A Line to Murder

By Karla Stover

Until she discovers the mutilated body of her best friend, widow Mercedes Mackaill thinks her life is dull and lonely. But somebody murdered Isca Haines, a secretary and part-time phone sex worker. Mercedes suspects it has more to do with the evening job than their boring nine-to-five at Jackson, Johnston and Associates, a Tacoma brokerage house.

In an effort to track down the killer, she teams up with Isca’s former husband, handsome Andrew Clay. Clues have them visiting the Psychic Showcase in Seattle for tarot card readings and a hippy colony on the Olympic Peninsula. But when Mercedes is stalked and her apartment broken into, things get a little too interesting. The hot cop who responds to her phone call has Mercedes choosing between two desirable men—and whether she wants a man in her life at all. She just has to stay alive long enough to make the decision.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BWL Publishing Inc.
• Release date: Jul 17, 2013
• ISBN: 9781771451185

Karla Stover

Karla Stover was born and raised in Tacoma, Washington, and graduated from the University of Washington with honors in history. She has been writing for more than twenty-five years. In 2008, she won the Chistell Prize for a short story titled "One Day at Appomattox." For more than fifteen years, she hosted a radio program discussing Tacoma and local history on KLAY AM 1180. She is the author of several books and is currently working on a novel based on the lives of the Everleigh sisters.

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A Line to Murder

By Karla Stover

Digital ISBNs

EPUB 978-1-77362-604-8

Kindle 978-1-77145-118-5

WEB 978-1-77362-603-1

Print 978-1-77145-281-6

Copyright 2015 by Karla Stover.

Cover Art by Michelle Lee.

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

Dedication

Dedicated to my husband, Ed, my parents, Ted and Virginia Wakefield, and the original members of my first critique group, Pat, Jean, and Bob

Chapter 1

I really think the Vicar has wigged out. Isca exhaled lungs full of cigarette smoke. Her smoke rings drifted away.

Ever since my friend, Isca Haines, began a part-time job on a sex phone line, I’d been hearing about her clients and their needs. Some were funny, most were routine but her stories were always entertaining.

Okay, now, I have two problems with that statement. First, does anyone say ‘wigged out’ anymore, and second, what’s with the word vicar? It’s an English term. I slid my shoes off and extended my legs into the unexpectedly warm spring sun, careful to keep my stockings off the gravel and hoping to cool my feet. The weather was too warm for my dark blue Laura Ashley dress, but I liked it because the raised waist made my butt look small.

Entirely irrelevant, both of them.

Or irreverent.

Huh?

Irreverent—for a vicar. Get it?

Isca snorted. "Well, Vicar is what he calls himself, so that’s what I call him.

I hummed the lyrics of a song and Isca shuddered. If that’s Bon Jovi’s ‘Only the Lonely,’ you’re killing it.

Bon Jovi is hot. I bet I could work my own nine hundred phone line with his picture in front of me.

Yeah, right. Isca stopped when someone revved an engine and then took off wheels squealing on the road behind the park. Anyway, he’s getting totally weird, and don’t say, ‘who, Bon Jovi?’

She knew me too well. People who call nine hundred numbers to, you’ll pardon the expression, get their rocks off are all weird.

Don’t be so judgmental.

I’m not being judgmental. I think it’s cool you came up with the idea. I actually considered doing the same thing but I don’t want to give you too much competition. I grinned. However, don’t you just wonder what Jimmy Carter thinks about them?

Jimmy Carter? Former President Jimmy Carter?

The nine hundred lines were created over ten years ago—1977 I think—so people could call and talk to him on some radio show.

As she usually did when I went off onto a tangent about something historical, Isca sighed. Well, anyway, the callers are mostly just sad and lonely.

That’s putting a spin on it. Anyway, I stand by my remark. Judgmental or not, calling psychics listed in the back of a magazine is pathetic, but calling dial-a-sex phone numbers is just creepy.

Unexpectedly, Isca giggled, softening her somewhat sharp features. I gotta admit, sometimes the visuals just won’t go away.

On railroad tracks near the waterfront, a street level below Firemen’s Park where we sat, two train cars coupled with an enormous crash. We both gave a start and foraging crows flew into the air with protesting squawks. The park overlooked the tracks that ran close to a bluff parallel to Commencement Bay. Beyond them was a small yacht basin. Boat motors started up as people left their moorage for weekend trips. Lucky rich people. I so wanted to explore the islands around Tacoma. Creosote, saltwater and tide smells filled the air. The sun was soft on my arms. I closed my eyes and listened to seagulls squabbling.

He’s gone from your plain old ‘what are you wearing, what would you do to me if I were there with you’ to having me imitate famous old movie stars, like Bette Davis or Clara Bow.

Clara Bow?

I found an old talkie of hers. She actually had an okay voice. How would he know what she sounded like, anyway? She was born in Brooklyn so I do a New York accent in a Betty Boop voice. As I was saying, I don’t mind being me on the phone, but I hate doing other people, even if they’re dead. Also, he asks all these perverted questions: ‘Kate, did you do it with Howard Hughes?’ He never used to do that.

Well, maybe he was trying to make a good impression at first, ease you into it so you wouldn’t be shocked.

Humph, I’d cut him off except I need the money. Only the brokers get rich at a brokerage house, certainly not anyone else.

You must have had a pretty good idea of what it would be like when you got into this stuff. It’s not a very nice side of life. At least, that’s what I figure most Americans think. Maybe if we lived elsewhere it’d be different. Anyway, if he’s playing out his fantasies on the phone with you, could be he’s not molesting someone, and that’s a good thing.

Maybe. Isca paused again, the elbow of her right arm resting on the palm of her left hand. Her cigarette, ringed with lipstick held between two fingers. A soft breeze blew a piece of red hair across her face and she tucked it behind her ear.

"It’s too bad smoking is bad for your health. There’s a lot of great body language involved with it. Remember Gregory Peck and Ava Gardener in The Snows of Kilimanjaro? Of course, if Gregory Peck was around to light a cigarette for me, I’d probably puff away ‘til the cows came home."

You and your old movies. Isca inhaled long and slow and blew out another set of smoke rings. He’s talking about being reborn. I suppose he means like a born-again Christian. Do you think it could help—rededicate his life to Christ? If he really is a vicar, wouldn’t that cure him?

Control, maybe, for a while, but not cure. From what I gather, his kind of problem isn’t curable, only controllable. How awful to be jonseing for dead actresses. Talk about your cock block.

Hah! When did you become such a potty mouth? Isca stubbed out her cigarette and picked up an apple. What are you doing this weekend?

Don’t know. I’ll look at the paper later and see what’s going on.

Why don’t you try that dating service again?

I snorted. Nuh uh. Not that one. When I said ‘I like a man with a sense of humor,’ they matched me with a guy who told knock-knock jokes.

Try another one. I’ve heard good things about Calculating Love. Anyway, you’re too prickly. You put men off. You need to soften the edges a little.

I didn’t tell Isca I’d already sent away for information from Calculating Love. Using a video dating service was just so embarrassing. Dates aren’t dates anymore. They’re just a prelude to sex. Whatever happened to ‘Do you kiss on the first date’ Isca snorted. You’ve pushed your sexual desire so far down it’ll take a jackhammer to unearth it. This is the eighties. Get with it.

That’s not fair. Though I admit I’d rather pay for my own dinner and have a nice get-to-know-you time than be expected to pony up by jumping into the sack on the first date. That’s how I was raised.

Don’t you ever see a set of buns in tight jeans and want to grab them?

Of course. I grinned. I look. I just don’t touch.

Well, I do.

You can get away with it. I’d be sued.

I know.

We both laughed. Isca had the dates. I read best sellers.

I looked at her with affection knowing she worried about my lonely life. She was a good best friend.

Isca had been hired as a temp at Jackson, Johnston and Associates, the brokerage house where we worked, five years earlier when I went on leave after my husband, Jack, had been killed in a motorcycle accident. She stayed on when one of the vice president’s secretaries quit. No two personalities could have been more different than hers and mine and we liked it that way.

In the distance, the clock on Old City Hall chimed a quarter of one.

Well, time to go. I put on my shoes. I wouldn’t want to waste a day like this lazing in the sun, not when an office with sealed windows and faulty air-conditioning awaits.

Isca and I were either underpaid administrative assistants or overpaid secretaries. Opinions varied depending on who was offering a point of view. Over the years, I’d bounced around from position to position, even trying my hand at sales before comfortably settling down to spend a mostly thankless career as slave to four men of varying degrees of charm, abilities, and work ethics.

When Isca moved back to the Pacific Northwest and came to Jackson Johnston in 1982, she’d left a job in California making radio commercials and doing voice-overs in cartoons. The movie stars were taking over the business. The pay was erratic but it sure was a lot more fun than finance. Isca had learned the bitter fact she was in a dead-end job with mediocre pay. Six months ago she’d gotten involved in providing services on a 900 phone line to supplement what she referred to as her paltry wages.

I’m out of here. On that particular Friday afternoon, Isca covered her typewriter and shot out of the office at three on the dot, but I was in no hurry and dallied over a cup of reheated coffee loaded with half-and-half to make it drinkable.

You want a ride home? my boss asked.

Thanks. I’m on an exercise kick. I took the bus to work so I could walk home.

So, he left.

What dumb idea. It’s practically all up hill. When it was warm, as it was that day, the blocks loomed like mountains.

I arrived home with a headache from the heat and sore feet from the hot pavement.

Hello, Mercedes. Mrs. Wakefield, the first-floor tenant was locking her mailbox.

Hi, Mrs. Wakefield. Hot, huh?

It’s lovely. I peeled down to just a sweater.

Wow.

She returned to her apartment and I got my mail and climbed the stairs to my place. Then I had a panic attack. It was the third such attack and I had no idea why they’d started five years after my husband’s death. I sank down on the cool, wood floor and hid my head in my bent knees. The attacks were always the same: it was raining hard and I was waiting for Jack to get home. He was late and I was worried. Sitting there, it seemed as if I could actually hear the rain. Heavy weight came down on my chest and I couldn’t breathe. After a few minutes, cold sweat broke out and I knew the horror was receding. I took a deep breath and lifted my head. I got to my feet, carried my shoes to the bedroom and fell back on the bed.

Isca is right. I’m lonely and I need a bigger base of friends, and I need a man. I’m too young to be alone. My apartment felt too small. I had no plans, had no date and couldn’t decide on how to celebrate the weekend. Not that being dateless was rare. As a thirty-something widow, my datelessness was a fact of life. I changed my clothes, piled a plate with cheese and crackers and poured a glass of wine. I took them to my balcony and sat munching. Across the street, gardeners in Wright Park cut the grass, filling the air with the fresh scent. I stayed outside until the mosquitoes drove me in.

Saturday I walked half-a-block to the Hob Nob, for breakfast. I snagged a window seat and watched the lawn bowlers. When I returned home, my answering machine light blinked.

Merc, you’ll never guess what! Isca sounded excited. Breathlessly she hurried to beat the tape. I think the vicar lives here, in Tacoma I mean, or close by. I’m going to check it out tonight and I’ll call you tomorrow. Bye. Click.

Uh oh. No good can come of this. I called, but her phone was out of order. More construction in the north end. I hung up. The neighborhood where Isca lived had been plagued with faulty service ever since construction of a large strip mall began. I could wait until she called again to hear what she’d found out, but I didn’t want to. Of course, nine hundred callers expected anonymity, but hey, I seemed to live my life through others such as Isca, anyway. My nosy interest raised its ugly head.

The apartment building felt empty. I liked the sound of muted footsteps but that day apparently everyone but me had someplace to go. I sulked around my unit for a while, picked up the paperwork from Calculated Love and answered the questions. Finally, to escape the heat, I drove down to the waterfront and took a lethargic walk along Ruston Way. People walking dogs and Spandex-clad inline skaters were out in full force. For an hour, despite their presence, I enjoyed the lowered temperature and the sight of stippled waves tickling the rocky beach and the sailboats’ colored sails. I returned home refreshed and got out my watercolors. Absorbed in my work, I painted until it got too dark to see. Then I watered the petunias on my balcony. Later I tried Isca’s number again, but the line was still out.

Sunday I decided to take advantage of air-conditioning and went to a matinee. Isca hadn’t called before I left. I knew from experience not to call her too early on the weekends. She occasionally entertained. When I got home several hours later, still wrapped in the ambiance of an historical romance, the answering machine stared at me, unblinking. Someone knocked at the door and I opened it to one of the college boys who lived in the attic apartment.

Want anything from the festival?

Thanks. I’m headed over.

Ethnic Fest was going on in the park. I walked over, greeted neighbors and sniffed diluted cooking smells from a variety of ethnic food stands.

The treasure of Wright Park was its trees--dozens of various types, mostly deciduous, which spread leafy boughs high into the sky. Some trunks bared identification labels. As a girl, my scout troop used to go to the park to learn the different types and something of their origins. My grandfather gathered English chestnuts for Thanksgiving there. None of us liked chestnuts much, but we wouldn’t have dreamed of hurting Grandpa by saying so.

I sat under one of the old maples and leaned against its trunk. A Mariachi troupe performed, and some small children danced uninhibitedly in front of the stage. The haunting notes of "Celito Lindo" filled the air.

What was Isca up to? Maybe I should take her up on her offer to find me another blind date. It’d be nice to have someone to hang out with. A group playing Klezmer music replaced the Mariachi band. I drifted into a semi-nap, rousing occasionally to brush ants off my legs. A couple of coworkers passed, but I didn’t wave. They were with their spouses and kids, eating curly fries and trying to control their dogs. Later, crossing the lawn toward home, Mrs. Wakefield and her sister, Mrs. Northover stopped me.

Our nephew, Stan, is coming for a visit and we thought it would be nice if the two of you met.

Uh, sure. That would be, uh, nice. When?

He hasn’t told us yet, but we’ll call as soon as we know.

Well, that’ll give me something to look forward to.

They beamed and I smiled. Suddenly the day didn’t seem so lonely.

At home, still no call from Isca. I sat on my balcony with a cup of coffee, the neighborhood stray cat and a book. When it was too dark to read, I took my book and a bowl of ice cream and went to eat it in bed. So much for my exciting weekend. When the ice cream was gone, I put the empty dish on the nightstand and turned out the light. I always slept well on a full stomach.

On Monday morning, the first words I heard were, Isca’s not in.

Sick?

Don’t know. She hasn’t called.

That wasn’t like Isca. I had some nagging unease, but I was familiar with the whole calling-in-sick process. People were usually running around asking, What’s going on? No one’s answering my phone, before the stock broker who took the call remembered he’d taken the message. On the occasions when I was sick, I called in as many as three times to get the word to the boss. Isca and I didn’t back each other up, so I didn’t have to do double duty, but during a quiet moment, I dialed her number. The phone line was back in order, but she didn’t answer.

After work, I drove to the neighboring town of Puyallup to put in an application for part-time work during the upcoming spring fair. When I got home, I had several hang ups and a giggly wrong number on the answering machine. Still no message from Isca.

Nothing on Tuesday, either.

Tuesday afternoon Janet, manager of the support staff—anyone who wasn’t a stockbroker—stopped by my desk. Have you talked to Isca?

Not since Friday.

A sense of something being wrong hounded my thoughts the rest of the day. At regular intervals, I dialed her number, letting the phone ring ridiculous amounts of time. Finally, just before leaving for the day, I called her ex-husband. Andy, this is Mercedes, Isca’s coworker. How are you?

We’d met socially a few times before the divorce and occasionally afterward in the office. He seemed to be scrambling to identify me. Very irritating.

Fine. He must have put a face to the name. Fine. How are you?

I’m fine. Listen, have you talked to Isca lately?

No, why?

I’m worried. She doesn’t answer her phone and hasn’t been to work. It’s not like her.

Maybe she’s sick.

Yes, but she hasn’t called in or anything. She always calls me to go in early and handle the phones if she can’t make it.

Did you call Buckley—talk to her folks?

No. If she’s not there, they’ll just get worried. This isn’t like her.

There was a long pause. Well?

I feel like I should go to her place and make sure she’s okay, but I don’t want to ask one of our coworkers to go over with me. Isca wouldn’t like it, and I don’t want to go alone. Can you meet me later at her house and see if she’s there, if she’s all right? She could have fallen or something.

I don’t have a key.

I do. What time do you get off work?

Five, but I’ll have to see about daycare.

Well, will you or won’t you? What a jerk! It had always seemed to me Andy and Isca’s divorce came suspiciously close to his getting his master’s degree after Isca helped put him through school. He also had a habit of turning and walking away when I was talking.

There was enormous reluctance in his voice. Okay. About five thirty?

That’d be swell. Thanks a lot. I wouldn’t have called if I weren’t really concerned. See you then.

Andy muttered something. I couldn’t catch the words, but there was no doubt about his tone of voice.

Jeez! Hope I didn’t put you out! Lie. I hoped I had. He was so dang arrogant.

Since Wall Street was in New York, West Coast brokerage houses kept East Coast hours. I worked the seven to three shift and clock-watched to get out on time. Overtime pay was rarely allowed. On the way home, I picked up some fresh dinner rolls. Dinner was a green salad, the rolls and decaf coffee—not as bad as it sounded. I loaded the salad with toppings and didn’t skimp on the dressing. A shower, clean shorts, a cotton shirt and sandals did wonders to counteract the humidity.

On the way out, I remembered to grab my garbage. The cans were in the alley and when I lifted a lid, I nearly lost it. Some rotting chicken mixed with the moldy produce lying right on top was a vulture’s delight. Jeez, the can was emptied just three days ago and the stuff’s already gone into major decomposition. I gagged and let the lid slam shut.

Hot didn’t begin to describe the inside of my car and I didn’t have air-conditioning. If Isca’s all right, I’ll quite frankly be pissed off at driving across town for nothing.

Chapter 2

Isca lived across town in a small house that overlooked the recently-closed Asarco plant. She already had a good view of Commencement Bay and Vashon Island, but environmentalists had more or less forced the plant’s closing, and it was being demolished. After the sprawling facility was gone, her view would be even more sweeping. I turned the corner and pulled up to the curb behind a red Honda. Andy sat sideways with the car door open.

No air-conditioning. I was surprised. The way Isca talked, her ex-husband liked amenities. He’d taken off his jacket and tie and sat reading papers with an open briefcase on the passenger seat.

As I approached, he looked up. There are three days of papers on the porch. I knocked. She’s not home. His tone of voice implied overreacting female.

Maybe if he didn’t look so hot and tired, while I felt so much better in my comfortable clothes, I would have been irritated. Instead, I cut him some slack. Unless she’s fallen or something.

Andy sat there looking at me.

I didn’t want to go in by myself, but if he’d at least wait in the car, I guessed I could manage. I was fairly sure he wouldn’t drive away. I fished Isca’s front door key out of my purse. When I turned and started up the walk, his car door slammed. I sighed with relief. Andy was behind me when I put the key in the lock and opened the door. Rather surprisingly, he had to step in front of me and give it a push because humidity had made the wood swell. It swung back. We were instantly hit in the face with the overpowering odor of rotting meat.

My God. Andy stepped back a little.

She must have left something on a counter.

I don’t know why she would have. Anyway, Isca has a garbage disposal. Don’t touch anything.

We need something to rub under our noses, like cops do on TV—Vicks, or something.

Andy ignored the remark, and we stepped inside to look around.

Isca’s house was small by north-end standards.