Peter Leonard - Trust Me

He went in the kitchen and wrapped his finger-the tip was bit off and gone-in a paper towel that turned red as soon as it touched his raw flesh. He folded a paper towel three times around the end of his finger that stung like a son of a bitch, and wrapped the whole thing in duct tape he found in a drawer.

What kind of fish was it? O'Clair would've guessed a baby barracuda or a shark, but it just looked like a normal dumb fish. He went back in the living room and looked in an old rolltop desk that was against a wall at the far end of the room. He found a bent photograph wedged in one of the narrow compartments. O'Clair stared at it. It was Bobby, no question, squinting, a big grin like he had a buzz on, holding a cocktail, posing with his arm around Megan, the little blonde he'd just visited.

He put the photo in his pocket. There were a couple of bills and an orange flyer announcing a Friday Night Mixer in the desk. These swinging Somerset people really knew how to have fun. The answering machine showed six messages, but no tape. He already knew who the calls were from.

O'Clair checked the bedroom. Pulled the mattress off the box spring, slashed it open with a knife from the kitchen, a serrated blade that sliced through the soft fabric, making a big X from corner to corner, exposing the guts, but no money. The bedding was in a pile on the floor. He picked up each layer, sheet, blanket, sheet, and shook it, but didn't find anything.

He went through a chest of drawers, pulled out clothes, socks, underwear, khakis, Levi's and then rows of golf shirts. Bobby had four times more clothes than O'Clair. He was neater too-all his stuff was folded in perfect piles, perfect rows. Maybe he was a fag. Who else would spend time folding his clothes like that? Even his underwear was folded in neat piles.

O'Clair looked in the closet. On the floor he noticed a pair of brown and white saddle shoes. He wondered how a grown man could wear shoes like that even to play golf. This guy Bobby had to be light in his loafers. He picked up Bobby's two-tone golf bag that said "Taylor Made" on it, and dumped the clubs out on the living room floor. He grabbed a 3-iron, took a swing, dropped the club and went through the golf bag, checked every pocket and compartment. Nothing except golf shit: tees and balls and a couple of gloves, a scorecard, a warm can of Bud.

He went back in the bedroom closet and pulled out all the coats, checked the pockets and threw everything on the bedroom floor. He looked in the closet one more time, checked the shirts that were lined up on hangers. He found a folded piece of yellow paper in the pocket of a green long-sleeve button-down. It was a receipt from a warehouse in Clawson. The name on it said "Lloyd Henry Diehl," with an address in Southfield. He'd stop by the warehouse in the morning check it out.

O'Clair hit the jackpot in the kitchen. He found $5,700 in a Green Giant Baby Sweet Peas box in the freezer. Found $1,800 more in a metal Johnson amp; Johnson Band-Aid box with a hinged top in the cupboard next to a bottle of aspirin. God people were dumb.

O'Clair figured the money, $7,500, was a bonus for all he'd had to put up with trying to find this clown. There was a bottle of Canadian Club in a kitchen cupboard. He made himself a drink and took it into the living room to get comfortable and wait for Bobby to come home, when his cell phone rang. It was Ricky all excited, saying Samir had been robbed and Yalda was dead. What?

O'Clair drank the whiskey, put the glass on the coffee table and went over to the fish tank and looked at the fish. It was still floating on its side close to the surface of the water. He reached behind the tank and pulled it toward him, the tank teetering on its metal stand before going over. The glass panels shattered as it hit the floor and water rushed out, flooding the living room, running into the kitchen, the bathroom. He didn't see the fish but figured it didn't have too long, riding the wave and then flopping around trying to find water. His finger still hurt like hell and he wondered if you could get any kind of disease from a fish.

Twenty minutes later O'Clair was parked in front of Samir's, watching the action. Four West Bloomfield police cars and two EMS vans were parked in the driveway, lights flashing, and an unmarked Crown Vic was parked on the lawn. It took him back- crime scenes flashing in his head. Dead bodies that had been shot, strangled, stabbed, beaten-and cops standing around drinking coffee, talking, waiting for the homicide detectives, the medical examiner, trying not to contaminate the evidence.

He got out of the car and went up to the house. Two paramedics wheeled a gurney out the front door. Samir was on his back, his face bruised and swollen, and there was an IV swinging from an attachment over his head. Now Minde came out of the house crying, hysterical, her face red and puffy on one side. The paramedics picked up the gurney, slid Samir in the back of the EMS van.

Minde said, "I have to go and take care of him."

One of the paramedics helped her in and closed the doors. O'Clair was surprised, thought she was in it strictly for the money. She could've gone back to her apartment, had a couple drinks and watched TV But she insisted on going with him. You could never be sure with women.

He moved toward the house. There was an acetylene tank, a big one on the front porch. At first he thought it was an oxygen tank the paramedics had brought, but now he knew what it was. The paint was chipped and it was dented like it had been used on construction sites. They'd wheeled it up to the front door and melted the lock. The molding around the front door was scorched black and smelled like there'd been a fire, that smell that got in your nose, you couldn't get rid of. The door itself was burned black on one end, and there was a hole where the lock had been.

In the foyer, a hardass West Bloomfield uniform asked O'Clair who he was and what he was doing there.

From the living room Ricky said, "It's okay, he works for us."

Ricky was on the white couch, talking to a detective.

"Give me a few minutes," he said to O'Clair, trying to sound like he was in charge.

There was a bloodstain on the white carpeting, looking strangely out of place in the perfect room. O'Clair had never wanted to go in there, afraid he'd mess it up, track something on the carpeting. Why'd everything have to be white? Samir's living room, his kitchen, even his cars. And yet the man himself dressed in black. O'Clair couldn't remember him wearing anything else. He thought of Samir as the Chaldean Johnny Cash. He moved into the man's office. The cabinet doors were open and the safe was gone. Who'd have the balls to come in here and do that?

Karen was leaning against the side of the minivan, smoking a cigarette, still tense from the events at Samir's. She couldn't stop thinking about Yalda, who she'd always liked, and Samir, who she didn't, but now worried about. This had been her worst fear, something going wrong, and someone getting hurt, or worse. She'd called 911 on Samir's phone, from Samir's office, and hung up.

Now she was in the warehouse, staring at the safe in the middle of the bare concrete floor. It was a Mosler, with gold Arabic writing on it, and weighed six hundred pounds. She had watched Bobby, Lloyd and Wade struggle to lift it in the back of the van, and then struggle again taking it out when they arrived at the warehouse.

Bobby had his back to her. He turned and grinned and said, "Next time I rob a Chaldean bookmaker with a safe I'm going to rent a Hi-Lo."

Wade was on one knee in front of the safe, turning the combination dial. He looked like he was praying, and Karen thought it was an odd contrast for an ex-con.

Bobby looked over at her again and said, "Well, without further ado," swinging his arm toward her, palm open in a theatrical gesture.