Read Fixed Online

Authors: L. A. Kornetsky

Fixed (3 page)

BOOK: Fixed
5.68Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

The girl fished into her bag, a bright yellow canvas courier bag, and pulled out a business card. She held it in her hand a minute, clearly unsure of whom to hand it to, and then placed it down on the bartop between them.

“That's the shelter's number. It goes directly to the back office, not the reception desk, unless nobody's there to pick up. But I answer the phone in the office most days; if I'm not there, they'll know how to reach me.”

“I take it nobody else knows about this yet?” he asked, based on her earlier words.

“No. And they don't know I've come to you. You can't say anything!” She suddenly went from worried to panicked, like he was about to take out an ad in the trades.

“If we take this job, our discretion is assured,” Ginny said, moving smoothly back into the conversation. “We simply need to discuss this between ourselves.”

“Okay. I'm, I'll wait until I hear from you, then.”

Nora turned and walked out of the bar without pause, her back straight and head high, as though she was aware that they were watching her, an audience of two.

Teddy picked up the business card, smoothing one finger over the slightly crumpled edge. Ginny swung around on her stool to look at the card in his hand.

“You think she's even twenty-one?” she asked, sounding somewhere between depressed and amused.

“Maybe. Barely. I wasn't going to card her unless she asked for a drink.”

Ginny's mouth quirked upward, then firmed again, all business. “This is the shelter I got Georgie from.”

He looked to his left, through the plate glass window that fronted Mary's, a remnant of its earliest life as a dry goods store, and saw the dog in question, sleeping in her usual spot. He'd talked Patrick into adding a rubber mat under the bike rack, better for sleeping dogs and tires alike than plain sidewalk. The local newspaper had done a write-up about them, for that. He didn't know if it had gotten them any more business, but it hadn't hurt.

And now Patrick was talking about changing things, cutting corners on the menu, focusing on foofy drinks and bringing in a band for the weekends, like that would be a good thing. . . .

“Yeah, I figured,” he said to Ginny, putting his worries about the bar to one side for a moment. “That's why she came to you?”

“I don't know. Apparently, people are talking about—” She stopped, and he understood why. Other people might talk about it, but they didn't. They'd been there. Their erstwhile client had been tagged by the feds for money laundering—thankfully after paying them and nobody had been around to sniff at that money, or tell them they had to give it back—and what more was there to say?

“Reputation?” he said, to fill in the uncomfortable silence. “We have a reputation?”

Ginny frowned at him, and he guessed that it wasn't because she didn't get the joke, but because she was thinking
about their new case.
Potential
new case, he clarified, to soothe his nerves. They hadn't agreed to take it, yet.

“The shelter's pretty new; it's only been around a few years. They're no-kill; they keep the animals until they can find a home for them.”

“So they're probably always strapped for cash.”

“Yeah, I think so. They had about a dozen dogs, when I found Georgie, and more cats.” Her frown deepened. “They're the only shelter in the area that takes in pit bulls and pittie mixes. If they close . . .”

Teddy wasn't much of a dog person, for all that he'd gotten fond of Georgie, but even he had read about the trouble finding homes for pit bulls, deservedly or not. He didn't like to think about what would happen then.

“They can't pay much, if they're strapped,” he said.

She raised an eyebrow at that, or tried to, anyway. Both went up, making her look more surprised than disapproving. “You're in this for the money?”

Now it was his turn to frown at her. “You know I'm not. I'm just not sure this is a good idea. I told you that.” He meant the entire venture, not merely this particular potential job, but he'd take it one battle at a time.

“We'd be doing a community service.” Her voice had a singsong tone to it he was starting to recognize.

“We'd be snooping,” he said bluntly. “In financial records. And she's not the owner, not even the manager. She has no right to ask us to do this.”

Ginny waved that off with a hand. “But she was the
one who was asked to handle the grant paperwork. Which means she has access to all the records we need.”

“Access doesn't mean authority, Mallard.”

“Well,” she said brightly, “then it's a good thing we're not official PIs with licenses that could get pulled, isn't it?”

“Damn it, Gin.” He pulled back from the bar and crossed his arms, staring at her.

“Look, just think about it, okay? If you don't want to do it, fine. I won't ask again.”

There was that voice again. “But you're going to do it, anyway?”

She gave an elegant half shrug and took the business card out of his hands, tucking it into the case of her cell phone, as usual set on the bar next to her like a digital IV.

“Ginny Mallard. Are you taking this case?”

“I don't know,” Ginny said. “I'm going to think about it, too.”

He wasn't convinced, but short of calling her a liar, there was nothing he could say.

*  *  *

Four and a half years ago, the owners of LifeHouse Shelter had taken over an abandoned warehouse down by the old docks, buying it for pennies on the dollar, and set up shop. Lacking the money to gut the building entirely, they had to adapt the existing structure as best they could, which meant that on the outside it still looked like an old warehouse, although what had been the loading dock area was now fenced and turned into a dog run.

The kennels were at one end of the building, the clinic at the other end, so that the smells of sick animals and chemicals were kept away from the adoption areas. In between there was a reception area, and behind that was what remained of the building, split into two areas by a Plexiglas wall inserted floor to ceiling, the remaining space filled with old sofas and remnant carpets, and climbing structures for the cats, where humans met with animals and scoped each other out.

LifeHouse was certified by the state to house twenty dogs and up to thirty cats. They'd been near or at capacity since they opened their doors, proving that the founders had been right: there had been a real need in the community.

The shelter opened early in the morning so that volunteers could come in to care for the animals, but visitors weren't allowed until much later. According to the sign by the front door, open adoption hours were from noon to 5 p.m., five days a week, Wednesday through Sunday.

At 4:30 that afternoon, the shelter was filled with light and activity. There were humans bustling about, cats sprawling and prowling, dogs being exercised in the fenced courtyard off the parking lot or wandering freely in the meeting areas, being socialized with each other. The receptionist at the front desk monitored the humans as they arrived, while volunteers kept an eye on the animals. A family with two preteen children were in one of the socialization rooms, sitting on the carpeted floor and letting kittens tumble over them, waiting for the right one to show itself.

At 5 p.m., the shelter's doors closed to the public, and
then the slow shutdown began as the animals were fed and exercised one last time, and then the dogs were placed in their kennels for the night, the cats rounded up and placed in their own cages. The sounds of barking and the patter of paws on floors and endless scratch-scratch of claws on carpeted surfaces faded, the murmur of human voices slowing likewise as the volunteers ended their shift and went home.

At the other end of the building, in the clinic, the vet tech made final rounds, ensuring all the cases were locked and equipment put away. There was only one dog in need of care that night, a new arrival still in twenty-four-hour isolation before being let into the general population. The tech paused to give the older hound mix an affectionate ear-pull and make sure that he was comfortable before turning off the lights and locking up.

At 8 p.m., the lights were out all over the shelter, pale red emergency lights glowing in each hallway, reflecting off linoleum floors and metal fire doors.

An occasional bark or whimper came from the canine quarters and was answered by another, then most of the animals, knowing the routine, settled down to sleep. Pale red and yellow lights shone through the windows, alarms activated on every door and window. The security company's patrol started after 10 p.m., swinging by the building twice an hour to pass a flashlight beam through the parking lot and make sure that there were no disturbances.

A little after midnight, a noise broke the silence, a low, unhappy yowl, followed by something else less identifiable, then the sound of heavy thumps. Throughout the
shelter, heads lifted, ears picked up, and low whines rose from throats. No barks, no howls, nothing that might draw attention to themselves, merely the sound of anxious worry, waiting.

If the security guard heard them during his pass, concrete walls being no barrier to a determined dog's voice, he didn't react; one howl was much like another, and the alarms were unchanged, no sign of activity outside the walls. His job was to prevent disturbances from the outside, not to investigate possible disturbances within.

He never considered the thought that someone might have come in through the narrow windows set high in the clinic walls, the glass carefully cut and removed, and bodies lowered on ropes into the space while others busied themselves outside, in the parking lot, black-clad shapes blending into the shadows when he passed by.

Eventually, when nothing more was heard, and no one came to investigate, most of the heads went back down onto paws, cats recurling themselves. Most, not all. Along the rows of kennels, noses were pressed up against the mesh, nostrils flaring, ears alert. Older cats and streetwise newcomers rested in alert pose, the tips of their tails barely twitching, waiting. Listening.

At 5 a.m., the first sound of human voices returned, the clatter and clank of wheels and doors, a man's familiar low voice calling out greetings to the first animals on his route.

Only then did the sentinels relax.

2

W
e'll talk about it tomorrow,'
you said,” Teddy muttered to himself, slapping the rim of the steering wheel in frustration. “Brilliant. Because now it's tomorrow, genius.”

It was tomorrow, noon already, and he still hadn't made a decision. And Ginny would be here soon, expecting an answer.

He got out of his car and checked the parking lot out of habit: an old beater Ford he didn't recognize, but otherwise empty, and the trash bins had been emptied last night, the lids left open. All was as it should be.

There was an entrance into the back of the bar off the parking lot, but Teddy instead went around the building and leaned against the front wall, waiting for Ginny to walk down the street, her stride probably hampered by Georgie's slower pace and constant need to stick her doggy nose into something.

He didn't know why he was even dithering; he knew how this was going to go down. There would be that look on her face, the one that said she knew something he didn't
and was going to tell him about it. And, in the telling, change his mind. Which he hadn't made up yet.

“No, Ginny.” He tried saying it out loud. “Absolutely, no.”

Even the air, damp and cool, seemed skeptical.

“Shit.”

He looked down the short, tree-lined block one more time, but it remained empty of anything other than a few midday shoppers and one jogger in professional-grade orange running gear, clearly not Ginny. He checked his watch: five after noon. She was running late, and he was, technically, on the clock.

Mary's front door was an old wooden beast, painted a bright red, and currently wedged open by a straightback wooden chair stuck between door and frame. Teddy stared at it, then sighed. After the bar had been robbed, and then would-be killers had gotten in a few months back, he'd suggested to Seth that maybe they should keep the door closed when the bar wasn't actually open for business. Obviously, that suggestion hadn't made a dent in the old man's habits.

“Seth!”

There was a clatter in the tiny kitchen, in response. Teddy shook his head, amused. Seth's bad moods were by now a source of comfort rather than concern.

Normally he'd have come in early and immediately gone behind the bar to check that everything was in shape before his shift started, obsessively prepping everything so that he was ready the moment the clock ticked over, no matter if it was a lazy afternoon shift or a hot-from-the-start Saturday
night. Today he ignored the bar entirely, pulled one of the small tables out from the wall and dropped himself into one of the chairs, stretching his legs out in front of him and contemplating the tips of his boots.

Teddy wasn't sure when meeting for lunch had turned into a semiregular thing, but Tuesday through Thursday, the three days during the week he took afternoon shift, Ginny would come downtown and grab lunch with him before Mary's opened for business. Sometimes she brought Georgie; sometimes Seth or Stacy would join them if they were on shift. Sometimes the conversation was serious, but more often it was casual. Mainly, Teddy thought, Gin used it as an excuse to get away from her desk for a while, force her to stop working for an hour.

He wasn't sure what he got from it, himself. Bad enough he was dragging himself out of bed earlier to get here in time. But he admitted, at least to himself, that he enjoyed the new routine. It wasn't that they'd become close friends, exactly. The competition that had formed between them over a year's worth of trivia nights was still as fierce as ever. Things had somehow shifted while they were working together on the Jacobs job, though she was still an occasionally irritating workaholic know-it-all.

BOOK: Fixed
5.68Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

Dirty Little Secret by Jon Stock
Miscegenist Sabishii by Pepper Pace
The King's Diamond by Will Whitaker
Coffee in Common by Dee Mann
La Danza Del Cementerio by Lincoln Child Douglas Preston