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Authors: Lee Goldberg

Mr. Monk and the Two Assistants (6 page)

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“You haven’t even looked at the evidence,” I said.

“Nobody has asked him to,” Sharona said.

“Maybe somebody should,” I said.

“Maybe somebody should butt out of things that are none of her business,” Sharona said.

“Mr. Monk has figured out murders that everyone else thought would be impossible to solve.”

“I know,” Sharona said tightly, “because I was at his side for most of them.”

“You were there for the early, less interesting cases before he really hit his stride,” I said. “I’ve worked closely with him on the classic mysteries that have made him famous. They even tried to make a movie out of one of them—the one with the astronaut whose alibi for the murder of his lover was that he was orbiting the earth in the space shuttle.”

“I heard about that,” Sharona said. “But wasn’t Adrian’s assistant in the movie going to be an Asian-American hot-tie with incredible martial-arts skills?”

I like Chinese food, I’m easy on the eyes and I can throw a mean punch, so it wasn’t
that
big of a change for the movie. But even so, screw her for mentioning it.

“The point I’m trying to make is that solving your husband’s case would be a no-brainer for Monk,” I said. “Why don’t you want your husband to be freed?”

“You don’t know the first thing about me or Trevor,” she said.

“I know he’s in jail and you want to keep him there,” I said.

“So do I,” Monk said. “He’s a threat to society.”

He was a threat to Monk. If Trevor got out of prison, it would mean Sharona would leave Monk again. Monk was so selfish, he’d rather let an innocent man rot in prison than jeopardize his own comfort.

“His whole life Trevor has been a scammer and a petty thief, always looking for the scheme that would make him rich,” Sharona said. “He’d take advantage of anyone, even his own family, to do it. I told you he had this landscaping business, right? Well, he’d go back to the houses when no one was there, break in and steal stuff. Then he’d sell the stolen goods on eBay—under his own name.”

“If he’s such a dimwit,” I said, “what did you see in him?”

“He’s not stupid. He just doesn’t think,” she said. “There’s a difference. The problem with Trevor is that he lives entirely in the moment. He never considers the consequences. That’s also part of his charm. I certainly fell for it. Twice.”

“She has terrible taste in men,” Monk said. “She once dated someone in the Syndicate.”

“The Syndicate?” I said.

“It’s how we law enforcement professionals refer to organized crime,” Monk said.

“If you were a cop in 1975,” Sharona said.

“Trevor doesn’t sound very dangerous to me,” I said. “What makes you think he’s a killer?”

“Because he killed someone,” Sharona replied testily. “A woman he worked for came home early and caught him in her house. He panicked, grabbed a lamp and hit her with it. I’m sure he didn’t mean to kill her. But that doesn’t excuse what he did.”

“What he did was unforgivable,” Monk said. “Luring you away to New Jersey with his smooth talk and false promises, forcing you to abandon the people who needed you most, plunging them into the impenetrable darkness and despair that lies in the pitiful depths of their tormented souls.”

Monk noticed us both staring at him and then hastily added, “And Trevor murdered someone, which is also very bad.”

Sharona glanced at me. “You know what? It’s a lot later than I thought. I’d better be going.”

She was right about that.

“What’s the rush?” Monk said. “We could measure my ice cubes to be sure they are perfectly square. Remember how you loved to do that every morning?”

“You loved it, Adrian,” Sharona said. “For me, it was a chore.”

“And what’s the definition of a chore?” Monk said, like he was asking everyone to sing along. “Something you love to do.”

“I don’t think so,” Sharona said.

“It’s in the dictionary,” Monk said. “Look it up.”

“Okay, let’s do that,” Sharona said. “Go get your dictionary. I’ll wait.”

Monk grinned at me. “Isn’t she a kidder? This was our thing, this witty repartee. We’ve fallen right back into it as if she’d never thoughtlessly abandoned me. We fit like a comfortable pair of new shoes.”

“Don’t you mean old shoes?” she said.

“Who would want to put on
old
shoes?” Monk said, shaking his head and looking at me. “See what I mean? This is gold. You should really be writing this down.”

Maybe I should just have fallen to my knees and genuflected in front of her, too. I didn’t say that of course, but the gist of my thoughts must have been evident on my face, at least to Sharona. She picked up her handbag and headed quickly for the door.

“I’ve really got to go,” Sharona said. “If I don’t leave now, I’ll fall asleep at the wheel.”

“You need to get a new job,” Monk said.

“Like what?” Sharona asked, pausing at the door. “Supermodel? Chef? International spy? This is all I know how to do.”

“You could go back to being a private nurse,” Monk said. “You could devote yourself to the simple needs of a single, disinfected person as opposed to dozens of unwashed strangers who spew germs and bodily fluids all over you.”

I stared at him in disbelief. Did he really just say what I thought he said? Didn’t he see me standing there? Didn’t he care at all about my feelings?

Obviously, the answers were yes, no and no.

If those were the questions on a test measuring sensitivity and basic decency, Monk would have just flunked.

“That’s a big responsibility, one I’m not sure I can handle right now,” Sharona said. “But I’ll think about it, Adrian. See you around.”

And then she left.

See you around?
What did she mean by that?

It’s not like they lived in the same neighborhood or moved in the same social circles. They weren’t going to just bump into each other at the grocery store while Monk was reorganizing every bottle of wine by date and shape.

The only way she was going to see him was if she planned it. And yet, less than twenty-four hours earlier, she was hiding from Monk. Now she was promising to be a regular character in his life again. What had changed?

I’ll tell you what changed. She discovered that, contrary to her fears, Monk didn’t hate her for abandoning him. And that fact opened up all kinds of possibilities she hadn’t considered before, like re-creating her old life in San Francisco as if the last few years hadn’t happened . . . as if I hadn’t happened.

“Isn’t it great that she’s back?” Monk said.

“I’m overcome with joy.”

“I’m sensing a little resentment from you,” he said.

“Really?” I said. “You must be a detective.”

"What do you have to be upset about on such a happy, happy day?”

“That,”
I said, pointing at him. “You’re absolutely giddy.”

“You don’t like to see me happy?”

“Of course I do, Mr. Monk. I just don’t like what this burst of joy implies.”

“That I’m not sad?”

I couldn’t believe how dense he was. “Has your life been that miserable with me as your assistant?”

“No more miserable than usual,” he said.

“Then why do you want to fire me?”

“I don’t,” he said.

“Twice now, right in front of me, you’ve not so subtly offered Sharona my job.”

“How can you say that? I couldn’t possibly fire you,” he said. “Not after everything we’ve been through together.”

I felt tears welling up in my eyes. “Really?”

“I need you in my life, Natalie. Don’t you know that by now?”

“You don’t know what a relief that is to me and how much I needed to hear you say that,” I said, feeling embarrassed, ashamed and stupid. How could I have so seriously misjudged him? “When I saw how thrilled you were that Sharona was back, I was sure that you were going to give her my job.”

“Don’t be silly,” Monk said. “There’s plenty of me for both of you.”

My heart skipped a beat. “What do you mean by that?”

“You can share me,” Monk said. “I’ve always needed more time and attention than one person can give. This is the perfect solution.”

“You want to hire us
both
as your assistants?”

“Isn’t that wonderful? You could alternate days. Or days and nights. Or weeks. I’m a flexible guy. I’m sure you two gals will work it out.”

I wiped the tears from my eyes and felt my cheeks flushing with anger.

“Are you going to pay each of us ‘gals’ a full salary?”

“Why would I pay you a
full
salary for only doing
half
the work? Get real.”

“Okay, here’s the reality. I can barely live on what I get paid now working full-time for you,” I said. “I can’t live on half of that.”

“You could get a second job,” Monk said.

“I don’t want a second job,” I said.

“Then you can use all of that free time to get your house in order,” Monk said. “God knows there’s plenty of organizing you can do.”

“I’m not going to share my job, Mr. Monk.”

“She came back, Natalie. The people who leave me almost never do. I can’t let her go now.”

Emotionally, I could sympathize with his feelings. His father had abandoned him when Monk was a child and only recently reappeared. Monk lost his wife and was never going to get her back. And then Sharona, someone he relied on every day just to survive, abruptly left him. I’m no shrink, but it was obvious to me that he needed to bury his anger and accept her back in order to ease his own insecurities.

Pretty perceptive, huh? Call me Dr. Natalie and give me my own TV show.

But on a practical level, I had to face facts and so did he.

“You’re not listening to me, Mr. Monk,” I said. “I can’t afford a fifty percent pay cut and I’m not going to juggle two jobs just to accommodate you.”

“Then what am I supposed to do?”

“Make a choice,” I said. “Sharona or me.”

“That’s not fair,” Monk said.

BOOK: Mr. Monk and the Two Assistants

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