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Chapter 6

I woke up the next morning feeling moderately hung over, and pissed when I realized I’d left Matilda at the garage and was going to have to walk to Seth’s in that state. My new place was only eight blocks or so from him, but there’s no amount of walking I want to do on a bright and sunny morning with a hangover.

Turns out, it had taken quite a lot of beer to calm Seth down, and not only had we closed out the Oar House, but we’d walked over to the Backroom Bar which tends to do a lively after hours business. Seth and the bartender dug out a pile of bartending guides she’d printed off the internet, and amused themselves by making every drink that had a dirty name. I wasn’t allowed to leave until I’d thoroughly discussed the merits of Sex on the Beach versus a Screaming O. Since I chose to be a good sport about the whole thing, they rewarded me with an amaretto Sweet Pussy, which was actually pretty good.

My cellphone was on the nightstand next to me, so I grabbed it, figuring I could call Seth and make him bring the car to me, but it went straight to voicemail. Irritating little shit.

I crawled out of bed and into the shower where I washed off the bar smell and cigarette smoke. Then I went to the kitchen and brewed coffee while I dug out the biggest mug I could find. If I had to take the walk of shame, I was doing it armed with caffeine.

Unfortunately, I ran out three-quarters of the way there, and there’s no decent coffee to be had in that part of town, so my mood hadn’t lifted any by the time I climbed the wooden steps and beat on Seth’s door.

He wasn’t answering that, either.

We had a long Saturday ahead of us, which included inventories of the repossessions and cleaning out the storefront, and I was in no mood to piss around. I pounded on the door until I heard crashing and groaning inside, and Seth pulled it open, staring blearily at me. He had on jeans and nothing else.

“Fuck, is it morning already?”

“It is, and I have no coffee, and we have a lot of work to do, Red, so wake up. You’ve got only yourself to thank for the state you’re in.”

“Well, aren’t you Mr. Sunshine this morning,” he deadpanned, holding the door open for me.

“You can thank yourself for that too. I would have been perfectly happy with beer.”

“Hey, I don’t remember anyone pourin’ the stuff down your throat, man.” Seth grabbed a T-shirt out of a pile, sniffed it, and pulled it on.

“I think there’s probably a lot of things you don’t remember, because that is exactly what you tried to do. My damn shirt was sticky when I got home.”

He grinned obscenely and said, “Oh yeah, that must have been the Blow Job.”

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t start. It was cute last night, but now? Not so much.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Seth took me by the arm and dragged me into the kitchenette, pointing over my shoulder. “Look...coffee. How much do you love me now?”

“You don’t have a coffee maker,” I said, even as I was staring at a shiny white KitchenAid with a pot of decent smelling coffee steaming away on it.

“It’s new. It has a timer and everything. I don’t know shit about grinding up beans or whatever the hell you do with them, so you have to suffer with canned coffee, but it’s better than nothing, right?”

“Yeah, this is great,” I said, pouring some into my cup. “This is remarkably thoughtful for you, I’m impressed.”

“Ouch, asshole, why don’t you twist the knife a little more.” Seth hopped up on the counter and peeled open a pack of Pop-Tarts, taking a big bite before continuing. “So, what the hell was up with that Serrano dude? I’ve never had anyone try to tackle the fucking car before. Did you see that?”

“Yeah.” I blew on the coffee and took a sip. “I was going to talk to you about that last night, but you didn’t give me chance. Anyway, I told you I thought that guy was going to be trouble, and I was right. There’s no way he’s going to let this drop. I’m gonna give Ernie a call and warn him as soon as the lot opens, and I think we should be careful when we take the car over there.”

“Think Ernie’s going to have trouble with him?” Seth asked.

“Maybe a little, but Ernie’s got insurance for that, and he knows a guy on the police force who’s usually willing to do a few extra drive-bys for anyone who’ll drink beer and watch football with him.”

“Can I drive it over there?”

“As long as you promise not to try to jump Ernie afterward. His wife is the jealous kind, and she could totally kick your ass.”

* * * *

We went outside to check on the Corvette, which was right where we’d left it, and I called Ernie to give him a report of the previous night’s work. He was thrilled to hear we’d gotten the ’Vette back and said he’d give his pal a call just to be on the safe side.

When I got off the phone, I found Seth already in it having some kind of religious experience. I rapped on the window. He rolled it down and I said, “Let’s do the inventory and condition report here and then take it over. That’ll be less time we have to hang out at Ernie’s while we do the others. I’d rather not be there if Serrano is gonna come and make trouble.”

Seth agreed and I went to my car to get the forms out of my briefcase. I gave him a clipboard and the Condition Report form, and took an Inventory Report for myself. I also carried a small cardboard box to collect whatever was inside.

While I got in and started to go through the glove compartment, Seth moved around the car making note of any damage or modifications. I noted the usual stuff, owner’s manual, tire gauge, registration, spare fuses. Serrano also had a Florida map, Miami map, two Snickers bars and a bunch of matchbooks from a place called The Shark Pond in South Beach. There was a cheap paperback fuck book wedged between the passenger seat and the console, and a silver lighter on the dash.

“Hey,” said Seth, poking his face in the window. “What’s the odometer reading?”

I peered at it and read the numbers off.

“Thanks.”

In the interest of being thorough, I climbed out of the car so I could check underneath the seats. There was nothing under the passenger seat, but under the driver’s seat I found a small padded envelope, folded in half and wrapped with rubber bands.

“What the fuck is that?” Seth asked when I stood up, turning it over in my hands.

“I have no idea,” I said. It was dirty, presumably from riding around on the floor of the car, and contained something fairly bulky.

I pulled off the rubber bands and unfolded it. There was a return address label from one of those mail order porn places, and a mailing label that was addressed to Serrano, but had a Miami address.

Seth said, “Oh-ho, have we found Serrano’s sex toy stash? My money’s on leopard print lovecuffs, what do you think?”

“Lovecuffs?” I asked, casting a sidelong glance at him.

He shrugged. “I read the catalogs. There’s all kinds of crazy shit in there.”

“Yeah, ’cause you need that.”

“Just biding my time, baby...”

I lifted the envelope flap and looked inside. What I saw was curious in how unremarkable it was.

“Well?” prodded Seth, trying to see for himself.

I tipped the contents into my hand. There was a small notebook, also wrapped with a rubber band, a key card, and a set of keys. Just two keys on a plain ring with a green rubber fob advertising Chico’s Car Wash. One was a car key, and the other a small gold one.

“Well...that’s interesting,” Seth said, picking up the keys and examining them.

I tucked the envelope under my arm and looked at the notebook. There wasn’t anything special about it I could see. I took the rubber band off and started to flip through it with Seth looking over my shoulder. Most of the pages were blank, but a few had notes on them, and several pages had lists of numbers written in groups.

“What the fuck?” Seth muttered. “Obviously this stuff means something or he wouldn’t have stashed it under the seat like that.”

“Yeah, but what?” I mused on it for a few minutes, trying to come up with a plausible explanation. Most of the information looked like it might be in code, which certainly piqued my curiosity.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” Seth said, “these keys aren’t for the ’Vette. This one’s new, and it fits a BMW.”

“I wonder where that car is then.”

“Good question.”

“Listen,” I said, ignoring the protest my conscience was making. “Let’s not list this on the inventory, all right? I’d like to have a closer look at it. We can always drop it off with Ernie later, say it fell out of the box on the way over or whatever.”

“You smelling a mystery here, Nero Wolfe?” Seth joked, elbowing me in the ribs.

“I’m not Wolfe,” I said. “I’m Archie Goodwin.”

“Well I’m sure as hell not Wolfe.” Seth looked horrified.

“No, you’re Fred Durkin.”

“Who the fuck is Fred Durkin?”

I rolled my eyes. “You need to read more.”

“So who is he? Is he hot like me?”

“Yes. He’s hot like you.”

“You’re doing that thing with sarcasm again, aren’t you?”

I smirked and wrapped up the notebook and keys the way we’d found them. Yeah, I know—keeping it was very unprofessional, not to mention stupid, but I was curious as all hell, and I was itching for something a little more intriguing than skip tracing and tracking cheaters.

* * * *

Later at Ernie’s, I had already completely inventoried the Caprice, and done the Condition Report before Seth finally rolled in with the hotwired Corvette. It’s a damn fine thing Ernie is a good sport. When Seth still hadn’t shown up fifteen minutes after I arrived, and Ernie was looking a little concerned, I told him I thought Seth might be taking the ’Vette for a test drive. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ernie laugh so hard.

When Seth did show up, he pulled up next to us and climbed out, giving me a wicked leer and a shit-eating grin. I was shocked to realize I knew damn well he had a hard-on. Ernie tried to give him a sales pitch on the car.

“Seth!” I yelled. “We have three more to do, and a pile of paperwork for this. Get your ass in gear.”

Seth flipped me off. “Hey, Ernie,” he said, “have you read the Nero Wolfe books?”

“Sure,” Ernie said, nodding. “Those are pretty good reads.”

“Who is Fred Durkin?”

I steered Seth away and shoved him in the direction of the three vehicles we had left to do. Behind us, Ernie yawned and trudged into his office. He’d been dragging all morning, and I wondered what was up. Ernie is usually a pretty perky guy.

Twenty minutes was all it took for us to get done. I tucked the paperwork into my briefcase and went to tell Ernie we’d have the finished reports for him as soon as possible.

“Thanks,” he said choking back another yawn. “Sandra will have your check ready, and you can come get it anytime you want, unless you’d rather have her just mail it.”

“Great. I’ll come and get it, I don’t trust the mail at the new place yet. What’s up with you, don’t you sleep at night?”

“Nothing serious. The alarm went off in the wee hours of the morning, that’s all. It’s not a big deal, happens every couple of months, short in the system or bird hitting the window or whatever. But it’s a pain in the ass, because I have to get out of bed and come down here to meet with the police to make sure everything’s all right.”

“And was it?” I asked, because I didn’t think this was any short in the system.

Seth had just stepped in the door and gave me a dubious look.

“Yep, everything’s accounted for and nothing’s broken. You know, the only time I’ve ever actually been robbed was in broad daylight when some punk took a Firebird out for a test drive and just kept on going.”

“Yeah...” I said, rubbing the back of my neck. “I think this was more than a bird hitting the window. I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if it was that crackpot I told you about who jumped the ’Vette.”

“You think?” Ernie looked completely dumbfounded. “I suppose anything’s possible. I’m glad he didn’t tear the place up when he didn’t find the car. That was good thinking, you guys. Anyway, my buddy’s going to keep an eye on the place for a few days.”

“Good plan,” I told him. “Get some sleep tonight.”

It was time for lunch when we got out of there, so I offered to buy Seth a quick sandwich if he’d help me do the paperwork before we started cleaning the storefront.

There’s a lot of paperwork involved in doing repossessions. I don’t mind it so much. I happen to be one of those rare people who doesn’t hate paperwork with a passion. I love to sit down with a full “In” box around lunch time and end up with an empty one just in time to go out and get some dinner. Seth, however, hates paperwork and complains like a baby, so he ended up in a mood similar to mine of that morning.