The Extortionist Read online

  “Sign those,” he says. “We’re getting out of here.”

  “I’ve got a needle stuck in my hand,” I say. “I can’t just pick up and go.”

  “The nurse is on her way in to take care of all that,” he says. “We got problems.”

  “What kind of problems, Detective Miller,” Henry asks in my place.

  He turns to her, then refocuses on me.

  “The principal of Loudonville Elementary School was stabbed to death less than an hour ago,” he says.

  The nurse arrives a few minutes later, as promised. She removes my IV and gathers my signed paperwork. I get myself dressed in the bathroom, and together, Miller, Henry, and me make our way down to the medical center’s first floor.

  “What about my car?” I say, as we step outside and into the cool night. “I left it at Gladys Carter’s.”

  “One of my guys collected it and parked it out front of your houseboat,” Miller says. “You can ride with me.” Then, to Henry. “This is where we leave you, Henry. We got business to take care of.”

  “Glad you feeling better, Jobzy,” she says, wrapping her long arms around me, giving me a squeeze. It’s a rare display of open affection.

  “Thanks, Henry,” I say. “You didn’t think you’d get rid of me that easily, I hope.”

  “You and that little white ass of yours did manage to throw a little scare in me,” she says.

  “I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” I assure her.

  For a beat or two, Miller and I watch her cross the hospital access road and enter the short-term parking lot. The glow from the many pole-mounted streetlamps seem to make her red outfit light up as if it were battery charged.

  “There goes one special woman,” I say.

  “Let’s go see to a dead woman,” Miller says.

  The old detective gets behind the wheel of his unmarked cruiser, and I hop in the shotgun seat. He pulls up to the shack, hands the kid who’s manning it his ticket.

  “You’re good to go, Detective,” the kid says grinning.

  “You got pull around here, Miller,” I say.

  “I got pull everywhere I go in this city.”

  While he drives, he tells me that Anita Simon was found by the nighttime cleaning crew. She’d been stabbed multiple times right inside her office.

  “Any word on the suspected perp?” I ask. “Anyone get a look? Anything on CCTV?”

  “I know as much as you know at the present time.”

  We’re quiet for a long minute.

  Until Miller says, “Now, what the hell happened to you this afternoon, Jobz? Other than bits and pieces, I’m pretty much in the dark about your situation, too.”

  I begin to tell everything I recall about what happened at Gladys Carters house, and how I ended up on her dining room floor, tits up. I start from the beginning. From the moment the sweet little old lunchroom lady opened the door to her rundown bungalow, to her insisting on making me lunch, to my studying the pictures on her wall only to discover her husband and son died long ago in a car accident, to my drinking cranberry juice—which was apparently laced with Methyl Iodide.

  “Wonder where she got that shit,” Miller says.

  I also tell him she took off a wig, drank a beer faster than a sailor that just stepped off the boat, and smoked a doobie.

  “She went through my wallet and pockets, too,” I say.

  “She take anything?”

  “Don’t think so,” I say. “And the mouth on that woman? I might have been out for the count, but she managed to embarrass even me. F-bomb city.”

  “So, basically what you’re telling me,” he says, making a right turn onto Osborne Road in the quaint hamlet of Loudonville, “is that Mrs. Carter might not be Mrs. Carter at all.”

  “Unless I was seeing things or hallucinating, Miller,” I say, “the old lady ain’t all that old.”

  That’s when it dawns on me. The picture of the picture I snapped inside Carter’s bungalow. Digging into my pocket for my cell phone. Down to ten percent charge. I’ve got to find a charger pretty quick. Opening the pictures I find the picture I’m looking for. The one with Principal Simon, Cute Brunette Chris, Frumpy, and an unidentified young woman sitting around a table in a strange kitchen pounding margaritas.

  “At first, I had no clue who the young blonde was in the picture,” I say, holding the digital screen up over the dash so Miller can view it while driving. “Now, I’m pretty sure that was the lady who drugged me tonight.”

  “And that cute little red-headed principal is lying dead on her office floor,” he says. “Text me that photo and anything else you got.”

  I proceed to do just that. As we approach the school, and the numerous bright flashers from the APD cop cruisers on the scene, I attach the photo to a text and send it to Miller’s phone. In the meantime, he pulls the radio transmitter from the dash, tells the dispatcher to have someone do a search on how many Gladys Carters live in the Albany area.

  “That’s Gladys with a Y. Over,” he says.

  “Copy that, Detective. Over.”

  He hangs up the transmitter.

  Something else dawns on me as we enter the parking lot and pull up beside the EMT van. I dig around in my jacket pocket, pull out the Field’s Food Service receipt.

  “I wonder if this means anything,” I say, holding it up for Miller.

  He takes it in his hand.

  “Just a receipt for food,” he says. “So what?”

  “Yesterday morning,” I say, “I saw a Field’s truck pull into the school’s back lot while I was making some calls. It caught my attention because it reminded me of the cafeteria, and naturally, the cafeteria reminded me of Mrs. Carter.”

  He reads the receipt.

  “Forty-seven thousand bucks worth of chicken fingers, beef patties, tatter tots, and more junk.” He clears his throat. “That sound like a lot to you, Jobz?”

  I shake my head. “Sort of,” I say. “But how should I know? I’m not entirely experienced in these matters.”

  “Yeah, well, neither am I,” he says, pocketing the receipt. “I’ll place this in evidence when I get back to the precinct.”

  He opens the door, goes to get out. But something else comes to mind then. I reach out for him.

  “Hey, one more thing, Miller,” I say.

  He glances at his watch. “What is it?”

  “After the food truck took off yesterday, I saw something strange,” I say. “Well, it didn’t seem strange at the time.”

  “Spill it, Jobz,” he says. “We’ve got a crime scene to observe.”

  “The ladies who work in the school’s general office . . . they were packing a van with boxes. Field’s Food boxes.”

  “Really,” he says. “Maybe they were just reusing the boxes to store something else, like books or records or something like that.”

  I bite down on my bottom lip.

  “It’s possible,” I say. “Or, just maybe, they were stealing the food.”

  “Now, why would they do that?”

  “You ever see Goodfellas, Miller?”

  He shakes his head. “If I did it was a long time ago, and I don’t remember it much.”

  “Well, in the movie, the mob takes over a restaurant and they use it as a front to sell all sorts of booze, food, and drugs on the black market for, get this, cash on the barrelhead.”

  I feel myself smiling, because my gut is telling me I just might be onto something.

  “And you think that’s what could be going on here, at this charming little school?”

  Me, nodding. “Maybe several schools,” I say. “Stranger things.”

  “Stranger things,” he repeats. “Let’s go look at Principal Simon.”

  She’s lying on her stomach, her body so bled out her skin is chalk white. Her arms are spread, her hands clenched into fists. A blood pool surrounds her torso. Her red hair is soaking in it, and her short skirt has bunched up around her bottom, exposing black bikini underwear. Her feet are unnaturally a
ngled inward, as though both her ankles somehow broke after she was stabbed. A man wearing a blue windbreaker bearing the name Albany CSI along with a pair of latex gloves on his hands and booties over his shoes is photographing the body.

  “Don’t come too close,” he says to me and Miller.

  “Not my first rodeo, Lieutenant,” Miller says, annoyed.

  I decide not to open my trap.

  “Weapon?” Miller asks.

  “A knife,” CSI Man says, “far as we can tell. A big knife, probably. Like a carving knife. But whoever did this was smart enough to take it with him.”

  “Or her,” I interject.

  “What?” he says, while snapping away with his digital camera. “Who the hell are you?”

  “I’m just saying it could easily have been a woman who did this to the principal,” I add. “And I’m a very important person according Detective Miller.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” he says, not without a sarcastic laugh and a roll of his eyes.

  Miller turns to me. “I’ve seen enough.”

  He exits the office and heads into the school’s vestibule.

  “You’ve interviewed Simon,” he goes on. “Besides those videos, she give you anything else of value? She mention anyone that might want to harm her, besides the sweet old lunch lady, of course?”

  “Not that I recall. Her focus was on the lunch lady and those videos.”

  “And what about Carter’s lawyer? Terry Kindlon.”

  “He claims she’s being railroaded. He says the CCTV vids don’t prove anything because you can’t see a face and that you and him already discussed it.”

  “We did,” he says. “I just thought maybe you might get more out of him.”

  “He did let me drink some of his booze.”

  “He always does that,” he says. “Help yourself to a drink on the way out. His way of getting you to like him.”

  “I do like him,” I say, “and his staff.”

  Miller can’t help but smile. “He does hire some exceptional talent,” he says. Then, glancing at his watch once more. “You and me are gonna take a field trip first thing tomorrow morning.”

  “Where to?” I say.

  “Back to Gladys Carter’s house.”

  “Will the real Gladys Carter please stand up?” I say.

  “Exactly,” he says.

  We leave the school and a murdered young woman who will never stand again.

  Miller gives me a lift back to my houseboat. Just like he said, my Mustang has been returned to me safe and sound. Before boarding the boat, I unlock the glove box and retrieve my gun, stuffing the barrel into my pant waist. Heading down the short flight of steps, I step onto the dock and then board the boat. Unlocking the sliding door, I head into the kitchen, place my gun and my cell phone on the counter. I attempt to search the phone for calls, but it’s run out of juice.

  Plugging the phone into the charger, which is plugged into the socket beside the sink, the phone lights up. Holy crap, I’ve got six unanswered messages, and they’re all from Brit. Is she really that mad at me? My stomach tightens and my mouth goes dry. The last thing I want is for Brit to be angry with me even before we’ve begun our relationship. That is, if a full-blown relationship is in the cards for us.

  Grabbing a beer from the fridge, I pop the top and steal a deep drink. Then, taking hold of the cell phone, I press the icon that bears her number in recent calls, wait for her to answer. Unlike earlier, she answers right away.

  “Steve,” she says, alarm in her tone, “are you still in the hospital?”

  “No,” I say, “I was discharged about an hour ago. You sound stressed. Is everything okay?”

  “It’s your mother,” she says. “Something’s happened.”

  The tightness in my stomach turns to all out dread.

  “Is she alive?” I ask.

  “Yes,” she says, “but barely. Can you come?”

  “Come where?”

  “Albany Medical Center,” she says. “Second floor, ICU.”

  My head spinning, heart pounding. I just left the place.

  “I’ll be right there,” I say.

  I hang up and pull the charger out of wall, shove it in my pocket. Drinking down the rest of the beer, I dig into my jacket pocket for my keys. All the keys are there, except for the car key. Whoever drove it home must have taken the key from my ring.

  “Let’s hope it’s under the seat or on the visor,” I whisper aloud.

  I glance at my gun.

  “What the hell,” I say, grabbing it from the counter and carrying it with me back out onto the dock.

  Taking the steps two at a time, I get in the Mustang, feel around for the key under the seat. It’s there. I slip it back onto the ring and start her up. The seat has been adjusted for a taller man, so I reposition it closer to the wheel. Shifting the transmission into reverse, I punch the gas. Then, throwing it into drive, I burn serious rubber and speed along the empty lot toward Broadway. With any luck, I’ll be at the medical center in five minutes.

  Parking in the lot near the main entrance, I don’t walk to the entry doors . . . I run.

  The information counter is directly to my right as I enter the vestibule.

  “Which elevator accesses ICU?” I demand from the lady behind the glass.

  “Elevator C. Go to the end of the hall and take a right. It will be up a few feet on your left.”

  “Thank you,” I call out as I’m already walking away.

  I jog out of the vestibule and into the corridor. Take a right at the end of it. I spot the elevators, go to them as fast as I can without knocking somebody over. Take the elevator up to the second floor, get out at the ICU unit. I’m greeted by a big round desk and several nurses and orderlies occupying it. They all look very intense and into their work. I step up to the desk.

  “Can I help you?” a thin African American man asks.

  “I’m here to see, Mrs. Jobz,” I say, swallowing something dry and bitter. “I’m her son.”

  “That’s okay,” comes a voice from behind, “he’s with me.”

  Turning quick. It’s Brit. Despite the circumstances, she looks beautiful in her tight Levi jeans, cowboy boots, and V-neck t-shirt, a bunch of silver bracelets dangling on her right wrist. Her brunette hair bobs against her shoulders.

  “Okay, Brit,” the man says, not without a smile, as if he too is mesmerized by her presence. “He’s all yours.”

  Don’t I wish . . .

  She approaches me and does something strange but wonderful. She gives me a hug. There’s nothing sexual or even suggestive in the hug. It’s a hug filled with empathy and maybe even a little happiness, never mind the occasion. Can it be that she’s actually happy to see me? Taking hold of my hand, she leads me into an area where maybe a dozen beds are closed off by green curtains. Each bed is equipped with all sorts of electronic monitoring and life sustaining equipment. Aside from the muted voices from the few loved ones and medical center employees scattered about the place, a heavy, almost dreadful silence fills the atmosphere. As much as I hate to admit it, it is a silence that accompanies near death. The kind of silence that can only be wrought by The Reaper.

  We come to one such bed and stop. It’s Mom. She’s hooked up to a respirator which means a clear tube has been shoved down her throat. A mélange of colored wires are attached to her arms, neck, and torso. An IV is inserted into the vein on the back of her left hand, just like mine was earlier in the evening. Like mother, like son. But then, not really.

  Seeing her like this is like a swift kick to the gut. Tears fill my eyes. But then, I know now’s not the time to break down. Now’s the time to be the strong one. I’m the only family she’s got left.

  “Go to her,” Brit says, giving me a little shove.

  “Can she hear me?” I ask. “Is she in a coma?”

  “Try to speak to her,” she says. “She will be glad to know you’re here, Steve.”

  Reluctantly, I go around the bed and look down on m
y mother. There’s not a lot left to her. She can’t weigh more than ninety pounds, if that. I gently place my hand on her free hand, careful not to disrupt the clothespin like device that’s been placed on her thumb.

  “Hi, Mom,” I say.

  She doesn’t respond. Instead, her chest heaves from the manufactured breathing apparatus. Her eyes are closed, so she can’t possibly see me.

  “It’s your son, Steve,” I go on, feeling foolish, like I’m talking out loud to myself.

  I attempt to squeeze her hand. But it’s so small and fragile, like a bird’s wing, that I’m afraid if I put any strength into it whatsoever, I’ll break it. But get this: part of me wants to hurt her, even if it’s the slightest pinch, so that she’ll wake the hell up.

  “Can you hear me, Mom?” I say again.

  But it’s like talking to a mannequin. Releasing her hand, I lean in, give her a peck on the cheek. Her skin isn’t warm. It’s cold, clammy, almost like she’s already gone. Coming back around the bed, I stand beside Brit, and refocus my eyes on my mother. I exhale a deep, sad breath. I realize this is the cycle of life, but boy does it suck.

  “How in God’s name did this happen?” I say.

  “She just won’t eat,” Brit says, crossing her arms over her chest.

  “She misses my dad,” I say. “Their life together.”

  “She’s retreated entirely into herself, Steve,” she says. “You must prepare yourself for what might come over the course of the next few days. Maybe start thinking about preparations.”

  I look into Brit’s green eyes.

  “You telling me my mother’s dying, Brit?” I ask.

  She sighs, sullenly. Answer enough.

  I stand there for what seems like hours. At one point, I’m offered a chair, but I’m not a sitter, no matter how tired I get. Brit never leaves my side. She’s a saint and found her true calling in the nursing field. She is the very definition of a giver. After a while, she takes hold of my hand once more.

  “Listen,” she says, “I know you’re working in the morning and you’ve been through your own trying ordeal today. There’s nothing you can do here. Go home and get some sleep.”