Winters & Somers (20 page)

The dog lay
panting on the grass, the white of his eyes showing. Cíara went over to free it
from its attachments of cement and the tin cans.

“Bravo,” a voice
drawled from behind her, and she whirled around, the gun still in her hand as
Winters backed off with his hands up. “For God's sake, put that away – it might
just go off! Don't you know it's illegal in a public place…?” His words tailed
off as Cíara's finger tightened on the trigger – and a gaudy red flag with
'Bang!' written on it exploded from the barrel.

“Really classy,
eh?” she laughed delightedly. “Couldn't believe my luck when I found this in a
toy store when we went looking for a christening present for Mary Margaret's
sister's baby.”

He struggled to
stop from grinning. Typical. “By the way,” he said, and he was obviously
enjoying himself now. “You've got a flat tire.”

 Cíara looked
over to where the MG listed sadly against the curb, and let out a string of
curses that made his delighted grin widen further. “I can give you a lift back
to the office. I'll even call a tow truck for you. Provided you promise to play
nice.”

“Play nice at
what?” she had to ask, but the sexy grin on his face told her everything she
needed to know. “Get lost.”

Winters
shrugged. He handed her his cellphone to call her garage, then opened the
passenger door for her but she lingered on the sidewalk. “I can't leave him,”
she said when he asked about her hesitation.

“Fine, we'll
wait until the mechanic gets here. Your rim is all bent – no point in changing
the tire until you know whether there's any further damage. Is it true that a
car parked in some areas of Dublin can be stripped of all spare parts before
you can say 'Guinness'?”

“Yeah, it's true
– but it’s not the car.”   She nodded towards the miserable ball of fur on the
grass.

“Oh, no…no, no…”
Winters began, but she'd already walked over and gathered the dog up in her
arms.

“He looks like
he needs help,” she said, depositing him on the pristine leather back seat of
Winters' vehicle. “And besides, I saved that dog's life and they say if you
save a life, it's your responsibility. Forever.”

“Oh, dammit, the
car stinks like dog already…dog, and something even less nice...”

            “I
don’t believe it. We're finally getting some work done around here.” Winters
pushed back from his swanky new desk, the rollers of his new office chair
gliding smoothly, and stretched his arms above his head. Cíara watched the
muscles of his shoulders flex under his shirt, noticed the springy black hair
that peeped from the open collar. Her mouth went dry as she imagined the feel
of that smooth pelt against her lips…..

It's only
lust. Ignore it and it'll go away,
she told herself firmly, once more
picking up the lists of dinner guests who'd attended events at each of the
eight wealthy homes that had been burgled.

“What's really
hard is that so many of these names are the same – Irish upper crust society
must be really inbred – and just about all of them have platinum bank accounts.
There’s no sign of any evidence to suggest that they're either in dire
financial straits or have been spending more than usual lately. Maybe your
grandparents could help. They're more in tune with what's going on in these
people's lives….?” His point was very valid, she admitted. It just went against
the grain to ask the Henleys for help.

“I don't know,
Jonathon. To be honest, what I know of these guests, they're all rich enough to
give away a few diamonds, not steal more…” She paused as a funny little idea
nagged at the corner of her mind. “You know ….” But the telephone ringing
interrupted her.

“Hello? Oh,
yes,” Margaret Henley must read minds, she thought. Anytime her thoughts
strayed in the direction of her grandmother, the woman seemed to snatch the
chance to intrude into her life.

            “I was just in town,
dear, and thought I'd bring along a little gift for your office. Jonathon told
me you'd been doing it up. Be there in five.” Cíara tried to get a word in
edge-wise, but Mrs. Henley had snapped her mobile shut. Moments later, she
heard the door behind her open – but she was fascinated as she watched Winters'
face. He'd half-risen from his desk to greet the newcomer, but his mouth now
hung open and an ashen color was spreading across his cheeks. She swiveled
around to see who was causing his shock reaction.

It couldn't
be!
But it was.

“Hallo, there,
darlin'! Bet you didn't expect to see old Grace Muldoon on your doorstep, now,
did you?” Judging from the look on Winters' face, Cíara figured Grace had
outdone herself in sartorial elegance, a vision no-one would have expected to
see on their doorstep. Bright red stretch pants valiantly clung to her hips,
while a wonderful peacock blue silk shirt flowed down over her generous chest,
as if trying to reach the spike-heeled green patent leather shoes on Grace's
tiny, plump feet. Her crowning glory was an orange, white and green silk scarf,
patriotically colored and wrapped around her head, turban style.

 “I was just up
in town getting a few bits, and I thought to myself, Grace, why don’t you just
go and see that little girl who you're as fond of as if she was your own
daughter? I wasn't sure I'd got the right place until this nice little old
granny type in the foyer told me it was up all those flights of steps.” Grace
collapsed panting into the office chair Winters had quickly vacated for her.

“Who's a nice
old granny type? Why, you cheeky mare, you! I'll have you know I'm a sure bet
to be a few years younger than an auld one like yourself!” Granny Somers stood
in the door, aiming thunderbolts of disgust at Grace.

Oh, no, it couldn't be –

“Well, dear, I'm
afraid it must be said – weren't you having an awful time getting up those
steps? Puffing as if your lungs were about to quit, you were,” Grace said,
preening comfortably in her chair.

“Who was puffing
on those stairs? I'll have you know I was a little out of breath carrying this
plant!”

“Ohmigod!” Cíara
squawked. Her worst nightmares were coming true all at once. Margaret Henley
had just walked in the door, definitely a bit red in the face and short of
breath, peering menacingly between the fronds of a potted fichus. Obviously,
she thought Grace's last words had been a slight on her. The situation was not
helped by Granny Somers dissolving in laughter. “You daft old coot!” She gasped
between giggles.

Mrs. Henley put
the plant pot down in the center of the room, hands on hips as she turned to
glare at Granny Somers. But the glare turned to a look of abject horror as The
Dog, as Cíara had named him, strolled over to the plant and raised a hind leg,
spraying casually both the pottery base and Mrs. Henley's fine leather walking
shoes.

Grace and Granny
Somers were now holding each other up as they laughed fit to burst.  Mrs.
Henley looked about to have a heart attack. Cíara was already considering
phoning an ambulance in advance when she saw a wicked grin struggle to birth on
her paternal grandmother's face.

“Why Lillian
Somers – and do you always go around with your blouse all undone up the front?
I heard Mary Marshall's mother started doing things like that – senile
dementia, they said it was. Poor old thing – they had to take her away after
she ran along the beach at Greystones stark naked in the middle of the day.”

Granny
Somers glanced down, saw her shirt really had come undone, and her giggles
dried to a furious silence as both Margaret Henley and Grace Muldoon roared
with laughter.

“Hey,
no-one ever told me Dublin people could be such craic! I always thought you was
all so tightly buttoned you couldn't pee straight!” Grace announced when she
could draw breath.

“And just who are you,
anyway?” Both Mrs. Henley and Granny Somers turned on Grace, who pushed her
chair back a step or two as the other two women glared at her. “I'm Grace,
Grace Muldoon, and I'm here to see this little girl who I rescued when she was
trying to seduce a man down in Waterford. Hit him with my umbrella, I did
and….”

A choked noise from behind
the big desk made all four women swivel towards Winters. His face was brick
red, except for the greenish purple bruise that he was fingering thoughtfully.

“Listen, er, we've an important
appointment, special case, we've got to go out for a while.Can you ladies take
care of each other till we're back?” Cíara grabbed him and literally dragged
him to the door, grabbing her purse from her desk as she went. As they left,
she heard the comments- “Ain't that like the young today?”

“You know, you
do your best….”

“All this way
just to see….” -as the door slammed shut behind them.

And the very
ominous “What did you say about seducing…?”

 It was possible
the three women would kill each other before she dared return to the office. Or
it was possible they'd set up an alliance… Cíara shuddered. But right now she'd
more worrying things on her mind. Like the fact that a furiously angry Jonathon
Winters was right behind her – and a beaming Anton Wallace was heading right
towards her.

“Jesus, Mary and
Joseph, and all the saints preserve us,” she muttered under her breath. But the
saints didn't seem interested in interceding on her behalf. Like the three old
women, the saints also seemed to be ganging up on her. “Anton!” she said,
forcing a bright smile, “Fancy meeting you here!”

“Well, it is
your office, isn't it?” Wallace was looking doubtfully at the shabby foyer, and
she sensed Winters bristling behind her.

 “Yes, well, you
know how hard it is to find office space in Dublin these days. Besides, this is
what people expect from a detective agency.” 

“It is?” Wallace
still looked puzzled, but shrugged his shoulders. “I thought I'd formalize our
arrangements for dinner tonight – I was thinking perhaps Jury's, around
half-past seven?”

Jury's? Cíara's
stomach rumbled. Good food, even if the company promised to be a bit dicey, she
thought, agreeing to meet Wallace there. She turned to a thunderous looking
Winters, and silently added the rider:
Assuming I live that long.

“I can explain
everything,” she said, with more confidence than she felt. Upstairs, The Dog
barked, then whined, scratching at the office door. Cíara felt a strong bond of
sympathy. She'd like to escape, too.

“Oh, I am sure
you have a wealth of explanations, and they'd better all be good. I'm in the
mood for some entertainment,” Winters said, taking her arm and propelling her
out of the building and onto the sidewalk. She thought of screaming for help,
but there's nothing Dubliners love more than a spectacle and she wasn't in a
performing mood.

            They stopped in at the
nearest pub, a dark and cozy place still resisting the temptation to become an
'Irish Pub' tourist style. This was the real thing. A peat fire burned in the
corner, there were worn leather seats, walls covered with photographs of
sporting events, many of them signed by heroes of past Gaelic League hurling
and football battles, and a thick fog of stale cigarette smoke and warm beer
permeated the air.

Ancient looking
red-faced men, in even more ancient suit jackets, sprawled on stools at the
bar, hands wrapped around dark pints; the odd show-off nursed a whiskey. They
gave Winters and Cíara a once-over as they arrived, immediately identifying her
as one of them, Winters as a Yank, and promptly lost interest.

Cíara sank into
a seat by the fire, beginning to relax. He went to the bar and got them drinks,
then came and sat alongside her. “So?”

“So what?” she
asked, lulled by the warmth of the fire and the familiar surroundings. The throaty,
threatening growl from the man next to her brought her back to reality quick
enough.

“You could start
with seducing Anton Wallace down in Waterford, and go on from there.”

“I did no such
thing! I did not seduce that man!” All eyes swiveled towards them as if by
heat-seeking radar, and she glared them down. The interested silence brought
her back to her senses and she lowered her voice.

“Well, you see,
I'd taken on this assignment – from the Walters Agency,” she told him,
desperately name-dropping in an attempt to impress with the bigger agency's
respectability. He didn't look very impressed. “They knew I – well, I do a lot
of work for women, finding out if their partners are the faithful type…”

“What….?”

“Okay, it's hard
to explain, but you would be amazed at the number of women who don’t trust
their men. They pay me to go out, all dressed up and looking available, and
approach...”

“Spare me the
details,” he cut in harshly. “Just tell me how I came to be assaulted by that
wild woman with the strange color sense – and where does Wallace come into all
this?” His tone brooked no nonsense.

“Okay, Wallace
was my target.”

“Dear God…..”
The disgust in his voice was enough to rile Cíara.

“Look, you asked
about all this. It's not really any business of yours – you forced yourself on
me...”

“Not quite…I
don’t recall force being used.”

Now she wanted
to slap his smug face, and instead grasped her large glass of Guinness. Maybe
she could tip it over him? No, that would be a criminal waste. She swallowed
some of the black brew instead, wiping the creamy foam off her mouth with the
back of her hand. Taking a deep breath, she hung onto the last tattered threads
of her temper.

 “Either hear me
out or forget it,” she warned. “Wallace was the target but he wouldn't leave it
alone. I was staying at Grace Muldoon's bed and breakfast place, and she was
worried about me so she went to the hotel where the jewelry convention was
being held and heard me scream. You heard me, too, and you... you rescued me.
I'm sorry, I never did properly thank you.”