Nina Wright - Whiskey Mattimoe 07 - Whiskey, Large (15 page)

I must have relaxed because the next thing I knew Chester was shaking me awake.

“You’re here!” he shouted, apparently convinced that pregnancy had diminished my hearing as well as my ability to stay alert.

I squinted out the window into the piercing orange sun, already low on the horizon. Indeed, we had arrived at the field in question, a vast undulating meadow now sprouting early spring weeds and wildflowers. Daylight would fade fast. Jenx and MacArthur looked anxious to resume their search now that the second-string canine had arrived. The chief gave a curt wave. Next to her MacArthur offered a sexy wink and a thumb’s up. I admired his ruffled black hair and ruddy face. Fresh air agreed with the Cleaner.

As Chester deftly unloaded Abra from the Lincoln, I made him promise to keep her leashed.

“Of course I will,” he replied. “She’s an Afghan hound, not a bloodhound or retriever.”

“Which pretty much sums up my confusion about why we’re here,” I said.

When Chester started to explain that Napoleon was a possible target, Roscoe was off the clock, and Mooney was on a honeymoon, I interrupted.

“I know about the labor issues. It’s the common-sense issues I’m struggling with.” I pointed at Abra, who was industriously licking her private parts. “Why deputize her? That hound has never earned her keep. Plus, she’s a known felon and corrupter of decent dogs.”

Chester shrugged. “She’s all we got. If MacArthur’s nose has led us to the right field, Abra should be able to lead us to the shell casing, or at least to the spot where she and Napoleon partied last night.”

Abra perked up at the mention of her boyfriend’s name. Maybe she expected to hook up with him again, hence the last minute grooming of her sweet spot.

Chester removed a few high-end doggie treats from his oversized backpack and fed them to Abra. To be accurate, she inhaled them.

“Time to get motivated, girl. We’ve got serious work to do,” Chester announced.

The Affie radiated pure irrational pleasure at the prospect of serving him. If she ever responded to me like that, I would faint dead away.

“What else you got in the backpack?” I asked Chester.

“Standard search and rescue supplies,” he said. “Plus a dog whistle, an extra leash and a pair of night goggles.”

“You didn’t bring your gas mask?”

I was kidding, but the question brought Chester up short.

“Do you know something I don’t?” he whispered.

I assured him I did not, on any level. When he looked unconvinced, I reminded him I’d never taken a single online course.

MacArthur called out to Chester that it was time to move. The team of one cop, two human deputies and one rogue Afghan hound started across the wide field, their destination determined by the sensitive nose of one handsome Scot.

My sigh signified lust without intention. I valued MacArthur’s manly virtues because they reminded me that I was more than an expectant mother. I was a full-blooded female. Sure, having a car and driver was a treat, but I was eager to trade in this grotesque version of my body for one I recognized, one designed to move and flirt. I would stay faithful to Jeb forever. Like most women, though, I longed to feel other men’s appreciative eyes on my flesh.

“I understand.”

Helen sounded so sympathetic that I wondered if I’d been thinking out loud.

“You do?”

“Of course I do! You want to go with them.” She nodded in the direction of the deputy squad, now vanishing over a knoll. “I know all about Abra’s adventures, and I also know she wouldn’t have had any of them without your help.”

“Abra’s misadventures, you mean. All of which she has had to spite me.” I shook my head. “You’re right, though. I do miss being a volunteer deputy. If there’s trouble that involves my business, my friends or my dog, I want to solve it.”

“Awww.” Helen beamed at me as if I’d just said the sweetest thing.

She reached out and snapped open the fancy Fleggers lunch box on the seat beside me.

“You’ll feel better when you eat,” she said. “May I serve you now?”

The only way I could imagine Helen serving me a packed lunch would be bite by bite, as if I were a toddler. The image made my toes curl.

“No thanks. I’ve got it,” I said and spun the box so that the open side faced me. “Tell you what, Helen, why don’t you step outside and stretch your legs? We’ll probably be here for a while.”

“Yes, but I’d rather assist you, Miss Whiskey. That’s my job.”

“Technically your job is acting as my driver, and you’re doing it well. I’d prefer a little privacy while I eat, so please humor me and step out of the vehicle.”

My voice had a slight edge that even soft-headed Helen seemed to absorb. She stiffened.

“Very well.”

Helen clicked off the ignition, popped open the driver-side door, and exited the Lincoln. She paused a few paces down the road, probably the maximum distance she felt comfortable placing between herself and her client.

Fortunately, Helen had left the windows cracked open a couple inches. I closed my eyes and inhaled the faint earthy promise of a spring evening. It was soothing, so soothing that I knew I would be asleep before dinner if I didn’t dig into Mom’s lunchbox at once. Sliding down into the seat, I used my huge belly as a serving surface. It sure wasn’t pretty, but it worked just fine. I savored every morsel of the tasty meal, consuming the peanut butter cookies with record slowness. Every rich crumb melted on my tongue.

Only too soon I’d be dieting, something I’d never had to do before. I closed my eyes, pretending it wouldn’t be necessary, imagining myself turning slim and agile because I wished it so. Like a certain piggish Affie, I licked my lips, then I tucked my used napkin inside the lunchbox and secured the lid. With a grunt I forced myself to sit up straight enough to peer past my belly. Down the darkening road there was no sign of Helen.

Had she turned in the opposite direction or followed the deputies into the field? I peered all around. In the shadows cast by the rapidly sinking sun, there was no sign of my driver.

I actively resisted the tingle of apprehension at the base of my skull. Most likely Helen was punishing me for pushing her away. She was one of those women with unresolved maternal urges, exactly my opposite. While I’d never thought I wanted a kid, here I was having one. Helen, on the other hand, oozed motherliness but had no appropriate place to channel it.

I thought about getting out of the car to look for her until I remembered why I had hired Helen in the first place. I reached for my phone and dialed her cell.

After four rings I heard, “This is Helen Kaminski, professional driver. I’m either driving right now, or I’m doing something else that keeps me from answering the phone. Please leave a message. Have a nice day.”

“Helen, it’s Whiskey,” I said. “I finished eating. Please come back to the car.”

Had I hurt her feelings when I insisted she step away from the vehicle while I ate? Okay, maybe I could have handled that better. Still, sweet Helen, of all people, should have been willing to give the giant pregnant lady a break.

I could deal with it if she were pouting. My fear was that she wasn’t pouting. My fear was that something had happened to her. Some kind of accident or sudden illness. What if Helen needed help? I was in no condition to stumble around in the dark looking for her.

Ironically, I was ten feet from a Magnet Springs Police patrol car, but the chief and her deputies, like Helen, were nowhere in sight. I shoved open the door of the Lincoln and leaned as far out as I dared.

“Helen!” I roared. “Helen Kaminski! Please come back to the car!”

The only response to my shout was the uninterrupted twitter of birds bedding down for the night. I repeated myself with the same ineffectual result. Enough light remained in the evening sky that I could make out a stand of tall trees some distance down the road in the direction Helen had headed. Would she have wandered off the pavement? More important, why didn’t she answer me? Couldn’t she hear me call?

Suddenly, my phone chirped.

r u enjoying ur dinner? c u soon

Another pointless teen-like text from Mom. Mom! She would know what to do. I dialed her number.

“Whitney, you’re supposed to text me back, not call me. I need all the practice I can get.” She sounded annoyed. “Texting isn’t easy when you have arthritis in your fingers. Just you wait.”

I blurted, “Helen’s gone, and I don’t know where she went.”

Naturally, Mom made me go back and explain what had happened. When I got to the part about my asking Helen to get out of the car while I ate, I distinctly heard my mother “tsk.”

“What?” I demanded.

Mom sighed. “You’re so touchy. We’re all trying to help, but you don’t make it easy. Poor Helen.”

“Poor Helen?” I echoed. “You’re the one who fired her.”

“That was decades ago. You probably pushed her too hard, and she needs to blow off some steam.”

“She’s not answering her phone.”

“Who can blame her? She’ll come back when she’s good and ready.”

I reminded my mother that it was rapidly getting dark.

“If I know Helen,” Mom said, “she carries a pocket flashlight. Did I tell you what a good Girl Scout she was? Helen had the most merit badges in the county.”

“Then why doesn’t she do her duty and answer me when I call?”

“She needs a break from you. Like we all do.”

Mom hung up.

I sat very still for several minutes watching darkness devour the last stains of sunset. I calmly tried Helen’s phone again, and I shouted out to her again. As much as I wanted to believe that Mom was right, and Helen simply needed a break, I couldn’t quite buy it. I had a bad feeling that ran all the way down to my swollen toes. Girl Scout Helen wouldn’t leave a hugely pregnant client sitting alone in a car on a dark country road. Would she?

Suddenly anxious, I tried to reach around the front seat to lock the doors, but my belly got in the way. I moaned in frustration. Somewhere far away Abra howled, and her ghostly
roo-roo
made me shudder.

This was exactly why we paid taxes to support a police force. Speed-dialing Jenx, I prepared to dump the issue in her capable unmanicured hands.

Inches from my head someone rapped sharply on the darkened glass. I screamed and fumbled my phone.

“Sorry!” a man said, sounding like he meant it.

I couldn’t make out his face until he held up his smart phone like a dim lantern.

I saw that he was in his late twenties with tightly curled hair and slightly slanted eyes. Although we’d never met, I knew him from the photo on his web page, which I had studied before I hired him.

“Ben Fondgren?” I asked. He nodded, and I introduced myself.

“What are you doing out here?” we said in unison.

“I’m a runner,” he said, and I realized he was panting. “I take this route three nights a week. What about you?”

“I lent my dog to the police to help with an investigation. They’re out in that field.”

I nodded toward the now invisible horizon.

Ben turned to look. After a moment he said, “I don’t see any lights.”

“That makes two of us.”

He kept his glowing phone near his face, presumably as a courtesy so that I wouldn’t feel creeped-out talking to a dark presence.

“There’s nothing wrong with your car?” he said.

“No, but I think there’s something wrong with my driver. She’s gone.”

“Gone?”

“She walked away.” I chose to omit the part about my asking her to leave.

Ben said, “Is your driver Helen Kaminski, by any chance?”

My heart jumped, or else Baby kicked. Maybe both.

“Yes. Did you see her?”

“Yeah, about a mile up the road. A car stopped for her, and she got in.”

Briefly, I wondered
how Ben would know Helen. Then I recalled that they both worked for Cassina, which was how they’d ended up working for me.

“Listen,” Ben said. “Do you hear that?”

I did. It was the unmistakable sound of Chester barking like a dog. What troubled me was that my dog didn’t bark back.

Ben and I watched three flashlight beams sweep the field while Chester continued to bark. In the distance, from several directions, dogs howled or whined in reply. Not Abra, though.

“Do the cops have a dog out there?” Ben said.

“Not anymore,” I said. “Just a kid speaking canine.”

Speaking of speaking, I suddenly realized that Ben’s voice in person lacked that sexy, late-night baritone buzz I’d found so impressive on the phone. Apparently, this was how Ben sounded off the clock, when he wasn’t selling his social media mystique. To fill the time until the deputies sans dog reached the road, I asked Ben if he’d launched our damage control campaign.

“Definitely,” he said, activating his phone voice. “Mattimoe Realty is tweeting as we speak, plus we’ve got a minimum of ten tweeps tweeting about you, round the clock.”

Call it pregnancy brain. Call it old school. For the life of me, I couldn’t track what he was saying. I requested a translation.

“No problem. Like I told you this afternoon, I set up your Twitter account to send out PR messages 24/7. Every day we’re adding hundreds of followers—those are your tweeps—who then retweet—that is, resend your PR messages to their followers, who in turn follow you and retweet your tweets. It’s all about building a brand and creating awareness.”

Ben sounded so impressed with himself you’d think he invented Twitter, or maybe even public relations.

“How’d you get into this line of work?” I said.

“I didn’t so much pick my field as it picked me.” He shrugged. “I’m a natural.”

“At what, exactly?”

“Fusing high tech and high touch to create seismic social and economic change.”

He might as well have said “blah blah blah” for all the sense that made to me. Some of us work with tangible things. Some of us play with egos and ideas. As long as Ben got the job done, we would get along.

“Whiskey! We got bad news!” Chester’s voice reached me before he did.

“Stand back,” I told Ben before I opened the car door. My goal was to intercept Chester. I wanted to spare him the distress of explaining what I already knew—that Abra was gone again—but I got stuck, groaning, halfway out of the vehicle.