Murder — His and Hers

Eddie Haskell in a Short Skirt

The Polk County Prison was located just north of Des Moines on four well-manicured acres. The newly constructed twenty-million dollar complex had no unsightly barbed wire fence surrounding its premises, nor a guard station at the front entry, or anything else that made it look like a prison. To the passer-by, the two-story red brick octagonal building might have been a clinic of some kind, a place you might go to have a skin tag lopped off, or an impacted molar extracted. Only the back of the building gave its purpose away: rows of small barred windows ran its length, windows so tiny that a man — or woman — couldn’t possibly squeeze through.

I’d been to this prison just one other time, with my father, Sam Knight, to visit a client. He and I — my name is Rebecca — are partners in an investigations firm in the city. (You might have read about us in People magazine last year for cracking “The Cutthroat Cowgirl Case” — their title, not ours.)

Getting back to the prison, I was really impressed by this state-of-the-art facility, with its laser sensors, computer-operated doors, and prisoner tracking bracelets. Even the cells were fairly comfortable, clean and new.

Anyway, mine was.

I was in for murdering my best friend, Vickie.

Footsteps echoed down the concrete hallway coming toward me, sounding like pop-guns going off, but I remained motionless on the little bed, my hands clenched tightly in my lap. Then a deputy sheriff, tall and gangly, was punching in numbers on a security pad, opening the barred door, informing me my father was here.

In the visitation room, which was small but not claustrophobic, my father and I sat at a long table, the width of which was between us. He looked older than his sixty-four years, older than I’d ever seen him, his craggy face drawn, bronze tan faded from the long winter months. But his eyes were strong, determined. If he was at all frightened, those ol’ blue eyes did not betray him.

I, too, must have looked a sight: no make-up, shoulder length brown hair uncombed, and very unfashionable in the orange prison dress with orange slip-on tennies.

He cleared his throat. “Are they treating you okay, pumpkin?” He’d hardly called me that since grade school.

I nodded numbly.

“Got a call in to Walter Conlon,” he told me. “He’s a good criminal lawyer.”

I nodded again. I would need the best.

Now my father stood up and came around the side of the table to stand before me, running the fingers of one hand on the table top, looking down at that hand. His voice was soft, even gentle. “You understand bail won’t even be an issue until you’ve been arraigned.”

“I understand,” I said weakly.

I stood up and gave him the bravest smile I could muster, which wasn’t much of one. “I’ll be all right in here, really.”

Then I fell into his arms, like I promised myself I wouldn’t do, reduced from age thirty-four to four, and sobbed into his chest, leaving big, wet stains on his gray suit jacket, crying for me, crying for Vickie.

He smoothed my hair and said, “I could stay here longer if you want, but I’d like to get right to work on this.”

“What is there you can do?”

He gave me a funny smile. “I might think of something. You hang in there, pumpkin.”

Back in my cell, I returned to the bed, where I sat staring at the tan wall.

If only I hadn’t gone to The Brew that night, our paths wouldn’t have crossed... And I wouldn’t be sitting here now with my life and business in shambles.

But then, our meeting again after so many years hadn’t really been left to chance, had it? Because Vickie had come to town looking for me. I realized that now, too late.

We’d met in the seventh grade, Vickie and me, and soon became good friends. I had a cousin, Ann, a few years older, who’d had a number of best friends in school. One by one they betrayed her: Sue spread nasty, false rumors; Janice stole her boyfriend, and Liz got her kicked off the Pom-Pon squad when Ann gained a few pounds. I watched on the sidelines and made up my mind not ever to have a best friend.

But the more time I spent with Vickie, the more she seemed like the genuine thing: someone I could confide in and trust. She knew the value of keeping secrets. Hadn’t she given me my first diary, for my thirteenth birthday?

And she was so confident, out-going and fun. Qualities I felt I lacked. When I was around her, she made me feel like a different person, a person I liked much better.

I lost track of Vickie after high school, when we went on to different colleges, me to the University of Minnesota, her to Northwestern. She didn’t come back for our tenth high school reunion, but a photo of her (looking gorgeous behind a desk in a fancy high-rise office) was tacked on the bulletin board, along with those of other classmates who couldn’t make it back. An accompanying letter said she and a partner named Kyle owned a very successful insurance company in Chicago. A p.s. on the note said, “A special hello to Rebecca!”

So you can imagine my surprise and delight when I turned around from the bar at The Brew six months ago, a glass of Chablis in one hand, to see my old friend Vickie. We squealed like little pigs, and hugged, and laughed and hugged some more, then found a booth in the back.

“You look terrific,” I told Vickie. And she did: long blond hair, startlingly blue eyes, porcelain skin, perfect white teeth. “Don’t have a portrait of yourself, getting wrinkled in the attic, do you?” I asked.

She laughed and shook her head. “You look wonderful, too,” she said.

Maybe. Maybe not. But it was nice of her to say it.

“What brings you back to town?” I asked.

“I’m going to open my own insurance agency here,” she said happily.

“Really!” I was thrilled. I reached out and squeezed her hand, immediately visualizing us lunching at Noah’s, shopping at Valley Junction, and spending Friday evenings at Billy Joe’s Pitcher Show. Just like the good old days.

She ran one manicured fingernail around the rim of the glass of red wine she’d brought to the table, and looked down into the drink. “But before I can,” she said, “I have to pass the Iowa exam, since I’m only licensed in Illinois. But that shouldn’t be too hard.”

Not for her. “What happened to your other insurance business?” I asked.

Her face clouded, and she stared off into the smoky, noisy room behind us. “My partner — Kyle was his name — and I had a rather bad falling out.”

“I’m sorry.”

She took a sip of her drink. “It’s not what you think... We weren’t lovers or anything. Just business partners who couldn’t see eye to eye.”

“I understand.” I’d been there with my father, but never bad enough to call it quits.

“I couldn’t take his unethical practices anymore,” she explained sadly.

Curious, I asked, “What do you mean by ‘unethical practices’?”

She paused a moment, wineglass to her lips. “Kyle would give customers more coverage than they needed, with outrageously high premiums, just so he could collect a big commission.” She took a sip of wine, then added, “That’s just one example, and believe me, there were plenty of others.”

“Wow.” I’d read about such scurrilous practices that were rampant in the 1980s, when suddenly, reputable insurance corporations found themselves in legal hot water because of some unethical agents. It cost the corporations millions and millions to settle all the claims.

“I just had to get out,” Vickie said, pain showing on her pretty face, “so I left it all behind.”

I smiled supportively at her. That must have been hard. That must have taken guts.

“Anyway,” she went on, “the first thing I have to do is find a temporary job, until I can move forward with my plans. Got any ideas?”

And a bolt of lightning struck me. Three weeks ago I let our office manager go because of poor performance, and I hadn’t gotten around to finding a replacement, doing the work myself.

“Have I!” I said. “You can come and work for me, doing bookkeeping and such.”

“Really?” she asked, her face lighting up. Then she sat back in the booth, putting one hand to her forehead, like she felt faint. “Oh, Reb, I’m soooo embarrassed. Here I’ve been talking about myself and my problems, never once asking you about yourself.”

“That’s all right,” I said, warmed by how considerate she was. “I run an investigations firm here in the city. With my father.”

“No kidding?” she said. “How exciting. With your father, you say.”

“Uh-huh.”

“How is he? Did he ever remarry after your mom died?”

“Nope. Too set in his ways.”

She gave me a half-smile. “I always thought you were so lucky having him for a dad.”

I smiled back; such a nice thing of her to say.

We fell silent for a few seconds, then Vickie raised her glass. “Here’s to us,” she said.

Our glasses clinked together. And I downed my drink.

Vickie would be perfect for the job, I had thought. After all, she had a business degree. She couldn’t possibly do any worse than the previous manager had done.

You think you’re way out in front of me, don’t you?

Well, within a week Vickie had cleaned up the mess left by the other manager — straightening out the payroll, collecting delinquent accounts receivable, even cracking down on employee pilfering of company supplies. She ran one hell of a tight ship with, “Do we really need that?” and “Can’t we buy it cheaper?”

Within the next few months, the coffers at Knight and Knight and Associates had never looked fuller. Which, in hindsight, made a lot of sense. Because there was just that much more money for her to steal.

Which she did.

Yesterday, Friday, the first day of Spring, I stayed late at the office to finish some paperwork when I got a call from a west coast electronics firm we’d purchased some surveillance gear from, saying their bill was ninety days overdue. I assured them there must be some kind of mistake because we always pay on time, but I’d look into it and call them back Monday morning.

I went into Vickie’s office to scribble her a note about checking on the overdue bill, and I opened the right hand desk drawer looking for a note-pad. There was the company checkbook, so I flipped back through the register and found that the check to the LA firm had been written nearly a month ago. But there was no check mark by it, which meant that it hadn’t cleared — as hadn’t a great many of the checks written two, even three, months ago.

Some checks had cleared — ones written every week for thousands of dollars, payable to Vickie and marked “expenses.”

Only we’d given Vickie no expense account privilege.

Ten minutes later, I found a large manila envelope stuffed in the back of the bottom drawer of a file cabinet; it contained the bills and checks that she’d never mailed.

It’s hard to describe how I felt that moment, but anyone who’s ever been betrayed by someone they trust knows. The range of emotions was incredible: shock, disbelief, sadness.

Rage.

I don’t remember getting my gun out of the safe in my office, but I must have, because I had it in my hand as I stood outside Vickie’s apartment on Hickman Road, using the butt of it to bang on her door as I called her bad names.

I knew she was home because her car was in the lot. So when she didn’t answer I shot wildly at the wooden door, the third bullet taking the knob off, then shouldered it open.

She was sprawled on the floor by the front door, face down, wearing the same blue suit she’d had on at work; a puddle of blood spread out from her chest like a red fan, soaking the beige carpet. She must have been coming to answer the door, I realized, when she was struck by one of my bullets.

Behind me, in the hallway, I heard alarmed voices. Someone yelled to call 911. My legs felt rubbery and I stepped into the apartment and eased myself into a chair by the front door to wait for the police to come. I felt detached, strangely cold — an out of body experience.

The room was in disarray, with papers and magazines strewn about and cardboard boxes sitting half-filled. On a coffee table lay Vickie’s purse, open, its contents dumped out. And next to the table were two large black suitcases, ready to go.

I remember thinking that it wasn’t very nice of Vickie to leave the apartment in such a mess.

It just wasn’t very nice at all.

The only thing harder than seeing my little girl sitting in that prison was leaving her there. But if I’d stayed any longer, she’d have got wind of how scared I was.

The Chief of Police had tracked me down the night before at Barney’s Pub where I was watching ESPN on a big screen, pretending an O’Doul’s was a real beer (I’m a recovering alcoholic). At first I thought he was joking about the trouble Becky was in, because she’s so straight it’s embarrassing, and the Chief has a sense of humor like a rash.

But there was too much sadness in those rheumy eyes.

I know my daughter’s got a temper — you can blame my gene pool — because I’ve seen it once or twice, and it’s not a pretty thing. But I never thought she’d get mad enough to kill somebody.

Especially her close friend Vickie.

I never liked that girl, from the first time she and Becky hooked up as kids; especially since that time I caught her reading Becky’s diary. But I didn’t let on. Becky seemed happy being around her, and as long as they weren’t getting into trouble (none that I knew of, anyway), who was I to tell Becky who her friends should be. Most of mine, at the time, were fellow boozehounds.

But I’ll tell you, I didn’t like the way Becky behaved after spending time with Vickie, which was snotty and disrespectful.

So what was wrong with Vickie? She was smart, charming and pretty. Usually a good combination. Yet there was something phony about her. When she came over to the house, I felt like I was Ward Cleaver and she was Eddie Haskell in a short skirt.

And she used Becky. Used her homework, her clothes, her meager allowance, all the while playing the grateful friend. Which kept Becky giving her more.

Then there was the time Vickie stayed over when she was fourteen. In the middle of the night, I felt something soft and warm in my bed. She’d crawled under the covers and was crying about having a nightmare. I wasn’t too sympathetic, though, thinking about another nightmare that might unfold if I didn’t get her out of there. For years I believed it was just my dirty old man’s mind that thought the worst of her... until three weeks ago.

She showed up on the stoop of my bungalow a little toasty, looking mighty fetching in a tight, low-cut red dress. She had a wicker basket and in it was a bottle of wine and two glasses.

“Well,” I said as I stood in the doorway, in a white undershirt and wrinkled trousers; I’d been watching a boxing match on the tube. “This is quite a surprise.”

She smiled seductively, looking up at me through veiled blue eyes. “Aren’t you going to ask me in?”

I smiled back a little. “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” I said.

“What’s the matter?” she teased. “I won’t bite.”

She had the basket, so why did I feel like Little Red Riding Hood and she was the Big Bad Wolf?

She shifted the basket in front of herself, holding it with both hands, swinging it from side to side as she twisted her body back and forth like Baby Snooks in an old Warner Brothers picture. “Besides,” she said slyly, “I’m a little older than fourteen now. You don’t have to be afraid.”

I dropped my smile, feeling heat spreading across my cheeks, which doesn’t happen very often. “I don’t sleep with employees,” I told her. “Clients, maybe — but never employees.”

The sweet, seductive look on her face turned savage. “You son of a bitch!” she spat. “Why I thought to waste a good bottle of wine on an old dinosaur like you, I’ll never know.”

I did. “Maybe I’m the one thing of Becky’s you never got your mitts on,” I said.

And I shut the door in her face.

It wasn’t easy sending her packing. But nobody likes being had, even in the most pleasant of ways.

I could have been wrong. Maybe it was possible for a thirty-year-old woman with an angel’s face and a hell of a body to be attracted to a sixty-year-old man with a potbelly and a butch haircut.

And maybe one little drink wouldn’t hurt, anyway. But I wasn’t about to partake of either.

Night was settling in over the city as I wheeled my three-year-old Escort into the underground parking lot of 801 Grand, the deco marble tombstone of a building where we had our offices. I took the elevator up to the main lobby, which was deserted on this Saturday evening, and switched elevators up to the twenty-first floor.

A couple of things had been bothering me about the body and crime scene, which Chief Coderoni was kind enough to let me in to see. First, the blood left in Vickie’s body, that which hadn’t spilled out on the carpet, anyway, had just begun to discolor the skin and settle, which told me death was a little further along than it should be. I was willing to bet ballistics would find that the bullet didn’t come from Becky’s gun.

Second, while it made sense Vickie was in a hurry to vacate the apartment, the place just didn’t look right. Drawers and cabinets hung open, but nothing seemed to have been removed. And the only time I’d ever seen my wife (rest her soul) dump the contents of her purse out, was when she was frustratedly looking for something. Whoever killed Vickie hadn’t found what he — or she — was looking for.

Maybe that person was now looking elsewhere. The bronze elevator doors slid open and I stepped out into the hallway and followed the carpeted corridor around to the right, to the double glass doors of our office. I dug out my security card and used it to enter.

The reception area was dark, but the door leading into the back yawned open; I went quietly through it and into the bullpen area, which was awash in streetlight and neon. Down a hallway to the right was my office, and Becky’s. To the left was Vickie’s, the door shut, but light streamed from under it. And I doubted Vickie was in there.

I took my snubnose .38 from my jacket pocket, where I’d slipped it from the car’s glove compartment where I kept it. As I moved forward, I could hear the slamming of file drawers from behind the door.

Whoever was in there must have used Vickie’s security card, from her purse, to get in to our office.

I opened the door quickly, the snubnose ready.

“It’s Pinkerton who never closes,” I told the thin, middle-aged man in an expensive tan suit, who stood behind the desk, its top covered with files. The man’s hair, which matched the suit, was cut conservatively, parted at the side, with bangs brushing the top of gold wire-framed glasses, behind which beady brown eyes went wide at the sight of me, his hands frozen inside a file he was going through.

“I just want my personal files,” he said, defensively.

I stepped inside the room, gun trained on him. “And what files might those be?” I asked.

His eyes narrowed to slits, and he dropped his hands down to his side.

“Vickie took personal papers of mine when she left Denver,” he said. “I want them back.”

Now I knew who he was: the unethical, untrustworthy Kyle I’d heard Becky mention.

And the person who killed Vickie.

“Put your hands in the air,” I said, with a little gesture of the gun. And he did, but one of his hands held a silenced automatic, which must have been lying on the desk, hidden behind the stacks of file folders.

There was a snick and a bullet missed me by inches, and I dove for the floor, firing back awkwardly, missing him. He was heading toward the office door before I could haul myself up, and I wasn’t up to playing grab-ass with somebody, so I reached out and snatched a hefty stapler off the desk and flung it at him, smacking him in the back of the skull, and he went down like an arcade target. Lights out.

I stood up, breathing heavily. From the look of the blood that was oozing out of his head, he was going to need a few stitches. He was coming around when I said, “Buddy, that’s a nasty gash — I hope to hell you’re insured.”

As impressed as I was with the Polk County Prison, I was more impressed by the smell of the Iowa countryside outside its walls.

Ballistics proved what my father had suspected from the start: the bullet that killed Vickie did not come from my gun, but Kyle’s, and the autopsy report showed the time of death to be earlier than when I arrived at her apartment in a red-hot rage.

Apparently, from statements made, and from what we were able to piece together, Kyle ran the shady insurance business with the full approval of Vickie. In fact, Kyle taught her everything she needed to know about how to swindle a customer. You might say he taught her too well. Because later, perhaps when the partnership began to sour, she started keeping files of damaging evidence on him, to be used later for blackmail.

That cost her life. And nearly mine, and my father’s.

Last week, I hired a new office manager. You can bet I did a comprehensive background check. As a matter of fact, in the interview I gave the poor bastard such a grilling, a big sweat stain formed around his neck. But he’s working out fine. Just the same, every couple of weeks or so, I stay late at the office... and look through the checkbook and files.

The Des Moines Register ran an article on the embezzlement, and made me look like a sap, but Virginia Kafer from People (who wrote that terrific piece a year ago) did a follow-up story, focusing on the betrayal of a best friend, which I thought came out okay.

Anyway, a few days after that People magazine article appeared, I got a call at the office from Sheila, a woman I was friends with in college. She was in town from San Francisco on a business trip and wanted to get together for lunch and talk about old times.

I told her I was busy.