Danger Comes Home (Kelly O'Connell Mystery) (14 page)

“You mean when they figure out he isn’t dealing drugs?” Maggie asked, and Theresa blushed and nodded. Jenny looked wide-eyed, a fact Mike didn’t miss. Maggie turned to him and said, “When are you and Conroy going to find the bad guys?”

“We’re trying.” There was a wry tone in his voice, and he turned his attention to Jenny. After he got her talking a bit about her mom’s plans for an as-yet unnamed hot dog restaurant, he said, “That’s a great contest for you girls. See who can come up with the best name for the hot dog stand.” Then, casually, “No word from your dad yet, Jenny?”

I knew he was trying to find out gently what Mona had told the child, but I held my breath. We could get into unpleasant territory here.

She shook her head. “I don’t miss him, and Mom’s a lot happier these days. I think she was afraid of him…and of those men who came late at night. She thought I was asleep, but I peeked a lot.” If Jenny knew about the raid on her house and Mike’s part in it, she never once let on.

“And they don’t come anymore?”

She shook her head to say no, and then she and Maggie were off on names for the hot dog cafe. I vetoed Dog Stand as hackneyed and then had to explain what that word meant. Em came up with a Jenny’s Fancy Dogs, which I applauded. Jenny looked pleased, but Maggie frowned and said people would think it was a grooming parlor. Mike suggested Puttin’ on the Dog. Em asked if there was a prize for the best name, so Mike said he’d give five dollars to the girl whose name Mona chose. Then they told him he couldn’t play, and Puttin’ on the Dog was out. When we were doing dishes, they still hadn’t come up with a name. Theresa shooed the older girls away, offering to do the drying while Em cleared the table, careful not to stack the plates. Then Em and Theresa disappeared to the apartment, with Mike reminding them to set the alarm.

“It’s still daylight,” Em protested.

“Theresa, set the alarm,” he repeated. “And you come in when Em does, say about nine?”

The two older girls were holed up in Maggie’s room with Gus. I could hear an occasional bark that meant they were playing with him.

Theresa brought Em in about nine as promised. Em’s hair was neatly done and she wore a delicate bit of makeup. Proudly, she showed off painted fingers and toes. “I had a makeover!”

I sent her to tell the other girls it was time to get ready for bed. No, they didn’t have to go to bed right now but teeth brushed, faces washed, their nightly routine was to be followed.

She had no more than left the room, when Gus set up an awful howl. This was no playing-a-game bark. It was an alarm. I remembered the time he slept through an intrusion that could have cost me my life. “Probably a squirrel. The dog has no judgment.”

“That’s no squirrel. He hears something. I’m going to look.” Mike was on his feet and headed to the back door. After he ran outside, I heard it—shouts, footsteps, a car peeling away from the curb.

Mike rang the front doorbell, and I asked Theresa to close and lock the back. When I opened the front, I tried to make light of things. “Are we under attack?”

“You might say that. Two punks just got away. I was inches behind them. If I ever find them, I’m adding a charge of resisting arrest.” He was clearly winded.

Theresa said calmly, “They wanted to frighten me. I’m not going to let them.”

“Well, they frightened me!” Em chimed in. “Theresa, you sleep in my bed.”

She patted Em’s head. “Thanks, Em. But Joe will be home soon. He’ll take care of me.”

Joe came in about ten-thirty. The girls were in their beds—Em was asleep but I could hear giggling from the other two. Theresa was at the dining table, diligently reading a text on American literature. “To give me a little cultural background,” she’d explained with a slight smile.

“Mr. Mike, did you know there’s graffiti sprayed on the apartment wall? My headlights hit it when I drove in.” Joe was obviously alarmed. We had quite a time juggling cars in the driveway but no one was allowed to leave their vehicle on the street overnight—too much vandalism.

Mike shook his head. “I didn’t even look. I just chased. Two guys, one pretty big.” A rueful smile. “Maybe good I didn’t catch him. Can’t run like I used to, don’t know what else I can’t do and don’t want to find out.” Mike’s leg, severely broken in an automobile accident, still bothered him.

“Big guy was probably Little Ben. That’s the reason for his nickname. They put up a gang symbol—the one for the gang Little Ben runs with. Then there’s my name. They were probably going to leave a message but you chased them off.”

“Maybe I should have let them finish. Might have told us something.”

Joe shrugged. “Some threat to scare me. No big deal. I’ll paint over that stuff tomorrow. You have the paint that matches or should I go to Home Depot?”

Mike looked at me, and I shook my head. “We don’t have paint, but Mrs. Hunt left me a list of the brand and colors. I can give you that.”

So it was settled, and we all went uneasily to bed. I was marveling that Maggie hadn’t come out of her room when Joe came home as I walked down the hall, but just then she popped open her door and asked, “What did Joe say?”

“For you to go to bed,” Mike said.

When we were settled, I said, “Mike, Jenny doesn’t know her father’s dead.”

He sighed. “We’ll make a detective out of you yet, Kelly. Of course, she doesn’t. That’s what I was fishing for. I suppose Mona has her reasons, and whatever they are it’s not against the law. But it sure seems against nature to me.”

“I’m going to ask her,” I said with determination.

Another sigh. “I was sure you would. ’Night, Kelly.”

Mona Wilson didn’t come to pick up Jenny the next morning.

One of Mike’s many talents is making pancakes that look like people or animals. He’s gotten so he does a fair imitation of Maggie and Em in pancakes, though it’s a talent he only practices on weekend mornings. This particular morning, he tried his best to make a Jenny pancake and presented it to her with a flourish.

She giggled. “That’s really me…well, sort of. I can’t eat it, because I want to keep it. I’ve never been in a pancake before.”

“We have. Lots of times,” Em said, as if this was old stuff to her. I considered giving her a rap on the top of her head.

“How about if I take a picture of it, Jenny?”

“Oh, that would be great. Then I could eat it and keep it both.”

I took the picture, promised to print it out, and she promptly slathered the pancake with butter and maple syrup, and then practically wiped her plate clean. Ate four link sausages. I’d noticed the night before that she had a healthy appetite, and I wondered how regularly she’d eaten and how plentifully. I was a mother hen, fluttering over a slightly weak chick until it began to flourish.

Theresa came in to do Jenny’s hair for church, and the child carefully put on the new short skirt and pullover top her mom had left for church, along with new patent leather shoes with just the slightest heel. I was afraid they would pinch but Jenny was proud of the way she looked, and Maggie fussed over her, which only made it all the better.

“What church do you go to?” I asked.

Jenny shook her head. “We’ve never gone before. This is the first time. But I think Mom said First Methodist, whatever that it.”

“It’s downtown,” I said, “and it’s a beautiful big church. You’ll be thrilled to be at the service.”

Maggie looked so jealous that I was once again shot with guilt for not taking the girls to church. Then I wondered if I did would I take them downtown to the big church, which I did love, or to Mom’s small church. I knew Mom would pout if I didn’t go to her church. She already let me know from time to time that I should be paying attention to the girls’ spiritual life, and it seemed weak to counter with, “Sundays are one time we can be together as a family.”

Jenny was obviously excited, and by ten fifteen she was perched expectantly on the couch in the living room, with one of my girls on either side of her. Ten thirty came and went, and she didn’t seem disturbed. But by ten forty-five, she said, with just a small whine in her voice, “We’ll be late.”

Eleven o’clock came and went, and she began to throw desperate looks at me.

“I guess something came up,” I said lamely.

“She should call,” Jenny said in a little voice. “I’m scared for her.”

I wrapped my arms around the child and said I was sure her mom was all right.

By noon Mike was concerned. “I’ll be back in about fifteen minutes,” he said. No one else noticed, but I did—he slipped his small derringer into his pants pocket.

It was a good thirty minutes before he was back, but he reported privately to me that Mona was not at their house. He’d searched every inch, even the crawl space that they’d discovered when they raided the house. The trap door to it was hidden by a throw rug.

“I’m really worried now, but I don’t want Jenny to know.”

“Can you think of anything?”

We were in the kitchen, whispering. Maggie had taken Jenny into her room and urged her to get out of her good clothes and put on jeans, so I was fairly certain they couldn’t hear us.

“She said she was going to dinner with a friend. They were going to the Seventh Street Wine Bistro.”

“Guess I’ll go to the Seventh Street Wine Bistro,” he said grimly. “There ought to be somebody there getting ready for tonight. Damn! I wish I had a picture.”

A thought struck me, and I ran to the girls’ room. “Jenny, do you have a picture of your mom in your purse or backpack.”

Startled, she said yes. “But it’s one of those you take in a booth. We took it one day, just the two of us. That was the day we went to the zoo. Todd was asleep and didn’t know till we got back, but then he was so mad!” She was reaching into her small bag as she talked and triumphantly handed me a tiny photo. Blurry, but you could see Mona.

“Will this help you find my mom?”

“Maybe. I hope so, sweetie.”

She bit her lip, and I knew we were going to have tears any minute. I didn’t blame her one bit.

Thrusting the picture at Mike, I said, “Go,” nearly pushing him out the door so I could rush back to the girls. Jenny was indeed crying—sobbing, her sobs punctuated by “I’m so scared. I’m so afraid something’s happened to my mom.”

I motioned the girls out of the room with my head, and they left, eyes wide open with curiosity and amazement. Jenny melted into my outstretched arms, and I began to talk in as soothing a voice as I could. Not easy considering that my whole brain was on high alert.

“Mike’s gone to look for her, Jenny, and he’s good at whatever he does. He’ll find her, and I’m sure she’s all right. She may be just as worried about you as you are about her.”

Jenny raised a tear-stained face to look at me. “No, she knows where I am, and she knows I’m safe. Maybe she did this on purpose.”

I pulled her to me again and asked what she meant. The sobs turned into hiccups, and she struggled to get the words out. “She sent me out the night I ran away. I didn’t just decide to go by myself. I’d never have left her. But she gave me a sandwich and a can of 7Up and told me to go. I guess she didn’t know to tell me to come to you.”

Still stroking her hair, I said, “No, I guess she didn’t. But, Jenny, she’s always looking out for you.” I paused a moment. “What has she told you about your father? Has she heard from him?”

She sniffed and I reached for a tissue. “She told me he’s dead. I don’t care. And today I’m glad. At least I’m not scared he’s got her. But I’m afraid someone else bad has.”
A
nd she dissolved into sobs again.

Eventually the child cried herself to sleep, and I tucked her into Maggie’s bed. In the living room, I found the girls watching TV—a baseball game in which, as far as I knew, neither one had any interest—and I cautioned them to keep the sound low to off and to be very quiet themselves. Of course, they questioned me, but there was little I could tell them, beyond the fact that Jenny was very afraid for her mother. I realized they didn’t know the backstory and it didn’t make sense to them to assume the worst because your mom was late.

“What would you think if I were three hours late to get you?”

“That you’d gotten involved again in something you should have left to Mike,” Em said with her never-ending practicality.

“Well, with Jenny, it’s kind of like that. Her dad was not a nice person, and he did some business with not nice people. Jenny knows that, so she’s afraid one of them has found her mom.”

They looked really frightened, and Maggie hugged me fiercely. “Promise me you won’t ever do anything dangerous again, Mom.”

Since it looked like I was about to get involved big-time, that was a hard promise to make. “I’ll try,” I said, “but I promise you I’ll always come back to you, and I’ll always stay safe so I can take care of you.”

“And Mike,” Em added.

“Yes, and Mike.”

Mike came back about an hour later and pulled me into the bedroom. The girls looked resentful, but they understood the tone when he told them to stay put and stay quiet.

“She was at the Seventh Street Wine Bistro with a man. Bartender was there opening up for tonight, and he remembered her. Said she and the man seemed to be having a serious conversation, not many smiles, drank two bottles of wine…that’s a lot of wine for two people, Kelly. They did eat. He even remembered she had the scallops on a vinaigrette salad and he had steak and a baked potato, so they didn’t drink on empty stomachs. And she seemed in control when they left. So unless he slipped something into her drink….”

I put my face in my hands and shook my head. “No,” I said, “Please, God, no.”

Mike put his arms around me. “There’s good news, if you can call it that. The guy gave me a good description of the man she was with, and I’ve already talked to Conroy and we’ve sent a police artist down there to the restaurant to do a sketch from what the guy says. And we’re putting out a missing persons report. We’re not waiting the twenty-four hours, because of what Conroy calls extenuating circumstances.”

“At least we’re moving.”

“We?” he asked and kissed the tip of my nose.

“Mike, I just had an inspiration.”

He groaned. “Kelly, I don’t think I have time for your inspiration. I’ve got to get back to that restaurant and babysit the bartender and the artist.”

“Wait a minute. Joe’s outside. The Grill is closed on Sundays. He might recognize the sketch. Even if he doesn’t, he can point you to—what are their names?—Little Ben and Nathan. They’ve been picked up on suspicion, haven’t they? So Joe can tell you where to find them and they don’t even have to know he had anything to do with it.”

“Kelly, I agree they’re pretty dumb, but I don’t think they’re that dumb. They’ll know it came from Joe. And I know we picked up Little Ben, but I don’t know about Nathan. I don’t think so. Then again, those two are the ones I chased in the driveway that night.”

He thought for a minute. “You find something in the freezer to fix for all of us for supper, and I’ll go get the sketch, get copies out on the airwaves, and bring one home to show Joe. You can send Em out to tell Joe and Theresa to come to dinner and that I need to talk to Joe.” Then he grinned. “Tell her to knock first. They’re still sort of newlyweds.”

Not these days,
but that was a bitter thought.

****

The girls were hungry. I had completely forgotten about lunch. While I fixed grilled cheese sandwiches, Em went outside to tell Joe and Theresa the news. I’m afraid she told them all of it but a garbled version. They both rushed inside, full of questions. I filled them in as quickly and softly as I could, told Joe Mike wanted to talk to him when he got back, asked Theresa what we could rustle up for supper without a trip to the store.

“I don’t mind going to the store,” she said. “Joe would go with me.”

He nodded agreement. We weren’t letting her go even to the nearby Fiesta by herself.

“I’d call Little Ben…I got his cell phone…but I think that would be too obvious,” he said.

I agreed and suggested we wait for Mike.

Theresa and I found two pounds of frozen hamburger, some cream of mushroom soup, egg noodles in the pantry—we could throw together a version of hamburger stroganoff. Theresa protested we needed something green and corn wouldn’t count as a vegetable with pasta—too much starch. For a young housewife, she was pretty conscious of balanced diets.

“I have a big package of frozen green beans. With butter, salt and pepper they’ll be fine.”

We set the hamburger out to thaw and settled down for a long wait, but we hadn’t been in the living room long when Jenny came in, rubbing her puffy eyes. Her face was blotchy, and the hair so carefully fixed this morning was stringy and limp.

“Did you find my mom?” She made a beeline for me—her mother-substitute at this point.

“No, sweetie, we didn’t. Mike’s following a lead. Do you know who she went out to dinner with last night?”

She shook her head. “Some man. She said she didn’t really know him, but he’d been good to her when she found out Todd was dead.” She cuddled closer.

Who would have known Todd was dead except a policeman? Maybe Johnson Goodroe at the bank?
I wracked my brain for what I know about Goodroe but came up empty, so I excused myself to call Claire. The fewer people who knew about this the better, but I trusted Claire.