1 Dog Collar Crime (21 page)

“I was only asking. Anyone could have walked into the house and picked up that spreadsheet. Mom never turns the alarm on during the day.”

“That’s a thought,” Frankie added. “With your dad locked up, people are bound to cross the line. Nobody would have the balls to do this if your dad was out, but since he’s not, what’s gonna happen?”

Joey scoffed. “He could still fix this.”

“Yeah, but some of these lower level guys aren’t geniuses. They’re cocky and don’t give the respect the older guys do.”

Joey’s shoulder shrug indicated it wasn’t completely out of the question. “I’ll poke around. Maybe I’ll run up to see Dad one day, see if I can get anything out of him.”

“Don’t tell him about all this. He only knows about the first incident.” Lucie turned to Frankie. “You didn’t tell your father anything else, did you?”

“I told him about the Sammy Spaniel theft. That was the last thing. “

“Okay. So we know he wouldn’t have told my dad about the diamond, right?”

“It wouldn’t do him any good. He promised your father he’d take care of you. You having a stolen diamond doesn’t exactly leave a good impression.”

Joey immediately raised his hands. “I won’t let on. I’m not stupid.”

“I think my missing spreadsheet is part of the answer. Someone had to have taken it from the house. If we find that someone, we find the dognappers. I’m sure of it.”

Chapter Thirteen

A loud scrape jolted Frankie from sleep and his breath came in one shuddering gasp.
What the hell
? He opened his eyes. Moonlight squeezed through the closed blinds and threw an angular shadow against the far wall. The ceiling fan spun in slow circles while the screech against his bedroom window blasted through his already battered head. He needed to trim that pain-in-the-ass tree before the wind sent one of the branches into his bed.

He inhaled and ever so slowly turned toward the bedside clock. Four-thirty. Way too early for any normal person to be awake. At least in his opinion.

The throbbing in his head went ballistic and his vision blurred. He needed a few more hours of sleep and then he’d get with his father about the dognapping problem. Lucie would skin him, but he’d live with it. His father had all sorts of connections and, even if someone close to Joey were behind swiping that spreadsheet, his father or Jimmy would have heard about it.

Wait.

Could his father have mentioned to Jimmy that Lucie found the diamond? What about Lemon? If Jimmy knew, so did Lemon. A sickness unrelated to Frankie’s pounding head whirled in his stomach.

If Jimmy and Lemon knew about the diamond, could they be trusted to keep it quiet? Hell, they could have told any number of lowlifes.

Frankie shifted sideways and dry heaved into the bucket by his bed.
Dammit.
He could be the cause of all this.

He rolled out of bed, made his way to the bathroom, raised his forearm over his eyes and flipped the light. After a second, he lowered his arms and pried one eye open to locate his painkillers.

Two hours. That’s what he needed to kill. By then his father would be up and reading the morning paper, perusing the sports section and checking out Frankie’s column, as he always did. Frankie swallowed two pills, looked in the mirror and scared the crap out of himself. His eyes held that shiny, unfocused look that came with concussions.

Rest. That’s what he needed now. Maybe the meds would kick in and by six, he’d be moving enough to get the four blocks to his folks’ house.

A sleepy Lucie stumbled into the bathroom. She’d insisted on sleeping on the couch. “Are you okay?”

“Needed the painkillers. Go back to sleep.” He eyed her in his beat up Cubs shirt. “In my bed.”

She rolled her eyes. “Even with a concussion? Unbelievable.”

“Still a guy, Luce. And that part of my brain is intact.”

“Thanks for the offer, but I’ll stick with the couch, for now. Do you need anything?”

“You just shot down the only thing I need.” This said as he crawled into his bed alone. He’d be no good to her now anyway. She’d have to do all the work. He pulled the sheet up and prayed for the peace of mind he needed to sleep. At least then he would stop thinking he’d put Lucie in danger.

Two hours later, after a raging battle for sleep, Frankie used his key to unlock his parents’ front door and slipped in.

“Pop?” His voice was somewhere between a whisper and his regular tone. No sense giving anyone cardiac arrest by sneaking up on them.

An eerie darkness enveloped the newly painted room. His mother had finally gotten rid of the fuzzy wallpaper, but a shaft of light filtered from the kitchen as Pop swung around the corner, still wearing his navy pinstripe pajamas.

“Frankie?”

“Morning.”

“What are you doing here so early? You okay?”

“I gotta talk to you.”

Dad put a hand on his back. “How’s your head?”

Lucie’s mother must have called his mother. Luce had warned him about that. He wasn’t the only one flapping gums with a parent.

“Could be worse,” Frankie said. “The meds help.”

“Jeez, Frankie, with your history, you gotta be more careful.”

Getting knocked to the ground by a would-be dognapper wasn’t exactly his fault, but his father didn’t know that. Not wanting to terrify her mother, Lucie had told her Frankie slipped and hit his head. Not exactly heroic, but it worked for their purposes. “Yeah. I know.”

“Come in. Your mother isn’t up yet. In a little while, she’ll make you a good breakfast. You hungry?”

“Not so much.”

Frankie wasn’t a breakfast guy, especially with a swollen brain, but his mother’s ham and eggs might relieve the ache a bit. If he could keep the food in place.

His father led him into the kitchen and poured a second cup of coffee.
The
Herald
sat open on the table. Pop read every article, every day, no exceptions.

“Sugar, right?” his father asked.

“Right.” He handed him the sugar bowl and Frankie hoped the burn of coffee wouldn’t send his tender stomach into a boycott.

“What’s up, kid? Why aren’t you in bed?”

Asking questions without them sounding like accusations wouldn’t be the easiest thing Frankie had ever experienced. He ran his middle finger and thumb across his forehead, felt the pressure drive through his skull.

Say it
.

“I don’t know how to ask you this, so I’m gonna lay it out.”

His father sat across from him, took off his reading glasses and dropped them on the table. His dark eyes held intensity, but Frankie recognized the look as being more concern than anything.

“You can ask me anything.”

Yeah, well, they’d see about that. “You know all this crap with Lucie and the dognappings?”

“She get hit again?”

“Almost. She zapped the guy with her stun gun.”

His father cracked a smile. “Is that a fact?”

Frankie couldn’t resist smiling. Nobody would ever expect Lucie to use a stun gun. He held up a hand. “Swear.”

“Maybe she’s got a little of her father in her after all.”

There was a scary freakin’ thought. “Anyway, we think someone swiped one of her reports from the house and that’s how they know who her accessory clients are.”

“Someone broke into the house?”

“We think so. She had a spreadsheet go missing. It never turned up.”

His father’s bottom lip poked out for a second. “Reasonable, I guess.”

“Pop?”

“What?”

“I told you about the diamond. Could Jimmy have overheard and told someone else. Maybe they’re going rogue?”

His father sat back, thought about it for a split second. If that.

“No. Some of these young guys, they’re a little…” Dad held his hand to his head and motioned like he was turning a screw, “…whacked. But Jimmy? No. Not with Joe’s daughter.”

Frankie slugged a gulp of coffee, set the mug down and waited for the impact. Nothing. So far, so good. “It sounds nuts, but it’s the only thing I can come up with.”

His father leaned forward, smacked a hand on Frankie’s arm. “I’ll ask around. If it’s one of our guys, I’ll find out and take care of it.”

Frankie nodded. “Keep it low profile. Lucie doesn’t want Joe finding out. He climbed all over her when we saw him last. We’ve got enough problems without her being pissed at me. We need to figure out where this diamond came from so we can all get back to normal.”

His father held up two hands. “I’ll keep it quiet, but you can bet I’ll take care of it.”

* * *

“How’s it going?” Frankie asked Lucie when she came through his door carrying a white paper bag.

Grateful to see her, he rested his head back on the couch, and hoped there was a meatball sandwich in that sack. “Is that from Petey’s?”

“You bet. Thought you’d like some lunch.” She knelt beside him, ran her fingers through his hair and he enjoyed the comfort of the gesture. They were together again and he intended to enjoy it. “Do you need anything?”

“I need a lot of things, but they all require you naked.”

She rolled her eyes. “So, your brain still isn’t the only thing swelled?”

He laughed. “Come on, Luce, I’d want sex if my arms we’re hanging off and I was bleeding out.”

The sandwich came flying at him and he tore into the bag. “I guess I’ll settle for this. Hunger set in about an hour ago, but I was too lazy to move. I can’t believe you went to Petey’s for me. You hate Petey’s.”

“Which is why I had Ro go in.”

Frankie snorted. “Atta-girl. Always searching for the workaround.”

“You deserve a meatball sandwich.”

“Yes, I do. What are you up to the rest of the day?”

“Today is the interview for the bank job, so I need to go home and change. After the interview, I’ll finish the run with Joey and tonight I’m meeting with a web-designer. I might want a website for Coco Barknell. I could put the dog walking services on one page and the accessories on the other.”

“Sounds like you have a plan.”

“Yep. It’s the safety net if I don’t get a job.”

He unwrapped the foil and a bit of sauce dripped onto his T-shirt. Nice. It’d probably get a lot worse before he was done so he ignored the stain and bit into the sandwich. The sharpness of the garlic and cheese caused a riot with his taste buds and he closed his eyes.
Heaven.

“Watching you eat one of those is always exciting. It’s almost a turn-on.”

He swallowed. “They’re so damn good. What are you thinking about the banking job?”

“I’m not holding my breath. There are a lot of people with more experience than me out of work.”

“Yeah, but you’re good. And Lutz recommended you. That’s gotta carry some weight. Be prepared if they offer you the job.”

She switched to a sitting position next to the sofa. “That would be nice.”

“Would you take the job?”

“I think I’d have to. I need health insurance. My benefits from the old job will expire soon and it’s expensive to buy my own. Plus, I need to get out of my parents’ house.”

After three bites, Frankie set the sandwich on the cushion next to him. Might as well take a break and see how it settles in. “Is it that bad?”

“Well, Joey is Joey, but he’s been laying off. I think he feels bad about the dognappings. And my mom is a dream. She’s saving my butt helping with the sewing.”

“What’s the problem then?”

Lucie hesitated. “The old neighborhood is too stifling. And when my father calls, we have to practically line up to talk to him and all he does is lecture me about wasting my education.”

“That’s because you haven’t told him Coco Barknell could be huge. You could open shops all over the country. Then will your education be wasted?”

“Frankie?”

“Yeah?”

“I have a business plan. I did production estimates and salary and benefit options. I’ve got it all figured out.”

Good girl
. A pulsing nailed him right in the gut. Might have been the sandwich, but he wanted to think it was the business plan. “You could open a store downtown.”

“Not right away. It’s too expensive. Unless I get another investor.”

“I can give you more money.”

She shook her head. “I don’t want you risking any more of your money. I was thinking I should ask Mr. Lutz. He may want to do it. If he doesn’t, he’d be able to hook me up with the right people.”

“Luce?”

“What?”

“Are you sure about taking the bank job if they offer it? You’ve got all this Coco Barknell stuff figured out. Might be worth the risk.”

Seemed like a no-brainer to him, but Lucie didn’t have that warrior instinct. She liked to play it safe. Analyze the figures, the market conditions, the
possibilities
.

“It’s the medical benefits. With a banking job, I have a safety net. All the money I’d spend on benefits could go into my savings. Once I’m working again, I can do Coco Barknell part-time until I have enough money saved to go full-time.”