Double Black Diamond (Mercy Watts Mysteries) (17 page)

I bit my lip. I supposed I was because, let’s face it, I can’t help myself. Whoever stabbed Rory hurt someone I liked and it looked like they stole Keegan’s oil. They were asking for me to find them and give them a good tasering. It would be my pleasure.
 

“Yes, I am.”

“Will you find them?” asked Kera.
 

“I’ll do my best and, between us, I’m not half bad at this.”
 

Austin leaned forward. “We’ll do anything to help. Where do we start?”
 

“Search the condo and confirm that the bag is gone. After that I’ll let you know.” I took back Dad’s card and wrote my name and number on it. “Let’s leave this between us. I’m unofficial.”
 

They nodded and I picked up my dog purse to go. A door slammed behind me and I swiveled in my chair. DBD came in. Beers stopped halfway to lips as Wade Cave came in, flashing a toothy smile and posing like there were cameras on him, which there weren’t. Mickey Stix was right behind him with Nina Symoan on his arm. She smiled with genuine amusement on her scarlet lips, but Mickey was grimacing like he was about to have a tooth pulled.
 

“What is up with those guys? It’s like they think they’re Arcade Fire or something,” said Austin.
 

I slid down in my seat. I so didn’t need a weird Mickey Stix moment, especially in front of Rory’s friends. Whatever credibility I’d mustered would be gone in a second.
 

“Dude,” said Mark, “you’re gonna slide under the table. Do you know them?”

“Not really, but my face garnered some attention this morning.”

“Gross,” said Kera, finally smiling again.
 
“They’re like as old as my grandpa.”
 

How old is your grandpa?

“Yeah. They’re serious geezers. Got to go.” I put up my hood and eased out of my chair. With my back to DBD, I sidestepped toward the kitchen. Aaron would let me out the back way, if he could tear himself away from the stove.
 

There was a crash directly behind me and I glanced over my shoulder. One of the guys with DBD had flipped over a chair and knocked a platter to the floor. He stomped across the bar with a finger pointing right at Rory’s friends, who’d froze in their seats.
 

“What’d you do with it, you little motherfuckers?” he screamed at them.
 

Chapter Ten

My hand automatically went into my purse and found my Def-Tec pepper spray under Wallace’s butt. That guy was definitely a candidate for police strength. His face was bright red and beads of sweat were popping out on the top of his bald head.
 

He banged his fists into their table and the mugs jumped. “Where is it?”
 

Rory’s friends mouths were hanging open and their faces were blank. If they knew what he was talking about, it didn’t show. I did an about-face and shoved the pepper spray into his nose. “You want to back off, dillweed?”
 

“What the fuck?” he yelled, eyes blazing.
 

“Exactly what I was thinking.” My voice was a lot calmer than I felt.
 

Wade Cave ran over and pulled the guy back. “Chill, man, they’re just kids.” He, too, was red-faced, but I got the feeling it was more embarrassment than anything else. “He’ll live.”
 

“They have to have it,” said the guy as Wade led him away.

I wanted to snatch that guy back by his stringy ponytail, but whispered to Mark, “You need to get out of here.”
 

The manager ran out of the back saying, “What happened?”
 

No one answered. We didn’t know what to say. DBD settled in at a table across the room. Mickey and Nina were looking at me and Mickey seemed ready to make a move.
 

“Now.” I hustled them out the door as Aaron emerged from the kitchen, carrying more fundido. I mouthed, “Home,” to him and he nodded.
 

I got them outside. Lyndsay and Kera were shaking and the guys wrapped their arms around them. I’m not so certain that they weren’t shaking, too.
 

“What the hell was that?” asked Mark.

“You don’t know him?” I asked.

“Hell, no.” Mark went to the door handle. “I’m going to go back in there and fuck that old man up.”
 

I stepped in front of him. “No, you’re not. He’s with DBD. You may not be impressed with them, but you can bet the authorities will be.”
 

“Why was he yelling at us?” asked Lyndsay.

I got out my phone, reopened the door, and took a picture of Mr. Nasty, scowling at me from beside Wade.

“What are you doing?” asked Austin.

“Sending a pic of that guy to my dad. He’ll know who he is,” I said, pushing send.
 

“What does he think we have?” asked Kera.

I herded them off the icy porch and looked out at the looming, dark mountains and then at the American Flyer. The police tent and tape was still up. “Did Rory know DBD?”
 

“Rory doesn’t hang with geezers,” said Mark.
 

“He never mentioned them? Even in passing?”
 

“I get it,” said Lyndsay. “You think he was making a delivery for that bald guy, too.”
 

Wallace yipped and stuck her head out.
 

“Can I hold her? She is so cute,” said Kera.
 

I lifted the stink dog out and handed her over. “She’s a menace.”
 

Wallace responded by wiggling out of Kera’s grasp and attempting to pee on my one clean boot. I was too fast for her and dodged the stream.
 

“Your dog is awesome,” said Austin.

“Yeah, she’s a real winner. Let’s get you back to the condo.”
 

We walked through the icy cold. The clouds had cleared and the night had a sharpness to it, everything in hyper focus, everything but Rory’s case. The only thing that was clear was that Rory wasn’t carrying only Keegan’s oil in his bag. He had something for DBD as well, but they didn’t get it either. I had to find out what exactly was in that bag.
 

I left Rory’s friends in his condo and went over to Uncle Morty’s. I’d been gone a long time, but no one noticed. The guys were still engrossed in their game and Calvin and Nancy’s Scrabble board was completely covered with peculiar words.
 

“Did Wallace go?” asked Nancy, not looking up from the board.
 

“Yes,” I said, taking the stink dog out of my purse. She smelled like sausage. I put her on the floor and she started barking at me, like I was an intruder bent on mayhem. “Where’s Fergus?”

“We reeducated him,” said Uncle Morty.
 

“Did he survive it?”

“Mostly.”
 

Poor Fergus.
 

“Has anyone checked on Rodney?”
 

“I did.” Pete’s eyes didn’t move from the robot on the screen.
 

“And?”
 

“He’s good.”
 

This is why we have nurses. Care, pure and simple. I went into the bedroom with Wallace nipping on my heels the whole time. “Stop it, you freak.”
 

“What’d I do?” slurred Rodney from the bed.
 

“Not you.”
 

Wallace bit the hem of my jeans and wouldn’t let go. I yanked her off, snarling at the both of us.
 

“My knee hurts,” said Rodney.
 

“I’ll take care of it,” I said, holding Wallace at arm’s length and then gritting my teeth as I set her on the bed. The second her tiny toenails hit the comforter, she calmed down, flipped over and curled up in her donut.
 

“If I knew that was all it took, I’d keep you on the bed all the time.”

Little bark.

“My knee hurts,” said Rodney again.

“I’m on it.”

The bags of peas were melted and mushy. “I bet it does.” I gathered up his pea bags and swapped them out. The swelling had increased and I wasn’t loving that. It might be more than a small tear. I gave him his next doses of meds, held his hand, and checked my dinging phone with the other. Dad had come back. Mr. Nasty was DBD’s manager, Victor Mooting, known for his hot temper and zealous representation. I told Dad I’d seen him in Aprés being a massive jerk and by the way did Wade Cave have any medical problems. Of course Dad wanted to know why. I said he didn’t look good in the bar. Dad got all freaked out like Wade seized in front of me. It took about seven texts to calm him down. Dad didn’t know if Wade had any issues other than addiction that is. I would’ve asked about the rest of DBD’s medical issues, but he would get suspicious. Dad got off saying he had a client meeting, which sounds weird since it was late but client meeting could mean anything. The most likely was a source and Dad’s sources weren’t all that crazy about daylight.
 

Rod had gone back to sleep and I looked up Open Mind Medicinals’s phone number when I got both hands free. There was one person who would know what was in Rory’s bag and that was his father, Cullum Dushane. I had low hopes of meeting with Mr. Dushane with his son on the edge of death and more than a little hesitation about calling him at all. I had an idea of the dark place he was in and questions, well, they were an intrusion to say the least. But I called and left a message in the hopes that Mr. Dushane was the kind of guy who would welcome a distraction instead of the kind that would attack the distractor.
 

I curled up next to Rodney and Wallace and went to sleep. Pete got me up at midnight and I yawned my way back to our condo. Wallace slept on our bed. I can’t say I slept well. I kept dreaming that she had lulled me in to complacency only to bite my face off while I slept.
 

To make a bad night even worse I woke to a smell I hope to never smell again. Some sort of fish. Now I’m not a fan of fish. It can stay in the water as far as I’m concerned, but this wasn’t your ordinary fish. There was something seriously wrong with it.
 

Pete rolled over and sniffed. “Hmmm.”
 

“Do you smell that?” I asked.
 

“Uh huh.”

“What is it?”
 

He sat up and stretched. Every stringy muscle stood out under his pale skin. Whatever that smell was wasn’t going to fatten him up any and he could really use it.
 

“You can’t tell?” he asked.
 

“Some kind of fish.”
 

“It’s lox, you weirdo.”
 

“Your mom is cooking lox?” I asked.

Pete slid out of the bed and had his back to me or he would’ve seen the look of horror on my face.
 

“It’s her secret recipe,” he said. “She pan-fries it.”
 

It should stay secret, even from her.

“That’s quite an aroma.”
 

He pulled on a pair of jeans that were barely able to hold on to his bony hips. I was starting to understand his terminal skinniness.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“I think it…”
 

Don’t say stink. Don’t say stink.
 

“Stinks.”

Damnit.

Pete jerked his head around and gave me a look eerily similar to the way Raptor looked at me.

Pull up. Pull up.
 

“I meant it has a certain air of originality and whimsy that is unexpected in lox.”

“Oh, okay. Whimsy is good.” He smiled.

Whew.

I threw on my robe and said, “Let’s go see if we can help.”
 

Pete led the way out and I held back for a second to see if Cullum Dushane had called me back since I had my phone on mute. He hadn’t. If he didn’t in the next few hours I wasn’t sure what to do. I could chat up Detective Carey and see if they bagged Rory’s bag at the scene, but that would be a miracle. Whoever he was meeting was connected to the bag. If they were willing to stab Rory, they’d certainly steal the bag. There was the question of Rory’s phone. If Carey had it I might be able to get somewhere. I wasn’t sure how to ask these questions without Carey catching on that I needed something in Rory’s bag and since I didn’t live in Colorado, I’d be taking it out of state. Not good.
 

Pete stuck his head back in the room. “Are you coming?”
 

“I’m just texting Philippa about Millicent. Checking in,” I said.
 

“Come on. Mom’s almost ready to serve.”
 

God help me.
 

“Be right there.” I thought about escaping out the window. That lox smelled worse than crab could ever hope to. There was a decent chance that I wouldn’t be able to get it down. I texted Philippa about Millicent and she responded that my godmother was up and gardening in the conservatory for short periods. Finally some good news. Then she asked if I’d met anyone nice. I assumed she was really asking if I’d gotten the oil. Rory’s stabbing must not have made national news. That made for a nice delay, but it put me into a difficult position. Lying is second nature to me. It had to be since I worked for my father, but lying wasn’t always a comfortable fit. I could say yes. After all I had met Rory. But it was still lying to my friend and by extension to Cecile who would take it as a sign that I had the oil. What if I came home empty-handed? It would be so much worse. I settled on, “Working on it.” I was, so that wasn’t too bad.