The Lady Who Sang High: A Reed Ferguson Mystery (A Private Investigator Mystery Series - Crime Suspense Thriller Book 7) (7 page)

Bill and Ivy were busy helping customers when I walked in. The music had switched from Bob Marley to some other rock station, but no 80s alternative. Too bad.

“Hey,” I said to Bill and Ivy as I came around the counter.

“Did you hear what happened?” Ivy whispered.

I shook my head, feigning ignorance.

“Jude was killed last night.”

“No!” I tried not to overdo my surprise.

“Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy,” Bill muttered sarcastically. “He said he would be long gone, but I didn’t know he meant
this
.”

“What does that mean?” Ivy snapped.

He blushed. “Nothing. I mean, uh, it was something I overheard, Jude talking to Carlo.”

“What’d Jude say?” I asked.

“Something about ‘It won’t matter because I’ll be out of here soon.’ That was it. I was just making a bad joke about…” he grew redder, “his death…” Bill was clearly embarrassed by what he’d said.

She glared at him, then threw me a wary look. “I’ll tell you about Jude later,” she murmured to me, then helped the next customer, who was impatiently waiting.

“Cool. Let me see what Jodie wants me to do.” I waved and headed through the back door.

I went upstairs to Jodie’s office. She was sitting at her desk, staring into space, a half-eaten burrito in front of her. I wanted to close the door so no one could overhear us, but I didn’t want to draw attention to us either. After all, I was just an employee.

“Oh, hi.” She rubbed her eyes and yawned.

I wondered if she was just tired or also stoned. As if she knew what I was thinking, she said, “No, I’m not stoned.”

She’d read my mind again, although I wondered about her leaping to that conclusion again. Or was that just a natural assumption in a weed store and she was clarifying for me, the newcomer?

“Okay.” I pretended like I didn’t care, but I was secretly satisfied. Normally I wouldn’t have cared what she did in her own store, but right now, I needed her focused.

“I’ve got so much to do and I’m having a hard time.” She sighed heavily. “I don’t even know if Jude had a will. And I’ll have to make funeral arrangements, once they finish the...autopsy.”

I was impressed that she was holding it together so well.

“Do you have any friends who can help you?”

“Yeah, I called my best friend, Liza. She lives in Pueblo now, but she’s going to come up and stay with me for a few days and help out.”

“That’s good.” I lowered my voice. “Let’s touch base tonight when no one’s around. Right now I need you to tell me what you want me to do.”

“Oh, okay.” She stood up and went into boss mode. “Let’s go down to the warehouse. I’m going to have you do some cleaning first around the plants, and then you can help in the store. Heath just came back from lunch. He usually spends some time in the warehouse, so hopefully you’ll get a chance to talk to him.” She talked quietly as we went downstairs. “Later on, I’ll have you help me feed the plants.”

“Feed them?”

She laughed. “They need special fertilizers. It’s all done very carefully or we could ruin an entire crop. And that’s tons of money lost.”

We went into the warehouse and she gave me instructions about how to clean carefully around each pot.

“When you’re finished with that, sweep the aisles. Then ask what you can do in the store.”

She left and I set to work, but soon found myself bored. However, my parents had taught me a good work ethic, so I did my best. I’m sure they never imagined that I’d put that ethic to work in a weed store. Frankly, my mother would keel over dead if she knew where I was right now. One of her worst fears was that I was doing drugs, and no matter how much I tried to convince her otherwise, she wouldn’t believe me. It had gotten to the point that if she brought up drug use, I teased her about how much I was doing, going into great detail about the whole thing. As I swept the floors and thought about my mother, I hatched a plan: I’d take a picture of myself here – in a marijuana store. Wouldn’t that get her goat?

I was so focused on my diabolical plot to mortify my mother that I didn’t hear someone come up behind me.

“You must be the new guy.”

I whirled around, almost dropping my broom. A man in jeans and a light blue shirt smiled at me. He was of average height, had short brown hair speckled with gray, and a forgettable face. Just someone you might meet and then quickly forget.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said, sticking out a hand. “Heath Zimmerman. I’m one of the partners here.”

I introduced myself as I shook his hand.

“How are you enjoying it so far?” he asked.

“It’s fascinating,” I said. “I had no idea what all is involved in growing weed.”

“Most people don’t.” He eyed me. “Has Jodie told you to be careful around the warehouse?” He waved a hand at the tall green plants. “You’d be surprised how much all this is worth.”

“Yes, she told me,” I said. I searched for a way to talk about Jude, but he took care of that for me.

“It’s terrible what happened to Jude.”

I nodded and murmured, “He seemed like a nice guy.”

“You met him?”

“Just once, my first day here.”

“He
was
a nice guy.” Something akin to sorrow flashed across his face, which made it much less forgettable, and then after a moment, he turned all business. “You don’t need to worry about being safe here. We’ve got state-of-the-art security. What happened to Jude was just a fluke. Wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Yeah, but he was killed in the alley. Was there security out there?”

“Unfortunately, no,” he said. “It was probably someone who hoped to get in the back door and rob us, and maybe Jude confronted him and was shot.” He pointed at me. “You found him, right?”

“Yes.” I wondered where he was going with that.

“You probably surprised the killer and he ran off.”

Was this his hypothesis or had Spillman told him that? She hadn’t seemed thrilled to see me here after Jude was killed, and I doubted she would tell me the details, so I’d have to ask Jodie about it.

“So you think it was just a robbery gone bad?” I asked.

He looked at me, surprised by the question. Or my bluntness. “What else could it be?”

“I don’t know. Did Jude have any enemies or money trouble? Something that would get him killed?”
Whoa!
Real subtle, Reed
, I chided myself.

“You sound like a detective.”

I thought fast. “I read a lot of mysteries.”

That seemed to mollify him.

“I can’t believe this happened. Especially now.” He seemed in a mood to talk. “I don’t know if anyone told you, but with the legalization of recreational marijuana, we’re growing by leaps and bounds. And we’re looking for more investment money.” His eyes scanned the plants, and he grimaced. “Jude’s death might scare people away.”

“Why is that?” I went for dumb again, hoping to keep him talking.

He gazed at the plants, thinking about something. “What was Jude doing?” he muttered to himself. I waited but he didn’t say more. He suddenly looked back at me and shook his head. “Anyway, if you have any questions, let me know. Or talk to Jodie. She’s in charge of things around here.”

“Do you work here in the warehouse?”

“Not really. I like to check on things, but Jodie’s the real grower. I haven’t been here that long, so I don’t know much about what she does with the plants. I handle the business side.”

“Okay, I’ll direct my questions to her.” I paused, then mentally circled back around what he’d said about Jude, that he was a nice guy. That didn’t fit with what others were saying about him. “I’m sorry about Jude. You really liked him, huh?”

“He was a good guy,” he said, his tone flat. I couldn’t tell if that was due to sadness or insincerity.

“How’d you meet him?” I asked.

“We worked together at a previous job. Then he left to start this business and I didn’t hear from him for a while. Then out of the blue, he called and asked me if I wanted to invest. It seemed like a good opportunity, and here I am.” He smiled again.

“You got that right.” I tried for just the right tone of envy. “I wish I had money to invest.”

“Don’t worry, we take care of our own.” He clapped me on the shoulder. “I better let you get back to work before Jodie gets mad at me for keeping you from your job.”

With that, he strolled off down another row of plants.

I halfheartedly started to sweep again, my mind on our conversation. Heath liked Jude? Or was he just being respectful of the dead? Or he didn’t want to bite of the hand that was feeding him, proverbially speaking? Bill and Ivy had worked at Blue Light long enough that I’d bet they knew if Heath was being straight with me. I’d have to figure out a way to ask them what they thought.

“But with more finesse next time,” I muttered to myself.

I glanced at my watch: almost four o’clock. I couldn’t believe how long it had taken me to finish the cleaning. I wasn’t used to manual labor, and my hands and back hurt from sweeping for so long.

I stretched my back and looked around, noticing the lab door was slightly ajar. I wanted to go in and look around, but could I do so inconspicuously? I hefted the broom in my hand. I’d use it as an excuse. After all, no one specifically said
not
to clean in there.

Turns out, I didn’t have time to use my excuse. I pushed open the door, stepped inside, and was greeted by a snarling voice.

“What’re you doing? You’re not supposed to come in here!”

Carlo was standing at the microscope in the corner, glaring at me. Pete was at the table, examining a plant. He stared at me with a disinterested look.

“Sorry, I didn’t know.”

I backpedaled as he stomped over. “Well, now you do.”

I tried to look over his shoulder but he pushed me out the door.

“I’m going for a smoke,” he said to Pete. Then to me, “Come on. I want to talk to you.”

“Uh, okay,” I said. “I’m not sure I can take a break.”

“Of course you can. You’re hourly, so you’re entitled to fifteen minutes every four hours. Trust me, no one’s going to say anything.”

I followed him down an aisle and to the back door. I left my broom by the door and we went outside. We crossed the alley and he leaned against the wall of the other building. I stood near him, in the shadow of the building, but the shade did little against the July heat.

“Am I in some kind of trouble?” I asked innocently.

“Forget it.” He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, shook out one, and lit it. “But if Jude saw you…” He glanced down the alley, where I’d found Jude’s body. A piece of yellow crime-scene tape dangled from the corner of the Dumpster, the only reminder of his murder. “Um, anyway, you need to watch your back, though, because they’re pretty careful about their secret.”

“What secret?”

He blew out smoke and threw me a sly look. “No one’s said anything?”

I shrugged. “About what you and Pete do in the lab? Just that you’re experimenting with new strains, trying for a better high.”

He grinned, his swarthy chin jutting out roguishly. “Trust me, it’s more than that.”

“Like what?”

“Hell, I don’t know.” He smoked for a moment. “But something’s going on, and Jude was acting weird lately.”

“No one seemed to like him.”

He laughed, a harsh sound without humor. “Yeah, he was kind of an asshole, and he’d gotten worse in the last few weeks.”

“Why?”

“It’s whatever this secret is.” He said it like it was so obvious. “He’d come in and ask me all kinds of things about my experiments, and he’d give me specific instructions. Then a day later, he’d add things to what I was doing, or he told me to quit doing one experiment and try something different. I could tell he’d been working on stuff at night, but he didn’t share what he’d found out. It sucks to be kept in the dark. But hell, they pay me well, so I don’t ask questions.”

“Was he having Pete do stuff, too?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Pete doesn’t say much. When we compare notes, it looks like all he’s working on is crossing strains, but who knows? I could be missing something.”

We stood in silence for a moment. A car with a loud muffler zipped by the alley entrance, its powerful roar rattling between the buildings.

“You said no one likes Jude,” I prompted after the reverberation died away.

“Yep.”

“That’s not what Jodie told me.”

He snorted. “Dude, people couldn’t stand Jude. But he was her brother, right? All she talks about is how he was there for her after their parents died, and how he looks out for her. She put him on a pedestal a long time ago, and there isn’t a thing that’s going to knock him off. She’s clueless.”

“Was he nice to people when she was around?”

“No, not really nice, he just wasn’t as mean to anybody when she was there. She acted like kind of a barometer for him, helped him keep his emotions in check. But if she wasn’t around, look out.”

“Sounds like she turned a blind eye to his behavior.”

“No argument there. It’s like the time he –” He stopped.

“What?”

He was looking down the alley toward the entrance. I turned and followed his gaze. A man stood in the shadows. He gazed at us for a second, then took a step into the alley.

Carlo took a drag on his cigarette and then flicked it away. “Come on.” It was hard to tell with his olive-skinned features, but he looked pale.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“What do you mean? No one’s there.”

I glanced back at the alley entrance, but the man was gone.

“Did you know him?” I persisted.

“No, but…” He jerked his head toward the Dumpster where Jude died. “It’s probably just a bum, but someone killed Jude right there. Who knows what they were after, but maybe they’ve come back.” He pushed me back across the alley. “No sense in taking any chances, dude.”

I yanked open the back door and as I stepped inside, I glanced back at Carlo. He was staring down the alley again. He noticed me watching him, so he quickly pulled the door shut behind him and locked it.

“I’ve got to get back to work,” he said.

“Me, too.”

I picked up my broom and headed across the warehouse, thinking about what transpired. Was that guy we saw just someone who wanted to Dumpster-dive? That seemed logical, as there were plenty of street people in this part of town. But I wondered if I’d seen him before. He vaguely reminded me of the man who’d been talking to Jude the day he died. Or was it my imagination? I wished I’d gotten a closer look him.

Carlo disappeared down the aisle, so I quietly turned back and unlocked the door. I poked my head out and looked both ways.

The alley was empty. Disappointed, I headed back to the store to see what I should do next.

***

When I entered the store, Bill was helping a customer. Ivy wasn’t around.

He gave me a curt nod, then said, “Ivy’s in the back room, separating seeds. She said if you show up, you should go help her.”

I hesitated, wondering if I should take a moment to talk to Bill in private.

“What’re you waiting for?” he growled. “Hurry up.”

“Why so grumpy?” I asked.

“Dude,” he said, his smile returning. “If you don’t help her, I’ll have to, and I hate that job.”

“Oh, okay,” I said. I felt like a pinball, bouncing between jobs. I went to the door and turned the knob, but it was locked.

“You gotta knock, Sherlock,” Bill said, rolling his eyes. The customer snickered.

I was tempted to say something snide about how I really
was
Sherlock, but instead I tapped on the door. It opened a moment later.

“About time,” Ivy said as she held the door open for me.

I sat next to her at the table and dove into a bag of weed sitting on the floor.

“Hurry up.” She pointed at another piece of paper.

“I am.” I set to work, trying to keep up with her.

She was edgy and I wasn’t sure why. Because she was regretting telling me she might blackmail Jude and Jodie? Or because she killed Jude? Was I sitting next to a murderer? Or was it
murderess
? I subtly moved my chair farther away from her.

“I forgot to give you some samples yesterday,” she broke the silence.

“It’s okay.”

“You’ve got to know something about the products you’re selling,” she snapped.

“Fine, I’ll make sure I take some samples home.” We worked for a few minutes, and then I glanced at her. “Are you okay?”

She shrugged.

“It’s terrible what happened to Jude,” I pressed.

“I can’t say I shed a tear,” she said.

“What does that do to your plan?”

“Nothing.”

“But Jude’s dead.”

“So I deal with Jodie.” She waved a dismissive hand at me. “She’ll be easier to manipulate anyway.”

Interesting phrasing
, I thought. Had she already tried to manipulate Jude and it went bad and she killed him?

“Are you going to help me?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

She thumped a jar on the table and I jumped.

“If I figure this out without you, you get nothing,” she said.

“I don’t know. With what happened to Jude…” I didn’t finish.

She suddenly stood up and her chair toppled over. “I’ve got to get back to the store.” Her eyes narrowed as she looked at me. “Remember, this is just between us.”

“Right,” I said.

After she left, I sat for a moment, thinking. What was up with Ivy?