Gumshoe #12

If anyone is reading these, could they let me know. I mean, I'm gonna keep writing them, because I enjoy it, but I'm just curious to see who (if anyone) reads this. And feel free to let me know with an anonymous comment.

James Troop sat with his back to the car, still breathing heavily from the little tussle we'd had.
"I need the name of whoever sent you to my office, because odds are good that whoever that fucker is, he's the guy who killed three people." I repeated myself in case he was getting second thoughts about telling me what I needed to know.
"His name is Andrew Grassley." He said hoarsely. "He works at my agency. Secretary, I think." He was taking his time as if trying to piece it all together.
"What do you know about," was all the investigating I got to do before I heard gunshots. Pop. Pop. I heard the bullets land in the car above me and I felt the adrenaline surge into my system. I took a deep breath trying to keep my head. Another Pop. Pop. I pushed trooop around the front of the car so we could use it as a barrier. If the bullets were hitting the car above me that meant the shooter was shooting from either inside the Ingersol or on top of it. As soon as I had us both around the camino, I gave a quick survey of the theater. I couldn't see anything.
"You hit?" I said without looking at him.
"No." He said with what little breath he could summon. "I don't think so."
The night was already being torn open by the loud sirens of the Des Moines Police Department, who were no doubt on their way here. I pressed my back against the car debating about going for my gun in the car and just waiting for the police. I didn't make up my mind when I saw the first police cruiser turn carefully into the alley. It pulled forward quietly as one of the officers used the spotlight to split into the dark alley infront of them. A moment later, another cruiser entered the alley from the opposite end.
"What do we do?" James said looking at me with desparation.
"Well, I'm pretty sure whoever was shooting at us is gone. But I'm gonna give it another minute before I stand up really, really slowly and make sure that I am not surprising any of these officers."
"Good plan." He said, taking
I felt myself slump against the car. It didn't make me happy to feel how relieved I was to see the police here. Originally, they had suspected me of being the murderer and truthfully, I wasn't really sure how innocent they thought I was. Especially since I'm showing up at the scene of a shooting. But I had to admit, I was feeling very happy to not have to get in a shoot out with anyone. I'm not a big fan of guns. In my line of work they come in handy, but I'd rather punch someone in the face than shoot them. It's way more satisfying for one. And there's a lot less of a todo made about it for two.
I could hear the police moving around, their leather shoes kicking through the gravel on the ground.
"All right." I said to James as I started to raise my hands above my head. "Officers!" I yelled. "Officers, my friend and I were --"
"Hands up." I heard a voice on the other side of the car.
"There are two of us officer. We are unarmed." The trick here is to be calm. These officers are trained to be calm, but it's human nature to not be calm. If they see you following their instructions and doing so calmly, it puts them at ease. At least that's how I remember it. Hopefully things hadn't changed that much since I left the force.
"Stand up. Slowly. Really slowly." We started to stand. "Slowly. That's good. Keep those hands where I can see them." When we got to our feet he told us to turn around and I could see there were indeed four young cops here. There were two who had surrounded us, the one who was talking to us from beyond the car and another who was looking around to make sure there was no one else in the alley with us.
"You boys just out for a stroll?" This came from the officer to my right.
"No officer. My name is [gumshoe], I'm a private investigator. This man is James Troop and I was interviewing Mr. Troop regarding a case I am working on when we were fired upon. I believe those shots came from either inside the theater or possibly on top of the roof." Either I figured just giving a statement at this point was going to make things go easier, or I was just so relieved they were here I was gonna spill. Sometimes I can't tell if I'm putting thought into things or not.
The police stepped slowly closer to us. "Are either of you armed?"
"No." James said quickly. Maybe too quickly. He was nervous. Understandably, but still. With the cops, it's always better to show them you have nothing to be nervous about.
"I have a gun in the glove compartment of the car." I said, quickly adding. "And the registration for that gun is in my wallet, along with my Private Investigator's License."
"Pat him." The officer across the car said, and I felt hands groping my body. Arms, armpits, back, crotch, legs. Pretty thorough. I could see from the side of my eye that James was getting the same treatment. I felt the hand remove my wallet from my back pocket.
"He checks," I heard the voice say from behind me.
"This one too." The voice behind James said and the guns got holstered.
"Wait in the car," we were instructed.
"Officer," I said quietly. "I beleive Detective Edna Muldoon will want to be informed of this incident as the case I'm working on has a lot to do with a case she is working."
James and I sat in the back of the police car, with the door left open. The red and blue lights cast the look of tragedy and excitement all over the alley and I could see people crowding around the yellow tape the police had put up. After the violence, there's only the show left.
Edna made her way through the crowd, stoppedto talk to the officers who responded to the scene and then headed directly toward us. I could tell she was less than thrilled to see me.
"You are going to end up dead soon, aren't you?" She said running a hand through her hair.
"If there's an office pool, I might get a date before Christmas," I said with a smile. "Sorry to interrupt your night."
"What are you doing here, [gumshoe]?"
"Interviewing a witness who--"
"And this is about the murders?" Her voice was angry.
"Of course." I said with a shrug. "Someone targets me, I don't wait for them to come get me."
"No, you run right at them with your arms flailing, yelling, 'shoot me.'" I smiled and shrugged. She let out a sigh and leaned against the car. "Are you getting anywhere?"
"Maybe. I'm not sure what I've got." I said. "I guess I was followed here and the killer saw a chance to take a shot at me."
"That's your statement?" She said.
"In addition to what I told the officers, yes. Should I give Clarence a call, or?"
"That won't be necessary," she said. "I won't get anything better from you. You just be fucking carefull." She let out a long breath and walked away. "You're free to go, for now."
"You really think the shooter followed you here?"
"Oh." I said almost forgetting that Troop was listening. "No. He followed you. where can I find this Andrew Grassley?"

Gumshoe #8

Sorry for the long wait. This is the scene I had in my mind when I wanted to start writing the Gumshoe, so I really wanted to make sure I got somethings right. I also want to make sure I'm not being too cliche with how I'm writing this. I was talking to my mother-in-law, who also loves detective novels, though I don't think she's read the Gumshoe or is aware I have a blog. But, she was talking about some of the cliches and I got a little worried I was falling into some of them without thinking. Clearly, I am using some cliche, but I'm hoping I'm doing them in a way that makes sense and is interesting and doesn't just take the cliche for granted. But ultimately I don't know. Either way, I hope you enjoy.

It was 10 o’clock. I sat in the car outside the Holiday Inn, loving the feeling of having slept for a good long while. My plan was to sit in the El Camino, to which Ms. Fortune had been gracious enough to drive me and watch the hotel for a while. I had to see if Chance or his friend “Jim” would be there and if that led me anywhere. If I didn’t see them by 11.30 or so, then I’d head in and try to see them from across the room. There would be a big risk of being seen, because the bar was pretty small, but I couldn’t risk missing them altogether. It wasn’t much of a plan, but this whole case was making me feel like I wasn’t much of a detective.
I had parked the car out of the range of the streetlights, its warm, safe glow about a yard from my front and behind my bumper, piercing the cold fall evening. It wasn’t cold enough to freeze, but it would probably get pretty close tonight.
As I settled in, I turned on the radio to my favorite classic rock station. Not to my surprise, it had commercials running, but I remained hopeful. “Tonight is the breakthrough,” I said to myself.
There are two things I love about a stake-out. The first is being able to just sit in your car and listen to the radio. When I was young, before I staked out anything, I’d lie on my bed and listen to music for days at a time. This was before iPods, when radio ruled your life like a god. If you were poor or had spent your allowance money on baseball cards (which was often the case for me) or you didn’t have allowance or an album wasn’t being sold at the crappy mall near your house, and you wanted to hear a certain song, you just had to wait for the radio to play it. I’d lay on my broken-down bed, my hands behind my head waiting for the moment the new Prince or the old BTO came one. I’d wade through the tides of good songs that would ebb and flow with the pools of bad songs. Sometimes there’d be hours of good songs, and you’d feel so good. So alive. But all too often there’d be a lot of okay songs and some really shitty ones, but that’s how it was. It sounds strange to say now, but there wasn’t anything you could do about it. But, it taught you patience. It taught you a little something about living in a world with other people and their tastes. And, if I haven’t overstated it too much already, it taught you something about life.
And when your song came on, or when they piled those great songs back to back to back, there was no better feeling. The radio waves opened up and smiled on you. Or when you were just driving home after a fight or make-up sex and that perfect song came on. When it looked like I wasn’t going to graduate high school and Springsteen was there to pick me up or when I had made the football team won a game (which wasn’t often on the south side of Des Moines, believe me) and Guns N Roses was there, perfect in the moment, it’s a feeling you can’t get by dialing an iPod to the song you think you want. The problem with iPods is they cater to your every whim, playing whatever song you think you want to listen to. But sometimes you’re the last person in the world who knows exactly what it is you need.
Did I mention the other thing I love about stakeouts is the propensity to get lost in tangents?
I looked up at the Holiday Inn. It’s a high rise hotel that rams into the sky out of nowhere. It’s called the downtown Holiday Inn, but it’s technically not downtown. It’s kind of close, which is good enough for most everybody, I guess. I was staking out the main entrance figuring that was the best chance to catch one of the two going in. He probably had no idea that I was onto him. Probably is a word that seems to get me into trouble a lot.
It’s an odd place to meet, I thought. Like I said, it’s not really downtown. It’s not too far out of the way, but still it’s not a typical meeting place. Not with actual downtown not so far away and full of places both more chill and more hip. But, I’m not the Chamber of Commerce, so if this is where they want to meet, so be it. The top floor of the building rotates, which may be a draw for Chance or his friend from “San Francisco”. It’s the only place in our little city that does that.
It started to rain outside. First, it started in a light mist that reminded us of the spring that brought the bright vibrant greens that now died in the cold of an autumn night. The rain picked up speed and intensity and the wind joined in. I had to crack my window a little so my windows wouldn’t fog over. I squinted through the plops of water on my windshield as I stared at the entrance of the building.
I chuckled to myself when I remembered. This is where they held prom. The thought crossed my mind so casually, but the pangs of the memories made everything come back fresh.
Mindy James. She looked so gorgeous that night. Her dirty-blonde hair tied in a ribbon, curls busting loose over her ears and one down her forehead, bobbing close to her right eye. The green dress she wore was modest compared to many of the others I saw that night, but she looked fantastic. We’d been dating for a long time before this, so I think I’d forgotten how beautiful she was. But I remembered that night. Sitting in my car, as Purple Rain started pouring from the speakers and the cold autumn rain pattered around me, I remembered again how beautiful she looked on that warm spring night. And I remembered how much I’d loved her.
There’s something different about your life the first time you tell someone you love them and mean it. Something inside of you breaks, never to be made whole again.
I never meant to cause you any sorrow.
I never meant to cause you any pain.
The music started slowly, quietly. And it brought me to the time before the break-ups and the reconciliations. Before we started hitting each other and I got arrested and she dropped the charges. Before we split up for good. And way before she was dressed up in a BTO t-shirt to cover the torture that had been inflicted on my sweet Mindy.
It’s such a shame our friendship had to end.
I sat still and rigid on my seat in the front seat. My eyes closed and I could smell her perfume. I could see the curls of her hair as I brushed them over her ear and told her for the first time that I loved her. I felt her body go rigid against mine for a second before she kissed my neck and said she loved me. If I hadn’t known how it would turn out for her, I would’ve said this was the best moment of my pathetic life. I had meant it so much. And I could have actually been good for her. It didn’t have turn out that way. I could’ve been less controlling. Less angry and protective. We could’ve made it work on my police salary. Or I could’ve at least caught the monster who skewered her. I could’ve been strong enough for that. And I didn’t have to run to Chicago after. That cult. I could’ve been better. Stronger. Anything. I should’ve been.
I know times are changing.
It’s time we all reach out for something new.
And that means you too.
You say you want a leader,
But you can’t seem to make up your mind.
I think you better close it.
And let me guide you to the Purple Rain.
I felt the tears coming out of my eyes as the song retreated and Blue Oyster Cult replaced it, probably the song that would cause someone else to break down like a sentimental idiot.
I heard a quick pop that sounded like distant thunder, but I suddenly felt the clouds surround my brain and I was out.
**********
When I came to, I was tied to a chair in a dark room. I struggled just long enough to realize I was tied with rope and that whoever had done this really knew what they were doing. I looked around, trying to get my bearings. There was a little light coming in through the sheer curtains that hung over the windows. I couldn’t say for sure how long I’d been out, but I was betting it wasn’t too long and we were now in the downtown Hilton.
I noticed a bulky presence sitting on the couch in front of me.
“Chance,” I managed to spit out despite my swollen tongue. There was no response. “Look, I’m pretty sure it’s you Chance, so let’s dispense with the melodrama.”
The lump stayed silent. I took a breath and let it out loudly. I was considering how to get more light in here when I heard a smash and a doorway appeared to my right. Light streamed in from the hallway lights for a second until an imposing figure stepped in and yelled “Police. No one moves.”
A figure behind the first flipped on the lights and I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. “Detective Muldoon,” I said with a crack in my voice. “I am happy to see you.”
Her eyes stared straight past me. I turned my head back to where the lump had been. It was Chance. He’d been stabbed in the chest and on the wall above him someone had written in blood, “I only wanted 2 be some kind of friend”.