Explosive Eighteen

TWENTY

FRANK KORDA AND HIS WIFE, Pat, lived in a white colonial house with black shutters, a mahogany front door, and a two-car garage. It was at the end of a cul-de-sac in a middle-class residential neighborhood in Hamilton Township. Korda’s memorial service was scheduled for nine in the morning, burial was to follow, and friends and relatives were invited back to the house for refreshments. I’d driven past the house at sunrise to check it out. Everything had been quiet. No lights on. The widow wasn’t an early riser.

I wasn’t an early riser, either, but I was on a mission today. I wanted to keep Joyce out of my apartment, and I had developed a curiosity about the chest. I wanted to see the contents.

I’d called Lula and told her I needed her to stand watch for me. We were to meet at the coffee shop at eight-thirty. I suggested she dress funeral appropriate, so we didn’t look out of place should neighbors see us sneaking around. I had no idea how I was going to get into the house. Break a back window maybe. If a security alarm went off, I was out of there in a flash, and Joyce would have to live without the chest.

I was wearing my standard black funeral suit and heels, carrying a big slouchy black leather bag that would easily contain a small pirate chest.

I parked in front of the coffee shop, and Lula’s Firebird pulled in behind me. Lula got out and walked over.

“I thought you might want to take my Firebird,” she said. “It might blend in better than your truck.”

I looked back at her car. “I don’t know. It’s a toss-up. The Firebird’s really red.”

“Yeah, but my sweetie don’t fit inside your truck, and he gonna look obvious sittin’ in the back in his suit.”

“Your sweetie?”

“I thought we might need muscle, so I brought him along. I got him dressed up in a suit and everything. And I met his mama last night. She didn’t say much, but I think she liked me.”

“He can’t come,” I said to Lula. “We’re breaking into a house. It’s illegal.”

“That’s okay. He does illegal shit all the time.”

“That’s not the problem. I don’t want a witness.”

“I see what you’re saying, but I don’t know how we’ll get him out of my car.”

“Leave him in your car. We’ll take my truck. Tell him we’ll come back for him in an hour.”

Lula trotted to the Firebird, had a short conversation with Buggy, trotted back to my truck, and got in.

“It’s all set,” she said.

I pulled into traffic and Buggy followed.

“Hunh, he must have misunderstood,” Lula said, looking in the side mirror.

I wove around a few streets, but Buggy stayed close on my bumper.

“I’m losing time trying to get rid of him,” I said to Lula. “Call him on his cell phone and tell him to go away.”

“He don’t have a cell phone,” Lula said. “His mama won’t give him money for one. And he don’t make enough stealin’ purses to get one on his own. People got a misconception about purse snatchers. It’s a real hard way to make a living.”

“Then why doesn’t he get a job?”

“I guess you gotta do what you love,” Lula said. “He’s a man who follows his heart.”

I turned onto Korda’s street and the black mortuary limo glided past me going in the opposite direction. It was carrying Pat Korda to the memorial service, and that meant her house might be empty. I parked and sat watching the house for a few minutes. There were no other cars parked outside, and I didn’t see signs of activity. I’d stopped at Giovichinni’s and picked up a noodle casserole to use as cover. My story, if I needed one, was that I had misunderstood the time and arrived at the wake early.

I carried the casserole to the door and rang the bell. No answer. I listened carefully for sounds inside the house. The house was silent.

Lula and Buggy were close behind me. Lancer and Slasher were parked behind the Firebird. Lula was wearing a black spandex miniskirt, a black silky spandex wrap shirt, and a fake leopard jacket that had been designed for a much smaller woman. She was in black four-inch spike-heeled shoes, and her hair was sunflower yellow for the occasion. Buggy looked like Shamu in a Russian-made secondhand suit.

“You want my sweetie to kick the door in now?” Lula asked.

“No!”

“How about we go around back and break a window?”

“No. I don’t want to see any property damage.”

“Well then, how we supposed to get in?” Lula asked.

“I’m going in,” Buggy said, pushing me aside. “I’m tired of waiting.”

And he opened the door. It hadn’t been locked.

I tiptoed in and looked around. “They have the buffet set out,” I said to Lula. “DO NOT let Buggy eat anything.”

“You hear that, Sweetums?” Lula said to Buggy. “We aren’t going to eat any of the funeral food. When we’re done here, I’ll take you out for breakfast.”

“I like breakfast,” Buggy said.

I found the kitchen and set my casserole on the counter. There were several other casseroles there, plus bags of bakery rolls, and a couple coffee cakes. A professional coffee urn was ready to go and a full bar was set up next to the urn. I did a fast scan of the kitchen, moved through the dining room, and into the living room.

“What are we looking for?” Lula followed.

“A little chest. A pirate chest.”

“You mean like that chest on the fireplace mantel?” she asked.

Holy cow, it was the chest. It was exactly as Joyce had described it.

Lula took the chest off the mantel and examined it. “What’s so special about this chest? What’s in it?” She turned it upside down and looked at the bottom. “It says ‘Miss Kitty R.I.P.’ ”

The top to the chest dropped open, and ashes flew out at Lula and scattered across the living-room rug.

“What the heck?” Lula said.

I clapped my hand over my mouth. I wasn’t sure if I was going to laugh, gag, or shriek. “I think Miss Kitty was cremated, and those are her ashes.”

Lula stared down at herself. “Are you shitting me? I’m allergic to cat. I feel my throat closing up. I can’t breathe. I’m makin’ snot. Somebody do something! Call 911!”

She ran into the kitchen, grabbed the DustBuster off the wall by the pantry, and sucked the ash off herself.

“Freakin’ cats,” she said.

So much for Miss Kitty’s final resting place.

Lula felt her face. “Do I got hives?”

“No, you haven’t got hives,” I said. “You can’t be allergic to cat ashes. They’re sterile. There’s no dander.”

“I feel like I have hives. I’m pretty sure I feel some popping out.”

“It’s all in your head,” I told her.

“I’m very impressionable,” Lula said. “My family’s prone to hysteria.”

I examined the chest, looking for a false bottom or secret message. I didn’t find either, so I carefully placed the chest back on the mantel.

“Do I get breakfast now?” Buggy asked.

“I want to make a fast run through the house to make sure there aren’t any more chests,” I told Lula. “Keep your eyes open for visitors, and maybe you can DustBuster up what’s left of Miss Kitty.”

I did a cursory search, found nothing, and we were all out the door in ten minutes. Lula and Buggy left in the Firebird in search of a breakfast buffet, and I drove two blocks down and waited for the mourners to return from the cemetery.

Lancer and Slasher parked behind me. They didn’t seem to be much of a threat for now, but I suspected that could change if their boss pressed the go button. And while I didn’t feel immediately threatened, they were a constant reminder that I had a huge, horrible, scary problem.

It was almost noon when the cars filed by. I was sure one of the cars contained Grandma. I couldn’t see her missing Frank Korda being laid to rest. I waited for the last car to arrive, and I gave it another ten minutes before I joined the crowd. I’d done a decent job of hiding my bruise under makeup, not to mention that after ten minutes, everyone would have knocked back a drink or two and not be noticing much beyond the shrimp salad.

I slipped into the house and located Grandma. She was sitting on the couch with Esther Philpot. They were drinking what appeared to be port wine, and they had a plate of cookies. I said hello and snitched a cookie.

“I didn’t see you at the service,” Grandma said.

“I couldn’t make it,” I told her. “I had a previous commitment.”

“She’s a working girl,” Grandma said to Esther. “And she’s got a gun. It’s not as big as mine, but it’s pretty good.”

“What do you carry?” Esther asked Grandma.

“Forty-five long barrel,” Grandma said. “What about you?”

“I have a little Beretta Bobcat. My grandson gave it to me for Christmas last year.”

They looked at me.

“What do you have, dear?” Esther asked me.

“Glock.”

“Get the heck out,” Grandma said. “When did you get a Glock? Can I see it?”

“I wouldn’t mind having a Glock,” Esther said. “Maybe I’ll get one next year.”

They leaned in and peeked into my purse at my gun.

“It’s a beauty,” Grandma said.

“I should mingle.” I looked around.

Grandma sat back. “There’s little bitty cupcakes in the dining room, and the liquor’s in the kitchen. I imagine that’s where you’ll find the widow. She was already three sheets to the wind at the service. Not that I blame her. A funeral is stressful, poor thing.”

“Poor thing, my behind,” Esther said. “She’s not upset. She’s celebrating. She was only staying with him for the house. Everybody knows that. Frank did some stepping out, if you know what I mean. There was Mitchell Menton’s wife, Cheryl. And Bitsy Durham. Her husband is on the city council. I’m sure there were others.”

“I guess Frank was having one of those midlife crises,” Grandma said.

“And I imagine there are advantages to having an affair with a jeweler,” Esther said.

I wandered into the kitchen, where Pat Korda was scarfing ham roll-ups and drinking something colorless.

“Vodka?” I asked her.

“Fuckin’ A,” she said.

I poured some into a tumbler. “Me, too.”

“Here’s to you,” Pat said. “Whoever the hell you are. Looks like someone beat the crap out of you.”

“Yeah, it’s been one of those weeks.”

Pat rolled her eyes and listed a little to the left. “Tell me about it.”

“Sorry about your husband.”

“Thanks. You want some ham? It goes good with vodka, but then, hell, everything goes good with vodka.”

“I noticed the little chest on your mantel. The one that looks like a pirate chest.”

“That’s Miss Kitty,” Pat said. “She was our cat. Frank used to keep her in the store, but I brought her back here when he croaked.”

“It’s an interesting chest. Is it one of a kind?”

“Frank got it at the pet crematorium.”

So if the Pink Panthers didn’t kill Frank Korda, and Joyce didn’t kill him… who killed him? Maybe his wife?

“Do you ever wear pink?” I asked her.

“No. I hate pink.” She took another slurp of vodka. “Frank was the pink guy. He had this whole pink thing. He used to tell his bimbos he was a Pink Panther. Hah! Can you imagine?”

“You knew about it?”

“Honey, wives know all kinds of shit. Frank had this whole routine. He got it from a Schwarzenegger movie. True Lies. Schwarzenegger was a spy, but his wife didn’t know. She thought he was, like, boring. She was all hot for this other guy who was pretending to be a spy. So the wife’s thinking of screwing the pretend spy, right? Anyway, Frank saw this movie and wigged out. He must have watched it a hundred times. Do you have a cigarette?”

“No. Sorry, I don’t smoke.”

“Nobody fucking smokes anymore. Just when I decide I need a cigarette, nobody smokes.”

“About the Pink Panther Schwarzenegger routine.”

Pat moved from the ham to the cheese. “Frank wasn’t the most exciting-looking guy. Short, bald, glasses, not a muscle anywhere in sight. But he discovered he could pretend to be a big-time jewel thief and get laid. Go figure.”

“How did you know all this? Did he tell you?”

“I knew he was messing around, so I hired a detective. He put it together for me.”

“But you didn’t divorce Frank?”

“I thought about it, but what was the point? I’m comfortable. I like my house. And I had someone to take the garbage out and shovel the snow. And the best part was I had some dumb slut taking care of Frank’s needs. I would have sent them all fruit baskets, but I didn’t want to give myself away.” She stared down into her empty glass. “Oh shit. Someone drank my vodka. Oh wait a minute, it was me!” And she did a sort of crazy-lady, semi-hysterical giggle.

“Do you have any idea who killed Frank?” I asked her.

“Probably one of his Pink Panther bimbos who found out the jewelry he gave her was fake. Personally, I’m not completely happy. I have to take my own garbage out now.”

I left Pat Korda and returned to Grandma.

“I’m going back to work,” I told her. “Do you need a ride home?”

“No, but thanks, I’m riding with Esther here. It’s a shame you missed the graveside ceremony. That’s the nicest cemetery. The deceased was laid to rest by a patch of woods. He must feel like he’s always camping out now. I swear it smelled like campfire.”

Esther nodded her head in agreement. “It did smell like a campfire. That’s such a cozy smell.”

I made a mental note to check the cemetery for Magpie.