Spook

9 Tamara

She spent most of the morning on a search for an insurance company client — hospital medical records that were supposed to be private. Hah. Wasn’t much of anything that was private these days. Small hospital up in southern Oregon, no cooperation through regular channels, so she’d hacked into their files. On the side of the angels here, right? Subject claimed he’d developed severe stress problems on his job that led to a mild stroke, wanted his firm’s insurance company to pay all medical expenses and provide a disability package. Said he’d never been treated for high blood pressure or any other stress-related illness. Flat-out lie. Hospital records said he’d been in there twice, once in the emergency room after passing out on the street, diagnosis both times of dangerously high blood pressure exacerbated by alcohol abuse. Given prescriptions for blood thinners and strongly advised to quit drinking. (Didn’t take the advice or the blood thinners; other searches proved that.) Both parents confirmed alcoholics, father also had high blood pressure and died of a stroke. Oh, yeah, this sorry-ass dude was toast in more ways than one.

She highlighted the records, tapped the print key. Feeling a little better now, with nobody around to hassle her. Just her and Mac doing their thing to keep her mind off all the crap in her life—

The door opened and somebody came in.

She looked up. Oh, Lord, she thought.

He came in slow and easy, the way he always entered a room, kind of gliding like a big old cat. Raindrops glistened on his coat and that out-of-shape gray hat with the moldy feather in the band. She hated that hat; everybody hated that hat except him. His lucky Fedora, he called it. Lucky it didn’t have a mess of lice crawling around inside it.

“Morning, sweetness,” he said.

That damn nickname. Made her sound like a female Walter Payton. Sometimes she didn’t mind it; other times, when she was feeling bad like now, it set her teeth on edge. Him and his pro football. Biggest disappointment of his life was hurting his knee his senior year at San Jose State and never getting a tryout at defensive back with one of the pro teams.

She said, trying to keep the annoyance out of her voice, “What’re you doing here, Pop?”

“Had to come to the city on police business. So I thought I’d stop by, see how you’re doing.”

Yeah, sure. “Doing fine,” she said.

“That’s not what I hear.”

“Claudia called you, right? Damn that girl! I told her—”

“Don’t curse your sister. I haven’t talked to her in a week.”

“Well, then, how—”

“Horace. Last night.”

“He called you? What, so you’d try to talk me around to his side?”

“He loves you, Tamara.”

“I know it. Doesn’t change anything.”

Pop took off his hat, ran a hand over his knobby head. Hairline receded more every time she saw him, seemed like; bald about halfway back now. Maybe that was why he wore that hat all the time. The long bushy mustache, too — a kind of compensation. Always was vain about his looks.

He’d been here before, once, to look the place over and meet the boss man. Made up an excuse for showing up that time, too; couldn’t just come out and admit he was checking up. But now he was looking around like it was his first visit.

“This office is pretty low-end,” he said. “Fits the neighborhood.”

“Rent’s cheap.”

“Still. Might be a good idea to upgrade your image.”

“Talk to the boss man about it, not me.”

“He’s not the boss man anymore, is he? Equal partners?”

“Not until next month. Still the boss man, anyway. I’ll be the boss woman.”

“So talk to him about new office space.”

“He’s the one built the agency, holds it together. He wants us to stay here, we’ll stay here. Knamean?”

“Don’t use that tone with me, girl.”

“What tone?”

“Little kid snotty. You know I don’t like it.”

“Just telling it like it is, Pop.”

“Like you told Horace how it is?”

She ground molars, swallowed a breath before she said, “Don’t be ragging on me, okay?”

“You going to sit down with the man?”

“Already sat down with him. It’s all talked out.”

“He doesn’t think so.”

“Not giving up my career for him.”

“Some career for a young African American woman.”

“Following in your footsteps.”

“I’m a police officer, not a private detective. I never wanted you girls involved in any kind of law enforcement.”

“And we done defied you. Claudia got her law degree and went to work for the D.A. instead of going into private practice and I turned into a private eye. Big disappointment for you and Ma.”

“For God’s sake, we’re not disappointed. We’re proud of you both. I’m only saying

“Please, Pop. I don’t want to hear anymore about my career or Horace and me. Decision’s mine, nobody else’s.”

“You don’t have to move to Philadelphia to make your relationship work.”

“Long distance romance? That’s honky movie stuff, not real life.”

“Watch your mouth. We taught you better than that.”

“I mean it,” she said. “I’m looking to build my life right here. What’s wrong with that?”

“Building it alone, that’s what’s wrong with it.”

“Marriage, kids? Been getting along fine without, so far.”

“You wouldn’t be here if your mother and me thought that way.”

That old song. She said, “It’s not for everybody, you know that.”

He went over and laid a hip on the corner of Bill’s cluttered desk. Out came one of his sticks of spearmint gum. Always chewing that stuff since he quit smoking. “We had hopes you’d come around,” he said. “You and Horace make a handsome couple.”

“Bull, Pop. You couldn’t stand him when I first brought him home.”

“Wrong first impression,” he admitted. “What kind of man wants to play a cello for a living? But I came around. He’s strong, smart, and he’s been good to you. Seemed right that you’d get married eventually.”

“No way,” Tamara said. Lie or truth? She didn’t know. If Horace had asked her under the right circumstances... Too late now anyway.

“You keep saying that. How about if the three of us sit down, I help you try to come to an understanding?”

“Dag, that’s a fine idea. Me and Horace, and Sergeant Dennis Corbin, Redwood City PD, handling the interrogation. That’d sure solve everything.”

“Snotty again. Knock it off!”

“I will, if you’ll please just stay out of my business.”

“You are my business, girl. You and Claudia. Two healthy daughters, raised the best we knew how, and you—”

The telephone cut him off. Tamara swooped down on it. Contact returning one of the boss man’s calls on the job for McCone Investigations. She took down his information, writing it in longhand rather than on the Mac to prolong the conversation. When she finally hung up, Pop was on his feet again — giving her that look of his, half glum and half evil-eye, like when she was a kid and she’d done something to piss him off.

“Almost noon,” he said. “I’ll buy you lunch.”

“Can’t today. Too much work.”

“You have to eat.”

“Catch a sandwich later.”

He hesitated, sighed, started toward the door, stopped again. “You can’t just leave it like this with Horace,” he said.

“So long, Pop. Thanks for coming by.”

The look for a few more seconds. Then he slapped that sorry old hat back on his head, said, “We’ll talk again soon,” and went on out before she could say anything else.

Men. Fathers. Lord have mercy.

Phone rang again. Damn phone. She managed not to growl when she picked up.

Jake Runyon. He said, “I’m at Visuals, Inc. Found something that might be useful, might not. Thought you’d want to know in any case.”

“Go ahead.”

“Came from one of the equipment handlers, Pete Snyder. He was on vacation last week, didn’t know Spook was dead until this morning. He told me a woman from the Department of Human Services mentioned Spook a few days before the shooting.

“Social worker?”

“Homeless caseworker. But Spook wasn’t one of hers.”

“What was her interest in him then?”

“No interest. She took a call about him.”

Tamara’s nerves twanged again. “Don’t drag it out, man, get to the point.”

“The point,” Runyon said evenly, “is that the social worker took a call about Spook at her office. Somebody wanted to know where to find him.”

“Who?”

“She didn’t give Snyder a name.”

“Caller say why he was looking for Spook?”

“If he did, she didn’t pass it on.”

“Well, what did she pass on?”

“Just what I told you.”

“Then why’d she come around to talk to him about it?”

“Look, Tamara... Ms. Corbin... I don’t mind being growled at when I’ve done something to warrant it, but this isn’t one of those times. I’m just doing my job here. Suppose we keep things on a professional level until my ass deserves chewing on?”

She bristled and framed a comeback, but the bristle went and the comeback didn’t get said. Man was right. She didn’t have any reason to rag on him; she was venting on Horace, on men in general. Get a grip, girl.

“Sorry,” she said. “I’m usually not a bitch-slapper — just a bad time for me right now. Personal stuff.”

“Okay. I’ve been there.”

Yeah, he had. Still was. Place he was in right now was a lot worse than the one she was in. “The social worker... why’d she go talk to Snyder about Spook?”

“She didn’t,” Runyon said. “He eats lunch in the same place every day, a restaurant over on Potrero. She goes there sometimes when she’s in the neighborhood. They were both there the day after she got the call, that’s when she mentioned it to Snyder.”

“Few days before the shooting, you said?”

“Friday before last.”

“What’s the social worker’s name?”

“Evelyn something. Snyder doesn’t know her last name. Young, Japanese. A stone fox, he says.”

“Uh-huh. Meaning he hit on her and she blew him off.”

“You want me to follow up or keep on Big Dog?”

“Big Dog,” she said.

“I’ll be in touch.”

Homeless caseworker, Japanese, young, and a fox — shouldn’t be too hard to track down. Agency didn’t have any contacts in the Department of Human Services, and people in city office jobs could be uncooperative with strangers on the phone. Might as well give it a try, though, see what shook out. She had her hand on the receiver when the bell jangled again, making her jump. Damn phone!

Boss man, this time. “Just checking in,” he said. “You going out for lunch or you want me to bring you something?”

“Not hungry,” Tamara said. She passed along the message on the Patterson case, then Runyon’s info on the social worker.

“You contact Human Services yet?”

“Just about to.”

“I’m down near City Hall,” he said. “I’ll stop over there, see if I can locate the woman. City workers tend to be more cooperative in person.”

“Fact. Just now thinking the same thing.”

“Great minds.”

“Yeah,” she said.

Only problem with his was, it was inside a man’s head.