Who Murdered Garson Talmadge (6 page)

“Not too many Irishmen go around showing each other their leprechauns, so I don’t really know how mine might compare with other leprechauns.”

“Will it stand at attention and take orders?”

“Willie sometimes has a mind of his own, but Willie lives to serve, my good woman.”

“Willie, huh, I guess yours must be special to have a name.”

“I’m going to change the subject now, if that’s all right?”

“Sure. We can come back to Willie at any time. As you said, Willie lives to serve; I assume that includes damsels in distress.”

“The story is that your dad was a broker of illegal weapons. True?”

“He did some of that, years ago. He quit before we left France. Not that quitting made his doing it okay, but it does make it old news.”

She stood again and went to the glass sliding door. “The sun hits the water every day about this time, reflecting into my living room.” She used two pull chains. The first drew the vertical Venetians across the glass; the second chain angled them closed.

“The way I see it,” I said, watching her walk slowly back to the couch, “it’s possible, if not likely that someone from those days killed your father. Someone who wanted to be sure the details of certain weapons deals didn’t come out.”

“Could be.” She sat back down, again curling her legs onto the cushion. “But I don’t believe it, all that’s back at least ten years. Anyone concerned about that stuff would’ve killed Papa a long time ago. I’m telling you Clarice killed him for the oldest of reasons, money.”

“I way I hear it, your dad called your brother in the middle of the night to tell him he planned to cut Clarice out of his will, and then your brother called you. Is this correct?”

“Yes. That was the call I told you I got from Charlie just after the club closed.”

“Your brother still lives here in town, right?”

“A few miles from here, on Ocean Boulevard, I can give you the address?”

“I have it.”

Susan escorted me to the door where she moved in close. “Have you been coming on to me, Mr. Kile?”

“Whatever made you think that, Ms. Talmadge?”

“Susan.”

“Whatever made you think that, Susan?”

“The interest you and Willie were taking in my bathing suit. Would you like to come onto me, Mr. Kile?”

I moved back one step. “I’m trying to do my job.”

“I don’t know if I was all that helpful, but hopefully I improved your working conditions.”

“Yes you did, and I thank you for that.”

She stepped forward, erasing my step back and held my gaze with her own. “Unlike my stepmother, I’m not married.” Then she kissed me, not the grab-and-squeeze kind, more gentle, our bodies touching, but she kept her hands on my shoulders.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Failing, if you can’t recognize what I’m doing.”

“Why?”

“I like you.”

“Everybody likes everybody when they’re kissing.”

She slowly moved her hand down my arm and brought it around to a more central location. My body rose to meet her.

“Been a while, eh, Mr. Kile?”

I decided not to mention my celibacy calendar. “Matt. Please.”

“Been a while, eh, Matt?”

There was no need to answer her.

Chapter 7

Charaxus Talmadge, known as Charles, lived on the eighth floor of a more modern and taller building than the one in which his sister lived. I walked past the elevator and took the stairs.

Before I pressed the bell, the door opened with Charles Talmadge holding the inside knob. We stood like two boxers center ring, without a referee to warn us about low blows. He was wearing silver-rimmed dark glasses with reflective lenses. I don’t often trust people who totally hide their eyes.

His swarthy complexion and attitude gave him just the right look to attract the ladies who favored bad boys. He was wearing a beige linen sport coat, black-pleated lightweight slacks, a black and tan tie, and a white silk shirt. The belt loops in his pants were wider than common to men’s pants. He stepped forward; his tan silk socks peaking out over tasseled black-patent loafers, a fashion plate outfit. It only took a first glance to know that Charles Talmadge had not grown up Mr. Roger’s neighborhood. He took off his shades and stuck them in the breast pocket of his jacket. His eyes were dark enough to go with his black-wavy hair, yet somehow his two didn’t exactly match, like holes in a working man’s boot.

“You didn’t need to dress up on my account,” I said, scoring the first low blow.

“I don’t like your manners, Mr. Kile.”

“They could likely use some improvement. I keep working on them, but so far they haven’t gotten much better, maybe even a little worse.”

“I was on my way out when Susan called to say you’d be here in five minutes. I told her I’d wait, although I see nothing to be gained by our talking.”

Free weights and a pressing bench filled the area the developer had designed to be the dining room. The left cut of his sport coat lumped slightly. He was carrying a gun and was right-handed.

His answers, laboring under a self-imposed gag order, were short and gift-wrapped in surliness. Despite the tough act designed to intimidate, my read was that, except when watching Sponge Bob reruns, most encounters intimidated him. The act was all he had.

Our first few minutes together had gone nowhere and had gotten there fast. “You know who I am and why I’m here,” I said, trying to pick up the pace. “I work for the attorney representing your stepmother.”

“That bitch. She made a great piece of ass. I don’t fault Papa for taking up with her, but a wife? Not on her best day. Papa had a great wife, but he left her in France. This bitch was the new, younger version, but Papa wised up. He told both Susan and me that he planned to axe her ass. Kick her down to their prenup. She found out and knocked him off.”

“That’s not true. Garson only told you. You told Susan.”

“Same thing.”

Far from it, pal. Generally he was saying the same things that Susan had said in her more stylish and respectable manner. I figured they had rehearsed.

He had still not invited me in, but he had retreated far enough to reach around me and push his door shut.

“Listen, Charaxus—”

“Charles to you, Charlie to my friends, and you aren’t one of them.”

“Okay, Charles it is. Your stepmother didn’t kill your father. I’m trying to find out who did. You oughta want that. Okay if I sit down?”

“The cops have his killer. In lockup she’ll sell her ass for much smaller rewards.” He pressed his right palm against my chest. Using his right hand was a mistake. He couldn’t reach his weapon. Then he said, “Time for you to go,” and pushed.

I grasped his hand and twisted hard, levering his thumb toward his wrist. “I didn’t say you could touch me. You need to ask your sister for some lessons on how to treat visitors.” He winced, bending at the knees to slacken the pressure. I twisted harder. “Drop the tough guy act. You look silly and it won’t work.” I let go of his thumb.

He flexed his right hand then slid it inside his jacket. I put the flat of my hand over his hand which by now was over his holstered gun, then drove with my legs the way I had in my younger days pushing defenders off the line of scrimmage. He stopped when his backside hit the closed front door. His dark glasses fell out of his coat pocket and clattered on the floor. I put my other forearm against his throat and leaned into it. I also put my foot on top of his glasses.

“I said, drop the tough guy act. You’re no good at it. Maybe it worked when you had your daddy’s rep backing you up. Now you’re just a silly pup trying to play with men.”

“Okay. Okay.” His shoulders slumped in childlike defiance. “Whatdaya wanna know?”

“For openers, where were you the night your father was killed?”

“I was at home most of the night. I was here when Papa called, and when I called Susan.”

“How do you prove that?”

“I think it goes like this: you have to prove I wasn’t.”

I pushed my arm harder against his throat. Then he said, “A couple people saw me around. I drove to a gym to work out on some equipment I don’t have here, around ten o’clock. Then I stopped at the liquor store on the corner of Carson and Atlantic to get some beer.”

“What about later?” I asked.

“I met some friends at six for breakfast.”

“That doesn’t tie it all down does it?”

“Hey. It was just another night. I wasn’t into alibi building. God bless America, I’m innocent until proven guilty.”

I took my arm from his throat, thrust my hand inside his jacket and pulled out his short-barrel Smith & Wesson. After yanking out his silk shirt tail and using it to wipe my prints off the handle, I held the barrel and tossed the gun behind a chair in the far corner of the room. While I did that he picked up his glasses. When he saw they were broken, he threw them against the far wall. I shoved him toward his dark-brown leather couch and sat on an ottoman fronting the matching chair in the corner.

“Why would your dad call you in the middle of the night to tell you his plans?”

“Papa was impulsive. Once he made a decision, he wanted to kick it into gear.”

“Your sister said your father used the two of you in his weapons deals.” Susan hadn’t actually said this, but I wanted to try out the idea to see if he would disagree. He didn’t do so right off, so I carried the idea forward. “She said, you were muscle, I would guess with some real muscle along to back your play. And Garson used your sister to tantalize the men’s eyes. Sex and violence, a winning combination, and he kept it all in the family. What a dad. That would also explain your recent trips to France.”

Charles wasn’t about to offer much, so I kept making some educated guesses designed to either get confirmation through his not challenging them, or learn something if he did.

“Lots of children work in the family business,” Charles said. “As for Susan, there are guys all over Europe spanking their monkeys with thoughts of my sister. Dad always said, ‘Whatever it takes. Get the deal done. There’s too much money at stake to be squeamish.’ Not that I didn’t help with a few wives now and again while Sis worked the husbands.”

“Now, now, gentlemen don’t kiss and tell.”

He smiled, adding a sound that made it a snigger.

“There’s no percentage in you lying about your dad’s late night call. Clarice’s attorney will get the phone records.”

“I figured somebody, likely the cops, would want verification, so I called and got my cell phone company to show me where I needed to go online to see and print a copy of my calls since the last billing. May I get up? I’ll get it for you.” I nodded. “It shows both my outgoing and incoming calls.”

He handed it to me and sat back down.

Damn. There it was, just like he said. We had expected it would be, but seeing it still had a deflating affect. Garson had called his son a little before two-thirty the morning that someone punched his ticket. After that Charles had called his sister, just like Susan had said.

“I’ll need that back. The cops may still want a copy.”

“They’ll get their own from the source.” Fidge probably already knew what I had just confirmed. My old partner was way ahead of me.

“Your last trip to Europe,” I said, “closing a deal or bringing somebody into line?”

“That trip was all about pleasure, Mr. Kile, pure pleasure.”

“Oh, come on. A handsome fella like you should be able to find lots of females that prefer the bad boy type without having to fly to France.”

“She’s an old friend. I’d give you her name, but it’s none of your business. Papa quit running guns nearly fifteen years ago, five years before we permanently moved to the U.S.”

For the fifteen years part of his story to be true, the dynamic duo of sister pussy and brother pain would have been flourishing during their mid-to-late teens and into their early twenties. I’m guessing that Susan could turn a man’s head during those ages. But Charles, muscle at that age? No way. Even now Charles wasn’t tough enough to scramble a man’s eggs.

“Just so we’re clear, Charlie, I don’t believe your father called you to tell you he planned to drop Clarice from his will. You understand what I’m saying?”

“Sure, that you’re entitled to your opinion. Both my sister and I will testify differently, and the attorney will testify he had set up an appointment after my father called to say he wanted to change his will. So, your opinion won’t mean shit.”

“Your mother’s Iraqi. What’s her name?”

“I never knew. Sis says Papa told her once, but she doesn’t recall.”

I parried with the punk for another ten minutes without learning the full depth of his shallowness. I considered bouncing him off a few walls. He would’ve cracked like a raw egg, but it wasn’t the time for that. Not yet. I needed to know more first. I also needed to think about how my doing would have compromised the man I was working for, Brad Fisher.

* * *

On the way back to my place my cell rang. It was Rose, my oldest daughter. “What’s this I see in the paper about you helping defend this woman, Clarice Talmadge?”

“Yes. I am,” I said while turning at the light and heading back toward Long Beach proper.

“Are you sure you want to get back into investigation work?”

“No. I’m not sure. But I felt compelled to do so in this instance.”

“Then it’s true.”

“What?”

“That woman was with you that night. I saw her on TV. She’s a beauty, although that’s not what Mother called her.”

“Oh. And what was that?”

“Mom said the woman must be a badge bunny. Mother told me she was a badge bunny when she met you. She also said you were too old now to be behaving like that, that you should know better.”

“She did, eh?” I was nearing my building, so I pulled to the curb so as not to risk my phone dropping the call when I pulled into the underground garage. “Rose, for your information I hope I’m never too old to behave that way. But it was nothing like what you’re suggesting.”

“Mother sounded jealous when she said it, too.”

“It’s been ten years. You mother and I are not getting back together.”

“Which of us are you trying to convince, Father? And, yes, I told mom that as well when she said pretty much the same thing to me earlier.”

“Can I go, now, dear?”

“Have a good evening, daddy. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Rose.”