— too dumb to be good. That way, I could be my own supervisor, find the limits or break them as needed. Only thing was, acting stupid takes a lot more brains than being stupid.
Chapter 11
I waited there for two hours and headed home. Something about the case didn’t feel right, but I was tired of chewing it over. Maybe my head had turned my senses to mush. Things didn’t seem right when I pulled my Buick in the driveway. The place was hardly bigger than a phone booth. I liked it that way. Less to mess, less to worry about. And how much roof does one dick need over him anyway? But something was off.
The porch light shining. I never leave the porch light on.
I killed the lights and motor and fingered the cold handle of my .45. I wanted chow, a stiff drink and sleep. I didn’t need intruders. If someone was ransacking my house, I wouldn’t be polite about it. It had taken me weeks to get it into the sort of mess I was comfortable with.
“Dad? Is there anything you need to tell me?”
I didn’t usually talk to dead men out loud, but felt Dad might answer just then.
Sorry. I’ve used my quota of words this month.
It was clear, and it was Dad. Yes, I’m nuts.
“Just tell me — is it safe to go in?”
I sat there for a full five minutes, waiting for an answer than never came. Then I realized if it wasn’t safe he’d warn me; and if he truly had used up his “quota” — whatever that was — he could reassure me by not saying anything. Goofy.
Through the front door my nose caught the stale residue of Rick’s cigars with something added — a faint aroma of vanilla. I slid off my coat and hat and slung them at the davenport. I stood there in the dark, listening, the drawn .45 my calling card. A dim flicker under my bedroom door, fainter than my bedroom lights would be.
Peering around in the darkness, my eyes adjusted enough to tell no one lurked in the kitchenette or living room to give me another love pat with a dense hard object. I moved to the bedroom door, twisted the knob and pushed it open.
She wore a glittering pair of gold chain earrings with pearls wrapped inside a twisting cage. They were classy earrings, and probably put her back three or four hundred bucks, if the pearls were real. She was real; that’s all she wore.
She had a handsome body, as slender as a young girl’s, with long thighs, tiny feet and firm round breasts unmindful of gravity. In the flickering candlelight her skin matched the translucent shimmer of the pearls in her earrings. I looked her over as I would Goya’s nude, a piece of artful grace, not really a naked girl in my bed, and just another side of Miss Mathews I’d wondered about. Mainly those legs. Above mid calf they got thicker in a hurry but stayed quite shapely. Not at all bird legs, like I’d suspected. I could almost feel them wrapped around me.
It seemed the most natural thing in the world, for Dee Mathews to be naked in my bed, with inviting eyes and a smiling pair of red lips that promised an escape from the week’s pain, a break from a confusing case. But just because it felt natural didn’t mean it wasn’t also irritating. A fleeting regret that the female in my bed wasn’t Julia, then it ran away when Dee shifted to one elbow and blew me a kiss. I hesitated. No warning voice was ever relevant for times like this. It was one challenge I’d have to meet, either headlong or reluctantly. It was like tripping over a wallet full of cash when you’re dead broke and you turn it in but hate yourself for being so damned honest.
“I don’t mind you dropping in, Miss Mathews. I don’t even mind you letting yourself in. I rarely lock the door, and sometimes I even wander about dressed as you are, except I don’t wear earrings. I have nothing worth stealing, nothing to worry about. I’ve entertained a good number of ladies, some want one thing, some the other. What do you want, Miss Mathews, besides the obvious?”
To me she’d always
Chapter 11
I waited there for two hours and headed home. Something about the case didn’t feel right, but I was tired of chewing it over. Maybe my head had turned my senses to mush. Things didn’t seem right when I pulled my Buick in the driveway. The place was hardly bigger than a phone booth. I liked it that way. Less to mess, less to worry about. And how much roof does one dick need over him anyway? But something was off.
The porch light shining. I never leave the porch light on.
I killed the lights and motor and fingered the cold handle of my .45. I wanted chow, a stiff drink and sleep. I didn’t need intruders. If someone was ransacking my house, I wouldn’t be polite about it. It had taken me weeks to get it into the sort of mess I was comfortable with.
“Dad? Is there anything you need to tell me?”
I didn’t usually talk to dead men out loud, but felt Dad might answer just then.
Sorry. I’ve used my quota of words this month.
It was clear, and it was Dad. Yes, I’m nuts.
“Just tell me — is it safe to go in?”
I sat there for a full five minutes, waiting for an answer than never came. Then I realized if it wasn’t safe he’d warn me; and if he truly had used up his “quota” — whatever that was — he could reassure me by not saying anything. Goofy.
Through the front door my nose caught the stale residue of Rick’s cigars with something added — a faint aroma of vanilla. I slid off my coat and hat and slung them at the davenport. I stood there in the dark, listening, the drawn .45 my calling card. A dim flicker under my bedroom door, fainter than my bedroom lights would be.
Peering around in the darkness, my eyes adjusted enough to tell no one lurked in the kitchenette or living room to give me another love pat with a dense hard object. I moved to the bedroom door, twisted the knob and pushed it open.
She wore a glittering pair of gold chain earrings with pearls wrapped inside a twisting cage. They were classy earrings, and probably put her back three or four hundred bucks, if the pearls were real. She was real; that’s all she wore.
She had a handsome body, as slender as a young girl’s, with long thighs, tiny feet and firm round breasts unmindful of gravity. In the flickering candlelight her skin matched the translucent shimmer of the pearls in her earrings. I looked her over as I would Goya’s nude, a piece of artful grace, not really a naked girl in my bed, and just another side of Miss Mathews I’d wondered about. Mainly those legs. Above mid calf they got thicker in a hurry but stayed quite shapely. Not at all bird legs, like I’d suspected. I could almost feel them wrapped around me.
It seemed the most natural thing in the world, for Dee Mathews to be naked in my bed, with inviting eyes and a smiling pair of red lips that promised an escape from the week’s pain, a break from a confusing case. But just because it felt natural didn’t mean it wasn’t also irritating. A fleeting regret that the female in my bed wasn’t Julia, then it ran away when Dee shifted to one elbow and blew me a kiss. I hesitated. No warning voice was ever relevant for times like this. It was one challenge I’d have to meet, either headlong or reluctantly. It was like tripping over a wallet full of cash when you’re dead broke and you turn it in but hate yourself for being so damned honest.
“I don’t mind you dropping in, Miss Mathews. I don’t even mind you letting yourself in. I rarely lock the door, and sometimes I even wander about dressed as you are, except I don’t wear earrings. I have nothing worth stealing, nothing to worry about. I’ve entertained a good number of ladies, some want one thing, some the other. What do you want, Miss Mathews, besides the obvious?”
To me she’d always
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