The Ghost of Mistletoe Mary (11 page)

Mona was seated at the far end of the counter reading a magazine when Jeremiah and Granny walked into the diner. There were only about six people in the place counting Mona and the cook. Jeremiah cast a look into the kitchen. The cook was different from this morning, but still a Latino. The customers were at booths—a middle-aged woman and two middle-aged men in one and a solo younger man in the other on a cell phone, all African-American. He wondered if one of them was Ace, especially the one on the cell phone. The woman with the two men looked too old and healthy to be one of Ace's working girls.

“Well, look who's back,” Mona said giving Jeremiah a half smile as he took the same seat at the counter he'd occupied earlier. Granny took the seat next to him in front of the desserts. “Can't get enough of our good cooking, huh?”

“You're working a long day,” Jeremiah said to her. He grabbed a mug and turned it over.

“Can't get good help these days,” she said getting to her feet with effort. She grabbed a steaming coffeepot and filled his waiting mug. She was wearing the same clothes as she had that morning but it looked as if she'd put on a fresh apron. “Our night girl called in sick and our other waitress is off on Sundays, so I get stuck with a double shift.” She shrugged. “But what are ya gonna do? You own the place, you pick up the slack. Know what I mean?”

“Sure do.” He took a sip of the coffee.

“Hey,” Granny whispered to him with excitement, even though Mona couldn't hear her. “That's exactly what the shooter's wig looked like.” She pointed at Mona's bob with bangs. Jeremiah shifted his eyes, hoping Granny would take it as a sign that he heard her. Unfortunately, he couldn't tell Granny that cheap wigs like Mona's were probably a dime a dozen.

“At least it's quiet on Sundays,” Mona said as she put the pot back on its hot plate. “You gonna order some food?”

He shook his head. “Just wanted some coffee for now. Maybe later. Been a long day for me, too. Glad to get off my feet.”

“So I heard,” Mona whispered, leaning forward and giving him another look down her considerable cleavage.

“And exactly what did you hear?” Jeremiah asked as Granny got up and started poking around the place. He caught her eye and motioned for her to check on the guy with the phone. She nodded and drifted over there.

“That that ho Mary was found dead in a rusty clothes dryer and that you were in a shootout over it.”

“I didn't think the news mentioned my name.” Jeremiah eyed her over the rim of his mug.

“It didn't, but word spreads fast down here,” she said, still keeping her voice down. “You were asking about Mary this morning, so when I heard an old black guy was involved in a shooting near where her body was found, it wasn't rocket science to piece it together, you being a PI and all.”

He took another sip of coffee and cast an eye around the place. No one seemed to be paying them any mind. “Is that Ace?” he asked Mona in a low voice, indicating the guy on the cell phone.

“Nah, that's Ernie,” she said, not giving any more information on the guy. “Ace isn't here tonight. The cops pulled him in on account of Mary and he's at the station being questioned. He'll probably be there all night, knowing the cops.” Mona curled her lip. “They're always trying to pin something on Ace. Not that he's an angel or anything, but seems like whenever something happens around here, they make him their first suspect.”

“Jeremiah,” Granny whispered in a slightly panicked voice as she perched back on the stool next to him. “That man over there is talking to someone about a girl with red hair. Said she's ready for delivery.”

Without reacting to Granny's news, Jeremiah gave Mona a smile and pulled out his phone. “Seeing him,” he said, indicating the guy on the phone again, “reminds me that I need to call my lady friend and tell her I'm going to be late tonight.”

Mona's smile changed to straight-lipped disappointment and she started to move away.

“Hey,” Jeremiah said to her, “I think I've changed my mind about food. How about a cheeseburger and some fries.”

The disappointment lessened at the thought of making a sale, but didn't disappear altogether. “Everything on the burger?”

“Everything but onions,” he told her with a grateful smile.

As soon as Mona left to put his order in, Jeremiah turned off his ringer and pretended to make a call. “Hi,” he said into the phone, keeping his voice down but not whispering, to make sure Mona heard what he wanted her to hear. Looking at Granny, he gave her a wink. She winked back, understanding that the call was a ruse.

“It's me.” Jeremiah said into the phone. He paused for effect, then asked, “What's going on?”

“Like I said. That guy is talking about delivering a red-haired girl to someone. I'll bet it's Lizzie.” Granny bounced up and down, electric with excitement. “And I think the shooter was here today,” Granny told him. “I knew it was familiar when I followed her. At least it smelled familiar. It's a cooking smell, greasy and meaty.”

Jeremiah gave the idea some thought, then said, “A lot of places are like that, darlin'.”

“Well,
sugar
,” Granny replied with a smirk, “my gut is telling me this is it. And that wig is another clue. I just know it.”

“Uh-huh,” responded Jeremiah. “Did you look in the back? Maybe you left it there.”

“Good idea,” the ghost said. “Let's see if I can get back there.”

“You go ahead and check,” Jeremiah said into the phone. “I'll hang on.”

Without another word Granny headed for the back of the Hi-Life Diner and disappeared through the closed door marked
Employees
. While he waited, Jeremiah rotated his stool back and forth as if bored, but kept the guy in the booth in sight. He took another sip of coffee. Granny was back in seconds, a look of anger plastered on her face.

“I was right,” she said with a jerk of her strong chin. “This is the same place. I found the room where the shooter changed and her stuff is there. So is poor Lizzie, tied and trussed like a turkey, but still alive.”

“You found it,” Jeremiah said into the phone with forced happiness. “That's great.”

“Not so great if we can't get her out of there,” snapped Granny.

“I understand, darlin',” he agreed after a pause to make it look like he was listening to a long comment. “Okay, okay.
I'm on my way.” He ended the call and sighed with fake frustration.

After taking a long pull from his coffee mug, Jeremiah got off his stool. Mona came back over. “Trouble in paradise?” she asked.

“You have no idea,” he said with a weary shake of his head. “Hey, can you pack that order to go? I'll eat it on the way.”

“Can't you just leave it?” groused Granny. “We have to help Lizzie.”

“Sure,” said Mona as she added up his bill and placed it on the counter in front of him. She turned to the kitchen window and gave the new to-go instructions to the cook in passable Spanish. By the time Jeremiah had paid his tab, his order was up and packed in a bag. Mona handed it to him and said in a suggestive purr, “You come back again, Mr. PI, when you have time to enjoy your food. And stay out of the way of gunfire, you hear?”

Back in the truck, Jeremiah dropped the takeout bag on the floor of the passenger's side and started the engine.

“If you're not going to eat that, why did you take it?” asked Granny.

“It would look odd if I just ran off without it,” Jeremiah told her. “I need them to think I'm heading away from the area.”

Granny tapped the side of her head with an index finger. “Smart thinking, Chief. I'll have to remember that.”

Jeremiah maneuvered the SUV down to 3rd Street and took a right turn. Another quick right took him on Central and an even quicker right landed him on Towne Avenue, the street one block behind Crocker where the diner was located. He drove slowly, looking for an alley access and found one pretty quickly.

“This looks very familiar,” Granny said. “I remember that drawing on the side of the building. She pointed to faded, but once colorful graffiti near the entrance to the alley.

Jeremiah pulled the SUV to the curb just past the alley, got out, and locked the vehicle. There were some tents and lean-tos set up against the nearby buildings, but not as many as a few blocks away, closer to the shelters and missions. Jeremiah noted several people gathered under a streetlight at the intersection farther up. The sound of drunken laughter and coarse speech came off them in rough waves. They paid no mind to Jeremiah as he used the cover of darkness to slip into the alley with his gun drawn but held down, close to his leg.

“Yep, this is the right alley,” Granny confirmed as she floated ahead of Jeremiah.

This alley was in better shape than the one behind the laundromat. There were more Dumpsters and they looked to be more consistently used, signaling that the alley served active businesses. Like the other, it was T-shaped. On the left and right a couple of closed doors with signs indicated the businesses beyond the doors and had small saffron lights above them. At the end was the butt end of another set of buildings with doors, Dumpsters, and lights. These were the small businesses that shared space on Crocker with the Hi-Life Diner.

Granny went straight to the one for the diner and pointed to a sign for the business affixed to the door. It was in the shadows and dirty. “I'm sorry I didn't see this before, Jeremiah. It would have saved us time.”

“You've done good, Granny,” he whispered. “It's very hard to see, even for me.” He waved her on. “Go on in and make sure it's the right place before we barge in.”

She nodded and disappeared through the door, returning in no time. “It's the right place. Lizzie's still there. I think they drugged her.”

Jeremiah started to move toward the door, but instead took a few steps back and pulled out his phone.

“What are you doing, Jeremiah?” Granny asked with frustration. “You need to kick down the door and rescue that poor girl.” To demonstrate, the ghost lifted her leg and gave a ferocious kick to the door with her booted foot. It went through it like a hot knife through soft butter.

“I'm getting backup, Granny.”

He punched a number he'd stored on his phone earlier. “Audra, it's Jeremiah,” he whispered into the phone. “I've found Lizzie. She's being held captive in the back of the Hi-Life Diner. You know it?” He listened. “Yeah, I'm here now. In the alley behind the place.” He paused again. “Okay, and I think I have a lead on Mary Dowling's killer. She's connected to Hi-Life, though how I'm not sure.”

He disconnected the call and made sure the ringer was still off before slipping it back into a pocket. “Audra and her people are on their way,” he told Granny. “I'll stay here and wait for them. Go inside and keep an eye on Lizzie. Come get me if you think she's in any immediate danger.”

“Will do, Chief,” Granny said with a salute. “But I still think it would be more exciting for you to kick down the door.”

Jeremiah positioned himself behind a nearby Dumpster that gave him a good sight line to both the back of the diner and the entry to the alley. He pulled the collar of his jacket up high on his neck to ward off the night chill starting to ooze into his aging bones and thought if he never saw another Dumpster or alley again, it would be too soon for him.

“You gotta come quick,” Granny said, popping up next to Jeremiah and startling him. “Some guys just showed up in the diner and are talking to Mona and that Ernie guy about Lizzie.”

“Are they looking for her?” Jeremiah asked as he pulled his phone back out of his pocket and readied it.

Granny shook her head back and forth vigorously, as if her brains were in a blender. “No. They're buying her!”

“What?”

“Yes! Mona is selling Lizzie to these creeps.”

Jeremiah took a second to think about it. “If that's true, they can't take her out the front way in her condition, they'll have to take her out the back, past me.”

“And drag her down the alley?” Granny asked with surprise.

“No, but I'll bet Mona is telling them where this alley is right now. Go check.” Granny disappeared.

“Audra,” Jeremiah said quietly into his phone after the detective answered. “Human traffickers are here right now buying Lizzie. Hurry.”

“Team almost in place in the front and we're about to cover the back.”

“Just make sure the cops don't shoot me by mistake, thinking I'm a suspicious black man.”

She chuckled, but it wasn't a happy one. “Don't worry, I'll be with the team in the alley to make sure that doesn't happen.”

“By the way,” he said into the phone, “last I looked there were three customers in the diner in a booth, along with a cook and the owner, a big black woman named Mona. She's deep into this, along with another guy sitting alone in a booth. His name's Ernie. I don't think the other three or the cook are involved. I'm betting the buyers will be pulling a car into the alley soon to take Lizzie out the back. You might wait until you see it enter and block them off.”

“Got it,” said Audra. “Waiting until they're in the alley will also keep the civilians out of the way.” She paused, then added. “Stay on the line, Jeremiah.”

“Will do,” he said holding on to his phone with the hand not holding the gun.

“You're right,” Granny said when she returned. “Mona took them in the back to check out Lizzie. Ernie stayed in the front. Then one guy handed her a bucket of cash and sent the other one to pull the car around to the alley.” Granny looked around. “Where are the cops? They're sure taking their sweet time.”

“Getting into position,” he told her after putting the phone on mute. “They should be outside the front now, waiting for a signal to move. Audra and her team are waiting to block off the alley after the buyers pull in.”

Granny hopped up and down. “This is so exciting.”

“Only because you can't get hit with a bullet,” Jeremiah snapped.

Granny stopped her celebration midhop. “You're right. My bad.”

Soon a black sedan pulled across the mouth of the alley, but didn't enter. Jeremiah ducked deeper behind the Dumpster while Granny investigated. She returned to report, “Yep, that's one of them.”

The man and the ghost watched as the sedan drove forward a bit, then started moving in reverse, turning as it backed into the alley. The backup lights glowed as the sedan slowly inched backward until it was just a few feet away from the back
door to the diner. Then the driver popped the trunk from the inside and got out. He looked at a few of the back doors until he located the one for the diner. He knocked on it and it opened. He went inside, leaving the engine running and driver's door open.

Jeremiah took his phone off mute and whispered in a rush. “Black sedan backed into alley. Open trunk. Engine running.”

“Roger!” came Audra's voice from the phone. Jeremiah spotted a vehicle without lights ease into the mouth of the alley nose first, then stop, waiting for instructions.

A minute later the back door to the diner opened and a short dark man came out and held the door open while the taller, beefier driver dragged a limp Lizzie through it. Jeremiah held the phone against his mouth. “Hold it. Hold it.”

The big man threw Lizzie into the trunk and slammed it shut. It was exactly what Jeremiah was waiting for. He wanted Lizzie out of the way as much as possible before anyone made a move. The two men were laughing and talking in a foreign language that sounded Middle Eastern. The big man went to the waiting driver's side, while the smaller one went around to the passenger's side, which was closest to Jeremiah. “Now!” he whispered into the phone.

At that second, a spotlight flooded the alley with a bright beam of light. The two men started for their guns, but Jeremiah ran forward and slammed his gun down on the back of the smaller man's head before he could finish drawing. With a grunt, he dropped like a brick. The larger man fired at the cops and the cops answered in kind. Jeremiah dropped to the ground and flattened himself.

It was over in seconds. The driver of the car was dead and the smaller man was cuffed and taken into custody. The cops coming through the front had grabbed Mona and Ernie. An ambulance took Lizzie away after she was rescued from the trunk. She was still unconscious, but the EMTs said she only seemed drugged and not injured.

“How did you know Lizzie was here?” asked Audra as they examined the small room where she'd been kept. He gave the still excited Granny a small, clandestine smile, then answered, “Just a hunch. Lizzie never showed up where we agreed to meet and was worried about Ace, so I came here. Mona was acting kind of odd, and I heard that Ernie guy talking on his phone about having a girl for sale. A girl with red hair. I didn't know for sure, but I knew some poor girl was back here and someone was coming for her.”

Jeremiah kicked a bundle of clothing in a corner with his toe. “I think if you check these out, you'll find that they belong to the person who was shooting at me. It might even be Mary's killer. And I think if you run any prints or DNA you find, you might get a match to a Greta Miles.”

“The woman who's always distributing produce to the poor?” Audra asked with surprise. “You sure about that?”

“Nope, just another hunch after piecing together some of the information I've gotten from different sources. I don't know why, but I think Greta was posing as Mary's long-dead daughter, and whatever the game, Lizzie knew about it or figured it out. Mona was in on it. Whether Ace was or not, I don't know, but both might have known about Mary having a daughter. They might not have known the kid was dead, but used the ploy anyway, knowing that Mary was a bit addled and
might buy it.”

“It looked like Mary was living inside that laundromat before her death,” Audra told him.

Jeremiah nodded. “I'd heard that Ace kicked her out of her room at the digs he keeps for his girls over on Stanford when he cut her loose.”

“As soon as Lizzie is able, we'll question her,” Audra said. “She must know something if they were willing to sell her off.”

“At least they didn't kill her,” Jeremiah said as he poked around the room without disturbing evidence.

“She's still young and sexually useful,” Audra noted sadly. “These two guys tonight are part of a human trafficking ring we've known about but couldn't pin down. They snatch or buy white women for sexual slaves in the Middle East. Natural redheads and blondes are in big demand, I'm told.”

“That's just awful,” said Granny, holding a hand over her mouth in horror at the thought.