Justice Dig (Chris Seely Vigilante Justice Book 9) Read online

  Finch said, “Well sometimes I give an abbreviated full name, what can I say. Holly put two and two together, which I didn’t expect.”

  “How’d that work, exactly?” Chris was asking dumb questions, but it was all interesting enough he supposed, no where else he had to be at this point, nothing earth-shattering waiting for him back at the apartment, where he typically fell asleep in the recliner these days watching reality shows or re-runs of Law and Order.

  “You seem to know everything else about our previous encounter,” Holly said, at least putting it lightly, “but you don’t have that part down?”

  “We were in Scion’s,” Finch said. “Holly’d been working on a story at my hotel. I withheld possible useful information to get her to have dinner with me.”

  “That you did tell me,” Chris said. “You bragged about how you maneuvered it.”

  Finch said, “And as I recall you said you were going to file away the maneuver, and use it yourself, when the appropriate opportunity presented itself.”

  “You believe this guy?” Chris said to Holly.

  “He started off in Scion’s,” Holly said, “delivering his personal reviews of the south bay restaurant scene. I was too polite to re-direct him to why we were there, and thinking oh Gosh . . . but then it dawned on me, just like you, Terrence Finch? In my case he’d introduced himself as Terry, so I had a clue.”

  “Fine,” Chris said. “Then I’m guessing you sprung on him that you write too, and he was kind enough to offer you some feedback.”

  “Something like that. I mentioned that after college I’d applied to a few MFA programs and got rejected. That my sample work evidently didn’t cut it.”

  “That was your problem then,” Chris said. “Sample work. You want to get somewhere, give ‘em real work.”

  Finch said, “I pointed out to Holly that MFA programs don’t necessarily make a writer better, they sometimes in fact make you worse.”

  “Yes,” Holly said, “and you told me to sit my ass the fuck down and let my fingers work the keys however they want. Let it fly, is what you added.”

  “Salty language,” Chris said, considering again that she could be a bit of a live wire.

  Holly said, “No I don’t use profanity, typically. I was reciting Terry’s reaction word for word.”

  “Ah,” Chris said. “Like a good reporter then. What was the big article you were writing, anyhow?”

  “Well,” Finch said, “as I may have pointed out, I live in the Valerian Inn Express.”

  Chris held up his hand. “My fault there, but before we get to that, let’s establish and complete one thing at a time. So why didn’t you show Terrence your work?”

  “I started to,” Holly said, “cut and pasted my best two chapters, had it all lined up, but couldn’t click Send.”

  Finch took a moment, and reached over and squeezed Holly’s shoulder.

  “Okay yeah, sorry,” Chris said, kind of feeling bad now too, reminding himself that more isn’t always better, and to just shut your big mouth sometimes.

  Though Holly had a little momentum going. She said, “My novel is about a woman who walks cross-country. To raise money for charity.”

  “By herself?” Chris said, figuring it was okay to chime in again.

  “Yes. She has adventures along the way. And a few scares . . . I suppose it’s trite and a bit corny to summarize it this way, but she essentially finds herself. And may or not have have improved her relationship with her sister. That part would play out in the sequel.”

  “That doesn’t sound trite at all,” Finch said, patting Holly on the shoulder again, and Chris couldn’t help thinking the old guy was politely stretching it, since to him the plot sounded terrible.

  “Well in that case -- here,” Chris said, writing down his email address. “Now you can send it to both of us.”

  “Oh my,” Holly said. “Thank you then, I guess, for your interest. I didn’t feel my story was that exciting, honestly . . . which I’m sure you’ve deduced by now is the real reason I didn’t follow through with Terrence . . . I guess expressing it to a stranger helps me gain some perspective. Thank you so much, actually.”

  “Well it sounds like there are interesting challenges in that storyline that we all can relate to,” Chris lied. “Meanwhile . . . part B now . . . what happened at the Valerian Inn Express, you say?”

  “There was a homicide,” Holly said. “Back in December.”

  Chris looked at her, and then at Finch, and decided they were serious. Now he regretted asking the question, big-time. One thing he didn’t need, was any more bits and pieces of that stuff skittering across his radar, even peripherally.

  But you had to ask, “What the heck?” And following it up with, “I didn’t even think to clarify -- you actually live at the Valerian Inn?”

  “I do,” Finch said. “It’s been a couple years now. The room is fairly spartan, faces the back of the parking lot, and when I come out the door you have the side of the auto body shop behind the fence.”

  “Wow,” Chris said, “but it works, I take it.”

  “I envy his situation actually,” Holly said. “And Gosh, he’s quite the deal maker as well.”

  “What’s that mean?” Chris said.

  “Well kind of dumb luck,” Finch said. “I liked the location and amenities -- they have a nice pool and not one but two hot tubs -- oh, and the full complimentary breakfast every day, not one of those Continental efforts limited to the toaster and Corn Flakes, but a real bacon and eggs breakfast with plenty of side options as well.”

  Chris was thinking the toaster and corn flakes was pretty much what he was limited to .

  “Anyhow,” Finch continued, “I approached them about the long term rate, and I can’t remember what it was, it was probably fair, but I couldn’t afford it. So I’m having lunch a few days later with my agent Portnoy, over in Culver City, and he suggests hitting them with a cash offer they can’t refuse.”

  “Jeez,” Chris said.

  “So yes, 40 grand -- cash -- up front. For 5 years. With the option to renew . . . It’s a franchise of course, and they had to get back to me, likely needing an approval, but it was my good fortune that they accepted.”

  Chris was trying to do some calculations in his head. “So what’s that come out to? A month?”

  “Around nine hundred I believe,” Finch said. “Under a thousand anyway, I’m pretty certain.”

  “I thought you told me it came out to around $700,” Holly said.

  “Did I?”

  You could see she was determined, and she pulled out a pen and paper and starting doing it the old fashioned way, and Chris was certainly interested himself, though the scenario was starting to disturb him.

  “Let’s see,” she said, starting and then hesitating. Chris said, “You can keep it simple, just divide 60 -- the five years -- into 40 grand.”

  “That’s perfect,” Holly said, and in a minute she announced, “Even better. I have $667 a month.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Chris couldn’t help blurting out. “Why didn’t I think of something like that?”

  “Well first of all,” Holly said, “I suppose you need to be willing, and able, to step up to the plate with the lump sum.” Nodding at Finch, with what Chris detected was a measure of admiration.

  Chris said, “That makes sense, I guess.” At the same time evaluating his own finances, that yes he could come up with it, but he’d have to sell some stuff . . . and this brought up a darn good point, shouldn’t you responsibly have more cash laying around?

  Either way, this sure put a damper on his own living situation, which Holly didn’t waste time asking him about. “What’s your arrangement?” she said.

  “Well,” Chris said, “I’ve learned now that we’re almost neighbors. Maybe Finch, you can sneak me into the breakfast sometime.”

  “Oh absolutely,” Finch said. “They never check, you just grab a plate. The chef comes around sometimes from in back, makes sure you�
��re doing okay.”

  “Wonderful,” Chris said, not exactly meaning it.

  “You didn’t answer,” Holly said.

  “Ah. Well . . . I started off at $2150 in a one bedroom. That was in October, when I moved down here.”

  “Sounds a bit steep,” she said.

  “Probably. I was subletting my place in San Francisco for 25, so for better or worse I accepted the differential . . . Later though, I did a couple favors for the landlord, and he told me drop it to 15. I kept paying him the full amount, but he’d be refunding me back, so I guess now I can declare that I pay $1500 . . . as opposed to this guy’s deal of the century.”

  “What kind of favors?” Holly said.

  “Gee. Do you always have your reporter’s hat on?”

  “I’m interested.”

  “Well, I try not to dwell on them, but there were two I guess, neither one particularly pleasant. The first one -- Sharif, my landlord, he also has a mom and pop motel on Sepulveda -- they had a guy, an overnight guest, he claimed something happened that was Sharif’s fault, can’t remember what, but the gist was he wasn’t moving, wasn’t paying for the room anymore, and had begun legal proceedings against them.”

  “You mean he filed a Summary and Complaint?” Finch said.

  “Don’t overcomplicate this,” Chris said, “maybe he just had a shyster lawyer write ‘em a letter. Either way, they couldn’t sleep, they’re a nice family, Sharif and everyone.”

  “So what did you do?”

  “I tried knocking on the door and speaking to guy, but it didn’t work. My roommate, Kenny, he got involved and resolved it, though Sharif thinks it was all me. Now Kenny and the deadbeat mope are even friends, apparently.”

  “Why did this Sharif person ask you to help?” Holly said.

  Chris figured it was probably on account of him tossing that guy over the second story rail of the Cheater Five and into the pool, but no point going into that. “He didn’t exactly,” Chris said. “I felt kind of bad for him, figured why not lend him a hand, as an outsider.”

  “Fresh approach,” Holly said. “What was number two?”

  “Man, you really are sort of relentless here, you don’t mind my saying . . . Well that was a little trickier, did involve some old fashioned reasoning and diplomacy . . . Sharif’s daughter, or maybe it was his niece, but she became a little too westernized for the family’s taste -- which on its own you can understand, growing up in LA -- but she started running with the wrong crowd. She broke up with a guy who didn’t take it well, and they were concerned there could be fallout.”

  “So what, you had to get physical with that gentleman?” Finch said, starting to jiggle around a little bit laughing, and Holly was now too.

  “Let’s get real here,” Chris said. “Alls I did, I drove by his apartment over in Westwood, tried to catch him coming home from work, hung out for a while, and eventually he shows up in exercise clothes, and a respectable looking woman with him. I figured they were an item, and he’d moved on, and I basically reported that back to Sharif.”

  “How’d you know it was him?” Holly said. Jeeminy, she kept digging in, and Chris had to extend the lie further by explaining he both had a photo of the guy and knew his apartment number, which had an outside entrance . . . the true story of course more complicated, that Chris did have to do something physical to the guy or at least show the ability to . . . and wow, he couldn’t remember it all that clearly right now, the details, and hopefully he was just blocking it out, but was this another a bad sign?

  And the full story being, the guy was hounding the niece, or daughter . . . and the hounding stopped after Chris’s visit.

  “Good story then,” she said. “So being a friendly citizen saved you, what, $650 a month?”

  “Something like that,” Chris said, still wrapping his head around Finch’s deal -- again, the old guy more on the ball than you’d give him credit for on the surface.

  “Why not raise the rent of your sublet?” Holly said. “My understanding is SF is the hottest big-city market in the nation.”

  This was a good point obviously, but what he’d done, after he’d had to evict that one guy, using the roof as a little leverage, was turn the whole works over to Shep, his favorite bartender at Weatherby’s. Shep was a good guy, and handy too, and right in the neighborhood, and Shep said don’t worry about a thing, he’d find him someone respectable this time, and Chris didn’t argue, and said if you can get me the same $2500 that would be great, and charge as much as you want over that and keep the change . . . and they hadn’t had to discuss it since.

  And it sure sounded insane, to be able to charge someone 3, 4, even 5 thousand a month for an apartment in the Marina district, but Holly was right, that city had lost its way and gone nuts.

  “Enough with the financial planning though,” Chris said, and he was starting to get a headache, different ideas swirling around . . . should he get a job, even a part-time one, and what would that be? Was he living too close to the vest? He knew he probably was, you had to watch it every month. He had his buyout of course from the Chronicle, and there was investment income trickling in here and there . . . but if a real crisis emerged, shouldn’t you be more on top of stuff? A rainy day fund, and all that?

  There hadn’t been any thought of getting a job this last year of course, the issue being that he might die . . . though he had had the little gig in Anthem, passing out the towels in the rec center, and that was admittedly kind of fun, you asked people about their day . . . not a real job naturally, but now that you declared yourself cleared, well, who knows.

  Chris said, “Before we get back to that apparent homicide deal . . . you’re a reporter? What’s that pay these days?”

  “It pays minimum wage,” Holly said.

  “Oh.”

  “I’ve with the Daily Gull. You probably know it.”

  Chris did, it was one of those weeklies that you saw for free on the wire racks inside supermarkets and other places. It covered the South Bay -- Manhattan, Hermosa, Redondo, maybe a little further toward Long Beach as well. Nothing much in there, to be honest.

  At any rate, Chris said, “So Finch, you’re telling me someone kicked the bucket at your hotel.”

  “More like a motel, keep in mind,” Finch said, “no rooms above a second floor. But yes, I’d come back from my routine in town -- I told you about that right? The way I work it?”

  Chris said yes you did, though Finch hadn’t broken it down exactly, but Chris assumed it was close enough to his own little deal most mornings, where he’d start off at Starbucks or Peet’s and shoot the breeze with whoever’s ear he could bend, and then wing it from there, typically in the direction of the beach. Somehow the whole shebang sounding a little less exciting now that this old guy was doing essentially the same thing.

  Finch said, “When I got there -- and first I’m taking the little covered walkway they have, past the pool and such -- but when I pop out in the open I see three squad cars. One in front of the main office, but two in front of a room, six or seven down from mine. Oh, and an unmarked car was there as well.”

  “I wasn’t on the scene yet,” Holly said.

  “No,” Finch said. “What it was, at that point, an officer sees me and motions me over. Proceeds to ask if I’m familiar with the people in 32-B. Name is Spenkmann, is what he said.”

  “Speed it up just a touch,” Chris said. “So were you?”

  “That was the thing, I told him it’s possible, but I’d need to see a photo or something, that I don’t recognize the name alone.”

  Holly said, “But he showed you one, and you didn’t identify them, right?”

  “Sort of like that. He mentioned the female was in LA General, and the guy had stabbed her, and they had him in custody as well. So I asked, were they on vacation, or just passing through or what?”

  “And?” Chris said.

  “The officer answered, and I’ll try to quote him, that ‘Let’s let me be the one asking the
questions, okay Bud?’”

  “They do that,” Chris said. “But not a bad rendition you gave there, kinda funny actually.”

  “Anyhow,” Finch said, “I started thinking . . . and I remembered a couple arguing quietly but with intensity a few nights previous in the lounge during happy hour. Incidentally, the Velarian, in addition to the marvelous free breakfasts, serves dinner three nights a week as well. Not a full course meal or anything, but they whip things up in and around the outdoor barbeque, more like large appetizers, but really, you couldn’t ask for more.”

  “Your deal is sounding better all the time,” Chris said, gritting his teeth slightly, “but what were they arguing about?”

  “The gentleman was quite neat. Gold chains, a mustache, though it appeared he had a hair weave. The woman was noticeably younger, likely in her twenties, very clear, porcelain-white skin -- and I must say she was somewhat statuesque in an outfit that was perhaps a size too tight. Particularly when she stood up once.” Finch glanced at Holly, Chris figuring he was concerned he went too far, and Holly gave him the don’t worry about it, keep going, look.

  “It was an interesting altercation,” Finch said, “something one might use in a novel actually, and I moved a bit closer, pretending to be absorbed in one of the front lobby tourist brochures on Universal Studios.”

  “You didn’t tell me all this,” Holly said. “You’re a pretty good detective.”

  “A sneaky one too,” Chris said.

  Finch said, “Fine, reaching the crux of the matter . . . my developing impression was the woman may have been a paid mistress . . . and from there I couldn’t quite figure it out . . . that perhaps she didn’t like it that this man was seeing multiple women, which sounded strange . . . or maybe it was one women in particular who for some reason had gotten under her skin.”

  “Either way she was angry, you’re saying,” Chris said. “So, we got a punch line here?”

  “Yes and no. The cop did pull out an I-pad and he flicked around and produced a photo, and it was the man from the argument. I took a look and said I didn’t recognize anyone.”