Robert B. Parker's Wonderland (4 page)

A cold beer in one hand and a warm pancake in the other; life was good. Z looked bored.

An hour and a half after I called, a striking woman walked into the Hong Kong Café.

I summoned my detective abilities to study her body to see if the description matched. Z watched her subtly from the bar. He raised his eyebrows. She was the kind of woman who expected men to stare.

The woman was tall, maybe five-ten in heels, with stylish, layered brown hair. Her eyes were large and dark. She had a pert nose, prominent cheekbones, and very large, sensuous lips painted bright red. She had the figure of someone who worked out and used weights. Perhaps she had even attempted Zumba.

The dress hit just above the knee, a black wraparound number with a deep neckline. Studying her legs, I guessed the boots cost about as much as my rent.

I stood and walked over to her.

“Do I know you?” she said, with the slightest trace of a British accent. I hadn’t noticed it on the phone.

I gave Walleye’s name and said he couldn’t make it.

“Why?”

“Tonight’s his night for the Big Brothers program.”

She gave me an appraising glance. “You look tougher,” she said.

“What you see is nothing,” I said. “I got a Balinese dancing girl tattooed across my chest.”

Even though she failed to smile, I motioned her to my table. The waiter had already cleared the plates and left me the check and two fortune cookies. He soon reappeared and asked if the lady would like to see a menu. She did not. Nor did she wish to have a cocktail.

Up close, she appeared older than I had first guessed. Which wasn’t a bad thing. A very fit woman in her forties with crinkles at the corners of her eyes and subtle laugh lines around her mouth. She wore large diamond earrings. Her makeup was impeccable, and she smelled of expensive perfume.

She smiled at me. I smiled back.

“And?” she said.

“Yes?”

“What’s the emergency?”

“Those people at the condo are giving us trouble.”

“That’s not our problem,” she said. “That’s your problem.”

“They ain’t backin’ down.”

I said it just like that, with the “ain’t” and the dropped
g
. I figured I’d go for the thick-necked Southie type. It went well with my broken nose and Irish heritage.

“You take care of it,” she said, studying the inside of her wrist, where she wore a gold watch twisted backward.

“You guys sure want this property,” I said. “Why not just go for somewhere easier?”

“I don’t pay you and your friends to think,” she said, chin dropping, eyes intent.

“These people got friends,” I said. “It could get messy.”

“How messy?”

I shrugged. “Some people might get hurt. You know?”

She stared at me and crossed her legs. I followed the legs. Her eyes caught me staring. She widened them and bit her lip. “You have until the end of the week,” she said.

“The boss is some fuckin’ ball buster, huh?”

The rain fell in a neat slant in the stadium lights behind her.

“I am the fucking boss,” she said, standing. “If you attempt to follow me or make any trouble . . .”

“So we’re not friends?”

“Not likely,” she said.

I smiled and shrugged.

She shook her head and walked away, sliding into a stylish little raincoat she’d kept slung over her arm. It matched her boots. She lifted the hair off her neck as she settled into the coat and knotted it tightly at her waist, heels clicking hard on the tile floor. Without a word, Z laid some cash down on the bar and followed her out to the parking lot.

I paid, pocketed both fortune cookies, and walked out into the rain. I turned up the collar on my jacket and headed up Boylston, cutting over to Commonwealth, where pink and purple magnolia blooms fell in the bright glow of streetlamps.

Let the kid do the work, I thought.

6

EVEN THOUGH
I was my own boss, I liked to arrive at the office early. I enjoyed the banter with the women at the designer showroom across the hall. I appreciated the routine of making fresh coffee, listening to it brew atop my file cabinet as I sorted through bills and searched for the occasional check that slipped through my door. Pearl had come to work with me that morning, and she curled herself up on the couch, sighing deeply, and returned to sleep as I turned to study more spring rain. Rivulets zigzagged across the windows facing Berkeley Street. Ella sang softly on my computer while I made a list of phone calls on a yellow legal pad.

I had just picked up the phone when Z opened my door and sank into my client chair with a thud. Pearl lifted her head with great attention but, recognizing Z, took another long sigh and returned to her morning snooze.

I put down the phone. I crossed off the first name on my list.

“You worried?” Z said.

“I got your message,” I said. “I had started to think that woman had taken you prisoner.”

“I wouldn’t fight it,” Z said, standing up from the chair and removing his black leather jacket. He hung it on my hat tree by mine and reached for a coffee mug. He poured us both a cup and slid one in front of me.

“Hawk usually brings donuts.”

“I promised Henry you’d cut down.”

“Have we not covered confidentiality in the snoop business?”

Z shrugged. With some more practice, he might shrug as artfully as I.

“So,” I said.

“Four Seasons.”

“You worked a tail job to the Four Seasons?” I said. “My God, how did you survive?”

“I left the car with the valet,” Z said. “Just like you said. Twenty bucks, by the way.”

“Expense it.”

“I found a place to sit in the lobby,” Z said. He folded his arms across his chest and sat up straight in the chair. “I watched her talk to the man at the desk and then take the elevator. I followed her and walked the opposite way on the same floor.”

“Did she come back down?” I said.

“Nope.”

“You get a room number?”

“Hmm,” Z said. “Would that help?”

“Maybe you could have relied on your heritage and tracked her boot prints in the carpet.”

Z just stared at me over the rim of his mug. He took a sip and sat it back down on the desk.

“Do we have a name?” I said.

“I had a beer at the bar.”

“Bristol Lounge.”

“Yeah, at the Bristol Lounge.”

“Good place to have a beer.”

Pearl jumped from the couch and trotted over to me, setting her head in my lap and looking up at me with baleful yellow eyes. I did not need to be Cesar Millan to know she wanted to take a stroll in the Public Garden. There were fresh flowers to sniff and squirrels to chase. I patted her head and waited for Z to finish.

“I pretended like I was going to charge it to my room,” Z said. “I gave the woman’s room number. I dropped a twenty-dollar tip on him before I signed.”

I nodded. “Boston ain’t cheap for a gumshoe.”

“Just as he snatched it up, I asked if the room was under my name or my boss’s.”

“And what did he say?”

“He told me the name of the hotel guest.”

“Smart.”

“How do you think the Cree won the Battle of Cut Knife?”

“That exact thought had just crossed my mind.”

“J. Fraser.”

“J. Fraser.” I placed my Red Wings up on the edge of my desk and noted a few new scuff marks on the edge. My A-2 bomber jacket and Dodgers cap hung neatly on a hook beside Z’s jacket. I scratched Pearl’s ears. She shook herself, and her collar jingled on her neck. I looked down at my yellow legal pad and tapped my pen in contemplation.

“Okay,” I said. “So we’re one step up the food chain.”

“Nice to know who J. Fraser is.”

“You write down her license plate?” I said.

“Looked like a rental,” Z said. “Didn’t figure it would matter.”

I reached an open palm across the desk as he handed over a scrawled paper from his pocket.

“Detective work,” I said. “Watch and learn.”

I picked up the phone.

7

I DON’T CARE
for computers besides using them to type reports, calculate a sometimes depressing income, or as a makeshift jukebox. I do not e-mail, surf the Web, or use Facebook. An electronic message was an instant record, and in my business, it was best to discuss private matters in person or on the telephone. There were also times when a phone call was faster and more thorough than a computer. So by the time I finished my first cup of coffee, I had connected J. Fraser’s BMW to a Massachusetts corporation called Envolve Development. It took two calls.

“Aha,” I said.

“A clue?” Z said, sitting with Pearl on my office couch.

“Better than a clue,” I said. “A lead.”

“We know who is trying to force out Henry?”

“Sort of.”

“And what do we do now?” Z said.

“This requires additional contemplation.”

I stood up, reached for my jacket and baseball cap. I tossed Z his leather coat and grabbed Pearl’s leash. “When stalled, walk a dog.”

“What number crimestopper tip is this?” he asked.

“Let’s call it thirty-seven.”

We took Boylston up to Arlington and followed the sidewalk to the wrought-iron gates of the Public Garden. A lazy drizzle watered the bright orange and bloodred tulips. The wind swayed the loose branches on the willows while ducks floated aimlessly across the lagoon and under the bridge. I placed one hand in my jacket and pulled down the bill of my ball cap. Pearl strained at the leash, pawing hard toward a squirrel. The squirrel worked on a stray bit of popcorn, unconcerned.

“You ever let her off the leash?” Z said.

“Chaos might ensue.”

We walked the pathways, heading east, the Financial District looming far over the Common and Tremont Street. We passed over Charles and into the Common, the State House’s gold dome gleaming from atop Beacon Hill. City lights shone wetly across Boylston.

“Okay, J. Fraser works for a company called Envolve,” I said. “Now we need to learn more about Envolve and why they want that condo.”

“I am willing to conduct as much research as needed on Ms. Fraser.”

“Have we forgotten she sent three thugs to put a beat-down on sweet Henry Cimoli?”

“Nope,” Z said. “And since when is Henry sweet?”

“He was sweet one time in 1974,” I said. “Someone should have written a poem.”

“Do you want me to go look up some records?”

“Stick to Ms. Fraser; I’ll stay on the paper trail,” I said. “Divide and conquer.”

“What if she notices me following her?”

“You’re an Indian,” I said. “Be both silent and stealthy.”

Z nodded. “I will remind myself.”

“It would be good to know the company she keeps,” I said. “Don’t worry about Henry. The men they sent have been properly discouraged.”

“Until they send for better men.”

“Nobody is as good as us,” I said.

“What about Hawk and Vinnie?”

“Sure,” I said. “But we’re on the same team.”

“That’s comforting,” Z said. “I would hate to go against Hawk.”

“I did a long time ago,” I said. “It wasn’t much fun.”

“Once we find out why this company wants Henry’s building, what’s next?”

“We ask Henry,” I said. “The next move is up to him. But I don’t think he wants to sell. Just be left alone.”

“We can create a buffer.”

“Yep.”

“You think him not selling has to do with the woman he lived with?”

“I do.”

“He never mentioned her to me,” Z said.

I nodded. Pearl panted heavily, nails scratching at the pavement, crouching and moving toward a group of pigeons. I gave her some extra lead, and after a few steps, she broke into a perfect point. I smiled with pride at Z.

“Some dog,” I said, and made a gun with my thumb and forefinger. I carefully aimed for Pearl’s benefit. “Pow.”

8

TWO MORE CUPS
of coffee and one tuna sub later, I had pretty much learned all the Internet knew about Envolve Development. They owned a lot of commercial real estate in the city, a shopping mall in Worcester, a hotel in Lexington, and a couple of condos in Revere. They were mentioned in passing in stories about corporate philanthropy, a brief item here and there about new construction or the purchase of a new property. A recent story in the
Globe
blamed them for the massive gaping hole by the now-defunct Filene’s Basement in the Financial District. No names were given, but there were some stern words from the Boston City Council and stiff fines levied.

I called Envolve’s corporate office and asked for a J. Fraser. The peppy woman who answered told me there was no such employee. I asked if she was sure. Still peppy, she assured me there was not. Being an ace investigator, I ran the name of J. Fraser with that of Envolve Development through Google. Nothing. I read back through the news stories for something that might help.

On the second read, I recognized the byline of a pal I had not seen in some time. I dialed up Wayne Cosgrove and invited him for a drink. Wayne seldom turned down a drink.

“You still hanging out in the Ritz?” he said, a slight hint of Virginia in his voice.

“I can drive down to Dorchester.”

“Nope,” Wayne said. “I’d rather come to you. The Ritz sounds nice after a rainy day.”

An hour later, Wayne walked into the old Ritz bar and joined me at a small table facing the Public Garden. I liked the bar because it offered the best nut sampler in the city. And it was just around the corner from my apartment. I stood and shook Wayne’s hand. Since the last time I’d seen him, he had grown a beard and let his hair get long. Both had some touches of gray that went well with his threadbare brown corduroy coat and plaid button-down. His shoes were wingtips, well worn and careless without socks. He looked like he should be teaching a sociology class at Harvard.

“Glad you haven’t been laid off.”

“Back on the beat,” Wayne said. “After a lot of time on the desk.”

“What did you like better?”

“I can’t say I miss afternoon meetings.”

“Which allow you to file stories and meet old pals for cocktails.”

“So where have you been, Spenser?” Wayne said. “I take it you want something, because you always call when you want something.”