Private Eye 1: Private Eye Page 4

  The Strip floated by him like a bad dream: neon, chrome, billboards, and whores, a garish montage of L.A. consumerism. He coasted to a stop at a red light, his eyes gazing blankly ahead. Sensing someone, he turned to his right to see a hooker moving in toward the passenger door. Her breasts spilled out of her low-cut summer dress as she leaned over and gave him a gaudy, blood-red smear of a smile. Then, just on the verge of a proposition, her practiced lines were forgotten and her smile faded as Cleary gazed right through her.

  The light turned green and he continued down the boulevard into the night.

  He parked outside the apartment building on St. Ives, and wondered why he lived here, why his past had been wiped away like words on a blackboard. He climbed the dimly lit stairway and lethargically pushed his key into the lock. The apartment was dark, except for the ambient light of the city leaking in through the living room window. He took one step across the threshold, then froze.

  The room had been turned upside down. Ripped apart as if a lion had been living here. For a brief moment, Cleary wondered if he had done it himself, and had forgotten. Then he heard a movement from behind the door, and spun around. A man with a hat low over his eyes stood there staring at him from the shadows. He started toward the man when he was struck on the head from behind, and crumpled to the living room floor.

  The next thing he was aware of was the sensation of a rough tongue lapping at his face. Slowly he regained consciousness and sat up. The black Lab puppy whined and wagged its tail as it hobbled around him on three legs. Cleary stroked the pup's head, waiting for the white ball of pain in his head to slide off to one side. Then he rose to his feet, clicked on a light, and surveyed the damage.

  The furniture was bleeding stuffing, drawers lolled like frothing tongues, papers littered the floor like confetti. Turning to the door, he slammed it shut, locked it. He wandered through the debris for a while, trying to set things right, but there was so much. The futility of his efforts drove him into a chair.

  An eternity of silence passed as Cleary stared vacantly into space. Finally the detective that was buried, yet still part of him, started asking the inevitable questions. Who had done it? Why? Was it thieves, vandals, or someone with a complaint? Hell, he had made a few enemies over the years. Maybe some badass was out on bail, and heard about his brother's death. Nothing like getting back at a guy while he's down.

  His fists clenched against the chasm of hopelessness that opened like a black hole in front of him. Where the hell was he supposed to go from here? Does it matter? He didn't know. He just didn't know.

  He bent over and picked up a framed photograph, its glass front shattered. He studied the picture of himself in uniform, arm in arm with Nick in his Marine's uniform, both of them beaming. It was taken the day of his graduation from the Police Academy.

  A long time ago. Sixteen years ago next month to be exact. Even then, when he still had another year of his stint in the Marines, Nick was talking about starting his own detective agency. He wanted the independence, the chance to do things his way.

  Nick had been the loner, while Cleary preferred the camaraderie of working with other detectives. And it had worked out well for him until he had been assigned to work on a city government corruption case. He had been investigating several councilmen when he received an anonymous tip that one of them had once been a Communist party member.

  He had noted the information, but hadn't done anything with it. Hell, he didn't know if it was true, and even if it was, he couldn't see that it had anything to do with the case. The councilman seemed the only one in the bunch who was halfway clean. As it turned out, it had everything to do with his future.

  Several weeks after he had gotten the tip, he was accused of accepting a bribe to keep the Commie crap from becoming public. A thick packet of one-hundred-dollar bills, totaling eight thousand dollars, was found in the trunk of his Eldorado. That had been the beginning of the end.

  The councilman resigned in disgrace, and he was suspended. At home, he drank and raved for days, until Ellen had told him to get out. In his drunken frenzy, he had struck her once, twice, three times. The moment he had done it, he knew he had just spelled the end of his marriage.

  You've made one damn mess of your life, Cleary.

  Cleary looked up from the picture and gazed at the mirror behind the wet bar. He stared at his reflection, hardly recognizing what he had become—a broken man one step from skid row.

  Several moments passed. The man in the mirror, a fuzzy figure, slowly focused. A light smoldered deep in his eyes. His features hardened like bone. Cleary set the photograph on the coffee table. With cool determination, he crossed to the wet bar and, with one powerful swipe, sent every liquor bottle crashing to the floor. The puppy scrambled for cover. Cleary strode over the shards, bits of glass crunching under his shoes like popcorn, and paused at the closet. He threw the door open, and removed a large metal toolbox.

  He carried it back across the room and set it on the table. He brought out a twelve-gauge, sawed-off, a two-inch Smith and Wesson .38, a six-inch Army issue .45 automatic, a good twenty pounds of ammunition and, inadvertently, his old LAPD silver detective's shield.

  He rubbed the shield against his shirt, then tossed it back into the box. To hell with the shield. The shield was dead.

  He set the weapons, one by one, squarely down on the table for cleaning and loading. His hand lingered on each one, a touch like a caress. There was something comforting about the cool metal, the heavy shape, the raw power of each of these weapons, even in repose.

  It was time to get a grip, and come out fighting.

  SIX

  The Cleary Agency

  The street shone like a new dime, and the early morning sun bathed the city in California technicolor. The impossibly clear sky curved over the city, enclosing it like a dome. The black Eldorado, sporting a new twenty-buck simonize job, stood out among the sky-blue Skylarks, coral-colored Caribbeans, and canary Manhattans.

  Seated behind the wheel, Cleary was attired in an immaculate sharkskin suit. His face was clean, shaven, and, for the first time in months, there was a clear, unclouded look in his eye. He slowed at the corner, saw the traffic was minimal, then cranked a smooth U-turn, pulling to the curb in front of a two-story, streamlined, modern office building. He turned off the engine, and glanced up at a sign printed discreetly on a second-story window, which read: CLEARY AGENCY—INVESTIGATIONS.

  A minute later, he stepped into the reception area, which was furnished in expensive contemporary design: a comfortable couch, overstuffed chairs. A wall of architectural glass separated the room from the office space. Nick's office was a cut above the quarters of most private detectives, and there was no comparing it to the detective cubbyholes at police headquarters. His brother's taste had always been first-class.

  He heard a voice coming from inside, stepped to the door, and slowly opened it until he could hear better. It was a woman talking, and the voice was sexy. "Can't ya see I'm nuts about ya, Frankie! Now put that gun back in your pocket ya big lug and show me a..."

  The woman's voice faltered, and Cleary wondered if she had noticed the door. "Can't ya see I'm nuts about ya, Frankie! Now—now—show me your gun ya big—Oh God."

  Cleary stepped into the office where a woman stood with her back to him. Her dark hair was piled in a beehive. She wore a tight red striped blouse, a red skirt with a wide shiny red belt, and red heels that looked uncomfortable as hell. She studied the sheet of paper in her hand, and was unaware of his presence. "Good time, stupid. Show me a good time."

  She cleared her throat and with forced Hollywood sensuality began again. "Now put that good time back in your pocket ya big lug and..."

  Her voice dissolved into tears, and she tossed the script down on the floor. "Aw, for chrissakes, Dottie. When are you... ?"

  She stopped as she saw Cleary standing in the doorway, and gasped. "Oh, it's you." She blew her nose with the wad of Kleenex in her hand and quickly composed herse
lf, hiding her embarrassment. "You're Jack Cleary."

  "Thanks."

  "No, I mean, I saw you at the funeral yesterday, and..." She smiled. "I'm Dottie. Your brother hired me on last month after Verna got herself knocked up... after she became unexpectedly engaged. And seeing as I'm paid up till the end of the week I just thought I'd come in and answer the phones and..."

  Her chin started trembling. "I don't know what I'm doing here."

  Cleary looked past her to a broken lamp and several overturned file drawers. "You should have seen this place when I opened up this morning. Some creeps must've broken in during the night."

  He nodded impassively. At the same time his mind was whirring. "What did they take?"

  "Nothing, as far as I can tell. Who knows what they were after."

  Nothing was missing from his apartment, either. He would bet a Ben Franklin the two break-ins were related, and the burglars weren't after money or negotiable hardware. He would lay heavy odds that whoever was behind it was also responsible for Nick's death. It was probably too late to dust for prints here, or at the apartment. The first thing he needed to do was find out what the unexpected guests were looking for.

  He picked up Dottie's script, handed it to her. He scanned the tide page. '"Racket Squad'?"

  Dottie nodded, wiped the tears from her eyes again. "TV show over at Paramount that, well, Nick used to make allowances for my acting career, and I've got an audition there at four this afternoon that took me three months to snag. My rent's a month overdue, and..." She grabbed for more Kleenex. "I can't even get through a lousy three lines without going through half a box of Kleenex."

  She shook her head, sniffling. "Your brother," she sobbed, "was such a wonderful guy, Mr. Cleary." She blew her nose again. "Aw, hell, I oughta just go back to Cleveland."

  Cleary studied her a moment, realizing she wasn't just shedding tears over the fix she was in, but out of a heartfelt anguish over Nick's death. He handed her his handkerchief, and walked over to Nick's office, where the man's penchant for the good life and a stylish front was evident in every square inch of the lavish suite. "You have any job offers after this week?" he called out to Dottie.

  She stepped to the doorway, blew her nose. "You mean something a human being can do without having to be hosed down right afterwards? No."

  Cleary pulled a C-note from his billfold. What the hell, he could use her help. "In that case, here. You're working for me the rest of the month. I need to look into a few things."

  Dottie looked up from the unexpected windfall she now held in her fist. She stared at him, mute with gratitude. "I—I don't know how to thank you, Mr. Cleary."

  "You can call me Jack for starters. You can also get me a cup of coffee, black. And you can climb into those files out there and dig up every phone call, appointment, and job my brother took in the past two months."

  Dottie looked love-struck. Her eyes were wide with wonder, and her mouth was no longer quivering. "You got it, Jack." She turned and walked out with a determined impetus to her step.

  Cleary stood in the middle of the room awhile, trying to recapture his brother in the surroundings. Then, sitting down in Nick's desk chair, he grabbed his desk calendar, swiveled around so his back was to the door, and propped his feet up on the windowsill. Resting the calendar on his lap, he began leafing through the previous weeks.

  After a couple of minutes pondering the various notations on the days, his mind slipped back to a recollection of Nick sitting here years ago and marking down a dinner date on his calendar. He had walked in, Ellen on his arm, and told his brother he had just gotten back from Las Vegas, where he and Ellen had traded vows.

  "Why the hell didn't you invite me, you big bozo?"

  "You know how it is, Nick. We just did it on the spur. We drove out, got hitched, drunk, and spent the weekend—"

  "Jack," Ellen said, lightly slapping his arm, "you don't have to give a blow by blow. I mean a girl likes to have some things just between her and her husband."

  He glanced from Ellen to Nick. "Sure, of course. I mean I was just saying we spent the weekend playing married couple."

  Nick grinned and laughed. "Seems to me you're not playing anymore, Jack. You are married."

  "Who says we were playing around before," Ellen said. "What did you tell him anyhow, Jack?"

  He held up his hands. "Nothing, nothing."

  "Well, since I couldn't be there myself, let me at least take you two out on the town." He leaned over and glanced at the calendar on his desk. "How about the night after next? We'll do it right. All on me." Jack's recollection was interrupted by the smell of Chanel No. 5 permeating the air. He glanced into the wall mirror and saw a rather remarkable pair of legs.

  "I wonder if you could help me?" a woman's voice said.

  He slowly swiveled about and gazed at a redhead in a turquoise suit posed in the doorway. Her hair fell in soft waves to her shoulders, hair that seemed infinitely touchable, and she wore dainty white gloves. Her bright red lipstick was nearly the same as the color in her cheeks. She had Ava Gardner eyes and a body that could hold down a U.S. patent.

  "I'm Lana Williams." She smiled, acknowledging Cleary's wandering eye, and at the same time embarrassed by it.

  "Any relation to Buddy Williams?"

  "Yes. His widow. Nick Cleary was doing some work for me before—before last week."

  Cleary rose from the chair, rubbed his jaw. "Yes, he mentioned something about that. I'm Jack Cleary. His brother."

  "I see." She pulled a cigarette from a case. "Then I assume you'll be handling his affairs."

  Cleary stepped forward, lit her cigarette. The scent of the Chanel was stronger. "That depends." He stared at her, a curious look on his face. "Which ones do you mean?"

  Dottie walked into the office with Cleary's coffee, and gave Lana a classic street-chick once-over as she handed Cleary the cup. "Dottie, have you met Mrs. Williams?"

  She manufactured a smile that failed to hide her envy of Lana's well-tailored curves. "Just on the telephone. Charmed, I'm sure." She gave a cursory nod. "Can I offer you a cup of coffee, Mrs. Williams?"

  "No. Thank you."

  An awkward silence ensued, which Dottie used to price Lana's nylons. Cleary frowned at her. Dottie took the hint, threw her head to the side, and walked out.

  Cleary closed the door after her. "Care to sit down?" He pointed to a chair.

  "No thanks." She puffed anxiously on her cigarette; smoke drifted through her moist lips. "Your brother was handling a personal matter for me."

  "Divorce case. Right?"

  She nodded, pursed her lips, glanced at the floor, then at Cleary. "Despite everything, I loved my husband, Mr. Cleary. If anything, I was trying to save our marriage." She looked idly about the room a moment, then continued. "Your brother had Buddy under surveillance for several weeks. He'd documented everything very well: names, dates, photographs, and a number of audio tapes regarding several affairs my husband had out at our beachhouse and—''

  "You want to take possession of the tapes? Is that it?"

  "Yes, I would."

  Cleary studied her a moment. "If it's just to satisfy your curiosity, Mrs. Williams, take my advice and—"

  "I can't help thinking there must be something in my husband's file that might shed some light on his death."

  "I see. If there is, I assure you you'll be the first to hear about it. Right after the homicide boys."

  Lana wasn't finished. She walked over to Nick's desk and dabbed out the cigarette in an ashtray. "Your brother mentioned that you were formerly a police investigator."

  "Formerly."

  She gazed at him, frowned. "I'm not very happy with the progress the authorities have made so far, Mr. Cleary. I could use someone with your expertise to look into it for me. Money's no object."

  "Never has been with me, either," he said, and smirked. "But aside from not being licensed for that sort of thing anymore, I've got some business of my own to deal with. Sorry."

>   Lana lowered her eyes a moment, a move Cleary suspected was supposed to elicit his sympathy. It almost worked. Almost. "Okay," she said, looking up again. "But will you at least think about it?"

  "Sure. I'll think about it."

  Cleary walked her to the door, opened it. The fragrance of the Chanel became a net that tightened around his temples, his neck. She handed him a slip of paper with her address and phone number. "I'm out at the beachhouse." Their eyes locked a moment. "In case you change your mind."

  Cleary watched as Lana crossed to the reception room, her skirt rustling, making a noise like the hot Santa Ana wind, and left. His senses mourned the sudden loss of the Chanel. He felt Dottie's judgmental eyes boring a hole through his cheek, and glanced toward her.

  "You're not taking the case?" He expected her to be relieved. She surprised him. Her face bore an expression of proletarian condemnation. "For chrissakes, Jack, she's a widow."

  "Yeah," he said, considering the fact. He walked back to Nick's office, and stared at his brother's calendar again. Unable to concentrate, he glanced out the window and saw Lana striding toward a pink-on-white '55 Thunderbird convertible. A turquoise vision, he thought as she slid behind the wheel and the convertible glided down the boulevard. He watched until it was little more than a pink-and-white speck against the light.

  "What're you looking for, anyway, Jack?" Dottie asked, dropping a stack of files on Nick's desk.

  He shifted his sight from the enigmatic city laid out before him to the files. "I don't know. At least, not yet."

  SEVEN