Allan Leverone - Postcards from the Apocalypse

“Jimmy Kilpatrick,” I said as a finger of icy dread worked its way into my gut. “Oh my God, Dad was killed by Jimmy Kilpatrick?”

“Not exactly,” my uncle said. “You’re on the right track, but slow down a little. Harold Dawes has been doing creative bookkeeping for the last several years, skimming money from a firm whose only major client is one of the biggest crime lords on the eastern seaboard. Essentially, Dawes has been stealing from…”

“Jimmy Kilpatrick,” I finished, once again feeling stupid that it took me so long to tumble to something Brick had figured out hours ago, maybe days ago. “So Dawes killed not just Billingsley, but also Dad, just to cover his tracks with Kilpatrick?”

“Exactly.”

“But, but,” I sputtered, sloshing iced tea over the rim of my glass and suddenly wishing I had stayed in L.A. So what if Allison had gotten just about everything we had built together in the divorce agreement, at least the weather was good. At least out there I didn’t have to face the ugly side of life every day when I went to work, like my father and uncle did.

I tried to get myself under control and speak calmly. “Uncle Brick, you told Dawes we’d leave him alone, but that doesn’t work for me and it shouldn’t for you, either. He has to pay for what he did to my father, to your own brother!”

“Slow down, sonny. He’s going to pay, don’t you worry about that.”

“But you told him we wouldn’t pursue him.”

“That’s exactly right, and the reason I said that is because our first obligation is to our client. You remember our client? I assume you do, since you were staring so hard at her in the office I was beginning to think you were going to propose to her on the spot.”

I felt my face redden. Sure, I had stared at her, but I didn’t think I had been that obvious. And besides, what was I supposed to do? She was beautiful, sexy and vulnerable. And I’ve been divorced for, heck, months now.

My uncle let me squirm for a moment and then took pity on me. “Ah, so you do remember her. Well, junior, she’s the only good guy besides us involved in this thing who is still alive. As much as I want to get Harold Dawes, we have to be smart, if only to protect Mrs. Billingsley. If Dawes felt too threatened, he wouldn’t hesitate to take her out, then follow up with us, just to be thorough.”

“Okay,” I agreed grudgingly. “Where do we go from here?”

“We call Mrs. Billingsley and set up a meeting.”

Now that I had heard the plan, I couldn’t help agreeing it was a good one. I didn’t quite follow where Brick was going, but I thought seeing Maggie Billingsley again was definitely a step in the right direction.

This time, when our client walked through the door and into the offices of Callahan Investigations, I was ready for her, so there was no repeat of the mouth half-open, feet stuck on the desk foolishness she caught me with on her first visit. And I only ogled a moment. I’m sure she didn’t even notice.

For today’s meeting, Maggie Billingsley was dressed in a pair of white jeans and matching white sweater. I wondered about the wisdom of wearing a sweater in the summer in Boston, then decided the last thing the woman needed was fashion advice from a guy who dresses out of the Lieutenant Columbo Collection. She looked like an angel, and that was all that mattered, at least as far as I was concerned.

I was determined not to let Uncle Brick get the jump on me this time, so as soon as I saw the office door swinging open, I was on my feet, sliding a chair around for her to sit in. She swept in, sat gratefully, and faced Brick’s desk. “My,” she said, “you work fast. I didn’t expect to hear from you so soon.”

“There was no reason to waste time,” Brick answered. “You were right about your husband getting killed because of things he discovered. I want to assure you that you are in no danger and that the persons responsible for Robert’s death will be punished. It might not happen as quickly as we would like, but it will happen.”

“Was it someone where he worked? Was Robert killed by a coworker? How could someone do that?”

Brick, as he had the last time Maggie Billingsley had visited the office, once again knelt before her and gently took her hand. I wished it were me, but since I had no idea what my uncle was going to say to reassure her, decided it was best to sit this one out. “Please believe me when I tell you it is in your best interest not to know any more than you presently do. As I said, you are completely safe, but if I were to tell you everything you want to know, it is entirely possible you could be in as much danger as Robert was, and I think it’s safe to say he wouldn’t want that.”

Sitting back on his heels, my uncle smiled warmly at Mrs. Billingsley and continued. “The time will come when we can share everything with you, and when that day comes, rest assured that my nephew and I will call you and set up an appointment at your earliest possible convenience to fill you in. Until then, try to put the circumstances of Robert’s death behind you, if you can, and know that he died loving you and wanting to protect you.”

Once again I was stunned at the sensitivity my uncle was capable of expressing when he chose to. Maggie Billingsley thanked us—okay, mostly she thanked my uncle—then rose and glided out of the office.

“All right,” I said to Brick. “We’ve taken care of the Maggie problem. She seemed satisfied that we will bring her husband’s killer to justice. So…” I waited for him to start explaining the plan, but no explanation was forthcoming, so I soldiered on. “So, how are we going to punish Robert Billingsley’s killer, and more importantly, to me at least, how are we going to punish Dad’s?”

“We’re going to pay a little visit to Jimmy Kills.”

To say that Jimmy Kilpatrick lived in a palatial estate would do the place a grave injustice. His home was located in the Wellesley Hills, a tony suburb west of Boston where even the maids and housekeepers seem to drive Beemers and Audis. The only difference is that the working folks’ luxury sedans are two or three years old, rather than brand new.

Jimmy Kills’ house was nestled among a grove of birch trees, set at the back of a lot roughly the size of the town I grew up in. To reach it, we had to wind our way up a driveway that seemed to be about three miles long.

We did this, of course, only after we answered a series of questions at the base of the driveway asked by some goon talking to us through a loudspeaker hookup that reminded me of the old contraptions you used to have to hang on your car’s window at the drive-in so you could hear the movie.

The goon, whose voice sounded like a tinny version of Andy Kaufman playing Latka Gravas on the old show, “Taxi,” was reluctant to buzz us in, but eventually did so after being threatened by Brick. My uncle told the poor dolt that Jimmy Kills would eat the guy’s heart for breakfast the next day if Jimmy found out we were turned away, after he heard what we had to say.

That seemed to do the trick, because the next thing I knew, the massive cast-iron gate was swinging open. We swept past it in Brick’s Mercedes and I turned to watch the gate clang shut behind us. “Uh, what makes you so sure Jimmy Kills won’t eat our hearts for breakfast?” I nervously asked my uncle.

“Nothing, really. Just a clean conscience and a sunny disposition,” he answered. “Plus, it’s closer to dinner time than breakfast.”

“Oh, great,” I said. “So there’s no pressure then.” I knew we were in trouble when my uncle was starting to make sense.

We finally arrived at Kilpatrick’s house after a long drive through a heavily wooded area. We burst out of the primeval forest onto what looked like the eighteenth fairway at Augusta National. I mean, Jimmy Kills’ place was immaculate. The lawn was emerald-green, and the walkway leading from Jimmy’s cobblestone driveway up to the front door of his southern-style mansion was swept so clean you could eat off of it. I didn’t see any groundskeepers, but I had no trouble picturing them cutting the grass in three-piece suits and spit-shined wingtips.