Motion for Malice (5 page)

"Very thoughtful," I said. "Except you don't have a license."

She shrugged. "A license is just a piece of paper."

"Like a bail bond," I agreed.

"Come on, Jamie. I'll be careful. You know I can drive. Remember when you twisted your ankle, and—"

"I remember," I said. "I can't let you take my car, Maizy. I need my piece of paper."

She stuck out her lower lip. "Do you have a better place to start?"

I didn't even know if the SUV was a place to start. For all we knew, it could have belonged to someone who'd pulled over to make a phone call. But for the moment, it was all we had. Which meant we had nothing.

*   *   *

About six months earlier, Howard had taken a hard look at the firm's emaciated balance sheet and reacted like every plaintiff's attorney worth his salt. He'd found some more people to sue. After Maizy had left, I settled in to type his most recent complaint. It was typical of the sort of case Parker, Dennis took these days: a goof who'd climbed on his roof during an ice storm to readjust his satellite dish and predictably had bodysurfed down the steep pitch right into the rock garden, taking the dish and some shingles with him. In keeping with the plaintiffs' attorneys' creed, Howard was giving the moronic homeowner a free pass. Howard was suing the builder for failing to properly install the shingles. For good measure, he was also suing the satellite company for failing to provide its contracted services, which were in fact being provided until his client body-slammed the satellite dish.

I was knee deep in Count III when Wally clicked up to my desk dressed to impress in navy pinstripes and a red power tie. It was a manly outfit as worn by Doogie Howser. "Did you find out anything?"

I'd given the whole Wally-and-Sherri thing some thought, and I had it pretty much figured out. "She's cheating on you," I told him. What can I say—I just didn't have the energy to play games.

His mouth fell open.

"His name is Frankie Ritter," I said. "He's got lots of tattoos and piercings, and he reviews adult films for a living."

Wally stared at me.

"Oh, and he weighs 300 pounds," I said. "Give or take."

He clamped a hand onto my desk to steady himself. "How can I compete with that?"

He had to be kidding.

"Okay, okay." He rallied and pushed himself upright. "That's not so bad. 300 pounds, that's a big boy, but I'm fighting for my woman here."

"Your woman doesn't think you're macho enough," I said, as gently as I could.

His eyes got wide and a little wet. His lower lip trembled. His Adam's apple bobbed around in his throat. "Is it because I shave my legs?"

Gaakk.
"I'm not sure why, Wally. Sherri is just drawn to bad boys."

"I can be a bad boy." He whipped out his pink hankie and snuffled into it a couple of times. "I know. I could get a tattoo. You think I should get a tattoo?" He looked down at himself. He was buttoned up to his chin. "You wouldn't be able to see it or anything. But I'd know it was there. Maybe a rose with her name?" He lifted his pant leg to study his ankle. "Do tattoos hurt very much?"

"I've never—" I began.

"Or a butterfly. I've heard women like butterflies. Or angels. I could get an angel on my shoulder."

He was going to need one. "Wally," I said carefully, "maybe you should try competing from a position of strength."

"Strength. Right." He pushed himself upright again. It took two tries. "What is that, exactly?"

I tapped my skull. "Intellect. You're a lawyer. You're smarter than Frankie Ritter."

He seemed doubtful. "You really think so?"

At the moment, I wasn't all that sure. "Give it some thought," I said. "I'm sure you can come up with a way to impress her." I paused. "By the way, Dorcas Beeber was murdered last night."

He frowned. "Dorcas who?"

"The psychic," I reminded him. "Wore a lot of jewelry, always carried that yappy dog?"

"Oh. Right."

I could tell he didn't have a clue who I was talking about. I blew out a sigh. "She was Howard's client. She just came in last week with her husband."

His face was blank. "That's a shame," he said, unconvincingly.

"It might be nice if we sent something to her husband. It's the—"

"Good. Fine." He glanced at his watch, back in full Boy Lawyer mode. "Take care of it, will you?" And he was gone, clomping upstairs to worship at his Howard shrine.

"It's the least we can do," I said very quietly.

*   *   *

"Wally is a moron," Curt said later that night. We were in my apartment watching an episode of
Bewitched.
The show was before our time, but we liked it anyway. I thought there was something very appealing about solving your problems with a twitch of your nose. And Curt thought Samantha Stephens was hot.

"What gets me is that he didn't even seem to care," I said. "He was more concerned about competing with Frankie Ritter."

"That's no competition," Curt said. "A slug could compete with Frankie Ritter."

A box of Cheese Nips sat on the coffee table along with two bottles of water and a stack of napkins from the local Wendy's. Nothing had been opened. Curt's idea of junk food was sesame pretzels. That was his tough luck. My apartment, my rules.

I watched Darrin Stephens admiring his reflection in a ridiculous gold lamé suit. "I've been thinking," I said slowly, "I'm not sure I want to work with someone like that."

Curt shifted to face me. "Honey, I'm all for you quitting your job, but do it for the right reason. Remember, this is the guy whose first concern when Doug Heath died was who'd be getting his office."

He was right. Wally's lack of decency was nothing new.

"Sooner or later he'll realize Howard doesn't walk on water," Curt said, "and he'll go off to open his own practice, and you'll never have to see him again."

"Unless he marries Sherri," I said gloomily. Not that Frankie Ritter was better husband material. Frankie Ritter didn't even use utensils when he ate.

"That's not gonna happen," Curt said. He seemed distracted, and when I looked back at the television, I could see why. Samantha was wearing a skintight silver dress that barely reached mid-thigh. Samantha had great legs. Between those legs and the nose-twitching thing, she had it going on.

I opened a bottle of water and took a drink, giving the Stephenses time to wrap up the scene. "How do you know that?" I asked finally. "He's crazy about her. He dyed his hair blond for her."

"Sherri could never respect a guy like Wally." Curt shook his head. "She flat out said he wasn't manly enough. The man needs some guidance from someone with testosterone. No offense, but I can just see her persuading him to get a string of pearls tattooed across his ass."

It'd have to be a short string. Wally didn't have much of an ass.

"Tell you what," he said. "I'll stop by the office next week. I should be in the neighborhood. Maybe I can help him man up."

"I appreciate the thought," I said. "But don't you have enough to do without mentoring Wally?"

He took my water bottle and guzzled it. "Everyone needs a hobby." He slid me a sideways glance. "Or would you rather have Frankie Ritter in the family?"

"Wally gets in around eight," I told him.

On Saturday I didn't watch the news or read the paper. When the phone rang, I ignored it. I opened the door only to collect the mail, which I dropped unopened on my coffee table. Curt had offered to call off of work, blow off a bachelor party that night, and cancel his racquetball game on Sunday, but I gave him a pass on all of it. Truth was, I kind of wanted to be alone.

By four o'clock I no longer wanted to be quite so alone, so I took myself to a matinee, a romantic comedy with no blood and guts. I sat alone in the dead center of the theater eating popcorn while eavesdropping on whispered conversations around me. When the credits rolled after ninety minutes, I'd had all the socializing I could stand, so I slipped out a side door and hustled back to my car as if I'd broken some law by going solo in the first place.

I got home to find Maizy sitting cross-legged on my landing, her face buried in her cell phone, a black hoodie pulled up over her hair. She followed me inside. "It's about time you got home. I was freezing outside. Of course, if I had the keys to my car, I could've waited in there."

I nodded. "With the engine running, I'm sure."

She looked at me with the innocence of a thousand angels. "Well, just for the heat."

One thing about Maizy, she had the focus of a heat-seeking missile. "You know your uncle Curt said when you get your license, you get the keys."

She frowned a little. "But I'm sure Uncle Curt wouldn't want me getting frostbite sitting on those cold metal stairs when all I'm trying to do is visit the Hutch to my Starsky."

I grinned. "Been watching Antenna TV again?"

"And Game Show Network," she said, grinning back. "They have
Match Game 78
now."

Something Maizy and I had in common was a mutual affection for fifty-year-old television shows. They made me believe there had once been a simpler time. And Maizy liked to try to match the answers.

We went into the kitchen. "So I found out something," she said.

"Yeah?" I hung my coat on a chair and put a mug of water in the microwave to heat. "Want some hot chocolate?"

"Hot chocolate's for little kids," she said.

I gave her a look. "Right. So you want some or not?"

"Well, if you're gonna force it on me." She dropped her backpack on the floor and shook off her coat. She kept the hoodie sweatshirt but pushed the hood back, and her mass of blue hair sprang free to form a Crayola-colored cloud around her small face. As usual, her eyes were rimmed in black.

When I had two mugs of hot chocolate ready, we sat at the table. "So what'd you find out?" I asked.

She blew some hair out of her eyes. "I found out we need a new approach."

I stifled a smile.

She took a sip from her mug. "Got any marshmallows?"

"I'm lucky I've got the hot chocolate." Shopping for anything, even food, wasn't my favorite activity.

"Yeah, I forgot you're a little domestically challenged." Maizy took another sip. "I might have been able to figure out what kind of SUV we're dealing with, except I'd have had to walk everywhere, and it's really cold. So I have another plan." Very casually, she inspected her fingernails. "They say killers often return to the scene of the crime."

"No," I said.

"I'm not talking about going
inside,"
she said. "We can just sit in the car and, you know, do surveillance. See if anyone shows up."

"And then what? Make a citizen's arrest?"

"Of course not. Then we call 9-1-1." She swallowed. "Only it'd have to be anonymous, because my dad would kill me if he knew I was doing this, so we'd have to get one of those prepaid cell phones that can't be traced."

I stared at her.

"That's what I've heard, anyway." She shrugged.

Right.

"I'm not sure I want to buy a phone just to throw it away," I said.

"You don't have to. I already did." She held up a little basic flip phone. "I bought thirty minutes already. After we use it, we'll toss it in a Dumpster, and no one will ever know it was us."

"If we use it," I said. "And unless they see my car."

"Oh, right. The car." She gnawed on a cuticle and thought about that. After a moment she brightened. "I know—we'll rent a car. I'll do it online. We can even get the AARP discount. You're a member, right? How much do you want to spend?"

"AARP?" I repeated. "How old do you think I am, Maizy?"

She shrugged. "Old. Does it matter? You look okay to me."

"Thanks," I said drily.

"So how much?"

"Couple of things." I pushed my mug aside and leaned forward on my elbows. "First, believe it or not, rental cars can be traced back, too. Second, I don't have the money to rent a car when I have a perfectly—an adequate car sitting in the driveway. And third, I am nowhere near AARP eligibility."

"Okay, so don't have a cow.
God."
Her fingers skittered across her cell phone screen. "So we want cheap. We can get an economy car at Honest Aaron's for $25 a day."

"I've never heard of Honest Aaron."

"That's because he spent the last two years in jail," she said. "He had a little trouble with the IRS." She glanced at her cell phone. "He doesn't even require ID, but if he has to dispose of the car for you after, it's an extra twenty bucks. And it's cash only. What do you think?"

I thought Honest Aaron's troubles with the IRS might not be over.

"I've got twenty bucks," she said. "I'll even drive. Maybe we can get a stick shift. I like driving stick shifts."

"I'm not sure I want to risk riding in an Honest Aaron car," I said.

"Come on, it'll be fun," she said. "Where else am I gonna get the chance to drive a '71 Pinto?"

Well, that shed a bright light on Honest Aaron's willingness to dispose of his rental cars. "As long as we just sit there," I said, "and don't get out of the car—"

"Yes!" She did a fist pump. "This is gonna be
great!
I get to drive an actual antique!"

"Yeah," I said, "about that. I'll be doing the driving."

Her face fell. "Why? I'm a good driver. You let me drive before."

"Because I want you to be able to get out if the thing turns into a fireball." I shook my head. "Couldn't we get something more modern, like, I don't know, a '77 Gremlin?"

"Would I be able to drive that?"

I sighed. "Yes, Maizy, you would be able to drive that."

"Then let me see what I can do," she said.

*   *   *

After Maizy took my grocery money—let's face it, I didn't need it anyway—and left to see about a '77 Gremlin, I poured myself a bowl of Chocolate Cheerios for dinner. Someone knocked on my door just as I sat down in front of the TV
to eat.

I answered it to find Wally shivering on the landing with white cheeks, red nose, and watery eyes. "I hope you don't mind my stopping by," he said. He stepped inside, rubbing his hands together and blowing on them. "It's a cold one tonight, isn't it?"