked up a small, framed black-and-white picture of a young man. He was thin, wearing jeans, a plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, smoking a cigarette and leaning against an old Plymouth sedan. He was good-looking, with fairly long, thick black hair and heavy-lidded dark eyes much like Richie's. The whole photo had the look of something out of the sixties or seventies.

The glass covering the photo had been smashed. “Why'd they do this?” Richie muttered. She knew he expected no answer from her.

“Who was he?” Rebecca asked.

“My father. It's my favorite picture of him, taken when he was young, hopeful, and maybe a little reckless, before everything went to hell for him. He died when I was only five, but I kind of remember him. Or, at least, I tell myself I do.” He stood the photo with the broken glass up on a shelf, and Rebecca could sense his sorrow as he did so.

Richie opened more windows throughout the house and then led her out the back door off the kitchen to clear their heads and wait for the smell of gas to dissipate.

“Want to sit?” Richie asked, pointing at the stairs. It was warm outdoors, which was a good thing since they had discovered earlier as they left her apartment that being stuck together with handcuffs made it impossible for them to put their jackets on.

“Sure.”

They sat side-by-side, facing his garden. Richie's feet were wide spread, his free arm flung casually across one thigh. She sat with her knees together, her free arm wrapped around them. Their cuffed hands were between them, palms resting on the step they sat on.

She tried to imagine what was going through his head after all that had happened since last night. More than anything, he looked deflated, and every bit his age, which Paavo once told her was around thirty-nine or forty. Crow's feet lined the outer corners of his eyes, and curved lines—laugh lines they were usually called but not, she thought, in his case—creased the edges of his mouth. His face was fairly thin, and his nose high and long—a very Italian face, to her Nordic eye.

In the sunlight, his hair was so black it had no trace of brown, and only the temples held a few gray strands. His eyes often appeared as black as his hair, yet in the sunlight she could see flecks of brown and even green in them.

He wasn't buff, but not soft and flabby either. He no longer had the lithe, slim body of a young man, but had the solid build of someone mature and strong. And while he wasn't movie-star handsome, something about him, especially around the eyes, and the nose, and the mouth, and definitely the somewhat long, rakish way he wore his hair, reminded her of Al Pacino back when she was young and he was a heartthrob, until she learned he was only about five feet seven inches tall, which meant he would barely reach her nose. At least Richie was taller than that. In all, there was nothing she disliked about his looks. Not that it mattered one way or the other.

She swallowed hard and forced her gaze down to the handcuffs, trying to rekindle her anger and suspicion.

Beside his, her hand was white and pale, the color of someone who did most of her work indoors or at night. His skin was olive and deeply tanned, and half-again as broad as hers. It made her wonder once more how he spent his days.

She averted her eyes from him altogether. Any good detective had a duty to notice details about people, places, and things. That was all she was doing.

She turned her attention to the simple but well-tended yard. The sun felt good on her face, and the smell of the lawn, flowers and shrubs a reminder that life offered more than dead bodies and finding murderers. In a corner she noticed a small vegetable garden. “Did you plant that?”

“Sure. You can't buy tomatoes that taste good anymore. Same with peppers and zucchini. Even artichokes. They grow easily here, except the artichoke, but I'm working on it. I like to grow my own herbs as well. Over there, to the right, you'll see basil, oregano, garlic, onions, and fennel.”

“It's nice,” she said, then added, “We used to have a farm in Idaho. My father grew potatoes and corn. That's how he supported us. At harvest time, everyone in the family helped. We also had a vegetable garden.”

He faced her. “You were a farm girl?”

She gave a small smile. “I left because it was too much work. I wanted something easier, like being a cop in San Francisco.”

He smiled at her attempt at a joke. “Do your parents still farm?”

“No. My dad passed away when I was twenty-three, and my mom sold the business to my uncle, my father's brother. She lives in Boise, my sister in Los Angeles, and I'm here.”

“Do you ever miss it?” he asked.

She thought a moment. “I loved it as a kid, loved the way my dad would strut around, so proud of how tall his corn grew.” She smiled at a memory. “My sister and I would sometimes hide in the cornfield and then jump out when we thought our parents couldn't find us. Thinking back now, I'm pretty sure they knew exactly where we hid, and went along with our game.”