Linda Miller - Deadly Deceptions

I tucked the message into the Death Threat file and forgot about it.

“My mom isn’t doing too well,” Justin said.

I looked back at him over one shoulder. “Are there any other kids in the family?” I asked hopefully.

Justin shook his head. “Just me and old Pepper,” he said sadly, “and he’s about on his last legs. Poor old dog. If I died six years ago, that means he’s almost fourteen. When he goes, I don’t know what Mom will do.”

I went to the Google page and typed Justin’s full name into the search line. “Does she have a job? Hobbies?” The Damn Fool’s Guide to Insensitivity, page forty-three. But I was trying.

Justin didn’t seem offended. He simply sighed and said, “She works at home, doing billing for a credit card company in a back bedroom. And her hobby is ordering stuff off QVC.”

There were something like seven thousand references to Justin on the Web, according to Google, but I wasn’t going to have to wade through them. The first one told the story.

“You were killed in a drive-by shooting,” I said.

There it was again, that ole sensitivity o’ mine.

Justin winced. “What was I doing at the time?”

“Waiting for a streetlight to change after a concert,” I answered, turning in my chair. “If it’s any comfort, they caught the perp. He’s doing life in the state pen.”

Justin absorbed the news with admirable ease. “Then I guess I’m not hanging around here waiting for my killer to be caught, like Gillian is.”

My heart seized. “Did she tell you that’s why she’s here? In sign language or something?”

“No,” Justin said. Then he reached for the TV remote, lowered the screen expertly and flipped to a rock-video channel. “You had me ask her if she knew who killed her. It was no great leap to guess why she’s still around. The question is, why am I still around?”

I thought I knew the answer to that one, though I wasn’t about to say so.

I do have some sensitivity, after all. There are moments when I positively exude it.

Justin hadn’t gone into the Light, if there was such a thing, because his mother couldn’t—or wouldn’t—let go.

MY CELL PHONE RANG AGAIN. Justin picked it up off the couch cushion and tossed it to me. I checked the caller ID panel.

Tucker.

“Hello,” I said, trying not to sound breathless.

“There’s some bad news coming down, Moje,” he replied.

“I know,” I responded. “Alex Pennington was found dead in the desert today. Full of bullet holes.”

Too late, I realized I’d made a mistake. I wasn’t supposed to know Alex had been pumped full of lead. And Jolie would get in a lot of trouble, maybe even lose her job, if I answered Tucker’s inevitable question.

“How did you find out?” he asked.

I closed my eyes. Opened them again. Logged off the Internet. “I’m a detective,” I said lamely. “I have my sources.”

Tucker thrust out an exasperated sigh. “Yeah,” he retorted. “Your sister, Jolie, the crime-scene tech. She’s so lucky you’re not talking to any other cop on the planet right now. Look it up in one of your Damn Fool’s Guides, Moje—this is a serious breach of ethics.”

“Got it,” I said. “But isn’t it a breach of ethics for you to call and tell me about Alex’s death before the next of kin has been notified?”

He laughed, but it was a raw, broken sound. “You have a point,” he said. “I hate it when you’re right.”

“Get used to it,” I replied. “It happens at least sixty-five percent of the time.”

“Damn Fool’s Guide to Stupid Statistics?”

“Very funny. Hilarious, in fact.”

“I’m going crazy, Moje. I need to see you.”

“Are you still living with Allison?”

“Yes.”

“Sorry,” I chimed, with a brightness I certainly didn’t feel. “All booked up.”

“Moje, be reasonable, will you? I’m not sleeping with her.”

“So you say.”

“You don’t believe me?”

My eyes started to burn. “I want to. I really do. But the map of that emotional territory is clearly marked ‘Here be dragons.’”

Tucker didn’t answer. What could he have said?

“How’s the investigation going?” I asked, to get things started again. I wanted to hold Tucker in my arms, get naked with him and lose myself in the wonderful world of multiple orgasms. I couldn’t, because even if he wasn’t having sex with Allison, he was in too deep. So I settled for stretching the conversation as far as I could, just so I could hear the sound of his voice.

Pitiful.

“It’s not,” Tucker said glumly.

I decided it might be in my best interests to be forthcoming about my plans to visit Helen Erland that evening, though I wasn’t about to let him know she was trying to arrange for me to see Vince in jail. He would have blocked that, on general principle. He’d hear about it after the fact, of course, but by then it would be too late.

I threw him a bone. Part of the truth. But, hey, that’s better than nothing, isn’t it?

“Mrs. Erland asked me to investigate Gillian’s murder,” I said, and braced myself for meteor impact. Oceans were going to overflow. Continents would shift. A new ice age would begin.

And here’s me, the flash-frozen mammoth with fresh grass in its mouth.

“When,” Tucker countered evenly, “did you speak with Helen?”

“Today at the convenience store where she works,” I answered after swallowing. “Gillian appeared in my car at Wal-Mart, and she wanted to see her mother. So I took her there.”

“Mojo, if you compromise this case—”

“I might solve it, you know.”

“As far as the sheriff’s office is concerned, it is solved.”

“Not what you said on the news this morning, Detective Darroch.”

“Look, Mojo, there’s an official investigation going on here, and it’s delicate.”

I ignored that. I was in charge of the unofficial investigation. “Helen doesn’t think he did it. Vince, I mean. And neither does Gillian.”

“Helen is out of her head with grief, and she doesn’t want to believe Erland’s guilty. As for Gillian—well, I hate to tell you this, Sheepshanks, but ghost testimony doesn’t hold up in court.”

I glanced in Justin’s direction, hoping he’d left.

He was still sitting on the couch, and he was listening. For all I knew, he could hear Tucker’s side of the conversation as well as mine.

“It’s not easy being a ghost,” I said.

Tucker sighed again. He sighed a lot whenever we talked about my strange new talent for seeing dead people. I could only conclude that he wanted me for my body, not my mind.

It was a sure bet it wasn’t my detective skills.

“Moje,” Tucker said. “I’m not sleeping with Allison.”

I would have replied, “And I’m not sleeping with you,” if Justin hadn’t been there, taking it all in.

“Whatever,” I answered.

“Stay away from Helen Erland.”

“No. But thanks for the input.”

“Mojo—”

I hung up.

“I could find out if he’s sleeping with her,” Justin said.

“Justin,” I answered, “don’t help.”

He grinned. “It’s not like I don’t have time on my hands,” he reasoned. “I could help you solve the case, too.”

“How?”

“By spying on people. I’m invisible to most of them, remember. That could come in very handy.”

“I’ve got a better idea, Justin,” I said. “Go home.”

“I can’t. My mom’s too sad. It’s a bummer.”

“That isn’t the home I was talking about.”

“I have to wait for Pepper,” he told me decisively. “He’s old and he might get lost or something. It won’t be long, and I might as well make myself useful in the meantime.”